#Fires and Frying Pans|Maine

[brooklynislandgirl]

@thrall-of-the-hill​

Beth had thought when she’d first moved to Maine that a change of scenery would do her good. She couldn’t stand the idea of going home, not when the last half of her life had been spent on the mainland, but she couldn’t stay in Brooklyn, either. Too much of the apartment held memories. The ghost of her brother was everywhere and if she had any hope of recovering from his death, she needed something new. Haven was the town she’d chosen. Partly because of the name. Partly because it was a seaside place. Partly because they could use the skills of a nurse-practitioner. She’d settled in just fine. Bought a little office just off the thoroughfare, and then a modest house on a cliff overlooking the ocean. She hadn’t yet made many friends but she did have patients. She keeps to herself knowing that malakini were not always welcome and it takes time to stop being the ‘new guy’. She continued to show up at her office, even hiring a receptionist-front office girl. And maybe she should have suspected something when she’d gotten the mysterious phone call. A voice she didn’t recognise nor pick out many details about, though she is sure it was a man. The message requested her aid because the town didn’t have their own doctor and this late in the year sometimes the roads could be problematic. She should have known better. She shouldn’t be here. Walking down the road in the dark and the cold, with her rental car stalled two miles back on County Road 73.  But she is. A Duffle bag with some of her clothing and other things inside over one shoulder, her old-fashioned doctor’s case in one hand, and a flashlight that seemed to have funny ideas about ‘strong and steady’ light in the other. At least she’d dressed warmly in uncharacteristic jeans, sensible hiking boots, layers of t-shirt, turtleneck, and fleece lined jacket with a hood. She hates the dark, has a bone-deep fear of it, and now, after an hour, she has to admit, she has no idea if she’s even in Silent Hill, or just hopelessly lost on a wooded back road. Frustrated, she drops down into a crouch. Balances on the balls of her toes and closes her eyes. Her voice is far louder than it normally is.  “C’mon already!” she shouts to exactly no one. “Can ya gimmie a sign I’m supposed to be here?!”

[brooklynislandgirl]

The hardest part of leaving New York had been finding someone trust worthy to manage her building and promising Jay that she could come up and stay with Beth when she had the time. Her hanai-sister seemed to understand that after so much devastation and loss that Beth needed to go somewhere else, at least for a while, to clear her head and try to pick up all the pieces that were further shattered by villain and superhero alike. Somewhere that no one knew what she could do, what she'd done in the face of the last ten years. She was sure Jay believed she'd go back to her Mother, but even the prospect of the Pacific did not soothe her heart. She left it up to fate. She'd unfolded a map of the country that encompassed both Alaska and Hawai'i, gathered up her rune stones, shook those bones and scattered them over the carefully laid out atlas. Wunjo was the only one that fell face up. The meaning of the stone was not lost on her; comfort, harmony, prosperity, a reward. It wasn't that she had any faith in the All Father, if anything she'd be more likely to spit on him, but the wisdom he wrested through the grace of Yggdrasil was not one she'd argue with. Port Clyde, Maine might not be the most auspicious name but the seaside town was post-card pretty. At first she considered buying a home on Hupper Island but she didn't want to have to rely on a ferry to get to work every day. The four bedroom, three bath grey house with its gabled windows and wide porch a stone's throw from the beach had taken her fancy and the realtor had dollar signs in her eyes when Beth offered twice the listing price to have everything kept off the records. She had taken a week to have the movers bring all new everything and she paid them handsomely to set everything in its place. Wood laid in for the fireplace. Groceries that would likely last her months with only an occasional weekly visit for fresh produce or dairy. A quiet young woman hired to keep the house, a plump-cheeked and grey haired stern Maine widow to prepare meals once a week. Beth didn't really need much. The solitude appealed to her. At first. Fortuitous, an opening at the school came up for a nurse, and Beth had applied. They snapped her up. She was in the infirmary just starting to really unpack her personal things when she heard the knock and turned. The man was tall and lean but looked like the All-American poster sort despite the way he sagged against the door frame, and she considered him for a moment before remembering to try and welcome him with what she hoped would be taken as a warm if closed lip smile. "Hi. Lucky for you, you found it. I'm Nurse Beth." From the sound of him, she's guessing divorced or widowed, possibly having been estranged from his daughter for some time, not that she was judging. She couldn't help but hear Andy's voice in his tone, and felt a surge of sympathy for the man. Beth stepped out from behind the desk, an absolute vision in purple scrub pants and crocs, a pale pink scrub top marked with stethoscopes and little friendly grey sharks wearing old fashioned nursing caps. "Okay. And what is your daughter allergic to? I don't see any forms in hand so you might have to take a seat at my desk and fill them out. Can I offer you a bottle or water, or apple juice or ~and please don't tell Mr Fielding~ I do have a super secret coffee pot back here, freshly brewed if you prefer." @defectivexfragmented

The only safe place for her was as far away from the Avengers as humanly possible. They couldn’t even know of her existence. It wasn’t an option. The moment the social worker knocked on his door with a young girl holding one hand and a letter in the other, Clint swore to abide by Natasha’s wishes and give Natalia the life of a normal child. Something neither of them had been privy to. It took him all of two hours to wrap his head around the note then immediately going for the bug out bag he had hidden away for emergencies.

Honoring Natasha’s wishes above all else was an emergency in his book.

With Natalia in the car and their bags in the trunk, Clint picked a direction and started driving, heading straight north along the coast. A normal childhood. It seemed like an impossible task considering how his better years as a child was when he was in the circus. If anything, he was probably the least qualified person on earth to be handed a child. Yet Natasha seemed to have thought differently for some reason.

Port Clyde, Maine. A seemingly remote little town where Natalia could grow up off the Avenger’s radar.

Natalia was surprisingly excited about the small house, barely able to be considered two bedrooms, with how close it was to the ocean. Storms would be possibly be a problem but with how happy the little girl was, he couldn’t say no. She had been through too much already with losing her mother and being dropped on a stranger’s doorstep. The next big thing was getting her enrolled in a school before she drove him up the wall at home, a problem that was solved within a week of arriving in the ocean side town.

“Hello?” A gentle knock with his knuckle on the open door, Clint leaned against the frame with a small box in hand. After dropping off Natalia off at her kindergarten class and meeting her teacher, he had managed to have gotten himself turned around at the gym after some third graders pointed him in the wrong direction. “I’m looking for the nurse’s office. Gotta drop off the kid’s – my daughter’s…my daughter’s medicine.” He held up the box with a tiny shake. Kid. Daughter. Step-daughter. Adopted daughter. Weird uncle she got dropped with. What was the correct term for what he was? “Epipen.”

@brooklynislandgirl

[flowerandblood]

The Prince and The Fox (8)

[ modern! • Aemond x friend! • female ]

[ warnings: fingering, smut, mention of grooming ]

[ description: After the events of her childhood, despite her best efforts, her neighbor and the younger brother of her friend Helaena, Aemond, does not want to know her. This state lasts until a house party organized by his older brother, Aegon, during which an incident occurs that will change their relationship forever. Slow burn, angst, toxic ex-Alys, rough Aemond. This is several anon requests combined into one fic. ]

WARNING: The main plot between the characters takes place in high school. Yes, in high school. The belief that teenagers wait with an intimacy when they are in love in high school is ridiculous to me. Aemond and the character here are the same age. Don't ask me how old they are, in my country you are of the age of consent in your first year of high school and an adult in the last year of high school, so if it is more convenient for you, think about it that way and decide for yourself. In this story, I am not following the trail that they are magically friends right away, but how they become friends and what that even means. I'm writing this fic to give the perspective of young, lost people, not adult women who want to see exactly themselves in everything they read. If that's all you expect, this isn't the fic for you.

I don't want whining about this in my comments or asks. I will delete these and block you. You have been warned.

Aemond + Evans Series Moodboard

This is my first story that has its own playlist, but yes! Get in the mood!

Story Music Playlist.

* English is not my first language. Please, do not repost. Enjoy! *

Next chapters: Masterlist

_____

She woke up hearing the clacking of dishes in the distance. She opened her eyes and furrowed her brow, not knowing for a moment where she was. She looked around and recognised Helaena's living room in confusion, only then remembering with a blush on her face the events of the evening before.

Their passionate kisses, his hand on her soft breast, his arms embracing her throughout the night.

He had slept with her on the couch, his face snuggled into her shoulder, his hands on her palms.

She thought they really were together.

She got up and followed the sounds that led her to the kitchen. In it she saw, amazed, Aemond standing over a frying pan, apparently just making scrambled eggs, next to him water was boiling in a kettle on the burner.

He heard her footsteps and glanced in her direction; she saw that he too was embarrassed and swallowed loudly, stirring in the pan with a wooden spoon.

"Will you eat with me?" He asked lowly, and she agreed with a smile, walking slowly closer.

"Can I help you somehow?" She asked and he nodded, pointing with his head to the mug standing on the countertop.

"Choose what kind of tea you want to drink. I don't know if you want sugar. There are plates upstairs in the cupboard, take three out, I'll ask Aegon if he'll eat with us." He said turning off the fire under the pan and went out into the corridor, shouting from downstairs to his brother if he would have breakfast with them.

After a while Aegon joined them and the three of them sat down at the table. Aegon looked at her wrinkling his brow, sleepy, not yet fully awake.

"Did you stay overnight?" He asked puzzled, and she lowered her gaze, embarrassed, swallowing the bite she had just eaten.

"Yes, I fell asleep on the couch and Aemond probably didn't want to wake me up again." She said in a slightly trembling voice, trying not to give herself away or look at them, taking another bite of scrambled eggs into her mouth.

Aegon raised an eyebrow and looked at his brother, then grunted loudly, clearly amused, already concentrating on his food.

"Helaena returned safely?" She asked uncertainly wanting to change the subject, worrying if anything had happened to her.

"She texted me a while ago that she was staying with a friend for the night and that she would be home this afternoon." Aemond replied, and she nodded.

Aegon left them alone, saying that he needed to sleep for at least another hour and Aemond looked at her uncertainly, fiddling with his cup in his hand.

"If you want, take a shower. I'll give you a clean towel. We can still play here or in my room. Or watch something." He muttered quickly, as if suddenly throwing out ideas and reasons why she could stay longer.

Her heart was pounding like crazy.

He wanted her not to go home yet.

She agreed and, at his suggestion, bathed, then they moved to his room to play games on his computer. They took their pads with them and spread out comfortably in two leather armchairs, one of which he had brought for her from Helaena's room.

She saw him looking at her, her hair was still slightly damp and completely loose.

She knew that, like her, he was thinking about what had happened between them and that for him it had been an equally groundbreaking experience.

He paused the game they were playing after a while and looked down at his thighs, his lips tightened.

"Can I ask you a question?" He asked without looking at her, fiddling with his pad in his hand, his voice trembling as he spoke the words. She nodded.

He licked his lower lip, as if he was gathering what he wanted to say with great difficulty. He was silent for a moment.

"Do you have any physical experience? I mean…one with yourself, for example." He mumbled embarrassedly, sliding lower in his chair as if he wanted to curl up and hide. She lowered her head feeling the embarrassment that was visibly painted on her face.

"…I've never had a boyfriend before, if that's what you're asking." She said quietly and he swallowed loudly, glancing at her out of the corner of his eye, pale.

"But have you…you know. Have you ever touched yourself?" He asked uncertainly, and she gave him a concerned look, furrowing her brow.

"Why do you ask about it?" She asked in a slightly trembling voice, and he looked at her surprised, feeling subconsciously that he might have crossed a line with this question, even though he didn't want to.

"I just…I just don't want to hurt you. I want to know what point you're at so I can…adjust to you. You know." He shrugged his shoulders pressing his lips together; she felt some kind of pain and at the thought that he was more experienced than her, that he had done it with his ex-girlfriend in all sorts of ways.

She lowered her gaze, looking at her pad with a blank stare, thinking about how she would be a disappointment to him.

How would she give him what she had?

She felt tears under her eyelids, her lower lip beginning to tremble a little. She heard him lean forward in his seat wanting to see her face and seeing her state he moved quickly towards her, touching his hand to her cheek, taking her hair back with a light flick of his fingers.

"− hey − what's going on? − tell me −" He mumbled out, frightened by her condition and the fact that he had offended her. She swallowed hard, looking down at her thighs and shrugged her shoulders.

"− it doesn't make sense − you'll be only frustrated with me − I can't give you what she had −" She uttered with difficulty, and he pressed his forehead against her temple, tightening his hand on her hair.

"− stop − okay? − you don't understand this − I regret a lot of things − I regret that I didn't wait with them − I regret that I couldn't erase all of this and start over, with you −" He whispered, and she felt a strong squeeze in her heart, breathing unevenly through her slightly parted lips.

"− I was proud of the fact that she treated me like a man − that she wanted me like a man − but inside I was terrified − she didn't care, she took what she wanted − I was left with this sickening sense that she used me, that I am just a flesh and nothing more −" He muttered, and she looked up at him, shocked by his words, her eyebrows arched in pain.

"Don't say that." She said softly, quietly, and he swallowed loudly, his jaw clenched, his fingers running over her cheek and lower lip.

"− but it's true − that's how I feel − I did fucked up things with her − I felt like an animal − when I came home afterwards I didn't know what my fucking name was − I couldn't look my mother in the eye −" He choked out with difficulty, his face and healthy eye red, his voice trembling making her feel a tightness in her throat.

"− but with you −" He stammered and chuckled under his breath, shaking his head, his thumb circled and returned back to her cheek.

"− I didn't know it could be like this − so tender − so peaceful, safe − − just your scent and your closeness makes me want you so badly that I can barely keep my hands off you −" He exhaled and bit his lower lip, sighing quietly.

"− that's why I just want to know what you need, how much I can allow myself − you're my girlfriend and I don't want to hurt you − okay? −" He asked in a trembling voice, and she nodded quickly, feeling hot in her heart at his words.

You're my girlfriend.

She looked up at him, swallowing loudly, her lips slightly parted.

"− I'd just like to please you − I'd like to be enough for you −" She whispered in a trembling voice, and he drew her to him, forcing her to sit on his lap and embrace him, his large chair creaking under their shared weight.

She felt safe in his arms, his hand stroking her hair, his lips kissing the top of her head with a tender click. She could hear his heart pounding fast.

"− I want you − I want to wait for you − I want to be worthy of you − make us slowly discover everything together −" He murmured tenderly, placing affectionate kisses on her hair again and again; she snuggled into him tightly, touched, lingering like this with him in the embrace, feeling that they were closer to each other than ever.

"− can you kiss me? −" She asked in a shy, trembling voice. He hummed contentedly and lifted his head, his nose gently rubbed against hers before his lips pressed to hers in a soft, innocent, warm kiss.

She hugged his neck and pressed herself tighter to him wanting to show him how much she needed him, how much she desired him, how happy she was. He murmured contentedly as he embraced her around the waist, their kisses loud, sticky and slow, she could feel his fingers trailing down her back.

She pulled away from him and looked at him with a misty gaze, thinking with a fast beating heart that she wanted to do this, she wanted to open up to him, she wanted him to think she was beautiful.

With a light movement of her trembling hands, she grabbed the material of her T-shirt and pulled it over her head, exposing her bare chest to him. She saw the pupil of his healthy eye narrowed in shock, his breath caught in his throat, felt his manhood pulsate hard beneath her in his trousers.

She looked at him uncertainly, feeling a slight chill, feeling vulnerable, exposed, however at the same time realising that she was safe, that he would never hurt her.

She saw him swallow loudly, his gaze running from her face to her breasts and back again, his hand gently running over the side of her naked waist. She felt him slowly move forward and press his face against her sternum, placing his hands on the bare skin of her back.

She could feel him pulsing hard beneath her, his fingers trailing up and down her body, but beyond that he didn't move. She slid her fingers into his hair, stroking his head and kissed the top of it leaning over him, pressing her cheek against him with a blush on her face.

She felt his lips place soft, tender kisses on her sternum, and then he pressed the side of his face into her warm flesh, one of his hands tentatively running his fingers gently over her soft, plump breast as he looked at it.

He traced his fingers up and down, a pleasant shiver passing through her every time he ran his fingers over her nipple. He felt it, his thumb deliberately beginning to tease and play with it; she felt a pulsing between her thighs and a pleasant heat in her lower abdomen, involuntarily rubbing against his erection she felt underneath.

She heard him sigh softly, his hips responded to her movements with slow rocking, their bodies in some subconscious reflex begin to press against each other with their breaths speeding up.

He surprised her when he lifted his head suddenly, his lips finding hers in greedy kiss, his hands gripping her armpits in such a way that both his thumbs brushed and teased her nipples.

She moaned into his mouth, feeling a pleasant shiver that shook her whole body, she felt him smirk.

"− feels good? −" He murmured between one sticky kiss and another, and she only nodded, unable to focus on anything other than the wetness and pulsing between her thighs, her hands stroking his cheeks and hair, holding him close.

He pulled away from her and looked at her in a way that made her hot, and then he leaned over and grabbed her right breast in his mouth, sucking and licking her nipple, making her clench her hands in his hair and tilt her head back, a moan escaping her lips again, her thighs speeding up their movements, rubbing against his manhood faster and faster.

"− quiet −" He gasped out between one lick of his tongue and another, starting to suck her again, and she pressed her lips together with difficulty, remembering that Aegon was asleep in the next room. The tension she felt was indescribable, she had never felt this good before in her life.

She heard him let go of her breast with a loud click of his saliva only to deal with her other breast in the same way, making a quiet mewl escape her throat, his hands sliding down to her buttocks forcing her to press harder against him.

"− fuck −" He growled, panting loudly along with her; she had the feeling that they had both lost control and surrendered completely to what was happening between them.

She squealed quietly as he stood up with her, grabbing her under her hips and walked with her towards his bed, thrusting himself onto it with her pulling away from her breasts, looking at her.

"− did you ever touch yourself down there? −" He repeated the question in a trembling voice, and she swallowed loudly, embarrassed, feeling that she had never been so wet before in her life.

"− yes, but − nothing ever came out of it − I mean −" She mumbled out, feeling that she was red, though she didn't know how to put it into words.

She touched herself and it felt good, but she couldn't bring herself to orgasm and had no idea what she was doing wrong.

Never then, however, had her insides pulsed as hard as they did now. She saw that he licked his lips, breathing hard, restraining himself with all his might not to just throw himself at her.

"− would you like me to try? − you know −" He muttered, and she swallowed loudly, looking at him with wide eyes.

"− we don't have to − we can only do what we've been doing − I just want to know −" He added quickly, terrified that he might have imposed too fast a pace on her and frightened her. She swallowed loudly, looking at him with her lips slightly parted, feeling her heart pounding hard.

"− we can try −" She mumbled embarrassedly and saw that he swallowed with difficulty, letting the air out loudly. He nodded, laying down beside her.

"− lie with your back to me − yes, just like that −" He murmured, pulling her to him, embracing her with his arms, she could feel his hard length pressed between her buttocks.

She swallowed loudly as his fingers gently began to tease her nipple again, and his other hand slowly slid lower to the material of her shorts, his warm breath surrounding her ear and cheek.

"− tell me if you get uncomfortable, okay? − promise me −" He whispered in a trembling voice, and she nodded quickly, feeling like her heart was about to jump out of her chest.

"− okay −"

She drew in a loud breath as his fingers slid under the material of her panties, in a slow, unhurried motion sinking into her most intimate place. He stopped as her whole body tensed through this new, foreign sensation.

"− do you want me to stop? −" He asked uncertainly, but she shook her head.

He swallowed loudly, gently exploring her condition with his hand, sinking into her hot, soft folds, his fingertips ran gently over her slit, so wet because of her arousal; she gasped, hearing his sudden, surprised, quiet groan.

"− oh fuck − little one − what happened here? −" He asked with some kind of appreciation, spreading her moisture all over her womanhood, his fingers in gentle circular motions began to tease the space around the spot from which shivers ran through her.

"− I − I don't know −" She mumbled embarrassedly and he chuckled softly, his lips placing a gentle kiss on her neck.

"− but I know − my little fox got all wet for me −" He whispered, and she felt his words between her thighs, a wave of heat went through her, the space inside her throbbed hard.

"− ah −" She moaned helplessly, his hands simultaneously teasing her nipple and her clit made her body all hot, she felt like the tension in her lower abdomen kept growing, that she was no longer thinking soberly, her hips began to move to the rhythm of his hand.

"− that's it − just feel it − such a good girl −" He praised her, kissing her hair tenderly, obviously feeling her leaking onto his fingers.

She squeezed her eyes shut, panting loudly along with him, feeling him rubbing against her from behind, feeling his hardness pulsing aggressively pressed against her buttocks, feeling that he was turned on by what he was doing to her.

