#I finish it and on New Year’s Day Kyle announces they’re coming back.

[twomystdunstans]

excited for my fucked up kfam relisten but I’m also scared not only because of what might happen to me but that it might shift something in the balance of the universe . Genuinely .

[libraford]

The short version: We had a serial thief at the flower shop. She’s retired recently and I think that due to Covid she really means it this time. 

The long version? hoooo boy, here we go.

This story, and others, are viewable on Tablo

There are rules and there are rules.

In dealing with shoplifting in retail, there are rules on how one engages with a thief. The handbook, if there were one, would consist of a single word. 

Don't. 

Don't pursue, don't interrogate, don't accuse. Let them take the merchandise, let them get away. Let them return the Cricut machine for an equivalent amount on a gift card to be exchanged once again for drugs. 

Let them. 

There is no handbook on how to handle Flower Thieves. Prior to working in a flower shop, I never thought that this was a problem. 

Life is surprising. 

 I'm sure some of you have figured that out by now. 

The Flower Thief is notorious, and she has a system. There are days when you simply know that she's going to be in. 

"Break the heads off the flowers before you throw them away," Grandpa will say. "She's going to be here tonight, I think." 

And sure enough, she would be. At 6:45, a quarter til we close- the Thief would announce her arrival. Loudly. 

"Heeeeey, baaaaaaby!" 

The very first time I encountered the Flower Thief, she came in through the back door. 

"Oh Hiiiii, Darlin'- ain't seen your face around here: you must be NEW! I'm Wren, you know- like the bird? Well, Kyle and I have an agreement that I come and work for y'all sometimes. You should take out this trash, it stinks to high heaven. Anyways, nice talkin' to ya, see ya later." 

I may only be a little bit psychic, but I've spent enough time around liars to know insincerity when I see it. Kyle, at the time, was the manager of our store and I have it on record that he's tried to throw her out of the building once or twice. 

While I was taking out the trash, her pile of purchase became so tall it towered over her. I watched Clark massively undercharge her for the sake of getting her to go away. 

She has a pattern.

She comes in during the design classes because she knows that when there's twenty people in the store, there's not enough people to watch her and make sure she's not stealing. "There's a class today," she asks as if it's not literally every Tuesday. "Don't worry I know you all wanna get out of here on time." 

The Flower Thief announces her presence in a grand way and then makes her way to the back to grab a trash bag or an empty box and then proceeds to bury any spare parts she finds in the cooler in the trash bag, hiding them under the things that she's actually buying. 

After that, she checks the garbage cans for things we might have thrown away that will last another three days and stuffs them underneath her other ill-gotten goods. 

Just when you think she's finished, she'll go through her pile of flowers and say: "You know what? I don't need this eucalyptus." And she'll go back into the cooler with it, stuff it in her purse, and walk back to the register. 

And when she's all done being sneaky, she asks one of us to come ring her out. 

This is the part that no one wants to do. Because ringing out the Flower Thief means haggling with the Flower Thief. 

"Oh baaby, you know I don't pay those prices." 

"Oh baaaby, I only pay $19 for roses." 

"Oh baaaaaaaaaby, those carnations were on special." 

She'll talk you down to under $100 with a sob story: 

"Oh baaaaby, you know I'm donating this spray to the family. It's for that woman you know- you know the one. She got herself murdered a couple nights ago? Two children and she was pregnant too! Pregnant! Can you believe it? Who murders someone with child? What's the world coming to? So I need a good discount to make sure we treat this family right because they got a looooong road ahead of them." 

"Oh baaaaaaby, you know this one's for that car crash over on Cleveland Avenue? I hear he was taking care of his dying father himself, so it's such a shame for him to go first like that." 

"Oh baaaaaaaaaaaaaaby, this is for that little boy that shot himself, isn't that sad?" 

Thank you, Sister Mary Loquacious. 

And you nod because you don't want to come off as an uncaring sociopath. And while you're nodding and adjusting the price for her sad, sad consequence and mulling over how good she is for donating to these people in their time of need, she steals some greens from the trash can and sticks them in her bag. 

She hands you crisp $100 bills. You check them and she makes jokes about how she printed them this morning. They're legit. Counterfeiting isn't why she went to prison. 

What she went to prison for was drug trafficking. 

"Do you need some help," you ask, trying to be a good citizen. 

"Oh no, I got it," she insists. "I'll make it in two trips. I'm stronger than I look!" 

And don't you dare get caught looking to see what she put in the bag or she will give you one hell of a lecture. 

By the time all of this has passed, the class will be over and there will two minutes left in the work day. She's spent thirty-seven minutes in the store. Your register is unbalanced because now you don't have enough small bills to balance it and only have one $100 bill to get you through tomorrow. 

And that's why there are rules. 

On occasion, a new person will break the rules not knowing that there's rules. One such occasion was when Clair decided to be helpful. 

"You know what? I don't need this eucalyptus," Wren said. 

"Oh! I'll put it back for you," Clair suggested. And before Wren could protest, it was out of Wren's hands and nowhere near her purse. 

It was mentioned to Sage, who only worked for us one summer, that Wren had failed to pay for something and she immediately chased her out into the street. 

Wren drives very fast. 

If you cross her too many times, she'll make sure you never forget it. One day, she stomped her way in through the front door, angry. 

"You ain't treated me better than a damn THIEF," screamed the Flower Thief. 

Grandpa, who was helping Blue make a wedding bouquet at the time, departed from the desk. "Beg pardon?"

"A thief! You been treating me like a thief ever since they made you manager and I'm sick of it! I see you bringing in your henchmen, following me in the cooler, chasing me down the street. Treat me with some damn respect." 

Words were exchanged. They were not kind. We thought we'd seen the end of her. 

But she was back one week later, doing the same damn thing. 

So now there are rules. 

If you make something and there's an excess of flowers left over from the pack, you have to make something out of the leftovers or she'll pick through them and stuff them in her bag. 

If you cannot make something out of them, you must throw them out. 

If you throw them out, you must break the heads off first. 

The trash cans must be emptied every night before 5:00. 

We do not keep trash bags in plain sight. 

Break down all empty boxes, or she will use them in place of trash bags. 

Do not leave any food or drink where she can find it. 

Do not leave any half-used rolls of floral tape where she can find it. 

Do not let her know anything about you- lest she use it against you. 

If you speak of a Thief, you summon a Thief- speak quietly, and never her name or you invite trouble. 

The basic rules one makes when dealing with pests. Or fairy-folk.

There are rules and there are rules and there are rules. 

If you want to keep a pest away, you make these sorts of rules. But if you want to get rid of a pest indefinitely, you have to remove their food source. And Wren's food source was her discount. 

You start exercising your right to say 'no' to a customer in small ways. 

She saw a bunch of carnations in the trash and said: 

"Oh baby, these are still good! I'll take them off your hands for you!" 

"They've been sitting without water for hours." 

"They're still good!" 

"They were out in the sun." 

"Oh baby, I've been working with flowers for 40 years and I know that these will still be fine for a couple of days!" She picks a bunch of them out of the trash and shoves it in my face. "See, it's still stiff- it's still good!" 

"Okay," I said. And before I could stop myself: "Full price."

Her eyes just about popped out of her skull. If it were just a little bit colder, I would have been able to see steam coming out of her ears. 

We stared at each other for about a minute, waiting for the other to flinch. She took the bunch away from my face and threw them back into the trash. While she was in the cooler, I took the liberty of snapping the heads off of them and burying them further into the garbage. 

And so began a war between the flower shop and the Flower Thief.

She came in: every single night. And each night, she got me. 

Again.

"Oh no, baby! These carns are supposed to be 39 cents a stem. I can bring up the email." 

"Sure." She brings up the email. "I see that they are 39 cents but... this was for Saturday." 

"Yea, and I bought those carns on Saturday and you charged me full price!" 

"Saturday." 

"Yeah." 

"You didn't buy these on Saturday. You bought them Friday." 

"Well I didn't know that they'd be on sale, so I need them for that price because I didn't know they'd be on sale." 

"The sales are one-day only. I can't adjust a sale from Friday to reflect Saturday's sale... on Sunday." 

She made a noise that reminds me somewhat of a cement mixer. 

 And again.

"I got a bad banner last time, can you print me a new one?" She shows me the banner in question. It's white. The 't' and the 'h' in 'mother' ran together. 

"Sure." 

"Okay, I need it to say 'Beloved Mother' and I want it in pink." 

"Sure." 

I print it. I ring her up $5. 

"Oh baaaaaaby, no, that one should be free." 

"Grandpa said- banners start at $5." 

"Oh, but you sold me a bad one last time." 

"We haven't sold you a banner in three weeks. How long have y'all had that body sitting in your cooler?" 

She grumbled, and paid. 

 And again. 

"I swear you been workin' every night this week! You must be tired," she said, nerves plain in her voice. "When do you get a day off?" 

"When the work is done." 

"That ain't what I'm askin'. When's your next day off, baby?"

"I stop working when the work is done, Wren." 

She narrows her eyes, which is a fun change from them bugging out of her skull like a fruit fly. "You don't ever get any days off?" 

"When the work stops, I rest."

 And again. 

"I'll be in and out, I know y'all want to get out of here on time," she said- announcing her presence to the entire class. She piled her stuff across the register counter and Grandpa began ringing her up. 

"Oh baby..." 

"No. We're doing away with the discounts." 

There are twenty people in the workshop for the class and Grandpa doesn't want to make a scene. She pulls her into the back, and I choose to make my instructions louder to mask the sound of them yelling. 

"So you're going to take your hypericum berries and you're going to cut the stem to about ten inches-" 

"How can you do this to me?" 

"And you're going to slowly fill the vase with these berries to kind of set the shape of the arrangement." 

"After all these years and this is how you treat me?" 

"Fun fact- you might know hypericum berries as their more common name: St John's Wort! St. John's Wort has been used as a medication for depression prior to modern medicine." You see- I, too, have taken notes from the Chattering Order.

"You can't do this to me," Wren said, stamping her feet like a toddler.

"But I wouldn't recommend eating them. However, they do smell somewhat like baked brown sugar." 

Stamp, stamp, stamp. 

Wren threw herself into the cooler and began putting a bulk of her flowers back. 

"This is robbery," I heard her say to Grandpa at the register. 

"Is it now?" 

 And again. 

She came in and immediately reached for a half-empty box of oasis bricks (the green sponge material that we use to hold flowers.) She said few words to me, few at all. She talked to Carrie about how she was going out to the country for awhile, to take care of her nephew's property. She needed to stock up. And oh- don't worry about it, she knows what she's doing. She's part of The Family.

She is in no manner of speaking, a member of The Family that owns this shop. Not even a third cousin. 

I saw her beeline for a rose I'd set in the trash. I picked it up, opened my mouth, and bit the head off of it. She stood in the middle of the workshop, absolutely stunned. 

Rose petals have the vague texture of arugula, by the way. Slightly sweeter, though. Tough to swallow in one go. 

She ran back into the cooler and didn't talk to me. 

I began taking down numbers. 

27 bricks of oasis. One pack of roses. Ten calla lilies. 1/2 pack of assorted greens. 

I punched the numbers in to the register. As if sensing something was amiss, she emerged from the cooler. 

"$54? What do I have that's $54?" 

"The oasis. They're $2 each." 

"Oh no baaaaaby, they're $1." 

"I can text Grandpa and ask her." 

"... that won't be necessary. Why are you charging me $22.50 for roses? You know my prices by now!" 

"22.50 is the price for a pack of roses." 

"22.50 is everybody prices." 

"Welcome to 'everybody.'" 

"I ain't paid a price increase in 7 years!" 

"The price of milk went up, Wren. So does everything else." 

She was seeing red, I knew it. There's a vein in her forehead that pops out when she's angry and it's the same shape as the river that runs through my home town. She sized me up, as if wondering if she could take me. 

I'm 256 pounds of 4H beef, and I have a knife. Try me. 

"I'm gonna call Kyle on this." 

"Do it." A lifetime of retail has made me immune to 'I'd like to speak to the manager.' 

She grumbled and put things back. Carrie offered to watch her, I held up my hand. 

"Can you do something for me  on these carns? They're the last pack in there and they're lookin' kinda ratty." 

"9.50." 

"9.50's the regular price." 

"Regular price is $14." 

"No it ain't." 

"Is today. You're taking our last pack and we need those for funerals." 

She put them back. 

She gave me a credit card. It seemed fake, but it ran. Every time I see here, she's got a different card. Did she print this one this morning, too? At least she stopped trying to sell me on Bitcoin. As you can see, it made her incredibly wealthy. 

She gathered her things and left. "Guess I'm getting the rest of my flowers from KROGER!" 

There are things you want to say. Like... I hope they enjoy your company just as much as we do. Or: Haven't graced them with your presence in awhile, huh? But at the time, it was better just to watch her leave with her minuscule bunch of flowers. I get a choice in where I loan my voice. 

Not here. 

Is it over? Nah. She'll be back for another round. But one day she'll finally retire in the way that she's always threatened to. And then? Then it can be as over as it ever will be. 

It is shocking to come from a history of retail, where you're not allowed to even hint at the idea of a customer being wrong, where you have to override every single price change to get the scores up, where you have to just let them steal your things and pull the wool over your eyes... 

... to flat-out telling someone 'no.' 

"No." 

It's such a great word. 

There are rules and there are rules. 

And there are thieves that the rules are made for. 

And there are words like 'no.' 

And all those things are magic in very human ways. 

[thesquidkid]

Lately I've been feeling so alone

Based of this post by @milady-bugg, thank you for letting me use it as inspiration for a fic 😁

This is sadder than intended, and full of Michael Guerin feels, hope you'll enjoy! This is also quite long (5.4k lmao), so you can read it on AO3 if you prefer.

Michael had isolated himself in his bunker, not letting anyone - even Sanders - in. At first, there were a few knocks, the door opening a few times and each time, Michael would slam it shut with his powers. He needed to process. It was one thing, to know that you were the son of a monster, another to face the man as he gave his own son a heart attack. Father of the year, right here!

So Michael had isolated himself between 4 walls, literally underground, where he could let all his anger free without hurting anyone. But the others couldn’t really understand that, and he couldn’t blame them. So everyone went on to live their lives, do what they were good at.

Isobel and Rosa were looking for Max, searching every cave, every abandoned house, turning every stone, using Rosa’s new found ability. Liz was making sure Maria stayed stable and healthy, her state hadn’t really decreased, but it hadn’t improved either. Whatever was going on, she seemed to continue the fight. Because Maria DeLuca was her own saviour, every damn time.

Michael didn’t have any news of Alex, just that he had found Kyle and that he was safe. He had hesitated calling Alex a few times, to compare notes on shitty father, but that wouldn’t have been fair to Alex, the person who tried every damn day to distance himself from his father, to fix what he broke, to be a better man.

So Michael was alone, in his bunker, with Sanders coming in every once in a while to complain that Michael wasn’t working, but both knew it was just an excuse to check up on him, make sure he was doing fine.

And really, he was. After the initial shock of finding out that his father was a copy of his brother (really, all those times Max had played his father, it was just in his DNA), where he completely and utterly lost it, he was now in a much calmer headspace. He had repositioned all the furniture that had been thrown against the walls, had done some extensive cleaning and given back a few tools and random parts he found to Sanders.

Although, he was still feeling empty. Had emptied his entire body, crying, shouting, wanting to break stuff with his powers, but knowing that if he did he would have to replace it somehow. And he was still broke. So he had to figure out another way of letting his emotions free, that didn’t involve breaking the little stuff he owned, and regretting it.

Instead, he focused on what he was good at. Had put all of the alien tech he had on the main workspace, fiddling with it at first, letting his hand move freely on it, feeling the way the tech reacted to him. From then, he realised that he still didn’t completely know what the tech could do, had assumed it was only part of the ship, but the recent events, with Kyle’s radio and Jones’ sword, he was getting curious as to what he could do, with his imagination and mechanical skills.

This is where it all started, with the alien glass and his tools, letting his hands move as they desired, his mind still busy thinking about - well, everything that happened in the last few days, from Jones being his father, to Max maybe still nearly dying, to Maria being in a coma, and to Alex being God knows where doing God knows what.

As he thought about his friends, his family, his people, his fingers were doing something similar. This is how he found himself, after three days in the bunker, barely sleeping, not at all in contact with the outside world - only going out to take a shower, get some food, and use the toilet in the airstream - with a bunch of glass objects, clearly designed for his friends, and not knowing what to do with all of it. Well, he knew, but that meant going out and seeing them, their faces, probably full of pity, no one knowing how to address the elephant in the room - Jones.

He was building up the courage to get out and gift his creations as peace offering, or whatever they wanted them to be, when he was disturbed by a knock on the latch, then it opened, followed by a very familiar voice that he didn’t expect to hear any time soon.

“Look, Guerin, I get that you want to be alone right now, and uh, yeah -” Alex Manes said, passing a hand across the face, fighting the want to jump down that ladder, understanding more than anyone what being the son of a monster felt like, and even then, neither of their experiences were comparable. “I’m just here to tell you that, ah, Maria woke up, and uh, she’ll be staying in the hospital for a little longer, so uh, yeah that’s what I came here to say.” he finished, and stood up from where he was crouching above the opened latch, looking down in the bunker but not seeing more than the ladder and light. He could also slightly distinguish Michael’s shadow, glowing under all the lights he guessed were alien.

Michael thought Alex had left, and nearly closed the latch using his powers, when he heard the last few words, barely a whisper, but clear as day to him. And he knew that Alex knew that he heard them. “I’m here. If you ever want to talk, or whatever. I’m here for you, Michael.” And with that, Alex left, understanding the peace of being alone with your thoughts, and knowing that Michael would come out whenever he was ready to.

And he was ready to come out. Soon after he heard Alex’s car leave the junkyard, he rushed to his airstream to take a shower and change clothes, taking with him the glass object he had made for Maria. When Sanders saw him leave the airstream, showered, dressed in clothes that hadn’t been worn the past three days, smiling, he couldn’t stop the teasing comment, “If I knew getting your boy here would get you out, I’d have done it long ago.” Despite the comment, he was glad that Michael was feeling better, and even more glad to hear the “Not my boy. Maria’s awake,” that came from Michael as he drove away, leaving Sanders in the junkyard, a smile on his face. The kid was starting to realise that family wasn’t the blood coursing through your veins, but the people you choose to surround yourself with. He hoped Ms. Nora would be proud of her boy, wherever she was.

Michael drove to the hospital at a respectable speed, not wanting to get arrested the day Maria woke up - she would never stop making fun of him about it. He nearly ran towards her room, stopping only at the open door, taking in the people in the room. Liz was at the foot of Maria’s bed, holding a board with papers clipped to it - most likely Maria’s health results - talking with her hands, a large smile on her face. Rosa was sitting on the bed, next to Liz, exchanging side smiles with Maria, her entire body more relaxed than she had been since Maria’s coma. Isobel was standing to the side of the room, leaning against the wall, facing the door. She was the first to see Michael, making him smile back, and promising her to talk and hang out, by their psychic bond. Finally, he turned his eyes to the head of Maria’s bed, where the two Manes men who had gone against their father were sitting, Greg leaning against the back of the chair, a hand holding Maria’s and the other going up and down on her arm in a reassuring sign, Alex on the other side sitting with his elbows on his knees, chin resting on one hand, apparently the only one truly listening to what Liz had to say.

He cleared his throat, not knowing how else to announce his presence. “Mikey!” came the synchronised shout from the Orthecho sisters, “what took you so long, dude? We texted you ages ago!” Rosa teasingly asked, Michael not bothering with an answer and simply sticking his tongue out to her, earning him a roll of the eyes from Liz and Isobel, a full on laugh from Rosa and a slight chuckle from Alex.

“How you feeling, DeLuca?” he started to ask, his voice clear with worry, but remembering many of their conversations, he continued with something he knew she would prefer to him worrying too much, “I might check out some other bar if you stay out of the game for too long.”

And he seemed to have been right, as Maria giggled and stood up straighter, “Oh I’m not too worried you’ll be right back at the Pony in no time Guerin,” she said smiling at him, which Michael copied. “And,” she added, pointing her finger in his direction, “you still owe me 15,09 bucks, don’t think I’ve forgotten.”

Michael shook his head, of course she wouldn’t forget the drinks he had during the last year that he hasn’t yet repaid in services. Since it was the pandemic, they both didn’t have much money so they agreed that whatever drinks he ordered would be paid back in free car or bar maintenance, and vice versa. As if they weren’t already cutting deals for each other.

Feeling all eyes on him, especially since he had gone AWOL for the last three days, Michael cleared his throat once more and took a few hesitant steps towards Maria, ignoring everyone in the room but her. “I, uh, made you something?” he said, cursing himself mentally for making it sound like a question, “here,” he put his hand in his jacket pocket and took out four little alien glass hairpins, ‘it’s alien glass, I thought you might like them.”

He looked at her to see some tears in her eyes as she took the hairpins and observed them in her hands. “They’re, Michael, those are amazing ,” she said with so much sincerity that Michael was taken aback by it, “Thank you.” she added with a smile.

In the end Michael sat on the floor against the wall, listening closely to Maria talking about what had happened with Jones. He felt at ease, surrounded by his friends, still feeling the weight of Kyle and Max missing, but everyone enjoying this small light in what had felt like a week of pure darkness.

Being with Maria, giving them his creation, had given him the courage to talk to the others, and hand them their gifts. He went to see Liz, one day, as she was still in Kyle’s office, observing scans of Maria’s brain. He pointedly ignored those pictures, deciding that he wasn’t going to think of what his father could have done to Maria and her brain, knowing the guilt he would feel if he did. Instead he stood in front of Liz and handed her two teardrop earrings made out of alien glass.

She stopped in the middle of her sentence, and stared up at Michael who smiled awkwardly, her mouth agape as she took in the beauty of the jewelry. “Mikey, wow, I - I don’t know what to say.” she said, looking back and forth between the earrings and Michael.

“It’s nothing, Ortecho, really, I had glass laying around and -” he started to say but was interrupted by Liz. “Thank you.” she nearly shouted, standing up and bending him in a tight embrace, which he returned gladly. He then held up Liz’s phone as a mirror as she put them on and admired herself, making both of them laugh, before reality caught up, and they both needed to focus on Max, Kyle, and Maria. Liz kept the earrings the entire day, and wears them on any occasion she can, the alien colorful glass going with a multitude of clothing combinaisons.

The next person Michael gave a present to was Rosa. She was at the junkyard to train her powers when he surprised her with alien windchimes. He quickly used his powers to hang them up while she had her eyes closed and let the wind do the rest of the work. She opened her eyes in admiration of whatever sound she had heard and turned towards the source of it. “Woa,” she said under her breath as she walked slowly towards them, until finally touching them with her hands, letting the windchimes sing under her fingers, the alien glass slightly reacting.

“You made those?” she asked, turning around to Michael. He nodded, smiling, feeling quite proud of his work. “The sound they make,” continued Rosa, turning once again to look at the windchimes, Michael walking closer to her, “it’s - I don’t think I can compare it to anything.” He nodded once more, encouraging Rosa to continue, “It’s like a melody. I can hear the wind, but it’s different, it’s beautiful.”

She leaned against Michael who was now standing slightly behind her, Michael instinctively putting her arm around her shoulders, the two of them standing in the middle of the junkyard, admiring the alien glass windchimes Michael had made for Rosa. She would come buy the junkyard many times, listening at the way the wind circled through the windchimes, admiring their beauty.

After that it all happened really quickly; Rosa and Isobel found Max, Michael and Liz had been called to the rescue (Jones had apparently regained his body and vanished), followed by Kyle waking up, Greg and Maria rushing to some ranch in the middle of nowhere to get Kyle and Alex. Eventually, all this craziness died down for a bit, Max was hiding in Alex’s cabin in the woods, since Jones had used his body to commit crimes, he couldn’t really go grocery shopping without getting arrested, and Kyle had regained his job at the hospital. Michael seriously wondered how he hadn’t been fired yet, but he wasn’t complaining, at least someone in their group seemed to know what he was doing with his life.

He made his way back to the hospital, except this time to see the one person he swore he would never visit as a kid. A doctor. But not just any doctor, a doctor who was quickly becoming a good friend of his, which he obviously wasn’t going to admit. He walked in the corridors, knowing the place quite well by now, and knocked on Kyle’s office door. A tired “Come in” answered and he opened the door.

As soon as Kyle saw who was on the other side of the door, he groaned and nearly snapped, thinking that maybe now would be the time to get a new group of friends that didn’t have alien emergencies every four hours. Michael must’ve sensed what Kyle was about to say (something along the lines “I don’t care that the world is burning because of some alien invasion, I need sleep! And no, a coma doesn’t count.”) because he raised his hands in surrender, a smug smile on his face.

“Relax, no alien life or death situations, or at least not that I know of.” This had the expected effect, Kyle relaxed in his chair, crossed his arms on his chest and raised an eyebrow at Michael, silently asking him why he was here then. Michael closed the door behind him and sat opposite Kyle, on one of the patients chairs. Still smiling, he took out of his pocket two glass paperweights that he delicately put on the desk for Kyle to grab, just as delicately.

Kyle was silent as he turned the paperweights between his hands, admiring all the different angles, reflecting his desk light on the walls and papers he had on his desk. While Kyle was busy, Michael slowly put his hand in his other jacket pocket and took out a glass snow globe with a little cardboard UFO, two little plastic aliens, and pink fake snow. He put it on the desk and waited for Kyle to notice, after having put the paper weights on top of two small piles he had.

When he saw the snow globe, his face lit up with astonishment, and he looked up to Micheal, once again speechless. “I know what it’s like to see a doctor as a kid and being scared,” Michael said, not looking at Kyle but at the little snowball, “and I know it’s not the same, but uh-”

“I’m sure the kids will love it, Michael.” Kyle said, honestly. He took the globe and shook it, chuckling at the way the UFO dangled, the way the little Aliens wiggled and the way the pink snow fell on everything. “Thank you.”

Michael shrugged, “Consider it payback,” he said, with a sincere smile this time, “for all the times you saved our asses.” And with that, he stood up, waved awkwardly at Kyle (who waved back just as awkwardly) and left.

Kyle took care of the paperweights, who in reality weren’t so heavy, but never broke as they fell. All the kids that came by his office would stare at the little snow globe, admiring it, feeling calmer and safer during their appointment.

Isobel called Michael over the next day. She said she wanted to go shopping for Max, since he was stuck away and was getting bored (how he had already read all the books Alex gave him, was a mystery to Michael, but he supposed when there really wasn’t anything else to do…)

Michael ran on her doorbell and let himself in, using his powers to unlock the door. He made his way to the living room and sat on the couch, looking at the decorations of Isobel’s walls. This house felt more homey than the one she had shared with Noah, there were paintings on the walls he knew Rosa had made, a few old and useless metallic pieces he had turned into sculptures and decorations laying around in various places. But what was really different was the huge bookshelf, books varying from science fiction (for Michael), to inspiring novels (for Isobel) to fantasy and romantic (for Max), indicating that this wasn’t just her home for her, but that her brothers were welcomed here too.

Michael put on the table the necklace he had made, the pendant made out of alien glass and the chain from some silver he had laying around the junkyard, and waited for Isobel to come out. When she did, she smiled at Michael and sat next on his left, facing him. “Okay, so I’ve been thinking, and our brother isn’t really the best cook so -”, she started to say, but cut herself as she saw what was on the table.

She grabbed the necklace between her fingers, and looked to Michael, who was leaning against the couch, an arm slung over it, a bright smile on his face. He winked at her, when he saw that Isobel was looking at him, and she leaned against him, her heard on his shoulder, Michael folding his arm around her.

“It’s beautiful, Michael,” Isobel said, emotions strong in her voice, “thank you.” Mihael rubbed his hand on her shoulder, not really knowing what to say, but wanting her to know that he would always be there.

Isobel wiggled the necklace in front of his face, Michael taking it with a chuckle as he attached it around her neck. The two of them stayed like that, leaning their heads against each other, in silence, in peace. Eventually, Isobel stood up, hurrying Michael out the door and into his truck to go shopping for Michael. And if they were a bit later than what they had told Max, arriving with humid eyes, no one made a comment about it, Max glad to have some company and more books to read.

Michael went back to see Max at least once a day, staying for a few hours or a couple of minutes, always checking in. The two had a lot to talk about, especially the elephant in the room - Max being a clone of Michael’s father.

Michael found himself enjoying those little brotherly moments, and more so the one after they had done the whole Jones subject. Michael would make a few comments about Liz staying in Roswell, to which Max would respond with questions about Alex.

“You know,” said Max on the third day Michael came when they were sitting around a fire pit, enjoying a few beers, after Michael had strongly avoided any topic about Alex, while also admitting to having some feelings (which Max knew of already, subtility wasn’t Michael’s - and Alex’s - strong suit), “this is the first time you and I have talked about dumb highschool crushed together.”

Michael chuckled at that, a hint of sadness that Max quickly brushed, “Hey no, the past is the past man, I’m just saying that I’m glad we’re finally talking, you know? Feels like we’re finally not hiding stuff.” And Michael raised his beer bottle at that. It was indeed the first time that they were both completely open, no more secret. They both were at fault on that, but as Max had said, the past was the past, no point reminiscing, when you could focus on making the future better.

With those thoughts in mind, he took out of his pocket an alien glass bolo tie with little turquoise end caps on the ties, and handed it to Max, who took it. They were both hypnotised by the way the flames reflected on the glass, the way the colors seemed to dance in the night.

Max didn’t say anything, didn’t have too. He put his beer on the floor next to him, stood up and motioned to Michael to do the same. Once they were both standing, facing each other, they hugged deeply, strongly. In the end, all the other bolo ties Max owned got mostly replaced by this one, being worn at every occasion he could, always with his brother in mind.

Michael had two more presents to offer, and was sitting in his bunker, not knowing how to approach either of the people they were made for. Luckily for him, he didn’t have to figure one out, as the person in question opened the latch and climbed down the stairs with a grunt. “Kid,” came Sander’s voice as soon as his feet reached the ground, “think you can use that brain of yours to build a lift here? Getting too old for this.”

“Well no one is forcing you to come, old man,” Michael replied, although there was no true bite to it. In fact, he quite enjoyed the old man’s occasional visits, even if all he did was complain. Michael turned around to face him, “Everything all good up there?” he asked, wondering why Sanders had come down. Sanders just nodded at him and took the last steps for him to arrive at Michael’s level, leaning his hands on the workspace. “What you working on, kid?”

“Uhm, actually -” started Michael, now that Sanders was here, might as well give him the present, right? “I got something for you.”

Using his powers, he approached a little metallic sunflower he had made from scrap pieces found here and there in the junkyard, and had made the center out of alien glass. The whole thing was attached to a chain to be held up against the door to Sanders house.

Sanders grabbed the sunflower and looked at it intensely with his good eye, remembering the colors Ms Nora’s creations were, seeing them once again on that little sunflower. Neither said anything, nor made a step forward to hug, neither being used to physical comfort, but they both knew how much that gesture meant.

To Michael, it meant acceptance, family, a sunflower for all the sunflowers they grew at the junkyard over the pandemic. To Sanders, it meant pride, it meant having kept his promise to Ms Nora to take care of his son, it meant family.

The sunflower was attached by Sanders' door, the alien glass glowing under the desert sun, always turning to face it, like all the many sunflowers they had in their field.

Which led Michael to one last gift. And if he was being honest with himself, the one he dreaded the most. Also the one that took him the most time and the most research. A gift for Alex. Taking his courage in both hands, he sent a quick text to Alex before he could have any chance to doubt himself. Free right now? I think I might take you up on your offer.

He didn’t have long to wait, as his phone buzzed almost immediately, On my way. Be there in 30 . He rushed back to his airstream, ignoring once more Sanders’ comment about getting ready for his boy , to get changed and put beers in the fridge. He opened the door of the airstream just as he heard Alex’s car arrive, and sat on one of the chairs, two bears in hand, while he made his way over. Alex sat on a chair next to him, accepting the beer, in silence.

“I heard you were busy while in your underground lair, judging by the gifts I’ve been seeing pop up.” Alex said with a smile, taking a sip of his beer, turning his head to look at Michael.

Michael frowned his eyebrows, “I thought you were busy out of town?” he asked, barely stopping the bite from escaping his lips. Alex looked sheepishly away from Michael at that, “I’ve been trying to not distance myself too much,” she shrugged, his tone lowering, until being a simple whisper at the end, “to not drive myself crazy.” He shivered at whatever thought was going through his mind, then straightened his body and looked up to Michael, “Anyway, you said you’d take me up on my offer, I’m assuming you want to talk?” he asked, forcing a smile that Michael didn’t buy.

“The hell is going on with you, Alex?” Michael asked, with a bit too much force that he immediately took back at Alex’s defeated look, “First you tell me you’d burn down the world for me, then that you don’t want me anywhere you or whatever, and then you end up finding Kyle in some creepy farm, which might I add is the exact same farm you got stabbed in .” He took a breath, and continued, “So yeah, Alex, I want to talk, I want you to tell me what’s going on with you.” He stopped at looked at Alex, who didn’t really seem like he wanted to say anything, so he lowered his voice, taking back all the bite and anger he could, channeling how much he cared and worried about Alex, “You said you were there for me, it’s a two way street you know. I’m here for you too.”

