#I sent you one you already answered so you are free to use a snippet of any of your other wips btw

[lains-reality]

nondualism and "manifestation"

okay so there was an anon question abt manifesting. i'll answer with this post. i barely proof read this so tell me if theres an error. if you need more (you don't) then there are relevent links at the end.

anon: Ima here with a question :) Suppose I'm manifesting my desired clothes , so I just be aware/know that I already have them in my closet ? And Whenever I think that nope it's not true they aren't there …I JUST USE MY IMAGINATION, SEE A PICTURE OF THOSE CLOTHES AND AGAIN BECOME AWARE OF THE FACT THAT I HAVE THEM ? Basically when I found myself thinking about them I just shift my awareness to that I have them ! is this all I have to do ? And what if I feel euphoric 🤧 knowing that I already those clothes in my closet ? Is it oky ig it should be bc feeling has nothing to do with it !? RIGHT ?

I'll ask these questions first: do you want the desire or to be free? could you let go of trying to get happiness from this item and sit in the happiness you are?

you don't use your imagination. you ARE imagination. you're living in your imagination.

you don't have to identify with those thoughts telling you, you don't have the clothes

you've asked this question to another blogger, so you're spamming, searching for an answer? not gonna get you anywhere .. also have u even read my posts?

are you the person that sent this? nondualism IS NOT A METHOD

first of all, i want to you to remove every information, believing that it's real, your brain, spiraling, wavering, blockages, the universe giving you what you want, someone outside of you, the 3d, the 4d, behind the scenes, the 3d mirroring you, saturating your brain, etc ... [choroukgod]

there's no manifesting.

you are not the manifestor. you are not the doer. i mean it as the character, anon, doesn't do anything. Self does. Self can also be called awareness or consciousness. for Self, all exists. its like a comb, there's the handle and then all the teeth. Self is the handle, you anon, are one of the teeth. you are Self imagining being a human with desires.

i'll give you a snippet of a draft post i made:

"they wanted to be the doer. the character doesn't do. it's not You, it's just a habit. when you know you are Self, then everything is harmonious and effortless. the Self does, it is under all the imaginary character - if the character isn't real, then it doesn't do, the Self does."

since you are Self, this means you are beyond time and space, body and mind. they're not real. only the character/mind thinks its real, it'll chat forever about how you need to do this and that.

this is because the mind only knows what it knows. it cannot know anything more than what it knows right now. it's a collection of thoughts, feelings and memories that you've collected and turned into a habit. it's a habit to go back to the memories as a reference point. its a habit to identify with thoughts that come into your awareness. when you stop the habit and don't identify as the character, it goes away.

abt the body: well when you dream, you might still think. you feel the body and all, all the sensations. it feels real enough. then you wake up. you didn't take the physical body into the dream did you? you just felt the sensation of having one. doesn't this mean it's a bunch of sensations, just like a thought in the mind is?

also the mind can affect the body (e.g. nervous feeling -> sweaty palms). the thought or feeling rising into awareness, the mind takes note and ownership "i'm nervous, my hands are sweaty", affecting the body. if the unreal mind can affect something, then is that thing also not unreal?

(try to observe the thoughts or feelings next time without attaching a story to it or resisting it. see whether it goes away quicker. being able to accept the present moment is essential for this)

extra note - you as Self is also imagining the concepts of manifesting and shifting (and all the concepts related e.g. states, 3d, persisting etc).

thinking they the reason why you can get what you want IS FALSE. THOSE ARE YOUR OWN CREATIONS, ARE YOU GOING TO CREATE SOMETHING OUT OF YOUR OWN CREATIONS? [choroukgod]

What is there to be saved from except illusions? And what are all illusions except false ideas about myself? My holiness undoes them all by asserting the truth about me. - acim workbook

so, you know now the reality of who you are and not to identify with the imaginary, lets talk about the desire.

desires are born out of not knowing who you are. if you think you're the body-mind then several hundred concepts are needed to be taken into account to just live.

another snippet

"all these memories, feelings, thoughts and subsequent stories create desires and fears. the mind will try and protect itself and plan for stuff, but it can't. because it's so limited in knowledge & power."

the character wants the desire because of the story it has, the feeling. usually of happiness, love, joy. what you don't know is that that's your standard way of being. so you search everywhere.

the characters main motivation is to find the truth and happiness, underneath the searching is the belief 'i am not okay' or 'i am not enough', which leads to several needs & fears but importantly, need of control, especially of the future. it refuses to sit in the present moment.

desire is completely fine actually, its the attachments to it that make it hurtful. when you don't understand that desire is just another passing sensation, you, as the character, think you NEED it and will not stop until you get it, or you suffer.

you think that theres a world to control. you think that its outside of you. you think that there is a physical world. you're missing the most important info of all: all is Self. all is consciousness. all is awareness. whatever you wanna say. all is you, theres nothing to manipulate now. theres nothing to force now. its all unreal. you as Self, are imagining to be a human with desires that now has to change stuff that they think is real! how exhusting! you don't even need to change yourSelf, Self is perfect!

there's nothing to do.

Self is all. Self is whole. Self is perfect. Self is who you actually are.

there's no transition to Self. you already are that. it's letting go of all the concepts of limitations that is a transition. - i don't remember who said this, maybe lester levenson?

manifesting is not the point. the point is to be free! it's to recognise your true self! not just to feel better or okay .. to BE freedom, to BE peace, love etc. do you want to keep going into imagination to fufilll yourself all the time? you don't have to if you understand that you are fulfillment, you are whole already.

the "world" changing can't sway you because you are complete as you are, when you manifest with the intention to fulfil the desire so you 'physically' get it - you're only gonna feel full when you get the thing .. and then it goes. things cannot fulfil you. what would happen if the clothes get shredded by a dog? your happiness goes. why? why would you place your happiness on a thing that is FINITE?

being in the present moment is best. its literally the only way you live. you can't see into the past or future, there is only now.

The best place to grow is right where you are. The best time is now.

when you're worrying abt the future, you're thinking more. when you're worrying abt the past, more thoughts. in the present moment, you slow down and see what is in front of you now.

when you get caught up in the mind, you can stop yourself halfway (or even after it happens) and go "oh the mind was doing ...", then you start to pick up how much your mind wanders back or forwards. you start to pick up how limiting the thoughts are when you remind yourself that you are not the body or mind. with the understanding that the mind is imaginary -> no need to listen or identify with what's happening. it just is. feelings or emotions that come up into awareness cannot do anything. you are never disconnected from Self.

'oh i want to go [x] but i have to buy a plane ticket and get this and that...' -> if you are not the body-mind you don't have to worry about physically travelling anywhere, you are beyond time and space naturally. you don't have to prepare anything either, the mind wants to plan, but Self is harmonious and all, so whatever you 'need' will come to you. lester actually did this once.

"With full confidence that “everything is A-okay and taken care of,” I packed a bag and walked out of the house."

when you catch yourself in the moment: release and disidentify. you can just disidentify with it immediatly if you want to.

to release a belief or emotion (probs also desires) (sedona method):

welcome the feeling.  it doesn’t have to be strong. it is what it is. ask yourself: Could I let it go? Would I let it go? When? then, remembering that you are not the body-mind, answer. deep breath in and out, let relief come if you feel it. read the link for more.

when you ask yourself, “Could I let this feeling go?”,  remind yourself that you can let any emotion go, like dropping an object. when you ask yourself, “Would you let the feeling go?”, consider whether you would you rather hold on to pain, stress, and suffering, or, would you rather be free? when you ask yourself, “When?”, what you’re doing is creating an invitation to do it now

it can take some courage depending on the emotion, the character'll want to run away. but sit in the present moment and observe the feelings. ignoring and suppresing is not healthy. the focus is to keep releasing the feeling when it comes up. you can also coax the feelings up yourself.

to disidentify: well, just don't identify with it. just go "oh that's a thought". maybe remember your Self. maybe say 'on this path i constantly give up trouble' and move on. a simple knowing that that is not You, is enough.

surrender. i used to be scared of surrender bcs i thought it'd mean i have to let go of control and i'd get nothing! or just the same thing or worse! i was scared, i as the character was in full force. then some days past and i calm down (and lowkey give up), then i get some experience where it feels like i'm saying 'yes you ARE your true Self, its natural!!' to myself. something happens w/ 0 effort and i'm never suprised tbh (i used to be), it only grows my faith in mySelf. i promise you when you go 'f it idk whats gonna happen, it'll be fine' it'll be okay. but first you need to understand who you are. you trust your Self and just release the stories that tell you you aren't, that you are stuck, that you haven't got it, that you aren't fulfilled etc.

let me rephrase that bcs ppl saying "just believe!" used to piss me off: surrender it all. just stop. on this path you constantly give up trouble. you give up entertaining thoughts that make you feel bad. stop getting annoyed at yourself. stop beating yourself up. stop trying. just let yourself relax. if you want to do something, do it so you can feel better rather than to fix, manipulate, control etc.

all this arguing takes effort. it takes energy to not surrender. its hard to be something you are not. all the effort is being put into being an ego or to resist being it. you're squashing god into a small box and going 'why won't i fit?!' - lester levenson (modified)

Self is perfection, you are not surrendering to get worse, you are surrendering to perfection. Absolute Perfection. your mind only knows like 20 years (less or more!) of experience, in only one way of being. to your Self, there is all.

if theres anything to "do" its recognising stories of limitation and releasing/disidentifying as them.

(although surrendering is put last here. it is actually the first step. it might even be the only step)

self inquiry pointers (do not skip)

could i let go of wanting to get happiness from [insert item] and allow myself to rest as the happiness i am? can i turn [desire] into a desire for freedom? would i rather have the desire or would i rather be free? am i longing for the desire or to get out of pain? can i let go of wanting to change this and let it be as it is? could i let go of [belief]? would i rather believe in [the belief] or know the truth? would i rather believe in [the belief] or be the truth? am i arguing for my limitations?

more

letting go of ego | haven't read yet, but the skim looked good.

detachment | edwardart

what is the main difference between the now and old? | nisargadatta

go all the way, not just tolerate and endure | lester levenson

the true you | 4dbarbie

self surrender | edwardart

things come to die | heavenlythea (use of the word 3d, but still great post)

manifesting is struggling, life is effortless | 4dbarbie

how did i get something random? | 4dbarbie

attachments | 4dbarbie

some pics to read

after thoughts

i talk abt a method after my you don't need a method post lol, but that method is actually completely for the mind, says it upront and isn't just used for manifesting. in the end you'll stop using this too

could this be a guide to recognising your greatness? maybe?

let go of the insane amounts of responsibility, pressure, and personal attachment you've put on yourself.

[jaegeraether]

Sunsets and footballers (Part 20)

Lucy Bronze x Reader (20)

Masterlist (other parts here)

YFN had just received an email from the company she now worked for, Lumos. She tried to research the company and the first thing that popped up was a popular charity, followed by several other companies sharing the same name. Eventually she found her company which had nothing beyond a basic internet site and new social media accounts, so she knew they were being honest when they said they were brand new and starting up.

The salary they’d offered her was already high, with the promise of increase based on performance, both hers and Lumos’. The amount of money they were putting into the business and expenses were also much higher than she expected. Someone really wanted this to work.

She looked over at Lucy who was making her own sandcastles and smiled. Once the email had come through, Lucy had insisted she read it and took her time to mull it over. YFN loved that she was doing anything she could to let her make a future in the country, and especially around her profession. That was her Lucy. Always three steps ahead.

She took her phone out to film a little snippet of her as she made her giant sandcastle. She couldn’t help the smile on her face looking at how happy she was. Lucy’s big kid was shining through. She looked up and saw YFN filming her and grinned, gesturing to her sandcastle as if to show it off. YFN ended the video and put it away, looking at Lucy sitting in the sand, a leg either side of her creation. She was wearing black shorts, her whole body tanned from Spain, abs shining with the sunscreen YFN put on her, regardless of the clouds. Her heart felt full just watching her.

“Admiring the view?” Lucy grinned.

YFN felt her face reddening, though she didn’t know why. She wasn’t ashamed to look. She nodded, pressing her lips together to hide a cheeky smile.

“Can you send me that video, little one?”

“Yes ma’am.”

She sent the video and went back to the email on her laptop. The email was promising, and she found herself excited at everything she read.

Her phone rang and she looked at the number, Lumos. She answered it, putting it on speaker, knowing Lucy would be interested.

“YFN speaking.”

“Hi YFN, it’s Joe, how are you?” She sounded lovely, like a mum.

“Hi Joe, lovely to hear from you again. I’m great, just at the beach soaking in all of the sunshine the UK has to offer.”

She laughed. “I dare say it’s nothing compared to what you’re used to in Australia. I hope I haven’t caught you at a bad time.”

“No, not at all. I was expecting this today, I’m free to chat.” She smiled at Lucy who gave her a supportive thumbs up.

“Excellent. Okay, well I thought we’d just go through the basics of what we’re hoping to accomplish as a company, our goals and along those lines. If you have the email open, we’ll just run through it together. Also, how’s the work Visa coming along?”

“Perfect, I have it open now. I’ve also spoken to my Visa agent and he’s confident they’ll have it approved by tonight. They’re happy with the contract and 6-month minimum guarantee that you’ve sent through.”

“Outstanding, that’s what we want to hear! Just send that through as soon as you receive it, or if you need any other information. Fingers crossed! Okay, let’s get started. So firstly, as you know, I’ve wanted to start this company for quite a period of time. I have a lot of friends and acquaintances in and around the industry, and we’re not seeing the movement in female football that we’ve wanted, so Lumos is a plan to change that. Now, the World Cup has been brilliant for progress, and we plan to latch onto that and keep the momentum building. Over the past year and especially the past few months, I and my friends in the industry have put our feelers out, gotten some feedback and have established interest by a lot of the players. Now, I understand it will start slow, but we’re willing to put the work in and definitely also put the funding into it.”

Lucy looked impressed, nodding as she was talking.

“That sounds fantastic, Joe..”

“I’m glad you agree! To be quite honest with you, YFN, you’ve been the lynchpin I’ve been looking for. I’ve been looking for someone with your experience and after reading your columns and seeing the interviews you’ve conducted, I’m beyond impressed. The research you put into your work, and the way you speak and ask questions to your interviewee’s are smart, and incredibly respectful. I can see that’s important to you, and it’s very important to me. We shouldn’t be asking the same boring questions, or we’ll get the same media trained answers.”

“Oh I completely agree. I was a bit worried at first that this job would encourage me to ask those simple and sometimes far too personal questions, so I’m really happy to hear you say that because people don’t realise that we can go beyond the norm of interviewing, and still remain just like that. Respectful. Not only that, but players will be more willing to open up, accept interviews, and request us if they’re comfortable around us. They’ll also want to use us to get their messages across and I know that if we do this right, the momentum will build and more players will be using us to fulfil their media duties.”

“Outstanding, that’s exactly what I wanted to hear! We’re so, so lucky that you happened to meet Katie so she could recommend you to us. We’ve been looking for you for quite a while.”

YFN was a little embarrassed, she didn’t know how to accept compliments and blushed. Lucy reached over and squeezed her leg in support. “Thanks Joe, that’s lovely to hear. I hope I can live up to your expectations, and I’m excited to get started! It’s a blank slate which means so much opportunity for the company.”

“100% agree. Any chance you’ve found our website and social media accounts?”

“I did just before you called..”

Joe laughed again. “Of course, you have. Straight into work! Excellent. We’re going to get along so well, I already know it. Our IT guy is Noel, and his contact details are in the email. Right now I’ve asked him to make the accounts all bare minimum, as I imagine you’ll want to create a theme to follow..”

“Yes! Absolutely, so I plan on organising a meeting with the whole team for Monday, I just wanted to make sure you were happy with that first..”

“Yes, please! And just for the future, this is your team, your baby. Anything involving the creation of this, meetings, team logistics, etc, all of that is yours. Obviously I’ll still like to be kept up to date with the progress and the plans, but to be completely fair with you, YFN, I run several businesses so I’m quite busy. This company is still in its start-up stages, so I’ll have much more time for it, and I do have a soft spot, this is always going to be one of my priorities, however I just wanted to make sure we’re on the same page with this.”

“That’s perfect, I’ll send you through weekly updates and expenses, planning, coverage and everything we change or create along the way. I appreciate the honesty and the communication also, I think until we establish that solid footing, you and I will have to be in a lot of contact to ensure we’re achieving the expected goals, and keeping everything in budget.”

“You don’t know how much this is music to my ears.”

YFN laughed, feeling positive and happy with the plan thus-far. Joe seemed perfect, offering her everything and having the blind faith in her to start up the business almost from the ground, up. “I think we’re starting at a good time, though. We’re catching the start of the seasons, so it gives us time to iron out any issues before the finals for both the WSL and the Conti Cup. A good timeline will be for us to have full coverage by Round 5 on the Conti Cup, and January for WSL, covering both through to the Final. Then we should be fully prepped and running smoothly for the UEFA Women’s Champions League.”

“That’s a very respectable timeline and exactly my thoughts. January will be perfect if we can have full coverage by then.”

“I think it’s achievable, I’ll have a better idea after I research a bit more and talk to the team. I’m sure everyone’s keen to get started! Also, it’ll be quite a heavy work period as we start up, and then when we finally start to get footing, we’ll be expanding to make sure we have the people to cover all games and the email also says you’re hoping for international team and coverage of the other leagues in Europe?”

“Yes,” Joe sounded a litte sheepish. “I know, I know, it’s quite a high expectation, but we’ll get there eventually. Let’s start with the WSL and Continental Cup. Definitely want to be all over the UEFA Women’s Champions League, that’s the first major goal. From there, you and I can talk about expanding to cover Tier 2. Then, depending on the timeline, we want to cover Tier 3 and Tier 4 so we can encourage grassroots and young girls upcoming through the leagues. Then we want Liga F, Serie A, Feminine, etc, also following the national teams, NWSL in the US, A-Leagues in Australia and onwards.”

“Very large goals! That’s great, a lot to look forward to and to aim for. We’ll make sure to split the goals up to feel more achievable for the team, but I think if they know the long-term goal, it’ll make everyone determined and ready to settle down into the job.”

“That’s exactly what we want. The team building and team trust in each other is vital to make this business a success. Anything you need, let me know and we’ll work through it together, that includes extra positions or professionals. I imagine a recruiter may become useful if you become inundated with the logistics.”

YFN nodded, even though she couldn’t see her. She was taking notes eagerly, excited by the conversation as she responded, a little distracted as she typed. “I’ll definitely let you know if we need anything to help us expand..”

“I heard you’re meeting some of the players, also?”

YFN stopped typing and tilted her head. Lucy groaned. She looked over at Lucy who had a frown on her face, gesturing to the phone. “Um… Joe I have Lucy close by who wants to say something I think?”

Joe was aware that YFN was dating Lucy. YFN had made sure she’d told Joe, fearing a conflict of interest, especially with the need to visit Spain. Joe had had the opposite reaction. She thought it was great that YFN was so involved in the industry, knowing that dating Lucy made her closer with the inner circle of football than just being part of a media group. As for Spain, she’d encouraged her to go, offering to pay for flights and knowing that the more she was involved with Barcelona, the easier it would be to expand into Liga F and onwards. She was particularly interested in Alexia Putellas and Aitana Bonmati as they had so much influence in the sport. Joe’s ambition was multi-faceted, but positive on all fronts. She wanted to encourage the young female footballers of tomorrow, give women strong rolemodels to idolise, and to bring much needed attention to all of women’s football in general, all around the world. Popular footballers like Lucy, Alexia, Aitana, could help expedite their growth and influence.

