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jflemings · 4 months ago

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— speak your mind

pairing: kate martin x reader

synopsis: upon realising that kate’s feelings for you might not run as deep as yours do for her, you spiral. kate’s there to set the record straight.

warnings: a lil angsty, a lil bit of anxiety, overthinking, insecurity if you squint

a/n: this is long and not fully proofread!! i hope this is okay for my first kate fic 😬 lmk how you feel!!

୧ ‧₊˚ 🎰 ⋅ ˚ ༘ ೀ⋆｡˚

one of your favourite things to do was look at kate, admiring her had become somewhat of a hobby for you. you’re certain that you’ve memorised the placement of every faint freckle on the bridge of her nose; absolutely positive that you could pick out paint swatches that match her eyes perfectly. her side profile is committed to your memory, burned in your brain for the rest of time, and you wouldn’t have it any other way.

for so long you had pined after her and hoped that one day you’d finally work up the nerve to actually talk to her instead of spending your time gawking at her.

your hopes were met when the two of you found yourselves sat on the porch of some frat house talking the night away. she’d left her friends for some fresh air only to find you, and before you knew it she was giving you her number and waving you off in an uber at the end of the night.

now, the two of you lounge around on her couch lazily, trying to find something to watch. she’s got one arm around you, keeping you tucked safely under her chin, whist the other fiddles with the remote.

“stupid fucking remote” she mumbles to herself “i change the batteries three times and still, it doesn’t want to work. might as well just get a new one”

you allow yourself the time to trace her features with your eyes like you have so many times before, letting your thoughts run wild whilst she’s distracted.

you knew how you felt about kate. you knew all too well.

you loved her, wholly and deeply. if someone asked you to list off reasons why you loved kate, you’d be sitting for an eternity. there was no one reason for your feelings, and there was no one thing that led you to them, it was just a fact.

the sky is blue. grass is green. you love kate.

simple.

you’d often wonder how she got to you, though. of course, you knew how she physically came to be yours but you often found yourself wondering how emotionally, she could belong to you.

there had been others before you. others that didn’t really need to wait for kate to come around.

she wasn’t known to date or be a player, but she definitely wore her heart on her sleeve a bit. any girl that she dated knew that kate was all in, and it made your stomach churn to know that maybe you weren’t one of those girls.

what if she waited so long to ask you to be her girlfriend because she didn’t know if she wanted that? what if you dove in too quick?

“see anything you wanna watch?” she says before turning to you “or were you just not paying attention to anything other than my face?”

you crack a faint smile and sit up, suddenly feeling sick. kate’s hand falls to your waist “you okay?”

the bitter taste of doubt dances on your tongue and trickles it’s way into your stomach “i’m honestly not feeling too good, i think i’m just gonna go” you say quickly as you stand.

kate’s quick to follow your movement, sitting up and tossing the remote to the side “are you sure? you can lay down here. i’ll get you some water”

“no, no” you say holding up your hand to her as she stands “i’m just gonna go. i’ll call you later”

the blonde doesn’t get another word in before you’re running out of her door with your shoes in your hand. she stands in the middle of her living room puzzled, looking at the back of her door.

it’s been a week since you’d practically jumped up and out of kate’s arms and ran out of her apartment, and she’s barely heard from you.

since you said you weren’t feeling well, she’d offered to go over and just hang out. you declined and said you didn’t want her to get sick and that you’d just catch up with her when you felt better.

then when she tried to call you and you didn’t answer, you told her you’d been sleeping, or studying, or taking a shower, or doing anything that didn’t require you to have your phone on your person.

kate never really thought of herself as controlling, but not knowing how you were was certainly making her feel out of control. she was worried. she had the thought to maybe message your roommate leah, but ultimately decided against it when she realised that that might be overdoing it, especially since you told technically did tell her what was wrong.

there was a feeling deep in her belly that she couldn’t shake though, and it was beginning to eat her alive.

the feeling was only amplified when she crossed paths with leah on campus and still didn’t get an answer. your roommate had nervously shrugged and said that you hadn’t spoken to her before rushing off.

jada squints at her friend from across the room as she takes another slow bite of her bagel. she watches as the blonde seemingly zones out completely, a blank look etched upon her face.

the same blank look that had been plaguing her for the past week.

“what’s up with you?” she calls.

kate snaps out of it with a shake of her head “what?” she asks

“i said” jada starts again, dusting her hands of crumbs “what’s up with you. you’ve been acting strange all week and it’s really unsettling”

kate purses her lips “it’s not unsettling”

“it is when you see it first hand”

the blond rubs a hand over her brow bone and sits up straight, rolling her head on her neck before putting her head in her hands “it’s y/n” she says “we have barely spoken all week”

“i thought you said she was sick?”

“that’s what she told me, but i know something’s wrong. i can feel it in my gut”

kate is quickly beginning to resemble a kicked puppy, the slouch of her shoulders and her sad eyes making her look smaller than she actually is.

jada frowns “what about her roommate leah? have you tried talking to her?”

“we ran into eachother but she wasn’t much help” kate says as she shakes her head.

the brunette takes her bagel and plate and stands, walking over to plop herself down next to her friend and teammate “maybe you should just go over there” she suggests softly

kate slumps back again “do y’think?”

jada shrugs “you obviously know her a lot better than i do but, yeah, i do”

kate ponders for a moment before jumping up from the couch and slipping on her shoes by the front door. she grabs her keys off the hook, makes sure she has her phone, and gives jada a half assed wave before she’s out the door.

she doesn’t even bother walking or taking her time, she runs. the route is burned into her brain. she’s on autopilot as she goes as fast as her legs will take her. she’s run this route plenty of times, more times than she’d ever like to admit.

as late rounds the corner to your building she comes to a stop to catch her breath, ignoring the odd onlooker that was curious as to what she was doing. she waves them off and kept going, never once faltering as she got to your door.

she knocks three times and bounces on her toes impatiently, almost barging in when the door cracks slightly.

leah pokes her head out curiously “kate?” she cocks a brow.

“is y/n here?” kate has to resist the urge to just look straight over her head and into your place “i just need to speak to her”

“no, she’s not” leah says whilst opening the door wider , her expression telling the basketball player that she knows more then she’s letting on “but you’re more than welcome to wait for her if you’d like”

you slam your front door open and kick it shut, flinching slightly at the loud bang “i’ve fucked it!” you practically yell through your apartment “once again, i am my own worst enemy” you begin to ramble to your roommate as you dump all of your stuff on the kitchen table.

leah freezes and her eyes go wide at the sound of your voice ringing through your shared place. you barely acknowledge the way she’s gone stone still like a deer in headlights, too caught up on the fact that you have basically ghosted your girlfriend.

“what if she hates me, what if she never wants to speak to me again because of this week? oh my god” you groan loudly, the anxiety continuing to bubble inside of you “i feel fucking horrible, lee, she doesn’t deserve someone who’s gonna shut her out like this. i wouldn’t even know how to start making it up to her”

you begin to messily organise your things. you dump the water out of your waterbottle and rinse it and put your laptop on charge, your train of thought never faltering “an apology would be a good start, y/n” you mumble to yourself as if you’re stupid “hey kate! sorry for avoiding you for a week, that was super shitty of me, but i’m ready to talk about my feelings now!”