She shuddered and barely stifled a loud moan when she suddenly felt the tip of his middle finger slide into her a little, pushing her tight, throbbing muscles apart.

"− shhh −" He hushed her and she swallowed loudly clenching her lips, reaching back with her hand, grabbing his hair with his murmur of delight, with subconscious movements she sank down onto his finger, letting it fill her, both of them sighing loudly.

"− fuck − so tight − we need to prepare you a bit before you feel this inside you one day, hm? −" He asked, rubbing his hard erection against her buttocks. "− I wouldn't want to tear you apart −"

She let out a loud gasp at his words, all hot, moaning and panting as quietly as she could, his finger sliding in and out of her with a loud click of her moisture.

She arched her back as he found a spot inside her that every time he rubbed it made her go dark before her eyes, his thumb teasing her clit as at the same time the fingers of his other hand massaged and pulled at her nipple.

"− A-Aemond − I think − oh my God −" She mumbled out and opened her mouth wide with a loud moan, sensing that something was coming; he managed to cover her lips with his free hand before she whimpered again and again, her body shook with a wave of pleasure that took her completely by surprise. She breathed loudly, quivering and moaning his name, falling and rising on his finger.

"− oh baby − so much flowed out of you − fuck, I want to feel you so badly −" He breathed out into her ear as her body shook with convulsions, his hand still clamped over her mouth.

He let her go when he felt her calm down; she could feel him looking at her but she just lay there with her eyes closed, concentrating only on how wonderfully intense the experience was.

"− how was it? − did you enjoy it? −" He asked in a trembling voice with some kind of pride, and she just nodded, unable to get anything more out of herself.

"− I'm going to go to the bathroom for a while, okay? − I'll get you some tissues so you can wipe yourself off −" He said quietly and she nodded again. He kissed her on her cheek and got out of bed, walking quickly towards his door, closing it behind him as soon as he left.

He'd been gone quite a while, but she didn't think about it, happy and fulfilled, thinking about the fact that she felt a little more like a woman now, not a little girl.

That even though her whole body was trembling, it felt good.

She opened her eyelids when he returned and took the packet of damp tissues from him, slipping them individually between her thighs, wanting to get rid of that uncomfortable, sticky feeling.

She tossed them into his bin standing next to his bed and lay down again. He settled behind her back as before with his arms around her, kissing the bare skin of her neck and shoulder; she felt that the hardness in his trousers disappeared.

"− what happened to that? −" She asked with amusement, rubbing her buttocks against him; she heard him hum behind her, she knew he was smiling.

"− it's my dark secret −"

_____

Aemond Taglist:

(bold means I couldn't tag you)

@its-actually-minicika @notnormalthings-blog @nikstrange @zenka69 @bellaisasleep @k-y-r-a-1 @g-cf2020 @melsunshine @opheliaas-stuff @chainsawsangel @iiamthehybrid @tinykryptonitewerewolf @namoreno @malfoytargaryen @qyburnsghost @aemondsdelight @persephonerinyes @fan-goddess @sweethoneyblossom1 @watercolorskyy @randomdragonfires @apollonshootafar @padfooteyes

[safarigirlsp]

The Lovely Things I'll Show You

Flip Zimmerman x Siren

Word Count: 16.6k

Warnings: NSFW. Smut. Horror. Angst, maybe? Lots of Violence. Violence Against Women. Violence Against Men. Rage. Revenge. Drowning. This isn't dark by my personal standards, but it's fairly dark by fic standards, so be warned.

This is from Flip's POV, so there's no X Reader language. However, I left the Siren pretty vague and I think she can be read as a reader insert. At least by readers with enough imagination to assume they have a tail etc xD. Also, I don't consider this as 'Dark' Flip, but some people probably will, so consider that an additional warning.

Inspired by Lighthouse by Halsey Based on a request I butchered from @cas-backwards-tie

AO3 Link

Eastport, Maine, perched on the Northeastern most tip of the state like a mole on the end of a witch’s nose, was about as far away from the rest of the country as a man could get. Alaska might be further, but the strange daylight and dark hours that changed with the seasons wouldn’t do a damn bit of good for the mental state of a man already on the brink. On the brink of what exactly, Flip couldn’t really say and he wouldn’t hazard a guess. Things like that should be left to professionals high above his pay grade. Professionals Flip wouldn’t denigrate himself to consult.

Talkin’ about a man’s problems is for pussies and whiners, Flip would say. To his own reflection in his bathroom mirror, leaning over the sink, wiping the sweat from his brow after waking from another recurring nightmare. A shrink is a poor substitute for a cold beer and beatin’ the hell out of a punching bag.

That was back in Colorado Springs, back during the aftermath of the Pigman killings. Sure, Flip had solved the case, shot dead the bastard dubbed Pigman for his penchant for frying strips of his victims up like bacon. Flip resented it in ways deeper than he could ever express to a shrink, how that sorry bastard had ruined the taste of bacon for him. One of his favorite guilty pleasures was his heart attack special – a breakfast of bacon, eggs, and waffles, all slathered in genuine Vermont maple syrup. Flip hoped that pleasure would return to him. After he was able to purge his memory of the smell of human ‘bacon,’ harvested from plump victims, sizzling in a cast iron frying pan, human fat popping up from the pan and burning his hand as he crept past with his gun held at the ready. Firing a bullet into the Pigman’s head was a relief, something he deserved for ruining the taste of bacon for Flip, in addition to his other gruesome atrocities.

Focusing on bacon as the greatest tragedy helped Flip mitigate in his mind what had happened to his partner. Flip had taken that memory, crumpled it into the smallest ball of pain he could, and shoved it down inside his mind, into the darkest, deepest recess. He understood now the meaning of that shrink term ‘unpacking.’ Well, he had no fuckin’ intention of ever unpacking that memory again, or those emotions. There was nothing equal to finding a partner dead and half butchered like a prize hog. Nothing in a shrink’s handbook to undo the damage caused by the smell of bacon frying in a cast iron pan. Thick cut bacon, freshly cut from his partner’s flanks.

These days, that memory was left buried in Flip’s subconscious, coming to him in sweaty, pulse-thundering dreams. Flip was a mentally tough man, highly disciplined. He could keep that terrible beast caged. But everything about the Colorado Springs police station reminded him of his partner, a constant kick in the guts that made it impossible to truly repress. Even his favorite restaurants and bars, his own house for fucks’ sake. All of it was now full to bursting with painful associations. This pain came out as anger, which was really the best and healthiest reaction in Flip’s arsenal. It beat taking up drugs, drinking even more, or putting a gun in his mouth and pulling the trigger.

Before he lost it on some poor bastard who cut him off in traffic or an asshole who pinched a waitress’s ass in front of him, Flip decided a change of scenery was just what the doctor ordered. He wanted to get as far from anything familiar to him as possible. When he came into work one morning and saw a newspaper clipping advertising a small town in Maine was looking for a new sheriff, Flip didn’t think twice about where it may have come from. He didn’t give a damn.

After a long weekend trip to Eastport, Maine that served as reconnaissance, Flip found a nice cabin that suited him, far away from people, and even a friendly little mousy-haired schoolteacher who suited him too. Well enough for some entertainment, anyway. She had great tits and a face that gave Flip the impression she was the kind of girl who’d let a man do damn near whatever he wanted whenever he wanted, because she wasn’t overly burdened with beauty or brains and had the good sense to compensate in more tangible ways. He took her out for coffee and a stroll around the small, quaint town, having her show him what passed for the sights. Afterwards, she was very friendly and rewarded him handsomely and enthusiastically for her mocha latte in the backseat of her car.

Come Monday, Flip accepted the sheriff gig for a surprisingly good salary and made a deal on the cabin for a steal. Both for the same reason – the market was thin pickin’s for successful men with Flip’s level of skill, who were willing to move to a town of fifteen hundred people with a higher population of sasquatch than eligible singles. Eastport was a nice little town, what there was of it. Picturesque in that quaint, rural way that looked great on a postcard but didn’t hold one’s interest for long.

Three months in, and Flip loved it. The work was easy. He hadn’t had to use his brain on a crime since he left Colorado Springs, and the most stress he had was searching for a dumb kid who had gotten lost in the woods and escorting the little shit back to his mom. He’d only had to fire his piece once to scare off a bear that was rummaging through the sheriff department trash. Most of the ‘crime’ he’d been prepped for consisted of vandalism, DWI’s, animal attacks, domestic violence, and bar fights. Flip had already dealt with a few bar fights, about one a weekend. He loved that part of the job. It gave him an excuse to take out some aggression on some wannabe tough guys who could handle it, and who wouldn’t be the wiser when they sobered up as to whether their fat lip or black eye came from the sheriff or the other guy. And the floozy schoolteacher named Cristy gave great head and made few demands, aside from dragging him to church a few times to keep airs that she wasn’t a loose woman. That was a royal pain in the ass, but he could endure it.

He loved the pace and the seclusion. He was damned sick of cities bustling like ants, air that smelled like grime. Colorado Springs had that big city grime along with big city crime, and the punks and gangbangers that came with it. It was nice to have the freedom of driving less than thirty minutes from town and being out in the middle of nowhere. Forest or coast, he could take his pick. He could go whale watching or moose hunting; hiking or fishing; watch the golden sunrise at a local coffee shop and watch it set fiery orange over the ocean while having a juicy ribeye, a fat lobster tail, and a cold beer. Eastport even had a barber shop with the red and white striped pole out front, where a man could get a haircut and a shave with a straight razor and not listen to women chatter about the latest Cosmopolitan article on how to please a man or what celebrity got which body parts inflated.

Six months in, and Flip was beginning to hate it. The easy work had grown dull. There wasn’t a goddamn thing that got his heart rate up anymore – fucking aside, anyway – and he hadn’t had a good adrenaline rush since he’d been woken up in the middle of the night by a bobcat in heat screeching on his back porch, sounding like some banshee straight outta hell. Even that little excitement had been weeks ago. The schoolteacher had grown as dull and uninteresting as a blowup doll, with a comparable IQ and conversational skills. It gave him more reason to keep her mouth occupied with other activities or her face shoved into the mattress, but that brand of enjoyment was only good for so long. Then she wanted to talk, always about the most mundane gossip and dumbest shit imaginable. Flip asked her once if she wanted to read a book with him – some adventure thing he’d picked at random in a used bookstore, packed with plenty of action for him and shirtless strapping men he thought she’d enjoy too. She looked at him with a bovine sort of vacancy in her mossy eyes – an association that had become hard for him to ignore – and asked, “Read? You mean like a magazine or a newspaper?”

The seclusion was turning to cabin fever, the endless wilderness closing in on him like a noose. The bad accents of the locals were as grating as a migraine, and the smell of fish and ocean pervaded every fuckin’ piece of his clothing, strong enough that it vied with cigarette smoke for his signature scent. Going to the five restaurants and three bars in town, having the same thing on the menu over and over had gotten old as hell. There wasn’t even a movie theater within an hour’s drive, only an old drive-in that was only open during the four months a year a man wouldn’t get frostbite on his dick trying to enjoy a movie from the bed of his truck with his girl in the old-fashioned way. The seclusion and boredom had been good for one thing. Flip had lifted weights and run himself into the best shape of his life. His arms bulged, his chest strained his shirt buttons, and both his cardio and timing on a speed bag were better than they had been during his tour in the Marines.

The teacher must have gotten bored with Flip too, because he stopped by her house a little early one Friday night to surprise her with a bottle of cheap wine and a chick flick, only to find her banging some pencil-dick science teacher he recognized as a specimen she had made assurances was just a friend. A married man too, aptly named Less, the piece of dogshit. Flip wanted to knock the bastard into next week, but he was truly concerned he might get a murder charge if the limp-wristed yuppie couldn’t take one of his punches. Actually, fuck the man. Flip wanted to knock that cheating slut around. He’d never hit a woman before, but if anyone deserved it, it was a fucking cheat. Dull and plain as she was, and despite ample opportunity, Flip had never cheated on the little skank.

The icing on the cake was when the murders started. Flip had come to this backwoods hellhole to get away from murders. It seems crime missed him and had followed him across the map. The first body washed up on the shore in a bucolic cove. It was a place Flip had found early on and driven to several times to have a beer and watch the sunset. Tall rocky cliffs populated with pine trees surrounded the ocean, and the waves crashed against the rocks with a thunderous susurrus. Those dense pine softened the light at dawn and dusk, bending into luscious pinks and oranges, and the water gleamed a vibrant sapphire. It was a scene straight off a postcard.

The bloated corpse lying on the beach slightly hampered that postcard beauty. Standing over the corpse in the sand, Flip guessed by the clammy pallor of the gelatinous skin and the damp putrid smell the man had been dead a week or so. Flip’s deputy, an older man with greying hair straight out of Mayberry, gave Flip his opinion that the man had fallen from the cliffs and drowned, or had been boating and drowned, or some other kind of accident that led to drowning. An accident that didn’t necessitate police involvement or investigation. The deputy had been there forever, and had turned down the sheriff’s position twice to avoid the added responsibility. The pattern was easy to see. As were the strange marks on the dead man’s neck and shoulders. The marks were faint, a little difficult to make out for an untrained eye, especially on the bloated, damp, decaying skin. They looked like something between hickies and strangulation bruises.

With a shrug, the deputy mentioned to Flip that accidents like this happened a couple times a year. Flip took the initiative to research exactly what that meant and how many similar accidents like this had occurred.

“Fuck me,” Flip muttered profoundly.

Based on his first cursory examination of the half-assed reports the Eastport Sheriff’s Department generated and the even worse records it maintained, he counted around fifty accidental deaths in that cove going back until World War II. He suspected there were many accidents the police didn’t deem worth documenting in their records.

“Accidents my dyin’ ass.” Flip swiped a hand over his face.

So much for a quiet change of pace.

*******************************************************************************************

The bodies had all been found washed up on the rocky beach of the cloistered cove. There wasn’t much of a beach, just the rocky bottom of cliffs that the waves crashed against. Flip thought it might be public land or even park land because it was pretty enough that some rich recluse should have bought it up years ago if the government hadn’t claimed it. He was surprised to find the entire cove and a couple hundred surrounding acres had been in one family for well over a century. The entire property was dubbed ‘Thundercliffs,” a term he guessed was coined from the sound the waves made crashing against the cliffs. The old house wasn’t abandoned in the technical sense, not in the way the townsfolk believed. A quick search at the County Clerk revealed it was owned by a trust along with the sizable acreage it sat on and a host of other assets. The sole beneficiaries of the trust were a pair of siblings by the names of Hortence Desdemona and Beauregard Mountbatten III.

“This is gonna go well,” Flip grumbled as he wrote the names and address into the small notebook he kept in his pocket.

The address listed in Port Clyde was easy to find, and even offered a nice drive down the coast. It led him to a quaint cottage in town overlooking a harbor abuzz with working fisherman hauling in nets of fish and cages of lobster. He pulled his truck in behind the only car in the driveway, one of those old station wagons with the wood side panels. Several potted plants taller than Flip lounged on the porch and in the windows there were crystals and weird looking wicker crafts shaped like moons and stars. An old German shepherd was curled up by the door, his muzzle more white than black. He lifted his head to appraise Flip, but decided he wasn’t worth getting up over, and settled for watching him warily. The scent of incense or maybe fancy candles seeped onto the porch from inside. As he rapped his knuckles on the door Flip hoped that froufrou smell wouldn’t stick to his clothes and stink up the inside of his truck on his drive home.

A dumpy eccentric woman answered. She inhaled sharply at the sight of the handsome stranger, instantly flustered, and set about smoothing her rumpled outfit and bushy curly hair. She was dressed somewhere between a seventies hippie and a new age wannabe witch. Flip didn’t really understand the difference, but there were lots of colors and flappy material to her getup, stacked jingling bracelets, and multiple rings on every finger.

“Hi, ummm, can I help you?” the woman stammered. It had probably been a while since she’d talked to a man.

“Is Hortence or Beauregard available?” Flip asked in an authoritative tone.

“Why on earth would you want to see them?” She bristled and folded her arms over her chest.

Clearly, he had taken the wrong approach. The woman was of indeterminate age. She could have been a good-looking sixty or a rode-hard forty. He figured either way, she probably wasn’t dried up enough to be immune to masculine attention. Leaning against the doorframe and towering over her, he turned on the charm.

“Sorry, ma’am, I didn’t mean to come off rude.” He flashed his handsomest smile and ran his hand through his thick cowlick. “I’ve been put in the position of looking into some abandoned property that may be part of a trust of which they’re the sole beneficiaries. I just want to make sure all the property they’re rightfully entitled to gets to them.”

“Property where?” the woman stiffened even more, a rare response to Flip’s moves.

“I can only discuss that with the beneficiaries, I’m afraid.” He looked over the woman’s head, starting to suspect something was off. The cluttered inside of the house looked more like a fortune teller’s parlor than the residence of wealthy siblings. “Are you a relative?”

“I’m May,” she snorted in what passed for a laugh. “You could say I’m their stepmother.” She flapped her arms in a kind of shrug. “If you want to meet Hortence and Beauregard, follow me.” She turned and snorted again. “You can ask them anything you want.”

Flip passed overstuffed bookcases and curio cabinets filled with a myriad of trinkets into a sunny kitchen. The windowsill was littered with more witchy hippie looking things and a large plant with striped leaves dominated the center of a small dining table.

“Can I get you something to drink?” May asked as she started tapping a can on the counter.

“Coffee, if you have it. Thank you.” Flip watched her odd tapping with the can. “About the folks I’m here to see…”

“They’ll be along shortly.” She smiled and poured a mug of coffee from an existing brew in her coffee pot. “Give them a minute, they don’t move as fast as they used to.”

Flip still didn’t know what kind of eccentric he was dealing with here, but he decided to be careful not to leave any stray hairs around just in case. The last thing he needed was some broad crafting a voodoo doll of him or some shit and summoning him to her bedroom in the witching hour. He wondered if witches only used hair for those things, or if any kind of DNA would work. That unsettling thought made him eye the coffee mug suspiciously. An old police trick was to offer a suspect water, then keep the glass for DNA testing after the suspect leaves. DNA was discarded material then, free game to search without consent. He decided he didn’t need coffee that badly after all and set the mug on the counter in the same motion that he leaned his hip against it.

A fat black cat waddled into the kitchen, greeting him with a trilled meow, looking up at him expectantly with rich green eyes. The cat jumped up onto one of the chairs at the dining table, then up onto the tabletop, where it sat politely. Another deeper meow heralded the arrival of a second cat, bigger and even fatter, with a bright orange striped coat, a white patch on its chest, a white tipped tail, and bright amber eyes that matched Flip’s.

May smiled at them and said to Flip, “Let me introduce you to Hortence,” she pointed at the black cat, then moved her finger toward the orange tabby. “And Beauregard.” She emptied the can of cat food onto a saucer and used a fork to separate the contents. “Ask away.”

Flip rubbed the scruff on his jaw, watching as the woman placed the saucer on the table. Hortence began eating while Beauregard hefted his bulk up onto the chair then the table beside her.

“Cat got your tongue?” May asked with a snort.

“They’re the beneficiaries of the Thundercliffs Trust?” Flip stroked the black cat.

“They sure are! Brother and sister. Twenty-two years young,” May beamed as if she were indeed talking about her children. “Their real mom died ten years ago, but they get their longevity from her. She lived until she was in shooting distance of one-hundred. She was an old maid like me, no human children. So, she left everything in a trust to her cats. I get a monthly wage as their caretaker, not that I wouldn’t do it for free. I used to help their mom with chores and errands. Part maid, part cook, part caretaker. She was more like my crazy aunt than anything though.”

“I see.” Flip smiled to buy time while his mind ran through any questions that might be useful. “The trust also owns an old house up in Eastport. Does that mean the cats own it?”

“I suppose it does,” May shrugged. “I left my law degree in my other pants, but I’m told we could all live in that big old mansion on the cliffs, the cats, and my dog, and I. But I don’t think I could spend a night in there and catch a wink of sleep. I used to clean it once a month, and I hated every second I spent inside it. Something’s just wrong in there. I couldn’t even get Elwood to go inside with me when he was young and reckless – you met him on the porch.”

“Why is that, do you think?” Flip asked. “I’d like to hear your thoughts on that house if you have time.”

“I have plenty of time, but those aren’t thoughts I like to spend my time on.” She smiled but her tone was firm. “I might look like a silly old woman to you, but I’m not that silly. Or naive. I know there’s nothing I could tell you about that house that you’d believe anyway. And I know it’s not smart to go telling a sheriff lots of outlandish things and making him think you’re crazy.”

