#I JUST WANNA READ IT I WANNA TALK TO MY FRIENDS AGAIN :(

[atleastpleasetelephone]

Little Darling

Epilogue

It's 1997, and Elvis is still alive and well. He quit music in 1972 after a successful world tour, and now he runs Presley Studios - teaching people karate across America. His daughter and grandchildren are regular visitors at Graceland, and when he’s in Memphis he likes to do a little teaching. His life is quieter now, though. Most of the Mafia have gone - going to live their own lives - and after his divorce from his second wife, Elvis is sworn off women for good. Will a Welsh girl with a wicked sense of humour be the one to make him break his promise to himself not to fall in love again?

Need to catch up? Go here.

Pairing: Old Man!Elvis x OC - Tegan, a Welsh girl he meets at karate.

Word count: 1.3K

TWs: Just a little dirty talk really.

A/N: Well, this is the end! Thanks to everyone who has interacted with this fic - it was a labour of love and I have cherished every single comment, reblog and message 💕

When Tegan wakes the next morning she feels the events of the night before in her body before she remembers them. As they start to come back to her, slowly at first and then more and more rapidly she feels a smile spreading across her face. She’d enjoyed last night. A lot. She rolls over to find Elvis already sat up in bed, reading. Groaning and stretching, she tries to wake herself up properly. It’d been really late when Jerry had finally left their bed for his own; they’d spent hours talking together about all sorts of things. 

“Mornin’ sunshine.”

Elvis closes the book and puts it down on the bedside table, looking at his girlfriend as she peers back through half-open eyes. 

“Mmmm. ‘Raur.”

“How ya feelin’?”

She closes one eye and squints at him through the other. “Thoroughly fucked.”

That earns her a belly laugh, one of her absolute favourite Elvis reactions. “Well that’s coz ya were, baby.”

She closes both eyes and puts her face in her hands, giggling. “I loved it,” she admits, still hiding. 

“Hmmm. Well it was a damn good Christmas gift, considerin’ ya didn’t even know Jerry was comin’ until the night before.”

She looks up, cautiously. “You think I’m a slut, for doing that? I only just met the guy…”

Elvis shakes his head, leaning down to kiss the top of hers. “Baby, I used ta fuck a different girl every night on some tours. Met ‘em, liked ‘em, made ‘em cum. Plus I know ya only jus’ met ‘im, but Jerry’s been my best friend fer years.”

Tegan thinks about this as she slowly sits up. “You ever do this with Stella?”

He blinks in surprise. “Uh… no.”

“Oh.”

“I uh… she wanted the picket fence life.”

She shifts to lean against him. “What kind of life do you want?”

“One with you in it, honey.”

She smiles against his pyjama top. “Me too.”

“But, uh, not one with Jerry… y’know…”

“I’m not sure I do know.”

Elvis sighs. “Yer makin’ me say it, again.”

“I mean, last night you told me you and Jerry used to take it in turns to fuck women you met on tour. And now you’re going all shy again?”

“I was a little drunk last night, darlin’.”

Tegan looks up at his face from her position with her head against his shoulder. “What’re you trying to say, ‘raur? Spit it out.”

Another deep sigh. “Last night was fun. But I don’t want Jerry as a permanent fixture in our bedroom.”

Tegan raises an eyebrow. 

“I don’t want him fuckin’ ya all the time!” Elvis snaps, exasperated. “Yer mine. I don’t mind if he borrows ya, under supervision… on special occasions y’know. But not…” he sighs again and waves a finger around in a circle. “This… ain’t a thing.”

Tegan smiles at his possessiveness. She feels like she ought to be offended by him talking about her like she’s a rare library book, but instead it makes her feel all warm inside. 

“I enjoyed last night a lot,” she begins, wrapping her arm around him. “I’m glad we did it. And if you and Jerry want to do it again before he leaves, then I’d be down. But I don’t want anything more than that. One boyfriend is enough.”

It’s Elvis’ turn to raise an eyebrow. “Ya wanna do it again?”

She giggles into his shoulder. “Mmm. Yeah.”

“Well, we’ll see about that, little girl…”

***

Elvis, Tegan and Jerry have fun together again more than once, but after Elvis’ massive New Year’s Eve party Jerry goes back to LA, and although they both miss him they’re glad to be back to just the two of them for a while. They get professional photos taken of the two of them with Coffi, and the best one - where they have forgotten the camera and are just staring into one another’s eyes, giggling over some shared joke or other - hangs with the other family shots on the wall in the living room of Graceland. They share their time between the mansion and the apartment, and despite Elvis’ best attempts to persuade her to give it up, Tegan continues working at the recording studio, though she drops down to three days a week as a compromise. She finally takes her grading seriously, and by the end of the year she’s a purple belt. Elvis is proud of her, but he still thinks she could practise more at home. 

