#How Peggy got into Real Estate

[servants-hall]

The Gilded Age Will Get a Lot More Operatic in Season 2

Full article copied below:

BY RICHARD LAWSON AUGUST 23, 2023

The second season of HBO’s The Gilded Age (premiering October 29) will amp up the stakes, along with the lavish production design. As we see in these first-look images and a new trailer, debuting exclusively on VF.com, the late-19th-century swells of the Upper East Side are back at it in extravagant fashion—while their maids and cooks and butlers scurry about the mansion basements attending to their own complicated intrigues.

“The whole thread of [season two] is wrapped around this story of dueling opera houses,” says executive producer David Crockett. Those houses are the Academy of Music, long the cultural destination of Manhattan’s most monied families, and the upstart Metropolitan Opera. (We, of course, know who won in the end.) “The opening nights of the 1883 season—and the first ever opening night of the Met—fell on the same night,” says Crockett. “So you have this very clear choice for all of New York society: Are you going to go the old money route, or the new money route? It’s a great engine for a classic clash.” 

Bertha Russell, the new-money industrialist’s wife played with flint and mettle by Carrie Coon, lays it plain in an early episode of season two: “The opera is where society puts itself on display, where the elite meet each other and their children court each other and where the wheels of society turn.” And so we will watch those wheels turn, and wrench. As dramatized by Downton Abbey creator Julian Fellowes, The Gilded Age gives viewers the vicarious delight of swanning around opulent estates and fabulous Newport parties—as well as perhaps the slight queasiness of guilt. After all, should we really be fawning over such blithe plutocrats?

Executive producer Michael Engler, who also directs many episodes of the series, says that moral shading is a deliberate part of TheGilded Age picture, perhaps even more so in season two. “They have moral choices,” Engler says of the show’s many rich folks. “As you watch them make [those choices], that’s how you determine their moral character and value. It’s not, We love the rich and we love watching them, so we don’t really care how they act. You see what it takes and what it costs people to behave a certain way.” Season two will also expand on the first season’s glimpse of Black society in Brooklyn, the home turf of Denée Benton’s Peggy Scott, who works for a white family—among them the imperious and very old money Agnes van Rhijn (Christine Baranski) and her spinster sister, Ada (Cynthia Nixon)—while negotiating political and social matters across the river. Ada, meanwhile, may finally be getting a love interest. 

Benton, Baranski, and Nixon are but three of the many New York stage luminaries who make up the cast of The Gilded Age. That the show is essentially a who’s who of Broadway stars wasn’t exactly by design; it was more an unexpected, and quite happy, development, says Engler. He remembers famed New York casting director Bernard Telsey telling him that a variety of notable names were eager to be a part of the project. “It was amazing. It was like, Really? She would play a recurring character on our show?”  Those actors are natural interpreters of The Gilded Age’s tone and temperament. “Our theater people are so trained to do this kind of material—great language, complex period character work—that they just never get to do on film,” says Engler. “Even Christine Baranski. She said, ‘I’ve done period plays my whole life, but I’ve never acted in a period thing on film.’ She was just so excited about doing that. It became clear that those were the people best suited to it, and we got particularly lucky.” 

With its intricate environments—careful mixes of practical sets, real locations, and digital effects—and a sprawling cast of ornately costumed characters, The Gilded Age season two promises to deliver on the period grandeur so beloved by fans. “It’s much bigger than Downton,” says Engler, a veteran of that show. How could it not be, as The Gilded Age considers a whole city, teeming with stories, burgeoning along? It’s fitting, then, that so much of season two will center on something as sweeping—and expensive—as the opera. The curtain can’t raise soon enough.

[socially-awkward-skeleton]

Kit + 🔮

Here's a bit from the upcoming Chapter 7 of American Beasts:

The gang was all there, tucked into the old wooden chairs and tables of the Eight Bit Pizza Bar. The ramshackle restaurant hadn’t seen this much life in weeks. Boarded up before the reaping even began, the owners had run after John had offered them the least amount of money possible for their little parcel of real estate. In the end they may have taken the smarter route rather than risking the chance of being scooped up into the cult along with it. Now, It had become the unofficial meeting place for the resistance, or at least the ones Kit kept in contact with, surprisingly that also included Hurk and Sharky. She hated to admit it but even they had their place, despite not always being useful. 

Kit looked around the table at her allies, elbows resting on the hard surface barely able to hold herself up. Eyes sunken into dark bags, deeper than her duffel. There had been no luck with the pharmacy, it was bled dry by the Peggies, she knew it was a long shot when Jerome had mentioned it but the hope was nice to cling to no matter how unrealistic. She hadn’t gone this long without her medication in years, not since she’d been diagnosed. Her daily ritual now consisted of scoring another line into her bedside table with her knife for the nights she’d gone without sleep. It was physically impossible to go for much longer and she could feel the walls crumbling around her. She needed just one day of rest, one day where the whole county didn’t depend on her. One day where the exhaustion would finally win out and the nightmares wouldn’t come, just blackness like the grave. 

She looked around at the team she’d built, most staring back at her with some form of pity written all over their faces, that slack jawed pout that people have when they felt sorry for a person. She wanted to scream, rant and rave, to get them to stop. It was the same face her mother gave her when she came back home and it made her furious. She didn’t deserve to be made to feel this way, to feel so weak. Her eyes fell back to the table, she didn’t need their sympathy, she didn’t want it. But there were two things she needed checked off her to-do list and sadly she was capable of neither. 

“Here’s the deal, I’m getting real sick and tired of well, being sick and tired. We’ve done a lot to strike back at the Peggies but they still have something we don’t.”

“What’s that?” Grace said, sitting back in her seat, adjusting the brim of her hat. 

“Advertising.”

“You mean those stupid fucking commercials John likes to put out?” Nick said, crossing his arms over his chest, leaned back in his seat with a disgruntled sneer. 

“No.” She paused, realizing those too caused her enough headaches. “Well yes, but mostly I mean the sign and the statue.”

“You want to tear ‘em down?” Adelaide slid forward in her seat, suddenly very interested in the conversation. 

“I wanna light them the fuck up.” Lifting her eyes, she focused on Hurk and Sharky across the table. Without skipping a beat, they bro-fisted each other, knowing full well they had a place in this plan. “I‘ve got enough other tasks keeping me busy. So that’s where you’ll all come in.” 

Nick, Grace and Adelaide were all aware of what she was trying to get at. The other two, not so much. 

“What do you mean, legs? Those are the kinda once in a lifetime missions you wanna take on. Who gives a fuck about a tunnel or an old landing strip?”

Nick cleared his throat, trying to interrupt Hurk’s train of thought, doing anything to get him to stop talking about the subject. Hurk looked at the pilot and stopped himself to apologize. “No offense.” Clearly the clue was too much for him to understand. “I just don’t get why you wouldn’t want to come?”

“I’m sorry my boy is such a goddamn idiot, Kit.” Adelaide slapped Hurk up the backside of his head. “She’s a fucking war vet, why do you think she cussed you out when you blew up that mill?”

Sharky’s eyes grew wide, his mouth falling agape. It had taken him this long but logic finally prevailed. “Wait, you don’t like explosions? Well goddamn Dep, why didn’t you say anything? Does it give you flashbacks or some shit?”

Kit sighed heavily, rubbing at her temple. “I’d rather not talk about it.” She cut the conversation short and returned to her actual point. “Adelaide, I want you to fly these two up to John’s sign. Burn it to the fucking ground, but just before you do I want to know about it. I want to make sure John’s eyes are peeled.”

[slothbookcase]

Really Looking In

I was reading the part where Ken & Fanchon are telling Joanie & Fitz that Tim found a new place after they got deported from Mexico, and Ken said it's a mansion with 64 rooms. So I looked up Millbrook, NY mansion and Hitchcock Estate came up.

That's when I figured out Outside Looking In by T.C. Boyle based on real event. And Boyle got a lot of key facts right. Timothy Leary is a real disgraced Harvard professor who became an icon for counterculture of the 1960s-1970s, otherwise known as hippie.

The setting for second half of the book, The Hitchcock Estate, is also a real place in Millbrook, NY. It is owned by the Hitchcock siblings, heirs to Mellon family fortune. Thomas and Billy are only mentioned once, while Peggy is only mentioned in passing. But they are real people. While it is unclear what is the relationship between Leary and Peggy, the book said they are dating. I can't confirmed if this is true or not.

Richard Alpert, in book is referred to by his nickname Dick, is also real person. Together with Tim, they rented the house and created a 'center for psychedelic study,' where they created a commune of students and their family who has adult tripping on psilocybin and/or LSD every week in the name of science. Alpert later more known as Guru Ram Dass.

None of the students in Boyle's book is a real person, except for one guy. Boyle didn't even mentioned Lisa Bieberman, Leary & Alpert's so called protégé that was labeled by Harvard Crimson as LSD PR Girl. But the book did mentioned an experiment done on Divinity School students, known as "Good Friday Experiment." The experiment conducted by Walter Pahnke, and he's the only student that is referred by his real name as the experiment happened in real life. But after the aforementioned experiment, Walter is nowhere to be found in the book. In real life, Pahnke (whose photo on Psychedelic Science Review made him looks like Anderson Cooper with dark hair) continue to do experiment on hallucinogen, but he used it as part of therapy session with terminal cancer patients and on alcoholic with goal to treating their addiction. The last one, as now we know, is just changing the substance but I don't think it'll stop their addiction.

This book calling their commune as Castalia Foundation, basing it on Aldous Huxley's Island. The truth is, Huxley also basing it from Hermann Hesse's The Glass Bead Game. I haven't read either books.

Although this book largely about Leary's commune, the first chapter of the book is reimagining how first LSD trip took place by none other than its creator, Albert Hofmann.

Boyle imagining how Hofmann, high on LSD, ride his bike home while being chased by his panicked assistant. That day, April 19th, is now commemorated as Bicycle Day in Switzerland. Interesting fact, Hofmann resent Leary for "giving his creation a bad name," according to this article:

[americanredragger]

Comparing Trump to Benedict Arnold is an insult to the memory of Benedict Arnold. Benedict Arnold had understandable reasons for doing what he did, even if they weren't the best reasons. He was already feeling underutilized and underappreciated by his superiors when he fell in love with a loyalist woman, Peggy Shippen, who ended up being a no-kidding Spy for the Crown (the highest paid of the war). We can all understand how we might start shifting when given a sympathetic ear to our frustrations in an environment that favors that kind of shift, especially when said sympathetic ear has a vested interest in it.