“Sheriff?” Flip grinned a little bashfully. He didn’t know his jig was up when he knocked on the door.

“I could tell you I’m a psychic and see if I could get fifty bucks out of you for a tarot reading.” May winked. “Or maybe news just travels fast in small towns. Especially between women. And extra especially about the new hunk of meat with a silver star up north.”

He laughed because it beat acknowledging his status as a slab of meat. “I’d like to take a look inside that house on the cliff. Would you be willing to show me around? The sheriff’s department would compensate you at the same hourly rate you get from the trust.”

“No way in hell, sheriff,” she smiled sweetly. “Not for the money or that handsome smile. I haven’t been up there in years and I don’t intend to go back. Not ever. If Hortence and Beauregard could sign legal documents, I’d advise them to demolish that house and every other structure on the property, bulldoze it clean, and turn it into a landfill.”

“Hell of a thing to do to a place with such a great view,” Flip said.

“I see. You’ve already been out there poking around.” It wasn’t a question and she seemed sad about it. “It’s always the handsomest men around who are drawn to that place.”

“Well, it’s also my job.” Flip didn’t tell her that he had gone to those cliffs many times on his own before anything suspicious had happened or any bodies had washed up on shore. That he thought the cliffs with the tall pine trees overlooking the boisterous cove was the best place in town to have a beer and watch the sunset. He damn sure wouldn’t say he felt drawn there. But even if he did, it was just the view. A man had every right to appreciate a nice view.

May opened a kitchen drawer and rummaged around, finally retrieving a keyring with a single key on it. She tossed the key to Flip and smiled as he snatched it out of the air with ease.

“Here’s the key to that house. Take it. The honor system is still pretty big here in our small towns.” She smiled. “Besides, if you use it to do something stupid to that house or anything inside it, you’ll have bigger problems than me.” She snorted again. “Actually, I doubt I’ll have to deal with you anymore at all after that!”

“What worries you so much about that house?” Flip asked, shoving the key into the front pocket of his jeans.

“Nothing about that house doesn’t worry me.” May shook her head. “You might want to ask me about the property too, not just the house itself.”

“Alright.” Flip nodded. “Consider me asking.”

“Lots of deaths on that land over the years.” She shuddered slightly. “I imagine that’s why you’re here. One of the first deaths the paper covered was in the forties. A strapping man who’d just come back from the war drowned in that cove. Everyone thought it was so strange because he was in great shape, fresh out of the military. They suspected it must have been a suicide. He was the second man to drown in the cove that year. But if you ask me, or most locals, the very first death was actually just labeled a disappearance. The military man’s wife.” She waved at the cats. “Their mom’s great aunt. I guess that’d make her their great great aunt.” Another snort. “Rumor has it she ran off with some man or other she met while her husband was off at war, and her husband committed suicide when he got home and found out.” She paused and looked at Flip. “But there are always rumors about beautiful women, aren’t there? If a woman’s pretty enough, men will call her a slut regardless of how many of them she sleeps with. Or doesn’t. Come to think of it, the more men a woman rejects, the more likely they are to label her a slut because it makes them feel superior. I’ve seen it a dozen times and I’m sure you have too. A small man’s way to destroy a woman who’s out of his league.”

“And that woman lived in the house?” Flip clarified. “The pretty woman?”

“She wasn’t just pretty. Rumor has it she was drop dead gorgeous. Bewitchingly, enchantingly, dangerously beautiful. But yes, Hortence and Beauregard’s great great aunt.” She patted each cat in turn, eliciting happy purrs. They had plopped down on the dining table, listening to the conversation. “All this was told to me by their mother. I wasn’t there, of course. I wasn’t around at all for a few more decades.”

“I appreciate it.” Flip gave her a genuine smile. “The key and the information. Don’t worry, I won’t hold you to anything you got secondhand.”

“There’s one fact that isn’t secondhand and you should give it some real weight, sheriff,” May said in the most serious tone she’d adopted so far. She was still stroking the orange cat. “Their mother owned that house for decades when she inherited it from her mother. It’s closer to a mansion than a house, and has that great view you mentioned. Still, she never lived one day in that house and she never sold it either. She didn’t want any living thing to live inside it. She rarely spoke of her great aunt, and when she did it was only to praise her beauty. I asked her more about her once and this is what she told me: ‘I don’t believe in speaking ill of the dead, especially when the dead might still be listening. But I will say that since she was a young girl, my great aunt was blessed with beauty and cursed with rage.’”

*******************************************************************************************

Flip stopped at a local bakery before leaving Port Clyde, letting all the new information settle in his mind. He had two slices of spectacular homemade blueberry pie, allowing himself to wander through this new world of information. It was a strange world for him, one with witches and ghosts and curses and haunted beaches. He didn’t believe any of that shit any more than he believed in Santa Claus, but it was an entertaining world to visit. Plus, it had a dangerously beautiful woman in it.

The drive back would take him around four hours. He’d be pulling into town just in time to catch the sunset. Picking up a cheeseburger and fries to go and a six pack on the drive sounded good. What sounded even better was eating his burger while watching the summer sun set over that gorgeous cove from high up on the rocky cliffs.

*******************************************************************************************

Flip’s favorite spot was on the highest cliff at the head of the cove. There, a flat rock served as an ideal bench near the edge, offering the best view of the cove from beneath the shade of a tall pine. He sat and just admired the view, the greasy-bottomed bag containing his cheeseburger and fries sitting on the rock beside him. He felt like a gargoyle perched on the top of the tallest building in a city, overlooking his domain below.

The sky was molten gold and fiery orange as the sun dipped below the horizon. The surface of the ocean glittered golden too, like it was a sea of coins instead of water. The light in the pines took on a soft dreamlike haze and a light fog was building along the beach. Lower in elevation and about two-hundred yards away was the lonely old house, its four tall stories keeping watch over the cove. Flip looked at it now from his vantage, conscious of what his senses might tell him. He felt nothing ominous at all. If anything, he felt content, a sense of belonging. A feeling that he could be happy here for a very long time, that he could even stay here forever. With a jolt, he realized he had been leaning nearer to the edge while lost in thought.

Movement on the beach far below caught his eye. Staring intently, he quite literally couldn’t believe his eyes. A woman lay on the beach, stark naked, and writhing in pain. She was also thrashing what appeared to be a shimmering golden tail. He didn’t believe in ghosts or Santa Claus, and he wasn’t about to start believing in fuckin’ mermaids either. But that’s damn sure what she looked like. Flip rubbed his eyes and forced them to focus more clearly. No, that long golden tail was still there, glistening wet and whipping violently on the beach. He could even faintly hear the wet slaps of it on the sand, paired with an ethereal voice calling for help.

Flip launched off the rock and ran back through the trees toward the house. A trail took off from the house, navigating the treacherous cliffs down to the beach. It would be suicide to attempt a descent anywhere else. At the base of the cliff, he charged into a full sprint, pumping his arms and kicking up sand as he ran down the beach toward the woman. Her cries for help were louder now, so loud they seemed to echo inside his head. There was a lewdness to it, too. If Flip hadn’t seen her writhing in pain, he would have taken the sound for loud moans of ecstasy.

He vaulted over a boulder at the head of the cove and found her, only feet ahead of him. The woman was every bit as naked as he had thought, but it wasn’t a tail he had seen thrashing. From the waist down, she was tangled up in a tawny fishing net. Somehow, the sunset must have made it look golden. In his mind’s eye, he could picture a perfect tail, complete with fins and individual scales of gleaming gold, thrashing and slapping the sand. He didn’t know how the hell he had seen that from the tangled mess of rope binding the woman’s legs, but he didn’t need to think about that now.

Falling to his knees beside the woman, he spoke soothingly like he would to a frightened animal. “I’m here to help you. I’m not going to hurt you. Let me help you.” It required a herculean effort to keep his eyes from wandering over her magnificent heaving breasts. He cupped her cheek to stop her from thrashing in the net. The ropes were digging into her, leaving angry red burns across her skin. Her eyes were wild with fear like a fox caught in a snare, but also bright and fierce. He grabbed her shoulder and shook her gently, keeping his voice soothing, “Look at me. I’m going to help you. Be still.”

The woman’s eyes rolled to meet his, and it felt like they bore straight into his soul. His throat went dry and his hands felt weak. The sun had set now, leaving a lingering purple twilight. Her eyes were luminous in the lavender light, somehow catching the ambient glow and reflecting it back even stronger. A mane of glossy hair was spread across the sand beneath her, and the fading light danced on her skin like diamonds on silk. Her eyes were no longer frightened, but still wild. They drew him in. Without realizing it, Flip’s hand had slipped from her shoulder to skim down her side, coming to rest on her hip on the only free patch of skin between ropes.

Flip flinched at the realization, fumbling a broken, “I’m sorry.”

The woman said nothing, continuing to stare up at him. Her lips curled in a slight smile that may have been satisfaction. Or it may have been relief at finding a savior.

Flip felt a foreign compulsion. Something dark and sick. Something he would have beaten another man up for. He felt the almost irresistible urge to unzip his jeans and cage the woman beneath him. To use the ropes to his advantage, plunge into her and ravage her like an unhinged beast. It was a base impulse, something at home in a feral animal instead of a man. Flip had felt lust, and he had a bad habit of thinking with his cock, but he had never felt the drive to take what wasn’t offered willingly. He had never felt desire so aggressive and consuming.

“How long were you out here on the beach?” he asked to ground himself. He shook his head, berating himself internally, asking himself, What the fuck is wrong with you? He had seen plenty of naked women, beautiful women. Had plenty of them beneath him writhing in much more lascivious ways than this one. He wasn’t a blushin’ virgin and he goddamn sure wasn’t a fuckin’ pervert.

“I’ve always been here,” she said with a laugh on her voice, as harmonious as a sonata.

Looking away from her, he took a breath to purge the perversion from his mind and unbuttoned his shirt. He roughly shrugged out of it and draped it over the woman’s torso, covering the most enticing bits of her. He wanted to rip the ropes off her, but he forced himself to move slowly and untangle her with care.

“Are you hurt?” he asked when she was free of the net, forcing himself to look into her eyes and nowhere else.

“No,” she said in a serene voice with a sound as pleasant as windchimes. “What are you going to do to me?”

That odd, innocuously asked question flooded his mind with another violent rush of terrible, driving, impulses, alarmingly perverse. His jeans felt tight, and he felt disgusted with himself. He decided it was even worse looking into her eyes than it had been looking at her perfect naked figure. He fought the urge to tell her what he wanted to do – ravage her, and even more than that he wanted to take her home and keep her chained to his bed. All to himself. Forever. In a great effort to remain civilized, he gritted hoarsely, “I’m gonna get you off this beach and somewhere safe.”

Flip wrapped her in his shirt, lifted her into his arms, and pushed up to his feet. He cradled her gently in his arms as he carried her back down the beach. It was now nearly dark, but her eyes were still almost unnaturally bright as they watched him serenely. She should have smelled like the ocean, even salty or fishy, but she smelled sweeter than anything he had ever scented. He couldn’t place her scent, but it was like an amalgamation of everything that had ever enticed him, from the hottest woman to the sweetest honey to the most fragrant perfume. All those scents mingled harmoniously where they lived in her skin. She laid her head on his chest and made a sound in her throat like a purr. It shook Flip straight through to his bones.

*******************************************************************************************

Flip carried her up the steep trail back up to the top of the cliffs. He carried her to his truck, parked near the trailhead. He wanted to take her to the hospital, have a doctor sign off that she was alright. But the strange woman protested, insisting it was too far and she was too cold. Flip hadn’t noticed her shivering before, but now she trembled in his arms, her body fluttering against his chest.

Instead, she asked him to take her into the old, abandoned house, assuring they could warm themselves inside. Though she had only asked and in the most melodious of tones, Flip found it was a command he couldn’t refuse. Still carrying her in his arms like a doting husband with an eager bride, he strode to the front door of the abandoned house. The door was a shade of purple-brown, like a fresh bruise, with a standoffish doorknocker in the shape of a lion’s head with a heavy ring clenched between its teeth. Glaring at the beast, Flip kicked the door in.

Still holding the woman to his chest, Flip paused at the threshold, looking from one dark corner of the foyer to the other, prepared for anything, like an old west gunfighter entering a saloon. He felt immediately ridiculous. Those ghost stories and tall tales must have gotten to him more than he’d wanted to admit. There was nothing amiss inside, save for some dust and cobwebs. Moonlight filtered through the windows, making the dust he had disturbed look like mist wafting lightly on the air.

“Upstairs,” the woman said. “There’s less dust upstairs.

Flip didn’t care whether she was right and he didn’t ponder her statement. He attacked the stairs, taking them two at a time. The house was Victorian-styled, filled with tall ceilings, ornate details, and airy windows. A pair of double doors stood open at the end of the hallway on the third floor, beckoning him inside. Flip carried his prize through them and into a master suite, noticing at once it was surprisingly clean. Bay windows were ajar, open just enough to allow a crisp breeze tinged with pine and salt blow in from the cove. The light wind must have kept the dust and cobwebs at bay because the room looked and smelled pristine.

Flip tried not to focus on the large bed, almost as plush and inviting as the woman in his arms. He aimed for the bathroom, intending to fight her chill with warm water. She tugged on his collar, pulling her face near his ear and whispered, “You just pulled me out of the water. Don’t put me back in it yet.” Her breath was hot on his neck. “Take me to bed.”

“That’s not what you need,” Flip rasped, trying to deny the way his blood boiled and remain a gentleman while his cock throbbed.

“Isn’t it just like a man to tell me what I need?” she laughed, both husky and harmonious.

“You need warmed up, and a doctor, and probably a hot meal,” Flip told her as he walked to the bed. In one swift motion, he sat her down and peeled his own soaked shirt off her, trying not to look at the perfection that revealed. He pulled the quilt around her in a cocoon, both to warm her and keep her hidden from his view. He turned her brusquely around and laid down beside her, wrapping her cocooned figure inside his arms, hoping the thick quilt barrier between them would keep his arousal his own dirty little secret.

“Can you not think of a more effective approach to warm me up?” the woman lilted.

Inhaling her scent with his nose near the back of her neck, Flip thought he had never been so intoxicated by any substance. He cleared his throat. “I’m not very imaginative. Sorry to disappoint.”

“I have some ideas,” she teased. “Do you care to hear them?”

“Not unless you buy me dinner first, darlin,’” Flip gruffed. “I’m not that easy.”

“You can take whatever you want, you know,” she said in a sultry invitation.

“I don’t want to take anything from you,” his voice rumbled.

“That’s a lie and we both know it. I can feel how much you’re lying.” She wiggled her perfect ass against the ridge in his jeans. He only tightened his hold to still her, making no moves to relieve his own suffering. She stilled, and when she spoke again there was a sprinkling of admiration in her voice, “What a strange man you are.”

“Darlin,’ you have no idea,” Flip laughed, adjusting his large arms around her body. “You should see me cut loose on the weekends. I really live on the edge. I have pizza with pineapple and stay up past midnight to watch Twilight Zone reruns and everything.”

Flip held her tight and forced his eyes shut, trying to ignore the way the moonlight danced on her pristine skin and glossed her hair; the feel of her curves through the quilt, as apparent to him as a pea beneath a princess’s mattress; the way her scent curled into his nose, as decadent as rose petals and as potent as whiskey. He could feel her weaving spells around him, through him, inside him, a kind of intoxication that settled in his blood. Flip knew once he was good and drunk on her, he’d never want to sober.

*******************************************************************************************

Flip dozed during the night, falling into a fitful nightmarish kind of sleep. His mind reeled with images of men screaming as they drowned, a beautiful beach corrupted by waterlogged corpses, and an unnaturally gorgeous woman swimming in the cove, watching the mayhem and smiling at it all.

The feeling of his back being forced down into the mattress made his eyes fly open. The sight of the mystery woman straddling his lap, her mane backlit by moonlight, the same moonlight that gleamed in her eyes, made his pulse thunder. Inhaling sharply, he gripped her naked thighs, his fingertips digging bruises into her skin.

Flip wouldn’t take her, but he was damn fine with being taken by her.

Pleasure rumbled through his throat as she raked her nails down his chest, tracing angry red streaks down his body. She had discarded the quilt, brandishing her exquisite and fully naked body like a weapon, her tits languidly jostling to the circular motion of her hips as she worked him into a frenzy through his jeans. She whipped his belt loose and yanked the button open on his jeans. He tried to sit up, to capture her pouting lips, but she pushed him back with a throaty laugh.

It was the first time in his life Flip had been manhandled by a fuckin’ woman. She was stronger than she looked. He looked up at her in a kind of daze, unable to look anywhere else, or to look away from those oddly luminous eyes. He had an unsettling feeling of being a prey animal, caught in the claws of some carnivorous predator. But with a cock as hard as his was now, he didn’t give a damn about that or any other misgiving.

Purring or maybe snarling, she arched her back and shook out her long glossy hair, crooning his name when she sank down onto him. Flip didn’t remember telling her his name, but that hardly mattered now. All around him, the room blurred like a steaming mirage until everything was a shapeless haze except for the glorious woman riding him. His skin simmered and his throat burned with every breath as if he were sitting inside an oven, but he had never felt more alive. Every sensation was heightened, and his pleasure was more intense than anything he had ever known.

Flip was a big, big man, and he was big where it counted. He was used to women being impressed by his body and his size, intimidated even. He wasn’t used to being stared down with unshakeable confidence as a woman took her pleasure from him. It was strange finding he wanted to give her not only pleasure, but everything else he had. He wanted to give it to her as good as he was getting it, bucking his hips beneath her while her hot pussy strangled his cock. Kissing and licking, grabbing and caressing, thrusting and bucking, he used every part of his body to earn her shudders and hear her moan his name.

Feeling her body tense around him like a silky vice, Flip fisted his hand in her hair and yanked her down to capture her lips. Growling into her mouth, he followed her over the edge, drinking her breath as she trembled in his arms while he filled her. He thrummed with something far deeper and stronger than lust, and he kissed her with a passion he had never given any other woman.

Holding her against him, Flip rolled with her, bringing her beneath him and propping himself up on his palms to admire this view of her under him. She locked her arms around his neck, urging him into her again, assuring him they were far from stopping for the evening. Again and again, they enjoyed each other until his back was stiff and his jaw ached, and until he even wondered if he would have some chaffing in some rather embarrassing areas by morning. When he finally fell asleep with her in his arms in the last hour before dawn, he dreamed of her still.

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Flip woke with the sunrise, a habit ingrained by his days in the military. Turning over in bed, he reached for the intoxicating woman. How he had released his hold on her in his sleep baffled him, but he resolved to keep her in his arms for the rest of the day to compensate. His hand met only cool sheets and a vacant mattress. As if she had been nothing but a drunken reverie or a fever dream, she was gone from the bed. She had left no note or token, only her luxurious scent lingering in the sheets.

With the sunrise, a realization dawned to Flip. His missing mystery woman was unlike anything he had ever touched or tasted. She was his wildest dream and wickedest fantasy. It was unnerving, frightening even, to realize he was so far gone after one impulsive evening. Flip had tried the most addictive substances in the world at one time or another – it came with the territory for an undercover cop, having to blend in with the worst kinds of men – but he had never sampled anything so addictive, so utterly arresting from the very first taste. The marks she clawed into his back and shoulders would last for days, but the mark she carved into his heart was one he knew would never heal. Flip was tempted to call it love at first sight, but this felt more like enslavement. Love, in his experience, had its limits. His feelings for this woman had no such limitations. Neither did the lengths he would go to have her.

Outside the window, it was a beautiful summer morning with bright sunshine and blue skies. Inside the lonely bedroom, Flip had awakened in his own private hell. A gloom so heavy as the one that settled over him upon seeing her gone should not have been possible after the night he had and the hormones that still flooded his body. There shouldn’t have been a single damn thing that could knock him off cloud nine, but all the happiness and pleasure he had felt throughout the night blackened into loss and sadness as despairing as a moonless winter night. Collapsing back into the mattress, he knew that he would give anything, absolutely anything, to hold her in his arms again.

That’s what love will do to you, he thought wryly.

The woman was the cause of his suffering, and only she could be his relief. He didn’t know where she’d come from or how he hadn’t encountered her before in the claustrophobically small town. As he thought it, despairing at his lack of leads to find her again, he heard her voice quite clearly. She sang a hauntingly beautiful melody in a language he didn’t understand. He didn’t know her words or even if her voice came in through the window or echoed out from the depths of his soul. But he knew her message with stark clarity.

When the moon shines on the ocean, you’ll find me. On that beach, inside this house, I’m yours. Surrender to me, and I’ll show you lovely things.