He travels less for work now, feeling content staying in Memphis for months at a time. There are still times when he has to pay one of the studios on the other side of the country a visit, and Tegan can’t always take time off work to go with him. He misses her like crazy, but she’s secretly a little relieved to have time to herself, though of course she doesn’t tell him that. 

One day after a trip to Kansas, he presents her with a big box with a pink bow on the outside. 

“Jus’ somethin’ for ya for next time I’m away.”

Tegan’s mind boggles at the possibilities, but nothing she thinks of is what she eventually finds in the box. 

“It’s…a bear?”

“Squeeze ‘im.”

Tegan puts both hands around the middle of the teddy and squeezes.

“Daddy misses ya, Tegan bach.” The teddy bear says, in Elvis’ unmistakable drawl. 

Tegan squeals, then giggles, then squeezes it again to see if it does the same thing, which it does. 

“He’s from build-a-bear,” Elvis explains. “Got ‘im from the second store in the country. Ya make ‘im yerself, put a little heart in him…” he smiles, bashfully. “...an’ ya can record a little thing for ‘im ta say. Got them ta open the store in the middle of the night fer me so I didn’t get papped doin’ it.”

“Aww ‘raur!” Tegan throws an arm around Elvis’ neck, cuddling him close and holding the bear out to the side slightly to avoid squashing him. “He’s adorable. You’re adorable.”

“Glad ya like ‘im, honey.”

They pull apart and she looks down at the bear again. “He needs a name.”

Elvis’ arm slips around her waist and he presses his lips to her ear. “Why don’tcha call ‘im Elvis?”

Tegan pushes on his chest, laughing. “Don’t be filthy now! This is a nice, cute bear!”

“Me? Filthy? I don’t know whatcha mean, Queenie.”

He’s desperately trying to keep a straight face, but Tegan can see his eyes shining with amusement. 

“You’re giving me a bear to keep me company when you’re away, and you want me to name him Elvis?” Her eyebrow is raised and her hand is on her hip, but she’s struggling to keep from laughing, too. 

“Uh huh. Ya can cuddle up ta him in bed when I’m not there.”

“Right, right, yeah of course. That’s all you meant.”

“Sure.” His lip is quivering at this point, as he tries desperately not to grin. “I mean I wouldn’t want ta get between a girl an’ her bear, and whatever else she might wanna do with him when she’s missin’ me…”

“Elvis Presley.” Tegan uses her best school teacherish tone, but eventually the pressure of trying not to laugh gets to be too much and they both burst into peals of laughter. 

“What?!”

She hits him with the bear, inadvertently making the voice go off and their hysterics even worse. 

“Hey, you’ll hurt ‘im!”

“I’ll hurt you in a minute!”

They keep giggling as Elvis pulls her in close, pressing his forehead against hers. 

“Yer always makin’ me laugh, little darlin’,” he breathes. “‘M glad I came ta teach that karate class.”

“I’m glad too, ‘raur.”

“Don't know what I'd do without ya, Queenie.”

She smirks. “Well I can get you your own bear if you really want…”

***

Taglist:

@vintagepresley @arg-xoxo @from-memphis-with-love @msamarican @blursedblegh @returntopresley @eapep @everythingelvispresley @i-r-i-n-a-a @sissylittlefeather @arrolyn1114 @jhoneybees @cattcb @polksaladava @lookingforrainbows @jkdaddy01 @ccab @epthedream69 @lustnhim @elvisslut @pomtherine @that-hotdog @ladelinee @angschrof @fairybloodsucker @deltafalax @makethemorning @elviswhore69 @ilovequeen978 @wildhorseinkansas @pocketfulofpresley @dkayfixates @iloveelvisss @kxnnxy

[koenigami]

and the nights were as dark as my baby, half as beautiful too. tags : hurt/comfort, fluff, fem!reader wc : 1k synopsis : Togame's not a great texter, but for you, he will always make an exception.

Togame's major trigger in a relationship is when you refuse. to. openly. communicate.

He doesn't blame you, though. He would never! He's aware that sharing your feelings freely can be simply a lot, and maybe even scary sometimes.