“Of course! I assumed she was there with you and then Lucy’s post confirmed it.” She laughed.

Lucy’s post? She looked at a now cheeky looking Lucy as she passed her the phone and stole Lucy’s to check on said “post”. She’d posted the video of her building sandcastles on the beach and grinning at the camera, but more importantly, she’d posted a selfie Lucy had taken of the two of them, YFN sat in-between her legs and being pulled back by Lucy who was kissing her cheek as she smiled. Her mouth dropped open. Hard launch. She looked at the caption.

“Happy place with my happy little Australian” *red heart*

She’d tagged her and YFN looked at the phone in Lucy’s hand, unsure how it hadn’t blown up from all of the notifications it must have had. Lucy winked at her as she moved next to her, resting her hand on her thigh and stroking her thumb there.

“Hey Joe, it’s Lucy.. funny you should mention that, I actually hadn’t told YFN that just yet..”

“Hi Lucy… oh, I’m sorry! I’d heard a few little whispers from a few friends..”

Lucy laughed. “That’s okay, she had to find out eventually.” She looked at YFN who looked curiously at her gorgeously tanned athlete. She couldn’t help reaching out and playing with a few strands of Lucy’s hair that were wildly playing in the wind. “I might as well tell you both.. YFN said a while ago that one of the first things she’d want to do is to have a get-together with a few players to ask them what they want, their likes and dislikes and to start building those relationships.” YFN’s fingers stroked down the side of Lucy’s face from around her temple, down to her jaw as she watched her speak. Lucy leant into her as she did. “So a few of the girls and I made a few phone calls to get some players together for dinner tonight.”

YFN’s fingers paused on her jaw, her eyes softening and heart filling. How did she get so lucky?

“That’s fantastic! A very strong start to everything! Relationship building is the most important thing for us, we want to build and maintain those special relationships with all of the players, so this dinner tonight is going to be the perfect start for that. I speak for our whole company when I say a big thank you to you, Lucy. This is just… beyond the start I was expecting.”

“You’re welcome, and to be fair, I know a lot of the players are excited for this. As you said, word has been spreading for a while now and heating up in the last few months so we’re all excited to see this come to life. The girls I’ve spoken to have been so under represented and misrepresented for so long that they’re excited for this to happen. YFN’s going to have a lot of work, but I know she’s going be the most amazing asset for you and create magic, like she does with everything else.”

YFN’s hand dropped and she looked at Lucy with an embarrassed but thankful expression. Lucy touched that little dimple, her eyes unable to leave it. She handed the phone back to YFN who was almost crying. So much work. She wondered how busy she would be in 13 days when she needed to head to Spain. Joe was aware of it, of course, and immediately approved, reminding her that she didn’t need her permission.

They spoke for a little while longer, talking about the email and the team members they had. The call ended and YFN folded up her little note taking book, pulling the band over it. Lucy’s mouth on hers was surprising, but not unwelcome. She kissed back eagerly, tilting her head and their tongues meeting. It grew a little bit more desperate as their hands tangled in each other’s hair, and Lucy pulled her on top, straddling her in a sitting position. YFN groaned into her mouth at the feel of Lucy’s body against hers. Then her phone rang again.

She jumped, assuming it was Joe calling back and looked at the phone.

“Nan calling. Baby bro calling.”

“Oh shit, Joe really distracted me.” She answered the phone on loudspeaker, sliding off of Lucy, noticing her confused expression. “Hi Nan, hey bro.”

Lucy understood and settled herself behind YFN, legs either side of her and pulled her back to lean on her body. She pulled a blanket around them.

“Hello!”

“Hey sis.”

They changed to Facetime and it was impossible for them to not see Lucy. YFN’s nan adjusted her glasses to better see and her brother looked surprised and unbelieving.

“Oh shit, you weren’t joking.” He choked.

Lucy laughed. “Hi! It’s nice to finally meet you both. I’ve heard so much about you two.”

“Oh, YFN, she’s stunning.” Her nan said, making her choke out a little of the water she was sipping. Lucy and her brother laughed as she coughed the water out of her lungs.

“It’s not just about looks, nan!”

“No, but it certainly helps, doesn’t it?” She laughed.

YFN could feel Lucy’s whole body vibrating as she laughed behind her. She rolled her eyes knowing that Lucy loved compliments.

“Oh and I saw the photos online, very nice!”

Her nan was far past retired, she was a pensioner who spent most of her time playing games on the iPad YFN had bought her, and looking through Instagram and Facebook she’d installed on there for her. She had no idea how to use them and only had a few friends and followers, but that’s all she needed. After that, Lucy took out her phone and followed them both, making sure it was okay first and warning them about random follows that would ultimately pop up.

They spoke for a while, Lucy immediately loved by both, of course. Everybody loved Lucy. Lucy and her brother clicked surprisingly well, perhaps even better than YFN did with him, though she suspected a part of it was his idolisation of athletes and Lucy was nothing if not an athlete. She felt Lucy’s abs against her back, her strong biceps cradled around her own arms and she held her and laughed with her family like this wasn’t the first time they’d all spoken. God, that woman.

By the end of the phone call, Lucy had already managed to convince them both to come over and watch a game, offering to pay for their flights and accommodation. YFN made a mental note to argue with her about that later, or pay before Lucy could. Somehow she’d even convinced her nan who had always said she was too old for flying, Lucy managing to sweet talk her about first class and how much room and food you got. She was excited at the prospect of seeing them both. She’d seen her nan only a few weeks before, but the distance was cruel. Also, she hadn’t seen her brother in 8 months as he was living in Japan, exploring and doing god knows what.

They ended the phone call after a good period, both agreeing to come and watch England play at some point in the near future. She was excited at the thought of seeing her family soon and wriggled back into Lucy to show her happiness.

When the call disappeared from the screen, she saw the notifications and groaned nervously. She opened the post.

*Lucy Bronze MBE tagged you in a post*

*Caitlin Foord liked a post you’re tagged in.*

*Caitlin Foord commented on a post you’re tagged in.*

*Jordan Nobbs liked a post you’re tagged in.*

*Jordan Nobbs commented on a post you’re tagged in.*

*Alexia Putellas liked a post you’re tagged in.*

*Ruesha Littlejohn liked a post you’re tagged in.*

*Millie Bright liked a post you’re tagged in.*

*Ridley liked a post you’re tagged in.*

*Ridley commented on a post you’re tagged in.*

*Leah Williamson liked a post you’re tagged in.*

*Mariona Caldentey liked a post you’re tagged in.*

*Katie McCabe liked a post you’re tagged in.*

*Katie McCabe commented on a post you’re tagged in.*

She didn’t finish reading the notifications before she cleared them and put her phone away. She’d look later. Right now, she was with Lucy, and she was more than aware that she only had her for one more day. Lucy hummed her approval and kissed her temple.

“Busy third date, hm?”

“Cute lunch, majestic sandcastle, exciting work call, successful first meeting with my family… I’d call that a brilliant third date.”

Lucy nodded against her. “It’s getting late, little one. We need to go; I want us to get unpacked and showered before we go out for dinner.”

“Okay…”

“What’s on your mind? I can hear you thinking.” Lucy nuzzled behind her ear.

“I was just thinking about how I need to say goodbye to you in a day..”

“Don’t think about that.” She whispered. “Let’s enjoy it.”

“I am. My heart is starting to feel sad already though..” She turned slightly to look at Lucy. “Also, just out of curiosity, are we going to not have sex tonight, or just be quiet so Jordan doesn’t hear us?”

Lucy’s head fell back as she laughed. It was one of YFN’s favourite sounds. “Oh, we’re having sex tonight. As for the noise… I’m going to make sure you’re thinking about it for the next 13 days so… good luck staying quiet.”

[deeptrashwitch]

Another snippet :D let's go!

"I thought you'd go to Arlington today" Edward said, going outside of the base with a little smile

"And drive almost a day? Maybe on friday I will" Alicia answered with a chuckle, then sighing and smiling slightly "...this bring me memories"

"Yeah, after Sand Palace, remember?"

"I do, you were like a little piece of stone!"

"Little? Are you blind or something?"

"Look who's talking! You called me kid!" she basically screeched "I'm older than you, brat!"

Edward laughed hearing his friend, smiling widely, then he looked how Alicia was playing with her keys. He raised an eyebrow in a silent question, just for her to shrug and laugh, a sound he missed for a long time.

"What do you say? Wanna go and have some fun like the old times?" she asked with a big smile

"...If you end up throwing me off the car, I'll kill you" he said, going towards the Impala with a chuckle

They went to Austin, remembering the time when they hang out together after the missions, joking and talking like nothing was wrong. And now, years later, they were doing it once again even if they changed a lot. Once they were there, the first place where they went was a place to eat, challenging each other to see who could eat more (of course Alicia lost).

"You damned barrel!" Alicia exclaimed with a laugh

"Hey, mama gave me a good appetite as a kid"

"Of course Ms. Jackson did, it's her"

Once they paid, Alicia dragged Edward to the theatre to see a recent release, to which he went...but he bought food for him while she was excited. They both ended enjoying the play, talking with joy as they were walking away, even discussing which part was the best. And soon they looked towards the park, finding a little group playing soccer, or well, arguing to do it.

"If you ask them, I'll play" Alicia said with a side smile

"Why me?"

"Because I asked for the tickets!"

"That doesn't count!"

"Don't fucking start! Do it already, it's an order"

"That's abuse of power" he joked, hearing an indignated gasp from her

However, Edward went to ask with the group, that accepted that they joined them. Like that the match started, filled with laughs and joyous screams, mostly from the young ones. For the two soldiers it was like going back to the time they were sent to England, when they passed part of their free time playing like that with the SAS, the 101st and the 267.

"C'mon Eddie! That's all you have, boy?!" Alicia asked with a smile while she stole the ball from Edward

"Oh! Come here, you little-!" he answered, running behind her between laughs

They chased each other while the other kids were helping them, also laughing, infected by the joy they showed. Soon the match ended, and they sat against a tree, catching their breath with big happy smiles. And in a second they remembered that first mission together, when they sat in front of the bonfire in silence, just drinking a cup of coffee after a long day.

"For so many years I missed this" Edward said with a smile "just us having fun"

"You speak like you were dying..." Alicia muttered with a scoff "I mean, I know we're soldiers but this is exaggerated"

"I speak like I almost lost you, because I almost did. When we met again, I was scared I would've lost my best friend because I didn't know what happened to you and I couldn't reach you" he admitted without looking at her "you know...I'm glad that isn't the case. You still you, despite everything, it still you-"

"...Yeah, I'm still me" she whispered with a touched smile

"The annoying and stubborn kid that was determined to talk with me"

"¡Jueputa! ¡Que soy mayor que tú! ¡Respétame ole!"

Edward laughed loudly without understand what she said while Alicia smacked him, absolutely irritated, and soon stood up and ran away. She followed him, scolding him...with a big and sincere smile, but scolding him anyway. It was good to have that kind of days.

[lotus0kid]

I've seen many posts about people missing how common asks used to be so I have been trying to send about an ask a week. Now I send this ask first anytime I follow someone as I really don't want to bother anyone, so I'd love to know if you enjoy receiving asks and if so what kind of asks. Not having energy for asks or being comfortable with them is perfectly okay.

The categories I have in my ask notebook that I file under are in colour. Please feel free to make your response as long as you want or private (the asker cannot directly respond to private responses).

Self, Job/Work: please let me know what you are comfortable with from eh idk just ask it to nothing personal at all.

Baggishield/Tolkien, Dragon Age, Johnlock/Sherlock, ineffable spouses, other fandom: Please let me know what fandoms. I think my main fandoms and ships are Bagginshield/The Hobbit, Sherlock/Johnlock, Dragon Age Inquisition, {Pippin/Faramir Merry/Eowyn}/The Lord of the Rings and I dip my toes in a few that I currently can't remember but ships I don't engage with the canon of at all are: Good Omens but only for Crowley/Azirapheal, Stranger Things but only for Steve/Eddie , The Witcher but only for Geralt/Jaskier.

OC's, art/drawing, their writing, blog specific only

Story snippets ideas and prompts: Do you like receiving them?

Pets: I'd love to know all about them

Garden and Hobbies: What type of gardening and/or hobbies?

Like being tagged in things: If so what kinds of things?

*Asks are sent for fun, no pressure to answer.

Hello! Hm, well, let's see...

Self, Job/Work: I don't post anything identifiable, but I don't mind discussing relatable/weird bits of my life as long as it's not too specific.

Fandoms: Bagginshield, for sure. I'm starting to think I should just go ahead and read LOTR, but I haven't yet. I suggest you do engage with the canons for Good Omens and Stranger Things, because they're pretty good canons (despite current revelations regarding the co-creator and showrunner of the former).

OC's (I don't have OCs- well, none that didn't just serve their purpose in whatever fic I need them for), art/drawing (I've done some of that- tagged "lotus0kid art" if you're interested, there might be new stuff coming since I leaped bodily on that steep Clip Studio sale a bit ago), their writing (sure, I can probably yammer all day about writing, my own or the concept), blog specific only (I'm not sure what this means)

Story snippets ideas and prompts: Argh... uh... I'm going to have to say no, I really don't need any more distractions from the ideas I already have. Though, I dunno, maybe one-word prompts where I can write a drabble response, just to get the wheels moving? That could be nice.

Pets: Ain't got 'em. -_-. Unless you count the spiders in my windowsill.

Garden and Hobbies: My current icon is a picture of my itty bitty succulent that budded off a bigger succulent a while ago. Another bud is coming off that bigger succulent- I'm waiting for the stem to be long enough to cut so I can plant it on its own. That's all the gardening I do currently. And fanfiction is basically my main hobby, aside from occasional art stuff (*eyes stalled embroidery project guiltily*). Maybe cooking too, I think certain aspects transcend the "chore" category, like the opposite of the way my art pursuits can feel a bit chore-ish.

[mareenavee]

Snippets Someday

Howdy again :> I was tagged by @dirty-bosmer to share more snippets. I'm also mid ground-up edit and even during the course of this, I can see the level ups so I'm happy to share. Picking a favorite chapter is HARD though, I must say. While I'm in it, it's hard to see what makes a chapter a favorite, but during the editing process, sometimes certain turns of phrase really make me proud of my past self and my last three braincells :> I think this should be normalized. Our writing is good and worthy and we are all doing our best.

Tagging the most esteemed: @paraparadigm, @changelingsandothernonsense, @thana-topsy, @polypolymorph, @thequeenofthewinter, @snippetsrus, @rhiannon1199, @oblivions-dawn, @airiat, @the-storytellers-seer, @archangelsunited, @inquisition-dragonborn, @saltymaplesyrup, @friend-of-giants, @gilgamish, @tallmatcha, @miraakulous-cloud-district, @kookaburra1701, @rainpebble3 and HONESTLY anyone else who wants to play this game! Tag me back so I can read more snippets!!

Rules:

Rules: Revisit an old fic (or earlier chapters of your current WIP) and share a snip from: * Your first chapter * Your favorite chapter * Your most challenging chapter Alternatively, if you don't write longfic, feel free to share your one-shots. Provide as much or as little commentary as you want.

Under the cut for snips from The World on Our Shoulders!

First Chapter: Chapter 1 - Prologue (Ah. The drama. Laid out like a picnic. Immediately. Without holding anything back.)

It had been months now, time inching ever closer to a year away. The last letter she wrote home to him was before the most recent complication to their situation. It had been filled with lies, of course, as most of her correspondence had been for some time now. He wrote all the time, even when he had no word from her. Though he was always reaching, even in the distance, as far away as she could keep him, it had become so easy to ignore his hands. She stooped with just a small bit of discomfort and picked up the soft shirt she had been drying in the sun. She had already wrapped her chest, and packed away her lighter armor for travel which had been scrubbed clean. Next to her bag, a crumpled letter, smoothed over many times, lay taunting her to read it again. The ink was smeared in places, perhaps written hastily and folded before it had a chance to dry. He hadn’t bothered to use the good parchment this time, either. She looked over the correspondence once again, searching and not finding anything of interest or note. There was nothing between these lines. That was part of the problem. He commented once again on the last letter she sent, and then begged her to come home. She had burned a thousand of these. Maybe not that many, but enough. And she never answered the persistent question: when? Because the answer, after a time, had become never. And Nyenna wasn’t sure how to phrase that nicely. There likely wasn’t a way.

Favorite Older Chapter: Chapter 8 - Haunted by the Ghost of You (I have a couple more new favorites but this did mention older chapters. I enjoy the ache of these doomed ships so here we are.)

Athis was exhausted. The weight of his thoughts, his worries, his sadness had him crumbling. Once, he could have turned to her and she’d take it all away. One kiss, one glance, and he would be okay again. She was his home, his shelter, his safety. He thought he’d given her that, too, but like with everything else, her path had taken this from her as well. Nowhere felt like home, once again, for either of them. That emptiness was tearing into his soul at this point. It had been just like before he even made it to Skyrim. Nothingness. Hopelessness. He couldn’t help inviting it in. There was nobody else in here, anyway. He had tried to push the bad memories away from him all this time, but in the void, they crept back in. Reminded him of all his terror, ceaseless in their torment. He sighed and leaned his forehead against his arms as he curled in on himself. “I can’t do this by myself, love. I really need you here,” he whispered to the ghost of the girl he remembered, singing in the kitchen with autumn eyes full of love and hope. She didn’t answer. Couldn’t. Wouldn’t. She was gone, and Athis knew no matter when Nyenna next came home, that girl in his memories would never, ever return.

Challenging Older Chapter: Chapter 12 - What Am I Capable Of? (Arguments, arguments, arguments. Hard to get into the headspace of.)

“I choose what I do with my life,” he insisted, trying hard and failing to keep the bitterness out of his voice. “You don’t get to tell me who and what I am capable of saving, even if you are this legendary hero.” And he knew they were fighting words. He knew because lately, especially, things being wrested out of her control caused so much pain and confusion. It was a sore point, an argument waiting to happen no matter who was on the other end. She did level her gaze on him again, and this time he could see a malice behind it, even if it did not belong entirely to her. “So you would have me relive this fear every battle? You would distract me from what I’m supposed to do just because you think I need to be saved?” she said, words icy. And he didn’t mean that, no. He knew she was deflecting. Trying to cover up her uncertainty, her hesitancy. The fact that she didn’t believe in herself, not even a whit, even when he knew she should. “Is that how you see me, Nyenna? A distraction?” he asked, eyebrows furrowed. It hurt to dig like this, but they were her words. Could she not hear how absurd this all sounded? She exhaled through her nose. Crossed her arms over her chest. Looked away. “There were minutes in our last fight where I couldn’t be sure if you were alive or dead,” she said after a moment, shoulders sagging under the weight of the revelation. “It was like I was back at the border, watching Eris be cut down, taken from me forever, and all I could do was keep running. I had to leave him behind – couldn’t help even if I knew the magic then. And the ghost of that decision has stayed with me. It is unceasing, relentless fear, Athis. I can’t just make it go away. It’s always on my mind. What could happen to you is always on my mind.” She didn’t exactly answer the question, nor did she apologize for her turn of phrase. But this was the heart of it. Fear. Something he could understand. He peeled one of her hands away from herself and held it in his.