*******************************************************************************************

Flip did as she asked. Or maybe as she commanded. If he could tell the difference, he didn’t care. Night after night, he returned to the mansion on the cliffs. Sometimes, the front door would be ajar, leading him inside and into her waiting embrace. Sometimes, he would find her on the beach, out for a walk in the moonlight, reveling in the way it shimmered on her skin. He would swim with her in the ocean, stroll with her in the sand, hold her in the sheets, and fuck her with an insatiable hunger every way she wanted.

She never came to him when the sun shone or when the moon was black, nor would she leave the acreage. She was always gone from his bed and his arms before dawn, no matter how tightly he held her. The rational part of Flip’s mind told him it was some weird game she was playing. Maybe she was married to some big asshole with a temper. The instinctual part of his mind, the dormant part where dreams and intuition reign, told him something that he couldn’t believe even though it felt true down to his bones. Flip knew he had found the creature who haunted that beautiful cove. Hell, he had probably found the woman responsible for so many deaths over the years that he hadn’t even cataloged them all.

As summer bled into fall and the colors turned vibrant, more accidental deaths occurred in the cove, more torn and bloated corpses washed onto the rocky beach. Flip now agreed with his unconcerned deputy, that these deaths were unfortunate accidents. Just as he knew damned well they were murders, Flip knew he had fallen under the spell of the murderess, that he could never again be free of whatever kind of enslavement this was. But he knew also that as much as she had enchanted him, he had captured her heart just as surely. It was like taming a man-eating tiger to eat from his hand and purr from his touch.

If something had cursed this magnificent woman to wander the cove on moonlit nights, that meant there should also be a way to cure her. That’s what Flip did, he solved problems. He was pretty damn good at operating within rules he thought were arbitrary and chickenshit – that’s how he categorized whatever rules held her prisoner. If he could find loopholes inside the penal code to get what he wanted, he could figure out how to save her.

If Flip couldn’t save the woman he loved, what kind of a man was he?

*******************************************************************************************

The nurses at the Eastport Hospital had all grown tiresome to Dr. Jason Monroe. Plowing through them all had taken most of the year, and it had been a nice ego boost – just what the doctor ordered, as he liked to say – but now the flock of nurses had become just as dull as the withered shrew of a wife he begrudgingly went home to most nights. In addition to the way her once mediocre looks had been eroded by age and the toll taken by their offspring, in recent years she had even neglected to remind Dr. Monroe how impressive he was, how lucky she was to have whatever morsel of attention he gave her. This was an unacceptable slight to a doctor whose ego had outstripped his credentials since his first residency rotation. Eastport was a good fit for him. People there were provincial enough to be highly impressed with Dr. Monroe whereas his arrogance had worn thin to his peers back in Boston.

The drive home from the hospital was long enough for Dr. Monroe to resent what he’d find when he got there – the yellowing smile of his middle-aged wife greeting him along with the smell of whatever trendy meal she had attempted – but not long enough for him to think of any suitable excuses to stay out for the evening. The missus believed him a few nights a month when he told her he had to work late but he couldn’t overuse it, and he was already over what he considered his safe allowance for the month. He decided to take the long way home, take a scenic cruise along the coastline.

The full moon glittered on the ocean like diamonds on satin. Without a large city within miles there was nearly no light pollution, and the moon and diamante stars illuminated the forests and beaches like a dreamscape cast in silver. The moon was so bright, he saw a white spume burst from the ocean and telltale black fins peeking above the waves as a small pod of whales swam near the deserted coast. There was no one else on the lonely two-lane road, so Monroe watched them instead of the road, smiling when a calf breached and turned its belly up toward the moon.

When he returned his eyes to the road, an unfamiliar cove came into view ahead. Frowning, he thought he must have taken a wrong bend in the winding road. The road narrowed and there was no shoulder, making it cumbersome to turn around. He quickly oriented himself when he heard the crash of thunder on the cloudless night. Monroe knew all the stories about the beautiful cove surrounded by thundering cliffs and the haunted house perched high above. He had always wanted to see it, but his doe-eyed and doe-hearted wife had always nagged him out of it.

“What about the rumors, Jason?” she would whine. “It’s supposed to be haunted and it gives me the creeps.”

What a fortunate wrong turn, Monroe smirked to himself. Now, he could take a walk along that beautiful, ‘haunted’ beach and see what all the fuss was about. He could even keep a clear conscience and save his evasion for when he really needed it.

The road had taken him to the beach before it doubled back and wound up the nearest hill toward the old, abandoned house on the cliffs. He thought about driving up there to get the bird’s eye view, but movement in the water caught his eye. Squinting, he thought he saw something glimmering in the water near the shore. It looked like a woman swimming, but that couldn’t be right. The leaves were starting to turn crisp and vibrant as autumn approached, and the nighttime air had a cool bite.

Stepping out of his car, Monroe strolled along the beach toward the head of the cove. The cliffs formed a perfect horseshoe around the ocean and towered above him. The beach was littered with fallen boulders and large monoliths that protruded from the sea like the teeth of a great petrified monster. The beach’s dangerous edges added to its beauty, like a woman in a tight red dress and stilettos.

Monroe saw the movement again, something glistening in the water. Closer now, just beyond the nearest protruding fang of rock. He couldn’t explain why his heart kicked up as he trotted around it to get a better look, but his intuition was rewarded. He’d been right at first. It was a woman. A fucking babe, too, so hot she could have walked right off a porn set. Her tits already had his dick twitching. She was treading water a few yards away, close enough for him to see the way her eyes reflected the moonlight. Below the swell of her tits, her body was hidden beneath the gentle waves, but Monroe had seen enough.

“Hey, baby!” he called to her, trying to sound suave. “Are you out here all by yourself? It’s dangerous for a woman. Especially a woman that looks like you.”

Monroe didn’t like operating from the disadvantage of his prey not knowing his professional status. But it did give him the opportunity to enlighten a new woman, watch the admiration bloom in her eyes when he regaled her with stories of all the lives he’d saved. But for the first time in years, he didn’t even feel the desire to regale her. Monroe just wanted to fuck her. He felt like an alcoholic at a bar, his mouth watering and hands shaking. He walked closer, waves lapping over his six-hundred-dollar brogues.

“It is dangerous,” the woman agreed in a voice as harmonious as a symphony. “You should stay away.”

Her angelic lift didn’t fool Monroe. He caught the sultry devil in her tone, too. It was the tone of a woman who wanted it, wanted him. He kicked off his waterlogged shoes and told her as much, “You look like a woman who wants some company.”

“How does your wife look when she wants company?” The woman asked and kicked away, further out into the ocean. “You should go home to her.”

Monroe saw a flash of gold in the water beneath her, something he swore looked like scales. He wondered if she was blonde down south and the thought caused another jump in his pants. He didn’t bother taking them off when he waded deeper. Fuck, the water was cold. It was a testament to how hot the mystery woman was that his hard-on could endure the frigid water as he swam out toward her.

Just as he closed in, the woman glided away. She looked back at him over her shoulder in what may have been fright or evasion, but Monroe knew better. She was playing coy, giving him a chase. Women did that to him from time to time, played those little games. It never meant they didn’t want him to catch them. He thought about what he’d do to this one when he caught her. He wanted to sink his teeth right into her. One thing he was certain of, he hadn’t ruined his shoes and his clothes to play coy. Play time was over once he caught her.

Which, judging by the way his outstretched hand was nearly clawing through her luxurious mane, was right about now.

Monroe caught her hair as she swam away from him, still playing coy, and used a little too much force when he yanked her back to him. Her beautiful features were twisted and her mouth was open when he yanked her head around. Monroe had expected that – a look of pain or surprise. But the woman was smiling. And she wasn’t a woman anymore. The creature was smiling at him. Its features were still beautiful, but its eyes were vicious with narrow, slitted pupils, and its smile was too wide with too many teeth. Dear god, the teeth! Rows of sharp, brutal, shark-like teeth.

The creature laughed, drinking his fear like wine. It laughed as it tore into him with its brimming smile and those terrible teeth, latching onto his neck with vice-tight strength. The pain and surprise belonged to him alone. And what exquisite pain it was, like nothing he had ever experienced. He felt his flesh being serrated by ragged teeth, and even heard the tearing of his tissue like a seam ripping as the creature tore a chunk out of his neck. He felt his blood oozing down over his collarbone, hot on his chilled skin.

Monroe didn’t think it should take so long to die or that a person could endure so much pain before the release of death. He flailed feebly, or possibly it was his muscles twitching spasmodically as the last currents of life tried to save him. He looked up at the full glowing moon and sputtered a prayer, blood frothing from his mouth as he pleaded to God for help. Or at least to let him die quickly.

“God’s not here tonight, doctor,” the creature told him, her voice still as wickedly harmonious as a devil’s serenade. A golden fin breached the water before the creature dove under with him, fanning a magnificent golden tail to drive them deep into the crushing black depths. Somehow, he could still hear her voice or perhaps the words were driven straight into his soul.

“There’s only me.” Her voice seemed to fill the water like light. Terrible, golden, hellish light. “And the lovely things I’ll show you.”

*******************************************************************************************

It took a week for Dr. Monroe’s corpse to wash back up onto the beach. Clammy skin had begun sloughing off in patches which, combined with the bloat of decay and waterlogged oozing, gave the body a poached egg sort of look. Flip always had thick skin when it came to murders and crime scenes, it had thickened even more in the last few months. The smell was particularly loathsome with bodies dredged up after marinating in water for days. Soggy, rancid meat was just a little more putrid than dry rot. It should probably worry him that the humid stench coating the back of his throat no longer bothered him, but now he was more concerned with not getting his boots wet from the waves lapping at a vacant eye socket, the surrounding tissue hanging loose like a worn-out buttonhole. In addition to the missing eye, there were other places the fish had eaten. They went for the soft tissue first – eyes, lips, genitals.

I hope you did something in life that warranted your dick bein’ chewed off in death, you poor clammy bastard, Flip thought as he studied the corpse. Fuck, I hope he was dead when that happened. He smirked at his own dark humor.

That humor faded quickly when he had to break the news to the doctor’s hysterical widow; console her while she sobbed, listen while she bemoaned the fate of their litter. He really needed to hire some deputy to do this part of the job, some kind of emotional support golden retriever in human form. Especially with the impressive accidental death toll Eastport boasted.

*******************************************************************************************

“I found your latest handiwork on the beach this morning,” Flip said to his golden girl between kisses as his mouth trailed from her throat down toward her navel. Moonlight gilded her skin as she moved beneath him in the bedroom he now considered theirs, hidden away in the seaside mansion. “You gotta quit doin’ that, darlin.’”

She bucked her hips against his face in invitation. “You don’t need to worry. I know what’s really bothering you. None of them touch me. No one has touched me since you. Only you.”

“It ain’t a walk in the park breakin’ the news to all these wailing widows, you know.” Flip nipped her skin, delighting in the way she shuddered in response.

“Tell the wife about the nurses the good doctor was fucking,” she said with no remorse. “That should put a bandaid on her grief.”

“Is that an educated guess?” Flip asked redundantly. He had learned earlier that day the doctor had been making the rounds in the hospital in multiple ways.

“When a man drowns in my cove, there’s a good reason,” she said with a hint of venom.

“A man-hater, huh?” he grinned against her skin, teasing her with the scratch of his beard. “Should I be concerned?”

“You? Never, handsome.” She laughed headily. “A hard man like you is good to find.”

“Is that what’s behind all the killing?” Flip asked more seriously, looking up at her and meeting her eyes. “Some asshole hurt you and have a score to settle?”

“I had a score to settle, alright. I was filled with rage, for years and years. But now, it’s nothing so simple as rage. Not anymore. It’s all part of a bargain I made long ago.” She tangled her fingers into the thick forest of his hair. “You might say, I have quotas to meet.”

“Tell me what happened.” Flip raised himself up, cupping her cheek in his hand and looking steadily into her eyes.

“You talk too much, handsome,” she said and used her surprising strength to roll him onto his back and hoist herself to straddle him. Better than that, she straddled his face. “I can think of a better use for that mouth.”

Some time later, she lay draped across his chest as the sweat cooled on their bodies. Flip marveled at her indefatigability. He felt like he had run a marathon, and she could go all night. They still had a few hours before dawn and Flip didn’t want to waste them sleeping.

“You know if you need a hero, I’m happy to step up,” Flip told her, rubbing his hand along her back.

“A hero can’t save me,” she scoffed with surprising rancor. “A hero would never do what’s necessary to save me. Only a villain would have half a chance. A man who chooses to be my hero alone and a villain to others.”

“Hero or villain, I’ll be whatever the hell you want me to be,” Flip assured her, his voice soft this time as he cradled her head on his chest. “Tell me what happened to you, darlin.’”

“What happened doesn’t matter,” she replied with a hint of melancholy. “Why things are the way they are rarely matters.”

“Anything that affects you matters to me.” His voice rumbled through his chest.

With her head resting on one side of his chest and her sharp fingernails tracing patterns on the other, she began her story. Her sonorous voice played harmony to the spell woven by her words. Flip had never been the best listener, not to the frivolous pillow talk most women tried to engage him in. Yet he found he hung on every word she spoke as if it were the thrilling cliffhanger at the end of a riveting novel chapter.

“It’s been more than eighty years since I’ve let a man have me for more than one night.” She kissed his chest. “But I suppose you figured that out.”

“Not really,” Flip huffed, jostling her on his chest. “I don’t have a damn thing figured out, other than I have you now, but I’m not supposed to be able to keep you. I know I want to keep you.” His brow was set and voice heavy with conviction. “I’ll find a way to keep you.”

“I want you to keep me, too,” she purred. “And you’re the first man I’ve ever said that too.” Her voice grew darker. “But there’s a price you must pay to keep me. You’re also the first man I’ve ever wanted to know exactly what that price is. If the price is too steep for you, I won’t force you to make the purchase.”

“No price is too high, darlin.’” He grinned. “Can I whip out a checkbook?”

She smiled up at him with great sadness and returned her head to his chest to begin her tale.

“I married too young to the first man who had ever made me laugh. I was just coming into my beauty and had never kissed a boy before. My husband promised he would take me far away when he returned from the war. I was young and foolish, and I believed him. While he was at war, men in town hounded me. They were merciless. Truly merciless, like hounds baying after a fox. I wouldn’t have looked twice at any of them even if I was single. I was more vigilant over my reputation than I needed to be, more vigilant than any other woman I knew. I couldn’t have done more to avoid and deter them, unless I started undermining my appearance. I wouldn’t give any man the power of making me lessen myself to make them more comfortable. I wasn’t too much. Those men were inadequate.”

Flip stroked his large hand along her back soothingly and kissed along her hairline, letting her take whatever time she needed.

“It didn’t take long – weeks it seemed – until one of those men, a fat, verminous, troll who could never touch a woman like me, started telling everyone who would listen that he had slept with me. That I had begged for it and moaned like a whore. I don’t know how many people in town believed it at first. I thought surely no one could. But the women who heard the rumor were jealous of me and fostered it – ‘I’ve always known she was a whore. Just look at her!’ And the men who heard it wanted it to be true so they might have a chance with me – ‘Yeah, you know she wants it.’ That foul rumor spread through town like wildfire, until I couldn’t walk down the street without getting poisonous looks and lewd propositions.”

“Let’s take a stroll down mainstreet tomorrow,” Atas suggested with gravel in his voice. “I’ll rearrange some faces and punch the teeth down the throat of any asshole who so much as looks at you sideways.”

“I’d give anything to have you show me off on your arm,” she said in a faraway tone. Her voice hardened when she continued. “All the perverse talk emboldened the perverts, I suppose. It didn’t take long until the looks and comments weren’t enough. Then the pinching started, then the grabbing. I could handle myself. I could even fend them off one at a time. I was never a meek woman and I was raised on a farm. Then they started following me in packs like hyenas.”

Flip’s hand stilled on her hip, his grip tightening.

“I went to the sheriff,” she scoffed. “He asked me what I expected, looking the way I look, dressing the way I dress. He told me I was asking for it, and I shouldn’t be surprised when men wanted it. He also asked what it was worth to me for him to do something about it.”

“Is that sonofabitch still alive?” Flip growled.

“None of them are.” She smiled at the thought. Then her lips thinned and her face hardened. “One night one of those men – I can’t remember his name, but I remember his face and his rancid breath – came to my house, the house on the cliffs. He broke in and knocked me out. I woke up when he was dragging me along the beach by my hair. When I fought back, he beat me more, beat me until he could take what he wanted from me. He was stupid though. He turned his back to me to stuff his little dick back into his pants. I bashed the asshole in the head with the nearest rock I could grab. I bashed him again and again and again until his face was hamburger, then I threw the rock into the ocean and dragged his body out. I waded until I was swimming and then I kept swimming. I was a good swimmer, and it felt good to wash the filth off me. I left his body in the middle of the cove to sink and swam back. When his corpse washed up days later, it looked like an accident.”

“That asshole deserved it,” Flip said genuinely. “He deserved a helluva lot worse.”

“My husband came home from the war a few weeks later,” she continued. “I tried to tell him these things. I needed to tell someone other than my damn pets. But he had heard the rumors in town too, and he had already been poisoned by them. He thought it was all my fault. That I must have been putting something out there to elicit the response I received. He thought I took lovers and flirted. That I acted like a whore in his absence because I couldn’t keep my legs closed until he got home.”

“I see why you wanted to get outta Dodge,” Flip grated, his body rigid beneath hers. He dreaded what he thought was coming, but still had to hear it from her lips.

“He said if he couldn’t have me, no one would. He killed me, beat me mostly to death,” she revealed. “When I was barely conscious, he dragged me to the cliff. I screamed and screamed, but no one heard me. He tied an anchor around me and shoved me off into the deepest part of the cove. You’d think it’s quick to drown, but it takes a long time when it’s happening to you. It felt like I sank for hours in my last few minutes. I screamed, watching my cries for help rise in bubbles toward the surface.”

Flip felt her body grow stiff against him as she continued. “I begged and pleaded. When I thought I would do anything anything to live a little longer, something answered. Something that lurked in the bottom of that cove. Something monstrous. I heard its voice inside my head and it offered me a trade. A trade I was all too happy to accept. Instead of a handshake, I felt thick slimy tentacles wrap around me. I thought they were dragging me deeper, but they dragged me somewhere else. I kicked so violently I broke free and I shot to the surface, kicking and kicking. A part of me realized that I should have drowned, that I couldn’t be alive after so long under water. Then I realized that my feet weren’t there anymore. The creature had stolen them, replaced my legs with a tail. I had become one of whatever that creature was. Something cursed. Something soulless.”

“Jesus,” Flip said dumbly, at a loss. What does a man say to that?

“Jesus wasn’t there that night. He didn’t answer my prayers,” she said vehemently. “I made a deal with the devil that night, or a kind of devil, and I became his pet and his ward. Since that night, I have taken my revenge and sated his hunger at the same time, luring men to their deaths with my beauty and my siren’s song. They find me on the beach, and come to save me, then they try to take me,” she laughed cruelly. “Then they beg God to let them drown. So, I show them all my teeth and then I laugh out loud. I never wanted saving, I just wanted to be found. That will teach them. All of them. They’re never to be seen again, and I’m still wandering my beach, swimming in my cove.”

Flip thought she was finished, so he asked with conviction, “So what’s the price I have to pay?”

“I’m glad I met the devil,” she said and propped herself up on his chest so she was looking down at him. “He showed me I was weak. He removed the weakness from me and replaced it with a part of him. In exchange he took a part of me too. The part of me he barters in.” She smiled grimly. “The price, as you see, is a piece of your soul.”

Flip chewed his cheek, considering this for only a moment. “I can go without a piece of my soul, darlin,’ as long as the rest of it belongs to you. And all of you belongs to me.”

*******************************************************************************************

When Flip awoke the next morning, she was gone. He knew she would be; he had grimly resigned himself to that reality months ago. It could have all been a dream, a fantasy or a nightmare. Maybe he could walk away from her and after a few painful years, convince his mind of that. Inconveniently, she was real. The realest and most alive Flip had ever felt and would ever feel was when he was with his siren.

Thunder roared outside and a gusty wind blew the bay window open with a rusty groan of hinges. Flip groaned himself as he rolled out of bed, grabbed his pack of cigarettes, pulled one out with his teeth, lit the tip and dropped his lighter back on the nightstand. Smoke trailed from his nose as he walked to the windows. He was still naked, boasting scratches from her nails across his chest, his hair wild from her fingers. Leaning against the window frame, he blew a stream of smoke outside.