“y/n” leah hisses

you swiftly look at her and frown. her brows are pinched together and her teeth are clenched in an almost comical way, making you cock your brow “what’s that face for?” you ask.

her eyes shift from the direction of your bedroom and back to you once, twice, three times, before she raises her brows. you shake your head slightly to show her you don’t understand until dread washes over you like a tidal wave. a deep pit forms in the bottom of your stomach.

you screw your eyes shut momentarily before walking down the hall to your bedroom, puffing your cheeks up and releasing a breath as your hand grips the handle.

from behind you, leah gets up from the couch “i’m going out for a little while” she says just loud enough so that both you and the person occupying your room can hear. you turn and face her briefly, catching the sympathetic look on her face.

you turn the doorknob and push yourself into the entryway of your bedroom, coming face to face with kate.

she’s sat on your bed with her hands tucked neatly in her lap and her head hung. her shoulders are hunched slightly as she lifts her head to look at you, offering the smallest of smiles “hey” she says quietly “leah let me in, told me i could wait for you”

“oh” you say dumbly, not moving from the spot you stand in.

kate nods her head once “have— have i done something to upset you?” she asks quietly

you shake your head “no” you shut your door behind you “you haven’t done anything, kate, i swear”

“is there a reason you’ve been avoiding me?” she raises her head fully to look at you now but her hands still stay neatly tucked in her lap. she doesn’t look like she’s been crying, but the frown on her face and her glassy eyes tell you that she’s very close to it. you feel your heart crack, you’d never seen her like this.

you sigh and cross the room to her, placing your hands delicately on her shoulders “it was me” you start “i— i was getting in my head and i didn’t know how else to deal with it. i’m so sorry kate. it wasn’t fair of me to do that, especially since i’ve made you feel like you were the one at fault”

the athlete’s hands uncross themselves and come to hold your hips. she looks up at you with wide eyes like she’s trying to figure out what’s going on inside your head “i don’t understand” she says “we tell eachother everything”

“i know” you mumble, flexing your hands against her broad shoulders “i’m sorry”

kate looks down at your feet before spreading her legs slightly and pulling you towards her by your hips. you step further into her space just as she looks back up at you “you can talk to me about anything, you know that right? i’m always here for you”

you nod “i know that” you say quietly. kate squeezes you hip.

“you didn’t fuck anything up” she assures you, referring to your words as you walked through your front door. “more than anything, i was worried. i didn’t know what was going on and you weren’t answering me”

“i’m sorry for worrying you” your hands shift so that they settle in the curve between her neck and shoulder “but i still shouldn’t have just shut you out like that. it wasn’t fair”

her hands slither around your hips and hold your lower back. she tilts her head “do you wanna tell me what’s going on in that pretty little head of yours?”

you take your hands back and chew slightly on your bottom lip before taking a sudden interest in your ceiling. behind your eyes feels heavy as you try to push down the lump that has lodged itself in your throat.

the hands that are around you suddenly feel too cagey, too suffocating, and you take a step back from your girlfriend. a twisted look of confusion and concern crosses the blonde’s features as she furrows her brows and allows her hands to fall back to her lap.

“i love you” you say before taking a deep breath “and i avoided you because i didn’t think i could face you knowing that you might not feel the same” you screw your eyes shut just as the tears slip out.

kate’s face relaxes into something softer, and she slowly holds her hand out for you to take “babe” she says softly “c’mere”

you hesitate for a moment before taking her hand. she pulls you back in to her space and swipes a thumb under your eye “you got yourself all worked up because you didn’t think i’d say it back?”

“i—” you begin, only to then realise that she, in fact, hadn’t said it back. you shut your mouth and play with the hem of your shirt, quickly wiping away tears with the collar.

kate’s hand moves to cradle your face “i do love you” she says softly, ducking her head slightly so she can make eye contact with you “and i have for a while”

your lip begins to wobble and you cover your face with your hands in an effort to hide from her. she isn’t having it though, and hooks a thumb in the belt loop of your jeans so that she can drag you into her.

one arm loops securely around you whilst she uses her other hand to try to pry your own off you face “babe” she says.

she smiles as you reveal your face to her and she takes one of your hands in hers “why did you think that i wouldn’t feel the same? i tried to show it, but maybe it didn’t communicate well”

you chew your lip nervously out of habit “i just thought maybe you didn’t feel the same since it took you so long to ask me to be your girlfriend” you mumble “like, maybe you weren’t sure of me or something”

kate frowns “i waited so long because i didn’t want to mess it up” she says as she squeezes your hand “i knew i liked you from our first conversation, and i didn’t want to scare you off or make you think that i was moving too fast. i’m sorry, baby”

you furrow your brows “it wasn’t your fault” you say as you shake your head “it was just me and my way of thinking”

“we’ll next time that happens i want you to speak your mind, okay?” kate stands and drags her hands delicately up your sides before she cups your face “but there’s nothing you need to worry about. my feelings for you don’t come close to anything else i’ve ever felt before”

“yeah?” you ask quietlyleaning into her touch.

“yeah” kate flashes you one of her big, toothy smiles and connects your lips. her thumbs caress the sides of your face lightly, making your skin tingle. “i love you” she mumbles against your lips.

you can’t help but smile “i love you too”

#jflemings writes #kate martin #kate martin x reader #lv aces #iowa wbb #kate martin fic #wbb x reader #wnba x reader

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sunsbleeding · 2 months ago

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Life has cut me open and all I bleed is love

You’d think it would be viscous maroon, full of anger, full of “why me?”, full of whitened teeth for biting, full of revenge dreams for the people who took my innocence like it was theirs for the taking/

But as I lay here bleeding, into the soft warm soil, the only thing that pours from the wound is the love I have squashed into my my stupid human body, finally seeping out, mixing with the earth, surely to feed the soil well enough that petunias will grow and people will press them to their noses, finding hints of a woman once cut by life’s kitchen knife.

It’s not hate that I bleed, it’s my friend brushing my hair gently, showing me that love can be soft, it’s my dad taking me to the movies when I was 7 and showing me good music in the car we would one day roll into a ditch, it’s me and my brother getting high in a car and laughing about the past, while we grin like idiots, smoke twirling around our similar faces. I bleed my favourite records, crickets in the night, white wine memories, I bleed dancing in the down pours, gouache paint, and the way it feels to fall in love for the first time.

Life cuts and I bleed, but it’s nothing but love. and I hear my friends laughing in the distance, so I sew the wound once more and chase the sound of music through the wild grass field where everyone I know is howling and hollering at the sun.