[agent-jaselin]

RP blog AU 8, please?

that one is rp drawings that started around august, though I don't think what's left of it was made than now.

I've got a sketch that will one day be my ardyn and Crowe in sexy outfits together. The same outfit actually. like grape things?

and a partially colored version of the Prince Arctus verse, the au where he's a reincarnated version of regular ardyn as noct's older brother. with the idea that they are meant to relive their ancestors past.

[rina-writes]

Hi Rina, how you doing?

First, I just wanted to say that I'm in love with your stories. I'm not even Jack's biggest fan (meaning, I didn't know much about him), but your stories are all I've been able to read for the past couple of days (and listening to his music in the process).

I know you don't take requests, and as a writer myself I totally understand your reasons. But a line in one of your stories got me thinking about a very specific scenario (I can't remember which one right now. Like I said, I read all your Jack stories in the past two days). It was something about Jack being very strict about condoms, because he was scared he'd get a girl pregnant. So I was thinking maybe a angsty to fluffly (maybe smutty) scenario where the reader finds out she's pregnant and is scared of his reaction to the news?

Please, feel free to answer even if you don't like the idea. I really really do understand your reasons for not taking requests.

Hope you have a lovely day!

Hi!! Sorry this took so long to respond. Life happened while I was editing and it took me longer to get out than I intended.  Firstly, thank you for reading my stuff and saying such kind words ♥ It's always an honor when someone outside of a fandom is slowly introduced through your work. 

 Honestly, I say that a lot in my fics because I thought it was a really funny snippet from his GQ interview last year. However, listening to the album, I think he's let go of that a bit :P. That being said, I love the concept and I want to do a little blurb for it. I hope you enjoy!!

Warnings: Fem!reader, pregnant!reader, mentions of breeding kink, references to ab-rtion,  mentions of infertility, smut (pregnant sex, breast/nipple play, unprotected sex), angsty in the beginning, 18+

Miracle

Shallow breaths escaped your lips as you sat on the bathroom floor.  The tile felt ice cold against your burning, sticky skin.  A thin layer of sweat had settled across your body after spending hours in the room.  You were surrounded by ripped cardboard boxes, folded slips of paper scrawled with instructions, and lots of toilet paper that you had scrunched up into balls  to use as tissues.  On the bathroom counter was a line of six pregnancy tests.  The only things in the room that were perfectly straight and aligned.  Each one of them slightly stuck out over the side so you could see the metal tip at the end from your crouched position on the floor. It was like they were mocking you.   The image of their status was burned into your brain.  You didn’t have to stand to look at them to see the result anymore. Pregnant.  You were pregnant.

You balled your hands into fists as you held them at your side, afraid to touch your own body.  Although you knew it was in your head, you felt like you could feel your stomach growing and something, or someone, moving inside.  The thought made you nauseous and you bent over the toilet to dry heave into it.  You had already thrown up everything in your stomach earlier in the day so, there was nothing left.  But, the clenching of your stomach numbed the dread in your chest that could no longer be soothed by crying.  It was like your body was trying to tell you that you were all out of coping mechanisms.  You were also out of tests and slowly running out of time.  Jack would be back any minute and you would have to tell him the news.

The thought sent a panic through you that allowed you to jump to your feet.  You grabbed the paper shopping bag and shoved all of the tests and discarded boxes in there to hide the evidence.  You tossed all the toilet paper into the toilet and flushed.  Crunching the bag’s top to seal it,  you dropped it behind the bathroom door before turning to the sink to wash your hands.  You couldn’t look at yourself in the mirror.  You couldn’t explain why you felt ashamed.  It wasn’t like you were the only one at fault.

In the beginning of your relationship and Jack’s career, Jack was very particular about using condoms.  He was terrified of either of your lives being put off course because of family planning.  Then, like many high school sweethearts, you two broke up.  When you two reunited a couple years later, Jack had a more lax attitude around protection.  As long as you both were exclusive and you were on birth control, Jack was okay with forgoing the piece of rubber.  The fact that you had a condition that made it difficult for you to get pregnant only seemed to be the icing on the cake.

But somehow, the 0.03% chance of getting pregnant was your current reality.  Maybe you should run out and buy a lottery ticket with this luck.  You might need a boost after your boyfriend inevitably left you.

You heard the sound of the front door opening and you became incredibly still.  Your eyes darted to the shopping bag, unsure of what to do with it.  You knew you had to tell Jack, but you were were terrified of losing him. Things were finally starting to get good.  He was talking about going public with your relationship and having you join him on radio interviews.  Urban had even let it slip that Jack was thinking of asking you to move in with him. This was an offer you welcomed because you currently lived with two roomates in a two-bedroom apartment converted into three  with the help of a plexi wall. 

 Your world was crumbling.  Now was the time you were going to need Jack the most and he was going to leave you.

“Babe?” Jack’s deep voice moved through the hotel room.  As usual, when Jack visited your city, you stayed with him while he was here.  It was always more luxurious than your place and Jack enjoyed having you around.

You tossed the paper bag into the shower just as Jack opened the door.  His sky blue eyes were wide and then slowly narrowed as he observed the surroundings.  You wondered if the room smelled disgusting: like your sweat or your vomit or your fear. You couldn’t really tell after spending over two hours in the space.  Jack’s large pale hand reached out to grab you and pull you to him.  He felt so wide and strong as he wrapped his arms tightly around your shoulders, pressing a soft kiss to the top of your head.  His soft cotton clothes made you more aware of how hot and sticky you felt in comparison to the cool, dry feeling of him pressed against you.  You wanted to relish in this moment, but seeing Jack made you more scared.

“Y/n, what’s wrong?” Jack asked, “You look like you’ve been crying.  Did something happen?”

You shook your head quickly before you could stop yourself.  Your brain searched for an excuse, any excuse.  You needed to buy some time.

“I just haven’t been feeling well.”  You told him.

Jack pulled back and looked at you through his long, brown lashes.  “I heard you throwing up this morning.  Was it something we ate last night?  You had the fish, didn’t you?”

“Maybe…” You said, staring at his straight nose instead of his eyes.  It was easier to lie if you didn’t make eye contact.

“Well,” Jack pulled you close to him again.  “I’m back and here for the rest of the night., I can take care of you.”

You held Jack tighter, knowing that if you pulled away the smile you were trying to muster would turn into a sob again.  Apparently, your tears weren’t completely done after all.  They were very thrilled to make an appearance with the new audience.  What’s worse was that your brain was preparing to say goodbye.  It was memorizing the strong, but sweet cologne that he spritzed on each morning, the feeling of his taut muscles straining against one of his signature cotton white t-shirts, and the way his trimmed nails raked effortlessly through the hair at your temple, massaging the area because he knew it soothed you.  It made this hurt so much more.

“What do you say to a bath?” Jack suggested. “I can run you a nice hot bath.  I think I saw some bath salts somewhere…”

Your heart lurched into your throat.  You shook your head, pulling back to meet Jack’s confused expression.  He was already in motion to pull back the shower curtain so, you broke free of his grasp.  Just as he pulled it back, you used your previously non-existent ninja skills to grab the bag in one motion.

“Whoa, what’s all that?” He said, referring the bulge in the bag thanks to your sloppy job of putting everything inside.

“Just some medicine I picked up at the drugstore.”  You lied.

Jack quirked a brow.  “Why did you put it in the tub?”

You bit your lip and half shrugged.  You clutched the bag tightly to your torso as if afraid he would take it.  You pushed past him, walking backwards in order to watch him as you spoke.  “I forgot.”

“Y/n…” Jack turned to face you as you darted from the bathroom into the bedroom.  “...why do I feel like I’m missing something.”

Jack walked closer to you as you stood on the other side of the bed.  He ran a hand through his brown curls, freshly cut for a recent magazine spread, and he ruffled them slightly as though forgetting their short length. 

“It’s just…” You fumbled with the words.  “...sorry, I need to call my mom.”

You explained, grabbing your phone off the night stand and running with the bag.  You pushed past Jack, this time forcing him to move out of the way to let you pass.

“Babe, what’s wrong?” Jack asked. “Did I do something? Please talk to me…”

Jack said, trying to close the distance between you.  You ran into the living room/office area as you fumbled with your phone to make the call.

“I just need a moment, Jack!” You barked back, hating the anger in your voice.  You weren’t mad at him.  At least, not yet.  Right now, he was still your sweet, caring boyfriend.  He didn’t deserve your snapping. Fear and anger were so closely linked and you knew it was the terror of losing your boyfriend that was putting you on edge.

Jack was taken aback by your tone.  You never spoke to him like that.  You had a stern voice, but you never yelled.  He almost didn’t recognize it as your voice.  It stopped Jack in his tracks and he stared at the ground.  A mix of worry and embarrassment settled in his stomach.  Similar to the feeling of getting scolded by a parent at school. With his eyes trained on the floor, he was staring at the carpet in front of you.  You were still struggling to make the call, a sign that you were nervous.  

Jack frowned as he saw the blue and white wand on the floor.  He had seen enough movies to recognize it immediately, but the shock made me him walk toward it slowly in disbelief.  He reached down and picked up the pregnancy test, his lips going dry.  He looked at you, but your back was turned to him, holding the open paper bag, with your ear glued to your phone.

“Y/n…” Jack’s voice was low,  making you turn toward him slowly.

He was staring down at the test unblinkingly.  It was one of those tests that didn’t do the lines.  Instead, it told you in plain English - Pregnant.  No pink lines. No  misconception.  No confusion.  Just pregnant. You looked at the bag, confused as to how one of them slipped, but then you noticed a small hole.  You closed your eyes, your phone dropping from your ear.

“Jack…” You said softly, tears welding in your eyes.

Jack’s eyes were dark when they met yours again.  It was like he was looking through you.  It was worse than you had feared.  You didn’t want to close the distance between you two, something you had grown accustom to craving these past couple of years.  For the first time ever, you wanted to be far away from him.

“You’re pregnant?” Jack asked you.

You nodded.  You turned the bag upside down and dumped the contents.  Jack’s eyes stared at each of the items littering on the floor. Even though there was no way he could read each test from where he stood, the message was clear.  You were sure.  You were pregnant.

“I thought you couldn’t get pregnant.” Jack’s voice was so measured that one would think he was emotionless, but you knew it was because he was angry.  “And you were on the pill.”

“Low chance.” You reminded him. “0.03% chance.  I was also off the pill for a little bit two months ago because of an insurance problem. It was only a couple weeks and I was back on by the time we hooked up when you came to visit.  I didn’t think…”

“You’re right, you didn’t f-cking think.” Jack said, his pink mouth tightening in frustration.  “You didn’t think you could have clued me in on that before we went raw?”

Your cheeks flushed with a mix of anger and embarrassment.  “Look I’m not the one with a breeding kink.  You were the one that came back into this relationship with this sudden desire to fill me up.”

Jack rolled his eyes. “Come on, Y/n! That’s dirty talk.” He threw his hands in the air.  “I also call you my little slut, it doesn’t mean I actually think that.”

Your eyes brimmed with tears and sniffled to force them back.  You shrugged, hugging yourself.  “What do you want me to say, Jack?  I’m not exactly thrilled about gaining 30+ pounds and pushing an infant out of my vagina.  But, here we are.”

“So you’re keeping it then?” Jack asked, the disappointment and judgment in his voice impossible to ignore. 

You were silent for a few moments.  While you knew that Jack was the first person you should tell about this, you wished you had asked your mother or best friend about it beforehand.  You had yet to sort out your own feelings about this and, yet, you were already on the defensive.

“Yes…maybe…I don’t know.” You frowned, staring at the ground.  “I accepted the fact that I would never have children.  I don’t want to regret this years from now if this turns out to be my only chance.” 

Jack’s lips flattened as he processed what you were saying.  He couldn’t tell you what to do with your body.  Especially, not with an explanation like that.  Jack did want kids one day.  He did want to have them with you.  But now was not a good time. He was about to embark on his largest and longest international tour to date.  There were legends in the business signing up to collaborate with him on their and his next projects.  There were days where Jack didn’t remember to eat.  How could he take care of a child?

“This isn’t a good time for me, Y/n.” Jack told you, honestly.  “I don’t think I can raise a child right now.”

Your eyes fell shut as the tears fell down your cheeks.  Droplets dampened your socks as your head was still tilted forward to face the ground.  You already knew this.  It wasn’t supposed to hurt so hard because you were prepared for this. But somehow, it still felt like your heart was being ripped out and stomped on in front of you.

Jack took a step closer.  “I’m happy to help you financially, Y/n, but I don’t think I have the ability to be good father right now.”

You looked up at Jack with wide eyes.  You didn’t think Jack would be this upfront about the next steps.  You at least thought he would try to make it work.  You weren’t even showing yet and he was already backing out.  You frowned at him, shaking your head.

“I don’t need a baby daddy right now, Jack.” Your lips trembled and you struggled to keep your voice from wavering.  “I needed my boyfriend.  I’m terrified, right now.  Just as much, if not more, than you are.  You haven’t even touched me since you found out I’m pregnant.”

Jack’s blue gaze softened as he attempted to close the distance, but you stepped back to widen it once more. His arms remained glued to his sides. He let out a sigh before biting his lip looking at you.  “This is a lot right now. Maybe we should just sit down and talk for a bit.”

Jack gestured to the couch as he slowly lowered on to it. You shook your head.  You needed to clear your head. Still clutching the empty bag to your torso, you slipped your phone in your pocket as you walked over to the coffee table.  You grabbed your keys and marched to the door to slip on your shoes.

Jack jumped to his feet as he realized you were leaving.  “Don’t do anything stupid, Y/n.”

“I already did.” You said, pulling back the door and running out.  

You ran to get an elevator and jammed the close elevator door button with your thumb repeatedly.  You figured Jack could be following you and wanted to ensure there was enough distance that he wouldn’t catch up.  Luckily, you had driven your own car to the hotel and the valet was quick to bring it to you.

The cold air stung your skin as the wind whipped at you. The sky had turned to a bluish gray hue with thick clouds warning of rain.  You wrapped your arms around your chest, feeling the shivers creating goosebumps against your skin.  You had emerged only in your pajamas and sneakers. You had your keys and your phone in your possession.   Oh and the empty paper bag that you had balled into your fist on the elevator ride down. You left your charger and your suitcase in the hotel room, lost in the fury of your escape.  Luckily, your credit cards and ID were in your phone case so, you didn’t have to go back.  Since you were driving to your parents house, you knew you would be able to get clothes, a charger, and whatever other toiletries you would need. Most importantly, you would get the sympathy that you were craving.

The valet pulled your sedan from the garage.  You smiled sweetly, unable to tip, but the person didn’t seem to mind.  You sat in the car and took a deep breath.  You buckled your seatbelt as you glanced in your rearview mirror.  You swore you could see the familiar curly brown locks darting around the lobby.  Adrenaline pumped through your veins, your foot pressed the gas before your brain could process if it was really Jack.  It was so quick, you wouldn’t be surprised if your car did the cartoonish smoke with skidmarks across the pavement. 

There was a blanket of security that enveloped you as you slowed your car to a reasonable speed. Your car obeyed your commands.  Your nose filled with the familiar scent of your air freshener.  You knew where your emergency lip balm was and your trusty water bottle was half full and chilled from a night in the garage. Being in your car  was something familiar in a day full of uncertainty.  

Seeing how well Jack’s reaction went over, you decided to call your mother in advance to tell her what was going on.  You told your phone to call “Mom” and it connected to your bluetooth as it rang.

“Hi honey!” Your mother’s voice rang into the car.  “I think I missed your call earlier.  I called you back, but you didn’t pick up.  Everything alright?”

Tears welded in your eyes.  You tried to blink them away, afraid of obscuring your vision on the highway.  You were a two hour drive a way from your childhood home and it had begun to drizzle.  You needed to keep a level head to get there safely.  To get you and your baby there safely.

“Mom,” Your voice broke despite your best attempts to keep it strong.  “I’m pregnant.”

“W-What?” Your mother’s voice was breathless as if she was underwater.  

“I’m going to have a baby, Mom.  I’m pregnant.”  You said again.  The words sounded so foreign to your ears.  You had to yet say the sentence out loud and it felt so much more real.

“B-But, how?  I thought your ovaries --” 

You nodded although she couldn’t see you. “I know, I know.”  You let out a dry laugh.  “0.03% chance.  What a miracle.”

“I’m so happy for you, honey.” You suddenly realized your mother was crying, with happiness.  “Congratulations.  How has Jack taken the news?”

“Uhm, Mom? This isn’t exactly a happy occasion.”  You let out a shaky breath. “I’m 24, unmarried, and secretly dating a superstar who is not interested in becoming a parent.  This is not something to be celebrated.”

“Oh honey, I had you when I was 26.” She made a dismissal noise.  “Jack will come around.  He’s just a little scared.  Everyone gets scared.  But you really do have a little miracle.  You should be careful though too much straining --”

“Mom, you’re not listening.” You argued.  “Jack straight up told me he doesn’t want to be a father.  That he will financially support me, but that’s it.  We’re over.”

There was a beat of silence before your mother asked.  “Did Jack say it was over?”

“No…”

“Did you say it was over?”

“No…”

“Well, then it isn’t over.”  

Your mother said it so confidently you almost believed her.  Until you remembered that she didn’t see Jack’s expression -- the dark blue voids that seemed to stare at you like a bug on the wall.  If she saw that, she wouldn’t dare tell you that there was still a chance.  With that realization, you felt your heart breaking and suddenly, you were now extremely invested in the heart growing inside of you. Maybe you would keep the baby after all.

Four months later

As you rubbed your rounded belly, you stared in the full-length mirror of your childhood bedroom. You knew moving back home was a good idea.  Your mother was taking care of you much better than your roommates could.  But, sitting in your room still marked with the joys of your teenage years made you feel like a cast member on 16 &  Pregnant.  Even with your new remote work setup, thanks to your job being understanding about your move, it still didn’t feel like the room of an adult.  You were in a time capsule of your youth as you prepared to bring a new life into the world.  It made you feel even less prepared and more bitter that you were doing this as a single parent.

As much as you hated that you still kept track, you knew it had been exactly four months since you last spoke to Jack.  It would be unfair to make it sound like Jack didn’t try to reach out.  He called you and texted you multiple times in the first few days after you left.  When you didn’t respond, he mailed your stuff along with a hand-written apology.   You had scanned it, disappointed to not find anything that implied he was going to be more than a financial support to his child.  You threw it away immediately and sobbed until you couldn’t breathe.  It was at that point that you decided that Jack meant nothing to you.

Or as close to nothing as you could feel for someone you still loved.

You walked over to your closet to put on a fresh top. Your stomach wasn’t super big, but it was obvious you were pregnant.  Your breasts had swelled as well which made all your current bras uncomfortable.  Since you were usually home, you had decided to no longer wear them.  You chose a collared floral top that cinched above your waist.  It added a bit of bust support without squeezing the top of your stomach.  You put on some black leggings and then marched out of your room in your slippers.

As you walked down the steps, you could hear your mother talking to someone.  The voice sounded female which meant it wasn’t your father, who should be at work right now anyway.  The moment you saw the long, dark brown curly hair, your breath hitched.  

You misstepped and slid down the steps, your butt hitting each one on the way down.  Your mother’s footsteps thundered toward you as more timid ones quickly followed.  You had a hand protectively on your stomach while the other rested on your back.

“Y/n, are you alright?” Your mother asked, with concern.  “You should be careful.”