Clouds as dark as gunsmoke hung low overhead and the thunder booming in the sky was louder than the crash of waves against the cliffs below. Waves ripped across the surface of the usually calm cove, cresting white like lipizzans in capriole. Watching the water boil from the storm, feeling the chilly air on his skin, and taking a drag from his cigarette, Flip wondered how in the hell he could pay the price for his siren’s absolution. If it was as simple as handing over a pound of his flesh, he would go down to the kitchen and cut a chunk out his side before breakfast. Ideas turned over in his mind, he rejected each one as fast as it bloomed. He focused so intently on that question, he didn’t realize he was chewing his lip around his cigarette until he tasted blood mingled with tobacco.

A strange movement in the water in the center of the cove caught his eye. The shape of the cresting waves in the center had changed, becoming sinuous. The water looked like insects crawled over its surface. Flip frowned, stepping outside onto the balcony, clamping the cigarette between his teeth. The wind buffeted him, raising goosebumps on his shoulders. Or maybe it was the sight of a long oily black tentacle reaching up from the water, twisting in the air, then vanishing again.

Flip spit his cigarette over the balcony rail, as he planted his hands on it and leaned forward. He strained his eyes, focusing on the sinuous writhing in the center of the cove. Horror prickled his skin like icepicks when he realized the strange movement of the waves were a multitude of black tentacles, wringing and twisting inside and on top of the stormy waves. The very center was calm, about the size of a dinner table. It gleamed like oil. Something inside the round center made a jerky movement. Flip realized it was an eye. A giant black eye. And that eye had just focused its abyssal pupil on him. The tentacles whipped wildly around it now, breaching the water in agitation or excitement.

Whatever this creature was, it was not his siren nor anything possessing of her beauty. He recalled her story and the tentacles that had caught her legs and dragged her under. This was the hellish beast that had lived in the cove long before the siren ever took her first swim. This was the eldritch monster that collected the souls his siren harvested. Flip stared at it, and the monstrous eye stared right back.

An idea flashed into his mind. Whether it was his own, a spark of brilliance born of the terrified adrenaline that coursed through his veins, or whether the tentacled monster had impregnated his thoughts, he didn’t know or even care.

Flip knew what he had to do to save his siren, to have her all to himself. He was too late to avenge her, but he could try his best to save her.

*******************************************************************************************

After meeting the shining black eye of that monstrosity in the cove, Flip was rattled. He didn’t like the idea that had been put into his head, but he wasn’t forcing it out either. He was allowing it to percolate, considering his options. His phone dinged from an incoming text as he was pulling on his jeans. It was unusual for him to be bothered by calls or texts out on that acreage; it allowed him to feel like there was only him and his siren alone in the world. Service was spotty and unpredictable at best out on the cliffs. His phone varied between one bar and no service depending on the device’s mood. He fished it out of his jeans pocket and glared at the new text, wrinkling his nose more from the text than he did from the smell of moist corpses.

“I miss you,” said the whoring schoolteacher, Cristy.

“I bet you fuckin’ do,” he gritted to himself and shoved his phone back in his pocket.

The thought that had taken root in his mind that morning blossomed into something thorny and brutal. Maybe even a little evil, the kind of thought that was rare for Flip. And it was brilliant.

Instead of the petty barb he had been poised to text, he typed a new message. “Then let’s do something about it. Pick you up at 7?”

“See you then,” her reply came almost instantly, followed by a string of emojis.

Another check in his siren’s box. She didn’t text him stupid shit with stupid fuckin’ emojis.

“Better get movin,’” he grumbled to himself as he shoved the phone back in his pocket and pulled his shirt on. He had a lot to do between now and seven.

*******************************************************************************************

Before picking up Cristy, Flip ran a few other errands. He went into his favorite coffee shop, as he often did in the mornings after leaving his empty bed. This time, he flirted with the barista he knew was married. Loud enough for his voice to carry to the surveillance camera behind the counter, he told the married woman he was thinking of watching the sunset from the local lighthouse and asked if she wanted to join him. She declined as he knew she would. Later in the day, he purchased a ticket for a show at the drive-in theater and made sure a few people spotted the sheriff there, talked to a few others. Once the movie was rolling, he doubted those same people would notice him leaving early, and there was no surveillance in the dated drive-in to be concerned about. He still had time to drive to the lighthouse, at the far end of town from the siren’s cove, and toss out an empty Coke can with his DNA on the rim. With the recent storm and the humidity, it would be impossible to place his tire tracks to a timeframe narrower than twelve hours, which was just what he wanted. His last errand of the day was surprisingly easy, and he even arrived early to pick up the teacher. He ensured there were no witnesses or cameras in the area. And he kept the radio loud in his truck while he drove her out for their date, loud enough to cover any noises coming from the truck bed.

The hardest part of it all was faking a smile at Cristy’s bland wit and keeping his mouth shut on the topic of her liaisons with the science teacher, Less. Even though he had no interest in her and now had the woman of his dreams in bed most nights, being cheated on still irked him. He wondered if that lingering anger would be resolved tonight too.

Flip just hoped her lackluster spirit and dented soul were fungible with those of his magnificent siren. He would never make that trade, but he hoped that was just his mortal sensibility.

Ignoring Cristy’s protests that the cove was haunted, Flip drove them there anyway. He remembered the road with beach access thanks to the late Dr. Monroe. It was convenient that any tracks on the beach were washed away by the tide within minutes. Few people ever came to this place, thanks to the ghost stories and tall tales surrounding the cove and the old house. From the beach, enclosed on three sides by high cliffs and tall, toothy rocks, a man could feel like he was alone in the world. Flip parked between two spires of rock rising out of the surf, near a small dinghy and oars he had dragged there that morning, still patiently awaiting him. They arrived when the sun was setting, the prettiest hour of the day to spend in the haunted cove.

“Get your whorin’ ass in the boat,” Flip ordered the woman in a frightening tone, shedding his pretenses of civility.

“What did you say to me?” Cristy tried to sound offended, but fear shook her voice.

“I’m askin’ nicely.” Flip smiled cruelly. “But I’m not above askin’ another way. I suggest you don’t make me ask twice.”

She was stumbling over her words, backpedaling some kind of excuse or apology. Atla didn’t care and he wasn’t listening. He got out of the truck, made sure to pocket his keys, and walked behind it to open the tailgate. He wasn’t concerned about Cristy getting away. She couldn’t get up the cliffs here, so all she could do was try to run away down the beach and Flip could catch her in seconds. Or she could try swimming away across the cove, which would be just fine by him.

Grabbing the bundle Flip had covered with a tarp in the bed of his truck, he yanked it out, letting it fall to the sand in a heap. He had thought the man, Less, might have given him more trouble, but he lived up to his name. Flip had dealt with stray dogs who put up more of a fight. Less was crying behind his broken glasses, sucking against the duct tape over his mouth as he sobbed. He wasn’t even fighting against the zip ties on his wrists and ankles.

Flip walked to the passenger door and yanked it open, unable to keep himself from grinning at the sight of Cristy’s dull, horrified eyes. Flip leaned on the door and told her, “I doubt you believe me, but I have no intention of hurting either of you. I just want us all to have a little chat.” He jerked his head toward the dinghy. “So, you can either walk your ass over to that boat and sit down in it on your own, or I can drag you to it and throw you in. Your choice.”

Trembling with fear and crying, Cristy complied. As she walked toward the boat, she looked around, calculating her odds of escape and realizing it was hopeless. Flip bent and grabbed hold of the man’s collar, dragging him through the sand and hoisting him into the boat like a duffle bag, landing with a heavy thud.

“I’m sorry,” Cristy sputtered. “I didn’t mean to cheat on you. It was all a mistake.”

“Yeah, it’s a dangerous world out there for a woman,” Flip menaced, letting her know the world she was in now was very dangerous indeed. “A girl never knows when she might trip and fall onto a dick. I don’t know how you navigate it. Me? I’m just thankful I haven’t tripped and fallen on top of any strange women yet.” He bared his teeth in a cold grin. “Get in the boat.”

“You said you weren’t going to hurt me,” she sobbed, climbing into the dinghy.

“I’m not,” he said gruffly. “You have my word.” He jerked his thumb at the quivering man curled in the bottom of the boat. “Believe me, if I was gonna rough you up, it would have been when I caught you with that fuckin’ joke.”

Flip shoved the boat with both teachers inside out into the water and jumped in as a wave caught it. He took the oars and began rowing them out into the cove. The sun had dipped behind the pines on the cliffs above and the light was rapidly fading. By the time they reached the middle of the cove, the shore was hazy and indistinct, shrouded with purples and blues and a light mist.

Flip retrieved a knife from his jeans pocket, smirking at the way Less cowered from it. Catching Less by the ankle, Flip cut the zip ties binding his legs. He jerked his hands back when he realized the pathetic excuse for a male had pissed his pants. He cut through the ties on Less’s wrists and then stood, trying to keep his balance in the small boat. Less staggered up on shaky legs, his puny fists balled at his sides. Flip grinned at the feeble sight, but it gave him an opening he had wanted for some time.

Still grinning, Flip slammed a vicious right punch straight into Less’s nose, feeling the rewarding crunch of cartilage as the skinny dweeb reeled backward. Before Less tipped over backward, Flip grabbed the front of his shirt and the waistband of his pants, and unceremoniously chucked him over the side. Less shrieked like a woman when he hit the water and sputtered in hysterics next to the boat.

Looking at Cristy, Flip gave her his best Dirty Harry glare. “Do you need help gettin’ out of the boat too, or can you manage on your own?”

“What are you going to do? You can’t leave us out here!” she screamed, but she timidly stepped out of the boat into the ocean to tread water beside Less.

“Like I said, I just want to have a conversation,” Flip said dangerously. “And what I want to hear is the two of you begging. I want you to beg for your lives. Beg not to drown. I want to hear what kind of bargain you’re both willing to make not to drown here tonight.”

“I’ll do anything,” the woman cried. “Oh, God help us! What do you want?”

“Keep it up.” Flip grinned at her.

Grabbing a fistful of the man’s thinning hair, Flip shoved his head under again. The man flailed and sputtered, giving Flip about as much trouble as a wet rat. The woman sobbed, treading water in place. It was pathetic how weak the couple was. Not an ounce of fight or flight in them, just sobbing and pleading. They didn’t even try to capsize his dinghy, which wouldn’t have been difficult.

Keeping hold of his hair, Flip let the man splash back to the surface, wheezing for breath.

“Beg, you sorry sonofabitch,” Flip growled in his grittiest tone. “Beg to be saved. Promise you’ll do anything.”

Less instantly amped his sobbing to the level of horror-movie-cheerleader, begging and pleading and promising with everything he had. Cristy followed his lead, stupidly thinking that being pitiable enough would save her. They carried on for minutes, wailing and splashing, pleading and promising.

“Please,” Less pleaded, snot clogging his nose and tears streaming from his eyes. “Please, I’ll do anything. I’ll give you anything you want.”

“Don’t let me drown!” Cristy shrieked. “I’ll give you anything you want if you save me.”

The ocean began swirling around the couple. They were too preoccupied by Flip to notice. The eddy was gentle at first, quickly gaining speed. Cristy noticed when it started to tug her under, like filth getting sucked down a drain.

“We begged you,” she sobbed. “We promised to do anything you wanted to spare us.”

“You weren’t beggin’ me for a fuckin’ thing.” Flip laughed cruelly. “And it wasn’t me you made those promises to.”

Punctuating his laughter, a forest of tentacles erupted from the whirlpool, oily black and as thick as Flip’s waist. The tentacles whipped around like cats o’nine tails. The woman screamed and the man cried pitifully. Flip grabbed the sides of the little boat to keep from being thrown out as it bucked on the turbulent water, hoping to hell it wouldn’t capsize.

The tentacles latched around the pathetic couple flailing in the water, catching Cristy around her legs and waist and Less around the neck in a slimy noose. His mouth opened in a scream that couldn’t escape his strangled throat and his eyes bulged from their sockets, as the woman splashed feebly. Their screams and sputters and splashing sounded deafening to Flip in the otherwise silent cove. Just as fast as they had appeared, the tentacles were sucked back beneath the water, leaving Cristy’s terrified face and Less’s lobster-red strangling head bobbing for another heartbeat before they too were sucked down into the water.

The whirlpool grew smaller, swallowing the couple down into the cursed depths of the cove. Flip’s dinghy settled with a splash, its violent bucking slowly calming until it was rocking gently. The whirlpool had vanished along with all trace of the teachers, and the waves had returned to normal. The starry night was incongruously peaceful, the ocean beautiful and the sky pristine. With a heavy sigh, Flip dropped his hands from the sides of the boat and let his breath return to normal, waiting for the guilt that never came.

Two worthless souls in exchange for one exquisite soul was a fine trade by him. Maybe he’d thrown in a little piece of his own soul as a tip, but he was fine with that too.

A hoarse cry coming from the shore snapped him back to attention. There was enough light from the moon and stars for Flip to see movement on the beach, but he couldn’t make out what it was. There wasn’t any way either of the two teachers could have gotten there that fast, and slimmer odds still they’d survived.

Grabbing the oars, Flip heaved against them, sending the dinghy lurching back to shore. His heart jumped when he recognized the familiar, superb figure of his siren. When he neared the shore, he jumped out of the boat, splashing water up to his thighs, and dragged the rowboat ashore. She was on her hands and knees in the sand, doubled over coughing up water. Flip ran to her, falling to his knees beside her, his hand going instinctively to rub her back.

“Are you alright?” he asked, still rubbing her back as she coughed. He had never seen her cough like this before, as if she had just narrowly avoided drowning. She was naked, as he had found her many times, but this time her skin was cool to his touch and goosebumps rose in a rash over her shoulders. Flip yanked his shirt open, shrugged out of it and wrapped it around her, pulling her onto her knees and into his arms.

She shuddered against him, her entire body heaving.  Worried, Flip squeezed her tighter. Then he realized she was laughing, silently laughing so heartily her whole body shook. Pulling back enough to look at her, Flip cupped her face, studying her smiling features.

“I think you did it, handsome,” she crooned, her smile widening further, tears brimming in her eyes. The ethereal lilt was gone from her voice, though it still spoke to his heart. The oddly luminous glow was gone from her eyes, though they were still bright and beautiful and looked right into his soul. Her mane of hair was still luxurious but lacked some of the gloss it usually held, and her skin was soft as velvet but was missing the ethereal golden flush that had always seemed to shimmer just below the surface.

“You’re free?” Flip asked, his voice hoarse in his tightening throat, a toothy smile blooming on his lips.

“I think so,” she laughed, threw her arms around his neck and kissed him so roughly she bruised his lower lip. “Take me to bed. If I’m allowed to stay until dawn, I’m yours.”

*******************************************************************************************

For the first time, Flip was able to watch the sunrise holding the woman he loved. He stayed awake all night waiting for it, just to make sure she wouldn’t somehow evaporate in his arms. He wanted to touch her, assure himself she was real, while he watched the morning sun gild her skin and dance in her hair. This morning, he would be able to take the woman he loved with him into the little coffee shop, show her off in town. Thinking of spending his life enjoying such simple pleasures with her made him feverish with love.

A thought played over and over in Flip’s head, making him grin like an idiot. She was still his as the sun rose. She would be his forever.

The sunrise was golden, lighting the reds and oranges in the autumn foliage aflame. The cove was calm, the water a peaceful sapphire. If Flip strained his ears, he thought he might have heard a faint cry, carried up from the water on a light breeze. With some imagination, it might be the screams of the souls trapped beneath the water. The new recruits Flip had engineered as a trade for the release of his siren. But a rational man would chock it up to the wind rustling the pines. The sound was barely audible when the waves thundered against the cliffs. And the waves would always be there. The waves would always come crashing down.

Flip would label the drowning of the two schoolteachers an accident. One might call it following traditional Eastport Sheriff Department protocol. Even if some ambitious cop wanted to investigate, there was no evidence to support anything else. Two lovebirds went skinny dipping in the cove and drowned. Damned shame.

Flip’s siren heard the faint sounds carried across the water, turning in his arms to look out of the windows. She smiled, a wistful sort of look in her bright eyes. Flip kissed her shoulders and neck, feeling her body respond to his touch. When she rolled onto her back and pulled him over her, he saw the familiar wildness in her eyes. Her wildness wasn’t a gift from the being in the lake. It was born into her and it remained a part of her. As Flip kissed her smiling lips, he wondered if her desire to kill, her rage, were gone too. Or if that had been a part of her long before she was taken by whatever dwells in the cove. She still seemed like a wild thing to him, like a fox or a tiger. Then he wondered if he could possibly domesticate a wild tiger. Or if he could only keep her sated. He didn’t know, but he intended to do his part on that front right now.

*******************************************************************************************

 © safarigirlsp 2024

Tagging some sexy sirens!

[laviefantasie]

Video 3

| series masterlist |

“Okay, this thing on?”

You sigh as you see yourself in the video camera, looking at all the current ingredients in front of you with doubt.

“If you don’t recognize the place, I’m currently at my school’s kitchen” you open your arms to showcase the big kitchen you’re at.

You let your arms down to grab some of the main ingredients of the dishes you have planned today, pork cutlet and vegetables.

“So, if you’re wondering what I’m up to… I’m making Satoru a bento box” your eyes move around the place as you feel yourself become flustered, “It’s not what you’re probably thinking though! It’s about my dignity!”

You sigh, “He said I couldn’t cook and that that’s why I’d never marry… and I can’t cook or care about marriage but he shouldn’t talk about any of it! So I’m gonna prove him wrong by making the best freaking bento box ever! I’ll even decorate like Digimon characters”

You grab the white rice bag holding it up proudly towards the camera.

“Let’s get started!”

You put the rice inside the rice cooker with the amount of water stated on the cook book you buy for this special occasion. While waiting for it to be done, you grabbed the pork cutlet.

You take a deep breath, preparing mentally for what you were about to try to do: Tonkatsu.

First of all, you seasoned the meat with salt and pepper before coating it with flour, egg and breadcrumbs. Then, you let it fry.

“If I’m doing this wrong please let it at least taste good” you whisper with a frown.

By the time that was done, you continued by focusing on doing a Japanese potato salad. Semi-mashed potatoes mixed with vegetables, ham, egg and mayonnaise. You had to make sure it is not too creamy, not too rich, but flavoursome. Hopefully the Kewpie mayonnaise makes sure it tastes perfect.

Or at least good enough.

You made sure to put the salad inside the Agumon moulds you bought before storing it inside the bento box.

The rice was soon done and you made sure to use the Patamom mould now. Black sesame seeds with salt sprinkled on the rice forming the shape to make it more obvious what character it was supposed to be.

“I’m not an artist but damn am I doing a good job at this”

Except maybe you were too confident.

You forgot that while you were decorating everything that you’d finish already, you had left some vegetables cooking. Meaning now the whole kitchen was full of smoke after you turned of the small fire caused.

And now you had your three classmates and teacher worrying over you.

“You could’ve died! What were you thinking?!”

“I need to check your breathing!”

“WATER! WATER! WE NEED WATER!”

“SILENCE” voiced loudly professor Yaga making the other three shut up, “What happened here, Y/L/N?”

You cough slightly, blushing in embarrassment, “I was trying to cook…”

Silence.

And then laughter.

You frown frustrated as Gojo and Geto’s laughter fills the space. It was bad enough you couldn’t even finish what you started, now you were a joke to them.

Even Shoko was stifling her laughter!

Yaga sighs, “Clean this up and let Shoko check you over… and don’t cook again”

More laughter from the boys.

You sigh and proceed to grab the burnt pan before throwing it into the sink, all while trying to mute the loud voices of both boys joking about your culinary skills.

Shoko stops you from washing the pan, doing a little check up before just to make sure there is nothing serious. You thank her silently.

“HAHAHAHA” Gojo laughs, “I KNEW YOU WERE A BAD COOK? BUT NOT TO THE POINT THAT IT’D EVEN ENDANGER YOURSELF!”

Your grip on the pan tightens.

Geto stops laughing loudly.

“HONESTLY” Gojo laughs, “YOU BETTER MAKE SURE TO MARRY RICH OR YOU’LL DIE IF YOU EVER HAVE TO COOK AGAIN”

Inhale. Exhale, you remind yourself.

Inhale. Exhale.

“THE ONE TIME YOU DECIDE TO COOK AND YOU ALMOST BURN US ALL” his grin widens, “Why would you ever decide to—?”

“SHUT UP”

Enraged, you turn off the water and go towards the unfinished bento box, grabbing it before walking towards one of your best friends.

Gojo’s eyes widen as they see your upset face, not believing he had truly bothered you with his jokes, before letting out a soft gasp once you push the bento box hard towards him.

“I was making you that, asshole”

And you leave before he can even process what you actually said. Unknowingly leaving the still recording video camera behind.