Arnold didn't just decide to turn coat, and when he did it cost him a lot. He was exiled from his homeland and spent the rest of his life in the UK and Canada where despite ample rewards from the Crown and a warm reception from the King's Court, he wasn't actually all that popular and he found himself just as controversial in Great Britain as he would have been on the other side of the Atlantic. His business ventures in Canada failed, and he essentially died alone in London with only his wife Peggy (he married her) for real, true companionship.

Donald Trump has none of that. His reasons are even worse (make a quick buck by destroying Democracy! OH YEAH! Insulate himself from the consequences by destroying it more!), he hates everybody, and has served exactly no comeuppance for his traitorous activities and associations.

Arnold I can understand, and maybe even forgive. He was only human after all.

Trump is unforgivable. He may be a fellow Homo sapiens, but he's not a man. He's a monster. He's Tolkien's Ungoliant: a massive bloated evil creature of pure betrayal and gluttony. He must consume, and he must betray, and at the end of his life when he has betrayed and consumed all else that he can get, he will betray and consume himself. And like Ungoliant, his children are every bit the toxic and hateful spiders that he is, just lesser. He would doom the world to an eternity in the Demonic Blood Vortex of Terror as long as he got a real estate deal once it was there.

Fuck Donald Trump: The Greatest Traitor in American History.

[peachhoneii]

What is your headcanon for Goofy and Peggy being married?

Goofy and Peg got married after Peg divorced Pete. Pete immediately remarried Trudy. Pete and Trudy are actually a happy, loving marriage. Weird.

Peg and Goofy? Peg doesn't understand a lot of Goofy's behavior, but she gets it. Goofy is actually very suave, which is how so many attractive women want him. They ended up dating after he and Sylvia broke up.

Goofy is the main cook.

Goofy gives great foot massages.

Goofy calms Peg down. Really.

Goofy and Peg have a daughter named Glory. She looks a lot like Goofy (hair/fur, teeth, ears, height) and Peg's face.

Goofy is Pistol and PJ's second dad and is very supportive.

Peg joins Goofy to waffle guild meetings.

She's the breadwinner as a real estate agent.

Actually joins in on some of the more strange Goof traditions.

Is Max's second mom.

PTA prefers Goofy over Peg. She's deemed too aggressive.

[theanimeview]

My Nitpick Issue with Sherlock in Moriarty the Patriot

By: Peggy Sue Wood | @pswediting​

It may surprise some of you to know that I have degrees in book reading and writing. While earning those degrees I studied one specific time period more than the others--that being British Literature from late-17th/18th century through the early 20th century. This is to say that it is a time period I know a little more about than you might think. And early 1900s is probably my favorite period out of that timeline, particularly England under Victoria’s rule. 

And, perhaps, because of this strange obsession I have with the period, I presently have a small bone to pick over Moriarty the Patriot. 

It’s not the minor inaccuracies of the clothes, nor the adaptation of character designs. It’s not even the adjustment to social tendencies depicted that are more Japanese than British-English of any period thus far either--because those kinds of things happen frequently in adaptations. And it's not Moriarty or his backstory too! Because, again, this is an adaptation, and liberties will be taken to fit the new story (besides, even in the original works by Doyle the man’s backstory was inconsistent). 

My issue is with the character of Sherlock and his supposed “deductions.” Well, maybe more accurately it's with the writing of Sherlock. 

You see, Sherlock is almost always introduced the same way in an adaptation. He makes a judgment about someone (usually about Watson or the Watson stand-in) and then proves it using his observational skills. This introduction is important because it clarifies that the world of the characters is one based on where common sense and science not only work but make sense. His deductions are logical and based on some semblance of rationality. Here is an excerpt from the original novel: 

“I knew you came from Afghanistan. From long habit the train of thoughts ran so swiftly through my mind, that I arrived at the conclusion without being conscious of intermediate steps. There were such steps, however. The train of reasoning ran, `Here is a gentleman of a medical type, but with the air of a military man. Clearly an army doctor, then. He has just come from the tropics, for his face is dark, and that is not the natural tint of his skin, for his wrists are fair. He has undergone hardship and sickness, as his haggard face says clearly. His left arm has been injured. He holds it in a stiff and unnatural manner. Where in the tropics could an English army doctor have seen much hardship and got his arm wounded? Clearly in Afghanistan.' 

How does this prove we are in a world where common sense and logic works? Well, because he didn’t pull any of these deductions from thin air. He just used his eyes and common knowledge to make a quick judgment. 

In the example above, everything that Sherlock assumes is true and based on reasonable assumptions about the time period and about what he can observe of the person before him. 

The tan of Watson’s skin is something he notes because London is usually dark and wet around this season, so you’re unlikely to get a tan. The way the man walks and stands is also a thing he can observe, and fresh military men walk very differently from the average citizen or gentleman. These two observations, coupled with noticeable injury and limp could lead one to think that maybe he has just come back from the current war (the First Anglo-Afghan War). Of course, maybe he wasn’t injured in the war at all--maybe something else happened; however, you can make a pretty good guess that an abled bodied soldier would not be home and looking for a room in the middle of war-times if something hadn’t happened to him on the battlefield.

My point is that all of Sherlock’s deductions come from observing details, paying attention to the basics of the world (such as the ongoing war or understanding rigor mortis), and using your senses. Sure, there may be a few things the average person doesn’t know that Sherlock does, but that’s because Sherlock has studied different things and to a more serious degree. The level of understanding is different, but not impossible to achieve in one’s own time or effort. And, as another note, Sherlock is not perfectly observant all of the time. There are plenty of examples of him needing to take breaks, of him closing his eyes to block out distractions so he can better focus on what someone is saying, and of him smoking to zone out for a bit so that he can come back to a problem with fresh eyes at a later time. 

It’s absolutely vital to Sherlock’s character, and the original story, that all of the deductions are based on the “possible,” which is why the introduction of Sherlock in Episode 6 of this adaptation immediately irritated me. Here is the scene:

Side note:  I’m sorry it’s shown as a poorly made gif--I literally could not find a copy of the clip with English subtitles on YouTube so I could not include it as a video. If you want to look at it in the episode itself, it starts at about the 13:00 minute mark. EPISODE LINK)

Here is what bothers me so much. Why would a mathematician be checking to see if the staircase on a ship fits the golden ratio? More importantly, why would that in any way matter to Moriarty as a character? Based on what we’ve seen so far of this character, and we’ve had 6 and 1/2 episodes to define him so far, none of Sherlock’s statement makes sense here. 

Like, at all. (And I know that this also happens in the manga--doesn’t make sense there either.)

You know what would make sense though? For the time period and the character development we’ve seen of Moriarty thus far? A pause to consider-- and maybe even compare--staircases on the ship between the main steps for passengers and the steps for commoners or staff. 

Why would that make sense? Oh, thank you so much for asking. Time to get real nerdy here for a minute: 

Class issues were a serious problem in Victorian England (as they are now, though in a different way). These issues were not necessarily the same as depicted in the show but it was still consistently present throughout the society as a whole. (A good, short read on the subject can be found here for those of you interested: Social Life in Victorian England.)

One way that this issue came out was in the very architecture of homes. In Victorian England, nobleman homes and estates were built with main staircases, where the residents and guests walked, and servent staircases, where the staff and other temporary employees walked. The difference in these stairs was huge, as the servant staircases were basically death traps. 

In the late 1800s, a mathematician (and architect) named Peter Nickolson figured out the exact measurements that would generally ensure a comfortable and easy walk upstairs: 

BTW: Here is a great video on the subject and how they were death traps: Staircases in Victorian England

However, Nickolson’s math and designs were not used regularly in the design of houses for years to come. 

By the setting of the story, and given Moriarty’s interest in maths, his understanding of class issues, and beyond--this kind of knowledge would make far more sense than searching for the golden ratio in a man-made set of stairs. 

Moreover, the golden ratio is generally interesting to mathematicians (to my understanding) because it can be seen in nature frequently. It is a pattern found everywhere, from the way that petals grow on flowers, to how seashells form, to freaking hurricane formations! So why on Earth would Moriarty be interested in an architect's choice to use such a ration when planning a staircase? 

He wouldn’t, I believe. Nor would Sherlock generally be able to make that assumption based on his time gazing at the staircase, distance from said staircase, nor angle. 

So what can he deduce, if not that? Well, he may be able to deduce that Moriarty is a nobleman based on his attire. He may also be able to deduce that the man is a student based on age, as in an earlier episode we were told he’s quite young to be teaching in university and appears close in age to his students. Maybe he’s a student of architecture? But, if he’s a nobleman--as we suspect he is based on his attire--then it's unlikely he works a labor-intensive job or one close to it. So, he must be in academia for academic reasons such as mathematics. Physics during that time, as an academic subject, focused more on lighting, heat, electricity, magnetism, and such. And, Sherlock notes that Moriarty is specifically looking at the stairs, not the lights of the ship. 

So, BAM! I’ve deduced Moriarty is a young nobleman who is likely a student of mathematics. Perhaps he’s recently had a lesson on staircases or another algebraic concept that’s caused him to pause with momentary interest. 

It makes a heck of a lot more sense than finding a “golden ratio” in a man-planned and man-made staircase... don’t you think? And, maybe, we can even deduce that rather than a student he’s a professor who has just thought up an interesting lesson--though that would be a BIG jump from the data we’ve been provided here. 

Deductions that come from major leaps in logic make it seem like Sherlock is doing magic... and he is--because it is magical that people find it impressive or believable. It’s not. And I would argue that the original character would find it insulting based on his comments to Watson regarding being compared to other fictional detectives.

Pay in mind, I have this feeling about several adaptations, so my judgment on Moriarty the Patriot isn’t technically exclusive. It just hit me so hard in my first viewing that I felt I needed to share because generally, this issue of deductions becoming magic rather than stemming from logic doesn’t happen in the first two minutes of meeting Sherlock Holmes.

So... yeah. Thanks for coming to my absurd history/lit lesson through Moriarty the Patriot. I appreciate you sticking with me to the end and hope it was enjoyable.

You can watch the series on Funimation.com right now at: https://www.funimation.com/shows/moriarty-the-patriot 

Overall, it’s a pretty good series; although there was a lot more child-murder than I expected...

[dorevenge]

where ignorance is bliss - chapter 1

SUMMARY:  Maria Collins Carbonell is a young woman in a man's world, fresh out of college and ready to take on the '60s with Obadiah Stane on her arm, until she meets an older and mysterious Howard Stark - who's on his way to change the world, and he wants to take her with him. [AO3 LINK] Rated Teen

CHAPTERS: [1] 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 ☆

PAIRINGS: Maria/Howard, Maria/Obadiah, Peggy/Daniel, Edwin/Ana, Carol/Maria

… Where ignorance is bliss,

 Tis folly to be wise

 – Thomas Gray, 1742

If you ever met Howard Stark, you only knew half of the man.

