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foldingfittedsheets · 4 days ago

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One of the most memorable speeches I've ever heard was given at my beloved's graduation. They attended a pretty crunchy school natural medicine. They went for acupuncture but they also had many degrees including nutrition, naturopathic medicine, and most importantly to this story: midwifery.

The common consensus across campus was that the midwives operated on their own frequency which is a nice way to say they were usually really weird, even by the standards of a pretty alternative crowd of people. Not weird in a bad way. But weird nonetheless. They straddled the boundary between life and death and it changed them.

I had never experienced a midwife before the ceremony which is why I didn't think anything of the fact that a midwife stepped up to give the graduation speech. My friends nearby had a stir of repressed amusement and elbowing each other which did puzzle me slightly.

The speech began as a story, which I heartily approved of. The midwife related an experience in which a woman told her that during her first birth she had screamed too much and used up her energy in that instead of pushing and the midwife, to the collective masses assembled to watch a solemn ceremony, said, "I told her this time she would need to scream with her vagina."

The audience was slightly stunned by this, myself included. I scanned the crowd to see dropped jaws and wide eyes. It was such a bold statement to make in an academic setting and no one quite knew what to make of it.

The midwife continued unperturbed.

She related that many dads didn't know what to do during the birthing process and that this particular dad chose to chant over and over, "You're gonna be huge, you're gonna be huge," as his wife screamed with her vagina to birth their child. The midwife mused that she didn't know if he was talking to their child or his wife or if he even registered what he was saying in that moment.

Then the subject strayed toward how the student body had strained and striven toward this goal, this endgame that was the result of sleepless nights, hard work, and camaraderie. The speech seemed to have moved onto more solid ground and traditional graduation reminiscences. The crowd settled, thinking the worst had passed.

But as the midwife wrapped up she said, "As you go forth into the world, pushed out by this noble institution to help the masses, just remember one thing," she paused and the audience held their breath while the beat drew out before she finally whispered:

"You're gonna be huge."

There was a roar of astonished laughter as her speech neatly tied their graduation into a metaphor for being birthed unto the world and we finally understood the point of her anecdote.

The speech lives in infamy in all our collective memories. Years later my beloved's dad will still be like, "Remember that bizarre graduation speech?"

And it was. It was bizarre. But I'll say this. I've attended a lot of graduations, and I don't remember any of the speeches half so well as I do that one.

#ramblies #funny #speech #graduation #writing #ffs foibles #story #funny story #graduation speech

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pellucid-constellations · 3 months ago

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Trial and Error

Pairing: Azriel x Reader

Summary: Based on the request: "Azriel with single mom reader? I feel like being a single mom in ACOTAR would be tricky as hell… reader comes from autumn court and flees to night court because she got pregnant out of marriage? 😯 the shame"

Word count: 2.2k

Warnings: A little angst

a/n: Okay this has taken over my brain. I hope you enjoy it!! You can read the previous little part here and part three here

Main Masterlist ♡

“And what would happen then?”

“I suppose then we would have to turn into giants, wouldn’t we?”

“Giants. Really?” Melanie deadpanned as if she hadn’t just unraveled the most incoherent line of questioning you’d ever heard. Her new favorite game was “what if,” and you were apparently awful at it.

“Well—” you began, pretending to think as you leaned against the counter and tapped your chin. “I guess we could just learn how to fly instead. That way we could go collect the, um… bunnies from the tops of the clouds.”

“It’s cats, mommy, not bunnies. Why would a bunny be on a cloud?”

“You are so right.”

You pushed off the counter and continued restocking the shelves of the small apothecary that had employed you for the past few years. You had started out in Velaris working at a few small bars, but that hadn’t lasted long when they discovered you were pregnant. You had earned enough money to get a small apartment at that point, and you just so happened to find one above an apothecary owned by a rather wicked old woman.

Lucky for you, she was a wicked old woman who no longer wanted to run her apothecary or deal with the space above it. So, you got a job and a place to live without many questions asked—a two-for-one miracle.

“Maybe we could ask Nyx to take us up to the clouds,” Melanie pondered as she fiddled with a bundle of cloves by the register.

“Who’s Nyx, sweetie?” you mindlessly asked.

“A boy in my class. He has wings. He told me he can’t fly very high yet, but soon he’ll be able to.”

You inhaled sharply through your nose.

There were probably several boys in her class who had wings and were unrelated to the Illyrian man occupying your thoughts, right?

You hummed in contemplation. “I don’t know, Melanie. Maybe Nyx could take you, but I might be too big for him to bring me up to the clouds.”