Your mother was worried that you were going to lose your “miracle baby”, as she kept calling it.  Your doctor had assured you that you had a healthy pregnancy. You could continue working and engage in light exercise. But, your mother still doted on you worriedly.

“I”m okay, I just slipped.”  Your eyes met the light blue eyes of the other guest in the house who stared at you sympathetically.  “Good morning, Mrs. Harlow.”

“Hi, Y/n…” She said, “Sorry to intrude like this.  I just--”

“I know.” You said, standing up with your mother helping you.  You didn’t actually need the assistance.  But you didn’t mind it.  “I assume you wanted to see about the baby.  Well, it’s real.”

“I can see that.”  Jack’s mother commented.  “You look beautiful, Y/n.  Your skin is glowing.”

You smiled softly.  Your best friend had teasingly told you to get on dating apps because of how radiant you looked these days.  Your hair was fuller, your skin was brighter, and men at the grocery store seemed to be entranced by the extra oomph in your chest.  However, you weren’t interested in anyone else right now.  You just wanted to meet your baby.

“Thank you.” You smiled wider.  “I feel good.  We still have awhile to go.”

Jack’s mother looked at yours.  Your mother gave Mrs. Harlow an encouraging nod and you frowned.  You could tell something was going on, but you couldn’t predict what it could be.

“Jack is outside.” She explained, finally.  “He wanted to see you, but he was afraid you wouldn’t let him in if he came alone.”

Your eyebrows raised in surprise.  You didn’t think that Jack would ever show up.  And if he was going to send a representative in first, you would have predicted Urban or Neelam before his mother.  Your heart clenched knowing that it took a lot of pride for Jack to ask his mother for help.  He was so self-sufficient, that he hated admitting that he was over his head.  He had to pretty desperate to ask his mother for help.

You felt self-conscious, covering your stomach with your hands.  Your body was very different from the last time Jack saw you.  Everyone saw the beautiful changes, but there were new stretchmarks and blemishes that had appeared as well. You worried that your face looked fuller than usual and that your occasional breakouts had ruined your complexion.  You knew it was stupid to be embarrassed by these things, but you couldn’t help that you were.  Just as much as you couldn’t help the fact that your heart fluttered at the thought of seeing Jack again.

“He can come in.” You said, walking toward the living room.  “I’ll sit on the couch.”

“Thank you, Y/n.” Jack’s mother said.  She motioned to walk to the door, but  turned and walked to you first.  Standing in front of you, her expression hardened.  “I’m so sorry about how Jack treated you.  I know I can’t take it away.  The hurt that you must have felt nor the betrayal.  But just know that I gave him hell and still do every day since he told me.  You’re a strong woman, Y/n.  However you decide to move forward, know you have my full support.  As your friend and the grandmother of your baby.”

Tears welled in your eyes and you sniffled loudly.  “Thank you so much!” You wiped the fallen tears with the back of your hand. “Sorry, hormones.  But, thank you.”

“Do not apologize, love.” Jack’s mother looked like a weight had been lifted off her shoulders.  She walked toward the front door, slowly becoming out of your view.  

You squeezed your thighs as you waited. There was a lump in your throat that seemed to get bigger when you heard heavy footsteps enter through your door.  As much as you willed yourself to look straight ahead, you couldn’t help, but turn when Jack’s tall frame came into your view.  His hair was a little longer than last time you saw him and his light brown beard had been shaped up recently.  He was wearing one of his sweat suits, a white and blue one that you always loved him in.  You knew that was on purpose.  He was holding a bouquet of flowers that was comically large.  It was also gorgeous.

Jack pulled his hood down as he searched for you.  You stood up slowly as his eyes traced you from your head to your toes and then back up again. You shifted uncomfortably.

“Y/n, you look…”

You turned away from him.  “If you say I look fat, I’ll slap you.”

Jack chuckled and walked closer to you.  “I was going to say beautiful.  But I think I deserve a few slaps anyway.”

You turned to look at him, not expecting the soft, sheepish stare of his clear blue eyes.  They were so different from the cold, sapphire pools that you saw four months ago.  Jack handed you the flowers and you accepted them, sitting back down on the couch.  You were grateful that he gave you something to do with your hands.  Instinct made you want to wrap you arms around him, but your heart was still too angry.

Jack sat on the couch as well, leaving the seat in the middle open so you could face each other and talk comfortably.  You put the flowers there to create an actual divider between you two. There was a silence as Jack admired you.  His eyes didn’t leave your stomach.  You were used to it from strangers, but it felt weird to have Jack staring at you like this.

“My eyes are up here…” You joked, usually telling him something similar when he stared at your chest.

The apples of Jack’s cheeks tinted red making you laugh, despite yourself.  Blushing Jack always reminded you of the first phase of your relationship -- when Jack wasn’t super famous yet outside of Kentucky and his hair was still long. He was shy when talking to girls he liked, no matter how much he tried to play it off.  Nowadays, Jack  had more confidence and bravado.  But, the blushing boy was still buried inside of him, apparently.

“Y/n,”  Jack’s voice came out hoarse and he cleared his throat.  “I am so sorry.  I have been such a coward these past few months.”

“No kidding.” You said, rolling your eyes as you folded your arms.

Jack hung his head as he nodded, “I was so worried about my world crashing because I wouldn’t be able to commit to you and our child.  But, without you, I already feel like everything is so messed up.  I told myself that once we got back together, I would never let you walk out again.  To think when you needed me most, I turned my back on you makes me sick.  I wish I could take it back, but I can’t.  So, I want to make it better.”

Tears stung your eyes and you sighed.  You had dreamed of hearing these words from Jack’s lips. This was the apology you wanted in that letter all those months ago.  Except, now you needed more than just kind words.  Jack was great with words.  His entire career was built around saying the right thing.  You learned the hard way that Jack’s actions didn’t always match what he promised.

You frowned as you turned toward Jack to see him fiddling with something in his pocket. He pulled out a black,velvet box and your eyes widened.  He opened it to reveal a gorgeous ring.  The diamond was incredibly large and in the shape you liked. The band was the color that always looked great on your skin tone. It looked like it should be on the hand of a movie star.

Jack shifted to get down on one knee, but you put your hand on your shoulder to stop him.  The tears rolled down your cheeks.  Part of you was happy, but another part of you was angry.

“Don’t do this…” You said to him, “...don’t do this if you’re just trying to make an honest woman out of me.  This isn’t 1932, we don’t have be married to have a child.”

Jack’s eyebrows furrowed deeply.  “Do you really think I’m doing this out of some obligation, Y/n?” At the risk of sounding like a douche, a ring like this takes a lot longer than four months to make.”

Your mouth fell open as you felt your cheeks heat.  You wiped your tears with the side of your hands and let out a small laugh as you said,  “You’re right, you do sound like a douche.”

Jack’s laugh came out raspy and realized he was more nervous than you thought.  He was really asking you to marry him and he was afraid you were going to say no.  As he should be.  But, would you?

“Well?” You asked him.

“Well, what?” He asked, confused.

“Is that all you had prepared? Over four months in the making and no speech?”  

Jack’s eyes widened, but when he saw the going of humor in yours, you saw him visibly relax.   Jack motioned to get down on one knee again, but you stopped him.

“For god’s sake, what now?” Jack groaned, impatiently.  “I’m losing my nerve.”

You laughed. “Let’s go upstairs.  I don’t want an audience.”  You gestured toward the dining room that was on the other side of the hallway to the living room.

Jack turned around to see both of your mother’s doing a horrible job of pretending they weren’t watching you two.  Jack shook his head and closed the box, shoving it in his pocket.  He stood up and reached his hand out to help you up as well.

You took it and let Jack hold your hand as you walked up the stairs.  He kept looking back at you concerned after each step.

“Is this too much for you?” He asked.  “I can carry you.”

As romantic as it sounded to have Jack carry you up the stairs, you couldn’t shake the image of you two falling down the stairs like a slinky.  You shook your head and smiled at him,

“This is my usual exercise.” You explained.

“You shouldn’t strain yourself.” Jack chastised you, but he didn’t push it any more. 

At the top of the steps, you pointed to your bedroom and Jack walked in that direction.  You had briefly forgotten that you were inviting him into your teenage bedroom until one of your many posters came into view.

“I know you like Harry Styles…” Jack commented, still squeezing your hand, “But this is a little humbling.”

You bit your lip to hide your embarrassed smile.  “Humbling?”

“I’m about to propose in front of every member of One Direction” Jack squinted at one of the posters. “Wow you have a lot of posters. Several of which have Harry’s face encircled with a heart.  Very humbling.”

You laughed, “Well, I hope this speech you have been preparing is better than “Little Things,” because I can’t guarantee I’ll say yes.”

Jack grinned as he got down one knee.  He pretended to stop halfway through and gave you a look to check if you were going to stop him again.  When you didn’t, he pulled out the ring.

“Y/n Y/l/n, you’ve been a huge part of my life over the last five years.  As both a friend and a girlfriend, you have been my greatest supporter and my biggest fan.  I got through some of my toughest shows thanks to you.  I also was reminded to celebrate my greatest highs thanks to you.  You deserve the world for everything you do for me, loved ones, and the people around you.  You deserve hell of a lot more than me, but I promise to give 150% to you.  You will be above everything to me.” Jack paused and smiled.  “You and our family.  I love you, Y/n.  Will you marry me?”

“Yes!” You said, nodding rapidly. 

Jack slipped the ring on your finger, a bit snug because of your pregnancy, but you didn’t care.  It still looked gorgeous nonetheless. He scooped you in his arms and pressed a kiss your lips.  You smiled into the peck and Jack chuckled.

“I can’t help, but feel like someone is getting between us.”  Jack said, glancing down at your rounded stomach.

You laughed, “Maybe if you’re lucky you’ll feel our baby kick.”

Jack’s eyes lit up.  He hesitated and you took his hand and pressed it against your stomach.  He didn’t apply any pressure at first.  He rubbed it delicately, resting his other hand on your lower back.  You couldn’t deny that you imagined this moment for months: Jack’s warm hands on your swollen belly and aching back as he rubbed the fatigue away.  After awhile there was a small kick. Jack’s eyes which had been trained on your stomach flicked to yours.  You gave him a quick nod and he gasped.

“That was a kick?” Jack asked.

“Yup.  A little one.”  You explained.  “The bigger ones tend to happen when I am going to bed. A night owl, just like Daddy.”

Jack chuckled, beaming.  “Do we know if it’s a boy or a girl yet?”

You shook your head.  “My mother wants to do a gender reveal party, no matter how much I try to talk her out of it.  She thought this would never happen so, she’s going all out. There’s a baby shower too.”

“I’ll be there.” Jack said with a finality. “I don’t care what day it is, I’ll be there.  And for any appointments. And anything you want to do for our wedding--”

“Jack, Jack…” You sat down on the bed and patted the space next to you for him to sit as well.  “...thank you, but you don’t have to overhaul your whole life for this.  Of course, you’re going to be involved, but don’t feel pressure to do all this. I don’t mind signing the marriage papers and postponing the wedding.  Besides, I had a different image of how I would look in a wedding dress.”

You stared at your stomach in the mirror.  You saw Jack staring at your expression in the reflection and you tried to brighten your features.  Jack hated when you got down on yourself and you didn’t want to argue about your self-image.  You were sensitive enough as it was.

“You really do look beautiful, Y/n.” Jack said again.  “I am happy to go at your pace. If you want to wait for the wedding, we will wait.  If you want me at any appointment, just put it on my calendar and I will be there.  I love you and I just want to make you happy.”

“Thank you, Jack.” You leaned in and kissed him

Jack’s eyes fluttered close as he cradled your jaw with his hand and deepened the kiss.  You missed how he always tasted minty fresh and the force of his tongue against yours.  Your body melted as his thumb massaged your cheek while the other hand rubbed circles into your back.  You truly missed the affectionate touch of your boyfriend.

“Y/n,” Jack’s voice deep and you recognized his tone immediately. “When you said you were doing light exercise on the stairs…just how much activity are you allowed?”

“Are you asking me if we can have sex, Jack?” You asked him teasingly.

Seeing his face turn red was completely worth it.  Jack nodded, glancing away from you as he bit his red lips.  “Yeah…”

“Yes, we can.” You said, “But we may have to figure out how we fit together with my bump in between us.”

“I’m sure I can figure it out.” Jack grinned.

You stood up and pulled down your leggings, letting them pool at your feet. You sat on the bed and kicked off your slippers and the leggings fell to the ground..  Jack helped your remove your top and his eyes widened when he saw your bare torso.

“Wow, those are new…” Jack remarked staring at your breasts.

You smiled shyly.  “I…uh…haven’t found a bra to fit them quite yet.”

“I’m not surprised.” Jack bit his lip.  “Do you mind if I play with them?”

“Please do…” You said in a breathy voice that would have been more embarrassing if you weren’t so needy.

Jack removed his sweatshirt and tossed it on the floor to reveal his black tank top. He had gotten a bit more toned since you last saw him and your eyes couldn’t look away his tapered waist.  You licked your dry lips.  He sat on the bed and motioned for you to straddle him. You did, holding on to his shoulders to steady yourself, as you pressed your knees on either side of his thighs.  He pressed kisses  into your neck as he gently massaged your mounds.  You moaned softly, not wanting your mothers downstairs to hear you.  Jack’s thumbs gently encircling your nipples didn’t help.

“Are they even more sensitive than before?” He whispered against your neck, not too far from your ear.

“Y-Yeah,” You muttered, already feeling a warmth pooling in your underwear.

“I guess I better enjoy these before little Harlow starts hogging them, huh?” Jack teased before placing one of your nipples in his mouth and sucking gently.

You covered your mouth to silence a loud moan.  You could feel Jack’s facial hair tickling your breast as his tongue wrapped around your nipple.  You grinded yourself gently against his hardening cock and Jack grunted before switching breasts.  He used his fingers to tweak the one he was previously sucking on, to make sure your nipple stayed hard.  You continued to roll your lower half against him, careful not to push your belly into his stomach.   

Jack pulled back and massaged your breasts with both hands. He pressed your your tits together and buried his face in your cleavage making you giggle. His nose and beard made it tickle but his fingers still brushing against your stimulated nipples kept the pit in your core alight.

“Can I tell you something?” Jack asked, pulling back to look at you, but still massaging your breasts, “And you promise not to make fun of me?”

“I would never promise that.” You joked, “But tell me anyway.”

“Ever since you mentioned my breeding kink in our last argument, it’s kinda haunted me.” Jack sighed. “I never thought about it.  No one ever said it like that either.  But now, seeing you like this--”

Your mouth fell open and you saw the panic in Jack’s eyes.  He was already sputtering trying to take it back, but you saw what was going on. It was too late.

“Are you even more turned on having sex with your pregnant girlfriend?”

“Pregnant fiance.” Jack corrected, meekly.  “B-But, yeah…this is so hot to me.”

“Well this won’t become a habit, Jack. I’m not getting knocked up constantly just to spice things up in the bedroom.” You teased, “But after the baby is born, I’ll be happy to put on one of those pregnancy bellies if that would get your rocks off.”

Jack groaned. “I knew I shouldn’t have told you.”

“I’ll  even keep my old maternity clothes.”  You continued to tease him.  “Mhmm, I bet you like this MILF couture.”

“I’m going to lose my hard on.” Jack warned.

You pressed yourself into him, cupping your breasts in your hands over and stared Jack down.  “Are you really?”

Jack’s eyes were filled with lust and you felt sexier than you had in months.  You were joking with this seductive pose, but seeing how much he wanted you was a huge confidence boost.  You bit your lip, continuing to give him a sultry stare.

“F-ck…” Jack shook his head. “I’m so bricked up right now.  I hate you. I love you, but I hate you.  F-ck you.”

“I thought that’s what we were doing here…” You joked.

Jack smirked at you.  “You’re right…”

He leaned back and pulled his waist band down just enough to free himself.  You stared down at his cock, unable to remember the last time you saw him this hard.  He was already leaking with pre-cum and his head looked angry and red.

“I don’t have a condom.” You said.

Jack gave you a look as he stared down at your naked, rounded belly and then back at your eyes. You both chuckled. There was a lightness in the air that you hadn’t felt ina long time.  Jack calmed you and you were thrilled to have him back in your life.  

You raised your hips and Jack steadied you by holding onto them.  You reached down and placed his tip at your entrance with one hand and twisted the crotch of you underwear to the side with the other.  You sunk down on to him with a low moan.  Jack grunted as he bit his lip so hard, you thought he would draw blood.  You bounced on Jack lightly, trying to find a rhythm.  You were worried it would take Jack a moment to adjust to your new weight, but he didn’t seem to notice. His hips lifted to meet yours effortlessly, coaxing you to come down harder and faster.

“God damn…” Jack swore under his breath.  “I’m trying so hard to be quiet, princess, but you feel so good around me.”

“I missed feeling you inside me.” You confessed.  

Jack reached between you two to play with your clit, making you grip his shoulders.  He watched you bouncing on top of him, his eyes filled with adoration.  His unwavering expression was making it hard to keep eye contact so, you closed your eyes and leaned your head back.  Jack took the opportunity to suck on one of your breasts.

“If you do all of that I’m gonna come.”  You groaned.

Jack let go of your breast with a pop. “It’s taking all of my willpower not to explode inside of you right now.  The faster you cum, the better it is for both of us.”  With that he went back to sucking on your other breast this time, taking in more of your breast in his mouth like he was actually trying to milk you.

You dug your fingernails into his shoulders as your orgasm crashed into you.  You squeezed him tightly and Jack’s hands jumped to your lower back to support you.  He helped you to ride through your orgasm and it wasn’t long until you felt the warm rush of his release filling you up.  Jack let go of your nipple to kiss you deeply, his tongue immediately swirling yours.  You swallowed each other’s moans as you  held each other tightly until you both stopped shaking from pleasure.

Jack helped you lift off of him. He laid you on your back and got to work cleaning you up.  He removed your underwear and got you a tissue to up the mix of your juices that settled between your folds.  He got some of the baby wipes off your vanity to wipe down the thin layer of sweat that developed on your skin.  He pulled on a fresh pair of underwear too.  

Jack held a tub of cocoa butter over you so you could see it laying down.  “Should I put this on too?”

You smiled.  “I use it for my belly. It’s supposed to help the stretch marks, but honestly it just feels nice.”

Jack immediately unscrewed the top and lovingly massaged cocoa butter on your stomach and breasts.  He took his time, laying soft kisses on the stretched skin.  You could tell he was truly enamored with your body and not only in a lustful sense.

“You’re so beautiful…” Jack reminded you as he helped you sit up.  He pecked your lips before helping you to get dressed.  Once you were ready, he adjusted his own appearance in the mirror.

“Shall we go downstairs and share the good news?”

“That you have a serious breeding kink?” You teased.

“No…” Jack rolled his eyes. “That you’re going to be Mrs. Y/n Harlow.”

“Of course…” You laid back down.  “After my nap.”

Jack smiled.  He waited until you got comfortable before putting himself around you to snuggle you into him.  Watching you sleep contently helped to lift a weight that had been on his chest.  

Jack  knew that this wasn’t going to be easy.  He hurt you and broke your trust.  He was going to have to show you he was a changed man.  But seeing you laying in his arms, his future child in your stomach, he couldn’t imagine how he thought he would be able to stay away from you.  Or worse, leave the chance for another man raise his child in his stead.  No, you were his world and he was ready to protect you with everything he had.  As a husband and a father.