He was lauded as a genius, a gamechanger in every field, a philanthropist for tomorrow, the best of humankind – yet he managed to be the worst of it at the same time.

I met him at a casino in ‘60, charmed and overpowered after losing millions for the thrill of it, and we married shortly after. It was the beginning of the last twenty years of my life.

 September 17, 1959 – Queens, New York City

“Obie, dear, we’re going to be late.”

“Darling, it’s check in four. Entertain me for just a few more minutes.”

“Chess minutes are longer than normal minutes, and being late in normal minutes makes Giulietta mad.” My eyes flash across the board, and the moves come to me. Hovering my fingers above the pieces, “I move my rook here, you’ll be forced to move this pawn, then my bishop here… Check in two, love, let’s go.”

I check in the mirror that every blonde hair is where it’s meant to be and adjust the pearls around my neck. Obadiah always wanted me to look good – not too good that other men would chase me, but enough that they would look at him because he was standing next to me. “They’ll look at the beautiful dame, then the businessman who’s arm she’s on, then ask to invest in his company just for a chance to be near her longer.” I wasn’t convinced that his plan worked.

Obadiah and I have been together for seven months at this point, long enough to grow tired of his perpetual tardiness, but not long enough for us to be seen leaving the same hotel room together. We slept in separate beds last night, of course; Obie is a man of high morals but tight checkbooks.

Purse hanging from the crook of my elbow, I call out over my shoulder, “I’ll meet you downstairs.” He hums in response, still curled over the chessboard trying to figure out where he went wrong. I close the door behind me.

-

“Fancy seeing you here,” Obie says, coming in from the elevator, fiddling with the cufflinks he bought just for the occasion – more than he could afford, he’ll probably return them at the end of the trip – the light from the chandelier above reflecting on his scalp. We leave the lobby to wait outside.

“Stop fretting. Your presentation will be flawless.” I straighten his tie as the taxi slides to a stop outside the hotel doors.

“I don’t want to let Howard down. Everything is riding on this.”

“I know, Obie, I know.”

-

I talk with the wives of the other businessmen in a corner, while they over-sip on over-sweet drinks. Obie didn’t send me to spy, but it’s hard not to notice when their loose lips spill secrets not meant to leave the boardroom, and surprises meant to wait for the expo. The first day of the event was reserved for socialization, for inventors and investors to shake hands, tease each other about what they might be presenting and prod for any information they can get. The women are undermined, seen and not heard, but always listening. Always listening.

This was my second Stark Expo; last year I attended as an intern at the Future Foundation, frequently dismissed as a secretary or spouse before I got the chance to share that I was about to graduate from Columbia Business School with Honors. I was put into a box before I opened my mouth. The fifties are a terrible time to be a smart woman.

Tired of the gossiping, tipsy wives, I leave to find Obie. He was almost always easy to find, taller and broader than most of the scholars who have never known a hard day of work in their life, and his bald head shines like a lighthouse. Unsuccessful, I wander off alone.

A waiter hands me a martini, and I find myself in front of the exhibit dedicated to Captain Steve Rogers. It was the same every year; there’s no new information about the man since he crash-landed in the Atlantic, but the fanfare and mythos around him has only increased. The shield and empty suit sat behind a wall of thick glass, carefully preserved by the curator, who was a close friend of the Captain. Several pictures of him decorate the exhibit. Tall, blonde, steel blue eyes. He was handsome, with wide shoulders and an even wider jaw. The perfect American specimen.

I stand in front of the suit, the reflection of my head barely coming up to its sternum, imagining how differently the war might have ended had he survived. A silhouette joins from my right and makes me jump, my senses a little dulled from the drink. I turn around.

“Peggy!”

The brunette Englishwoman takes me in her arms, and I breathe in her perfume. I had met her at last year’s expo when she tried to convince me to learn some self-defense, promising it wouldn’t make me too muscular and unfeminine.

We let each other go, and I notice her cast a sad glance at the exhibit before looking back to me. “Maria, how are you? Are you still working for the Future Foundation?” She looks perfect, as always, with her signature red lipstick.

“I’m well. I graduated from the internship and am working elsewhere. I’m here with a man.” Her eyes widen curiously as I continued. “He’s presenting an invention on Saturday.”

“Is it serious?”

“It’s… Comfortable.”

“If you need some excitement, my offer from last year still stands,” she offers. I smile at her politely, looking down at my shoes. I don’t think I was meant to be a secret agent.

“Maria, there you are! I have someone I want you to meet.” Obadiah blunders into the exhibit, a drink in his hand, and it is clearly not his first. He places a large hand on my shoulder and turns around to point back into the party. “Oh, I don’t know where he went. Howard was just here.”

“He’s probably off in a corner with some blonde,” Peggy smiles. “I need to speak with him, I’ll send him your way once I find him.”

She leaves, and once she’s out of eyesight, Obie’s hand slips from my shoulder to my waist. The forwardness brings me out of the martini-induced hazed, and I stand straight up. I move his hand for him.

“Sorry, Mar,” his breath reeking of alcohol, releasing me. “I’ll find something to eat, get something to soak it all up. I’ll need to stay sharp tonight.” He kisses me on the cheek, and I’m alone again, the swell of music and murmur of guests in the background.

-

Obadiah’s presentation went smoothly, but not as fantastical as he had hoped. The inventor before him showed something very similar, and the crowd was unenthusiastic and less receptive. Some investors bit at the bait, handshakes and promises were exchanged – but no money, which is what Obie desperately needs to continue this charade of a rich man. He came from very little, but he is very good at multiplying anything that crosses his path, a paradigm of the American legend. I do not know much of Obie’s past, but I do know it is grim enough to make him cry in his sleep some nights. Maybe I should invest in gasoline, he would ponder, or some new kind of energy. I need to create a legacy.

His legacy. We talked more of his legacy than anything else, more than chess moves or what to have for dinner or even the weather. His legacy. And he was positive his legacy would start with the two of us, flowing from our descendants, a watershed to admire for decades to come. While he hasn’t asked my father for my hand, he has dropped more than enough hints about his intentions, and I dodge every one of them best I can. He was 29 – six years older than me – and it was time he started a family by society’s expectations. I just wasn’t sure I that wanted to participate.

He lives in a tiny apartment in the Bronx – an apartment, not a house – and invests every penny he earns back into his machines. My father, a realtor, tried to convince him into investing into some real estate in the Upper East Side, but Obadiah gently refused his help, believing the only way to make in this world is to make it on your own.

I am asleep by the time he returns from the second day of the expo, and his entrance wakes me in a start. I had retired early, not wishing to entertain the drunken wives any longer.

“That bastard,” Obie trails off, locking the hotel door behind him and setting the key on the dresser. He sits on the second bed in the room and collapses into a sunken posture, his head falling heavily into his hands.

I slip out from under my covers and sit next to him. I run my hand up and down his back, trying to bring comfort to the defeated man. He would never tell me what had occurred that day, no matter how many times or ways I tried to ask, only the aftermath and resentment that followed, and it is my duty to pick up the pieces.

“God strike me down if I ever willingly enter business with a Stark,” he finally sighs into his hands. “That man is the worst of them all, a piranha and a coward. I told him my next great idea, and not five minutes later I hear him pitching it to an adoring crowd like it was his own. The rich get richer, and I’m still at the bottom. Hold me to it, Mar, if I ever shake his hand, it better be when I’m buying his company out from under him.”

“Yes, dear.”

[blissfulalchemist]

For the character thing: Adelaide Drubman:3

Ah Thank you Lydia. I don’t really talk about her much do I? 

favorite thing about them

She's snarky and I love snarky women. She also calls me honey in that southern-y mountain accent that I just love so much.

least favorite thing about them

That she is a fine example of what a milf is when you are not rich and I cannot probably shouldn't have a chance with her 😥

favorite line

She's got a few! And here's like three of them that I can't stop laughing at now that I have looked back at transcripts for this ask.

“Punch it Chewie! Bet that got you excited, fucking nerd.” (reminds me of the Moonknight meme that I am begging Disney to have Oscar Isaac say at least once in the show)

"do peggies even know what peggin means?" (No they do not and it's why they are so angry)

“Such a beautiful day. Only thing that’d make it better is if a park ranger visited my forest.” (Just....fuck yeah you get it girl!)

brOTP

Her and Chance. Look he’s already friends with her son and he’s got mommy issues very appreciative of how chill she actually is.

OTP

Her and Xander or a one night stand with Lance long time ago.

nOTP

Uhm why would I want to see her with her ex-husband again or ever. Man can choke!

random headcanon

She will at times use her very blatant and suggestive flirting to keep people away from her since she knows that it makes people uncomfortable. Especially John when he’s just being too much for her since she is the only and main real estate woman in the area.

unpopular opinion

I don’t know if I have one really. 

song i associate with them

“Rebel Yell” cover by Black Veil Brides. Don’t think I need any explanation as the lyrics speak for themselves.

favorite picture of them

I don’t think I have one really. I’m lame with these I’m sorry.

[houser-of-stories]

request 12/? You’re overdue on this book and I want it so I’m tracking you the fuck down feat. hamilton 💛

“I have gathered you all here today for a very important mission,” Peggy begins. The music room, that’s really more of a cupboard, has had some... minor aesthetic changes made to it. As in, she got rid of most of the instruments. And covered the wall in A2 sheets of paper. And stole music stools from the other rooms so her sisters had something to sit on.

    (She took the piano as a chair. Free real estate and all that.)

    “Has the cafeteria run out of lasagna again?” Angelica asks. Next to her, the chemistry textbook she prefers over her teacher is sticking out of her bag. Peggy squints, and she’s pretty sure there are notes in the margins. “What? A dissected frog could teach me more than Mr Jackson. You know this.”

    “Did you steal a textbook?”

    “Yes.”

    “Okay,” Peggy says, and moves on. “This isn’t about lasagna. This about Alexandra Hamilton, and how he’s stolen my book.” Taking out her best set of Planning Markers, she starts to draw out her master plan on the wall. “It’s been stuck in his bag for two months now, and I want it, and he’s never renewed it so it’s mine. First, I’ll need a distraction.”

    Eliza hums thoughtfully, absentmindedly scratching at the mud splatter on her skirt. “What if I fell off the roof?”

    “I’ll do you one better, what if you didn’t?” Angelica’s looking concerned as if they hadn’t learned from the accident last Spring. The oak tree near the gates will never be the same again.