“Oh, good idea, mommy! Nyx’s daddy can fly too and he can bring you. Or he has two uncles that could.” Your daughter stuck two fingers in the air with pride. “I wish I had wings. Mommy, did my daddy have wings?”

You shook your head and abandoned the box at your feet to brush your daughter’s hair back instead. Going to school had opened doors to many questions you had been dreading, and Melanie’s questions about her dad had been coming in waves.

“Your daddy didn’t have wings,” you began, looping a finger around her red curls. “But he did have hair just like yours.”

Melanie tilted her head to the side. “Did you love my daddy? Nyx drew a picture at school of his mommy and daddy and said they love each other very much. Like as much as you love me.”

You fought back a sigh. Nyx was causing you a plethora of issues and you hadn’t even met the kid. “Sometimes families look different,” you explained, running your hands down to brush off the dust on Melanie’s clothes that she’d surely obtained from playing in the apothecary. “I didn’t love your daddy, but that’s just because I had so much love saved up for you.”

“Hmm…I hope you can have someone to love like how Nyx’s mommy has his daddy,” Melanie said after a small pause. And then she swung off the counter and started trekking up the stairs to the apartment as if she hadn’t just aged ten years with her statement.

You blinked at the space she left, baffled by your five-year-old’s abruptness. She had only been at school for a week and was making revelations about your life that even you struggled to come to terms with. You let out a small sound of disbelief and made to follow your daughter up the stairs when the bell above the front door chimed.

“Sorry, we’re closed for the—”

A boot heel clicking silenced your call.

His shadows came in before him, dark swirls instantly sweeping along the walls and wrapping up around the front counter. They didn’t touch you, but there was a hesitance about them that suggested they wanted to. You tore your gaze from their behavior to meet the eyes of the Illyrian from the school—the one you hadn’t seen since and definitely not because you were avoiding all situations where he could spot you.

“Hello,” Azriel greeted with a calmness that was not reciprocated. “Are you closed? I can come back another time.”

Every thought tumbled out of your brain. You had forgotten—almost—how intimidating he was. Not just in sheer size, but in the way he held himself, in the sharp planes of his face that smoothed into softness in the exact places they should.

His wings pressed in towards his back as he took another step forward. The floor groaned beneath his weight.

“Oh, um—” you uttered along with the straining floor. “We are—technically. But I can help you find something. Or place an order for you. No big deal.”

“I wouldn’t want to keep you if you’re closed,” Azriel stressed.

“No, no, it’s okay,” you nervously laughed. Act more normal. Act like there’s nothing… abnormal about you. “Anything for someone from Melanie’s school. What are you looking for?”

Azriel hummed, his eyes lightning. “Ah, so you do remember me. I was wondering.”

Was he looking at you strangely? Azriel kept trailing his gaze around the room and letting it land on your face, evaluating you… profiling you?

You were being ridiculous.

“Of course I do. You gave me great intel on the teacher. I don’t come until the bell rings now.” You rocked back on your heels and shifted your fidgeting hands behind your back. “Was there something specific I could help you with?”

Azriel ignored your question for the second time. “Is that why I haven’t seen you? You come later?”

Was he looking for you?

A strange combination of excitement and trepidation made your stomach drop.

Another nervous laugh. Your palms were sweating. “I guess so. There’s a lot to be done here so I usually wait until the last minute to close up shop and pick her up. That’s why your tip was so helpful.”

Azriel narrowed his eyes in a way that echoed concern, but you refused to read into it. You balanced up onto your toes and fell back onto the soles of your feet.

You could tell he wanted to say more about something—to ask more questions unrelated to the apothecary. But he stopped himself and the restraint was clear in the tenseness of his shoulders.

“I get headaches,” Azriel shared. “Awful ones. I’ve tried healing magic and a few medicinal remedies, but I was hoping to find something herbal. Could you help me with that?”

You breathed a sigh of relief and began rifling through a cabinet to your left. “I may have just the thing. I had terrible migraines when I was pregnant and it took me six tries to get this recipe perfect, but I think it would do the trick for you. I almost hate to share it because I was the one that had to suffer through all the bad batches, but I guess that’s kind of my job.”

You pulled back from the cabinet with a small bottle in hand, a tiny rendition of your handwriting scrawled along the side. You rolled it in your hands for a moment until you saw the shimmering nature of the liquid inside, and then you held it out over the counter and offered Azriel a smile. He replicated it, but it was smaller and looked forced.

“You didn’t have anyone else to try it out on?” he asked.

The question twisted something deep within your chest, but you only grinned and ignored the tightness of your jaw. “Who better than the one with the migraines herself?”