That seemed to do the trick, as Alex’s teary eyes met Michael’s, who wanted nothing more that to wipe his thumb across his cheeks, to take away the fear and the pain he could see in those eyes. But he didn’t, they weren't there yet.

Alex took a deep, shaky breath and told Michael everything, from quitting the Air Force (getting a discharge with full honors, Michael could tell the pride in his voice as the last ten years of Alex’s hadn’t been totally useless), to joining Deep Sky, to the Lockhart machine, to his boss not being who he said he was, to discovering that the Lockhart machine had driven people crazy, to the reason he had been recruited by deep sky. After his explanations, he fell quiet, looking at Michael, not truly knowing what to expect.

What he didn’t expect however, was for Michael to get up hastily, move the airstream and rush to his lair, leaving Alex sitting on his chair, a half empty bottle of beer in one hand, tears in his eyes. But Michael came back, just as fast as he had left, holding some piece of alien tech mixed with metal in his hands. It took a moment for Alex to register what that object was, and once he did, he widened his already teary eyes in surprise, his mouth was slightly agape, his eyebrows were frowned, as he searched for the words to express his confusion, not wanting to get his hopes high. On the other hand, there wasn’t a multitude of people Michael could’ve made an alien prosthetic leg for.

Michael approached slowly with the leg in his hands, handing it to Alex once he was close enough. “I uh- I made you this.” he said, clearing his throat, while Alex was examining the leg, “It’ uh, lighter than the one you have now, but it’s also more resistant and, well, you could really bludgeon someone with it, if uh - if you wanted to.”

Alex kept looking at the leg, not saying anything, which Michael interpreted as him not being interested. “You don’t have to take it, if you don’t like it. I also made you this,” he rushed out, taking a braided leather cuff with a piece of alien glass as a stamp and handing it sheepishly to Alex, who was looking at him, with the same teary look he had for the past few minutes. Michael took a deep breath and sat back down, “Look,” he breathed out, “what I’m trying to say, Alex, is I’ve got your back, okay? I’ll build you whatever you need, I’ll go wherever you want me to, I’ll - I care about you.”

As Alex opened his mouth to say something, Michael raised his hand to interrupt, and continued, “And I’m the son of a literal dictator whose powers I’ve inherited. I can defend myself. And I know that you wanna protect me - I do too - but maybe we could, I don’t know, protect each other by being there?”

Alex, whose tears were now running free on his face, bent down to take his right shoe off, under Michael’s curious gaze, who could also feel tears running down his cheeks. Alex raised his trousers and took off his prosthetic, before grabbing the alien one and putting it on. He knew the size would fit, knew that Michael had worked hard on it, had probably had the idea of making him a new leg from the moment they met again, in front of that same airstream, under completely different circumstances.

They had gone a long way from that day, and they still had some more to do, but Michael was right. Maybe this time, they could be there, together, to take that new road, to protect and take care of each other, together. Before standing up, Alex attached the bracelet Michael had made around his left wrist, admiring the colors of the alien glass under the desert sun.

Alex stayed at the junkyard for some more time, until his alarm rang, informing him that he should head back to the Lockhart machine. Taking a deep breath, he turned to Michael, asking him if he wanted to come with, and together they drove to the farm, down a road they had both taken together once, but this time Alex wasn’t bleeding out.

After that day, Alex still went to the VA in Albuquerque for meds prescriptions and physical therapy once in a while, but all the repairs that needed to be done for his prosthetic, all the improvements, were done by Michael, in his lair, under Alex’s curious gaze, who wanted to know everything about Michael’s ideas.

After all his gifts, Michael found that he still had some alien glass laying around in his bunker. So he decided to turn it all into little rings, wanting to distinguish as much as he could from the weaponizing of the alien glass, like Jones had. Eventually, all of little friend group, all of his people, owned a ring.

And when the day came, when the fight with Jones reached its last stretch, Michael was ready. He didn’t have an alien sword like Jones had, but he had something much more. A group of people, by his side, all sharing his strength through the little alien gifts. His people, his family.

Lately I've been feeling so alone Can someone give the antidote to me so I can Finally understand where I belong

[spine-buster]

The President Wears Prada (William Nylander) | Chapter 30

A/N:  Okay, so, special announcement.....

The President Wears Prada is ending at Chapter 35.

I know a lot of you weren’t expecting this, but that is where I have planned it to end.  It’s a natural end.  Nothing will be forced.  There’s still a lot left to go, a lot to happen with Aberdeen, Willy, and everybody else, and a lot to write about.  I haven’t written up to it yet, but I know exactly what is going to happen.  I didn’t want the end to come as a shock to you, which is why I’m announcing it now.

In the meantime, enjoy this chapter!

July 1st, 2020

Aberdeen Bloom was with William on the rooftop of his condo building.  

She’d spun a wild web of lies to make sure she could be with him after he begged to see her for Canada Day.  It was a bit awkward this year, because it landed on a Wednesday, right in the middle of the week, but she’d managed.  She’d told Kasha she was with her family.  She’d told her family she couldn’t stay the whole day, and because they spent the morning and the afternoon together already, they were okay with that.  

She was getting too good at lying.

“What are you thinking about?” William asked as they lay together on a recliner they had dragged from underneath pergolas so they could see the night sky.  Though there was too much light pollution in Toronto to see a sky full of stars, there were still some bright stars in the sky along with the glowing moon.  From all the way atop the building, they could barely hear the noise from the city below.  

She smiled.  “For the first time, nothing,” she said, cuddling her head onto his chest even more as he held her hand against her heart.  “My mind and my heart are at ease right now.”

She could feel him smile.  He liked how she felt so at east with him.  He liked how he could make her feel that way in between the stress of her job and moving forward in her career.  He brought her hand up to his lips and kissed it.  “I love you.”

“I love you too.”

“Can I show you how much I love you?”

She raised her head from his chest to cock an eyebrow up at him.  “We’re not having sex on the roof of your condo,” she deadpanned.  

He snorted.  He didn’t blame her for thinking that’s what he wanted.  Ever since he got back to Toronto, they fell back into the habit of sneaking around.  Most of it happened at his apartment now, in between skating at Scotiabank Arena and Aberdeen telling Kasha she’d have to be there the whole day and not just the few hours when they boys were in.  “No, minskatt.  Something else.”

“What something else?”

William shifted his body so he was sitting up more, causing Aberdeen to shift too, straddling his lap to face him instead.  She ran her hands over his chest quickly before he took them, kissing them both, before she watched as he pulled his phone out of his pocket.  “You weren’t the only one I was talking to during quarantine.”

She furrowed her brows at him.  She knew he wasn’t cheating – he wouldn’t be risking her career and her reputation if he was just going to cheat on her – so she had no clue what he meant by that.  “What does that mean, exactly?”

“I thought you deserved some good news during the lockdown…quarantine…whatever,” he began.  “So I got Kyle to send me Max’s number.”

“Who’s Max?”

William rolled his eyes and giggled.  “Max Kerman, minskatt.  From the Arkells.”  He watched as her face lit up before he continued.  “He told me to tell you they’re coming out with a new album.  Well – new.  It’s, like, an acoustic album.  They’re re-imagining all of their songs as if you’re singing them around a campfire,” he explained.

“Really?” Aberdeen was excited by the news.  “That’s so cool.  I love when they do acoustic sets.”

“Mhm,” William nodded.  “They’re releasing it in August.  But they’re actually including one new song.”  He paused for dramatic effect.  “Want to hear it?”

Aberdeen’s eyes bulged out of their sockets.  “What do you mean want to hear it?  You have it?!”

William nodded.  “Max sent it to me.  I told him about how much of a fan you were, and he remembered you from the mentor’s trip, so he didn’t mind so long as we were the only ones who heard it.”

He could see her eyes light up like fireworks.  “Well—well of course!  I’m not gonna leak it!” she said as if Max were standing in front of them.  “Is it acoustic too?” she asked.  William nodded.  “What’s it about?”

“Let’s see,” he smiled, fiddling around with his phone, shaking slightly.  “I’ve listened to it once or twice.  I think it’s a love song.”

Aberdeen waited impatiently as William found the song.  He turned the audio up on his phone to the highest level as she heard Max’s voice count the beat in.  When the acoustic guitar started, she automatically fell in love with it.  Melodic, as always, sounding like a perfect Arkells song.  She swayed back and forth gently, and at that point, she saw William staring at her.  

I think about you all the time I can’t get you off my mind

Aberdeen’s body seized up immediately.  I think about you all the time.  I can’t get you off my mind.  I think about you all the time.  I can’t get you off my mind.  I think about you when I’m not even thinking.  I think about you when I’m not even thinking.

A rush of emotion flushed her entire body.  “Willy—” she tried to get out, her voice strained as she pushed away from him.

“Minskatt—” he grabbed her hands on his chest as she pushed away so she couldn’t push away any further.  “Minskatt, come on—”

“—Willy what did you do—”

“—Minskatt, minskatt shhhhh,” he cooed as he saw tears begin to fall down her cheeks.  “Minskatt, listen to me—”

“Willy,” she stressed, looking him in the eye.  “Willy, is this song about me?  About us?”

He nodded softly.  “I got him to write a song about you.  Like your dream.”

Aberdeen burst out into tears, covering her face with her hands as she sobbed into them.  William stopped the song and leaned forward to wrap his arms around her, bringing her into his chest to cry.  He held her tightly and placed a kiss on the crown of her head.  “Why are you crying, minskatt?” he asked.

She didn’t respond at first.  But when she lifted her head from his chest and wiped her eyes to be able to see him clearly, she finally did.  “Are you joking?  Why am I crying?” she asked rhetorically.  “My boyfriend just got my favourite band to write a song about me!��� she exclaimed.

“But you like that I did that though, right?” he asked.

She rolled her eyes.  That at least made her smile.  “Of course I like it, you Costco hot dog,” she said, making him chuckle.  “But I don’t – how did you – I mean what – how—”

“I called Max, and I told him about how there was this girl,” William said.  “I didn’t tell him too much.  Don’t worry.  I didn’t tell him it was you.  But I told him what was important, and some things to include.  And he wrote it, and sort of filled in the rest with his own stuff.”

Aberdeen couldn’t believe what she was hearing.  William had gotten Max Kerman to write a song about her.  About them.  Without even revealing their secret.  And he’d recorded it.  Mastered it.  Put it on an Arkells album.  Would tour with it.  Sing it to crowds—

“The best part about it is whenever we hear it on the radio, we’re the only two people in the world who know it’s about us,” William said softly, looking her in the eye.

Aberdeen started crying all over again.  She let her face fall back into his chest as he held her again.  She cried her eyes out.  This was, bar none, the most romantic thing anyone had ever done for her, let alone a boyfriend.  She was so overwhelmed with emotion that she almost couldn’t handle it.  William, for his part, let her cry until she was all cried out – until she lifted her head again and wiped her eyes again too look at him.

“Can I play it?” he asked.  

She nodded her head, preparing herself.

I think about you all the time I can't get you off my mind If they only knew Who I've been talking to You got a place off the park I'll come on by after dark Was nervous then When you let me in

We were hanging at cross town parties, oh Just killing time until the main event

And it hurts All throughout my insides I couldn't stop if I tried Loving you I'll never learn So I'll call you when I'm outside You said, "The key's behind the porch light for unit two" I thought of maybe quitting But there's no quitting you

You said that the fridge is dry But you got some red, you got some white The drunks outside Singing lullabies Slow dance swaying back and forth Whispering "What's mine is yours" When you say my name Hits in a different way

You call me out when I'm talking nonsense, oh And I'll kiss you when I got nothing to say

And it hurts (oh oh oh) All throughout my insides I couldn't stop if I tried Loving you I'll never learn (oh oh oh) So I'll call ya when I'm outside The key's behind the porch light for unit two And I thought of maybe quitting But there's no quitting you

My whole life I'm scanning for the exits, oh Lying next to you I don't wanna leave

And it hurts (oh oh oh) All throughout my insides And I couldn't stop if I tried Loving you I'll never learn (oh oh oh) So I'll call ya when I'm outside The key's behind the porch light for unit two And I thought of maybe quitting But there's no quitting you There's no quitting you

By the time the song finished, Aberdeen had stuffed her face into the crook of William’s neck.  She let some last tears fall.  “You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me,” she said in his ear.  

“You’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me, minskatt.  Jag tänker på dig när jag inte ens tanker.”

“Jag tänker på dig när jag inte ens tanker.”

***

July 10th, 2020

The NHL announced its Return to Play Plan on May 26 with 24 teams in competition for the Stanley Cup.  The tournament begins with the Stanley Cup Qualifiers, which include 16 teams paired in eight best-of-5 series and a round-robin among the top four teams in each conference to determine seeds for the Stanley Cup Playoffs. "I want to make clear that the health and safety of our players, coaches, essential support staff and our communities are paramount," Commissioner Gary Bettman said when announcing the Return to Play Plan. "While nothing is without risk, ensuring health and safety has been central to all of our planning so far and will remain so. "Let me assure you that the reason we are doing this is because our fans have told us in overwhelming numbers that they want to complete the season if at all possible. And our players and our teams are clear that they want to play and bring the season to its rightful conclusion." The format was determined in meetings of the Return to Play Committee, which included executives from the NHL and NHL Players' Association, and five players: Ottawa Senators defenseman Ron Hainsey, Edmonton Oilers center Connor McDavid, Winnipeg Jets center Mark Scheifele, Toronto Maple Leafs center John Tavares and Philadelphia Flyers forward James van Riemsdyk. The qualifiers are being held at two hub cities: the 12 Eastern Conference teams are in Toronto, and the 12 Western Conference teams are in Edmonton, also the site of the conference finals and Stanley Cup Final.  A comprehensive system for testing is in place in each hub city, and each team was permitted to travel a maximum of 52 personnel, including players, coaches and staff. "Obviously, we anticipate playing over the summer and into the early fall," Commissioner Bettman said in May.  "Obviously, these are extraordinary and unprecedented times.  Any plan for the resumption of play, by definition, cannot be perfect. And I am certain that, depending on which team you root for or which team you cover, you can find some element of this package that you might prefer to be done differently.  But we believe we have constructed an overall plan that includes all teams that, as a practical matter, might have had a chance of qualifying for the playoffs when the season was paused. And this plan will produce a worthy Stanley Cup champion who will have run the postseason gauntlet that is unique to the NHL."

***

This was Aberdeen’s second training camp for the same season.  She never thought she’d ever experience a professional sports team’s training camp in her entire life, let alone two.  But her life had taken a turn one year ago (thirteen months now, if we were really counting) when she met William at that bar and had slept with him.  Everything she had experienced this year was…surreal, to say the least.  And that was just in her personal life.  Never mind her professional life.

Although the lines were blurred these days between her personal and professional life.

At Scotiabank Arena, she knew the entire team was on the ice a few floors below Brendan’s office.  She knew Sheldon was putting them through drills, making them skate laps around the rink, shoot at the net – whatever they needed to do to feel like hockey players again.  Whatever they needed to do to go all the way.  Whatever they needed to do to win the Stanley Cup.

“Aberdeen,” she heard her name being called by Brendan.  She shot up from her seat and made her way into his office.  He looked up at her through his glasses as he continued to focus on his laptop screen.  “Close the door behind you, please.  And sit.”

Suddenly her nerves got the best of her.  He never usually needed her to shut the door unless they were talking about something confidential.  “Is everything okay?” she asked, sitting.

He sighed, taking off his glasses and laying them beside his laptop.  He took a good look at her before he began speaking again.  “Aberdeen, I’m going to ask you a serious question, and I need you to think about it before answering me.”

She gulped.  “Okay…”

“Do you want to come into the bubble?”

She was shocked.  He hadn’t spoken to her about the bubble yet, and on the first instance he did, he was asking her to go into it.  This was a grand total of three days before the clubs had to submit the final list of the 52 personnel who would be going in, so she was sure she wasn’t being considered anyway.  “Me?”

He nodded.  “You’d fulfill roles for both Kyle and I, and you would be helping the content creator with the social media aspect of the bubble,” he explained.  “But Kyle and I were speaking, and as we were going through the list of employees to bring, your name came up.”

“I…me?”

“You’re reliable.  Your hard-working.  We know you’re not going to break any rules.  And fuck, there’s some extensive rules,” he picked up a heavy duotang, wagged it at her, before plopping it down on his desk again.  “But it’s going to be tough going in there.  Psychologically.  It’s not going to be easy.  Especially if we go all the way.  And believe me…we want to go all the way,” he stressed.  “That’s why I want you to think about it.”

***

“Brendan asked me to be in the bubble.”

Aberdeen and William had a bad habit of asking things or blurting things out after sex while they were lying in the bed, she with her tits out, trying to catch their breaths.  When she looked over at him, his eyes were bulged out.  “What?”

“Yeah,” she nodded her head.  “He wants me to fulfill my role and help the content creator with the social media aspect.  But yeah…he wants me in there.”

Aberdeen didn’t know what she was expecting to hear from William, considering the information they already knew about the bubble and knowing that much more information was to come, but it definitely wasn’t a decisive, stern, “No.”

It was her turn to whip her head to look at him.  “Excuse me?” she asked.  “No?”

“No,” William shook his head.  “I don’t want you in there, Aberdeen.”

Aberdeen furrowed her brows, not understanding why William was acting like this and saying these things.  She shifted so she was propping herself up on her elbow.  “William…I…what?”

“You…I…listen,” he began, sighing, “as much as I love you and as much as I’m gonna miss you when I’m quarantined in there, I don’t…I don’t know if I want you being in there.  I don’t want you to experience that.”

“Why not?”

“We’ve already gotten the rules.  We can’t be in each other’s rooms.  Aberdeen, we can’t even speak in the elevators.  It’s…I don’t know if I’d be able to do all that knowing you’re there too.  But even more important than that, I don’t want you to risk anything.  Your safety, your health.”

“Willy…” she cooed, bringing an arm up to drape around him.  In turn, he wrapped an arm around her and pulled her close, placing a quick kiss on her shoulder.  “I know you want me to be safe, but I’ll be safe in there.  If you’re safe, I’m safe in there too.  What’s the difference?”

William continued to shake his head.  “I don’t want you to have to go through, psychologically, what I’m gonna have to go through.”

She brought a hand between them to cup his face.  “You don’t have to be the martyr here, Willy.  It’s not like I want you to go through it either.”

William sighed, nuzzling his face into the crook of her neck.  She could feel his lips graze her skin on her neck and shoulder, but he stayed silent.  He didn’t say another word.

***

July 12th, 2020

“I’ll do it.”

“You’ll do what?”

“I’ll come into the bubble.”

Brendan looked up from his desk, finally.  He took off his glasses.  “You’re sure about this?”

“Positive.”

“Because once you say yes you can’t back out.  We have to submit the names to the NHL officially tomorrow.  And once you’re in the Royal York, you can’t leave unless it’s a family emergency – death, birth of a child—”

“I know.  I read the package,” she nodded her head.  “I understand what I’m getting myself into.  I’ll do it.”

***

July 16th, 2020

Aberdeen walked gingerly into the coffee shop Brendan had sent her to.  In the middle of a pandemic.  She understood cases were now fairly low in Ontario, but she was still apprehensive.  People shouldn’t just be…going places.  Walking into offices that weren’t their places of work or coffee shops that weren’t their regular coffee shops or grocery stores that weren’t their regular grocery stores.  Places that they didn’t know.  That they weren’t used to.

Yet here she was.

She stood at the door awkwardly.  There were exactly three spaces for indoor dining when, in regular times, she knew there would be much more.  At one table, a couple sat with masks on and coffees in front of them staring at their phones.  At another, a girl who couldn’t have been older than here was sneakily taking a Snapchat selfie.  At the third—

“Aberdeen Bloom?” the woman sitting at the table asked.  Her eyes crinkled slightly, signaling to Aberdeen that she was smiling behind her mask.  “Please, sit!” she motioned to the chair.  

“Hi,” Aberdeen said awkwardly, extending her hand but then pulling it back violently before half bowing as a form of saying hello.  She was so fucking awkward.  She didn’t even know what this was for.  “That’s me, Aberdeen Bloom.  I’m Brendan Shanahan’s personal assistant.  And your name is…”

“I’m Beth Zadakis, the major features editor of Toronto Life magazine.”

Aberdeen’s breath hitched in her throat.  She was going to fucking kill Brendan.  She was going to go back to the office and murder him in cold blood.  “It’s so nice to meet you,” she said politely, thinking about the gold-plated envelope opener in Brendan’s desk she could use to stab him.  “You’ll have to forgive me, but Brendan didn’t really give me any information about this…uh, meeting,” she said.  “What is it that he needs from you?  Or you from him?”

“Nothing, actually,” Beth’s eyes crinkled again.  “It’s actually more so about you.  Brendan tells me you’re a writer.”

Aberdeen gulped.  “I’m definitely trying to be.”

“Have you submitted to us before?”

Aberdeen nodded.  “Just to the memoirs section.  I think it was Sandy who read my work, but it was ultimately rejected.  At least, that’s who I got the email from.”

Beth nodded.  “Sandy’s actually left to take a job with The Globe and Mail.  And due to some promotions and transfers, there’s actually an opening for a contributing editor – it’s what we call our writers.”

Aberdeen knew very well what Toronto Life called their writers.  She had dreamt of seeing her name on that list for years now.  “Why…I mean—how do I factor into this?” she stuttered out.

“Brendan tells me you’re going into the NHL bubble.”

“I am.”

Beth leaned in slightly.  “We’d like for you to write a feature for the magazine about life in the bubble.  The hotel, the boys, the games – everything.  Hockey in a pandemic.  A full feature, anywhere between five to ten thousand words.”

Aberdeen’s body felt like it was on fire.  She was sure her eyes were bulging out dramatically, but at this point, she didn’t care.  “I can do that,” she said, nodding her head.  “I can do that.”

“If you can pull it off, Aberdeen, you’ve got a job with the magazine.”

Her heart fluttered in her chest.  “I can do it.  I won’t let you down.”

Beth shifted slightly in her seat and took out a piece of paper.  “I’m going to write you the name and contact information of my senior editor, Alec,” she said.  “He’ll want to meet you and speak to you about the piece.  But it’s a go, Aberdeen.”

***

“A major feature, minskatt?” William’s eyes lit up at the news Aberdeen had just shared, her giddiness and excitable energy rubbing off on him quickly.  “That sounds important.”

“Is is important!  It’s the longest feature of the magainze!  Willy, it’s usually the cover!” she exclaimed.  “The—the cover!  Do you know how much of a big deal that is?!”

“I can tell from how much you’re freaking out about it,” he smiled.  He reached to grab her hands and intertwined their fingers.  He pushed them and crossed them at the small of her back before moving closer to her body and giving her a quick kiss.  “Look at you, minskatt.  I’m so proud of you.”

“Well, I haven’t written it yet.”

“Yeah, but you’ve shown me your writing.  And it’s fantastic.  So you’re gonna knock this one out of the park.”

Aberdeen knew how lucky she was to have someone like William in her life, always supporting her and always being her biggest cheerleader.  While other people had told her to pursue other things, he was there encouraging her – the silent support she always wanted and needed.  “I love you.  D’you know that?” she asked tenderly, looking up at his big blue eyes.

He could only smile.  “Not as much as I love you.”

She chuckled slightly.  “You realize if I knock this out of the park, that means I become a contributing editor at the magazine.  I become a writer.  My dream.  And that means I leave the Toronto Maple Leafs.”

“That means I can finally kiss you in public.”

Aberdeen smiled.  It did mean he could finally kiss her in public.  It meant a lot of things.  They could finally be open with their relationship.  They could go out on dates publicly.  They could go out to dinner.  She could bring him to San Remo Bakery.  They could have picnics in the park.  They could walk along the lake.  They could post on Instagram about each other.  She could finally have the name set as ‘William Nylander’ on her phone as opposed to ‘Head Empty’ (maybe she’d keep it that way).  They could do so much.  So so so much.  “It would be bittersweet leaving…” she bit her lip.  “I mean…I love my job, Will.  I love all the guys.”

“Brendan wouldn’t have put you up for the job if he didn’t think it would be a great opportunity for you,” he shrugged his shoulders.  “The guys would miss you but they know you want to become a writer.”

“But what if I can’t deliver?”

William shook his head.  “Brendan wouldn’t have put you up for the job if he didn’t think you’d be able to deliver, either, minskatt,” he said.  “I know you can do it.  We all do.”

***

July 17th, 2020

“You must be Aberdeen Bloom,” Alec Young said with no hint of any emotion in his voice as Aberdeen stood in the doorway of his large, expansive office.  As per COVID-19 protocols, there were very few people in, but apparently Alec was important enough to be in the offices working instead of working from home.  She imagined he had piles and piles of articles to edit for future issues.  She was surprised he even had time for her – granted, it was a quick lunchtime visit, but still.

“Yes sir, that’s me,” she nodded quickly, clutching her purse handles in her hands.  

“Beth tells me you’re going to be writing a feature for us, possibly,” he said.  “About the NHL bubble.”

“That’s the plan, sir, yes.”

He eyed her.  “Sit.  And close the door behind you.”

Aberdeen did as she was told, sitting in the plush chair more than six feet away from his desk – his office was that big.  She settled in but he made her wait as he typed away furiously into his laptop before he finally stopped and turned towards her.  “She told you the length?”

“Yes.  5,000-10,000 words.”

“And what we’re looking for?”

Aberdeen furrowed her brows slightly.  “I…I assume about life in the bubble.  Playing professional sports during a pandemic,” she said.

That was when he smiled.  “No Miss Bloom.  We’re looking for…more.”

“More?”

He clasped his hands together on his desk.  “We know what hockey players are like, Miss Bloom.  You’ve been working for the team for about a year now, right?  I’m sure you’ve seen the shenanigans they get up to.”

“Shenanigans?”

“You know exactly what I’m talking about.  The booze, the drugs, the women.  They’re professional athletes,” he said.  Aberdeen thought back to a hotel visit in Calgary where she found Mitch Marner and Jake Muzzin playing mini-sticks in the hotel hallway like they were a peewee team on their first-ever road trip; she also thought back to the snowball fight a bunch of them had in Montreal where they were giggling like schoolgirls while also deliberately aiming for each other’s nuts.  If Alec only knew.  “That’s what you’re covering for us.  The shenanigans.  Sneaking women into the bubble, the fights, the booze – everything.”

“I…” she began to protest, not knowing which words should come out of her mouth first.  “They’re…they’re nothing like that anymore.  They’re just not,” she said.  Alec looked unconvinced.  “These are guys that are bringing their gaming consoles into their rooms at the Royal York.  They’re worried about the wifi being too weak when everyone’s gaming that it’s gonna lag or something.  They’re not sneaking in women—and drugs?  I don’t even know where to—”

“Listen,” Alec said firmly, holding his hand up to get her to stop talking.  “Either you get us the scoop, or you don’t.  If you get it, you have a job here, and the guarantee that your article will be on our cover and be front page on the magazine racks and newsstands.  If you don’t get the scoop, you don’t get the job.  It’s up to you.”

Aberdeen thought back to when Mike Babcock got fired.  She thought back to getting called by Brendan late at night and less than an hour and a half later she was on the MLSE private jet.  She thought back to just before going into the locker room, and what Kyle had said to her.  “You know Aberdeen, Brendan trusts you.”  She thought back to what he said after he thanked her for not leaking the information.  “You could have sold that information to any newspaper or reporter and they would have offered you a job.  But you didn’t.”

She remembered what she told him.  “I would never burn this bridge.  I’d never sell Brendan or the team out like that for personal gain.”

And then, what Kyle followed up with.  “This city is rife with opportunity for people who take advantage of others.  But you’re not like that – at least yet.”

That was before everything.  Before she had sex with William.  Before she carried on a secret relationship with him behind everyone’s back.  Before she started lying to everybody.  Had she changed?  Was she a person, now, who would take advantage of others?  Would she take advantage of the organization that had given her so much for her dream job in writing?  Was she that person?  A person who would lie to get what she wanted?  Fabricate entire stories just to secure a dream job?

The answer, to her, was immediate.

No.

But she looked at Alec.  “I understand,” she said instead.

He smiled.  “Good.”

[taliaquinn]

Why Me!? Chapter 13

s-“Wait a minute. You guys have an almost-deathiversary?” Marinette asked slightly puzzled.

Dick took Marinette to see Jason on his “almost-Deathiversary”. Jason was kidnapped and nearly killed by the Joker when he was younger but they had to stage his death to deter any further attempts on his life.

“Yup, Jason is not in the happiest person on this day for obvious reasons, right now he’s probably somewhere in Gotham getting Drunk” Dick replied, “I'll go look for him later of course but right now I’m here to drop off food from Alfred and your sweets” Dick was most likely gonna spend tonight hunting for a drunk Redhood. What he didn’t tell Marinette was that he was also going to leave a note for him.

“Don't make eye-contact with anyone and stick close, I’ll keep ya safe” 

Safe!? She was currently standing outside an old run-down apartment building in Crime Alley. Everything around her looked dark and scary. The people were constantly scurrying around. Heck, even the rats look sleazy. She's pretty sure she saw a mugging a few blocks back. 

Was the boarding school alternative still available?

Some people just flat out stopped and stared at them. Marinette and Dick did their best trying to dress normal-ish. Unfortunately, that was sort of difficult to do when you're the son and daughter of a billionaire and you're a fashion designer. 

However, they stuck it through since they’ve been itching to check up on him since he hadn’t been around the manor in two weeks. What Marinette didn’t realize that Red Hood was in the Batcave last night nursing a few bruises. 

She caught one guy staring at them for one second too long she inched closer to Dick. Dick quickly wrapped an arm around her shoulder while glaring at the guy. Hey, you can never be too safe. All of the Wayne kids have been kidnapped at least once before. Maybe that explains why Marinette gets constantly targeted by akumas? Scratch that, it’s probably just her luck working against her. 

Speaking of Luck, Tikki demanded to stay behind with the rest of the Kwamis. They claimed to have some shows to catch up on. Marinette left them in her enormous closet with her new tablet and some food. 

Her parents had left to go back to Paris yesterday, of course, there were tears and of course, most of them were from her dad. Dick was sniffling in the background “What I’m a sucker for family moments, bite me” Marinette already missed them but luckily technology existed. 

Her parents were going to send Bruce her transcripts so she could enroll in a school in Gotham. Marinette was regretting agreeing to it. She’s going to be the new girl halfway through the year, bleugh. She tried advocating for homeschooling but she was overruled by all three parents. Apparently, she needed “human-interaction”, pfffttt.

Dick quickly opened the apartment building door to let Marinette in. They went to the highest floor. Once they were in front of Jason's apartment door, Dick was able to quickly pick the lock and disable the security. Marinette placed her platter of baked sweets on the counter while Dick went over to the fridge to restock, taking a glance to make sure Marinette wasn’t watching he slipped in a scotch, the good scotch along with his note. He had to steal that from Bruce's alcohol cabinet. The man has so many kids he needs to drink every now and then.

Marinette thought Jason's apartment looked nice. Which was confusing since the outside looked like a mess. 

“Come on Maribug let's get out before we’re caught by a pissed off grouch” Dick knew that he wouldn’t come home for a few more minutes but he wanted to keep Marinette from exploring and noticing a few interesting things. “We gotta go shopping!!!” 

At that Marinette immediately bolted out. It’s been a few days since she's gotten her hands on a sewing machine or new fabric. Most of the Fabric she brought with her is gonna end up being used on a new dress for Bruces “Girlfriend’ Selina Kyle.  

Her commissions were stacking up and she had ended up filling up her current sketchbook. Hawkmoth has been behaving himself so she hasn't had a good excuse to teleport to Paris and pick up a few of her supplies. Which sucks. Seriously, the one time she needed an Akuma and Hawkmoth decides to be decent. 

She jumped into Dick's car parked a few blocks away in a garage. Dick slides in and off they went to the mall. Marinette couldn’t wait!!! She was gonna be surrounded by fabrics and they’re gonna eat at a cafe with Tim afterward to actually make sure the Dude actually eats.

Marinette took her sketchbook and quickly started flipping through and checking what designs she wanted to create. She jotted down what materials she’s gonna need. 

Dicks’ phone suddenly started blaring to girls just wanna have fun. Uh-oh, it's Jason. Quickly he put it on speaker

“Yello, Cute one speaking”

“YOU FRIGGIN TRESPASSER!!!”

“Hiya Jaybird, Ya like your gifts?”

“Tell Mari thanks for the sweets, she's a gift to humanity YOU, ON THE OTHER HAND, CAN GO FU-” Marinette decided that this was the perfect time to intervene.

“Hi Jay!” she chirped.

“UGGER OFF, Hi Mari, your sweets were great!? I can wait to eat all 20 of these macaroons” he said softly. Jason was pretty sure that Marinette was the most sweetest child in the world. And that she must be defended at all costs. Plus it was nice to have a civilian sibling for once.

20!! Marinette knows for sure she made 22, she quickly gave a glare at Dick, who was focusing a bit too intently on the road in front of him. The nerve. 