    “We could drag a gym mat out and hide it in bushes?”

    “Good idea,” Eliza says. “I’ll wear knee pads.”

    Angelica sighs like someone who’s never been part of one of their grand schemes. She’s an excellent actress. “Then while he’s distracted by Eliza falling out of the sky, we grab the book? And that’s it?”

    “You’ve forgotten the reverse ambush afterwards.”

     “The what?”

    “I walk up to him and give it back after I’m done with it, because he’s very clearly lost it and isn’t it lucky I knew it belonged to him?”

    “Peggy,” Eliza says, trying to hide her smile. “How long are you going to be using that book for?”

    “Let’s just say, it’s a reference book and I do not want to be the one paying those library fines.”

[rayofdawnworld]

A Good Girl

So, for context: Earlier this year our darling @saiyanprincessswanie got sick and needed surgery. I being a worried friend, reached out wished her luck promised her a get well fic, and then prayed for her. All good and dandy. But not. See, the incredible idiot that I am, NEVER POSTED THE FIC!!! I PUT THE STORY IN MY POSTED FILE BUT I DIDN'T GIVE IT TO HER!!! I. Am. A. Moran... But, this has allowed me to re-read my work and I can make it better. So, I'm posting part one now and I'll post part two next Monday. Our beloved @saiyanprincessswanie deserves more than just a one-shot at this point. I'm so sorry my Dear. I so hope you like it.  

For those interested, Tag list is open for this fic. 

Moodboard by me. :)

Grey!Steve/Sassy!OC

A Good Girl

Part One- Warnings: None

She was a good girl. Anyone with half a brain cell could see that. Steve looked at the young man once again stunned. Not only was the young woman beautiful, she looked soft and sweet,he could hardly believe that she looked so young. If asked, Steve would have sworn the beautiful woman was a young girl of eighteen and not a woman of twenty-seven, but she did have an inner lining of steel running through her, she had a fire, judging by the way she was ranting with the younger man. Steve found himself drawn to her, captivated in a way that no one ever managed to captivate him. Not even peggy. A man can get up to some very bad things for just a chance at getting a Girl like her. He thought to himself with a half formed idea backing at the back of his head. 

In hindsight, he was glad that he came with the idiot. They had met in one of his Support Group Meetings. The young man was in bed in the “act” when his girlfriend was dusted. But the relationship had been rocky, and he had been thinking about an old girlfriend of his, more and more. From what he gathered the girl had been left alone. An orphan, she had gotten a scholarship in Forensic accounting where they had met. They had dated throughout their college years but had sadly drifted apart when they hit the workforce despite having both been accepted in a prestigious firm. The stress had simply been too much. That's when things had ended. 

One of the many consequences of the snap had been unemployment. Companies had gone bankrupt either because they had lost all or most of their workforce or because the owners and shareholders had evaporated and there was no one to sign the paychecks and pay the bills. The snap had caused more problems than solved them, at least on earth. Such, in point, was the young girl's case. Steve hadn't understood why she had quit her job at the firm and had gone to a much smaller firm with a significant downgrade in income, but now he understood. She was working as a waitress in a rundown diner. The smaller firm had lost everyone. She had been the only one left. 

Steve had only just managed to dodge a flying cup aimed for the young man but alas, she didn’t have a very good aim. This argument had been going on for the better part of forty minutes. She knew she was going to get fired, so she may have decided to go all out. 

The idea had been to go with the dolt, as moral support, go talk to the girl. He had sat in a booth, while the younger man had sat in another. Her face had soured from the sweet smile she had the moment she had recognized her ex-boyfriend. She had been polite, asked him what he had wanted, he said he wanted coffee and a chance to talk. She had agreed and went to get his order. Her boss had given her ten minutes that would be reduced from her lunch hour. He listened in thanks to his superior hearing. It had been a simple conversation at first. The air stiled when, the Moran had said that he missed her. Things became frosty when he informed her that the other woman had been dusted. It took a turn for the worst when he said that he wanted her back. At first, she just laughed, then… Then the argument started. That's when Steve got the truth. He had always suspected that there was something off about the sap story the other asshole had shared with the group. Now he knew. My poor sweet girl. Don’t worry I'll  take care of you. 

Sadie was done. Just done. All her life she had been a good girl. She always did what the nuns told her to do. She never broke the rules, worked hard, was kind to all even when she was bullied. She did her damn best, to tell the truth, she saved herself waiting for “the one”, she had been faithful, loyal. She was humble, modest. And for what? To be called boring and humiliated by being compared with another woman. She had felt so small when Kevin had said that, what’s her name was sexier and better in bed. She had rebuffed that she had been a virgin when they had met. Not to mention that he never wanted to try anything new, telling her that she shouldn’t try to be someone she wasn’t, whatever THAT meant. Kevin then had the gall of saying it was all her fault he slept with the other woman. She should have done more, tried better. Learned more. When she asked him acidly, if the point of exploring one's sexuality was to do it as a couple, the bastard had accused her of making a scene. She had quit her job and left the apartment they shared that very day. He had called her accusing her of being childish and overreacting, she threw her phone away, just in case he could track the serial number. Sadie wondered how long it would take the firm and his new flame to find out that eighty percent of his so-called excellent work was done by her, at home. In some misguided and deluded idea of good to him.

The world had changed a year after that. She was still hurt. But not in the way most thought. She was hurt and angry at herself. For not saying what she wanted. For not realizing what a jackass Kevin was. But above all, she wished she could have punched him. And now here he was… Telling her how sorry  he was, what a mistake he had made, and how much he missed her and how much he wanted her back. Everything went red after that, she didn’t know what she said but she did remember throwing something at him. She nearly hit the client sitting in the booth behind them. She was going to get fired for that. She just knew it. She didn’t care. It was a lousy job anyway. She did on the other hand get to do something she had dreamed of ever since they had broken up, no ever since she had caught him cheating and left him. It wasn’t a punch, no. But it had been a slap. And a very big mighty slap. 

Later that evening, Frank had been gracious enough to “let” her finish her shift, with no job and slim prospects, she was still smiling. Her smile dropped when she saw Captain America himself waiting outside for her with an apologetic face. Now that she thought back on it. Kevin had walked in with him. Before she could say anything the tall Adonis took a step forward and smiled minutely.

“I’m sorry about today. I didn’t know the whole story. If I had I would have stopped him from coming here.” Steve Grant Rogers was talking to her. Apologizing to her. Sadie smiled stunned but sadly.

“It’s alright. Kevin has always had this way about him. It takes a bit for you to see past his bulshit.” Steve chuckled and shook his head. We’ll have to do something about this language though. “I’m not surprised you fell for it. You're a good man, Captain.” 

Hearing that did things to him. She was perfect in every way. Sweet, pure, good-natured. She deserved better than Kevin. She deserved someone who would keep her safe from the ugliness that this word had become. She deserved to be cherished. Taken care of. And HE wanted to be the one to do all those things for her. But he also realized that he would have to pace himself. 

“Well, to make it up to you how about I offer you a job? I was going to give it to Kevin, but I think there's a story he’s not telling us about him being fired from the firm you were both working at, so I feel my safest bet is offering it to you.” Steve said shifting his weight from foot to foot. Sadie smiled at that.

“Yea, someone at the firm must have found out that he was a slacker. I did most of his work for him remotely from home at night. And with no hot, exciting girlfriend in HR to cover up for him…” was all she had to say. “What kind of job are you talking about?”

“Simple accounting. Nothing out of the ordinary. Howard Stark stopped the government from declaring me dead so the hundred dollars I invested in his company have grown in stock value ever since. He also apparently bought a bunch of Real Estate and a lot of other stuff, so now I don't know what I have or what I owe to the IRS. I need someone to look at my books… that have been untouched since nineteen ninety-one.” Steve explained, a bit overwhelmed. Sadie wished she could have told him that she needed to think about it. But she didn’t. Without any job prospects, she wasn’t in a place to decline Steve's offer. The fact that she would be working for America's Golden Boy and getting one over Kevin was just a bonus. Thanking him he gave her the compound address and they parted ways. 

He followed her from a safe distance. He wanted to make sure she got home alright. At least that's what he told himself as he melted into the darkness. 

[aion-rsa]

The Godfather Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone Proves a Little Less is Infinitely More

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This Mario Puzo’s The Godfather, Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone analysis contains spoilers.

The ending will be discussed at length. If you haven’t seen it, I’ll make you an offer you can’t refuse. Find the film, watch it with fresh eyes, then come back and celebrate The Death of Michael Corleone.

“The power to absolve debt is greater than the power of forgiveness,” Michael Corleone observes in the revelatory new opening of Mario Puzo’s The Godfather, Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone. He may well be speaking for Francis Ford Coppola. The Godfather Part III concluded the family saga, made a profit for Paramount Pictures, and garnered seven Oscar nominations in its time, but Coppola has never been forgiven for it. The 1990 film has such an undeserved reputation, it almost feels like there was a vendetta against it. Having seen the new cut several times, the director can finally be absolved of sins he never committed.

Coppola’s finale has been bashed for its structure. Critics said he was just going through the motions and the arc of the first two films, and doing it much too slowly. However, the filmmaker was making one long film, and this is the conclusion. It references the other two films because the reality which forms this family history is well known. It is canon, the arcs are similar because each film dissembles William Shakespeare’s King Lear. The Godfather, Part III also has the balls to wear its opera cape up front, and it’s a Sicilian one. But does it move as slow as critics accused? We get an ear bite in the first quarter, a helicopter mass execution, and enough intrigue for three Hitchcock films.

The Godfather, Coda is not much different than The Godfather Part III. Coppola only cut five minutes from the 162 minutes of the original. But like a good haircut, it makes a difference, even though I think he took too much off the top. The streamlining speeds it up and makes it feel more tragic. Michael’s regrets are palpable, the dangers he and his family face are recognizable. It’s the same movie but tighter. The Godfather and The Godfather Part II are perfect films, like Casablanca or Citizen Kane, not a single scene is less than flawlessly framed, acted, and situated. The third one is a little sloppy. It happens. Martin Scorsese’s Mean Streets is sloppy and works perfectly because of it. To this writer, Mean Streets packs more of an emotional punch than Goodfellas, which is also cinematic perfection from setup to cut. The Godfather III is rough around the edges.