#mine #art #healing #spilled thoughts #poetry #illustration #bad poetry #love #words

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vashvenus · 11 months ago

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★ミ serpentine.

synopsis: naga knives has a sort of morbid fascination with you than manifests in a strangely sexual manner.

contains: naga/serpent knives, knives’ taxidermy hobby is mentioned, sort of medical? but he’s just exploring and weird, dubcon i think?, he has two weewees, and afab reader. 3.5k words.

note: teehee!! this is a (late) christmas present for my BEST FRIEND!! my cool, adorable, and wonderful bff @knivesbunny <33 hehehe enjoy bee + everyone else!!

it was about time you moved on in the world. getting a fresh start in the form of a cozy cabin at the edge of the woods sung your name and the price point was staggeringly low so, after confirming there were no safety hazards, you took the place. with dark wood and muted tones alongside a beautifully kept garden by the previous owners, how could you possibly go wrong? well, ‘wrong’ is an arbitrary term and ultimately up to the individual for judgement.

your moving process went without a hitch. furniture and belongings all being placed properly following a good deep clean plus a couple coats of paint, things any place would need upon a new owner arriving. you'd been rather happy at the final product, something dreary at first taking the form of your own home; a fond word. trinkets, cupboards of dishes, and an amalgamation of photos and artworks lining the walls to create an atmosphere you almost wished you could share but, alas, a solitary life was your preference.

the garden out back was complete with a greenhouse tucked to the side, surrounded by an abundance of flora and fauna that also colourfully dotted the rest of the greenery. small plots had been sectioned out for different fruits and herbs and the idea of being able to grow a large quantity of your own food was an exciting new feeling, one that you couldn't wait to grasp. thusly, it wasn't long until you found yourself kneeling in the grass and working new seeds into the dirt. a variety of the basics alongside some of your favourites was the route of action, one also deemed reasonable. between fondly nestling new seeds and sipping at cool beverages, the thought of the greenhouse slowly slipped your mind despite how vital it was to your task. swiping the gathered sweat from your forehead, you rose up to analyze your progress to which brought your eyes back to that small addition cozied up to the side of the property. the bags of dirt and tools resting on the ground would need a place to go after all... so, you wandered over to that little building and fiddled with the door.

the wooden door was slightly overgrown and gave you a good fight to open, weeds and rust seemingly actively working to keep you out of the space. stepping back, you looked it over a bit more, not wanting any splinters, before pressing your shoulder into it for added force. with a combined 'bang' and 'groan,' the door scraped across the inner concrete floor before coming to a stop about three quarters open. you huffed and slipped in, cursing the rotten chunk of wood and attempting to get a good look at what you were working with. eyes glazing over various rickety shelves, a sharp and icy chill rolled down your spine. a small nagging voice in the back of your head whispered ‘something isn’t right,’ in response to the unusual, for lack of better words, appearance of the inside.

atop aforementioned delicate shelves lay different jars full of an indistinguishable liquid and what appeared to be organs, small ones so hopefully not human, as well as a range of entire animals fully submerged in their own watery tombs. wind chimes made of bones twinkled from the ceiling above firmly locked chests and you weren’t totally sure you were interested in the contents. the previous owners, an old couple, didn’t seem like the type to hoard such morbid trinkets but sometimes it’s the most innocent ones, you figure. still, the lingering idea of this being the work of some beast that had chased them away from their lovely home rattled at the back of your mind ominously. shifting on shaky knees and feet, you contemplated poking around a bit but rationality told you to at least find a sturdy pair of gloves first. though, as it would seem, the choice wasn’t yours to make judging by that same yet more aggressive scraping and slamming door.

whipping around, you came face to face with… a man? one with frosty eyes, near white hair, and a scowl that could skin you alive. more importantly, he was hanging from the ceiling of the small shed you were now trapped in; stuck. with him. this… not quite man, if your judgment of his long serpentine looking lower half meant anything. all wide eyes and dry mouth, you gaped helplessly at him, attempting to find some sort of explanation for what exactly you’re doing, as if this isn’t your property he’s on. his eyes turned to slits seeing you fumble for words and, with an amount of grace that shouldn’t be possible, he slithered off the ceiling to instead… stand? lay? rest? you’re not too sure but he’s in front of you now right side up. pupils merely scratches inside his powdery blue eyes, you fear he’s deciding if you’ll make a good meal and you’ve half the mind to assure him you’re not as tasty as he may think. alas, he speaks before you get the chance.

“name,” it’s a simple but firm commanding question you weren’t quite expecting but, to be real, what were you expecting from an interaction with a snake man? you stutter out a whimper of a reply and he clicks his tongue; it’s forked, you note. with all confidence you can muster, not much, you promptly for his own. he hums low. “millions knives. shorten it to knives at most. don’t dare to give me any sort of nickname, as you humans often do; it’s abhorrent,” and you’re shocked he’s so eloquently spoken. perhaps there’s snake people schools you aren’t aware of?

“right. noted, millions knives,” you hesitate, not keen on irritating him further, as clearly just your presence has perturbed him, “i… apologize if i’ve intruded but… this is my property after all. some sort of explanation on your,” you gesture widely at the space, “hobby would be appreciated.” your poor attempt at mimicking his speech pattern has him letting out a chuckle that sounds more like an array of chitters. palms sweaty and desperately avoiding eye contact, you gulp hoping he’ll entertain your question before potentially swallowing you whole; snakes can do that. his tail flicks your shin jolting you to bring your eyes back to his, admittedly handsome, face.

“my… hobby, hm? it’s nothing to you,” a disappointing response, “were you hoping i’d have a jar your size, little human?” you’re positive he’s making fun of your fear yet somehow his words feel flirtatious in a way that has your brain swinging like a pendulum between crying out of petrification and placing a hand on his built chest. “i’ve been watching you for some time now. you’re utterly,” his tail wiggles up to grip your waist, “fascinating. a perfect experiment.” if he didn’t sound like he was flirting before, he sure does now.

his words were true to an extent beyond your knowledge. ever since the first tour you took of the place, he had kept an eye on your every move. knives hadn’t found an ounce of appeal in new people moving into the small home but, if he had it his way, it would turn abandoned for him to find sanctuary in. alas, the housing market wasn’t on his side as people inspected the place top to bottom and he was stuck merely seething beyond view; that was until you came along. all bright smiles and eager nods, he was beyond irritated with the way he found you undeniably irresistible. something so... keen would make a lovely study after all, he thought, though destroying you utterly and completely was off the table for he'd never be able to poke and prod at you after that. unfortunately, in the time it took for him to mull over a game plan, your first visit was over and he slithered back into the thick woods while scowling; unfair. the jump knives felt in his heart upon your second visit was one that caught even him off-guard, an emotion towards humans beyond that of revolt? unheard of and vile. yet, he was the one who had it and couldn't simply deny that he was feeling something beyond curiosity. your scent, perhaps? he muses over a handful of biologically reasonable conclusions for his reaction to a distantly nodding vash whos already figured out the truth. he saves it though, as to not have his other arm lobbed off, and instead hums along agreeing to every point with faint amusement.

it's with thoughts racing past at speeds no human could match, that knives brings himself back to the present, large palms and boney fingers coming to trail your jaw. another flick of his tongue appears between the grin now forming along his pink lips and impossibly long teeth; even a playful nip would draw extensive blood. he makes a sound between a hiss and growl as one sharp nail trails along your neck down to your sternum slowly, as if assessing a piece of meat; perhaps, in a way, he was. silvery tail wrapping around your left ankle, he tugs your leg up with his head dipping to peer curiously at the limb. you can't really blame him considering legs are the only human trait he lacks but the unsettling nature still makes you shiver. knives takes turns with each of your legs and arms, taking them in at all angles and seemingly pleased with what he was seeing. sure, he wasn't fond of humans at all but, he can appreciate when one is well made; easy on the eyes. a slightly morbid fascination, maybe. finally letting you go from his clawed grasp, he nods, satisfied.