But the moment he sees you sitting on your shared couch, the TV playing your favourite show yet your gaze so far away as you stare into nothingness-

Images of his childhood friend suffering in silence cross his mind. Memories of past mistakes and his incompetence at helping the person closest to him, and letting both of them drown in loneliness and bitterness.

No. He won't let that happen again. He won't let you get consumed by your own thoughts and doubts, won't you brush every worry of his away with a forced smile and false reassuring words because you fear that he might run away from you at the slightest inconvenience.

It just has been a rougher week than usual, too many things gone wrong, too little right. You still tried to move on because no matter how awful a situation may be, they never last forever. Or so you have though. Because somehow you feel them still ingrained so deeply in your head, and they make you rethink and relive every single mistake that you've done the past few days in a way that makes you wonder whether there is something that you can actually do right for once.

You don't notice Togame disappear from the doorway and slip into the bedroom, too busy with slipping further into a downward spiral.

That is until the sudden and short vibrating sound of your phone pulls you back into reality. With a strained huff, you lean forward to grab it from the coffee table, and as soon as the sender's name on the display appears, you freeze in place.

Togame did not tell you that he'd gone somewhere, neither have you heard him leave the house, so why is he- Oh.

'Wanna tell me what's happening inside that pretty little head of yours?'

You stare at his text for a few seconds, rereading each word as if you were trying to learn his sentence by heart. The phone in your grip shakes the slightest as you feel your fingers twitch nervously, unsure about whether to answer or ignore him, meanwhile Togame sees the little dots beside your name appear and disappear over and over again.

Why would he let you burden him with your silly problems? Some of them minor, others nothing but a mere creation of your imagination and overthinking tendencies. He cares. He cares. He cares, is what you keep repeating to yourself once you decide to type out two simple words.

- 'A lot.'

Togame's glad that you can't see him right now. The way he jolts instantly, quickly sitting up once his phone pings with an incoming message from you. It feels as if he had travelled a few months back into the past. A time when every single text of yours, every touch, every smile that you shot his way, made his heart beat erratically and plaster a stupid lopsided grin on his face.

The excitement and giddiness of your love has slowly become something quiet and soft. A constant that makes him feel comforted and safe. The kind of love that he knows you need, especially in times like these.

'I see.. Wanna talk about it? It's okay if you don't'

Warmth spreads through your chest as you take slow deliberate breaths, each one shakier than the other. Never one to pressure or rush you, always a gentle voice, and a calm aura. That is your Jo.

And so you let your thoughts run freely as your fingers tap over your screen. With enough time to contemplate over your words, express your feelings properly while clumsily trying to explain some of them that you yourself truly don't quite understand, you feel your eyes sting.

He knew that this is what you needed.

Togame anxiously stares at the last text he has just sent three minutes ago, left on read. His own chest feels so much lighter knowing that your own hopefully feels just the same. Yet as he stares at his unanswered message, he wonders if he might have crossed a line. He starts feeling like a cowardly idiot for making you sit out there in the living room, all alone with all these overwhelming emotions while he's lazily lying in your shared bed.

Soon, the sudden noise of quick steps padding against the floor appears until the door bursts open. His body is quicker than his mind to register what is happening when you throw yourself on him, making him let out a breathless oomph. The bed and mattress creak and jump, but Togame immediately has a steady hold on you as his arms instinctively wrap around your waist.

"Hey-" His forehead creases in worry when he feels you shake, soft sniffles and sobs muffled by his chest.

But when you lift your head and smile at him, such a sweet, beautiful and real smile, he knows that you'll be fine despite the tears that keep flowing over your puffy cheeks. He gently wipes them away, not minding that they're immediately replaced by new ones.

The lightest shiver makes you jolt against him when his hand slips under your shirt and slowly caresses the skin along your back, his thumb softly moving back and forth. His chest rumbles with a deep chuckle when you groan annoyedly before almost aggressively wiping with your sleeves at your face to get rid of the overflowing emotions that somehow never cease to escalate when Togame's in your proximity.

At the same time, the world always becomes a quiet place when you're like this. In his arms, in safety and comfort, with nothing left but both your beating hearts and the feelings that you harbour inside them for each other.

"Thank you, Jo. I love you." You whisper as if it was a secret, and watch how Togame's eyes soften as if you'd said it for the first time again.

With a hand on the back of your head, fingers tangling into the soft strands of hair, he pulls you so close that you can feel his lips move against yours as he speaks.

"Love you more, doll."

[puppyeared]

i like him

[bixels]

I'm not getting into The Giving Tree discourse...