Azriel breathed a laugh through his nose, his eyes not leaving yours. “I suppose that’s true.”

The flecks in his eyes had you paralyzed, unable to move as his gaze held yours. You were breathless, fist tightening around the small tonic still held out in front of you as Azriel reached forward and grabbed it. His skin brushed yours. You shivered.

Azriel’s lips parted to speak. “Where are you—”

A loud thump from upstairs cut him off.

Azriel started, his chin clipping up and his body tensing. He quickly looked back down to you with a panicked question in his eyes.

You fought for the words to say. If you revealed it was only Melanie, he would know where you lived—another piece of information you liked to keep close. But if you didn’t tell him, that could lead to something worse. He looked about ready to bolt up the stairs and battle your five-year-old.

The decision was made for you when Melanie came bounding down the steps with a bowl in one hand and a large wooden spoon in the other.

“Mommy,” she began with a lax posture that did not match the room. “Can I—Oh, hi, Mr. Azriel. What’re you doing at my house?”

Melanie’s interpretation of his name included an extra syllable, and she was still working on pronouncing Zs, but the Illyrian ignored that. “Your house?” he asked. His attention was fully on Melanie, but he sent you a raised brow.

“Um, yes. We live above the apothecary. Melanie sometimes forgets that it’s a business downstairs and not just a private playground,” you explained, rubbing your forearm in discomfort. Azriel tracked the movement.

“Ah, well, it does seem rather fun down here. I can see the confusion.”

Melanie perked up, waving the spoon in front of your face. “See, mommy? There’s lots to play with.”

One of the tightly bound coils in your chest loosened as you shot Azriel a look. “Great. You’re encouraging her.”

“I’ve been an uncle for a few years,” Azriel smiled, rolling the headache tonic between his hands. “I’ve gotten quite good at encouraging terrible things.”

You laughed with a huff and placed a hand on Melanie’s head, bending down to meet her gaze. “Were you going to ask me for dinner? I’ll be up in just a few minutes. I was just putting a few things away.”

“I know, mommy,” she nodded. Then, after a quick look at Azriel from the corner of her eye, she whispered, “Is Mr. Azriel having dinner with us? Nyx has been asking about when we have dinner and said to keep the question a secret, but maybe that’s why he’s here.”

A few feelings barraged you at once. Confusion over your daughter's words; fear that the night court’s inner circle seemed to be asking questions about you; regret that you had given into Melanie’s pleas to go to school so readily.

But Nyx was just a child—perhaps he asked everyone when they had dinner and Melanie was just connecting dots that weren’t there.

But maybe that wasn’t the case.

Maybe Azriel came to the apothecary specifically because you worked there and he was trying to gather intel for the Autumn Court. It had to be common knowledge that the daughter of one of Beron’s men had run away. But Night and Autumn weren’t on the best terms. That’s why you chose Velaris to—

You couldn’t do this right now.

Not in front of Melanie and certainly not in front of Azriel.

You pressed your lips into a firm line and whispered back, “No, he came to buy something from mommy’s shop. It’s just us for dinner, like always.”

A sliver of disappointment fractured Melanie’s gaze. She hooked her chin over her shoulder and sent Azriel a small smile before disappearing into the apartment once more. You wiped your palms on the front of your pants as you stood, taking a breath to calm your raging anxiety.

“Sorry, she…”

“It’s alright,” Azriel dismissed. You looked at him for the first time in a few moments, his expression pinched and difficult to read. “I’m around Nyx a lot. You don’t have to apologize.”

A beat of silence.

The room was cloaked in unrealized tension. You weren’t sure if it was fueled by suspicion or something else. For you, it was, but the wistful way Azriel continued to linger on your figure was read as something else. Something older, more entrenched.

“It’s just two coppers.” You broke the silence, gesturing to the tonic still held between Azriel’s fingers—his scarred fingers, you then realized. You looked back up to his face.

“Only two? After all it took for you to make it?”

You felt your mouth twist at the corner despite yourself. “I don’t know if you’ve seen this place, but it’s not exactly up to par with the rest of the apothecaries. I’m surprised you found it, to be honest. My customers are typically ancient fae with boils and warts.”

“Sorry to disappoint,” Azriel teased. He searched through his pocket and placed a small sum of money on the counter between you. “Five coppers—for interrupting dinner.”

“I hadn’t even—”

“Goodbye, y/n.”

You watched him go, not noticing the shadow that lingered in the corner.

part three

#azriel x reader #azriel x you #azriel x female!reader #azriel x y/n #azriel fanfic #azriel shadowsinger #azriel acotar #acotar #acotar fanfiction #azriel fluff

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