College Francis Dupont                                                                              Paris, France                                                                                                11:00 am

All of the kids in Francis Dupont were happily eating their lunch in the courtyard. Unfortunately that happiness was soon going to come to an end. Alya was standing up and was busy trying to get everyone's attention, most of the students were ignoring her. 

Once Alya felt that she had the necessary attention she started “HELLOOO everyone, As you all know a spot for the planning committee for the spring dance was suddenly uh vacated,” At that, a lot of people turned to glare at Alya, they all knew good and well that she was the reason why Marinette had to drop out of the planning committee. “which is why I want to recommend that we move ahead without them and ensure that this dance is awesome” Alya finished. 

The only reason she was making this announcement was because Alya realized that any plans they had written up back when Marinette was on the committee were suddenly missing. She needed the rest of the committee to get those plans back. Marinette's original plans had Jagged Stone as a guest performer. The Grand Hotel catering for food and desserts being given by her parents bakery. None of those things can happen without Marinette. And Alya does not want to beg her. 

Chloe Bourgeois wanted revenge. Chloe along with Kagami and Aurores made sure to get rid of all the previous dance plans. She couldn’t possibly let Rossi and Cesaire get away with what they did to Marinette. She wants to watch them flounder. It would be unfair to make the whole school suffer, so they were going to help a bit with the planning for the school dance. But everything else she’s going to make life difficult for Bustiers class. They can say adios to their fun field trips.

Chloe, Kagami, and Aurore stayed up all night plotting their revenge, unfortunately, they had to wait a few weeks to set their plans into motion. Marinette won’t know about anything only until they figure out what she can do to get her revenge. 

They're going to call her tomorrow to give her status updates. Revenge is going to be sweet.

Taglist:

@another-fan-of-anotherplan @damianette-is-life @amayakans @parallelparabox @miukiiu @valeks-princess @toodaloo-kangaroo @vixen-uchiha @thezestywalru @dreamykitty25 @pirats-pizzacanninibles @mochinek0 @shamefullove @mochegato @souleateralicestein @thestressmademedoit @throneoffirebreathingbitchqueen

A/N:

Ha sorry i’m a bit late “celebrating” Jason's’ Deathaversary >.< Also I forgot to announce that I have uploaded my first chapter in my one-shot series. I am creating a seperate tag list for that series :). Stay safe and healthy my peeps :)

[youngjusticeslut]

Center Stage (Chapter 4)

Fandom: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power Characters: Adora, Catra, Glimmer, Bow, Mermista, Sea Hawk, Kyle, Perfuma, Frosta, Angella, Micah, Shadow Weaver Ships: Catradora, Glimbow, Seamista, Kygelio, Scorptra Rating: T+ Summary: A Catradora Ballet School AU AO3

Adora wakes up long before her alarm goes off.

First day of classes. Big day. Her phone tells her it’s a little past six in the morning, and a quick glance to the side of the room tells her that Glimmer is gone, bed unkempt. Carefully, she crawls out of bed, hoping not to wake Catra. Though judging by the girl’s soft snores, there’s not much to worry about.

Six am means she has two hours to kill before her first class. Two hours is plenty of time. Enough for a quick workout, a thorough stretch session, and maybe even a bit of breakfast. If her stomach calms down enough to eat, that is.

From her bedside table, she grabs her earphones and plugs them into her phone. Quiet as can be, she starts with a series of pushups, followed by crunches, bicycle kicks, and leg lifts. Three sets, rinse and repeat. It helps Adora work her nerves out, and lucky for her, Catra sleeps through the entire thing, unaware of it all. She takes extra time to stretch out her muscles, especially her feet. They’d be put through the ringer today, the least she can do is prepare them for what’s to come.

By the time she showers and grabs a couple of muffins from the cafeteria, Catra’s just waking up. She smiles, seeing her awake when she enters the room. Glimmer is still nowhere to be found, it seems. “Hey there,” Adora greets softly, trying not to startle her roommate. “Late start?”

“Not an early riser,” the brunette responds. “What time is it?”

“Seven thirty. Still got about thirty minutes until class.”

“Shit.” As if on cue, Catra’s stomach growls. She glances away in mild embarrassment.  

“It’s okay,” Adora says, tossing her a muffin. Catra catches it without missing a bit. “I came prepared.”

Adora tries not to relish the look of surprise on Catra’s face. Score a point to her, for being the best roommate ever. As Catra nibbles on the muffin, Adora rifles through her drawers, pulling out her black leotards and pink tights. Boring, but apparently the required uniform at Bright Moon.

She keeps her back to Catra as she’s changing, humming to herself as a distraction. At the moment, she doesn’t even remember the name of the song she’s humming. It’s a Spanish one, something Mara would sing most mornings as she made breakfast. The routine quells the little bit of homesickness that she’s feeling.

Once she’s dressed, she walks over to the mirror and starts to pin up her hair. By now, Catra’s finished the muffin and has also begun to get dressed. “Want to walk to class together?” she asks, hoping to continue extending the olive branch. She’s not great at making friends, but she promised Mara and Razz that she’d make a better effort at it.

“Uh, sure. I have to brush my teeth, though.”

“That’s okay, I’ll—wait, is that what you’re wearing?”

Catra glances up from adjusting the straps on her leotard. “Yeah?” She pauses, cocks her head to the side and gives a little smirk. “Doesn’t suit your taste?” Unlike Adora, she wears red, with nude colored tights. It looks far better than it should, and Adora can’t help the blush that tints her cheeks.

The question leaves Adora flustered, more than it probably should. It’s too early for this. “What? No. No, it’s fine. Cool actually, super— I mean…” She stops rambling and collects herself with a deep breath. “What you’re wearing is nice, but Bright Moon has a uniform.”

“Uniform?”

“Yeah. Didn’t you read the orientation packet?”

Catra’s face says that she very much hadn’t, but the girl shrugs it off and takes off the hair tie from around her wrist. “Whatever. It’ll make me stand out.”

“I don’t think it works like that. What if you get in trouble?”

The brunette pauses from tying up her hair, shooting a quick look at Adora. “Worried about me?”

Adora scoffs and crosses her arms. “I’m trying to save you from getting your ass kicked out on the first day.”

“They won’t throw me out. Trust me, once they see me dance, they’ll forget all about what I’m wearing.” Her words are strong, but something in Catra’s eyes doesn’t exactly convince Adora. It comes off more like a front, a facade to protect her. Part of her wants to call Catra out on it, but something stops her. Truthfully, it’s none of her business. Who is Adora to stop Catra from doing what she wants?

“Hey, it’s your funeral,” Adora ends up saying.

Catra finishes to tie up her hair, leaving it in a sloppy bun with bangs framing her face. It’s a stark contrast to Adora’s sleek, neat do. “I appreciate the concern,” she says with a wink.

While Catra scoots past her into their shared bathroom to brush her teeth, Adora checks the time on her phone. Class starts in fifteen minutes. She pulls at her fingers for something to do, resisting the urge to chew on her lip. They’re cutting it awfully close. What if all the good spots are taken by the time they get there? She really wants to show up early, scope out the other girls, make a good impression on the teachers.

“Almost ready?” It comes with a bit of a whine, and Adora mentally kicks herself. Now Catra probably thinks she’s such a goody-goody. It doesn’t matter, though. There’s no answer. “Catra?”

“Nearly done. If it’s getting close, go on ahead.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah. I’ll catch up.”

Permission granted, Adora grabs her already-packed ballet bag and slings it over her shoulder. She barely remembers to grab her room keys on her way out the door. Part of her feels guilty for leaving Catra behind, but she really doesn’t want to be late. Especially not on the first day.

Thanks to her strategic mapping technique from the day before, Adora is able to make it to class in less than five minutes. The dorms aren’t too far from this particular studio, and for that Adora is eternally grateful. As expected, several girls are already there in various points of preparing their pointe shoes. Glimmer stands off to the side, testing out a shiny pair of shoes. In comparison, Adora’s faded ones look abysmal. She really needs a new pair.

Adora takes her place in the center of the room, close to the barre. When class begins, she’ll be front and center; perfect for watching the teacher, and right up front to get her noticed. Easy. Almost too easy. Her pointe shoes are already broken-in, so she takes the time to prep her feet properly before slipping them on. No distractions today. She has to be at the top of her game.

Her nerves aren’t nearly as bad as they were on the day of her audition. Maybe it’s because she’s already in and the hard part is over. Or maybe it has something to do with being inside the gorgeous dance studio again. Last time she was in here, it felt like a dream. Today, it’s her reality.

“Adora!” Perfuma waves at her, grinning from ear to ear. “It’s your first day, how are you feeling? Did you eat breakfast?”

Any other morning, this amount of energy so early in the morning would have turned Adora off. She doesn’t mind it so much today. “Yeah, I got something to eat. And I’m fine. Excited for it to start, really.”

Perfuma places a hand on Adora’s shoulder and gives it a soft squeeze. “Glad to hear it. No stress?”

“Not really.”

“That’s great! I’m sure you’re going to be amazing.” For some reason, Perfuma’s encouragement actually helps Adora feel better. She knows that she’s only met the girl a day ago, but there’s something really calming about her general demeanor.

Adora’s about to respond when the doors to the dance studio open. A flock of boys enter the room, and the excitement increases tenfold. Returning students hug and squeal and group together. Off to the side, Adora finally locates Glimmer. She throws her arm around a boy, who cheers and spins her around in delight. Following right after the boys are a group of adults. Teachers, she assumes, judging by their higher air and the way they watch the students interact. Adora recognizes Angella, Spinerella and Netossa from the audition. Angella holds herself at the front of the room, standing beside a dark-haired man.

“Good morning,” she announces, bright and chipper. The energy in the room immediately simmers down, and many echo the words back to her. “We are so pleased to welcome everyone to the first day of what I am sure will be a wonderful year.”

As she welcomes the new students, Adora scans the crowd for Catra. She doesn’t find her. Biting her lip, she attempts to  focus back on Angella. Why is her roommate like this?

“You are our senior class, which means that this will be your last year attending Bright Moon Academy,” the man beside Angella continues. “At the end of the year, we will be picking the top dancers to join our company.” He scans the crowd, and offers a kind smile. “While I’m sure that all of you are incredible, this year we will only have room to add six students to the company.”

Six students? Adora clenches her fist in determination. She’s faced worse odds.

“Throughout the year, we will be observing you and your talents as ballet dancers. However, we will not make any final decisions until we see how you dance in the final workshop performance. With that said, we wish you all the best of luck, and advise you to make this your year.”

When Angella finishes speaking, the group claps. The door opens again, and Catra walks in, completely neutral, not a hint of shame on her face. The man beside Angella raises a brow. “So nice of you to fit us into your schedule, Miss…?”

“Catra.” She grins right back at him. “And no sweat.”

The class snickers at her response, but if Catra cares, she doesn’t show it. Adora sucks in her teeth. Late, again? Really. Is Catra actively trying to get herself kicked out, or does she just not care?

“One more thing before we dismiss you for classes. As you may have heard, the company gala is taking place this weekend. We always invite our senior students to attend the performance and help out at the party afterwards, so please plan accordingly. We do expect you all to attend,” Angella says. “Thank you all!”

That said, the teachers trickle out of the room and the boys bid their goodbyes before leaving for their own class. A dark-haired teacher remains at the front, hands clasped tightly. Catra catches Adora’s eye and gives her a wink, but her expression changes completely once she sees the teacher. That’s weird.

“You may call me Madame Weaver,” the woman continues. “In this class, we will be working on technique, sequences and formations three times a week. At the barre,”  she instructs, giving no pleasantries. Needless to say, the girls toss their bags to the side and scurry to their positions at the barre. Adora already has her spot, and Catra manages to grab the spot on the opposing end. Their hands are inches away from the other. Adora’s not sure why, but it makes her nervous.

“Let’s start with our pliés. First position, demi, and stretch. Full grand plié and return. Port de bras forward. Full port de bras back. The same in second, third, and fifth positions, and then rise and take a balance in fifth.” She speaks a little too quickly for Adora to fully understand what she’s asking, but since she’s good at following along, she’s not too worried.

Madame Weaver nods to the pianist in the room, who begins the opening transition. To no one’s surprise, the girls move through the pliés seamlessly. Thanks to her rigorous stretch earlier, Adora feels nice and limber.

The teacher walks around the room with something to say about everyone. Mermista needs to relax her fingers. Perfuma needs to work on feeling the support from her center. Glimmer is complimented on her technique. Adora glides through the movements, feeling confident and waiting for Madame Weaver to no doubtedly comment on how wonderful her technique is.

When she gets to her, she pauses. “Your name?” Madame Weaver asks.

“Adora.”

“You need to work on your turnout. Without it, your dancing suffers.”

It’s not the advice Adora expected to hear. She looks down at her feet and adjusts her turnout, feeling less comfortable. “Better,” Madame Weaver says before moving on. As Adora continues her plies, she watches from her peripheral as Madame Weaver approaches Catra.

“You will be on time to my class and wearing appropriate attire. You would do well to remember that your place here is subject to my approval. Do I make myself clear, Catra?”

Adora doesn’t hear a response, but she assumes that Catra agrees, for Madame Weaver moves away and proceeds onto the next student. Something about her interaction with Catra unsettles her. It’s almost like they know each other. With a slight huff, she forces the thought out of her mind. She can’t think about that right now.  

The class continues. They spend an hour on barre work alone. From there, they move on to floor work and practicing routines across the room. As much as Adora would like to admit otherwise, she struggles. She comes out of turns too slow and stumbles one time too many for her liking. Madame Weaver works quickly and she isn’t always able to catch everything she says. On the whole, she feels like she has much to improve on.

When class ends, Adora sinks down to the floor and yanks open the laces of her pointe shoes. Her feet throb and she just wants to be out of them. Lunch sounds good, too. The lonely muffin she had for breakfast is long gone, and she needs more than just a salad today.

“Hey.” Adora looks up to see Glimmer, offering her an apologetic smile. “Don’t let it get you down. The first day is always rough.”

It’s hard not to take her words personally, especially not after an entire class where Glimmer was the model student. She swallows any bitterness and smiles back. “I guess you’d know, huh?”

“Trust me, there are days I mess up too. Do you want to go have lunch?”

Adora slips into a pair of slippers and stuffs her pointe shoes in her bag before standing up. “Lunch sounds great. I don’t think I’m in the mood for salad though.”

Glimmer laughs and interlocks arms with her. The action is unexpected, but welcome. They head in the direction of the cafeteria, arm in arm. “Hard same. What are you thinking?”

“I could go for a sandwich. Grilled cheese?”

“Deal.”

In less than ten minutes, the two are in line at the cafeteria waiting to pay for their food. Adora steals a fry off her plate, nibbling at it to quell her hunger. “So, it gets better, right?”

“So much better. Weaver never gets easier though.” Glimmer chews on the inside of her cheek before looking off to the side. “She’s just very… particular.”

Adora remembers the short conversation she overheard between Madame Weaver and Catra. Note to self, stay on Weaver’s good side. Couldn’t be that hard, right? Glimmer seems to have figured it out. “She likes you, though.”

“I wish she didn’t. Believe it or not, I kind of hate being the teacher’s pet.”

“What? No way.” When it’s her turn, Adora sets down her tray and pulls out her student ID to pay for the meal. She’s so lucky that she qualified for Bright Moon’s scholarship program. Mara and Razz were more than willing to chip in, but Adora’s never been comfortable with putting more financial burden on them.

“Way.” Glimmer pulls out her card to pay for her food when she looks up and her eyes widen. “I am so sorry.”

“For what?”

“Glimmer!” Angella meets them at the cash register, a stack of papers in her hand. “You haven’t answered my texts. How was your first class?”

Glimmer flushes in embarrassment and grits her teeth. “Mom, you’re holding up the line.”

“Oh, you’re right. Here, let me pay, Dear,” she says, handing the cashier her credit card before Glimmer can argue. Once they’re all settled, Angella walks with them toward a less crowded spot.

“Adora, this is my mom,” Glimmer introduces reluctantly. “Mom, Adora.”

“Yes, Adora. I remember you, from the audition.” Angella takes her hand and gives it a squeeze. “It’s so nice to meet more of Glimmer’s friends.”

“Mom.”

Angella clears her throat, smiling bashfully and letting go of Adora’s hands. “Right, sorry. How was the first class?”

“It was good. Nothing to worry about. Right, Adora?”

Adora nods, quickly trying to swallow her mouth full of a couple more fries. “Yep! Just fine,” she says, hoping that Madame Weaver hasn’t already soiled her reputation to Angella.

“Good. I’m so glad to hear that. I won’t pry any more, you girls go on and enjoy your lunch, I just wanted to say hello.” Angella takes note of her daughter’s tray and rests a soft hand on Glimmer’s shoulder. “I thought we agreed on salads for lunch. We spoke about this, Glimmer.”

Glimmer turns as red as the ketchup on her plate. It clashes horribly with her hair. “Mom, I know. I promise, salad for dinner,” she mutters, unable to look at Adora.

The answer pleases Angella, for she pecks her forehead and lets go of her. “Good. Keep an eye on your phone, and call me tonight?”

“Yeah, Mom. Say hi to Dad for me.”

“I will. Bye girls.”

Adora watches after her as she leaves before following Glimmer to where she’d hunkered down at a nearby table. Glimmer angrily stabs a fry in some ketchup before tossing it to the side of her plate. “I don’t want to talk about it,” she warns before taking a deep breath, trying to calm herself.

“Fair enough. My family can be a lot too,” Adora says, trying to make Glimmer feel better. “Was your dad the guy standing next to Angella this morning.”

“Yeah. I may have mentioned it yesterday, but they run the school and the company. My dad takes a bigger role in the company, and my mom the school. It works out.”

“Must have been cool to grow up around all these ballet dancers. You must have been able to learn so much from them.”

Glimmer nods, swirling a fry around in some ketchup before popping it in her mouth. “Something like that.”

As Adora digs into her grilled cheese, she notices Catra sitting at a table not too far from them. She talks to a girl with platinum hair and she looks… upset. The tall girl attempts to comfort her but Catra moves away. It seems that Madame Weaver’s words really got to her. “Kind of serves her right,” Glimmer notes after following Adora’s gaze.

“What do you mean?”

“Who does she think she is, showing up late on the first day? And breaking the dress code at that! Catra’s just asking to be kicked out,” Glimmer scoffs, taking a bite of her grilled cheese. She chews, mulls it over, and smirks. “Or maybe she just likes attention.”

Glimmer’s words don’t sit well with her. Adora crosses her arms and takes a shaky breath. “Look, I know you and Catra don’t get along. But you didn’t hear what Weaver said to her. It was… way harsh. Harsher than it should be.”

“That’s just how Weaver is.”

“I don’t think so. I’m not saying what Catra did was right, and I’m not going to sit here and make excuses for her. But I’m also not going to sit here and badmouth her.” Adora looks down at her plate. “That’s not who I am. Okay?”

Glimmer reaches for her hand. “I’m sorry, you’re right. Let’s just talk about something else?”

“Yeah.” Adora looks back in Catra’s direction, but the brunette is no longer there. Maybe she’ll talk to her later, see what’s going on. “So, about the Gala thing this weekend… Can you wear jeans to that?”

[bestillmyslashyheart]

(for @manesguerin and @partsofthesamecosmicbeing who quite literally came and yelled at me for leaving it like that)

There was a moment, probably not longer than ten seconds, where the room stood frozen. Alex fell back a step and clutched at his chest involuntarily, the shirt wet with what he assumed was blood. Kyle, Liz, and Rosa all looked furious, though Alex imagined for different reasons. Maria looked heartbroken and confused. Isobel looked…blank.

The tableau shattered with Michael. One second he was calm and even gazed and the next he was horrified, his face twisted in sorrow as he leapt out of his chair and across the room. Kyle jumped between him and Alex but Michael pushed him aside. “Alex, no, no, no, I love you.” Alex braced for another cut but it didn’t come. “I love you. I love you. I love you.” He kept repeating it and every time Alex braced himself only to find that his skin remained intact. Eventually he stopped bracing for injury and embraced the words and the feeling that came with it.

“What is going on?” Maria asked. Alex hated how shattered she sounded.

Michael ignored her, pressing his forehead to Alex’s as he kept repeating those three words. “No lie,” he finally whispered. “I promise. No lie.”

“Okay,” Kyle said slowly when it became apparent to him that Michael wasn’t hurting Alex any further. “What the fuck just happened?”

Michael was suddenly furious and Alex took a step back as he whirled on his sister. Isobel looked like she was in between emotions. Alex imagined that a moment ago she looked pleased with herself but the expression was quickly falling in the face of Michael’s reaction and his rage. “What the fuck was that, Isobel?!”

Isobel looked offended. “You said we would need to demonstrate our powers for Maria! We agreed I would use you instead of any of the humans!”

“Wait, so you made Michael tell Alex he loved him?” Maria stepped forward. “Why would you do that?”

“I couldn’t make him say something he didn’t want to and it was the one thing he was holding himself back from saying! If I made him say something he was already going to say it wouldn’t have proved anything,” she looked between Michael and Maria and Alex. “But I only made him say it once.”

Alex still had his hand on his chest, still felt the blood coating his palm through his shirt. “I don’t understand.”

“It was Isobel,” Kyle realized. “It might have been Michael’s mouth saying the words but it was actually Isobel. His mouth saying words with her intent.”

Michael turned back to Alex and said once more for good measure, “I love you, Alex. I swear to god that’s not a lie. That’s never going to be a lie.”

“What I don’t understand,” Rosa asked. “Is if you two are soulmates, why is Michael with Maria?”

They both turned to look at her.

“We don’t have soulmates,” Isobel protested weakly. But by now the blood was obvious enough that it was hard to deny what had happened.

“I think I hate your sister,” Alex said tiredly.

A mark bloomed on Michael’s wrist. “Liar,” he smiled weakly.

“I’m going to go,” Maria announced. Liz cast a glare at Michael before her eyes turned to Alex and softened into something close to pity as she followed her out.

“Let me look at that,” Kyle ordered gently. He was walking in from the kitchen with a first aid kit. Alex hadn’t seen him leave the room. Michael took the kit from him without letting go of Alex.

“I’ve got him,” he said. Gently he turned Alex around and guided him to the closest bathroom.

“Alex?” Kyle called stepping into their way. He cast a wary glance at Michael.

“I’m good, Kyle,” he nodded at him. Truthfully, he didn’t want to know how Kyle would react to seeing all of the marks on his chest. Alex imagined that it wouldn’t go over well and he had no desire to see Kyle and Michael get into a fight tonight.

“Here,” Michael put down the kit as soon as they were in the bathroom and started tugging at the hem of Alex’s shirt. Together they got it as far as his chest before Alex realized it wasn’t going to happen.

“Just cut it off,” he sighed. “Does Isobel have any of Noah’s stuff around I could borrow?”

Michael shook his head. “She threw it all out.” Nonetheless he fished a pair of scissors out of the door and cut Alex’s shirt straight down the middle. When he was finished he froze, the scissors falling to hang limply at his side while he stared at Alex’s chest.

Alex didn’t particularly want to look but he couldn’t help it. It was bad. The mark from Caulfield was about half an inch log and had raised scar tissue. He’d thought it would be the worst mark he received but no. This one was worse. It almost looked like a surgical wound, cutting a neat, straight line deep into the meat of his chest. Alex estimated that it was over an inch longer, twice as long as the mark from Caulfield which itself was longer than any other.

“We might need Kyle in here,” Alex realized. It would probably need stitches.

“I did this,” Michael’s voice shook. Alex was distressed to realize he didn’t get a new mark.

“No,” he said firmly. “This was Isobel. She didn’t know what she was doing but this is because of her.” No marks appeared on Michael but Alex wasn’t sure he realized it.

“Because I didn’t tell her. If I’d told her the truth, been honest about you, about us, this wouldn’t have happened.”

“Michael,” Alex lifted his chin from where he was still staring at the new mark. “You didn’t do this. This is not your fault.”

“I-”

“Do you love me?” He cut him off.

“Yes,” Michael replied immediately.

“You’ve now said that about 20 times,” Alex smiled. “And I don’t have another mark on me. This wasn’t you.”

Michael shook his head. “I’m quite literally the only person who could do this to you, Alex.”

“I guess the rules are different when aliens get involved.” Alex reached for Michael with the other hand but couldn’t. “Okay we need to work through your issues another time. For now, go get Kyle.”

(for the record, Alex was right about Kyle not being happy with the state of his chest)

—

“Hey,” Maria greeted timidly. She held a box of chocolates from the chocolate shop on Main St. “I come in peace?”

Alex snorted and waved her in. “I think I’m the wrong audience for that line.” She smiled and handed him the chocolates as they sat down on the couch. “To what do I owe the pleasure?”

Maria shot him a look. “I’m sorry.”

“You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“He’s your soulmate,” she countered.

“But you didn’t know that.” They’d broken up that night even if it took them three days to actually have the conversation because Michael refused to leave Alex until Alex could move without wincing at every breath.

“I should have.”

Alex snorted. “How? Maria I didn’t even realize until the day before Max died and it took me weeks to get Michael to see the truth.” He shook his head. “The only person at fault here was Michael and he had his own valid reasons.”

“He hurt you,” she said sadly.

Alex nodded. “He did. In more ways than one. But that’s okay because we’re working through it. And learning new things about each other. Like how I love when he leaves wet towels on the bathroom floor. Or how much he enjoys cleaning up after Buffy. And how great a cook I am.”

“Really Alex?” Michael’s voice carried in through the window.

Maria looked at the window in surprise before turning back to Alex. “I take it those were all lies?”

Alex shrugged. “I spent 20 years carefully not lying about anything. It’s actually rather freeing.”

“Still,” she said quietly. “Doesn’t make up for-”

“Maria,” he cut in. “I think it might be a better idea for both of us if we didn’t discuss the particulars of either of our relationship with Michael.”

She considered that and then nodded. “I think maybe you’re right.”

“Thank you for the chocolates,” he smiled. “They’re my favorites.”

She smiled, genuinely this time. “I know. Who do you think sent them to you while you were deployed?”

“You are a goddess Maria DeLuca,” he sighed. He’d suspected but the boxes were always unmarked so he couldn’t be sure. “Everyone on base was jealous of me when those boxes came in.”

“Well I’m glad. They should’ve been jealous.” She laughed and hugged him gently before leaving.

“Everything okay?” Michael asked from the back door.

Alex nodded. “You should talk to her.”

“Ah,” Michael shook his head. “I think it’s better for everyone involved if I give her some space.” He grabbed a bottle of water out of the fridge and downed half of it. “We still going to the Crashdown for dinner?”

Alex raised his eyebrows. “After you take a shower. You look gross.”

“Hey!” Michael replied, voice full of faux offense. “I-” he stopped and looked down at himself then looked slowly up at Alex. “You filthy liar.”

Alex shrugged. “You should cut your hair. It looks terrible.”

“Lie,” Michael came up behind the couch and pressed a kiss to Alex’s neck. “And lie.”

“I’m not lying.”

“Another lie.” Michael tilted Alex’s head back and they looked at each other upside down. “Try again?”

“I don’t want you to kiss me.”

“Liar,” Michael whispered as he brought their lips together.

[smileyjaeminies]

The flirt with the biggest heart

Synopsis: You weren’t feeling so well, but gladly Nana was always there to comfort you. You leave yourself exposed to him, simply laying your heart at his feet. With your upcoming competition, how will everything turn out?

Word Count: 4,6k

Genre: slow burn, angst, fluff

Warnings: none

Member: 00z, ft. Yangyang

A/N: I’m so sorry these have been taking forever to come out :( I hope you like this, make sure you keep an eye out for the finale!

~Series Masterlist~

  School would be your demise. After spring had finally showed the face you liked, the carefree and shining side you always longed for, your dance competitions stopped you from truly enjoying her gift.

  Your competitions lasted for three weeks in total, which meant daily practices for everyone. This year, your number was intense with flips and jumps, difficult formations and sharp moves. You loved it though, you thrived within the hard beat and the long hours.

  Elena was always there to pull you out from your slump, helping you with homework and assignments and basically carrying your weight for almost a month. But she would never say a word, and you loved her for it.

  The first two weeks of your competitions had already passed, with the previous Sunday being victorious for you and your team as you got second place. You celebrated grandly at a pizza place downtown when the worst thing that could happen did.

  You got your period.

  Okay, maybe you were exaggerating a little bit, but this was no time for your body to be making its own battle against you. You needed every cell you had under your control and that was vital.

  After a quick word with your dance instructor, you both decided that it would be for the best that you stayed inside on Monday, to rest and gather your strength for a good practice on Tuesday. And then… Well, you’d have to see.

  Which brought you right to this moment, early Monday afternoon, all alone in your house, watching whatever popped up in your recommended on Youtube. You mindlessly watched video after video, just lying down and trying not to think about the searing pain that tortured your abdomen.

  The stillness of your room helped the stillness of your mind which for once decided to stop its racing; the numbness was welcome, an old friend you greeted at the door and bid to come in. You wrapped yourself in her arms, allowing her to lead you back and rest.

  Uncalled for, the ringtone of your phone disturbed the delicate balance. You debated answering for a few seconds but as you saw Jaemin’s name you knew that he wouldn’t stop calling until you picked up. You took him out of his misery, answering with a simple, “Hi Nana”

  “Y/N!!” he shouted.

  “I need to teach you kids to talk more quietly” you mumbled under your breath.

  “Y/N!!!” Jaemin repeated. “Today is Monday!!!”

  “I’m aware of that Jaemin” you replied.

  “You missed the club meeting” He said and you could distinguish the pout in his voice.

  “I know, I am supposed to stay at home and rest today.” You explained.

  “Are you sick? I heard you won yesterday, congratulations!” he said.

  “No, I’m just tired. And, yes we got second place, exciting stuff!” you answered.

  “Well, if you’re not sick, then I’m coming over! Movies and coffee afternoon, just the two of us!”

  “No coffee allowed, Jaemin” you informed him.

  “Why not?” he said, sounding hurt.

  “Jaemin, I’m having one of those days” you tried to explain.

  “Why? Are you feeling sad? Did Donghyuck say something to you?” He asked question after question as you chuckled.

  “Jaemin, listen to me, I’m having those days of the month…” you cut him off, explaining again.

  You heard him take a deep breath as realization hit him. He stayed quiet for a few seconds, and then:

  “Wait! No magic bean juice, like at all? No wonder girls are so grumpy when they’re on their periods!”

  “Nana!” you reprimanded him slightly.

  “Okay, okay. No magic bean juice… Snacks then?” he asked.

  You wanted to say no. You knew your dad would be furious when he came home and found a boy in his house. But it had been weeks since you had hang out with Jaemin and you missed him a lot. Just one movie wouldn’t hurt.

  “Alright. But bring me a lot of chocolate.” You requested.

  “Yes ma’am!” Jaemin answered, hanging up the phone.

  You managed to peel yourself off your bed and went to the bathroom to freshen up a little. You were looking pretty rough if you were being honest, but oh well, this was just Jaemin. You went back into your room and tidied it up, folding all your clothes and making your bed. The bell rang, announcing Jaemin’s arrival and you rushed to greet him.

  “Is this enough?” Jaemin asked, holding up a huge grocery bag.

  “It will do I guess” you answered him, grinning.

  After one tight hug and another round of congratulations on second place, you both made your way inside, getting comfortable under the covers. You tried (and failed) to convince Jaemin to watch a new movie that you were sure would get an Oscar nomination. But he wouldn’t budge.

  “Disney movies are like a painkiller! It will help with your cramps!” he insisted.

  “Oh please, we’ll shut it off before 30 minutes are up. Besides, I don’t even like Disney that much.” You countered.

  “Ha! Sure you don’t. Who are you kidding Y/N? You’ve picked up on every single reference I’ve made!” he scoffed.

  You blushed and chuckled at his words. Disney and Pixar movies were indeed some of your favourites. You could recite whole movies by heart, you knew every lyric and song. But you wouldn’t admit it to Jaemin.

  “Fine, fine! You win! Play the movie.” You told him.

  Jaemin bent down to press a kiss to your cheek, before grabbing your computer and finding the movie he wanted. You watched him, eyes filled with concentration as he went on about how he hadn’t watched the movie in ages.

  Soon enough, you found yourself wrapped up on Jaemin’s side, your favourite chocolate in your hands and the Disney movie filling the silence in the room. However, that didn’t last long.

  The movie Jaemin suggested turned out to be a total bore, so you shut it off only 20 minutes in. You had made a brand new playlist, its soft music now drifting through your laptop's speakers and dancing through the room. You had laid back onto Jaemin, and he was now playing with your hair. The gesture should've been intimate, but it was more comfortable than anything.

  Your thoughts drifted of course, to the boy next to you. Nana was playful flirting and rosy cheeks. Jaemin was constantly pushing the boundaries and a fluttering heart. Jaemin was the buzz of morning coffee, the heat seeping from it onto your palm warming up your hand and your heart.

  Jaemin was everything but routine. He was the unpredictable, racing through the night and screaming the lyrics to your favourite songs. He was sneaking into his parent’s liquor cabinet for alcohol, letting your insides burn with its fumes.

  Jaemin was the easiest person to love. He poured and poured his love onto anything his life touched and never held back. Jaemin was thinking about the consequences after the action.