[xxplastic-cubexx]

Hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii, I recently went into the x-men and I found my own dead with Charles and Erik AND I NEED READ MORE OF THEM BUT I SO LOST AFTER POWERS AND HOUSE OF X SO I DON'T KNOW WHERE CONTINUE, can u help me?

(alsoIlikeyoursdrawingsiwishbeingsoconstantwithmycontentlikeu)

i'll be very candid with you my friend: i'm totally lost too !!!!!!! your comic-reading journey is about as green as mine and so i cant personally give you a super great guide- but beautiful people on the internet exist who've done most of the dirty work for us when sorting through the stories you 'should' read so i'm borrowing them to help us both

you can read this article to read about one person's advice with exploring krakoa and- in their opinion- its most 'significant' stories, though to summarize the issues they recommend looking into:

House of X/Powers of X (which you should have already done)

X of Swords event

Hellfire Gala

Inferno

X Lives and X Deaths of Wolverine

Second Hellfire Gala

Third Hellfire Gala

Fall of the House of X/Rise of the Powers of X (also should have already done, however...) +Single issue: X-Men (2021 series) #35 aka Uncanny X-Men #700 is featured at the end of the FoX omnibus, though the omnibus excludes an extra bit at the end involving a cliffhanger for Charles's fate after he's arrested

if you want to dig a little deeper though, you can check out this article from another individual which includes another wave of 'relevant' (word used loosely as some can be considered more poignant than others) krakoa stories and stories related to it or set during the period.

it's a lot longer and more in depth than the last article, so again i only really rec peaking at this one depending on how deep you wanna go, or if you decide you want to explore more after reading the more 'key' stories. def wouldn't hurt to give it a glance just in case you read some summaries that pique your interest!

all in all, don't take these as concrete rules or guides to follow: comics are meant to be fun, these are just good starting points if you're feeling lost or overwhelmed. at the end of the day, you decide ultimately what you want to read and which stories interest you the most

happy reading !

[silverware-is-interesting]

i think i've drawn lankmann a few times. just a couple

[stop-breaking-my-heart-dragonage]

This. This. This entire conversation with Morrigan actually makes me want to sob. She and my Tabris always becomes close friends over the course of DAO; that, paired with the fact that my Tabris always romances Alistair, makes everything about this hurt so much more when you take DAO's ending into account.

Her confusion over why my Tabris didn't send her away. Why she didn't abandon her after they learned of Flemeth's plans. Why Tabris went out of her way to slay Flemeth and bring her the true grimoire. She asks Tabris why, and is baffled when the answer is, "I did it because I'm your friend," as if it's that simple.

The way Morrigan looks at the warden, the way her voice cracks when she says, "I want you to know that while I may not always prove... worthy... of your friendship, I will always value it."

She knows how this will end; Flemeth sent her with the wardens with the end goal of stopping the blight and obtaining the old god soul through the dark ritual. Morrigan knows that Alistair and Tabris are the only Grey Wardens here, and assuming they don't find more, one of them will have to die defeating the archdemon unless they agree to do the dark ritual.

With that context, her asking Alistair, "And what if a Grey Warden has forced to choose between the Warden he loved and ending the Blight? What should his choice be?" suddenly has so much subtext weaved through the words that I'm gonna start foaming at the mouth. She's practically telling Alistair that a warden has to die. She's scrutinizing his reaction to find any hint that suggests he would agree to the dark ritual in order to save himself and the woman he loves. And when he doesn't choose, she has her answer.

Morrigan made comments to Tabris about him, almost hopeful that their relationship was just a physical thing between them and not actually riddled with feelings... and then gives disapproval when Tabris says she loves him.

She doesn't want the warden to die; hell, she doesn't want Alistair to die, either; whether because she does actually care about him or because she knows it'll break her friend's heart if she loses him, or both!

Things would be so much easier if the only two Grey Wardens left to defeat the blight didn't fall in love, wouldn't they, Morrigan?

She knows that in the end, no matter the outcome, she will lose the woman she called sister and it's devastating.

Morrigan, who has never known true friendship. Who grew up isolated in the woods with an abusive mother and terrible implications for her future. Who discovered said mother planned to take over her body just as she did with her other daughters. Who doesn't understand kindness as it was rarely given to her without a catch. Who isolates herself from the others in camp. Who finally has a companion she cares about... and in the end, if her plan works and the dark ritual is completed, she'll end up pregnant and alone and wearing Tabris' resentment like a tender wound on her heart.

Or Tabris will reject the ritual, and will die to the archdemon.

Or her lover will.