"alluring. remove these pesky clothes," he scrunches up his nose while pinching the fabric of your shirt, "and seat yourself atop that cabinet." his gaze never once easing up, you're between bolting or following his instructions. the former would rely on you being stronger and faster than the behemoth of a man-snake standing directly in front of the door and you're positive you'd be dead two steps in. with trembling fingers, you pull the dirt dusted shirt from your body and shiver at cool air ghosting across your bare chest, only held back by the simple bra clinging to your breasts. you swallow thickly before shimmying off your denim shorts past your thighs and awkwardly down your feet. having not removed your socks or shoes, it was quite the task, but potential tetanus from the rickety floors wasn’t on the menu today. knives found amusement in your struggle, if the chittering in front of you meant anything though, in truth, he was rather charmed. such clumsy behaviour almost reminded him of a newborn bunny. face flushed, you finally unclasp your bra and slip off your panties with no more grace than your shorts had been discarded with, before perching yourself on the cabinet knives had dully gestured to.

“is this… is this good?” the words slide past your lips before you let them, sounding too pleading for your liking but knives seemed to enjoy that despite a hum being all he offered in return. his strong chest was quickly in front of your eyes, curse his fast snake body, while his hands found purchase on your legs again. with one palm on each of your knees, he gently eased them open, nearly purring at the sight.

“you’re something of a gem, hm?” his voice was low, hands inching up your thighs with sharp nails leaving a trail of goosebumps. “how very kind of you to welcome me with such a,” the forked tongue of his makes a third appearance, “wonderfully prepared gift? such a lovely homeowner…” though sarcastically sweet in tone, his words did nothing but shoot directly between your legs. “i’ve got a keen nose, little rabbit, are you enjoying being my area of study?” his gaze was hard as he looked at you down his nose and from between long lashes. “your most intimate nodes are crying out ‘yes’.” he presses against your folds to spread them with feather light fingertips, much like one would a dissection. spreading you softly, his head tilts to one side while his eyes seem to slowly drag up and down the weeping slit of yours he's not fully exposed. knives wedges himself fully between both of your legs as to not allow you to close them and his other hand joins in on the fun, prodding softly at your entrance. he seems to revel in the small whimpers you make, crystalline tears clinging to your lashes from a mixture of desperation and humiliation at letting him do such to you so easily.

employing a sort of gentleness and patience you didn't think he had, knives slowly eases in one of his fingers down to the second knuckle before pulling it out with a wet 'schlick' to wrap his mouth around it. the taste seemed to please him based on his own moan and he returned to his previous ministrations, softly thrusting the finger in and out of you. with the hand that had been used to spread you, he smoothly switched to rolling gentle circles over your clit, eyes still fixed firmly on watching the way your body reacts. a second finger accompanies the first in its delicate rock, encouraging more of the sweet sticky essence of you to drool out and across his hands. panting and whining, you buck pathetically into his hands with closed eyes and red bitten lips; you miss the way he slides to his knees. for a man so large he is more than quiet, something you can't match with the harsh suckling on your clit coaxing loud cries from you. his mouth curls the slightest bit with a smug smile and you can feel it past the swirling of his tongue and sharp incisors teasing your skin. briefly, you hope he won't bite. the soft plunging motions of his fingers turns harsh alongside the movements of his mouth. he seems eager to have you unravel on his face and, despite your own tattered pride, you can't stave off the shuddering of the orgasm that washes over in the most intense waves you've ever felt. embarrassingly loud slurps echo around the small shed as knives continues his own motions with glee. it's only when you gently push at his forehead that he shifts backwards and up, allowing you some reprieve from what he had just done. you're breathless, to say the least, having been made to come so shamefully on the handsome mouth and hands of this stranger but somehow you don't feel as though you were the only one who had fun despite his firm acclaims of experimentation.

you're struggling to regain your breath while knives looks you over with thinly veiled lust, you figure teasing him for it wouldn't go well so you restrain despite the thick atmosphere begging for some reprieve. while still gasping for air and shaking the post-orgasm fog from your head, he's pushing you down with his body weight and adjusting the way you lay across the cabinet to his personal preference; legs bent around his waist and hand beside your head. with hazy eyes, you look down to catch the way not one but two thick cocks slide out from the slit they had previously been held in. hanging heavy but curved up slightly, thick arousal is pooling at the tips and you think you can see ridges along the base of each. your jaw is slack as knives lets out another one of those chittery laughs.

"scared, bunny? no need, i'll make it work," his smarmy expression is nearly enough to have you shooting something snide back but he's lining up the tip of the lower cock and sinking himself in faster than you can think. "let go of any premonitions, this will be mutually beneficial."

if you could have any thoughts, they'd be nothing more than slurred curses but with the thickness and impossible length occupying and stretching your insides, you're rendered incapable. he's slow enough to give you some time to adjust but still fast enough that your body can't quite keep up with what he's giving; a pleasurable form of purgatory. knives allows his hands to wander your body, one coming to grip and gather your wrists to now rest above your head while the other fondles your breasts harshly. he's grabbing you in a way that feels inexperienced and almost charming though the harsh penetration is tearing you away from the idea. knives trails his hand from your breasts, to your stomach, and back up to grip your throat as he finally bottoms out inside of your tight heat. the wetness and warmth covering him is seeping out and down his tail to leave a lewd trail of combined juices he briefly admires the shimmer of before he's sliding himself out and roughly back in with a resounding slap. a high and needy sound escapes your throat as the tip of his cock taps your cervix and the rest of it rubs across your walls, eagerly taunting all of what's to come. the hand around your throat compresses your blood flow just enough to have your head feeling like it's full of cotton and your body even more pliant for his use. nails tilt your chin to have you make eye contact with the man currently deep in your guts, a glittering and dangerous grin spread across his face. with your eyes on his, knives begins pounding into you with earnest.

all of the sounds that leave you are high-pitched and warbled with unshed tears borne of the hand around your neck and stretch of your cunt. he's letting out strangled grunts and eager clicks at the grip of your wet pussy trying to milk him dry. his second cock his sliding against your clit and lower stomach with every harsh thrust he gives you, rubbing and pulling pleasurably. all of your nerve endings feel ablaze with the way he's using your body in a way that's filled with determination. his head drops down to make contact with your shoulder, his mouth sliding up your neck to replace his hand and add plentiful marks along the untouched skin; he figures an array of bruises will decorate it better than any necklace. dark indigo and rouge dappling the skin as blood comes to the surface, he's enamoured with how it looks tainting your flesh. both of his hands are now around your hips to hold you still for every pump of his cocks along and into your body, forcing you to take it all in full. you're crying with your back arched and chest forced to the ceiling as he continues his fast pace with teeth grazing your nipples. knives is biting numerous times across your tits, imprints of his fangs left in the wake akin to a path on a trail; he's oddly proud of his work. you're beyond your own body, desperate for him to bring you to a second high of the day, hips trying in vain to undilate against his own but his grip is too firm; his unnaturally strong. tongue flicking at your nipples, one cock deep in your guts, and the other beating against your clit, it's not long before you're babbling useless pleas for him to not stop. through choked sobs and moans, you're falling to pieces with his cock nestled deep inside of you. your brain is blank as lights splatter across your vision, eyes rolled to the back of your head and drool leaking from the corners of your mouth. still, his heavy rutting hasn't ceased. every limb of yours is twitching as sobs move past your lips without permission and your hands slide from his grip to claw uselessly at his back from overstimulation until knives is letting out an otherworldly growl as he sinks to the hilt one final time. you can feel the thick ropes of his seed coat your insides as his body curls around you protectively; a mating instinct maybe. he's grumbling lowly as an impossible amount of his spend leaks in and out of you with each twitch of his shaft.