Which is how it catches the soft look on Satoru’s face as soon as he eyes the bento box in his hands, and the regret his eyes show once he realizes his mistakes.

Geto and Shoko stay silent beside him.

What a day.

taglist: @gumiiiiezzzz @reagan707

[ohbo-ohno]

price x reader where reader is stranded at a cabin in the woods? 👀

1k game here - no more please!

first price drabble for this challenge without a single mom reader. i'll hold for applause

1.8k of hermit in the forest price x escaped convict reader (no smut!)

At first you don't think the cabin is real.

You see it after days of wandering through the forest - days of barely any sleep, terrified you'll wake up to a bear or a wolf or some other beast, stomach aching and feet bleeding, the picturesque cabin seems too good to be true.

It's straight out of a picture book. Right on the bank of a river, made of wood with a stone foundation, a nice porch, a working fireplace judging by the smoke coming out from the chimney...

There's just no way it's real.

You know there's someone home - either that or the house is burning from the inside - but the first sign of shelter in days blinds you from the dangers, and you stumble right up to the door.

It's unlocked.

You don't walk in at first. You're standing at the entrance, wood under your bare feet and palm, and it still doesn't feel real that a place this perfect appeared out of nowhere.

It's homey inside, an open concept so that even from the front door you can see the bedroom, the kitchen, and the living room. Just one big room with areas sectioned off - the kitchen on the left, the living room on the right, the bedroom at the back.

It's also empty. Which means it's far too good to be true.

Still, you can't turn your nose up at such a blessing right now. Hell, you'd sleep in a cave if it meant having even a scrap of cover. So you stumble into the cabin, blood and dirt leaving clear footprints on the floor. The door swings closed behind you, and you can't help but jump when it slams.

You force yourself to take a deep breath. You can't afford to be so jumpy when you'll have to face the cabin's owner before safely sleeping. There's no one in the main cabin, but you highly doubt the owner lit a fire before going out on a walk. If you had to bet, you'd say they're behind the closed door near the bed.

You've been running on adrenaline ever since you escaped, and it's what keeps you steady now. You try to be as silent as possible while digging through the kitchen, looking for.... bam.

A block of knives, and a dirty frying pan on the stove. The owner must've had scrambled eggs that morning, but the pan will still work.

You pick the biggest knife in the block and twirl it in your hand, heartbeat picking up. You hold the frying pan in your dominant hand since it's heavier, and the knife gets tucked into the front of your pants so you can grab it quickly.

You try to walk on your tiptoes as you make your way to the back of the cabin, then realize that it hurts far too much and hobble slowly instead. You settle yourself beside the bathroom door, holding the pan in the air while you wait.

It takes longer than you'd expected for the owner to come out. There's no clock in the cabin, and you're too strung-out to count, but you'd bet it's no less than five minutes before the door finally opens.

You jerk back to standing up straight from where you'd subconsciously fallen against the wall, and move before you're even really thinking. You swing the frying pan with both hands, ready to hit whoever's coming out of the room with full force.

Your first miscalculation is immediately obvious - the person coming out of the bathroom is far taller than you. Instead of swinging towards his face of neck, you're about to hit him squarely in the chest. Much less likely to knock him out.

Your second miscalculation is the one that actually gets you into trouble - your victim stops you before you can hit him.

You see what happens almost like an out-of-body experience, everything moving too quickly for your stressed mind to keep up with. You know that he shoves you by the shoulder closest to him, sending you reeling and eventually falling before the pan can ever meet it's mark.

You squawk as you stumble to the floor, frying pan going flying and knife nearly stabbing you in the gut.

"What the fuck?" The cabin owner says, voice low and shocked.

You're about to dart up and away when a heavy foot lands on your chest, leaning down with just enough pressure to keep your exhausted body pinned to the floor. You trace the ankle up to the man, glaring at him.

He's- well, he's wearing nothing but his birthday suit. Dripping water and completely naked, you're taken off guard again by the figure above you. Past the nakedness, you notice he's big - probably at least a full head taller than you, with a large frame to boot. Standing above you like he is, he looks like a giant.

He's got thick brown hair that's cut close to the head, a far bushier beard that nearly covers his mouth. He's well-muscled but with a layer of fat on his torso, giving him a barrel-chested look. He's furry, too, varying amounts of hair covering every part of him you can see - which is nearly every part.

"What the fuck," he repeats, droplets of water falling onto your face when he leans over you. "Who the fuck are you? What the fuck are you doing in my house?"

You scowl up at him, clawing at his ankles. Your nails don't do much since you've bitten them until they bled, but you try to dig them in anyway. "Get the off of me."

He blinks down at you for a moment, clearly bewildered. "No. I'll ask you again - why are you in my house?"

You try to use your feet as leverage, then when that fails you do your best to try and kick his legs out from under him. You snarl when you remain firmly pinned by just a foot.

His ankle shifts back a little to put more pressure on your stomach, and you're reminded of the knife. Of course.

Before he can try and ask anymore idiotic questions, you pull the knife out from your pants and try to stab him in the calf.

Again his reflexes save him and he flies off of you, leaving you free to scramble onto sore feet and bare your teeth, brandishing the knife in front of you.

"Aha!" You exclaim, somewhat delirious. "Not so brave now, huh tough guy?"

He wears the perfect mix of unamused and amused both, like he doesn't appreciate what you're doing but he is willing to laugh at you. The expression makes you snarl, draws your hackles up even more.

"Here's what's gonna happen," you start, shifting to what you hope is a more defensive stance. "You're going to give me all your non-perishable food, a pair of shoes, and a map, and nobody gets hurt."

There - that's a good list of demands right? It's regrettable that you won't be able to stay the night, but that was only ever going to be possible if you managed to kill the man, and it's very clear that you'll never pull that off in your current state. The best you can hope for is food and a way out of the damn forest.

He doesn't seem to think so, cocking an eyebrow. "That so?"

You scowl. "Yes. Or I'm going to stab you."

His mouth twitches. "You're gonna stab me? You?"

"What, are you deaf? You heard me the first time."

"Just checking." His tone is almost teasing, which only makes you angrier. The only thing keeping you on your feet at this point is anger and adrenaline, so you welcome the emotion with open arms.

You jerk forward suddenly, making like you'll stab him in the chest but not quite getting within arms reach of him. He doesn't flinch.

Your scowl deepens. "You stupid, then? I really will stab you, don't think I won't!"

He shifts his weight and you flinch, then scold yourself when his smile grows. "Oh, I believe you. But I'm not givin' you my food or my shoes, so I suppose you've got a decision to make."

Oh, there's no decision to be made. You don't even really think when you dart towards him, arm raised high to try and stab him in the heart.

The weapon is knocked out of your hand before you even get close, your body turned and forced chest-first into the wall as the knife clatters to the ground beside you.

The man is heavy at your back, leaning his naked chest against you and forcing your dominant arm behind your back. You fist your free hand against the wall, gritting your teeth against the pain.

"That all you got, kitten?"

You snarl, thrash desperately against his hold and bite back a whimper at the twinge in your shoulder when he doesn't even twitch. "What the fuck did you call me?"

"Kitten," he repeats, amusement audible in his tone. "'S what you're acting like, hissing and spitting. But you're harmless, aren't ya?"

No, you're not. You're an escaped convict who was locked up for first degree murder. You're the furthest thing from harmless in this whole goddamn forest.

"Not a fucking cat," you growl, craning your head over your shoulder to glare up at him. "I'm gonna kill you and rob you blind, old man, you have no idea what's comin'."

To your immense frustration, he almost looks excited, pressing closer to your body and leaning so you two are face-to-face. His hips push against the small of your back, and to your horror you feel that he's hard against you.

"Yeah?" He grins down at you, smile a little sharp. "Think this old man can't handle one little brat? Oh, sweetheart, I think you and I are gonna have plenty of fun together."

As you consider the merits of spitting in his face, you think to yourself that this man cannot possibly have the same definition of fun as you. He's got another thing coming if he thinks he's going to be able to keep you beneath his heel - you'll raze the old man's cabin to the ground with him in it if you have to.

He must see some of that fire in your eyes - either that or he sees the way you work your jaw to gather more spit - because he pulls away from your face, going back to hovering behind you.

His hold doesn't change, but his free hand shifts down and gives you a sharp tap on the ass. You hiss and squirm away, blushing indignantly.

He laughs again, then rests his chin on the crown of your head. "Oh, yes, I think you'll be quite amusing. It's been a while since I've had a pet project, kind of you to just drop yourself in my lap like this. I think you'll take quite a bit of work, won't you?"

You grit your jaw as you rest your forehead against the wall and make a silent promise to yourself that you'll make this man's life hell.

[nerdestiwrites]

predator and prey (a hazbin hotel reader insert)

It had been just under a year since you died and ended up in Hell. It was a shock, at first, how could it not have been. You didn’t think Hell existed in the first place and yet you had woken up in a dark alleyway with the sky above a dark shade of red. The ground underneath you was wet in a liquid that reeked and there was trash of all kinds scattered above from beer bottles, empty chip bags, used needles, bags with unknown substances in it, and even gun shells. 

It hadn’t been the red sky or the putrid smell of sulfur that made you realize where you were, it wasn’t even how you felt *different*. It took you stumbling out of the alleyway like a drunk, stumbling onto the street and seeing the residents of your new afterlife. They weren’t human, none of them were. Even the *human* looking ones had something fucked up going on with them. Horns, long claws, some were tiny while others towered over everyone. It was Hell, you came to realize, but Hell seemed scarily familiar to what you had just left. 

What got you into Hell took a few days figuring out. You weren’t exactly a *good* person, but you hadn’t been *evil* either. You had been a drug user, dabbling in harder substances at parties but never an active user other than weed. You drank, more than you’d like to admit, it was easier to drink and hide everything than it was to face lifes never ending problems. You participated in corporate greed but only because it was forced upon you, if you didn’t you’d been homeless and dead sooner. Then there had been the kleptomania you had. It came in spurts. You’d steal things, sometimes without even thinking about it, other times it’d be purposeful. Sometimes you’d go months, even years without an incident. Perhaps you could’ve been less selfish, maybe less prideful, had less anger issues, but that was just part of being human, right?

The crimes seemed to stack against you, the more you thought about it. On top of not believing in God, you nearly checked every sin box there was and had your fair share of regrets. However instead of wallowing in self pity for ending up out of the frying pan and into the fires below, you decided to take this as a second chance. After all, as you had noticed quickly, Hell wasn’t all that different from the worst cities up on Earth anyway. 

Getting to understand the hierarchy of Hell took all but one day to understand. After attempting to get a phone for yourself to keep up with everything, and because you could barely live without your phone when you were alive, souls seemed to have been one of the main forms currency. You didn’t make any deals, at least having that much of an understanding on how fucked you’d be if you did for something as simple as a phone. So instead, you stole a phone. What were they going to do if they caught you? Kill you? You were already dead, could you become dead times two? Dead squared? 

It was in your second month of being in Hell that you understood who was considered an Overlord and who was a demon with just a handful of souls. There had been the TV demon that seemed to own every technological aspect of Hell, Vox. Everyone seemed to have been influenced by him or his colleagues in some way, the other Vs, other Overlords, as it was put. After the first broadcast you had witnessed, you quickly searched the Hell internet, hellternet, for any sort of VPN or antivirus program. You had a VPN back when you were alive, might as well have one now too, it might even be more important in Hell.

There was Carmilla, the arms dealer, who you’d her daughters briefly once. Rosie, another Overlord, a cannibal and leader of the accurately named Cannibal Town. Then there was Zestial, one of the oldest beings in Hell, according to everyone you had asked about. The Radio Demon, Alastor, was one to be weary of, you’ve heard the rumors of how quickly he became an Overlord, or more specifically *how*. Then a few more others that hadn’t made a big impression when hearing their stories. 

It was in month three that you finally decided what you were going to do with your afterlife. Every sinner, or denizens as Hells occupants were called, were terrified of Overlords and overstepping. It was the power that could be felt radiating off of anyone who held more than just a couple souls, and those who started to gain some traction seemed to always be stopped. Like the Overlords who controlled Pride Ring wanted to keep their circle as small as possible. 

You were going to break the system.

You were going to cause as much chaos for the Overlords as possible.

And you were going to do this without anyone knowing until it was too late to stop.

Two weeks after that you had made your first deal. Not for a soul of the other participant of the deal, but for a favor. Any favor to be redeemed whenever you saw fit. The demon, down on their luck and high out of their mind had been more than happy to make the deal. The catch you put in there was, the demon wouldn’t be able to say *who* they made a deal with, or what that deal entailed. If they did, then you’d own their soul. If they refused to repay the favor, you’d own their soul. 

Three days later and another deal was struck, with the same fine print. A favor for a favor. Favors were everything, after all. And another deal just a day after that. And soon you had over two dozen deals by the end of the week, but no power as you owned no souls. So no one would even give you a second glance.

At five months you started to turn in a few favors, gaining a meeting with one of the Vs. Velvette to be more specific, as you figured she’d be easier to talk to and come to an understanding than the other Overlords. You and her weren’t that far apart in age, and you both knew the importance of how influencers truly ran the world, or rather Hell. You had dressed up, almost like you had been going to an interview, and had been glad you barely posted on any of the social medias that were run by Voxtech. It meant there was less that Velvette would be able to learn about you than what you had learned about her. 

Velvette had made you wait twenty minutes over the agreed upon meeting time, but you had dealt with dozens of horrible interviews and managers that you easily sat in the office unaffected by the delay. It was a tactic of hoping to get the other to leave in annoyance or defeat, or get them frustrated to the point of being able to end the interview or meeting early. Good thing you knew these tricks already. So when the youngest Overlord walked into the room talking on the phone, you stayed seated, making no move to interrupt her. 

“Make this quick, I’ve got a show to put on in twenty minutes.” Her voice was snappy, filled with disinterest, and she sat herself down in one of the chairs around the large table. Her eyes never left her phone as her fingers typed away, not giving any attention towards you.

You give a cocked eyebrow before nodding, standing now, just to stretch. “Right, well, I’ll make this quicker than a Voxtok video.” You started and the meeting lasted four minutes and ended with the exchange of numbers, gaining Velvettes personal phone number and an invite to a night out for drinks.

 What had been said in that meeting was kept a secret, and those who tried to eavesdrop for Vox, as Velvette had pointed out might happen, had been quickly killed by the Overlord. 

Month ten was when the Extermination happened. Your first time experiencing the slaughter of sinners from the Exorcists. Velvette invited you to stay with her and the Vs during the slaughter, but you declined offer, not one to be indebted to someone. You instead took chance of staying in your own little apartment, which you had upgraded some during your brief time in Hell, thanks to the favors those owed you. 

After the Extermination, it had been an amazing playing field for deals. By the end of the week you had nearly doubled the favors people owed you, some demons coming back and now owed more than one favor. You could now spend favors and still be having an influx of them, so you used them to gain information on all the Overlords. As much as you possibly could. The two hardest Overlords to get information on were Zelestial and Alastor, who seemed to have been missing for seven years now. 

A text appeared on your phone, pulling you out of thought as you sipped the steaming coffee from the mug. Your eyes scanned over the text, eyebrows furrowing slightly, before you grabbed the remote to the TV you had bought yourself. You knew that Vox could at any point use the device against you, but you had given him no reason to. You were a nobody after all, or that’s at least what he thought. With a click of a button, the TV flickered on and showed a broadcasted commercial briefly showing a Hotel before it was interrupted by the news. The next Extermination would be happening six months sooner. And chaos erupted outside on the streets. 

Velvy: There was a meeting today between the Princess and Heaven

Velvy: My bets is the royal brat pissed off Heaven 

Velvy: That commercial wasn’t even good. Don’t know how they managed to get it on the network without Vox knowing.

The texts came in quick and you read them over. So the Hotel had been the Princess’ project then? Perhaps meeting with the Princess of Hell now wouldn’t be a bad idea, perhaps you could give your input on the whole thing, maybe get on the royals good side even. 

You: I’ll figure it out. 

And with those words, you made plans to take a trip to the outskirts of the city to the hotel and see what the Princess had been doing.

[creatingblackcharacters]

Some of my thoughts for your conversation about inaction towards antiBlack/racist behavior in shared online spaces (particularly fandom).

1. "I dont see it / I dont go here" - this was my first thought/defensive reaction and in reading others responses I think its a shared one.

Tumblr is perhaps unique in how purposely you can shape your experience and limit what you interact with. Blocking someone just cause is fully acceptable and expected here.

So, when Ive seen depictions of 'Black' characters that made me go, "Mmm idk man" its been my policy to just block and move on. Less chance of seeing a racist in the tags I like in the future *shrug*

Now on other sites perhaps there is some consideration that could be given to not wanting to boost something racist via interaction...but that's not how Tumblr works. Furthermore your reminder that seeing things go unopposed is the problem hit me like a frying pan to the face. Because...yeah duh.

We know the 'social rules' of this platform, you report/block the porn bots, you dont spam tags for engagement (or report if you see it), add image descriptions, reblog things you like etc. Would it be so hard to leave a simple comment on the things you want to see be changed?

2. "What if I do it wrong/I dont know this fandom/Not my place to speak?" - I firmly believe the main reasons people dont meaningfully engage with posts here or on other platforms is two fold: Responses and Outting.

If you were to post a mild comment saying for example, "Hey, feels kinda weird how you're only talking about this Black character being violent in this show. Why dont you check out this blog post by CBC, a Black artist who really digs into this topic more?"

Now you are expected to 1. 'deal' with whatever that persons response is and 2. Anyone an see and respond to what you said.

I think we generally expect random stranger interactions on the Internet to be unpleasant but, like if we are putting the focus on caring about Black people in out spaces...shits already 'unpleasant' for them.

Its time to start firing fireworks off in our neighborhoods to keep the rents low so to speak. You, non-Black folk (i.e me), dont have to wage endless comment battles with someone who wont listen. Just stating what you are seeing is enough, its marking that post for other people coming along. Forcing the question, "Y'all are we cool with this?"

As for messing up/having a record of things you said someone else might take issue with later on. Yeah but thats already happening whenever you reblog anything.

If you actually spoke out of turn just say, "Im sorry thanks for letting me know" and move on with your life. Otherwise folks on here will actually harass you over your shipping preferences so your rolling those dice already. Why not do it for something better worth it?

3. A Note - Genuinely thank you for posing these thoughtful question and just honestly expressing your frustration/hurt. It helped me think more deeply about some old habits.

Thank you!

Hm. And you're welcome

[notpixl]

Big thanks for the wait, my four followers 🥲

Also I should really just lean onto writing during the weekends since my ahh could NOT find the time during weekdays 😭

Maybe hcs would work for weekdays 🧐

Anyway just enjoy this drabble 😀

Firefly cooks Dinner for the two of you. (and doesn't burn the house down for once)

Your honor, we were not cooking with this one.

GN!Reader as usual and actually might be ooc since my mind's hazy about FF's personality.

"Text." Is you, the reader.

"Text." Is Firefly.

...

....

...

"I'm home!"

Firefly takes off her shoes before seeing you lounged up at the couch, watching some sort of show to pass the time.

"[Name]?"

"..."

"Hmm..."

Making her way to the living room, she sees your sleeping figure with a little bit of drool escaping your mouth.

She crouches down, wiping it off with the sleeve of her shirt before turning off the TV.

"Chicken..."

"Ahaha... looks like you're having a nice dream there... but now that you've brought it up..."

Standing up she heads to the Kitchen, opening the Freezer.

"There you are!"

She grabs the raw, frozen chicken, taking off the plastic wrap as she places it on the cutting board.

"Now where's the- oh..."

With the noticeable open space in the middle of the counter, one would wonder...

Where the hell did the Stove go?

Flashback:

"Forgive me, Your Majesty."

Wearing just the headgear of her armor and holding both an air freshener and lighter, Firefly rained hellfire.

Though it doesn't goes as planned...

"Stay... still...!"

The fly swiftly maneuvered the incoming fire as it buzzed around around the Kitchen.

It soon stood still at the frying pan above the stove, its legs stuck from the grease unfortunately.

"Now I've got you in my sights..."

Ditching the air freshener, Firefly grabbed the knife next to her, eyes full of concentration as she pulls back her arm...

"I brought Oak Cake Rolls!"

"Eek!"

Startled, she immediately throws the knife towards the pan in blinding speeds not even the poor fly could comprehend.

A sweat rolls down her forehead afterwards.

"..."

Good news? The Fly is gone!

B... bad news?

"MY STOVE!"

Thank god you still had those insurance papers...

End of Flashback.

"Mistakes happen, Firefly... mistakes... happen..."

She looks at the empty spot with a frown before clasping her hands together.