I just- the dynamic between the warden, romanced Alistair, and Morrigan is so good and painful and rich that I'm gnawing on furniture as we speak.

[lucabyte]

🐮

[bookwyrminspiration]

hey, as the page number guy, i was wondering if you could find a quote for me. it's from unraveled

(joke in honor of you still not having unraveled if that's not clear)

oh you think you're soooo funny oh he he look at wuil quil doesn't have unraveled yet they can't read it they don't know what happened even though basically every single on tof their friends has read it probably like six timesby now they know the plot by heart but quil doesn't because quil wont look at spoilers and their books always take forever to arrive because they sacrifice their time oney and effort to go to thoae eevents that onobua else goes ot to gget us all new keeper info and so they cant read the new nook ery fast st that so soooo funny tee theee i agonna poke fun at uil and mock the fact they cant read unraveled and theyre so lonely and alone and all they have for cojmaptn is their finals and assignmens wheil atll the rest of their frinds are rading the new boka dn having fun and making memories meanwhile quil hasnt been in the kotlc tag for weeks because they dont trust everyoen to tag their spoilers so theyre soooo out of the loop isnt that soooo funny there coudlve been a new fandom wide joke and quil doesnt knwew and everybody elsedoes and thaey all laugh at quil ha ha ha for not knowing when quil is so nice and kpind and loving and helpful and soooo sweet and everyone should be so niceys to them and and they just wanna be included but they caaant becasue the shipping takes for eer but they do it for you they do it foe ryou and yet you mock them for it ohhhh they cdont know the pages they cant see the pages silly silly quil so left out and excluded and sad wet kitten pathetic man cant read they dsee all their mutuals scerams ing and they dont know they cant know gotta gotta poke fun at quil tee teee im soooooo funny >:[

[seiwas]

might go on a ~kinda semi-hiatus for a few days! will mostly just run on queue (like i always do anyway) and might take a while to reply/interact!

wishing everyone a good week ahead though!! 🫶🏻

[lizzerswillpoststuffmethinks]

Spoiler: I didn't go to sleep. But I will shortly after this post

[diabolicjoy]

it’s just hitting me this year how truly alone i am - i only had like 2 close friends since i was 14-15 and it took me a while to realize that one of them is kind of a bad friend to me and the second one is slowing but surely drifting away from me/doesn’t seem very interested or invested in my friendship anymore as she has many other friends and i don’t and all that is actually killing me inside since i love and miss her so much and the prospect of making new actual friends (not just party friends) and letting people into my life is so so terrifying mostly because i’m so embarrassed of who i am and how little i have achieved/how many ‘issues’ i have… i can’t stand being in bad friendships anymore i had my fair share of bullies-as-friends during high school and i know i’m almost 23 but these things are hard to get over. if i ever make a new friend again and they’re an asshole to me it’s gonna kill me actually. i feel 13 again crying because i don’t have friends !! it’s so pathetic!! fuck!!!

[saeshiraw]

tired girl hours i’m just ranting bcos i don’t have enough time to cry

[appreciatingtokrev]

hey guys do y’all remrmber me ..... i am alive and doing well 👍👍

[xxplastic-cubexx]

thank you so much for spreading comics love and (how to read them advice) advice!! helps to cope with how hard and/or expensive they are to get where i live while also motivating me enough to look for solutions or seize the opportunity if i do see one at some point <3

of course !!! what's a community if we ain't doin community things yk :]] ik comics can be kinda confusing or just. Overwhelming so if i can help in any way with pickin em up an readin em im glad to do so !!!!

ive only just started picking up comics again after maaaaybe just shy of a decade so it'll be a fun journey for all of us ^^

[marsixm]

im trying to wrap my head around why i dont get enthusiastic about reddit style fiction (not a dig but a descriptor) like scp and shit like that, bc its not that i can’t enjoy them but i think its like… when stuff is framed as if it were real, but its fiction, its like, well KNOWING its fiction eliminates a huge element of the intrigue, but also, crucially, i like character-driven stories, or at least stories WITH characters. but i also like it when things are interesting for said characters to experience, like, i want the ghosts and monsters and conspiracies but i want the characters to be character-ing, yknow? not that i dont enjoy slice of life and… what would u call the first thing, non-character specific horror? idk? but i prefer when its both. its like i love kirk and spock but also i do enjoy watching them Experience Situations when i watch star trek. i enjoy the idea of spooky national forest monsters that arent real but experiencing it alongside a character would be better, and i want more trans and gay characters whose lives are clearly trans and gay but i want a plotline to unfold too