  That's why, when your tears started to fall, you did nothing to conceal them. You didn't have to. Not with Nana.

  “You want to tell me what’s wrong?” he asked, his voice low.

  And so you did. You poured and poured your heart out to him. You left nothing out, from your breakup, to Renjun, then Jeno and Yangyang. You went over that dreadful afternoon with Kyle, how Donghyuck found you later. You talked to him about how scared you still were, how anxious and heartbroken and confused.

  He sat next to you and then continued to sit on your bed as you got up and started pacing around the room. He never said a word, he allowed you to talk for as long as you needed, to give him all the facts and details before he said anything.

  It took a while for you to sit back down at the foot of your bed, only to drop your face in your hands.

  “I’m such a mess” you admitted.

  “You want to know what I think? These are my friends after all” Jaemin offered. You only nodded slightly at his words turning to look at him.

  “I think if someone had caught feelings, you’d have known by now. The kisses were spontaneous and that’s why no one mentioned them after. And because you asked. You know us Y/N, all of us. Do you think we’d ever go against your wishes? Especially on something like this? No. None of us would, not even Hyuck.”

  “About the Kyle… situation. I wish you’d let me beat up his face. I may have tiny fists, but I’m sure if I took him by surprise… Whatever. You should’ve reported it. I understand why you didn’t, I do. But that was dumb baby, I’m sorry. The good thing is, he has drawn himself back into the fiery pit he likes to call home.” Jaemin finished.

  “His house is actually very pretty” you joked.

  Jaemin’s face lit up at your silly joke.

  “She jokes! Ladies and gentlemen, after an hour of crying, she jokes!” he teased you.

  He moved over on the bed, making his way next to you. He wrapped you in his arms in a weird embrace filled with arms and limbs and bodies. But you wouldn’t have it any other way.

  “Nana?” you asked after a few minutes dragged on.

  “Yes?” he responded.

  “Can you come to my last competition on Friday? For moral support?” you asked.

  “I’ll be at the first row.” Jaemin agreed, running his hands through your hair.

  Your peaceful moment was interrupted by keys at your front door and your mother’s excited voice.

  “Shit. Mom’s home.” You mumbled under your breath.

  “Is that bad?” Jaemin asked.

  “Not that bad, unless Dad’s with her” you answered and paused to listen carefully for your father’s voice.

  Luck was on your side however as your Dad hadn’t returned just yet. Your mother called your name, announcing she’s back and you pulled Jaemin to his feet as quickly as possible.

  “Best behavior. Do not try to charm my mom or I will kill you. You say hello you DECLINE dinner and you’re out the door. Deal??” you turned to him.

  “Damn baby, are you embarrassed of me?” he asked, slightly hurt.

  “Not you…” you whisper under your breath, already pushing him out of the door.

  “Hi Mommy! Did you have a good day at work?” you greet your Mom in the kitchen, putting back some groceries.

  “It was okay. You know, work is work.” She answered as she hugged you.

  “Mommy, this is Jaemin. He came to keep me some company.” You introduced your friend.

  “Jaemin, it’s really nice to meet you! Y/N talks about you all the time!” your Mom said and you couldn’t help but glare at her.

  Jaemin however only shot you a funny look and proceeded to greet your mother kindly. He declined dinner like you asked him, but he couldn’t help charming his way into your mother’s heart. After he left, your mother wouldn’t stop talking about him, asking about him and going on about what a kind young man he was already.

  You didn’t really mind, on the contrary, you were glad your Mom had liked Nana. But the untold promise was that you wouldn’t talk about any of this in front of your Dad. Your father was… Old fashioned let’s say, so this was a strictly only girls topic.

  After helping your mom with the groceries, you excused yourself back to your room. Once you got there, you opened your phone, your hand hovering over the familiar username, before you took the next step and dialed his number.

  He picked up on the third ring.

  “Hello?” he asked.

  “Hi” you answered.

  “What’s up, Y/N? I missed you today… In fact, it feels like I haven’t seen you in forever.” He scolded you.

  “I know, I know… That’s why I called… I have a favour to ask you.” You said.

  “Oh? Let’s hear it then!” he responded.

  “I need a good luck charm…” you trailed off.

  “The tables have turned then?” Jeno teased you.

  “They have… You think you could help a friend in a tight place?” you asked.

  “I’ll be in the front row” Jeno said, not hesitating.

  How ironic, you thought, that both of them had said the exact same thing. Or maybe it wasn’t ironic at all…  

  “You want me to bring everyone?” Jeno asked.

  “I already asked Jaemin and Yangyang is going to be there since we’re competing against each other. I doubt Donghyuck will be willing to come, so that just leaves Renjun. You should ask him though, maybe he’ll need a ride or something.” You finished.

  “I think you don’t give Donghyuck enough credit. I’m sure he’ll want to support you and Yangyang. Anyway, I’m going to ask.” Jeno said.

  “I think you forget that Donghyuck hates my guts but oh well! Ask away! Maybe he’ll come for Yangyang.” You replied.

  Jeno mumbled something under his breath that sounded a lot like “Typical”. He brushed it off right after however, hanging up the phone.

  After talking to both Jaemin and Jeno, you felt significantly better. A weight had been lifted off your shoulders, first by Jaemin’s wise words and comforting hugs. Second, the weight was shared with the knowledge that Jeno would be there at your last competition, knowing exactly what you were feeling and helping you through it.

---------------------------------------------------------

  The day of the competition arrived sooner than you thought. Elena drove with you in your Dad’s car, holding your hand throughout the ride and sharing her earphones with you. Calm, comforting music rushed through them into your ears, but your mind was replaying the beat you would be dancing to in a few hours, going over every move.

  Once you stepped foot at the venue, you were met with the familiar rumble of the competition. You signed some forms and you headed straight backstage to meet your instructor and the rest of your team. You were carried away for a warm up as you had to rehearse on stage soon enough.

  Rehearsals were a blur, your mind failing to concentrate at more than one thing at a time. Your instructor scolded you slightly but stayed reassured that you’d keep your head in the game for the actual erformance.

  Backstage, Elena scooped you up in her arms, reassuring you that you did great and that you hadn’t shown anything yet. You calmed down after a bit, still sharing Elena’s earphones and keeping your hands together in a tight hold.

  Before long, Elena led you to a make-up stand and got to work. As an artist, Elena had her way with make-up, producing looks that you couldn’t even dream of. She even helped you tie your hair back in a tight ponytail to match everyone. When she finished, she didn’t allow you to look at the result, but helped you get into costume first.

  Once your whole outfit was complete, you walked in front of a full length mirror. The result was outstanding. Your outfit fitted you well, the black and red contradicting each other. Your eye look matched the outfit, red eye-shadow dancing over your eyelids with a fierce cat eye completing the look.

  You hugged Elena and thanked her a thousand times for her help. You had begun to really calm down, a tranquility taking over you. You decided to look for Yangyang and soon enough you found his group’s dressing room and made a beeline to his arms.

  “Are you sure you’re Y/N? You look amazing!” Yangyang complemented you, twirling you around.

  “Elena does work wonders, what can I say!” you said.

  “Well Elena clearly needs to do my make-up as well! You think I could steal her for a while?” he asked, turning to Elena.

  “You want your make-up done? Really?” Elena asked.

  “I don’t have the words toxic masculinity on my vocabulary, ma’am. I’d be honored.” Yangyang replied, and you had never felt more proud.

  Elena fumbled for words for a few seconds before ushering Yangyang to a seat. You talked with both of them and Cat, Yangyang’s official girlfriend now, for a while before Elena turned to you.

  “You know, it’s getting late, if you want to see the boys, you better get out now” she said.

  “You’re probably right. Yangyang, don’t you dare move before I check the final result. I’ll be back in a second.” You announced, taking your leave.

  You walked out of the dressing room and headed to the stage. Taking out your phone, you saw a message from Renjun.

    Junnie

Hey Y/N! Traffic is being a bitch so we’ll be there in like, 10 minutes. Wait for us!! We want to give you good luck hugs!

  You

I’ll be waiting! Tell Jeno to be careful, you have time!

    After replying to Renjun’s message, you decided to step out anyway, to get some air and talk with some of your friends. You were introduced to some people from opposing teams and you were currently discussing the judges when you felt a hand on your shoulder.

  You were surprised to find Donghyuck smiling at you once you turned around. Quickly composing yourself, you tried to hide your nervousness as you greeted him. You almost screamed when he bent down to give you a hug and wish you good luck.

  “So, what do you think about today? An easy win?” Donghyuck asked.

  You were still perplexed by his hug and his overall nice demeanor before you answered.

  “Winning is never easy. All the teams put in a lot of work, or else they wouldn’t be here.”

  “Here, here tiger, no need to get defensive. Besides, I’m supporting two teams today, aren’t I?” he asked.

  “You don’t mean to make me believe that you’re here to support me, are you?” you asked him in return.

  Donghyuck’s face flashed with emotion.

  “Why not? Aren’t you my friend?” he asked and you could hear the hurt in his voice.

  “I don’t know Donghyuck… Are we? I mean, you always have some snarky remark to make about me day in, day out. You don’t even allow me to call you by your nickname while everyone and their mothers do… I’m not sure that’s friendship.” You replied.

  His face flashed with emotion once again. He took a few seconds to gather his thoughts before saying:

  “You know Y/N, that’s…” but you wouldn’t find out what it was.

  A huge burden was pushed on top of you as two strong hands lifted you up and twirled you around. Laughter erupted from you as you heard Jaemin praising you. All of the boys gave you their ‘good luck hugs’ and you spiraled into conversation with them.

  Donghyuck wasn’t excluded from this, but your moment was clearly over. Renjun was talking about your make-up and Elena’s skills and the others were asking you how long it would take you to perform. They almost made you dizzy, all talking at the same time but you didn’t mind; not at the moment.

  You kept stealing glances at Donghyuck and you would always find him staring right back at you. It made you nervous and it made you blush, but you couldn’t even pretend that it was a bad thing.

  Not long after, your teammates had to separate you from your friends. You hugged them again and you even got a kiss in the cheek from each of them for good luck. You promised to convey the same message to Yangyang and you were off.

  Backstage, it seemed like everyone was moving to every direction. People were talking loudly, making last minute checks and changes. You headed straight to Yangyang’s dressing room, to grab Elena and reunite with your team.

  “So, what do you think?” Yangyang asked, facing you.

  You were shocked. He was all angles, high contour on his cheeks and bright orange eye shadow around his eyes.

  “Yangyang you look…” you trailed off.

  “Show stopping? Spectacular? Like the man of your dreams?” he offered.

  “Beautiful” you said.

  “I know right? It’s hardly fair, my own boyfriend is more beautiful than me” Cat teased, smiling at Yangyang.

  “I could never” Yangyang answered.

  “Yeah, yeah, you’re in love okay OKAY. Don’t you need to go?” Elena said, turning to you.

  You nodded and hugged both Yangyang and Cat, exchanging good lucks. You finally stepped back in your team’s dressing room. Your instructor reprimanded you for being late, but you hardly listened. The blood in your veins had already begun to boil, the familiar buzz of the upcoming performance taking over you already.

  There were only about 10 teams competing, your team taking the number 8 spot. Not too early, not too late. You were restless, pacing up and down the small room and annoying your teammates. Elena managed to pull you down on your chair as yet another group took the stage.

  Your eyes were glued to the screen. They were good, too good. They moved as one, never missing a beat. The strong choreography worked amazing, their formations tight and moving around all the time. As they finished, you all took looks amongst yourselves. These people were the real stars of the night and the crowd went crazy over them.

  Next was Yangyang’s group. You found Yangyang and refused to take your eyes off of him. He did well, really well. He was nervous though and you could tell by the way he would keep looking at his teammates to make sure his position was correct. You could feel he was extra nervous in the couples’ part. But his hard work paid off. He didn’t make any mistakes you could see and overall their performance was very well structured and interesting.

  Before you even had time to process the performances, it was already time for you to standby. Elena pestered you with hugs and whispered soothing things in your ear, but you were buzzing. It was hard for you to stay still once again, and you felt your hands shaking uncontrollably. Your teammates moved around you and it was already time for you to step on the stage.

  The bright lights blinded you, but your mind was finally still. The music flowed through you, your body moving on its own accord. You were focused and not at the same time, moving right on the beat but without fully understanding what you were doing. And just like that, it was over.

  The cheers were deafening and with a simple glimpse at the crowd, you failed to see your friends. Your teammates pulled you backstage and a river of hugs and praise came over you. Elena jumped in your arms and praised how focused you were. If only she knew…

  Slowly but surely, the high of the stage left your system. You remained in your seat as the two teams left performed. Then, it was time for a short break for the judges to decide on the three best teams.

  Nervousness seeped through you once again. Elena had a tight grip on your hand and you felt dizzy, getting hotter and hotter, your back sweating. Before long it was time to go back on stage for the results to be announced.

  “I’m scared” you whispered.

  “It’s okay. You’re going to be fine” Elena tried to console you.

  Your friend Alex dragged you back on stage. You were standing amongst the rest of the teams and you were on the edge of your toes.  You tried to look for the boys to no avail; they were either too far away, or you needed contacts.

  The judges took the stage and seconds seemed to drag into hours. Third place was announced. It was Yangyang’s team. You let out a small scream and you couldn’t hold back the huge smile that took over your face. He did it. The idiot did it. As they raised their trophy, your eyes filled with tears. It felt like your own win.

  It was time to announce first place. You took a deep breath. It wouldn’t be you. You had settled within your heart that this wasn’t a winning day and it was okay.

  The envelope was opened and the name was called. Your group’s name. Your groups name. You’d won. You were pushed in a sweaty and smelly group hug, as tears left your eyes. You were full on sobbing as you saw the trophy being pushed from hand to hand until you were holding it.

  First place. It felt like a dream. Your mind was hazy as the team that ranked second, the “stars” like you had named them, gave their speech. And it was over.

  The crowd flowed on stage, loved ones finding loved ones and hugs being exchanged everyone. You stood frozen in the back of the stage. First place.

  Your name was called from somewhere. Your mind registered it, but your body failed to move at the sound.

  “Y/N!” You heard again, and finally your head moved towards the sound.

  Jaemin ran over you, arms extended. He lifted you up screaming in your ear.

  “FIRST PLACE! Y/N OH MY GOD, I CAN’T BELIEVE IT, YOU DID IT”

  His loud voice quieted down to a whisper as you sobbed silently into his shirt. Low words of praise filled your ears as several pairs of arms rubbed your back, trying to calm you down. You grabbed fistfuls of Jaemin’s shirt in an attempt to ground yourself, burying your face in the crook of his neck.

  After a while, you were finally able to move away from him and into the rest of the boys’ arms.

  “Oh, your little cry baby” Renjun said, hugging you tightly.

  “Good luck charm worked” Jeno said, giving you his signature eye smile and keeping you close.

  “You were amazing up there” Donghyuck said and hugged you tightly. You felt dizzy again. Your mind finally decided to start working, only to note that he smelled like the sea.

  “Y/N! There you are!” Yangyang shouted, running up to you, Cat and Elena not far behind him.

  You jumped onto him without second thought, screaming.

  “YANGYANG! YOU DID THAT! I, I’M, OH MY GOD, I’M SO PROUD OF YOU” you screamed, squeezing him tight.

  “ME? FORGET ABOUT ME YOU IDIOT, YOU GOT FIRST PLACE! I CAN’T BELIEVE IT!!! Y/N YOU GOT F I R S T” Yangyang screamed back.

  You went over each of your steps, each praising the other.

  “Although I love the spirit” Renjun interrupted, “Wouldn’t you want to celebrate somewhere more private?”

  “Re- group for burgers downtown?” Jeno offered.

  Everyone quickly agreed and you went backstage to change. Your dad picked you and Elena up, driving you back home for a quick shower and change of clothes. You headed downtown and met the boys in front of your favourite burger place.

  The night was easy going, a celebration with the people that mattered the most to you. Squeezed in the booth between Donghyuck and Yangyang, you laughed and enjoyed your food. All your senses were heightened to Donghyuck moving and laughing next to you. You tried to take your mind away from him, but your gaze would always go to your right, where Donghyuck was usually looking right back at you.

  That night, you hardly got any sleep despite being tucked inside your warm covers. Your mind was replaying the events of the day in an endless loop, the high of being on stage, the thrill of coming first, being in Donghyuck’s arms, the way the area around his eyes creased when he laughed.

  You were going crazy. There was no other word for it. You were going crazy over a boy that only recently stopped hating your existence. Great. You were screwed.

[agent-yolk-writes]

Friends Like You and Us - Venom!Reader - Ch. 6

I really gotta post this after I updated it on AO3 goddamn

In today’s episode: The gang puts too much thought into planning, you have terrible codenames, and you wonder if the circus is in town.

Don’t forget to reblog so others can see it! If you want something featured, don’t be afraid to drop an ask. We’re almost around the halfway point and it’s all downhill from here. Get your thoughts in now or forever hold your peace,

AO3 Version | Masterlist (TBD)

After scrambling to figure out a plan and translating interdimensional slang, the plan goes as follows:

1. You enter the building with Ham in a backpack. Peni has hooked all of you guys with little telecommunicators that can fit into your ear. They look like they can be passed off as the cool new earbuds you’ve seen your classmates wearing.

1a. Peni, SP//dr, and Noir will be outside as backup should anything happen along the way.

2. Get through the guards by showing your ID, which indicates a trusted employee of the building, Mary, has granted an outsider, you, permission to enter the building and their individual office. That’s it, that’s your only access.

3. While you do what your aunt asked you, Ham goes in the vents and finds a way into the Alchemax section upstairs. There he’ll find anything that could help figure out what happened to Spider-Man.

From there, depending on the situation, it could go two ways.

4a. Ham retraces his footsteps in the vents and gets back to your aunt’s office.

4b. If Ham needs to be recovered, you’ll “accidentally” stumble into Alchemax, claim you’re trying to find the bathroom, to retrieve Ham and any data he managed to recover.

5. Leave without raising any suspicions, if possible.

A simple plan in five or so steps. You’re taking the usual subway route to her office with Ham squished inside your mini backpack. It’s uncertain what Peni and Noir are doing above ground, but you could imagine them hopping between buildings in a cool montage like that cool cartoon of those ninja lizards. Thankfully this cart was almost packed to the brim, so no one can see, Ham included, tendrils wrapping around your hand and giving a comforting squeeze as if someone was actually holding your hand.

You got this. We believe in you.

I...I dunno. It sounded too easy in my apartment.

We can handle anything that comes our way.

“I sure hope so.” You muttered, glancing at the people close by to see if they’re looking at you. Swinging your bag around so it’s hanging in the front, you subtly zipped open the bag to look at the cartoony companion. At the sign of first light, he hisses at the sudden stimulation by squinting his eyes for a few seconds.

“Are we there yet?” He asks, a bit bored.

You glanced over at the display showing how many stops are left. “Not for another stop or so. How are you feeling in there?”

Ham sighs at the response. “I knew I should’ve brought something to read.” He pulls out a sleeping mask and puts it over his eyes.

“It’s either this or waste SP//dr’s fuel but doing about three trips back and forth.” You could feel some glances over your way, so you lower your voice a bit. “Anyone with a phone is going to post it on Twitter and we really don’t want that. Especially if it’s going to be on Insider Edition tonight.”

Your communicator buzzes to life, even with all the concrete around you.

“Actually, it’s powered by the psychic link between me and my spider friend in the suit.” Peni corrected you.

“There’s a spider...in the suit?” You said with genuine surprise.

“Hey now, you didn’t ask.” Well, she has a point there. “Oh heads up, here comes your stop.” As if on cue, the overhead speaker announces your stop. It doesn’t help your heart kicking up a notch in anticipation. A thousand scenarios are running through your head as you tried not to give Ham a whiplash putting your bag in its proper place. You even straighten out your blouse as you exited the subway train. Despite only being bonded for a week, it felt strange wearing clothes outside of your symbiote. All there’s left is to pray to your not-so empty head that everything can and will go right for a simple infiltration.

~

“This is Black Spider. I’m in position.”

“Spider Pig here. Let’s get this show running.”

“Mecha Spider is ready when you are!”

“This is Classic Spider, cruising for a bruising on the bench.”

…

You should’ve opposed to using codenames. This is an in and out, not an actual heist. If anything, you could’ve at least used different spiders to call each other by. It’d make sense if you refer to yourself as, for example, Black Widow rather than Black Spider. In the end, it’s all apples to pears.

Taking a deep breath, you pulled on the ID card you knew was on you just to make sure it's really there. It doesn’t go bad for another year, so they can’t stop you by saying it’s expired. If one of your aunt’s coworkers spotted you, then the suspicious glares from security will weaken. They swap floors every six months or so for security purposes. You haven’t been in the building proper since...ten months ago. Hopefully, that retired Sergeant got mobilized to the main floor. If he got moved to Alchemax, then you’ll have to pray for Ham’s safety-

Said spider-pig poked his head out. “What about my safety?”

“Nothing.” With Venom’s help, your arm pushed your smuggled package back into your back of the cramped bag. With Venom’s sixth sense you can almost feel Peni and Noir staring down from the roof of a neighboring building. “Let’s go.” With a shaky step, you begin your ascent up the stairs and entered the revolving door.

To your left, you see the guest desks and the CCTVs in an open room behind the woman at the desk. She had her head down, so she’s probably on her phone. Directly in front of you is the series of elevators being guarded by a single security guard, a glorified elevator worker if anything. You vaguely remember him, but it might not be the same vice versa. Through the handful of people coming in and out, you make your move to the first elevator open.

Your aunt’s workplace is one of the higher floors, so it’s going to be a while in this metal death trap. It became empty quicker than you expected, not that you don’t mind.

“What’s your status Black Spider, Spider Pig?” Peni said through the communicator.

“Entering the building was a success, no complications so far.” You whispered back. You try not to stare at the camera you know is staring at you in the corner. ”Pretty much going to be a smooth ride up.” Was the last thing you said before said smooth ride came to a halt at a different floor.

Oh no, someone else is coming up.

If you don’t make eye contact and shuffle to the side, maybe they won’t-

“Oh look, it’s you.” Oh no, it’s her.

You forced your eyes to look at one and only Stacy Adams from your school. She’s a senior, just a year above you. She’s one of the most popular people in your school and like every high school movie out there, she thinks she’s the queen of the institution. The only reason she could be here is that senior intern experience your school offers where seniors spend three of the five day school week learning. To your chagrin, it looks like today is one of those days.

She hates your guts for some reason. You couldn’t recall what you did to piss her off. Maybe she got jealous of you a guy that just so happens to be a friend of your friend. You did, however, ate her boyfriend aka the top varsity football player bound for Ohio State, so there’s that. In your defense, he attacked you.

We should eat her as well.

Shush, you.

You eyed the security camera in the corner.

Not yet.

“Hey, Stacy...weird meeting you here, huh?” You mustered up whatever you can to pretend you’re happy to see her.

“It’s weird meeting you here.” She shoots back. “Should I report you for skipping school to trespass?”

“Unlike your daddy’s money, I actually know people here.” You replied before you could process it. So much for putting up a fake front.

Stacy, of course, wasn’t having it. “You don’t need to know people if they’re hiring a fucking clown.”

“A fucking clown? Oh wait, is that who you’re seeing after Kyle basically ghosted you? Wooow Stacy, how faithfu-“ You didn’t get a chance to finish it when a handmade sharp contact with your cheek. You weren’t sure if the sting was from the palm or the sharp nails she raked across your skin for extra damage.

Your heart was beating so loud in your ears. Whether it was Venom’s boiling rage or your own, it almost affected the next step you were about to do. If it wasn’t for Peni bringing you back to Earth with, “-ck Spider, is everything alright in there?” in your ear, you would be deep in bloodshed.

Instead, you calmly removed your earpiece and stuffed it into your bag. You hope she notices the unhuman bend of your arm.

“Look, I don’t have time for you.” You said lowly, voice borderline a growl. “I’m going to do my thing, you’re gonna do your thing, and then you’ll continue to pop your gum loudly every time I even blink in your direction. Got it?”

Stacy stares at you like you grew two heads on the spot. Your cheek tickles a bit as Venom heals the scratch marks.

She started sputtering some nonsense to try and get something in before the elevator finally slowed down to your aunt’s floor. Time to finally get out of this cramped box.

But first…

As you took a step out of the elevator, you couldn’t help but turn around to face her one last time.

“Oh, by the way…” You said with a growing devious grin. “Kyle’s brain was absolutely delicious.” Venom couldn’t help but join in at the last second, but it got the results that you wanted. Stacy tried charging at you but the closing doors were quicker. You could hear her banging at the door all the way up. Ah, you’ll remember the face she made. You wonder if her boyfriend had that same expression.

~

Ham decided to pop his head out once you used your aunt’s card to get into the bathroom. He had a sponge lodged into his ears that managed to take out by pulling it out of one ear with a comical pop. You’re too

“Geez, took you long enough. Thought the catfight was gonna take foreeeever.” He complained.

“Well sorry for having enemies, I guess.” You replied as you readjusted your communicator. “This is Black Spider. Um...Sorry that I went AWOL there. Bumped into a rather unpleasant classmate of mine in the elevator.”

“About time! Thought about going in there thinking you croaked.” Noir’s voice crackled through his mic.

“Weren’t you able to hear anything from Ham’s mic?”

Peni answered your question with, “The microphone is designed to cancel out any background noise so whoever’s talking into it can be heard. You’ll never find anything better for noise cancellation!”

The wonders of the future could not be thanked enough.

You pushed Ham’s head back in the bag at the sound of the bathroom door unlocking for someone else. This is your cue to leave and head to your aunt’s office.

The first phase of the plan is now successful. Now that the second part is about to be achieved, you’re looking forward to the idea of getting away without being caught. Well, you almost did, but that doesn’t count in your books.

It should be smooth sailing from here, right?

...Right?

[sweet-lil-psycho]

You can hear me? - Post-death Kyle - AHS Coven - (1)

Dedicated to @slightlyvicked for her amazing contributions 

Summary: The newest guest of Miss Robichaux's Academy is a powerful witch, but on of her powers is something Kyle had only dreamed of.

Word Count: 2891

(Authors Note: I know I said this would be up tomorrow, but I got super excited and ended up finishing the whole thing today. I really loved writing it and added a number to the title in case anyone wants me to write more and turn this into a series.)

You walked through the front gate of Miss Robichaux's Academy for Exceptional Young Ladies and immediately knew someone was watching you. It was a primal skill that most witches had forgotten or discarded over the centuries, but you had learned to harness it just as the old witches did. The person, you could already tell, did not match you in magical skill and posed absolutely no threat, so you happily ignored it. Why wouldn’t you? You were a lioness and they were... a bunny rabbit, yes, that seemed about right.

Your suitcase dragged close behind you up the walkway, propelled wholly by magic. As you stepped up to the front doors, they opened for you. Clearly the house knew better than to make you wait. They parted widely and once you, and your suitcase had stepped over the threshold, shut softly behind you. 

There was a thing about thresholds that most witches didn’t know. They keep track of all the magical beings who pass through them. It was as if you had been presented with a registry of all the witches in the house the moment you walked in. Not by name, of course, but a display of the skill level and aura of each magical being which you would easily be able to pair with the witches of the house upon meeting them. 

Nothing special, you noted with a small smirk, perhaps Miss Robichaux's Academy’s young ladies were not as exceptional as they thought they were.

You didn’t bother calling out your arrival, the witches of the house were expecting you... or at least the ones who mattered were. Instead, you were fast at finding your way to their library of magical texts, curious to see what books they had acquired since your last visit.

Despite all your attention being in the yellowed pages of The Witches Guide To Advanced Spellwork; Volume 4, which you were finding quite amusing, the intended entrance of a familiar witch did not slip your witchy senses. She must have been about to cross the archway of the room when you spoke

“Cordelia! What a pleasure!” You said with a large smile, only now looking up from the dusty and quite trivial tome.

“Y/N, what an absolute honor and pleasure it is to have you with us at Miss Robichaux’s.” Cordelia greeted you warmly

“I couldn’t possibly pass through New Orleans without dropping by.” You told her as you opened your arms for a hug

You and Cordelia went way back. Well...as way back as a 19 year old could go with someone. You’d briefly met and studied with her mother, the Supreme Witch, Fiona Goode, before deciding your studying efforts were best spent elsewhere. A decision which lead you far from American soil and on a long string of adventures. In the time you had known each other, you had been quite close.

“Well, we are delighted to have you stay as long as you would like.” She assured you “I’ll send Spalding to carry your bags and show you to your room.”

“No need,” you said simply “I’m quite capable.”

The bag followed you as you began to walk out of the room. Cordelia followed and watched the bag in amazement. You’d definitely learnt a few new tricks since your last meeting. As you ascended the stairs, the suitcase began to float over the steps and you could just barely hear the small laugh Cordelia gave.

You vaguely recalled the layout from your previous visit, which was enough to allow you to find the room with ‘Visitor Quarters. Not for student entry’ on the door. You couldn’t contain a laugh as you touched the doorknob and surveyed the room with your witch senses.

Predictably, the students were huddled on the bed and floor discussing some nonsense speculations about your arrival. The movement of the doorknob was enough to hear them loudly scramble and whisper ‘hide’ to one another. Generously...or perhaps cruelly, you allowed them enough time to conceal themselves before opening the door.

The room was the grandest in the house, complete with a crystal chandelier and golden velvet curtains, which seemed unnaturally lumpy with outlines of very tactless witches. The lights in the room were out and you wondered how much more obvious the hiding of the students would be once you illuminated the room.

“It’s so dark, should I open the curtains?” You wondered aloud, which was met with an audible ‘shit!’ from the direction of the lumpy fabric.

“No need” You added, snapping your fingers and watching every candle in the room light.

You could tell they were watching. Eyes boring into your skin with the telltale spark which let you know they were witches. If they want to watch, give them a show, you thought.

The suitcase threw itself onto the bed and began unclipping and unzipping. You started pulling out all your packed goods from inside the small, black suitcase. Your clothes for a start, which soared out of the bag, unfolded, and began hanging themselves in the closet, the door of which was flung open. You didn’t need to look to see the absolute fright which flashed on the face of the student who had chosen to hide in there. It made you smile, but still you played oblivious. 

Next, you hoisted out the high candelabra out of the bag and allowed it to settle in the darkest corner of the room, adding to the glow of torches. Then came your armchair, which squeezed it’s way out and scuttled across the floor to a lovely spot in front of the fireplace.

“What the hell is this?” you heard a voice whisper from the curtains, promptly followed by “shh!”

Then your trunk, your vanity table, the tall, pedestal birdcage which housed your raven, Corvis, some trinkets and rarities from your travels, a large mirror with pitch black glass, and finally your cat, jumping out from the still half-full suitcase and stretching out her black body after the nap you surely woke her from.

Once she finished, she meowed loudly and walked in circles, indicating there were people about.

“Oh I know Salem, they’ll come out when they’re good and ready” You told the cat, who then decided to curl up in the center of the bed.

“Is she talking about us?” A voice whispered, “Shh!” 

"You really should come out, you know. You girls are really making fools of yourselves.” You announced

They all came out and you laughed to yourself, they thought they could hide from you. The young witches were similar ages, but had no where near the experience or magical level that you possessed. Finally you were able to place each magical identity the threshold had given you to it’s owner.

“You should have warned us, Nan!” One of the girls huffed

“Warn you of what? Her mind is blank.” Nan replied

“Not blank, simply unavailable to the likes of you. I’m not too fond of little witchlings prying through my thoughts” You interrupted

“This is all your fault, Madison, I told you we shouldn’t be in here! We’re going to get in so much trouble!” One of the girls snapped at another

“Shut up, Queenie!” Madison snapped back

“Surprise! Welcome to Miss Robichaux's Academy” Nan said with an innocent smile

“She’s not an idiot, Nan. What’s wrong with you?” Madison said viciously

“Hey! Don’t talk to Nan like that!” Another girl defended

“You shut too, Zoe!” Madison added 

“Don’t tell me to shut up, you shut up!”

“Yeah Madison, why don’t you shut your mouth for once!”

“This is all your fault anyway, Madison.”

“Yeah, she’s right”

“Shut up, Nan”

“Shut up Madison!”

“Yeah, shut up Madison!”

“All of you shut up!” You raised your voice and it echoed around the room

All the girls went quiet, not by choice, but because their voices had left them entirely. This seemed to enrage them more and they started mouthing louder at each other in an attempt to continue their argument.

“Now when you’re all done blubbering like fish, let’s get a few things straight.” You said and watched them quiet down, realizing they weren’t going to get their way by fighting each other soundlessly

“First of all, this is the last time any of you come into my chamber uninvited. Secondly, Cordelia will be hearing none of this from me so long as you little witchlings show me a bit more respect from now on. Third, no more bickering...it is unpleasant and frankly, very unbecoming of all of you. And finally, any more of this kind of nonsense and you will regret the day you ever met me. Am I clear?”

Madison noiselessly muttered some snarky comment which made Nan break out into a grin

You flicked your wrist and Madison’s eyes widened as her hair was violently tugged backwards.