Coppola loves the editing room as much as any wine vineyard. He recut Apocalypse Now Redux, and added scenes which may not have been imperative, but are wholly welcome. Coppola filled in the storyline to The Cotton Club for his reworking. When The Godfather trilogy was recut and re-released as a seven-hour chronological saga, it was like hearing the Beatles’ White Album with discarded tracks included. Scenes which landed on the cutting room floor were put back in. The Godfather, Coda takes scenes out. We get less of Eli Wallach’s Machiavellian cannoli-lover Don Altobello, which is a shame because his performance has grown on me since my initial viewing. Coppola also cuts Talia Shire’s Connie Corleone when she goes full-on Lucretia Borgia, ordering an execution in a chapel.

The Godfather Part III is the purest of the saga’s films in terms of cinematic input. The first film was a masterful adaptation of Mario Puzo’s book. The second one also drew heavily from the book. By the third, the motion picture saga was on its own. Part III was also the first of the films which didn’t have the Godfather himself, Vito Corleone, in it. Marlon Brando’s performance is more than iconic; it is Americana itself. Robert De Niro bridges generations as the young Vito in The Godfather Part II. Al Pacino’s Michael is the only godfather here.

“The Pope, the Holy Father, on this very day has blessed Michael Corleone. You think you know better than the Pope?”

The original cut of The Godfather Part III opens on the flooded Corleone compound in Lake Tahoe and dissolves to Old St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Lower Manhattan’s Little Italy. The Godfather, Coda opens with a low-angle establishing shot of the exterior of St. Patrick’s Cathedral. It looks like a relic of another time. It is surrounded by the cold steel and glass of modern architecture. The midtown cathedral represents old money.

The first scene is a meeting between Michael Corleone and head of the Vatican Bank, Archbishop Gilday (Donal Donnelly). The Vatican is selling controlling shares in real estate conglomerate Internazionale Immobiliare to the Corleone family. These details don’t come out until 30 minutes into The Godfather Part III. By now putting the Vatican meeting at the beginning, followed by the Vito Corleone Foundation celebration, it fits better into the structure of The Godfather, and gives the proper weight to the deals with the Holy Roman Church.

The scene also reestablishes the Corleones as a family of great wealth. They have so much money they can bail out the Vatican. We don’t know how they made that money; we get very little detail about the years between The Godfather Part II and the late 1970s, when The Godfather, Coda is set.

We assume the Corleones had nothing to do with heroin, probably sidestepped any involvement in the Kennedy assassination, and stuck with the traditional vices, which could be best maneuvered into real power. We can imagine a Hoffa scenario because of their union involvement, but we get little indications of business beyond the chase for legitimacy. With this deal, Michael will be one of the wealthiest men in the world.

Moving the meeting also casts the archbishop in the same role that the funeral director played in the opening scene of The Godfather. The priest’s favor becomes his regret, but in a way that inverts the structure of the original film. The funeral director came to Don Corleone seeking justice after chasing the American dream, believing in it with all his soul as much as he believed in holy Mary, mother of God.

Archbishop Gilday’s impossible dream is to turn that around, to siphon the American success of the Corleone family back to Italy, after skimming his part, of course. Michael is awarded the Order of St. Sebastian from the Catholic Church after the charity run by his daughter Mary (Sofia Coppola) donates $100 million to the institution. Immobiliare is the other side of the coin, and it is a beautiful flip.

The move also fits the film closer to the original 1972 classic, positioning the Vito Corleone Foundation ceremony as the wedding scene, and introducing us to the players, and the ones who don’t play well with others. Joe Mantegna plays Joey Zasa, who is a stand-in for the John Gotti ascendancy, running Don Corleone’s old territory now that the family has moved up. Eli Wallach ties us into the family behind the family. Vincent Mancini is the bastard son of Sonny Corleone and his mistress Lucy. Actor Andy Garcia clearly enjoys this part. He turns into James Caan a few times.

Sofia Coppola’s performance has been called flat, amateurish, and not in the same universe as the rest of the film. Mary is an important part. For most of the audience, she is the most recognizable character as far as an entry into the world of the underworld. Sofia did it because her father needed her, and quickly. Winona Ryder’s unexpected bout of physical exhaustion didn’t fit with Paramount’s time schedule, and the studio’s replacement options didn’t fit the age of the character.

Coppola’s 18-year-old daughter, Sofia, still had baby fat on her face. She’d made appearances in Rumble Fish and Peggy Sue Got Married, and was used to working with her father, even though she was not an actor. European filmmakers cast non-actors all the time; they bring a real quality to roles. Lenny Montana, who played Luca Brasi in The Godfather, was a former wrestler who came to the set as the bodyguard of a ranking Colombo family member. Martin Scorsese’s mother Catherine makes an appearance in The Godfather Part III. Sofia is playing herself, a college freshman who wants to help her father.

This makes the gnocchi scene feel almost uncomfortably incestuous. Mary is Vincent’s first cousin, and we can see in the way they look at each other; it’s wrong even though it feels so right. Sofia is natural in her scenes, not emotive. She is the tourist the audience needs to circumnavigate the treacherous waters. Mary is the civilian who becomes the collateral damage of the Corleone family life. She takes the bullet intended for her father, Don Michael Corleone. Sofia did the same for her father, becoming the scapegoat for a job she took to get his movie in on time.

Read more

Movies

Redeeming The Legacy Of The Godfather Part III

By Don Kaye

Culture

The Real Goodfellas: Gangsters That Inspired the Martin Scorsese Film

By Tony Sokol

Mary’s death scene has been called the worst in the history of motion pictures. It never was, and as presented in the recut, it’s entirely, emotionally effective. It’s not Bette Davis in Dark Victory, and even though it happens on the stone steps of a church, it isn’t James Cagney’s death scene in The Roaring Twenties. It isn’t meant to be. It is sad. The death itself is one of the most underplayed in film, but the music gives it the tragedy to match Michael’s reaction.

It is hard to resist the pull of the music when considering how much of a worthy ending this cut is to The Godfather saga. The themes are the trilogy’s blood and wine. Composer Nino Rota tells us when to celebrate and how to mourn. We relive Michael’s lost love Appollonia more through our ear’s memory than we do from the faded black and white photograph in the old Sicilian villa. And his reunion with Kay evokes the post-war era they met in. The music ties the film together so beautifully that this time around it feels like the skin of the original, rather than its clothes.

By the end of the film, the emperor has no clothes. Michael thinks he can break a glass ceiling through legitimate business but admits “The higher I go, the crookeder it becomes.” Senators and presidents have men killed. The church is no different. Legitimacy is an illusion. Coppola saw The Godfather Part III as an epilogue. Paramount wanted to grow a franchise. Coppola had to be persuaded to make a sequel to the first film. Paramount wanted Coca-Cola instead of wine. And they treated The Godfather Part III like the Fredo of Godfather movies.

Fredo is all over this film. How he died is the first question Mary asks Vincent. It’s the last rite in Michael’s confession to the Vatican priest who will become Pope, a scene which contains one of the funniest exchanges in the film. Michael tells Cardinal Lamberto (Raf Vallone) a list of his sins would take up too much time. The first cut may have been the deepest, but the final cut in The Godfather, Coda is the most ironic. Coppola adds the subtitle, in quotations, apart from the puppeteer logo of the films and book, and then takes exactly that promise away.

The final scene cut from The Death of Michael Corleone is the death of Michael Corleone.

The Godfather Part III ends as Michael is sitting alone outside a villa in Sicily. All family debts have been settled, but he has no family left. He is wearing dark glasses, slumps in his chair, loses his grip on the orange in his lap, and falls dead to the ground. Mario Puzo’s The Godfather, Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone ends, not only with him still alive, but wishing him Cent’anni, telling the audience it means “for long life” and reminding viewers “a Sicilian never forgets.”

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The phrase actually translates to 100 years. Imagine how many Godfather sequels could be made in that time. Michael is left alive, alone. Atonement is beyond him. He loses his family just as he is on the precipice of finally being able to give them what they need. But the coda to Mario Puzo’s The Godfather, Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone is an allegory to what Paramount wanted, more life. Yes, Al Pacino’s Don Michael Corleone spent all this time waiting for them to pull him back in.

The Godfather, Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone is available now on Blu-ray and digital.

The post The Godfather Coda: The Death of Michael Corleone Proves a Little Less is Infinitely More appeared first on Den of Geek.

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[webuyhousesfastllc]

Selling Your House Fast using the “Subject To” Method

By: The Massachusetts Home Buyers LLC

Why would anyone want to sell their home via subject to financing? Aren’t their major risks associated with such undertaken? What if the buyer flakes and defaults on the note? This situation alone would be enough to deter any homeowner from selling their home in such a way as relying on another stranger to pay their mortgage. Worst of all, your credit score would take a significant hit alongside many other financial hardships. On the contrary, everything could also, too, go as planned with the mortgage getting paid down and your credit score gradually increasing.

Today, most FSBO’s shy away from such creative deal structuring due to one major issue, LACK OF KNOWLEDGE!

That’s right! A recent poll taken by The Massachusetts Home Buyers LLC had determined this issue among a survey selection of 50 FSBO’s who were either currently selling or planning to sell their homes very soon. The survey showed us that out of the 50 FSBO’s, on a professional critique level, 42 within the sample of 50 would have benefited more from a subject to deal than a traditional one-time closing. Out of the 50 FSBO’s 48 had no idea what it was and why it is used.

Why would a homeowner sell their home via subject to their existing mortgage?

Let’s start with the real-life story of Peggy Labate of Massachusetts. Peggy had lost her job Do tour company going to economic trouble. She then began facing the possibility of her home going into foreclosure, Putting her in a particularly dire financial situation. Peggy owed a total of $74,000 on her note for her home. This put her at an astonishing $12,000 in the hole.

She had an investor interested in a property, however, He did not actually have the full $74,000 needed for the sake of purchasing the property. Instead, the two of them worked out a compromise that would work for everyone. The compromise consisted of the following: He would purchase the property in such a way that he was subject to the existing mortgage payments per month. If agreed upon, Peggy will no longer have the monthly payment mortgage burden because the investor will be taking over her payments. Peggy then was able to make the sale work and avoid a disastrous credit hit by foreclosure. She barely had any money for food for that week, nevermind a mortgage payment. She was also able to sell the home within 2-3 business days following the agreement. YES! It was that easy.

In other parts of the country subject to the existing mortgage now has become quite popular among for sale by owners. Especially in post Covid era, selling subject to deals have increasingly spread. Especially in areas where unemployment has increased drastically.

Furthermore, most people don’t have the time in today’s world to even market the property by themselves. Additionally, they are not adapt to marketing, interviewing potential buyers, and credit analysis as Massachusetts license representatives are trained for. But why pay commission when you can simply pass your mortgage bill over to a investor who will take over the payments as well as put some money on the sellers pocket.