you're still feeling a touch foggy when he pulls out, globs of shared slick pooling beneath you. knives is assessing your form critically, hands and eyes sliding over every bruise and bite left behind from his own roughness. it's almost sweet, how he seems to care for your well being despite his words claiming otherwise, and you simply allow yourself to enjoy the way he's fussing over you. once satisfied, he nods to himself and moves to scoop you up in his arms despite your small whines of protest but your indignation doesn't last long as he slithers you both over to your home, mumbling something about a shared bath; for purely experimental purposes, of course.

#cw: dubcon #trigun x reader #knives x reader #millions knives x reader #trigun maximum x reader #trigun stampede x reader #trigun 98 x reader #trigun smut #millions knives #trigun maximum #trigun stampede #trigun knives #trigun 98

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writingriver001 · 4 months ago

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Obey me character hc 💙

🤍 Brothers and side characters 🤍

General hc of mine, a mixture of things I thought of, things my friends have thought of, and things I've seen online. Just move on if you don't agree, there is no reason to hate. ((Possible ooc? I haven't gotten too far in the game))

Requests are open 🩷

Lucifer ❤

- He and Satan have the exact same birthmark on the back of their neck.

- The first to tell Satan a few stories about Lilith

- Has scared Mammon a lot because he has a tendency to stand in a room and zone out while thinking, but the room is pitch black and he is silent.

- He went with Levi to his first cosplay con because Levi was too scared to go alone

- Likes cooking, a lot. Makes brilliant soups.

- His desk has many scratch marks from digging his nails into it when stressed.

- He has a matching ring with Mammon and a matching anklet with Asmo (He begged, Lucifer pretended to be annoyed but actually thinks it's really sweet.)

- He is attracted to all genders but has a preference for men.

- Has a lingering smell of coffee and ink, it's oddly comforting

- He always has a bowl of mints on his desk that he eats when he is sitting there

- Enjoys wearing Victorian style clothing

- Asexual and Non-binary I will die on this hill

Mammon 💛 (On mobile and I can't do yellow, sorry guys <3)

- Very cuddly. Like, extremely.

- He randomly leaves notes in his brothers' rooms, reminding them to eat, or drink water. Most of the time he shoves the note under the door, knocks and runs away. He tries to disguise his handwriting but everyone knows it's him (They pretend not to know.)

- Demi aroace.

- ADHD

- Has a minor fear of the dark

- Matching keychains with everyone (Including Diavolo, and surprisingly Barbatos. His favourite is matching with Luke.)

- Has awful eyesight and has to use contacts

- Adores wearing heels (Icon)

Leviathan 💙

- He wants to spend more time with his brothers but doesn't know how to ask so he paints Asmo's nails whenever he can, and often has random colours of nail polish under his fingernails or on his fingertips

- Really enjoys love songs

- Will randomly "boop" his younger brothers noses.

- Smells like the ocean/perfume (Asmo buys him different perfumes he thinks would suit him.)

- He doesn't really care what pronouns are used for him

- Non-binary

- Snake bites (piercing)

- ADHD + Autism

- Has a split tongue

- Has a small collection of feminine clothes in a drawer. Anxious about wearing them, but his brothers hype him up enough to get him to wear them around the house

- Hates showing his legs unless he is wearing shorts

- Has fangs

- He has pointy ears that are purple at the top

- HATES wearing matching socks for no reason

- Literally allergic to grass.

- Loves centipedes so much (They were a special interest of his for a while.)

- Tan skin, scale skin pattern across his body, it even goes up the side of his neck and ends on his right cheek, next to his nose

Satan 💚

- He has a cat plushie that sits on his lap when he reads

- When somebody he knows is wearing glasses while he is walking past, he will just grab them and run. They usually have to tackle him to get them back

- Smells like lavender and occasionally old books

- Trans guy (proof? The thing in my wardrobe said so)

- ADHD

- Part of his phone case matches with Asmo's

- Has a bar piercing in his ear, idk what its called

- Part of his hair is naturally black. He always dyes it but as his relationship with Lucifer improves, he lets is grow out and doesn't dye it

- Wears hairclips

Asmodeus 🩷

- Once convinced Lucifer to let him do his makeup. Lucifer let him do his eyeliner a couple of times after that.

- He genuinely loves onesies, specifically ones that have a hood

- Genderfluid, Can and will shapeshift to change his body depending on how he feels that day. Literally doesn't care about pronouns, say whatever

- Autism, Goes nonverbal when really upset

- Helps Levi with cosplays

- Used to beg Satan to read him bedtime stories occasionally to help him feel like he was part of the family like he was asmos older brother. It's become a routine for them at least once a week

- When he goes nonverbal he will go to Satan or Lucifer for comfort, and will cling onto them

- His special interest is snowglobes.

Beelzebub 🧡

- Loves cooking, but often eats it before he can show people what he made

- If he loves somebody he will randomly bite their hand/arm.

- He has matching T-shirts with Belphie and Asmo. Once a month they have a sleepover (Asmo will do their nails, they will watch films and eat snacks.)

- Chews his shirt sleeves when working

- Has an undercut

- Dark tan skin, freckles

Belphegor 💜

- He only wears socks with patterns

- He hates bugs. Absolutely hates them.

- He likes drawing patterns on his arm, or little farm animals.

- Loves strawberry milk for no reason.

- He hates the fact that pigeons can sit down.

- He has a bad habit of falling down the stairs, and he will just lie there for 10-15 minutes before getting up.

- Snake bites piercing

- Loves audio books (managed to get Satan to record one for him, and he listens to it often.)

- Autism

- Smells like fabric softener, general floral scent but a very specific brand

- Demiromantic

- They/He pronouns, but doesn't correct people or really tell them

- He won't admit it but human men were his bisexual awakening

- Dark skin, braids (What braids? No clue, my friends hc not mine personally.)

Diavolo ❤

- Has matching bracelets with mc

- He has this one mug that he will always use for tea/coffee/hot drinks and it's bright yellow. He loves it.