"Hmm... maybe that would work?"

She heads back to the Living Room, passing by your sleeping figure as she looks up at the suit of armor just proudly being put up for display.

It was actually your suggestion since you used to collect those little action figures... what were they called? Ka... kame... whatever, she thought that that was just... so cute.

Grabbing one of its arms she slides it in her right arm, getting a feel of it as she heads back to the kitchen. Shortly after that she thoroughly washes the chicken before placing it on a tray in middle of the kitchen.

"Here goes nothing..."

Taking a couple steps back, Firefly extends her arm out, fire emitting from the palm of her hand as it spews out like a flamethrower, gently roasting the chicken.

She walks around, making sure all sides of it are roasted before deactivating the arm.

"Phew..."

She gently grabs the tray with the help of her robotic arm, using her left hand to grab a plate as she sets it down.

Placing the tray by the sink she opens the rice cooker, steam erupting out of it as she blows it away.

"Aw... one step ahead, huh?"

Thankfully, she didn't to cook anymore since you already did it beforehand, how thoughtful of you.

"Now... time for our main guest..."

Taking off the arm she heads her way to the couch, raising your head so it can lay on her lap.

She fiddles with your hair, ruffling it up as your eyes flutter open.

"Mmh..."

You look up at the smiling face of your girlfriend, raising your hand as she brings it up to her cheek.

"Missed me?"

"Very..."

A moment of silence ensued, the both of you lovingly looking at each other.

"I made... rice before I slept."

"Mhm! Good job...!"

A smile crept to your face when she said that.

"And since you kept muttering about chicken I... I made some!"

"Did you now?"

You sit up, sniffling the air as you face towards the Kitchen.

Your hand was still cupping her cheek while she looked at you.

"Ooh... that's definitely some good chicken..."

"Well, let's eat then-

You plop down, earning a confused look from Firefly.

"Eh?"

"Let's... stay like this... for a bit."

Firelfy sighs, patting your head while you close your eyes shut.

"You'll end up turning intoa koala by this point..."

"Mhm... and a cute one at that..."

"...fair."

Eventually, tiredness would loom over Firefly as she eventually lays on top of you, holding you close.

"...love you."

"...love you too."

...

....

...

Aughhhhhhhhhh I need this bbg to be pampered, have cuddles, given affirmations, smooches, and kisses-

Also massive thanks and credit on Vee for letting me show the world this absolutely cinematic piece of art 🥹

Anyway, with this drabble done... I'm held at gunpoint by Feixiao because DEAR GOD am I in love with Foxians-

[pirateshelly]

I'm constantly thinking about the parallels between Claudia and Armand, but specifically right now thinking about them as the only two main characters without last names.

Like. Both of them children yanked out of their old lives far too young, their old identities and names lost to them. I guess the book parallels are more obvious, with Armand being turned as a teenager, but the show still maintains a certain similarity where even though he wasn't turned too young like Claudia was he was still groomed to be a part of the vampire world as a child, they were still both robbed of a normal human adolescence.

The way they're both people whose lives are in a constant state of like, out of the frying pan and into the fire from the get go, over and over again, even before all the vampire stuff.

And while I would never ever want to imply that Louis is in an way like Marius (because for all his faults on that front I think Louis truly did do his best with Claudia and would obviously NEVER have dreamed of doing the things Marius did, I just want to be totally clear that I'm not bashing Louis here and would defend him with my life lol) there IS still the parallel of like; vampire finds a seemingly hopeless lost damaged child, takes them in, gives them a whole new identity and tells themself it was an act of benevolence because SURELY this child wouldn't have had a chance at a normal human life.

I don't know what point or connection I'm making with all this, just something I'm ruminating on.

[f1bordeaux]

Landslide | cs55

"Even children get older, And I'm getting older too" Life moves on, pretty quickly at that. Your last night with Carlos is one that you'll both remember forever. Even years later when he fulfills his biggest wishes. Warnings: Suggestive content, heated make out sesh lol, sadness, happy/unhappy ending? Mostly unhappy Pairings: Carlos Sainz x Reader(y/n) Word Count: 4.2k Poetry style | Story style A/n: I LOVEEEEEE Landslide by fleetwood mac and the way this song hits you when you're about to move out-UGGHHHHHH I wrote the first half of this then went out, got drunk as fuck, woke up and wrote the rest of it with a hangover, so forgive me if there are any errors. Anyways, enjoy this internal dread i'm feeling turned into a FanFic. Growing up is so weird, isn't it?

I took my love, I took it down I climbed a mountain and I turned around And I saw my reflection in the snow-covered hills 'Til the landslide brought me down

2012.

“¡Sainz joder!” He turned around to look, a smile splitting his lips. Antonio had a frying pan in his hand as the two of you ran through his kitchen. Carlos’ hand squeezed yours with so much force that you wondered if it would bruise. It didn’t hurt, though. In that moment, nothing mattered but that damn smile that Carlos carried. “¡Anda, anda!”

Finally, you reached the back door of the kitchen. Carlos used his whole body to push it open, hoping that nobody would be on the other side. Luckily, the alleyway was empty, save for an employee sitting on a bucket smoking a cigarette. Carlos kept running and you had no choice but to keep up-your hands were still intertwined after all.

Antonio ran out the door, stopping as he watched you two make your grand get away. “Bastard! I ought to tell your father! And your father too, young lady!”

It was the same threat he used every time you and Carlos cut through his kitchen. I’m going to tell your fathers that you two are devious children! He’d say. He never did, though. Antonio was a friend to both yours and Carlos’ parents. He could if he wanted to, but he didn’t. For over ten years, you and Carlos would walk into his restaurant-situated on a busy Madrid street-and slowly sneak your way into the kitchen. Sometimes, when he wasn’t there, the waiters and cooks would just let you freely pass. But, more often than not, he was there and it suddenly became an obstacle course of running past cooks, dodging frying pans and slipping between shelves. It was worth it, however. A small, secret alleyway that was blocked off by a fence from the main road laid on the other side of the restaurant.

On the left-the building that Antonio’s restaurant was in-was a fire escape. It spanned up ten stories to an abandoned rooftop bar. Over the years, Carlos would bring small objects up there. Pillows, blankets, a small folding table, a few boxes to keep the stuff safe. He had the place designed to his liking-like it was his house or something. He’d put string lights up there too, giving the space a dreamy, photogenic atmosphere. So many nights were spent underneath the abandoned bar. You’d slept there a handful of times. You’d gotten drunk for the first time there, too. That space was yours and his. It was Carlos and y/n’s spot; everyone knew it.

So, as you and Carlos climbed the fire escape, it was hard to believe this was the last time the two of you would be spending the night up there together. It made you nauseous to think about.

“Try not to look so down.” Carlos chuckled as the two of you kept climbing the stairs. He could read you like a book, obviously he saw how upset you were. “Let's enjoy tonight.”

“Easier said than done, Carlos.” He stopped suddenly, your chest running into his backpack. His hands grabbed your shoulders and he-shook you? “Carlos stop it!”

“Sorry I was just trying to get the idea that I’m leaving you out of your brain.” He said, dropping his hands.

“But you are.” You said, evoking a sigh from him. Before he could apologize-which you knew he was about to do-you shook your head. “Listen, I’m so excited for you, Carlos, but-I don’t know. Life is going to be so different without you in it.”

“I’ll still be in it, mi novia. It’s not like I’m dying.”

“But Carlos, you’d always come home to Madrid after a race. You’d always be back to see me. We would work on school work together. I’d come to your races sometimes.” You sighed, looking at the metal ground beneath you. “But I’ll be in college and you’ll be in the British Formula 3 now. That's a massive step up. And when you do come back to Madrid, I won't be here.”

He didn’t speak, not for a while. The two of you just stood there, in the Spanish heat, looking at the ground. Life would never be the same. He couldn’t say anything to deny that. Tomorrow night, he would be catching a flight to London, and at the same time, you would be catching a flight to the United States. You’d both leave behind Madrid and only ever return as guests to your hometown. Maybe your rooftop hideaway would go untouched. Maybe some new children would find it and claim it as their own. They’d find the boxes that said, Carlito&Muneca, in sharpie and wonder what those names meant. Maybe they’d sort through your things, maybe they’d turn on the string lights and gasp at how beautiful the place looked.

Being eighteen was weird. You didn’t like it too much.

“Let's go, y/n.” Carlos grabbed your hand once again, pulling you up the fire escape. Three more flights awaited you. The sunset had just begun, but the primary color in the sky was still blue. You could still hear car horns from nearby streets. The air was still warm. The two of you were still young. At least for tonight you were.

Once you reached the top Carlos stepped aside, allowing you to take in the scene.

Oh, mirror in the sky What is love?

The spot on the stage where Carlos and you normally sang and danced to his iPod Nano was now completely redecorated. There was a plush blanket, pillows, a pizza box, and those damn string lights you loved were hanging from the roof. A small card was on one of the pillows. It was, of course, addressed to you in Carlos’ fanciest writing.

Anyone would think that this was a romantic gesture. But you two were best friends. Since birth, really. Not a day went by without conversation between the two of you. Carlos was your soulmate. Of course you had crushes on him here and there-he was hot, funny, caring, charming; you could go on and on. But you never acted on it. Keeping him around was better than losing him.

“Carlos,” You cupped your mouth with your hands. It was beautiful. “When did you-Is that pizza from Antonio’s?”

Carlos laughed, amused that the first thing you pointed out was the food. “Yeah,” He said. “He’s pretty sad that he won't see us around town anymore, either.”

Your heart sank. Right. That's why this was all set up-as a final goodbye. In the few moments of excitement and shock that filled your body upon seeing all this, you had forgotten that tonight was it. “I don’t know what to say.”

“Vamos, let's eat.”

That you did. Carlos and you sat at the bar and ate, watching as the sun sank lower and lower over the city skyline. Somewhere along the way, he pulled some liquor out of his backpack. You two drank and talked, reminiscing over everything the last eighteen years had brought. That one time you spent the night at his house and started a small fire in the kitchen-from then on sleepovers were at your house. That one time you two took a day trip to the beach and Carlos’ foot brushed a stingray's back. That one time you were at one of his races and a driver started hitting on you, so Carlos punched him in the jaw and got suspended for three races. That one time a wild hare was in your guest bathroom and your parents weren’t home so you called him over to help and you trapped it in your mother’s favorite cooking pot. That one time he lost a bet and went streaking through his neighborhood in the middle of winter.

The two of you were hunched over in laughter, your abdomens cramping from how hard you were laughing. Carlos wiped a tear away from his eye. “And remember Mrs. Nunez? She saw me that night and sprayed me with her garden hose!”

You sniffled. “Like why was she awake at five am? And why was she gardening?”

“Literally! I was fucking freezing. The scream that came from my mouth after that-”

You both mocked his scream at the same time, laughing even harder as you remembered the old lady’s shocked face from that night. Slowly, you both started calming down, giggling as you remembered the streaking ordeal. Carlos took a sip from his beer. You drank from your rum and Coke. It was darker now, still not pitch black, but darker. You looked up into the sky, watching as clouds rolled by.

“What am I going to do without you?” Carlos asked. You looked back down. He was staring right at you, bringing the beer bottle back up to his plush lips. “Can’t you just quit college and travel with me?”

You scoffed. “And be what? Your trophy bestfriend?”

“Trophy wife?”

You swore that your heart stopped beating. Wife? As in marriage? Obviously he wasn’t being serious, right? Carlos was a playboy. He’d had plenty of girlfriends in his lifetime. From your past observations, you weren’t his type at all. He preferred dolled up girls, ones with fake blonde hair and exquisite makeup. He preferred high heels and short, skin tight dresses. He preferred long nails and longer lashes. Synthetic beauty. You were far from that. When you put on makeup, it was simple. You dolled yourself up, yes, but everything about you was natural. From your hair color to your nail length. You were a natural beauty-something Carlos had never indulged in.

“Very funny,” You smiled as you took another drink.

“What?”

You blinked very slowly at him. “Us getting married? Sure.”

He shrugged. “Why not? You don’t love me?”

“Of course I love you, Carlito.” You tried using his nickname to deescalate the situation. “But you would never marry me.”

“Bold assumption.”

Was he drunk? Or, was he shooting his shot because tonight was it? This was quite possibly his last chance, was he taking it? Was he working you up so you’d miss him more? God, this was confusing. “Carlos-”

Before you could even say another word, he was leaning forward to kiss you. His lips were warm on yours, a side effect of the alcohol you were sure. His lips were so soft, so large, so perfect. They pulled yours in with such ease, such delicacy-almost like you were fine China. His free hand came to your jaw, thumb resting on your cheek.

He pulled away first, much to your surprise. There was about half a beer left in his bottle. He downed it before speaking again. “I’m sorry, y/n. I don’t know why I thought that was ok.”

Your teeth pulled your bottom lip in. You’d just kissed Carlos, something you only ever dreamed about.

Can the child within my heart rise above? Can I sail through the changin' ocean tides?

You reached out, both palms resting on his cheeks this time, pulling him in for another kiss. Fuck it, you thought. This was a new dynamic between the two of you, but it was one that younger you would be ecstatic about.

This time, there was more hunger behind the kiss. Carlos understood this was something you wanted, and you now understood this was something he wanted. His tongue slipped between your lips, finding a home in your mouth. His hands wrapped around your neck, not applying any pressure, just applying warmth. You felt so warm, so satisfied. This was finally happening. Why couldn’t it have happened two years ago?

Carlos pulled away again, gasping for air while resting his forehead on yours. “Come here, hermosa.”

You got off your barstool and sat on his lap, your chest flush to his. The two of you resumed your makeout session, his hands roaming your back, your hands draped around his neck. You moaned into the kiss once his large fingers snuck beneath the fabric of your shirt and touched your hot skin. It was electrifying, it was new, it was so good.

You could feel the bulge in his lap pressed against your thigh. His kisses turned sloppy, his hands moved quicker, his breath grew shorter. It was obvious he was growing impatient with you sitting right there. He was hungry for you. He only wanted you.

His lips attacked your collarbone, leaving little bitemarks and wet spots across your skin. You ran your hands across his broad shoulders, leaning your head back as he created a constellation across your chest. The night air was cold, the sky was now completely dark. The string lights were off, but the glow from the city provided enough light for you to see Carlos at work. He looked so good, so handsome, so perfect.

He chuckled into your skin, the vibrations causing you to shiver. He involuntarily thrusted his hips up, grunting as he did so. You hung your head on his shoulder as he composed himself. “Wrap your legs around me when I stand up, ok?”

You could only nod, feeling gravity shift as he rose to his feet. You did as you were instructed, his arm coming to your lower back for support. Your chest was pressed so deep into his that you wondered if two humans could possibly get closer than this. You really wished your shirts were off so you could feel his skin on yours.

Softly, Carlos laid you down on the makeshift bed. It was more comfortable than you imagined it would be, but maybe your mind was too clouded with lust to be rational. You were focused on Carlos and only Carlos.

A gasp pushed past your lips, not because of anything Carlos did, but because of a loud and sudden explosion. The sky lights up in colors of reds and yellows, blues and purples, greens and oranges. Sparks quite literally fly as fireworks rip through the once still air. Carlos is beside you now, watching the sky with such intensity you wonder if he has ever seen a firework before.

“It’s Saint James Day.” He says to himself.

You’re pulling the covers up to your chest as you catch the small, toothy smile that he holds. He pulls his knees up and rests his elbows on them. You’re amazed at how quickly his attention changed from you to the fireworks.

“You had no idea?” You ask. “I knew there would be fireworks but I didn’t know they’d be close enough for us to see.”

Carlos shook his head. “I didn’t know, no.” He looked back over to you, that smile still on his lips. “What a way to spend our last night in Spain.”

Your heart stops beating. It’s like he was hellbent on reminding you that this was it.

Slowly, he reached for your jaw once again, bringing you in for a kiss. It was soft, it was gentle. It was reminiscent of the first kiss the two of you shared only a few minutes ago. Never, you thought, do I want this to end. It did, however. Everything has a beginning and an end. The circle begins when you place your pen on the page and it stops when you’ve finished drawing it. The story begins at birth and appears like it ends on a rooftop in Madrid-semi naked with fireworks in the background.

The fireworks carry on for a few more minutes. They seem to illustrate photos in the sky. Carlos sees it, too. He pulls out his phone to snap a quick photo before turning it to you. This goes unnoticed, you’re too preoccupied in watching the show before you. He snaps a candid photo of your side profile. It was one he would cherish for the rest of his life, even if it was low quality and dark.

When the sky falls dark once more, the sound of cars below once again filling your ears, Carlos turns his whole body to you. “I love you, y/n.”

Can I handle the seasons of my life? Well, I've been afraid of changin' 'Cause I've built my life around you But time makes you bolder Even children get older

And this time, it feels different. It feels like there is a non-platonic meaning to the sentence he says everyday. Carlos has been telling you he loved you since the two of you could speak. Everytime you two say goodbye his last words are, “I love you.” Every time he’s overjoyed with you he says, “I love you.” Every gift you’ve ever given him has been opened as he says, “I love you.” Every time you run into his garage after a good or bad race he greets you with, “I love you.” You begin to wonder if you’ve missed some signs along the way-if you were too immersed in the thought that, he would never date you, to realize he’s been fighting for you all along.

He answers your question when he speaks again. “All I've ever wanted in life was you. I knew that at the end of the day, I’d be alright as long as you were there, y/n. After a bad race, you were standing there waiting for me and I realized that it isn’t the end of the world. After a bad breakup, you were there to tell me that I’m not a douchebag and I’m actually a good person. After people told me I could never make it big in racing, you stood proud as my number one fan and forced me to carry on with my head held high.”

Your throat begins to burn. This was goodbye. This was Carlos’ confession.

“I have loved you for such a long time, y/n. It’s always been you. I have always wanted you.” No. “I have never clicked so well with someone. I have never thought someone was so beautiful as you. You don’t even have to try, either! You’re just so,”

He trails off, looking straight ahead at the city. His eyes glisten. You wonder if he’s about to cry. You know you’re one more word away from crying.

“I don’t know how I'm supposed to be ok after a bad day without you there to hold me.”

That does it. You hold a hand over your mouth as tears pour down your cheeks. They’re hot, but they aren't the same warmth that Carlos radiates. They’re painfully hot, his touch was pleasantly hot. You’ll have to learn to live with one and not the other, however.

“Carlos,” You choke out. He doesn’t turn to look at you, just staring straight ahead as tears of his own trickle down his cheeks. “Oh, Carlos.”

“This sucks.” He says.

“This sucks.” You repeat.

It sucks. Saying goodbye sucks. Leaving your hometown that you love so dearly sucks. Leaving your best friend sucks. What will become of the two of you? Will Carlos still love you? Will he return to Madrid and visit with your parents? Will he be saddened to see your empty room? Will he turn to look at every girl who resembles you and hope that somehow, someway, you found him? Will you do that to every man who looks like Carlos?

He leans back, laying flat on the bed. You rest your head on his chest, his fingers coming to play with your hair. “I believe with every bone in my body that you will do amazing things, Carlos. You’ll be a world champion one day. And guess what? You’re going to do it because you are strong. It’s not going to be because I’m holding your hand, it’s going to be because of your dedication, your talent, your strength, your skill. You’ve worked for this, Carlos. And you are going to do it.”

He sniffles, placing a kiss to the top of your head. “I love you, Carlos.” You say. And maybe things will be ok, maybe they won't. But you know that Carlos will go on to do great things. You know that he's the type of boy-no-he's the type of man to accomplish whatever he puts his mind to. He’ll fight for his life in that damn race car and then step out of it and make the whole room laugh and smile. He’ll make amazing friends, ones that will occupy the space you have always resided in. He’ll be happy and feel whole. He’ll think of you from time to time. Maybe you’ll visit one another when you both are in Madrid at the same time.

“I love you, y/n.”

And I'm getting older too

2026

You haven't run this fast since high school. Somewhere in the crowd, you’ve lost your husband, but you don't care. You have a mission to accomplish, a friend to see.

“Carlos!” You shout, waving your hands like a maniac. “¡Mi hijo! Carlos!”

A hand grabs you by the bicep. “You can’t be in here!” The strange man shouts. Did you run past some barriers? Yes. Did you push some young fans? Yes. Is security worried about your intentions? Yes. But there, only a few feet away, if the new World Champion.

“Let me go! I know Carlos!” You fight the man causing another to join in on the situation. Both of your arms are restrained and they’re practically carrying you out.

“Everyone says that.” One of them says.