Another example was Hank. Hank was upside down on his mortgage because he bought right before the 2008 crash. The homes value dropped significantly but was able to almost break even in 2021. Let's look at Hanks predicament below

Home cost 2005: $320,000.00

Mortgage note: $335,000.00

POST CRASH

Home cost 2009: $245,000.00

Mortgage note Current 2009: $315,500.00

Present 2021

Home cost 2021: $285,500

Current note Balance: $295,000

Since Hank lost his job due to the COVID-19 virus, he is now finding it hard to pay for every day expenses and his mortgage. Therefore he’s in a little predicament. A friend of his told him “to suck it up and pay up to $10,000 and be done with it already”, but Hank doesn't have the $10,000 to come out of pocket. Plus, Hank is thinking “who actually sells a home to lose money?”. The plot thickens as the days go by and his bills pile up he is now three months behind on his mortgage and his banks are calling leaving messages on his voicemail. His monthly mortgage PITI is at $1,250.00. Thus, on top of all the other bills, as well as the $10,000 he will need to pay out-of-pocket if he wanted to sell, he is now behind approximately three months and four days owing a whopping $4,200.00 (includes late payments). The home is getting close to breaking even, and he has pre-permitted lot space to extend the square footage of his home. He was told by an investor he could add another 1000 to 1500 sqft to his home. Although costs would range anywhere between $68,000 to $80,000, it would bring his home value from $285,000 to $390,000. Additionally, if he were to add another a bathroom and a half in this addition, the after renovations value would be anywhere between $415,000 to $425,000. Unfortunately, Hank did not have the funds, which would probably be anywhere between $110-$120,000 to do such work, even though the value add would be $200,000 to $215,000. What is Hank going to do.

Hank is definitely stressed out!

Hank is now slipping into foreclosure and is getting unrealistic to almost cruel advice. Until one day he found an ad in his local paper from The Massachusetts Home Buyers LLC.

Hank called The Massachusetts Home Buyers LLC and told him his predicament. Hank began his conversation by saying, “ Look, I know you can’t help me in my situation but maybe you can give me some advice?”, the investor from The Massachusetts Home Buyers LLC laughed and calmly said “ Well hello, my name is Gary, Whats yours?”. Hank forgetting his manners backed up his excitement and said with a sigh, “My apologies, Hank here”. The caller than asked Hank to fill him in on what’s going on. At the end of the conversation, the investor asked to visit the property and take a look at the permits that were once pulled by Hank that he never utilized back before the crash.

Although the permits had become null and void, the investor knew the area very well as well as the permitting process for building additions. The Massachusetts Home Buyers LLC are constantly scrutinizing and investigating the housing market and its bylaws. At the end of the walkthrough the investor suprised Hank with a deal that almost had him fall to the ground. The deal, according to Hank was pure genius.

The deal looked like this:

First, Hank will transfer title to the property over to the Massachusetts Home Buyers LLC.

Instead of paying out of pocket, the investor offered him $20,000 cash in pocket for the transfer of title.

The Mass Home Buyers LLC would bring an additional $6,000.00 for closing expenses incurred and pay up the missed payments of $4,500.00 to the bank.

The Massachusetts Home Buyers LLC would then own the home, however, Hank would need to leave his mortgage untouched and in place.

To lessen Hank’s anxiety, Hank and the investor called his lender on a three-way call to explain the transaction. Strangely, the lender knew the investor by the first name. Hank knew he was dealing with professionals. The investor kindly told the lender about Hanks's situation and that he offered him the title in exchange for paying off the back payments as well as take over his note as-is. The lender said, “ Ok, Gary, so you want to subject to the existing note and make payments on Mr. Hanks 30 year fixed?” The investor replied, “yes, Sir.” The lender asked, “ok, that's fine; when do you think it will transfer or be paid in full?” The investor said calmly, “I don’t know now; however, you will be the first to know when we do so.” The lender stated, “fair enough- ok, we are good, no static on this end.” Hank had heard about the dreaded due on sale clauses and was just relieved. Besides, the investor boldly asked the lender to keep the mortgage under Hank's name; however, cancel his insurance for a tenant-buyer who can be vetted additionally by the lender will be taking over. Hanks's problems were swiftly Disappearing. How does this subject to thing work anyhow?

Finally the closing date has come and looked like this.

Purchase: $25,000 transfer of deed w/ subject to $290,000 fixed 30 year mortgage payments.

Hank has money for first and last for a apartment and got his job back. Also, his credit was soaring because of all the additional payoffs by the tenant-buyer the Mass Home Buyers LLC had moved in.

Investors side

Current mortgage: $1,250 per month

The Mass Home Buyers Lease Option Payments by tenant buyer: $1,900.00 ( the areas rental median is $2,500) Cash Flow $650.00

The tenant-buyer was a carpenter who pulled a new permit and added over 1600 SF of home and an in-law and two full baths. The home soared from $290,000 to $480,000.00

After cash-out refinances, the tenant-buyer will be able to reflip, and the Massachusetts Home Buyers LLC will make over $235,000 within 1.5 years. Not bad for one deal.

Hank no longer is upside down and in debt. He also has money in the bank. The tenant-buyer has an affordable investment he will inevitably reflip. The Massachusetts Home Buyers LLC made a healthy profit for saving Hank's credit from annihilation while providing inventory to one of many tenant buyers. Talk about a win/win/win heh? Subject to deal structuring is highly beneficial for sellers who are in situations like Hank, but also if they need to sell in a hurry due to a strict timeline that cannot wait for a realtor to research, market, interview, negotiate, and inevitably, sell their home.

Subject to candidates usually have three main scenarios in common:

They are facing foreclosure and/or exceptionally behind on payments

They want to repair their credit score and what better than a real estate solutions company paying their tab under their name on a monthly basis for an extended amount of time. As the buyer pays on the mortgage, the previous owner of which the note is named under, is being paid consistently. Sometimes even double paid due to the buyers motivation to pay down the balance in preparation of either a resell or a cash out finance situation.

They need to move very quickly and do not have the time to A) remote manage a realtor on the property which can result in miscommunication and other issues B) Has a new job that begins relatively soon that is out-of-state. C) A or B, however, has a significant amount of mortgage left to pay. and D) Is negative on their note and does not want to come out of pocket to pay the difference. The Massachusetts Home Buyers LLC not only assists those in selling their upside-down notes but will also. Reward the seller for transferring the title. What would you rather do?

The moral of the story is, long as you’re dealing with professionals and people who know how to market with structure and don’t hide things from anybody, make deals such as a subject to or any other Creative Financial matter that much more beneficial for all. As of today, the Massachusetts homebuyers not only helps people in need like Hank but also work with retail homebuyers because they structure their deals in a way that gives both the seller what they need in regards to pricing at the same time, create a good investment for their company. REMEMBER THIS: THE SELLER OF A PROPERTY MUST ALWAYS HAVE A MORTGAGE OR ANY ALTERNATE LIEN AGAINST THE HOME TO CONDUCT A SUBJECT TO DEAL. IF THEY DON'T HAVE ANY PAYMENTS AGAINST THE HOME THAN IT WOULD BE KNOWN AS SELLER FINANCING.

[tisfan]

Season of the Witch

More of the Bewitched AU that no one asked for

for @livewire28

1 - Something Wicked this Way Comes

“These are all boring,” Wanda complained. “And wrong.”

“What’s wrong with a house,” Bucky wondered. Wanda had been poking at real-estate sites on the internet for the last three days. Apparently his apartment wasn’t going to do anymore, and Wanda was looking to move out to the suburbs.

Bucky was pretty sure he could afford a house in the suburbs, although he had never really considered the idea before. And the commute was going to be a bitch and a half.

“No one considers the flow of energy,” she said. “All these buildings have no emotional spirit. They’re as dead as a box of crackers, and about as interesting.”

“Are you talking about feng shui?”

“I’m talking about containing the energy of the house inside, of making it strong, and keeping our family safe,” Wanda said.

“Our family?”

“Well, just you and me, so far, but there might be more family,” Wanda suggested. “That is the goal, isn’t it, to have children?”

“Will they be witches?” 

“They’re certainly not going to be penguins,” Wanda said. “Witchcraft is half innate, half training. They’re just a little more likely to be witches than your normal second grader.”

“Okay,” Bucky said. He filed that away under things to think about later. “So, you’re not happy with these houses. We can always have something built to specifications. Buy land, and build.”

“How long does that take?”

“Depends on what you want. Ten to sixteen months,” Bucky said. “Since I don’t think what you want is a customized box-house. All your cracker box houses can be moved around like building blocks. We can talk to an architect, find out what you’re looking for.”

“Sixteen months?” Wanda wailed. “That’s ridiculous, I can build a house in four hours.”

“Yes, darling, but people will notice,” Bucky said. “And you said you weren’t going to do obvious witchery anymore.”

“Is four months reasonable?” Wanda wondered. “I can make it look like your architect came in and built the house. Just. You know, faster.”

“Can you show me what you’re thinking about?”

Wanda smiled, delighted, and pushed the chair around to face him. He didn’t usually ask her to do much magic. She’d done some, of course, as she got adjusted to things like washing dishes (instead of just stacking them in the dishwasher where the water pressure smashed them to bits) and she didn’t much like dusting. His apartment was cleaner than it had ever been, and he hadn’t even had to buy a vacuum. He’d been borrowing his landlord’s about once every two months since he moved in.

She wiggled her nose and moved her fingers and she was cupping a tiny model home in her hands.

“Uh, that looks like the Hobbit homes got together with a Transylvanian castle and had a bastard cabin,” Bucky said. “No. No, no, no, people are going to think it’s weird, and they’re going to come by and stare at it.” 

Wanda smushed her hands together, and when she opened them again, there was something a little less… noteworthy. Victorian style, three story.

“Is the tower necessary?” It wasn’t too outlandish, and certainly he’d seen Victorian homes that dotted up and down the East Coast. No one would stare too much.

“The tower is absolutely necessary,” Wanda said. “I need the top of the Tower.”

“For what?”

“Witch stuff,” she said. “Don’t worry, no one will notice.”

“We can probably find an original Victorian, if you want to take the time to restore it,” Bucky said, “that’s in our price range.”

“All right,” Wanda said, clapping her hands together. “Let’s go shopping for a house.”

“Today? It takes time to get an appointme--”

Wanda’s nose was already wiggling. “I think you’ll find if you call--” she handed him a card. “An appointment just opened up.”

*

When it turned out that Bucky’s biggest objection to moving wasn’t the work commute -- Stark was delighted to set up some sort of hard-light display in Bucky’s new home-office where they could talk and run diagnostics while a bright blue Tony Stark walked around the room, projected by a device on the ceiling (and Bucky complained about Wanda’s magic) -- or the smallness of the neighborhood, but that most of his friends lived in the city, and so he’d miss a lot of the spontaneous social activities, Wanda knew she had work to do.