- Pointy ears + ear piercings

Barbatos 💚 (Another character I know little about)

- He has fangs

- He wears glasses to read

- He really struggles to show affection with words, he is better with actions

- Split tongue

Simeon 💙

- I actually have none for him... I don't really know anything about him actually 😭

Solomon 🩷

- He can only make sausage rolls. It's the only thing he can make, but nobody trusts his cooking

- Asmo is jealous, Solomon has really long eyelashes

- Likes to crochet

Luke 💜💜

- He teaches Solomon how to cook (Tries)

- He has accidentally called Simeon AND Lucifer dad before but denies it (They have no proof)

- Levi is his favourite brother, and he really looks up to him. He tried to bake Ruri-chan gingerbread people, but when it came to the decoration it didn't go the way he wanted it too so he got really upset. Levi absolutely loved them, thanked Luke and ate them all happily regardless. (I say all... I think we all know Beel got to a few)

#obey me headcanons #obey me lucifer #obey me mammon #obey me leviathan #obey me satan #obey me asmodeus #obey me beelzebub #obey me belphegor #obey me diavolo #obey me barbatos #obey me simeon #obey me solomon #obey me luke #headcanon #obey me! shall we date?#obey me shall we date

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jemmo · 3 months ago

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ahhhh. the familiar stress of a female character being introduced in a bl and waiting to find out whether she’s an ally or an obstacle. in this case with maya, definitely an obstacle. what remains to be seen is how much of an obstacle and how it’s overcome. now im not adversed to a romantic enemy, its one of the most commonplace things to find in a bl, and im also glad we’re getting a hearing impaired character that isn’t perfect, bc it’d be very easy to try and paint everyone with a disability in a good light when they are still people and can act out for their own interests. what im interested to see is how the romance will interact with the commentary on hearing impairment this show has been touching on both directly and indirectly. before, we had a hearing female character that caused drama bc she romanticised kohei and his disability and the ways she could help him and be by his side. now we are getting the opposite, someone who also has a hearing impairment who wants to be by kohei’s side and support him as someone who shares his disability. and i like that they’re showing that both are bad. maya is trying to distance kohei from the hearing people he’s made friends with, which was a huge step for him, by trying to make out that someone that shares his disability is inherently better for him and can support him better - she’s separating him from the larger world and trying to keep him within this small bubble of their disability so that she can have a romantic relationship with him. the thing is we don’t know if maya actually believes it’s right to keep these worlds separate or she’s using it as an excuse to be close with kohei, either way the commentary is still being made. she’s also kind of playing the victim card with her comment about how taichi’s friend has never faced hardship, but she has bc her hearing is impaired, and that means she’s got in worse. and yes - on a day to day basis that is hard to deal with, but in no way does that mean no one else has struggled. i feel like that hit taichi particularly hard bc he has struggled in childhood, it was just different. we saw this in last twilight too when they argued, the disability vs no family battle, which one is worse. the thing is, you always want what you don’t have, the grass is always greener on the other side, but really there is nothing to gain from these comparisons. everyone’s life is hard to themselves, what matters is helping others whilst also acknowledging your own hardships, it’s a balance give and receive, which is what taichi and kohei’s relationship is, despite what maya thinks. but i do want to see where she’s coming from, and i think meeting a guy like kohei who is so sweet and kind and also shares this disability and all the shared experience that comes with that, and also just looks like that, it’s hard to not think he’s the most ideal person and want to be with him. i just hope they do give her a resolution that both holds her accountable for behaving poorly whilst also being empathetic to her feelings.

but in other news, i want to point out a few fave bits from the ep, starting ofc with my favourite thematic sound editing when all the cafeteria noise fell away when kohei and maya started communicating with their phones. its the small things like that that make this series so special, even if it was used with maya instead of taichi. i feel like they also do a really good job of highlighting noise, both when taichi was with his friends and at the dinner, you can understand how loud things are even when kohei isn’t there and imagine how overwhelming it would be for him, and it also highlights well how that chaos dies down when he’s alone with taichi, and you understand what kohei means when he says he hears taichi’s voice so clearly bc even in a crowd, his voice pierces through. i absolutely loved taichi blushing remembering the kiss and kohei being so forward in getting that girls attention away from taichi, we love a possessive queen. and finally i have to give my biggest shoutout again to kohei’s mom. she is so supportive in the simplest and quietest ways and when she took out those two lunchboxes i nearly cried. and it’s the way she always makes it seem coincidental, they just came as a pair, but it covertly shows that she’s supportive of whatever relationship kohei has with taichi. she doesn’t have to ask and kohei doesn’t have to say - she knows they’re close and so she just supports the relationship in these small ways without overstepping. it’s just so beautiful. honestly, one of the best bl moms ever.

#I really hope the story handles this well - I have faith bc it’s been excellent so far but i just want a good resolution #and I don’t want it to drag on #i hear the sunspot #hidamari ga kikoeru

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thatcoyperson · 11 months ago

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// SESSION 9 SECRET LIFE SPOILERS [the ending] AND I MEAN MAJOR ONES

I got this idea from what Martyn said during his lore stream the other day and it cured me of my writers block, so I wrote this in a few hours after hearing it

[CW for blood, mentions of death, and I feel like the fact that my friend was saying "it all hurts" for like 30 minutes after reading this counts for something]

• -------- • -------- • -------- •

It’s over Scar. She's dead.

Standing in the ravine, Scar stared blankly at the stone ahead of him as those ghostly words echoed in his mind.

It was over.

He’d won.

Despite everything, he’d won.

A breathy laugh escaped him. It didn't feel like a win. Nothing about this did. It felt hollow and empty, meaningless.

A win was supposed to be a grand show to the world that you can make it to the end, a final showing that it can be done despite everything. One last stand against the world. That's what a win was meant to be.

But this wasn't any of that, not when Scar was stuck frozen in place, the faint rhythmic sound of liquid dripping off the rocks somewhere behind him being the only thing he could hear once the blood rushing to his ears subsided. How was any of this meant to feel like a win, like the grand finale to something that had been the last few months of his life when it was the furthest thing from grand? When he felt the furthest thing from victorious? How was he even meant to feel victorious or grand in a situation like this? He'd spent the whole season alone just trying to make friends, only for him to win by shooting the closest person he has to one of those.

Alone…

He never liked being alone.

How did he win while he was alone?

How did the guy with no friends win?

He laughed to himself, bow still held in one hand, and using the other to push his hair back. A pained smile was painted across his face as he laughed, asking himself how? How did he win? How did he make it this far all alone? How did he manage to tell himself that just one more day, one more day and it would be worth it enough times to where he won? It didn't make sense. Not to him at least.

No matter how long he stood there wondering to himself, there was still one thing that was left to be done. Hit the button.

He had succeeded his task after all, right? Scar had won, despite how meaningless this victory truly was.

All he had to do was hit the button and it would all be over. It would finally end. He could go back to Hermitcraft, his home, his friends. He finally wouldn't be alone anymore.

It didn't quite feel like his own movements when he started to climb out of the ravine, disconnected from everything going on. He desperately ignored the hazy sight of a red shawl to the side of his vision, feeling sick if he put any thought into what he knew was laying under it.

He didn't feel nearly as sick passing by a similar black shawl on the ground up on the surface, orange hair catching his eye for a split second as he slowly made his way across the blood stained grass and battle worn landscape of the world. And, shortly after, he reached the statue that stood in the centre of it all.

The Secret Keeper.