“Please!” You beg. It’s been over three years since Carlos and you have seen each other in person. Life dragged you two apart. You thrived in college, becoming the girl that everyone loved. You made friends quickly and made memories even quicker. Carlos thrived in racing, too. He moved his way up pretty quickly, his Formula One debut coming just three years after he left. You’d seen the Youtube videos of him and his friends, you’d heard the inside jokes, read about Carlando-you knew he was happy. But, you two weren’t as close anymore. You’d text frequently, reaching out before a big race or after a difficult one. You’d facetime, too. You both had one another on social media, and sometimes he would comment on your post or respond to a story you had up. Life was different now, however. You and him were married. He couldn’t come to your wedding, it fell on a race weekend. You couldn’t go to his. You said you had work but watching him marry another girl would stir up some pain, even if you were in a happy relationship. You didn’t frequent Madrid all too much, choosing to vacation elsewhere when the time arises. But, vacations were rare now that you were a mother. This was the first time you’d been out of town since giving birth three years ago. It was worth it.

“Carlos!” You cried out once more. He knew you were at the race-he was the one that bought you the tickets-but you wanted to see him now, not later.

The commotion caught his attention. He stared for a second, trying to understand why two men were carrying out a girl, but then he saw who it was. “Y/n!”

He dropped the conversation he was having to run over to you. The hands of strange men were replaced by those of a familiar friend. You felt warm again. You felt whole.

He swept you up in a hug, spinning you around as you squealed. “You did it! You fucking did it Carlos!”

“I know! You were right muñeca! You were right!” The nickname alone was enough to make you cry. You hadn’t been called that in years. Since the two of you were in your teens.

He dropped you, hands sliding onto your cheeks. For a brief moment, you thought he would try to kiss you. He didn’t. But your mind wandered.

“I’m so happy you’re here.” He smiled softly. “None of this would have happened without you.”

“Me?”

Carlos nodded. “I carried your words with me every day. Nobody has ever believed in me as much as you have.”

“Carlos-”

“I love you, y/n.”

The tears were back, and they fell hard. “I love you, Carlos.”

He was pulled away to go do his podium celebration. The Championship had come down to the last race of the season. Carlos beat out his competitors, however, winning not only the race, but the World Championship. And as he stood on that podium, champagne spraying through the air, fireworks began to pop in the sky. It lights up in colors of reds and yellows, blues and purples, greens and oranges.

He looks down at you, a smile splitting his lips.

It seems like the highest award to achieve, but he hopes that in another life, one hopefully close by, that he can get the one thing he desires most.

You.

Maybe in another life, you followed him. Maybe in another life you two got married. Maybe in another life you reached out more. But in this life, Carlos is a World Champion. You wouldn’t trade his excitement, his pride and his joy for anything.

[girlfriendsofthegalaxy]

tuesday again 6/18/2024

might flood today! might not! who knows! i live in the paved over swamp! mackintosh’s main concern is this bowl of grapes

listening

sligo river blues performed by john fahey. part of the point of doing this weekly is when i sit down to draft these, i am occasionally forced to go "ooh. i forgot to listen to music while pacing around last week. maybe that's why i was a tremendous cunt and wanted to claw out of my own skin."

anyway i care about two people on tiktok and one of them is a couple renovating a stunning house in the pacific northwest from a level 5 hoard (DK Dreamhouse), and one is this guy dylanwesch who is i guess music nerd tok? a lot of ambient stuf which i love to click around on the computer to. listened to part of this album while debugging a GIS problem this week

-

reading

i read six books this week, which is really the clearest possible sign i need to up my antidepressants. read the shepherd king duology by rachel gillig (Fine but i had some issues with the authorial style, felt very YA as opposed to NA, did have a very cool magic system, unfortunately i liked the second couple’s banter and relationship Way More than the main couple’s). finished the last three books in the temeraire series, i have not much to say about them except i adored them wholeheartedly. also before i read those i wrote all the below in a fit of pique

the great state of west florida by kent wascom. instagram kept serving me ads for this book and i am once again a little unnerved by meta's advertising.

publishers' weekly synopis

In Wascom’s wacky and wild fourth adventure for the Woolsack clan (after The New Inheritors), lawless gunslingers and reactionary Christian nationalists face off in a divided Florida. The year is 2026 and 13-year-old orphan Rally Woolsack is rescued from the abusive foster family who brought him to Louisiana by his long-lost uncle Rodney, who regularly responds to challenges of mortal combat on the app DU3L. Rally is thrilled to get away from his tormentors and return to Florida, although it turns out Rodney has pulled him from the frying pan into the fire. Troy Yarbrough, a state legislator whose family runs a creepy evangelical Christian college in its mansion on Florida’s panhandle, has introduced a bill calling for the region to secede from the state. Rally, reckoning with the long-running bad blood between his family and the Yarbroughs, derides Troy’s vision as a “Jesus-riddled white ethnostate with a beachside pastel tinge.” With the bill on the floor of the state legislature, and with everyone packing firearms, the Florida Wars begin. Fans of pulpy dark humor will relish the climactic showdown between Yarbrough’s henchmen and those loyal to an elusive figure called the Governor, as right-wing nutjob Troy is saddled by mad cow disease and Rally is rescued by his crush. This high-octane satire feels all too plausible. Agent: Gail Hochman, Brandt & Hochman Literary. (May)

i had some trouble with this one! on its face it seems like the kind of thing i would eat with a spoon. in practice it's more of a coming-of-age than a just-before-the-apocalypse story and i have a lot of trouble relating to a thirteen-year-old boy. even if he is bisexual. in this interview wascom says he's "re-mythologizing the Western" which i can kind of see? it's very pulp and ultra-violent in a spaghetti western kind of way, and seems written in a way easily adaptable to the screen. not quite vaporwave but a lot of anime influence: the author thanks twelve Japanese directors and manga artists at the end of the book.

there's an odd authorial quirk where the thirteen-year-old boy often points out (internally and externally) that the adults in his life are just talking at him about politics. which is a pretty accurate portrayal of childhood, but lampshading it in this way doesn't really make me excited about wascom's authorial chops? this is your fourth book. this book revolved around a couple brutal fight scenes (and one giant setpiece crowd scene, which has vibes and atmosphere in spades), and that's a perfectly fine reason to write a book, but if that's your strength i would be very happy to have you focus on that instead of sections where both the kid and i the reader are bored.

there's a scene with babysitter/babysittee sexual abuse that unlocks how the abused character makes decisions for the rest of his life, but it was extremely graphic and i wasn't really prepared for that. i don't know that i would have read this book if i had that knowledge aforethought.

overall not quite what i wanted it to be: the author in this interview said he's been working on it for over a decade and had to keep throwing out parts coming true during trump's presidency. i picked this pulpy novel up as an escape from the terrible politics of today, which is not what this books is. i don't know if i buy that he was simply too good at predicting the future, but i do like the choice stated in his interview "I abandoned the predictive stuff and tried to tell a story like it was written on an obelisk in the future, like what Denis Johnson did with Fiskadoro, or Joanna Russ with The Female Man". it does feel very much like the narrator from Mad Max 2 telling his story of meeting Max as a feral kid. again, some interesting ideas in here, does deliver on the Southern Gothic doomed political family aspect, as well as the same flavor of heat-wave climate tragedy as JG Ballard's The Drowned World, but i would have liked to focus more on his cool furiosa-like aunt in a white mustang with an anime mech arm. criminally underused character

-

watching

watched The Hunter (2011, dir. Nettheim) because of the Temeraire books! they used an archaic name for Tasmania that made me go “where the Fuck is that” and then i looked at the media mentions section of the wikipedia page. beautiful film in a very spare way. lots of long loving shots of willem defoe in the wilderness enduring various weather conditions.

i don’t know if it stuck the landing quite as well as i would like, but like defoe you fall in love with the land and the family so slowly it’s very startling when you finally do fully realize it. i think i was supposed to cry at the end but didn’t quite manage it. one of my favorite springsteen songs is part of the diagetic score in a way that made me cry, which i also did not expect.

-

playing

shoutout to the Thing Matching genre of phone game. this one is very much watch-ads-to-win but the levels are pretty long and i like shuffling objects around while listening to podcasts and trying to fall asleep

-

making

fallow week

[umbra-tsukasa-official]

[Akito had found himself having to steal food, again. That had become a regular occurrence at this point. Not many people were willing to hire an exile, much less once they figured out he had destructive fire powers.

So, here he was. Running away from a horde of soldiers with his measly bag of bread and fruit. The whole thing couldn’t have cost more than a few gold. He pushes his way through the forest, eventually stumbling into what appeared to be some sort of clearing. It was beautiful, to be honest. But that wasn’t his priority right now. In front of him was a huge tower, and that seemed to be his only out. So, he did what any sensible criminal would do, and started climbing until he reached a window and pushed himself through it.

He pants, leaning against the wall and sitting down to eat one of the rolls he’d stolen.]

finally… ‘m starving.

- @helio-akito-official

[Tsukasa was carrying a frying pan, about to walk towards the stove when he suddenly heard... someone getting inside the tower? But he didn't hear the hidden door open... unless...]

[Panicking, Tsukasa quickly goes to hide in the shadows and goes over to the main room. There, he spots a stranger. An intruder.]

[... How did an intruder get in undetected?]

[Doesn't matter. He has to knock this person out and get him out.]

[He slowly steps out of the shadows, about to swing his frying pan at the stranger. He tries to aim for his head...]

[But Tsukasa swings at the wrong angle and hits his shoulder instead.]

...!!!

[Tsukasa proceeds to back away very quickly, pointing the frying pan at the stranger as to warn him to not get any closer. His attempt to look intimidating doesn't quite work out, as Tsukasa is visibly trembling in fear... that, and he's holding a frying pan.]

[ichorai]

live like animals ; kimiko miyashiro.

track five of BROKEN MACHINE.

pairing ; kimiko miyashiro x gn!reader, frenchie x gn!reader

synopsis ; you and frenchie try to show kimiko how to have fun on a day off.

words ; 1.0k

themes ; fluff, mild comedy

warnings / includes ; mentions of fire/bombs, frenchie and reader get in a heated debate on stacking cards in uno, basically just domestic fluff

main masterlist.

“This is Monopoly,” you told Kimiko, gesturing out to the board game in front of you. You handed her a couple wads of money. “That’s yours. You can use it to buy land and houses. See, if you land on these particular squares, you have to draw a card and do what the card tells you.”

Appearing puzzled, Kimiko moved her game piece to the question mark and picked up a card without rolling. Frenchie winced, placing down his own fake Monopoly money.

“Eh, perhaps we can play something else—something that involves a bit less explaining, maybe?”

Relenting, you moved on to the next game, pulling out a deck of cards—Uno.

“Okay, okay, for this game, you just gotta put down cards that have the same color as each other, or it could be the same number,” you explained patiently, smiling at Kimiko as you handed her a few colorful cards to start out with. Forgetting to explain to keep your cards close to your chest, Kimiko splayed out her cards with a smile, pointing out that all of hers were blue, save for a single red one.

“Ah, mon coeur, don’t show us!” exclaimed Frenchie, dramatically flying his forearm up to cover his eyes.

Kimiko, worried she’d done something wrong, gathered her cards back in her hands and furrowed her brows. 

“We’re not supposed to know what the other players have in their hands,” you told her, not unkindly, “it keeps the game fair and more interesting.”

After you dealt out a fresh set of cards, on the three of you played, glad that you’d finally found a game Kimiko could enjoy—until you placed down two sevens: one green, and one yellow.

“No,” stressed Frenchie, thick brows pinching together. “You’re not supposed to stack!”

“What do you mean, everyone stacks!”

“It’s practically cheating!”

“It’s not cheating! And how ironic, the man who builds bombs for a living is raggin’ on me for ‘cheating’ Uno!”

Crimson-faced, Frenchie shot back, “It defeats the entire purpose of the game! You either place the same color in one go, or you put the same number, you cannot place down two cards of the same number but different color—it makes no sense!”

The two of you burst into a heated argument between who was right, Kimiko glancing back and forth between the two of you with a baffled expression. After almost five whole minutes of bickering, cards were hastily shoved back into the deck. 

“Fine. We’ll play another game,” you huffed, glaring at Frenchie and childishly sticking your tongue out at him. “Sorry, ‘Miko. He’s just being a sourpuss.”

“At least I don’t have to cheat to win the game,” hissed the man, accent thickening with his frustration.

You rolled your eyes, ignoring him.

“Here—why don’t we play Twister?”

Twister was also a disaster. Kimiko had nearly snapped Frenchie’s leg in half when she toppled on top of him, and Frenchie had accidentally kicked you in the face while he was twisting around to put his left leg on a red circle. All in all—it wasn’t the most pleasant of experiences.

“Alright… I guess playing games is a bust. You have anything else you wanna do, Kimiko?”

The woman’s expression lit up, and she tugged on Frenchie’s sleeve, miming cracking an egg open and frying it on a pan.

“You wanna cook?” he asked, grinning. “Sure—I’ve been meaning to teach you, anyways.”

The three of you filed into the dingy little kitchen, where Frenchie began pulling out ingredients. “We can make french toast. It is not actually French, but it will do for now.”

You were tasked with whipping the eggs while Frenchie showed Kimiko how to properly cut up the strawberries. It was all going smoothly—until the frying bit.

Somehow, Kimiko had ended up burning the toast with a pan that was far too hot. The two of you winced, telling her to try again. The second time, a small spark of fire somehow kindled aflame when Kimiko accidentally spilled some oil onto the stove. Hurriedly, you ran out of the kitchen to grab the fire extinguisher, yanking the pin out and spraying the white foam all over the fire, ruining the remains of the french toast beyond salvation.

Frenchie wiped some of the extinguisher’s foam from his brow.

“Well,” he said, huffing out a sigh. “Anything else you wanna do?”

The three of you settled on watching a movie. It was an old sixties film that you couldn’t recall the name of, but it had Audrey Hepburn and the characters were singing a song about being a ‘prim and proper’ woman, which seemed to completely enrapture Kimiko’s attention.

“You okay?” Frenchie quietly asked you when he noticed that you weren’t paying much attention to the movie.

Instead, you had your gaze trained on Kimiko—on her sweet smile, on her indented dimples, on the way the corners of her eyes wrinkled as she laughed. 

“Yeah,” you distantly replied. “I’m just glad we got to spend the day together.”

Kimiko turned to you with a wide, toothy grin. She began signing, and you looked to Frenchie for the translation. 

The man had his own warm beam pulling his lips thin. “She says thank you for being so patient with her.”

You reached over to gently take Kimiko’s hand in yours. “It’s my pleasure, Kimiko, really. It’s not often we get days off—what with Butcher sending us on missions every other minute and Vought looking out for us like hawks. It’s nice to just relax for once.”

“Cheers to that,” said Frenchie, sipping on a bottle of beer he had procured out of seemingly nowhere. 

The three of you fell into a comfortable once more, fixing your attention back to the movie in front of you.

Not twenty minutes later, you and Frenchie had both fallen asleep, your dozing heads resting upon either side of Kimiko’s shoulders. She, however, stayed wide awake, watching the movie until the very last of its credits, silently mouthing along to the songs.

[fandom-friday]

Thank you so much to everyone that submitted recommendations this week! A comprehensive list of this week’s submissions can be found under the cut! Recommendations are organized by show/media, and any main pairings will be listed after the title.

🎆 = 18+ content ✨ = contains spoilers of a currently running show

Fics:

The Clone Wars: 🎆 A Girls Night Out (Jesse x OC Lina, Fives x OC Sue) by @marierg & @the-rain-on-kamino 🎆 Let's Call It Love (Barriss Offee x Ahsoka Tano) by @stellanslashgeode Fire in the Frying Pan by @barbaricyawn In Spite of Everything, We Thrive by @chaosgoblinhours The Tattooist by @whiskeygoldwings-blog

The Bad Batch: As Iron Sharpens Iron (Hunter x f!Reader) by @arctrooper69 ✨ (TBB S3) Revelation by RheaShay (AO3)

The Book of Boba Fett: Life Day (Boba Fett x OC Seba) by @kimiheartblade 🎆 Biscuits and Beskar (Boba Fett x OC Kaylee Manu) by @marierg

Batman: He's Ours Now by Lulu_Rythmea (AO3) Batman Beyond: Days of Future Past by @blightwritesfic Cards on the Table by @wesslan Family You Made (Go Back, Do it Again) by @jube514 Dragon-Tamer and the Wing of Night by @evergreena I Don't Belong Here (I Wish I Was Special) by @the-booty-crusader The Bat Trap by Threee (AO3)

Star Trek: We Have Engaged the Borg: The Oral History of the Battle of Wolf 359 by TranquilityPress (AO3)

Crossover AUs: Family Bonding and Other Perilous Pursuits (Batman X Danny Phantom Crossover) by Shynnohwen (AO3) La Petite Mort (Barbie X Dracula Crossover) (Barbie Roberts x Dracula) by @howlingmoonrise How is This My Life? (Pokemon X Dragon Age: Inquisition Crossover) by @thequietdreamerposts

Art:

The Clone Wars: Commander Cody Art by @cc3542taki Jedi Temple Guard OC Ren Art by @archfey-edda Thick Healthy Clones Art Series by @rexxdjarin Good Morning, Mesh'la by @the-rain-on-kamino Quinlan Vos Art by @purgetrooperfox

The Bad Batch: ✨ (TBB S3) Shadow of Tantiss Supremacy by @madsayo

The Book of Boba Fett: OC Kaylee Manu Art by @the-little-moment

Star Wars Legends: Jaster Mereel Art by @corrie-guard-things

[sparkingcircuits]

HIKIKI AU CHARACTER DESCRIPTIONS: The Headspace Cast!

(also thanks to @/princesstears0901 for the au name i actually love it so much it’s so clever)

Kiki: Our main character of sorts, and the youngest of the group! He doesn’t seem to talk much, or really at all, but he’s still quite the friendly face! He has been working on being more assertive, thanks to Carmine’s encouragement, so he usually takes the lead when him and his friends go on adventures!

He doesn’t specialize in any specific type on his team, and when it is needed, his weapon of choice is his trusty knife.

Carmine: Kiki’s wonderful sister! She’s strong, assertive, and determined, but can be a bit rude and snarky at times. She means well, though! She’s been trying to get Kiki to stand up for himself more often, and the progress she’s seen has made her very happy! She and Drayton tend to get into a LOT of banter, sometimes seeming like a full blown argument, but those that have been around the two know they’re just messing with each other!

She doesn’t specialize in any specific type on her team, and she tends to stay by their picnic tables while the others go on adventures.

Amarys: One of Carmine’s best friends, and also is friends with everyone else! She’s quite smart, and always tells the truth, even if it may hurt. Kiki finds it nice that she would never lie to him. She can sometimes be a bit blunt with her words, and others might see her as a bit of an odd one out when looking over the whole group, but her friends don’t care, they’re friends after all!

She specializes in steel types, and much prefers to use her team in battles. Though, if required, she will use her metal bat to protect herself or her friends.

Crispin: One of the most social members of the group, Crispin is quite the energetic person! Sometimes he may miss a social cue here or there, but that’s fine! He’s got quite the passion for cooking, especially when it comes to spicy food. He prefers it much better when everyone is happy, as to him, everyone seems to linger just a bit too long on negative emotions. He can be a bit blunt, like Amarys, so the two occasionally get into small arguments. It’s never too big of an issue, though!

He specializes in fire types, and if needed, will use his trusty frying pan as a weapon, using both to heal up his friends, and to burn the enemies with spice!

Drayton: One of the oldest members of the group, Drayton is quite the character. He tends to playfully make fun of the others, which sometimes can make him seem like a douche, but he does care for his friends! He just shows it in his own way, is all. Since Carmine tends to stay behind when they go on adventures, Drayton has taken the role of the “adult” of the group, which, may or may not have been the best decision. He does keep them out of trouble, though, and that can’t be ignored, even if Kiki thinks he’s a bit annoying sometimes.

He specializes in dragon types, and his weapon of choice is his “sparkling personality,” aka, he mostly just makes sure the others are okay instead of fighting himself.

Lacey: Last, but definitely not least, is Lacey! One might call her the peacekeeper of the group, as she tends to make sure the arguments within the group don’t get too extreme! A kind and gentle soul, but don’t underestimate her, she is also quite strong, and has a very high sense of right and wrong. She also has an in depth knowledge of fairy types, which also gives her a bit of a knowledge on plants, as there are a good few fairy types that have some involvement with nature. But just because they’re cute does not mean they are weak, and Lacey will make sure that people know that!

Her specialty is fairy types, and she doesn’t have a weapon of choice, since she doesn’t really like battling in hand to hand combat.

Unfortunately, Lacey is currently missing.. Hopefully Kiki and his friends will be able to find her soon!