Sam was easiest to relocate. She leaned on his boss and got him a promotion, that came with some moving expenses, and Sam found the perfect little rental, right in their neighborhood. Across the street. What a coincidence A month after that, Natasha stopped complaining and moved in with her boyfriend.

 It had an attached garage apartment, and not long after that, Clint got evicted and ended up renting the apartment.

Steve and Peggy were harder, but Wanda did some tugging and poking, and then-- turned out Peggy had a long lost great aunt who died, leaving Peggy sole owner of a nice house just down the street.

“How lovely,” Wanda exclaimed when they were told the news. “We will all be able to have neighborhood barbeques!”

“You think your brother will come by?” Sam asked, because of course he did.

“I can ask,” Wanda said. 

“That would make us popular in the new neighborhood,” Sam said.

Bucky nodded. “I haven’t even met him yet.”

He hadn’t met any of Wanda’s family yet. That wasn’t an accident.

“Well,” Natasha added, giving Wanda a suspicious look, “seems like a housewarming barbeque is the perfect time.”

This… was going to be tricky.

Wanda smiled. “Sure, sounds lovely.”

[what-is-your-plan-today]

Stark Spangled Banner One Shot: Driving Home For Christmas

This is a one shot nonsense song-fic/ drabble to be read alongside my Stark Spangled Banner Series  and is inspired by a little drabble from @valkyriesryde​ which she posted Saturday Night.

Timeline wise this takes place the Christmas after Katie Stark and Steve’s wedding...but it can also be standalone

Song is Chris Rea- Driving Home For Christmas

Stark Spangled Banner Masterlist

Warnings: Bad language, Hanger, and SMUT towards the end (NSFW) NO UNDER 18s.

 Driving home for Christmas Oh, I can't wait to see those faces I'm driving home for Christmas, yea Well I'm moving down that line And it's been so long But I will be there I sing this song To pass the time away Driving in my car Driving home for Christmas

"This is your fault" Katie sighed, looking out of the window with a frown.

"What?" Steve's head snapped to the side to look at his wife, who was lounging in the passenger seat with her feet on the dash "this is Tony's car so how on Earth am I responsible for it breaking down?"

"I wanted to fly but oh no the Star Spangled Man with a Plan had a better idea..." she said sarcastically "let's drive and on the way home I'm gonna detour off the damned Parkway into the middle of butt- fuck nowhere so pray, do tell what is your plan to get us out of this?"

Steve snorted a laugh, he could help it. For a split second he was sent right back to the 40s and a conversation he had with Colonel Philips before he headed off to bust Buck and the men who would become the Howlies from a Hydra Camp.

“Oh if it isn’t the Star Spangled Man with a Plan, what is your plan today…”

"Oh I'm sorry, am I amusing you?" Katie looked at him, the smile on his face evident.

“In a word, yes.” he looked at her.

"Jerk" she glowered "FRIDAY, update please?!"

"Mr Stark is still running a diagnostic..." The AI replied and Katie groaned.

Her brother's technology was great, except in circumstances like this. Plenty of people had stopped to help them on their way but there was nothing they could do as the car ran off a combination of a smaller arc reactor and a ludicrously complicated computer system. When Steve had suggested they drive, Katie had suggested they take her Camero. But he preferred the bigger cars, the SUVs, said they were more comfortable to drive. So they had taken Tony's Q7. Which had been fine, they’d made it to DC fine, been to see Peggy and then meet with the Real Estator who had just sold their old Penthouse to sign a few documents and hand over the last set of keys. But now, on the way back, they were stuck as something had gone wrong. A bug in the system. FRIDAY had said.

Well fuck bugs and fuck systems. "How far are we from that diner you were aiming for?" She sighed. "I'm starving"

Ahhh. So she was doubly pissed because she was hungry. Steve knew he was on dangerous territory if the hanger was hitting her system. He hit something on his phone which lit up the console in the middle of the car and studied the map.

“Mile and a half. 30 minutes or so walk.” “Or a 5 minute run for you.” “You want me to go?” he asked.

Katie knew he hated the cold. The fact he was offering made her anger at him dissipate somewhat. She looked out of the window. It was dark but clear. They could get wrapped up

“Nah let's just walk.” she said.

The two of them stepped out of the car into the brisk December air and hurriedly pulled on coats, scarves and hats. Steve took Katie’s hand and positioned himself between Katie and the road, as always. As they walked she fired a message to Tony telling them they were seeking shelter at the diner, pinging him the locations.

It's gonna take some time But I'll get there Top to toe in tail-lights Oh, I got red lights on the run But soon there'll be a freeway Get my feet on holy ground

“You know this isn’t exactly how I envisaged our trip going.” Steve said as they walked and Katie gave a huff, her breath forming a cloud in front of her. 

“It wouldn’t if we had taken the jet!”

“You know…” Steve sighed, his temper rising a little “I suggested driving because we needed to clear the apartment.” “No, we didn’t, that’s what Happy is doing!” she said, exasperatedly “I told you that when we got there!”

“Yeah, well, maybe I wanted to do it!” he was talking a little louder now “Instead of leaving it to someone else.” “Why?” she said, frustration lacing her tone “What was the point of us doing that? Happy is still gonna have to go and get the stuff we couldn’t bring!”

“The point is I loved that apartment.” he sighed. “And I wanted to clear our stuff ok? Take a last look round…”

Katie stopped walking and he did the same, turning to face her.

“You getting a bit sentimental?” she looked at him, a smile playing on her mouth. His blue eyes looked back at her, his handsome face illuminated by the moonlight and he sighed with a shrug.

“Look, when I came out of the ice, New York didn’t feel like home, not really, not anymore.” he took a deep breath “But DC did because you were there. And I know we didn’t live there together for long before we moved back to the tower but it has a lot of happy memories for me, from before we even started dating.”

Katie looked at him, her head cocked to one side as she continued to smile. He was a hopeless, romantic idiot at times and she loved him for it.

“You know movie nights, cooking together…” he continued as they started to walk again. “By together you mean I cooked, you ate.” she said.

“It was the first place we kissed, first place we made out.” he continued his trip down memory lane as their feet trod through the light dusting of snow. “First place you literally ripped my pants off like a horny school kid.” she quipped. “Yeah.” Steve grinned at the memory of the first time they had ever had sex “That was…”

“Good.” Katie smirked up at him. “Very good.”

“So, sorry for being a sentimental idiot.” he shrugged

Katie stopped, gently tugging on his hand before sliding her arms up round his neck. She pulled him down so her lips met his “I adore you, Steven Grant Rogers.” she whispered into his mouth as he returned her gesture, hand on the base of her back pulling her closer. “I’m sorry for snapping.” she sighed gently, when they pulled apart “But I really am hungry.”

He chuckled and pulled her to his side, his large arm wrapped round her shoulder, hers round his toned waist and they continued on their way.

So I sing for you Though you can't hear me When I get through And feel you near me I am driving home for Christmas Driving home for Christmas With a thousand memories

They eventually reached the Diner, but as Steve went to open the door he stopped dead and pushed Katie to the side, forcing her down below the window.

“Steve, what the…” “Robbery.” he said. Katie stood a little, peering in the window. There were three men inside, one ransacking through the till, one holding a gun to the Cashier’s head, the other had his gun trained on a group of civilians in the corner.

Katie sighed, her hand undoing her coat. “I make 10 hostages…” She pulled out the small pistol which had been tucked into her waistband and Steve looked at her. She seemed to permanently carry an arm now, especially after the trouble with HYDRA.

“Don’t suppose you have my shield tucked in there?” he quipped and she grinned.

“Sorry Cap.” “Worth an ask.” he said, looking round on the floor. Spotting a fairly big rock a few feet away he grabbed it before taking a quick glance through the window. “Ok, I’ll go in first, take out the one by the hostages. You get the other one with the gun.” She nodded.

Together they kept low, heading back to the door.  Steve stood at one side, Katie at the other and with a nod he kicked the door with his foot. It swung inwards and in a flash Steve was inside, the rock in his hand flew towards his target, connecting straight with his head, taking him down. At the same time Katie had leaned round him, discharging her gun into the knee cap of the man by the counter. With a yell he dropped to the floor, pistol falling from his grip. The other man vaulted the counter but ran straight into Steve who gripped him in a choke hold, rendering him unconscious. As he dropped to the floor the screams that had been ringing around the diner died down.

“Wouldn’t have gotten this much excitement on the jet.” Steve grinned at his wife, as she rolled her eyes, stooping to collect the weapons from the 2 men, before Steve instructed someone to call the police.

I take look at the driver next to me He's just the same Just the same

It took the cops about 20 minutes to arrive, by which time Katie and Steve, with help from the staff had managed to restrain the perps in the kitchen. Steve explained what had happened to the Officers and as they hauled the men out and once they were gone Katie turned to the waitress.

“Any change of a burger?” she asked, and Steve’s head whipped round to look at her.

“Seriously?” he shook his head.

“Listen, we’ve broken down, it’s the day before Christmas Eve, we just kicked some low-grade, good for nothing shit head asses and I’m really, really hungry so I ain't leaving here without a damned burger and a shake.” her voice grew loud and with the last word she stomped her foot.

She stomped her foot. Like a 4 year old kid.

“You are such a brat.” He shook his head with a sigh and looked at the Waitress ready to apologise, but she was smiling

“Anything you want guys, it’s on the house.”

Katie flipped Steve off as she settled in one of the booths, an annoyingly smug expression on her pretty face that made her look just like Tony. 

“You know...” Steve intoned, settling in opposite her, his voice growing stern as he leaned across the table “I don’t appreciate your little temper tantrums in public.” “Yeah?” she looked at him, her voice informing him she gave absolutely zero shits as to what he thought “What you gonna do about it?” “Oh you’ll see,Darlin’” his voice was full of his Captain authority as he leaned back and smirked, “you won’t be able to sit down for a week.” Her eyes widened, and Steve’s own flashed with mischief as he was now the one smirking with smugness as he knew full well he’d gotten her in the only way she responded to when she was in full on brat mode, and she squirmed a little in her seat, her teeth biting her lip. 

Gotcha.

Top to toe in tail-lights Oh, I got red lights on the run I'm driving home for Christmas, yea Get my feet on holy ground So I sing for you Though you can't hear me When I get through And feel you near me Driving in my car

It was hot and sweaty in the SUV, the cold of the outside forgotten as Steve rutted into his wife over and over again on the back seat. It wasn’t comfortable, trying to contort his 6ft 2 frame across the rear of the car but he had managed it and right at that moment, comfort was the last thing on his mind as her hands tangled into his hair, nails scraping his scalp as she whined and keened underneath him.