The being that doomed him from the very start. Quietly, he wondered to himself, was it proud? Proud that it's favourite player to mess with - proud that the one it moulded into the unwilling villain - had won? Was it proud of everything it had done, all the pain and suffering it caused? Or did it even think at all. Maybe it was just a simple stone statue, designed to have no will or intention, to have the sole purpose of handing out tasks at random, and Scar was just losing it from being alone for so long. He’d likely never get an answer.

It didn't matter though. Not when he was about to leave, not when he was about to finally be free from this hell he was stuck in, not when he was going to finally be able to see his friends again.

Letting out a shaky breath, Scar reached down and pressed the button.

…

A faint click echoed around the area, and then nothing. Nothing happened. It was just silence. No gust of wind to whisk him away back home, no welcoming voices of the hermits congratulating him on his win as they fade into view. No anything. Just silence. Painfully loud silence. Nothing changed. He was still there. Alone.

“Uhm… haha real- real funny there guys,” Scar chuckled awkwardly, his voice filled with unease. Why was he still here? That should’ve worked. Staring up at the Secret Keeper, he waited for a moment to see if it would react at all.

Nothing.

With a level of anxiety he hadn’t felt before, the button was pressed again, and again nothing happened. The world continued to stand still around him.

The feeling of unease began to grow in Scar’s gut, mixing with fear and making him feel sick all over again. “Aha, ok now thats-” The button was pressed again. Nothing. “-that’s enough this isn’t-” Again. Nothing. “-this isn’t funny anymore- oh god no please.”

Scar’s chest tightened the more he pressed on the button, becoming more and more desperate every press. “No no please just- please just take me home please I can’t do this anymore please.”

Tears began to swell in his eyes, panic truly setting in as he pleaded for an escape. Why wasn’t it working- why wasn’t it doing anything?! Was it broken now that the game was over? Was that why he was stuck- why he couldn’t get this stupid button to work?!

Falling to his knees beside the button, his head hit against the corner of the pedestal it was on. Pain slashed across his forehead at the impact, and he could feel the sickeningly familiar warmth of blood begin to well from the cut.

“PLEASE GOD JUST LET ME GO HOME!” he screamed, hitting the button again and again, his hand becoming sore and bruised the more time went on. The more he begged and pleaded and cried for whatever stupid entity was in control of this game to just let him go.

All he wanted was to go home, to see Jellie, to see his friends, to not be alone anymore. He’d been alone for too long, wasn’t that enough?

Loud cries and desperate pleas slowly turned into quiet sobs, and he brought his hand away from the button, resting them both on the edge of the pedestal beside his head.

“Please…” he sobbed, blood running down into his eyes and mixing with his tears. “Please just let me go.” a moment passed for him to catch his breath. Then, quietly: “I can’t do this anymore, please…”

His pleas went unheard. He was alone.

Alone…

He never liked being alone.

#Im really proud of the writing in this Im gonna be so real #my friends were in shambles after reading this and I mean Im taking that as a good sign #so enjoy the angst #man as a guy who claims to write a lot of hurt/comfort ive been doin a lot of hurt/no comfort lately huh #....eh whatever #secret life spoilers #secret life #goodtimeswithscar #coy writes #I NEVER KNOW HOW TO TAG MY WRITING HELP ME

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3terna15unshin3 · 1 year ago

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time, curious time

1 of 6 ★ 6433 words

masterlist — next

— warnings: alcohol consumption, recreational drug use

“This area’s too dry. Grass looks like hay. It’ll look rubbish to set all the mic stands on it,” You argue.

Matty sighs in defeat. “You never like my ideas,” he whines sarcastically, rolling his eyes in the process.

Your elbow juts into his side, making him groan and then laugh. It’s your turn for an eye roll.

“Do you want my help or not?” you challenge. “I don’t have much experience with music videos, to be fair, so if you'd rather empty your pockets and hire someone professional—”

“Okay, okay, okay. Shut up. Let’s keep moving,” he interrupts.

You both continue on your path, scoping out locations for a video that the boys want to film later in the week. There are plenty of spots Matty suggests, stopping repeatedly to ask you to capture a certain frame. Though, as he had complained, none of them have been up to your standards.

By now, you’re used to his constantly fleeting and sometimes messy creativity. You find comfort in it, actually, and feel the most empowered in your own strength as an artist when Matty’s there. Your camera seems the strongest in your hands when it’s pointed at him.

He nudges you to point out one last possible shot. The trees hang hauntingly low and its branches are frail, almost skimming the tops of your heads. Your feed tread over the now slightly greener grass as you come closer and look around in awe. Matty’s right, for one of the few times today.

“Now we’re talking,” you whisper in satisfaction, raising your Nikon to your eye out of instinct.

You back away slightly to get him in frame. From behind, the last hour of daylight shines through the kinks of Matty’s hair, backlighting him. It accentuates the slope of his nose as he turns to the side and looks up at the tree above him. His side profile is one of your favourite things about photographing Matty. It’s strong, but gentle.

He glances back at you after hearing a few clicks of the camera’s shutter. The sun that lights his silhouette contrastingly shines directly onto your face—since you face him—painting an orange glow across your skin.

There’s something that makes you feel like he’s staring. And you’re right, because he is, but it’s a stare that feels good. Not exposing, or perceptive in a way that usually made your heart drop. You almost want to look behind you to see if maybe he was looking at something else.

It’s sort of how he always looks at you, though. Maybe that’s how he looks at everyone, you think, but part of you hopes it wasn’t. That you were an exception. Something outstanding.

You gasp when Matty suddenly lunges to steal your camera from your grip.

“Gimme this for a sec,” he mumbles. He’s lucky it isn’t hung around your neck as it usually was.

Embarrassment immediately creeps up your neck as he points it at you. You habitually block his view of your face with your hands, and insist, “Stop it!”

“The lighting’s nice!” Matty protests, pushing your hands away.

You replace them quickly to prevent any photo opportunities. “I don’t have space on my memory card for you to fool around, Healy.”

He rolls his eyes, turning the lens back onto himself to take a horrendously close-up picture of his own face. You giggle at the way his wrinkled skin was on display from the weird expression he pulled and the odd angle he held your camera at.

“This is literally our last location. Relax,” Matty points out.

Then, a bird tweets aggressively behind you, so you turn around to look for the culprit. Your eyes widen when it catches you off guard and squawks again, your sight flickering around the sky to try and find it.

“God, what was that?” you mumble, but when you face Matty again, he has your camera held up. A flash and click tells you that he sneaks a picture.

“Seriously, Matty,” You say after catching him, and his smile falters. The thought of him capturing you candidly makes your stomach flip with anxiety, and he knows that. Since he’s aware, he hands your camera over, in case he’d pushed a bit too far.

It’s the way you’ve been since he can remember; always groaning and uncomfortable to be in a group photo at school or denying his requests to pose for his camera every once in a while.

It grows frustrating sometimes, since it’s hard for him to grasp what you could possibly be insecure about. And, most of the thousands of pictures from the years you’ve grown up together showed everyone else’s faces and not yours, which made him even angrier. But that’s how you wanted them, after all.