[johaerys-writes]

1, 29 (heat), and 30!

Thank you so much for the ask!! 💙

1. What was the first fandom and/or pairing you wrote fic for? 

Already answered this one here!

29. send me a word. If it's in your WIPs, include the sentence and a short summary of the fic. 

You sent me the word heat! And I'm going to cheat because I've sent you that snippet in DMs already haha, but it's all I have. From the next chapter of Twin Flames! 

Patroclus' pulse skips at their proximity. A tingle runs up his arm with the sudden heat of Achilles fingers on his bare skin, like static charge. Achilles' eyes are on him, and for the first time, perhaps ever, Patroclus realises how difficult it is to hold that unflinching stare.

30. Tell us an idea for a longfic you want to write in the future.

OH MAN where do I even start. I have so many ideas that just listing them would take all night lol. I'm going to keep it Patrochilles because I usually get most of my ideas for them anyway. I have plans for a Reincarnation AU, set in Victorian London. I started is as part of Patrochilles Week 2020 and got about 3 chapters in before I hit a block and decided to let it sit for a  bit. I have worked out the kinks in my head now, I just need to actually sit down and finish it. Perhaps one day soon!

ALSO, I have been thinking of a vampire/Beauty and the Beast/Gothic Horror sort of AU recently and I should say it's all your fault for being an enabling enabler haha. I have most of it worked out in my head so I might start it soon for funsies. :) 

Feel free to send me more asks from this list!

[from-a-reckless-writer]

Supercorp 26 if you’d please?!

"Yeah? Well, fuck you too."

Kara fought the urge to flinch at the harsh way the woman beside her slams her phone down in the space between them.

Kara was sat peacefully in her usual park bench today, like every day when she's got a few extra minutes on her lunch break. She's spotted this woman a few yards away, next to the drinking fountain, angrily talking into her phone.

An expensive looking, six-inch heel wearing, raven-haired woman.

Kara had observed her for a good few minutes before getting distracted by the ice cream truck.

By the time she came back to the park bench, said woman was already sitting next to her spot. Still ranting away into her phone.

Kara doesn't know whether to pity the creature on the other side of the phone or be curious. What could they have possibly done to warrant such a violent reaction???

The woman now has her hands pressed to her face, back hunched low, elbows resting on knees. Kara can feel the frustration rolling off of her in waves.

Kara gingerly pushes the 2nd cup of her ice cream towards her. It was a half-hearted decision really, she was excited to finish the second cup. But oh, well, when life calls for kindness Kara would deliver.

"Uhm, here, you sound like you had a bad day."

The woman slowly raises their head, looks at the offering in Kara's hands and then to Kara and then to the ice cream and then to Kara again.

Her eyes were a light green mixing with gold in the open sunlight of the park.

For a moment, Kara thinks, she wouldn't accept.

But then, pale hands reach towards hers and then, "Thank you."

Kara smiles brightly, perks up a bit at the approval.

'Of course," Kara says. "Nothing like ice cream to cheer you up!"

The woman gives her a small polite small, nods slowly and brings the plastic teaspoon to her lips.

Kara should not have been distracted by such a mundane gesture.

But here we are.

She tries to hide her blush, fidgets with her glasses and takes a spoonful herself before speaking again.

"So, if you don't mind me asking, what's got you so upset? I mean you totally don't have to tell me! If you don't want to, that is! I mean who am I, right? I'm probably a serial killer for all you know, but also would serial killers offer you ice cream, though? I don't think they would, I think they'd straight up just mur-"

Kara glances at the woman who seems to be holding her free hand over her face in an attempt to cover her amusement.

"Please stop me," Kara pleads. The other woman's shoulders shake in silent laughter before saving Kara.

"First off, thank you again. For this." She raises the cup playfully. "Second of all, it was just a work thing. But nothing I can't figure out and for the record, I also don't think serial killers would offer you ice cream."

And then more hesitantly the woman asks, "Do you have a sibling?"

Kara doesn't know if she should answer, the sibling question has no relevance to their current conversation after all. But Kara finds herself nodding along.

"Oh, yeah. I do. A sister. I have an older sister,' She elaborates.

"Good. Great. Then you know that feeling when your mom asks your sibling to do some chore and then somehow somewhere along the way, the chore ends up being your responsibility even though you weren't the one who was supposed to do it anyway??"

Wow, okay. That was a lot to take in. But Kara got most of it. And yeah, she does know. Snippets of Alex sneaking out and telling Kara to wash the dishes for her or fold the laundry for her--errands that were Alex's job getting passed down to her. Alex using the 'I'm older do as I say.' card when they were younger.

So, again, Kara finds herself nodding along.

"Yeah. I get what you mean," She says.

"Now, take whatever scenario in your mind and then multiply that ten-fold. Multiply it to disastrous proportions. To corporate, career-ending proportions,' The woman tells her, her irritation once again showing.

"Oh, oh wow, that sounds really bad?' It comes out like a question, she doesn't really know what to tell this woman. She doesn't want to say, Well, I think your sibling is an ass if they do that to you, she thinks that might be too much, might be overstepping a bit.

But then, "Oh yeah, my brother's an ass."

Oh, so not too much then.

Her companion lets out a deep sigh, "But what can you do? You can't change family. Not like I have much of a choice anyway."

The woman sounds defeated, tired. And it's only then that Kara notices how her eyes are sunken and how unnaturally pale she really is.

Kara wants to console her, to tell her that everyone always has a choice, every single one--even angry women she met in the park. You can always choose who you want as your family.

But instead Kara says, "Well, that's okay. Just look on the bright side, at least you got a free ice cream over it, right?"

The woman gives her another smile. A big smile, a real one this time.

And oh, she looks really beautiful when she smiles.

"I guess you're right. Thank you, really. I appreciate it very much," She tells Kara. "But I do have to get going now. Thank you again."

The woman collects her trash, picks up her phone and leaves Kara sitting there, a 'You're welcome!' stuck in her throat.

It isn't till the woman is lost to the crowd that Kara realizes she didn't ask for her name.

She tries to push down the disappointment, no use crying about it now. And besides, it's her first real interview today. Her first real exclusive and...she is so damn late.

******

"Miss Danvers, there have been a slight change of plans. Mr. Luthor seems to be unavailable for today but he did sent Ms. Luthor, LexCorp's R&D chief, to discuss the interview with you today."

Well, Kara can't really do anything about it can she? This is what Clark and Cat Grant had warned her about, people like Lex Luthor, making a journalist's job harder that it actually is.

"Oh, well, thank you for informing me. Can I go in now then?"

"Uh, yeah. Follow me please, it's just through here."

Kara is led through a long hallway of empty conference rooms and walls with abstract painting.

They reach the double doors at the end of the lobby and the petite woman guiding her, went on inside.

"Ms. Luthor, your CatCo appointment is here."

Kara hears a curt and brief, "Thanks Jess."

And then, there, sitting in a pristine office, National City skyline behind her is Lena Luthor--angry park bench seatmate who ate Kara's precious 2nd cup of ice cream.

Lena's eyes sparkle with recognition at the sight of Kara.

Her lips curling into a smirk.

"Oh, and who are you exactly?"

prompt list here

[drwcn]

ok but for fem!wwx au does lan zhan believe the rumours? and if so what does that mean for the whole 'i birthed him with my own body!' cause lan zhan did the maths and was like 'no it was just the once and this child is too old' but if he thinks he was just one in a line does he go back to bm after nightless city to rescue a kid he thinks is wei ying's but with another man? does he spend the three years in seclusion cursing every jin whose name he remembers as cowards only to step out, take one look at sizhui, and have an 'oh. i know why wei ying was so determined to save wen qionglin' moment???

Answer:  Haha, nah, Lan Wangji was fairly sure Sizhui wasn’t Wei Ying’s, for several reasons. One, Wen Yuan was born before the wen remnants even went to the Burial Mount. Lan Wangji saw the small child amongst the escape party that rainy night at the  concentration camp. Also, Wen Ning was several years younger than them, which would make it kind of weird if he were the dad. Before Wen Ning became the Ghost General, everyone just knew him as Wen Qing’s kid brother.  Lan Wangji, however, absolutely believed Jiang Yan to be Jiang Cheng and Wei Wuxian’s child even before Wei Wuxian was resurrected... 

《the midnight sun》 — 

[original], snippets [x] [x] [x] [x], other posts found under #lanyan or #midnight sun

midnight sun [snippet 7]

When Yan’er turned ten, Jiang Cheng decided it was time for her to accompany him to Cultivation Conferences. Most sect heirs began their training this way; Jiang Cheng still remembered his first time, trailing nervously in Jiang Fengmian’s wake. 

Heiresses, in comparison, were few and far between. Even head disciples were rarely girls. Jiang Wanyin had no children. His head disciple was his heiress, and his heiress was Jiang Yueqian (江月千). 

长烟一空 - when the smoke clears; 皓月千里 - the moon casts a thousand miles of light 浮光跃金 - which dances upon the water, golden 静影沉壁 - the shadow of the moon itself like jade underwater*

A jade underwater indeed.

“Shifu.”

Speaking of the devil, here she comes, walking measuredly down the long stairs of Jinlintai towards Jiang Cheng, the epitome of an obedient, filial disciple. It had only been a day and Jiang Yan already had the world fooled. Only Jiang Cheng knew how impossibly obstinate and utterly uncontrollable she was when her mind was fixed.

"Ah, Jiang-zongzhu, this is..." Spotting her, Lan Xichen glanced beyond his shoulder, the question dangling in the sentence he did not deem necessary to finish.

Unbeknownst to Lan Xichen, the child that made her way over was his niece by blood. Jiang Cheng was acutely aware that Yan'er actually resembled Lan Wangji a great deal, and despite having weighed the risks and gains against each other repeatedly before deciding to bring Jiang Yan along, now he was no longer so certain in his calculations. Lan Xichen was not a simple peasant; what if he detected a trace or a hint of her heritage between the furrow of her brows or the curve of her eyes? What if...

Jiang Cheng turned, raising an arm towards Jiang Yan, an introduction ready, but whatever words he had prepared in advance died on on his tongue when he laid eyes on the girl. Suddenly, he was no longer worried that others would suspect her to be Lan Wangji's child.

There was a red ribbon in her hair.

Yan'er stopped at a polite distance from the two older men and bowed in perfect form.

Jiang Cheng's heart stuttered violently in his chest at the sight of that red ribbon falling sideway over her small shoulder. If souls could travel, his would have left him in an instant. He stood in disincorporated panic, wrestling with the nauseating sensation of being ripped from his reality and tossed so far into the distant past that he felt whole again.

"Shifu, Lan-zongzhu." Yan'er greeted.

Shifu. Lan-zongzhu. In another world, another life, she would not need to be so formal. She could easily bound up to them, carefree, cooing jiujiu and bobo and ask to be bailed out from whatever trouble she caused.

Instead, he was only her shifu, and Lan Xichen, a stranger in her life. It would be laughable, if fate had not dealt them each such a wretched hand.

Jiang Cheng stepped towards her. “Where did you get this?” 

Jiang Yan looked up in surprise, her hand reaching up and making an aborted motion to touch the red ribbon in her hair.

“Qin-shenshen gave it to me. Is it not nice?” 

Qin Su. Jiang swallowed down a sigh of relief. Earlier, the Jin servants had sent word that Jin-fu'ren had baked treats for Jin Ling, and the boy had wasted no time dragging his favourite person - his Yan'er jiejie - to his aunt's place with him. Clearly, Qin Su had seized the opportunity to dote on the girl in place of the daughter she never had. Qin Su meant well. She couldn't have known. She's never even met Wei Wuxian.

In this state, Jiang Cheng could barely bring himself to look at his disciple, but he forced himself nonetheless to kneel and tuck an errant strand of baby hair behind her ear. “Very pretty.” 

Yan'er smiled.

Jiang Cheng could cry.

They'd been lucky thus far. Yunmeng's Jiang-xiao-guniang was born a taciturn girl who did not like to smile or laugh, not even when she was expected to for polite society. Whether she was happy or sad, one would be hard pressed to tell. Only in front of her master Jiang Cheng or her Jin Ling-didi did she elect to reveal the full expanse of her emotions. Yet, whenever Jiang Cheng bore witness to that smile as warm and incandescent as sunlight, he could not help but shudder somewhere deep. Recalling the radiant days of years gone by, he could still see - every time he closed his eyes - his er-shijie smiling at him in the very same fashion.

Aiyo, Jiang Cheng ~

So...they'd been very lucky thus far, that Yan'er was not so like her mother in that way, not so free and generous with her smiles. Or else this devastating secret —Wei Wuxian's only wish — would not be able to withstand the test of time.

"Very pretty, Yan'er." He reaffirmed. "Did you thank Jin-furen?"

"I did."

Jiang Cheng stood and turned back to face Lan Xichen, and realized they were being joined by two others: Lan Qiren and Lan Wangji. The latter of two stared directly down at Jiang Yan, visibly stricken and unblinking, as though he'd just seen a ghost. After all, he had often been on the receiving end of that signature smile once upon a time. It was probably not a smile he'd ever expected to see again in this life.

In hindsight, perhaps Jiang Cheng should have made Yan'er wear her uniform like all the other disciples instead of her favourite indigo robes.

“Ah, Wangji, shufu -” Lan Xichen was quick to react, sensing animosity brewing in the disquiet that stretched taut between his younger brother and his fellow sect master. "Jiang-zongzhu, perhaps you would introduce us?"

The First Jade smiled kindly down at Yan'er. She returned his kindness with a polite nod.

Lan Wangji finally dragged his gaze up to meet Jiang Cheng's, a rarity since their violent parting at Nevernight. The venerated Hanguang-jun had developed a habit of pretending that Jiang Wanyin of Lotus Pier did not exist at all. He probably preferred, dreamed of it even, if Jiang Cheng had been one to fall of the cliff that day. He probably hated himself for not shoving him into the molten abyss when he could to avenge the love of his life.

Love. What did Lan Wangji know of love? Jiang Cheng sneered inwardly. One did not compromise one's love and abandon her, ill and with child, to bleed out alone in a cave tainted by demonic spirits.

One did not watch idly as one's love and her people are reduced to ashes for the power and greed of men either....

Jiang Cheng buried the offending thought, too familiar with Wen Qing's ghost that still haunted him in his moments of weakness. Without breaking gaze, he laid a hand on the crown of Jiang Yan's head and said, "This is my first disciple, Jiang Yan, Jiang Yueqian."

"Yueqian greets Zewu-jun, Lan-lao-xiansheng, Hanguang-jun."

Jiang Cheng watched as the icy fire within Lan Wangji's eyes flicker, fizzle, and extinguish entirely. Jiang Cheng's vague silence had allowed him the space to make his assumptions, and he had assumed the most insane explanation.

Is it so difficult for you, wondered Jiang Cheng. To believe that she could be yours? So impossible, that you would choose to doubt Wei Wuxian instead?

Fine.

Hanguang-jun. The venerated Second Jade of Gusu. That's all you'll ever be. Yan'er will never call you Father.

Jiang Cheng decided he had spent enough time today making nice. "Zewu-jun, it's getting late. If nothing else, I will be taking my leave. The conference continues tomorrow. I will see you then. Yan'er, come."

Yan'er bowed again to the senior cultivators, perfectly well-mannered. A dash of surprise crossed those bright eyes, however, when Jiang Cheng took her hand to lead her away. She followed wordlessly, trusting him, and did not look back once at the Lans she left behind.

Now that Yan'er was out in society, there would surely be rumours. No matter. Rumours were nothing Jiang Wanyin could not withstand. How ironic, indeed, that this was to be his lot in life.

For the first time, Jiang Cheng felt he could understand his father.

Note:

The poem is from the Song dynasty, by poet 范仲淹 from his work 《岳阳楼记》

Jiang Cheng of course is also working off a lot of assumptions about Wei Wuxian and Lan Wangji's relationship. He has his reasons for hating and blaming Lan Wangji, but not all the blame is deserved.

[robininthelabyrinth]

Spilled Pearls

- Chapter 19 - ao3 -

Time passed, as it had a tendency to do.

After Cangse Sanren left, Lan Qiren remained in seclusion for the next two months, reviewing texts on the Lan sect rules regarding reciprocation, filial respect, and loyalty, and occasionally playing some new pieces – he’d started composing music as well as simply learning it, and that was a finicky business. Not only did he need to worry about the musical composition itself, like any normal musician, but there was also interweaving the spiritual energies and figuring out the way the song could be used as a spell, which was a completely different and often completely contradictory set of rules.

Moreover, the most powerful song-spells, he knew, were the ones that incorporated and drew on emotion, and he’d always had difficulty with those. Like most of his clan, Lan Qiren cleaved towards the more intellectual melodies, difficult but cold and distant, yet if he wanted to be truly innovative, he would need to find melodies in his heart.

Not long before he went to the Nightless City he had been inspired in a dream with a half-snippet of sound, which he had been painstakingly building up into a song in fits and starts, but recently he had found that whenever he played it the only image that came to mind was that of pearls scattered amidst blood-red mud.

The song was good, though, although it felt unfinished and incomplete. After he emerged from seclusion, he played it for his music teacher, first without qi and then with, demonstrating the suffocating and asphyxiating feeling of it – a heavy stone sitting in the midst of his chest, all his misery and anxieties wrapped up into musical notes – and his music teacher had been thrilled.

“You were born to write tragedies, child,” he said, examining the score proudly. “This is not only good but innovative, a new style with unexpected effects. I look forward to seeing you refine this further, and to your future works.”

Lan Qiren saluted deeply.

Music was just about the only thing that was going right for him at the moment.

The other disciples had been lured back into gossip by his presence, consumed by curiosity, and the teachers had come down on it hard, breeding resentment; even his few friends had been made tired by the whole fuss and only wanted it to die down. The rumors went by swiftly and quickly, anything to do with the Wen sect or the Nightless City almost immediately spread around everywhere, reaching his ears almost immediately upon his exit from seclusion.

One in particular caused him alarm, suggesting that Madame Wen had been discarded or even killed immediately after successfully bearing a son to her husband, but Lan Yueheng had convinced Lan Ganhui, always good at making friends, to write to the Wen sect disciples he’d become friendly with in the Nightless City to find out the truth. In the end, it turned out that Wen Ruohan had merely grown more distant from her, instructing her to go into seclusion for the birth a little early, and had perhaps sarcastically sent her a few treatises on the subject of a wife’s duty to support her husband. In the end, Wen Ruohan was an ambitious and ruthless man who encouraged his sect to take him as his model - as he himself had remarked, Madame Wen’s viciousness in fact demonstrated how she was an excellent match for him.

Lan Qiren hated that he was relieved that Wen Ruohan had not taken out his rage at what had happened on his wife, who had instigated the incident. He hated even more his suspicions that Wen Ruohan might have refrained from doing so not out of morality but out of the thought that Lan Qiren himself might disapprove - he wasn’t sure if that thought made him happy or sad.

At any rate, he soon didn’t have time to worry about things like that.

Lan Qiren’s refusal to explain in any detail what had happened at the Nightless City that had sent him fleeing and retreating into seclusion was largely not accepted by his curious peers, especially when someone had jeeringly pointed out that he’d probably told Cangse Sanren the whole thing already, and he refused to go to his teachers to complain, as he had in his youth.

His brother hadn’t accepted it, either.