His teeth nipped at her neck, harder than normal, causing her to groan and he hissed into her ear, his voice low. “You’re such a fucking brat…” his breath was hot on her neck, his thrusts hard as she banged her head against the door, neither of them paying it any attention.

“Fuck you.” she replied as he thrust harder still, his hands sliding underneath her sweater, gripping her hips harder as his lips met hers in a hard, deep kiss.  He moved his hands down to her thigh and hooked her leg over his hip to find a deeper seat within her and boy did he find it. Beneath him, Katie let out a soft cry which he swallowed, his lips still on hers.

“Oh I’m gonna...” he ground out, his hips snapping forward, driving his cock as deep as he could “Gonna fuck some manners into you, Sweetheart...”

At his words she let out a filthy noise, and Steve thrust harder over and over again, and it wasn’t long before he felt her clench around him which was a tell-tale sign she was nearing her release. He quickened his pace even more and her moans became louder, her face turned and pressed into his neck.

“Fuck…” the curse tumbled from her lips as her body bucked “Stevie….”

White lights exploded in front of her eyes as she cried out, her back arching as she clawed at his skin, her hands under his Henley, the bite of pain from her nails overwhelmed him and he felt his own stomach tighten. His thrusts became desperate and then he was done for. His hips stuttered as he let out a load moan before he collapsed forward, trapping her between him and the rear car seats. The pair of them lay still, catching their breath. Katie smiled to herself as she moved her hand to wind into his hair, as his head lay nestled on her shoulder, face pressed into her neck before he moved his head to give her a lazy kiss, noses sliding against one another.

Their moment of bliss was disturbed by FRIDAY.

“Mr Stark has located the issue…” the voice made them both jump slightly, “it appears there was a glitch in the hardware.” “Can say that again.” Katie mumbled, and Steve let out a chuckle, both of them missing the rest of FRIDAY’s explanation.

“...and he has fixed it remotely.”

They caught that bit though. The car fired up and Steve looked over to the dashboard which was now alive again.

“Ready to go?” he asked, propping himself up allowing Katie to move and pull her jeans back on as Steve tucked himself back into his.

“Hmm. Had a fight, been fed, been fucked.” she said, ticking each of them off on her fingers. “Yeah, I’m good.” They both climbed out of the back and settled into the front. As Steve pulled off the side of the road he laced their fingers together and raised the back of her left hand to his lips, pressing a soft kiss to the back in a simple sign of affection.

Katie looked out of the window, this time with a smile.

Driving home for Christmas Driving home for Christmas With a thousand memories

 Tags

@the-omni-princess​

@momobaby227​

@geekofmanythings16​

@angelofhell-666​

@thewackywriter​

@marvelfansworld​

@valkyriesryde​

@cobalt-gear​

[cammi-writes]

Title: Puppy Love

Parts: part 1 | part 2

a/n | warnings:  | alternate universe where Steve never went back in time and Tony never fucking DIED.

Fandom: MCU

Pairings: Howard Stark x Reader , Bucky Barnes x Reader , Steve Rogers x Sister!Reader

Tag List: message me if you want to be tagged

“I bought us a house upstate” Howard held your hand as you both walked off of his private plane.

“A house upstate?” You subtlety pulled your hand away but Howard recognized that worry in your tone.

“It’s not for now. It’s for when we’re ready to retire from all of this hero work” Howard cracked a smile. 

“Howard, you know that they won’t let me retire” You smiled back, but you weren’t happy with that at all. You really only ever wanted a normal white picket fence life. 

“Sugar, I’m Howard Stark. Founder of Stark Industries and co-founder of the Strategic Science Reserve. We’ll convince them to let you retire. Or we’ll run away from it all” Howard announced confidently. 

“Okay, Howard” You snickered, feeling your heart swell at his words.

“Mr. Stark. Miss. Rogers” A man in a black suit opens up a car door. “I’m here to bring you to the reserve” 

His face will blur in your mind. Until he becomes the reason your life comes crashing down. 

“I remember Howard saying something about a house upstate” Peggy sits with the group as they tried to figure out where you and Howard could possibly be. 

“Friday, search my father’s records for any real estate purchases” Tony spoke. 

“There are 112 real estate purchases in the name of Howard Stark from 1939 to 1990″ Friday spoke making Steve raise his eyebrows at the outlandish number. 

“Narrow it down to purchases made in 1948 to 1950″ Peggy said. 

“7 real estate purchases were made within that time frame” Friday spoke. 

“Pull up the addresses for me” Tony commanded. When they appeared he spoke again. “Most of these are commercial properties except for these two. This one is in the financial district so that one must be it”

“That’s where they must be” Nat said.

“How do we even know it’s still there?” Bucky spoke for the first time since he watched Peggy’s memories. 

“I own it” Tony raised his eyebrows as he scrolled through the house records. “My father paid for it’s upkeep until I was born. I guess he was ready to leave my Mom if he ever completed Project Regen” 

“Tony-” Tony cut Peggy off. 

“No, I understand. I’d do the same if I was in his position with Pepper” 

A few hours later, Peggy, Tony, Steve and Bucky piled into a truck and made there way to the house where the suspected you and Howard to be held up in. 

Tony turned down a dirt road that lead to a house in the distance. 

“Where’d you get that memory player?” He asked the question that’s been bugging him for hours. He was fascinated and annoyed that he hadn’t thought of something so useful. 

“You’re just like your father” Peggy laughed. “Howard grabbed it when we escaped the HYDRA facility. He had watched them use it. He was also quite annoyed that he had never had the idea” 

Tony nodded, his heart speeding up as they parked the car. 

“Well someone’s obviously here” Steve commented at the way the house looked and the music that was coming from inside. 

He recognized the song as “Sea of Love” by Phil Phillips and The Twilights. 

“Come on” Peggy spoke as they got out of the car. 

The group made there way to the front porch. A bush of pink roses caught Steve’s eye. Just like the one’s that you used to have on the window sill above the sink. You were here. 

Peggy silently opened the door and the group walked inside. Their eyes glanced at the house and the pictures that decorated the walls. 

There were many of you and Howard. New and old. There were also some family photos of you, Steve and your mother. Tony couldn’t help but notice the many photos of him that were there. Of his graduation. Of his childhood. One family photo of him, Howard and his mother. 

Bucky’s eyes met a photo that made his heartbreak. He was dressed in his uniform. A smile on his face and his arms around both you and Steve. The night before he shipped off. The last date night you both had. 

“Sarah, stay there” Bucky cringed at the sound of that voice. 

Howard shut the door to the room he had just left and stood in front of it protectively. His eyes darting between Bucky and the room to his left. 

Steve furrowed his eyebrows at the sound of his late mother’s name. 

“Howard? Are you alright?” 

The sound of your voice from the room Howard was watching carefully made both Steve and Bucky’s heart stop. 

“Y/n, stay there.” Howard took a step towards the group and out of your view, making you worry. “Peg, why are they here?” He spoke quieter now.

The sound of the safety being turned off sounded from the room you were in and then you appeared, gun drawn. 

You were wearing a simple yellow sundress with a floral print and your curly hair fell perfectly around your face. Just the way Bucky had remembered. He stared at you with wonderment. He took a step forward absentmindedly but was immediately blocked by Howard who had a challenging look in his eyes. 

Bucky restrained himself and fell back into place. 

“I told you to stay where you were” Howard said without breaking eye contact with Bucky. 

“And leave you without back up?” You rolled your eyes, putting your gun back on safety. 

You took a few steps forward, going to give Peggy a hug but Howard stopped you. Everyone saw the fear that flashed in Howard’s eyes. 

“Howard, you’re my husband. Not my body guard” You raised your eyebrow at him. You tugged your arm away from Howard and wrapped them around Peggy. “I’ve missed you” 

“I missed you too, Y/n/n” Peggy hugged you back. 

You stepped back, glancing at your brother and ex-fiance. 

“What was my favorite toy when I was a child?” You tested. 

“A little stuffed rabbit” Steve spoke and he realized his mouth was dry. 

“You named it James” Bucky spoke quietly making your heart clench. 

“They’re safe” You smiled at Howard and he frowned. 

Howard’s eyes finally locked with Tony’s. There were tears glassing over Tony’s eyes and Howard, for the first time, cracked a smile. 

“Son” Howard took a step forward and Tony cracked. 

“I’m sorry” Tony pulled his father into a hug saying the words he had so longed to say.  

“No- I’m sorry Anthony” Howard pulled away from him. “I wasn’t a good father. I was so consumed by grief and guilt that I let you and your mother suffer”

“Why didn’t you come find me?” Tony furrowed his eyebrows.

“By the time we got word that you were back... you were already settled down. We didn’t want to disturb your life” Howard explained with a sad smile. 

“Is that my big brother?” A tiny voice came from behind you. 

Everyone’s attention turned towards the little girl with Howard’s eyes and your hair. She was no more than 3 years old. 

“Sarah, Papa said to stay in your room” You spoke softly. 

Howard walked over to his daughter who was now hiding behind your legs with Tony, Steve and Peggy in tow. 

“C’mere” Howard smiled and Sarah shyly came out. “This is your big brother, Anthony. Your uncle, Steve and your aunt Peggy” 

Sarah gave a small wave and covered her smiling face. 

“Hey there” Tony bent down to Sarah’s level.

“Oh congratulations!” Peggy gave Howard a hug. 

“You named her after Mom” Steve grabbed your hand and for the first time in a long time, you let your tears fall. 

Steve pulled you into a hug and you melted into the familiar feeling of comfort in your big brother’s arms.

Bucky stood by the front door and he hadn’t moved a muscle. 

Being in the same room with you made him feel like himself again. And watching you all have a reunion made his heart hurt. He felt dejected. Because he knew... He knew that he would never be able to have a spot in your life. Because Howard would never make that mistake again. 

Howard wasn’t going to let Bucky hurt you the way Bucky hurt Maria. He couldn’t lose another person like that again. Especially not you. 

So Bucky stood there. He could feel the happy emotions coming from everyone but he could never have that. Never again.

[onekisstotakewithme]

what's your favourite throwaway line about peggy hunnicutt

- she’s five one (that’s my height)

- that time she got poison oak

- real estate broker margaret hunnicutt thank you

- tried to fix the sink herself, flooded the kitchen

- tried to make jam, ruined the stove

how do you not love the bisexual disaster that is Peggy Hayden Hunnicutt I ask??