“Am I clear?” You asked again, waving your hand over them so they could speak once more

“Crystal clear.” They all said in a dreary unison, probably habit from Cordelia asking them the same question so many times 

“Right then. If that’s everything” You said and the door swung open behind you, inviting them to leave

“You can come out now Kyle, she caught us.” Zoe called out and a final figure emerged, this time from under the bed.

How could you have missed this?...Hang on, he’s not magical...or human..., you were puzzled, which was rare, especially when it came to magic.

“Kyle?” You said, feeling the name in your mouth curiously

He didn’t speak as he went to stand behind Zoe. He was tall and muscular looking, almost the frat-boy type if it wasn’t for his vacant expression and strange, detached way about him. 

“Kyle” You said again, softer this time as you tried to understand what he was and how you hadn’t detected him

“Yes, I’m Kyle”, a voice wrung inside your head clearly, your telepathic abilities picking up on his response

It’s nice to meet you Kyle, you sent the message telepathically, wondering if he could hear it. You’d never met anyone like this before and had no idea what his capabilities were.

The girls had begun to file out of the room, but Kyle stood in place, his dark eyes locked with yours, thinking.

“Come on Kyle” Zoe called him

He didn’t move and you stepped closer to him without acknowledging her, waiting for a response

“Who are you?” he asked, he sounded almost scared

I’m Y/N, I’m not going to hurt you, you transferred the message into his mind.

“How can you hear me? No one can ever hear me.” 

“Kyle, come on!” Zoe called him once again, this time tugging at his arm

“No.” He said, still not looking away from me

“What are you doing to him?” Zoe demanded, moving away from Kyle and coming up to me

“No!” Kyle shouted more urgently, stepping forward to pull Zoe back, but you beat him to it and flung her back with a magical force which sent her stumbling to the ground

“What the hell!” Madison exclaimed after watching her fellow witch get tossed aside. She walked back into the room and heading towards Kyle, no doubt to try and drag him out. “Come on, Kyle. We’re leaving!”

“No! No! No!” He shouted

“That’s quite enough” You groaned tiresomely, growing more and more irritated by these little witches.

With a sweeping gesture of your hand, the girls were thrust out of the doorway and the door closed loudly after them. The lock on the door slid over and fastened into place, preventing them from reentering, though they still tried.

Kyle still seemed agitated and you put your hands up gently to calm him

Everything is alright, Kyle. They’re gone now, they’re not going to make you leave before you want to

“I didn’t mean to yell, I really didn’t” his voice came softly “I just get so angry some times that I can’t stop what happens.”

It was like his consciousness was trapped in a body which couldn’t contain it. His emotions were unable to regulate themselves as they traveled from his mind to his actions. His mind seemed perfectly intact and developed, it was almost as if the connection between his mind and body was damaged in some way.

It’s okay Kyle. Why don’t we sit down?, you suggested, sitting on the bed where Salem watched curiously

“Sure, why not.” he came and sat on the bed, his eyes finally leaving mine in order to look at Salem

“Salem, this is Kyle, he’s a friend.” You told the cat

Salem immediately let her guard down and she rolled on her back, displaying her stomach for belly rubs

“I like cats. A big tabby named Monty used to live on our street, he was such a fat cat, always rummaging through people’s bins for scraps.” He smiled at the memory and began to pat Salem

“Why can’t the others talk to me like this?” he looked up for a moment, there was so much sadness in his eyes

I’m a very powerful witch. I’ve studied my whole life and learned from the best teachers all over the world. Telepathy is a tricky skill on it’s own to master, but for some reason it’s more complicated with you. Usually there’s just a locked door leading right into someone’s consciousness, but with you, it’s like there’s a labyrinth. It was true, his whole consciousness was locked away by this elaborate protection. The more you learned about Kyle, the more interested you became.

“Oh...How long are you staying?” His voice held a tone of worry at the thought of you leaving. You knew you would be the same if the only person who could truly talk to you was only passing through on their own travels.

I haven’t decided yet, Kyle. I didn’t think I’d meet someone as interesting as you, you told him and he smiled in such an effortlessly charming way that you had to stop yourself from swooning.

He was cute, to say the least, and in the moment where his more human side came out, he made your heart pound so loud you were surprised he couldn’t hear it.

Kyle moved his arm to further pet Salem and you noticed a severe looking scar on his neck.

What’s happened there? you pointed at the mark

He instantly moved to hide it, pulling the neck of his t-shirt higher, which only loosened it and made the mark more visible.

“It’s nothing. Nothing at all, really.” he replied quickly

Kyle please, is it a scar? Let me take a look? you asked him telepathically and he didn’t answer

“Please, Kyle. I’m not going to hurt you or anything. I just want to see.” You said aloud

Hesitantly, Kyle moved his hands away from his neck and allowed you access to the deep scar-tissue. It looked incredibly painful, but when you touched it gingerly, he didn’t flinch. Upon closer inspection, the mark went entirely around his neck and you gasped.

He immediately pulled away and tried once again to cover it up.

It’s okay Kyle, really. I just...it looks like it hurt a lot, you said, suddenly teary for some reason.

Kyle noticed the sudden redness of your eyes and stopped pulling away.

“It didn’t really. I hardly felt it.” He told you.

You wondered how that could be for a second and then the answer hit you hard. A lot about Kyle rapidly began to make sense and you realized why Kyle was so unlike anything you had come across before.

May I? you asked him, holding your hand up to touch the scar once more.

He moved himself closer to give you better access to the wound, silently complying with your ask.

Once again you placed your hand on the scar, this time channeling it with a skill you had learned in small town Romania.

“arătați-mi” you whispered

Your eyes glossed over with a pale film of white and you began to see Kyle’s life unfold before your eyes. The good, the bad, and the just plain tragic.

It was blurry, but as you came closer to the events which led to the scarring, it became clear. You saw his time at Kappa Lambda Gamma, the party, Zoe, Madison, the party bus, Madison and Zoe’s sloppy, infantile attempts at a complex post-mortem revival spell, Kyle’s struggles with his new life.

“Oh my gods above and forgotten... what in the name of Hecate. Someone had better slap those girls from Venus to Neptune.” You whispered to yourself “I am so sorry this happened to you, Kyle.”

You cupped his face in your hands and rested your forehead against his. He stiffened for a moment and then relaxed, putting his hands on your waist so gently, as if he were afraid of hurting you.

“You don’t...hate me, do you?” he asked after a few seconds of silence

Hate you? Kyle, why would I...how could you think I would hate you?, you were baffled by it, he’d been put through so much and he thought you would...hate him for it?

“Fiona always says I’m disgusting and unnatural. I’m like Frankenstein's monster.” He told you

“First of all, Fiona’s a bitch. Second, I always did like Frankenstein.” you said aloud, placing a soft kiss on his cheek.

[clubdolan]

A Tame Surprise | E&G

I know you all hate when I use names but since there’s two girls, one dating each boy, I had to or it was SO confusing.. just for me to write it was confusing. So there’s names. If you want, copy and paste it into word or pages and then ctrl+f and it’ll give you an option to find one word (one of the names) and replace it with yours or someone else. Anyways.

Stella + E  - she’s a writer/singer ‘Stella Jade’, was friends with them long before they started dating, met them through Bryant, dating E for a year now, kept it secret for months but once she had a few shows in california he kept attending she posted a cute candid of them before a show with an odd caption (she was side stage with him behind her, resting his head on top of hers, his arms around her shoulders and her hands holding onto his arms and a microphone) ‘bagels in the morning’ it said beneath it, she’s about to go on tour and open for Camila Cabello, spends her time hidden in the studio or wandering around with a backpack on full of notebooks and markers to write down ideas

Liv + G - she’s a fellow YouTuber, ‘Livi’ (aka: ‘LivianaXO’) makes videos about beauty, fashion and traveling, just hit 6 million subscribers and 2.5 million instagram followers, they met at a convention and kept in contact while she still lived in Texas and immediately started hanging out when she moved to LA, no one knows when they really ‘started dating’ but they estimate six or seven months, she has collaborated with morphe and colourpop, she used to be hidden behind her computer at all times to edit but she recently hired and editor and enjoys having spare time to actually do things like pilates (with g) and thrift for hours upon end

Two girls walked up the drive way, one filming themselves with a camera and explaining their plan.

“We’ve started filming because they may be able to use today for a Tuesday video but they don’t know what we’re doing. So they won’t just film it... I don’t know, but we’re getting the behind the scenes until Kyle shows up.” Liv panned over to the other girl who had stopped and was texting quickly on her phone. “We still good?”

“Yes. Perfect, we’ve got like 4 hours.” Stella sighed in relief and put her phone in her pocket before quickly catching up, just as they reached the door and let themselves in.

“HIIIII!” Echoed down the halls as they screamed in unison and walked to the living room to find Grayson sitting on his phone.

“Hi babe---why are you filming?” He stopped in front of Liv, looking directly at the camera.

“It’s a surprise.”

“What is?”

“What we’re about to do.”

“You said it was the flea market.”

“I lied. But I promise you’ll love it.” She grinned looking at his face droop, “You can get new records tomorrow, we can drive to the place in Venice.”

“I assume E’s in bed still because he hasn’t answered my texts.” Stella groaned, laying across the couch. 

“Actually he just got out of the shower. I told him to not text you because I was texting her. Hoping it would hurry him up.” Grayson rolled his eyes, “But really,  you’re filming?”

“It’s for your channel, if you want it.”

“You’ll want it.” Stella reverberated, scrolling on her phone with a portable steamer up to her nose and mouth. She had spent the past 48 hours in the studio and her voice was on it’s last life.

“Three minutes late.” Ethan said, shoving his phone in his pocket and swinging his keys around his finger. “Why are you filming?”

“They’re surprising us...” Grayson said, looking at both of them suspiciously. “And Kyle’s on his way to film, she got his number from my phone.” Liv smiled at her antics; she wasn’t just using his phone to see what her Instagram looked like to the public the other day.

“Put your key down, we’ve got a car outside.” Stella patted Ethan’s chest and went towards the door, “First, we’re stopping to get tea.. or coffee.. whatever. Then.. it’s happening.” She whispered the end, pulling her steamer up to her face as she backed out the door. 

Stella’s honey and lemon tea was not really what she wanted, she about drooled over the three iced chai lattes the others got but continued to sip on her tea.

“You can have a drink of min--” 

Before Ethan could finish Liv had turned around from the middle row of the SUV, “NO! She can only have tea and warm or room temperature water.”

“One sip?” He inched it closer to Stella’s face and watched Liv’s reaction, “No sip, okay, got it.”

Stella sighed, “You both need to lay down now.” She motioned to her lap, pulling her steamer back to her mouth. A mumble came from behind the little mask, “You can't see where we’re going.”

Without hesitating they both moved around to lay their heads in their girlfriends laps, looking up at the roof of the car. “Is it far?”

“Depends on traffic.” Liv said, “Probably like twenty minutes.”

Thirty minutes later, Ethan was asleep in the back seat, one arm over his head and the other holding onto Stella’s hand on his chest. 

Grayson and Liv talked about home renovations he was wanting to make and she looked up paint colors for their guest house. They had practically become Mr. Kate and Joey in the past few weeks, rebuilding and painting anything they could. “It’s good content.” They would both say, carrying an old table and chairs into the backyard. 

Ethan was barely awake as Stella dragged him down the side walk of a random road of shops he’d never been to. She was talking on the phone saying they were almost there before she hung up. “Where ar--

“Stop asking.”

Liv and Grayson followed them, she knew if Stella was calm, everything was going to plan.

Just then Stella turned and knocked on a black door to a building with no sign on it. Grayson and Ethan exchanged looks but Liv assured them it was fine.

“Stella Jane!” A strong voice announced as the door opened, “I’ve heard you’ve been here all week.” His voice was adorned with a thick British accent.

“On and off.” She held up the steamer and he laughed as he opened the door. “This is my boyfriend, Ethan. That’s his brother Grayson and his girlfriend, Liv, who I think you’ve met before.” Both the guy and her nodded, “This is Pauly, he owns this place.”

Everyone waved and said hello. “What is this place?” Grayson asked, looking down the weird hallway in front of him.

“A recording studio, come on.” Stella grabbed Ethan’s hand and led them to a room. She sent a quick text and a door opened, her friend Spencer answered the door, pushing it open wider to reveal her writing team. 

The group chatted for a few minutes as Stella talked to the producer that sat in front of a bright computer with big red headphones on. 

She turned around when she felt a hand on her back, “Stel, is this the surprise?”

“No, I just want to hear a cut of this song real quick.” She smiled up at him and grabbed his hand, keeping hold of it as she turned to mention one more thing to the producer before pushing Ethan to sit on the couch.

Surround sound speakers started playing a beat and Liv noticed quickly, “Avalanche?” (click the word for the song)

Stella nodded back to her, holding crossed fingers in the air, “Hopefully finished.”

You always find the exit sign in a crowded room 

Everybody wants their shot, but you're bulletproof

She sat on the arm of the couch, mouthing the words as they played, every beat was coincided with a fake drumming motion and the harder notes would make her face squeeze together as she heard them. As the chorus came, Liv began bouncing along with Stella as she had heard a rough cut of the song millions of times.

So you’re scared, don’t think you’re ready yet

We'll take it slow, I'll walk with you on the edge 

Paint the colors on top of the sunset

Stella turned to face Ethan, pointing as she dramatically lip synced along.

So give me one night, one minute 

And I'll watch you fall like an avalanche 

Let your walls down, I swear you won't regret it 

Hold on tight, baby, if you can

She turned to look at the producer’s computer as he made notes. The song kept playing and another writer handed Ethan a notebook he immediately recognized as Stella’s. It was flipped to a page where Avalance was written all over it in marker, scribbles, words, notes, tiny drawings, a chipotle order and at the bottom a tiny heart with E+S inside of it.

Stella turned around, looking at the other writers with a death glare, “I will kill all of you” she whispered and they laughed. 

“You don’t look too worried.” One said as Ethan flipped through the pages.

She shrugged her shoulders as the song ended, “I mean if by now people don’t realize my good relationship songs are about E, I don’t know who they think I’m talking about.”

“Why does this one say PG 13 in bright red? Make Up?” He asked, holding her notebook up to her. 

Liv and Stella lost it as she pulled it from his hands, “That means it’s not on the album. I recorded it though. But my Nanny would drop dead if she heard it.”

“It’s a total bop.” One of the writers added, the second accent they had heard today. “It’s just a little... risqué.. a bit... bold.”

“She sings about fucking with someone...” Liv said, “You I guess?” She looked at Ethan who looked at Stella.

“Okay, not like that.” She groaned, “It’s like.. I mess with you and make you mad so we can make up and all is good in the end, smooth sailing, let’s--

She froze as the familiar sounds played over the speaker, “Please don’t. Turn it off. Please.” She begged the producer, who just leaned back in his chair and smiled as it played.

In agony she fell from the arm fo the couch and onto Ethan’s lap, digging her head into his shoulder as he laughed. (click for the song)

I like to fuck with you-- just to make up with you 'Cause-- the way you be screamin’ my name Make me wanna make love to you I might break up with you-- just to make up with you At-- the end of the day, boy You know that I'm 'bout to wake up with you

The writers mumbled lyrics along, swaying in their seats,

“I love it when we make up. Go ’head, ruin my makeup.”

The entire song she kept her head buried in his shoulder, glad she requested it not be on an album. 

“I like it.” Ethan said to her as the song finished. Her head swiveled to make eye contact with him, “I mean I don’t dislike make up sex either.” He mumbled to her, making her laugh.

“I hate to break up this listening party” Liv stood up and announced, “but we still have a surprise to...show you.”

“Yes, surprise, think of that, not me or my songs.” Stella stood up and walked to the door, “I’ll be back tonight to finish recording.” She opened the door and motioned for them to leave, following the other three into the hallway.

“So as you can see, there’s a bunch of recording studios here. So we scheduled you one so you two can create a song!” She excitedly said, waiting for their reaction, which was nothing. “Well that wasn’t a fun response.”

“You’re not recording a song.”

“You can if you want to.”

“We don’t want to.”

“What’s the surprise?” Ethan sighed.

“In the back of this place is a room they call a set-up venue which means like, you set up your stage before tour to make sure it’ll all fit and yeah. I was wondering in the halls the other day and ran into someone who is using the set-up venue and we got to chatting for a while and I went to see what they were up to. Anyways,” She took a deep breath, “I asked if we could come to a rehearsal of theirs and I figured I would invite you guys.”

Liv danced around in excitement, “You’re gunna freak.”

“We’re going to go in and there’s like some old booth seats from a diner we can chill in. Just like don't record stuff, that was their only request.” Stella grabbed both of Ethan’s hands and pulled him behind her, weaving down a few hallways before they reached a door, “This is all sound proof, so prepare for it to be a little loud.” 

She pushed open the metal door and sound came blasting out, “No fucking way.” Ethan froze, stopping Stella from walking in. “No.”

“Yeeeees, come on.” She tugged at him, but obviously he didn’t budge. “Come on, Gray.” She looked over at a gobsmacked Grayson, “I told you you’d like it.”

“Tame?” Ethan peered at Grayson who replied with the same thing, “Tame.”

“We said you’d like it.”

With another tug of his arm she led them all to the row of booths along a side wall. A full band was set up, playing a song and continuing with their set, lights were going off and a few crew members ran in and out to swap instruments.

Ethan grabbed Stella’s thigh, almost crushing it, “What the fuck?” She could only laugh and wrap her arms around his, resting her head on his shoulder to listen.

The twins kept exchanging glances at each other, especially when different songs started. 

“This is my favorite.” 

“This is his favorite.” 

“This music video is rad.” 

“Bryant loves this one.” 

“This one just came out.”

A brilliant guitar solo played at the end as the lights above the band shut off. “One more run through and we’re good today.” A crew member yelled, grabbing guitars.

“Hey Stella!” One walked over, giving her a quick hug.

“That ending... was sick.” 

“Ahh, thanks, we debated on that or a quick synth drop out.”

“Keep the guitar.” She nodded, “This is who I told you about. My boyfriend Ethan, his brother Grayson and his girlfriend Liv. Guys this is Jay.”

“And I’m Kevin.” The lead singer came up with a cup of tea, sticking his hand out to join in on the round of hand shakes. “What’d you think?”

“Uhh, awesome.” It was as if Grayson couldn’t speak, “We’re coming to the LA show in a few months.”

“Yeah you are, we’ll have to get you hooked up with some passes, I’ll talk to Stella about it.” 

“They’re being weird...” Stella laughed at the boys, “You’re their favorite. Records play all day, all night, in the car, everywhere.” 

“Cool, I’m glad you like it.” Jay smiled, “Can’t wait for you to hear the new album.”

“When’s that coming out?”

An hour later they were leaving the studio, holding in giggles and internal screams until Stella finished talking to Pauly and let the door close.

“HOLY SHIT” Ethan grabbed Stella and held her over his shoulder, “Are you kidding me!?” He jumped up and down, Stella laughed at his excitement. “Seriously?” He pulled her down to face him, holding her up by her bottom, “Did we really just watch Tame Impala rehearse?”

“Did we really just talk to them?” Grayson asked, shaking Liv’s arm. “Like we met Kevin and Jay and Dom and Cam? Or am I dreaming?”

“You’re not dreaming.” Liv softly smacked his cheek.

“Harder.”

She returned the smack with a loud slap being heard, “No, not dreaming.” He grabbed her for a hug and didn’t let go, walking with her backwards down the sidewalk.

“I can’t believe you.” Ethan sat Stella down, grabbing her cheeks, “I can’t.. like... how did that happen?”

“I was talking to Jay and it just led from there.” He kissed her lips, then her cheek, her nose, her other cheek, her chin, her lips and her forehead as she giggled, “You’re welcome.”

“I just want to..” His eyes squinted as he let out a yell, leaning back in to kiss her. “You’re the absolute best.”

“Ahhh, shucks.” She shrugged as if it was no problem. “I like having that title. Absolute best. Don’t forget to tell everybody that.”

“I will literally tell everyone.” He grabbed her hand and started following Grayson and Liv to the car, who were singing a Tame song to each other in an over-dramatic fashion. “Like, hi this is my girlfriend Stella and she’s the absolute best.”

They filmed their reaction with Kyle before they got into the car and he kept filming as they talked about it in the car, blasting songs to sing along to. 

Later that night Ethan posted pictures of Stella sitting on his lap in the studio that Liv took without them knowing. He was holding her notebook and they were laughing at each other in the first one. The second one she was listening to someone across the room and Ethan had his chin resting on top of her head, also looking at the person who was talking. Stella was slid down between his legs, holding onto his hands that wrapped around her body with her feet on the little table in front of them.

@ethandolan: Today we filmed next Tuesday’s video. I can’t tell you what it is but @stellajane and @livlivliv surprised @graysondolan and I with one of the coolest things. (Stel is the ABSOLUTE BEST)

Stella replied-- ‘I just love being the absolute best. 😎’

Liv replied-- ‘📷 pic cred ur welcome 📷’

Stella replied to Liv-- ‘yeah 😂 thanks for secretly taking pictures 🕵🏼‍♀️’

Grayson replied-- ‘I still don’t even believe it happened.’

Then Grayson replied-- ’You’re ugly.’

[ionlyreadfivebookslastweek]

Bless The Broken Road - 3

The next morning, the two women awoke to a text from Hotch telling them to all meet in the lobby in a half an hour. Another body had been found.

“Good morning,” Reid greeted Jane as she went to stand by him. She returned his greeting with a brief smile before turning her attention to Hotch.

“Let’s head out to the vehicles. We’ll talk at the station,” Hotch told the team.

Once the team gathered in their temporary headquarters, Hotch shared that the newest victim had been stabbed to death and raped postmortem. The UNSUB didn’t even bother to go to a secondary location.

“That’s different than the others,” Morgan said, stating the obvious.

“She must have fought harder and managed to get the chloroform away from her before it knocked her out,” Rossi suggested.

“There’s more. They managed to find a condom.”

“He’s unraveling,” JJ chimed in.

“Did they find any DNA?” Jane asked.

“They’re in the process of checking right now,” Hotch informed them. “Jane and Reid, why don’t you head to the M.E. Rossi and Morgan, head to the new crime scene. JJ and I will interview the victim’s roommate.”

A couple of hours later, the DNA test results came in and they were able to find a match.

“Kyle Wells, age 33. When he was 12, he was sexually abused by his nanny. It says it went on for over a year before she was finally caught and fired. There was a police report, but charges were never made,” Garcia shared with the team.

“That must be why he strangles them. His voice was never heard when he was abused and so he makes sure they’ll never be heard either,” Hotch concluded.

“The nanny passed away a little over four weeks ago. Did someone say trigger?” Garcia said.

The local sheriff knocked on the open door. Everyone looked towards him. “A woman has just been reported missing,” he informed them.

“Garcia-”

“Addresses already sent!”

The team quickly headed out to the vehicles and rushed to Wells’s address.

“Kyle Wells, FBI, open up!” Morgan yelled as he banged on the front door just minutes later. When there was no response, he kicked down the door and the other agents rushed inside.

After clearing the main level of the house, they found a door to a basement where Wells had the missing woman tied up. As soon as he saw the team coming down the stairs, he pulled the woman upright and held a knife to her throat.

They tried to talk him out of it, but before they could stop him, Wells turned the knife on himself and slit his throat.

Jane and JJ holstered their guns and moved forward to untie the victim. They helped her up the stairs and out to the ambulance that was waiting for her. Once they were sure the victim was going to be alright, Jane went to take a seat on the steps outside of the house.

She ran her face through her hands and let out a shaky breath.

“Hey.” She looked up to see Morgan walking towards her. “You alright?”

Jane nodded. “Yeah. Yeah uh...I’m just a bit shaken up that’s all.” Morgan took a seat next to her. “Does it get easier?” she asked him.

Morgan sighed and took a moment before responding. “You don’t really ever get used to it or over it, but you have to think of all the people you save and it makes up for the ones you can’t save.”

Jane gave him a half-smile. “Thanks.”

“Anytime. You ready to get out of here?” Jane nodded and Morgan stood up, reaching out a hand and helping her to her feet.

~~~ Jane set down her file after filling out the last of her paperwork before letting out a groan and rubbing her face.

“Tired?” Reid asked from his seat across from her.

“Exhausted,” she replied.

“You should try to get some sleep.”

Jane shook her head. “There’s only about twenty minutes left before we get back so there’s really no point.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right. You don’t have long to wait until you can go home and sleep.”

“No, I can’t sleep at home. As soon as we land, I’m going home to pack a few things and then I’m driving straight to my brother’s place to stay with him for the weekend.”

“You really should just go home and rest and head to your brother’s in the morning,” he argued.

She shook her head. “I can’t wait. I have to get there as soon as I can.”

“It’s not safe for you to drive when you’re this tired. Driving while drowsy can be as dangerous as driving while under the influence.”

“Look, I can handle myself. You don’t need to worry about me,” Jane told him before he could spit out any more facts. She stood up and moved to sit off by herself for the remainder of the flight.

~

Jane pulled into the parking lot of Jack’s apartment. As she walked up the stairs, she took out her phone and saw that she had a message from Reid.

“I’m sorry about earlier. You’re right. You can make your own decisions.”

She smiled down at the screen and sent a quick text back.

“That’s alright. I’m sorry for snapping at you. I made it to Jack’s place, just so you know I’m safe. I’ll see you at work on Monday.”

Opening the door to the apartment, Jane called out, “Jack? It’s me.”

She listened for a response but didn’t hear anything. After slipping off her shoes and setting her bag down by the door, she headed down the hallway back to his bedroom. The light was on but he was passed out on top of the blankets. He must have been trying to wait up but got too tired.

Jane went into the closet and found an extra blanket. She reentered the bedroom and laid it on top of him, tucking him in. As she kneeled next to the bed, his eyes fluttered open.

“Jane? You’re here!” He sat up quickly and reached forward to pull her into a tight embrace.

“Hey, little bro!” she laughed as she returned the hug.

“I fell asleep waiting for you. I’m sorry.”

“I can see that. Don’t worry about it. We should both get some rest. We’ll talk in the morning, ok?”

He nodded. “OK! Here, you take the bed and I’ll sleep on the couch,” he offered.

“No, that’s ok. You stay here. The couch is fine,” she assured him. “Goodnight, Jack.”

“Goodnight, Jane.”

~~~~~~~~~~

After a great weekend of catching up with Jack, it was back to work on Monday.

On the way, Jane stopped by the coffee shop again. As she exited the shop, Reid entered.

“Hey!” she greeted him while passing by. “See you at the office!”

She headed back to her car and set off for work. When she arrived, she noticed Reid getting out of his car.

“How’d you beat me here?” she called out. He spun around and saw her walking towards him.

“I guess I just got lucky,” he chuckled.

The pair began to walk in sync as they headed up to the BAU’s floor.

“So you read a lot,” Jane stated, starting up a conversation. “What about movies or TV shows? What’s your favorite?”

“That would have to be Dr. Who,” he shared.

“I’ve never seen it.”

“What? Seriously?!” he questioned, holding the door open for her to enter the building.

“Seriously.”

“Well, I think you’d really like it. What about you? What’s your favorite?”

“Well since we’re talking TV or movies, I’d have to say Harry Potter.”

“I’ve actually never seen or read the Harry Potter series.”

“What? Seriously?!” Jane mimicked.

“Seriously.”

“Well, I think you’d really like it.”

They looked at each other and started laughing just as the doors of the elevator opened up to their floor. They walked out and Reid held the door open for her again.

“Well, seeing as we both have never seen each other’s favorite, maybe we should watch them together sometime?” Reid suggested.

A beat of silence passed between them as Jane stopped to look up at him, seeing if he was serious. As she considered it, Reid couldn’t ascertain the look on her face and began to panic that she had taken it the wrong way. He was about to say something to retract his statement when she finally spoke.

“Deal, but you have to read the Harry Potter books first.”

His face broke into a grin. “Deal.”

”We have a case,” Garcia announced, passing by the two and bringing it to their attention that they had made it to their destination.

~~~

When Jane boarded the jet, she made her way over to Reid and handed him a pile of three books.

”Here you go, the first three books of the series. I figured you’d need more than one to start with since the first three are smaller than the rest,” she told him. He exhaled a breath of amusement. “Alright. I’ll get to it.”

~ Nearing the end of the flight, Reid moved to take a seat next to Jane.

”I finished,” he told her.

”Already? Wow!” she said, closing her own reading material and turning her attention to him. “So what did you think?”

”They’re great! I wonder though about the whole ‘I am Lord Voldemort’ bit in the second one? How does that work in other languages?”

She laughed. “I’m glad you asked. They actually had to change his name to make it work. For example, in the French translation, his middle name had to be ‘Elvis’!” As she spoke, her eyes lit up, much like Reid’s did whenever he talked about something he found fascinating.

”Do you have the rest of the books with you? Maybe I could finish them later in my hotel room or on the flight back.”

”Sorry, you’ll have to wait,” she told him.

”Dang.”

She chuckled. “I had to wait for each book to be released. You can certainly wait until the end of the case.”

~~~~~~~~~~

The team returned from the case on Wednesday and Jane gave Reid the rest of the series to read.

Thursday was a paperwork day. A little after lunch, Reid came over to Jane’s desk.

“So I was thinking that we could watch Harry Potter sometime this weekend.”

Jane set down her pen and turned her attention to him. “Yeah. You could come over to my place Friday after work and we could order a pizza. Then if it’s ok with you, you could stay overnight and sleep when we get too tired and finish the rest of the movies in the morning,” she suggested.

“Sounds perfect,” Reid agreed. “I’ll let you get back to work.”

Jane watched as he walked off to the break room. When he was out of sight, she let out a small squeal and spun around in her chair, unable to contain her excitement.

“Someone’s happy! Please share,” Garcia said, coming over to Jane’s desk. Jane filled her in on the plans she had just made with Reid. “Pizza and a movie marathon? Sounds like a great idea for a first date,” she cheered.

“Oh no, it’s not a date,” Jane told her, shaking her head.

“Oh yeah, sure it isn’t,” Garcia replied sarcastically.

“It isn’t! Look, Reid and I have been becoming really good friends. I’ve never really had any friends before so I’m a little excited that I finally have one.”

“Still...it sounds like a date,” Garcia insisted. She began to walk away but stopped and turned back, “Oh and Jane?”

“Yeah?” “You have more friends here than just Reid. I hope you know that.”

Jane smiled as she walked away.

~ Reid filled his coffee cup in the break room. As he stirred sugar in, he couldn’t keep himself from smiling.

“Someone’s in a good mood,” Morgan pointed out as he approached his younger colleague. “You finally get some love from Addison?”

“No!” Reid argued. Morgan gave him a look and he explained to him the plans he and Jane had just made.

“Plans to get some love,” Morgan joked.

“No, Morgan! We’re just friends, ok? Friends hang out. Friends watch movies and eat pizza. Just friends.”

Reid moved past Morgan and headed towards the door. As he left the room, he heard Morgan call out behind him, “For now!”

~~~~~~~~~~

A/N: Quick note: This story started in May 2009 and so only the first five HP movies had been released at that time.

~~~~~~~~~~

The next morning, Jane popped over to Reid’s desk to ask what time he planned on coming over.

“Well, we get off at 5 and it takes 12 hours and 30 minutes to watch all 5 movies. Of course, that’s without taking into account breaks in between to grab snacks and go to the bathroom-”

“Reid, time?” Jane cut in, taking a seat on his desk.

“Sorry. Around 6-6:30.”

“Alright. I’ll have the pizza ordered to get there around then. I’m so excited. I can’t wait, this is going to be great!” Jane cheered.

“Morning, lovers,” Morgan greeted them, coming over to join in on their conversation. Jane rolled her eyes. “Talking about plans to make some sweet love tonight?”

“Harry Potter, Morgan. We were talking about Harry Potter,” Jane spoke through her teeth.

“Oh, role play!” Morgan smirked, causing Jane to scoff. She got up from Reid’s desk.

“I’ll see you later, Reid,” she told him before walking away.

“Way to go, Morgan!” Reid snapped. “Why do you have to be so infantile? She’s the first friend I’ve had that’s my age and is interested in the same things as I am. Why do you have to come in here and ruin it?”

“Hey, I’m sorry, man. You know I was just having some fun,” Morgan apologized.

“Don’t apologize to me. Apologize to Jane.”

Morgan sighed and nodded before heading over to Jane’s desk.

“Addison,” he spoke. She looked up from her paperwork. “I’m sorry about what I said. I was just having fun, but I went too far.”

She set down her pen and turned her full attention to him. “I accept your apology,” she sighed, “I’m just sick of everyone hinting at Reid and I being more than friends. People would know if we were dating, but we’re not so they should stop joking about it.”

“I get it,” Morgan said. “We’re probably not going to stop, but I’ll try to tone it down.”