He’d given Lan Qiren ten days after exiting seclusion, clearly expecting him to come and report on what had happened. When Lan Qiren had not done so, he had finally grown impatient and found him, demanding to know what it was that he had done that had caused such a fuss.

Lan Qiren had knelt and declared that he was unfilial and disobedient, that he had broken the rules, and requested that his brother punish him for his wrongdoing.

His brother had stared at him for a long time before realizing that Lan Qiren was serious – that he would rather be punished for intentionally breaking the rules against honoring and obeying his elders than tell what he had done or what had happened. Even when he was dragged to the hanshI, his collar pulled tight in his brother’s fist until he was thrown down to kneel in front of their father the sect leader, Lan Qiren did not object; he knelt without complaint, and even pressed his forehead to the ground in deference, but he did not speak.

The punishment his father decided upon for him was harsh, but Lan Qiren accepted it willingly. By the rules of his sect, an accepted punishment expiated a breach of the rules; once punished, he could no longer be persecuted for what he had done to earn the punishment. It would be over and done with.

Of course, there were always ways around that.

Technically, Lan Qiren’s breach was not in refusing to tell what had happened, but in disrespecting his elders by so refusing. A few days after he recovered from his initial punishment, his brother, still furious at having been denied, asked him the same question, with the same result. Their father looked disapprovingly at his eldest son – deliberately exploiting loopholes was not good etiquette – but again imposed a punishment.

Lan Qiren gritted his teeth and endured.

Lan Qiren’s brother did not bother him a third time, but by then it was too late; their relationship continued to deteriorate. Lan Qiren sought to avoid his brother whenever possible, and his brother’s disappointment in him grew; although he did not explicitly complain or impose punishments directly, he made his views clear. Those disciples and teachers that most admired him were, as always, more than willing to follow his lead and fill in the gaps, and for one reason or another Lan Qiren spent more time in the discipline hall than ever before. 

Eventually, noticing the division, others in the sect sought to reconcile them – their teachers, in the most part – but Lan Qiren rebuffed them, having noticed that their requests to be more considerate and free-minded were always aimed at him and never to his brother.

After poor Lan Yueheng, who never cared about anything but his alchemy and his mathematics and, possibly, the particularly indulgent outer-sect female disciple that guarded the stockroom of the ingredients he used to make things explode and regularly looked the other way when he came to get an extra helping, got roped into trying to tell Lan Qiren to be more forgiving, citing rules about fighting within families leading to nothing with a miserable and bemused expression on his face, Lan Qiren went to the teacher in question and rather acidly pointed out the discrepancy.

“He’s your elder,” the teacher said.

“Do not disrespect the younger,” Lan Qiren retorted.

“He’s your family –”

“Am I not his?”

The teacher sighed. “It’s not the same, with him. You know how he is – how he’s always been.”

Lan Qiren knew. Still, he said, “If you can identify where my conduct does not live up to the rules, please do so, and I will consider if my conduct requires modification. At the moment, I do not.”

“Qiren…”

“Why must I always be the one to yield?” Lan Qiren demanded. “I didn’t answer one question, and I took the punishment for it, as was my right. He is the one who is insisting on making a fuss, not me – why come to me? I don’t want anything from him.”

“That’s the problem. You shouldn’t fight so – why this, why now? You’ve always yielded to him before.”

Lan Qiren said nothing.

“He’s still your elder brother, Qiren. Soon, he’ll be your sect leader.”

“Do not fear the strong; do not bully the weak,” Lan Qiren said. “Being sect leader makes him more responsible, not less.”

“Qiren –”

“I have been a good brother to him for nearly twenty years, honored teacher. Perhaps not the most promising, perhaps somewhat embarrassing, but devoted in my own way. I have not changed so much. I am still loyal, still filial; I still do all that I am asked…the only thing that changed is that I expect nothing from him.”

Not even his love.

Lan Qiren knew better, now. He’d seen what a brother could be, what it should be - he’d experienced, however fleetingly, having someone genuinely care for him, listen to him and indulge him and take joy in his company; no longer would he accept his brother’s barely concealed disdain as an adequate substitute.  

“Qiren –”

“Has my father said anything?”

His teacher fell silent.

Lan Qiren bowed his head, having expected nothing better. His father was growing more and more distant from the world, less and less interested in the minutiae of everyday life; he could still stir himself to care for his precious eldest son, the child of his heart, but his oft-forgotten and overlooked second?

Unless Lan Qiren’s brother had complained about him, his father was unlikely to remember that such a person as Lan Qiren even existed.

“Does father hate me?” he asked, emboldened by his misery. It was the question he had always wanted to ask and had never dared to, and his teacher flinched as if struck. “Is that why he never saw me?”

“No,” his teacher said. “No – it wasn’t…”

“Does he blame me for my mother’s death?”

“He blames himself,” his teacher said, and sounded tired unto death. “From the very first. He thought that if he had not been sect leader, they might not have lost their children; if he was not sect leader, it wouldn’t have mattered if they’d had only one child left. But he couldn’t blame the sect, so he blamed himself – you don’t know how bad it was, Qiren; you don’t know what we all went through back then. When your mother died, he even lost his mind for a time.”

“What does that have to do with me?” Lan Qiren demanded. His hands had clenched into fists at some point, his knuckles pale and white. “If he blames himself and not me, then why did he – he never –”

He barely even saw me, he wanted to say. I am his son, just like my brother, yet it’s as if I don’t exist.

Why couldn’t he love me, too?

“You were very young,” his teacher said, his voice suddenly very distant as if he were remembering something. Lan Qiren looked at him in surprise. “I shouldn’t tell you this, but...she had just died, and he had lost his mind; none of us had realized the extent to it, thinking it merely grief. You were young, you didn’t understand. You ran to him, seeking comfort, and he nearly – he couldn’t risk having such a sin on his conscience, Qiren. You should not blame him.”

“What are you saying? That he neglected me and held me at arms’ length to console himself for nearly murdering me?” Lan Qiren asked, and thought back to all the times he had found himself afraid of his father’s glacial voice, terrified for no reason. If his father had tried to kill him in a rage, as his teacher suggested, shouldn’t he have been more scared of the heat than of cold?

Unless - his brilliant and accomplished father, who always acted as the rules said he should but who had lost his heart along with his wife - unless he had knowingly - 

Perhaps it had been the sect that had ordered their separation, not his father. Perhaps his father, who had spent years going through the motions of leadership and caring only about the son that reminded him of his wife’s joy and not the one who reminded him only of her death - his father, who led their sect and raised his eldest son and in so doing taught them all to be like him, overly partial to favorites and overly harsh to those that did not meet expectations - perhaps he had not objected to that arrangements. Perhaps it had been the elders that had set the rule of meeting only once a month, rather than not at all.

Perhaps they had thought that it had been for Lan Qiren’s own good that they had done so.

Perhaps they thought it was for his own good that they encouraged him to yield now to his brother’s temper, to humble himself despite having done nothing wrong, and all for the sake of familial peace.

That was not the conduct mandated by his family’s rules. Not the ones he followed, anyway.

It’s his fault, Lan Qiren thought suddenly. He saw the path we were walking down, my brother and I, and he did nothing to stop it; he loved my brother too much and me too little, and ruined us both through his negligence and indifference. He made my brother think he deserved the world that he then had to hold up on his own, while he made me think I deserved nothing...he could have done better by us. He should have done better by us.

Finding that his teacher had run out of things to say, Lan Qiren saluted him once again.

“I will be filial and loyal, as the rules require,” he said simply. “I will respect and honor my father and brother. Do not doubt that.”

He said no more. Instead, he returned to his quarters, wondering if they thought he was happy about how things stood between him and his brother, who he still loved.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

He thought miserably to himself that he had been happier living in denial, pretending to himself that there was brotherly affection between them, that his brother’s coldness was only because Lan Qiren had spoiled things somehow by being inferior than his brother would have preferred. When he could love his brother whole-heartedly and think to himself that his brother secretly loved him back, when he suspected but did not know that that had only ever been a lie he had concocted for himself. He had been far happier back then than the way it was now, when even the paper-thin one-sided façade of love was gone.

The saddest part of it all was that Lan Qiren still loved his brother, his stupid Lan heart as inexorable as a mountain avalanche already set in motion. He just didn’t much like him.

He did like Wen Ruohan, the brother that liked him back and might even have loved him if a man such as him could recognize such a tender emotion, but that wasn’t really relevant.

Lan Qiren knew his duty, whether to his sect, to his brothers, or to morality. He knew what he had to do.

For his part, Wen Ruohan waited over a month and a half after Lan Qiren’s exit from seclusion before trying to reach out again by mail. No doubt conscious of his dignity and ego, the powerful sect leader that no one ever really denied, his letter talked around the subject in Wen Ruohan’s usual high-handed manner and evaded either apologies or explanations; from his tone, it was likely that he expected Lan Qiren to respond in anger and denial, or even not to respond at all. Instead, Lan Qiren wrote back obediently, reporting dully on his daily life. When pressed, he even wrote a short summary of his ongoing projects, copying the words precisely from the submissions he made for his teachers to avoid excessive enthusiasm.

Wen Ruohan’s letters developed a certain level of concern after that, which Lan Qiren ignored in favor of continuing to respond politely but unenthusiastically; a filial younger brother, just as he was to his own blood brother, and nothing more. At the next discussion conference, he saluted Wen Ruohan to the exact degree required by their relationship and called him xiongzhang as a respectful younger brother ought; Wen Ruohan had an expression on his face that suggested he had bitten into a sour lemon and stepped in dog shit at the same time, and his eyes followed Lan Qiren around for the remainder of the afternoon.

Lan Qiren was concerned for a while that Wen Ruohan would try to summon him once night fell, forcing the issue, but he was saved through an unexpected twist of fate – namely, that Jiang Fengmian had, like all the others, completely misinterpreted Lan Qiren’s relationship with Cangse Sanren. The Jiang sect heir marched up to him not long after the opening ceremonies had been completed and asked him, stiffly, to swear that he had no interest in the lady and would not communicate with her in the future. Lan Qiren, thinking primarily of their friendship, refused, and then Jiang Fengmian punched him right in the face.

Lan Qiren might be cold and standoffish as a rule, but he did have a temper, and that temper did not hold with being assaulted over things that weren’t even his fault – neither of them were even involved with Cangse Sanren! – and having been so thoroughly goaded he had no choice but to hit back.

In the end, Cangse Sanren had slapped Jiang Fengmian silly and Lan Qiren’s brother had sent him to kneel in disgrace all night, reminding him no fighting without permission and with his eyes silently promised additional punishment when they returned home.

Wen Ruohan didn’t disturb him that night, and Lan Qiren was able to persevere. Indeed, Wen Ruohan troubled him much less than he’d feared, opting in his hurt pride to instead turn to Lao Nie and stay remarkably close by his side – Lao Nie was the one who looked apologetically at Lan Qiren and tried to find time for him, whether to invite him on outings or to scold his brother for the apparent breakdown in domestic tranquility. For his part, Lan Qiren ignored Lao Nie and didn’t hold it against him even when he started showing up to the discussion meetings with distinctive red marks on his throat.

All right, he held it against him a little.

How Lao Nie had such bad taste, Lan Qiren had no idea. Surely he, unlike Lan Qiren, had known enough to realize that Wen Ruohan was an evil man…?

Probably he had; it was only that he didn’t much care. Lan Qiren had promised to try to stop lying to himself about people he liked, and that meant he couldn’t pretend that Lao Nie wasn’t a remarkably callous man at times, ruthless and careless with anything that was outside his sect – even his friends. There could be no doubt that he loved them, sincerely and honestly, and yet…

Lan Qiren was a little disappointed, but not much, knowing that he, too, was irrevocably bound to such a man as Wen Ruohan. He couldn’t blame Lao Nie for the same thing he himself had done. 

Mostly he was just pleased that his suspicion regarding their relationship had been confirmed, even if somehow – unbelievably – no one else seemed to notice it.

In fact, he thought it might mark the very first time in his life that he’d figured out something interpersonal before other people had. Normally he would report it to someone at his sect as soon as he noticed that they’d overlooked it, wanting to do his best for them, but the sensation was too novel and his relations with his sect a little too cold at the moment; he hugged the knowledge to his chest instead, enjoying the brief warm feeling of knowing something other people didn’t.

He intended to tell them, of course, once they returned back to the Cloud Recesses, only they had barely brushed the dust of their journey off their shoulders when they were summoned to the gathering hall for what everyone had now expected for years: Lan Qiren’s father, eyes blank, made the announcement that he was officially setting the date for which he would be retiring as sect leader and retreating from the world, going into seclusion to try to break through the boundaries of cultivation and reach the heavens in a single bound or else die in the attempt.

Lan Qiren’s brother, naturally, would inherit.

He was as fresh from the road as the rest of them, but with his hands behind his back, standing beside their father, he looked as fresh and untouched as a new-bloomed orchid, as beautiful as a polished piece of jade. His eyes reflected the dichotomy that Lan Qiren had learned governed his brother’s life: pride, for the power that he was going to inherit and the accomplishments that everyone agreed made him worthy of that inheritance, and envy, looking at his own father with jealousy, longing also to withdraw from the weight the world had placed on him and do what he could on his own, unburdened by others.

Lan Qiren’s brother, Lan Qiren had learned, saw everything in his life through the prism of himself – did others have something he wanted, did he have something that they didn’t, how did he compare, was he being compared…when he got something into his mind, he cared for nothing else but how to achieve it, no matter the cost, and most of the time he was successful, too. He was fundamentally self-sufficient, requiring nothing and no one but himself, and so was capable of performing miracles – if he was motivated to do so.

Lan Qiren was much less capable. He was lacking in cultivation, lacking in social skills, lacking even in a similar degree of independence, longing as he did for the company and acceptance of his peers even as his introversion demanded sufficient time to himself. There was no way in which he was superior to his brother; in every respect, he was inferior.

And yet, sometimes, he thought that his brother was jealous of him, too.

(Their father retreating into seclusion meant that they would both be losing him – but it was really only Lan Qiren’s brother that lost something. For Lan Qiren, what he mourned was only the absence of what had never been there, and he had finished mourning for that already.)

In the end, the main change occasioned by the impending change in leadership was that Lan Qiren’s brother grew too busy to pay much attention to Lan Qiren, much to his relief. Relations between them grew…not warmer, no, but less fraught, and although Lan Qiren knew he ought to celebrate, he mostly mourned that the cause of it was not a real mending of fences but rather his brother simply forgetting that he existed, just as their father always had.

Lan Qiren took the first opportunity he had to get out of the Cloud Recesses, even attending a party to celebrate sworn brother’s new son with relatively little issue. During the visit, Wen Ruohan ignored him in favor of sticking ever closer to a strangely distracted Lao Nie, almost as if he were deliberately slighting Lan Qiren for having been cold in their last interaction and for not answering his letters the way he wanted. Lan Qiren briefly felt hurt at having been put aside and forgotten so quickly - assuming that he had been forgotten, which he wasn’t sure of, as Wen Ruohan ignoring him sometimes seemed almost performative - but then reminded himself that this, like his poor relationship with his blood brother, was only the results of his own actions, and those of others.

He didn’t – regret it, not really. He’d lived his life by the Lan sect rules, and he didn’t regret doing so now, no matter how lonely the results might make him feel.

Instead, he returned to the Cloud Recesses and began to plan out in earnest his plans for departing the Cloud Recesses to travel the world as a musician, the goal he had set since he was young and was finally, impossibly, on the verge of satisfying. He would need to stay for his brother’s ascension to sect leader the next year, he thought, and perhaps for a year after that – just because their relationship wasn’t good didn’t mean he was entitled to do things that would let other people talk about it – but after that…

After that, he would go.

He would make new friends, or not. He would learn new things. He would see what the world was like.

Sooner than he thought, Lan Qiren turned twenty, thereby finally becoming an adult. The event took place with little fanfare, and Lan Qiren sent back the gifts he received from both Wen Ruohan and Lao Nie unopened with a polite note indicating that he was unworthy of such attention, and Cangse Sanren’s with a much more emphatic note reminding her that he was largely uninterested in sexual matters and therefore had no need for these sorts of implements. 

His brother got him new guqin strings, the same gift he always gave – Lan Qiren had once been very happy to receive it before he realized that it was the storeroom distributing the gift in his brother’s name – and Lan Qiren returned that as well. Lan Yueheng was the only one who successfully managed to give him a gift by virtue of sneaking the fancy brush he’d bought for him into his table in such a way that Lan Qiren utilized it before realizing it was new, and then refused to take it back on the basis that it had already been used. He looked so pleased with himself over his little trick that Lan Qiren didn’t have the heart to scold him.

Time continued to pass: day by day, night by night, season by season.

And then she arrived.

[clare-with-no-i]

K, S and U

Have a lovely day my love xx

aw helloooo my love! so great to hear from you :)

K: What’s the angstiest idea you’ve ever come up with?

oof. answered this one talking about derelict, but I think my story about Regulus and Sirius reuniting in the afterlife was pretty angsty. other than that, probably just some brutal order-era things! war-time Jily is one of my favorite things to write but also lends itself to being very angsty :/

S: Any fandom tropes you can’t resist?

I love when all of the friends know that the two people are being idiots and love each other, but the two individuals themselves are completely oblivious and convinced the other doesn't like them back. it's SO FUN

U: Share three of your favorite fic writers and why you like them so much.

oh my GOD. ok this is absolutely brutal - you want me to pick three?! I have SO MANY.

have to of course say @thequibblah because, and I know I always say this, I was a massive fan before we ever spoke, and I continue to be blown away by her and am one of her biggest fans, but I won't say more than that because neither of us can handle when the other is too nice. so. NEXT I'm in love with @theesteemedladydebourgh 's works, her content is always so amazing, and that snippeted bi!Lily piece brought me to such violent tears LOL. she's so succinct and so powerful, it's always a gut-punch when she goes for your emotions. thirdly (though I still resent being given only three spaces) is @mabeltothknows, who is not only absolutely hilarious but is just…so gifted. "The Summer of Dying" sent me into the stratosphere. she has such incredible mastery over her stories, and everything is written with such care and such intention. oof.

I seriously can't believe I'm only allowed three, this is bullshit I have so many more people to talk about and because I'm a rebel I'm going to tag @sunshinemarauder because kat is supremely gifted and SO creative; she comes out with such brilliant premises for stories and always executes; @jilyesplz you literally already know, CC. you just already know. @emerqldv is prosaic and wonderful and just takes you on these beautiful, wistful journeys; @firefeufuego2 's "it's all about the gazing" mentality is just…insane. rugby james and the followup have me dead constantly. @cesays needs to be locked up for her angst but also not because I want her to produce more of it all the time.

there are more of you that I want to tag but I'm going to not bombard everyone I follow with notifs, but just know that I am a fan of so many people here and I will absolutely be spamming people's stories with my bs now that the test is over and I might have, like, two minutes of free time to myself

thank you so much for these questions my love!! <3 sending you love

[sundiscus]

wangxian dragon age au: ficlet

[part of a larger au i’ve mapped out + started drafting, but want to post as snippets for now! i’ve taken many liberties with the worldbuilding, and as such i think most can be inferred with context if you’re unfamiliar with dragon age.

part one now here

this snippet: the meet-ugly, ~1.7k]

✨✨✨

When Lan Wangji wakes up, he isn’t alone.