Jane chuckled. “Deal.”

~~~~~

“Hello?”

“Hey Jane, I’m just calling to see if you were coming to visit this weekend again.”

“Oh Jack, I’m sorry. I can’t, I already have plans. But I promise I will try to visit again soon, alright?”

She heard Jack sigh through the phone. “Alright.”

Jane heard a knock at the door. “Listen, I gotta go, but I’ll call you later this weekend. Love you.” Jack said goodbye and Jane hung up before going to answer the door.

“Hey,” Reid greeted as she opened the door.

“Hey! Come on in,” Jane said, moving aside.

“Thanks,” he obliged.

“I didn’t know you had glasses,” she commented.

“Oh, yeah.” He touched the frames self-consciously. “I figured if we’re watching movies late into the night, it’d be best not to wear contacts. I know they’re not the most stylish but they help me see and that’s the whole point, so who cares if they look nerdy,” he rambled.

“No, they don’t,” Jane objected. “Well, they do but that fits with your personality, which there’s nothing wrong with. They fit you and they’re cute.”

There was a pause between them and Jane realized what she had just said. Another knock came at the door.

“That must be the pizza,” she said, breaking the moment to get the door. Did she just call him cute?

The two settled down on the couch, ate their pizza and watched the first movie. Before starting the second, Jane took the time to clean up the pizza.

”I’ll turn the lights off since we don’t need them anymore,” Jane told Reid as she reentered the living room. She turned them off and sat back down.

”Actually, can you leave them on?” he asked.

”Why? Are you afraid of the dark?”

“Actually, yes,” he admitted.

Jane laughed. “You're a federal agent, how's that possible?”

“I'm working on it, alright?”

Jane laughed again. “Alright, I’ll go turn on the light.” She got back up and went to go turn it on. Instead of turning it on right away, she waited for a moment before jumping up behind him.

He screamed and fell off the couch.

Jane tried to apologize but couldn’t stop laughing. She went to go help him up, but instead, he pulled her down to the floor with him.

“Ahh,” she shrieked.

They both laughed and looked at each other. Slowly, the laughing ceased and for a moment, it turned serious as they both stared at each other.

Jane snapped out of it and got up, this time actually turning the light back on. The pair both got back onto the couch and started the second movie.

After the third movie, they fell asleep.

~~~

When Jane woke up the next morning, it took her a moment to figure out where she was. She looked around and realized she was in her living room, but she was laying on something. Turning her head, she saw that she had somehow ended up sleeping on Spencer.

Spencer turned his head and opened his eyes, looking up at her. Jane blushed and apologized. “We must have both fallen asleep at the end of the movie.”

She got up and ran a hand through her hair. “So what would you like for breakfast? We have cereal or toaster waffles, or I could make some eggs or pancakes,” she offered.

“Waffles sound good,” Reid said, sitting up and rubbing his eyes.

“Then waffles we shall have.”

After making the waffles, Jane returned to the living room and they started up their marathon again.

When they finished the movies, Spencer stretched his arms up and yawned. “I should get going, but we’ll have to do this again sometime with Dr. Who. You’re not getting out of watching them.”

Jane laughed. “Alright. This was fun.”

“Yeah, it was.”

“I’ll see you Monday,” she said as she held the door open for him.

“See you then,” he replied, exiting her apartment.

~~~~~~~~~~

Bless The Broken Road Masterlist

~~~~~~~~~~

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[wineanddinosaur]

VinePair Podcast: Wine Experts Are Ignoring Full-Bodied Reds — and Shouldn’t B‪e

There’s a bit of a disconnect these days when it comes to red wine in America. Consumers still seem to be deeply interested in and passionate about full-bodied red wines — be they blends, Cabernet Sauvignon, or other varieties. Yet it often seems that wine experts and professionals would rather talk about any other style of red wine.

Why is it that sommeliers, writers, and retailers seem more interested in lighter, higher-acid styles of red wine than the majority of consumers? Why have so many red wine drinkers been alienated by the very group that’s hoping to court their patronage? That’s what Adam Teeter and Zach Geballe discuss on this week’s episode of the “VinePair Podcast.”

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Or Check out the Conversation Here

Adam Teeter: From Brooklyn, New York, I’m Adam Teeter.

Zach Geballe: And in Seattle, Wash., I’m Zach Geballe.

A: And this is the “VinePair Podcast.” Before we jump into today’s topic on Big Red, as I’m going to call it, there was a pretty big holiday for both of us recently. It’s a pretty big alcohol holiday. Not like getting wasted, but wine has a big component to it. I’m curious, what have you been drinking, Zach?

Z: Well, it wasn’t necessarily in preparation for today’s episode, but in thinking about it, it was appropriate for Passover. I had a couple of full-bodied red wines, a Cabernet Sauvignon from here in Washington, from Abeja, which is a winery in Walla Walla. Adam, as you might recall, we had Dan Wampler when we did a live episode, also with Kyle McLaughlin for the Great American Drinks episode I believe we did last year. Dan is Kyle’s winemaker but also is a winemaker at Abeja. It was a very enjoyable bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon. Part of the reason why I picked it is because, as you know, the seder involves a lot of drinking before you have any food. It made sense to me to pick a wine that I knew I was going to enjoy both before eating and then also with the meal, which is where a lot of these wines perform really, really well. I also had a wine from another Walla Walla Winery, L’Ecole No. 41, Perigee, which is a Bordeaux-style blend, so Cabernet and Merlot-based blend. Both were delicious and helped me think about this topic a little bit more. How about you?

A: First of all, you made me think about something that I want to address, which is before I tell you what I drank this week, which is what I drank two weeks ago, because it was so sad. Two weeks ago, you and I were going back and forth for the podcast. I was thinking about what I was making for dinner Friday because in  Covid on Friday and Saturday nights, we try to make it a little more special. If I’m cooking at home, we open a nice bottle of wine. I was going to open the Baby Bear from Pursued By Bear that Dan made. I popped it and it was the most corked wine I’ve ever smelled, and I was so bummed. So bummed.

Z: Kyle and Dan, if you’re listening and you want to send Adam a new bottle… I’m so glad that didn’t happen during the live recording. That would have been instructive, but boy, it would have sucked. Have you had that happen dining out somewhere where you had a corked bottle?

A: Oh, yeah. I’ve had it happen sometimes when the server doesn’t believe me, which is really lovely, really lovely. That actually happened at a restaurant in Covid dining outside and I felt bad and said it was corked. The server said “this isn’t corked, you just don’t know what old wine tastes like.” That’s what they said to me and I said, “No, this is corked.” I happen to be with a friend who’s a journalist but not a wine journalist. He writes at The Times and he’s a big wine person, too. He even said it was corked. This isn’t because the wine was old. We happened to find a random gem on their list. It was an old Italian bottle that was $65 a bottle and it was a 2005.

Z: It’s old, but it’s not like you opened a 1957 bottle and the server could realistically say that “you probably haven’t had a lot of wine of this age.” But 15-year-old Italian wine is not that old.

A: Then, the server came back. Now we’re on a crazy tangent and says, “I’m going to decant it, because it’s definitely not corked.” Then I said, is the beverage director here or the person who buys wine? They say, “The person who buys the wine is one of the owners and he’s not here tonight.” Then I said OK, fine, decant it. And we were like, yeah, it’s still corked. Can you please open another bottle? They say “we’ll see if we have any left.” Of course, they did and it was totally different. I literally said to the server, I’m not trying to be a d*ck, but can you smell both? Do you see the difference? The server literally said to me, “I don’t see the difference, I don’t smell the difference.” Anyways, that was really a huge bummer. Passover for me, I had two really cool wine experiences. The first night, I don’t think people know this, but we have an article that’s about to come out about it. Mayacamas is probably one of the most revered wineries in Napa, and they make incredible Cabernet. We named their Cabernet the No. 1 wine on VinePair’s Top 50 a few years ago. I don’t think the people know that the winery is now owned by Orthodox Jews.

Z: I didn’t know this.

A: They keep kosher, so they can’t drink Mayacamas. Mayacamas is making a version that’s kosher. They mentioned it to me and I said I don’t keep kosher. Well, we’re not even from that Jewish family where the wine has to be kosher at Passover. I have tons of friends that say they got to bring kosher wine. They asked, do you want to try them? They sent them to Katie on our team, who’s writing the article because we just thought it was so crazy and cool. They sent them to me, and the way the wine is kosher is that they keep it separate. They follow all the kosher guidelines. I’m not going to go into them here, but it’s basically the exact same Cabernet Sauvignon. It was really awesome to be drinking these two kosher Mayacamas Cabernets for Passover, which is nuts. I posted on Instagram, and I had so many people commenting, like, what is this?

Z: Yes, I had the same response when I saw it, although I don’t think I messaged you about it because I had no idea.

A: Of course, we drank those two bottles, and I should have known better. Now, I’m responsible for bringing the wine to a family function and I brought more white than red. I think that’s what I was in the mood for. And again, both of the Mayacamas came out on the first night and were finished. I also brought a Syrah that came out on the first night and was finished. All my beautiful whites that were sitting in the refrigerator did not get drunk. Now, I was thinking I had to go to the Pennsylvania state store. I walk into the state store and I’m looking around. I will say I feel people’s pain that all of you have is a state store, right? It’s very much the biggest brand you can find on the shelves, and you really have to dig. Anyways, I went with my brother-in-law, and we went to the Italian section, which was pretty small. I went to one of the smaller state stores that were closest to the house and sitting on the shelf was three bottles of 2013 Pio Cesare Dolcetto for $19 a bottle. We bought them, and they were amazing. It was really cool to be drinking eight-year-old wine at Passover and showing people that this wine is wine that could age. I think a lot of people don’t think Dolcetto can age, but this one was really, really beautiful still. It was cool, fun, and a neat find. I said to Noami, “Maybe next time we come, I need to go to Pennsylvania state stores and just do some digging, because there are some finds on the shelf for the price we bought for.”

Z: The one risk is you got to find the part of the store that hasn’t been sitting in direct sunlight, because the bottles have not moved since they were put on the shelf.

A: Before we kick off the topic, I did want to mention that I saw two weeks ago, you posted it and it was also in the news, the Dahlia Lounge, which was the restaurant that you’ve worked at for 13 years, is not going to reopen post-Covid. First of all, I wanted to just offer my condolences, because so many people are going through this, and it absolutely sucks. You started as a sommelier there. You were the head beverage educator. I think a lot of people who listen to this show are going through this, too, because while a lot of restaurants are reopening, a lot of them aren’t. I was wondering if you had any thoughts that you wanted to share about what that has been like for you going through all of this and what your memories are of the Dahlia, as well?

Z: Yeah, I appreciate that, Adam. The specifics of the Dahlia Lounge not reopening are what they are and have a lot to do with a lot of forces that you and I have talked about on the podcast. We’ll continue to talk about it, how the restaurant industry in various cities is changing and having to adapt not just to life with a pandemic, but life after a pandemic. A lot of those forces, I think, conspired against Dahlia Lounge and against a lot of other restaurants of its ilk. I would say personally, and I know this is true for you, Adam, also listeners, if you have stories like these, restaurants that you worked at or dined out that announced they’re not reopening and you want to share them with us, I would love to read a little bit about that. Email us podcast@vinepair.com and just drop us a line. We’ll even share some of them on the podcast. For me, the Dahlia Lounge is a restaurant I worked at for, as you said, 13 years. I started working there when I was 23 years old and went through a lot of different life events, changes. My wife and I had our rehearsal dinner there. There were lots of memories, and more that I could reasonably fit into a little moment here. The two things I was going to say in light of that are, one, I think it’s important for all of us to remember that anyone who is a diner at a restaurant — whether you’re a regular in the once-a-month sense or once-a-year sense — restaurants provide a really unique facet in society. For many of us, it is integral to celebrating important moments, whether they’re birthdays, anniversaries, or just big life moments. One of the saddest things for me about all this is thinking of our many regulars who did count on a meal at the Dahlia Lounge for a way to celebrate a big moment in their life for a birthday, anniversary, graduation, etc. Many of them will not experience that going forward. It’s also important for us to think about, and for all the listeners, whether you work in the industry or are just a restaurant-goer, we’re at this inflection point that we’ll be at one for the next year or two. The face of dining in America can change fundamentally. There are going to be fewer and fewer restaurants that offer full-service dining, I think. It’s just expensive and difficult. There’s also been a tremendous talent drain over the last year in the industry, and a lot of people who were laid off, like I was, are not going to go back. They found other work. They’re going to do other things. They’re not interested in the lack of security that it turns out that industry provides, so there are going to be real challenges. We all make decisions. We all vote with our dollars and make purchase decisions that way. I encourage those of you listening to think about the places that are reopening, that matter to you, and think about trying to support them just by being a guest. No one is asking for donations at this point, I don’t think. The places that you want to have in your life, the restaurants that you want to have opened, the places you want for those special occasions, make an effort to go to them more than just for a special occasion every once in a while, because the restaurants are fragile. I felt that very acutely over last year, but especially when the not surprising news came out. It was a sad day for me and for all of the Dahlia Lounge team. As Adam said, for many people across the country who have had a similar type of restaurant or restaurant they worked at not reopen, it’s a tragedy in a way. We’ll remember them. At least I certainly will.

A: Yeah, man, it’s not easy. You made me think about something as you were talking. You mentioned something that maybe is even another episode, or it becomes this episode. I think what we’ve all realized over the last year, or maybe we haven’t realized, those of us who covered and worked, is how much restaurants truly depend on regulars. The question now becomes how much our culture had pushed against that. In the last decade — VinePair doesn’t really write a ton about “this is the hottest place to go to right now” — but there are a lot of publications that say this, that rate restaurants and give them points and say this is the hottest thing you need to eat out right now. That did create a culture. Then the user experience, platforms, did the same thing in creating a culture that said, man, I need to be the person that goes to the buzziest at all times. I think there was already a lot of noise in the restaurant industry amongst owners about how damaging this type of stuff was for them and how they were already watching that. You had to reinvent yourself every two years because consumers were reading these types of publications. Then they were moving on really quickly or they were on social looking at people posting food-porn photos and moving on really quickly. That really hurt a lot of restaurants that people actually remembered then afterward how much they loved in the pandemic. They would say “Oh, you mean that place isn’t going to come back?” It wasn’t just because of the pandemic that these places were closed but because that behavior was encouraged by a lot of publications and rating review sites. It was already hurting them. They were already on their last legs, whether they were putting on a good show or putting on that bright, smiling face to try to get the consumers to come back. Without a huge amount of regulars, it just wasn’t possible. The neighborhood restaurant was dying. I hope that post-pandemic, we let the neighborhood restaurant come back. We’re not just thinking about the buzziest. I got to go to the see-and-be-seen place every single day. I know that you may not be able to prevent that in Manhattan. I’m hoping in Brooklyn that stops. The restaurant I love in my neighborhood and counted on even during the pandemic will stay. My neighborhood will continue to support those restaurants and we won’t see some of my favorites reinvent themselves in a year or two because they just haven’t had press and their crowds aren’t the same. I really hope that’s the case. Look, the same did happen at bars, to some extent. Bars have a stronghold in New York like Death and Co. are still going strong. It’s still a place people really want to get into. Same with PTD, things like that. It just wasn’t the same as restaurants. I think that’s because the drinks publications like ourselves and others just don’t do that as much in terms of coverage like what’s the buzziest? I do think that’s been a contributing factor. You mentioned regulars are really important for people to think about. You have to think about the places you want to support and then support them. When you’re vaccinated and feel comfortable going back out to eat, if you haven’t already, go to the places you love if they’re still open or they’re reopening because they’re going to need support. If not, they’re not going to be there.

Z: One last point on this before we move on is I’ve had the opportunity to deal with the interaction between regulars and a restaurant on both ends. I obviously served many, many regulars in my life, but also been a regular at some other restaurants. I’ll just say this. You’ll never have a relationship with a restaurant as meaningful as being a regular at a restaurant. There is nothing, I think, in the dining world as rewarding. You can throw me your three-star Michelin restaurants and your incredibly trendy spots. Those can be really fun and exciting, and I certainly enjoy those dining experiences, too. However, the feeling of walking into a place, being known, feeling comfortable, knowing the staff a little bit, those are meant to be places where people feel welcomed, comfortable, and almost at home. But then also, you don’t have to deal with all the bullshit you have to deal with at home. If you don’t ever build that relationship, if you treat restaurants like trading cards or a collectible, I don’t see how that can be as satisfying. I don’t think even the people who do that are truly satisfied by it because, in the end, would you remember that place a year later? I don’t think you do.

A: Yeah, I completely agree. It is really amazing what it’s like to be a regular. I think people get away from it when you want to say you have been to all the places everyone else is talking about. You walk in and you wonder why that treatment always feels the same is because they don’t know you. Whereas there is someone who probably is a regular at that buzzy place that you randomly scored a reservation for that always seems to get the reservation. Yes, it is because they are a regular, and there are notes in their reservation in the system that give them a better table and the better service. It is because they come and support. That’s what the restaurant needs. Anyways, we are already pretty deep into our episode. Let’s talk a little bit about this conversation around the disconnect that we’ve seen in terms of consumer preference for fuller-bodied red wines and the trade preference for lighter-bodied, high-acid wine. Zach, you were the one that initially brought this to my attention, so why don’t you kick us off, and then we can go from there?

Z: Sure. There’s always been a little bit of attention, or at least in the time that I’ve been in the restaurant and beverage alcohol industry, a tension between what the people who run wine programs and to some extent the people in the wine press are interested in, and what consumers want. It was a thing for me running wine programs that inevitably made my biggest selling category was Cabernet Sauvignon and Cabernet-based wines. No matter my own personal preferences, I would be derelict in my duty as a wine director to not put a lot of time and energy into a particular amount of space or category. Then, claiming to people who come in and say, “I like a big red wine, I like Cabernet Sauvignon.” “Well, actually you would prefer this other thing.” We’re trying to move the consumer too much. That is both an egocentric move on the part of most wine directors or restaurants, and frankly, I think, bad business. I think there’s something to be said about building a list that offers people opportunities to try new things, to diversify, but also gives lots of people safe landing spots and gives people wine they’re familiar with. In the end, the hospitality industry is exactly that, hospitality. Part of hospitality is telling someone the thing they love, you have. There are always going to be limits, you’re not going to be able to stock every wine. You’re going to have to make decisions, no matter the size of your program, about excluding some things. To build a wine program that does not meet the consumer most of the way is interested in something for reasons that I find off-putting and again, ego-driven, as opposed to being about serving the guests. To me, you see this a lot in the seemingly endless attempts to convince the wine-drinking public that they don’t want the wines they love, big, full-bodied red wines, the No. 1-selling category in America — that they actually want obscure European variety acts, high-acid, tart red fruit, pale red color. “Actually, this is the wine you want,” and it’s like, no, it’s not. Part of it is Americans have a culture of drinking wine without food. I’m not going to argue the pushback of “these big red wines don’t pair well with food,” to which I would say after, as mentioned, 15 years of experience., who the fuck cares? Your consumer mostly doesn’t care. They’re used to drinking big red wines, and they’re used to eating whatever they eat with it. Again, if the conception of your job, the role is so tied up in convincing this person who has these things they love that they will give you money for, that they are wrong and you will show them the light, I think you’re doing it for the wrong reason.

A: Yeah, I agree. I want to get into why you think it is because we definitely have theories, but look, my personal preference is high-on-acid reds, but that’s because I’ve drunk a lot of wine throughout my career and that’s what I’m into right now. I definitely have an appreciation for the full-bodied reds, and I understand why people like them. I don’t think anyone is wrong for liking them or less of an educated consumer. I do think it’s really interesting to assume that these wines have a problem. I think the biggest thing that has been eye-opening for me is, when I hear people say to me who are in the industry, “Napa is going to have a huge issue. The young people aren’t going to go to Napa. They’re just not going to drink Napa wines.” I would say, “Who are you talking to?” When I go to wine festivals in Atlanta and L.A., and I’m talking to consumers that come up to me, they tell me the region that’s on their bucket list to visit with their friends or significant other is Napa. Then, when I ask them what wines they drink, they say wines like Caymus. Some of them say Ashes & Diamonds, but the majority of them say these big Napa Cabs. I don’t know why we are as an industry saying that that’s bad. We don’t have to make everybody drink Beaujolais. I really enjoy Beaujolais, but not everyone has to drink Beaujolais. If they don’t like it, you don’t need to make them feel bad for it, and you don’t need to feel bad that you like it. Do you know what I mean? I believe everyone just needs to get over themselves in terms of no one is trying to offend somebody else by somebody not liking something. When the majority of the data points to one style of wine that people like, we don’t have to say, “Well, they must not know what they’re doing.”

Z: Yes, that’s the problem in my mind. The thing that I don’t like is when someone tells you, “Oh, I like your Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa Valley,” there is a fundamental issue and a reflex on the part of a lot of people in the wine industry to be like, “Well, let me explain to you why you’re wrong. You just haven’t tried the right alternative wines.” In some small percentage of cases, that might be true. There might be some people where wine is something they don’t think a lot about. They drink wine on occasion. They drink wine when they’re out to dinner with friends or family, maybe for special occasions. It’s not an everyday thing. You and I, and sommeliers and winemakers, we live and breathe this stuff. This is our everyday. Of course we’re well apprised of all the many options and we try lots of wines and that’s fine. For most people, wine is something they don’t have all that often. If they do, they may not think about it a lot. They might belong to a wine club because they had a great experience somewhere. They might buy wine at the grocery store. They’re beholden to this selection that’s put in front of them and they like those wines. It’s the height of arrogance to me to tell someone who says “I like this” to then actually say “No, you don’t, you’re wrong.” You can try and explain to someone in a setting, maybe if you’re graceful and gentle about it, why they might also like something else. That’s how I always try to frame it with people who were like, “Oh, here’s what we like.” If I didn’t have that or I had something else that I thought would be a better fit, I would say, “Wonderful, here’s something else you might like.” You shouldn’t say here’s why the thing you like is wrong. You’re going to suddenly change your purchase preferences based on some random asshole telling you otherwise or some article or TikTok video.

A: I’m saying that it’s just going to turn people off. We’ve used this analogy before. For those that remember this amazing movie, it reminds me of Jack Black’s character in “High Fidelity,” where it’s the music snob basically being like, “Wait, you like this mainstream band? You don’t like music.” No, you still like music. There are so many different genres of music and varieties of music. People who work in music all day don’t want to listen to pop all the time because there is a formula to pop. There are things about pop music that if you spend enough time working in music, you would say oh, wow, this is a derivative of this or this. Then, you want to listen to something different, even though when you go into the indie-rock spectrum, they all are copying each other in some way. But whatever. Let’s pretend that they’re original. I think you and I have gotten called out before for being anti-natural wine. I’m not anti-natural wine. I’m anti-the movement. I have a problem with the movement that’s telling people if they don’t like it, they don’t get it. That’s what I’m anti about. My issue here is, and I’ll give just a quick example: Someone on our staff posted an image of a pretty mainstream wine and how great it was for people who they knew drink that wine. That wine is available in a large number of retailers. They got a lot of hate comments back, and I got comments too. How dare you post that wine, no one should be drinking that wine. For the category, this is a great wine. If you’re unable to see that, that’s fine, but you need to get out of your own feelings. Because you’re inside your feelings right now, and that’s not what we’re here for. We’re here to tell the consumers who do like that wine, that this is great and they should feel good about liking that wine. We’re not here to make people feel bad for that. I’m not going to sit here and say that you should be drinking Chateau Diana from the CVS and comparing it to actual wine. By the way, that is a wine product. It’s a wine product, but if you like anything else, that’s good. As we talked about before, it gets people into wine. It’s just so infuriating.

Z: I think there are two other pieces to this. I think the rock or the indie music comparison is a great one. I think there’s a cynical motive to it in a lot of cases, where telling someone about why they should drink Napa Cab or big reds, you can’t make a name for yourself, right? You can’t create a business around it. Those wineries are already well represented. The wines are distributed by established companies. They have established relationships and reputations. If you’re someone who is an ambitious person in wine, it makes a lot more sense to become an advocate for an obscure European region or grape, or a style that’s not as in vogue, because you can make a name for yourself. I think whether they’re conscious of that or not, I think that’s what causes a lot of people to gravitate towards it. Again, you can be the face of a trend as opposed to the person who’s just selling the wine that people actually like. You and I taste a lot of wine professionally, it’s just our job, right? We do a lot of things. We get samples, we go to tastings. When you’re in that setting, I won’t deny that the fresher, higher-acid styles of red wine are often a little more enjoyable.

A: They stand out more.

Z: When you drink a lot of full-bodied red wine, especially one that might be a little higher in alcohol, pretty quickly you get fatigued. Again, who gives a shit unless you are a professional and no one cares about what your personal drinking habits are, really? If you’re a consumer, you’re someone who just likes to drink wine. You don’t give a shit if after tasting 30 of them, you can’t tell the difference, because no one is ever going to do that. They’re going to drink a single bottle at a time. Again, this inability of people, whether they are sommeliers, wine directors, retail operators, or writers in some cases, to get out of their own head and get out of their own world experience and think, “OK, is there anyone I’m communicating to? Is my guest going to view wine this way? Are my readers or listeners going to view wine this way?” For so many of them, I think the answer is of course not, because they’re drinking a bottle every third night. They’re not tasting 50 wines a day. It’s such a stupid and self-centered, shortsighted way of looking at this product that you work with that drives me crazy.

A: Yeah, it drives me bonkers. I think the other thing, too, and it’s going to take decades for if ever, the regions that you are pushing to be considered regions worthy of buying during a special occasion. If someone came to the Dahlia Lounge, and they were celebrating a momentous anniversary or a big promotion, were you going to be more easily able to sell them a Napa Cab? Or were you going to be able to somehow convince them that they should try red wine that’s from this region of France that’s maybe a little like Napa Cab, but is more your style of higher acid, more fruit, less oak. Probably not.

Z: One other point, presumably the Napa Cab is going to sell for a lot more than your obscure southwestern France Madiran. One, it’s just bad business. I think Napa is a great illustration of this in a way. Champagne is, also. For a lot of consumers, part of what they’re buying when they order a bottle of wine from Napa Valley is the sense of luxury and prestige that goes along with it. Again, if you’re not honest with yourself, at least about that as a buyer or as a sommelier, you’re just deluding yourself. It matters to people. The fact that they’ve heard of Napa Valley, they may have been there, they can spell it and pronounce it is always going to resonate with most consumers. Yes, there is a subset of consumers who get off on novelty and having the ability to say, “I tried something new today.” That’s great, and recognizing those people and meeting them where they are is also really important. Having all this, that’s just a Napa Cab is also bad. That’s not a good wine program, either. But one that takes the bulk of wine drinkers and treats them as idiot children who must be shown the error of their ways, they must be clued to the wine that they truly will love, because they can’t possibly love the well-established wine that you, the wine writer, are so sick of. It’s just ego at this point. Again, it is the self-centeredness that I find so appalling. It’s one thing if you’re a winemaker and you want to tell people about the wines that you make. If it’s a thing you make, fine. As a sommelier, as a writer, you are not in any way involved in the production of that product, and inflating your own ego around something that literally you did nothing to other than maybe take a corkscrew to. Again, it’s masturbation. I find that to be really unpleasant in a public setting.

A: Can I share one huge pet peeve with you? My biggest pet peeve is when you go to a wine shop or to a restaurant and they have a classic region on the list, and not a single bottle from that classic region is indicative of what made that region classic. That just pisses me off, because if I’m having dinner with someone who’s never had Northern Rhône Syrah from Saint-Joseph. If all you have is super-natty versions, I can’t do that. I want to show someone what makes that region so amazing for Syrah. It kills me, dude. When that does happen, it’s just so frustrating, because I get it, you want to have a few of those bottles because you want to be different. If you want to be a little quirky and you want to show that there is diversity in that region, awesome, I think you totally should have. But to not have one or two that is representative? That’s when it really, really bothers me.

Z: To come back almost to the point where we started, and this is something that I worked on because it changed my own mindset as I evolved and matured as a buyer. It’s also important to have some recognizable names. Whatever the category is, especially if it’s a good chunk of your list. If it’s Napa Cab, you should have some established producers on there as well. It’s good to have benchmark producers or classic producers that people are going to recognize. You want to have both, ideally. Certainly, if you’re only going to have a couple, they should be largely classic representations, because someone who looks at a list that has wine from all over the world and you have five red wines from Bordeaux, if four of them are unoaked, with short maceration times, then you’re doing a bad job. If you’re at a restaurant with an immense French list, and you want to have 40 Bordeaux offerings and some of them are for the people who like that kind of wine or want to try Bordeaux, great. Again, whatever you are, whether you’re a retail shop owner, a restauranteur, a wine director, writer, or a member of the press, putting your own ego and your own self ahead of the people you’re ostensibly serving or writing for is just bad. It’s not doing a good job.

A: Well, I think this comes to the moral of the story, which is that wine is the only industry that I’ve ever been a part of — and I haven’t been a part of a lot. Wine is the only community that doesn’t want to look at the f*cking data. It’s like data is bad. I don’t understand because the data would refute everything that people’s influencers in wine are saying. That’s not to say you still shouldn’t also tell people to drink the things that you’re interested in. But to push those like they’re the only options is crazy to me. There is a reason when you walk into most breweries in America right now, everyone has a fucking hazy IPA on their list, because the data shows this is what sells. There is a reason that the majority of pop music sounds the same right now, because when people look at the billboard charts, they are very aware of what the majority of the country wants to listen to. When people look in spirits, it’s the same. They are always looking at what’s trending up? What’s trending down? There’s a reason everyone’s moving into tequila. Why are all the celebrities moving in tequila? It is not because they all live in L.A. and they’re really interested in agave. It’s because when you look at the data, tequila is the fastest-rising spirit in America right now. It is very quickly catching bourbon, right? It’s very quickly catching whiskey. It’s catching vodka. That is why. With wines, we don’t want to look at that. People don’t care. Then they complain about the big companies who continue to grow. Why?  It’s because they look at data.

Z: I think that there’s a space — especially on the production side — for winemakers to say, “This is what I want to make.”

A: One hundred percent, you should.

Z: And I think that winemakers recognize it, in a fundamental way, because if you choose to make an unusual variety of wine in a different style, you know that you’re capping your market for it. That’s fine if you’re making a few hundred cases. But as a restaurant, a retail shop, even potentially a wine bar, if you have a very specific vibe, that’s  why people will seek you out, who want that kind of thing. Your guests are going to come with all levels of experience and preferences, but the one thing that most of them are going to have in common is that their favorite wine style is a red blend or Cabernet Sauvignon. If you can’t meet that need, you’re doing a bad job.

A: I agree. Again, I love the producers that do whatever they want. I like going to the small indie brewers who are making styles that aren’t just New England IPA. I also do appreciate a New England IPA. I’m a haze boy every once in a while, as Cat likes to tease me, and I like all kinds of wine. Since I’m in the industry and I’m looking for interesting stories and stuff, am I mostly gravitating towards those producers that are going against the grain in the region’s stuff? Of course I am. It’s just so stupid to put your head in the sand and try to pretend the large trends of the industry don’t exist or make those people who have those flavor preferences feel like they’re stupid or they don’t know what they’re doing and they’re wrong or behind the times. Because that’s just not cool. That doesn’t help anybody when it comes to drinking. That doesn’t help the overall industry of wine, and it doesn’t help your bottom line.

Z: All true.

A: Well, this was a great episode. I loved you sharing your thoughts about Dahlia Lounge. It was really powerful. Again, I want to reiterate to anyone who’s listening to the podcast, if you have worked somewhere that has gone out of business during Covid or is going to go out of business and would like to share your stories, please email us at podcast@vinepair.com. We’d love to hear them. This could possibly wind up in a larger article. It could wind up as a podcast episode. This has been more than a year that’s been very hard for everybody, and it’d be great to hear some peoples’ experiences.

Z: For sure, we would love to hear them.

A: Zach, talk to you next week.

Z: Sounds great.

Thanks so much for listening to the “VinePair Podcast.” If you love this show as much as we love making it, then please leave a rating or review on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever it is you get your podcasts. It really helps everyone else discover the show.

Now for the credits. VinePair is produced and recorded in New York City and in Seattle, Wash., by myself and Zach Geballe, who does all the editing and loves to get the credit. Also, I would love to give a special shout-out to my VinePair co-founder, Josh Malin, for helping make all this possible, and also to Keith Beavers, VinePair’s tasting director, who is additionally a producer on the show. I also want to, of course, thank every other member of the VinePair team who is instrumental in all of the ideas that go into making the show every week. Thanks so much for listening, and we’ll see you again.

The article VinePair Podcast: Wine Experts Are Ignoring Full-Bodied Reds — and Shouldn’t B‪e appeared first on VinePair.

source https://vinepair.com/articles/full-bodied-reds-podcast/

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VinePair Podcast: Wine Experts Are Ignoring Full-Bodied Reds and Shouldnt Be

There’s a bit of a disconnect these days when it comes to red wine in America. Consumers still seem to be deeply interested in and passionate about full-bodied red wines — be they blends, Cabernet Sauvignon, or other varieties. Yet it often seems that wine experts and professionals would rather talk about any other style of red wine.

Why is it that sommeliers, writers, and retailers seem more interested in lighter, higher-acid styles of red wine than the majority of consumers? Why have so many red wine drinkers been alienated by the very group that’s hoping to court their patronage? That’s what Adam Teeter and Zach Geballe discuss on this week’s episode of the “VinePair Podcast.”

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Adam Teeter: From Brooklyn, New York, I’m Adam Teeter.

Zach Geballe: And in Seattle, Wash., I’m Zach Geballe.

A: And this is the “VinePair Podcast.” Before we jump into today’s topic on Big Red, as I’m going to call it, there was a pretty big holiday for both of us recently. It’s a pretty big alcohol holiday. Not like getting wasted, but wine has a big component to it. I’m curious, what have you been drinking, Zach?

Z: Well, it wasn’t necessarily in preparation for today’s episode, but in thinking about it, it was appropriate for Passover. I had a couple of full-bodied red wines, a Cabernet Sauvignon from here in Washington, from Abeja, which is a winery in Walla Walla. Adam, as you might recall, we had Dan Wampler when we did a live episode, also with Kyle McLaughlin for the Great American Drinks episode I believe we did last year. Dan is Kyle’s winemaker but also is a winemaker at Abeja. It was a very enjoyable bottle of Cabernet Sauvignon. Part of the reason why I picked it is because, as you know, the seder involves a lot of drinking before you have any food. It made sense to me to pick a wine that I knew I was going to enjoy both before eating and then also with the meal, which is where a lot of these wines perform really, really well. I also had a wine from another Walla Walla Winery, L’Ecole No. 41, Perigee, which is a Bordeaux-style blend, so Cabernet and Merlot-based blend. Both were delicious and helped me think about this topic a little bit more. How about you?

A: First of all, you made me think about something that I want to address, which is before I tell you what I drank this week, which is what I drank two weeks ago, because it was so sad. Two weeks ago, you and I were going back and forth for the podcast. I was thinking about what I was making for dinner Friday because in  Covid on Friday and Saturday nights, we try to make it a little more special. If I’m cooking at home, we open a nice bottle of wine. I was going to open the Baby Bear from Pursued By Bear that Dan made. I popped it and it was the most corked wine I’ve ever smelled, and I was so bummed. So bummed.

Z: Kyle and Dan, if you’re listening and you want to send Adam a new bottle… I’m so glad that didn’t happen during the live recording. That would have been instructive, but boy, it would have sucked. Have you had that happen dining out somewhere where you had a corked bottle?

A: Oh, yeah. I’ve had it happen sometimes when the server doesn’t believe me, which is really lovely, really lovely. That actually happened at a restaurant in Covid dining outside and I felt bad and said it was corked. The server said “this isn’t corked, you just don’t know what old wine tastes like.” That’s what they said to me and I said, “No, this is corked.” I happen to be with a friend who’s a journalist but not a wine journalist. He writes at The Times and he’s a big wine person, too. He even said it was corked. This isn’t because the wine was old. We happened to find a random gem on their list. It was an old Italian bottle that was $65 a bottle and it was a 2005.

Z: It’s old, but it’s not like you opened a 1957 bottle and the server could realistically say that “you probably haven’t had a lot of wine of this age.” But 15-year-old Italian wine is not that old.

A: Then, the server came back. Now we’re on a crazy tangent and says, “I’m going to decant it, because it’s definitely not corked.” Then I said, is the beverage director here or the person who buys wine? They say, “The person who buys the wine is one of the owners and he’s not here tonight.” Then I said OK, fine, decant it. And we were like, yeah, it’s still corked. Can you please open another bottle? They say “we’ll see if we have any left.” Of course, they did and it was totally different. I literally said to the server, I’m not trying to be a d*ck, but can you smell both? Do you see the difference? The server literally said to me, “I don’t see the difference, I don’t smell the difference.” Anyways, that was really a huge bummer. Passover for me, I had two really cool wine experiences. The first night, I don’t think people know this, but we have an article that’s about to come out about it. Mayacamas is probably one of the most revered wineries in Napa, and they make incredible Cabernet. We named their Cabernet the No. 1 wine on VinePair’s Top 50 a few years ago. I don’t think the people know that the winery is now owned by Orthodox Jews.

Z: I didn’t know this.

A: They keep kosher, so they can’t drink Mayacamas. Mayacamas is making a version that’s kosher. They mentioned it to me and I said I don’t keep kosher. Well, we’re not even from that Jewish family where the wine has to be kosher at Passover. I have tons of friends that say they got to bring kosher wine. They asked, do you want to try them? They sent them to Katie on our team, who’s writing the article because we just thought it was so crazy and cool. They sent them to me, and the way the wine is kosher is that they keep it separate. They follow all the kosher guidelines. I’m not going to go into them here, but it’s basically the exact same Cabernet Sauvignon. It was really awesome to be drinking these two kosher Mayacamas Cabernets for Passover, which is nuts. I posted on Instagram, and I had so many people commenting, like, what is this?

Z: Yes, I had the same response when I saw it, although I don’t think I messaged you about it because I had no idea.

A: Of course, we drank those two bottles, and I should have known better. Now, I’m responsible for bringing the wine to a family function and I brought more white than red. I think that’s what I was in the mood for. And again, both of the Mayacamas came out on the first night and were finished. I also brought a Syrah that came out on the first night and was finished. All my beautiful whites that were sitting in the refrigerator did not get drunk. Now, I was thinking I had to go to the Pennsylvania state store. I walk into the state store and I’m looking around. I will say I feel people’s pain that all of you have is a state store, right? It’s very much the biggest brand you can find on the shelves, and you really have to dig. Anyways, I went with my brother-in-law, and we went to the Italian section, which was pretty small. I went to one of the smaller state stores that were closest to the house and sitting on the shelf was three bottles of 2013 Pio Cesare Dolcetto for $19 a bottle. We bought them, and they were amazing. It was really cool to be drinking eight-year-old wine at Passover and showing people that this wine is wine that could age. I think a lot of people don’t think Dolcetto can age, but this one was really, really beautiful still. It was cool, fun, and a neat find. I said to Noami, “Maybe next time we come, I need to go to Pennsylvania state stores and just do some digging, because there are some finds on the shelf for the price we bought for.”

Z: The one risk is you got to find the part of the store that hasn’t been sitting in direct sunlight, because the bottles have not moved since they were put on the shelf.

A: Before we kick off the topic, I did want to mention that I saw two weeks ago, you posted it and it was also in the news, the Dahlia Lounge, which was the restaurant that you’ve worked at for 13 years, is not going to reopen post-Covid. First of all, I wanted to just offer my condolences, because so many people are going through this, and it absolutely sucks. You started as a sommelier there. You were the head beverage educator. I think a lot of people who listen to this show are going through this, too, because while a lot of restaurants are reopening, a lot of them aren’t. I was wondering if you had any thoughts that you wanted to share about what that has been like for you going through all of this and what your memories are of the Dahlia, as well?

Z: Yeah, I appreciate that, Adam. The specifics of the Dahlia Lounge not reopening are what they are and have a lot to do with a lot of forces that you and I have talked about on the podcast. We’ll continue to talk about it, how the restaurant industry in various cities is changing and having to adapt not just to life with a pandemic, but life after a pandemic. A lot of those forces, I think, conspired against Dahlia Lounge and against a lot of other restaurants of its ilk. I would say personally, and I know this is true for you, Adam, also listeners, if you have stories like these, restaurants that you worked at or dined out that announced they’re not reopening and you want to share them with us, I would love to read a little bit about that. Email us podcast@vinepair.com and just drop us a line. We’ll even share some of them on the podcast. For me, the Dahlia Lounge is a restaurant I worked at for, as you said, 13 years. I started working there when I was 23 years old and went through a lot of different life events, changes. My wife and I had our rehearsal dinner there. There were lots of memories, and more that I could reasonably fit into a little moment here. The two things I was going to say in light of that are, one, I think it’s important for all of us to remember that anyone who is a diner at a restaurant — whether you’re a regular in the once-a-month sense or once-a-year sense — restaurants provide a really unique facet in society. For many of us, it is integral to celebrating important moments, whether they’re birthdays, anniversaries, or just big life moments. One of the saddest things for me about all this is thinking of our many regulars who did count on a meal at the Dahlia Lounge for a way to celebrate a big moment in their life for a birthday, anniversary, graduation, etc. Many of them will not experience that going forward. It’s also important for us to think about, and for all the listeners, whether you work in the industry or are just a restaurant-goer, we’re at this inflection point that we’ll be at one for the next year or two. The face of dining in America can change fundamentally. There are going to be fewer and fewer restaurants that offer full-service dining, I think. It’s just expensive and difficult. There’s also been a tremendous talent drain over the last year in the industry, and a lot of people who were laid off, like I was, are not going to go back. They found other work. They’re going to do other things. They’re not interested in the lack of security that it turns out that industry provides, so there are going to be real challenges. We all make decisions. We all vote with our dollars and make purchase decisions that way. I encourage those of you listening to think about the places that are reopening, that matter to you, and think about trying to support them just by being a guest. No one is asking for donations at this point, I don’t think. The places that you want to have in your life, the restaurants that you want to have opened, the places you want for those special occasions, make an effort to go to them more than just for a special occasion every once in a while, because the restaurants are fragile. I felt that very acutely over last year, but especially when the not surprising news came out. It was a sad day for me and for all of the Dahlia Lounge team. As Adam said, for many people across the country who have had a similar type of restaurant or restaurant they worked at not reopen, it’s a tragedy in a way. We’ll remember them. At least I certainly will.

A: Yeah, man, it’s not easy. You made me think about something as you were talking. You mentioned something that maybe is even another episode, or it becomes this episode. I think what we’ve all realized over the last year, or maybe we haven’t realized, those of us who covered and worked, is how much restaurants truly depend on regulars. The question now becomes how much our culture had pushed against that. In the last decade — VinePair doesn’t really write a ton about “this is the hottest place to go to right now” — but there are a lot of publications that say this, that rate restaurants and give them points and say this is the hottest thing you need to eat out right now. That did create a culture. Then the user experience, platforms, did the same thing in creating a culture that said, man, I need to be the person that goes to the buzziest at all times. I think there was already a lot of noise in the restaurant industry amongst owners about how damaging this type of stuff was for them and how they were already watching that. You had to reinvent yourself every two years because consumers were reading these types of publications. Then they were moving on really quickly or they were on social looking at people posting food-porn photos and moving on really quickly. That really hurt a lot of restaurants that people actually remembered then afterward how much they loved in the pandemic. They would say “Oh, you mean that place isn’t going to come back?” It wasn’t just because of the pandemic that these places were closed but because that behavior was encouraged by a lot of publications and rating review sites. It was already hurting them. They were already on their last legs, whether they were putting on a good show or putting on that bright, smiling face to try to get the consumers to come back. Without a huge amount of regulars, it just wasn’t possible. The neighborhood restaurant was dying. I hope that post-pandemic, we let the neighborhood restaurant come back. We’re not just thinking about the buzziest. I got to go to the see-and-be-seen place every single day. I know that you may not be able to prevent that in Manhattan. I’m hoping in Brooklyn that stops. The restaurant I love in my neighborhood and counted on even during the pandemic will stay. My neighborhood will continue to support those restaurants and we won’t see some of my favorites reinvent themselves in a year or two because they just haven’t had press and their crowds aren’t the same. I really hope that’s the case. Look, the same did happen at bars, to some extent. Bars have a stronghold in New York like Death and Co. are still going strong. It’s still a place people really want to get into. Same with PTD, things like that. It just wasn’t the same as restaurants. I think that’s because the drinks publications like ourselves and others just don’t do that as much in terms of coverage like what’s the buzziest? I do think that’s been a contributing factor. You mentioned regulars are really important for people to think about. You have to think about the places you want to support and then support them. When you’re vaccinated and feel comfortable going back out to eat, if you haven’t already, go to the places you love if they’re still open or they’re reopening because they’re going to need support. If not, they’re not going to be there.

Z: One last point on this before we move on is I’ve had the opportunity to deal with the interaction between regulars and a restaurant on both ends. I obviously served many, many regulars in my life, but also been a regular at some other restaurants. I’ll just say this. You’ll never have a relationship with a restaurant as meaningful as being a regular at a restaurant. There is nothing, I think, in the dining world as rewarding. You can throw me your three-star Michelin restaurants and your incredibly trendy spots. Those can be really fun and exciting, and I certainly enjoy those dining experiences, too. However, the feeling of walking into a place, being known, feeling comfortable, knowing the staff a little bit, those are meant to be places where people feel welcomed, comfortable, and almost at home. But then also, you don’t have to deal with all the bullshit you have to deal with at home. If you don’t ever build that relationship, if you treat restaurants like trading cards or a collectible, I don’t see how that can be as satisfying. I don’t think even the people who do that are truly satisfied by it because, in the end, would you remember that place a year later? I don’t think you do.

A: Yeah, I completely agree. It is really amazing what it’s like to be a regular. I think people get away from it when you want to say you have been to all the places everyone else is talking about. You walk in and you wonder why that treatment always feels the same is because they don’t know you. Whereas there is someone who probably is a regular at that buzzy place that you randomly scored a reservation for that always seems to get the reservation. Yes, it is because they are a regular, and there are notes in their reservation in the system that give them a better table and the better service. It is because they come and support. That’s what the restaurant needs. Anyways, we are already pretty deep into our episode. Let’s talk a little bit about this conversation around the disconnect that we’ve seen in terms of consumer preference for fuller-bodied red wines and the trade preference for lighter-bodied, high-acid wine. Zach, you were the one that initially brought this to my attention, so why don’t you kick us off, and then we can go from there?

Z: Sure. There’s always been a little bit of attention, or at least in the time that I’ve been in the restaurant and beverage alcohol industry, a tension between what the people who run wine programs and to some extent the people in the wine press are interested in, and what consumers want. It was a thing for me running wine programs that inevitably made my biggest selling category was Cabernet Sauvignon and Cabernet-based wines. No matter my own personal preferences, I would be derelict in my duty as a wine director to not put a lot of time and energy into a particular amount of space or category. Then, claiming to people who come in and say, “I like a big red wine, I like Cabernet Sauvignon.” “Well, actually you would prefer this other thing.” We’re trying to move the consumer too much. That is both an egocentric move on the part of most wine directors or restaurants, and frankly, I think, bad business. I think there’s something to be said about building a list that offers people opportunities to try new things, to diversify, but also gives lots of people safe landing spots and gives people wine they’re familiar with. In the end, the hospitality industry is exactly that, hospitality. Part of hospitality is telling someone the thing they love, you have. There are always going to be limits, you’re not going to be able to stock every wine. You’re going to have to make decisions, no matter the size of your program, about excluding some things. To build a wine program that does not meet the consumer most of the way is interested in something for reasons that I find off-putting and again, ego-driven, as opposed to being about serving the guests. To me, you see this a lot in the seemingly endless attempts to convince the wine-drinking public that they don’t want the wines they love, big, full-bodied red wines, the No. 1-selling category in America — that they actually want obscure European variety acts, high-acid, tart red fruit, pale red color. “Actually, this is the wine you want,” and it’s like, no, it’s not. Part of it is Americans have a culture of drinking wine without food. I’m not going to argue the pushback of “these big red wines don’t pair well with food,” to which I would say after, as mentioned, 15 years of experience., who the fuck cares? Your consumer mostly doesn’t care. They’re used to drinking big red wines, and they’re used to eating whatever they eat with it. Again, if the conception of your job, the role is so tied up in convincing this person who has these things they love that they will give you money for, that they are wrong and you will show them the light, I think you’re doing it for the wrong reason.

A: Yeah, I agree. I want to get into why you think it is because we definitely have theories, but look, my personal preference is high-on-acid reds, but that’s because I’ve drunk a lot of wine throughout my career and that’s what I’m into right now. I definitely have an appreciation for the full-bodied reds, and I understand why people like them. I don’t think anyone is wrong for liking them or less of an educated consumer. I do think it’s really interesting to assume that these wines have a problem. I think the biggest thing that has been eye-opening for me is, when I hear people say to me who are in the industry, “Napa is going to have a huge issue. The young people aren’t going to go to Napa. They’re just not going to drink Napa wines.” I would say, “Who are you talking to?” When I go to wine festivals in Atlanta and L.A., and I’m talking to consumers that come up to me, they tell me the region that’s on their bucket list to visit with their friends or significant other is Napa. Then, when I ask them what wines they drink, they say wines like Caymus. Some of them say Ashes & Diamonds, but the majority of them say these big Napa Cabs. I don’t know why we are as an industry saying that that’s bad. We don’t have to make everybody drink Beaujolais. I really enjoy Beaujolais, but not everyone has to drink Beaujolais. If they don’t like it, you don’t need to make them feel bad for it, and you don’t need to feel bad that you like it. Do you know what I mean? I believe everyone just needs to get over themselves in terms of no one is trying to offend somebody else by somebody not liking something. When the majority of the data points to one style of wine that people like, we don’t have to say, “Well, they must not know what they’re doing.”

Z: Yes, that’s the problem in my mind. The thing that I don’t like is when someone tells you, “Oh, I like your Cabernet Sauvignon from Napa Valley,” there is a fundamental issue and a reflex on the part of a lot of people in the wine industry to be like, “Well, let me explain to you why you’re wrong. You just haven’t tried the right alternative wines.” In some small percentage of cases, that might be true. There might be some people where wine is something they don’t think a lot about. They drink wine on occasion. They drink wine when they’re out to dinner with friends or family, maybe for special occasions. It’s not an everyday thing. You and I, and sommeliers and winemakers, we live and breathe this stuff. This is our everyday. Of course we’re well apprised of all the many options and we try lots of wines and that’s fine. For most people, wine is something they don’t have all that often. If they do, they may not think about it a lot. They might belong to a wine club because they had a great experience somewhere. They might buy wine at the grocery store. They’re beholden to this selection that’s put in front of them and they like those wines. It’s the height of arrogance to me to tell someone who says “I like this” to then actually say “No, you don’t, you’re wrong.” You can try and explain to someone in a setting, maybe if you’re graceful and gentle about it, why they might also like something else. That’s how I always try to frame it with people who were like, “Oh, here’s what we like.” If I didn’t have that or I had something else that I thought would be a better fit, I would say, “Wonderful, here’s something else you might like.” You shouldn’t say here’s why the thing you like is wrong. You’re going to suddenly change your purchase preferences based on some random asshole telling you otherwise or some article or TikTok video.

A: I’m saying that it’s just going to turn people off. We’ve used this analogy before. For those that remember this amazing movie, it reminds me of Jack Black’s character in “High Fidelity,” where it’s the music snob basically being like, “Wait, you like this mainstream band? You don’t like music.” No, you still like music. There are so many different genres of music and varieties of music. People who work in music all day don’t want to listen to pop all the time because there is a formula to pop. There are things about pop music that if you spend enough time working in music, you would say oh, wow, this is a derivative of this or this. Then, you want to listen to something different, even though when you go into the indie-rock spectrum, they all are copying each other in some way. But whatever. Let’s pretend that they’re original. I think you and I have gotten called out before for being anti-natural wine. I’m not anti-natural wine. I’m anti-the movement. I have a problem with the movement that’s telling people if they don’t like it, they don’t get it. That’s what I’m anti about. My issue here is, and I’ll give just a quick example: Someone on our staff posted an image of a pretty mainstream wine and how great it was for people who they knew drink that wine. That wine is available in a large number of retailers. They got a lot of hate comments back, and I got comments too. How dare you post that wine, no one should be drinking that wine. For the category, this is a great wine. If you’re unable to see that, that’s fine, but you need to get out of your own feelings. Because you’re inside your feelings right now, and that’s not what we’re here for. We’re here to tell the consumers who do like that wine, that this is great and they should feel good about liking that wine. We’re not here to make people feel bad for that. I’m not going to sit here and say that you should be drinking Chateau Diana from the CVS and comparing it to actual wine. By the way, that is a wine product. It’s a wine product, but if you like anything else, that’s good. As we talked about before, it gets people into wine. It’s just so infuriating.

Z: I think there are two other pieces to this. I think the rock or the indie music comparison is a great one. I think there’s a cynical motive to it in a lot of cases, where telling someone about why they should drink Napa Cab or big reds, you can’t make a name for yourself, right? You can’t create a business around it. Those wineries are already well represented. The wines are distributed by established companies. They have established relationships and reputations. If you’re someone who is an ambitious person in wine, it makes a lot more sense to become an advocate for an obscure European region or grape, or a style that’s not as in vogue, because you can make a name for yourself. I think whether they’re conscious of that or not, I think that’s what causes a lot of people to gravitate towards it. Again, you can be the face of a trend as opposed to the person who’s just selling the wine that people actually like. You and I taste a lot of wine professionally, it’s just our job, right? We do a lot of things. We get samples, we go to tastings. When you’re in that setting, I won’t deny that the fresher, higher-acid styles of red wine are often a little more enjoyable.

A: They stand out more.

Z: When you drink a lot of full-bodied red wine, especially one that might be a little higher in alcohol, pretty quickly you get fatigued. Again, who gives a shit unless you are a professional and no one cares about what your personal drinking habits are, really? If you’re a consumer, you’re someone who just likes to drink wine. You don’t give a shit if after tasting 30 of them, you can’t tell the difference, because no one is ever going to do that. They’re going to drink a single bottle at a time. Again, this inability of people, whether they are sommeliers, wine directors, retail operators, or writers in some cases, to get out of their own head and get out of their own world experience and think, “OK, is there anyone I’m communicating to? Is my guest going to view wine this way? Are my readers or listeners going to view wine this way?” For so many of them, I think the answer is of course not, because they’re drinking a bottle every third night. They’re not tasting 50 wines a day. It’s such a stupid and self-centered, shortsighted way of looking at this product that you work with that drives me crazy.

A: Yeah, it drives me bonkers. I think the other thing, too, and it’s going to take decades for if ever, the regions that you are pushing to be considered regions worthy of buying during a special occasion. If someone came to the Dahlia Lounge, and they were celebrating a momentous anniversary or a big promotion, were you going to be more easily able to sell them a Napa Cab? Or were you going to be able to somehow convince them that they should try red wine that’s from this region of France that’s maybe a little like Napa Cab, but is more your style of higher acid, more fruit, less oak. Probably not.

Z: One other point, presumably the Napa Cab is going to sell for a lot more than your obscure southwestern France Madiran. One, it’s just bad business. I think Napa is a great illustration of this in a way. Champagne is, also. For a lot of consumers, part of what they’re buying when they order a bottle of wine from Napa Valley is the sense of luxury and prestige that goes along with it. Again, if you’re not honest with yourself, at least about that as a buyer or as a sommelier, you’re just deluding yourself. It matters to people. The fact that they’ve heard of Napa Valley, they may have been there, they can spell it and pronounce it is always going to resonate with most consumers. Yes, there is a subset of consumers who get off on novelty and having the ability to say, “I tried something new today.” That’s great, and recognizing those people and meeting them where they are is also really important. Having all this, that’s just a Napa Cab is also bad. That’s not a good wine program, either. But one that takes the bulk of wine drinkers and treats them as idiot children who must be shown the error of their ways, they must be clued to the wine that they truly will love, because they can’t possibly love the well-established wine that you, the wine writer, are so sick of. It’s just ego at this point. Again, it is the self-centeredness that I find so appalling. It’s one thing if you’re a winemaker and you want to tell people about the wines that you make. If it’s a thing you make, fine. As a sommelier, as a writer, you are not in any way involved in the production of that product, and inflating your own ego around something that literally you did nothing to other than maybe take a corkscrew to. Again, it’s masturbation. I find that to be really unpleasant in a public setting.

A: Can I share one huge pet peeve with you? My biggest pet peeve is when you go to a wine shop or to a restaurant and they have a classic region on the list, and not a single bottle from that classic region is indicative of what made that region classic. That just pisses me off, because if I’m having dinner with someone who’s never had Northern Rhône Syrah from Saint-Joseph. If all you have is super-natty versions, I can’t do that. I want to show someone what makes that region so amazing for Syrah. It kills me, dude. When that does happen, it’s just so frustrating, because I get it, you want to have a few of those bottles because you want to be different. If you want to be a little quirky and you want to show that there is diversity in that region, awesome, I think you totally should have. But to not have one or two that is representative? That’s when it really, really bothers me.

Z: To come back almost to the point where we started, and this is something that I worked on because it changed my own mindset as I evolved and matured as a buyer. It’s also important to have some recognizable names. Whatever the category is, especially if it’s a good chunk of your list. If it’s Napa Cab, you should have some established producers on there as well. It’s good to have benchmark producers or classic producers that people are going to recognize. You want to have both, ideally. Certainly, if you’re only going to have a couple, they should be largely classic representations, because someone who looks at a list that has wine from all over the world and you have five red wines from Bordeaux, if four of them are unoaked, with short maceration times, then you’re doing a bad job. If you’re at a restaurant with an immense French list, and you want to have 40 Bordeaux offerings and some of them are for the people who like that kind of wine or want to try Bordeaux, great. Again, whatever you are, whether you’re a retail shop owner, a restauranteur, a wine director, writer, or a member of the press, putting your own ego and your own self ahead of the people you’re ostensibly serving or writing for is just bad. It’s not doing a good job.

A: Well, I think this comes to the moral of the story, which is that wine is the only industry that I’ve ever been a part of — and I haven’t been a part of a lot. Wine is the only community that doesn’t want to look at the f*cking data. It’s like data is bad. I don’t understand because the data would refute everything that people’s influencers in wine are saying. That’s not to say you still shouldn’t also tell people to drink the things that you’re interested in. But to push those like they’re the only options is crazy to me. There is a reason when you walk into most breweries in America right now, everyone has a fucking hazy IPA on their list, because the data shows this is what sells. There is a reason that the majority of pop music sounds the same right now, because when people look at the billboard charts, they are very aware of what the majority of the country wants to listen to. When people look in spirits, it’s the same. They are always looking at what’s trending up? What’s trending down? There’s a reason everyone’s moving into tequila. Why are all the celebrities moving in tequila? It is not because they all live in L.A. and they’re really interested in agave. It’s because when you look at the data, tequila is the fastest-rising spirit in America right now. It is very quickly catching bourbon, right? It’s very quickly catching whiskey. It’s catching vodka. That is why. With wines, we don’t want to look at that. People don’t care. Then they complain about the big companies who continue to grow. Why?  It’s because they look at data.

Z: I think that there’s a space — especially on the production side — for winemakers to say, “This is what I want to make.”

A: One hundred percent, you should.

Z: And I think that winemakers recognize it, in a fundamental way, because if you choose to make an unusual variety of wine in a different style, you know that you’re capping your market for it. That’s fine if you’re making a few hundred cases. But as a restaurant, a retail shop, even potentially a wine bar, if you have a very specific vibe, that’s  why people will seek you out, who want that kind of thing. Your guests are going to come with all levels of experience and preferences, but the one thing that most of them are going to have in common is that their favorite wine style is a red blend or Cabernet Sauvignon. If you can’t meet that need, you’re doing a bad job.

A: I agree. Again, I love the producers that do whatever they want. I like going to the small indie brewers who are making styles that aren’t just New England IPA. I also do appreciate a New England IPA. I’m a haze boy every once in a while, as Cat likes to tease me, and I like all kinds of wine. Since I’m in the industry and I’m looking for interesting stories and stuff, am I mostly gravitating towards those producers that are going against the grain in the region’s stuff? Of course I am. It’s just so stupid to put your head in the sand and try to pretend the large trends of the industry don’t exist or make those people who have those flavor preferences feel like they’re stupid or they don’t know what they’re doing and they’re wrong or behind the times. Because that’s just not cool. That doesn’t help anybody when it comes to drinking. That doesn’t help the overall industry of wine, and it doesn’t help your bottom line.

Z: All true.

A: Well, this was a great episode. I loved you sharing your thoughts about Dahlia Lounge. It was really powerful. Again, I want to reiterate to anyone who’s listening to the podcast, if you have worked somewhere that has gone out of business during Covid or is going to go out of business and would like to share your stories, please email us at podcast@vinepair.com. We’d love to hear them. This could possibly wind up in a larger article. It could wind up as a podcast episode. This has been more than a year that’s been very hard for everybody, and it’d be great to hear some peoples’ experiences.

Z: For sure, we would love to hear them.

A: Zach, talk to you next week.

Z: Sounds great.

Thanks so much for listening to the “VinePair Podcast.” If you love this show as much as we love making it, then please leave a rating or review on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, or wherever it is you get your podcasts. It really helps everyone else discover the show.

Now for the credits. VinePair is produced and recorded in New York City and in Seattle, Wash., by myself and Zach Geballe, who does all the editing and loves to get the credit. Also, I would love to give a special shout-out to my VinePair co-founder, Josh Malin, for helping make all this possible, and also to Keith Beavers, VinePair’s tasting director, who is additionally a producer on the show. I also want to, of course, thank every other member of the VinePair team who is instrumental in all of the ideas that go into making the show every week. Thanks so much for listening, and we’ll see you again.

The article VinePair Podcast: Wine Experts Are Ignoring Full-Bodied Reds — and Shouldn’t B‪e appeared first on VinePair.

Via https://vinepair.com/articles/full-bodied-reds-podcast/

source https://vinology1.weebly.com/blog/vinepair-podcast-wine-experts-are-ignoring-full-bodied-reds-and-shouldnt-be

[thatbluegibson]

CH 44

Dave reached across the bed for Liz, his eyes opening when he only felt the cold sheets beside him. He sat up and rubbed his eyes, checking the clock on her nightstand that read two in the morning. He threw his shirt on and went after her, finally finding her on the tile floor of the dining room, staring out at the moonlit waves.

“You ok?” he asked expecting her to jump, but she just shrugged.

“Just over thinking my entire existence,” she smiled up at him.

He sat next to her on the floor and she threw the other half of her blanket over him as he put his arm around her. They sat quietly for a long time, listening to the muffled waves before Liz sighed. There was so much that Liz wanted to say, so many things she wanted to ask him, to get his advice on, but she was just too exhausted to ask. She wanted her quiet life back, but she wouldn’t have any peace for such a long time. She knew that someday she would be a has-been, just a “remember her?” segment on some garbage online news site, but at the moment it seemed so far away.

“I swear I’m a well adjusted, normal person,” she finally said, “You just caught me on an off week, I guess.”

“You mean you’re not always running from ex-husbands and photographers?”

She laughed a little at that, turning her body to face him when her smile faded, “Am I always going to be running?”

Dave sighed, “That depends. You can run from it or you can embrace it.”

“I want to run. Every part of me says run.”

“But they’re always going to be faster than you, Liz. There’s always going to be someone pounding on your door, interrupting your life, someone begging for a piece of you and once you realize that you can’t physically get away, you’ll turn to something… else.”

She examined his profile in the dark as he stared out to sea. He was right, she could easily see herself falling down the slippery slope of escapism when the pressure, the LA bubble and the world became too much, “How do I embrace it?”

He took a deep breath and leaned back against the table leg, “When Nirvana got really big, we weren’t even in the states. We were on some European tour, playing these little venues and just getting phone calls from people back home telling us we were on MTV and shit, and we thought it was hilarious. We thought it was a big fucking joke… and then we came home and it was happening. Krist and I just continued thinking it was all funny, but Kurt just couldn’t. They wouldn’t let him.” He cracked his knuckles and thought for a moment, “I’ve seen so many people destroyed by what they thought was their escape, something they thought they were in control of and… well, you either embrace the fame and learn to live or you run from it and it catches you eventually. Either way, it gets you.“

“Something gets everyone in the end, though,” Liz was starting to think he was talking about something else entirely.

“Yeah, but fucking hell what a way to go.”

She felt her heart constrict a little and leaned into him, resting her head on his shoulder. She thought about her plan and timeline she had set in front of her just a few days ago. She would finish her commitments and then stop, just stop working for the film industry. She could walk away completely within a year and a half and luckily hadn’t signed any contracts or made any further commitments. She could just step aside and let the next girl take her place. Acting had been an accident, something she had fallen into when Kyle’s mom had gotten her a bit role in an indie just after Jack was born. She had loved that small supporting role and the ability to completely immerse herself into someone else’s life for awhile and forget her own. Kyle had been taking extended ‘business trips’ and she was struggling with depression, but somehow Jack was thriving. Very soon afterwards more studios began seeking her out and she became addicted to the separation of her own life and the script. She especially loved the historical period dramas where she could use her history degree in the construction of her characters, but also for the complete separation of time. It was easy to forget the real world when you’re riding around the countryside on horseback in amazing costumes. If she didn’t have that world to escape to, she didn’t know where else to go.

Dave turned away from the window and whispered into her hair, “Come back to bed.”

“Yeah, I’ll be right there,” she watched him stand and walk towards the stairs, thinking he might be a pretty good place to start.

*

A day later, Liz sat in her first class seat, nervously fidgeting as her phone powered down for take off.

“What if I just don’t go?” she asked.

“Well,” Dave leaned back into his seat, “There would be an awkward silence when they announce you’re the winner and then some random B-list celebrity would have to claim it for you.”

“Great! Then it’s settled,” Liz moved to stand, but Dave dragged her back down.

“Seat belts, please!” the flight attendant chirped as she headed up the aisle.

“I fucking hate flying,” Liz grumbled, her eyes followed the flight attendant as she settled back into her seat.

“I used to hate it, too,” Dave leaned across her and lifted the shade on the window next to Liz. “Look at the wings.”

Liz raised an eyebrow at him, but did as she was told. It was dark, the only flight they could get back to LA was a red eye, but the wings were illuminated from lights on the airport.

“The outboard and inboard flaps will lower and once the plane gets up to speed, the downdraft creates the lift that raises the plane.”

“And if we don’t get up to speed?” she looked over her shoulder at him.