He doesn’t realize it right away. The first thing he notices is that, this time, there are no shackles. He shifts his hands the slightest bit, enough to confirm they are indeed free. The movement pulls at the little cuts on his fingers and forearms from where the shackles shattered apart, already scabbing over—so he has been unconscious long enough for the magebane to burn out of his system, which he confirms, finding his meridians free and clear. He’s lying on his back, something that feels slightly too soft to be a stone floor under him and something that feels slightly too rough to be a blanket draped over him. An odd green light pulses against his eyelids and the only sound is a muted, continuous hiss, like a distant waterfall. Wherever he is, it isn’t the cell from earlier.

It doesn’t matter. He won’t be here long.

He takes one more slow breath, listening closely. There. To his left, a few paces away, he hears a tiny, cut-off inhale. Now he knows where to aim. His eyes fly open as he launches himself upright, summoning his sword into his raised hand, and—

It’s like expecting the ocean and finding only a puddle. His sword flickers into existence for the barest moment, its glow illuminating a circle of stone walls, a pallet beneath him, and then Lan Wangji’s lungs stutter, pressure squeezing his temples, as if all air has been sucked out of the room. Bichen dissipates and Lan Wangji is left gasping, one hand still raised uselessly in the air.

From the shadows, someone says: “Ah, that’s not going to work.”

Lan Wangji is already looking to the side. He sees only a figure at first, because when his sword disappeared so had the strange, omnipresent green glow. The glow returns now, slowly illuminating a young man curled against the opposite wall, his hair a dark, tangled wave over his shoulders, wrists chained together with thick iron manacles. For a moment his eyes, staring right back at Lan Wangji, are the brightest thing in the room.

“What do you mean?” Lan Wangji demands, finding his voice. “Is there a suppression array?” It must be powerful to choke off his magic so finitely. If he can see it, though, he can figure out how to undo it.

The man wrinkles his nose. “Not exactly. But—ah, ah,” he says as Lan Wangji starts to stand, “don’t move too fast, the blowback from that is going to be pretty harsh.”

Lan Wangji understands almost instantly as a wave of vertigo hits him. His knees buckle before he’s halfway to his feet and he collapses back on the pallet, bracing his weight on his elbow to keep from falling entirely. When his ears stop ringing he can hear his own ragged breathing.

Enough, he thinks, and forces himself to even his breaths. To shift focus. Clearly whatever precautions Wen Chao and his soldiers have taken to secure this room go beyond magebane and a simple suppression array. He won’t be able to escape by sheer force like last time, but this will still be no more than a brief detour on his journey. He will make sure of it.

Yesterday—was it yesterday, now? The chamber has no windows, just the eerie green glow emanating from the walls—Lan Wangji had been traveling with a retinue of junior enchanters to retrieve research texts from the Circle in Hedong, where scholars claimed to have promising studies related to fade rifts. They were nearly there when a raven alighted on Lan Wangji’s shoulder, bearing the message: Siege on Gusu Circle. Reconvene to the north. He’d sent the junior enchanters ahead and turned back before the raven even took flight.

(The note had not mentioned his brother, so his brother must be alive. Rumors were already spreading outward from Gusu as he rode, saying Wen Xu had an archdemon, Wen Xu burned the Gusu library to the ground. They did not say Wen Xu killed Zewu-jun, Wen Xu killed a mage with a glowing hand. So his brother must have escaped. Knowing this did not stop Lan Wangji’s heart from racing as he spurred his horse faster, past refugee settlements and Templar camps, toward the distant gash in the sky.)

And then: a poisoned arrow biting into his arm, his horse crumpling on a hardpacked road outside Lingchuan. The Wen soldiers, ready for him. (Not ready enough, when at least six of their bodies fell before Lan Wangji did.) One day in the first cell, his failed escape attempt.

And now: magicless, trapped in a strange room with a strange, sharp-eyed prisoner watching him struggle to sit upright, the slow crawl of time a physical weight on Lan Wangji’s shoulders.

“Honestly, just ride it out,” the prisoner is saying. He has his chained hands up and open, like he’s trying to calm a spooked animal. “You’ll feel better in about an hour. Maybe less, if you’ve had a good meal recently.”

Lan Wangji’s head spins sickeningly. He ignores it, pushing himself up until he can prop himself against the wall, putting himself eye-level with the prisoner, at least.

“Or sit up anyway, I suppose,” the prisoner says. His voice has a ragged edge, as if it’s scraping its way out of his throat. “Sorry, I’d offer you some water, but I drank it all before I knew I’d have company. What are you doing here, anyway?”

If First Enchanter Lan wants his nephew back, he’ll have to lend us a few books, Wen Chao had mocked from outside the first cell. And if he wants you back with all your limbs attached, he’ll have to throw in trading deeds with the eastern lyrium mines for good measure. Do you think he can deliver that before you die here?

Wen Chao wanted demonic texts, Lan Wangji had guessed, the ones hidden deep within the library. No doubt for some dangerous, power-hungry scheme, and no doubt connected to the rifts. From there, it wasn’t hard to piece together that the attack on the Circle was meant to discover which texts were critical enough to be rescued and transported away, and likely steal them in transit. There are protocols for such events, Lan Wangji knows, and his presence here means the raid was unsuccessful, and he will be used as leverage for a second attempt.

If Wen Chao meant to scare Lan Wangji with his demands, he had only succeeded in doing the opposite. Because if all they want from Lan Wangji’s family are books and deeds, it means they don’t know about his brother yet.

Lan Wangji doesn’t share any of this. “Political prisoner,” is all he says.

“Ahh.” The man nods. “I figured, what with the…” He gestures at his own forehead, chains clinking as he does. “You’re obviously a Lan. Someone will pay well to have you back home.”

“They should not have to pay at all,” Lan Wangji bites out. Something about the prisoner’s casual attitude grates at him. The world outside is quite literally falling apart at the seams, and Lan Wangji doesn’t have time to be used as bait in Wen Chao’s small-minded games.

The prisoner shrugs. “Yeah, but there’s not much choice at the moment, is there? For now you’re stuck here with me. I’m—my name is Wei Ying, by the way. What should I call you, while we wait?”

“Do the Wen soldiers enter this cell often?” Lan Wangji says instead of answering. “Is there a chance of overpowering them?”

A grimace. “Often enough. And no, I’ve tried. They’re stupid, but they’re prepared.”

Lan Wangji casts another glance over the man—Wei Ying—and carefully keeps any skepticism out of his expression. Then he looks around properly for the first time. Wei Ying is right—there’s no visible array on the floor, no glyphs on the circular stone walls. The green glow fades as it climbs the wall, leaving the ceiling cloaked in shadow and dizzying to look at, like an endless tunnel. Disturbingly, there isn’t a visible door, either. There isn’t much of anything but the one straw pallet, a lidded pot against the wall, an empty bowl next to Wei Ying, bone-dry, and Wei Ying himself.

“A Lan,” Wei Ying says when Lan Wangji is silent for long enough, pitched low, almost like he’s talking to himself. “I’m surprised Wen Chao would be so bold. He has to know that won’t go over well in the long run, I wonder if his father has any idea? No, he would’ve sent Wen Xu. Maybe Wen Chao thinks that by the time someone comes for you, he’ll have—” Wei Ying cuts himself off. Blinks. “You are real, aren’t you?”

Lan Wangji narrows his eyes. “What do you mean?”

“Oh, you’re not…” Wei Ying waves a hand at the room around them. “But, ah, why would I dream up a whole Knight-Enchanter? A Lan at that? You felt real enough, when I dragged you onto the pallet, but it’s still hard to tell.” Lan Wangji must have some reaction to that—to knowing this stranger’s hands have been on him, when he was unconscious—because Wei Ying adds, defensive: “What was I supposed to do? They left you on the floor.”

Lan Wangji doesn’t have an answer to that.

Wei Ying tips his head back against the wall. “Well. Your Circle, they have your phylactery, right? They’ll find you. Pay the ransom, or lay siege to Wen Chao’s little fortress here. That would be nice.” He casts his gaze over Lan Wangji again. “Looks like our captors were gentle enough in the meanwhile.”

There’s dried blood tugging at the hair of Lan Wangji’s temple, and he still has the nauseating sense that if he moves too fast he might collapse again. Gentle isn’t how Lan Wangji would describe his treatment so far. But it is also far below the threshold of what he can withstand, so it doesn’t seem like a point worth arguing. “And you?” he hears himself say.

“Uh.” Wei Ying shifts and holds up his shackled hands. “Less gentle, I suppose.”

“I meant—who will be paying your ransom.”

Wei Ying drops his hands into his lap. “Oh. No one.”

“Then,” Lan Wangji says, “why are you here?”

For the first time, Wei Ying flashes a smile. A hooked dagger in the dim light.

“I have something they want.”

[tennessoui]

40 or 43 if you’re still taking prompts! i love ur AUs they’re so beautiful and contain so much brilliance within a short snippet!

it's been so long, anon, you probably forgot you sent this but here is prompt 40, exes meeting after not seeing each other for a long time. in true tennessoui fashion, they don't. actually. meet and/or see each other in this snippet. also in true tennessoui fashion, all tennessoui needs to decide to continue this is one (1) validation.

the backstory here is something i have been thinking about for days after a discord convo, where during the fight on mustafar, obi-wan hits anakin hard enough in the head that he loses all of his memories. obi-wan takes him with him for a few months but the wounds of Order 66 and vaderkin's role in what happened is too fresh for obi-wan to (understandably) get over, even if this anakin doesn't remember doing it, so they separate. this is set 8 years after Mustafar.

(1.7k)

“Kenobi won’t come,” the fighter pilot says immediately upon disembarking from his craft.

One commander lets out a groan. Someone else hits the durasteel side of the closest x-wing with a closed fist.

“Do we really need him?” Anakin demands, crossing his arms over his chest. “It’s been eight years since the rise of the Empire. Surely a washed-up Jedi General from the Clone Wars won’t have people jumping to join the Rebellion!”

No one meets his eye. In fact, the air room suddenly feels very, very uncomfortable.

Organa exhales heavily and turns to look at Anakin, which is rare because the man never voluntarily looks at Anakin. “There are few names from that time that still carry an untainted weight in the eyes of the galaxy. Obi-Wan Kenobi is one of them.”

“I grew up hearing about The Team!” A teenager says eagerly. “I’d join any resistance movement if I knew both of ‘em were fighting with me!”

“You’re already a part of a resistance movement,” a girl next to him pointed out waspishly.

The boy waves her off. “Skywalker and Kenobi, saving the galaxy! It’d be wizard to be a part of that, and you know it, Aasha!”

Anakin’s throat tightens at that name. Skywalker. His name. Or, his old name. He has no more connection to it now than he does to the name Kenobi or Organa. They’re just letters.

He catches Organa’s eye. The man is looking at him with a mix of curiosity and wariness. Anakin knows instinctively that this is another one of the man’s tests. Will this time be the time that whatever injury has kept his memories suppressed for eight years is undone, and his previous life comes thundering through his mind?

He’s sick of these tests. He’s never failed one, but Organa never comes closer to trusting him afterward. He can only assume that whatever Anakin Skywalker had done in his last few days alive had been so terrible that only a few people knew the truth, and those who did would never forgive any version of him for it.

Organa certainly knew, though he had never shared that information with Anakin. And.

And Kenobi did as well. That was clear. They’d only been together for five standard months, sharing a small spacecraft made smaller by the fear, agony, grief, fury, and hurt radiating off of his companion into the space around them.

It had been hard to tell at the time if one of the things Obi-Wan Kenobi had been grieving was the loss of Anakin Skywalker. Anakin isn’t sure Kenobi would have been able to answer that either.

Some part of him that usually rests dormant in the back of his mind stirs and hisses that it had to have been. That Skywalker’s loss had torn Kenobi’s soul to shreds.

This doesn’t necessarily feel like his own thought, but it’s quite hard to ignore. He wants to rub a hand against his aching head, but that surely would tip off Organa that something’s--what? That he’s having thoughts?

Perish the very idea.

One would think Anakin hadn’t joined the Rebellion of his own free will. That Anakin hadn’t spent three standard months on the planet Kenobi had left him on before catching wind of the existence of the Rebel Alliance, that he hadn’t risked life and limb (more limb, apparently, given his missing flesh hand) to find them afterwards. He hadn’t known much anything about himself, but he had known that he hadn’t liked what the Imperial troops were doing, how much destruction they were causing, how the people they were supposed to be protecting hid in fear of their white armor.

Something in Anakin had rebelled at that, had thought it wrong and twisted. Someone needs to stop them, he’d thought. So he had found the people that were trying to.

And yes, a small part of him had thought--perhaps hoped--that Obi-Wan Kenobi would be a part of the Rebel Alliance by the time Anakin made his way to their biggest base. He had thought--perhaps hoped--that he would be able to prove himself to the other man. Look, he had wanted to scream at Kenobi, I’m not like that other Anakin, I would never do what he did. You can trust me. You can look me in the eye, I won’t stab you in the back.

Because something in him had yearned, still yearns, for Kenobi’s approval. For the weight of his gaze settling warmly around his shoulders. For his small smiles, his calloused hand clasping the back of Anakin’s head to bring their foreheads together in a gentle tap hello.

These are things Anakin knows he’s never experienced. But he must have in his past life, because his whole body will ache for them like a phantom limb. It’s been seven years and a few months since he last saw Kenobi.

“I’ll go,” Anakin says, which is what he said the last time they were standing like this, huddled around a fighter pilot delivering the same message of failure.

Organa’s mouth tightens in displeasure, and Mothma places a hand on his arm in warning.

Everyone else falls silent around them, as if recognizing the fact that they’re in the middle of a brewing storm, and they’re lucky to be in its eye right now.

“I do not think--” Organa starts, but Anakin cuts him off, crossing his arms even tighter over his chest, as if to hold himself back. The force suppression collar around his neck grows warmer, but it holds. It always holds.

“You’re already sending men who look like me to him!” Anakin points out irately. “The last four men could have been related to me!” It’s something Anakin’s thought about in the past but never said out loud. He’s glad to say it now though, especially because Organa flushes a bit which means Anakin’s right. “Just send me! If it doesn’t work, nothing in the galaxy will!”

Now, Anakin isn’t sure that’s true at all. He’s taking a huge leap with this, but it’s been seven years and a few months since he saw Obi-Wan Kenobi in person, and every part of him is aching with the desire to lay eyes on the man again. Will he hate him still? Will he see all the differences Anakin’s made to his appearance? Will he like them? He fights the urge to run a hand over his shorn hair.

Will Obi-Wan even let him through the door?

The people around them are murmuring now. They don’t know what Organa knows, what Anakin has guessed at: that Skywalker died a traitor to the Republic, that he had tried to strike down Obi-Wan like the Emperor struck down the rest of the Jedi. To them, these fortunate outsiders, they’re wondering why Anakin Skywalker hasn’t already been sent to locate and bring back their errant General.

Before, Anakin’s offer had been quiet, easily ignored over someone else’s. Now he’s loud and confident. Impossible to turn away without making a public scene, without explaining why. And Organa has tried very hard not to do that. For whatever reason, Anakin doesn’t know. All he knows is that after he’d been examined by a battalion of med droids and interrogated by all three leaders of the Rebellion, Organa had given him a list of rules he had to follow in order to join the Rebel Alliance. Firstly, never remove his cuffs and collar.

It’s not a slave collar and it won’t electrocute you if you touch it or try to take it off, Organa had told him when he’d blanched away at the sight. But I have been informed by a trusted ally that the Chance--the Emperor knows your Force Signature intimately. We cannot risk being found. It would kill all hope for us.

Secondly, never confirm his identity. Never talk about who he used to be.

People will know, Organa had grudgingly admitted. Skywalker was one of the faces of the Clone Wars. But you cannot confirm it. In fact.

Thirdly, give up the name Skywalker. Pick another last name, if not first as well.

But Anakin had been attached to his first name for some reason he didn’t know how to begin to question, so even after he toyed with the idea of changing it completely, he couldn’t go through with it. Weeks later he had shown up in Organa’s makeshift office.

I had a mother, didn’t I? He had asked, causing Organa to stiffen immediately.

Do you remember? Organa had interrogated immediately, his standard greeting for Anakin. Anakin had gotten the feeling, especially in those early days, that Organa was waiting with baited breath for Anakin to remember so he could try him for war crimes or treason or whatever it was that Skywalker had done.

No, he had responded honestly. Just a feeling. If I am to take a new last name, I want her name.

A few days later, Anakin had stumbled into his bunk, tired from a day of hard training, to see a packet of documents on his pillow.

Anakin Shmison was written at the top of the first page.

The list of rules goes on and on.

But nowhere does it say that Anakin Shmison isn’t allowed to mention Obi-Wan Kenobi in public. He just never has, because even the sound of the man’s name makes him feel very nauseous, a combination of butterflies and adder snakes wrestling around inside his stomach.

Bail Organa is looking like he’s regretting that oversight right now, but Anakin has backed him quite solidly into a proverbial corner. Either finally tell everyone what happened between Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi in the last few hours of the Republic, or give Anakin Shmison leave to retrieve Kenobi.

“Fine,” Organa gets out, jaw locked and vein throbbing in his temple. Anakin has the distinct feeling he’se spent a lot of his life on the receiving end of that expression. “Have this X-Wing refueled, and leave tonight.”

“No sir,” Anakin says, enjoying the way one of the man’s eyebrows shoot up in angry incredulity.

“No?” Organa asks. “Would you like more beauty rest, perhaps, Shmison?”

“No sir, I don’t need it,” this time he doesn’t resist running a hand through his hair, messing with its part so his longer bangs fall to one side and balance out the mysterious scar that bisects his eyebrow. He grins. “But I will need a craft that sits two. For the return trip.”

[mercurial-madhouse]

Last Line and Snippet Tag

I've been on a writing break these past few weeks, but in the interim, so many amazing souls have shared pieces of their upcoming fics with me. I've loved every moment of being able to see what everyone is up to! Thank you so much @oldbay-on-apples​ @larryyouknow​ @crinkle-eyed-boo​ @zannithinks​ @evilovesyou​ @pocketsunshineharry​ @mugglemirror​ @lululawrence​ @kingsofeverything​ @reminiscingintherain​ @sadaveniren​ @quelsentiment​ @londonfoginacup​ @brightgolden​ @solvetheminourdreams​ @justalarryblog​ @allwaswell16​ @dehydratedpoolfics​ @haztobegood​ and @cyantific​ !!! I'm tagging you all back for last line, snippet, or both! Whatever you'd like to share if you have anything! Also, @theisolatedlily​​ @fallinglikethis​​ and @louandhazaf​​ ? Anything to share?

I’ve decided to combine my tags. A first/last line from one WIP, and a snippet from another.

LAST LINE

This is the first line of a fic I’m writing based on the awesome prompt @haztobegood​ sent me. This fic may or may not make it into @wordplayfics​ depending on how quickly I can write it.

The last time he woke up was eight months, twenty-eight days, and two hours ago.

SNIPPET

This is a snip from my Larry ABO Sheet Anchor, originally a prompt for the @1daboficfest​. (You can find more about the plot here.)  @pocketsunshineharry​ is amazing and is letting me post it ‘better late than never’! It’s longer because I’ve been away and this is so unedited it’s comical.

“He can’t just drop, Haz. Omegas don’t drop anymore except maybe if they’ve some underlying medical condition. Tommo’s a Premier League athlete.”

“Well when has ‘that’s not possible’ ever stopped Lou? That’s his bloody password to do whatever you tell him he can’t do, Liam! I’m telling you, he’s dropped and I don’t have time to prove it to you.” 

Sucking in another breath, Harry attempts to quell the rush of fear surging through him. He tucks the phone against his other shoulder, freeing his hand to brush stray strands out of Louis’s face. 

When Louis doesn’t respond to his touch, anxiety grips Harry’s heart so his words come out strained. “It’s already been five minutes. I need to know what to do, Li. I can’t wake him. He can’t hear me.”

“Are you alone?”

The Harry glances around the unfamiliar bedroom as he answers. “Yea. Yea we’re alone.”

“You’re sure there’re no alphas nearby?”

The sweat still cooling over his naked body heightens the freeze of dread oozing down Harry’s spine. Letting go of Louis is like getting a body that’s not his own to obey his commands. The air outside the sheets, away from Louis’s heat, needles into his skin. He peeks through the closed curtains at the empty street. The door to this bedroom creaks as he opens it a sliver to peer out. He strains to hear over the thud of blood rushing in his ears, listening for any signs of movement in the empty flat.

Louis’s omega abilities allow him to hear far better than Harry can. Until now they’ve relied on his heightened senses. Harry’s tried to make up for that shortcoming by paying attention to every little detail, but he knows biologically there’s only so much he can do.

“There’s no one here. We’re alone.” He snicks the door closed, flicks the deadbolt just in case. 

“No threats?” Liam asks as Harry darts back to Louis’ side and settles Louis against him once more.

“Besides what’s already happened to us?” Harry shakes his head, pushing out a slow breath as he curls Louis closer to his chest. “It’s just us. I don’t know what happened, Li. We were having sex and he just dropped.”

“What?”

Disbelief colours Liam’s tone so stark that Harry struggles to keep his heartbeat even and not succumb to his own shock. 

The moment Liam flicks into doctor mode lances a rush of pure panic through Harry’s nervous system.

“Were you trying something new? Toys? Breathplay? Bondage?”

Harry wishes Liam had stayed in friend mode and quipped about not wanting to hear about his best mates’ sex lives. If Liam feels the need to go into doctor mode, it’s because he’s really fucking worried.

“No! Nothing! Payno, we were just-” Harry buries his nose in Louis’s hair, forcing himself to take a deep breath. This can’t be happening. Not here. Not now. His grip on the new phone tightens until the edges dig into his palm and knuckles. “We were just… Christ, we were just making love.”

His throat closes over the words. It’s the first time they’ve made love since everything’s happened. He’s risking everything just calling Liam, but Louis needs help. “There was nothing wrong. I didn’t go anywhere near his bondmark.”

Even with Louis tucked sideways against his chest, Harry’s staying as far away from it as he can be. Any contact now with the tender, darker patch of skin just above Louis’s right collarbone will only drag him further into his drop and away from Harry.

[kayecorral]

Freight Car

Chapter One of the Brown Book Series

Rating: Mature

Warnings: Mentions of violence, PTSD (!), swearing

Word Count: 3.4k

Series Summary: Nine years ago, The Winter Soldier murdered your friend in front of you. Nine years later, Bucky Barnes shows up at your door with the hope of making amends.

⭑⭑⭑

⭑⭑

⭑

You wake up on the floor again.

In the crossfade between dreaming to waking, the hardwood is concrete against your cheek. The sweat in your hair is the slick of blood. You fade in and out, and awareness comes back slowly. A siren descends, moving closer and closer, then recedes into the quiet. You don’t know if you imagined it.

You do know that your alarm isn’t blaring. Your ringtone isn’t sounding. The birds chattering and chirping at your window are real. The steady knocking of your heart against your ribs is real. Maybe that’s enough.

You open your eyes. A sliver of light from the parted curtains cuts across the floor. Above it, dust dances in the still air. All is calm. If you had woken up in your bed, this would be a good morning.  

But you didn’t wake up in your bed. So, you peel yourself off the floor and half-walk, half-limp to the bathroom. As you cross the threshold and flick on the light, a face flashes before you. Before your mind can work to discern its features, you slam the door shut and flip the switch. You cry in the dark.

⭑⭑⭑

You call into work again.

You’re tempted to stay where you are—curled in on yourself under the covers—but Dr. Kaplan’s gentle voice prods from inside your skull.  “Trauma changes over time,” it says. “You have to face it as it comes. You’ll feel worse if you put off dealing with it.”

She picks up on the second ring. Judging by the sound of clinking silverware, she’s on her lunch break. You promise to keep this impromptu session short.

“I haven’t had a nightmare like that in a long time. That’s why it hit me so hard, I think.” You begin. Your eyes fill with tears. You don’t know why. The nightmare is so distant now — just bits of feeling. Your brain is scrubbing away the memory like a mounted defense.

You’re quiet for what feels like minutes, and Dr. Kaplan just waits. She doesn’t pose a question or make a suggestion: in other words, she doesn’t offer an out. She never does. At first, her silence and seemingly unending patience unnerved you. You would later understand the value of having the space to organize your thoughts before speaking them.  

“I thought I was doing better,” you eventually say. “But now, it’s like I’m back where I started.”

“You are not back where you started,” she says. “We haven’t talked about your night terrors in months when we used to talk about them every session. That’s incredible progress. You should be proud of how far you’ve come.”

You hold the phone away so she can’t hear the tears in your voice. “But what does it mean? ”

“Well,” she pauses. “Have you been thinking about Jean lately?”

“Kind of,” you start to say, then remember Dr. Kaplan’s rule about specifics. “I’ve probably thought about her… twice in the past week. Marie, she, uh, she sent me a Facebook request.”

“Did you accept it?” She asks, with just a hint of amusement.

“I haven’t. I don’t know if I should.”

“Why not?” Dr. Kaplan asks. She knows the answer, of course. You haven’t spoken to Marie since the funeral nearly a decade ago. You know she resents you. You saw it in the tightness of her smiles and the way her eyes turned to stone as you stood before Jean’s casket. You’re alive and her sister isn’t. You understand that. What you don’t understand is why she would reach out to you after so many years.

“I’m afraid of what she’ll say,” you admit.

“It wasn’t your fault.” Dr. Kaplan says. You shift on the couch. “She knows that. Maybe she’s been thinking about Jean, too.”

“Yeah,” you respond simply. Your head is light from dehydration, and you should probably take a nap at some point.

“I’d recommend you take easy today…”

“But?”

“But next week, I’d like to hear about your Facebook convo.”

You smile. The tears have dried on your face.

⭑⭑⭑

Snippets of dialogue filter through your thoughts. A woman is talking about a missing child, and a detective is asking the “who, what, where”s. It’s an episode you’ve already seen, but it makes for good background noise: the dramatic stings, the fast-talking, the screech of tires as the driver peels off. You don’t know why you gravitate towards crime shows. It might be a bit morbid, but until now, you’ve never thought to mention it to Dr. Kaplan.

You’re almost done with the cake batter. It’s looking a little watery, though. You really should have followed the recipe instead of improvising.

You reach for the flour bag on the counter, and just as you raise it to the mixing bowl, someone knocks at your door. You jolt and the bag slips from your hands. You narrowly dodge as it plummets to the ground. It lands with a  thump and now, your feet and pants and floor are covered in a film of white powder.

“Fuck,” you breathe.

There’s another knock, a bit louder this time.

“Give me — give me just a minute!” You call out, voice frayed.

You step over your mess and towards the door. You notice how slick your hand is on the doorknob, so you wipe your hands on your pants and try again. You forget your ritual of checking and re-checking the peephole. You unlock the door, already anxious at the idea of keeping anyone waiting.

When you finally swing the door open, a tall, dark-haired white guy is staring at the carpeted hallway floor. He’s not looking at you, but you feel exposed in your flimsy tank top and flour-splattered pajama pants.

Meanwhile, his look is carefully nondescript: a leather jacket, a dark shirt, and jeans. His hands are stuffed into his pockets and his shoulders are slightly hunched. He looks like someone who doesn’t  want to be seen, but here he is, standing at your door.

Maybe he’s just a neighbor on a reluctant mission to convince you to turn your volume down. Maybe he’s a dealer at the wrong address. Maybe he —

Your stomach drops. The shadows had been obscuring his face, but now that he’s tilting his chin up to look at you… the broadness of his forehead, the color of his hair, his height, all these things pull together. They pull tighter and tighter around your heart, and you realize that you’ve seen this man before. You’ve seen him a thousand times.

Your hand flies up to your neck. Fear hits like a punch to your gut. He looks normal — so normal that you could convince yourself that it’s not him. It’s not him.

But now, his eyes — a startling shade of blue— meet yours. Cold washes over you as every sensation in your body amplifies. You feel small and weak. Your vision starts trembling at the edges. You can’t move — not even to release your breath.

“I’m not here to hurt you,” he says. His voice sounds so different from the one in your memories. It’s not as coarse and low, it’s gentler and higher-pitched. “I just wanna talk.”  

“Talk.” The word escapes you, but you hadn’t meant to speak. Hearing your own voice makes this real.

He clears his throat. “My name is James Barnes, and I’m no longer The Winter Soldier.”

The Winter Soldier. You suppose it doesn’t matter now what that means. If these are your last moments, you’re not going to spend them deciphering code. Instead, you think of your life and all the things you’ve done and all that you haven’t done. In the span of moments, you try to make peace with your death.

“If you’re going to kill me...” you can’t keep your voice from shaking, “do it.”

His eyes widen. “I’m not here to kill you. I’m — ”

“Hydra wants to know what I know. Is that it?” Your mind reels with the new theory.

His eyebrows tick up. “Hydra doesn’t exist anymore,” he says with a measured tone. “Not really.”

You don’t know how to respond to that divulgence. You don’t even know if you can trust it.

“I’m here because you,” he adds your name — your real name, “are part of my efforts to make amends.”

Your thoughts catch on how he knows your name. It’s a small thing, really. He knows where you live, after all. 

“I know you’re confused, and I know you have questions.” He reaches up to scratch his neck. “And if you’re not, ah...” he glances from your face to your body, as if he were just now noticing your state of dress, “comfortable talking here, we can talk somewhere public. I guess what I’m asking is: can I buy you lunch or, uh, dinner? ”

You consider, seriously, that this man may be clinically insane. You have no other rational explanation for his showing up at your door on a Thursday afternoon, let alone his proposition. But you allow yourself to imagine it: you and him, sitting across a table with Jean’s ghost between and behind you. Your stomach turns at the thought.

“You murdered my friend,” you say slowly, “right in front of me.”

He nods. A pained look crosses his face, and that expression spurs your anger. It hadn’t occurred to you earlier that you should call the police. This man is a murderer, and he’s walking free. 

“You shouldn’t even be here — you should be in a prison somewhere!” You choke out as your throat tightens with impending tears.

“I didn’t have a choice. I didn’t want to kill her!” He says forcefully. “I didn’t want to kill anyone. I — ”

“But you did kill her!” You can’t hold them back anymore, and now, you’re crying in front of the man who killed Jean. Humiliation heats your cheeks.

“You did kill her,” you repeat quietly. You turn your watery gaze away.

“You’re right, I’m sorry.” He says.

In your peripheral, you watch him step closer. When you flinch, he bobs back.

You should step back, shut the door, and call the police. Not that a slab of wood could stop him if he wanted to get to you. You’ve seen his silver arm. You’ve felt the grip of its fingers at the base of your neck. But, maybe you could manage a dial ‘9-1-1’ before —

“Look, I’m not asking for your forgiveness,” he interrupts your line of thought and, against your will, you look at him again, “I know I don’t deserve it, but I do want to offer you answers. Maybe it can…” He waves his hand as he searches for what he thinks are the right words. “Maybe it can give you some closure. And then, you’ll never see me again.”

You consider the furrow of his eyebrows. Over the years, you’ve tried reconstructing his face from its missing half. Now that you have the full picture, it makes perfect sense: the upper edges of the mask aligned with the cut of his cheekbones, the thin bridge really did conform to his nose, and the wideness of his jaw was merely accentuated. But his features are such a striking contrast to the severity of that mask and that metal arm. He looks so much leaner than you remember. He looks like a man, not a machine.

“Stay here,” you say. “I’ll be out in a minute.”

He nods and his brow softens. You shut the door and press your forehead against it.

After a few beats, you rest your hand on the base of your neck and suck in a few deep breaths. It’s a calming technique Dr. Kaplan taught you. But without meaning to, you flex your fingers. Just as your heart was beginning to slow, you’re pulled into the memory of him raising you by the throat. You gasp for air.

That man is behind this door. That man is behind this door.

You race around the couch to snatch your phone off the coffee table. You unlock it with shaking hands and now, your thumb hovers over the number pad.

“Fuck,” you whisper as you press ‘9’.

It’s true. You do want answers. You want to know why he killed her. You want to know about Hydra and his role in it. You want to know why he left you alive.

So you’ll get your answers,  then call the cops.

You pull on some real pants and cover up with a sweatshirt. But at the door, you hesitate to step out again. If you’ve imagined that whole encounter, if it was some vivid manifestation of your survivor’s guilt, then you wouldn’t have to go.

You press your ear against the door, and, as if your doubts had broadcasted through the wood, he coughs. You sigh and grab the doorknob. Your hand isn’t sweaty this time.

At the sound of the hinges creaking, his gaze snaps to you. You meet his eyes without meaning to. There’s no recognizable emotion in them. The creases in his forehead and the furrow in his brow are gone. Now, his face gives nothing away.

“There’s a place about two blocks from here,” you say simply.

He nods and looks to you as if for direction. If he were anyone else, you would start heading for the elevator without further ado, but the thought of Jean’s killer trailing behind you makes your stomach flip.

“I’d prefer you walk ahead,” you utter. His eyebrows raise slightly, but he gives no other visible reaction.

“Alright,” he says.

He moves down the hallway, and you follow. Your eyes stay trained on his back. Aside from your occasional direction, it’s a silent walk.

⭑⭑⭑

Sully’s is a dive, but it’s always busy, and this evening is no exception. The people who frequent this place are the kind of people who get loud after a few drinks and don’t give two shits about you unless you’re bleeding out on the floor. That’s perfect. God forbid anyone overhears your questions about murder and secret organizations.

“You want anything?” He asks after you choose a corner booth and tuck in. His casual tone bothers you, but he keeps his distance, at the very least.

“No,” you deadpan.

He nods and starts for the bar. A few people graze him as he passes, and it’s so crowded that you’ve already lost sight of him.

You place your phone face-up on the sticky, varnished wood table. Absentmindedly, you nudge the pedal base with your foot. You try to hone in on any particular voice, but all you hear is a buzz of conversation. It’s a comfort. It means that you’re not alone and he can’t hurt you here.

“I know you didn’t ask for anything, but…” Fuck. Your knee knocks on the bottom of the table. His voice is so sudden at your side.

He places a water glass in front of you, and you stop yourself before you can say “thanks”. He drops into the chair in front of you, a beer bottle tucked between his gloved palms. Gloves. He’s wearing gloves. You hadn’t noticed until now.

There’s an awkward pause. He watches you intently. Your stomach is churning, but you steadily meet his gaze. You have so many questions. Some of the things he’s said don’t make sense. One thing, in particular, though, is nagging at you.

“Back there, you said you didn’t have a choice,” you say dubiously, “what did you mean?”

He takes a drag of beer and sets the bottle down carefully before he speaks. “They brainwashed me.” He replies bluntly. “Hydra, I mean.”

Brainwashing? It’s not entirely outside the realm of possibility. Aliens exist, as do superheroes and Norse gods and Mad Titans. What was once science-fiction is now very real and devastating.

He gives you a few beats to process, then continues. “For seventy years, I operated as The Winter Soldier.”

“Wait. Seventy years?”

“I just turned 106 in March,” he says with a sardonic smile.

“How is that possible?”

“I was on ice.” He sighs. “They only took me out when they needed me.”

“And Hydra… what happened to them?”

His jaw tightens. It’s the most reaction you’ve gotten so far. “They used to have this saying: cut off one head, two more take its place… Maybe they’ll come back, but right now, they’re gone.”

“So they aren’t after me,” you say softly, more to yourself than him.

“If Hydra wanted you out of the way, they wouldn’t’ve sent me.” He grimaces, even as his voice mocks a shrug.

You get it now: you’re not a threat, and you never were.

“But I was a loose end, wasn’t I? Why didn’t you kill me?”

He shakes his head and says, “I don’t know.”

He doesn’t elaborate further. Instead, he finishes off his bottle and shifts his gaze to the table.

After a minute or two, you consider moving on, but something about his expression, both vacant and pensive, implores you to wait. In the interim, you glance from the people knocking shoulders at the bar to the couple in front of you.

“It was that look on your face,” he says, and you find his gaze is fixed on you again. “It was rage. And grief. And that-that grief almost overtook everything else, but I saw it.” He leans towards you, his eyebrows knitting close. “That part of you that… that part of you that wanted me to kill you, too.”

He glances at his hand on the table and releases a shaky breath. “I understood that,” he says. “I know what it’s like.”

Like a clenched fist releasing, the tightness in your chest eases. You understand something else, now, too. This is meant to be an exchange. He wants answers as much as you do, no matter how much pain they carry.

“Do you wanna know what I saw? On your face?” You ask after a few beats. He hesitantly nods. “Nothing. There was nothing,” you say. “You didn’t even look human.  It was like you were an animal. And you were looking at me like I was prey.”

You look away. The intensity of his eyes threatens to pull you into that memory. “I’ve never been more terrified in my entire life.”

“I’m so sorry,” you hear him say.

“I’m not the one you should be apologizing to,” you say quietly, chancing a glance up.

His face twists into something like shame. If he were a different person, you might try to comfort him. But he’s not a different person. He’s a stranger wearing the face that’s haunted you for nine years.

“So why now?”

“Well, I was…” He mimics a snap with his right hand. “And after that, I… started going to therapy.”

He pulls a small, brown book from his jacket pocket. “My, uh, shrink told me to make a list of people I’ve wronged,” he says as he flips it open to a page in the middle and places it in front of you. “You’re one of the last.”

You find your name third-to-bottom. The ones above are crossed through. He glances from your face to your fingers as they trace his careful scrawl.

“You don’t let people look at this, do you?” You ask.

He half-smiles and shakes his head.

“So why are you letting me?”

“I, uh,” he flexes his hand. “I don’t know. I just… thought I owed it to you.”

You briefly consider asking about the other names, but he doesn’t owe you those. He owes you answers about the life he can’t return. Just as another question bubbles up your throat, a ringtone sounds. You glance at your phone’s black screen, then back to his furrowed brow. He reaches into his back pocket to fish out a flip phone. A  flip phone.  You haven’t seen one in years.

“Shit,” he mutters under his breath. He looks up from the screen.

“Sorry, I have to take this,” he says as he squeezes out of the booth. He disappears as quickly as before.

⭑⭑⭑

You finally take a sip of water. The sweat of the glass bleeds onto your fingertips, so you wipe your hand off on your pant leg before touching your phone. 6:15, it says, which means you've been sitting on this hard, plastic seat for over forty minutes. He's been gone for about ten of them.

Before you can seriously consider just leaving, his form comes into view.

"I've gotta go, but..." He says as he pulls the brown book out of his pocket again. When he opens it, he tears a small piece from the page corner, then scribbles something with a pen.

He places the piece of paper next to the perspiration ring on the table. Stealing one last glance at you, he turns and leaves for the third and final time.

On it is a phone number and a name:

Bucky