“Then we’re fucked. But we have pretzels!” he dangled a tiny bag between his fingers and grinned at her.

“Thanks, Dave. That helps a bunch,” she laughed and sat back, already feeling much less tense.

“I spent a lot of time reading about the physics of flight when I started touring a lot,” he said quietly, double checking to ensure the seats around them were empty. “I was so used to touring in a van that flying everywhere just terrified me. It seemed like we were tempting fate, you know? It didn’t matter what the odds were because we were flying so much. Then my mom sent me a book and I read that fucking thing cover to cover on a flight from Seattle to Amsterdam. By the time we landed, I wasn’t scared anymore.” He paused for a moment, glancing over at Liz as she listened. “I didn’t even tell my mom that I was scared, she just sent it. I still don’t know how she knew.”

Liz smiled at that, “Moms always know,” she said quietly.

The plane began hurtling down the runway and Liz took a deep breath as she was pressed into the seat back. Dave took her hand and rubbed his thumb across her knuckles, listening to the plane make the necessary adjustments and speed to achieve flight.

*

“So he wakes up out of a dead sleep and yells “Oh my god!” into this completely silent and fucking booked airplane and every one turns around and looks at me like I’m the asshole!” Dave was explaining why he hated flying with Josh Homme while Liz was doubled over in her seat laughing so hard that tears streamed down her face. “He asked me to fly with him to Hawaii next month and I told him to go fuck himself. I’ll never fly commercial with that man ever again.”

“Did he even say what he was dreaming about?” Liz managed, trying to keep from laughing too loudly.

“I don’t fucking know. It was a goddamn nightmare,” he shuddered at the memory of hurrying off the plane while nearly two hundred people glared at him. He felt a hand on his shoulder and looked up at the flight attendant who had a worried look on her face.

“I’m so sorry to interrupt, but there’s a bit of an issue back in coach and since you’re the only ones up here, I wanted to ask before bringing anyone up.”

Dave glanced at Liz, who looked just as worried as the attendant now.

“What’s going on?”

“There’s a mother with a few kids and they’re having a tough-“

“Bring them up,” Liz said, waving her arm towards the front of the plane. 

The attendant visibly slumped in relief and hurried back to coach while Liz craned her neck to see where she went.

“I thought she was going to say someone was drunk. It’s fucking three in the morning,” she muttered, “that poor woman.”

A wailing sound drew nearer; increasing to stress inducing levels when a young woman with three little boys were ushered passed the dividing curtain.

Liz immediately stood and tapped Dave’s knee. “Move,” she demanded, her eyes on the youngest who was only about a year old and screaming wildly.

He did as he was told, moving into her window seat and watched her hurry up to the woman as the attendant sat them in a row a few back from theirs. The middle boy about three was so sleepy that he immediately threw his head into his mother’s lap and the oldest boy about five looked around, terrified. Liz spoke quietly to the mother before taking the baby from her arms and reaching for the five year old’s hand. She led the boy up the aisle and sat him next to Dave while continuing up the aisle with the screaming baby. Dave looked down at the little boy who was staring up at him, just moments away from bursting into tears as well.

“Hey, buddy,” Dave said quietly.

“Hi.”

“What’s your name?”

“Cooper.”

“Hey, Cooper. I’m Dave.” He shook his little hand and noticed he was wearing a Nirvana shirt. “I like your shirt.”

The little boy instantly went from terrified to excited. “They’re a band from the nineties,” he said, his eyes widening as if it were millennia ago.

“Oh yeah?” Dave chuckled a little, feeling his age. “Do you play any instruments yet?”

“Santa brought me a drum kit, but I’m not very good at it,” Cooper said, looking a little deflated.

Dave smiled at him and bent down, retrieving his bag from the floor and pulling out a set of drumsticks. He handed them to Cooper who looked at them in amazement.

“Are you a drummer?” he asked.

Dave glanced back down at Cooper’s shirt, “I was… way back in the nineties.”

Liz snorted a laugh as she walked passed them up the aisle.

“We can practice on the seat here,” Dave said, tapping the seat back in front of Cooper. “Hold the sticks like this…”

 *

The baby’s tears increased slightly as Liz tried bouncing him in her arms, but stopped just as quickly once she cradled the baby’s head against her own and began singing softly against his skin.

Blackbird singing in the dead of night, take these broken wings and learn to fly…

There was something magical about that song had worked on her when she was a baby and continued to work on her own children. She met eyes with Dave and smiled brightly, proud that she had conquered over the screams. As soon as the baby was sound asleep against her shoulder, she walked back to his mother.

“Try to sleep,” Liz whispered to her, receiving a grateful nod in return.

She headed back up the aisle and sat across from Dave as he taught Cooper how to hold the sticks.

 *

By the time the aisle lights flickered on signaling their descent into LA, Cooper had learned the American and Traditional grip, how to twirl the sticks and the first few basic rudiments.

“Here’s your sticks, Mr. Dave,” Cooper said, holding them out.

“Keep ‘em, buddy,” Dave smiled.

“You should make him sign them,” Liz crouched next to Cooper’s seat already having handed the sleeping baby back to his exhausted mother.

“Yeah, they’re already signed,” Dave muttered, a little embarrassed that he carried signed sticks with him when he travelled.

Liz took Cooper back to his mom and helped him with his seat belt while Dave listened to her quiet conversation with the mother.

“Thank you so much,” she gushed.

“It was really no problem,” Liz insisted, pulling Cooper’s belt tight.

“It’s my first time flying with all three of them alone. Usually their father is here to help, but he’s in the service. We’re on our way to see him during leave.”

“Marine?”

“Yes, Staff Sergeant now.”

Liz smiled at that, “Mine was at Twentynine Palms for a few years.” She caught Dave turn to her out of the corner of her eye when the seatbelt light came on.

“Good luck tomorrow,” she called as Liz turned away, “and thank you again!”

Liz just smiled, a little sad that she had been recognized and returned to Dave.

[creativitytoexplore]

Who To Call In Case Of Emergency by Marina Rubin https://ift.tt/35BZ5iG Tulip's mundane work environment is brightened by her adventurous, bubbly and promiscuous co-worker; by Marina Rubin.

You can learn a lot about other people's lives when you ask for their emergency contact number. A daunting task Tulip undertook with a mix of idealistic dedication and administrative weariness, when one of her colleagues, a senior underwriter, Didi Estefanos, fainted at work. Everyone ran around the office, scrambling to find a number for her next of kin as she lay on the floor unconscious, her feet in thick brown stockings protruding from the partition of her cubicle. As the crowd swayed above her, spewing water on her face and wailing Didi, Didi, someone found her profile on Facebook, tracked down her son and sent him an SOS message. By the time two masculine paramedics rolled in and strapped Didi onto a stretcher, someone was already on the phone with her frantic son, Nicholas, instructing him to meet his mother at Mount Sinai Hospital. "Would you look at that man?" Senna, the new girl from marketing, whispered into Tulip's ear, smiling at a tall paramedic with a sleeve tattoo. "It's true what they say - New York has the best looking men!" Senna had recently relocated from Florida so most of her sentences began with "It's true what they say" and were awe-inspired declarations about her new city. Tulip had seen the tall paramedic before. Twice. Once, when the Operations Manager collapsed with a stroke and, of course, the staff struggled to find his emergency contact number since the one on file in HR was from twenty years ago - his father who had long been gone; and the second time, when one of the salespeople had a seizure while closing a deal on the phone. "What kind of business is this?" the paramedic sneered, shoving consent papers into his EMS bag. "Everybody gets rolled out on a stretcher! What do you people do here?" "Healthcare insurance." Tulip shrugged, failing to see what he was implying. Then she watched Senna, in a surprising display of concern, chase Didi's stretcher down the hall and plunge into the elevator, like a puma, behind the handsome paramedic. Tulip returned to her desk and, as if on a mission, composed a fervent email to the entire department letting them know she was collecting emergency contact numbers, "so we can avoid another Didi situation". In the coming days, emails floated from every direction, from benefit clerks to C-level executives, offering up names and numbers of loved ones: "...My wife Susan... my husband Edward... my brother Boris... my mother Beverly..." hoping they would never be used, the urgent phone calls that would never have to be made. Tulip included her husband George, although he was impossible to reach, a criminal attorney who spent most of his day in court. Tulip's boss, McNally, a devout Catholic and a perpetually angry ex-alcoholic barked, "If I drop dead, I don't want you calling anybody. Let them throw me to the dogs!" As the spreadsheet expanded into several pages and circulated around the office like some kind of a death list, there was still no news of Didi. Some speculated she was in a hospital undergoing observation, while others joked she was already on the beach in Barbados, collecting disability. One morning Senna appeared in Tulip's cubicle and, pressing her body against the grey fabric panel, said enigmatically, "I know you are collecting emergency contact numbers, I'm going to give you my children's father's number." "Sure, that's fine," Tulip replied, not looking up from her computer. "Well, he's my ex-husband, actually," Senna clarified, hanging her face on the divider and staring at Tulip with oval eyes full of longing. "But we are not together; the children are with him though... well, they're in boarding school." An attractive woman in her late 30s with long bleached hair and large breasts, Senna told everyone she had always wanted to live in New York, it had been her life-long dream. She was renting a basement apartment in Brooklyn that she called a dungeon. "It has the allure of a dungeon," she once said at a staff meeting, with tenacity and pride. "I didn't know a dungeon could have allure!" McNally jeered behind her back. But Tulip liked Senna. There was a certain endearing quality to her, she was like one of those porcelain dolls, one minute beautiful in a box in a pastel ballerina skirt and the next ashen and warped, left outside in the rain with one eye broken and a dirty dress. "Actually let me think about it, maybe I will give you someone other than my ex-husband," Senna said broodingly and walked away, bumping into McNally. "What did she want?" McNally asked, dropping off a report on Tulip's desk. "She was giving me her emergency contact number." "Weirdo," McNally hissed and disappeared. Next day Senna told Tulip by the water cooler, "I'll give you my Daddy's number." "Great. Is your father here or in Florida?" "No, he's not my father," Senna laughed. "He's my Daddy... you know, like my master." "You have a master?" "I'm in an S&M relationship," Senna said, beaming. "It's true what they say - you can be and do anything you want in New York!" At home during dinner, Tulip told her husband George about the new girl Senna who apparently had a master. George nodded and yawned, "to each his own." That night in bed, he rolled on top of her and, nuzzling her ear, teased that he was now her master and she better obey him. On Friday, McNally announced that Didi Estefanos was not coming back to work any time soon, she was officially on long-term disability, and no, he didn't know what was wrong with her. The team filed out of the conference room with an intense sense of envy and resentment towards their sick, stay-at-home colleague. Senna came over to Tulip's desk and declared, "I'll give you a different emergency contact number. It's my neighbor..." "What happened to Daddy?" "We had a fight." "I'm sorry to hear that." "He's such an inconsiderate jerk!" Senna confessed, biting her nails. "He set up a date with this girl and forgot to tell me so I could schedule a date for myself too. Who does that?" Tulip shook her head. "I hear you. Men are the worst. My husband won't even put his plate in the dishwasher after he finishes eating." Then she leaned in closer. "So it's kind of like... an open relationship? Sorry, I don't know much about these things." "Open but very committed. We do play dates together and separate, with couples, and singles. It keeps our love fresh and exciting... It's just that he should have given me a heads-up so we could sync our calendars, you know what I mean?" "Right... right," Tulip nodded. "You think it's ok if I give you my neighbor's number?" Senna asked, still agonizing. "Senna, it's just a list! A formality. In case of emergency. If anything should happen to you in the office. Hopefully nothing will happen to you in the office and they won't have to carry you out on a stretcher. Your neighbor's number is just fine! Don't worry." "Of course. Nothing will happen." Senna smiled, holding up tightly crossed fingers. In time, Senna and Tulip became chatty confidantes. When they met in the elevator on Monday mornings, they inquired about each other's weekend. Senna was always eager to share her stories, no matter who was around to hear them - here she was making a guest star appearance at some elite orgy, or dressing up as a bumblebee in a simple threesome. Tulip's weekends lacked the same kind of luster and sensationalism, but still, she kept up conversation by recalling her two days of cooking, cleaning and driving her ten-year old daughter, Abby, to ballet classes and gymnastics. When the two women bumped into each other in the hall, they shared a giggling hi-five. When they met in the kitchen for a snack, they always took a minute to whisper what an insufferable prick their boss, McNally, was and couldn't someone just put him out of his misery. Eventually they discovered they both liked foreign films - naïve romantic comedies starring unattractive yet lovable French men with big noses. They also enjoyed the same kind of music - brooding guitar ballads by Joni Mitchell and Joan Baez. They started having lunch at a little Indian place down the street called Ms. Bombay, where they always ordered the same appetizer, aloo papri chat - chickpeas in tangy sauce - and shared chicken tikka masala, wrapping chunks of meat in Peshwari naan. "Can you believe this naan?" Senna gushed every time. "It has raisins and nuts! Only in New York!" Senna told Tulip about her life back in Sarasota, how she married her high school sweetheart and gave birth in succession to two boys, Chris and Kyle. How she came to be interested in the underground S&M scene; at first her husband joined her at parties at the swingers' club, and when it escalated to dark cellars, chains and fetishes, he opted out, said he was concerned for her safety, but by that time they had nothing in common, and he couldn't stop her. She was still a young, attractive woman and didn't want to live in a matrimonial tomb. So she moved to New York. She met Daddy on-line. "There are websites and user groups for this kind of thing," Senna explained to Tulip, who listened, wide-eyed, her cheeks pudgy from Indian bread infused with nuts. She even told her how she once had sex in suspension, "You haven't had sex until you've done it suspended in the air!" "Ok, stop, please!" Tulip yelled, covering her ears, "I don't think I want to hear any more."

"So you're now friends with the dominatrix?" Tulip's husband George snickered one night, brushing his teeth before bed. "I hope she doesn't recruit you into the world of bondage." "You don't need to worry about that," Tulip laughed. "It's the last thing I would want to try! She is sweet, you know, and amusing. I'm not even sure if what she says is true... But she has this touching enthusiasm for life, New York, sex, even naan! Plus, she is not a dominatrix, honey, she must be a submissive, right? She has a Daddy." George, gurgling mouthwash, muttered something along the lines of you know better, and went into the bedroom tugging at his pajama pants. "Did I tell you I had a date with the paramedic?" Senna broadcasted one day in the kitchen. There were other people around, stirring oatmeal, making coffee, slicing grapefruit. Senna did not care what anyone thought. Tulip often wondered if she did it on purpose, shocked people. "How was it?" Tulip whispered, signaling for Senna to keep it down. "We met for a drink, then went back to his place. It was very vanilla." "Vanilla," Tulip repeated, nervously looking around. That word, the flavor of ice cream she never ordered, came back to her on the train going home to Glen Rock... Vanilla... Was Tulip's life in suburban New Jersey vanilla? As in plain, dull, without flavor or spark? Her job, her marriage, her sex life? Not that she wanted to have sex in suspension, or wear leather in a room full of strangers, hell no, but the thought, as small as a sliver of an almond in a Peshwari naan, nestled between her teeth and would not budge. She was happily married, she loved her husband; when they met in college he was applying to law school and they were such a team, so committed to getting him through it that by the time he graduated and got a job at a prestigious law firm, yes the spark was gone and so was the passion, but this was their joint achievement, a real triumph, plus they already had a beautiful daughter, and Tulip was all gratitude, but that word - vanilla, that sliver of an almond... For their office summer outing the company organized a scavenger hunt. Everyone ran around the Meatpacking district, agonizing over trick questions and looking for clues in the bricks of the buildings and inside the elevators of the overpriced Chelsea Market. "Which structure used to be a church, a nightclub, a shopping mall and now a sports club?" Insurance adjusters and claim processors struggled to answer on a sweltering day in Manhattan. Senna was wearing a pair of tiny jean shorts and high heels as she leaped over cobblestones, solving demanding brainteasers, winking at construction workers and tossing excited exaltations about the history and beauty of the city. "Look at her," McNally grumbled as he trudged alone, behind all the teams, smoking a cigar and scratching his rotund stomach, "the only thing she's missing is a balloon cluster!" Senna's team won. Wearing medals around their necks that looked like chocolate wrapped in gold foil, they celebrated in a seedy bar in Union Square. Tulip had to leave early to attend Abby's ballet recital, so Senna stayed with the analysts from Logistics. Later on she was joined by a petite, dark-haired woman with a wedding ring and a briefcase. "This is my neighbor and lover Francesca," Senna introduced her to a few remaining, intoxicated co-workers. They reported that the two women were fondling each other at the bar until a glistening Mercedes came to pick them up and whisked them to an unknown destination. Next morning Senna told Tulip how sorry she was she missed Francesca, her neighbor and her lover, the one she was telling her about, the one who would be her emergency contact. "It's alright," Tulip insisted, "I don't need to meet your emergency contact." The following week, on Friday, Senna was all pins and needles, awaiting a FedEx delivery. "Have you seen the postman?" she asked every executive assistant, madly dashing towards the reception area to see if anything had arrived. She and Daddy were leaving for the long weekend at an exclusive S&M retreat in the Catskills and she had bought a lamp on Amazon to decorate their tent. "It's a beautiful white lotus lantern with twenty leaf string lights," she told Tulip, almost in tears, showing her photos on the Internet. "I was going to hang it around our tent like a garland, so it's festive and inviting, and more people will come to visit us." "Don't worry," Tulip comforted her. "It's still early, I'm sure it'll arrive." Oh, how Senna screamed when the FedEx man appeared on the floor. A week later, the building security office was conducting a fire drill and forced everyone to leave their desks and assemble in the hall by the elevators. As the fire warden droned on about what to do in case of an emergency, Tulip noticed how three women from Payroll with strangely similar hair bobs were whispering to each other and pointing in Senna's direction. "I need two volunteers to be Floor Searchers," the warden announced, looking at the gloomy faces in the crowded hallway. "One male and one female. The role of a Searcher is very important. In case of fire, you must search the restrooms, offices, conference rooms and instruct all the floor occupants to evacuate. Do I have any volunteers?" There was an ear-piercing silence and everyone looked at each other. "Alright, I'll do it," Greg, the HR Manager, like a white angel, descended onto the floor. "I guess I could be the female Searcher," Senna raised her hand. "Great! Please come up to me and give me your names. This concludes our fire drill, thank you," the warden said in a raspy voice, as everyone trailed back to the office. "Knowing her, she'll be checking the men's room first and we'll never see her again," McNally snorted under his breath, loud enough for the interns from Group Benefits to exchange glances and burst out laughing. The word about Senna was spreading around the firm, and Tulip felt bad for her friend. "You know, you don't have to tell everyone about your life," she said to Senna in one of the little nooks of the office. "No one needs to know about your lesbian affair with the neighbor, or the hot date with the paramedic, or Daddy and the orgies you attend every weekend. Really, it's no one's business. It's your private life!" "But my life is not a secret," Senna insisted. "I married young and lived like a nun for years until I realized I deserve better. I have nothing to hide. I'm proud. I'm finally living!" For her birthday, a pair of shiny thigh-high boots in black patent leather with laces up the back was delivered to the office. Senna hiked up her skirt and tried them on at her desk. "Daddy sent them!" she exclaimed excitedly. "He's taking me to the opera! We're seeing Aida at the Met!" "You're not wearing those to the opera, are you?" Tulip asked in a thin, shocked voice. "Oh no, of course not. These are for the party we are going to on Saturday." "What do you wear them with?" Tulip asked, feeling the pleather with her fingertips. "Anything you want, really, or nothing at all! You can always dress them up with a pair of long gloves, or a classic headband." "Well, have a great time at the opera!" Tulip wished her friend, just as she noticed, from the corner of her eye, McNally standing in the middle of the office, shaking his head back and forth and staring at the black sleek boots, as if they were the cadaver of an animal. A month later, completely by accident, Tulip met Daddy. On some idle Tuesday when Tulip's husband was working late and her daughter was at a sleep-away camp, Tulip and Senna were having a drink after work. A man in a grey suit and tie surprised Senna from behind by covering her eyes and commanding her to smell his fingers. Bald, stocky, in thick dark-rimmed glasses, the man whom Senna introduced as her Daddy, her master, her lover who fulfilled every one of her fantasies, literally looked like her father, a severe man with a humorless expression, someone the IRS would send to conduct an audit at an automotive company in Detroit. Senna and Daddy insisted on driving Tulip home. Tulip sat in the backseat, watching Senna weave her arms around Daddy like a willow tree, as he drove in silence with the tempo and precision of a German tankman. Tulip wondered why they were driving her to New Jersey, so completely out of their way. Did they know no one would be home, was this a ploy to get her into bed, did they want her for a threesome, was she being recruited into the world of bondage? They dropped her off in front of her house just as George was pulling down the curtains on the bay window. Tulip breathed a sigh of relief. Daddy stepped out of the car and gallantly opened the door for her. "Who was that?" George asked when Tulip walked in. "You are not going to believe it. That was Daddy!" "Daddy? You mean, your crazy co-worker's S&M master? He looked more like a Certified Public Accountant from KPMG... Do we have anything to eat?" Sometime in November, it suddenly became bone chilling and viciously windy. "It's true what they say - New York is a toothless witch of a winter," Senna announced. Having moved from Florida, she did not have any warm clothes, so she layered her summer shirts and wore the company sweatshirt advertising their new PPO plan on top. Tulip hated watching her shiver in the revolving doors of the building. Daddy should have bought the poor girl a coat, instead of those hideous knock-me-down-and-fuck-me boots, Tulip thought to herself, fuming. Instead of saying anything, she opened her closets. With care and dedication, she picked a few warm sweaters, a scarf, a hat, woolen socks, even mittens. Then she added a Burberry double-breasted cashmere coat she had snatched up on sale at Neiman Marcus. Something every lawyer's wife should own, she wore it once to a holiday party at George's law firm, now it adorned her closet like a mistletoe, something pretty but useless. She took it off the hanger and threw it in the bag. "You can have these for the winter," she handed the bag to Senna on Monday. "Oh my God, you shouldn't have. Thank you so much. That is so sweet," the Florida ex-pat jumped up and hugged her friend. Then she tried on the coat and even though she was taller and bigger in the bust than Tulip, the coat fit her perfectly. And then the morning arrived when Senna was circling Tulip's cubicle, fidgeting and fretting about something, until she finally came out with it and asked Tulip to be her emergency contact. There was something so heartrending and pitiful about the way she asked, smiling, standing by Tulip's desk, still wearing the coat, holding out banana bread she had made over the weekend in a plastic container like some kind of sacrilegious offering, that Tulip had to look away. "What happened to Daddy?" "I don't think he wants to be my Daddy anymore," Senna said, biting her chipped nails. "He found someone younger, and prettier." "I am sorry. What about your lesbian lover, that neighbor Francesca, or something?" "Her husband found out and threatened to divorce her if she didn't stop seeing me." Tulip sighed. "Look, Senna, I can't be your emergency contact, it's ridiculous. We work in the same office. It has to be someone from outside, you know, like a family member or a friend." "Why?" Senna objected. "Well, for starters..." Tulip tried to elaborate, until she realized she couldn't come up with anything reasonable, and that's when she folded, "You know what - okay, you got me!" "Really?" Senna lit up. "Great! Can you put it down in the spreadsheet?" At night, Tulip was having dinner with her husband and her daughter, a new crock-pot roast beef recipe she was trying with red-skinned potatoes, when her phone rang. It was Senna. "I'm just calling to activate my emergency contact number," she said, laughing like a gloriously happy child.

Sometime around Thanksgiving, rumors, like pocket-sized mice, were scurrying across the office and making squeaking noises in the walls. Employees congregated by the water cooler, in the hallways, in the kitchen, whispering, shaking heads, weighing in on the latest news. Didi Estefanos was not coming back to work, in fact, she had slapped the company with a massive lawsuit, claiming everything from emotional abuse to sexual harassment, ageism, racism, and all kinds of atrocities that had caused her to collapse in the office and get rolled out on a stretcher. What was wrong with her exactly, what particular ailment she was inflicted with, no one knew. Since all the tests came back negative, the doctors assumed it was stress. She hired a high-powered attorney who specialized in harassment in the workplace. The company executives from around the country flew into the New York office and spent long days in glass conference rooms, behind closed doors, talking into round speakerphones that lay in the middle of the table like UFO plates. They walked out, exasperated, wheezing, loosening their ties, pooh-poohing the process, and hurried along to lunches and dinners at the lavish New York restaurants they enjoyed on their expense accounts. Greg, a highly respected HR Manager and a proud gay man since the 80s, was seen standing outside the building, wiping his face with a paper towel. McNally was in and out of meetings, giving testimony, defending himself. "Sexual harassment my ass," he was heard screaming, "that old hag was a hundred years old!" Meanwhile, a Thanksgiving sale was in full swing at Bloomingdale's down the street. All the girls from the office were shopping in the intimates department. Tulip always joked how their check was directly deposited into the iconic department store. "I need your honest opinion." Senna came up to Tulip one day with a shopping bag. "I bought this corset for a party on Friday. But I'm not sure if it fits me right. Could you please take a look and tell me the truth, please!" "Sure." Tulip nodded. "Let me just finish this report." "Great, meet me in the bathroom in ten minutes." When Tulip walked into the bathroom, the small vestibule with a full-length mirror and a few armchairs, was empty. She proceeded into the lavatory, it was empty as well, except for the one stall at the end where Senna was fiddling with zippers, swooshing fabric. Someone had left the water running in the sink, Tulip turned off the faucet and waited. Finally, the stall door opened and Senna appeared, wearing just a corset and a pair of a high heels. "Oh wow!" Tulip squealed, veering her face to the side as if someone had just punched her. "Wow," she repeated, violently, "wow." "What do you think?" Senna asked, standing in the middle of the bathroom, anxious, alert, her breasts bulging from a see-through corset, her shaved pale vagina on display. "Looks great," Tulip said, her hand raised to her temple, partially blocking the view. "Does it make me look fat?" "No, it looks fine, not fat at all," Tulip stuttered, looking away, focusing on a crack in a tile. She did not expect to see her friend wearing nothing but high heels and a corset. She reasoned there was no real necessity to take off her pants or the skirt that she was wearing, let alone her underwear, to demonstrate a corset, especially one that went only to her belly button. And why the high heels? For the full dramatic effect, the big picture? "Do you think it's tight in the back?" Senna turned around, flexing her muscular buttocks. "No... Not tight at all." "You don't think it's too small in the breasts?" "No, it's great," Tulip repeated, making an effort to hide her embarrassment. "Are you sure? You're not just saying it?" "Definitely! You'll be a huge hit at the party on Saturday," Tulip assured her, as she hurried out the door, blaming an urgent report she forgot to do. She ran out of the bathroom and walked down the hall, shell-shocked, frazzled, smoothing wisps of hair on top of her head, grinning to herself, imagining her husband's face when she told him tonight what had just happened, how he would fall off his chair, laughing. "What's so funny?" Tulip bumped into McNally, who was always stalking the hallways and had an uncanny talent for appearing at the most opportune place at the most opportune time. "What is it?" he demanded, studying Tulip's face. "You look strange... Is everything alright?" "Yes, fine," Tulip, taken off guard, giggled in a surge of nervousness. "I was in the bathroom with Senna, she asked me to look at this corset she bought at Bloomingdale's, but... she was wearing nothing but a corset, you know..." Tulip laughed uncontrollably. "Oh, and high heels too," she added, slowly gaining composure and realizing her mistake. McNally stood quietly, his arms folded on his stomach, listening. That night, when Tulip told her husband about the encounter in the office bathroom, he did not fall off his chair laughing, as she expected. He turned surprisingly serious and asked her all kinds of questions, as if she was a witness on a stand, or a victim, or maybe even a co-conspirator. "And what did you do?" "Nothing, I ran out of the bathroom..." "Why did she do that?" "I don't know, she's probably an exhibitionist..." "What is the nature of your relationship?" "You can't be serious, honey... That's it. I am going to bed." A few days later, Tulip was in the office kitchen, draping almond butter onto a Granny Smith apple, when Greg, the HR Manager, approached her and invited her in for a chat. In a corner office crammed with ceramic bowls and teacups that Greg made in the pottery class his partner Rob bought him for his birthday, the tired HR Manager offered Tulip a chair and asked if she wanted anything to drink. She looked at the large pitcher of water sitting on the side of the table, a testament to the many people who came through this office in the last few days, and immediately said, "Greg, I don't know much about Didi, or whatever her claims are... She seemed like a nice lady, very erudite, but other than that I have nothing to add." "Tulip, I didn't ask you here to talk about Didi," Greg said in a serious tone. "Okay..." she looked at him, waiting. "I want you to know this is a safe place and everything you say here is confidential." "O-kay..." "Tell me what happened with Senna," he said compassionately. "We have zero tolerance for sexual harassment and abuse in this company, and you did the right thing by reporting her." "What?" Tulip jumped up. "What do you mean what happened with Senna? What do you mean, reported her?" "McNally came into HR and filed a complaint on your behalf. He said that your colleague, Senna Andrews, has created a sexually abusive environment for you... Tulip, if Senna has sexually abused you, or harassed you in any way, you need to tell me right now." "Sexually abused me?" "Look, we received a complaint... It went all the way to the CEO. Of course, the big wigs upstairs are worried about you suing the company, but I care about your well-being." "Suing the company? Is this some kind of a joke?" "There is nothing funny about sexually unwanted advances, especially in the workplace, especially now - with the MeToo situation, we take these matters very seriously." "This is not a MeToo situation!" she burst out, enraged. "No one harassed me! Not me! This is a NotMe situation!" "Okay," Greg looked at her keenly. "Then why did you report her?" "I didn't," she covered her face with her hands. "Well, you communicated the entire bathroom incident to your manager, Eric McNally. To tell you the truth, I was surprised. I thought you and Senna were friends." "We are friends," Tulip sighed, a tear rolling down her cheek. "Then I don't understand what happened. Why did you report her?" "I did not report her... McNally snuck up on me. That's what he does - he stalks the hallways like a creeper, and he just caught me off guard..." "I don't know if you realize it, but your accusations could get Senna fired." "No!" Tulip exclaimed. "It was a mistake, a misunderstanding. I don't want her fired. It was a mistake. Nothing happened. Greg, you have to help me. Don't let her get fired!" She rushed out of the office and took the elevator down to the lobby. She ran across the street, sat down on a fire hydrant in front of her building and dialed her husband George. He didn't pick up. It was late afternoon and he was usually in court at this time. She kept dialing his number frantically and it kept going into voicemail. She looked at the gnarled trees around her and it suddenly occurred to her that if this was an emergency, if she was sprawled out in the middle of the street unconscious, or taken out on a stretcher from the office, no one would be able to reach George, and she finally understood what Senna had been agonizing over all this time. Tulip looked up at their building. Senna was somewhere on the 24th floor, and so was McNally, and HR, and the big wigs; what was happening up there, she wondered, what were they doing to Senna now? At night when Tulip finally saw her husband and told him about her surprise meeting with HR, he put down his fork and somberly expressed his disappointment - she had played it all wrong, she should have consulted him first. "You can't be serious, George." "When your HR rep said they were worried about you suing the company, he was right. They should be worried, because this was an open and shut case. And if you had teamed up with this Didi woman and joined her lawsuit this would have been a winning case. But instead you chose to defend your little girlfriend." "I can't believe you're saying this nonsense," she hissed. "I would never accuse a friend of such wrongdoing and get her into trouble like this." "What are you defending?" George scoffed. "Your lusty little encounter in the fitting room?" "It wasn't lusty!" Tulip shrieked, slamming the door. "And it wasn't a fitting room, it was a bathroom!" she corrected him, slamming the door again. There were many slammed doors that night which ignited a bit of spark in Tulip's otherwise vanilla life.

When she came to work the next day, absolutely nothing out of the ordinary was happening. Every one of her colleagues was sitting at their desks, in their cubicles, in front of their computers, doing what they were paid to do. Greg was in his office with his door closed. McNally was on the phone with his back towards the exit. Tulip looked across the floor, studied the layout of the office, and for the first time noticed the precise division of the cubicles, the symmetrical way in which the partitions were mapped out, like prison cells, or a closed mouse maze. Senna did not get fired. Whether it was Greg's humanitarian efforts or McNally's endless maneuvering, she was transferred to another group, the only division that did not report to McNally. Was she ever called into HR, reprimanded, given a warning? Did she ever find out who reported her, Tulip often wondered with trepidation. But after the bathroom incident, she started avoiding Senna. When Senna asked if she was free for lunch at their favorite, Ms. Bombay, Tulip told her she brought lunch from home, or had an important client meeting, or was running to a spin class at the gym. When Senna invited her for drinks after work, Tulip lied again and blamed PTA meetings, ballet recitals, and date nights with the hubby. One day Senna came over to Tulip's desk and asked her if she would look at a necklace she bought downstairs. "You would tell me the truth if it was gaudy, right?" "Sure, let me see it." Tulip nodded with an old familiar smile. But when Senna told her to meet her in the bathroom, Tulip looked at her for a long time and finally said, "We don't really need to go to the bathroom to try on a necklace. You can just put it on right here in this cubicle." Senna went to get the necklace and never came back.