This attribute of yours is one of the things most different about you and Matty. He loves having eyes on him—craves it, even. Wants to be seen and understood. But you're an observer, on the other hand. The world is fascinating to you, lighting your urge to preserve and savour its meticulosity. It explains your addiction to capturing it all with a camera.

The difference makes you two a great team. Though you regret your commitments in moments like these.

“Let’s go before we get shat on by that bird,” you snicker, lighting the mood back up and giving Matty a shove. He stumbles over with a chuckle and the two of you bee-line for where his car was parked.

By the time he’s arrived outside your building, the sun has set. You yawn after a fairly long day, walking in with Matty and dreading the four flights of stairs you’re about to climb together. The lift in your building is under maintenance and has been for the past few weeks, so you’re used to it. But that doesn’t stop Matty from complaining.

“What maintenance could they still possibly be doing on that fucking lift?!” he puffs as you tackle the first flight.

“I’d rather take the stairs than plummet to my death in a dodgy lift,” you add.

The second floor approaches. Matty trails a couple of steps behind you and is already audibly out of breath.

“Agree to disagree, I guess.”

You finally reach your level and walk side by side over the creaky floor of the corridor. There’s still quite a way to travel until your flat nears.

“I feel like you can’t really complain about the stairs when you and the guys only live on the second floor. That’s half the amount we need to get to ours,” you point out, fishing your keys out of your pocket as the flat numbers grow closer to your own.

“And what do I do every time we arrive? Walk you up to your flat! Up four and then back down two!” he exclaims. “I’ll complain as much as I’d like.”

You unlock the door and your best friends are sitting on the sofa. Their heads of hair—one blonde and the other raven—turn around to watch you and Matty barge in.

“And each time I insist that you don’t need to walk me up,” you counteract, bending down to take off your boots.

Matty stops at the doorway, not planning on sticking around. He gives a wave to Avni and Greta with a small smile, but isn't done making his point to you. “I don’t trust our weirdo neighbours. You should thank me, honestly.”

“Fine. Thank you for always walking me up. Happy? Now please leave. You smell like dirt from when you laid down on that pile of gravel,” you say, waving him off and grabbing the edge of the door to let him out.

“I wanted to see if it looked cool,” he defends, then pulls you in for a hug goodbye, and pecks your temple before you back away. He begins walking back down the corridor to the stairwell.

You call out, “It didn’t!” and watch him throw both of his middle fingers up in response.

The door closes and you bolt the lock. You sigh, ready to collapse into bed. But before you have the chance to, Avni motions for you to come sit on the sofa. And though there are many places you’d rather be, you oblige, sinking down into the cushions between her and Greta.

“Come on, talk to us! We haven’t seen you all day,” she nags, nuzzling the side of her face into your shoulder.

“Yeah,” agrees Greta. “I thought you were going to be back after your shift?”

“I was going to be, but then Matty picked me up and brought me dinner as a bribe to scout music video locations with him all evening. I was hungry, so I accepted his offer,” you explain.

Avni shrugs. “That’s a fair deal, I guess.”

You begin to stand up, thinking that what you’ve given was enough to satisfy your flatmate’s curiosities, but Avni’s hand yanks you back down.

“But wait,” she starts. “Everything’s okay, right?”

There was worry in her voice that confused you. “...Yes? Why would it not be?”

“Oh,” she lets go of a breath she seemed to be holding. “I just saw Matty hug and kiss you before leaving so I thought he might be comforting you, or something. I don’t know. Forget I asked,” Avni finishes with dismissal.

The three of you chuckle casually and they finally allow you to get up.

“Doesn’t he usually do that? I feel like that’s always how he bids any of us goodbye,” you say, walking around the sofa to head to your room, but pause to hear their answers.

“I’ve known that bloke since he was pre-pubescent and never has he just casually kissed me without reason,” declares Avni, raising an eyebrow suggestively and making you shake your head in annoyance.

You know what she’s trying to get at, but you don’t want to talk about it. You never want to talk about it. Avoidance really is your best friend.

She’s convinced she sees something there—and though you secretly wished there was something, the idea of attempting to do something about it makes you want the ground to swallow you up. You could barely admit it to yourself, let alone another soul, or Matty.

Plus, you really are convinced that it’s just a you thing, not a you and him thing. That you just need some time to get over it, even though it’s been nearly ten years. How could it ever be a you and him thing?

Thankfully, Greta’s big ego and her pestering lighthearted crush on Matty shuts down anything Avni is trying to insinuate, when she says, “He’s kissed my cheek plenty of times,” as if it’s obvious.

You glance back at Avni, and as you expect, she’s giving you a look that screams, ‘Of course Greta’s just said that…’

“There you go,” you point to Greta and end the conversation, acting like she helped prove your point. “I’ll see you guys tomorrow. I work the morning shift so I should be back early.”

They respond tiredly and continue watching the telly, not concerned about the late hour like you are. Neither of them have an early morning to worry about, so you won’t be surprised if you hear another film begin when you’re about to shut your eyes.

Avni is a full-time student about to finish her degree—which her parents fund for her—so she only works here and there, doing integrated jobs within her program at the University of Manchester. The only time she sees the early hours of the day is when she��s been hunched over a computer through the night, writing a paper about something you don’t understand. Since it’s the weekend and Avni’s free of class, you assume she’d sleep in.

On the other hand, Greta is like you, and opted out of A-levels and uni once completing GSCEs. She’s never been all that interested in studying, so after working as an associate at the Space NK back in Wilmslow, a position opened at the Manchester location and she stuck with it. In perfect correlation with the rest of the group also moving to the big city.

At this point she’s a manager and is earning quite a lot—certainly more than what you make at the cafe—so her working hours can be unpredictable. But since the store never opens earlier than 10 o’clock, Greta’s rarely a morning person either.

You wake up at a concerningly early time to make it to Cafe North for 6am. It doesn’t open for another two hours, but since you’re desperate for as many shifts as possible, you take on any position necessary. This morning, your position was baker.

It’s not a strong suit of yours, and you were only hired as a waitress, but the cafe being known for its fresh pastries made the morning shift annoyingly important. So, you often find yourself trudging in at the crack of dawn to cover for your coworkers when things come up and your boss needs you.

Cafe North helps pay your bills, since doing freelance photography work in Manchester isn’t quite enough to live comfortably. Work seems to be slowing down as the year goes on as well, so your only consistent clients are the up and coming local bands. You photograph their shows even though they barely make enough for themselves, let alone to be able to pay you fairly.

The reason you frequent the music scene is due to the growing popularity of your favourite band—the one that happens to be made up of some of your closest friends—so of course you photograph every one of their shows. Though you refuse to let them pay you, being at their gigs leads to plenty of more work, so you manage.

Thankfully, you leave your shift at the cafe with your newest paycheque in hand. So, you stop by the bank on your journey home and deposit most of it into your savings. It’s what you do every time you get paid, and the guys sometimes make fun of how frugal it makes you.

Their teasing persists when you walk into the pub to meet them for a gig. A morning shift and a night out all in the same day is usually a bad idea, but you run home to nap for a few hours and have tea with Avni before showing up, so you hope it isn’t a completely terrible night.

“Come on, mate! One cocktail?! It’s Saturday night, get pissed with us,” begs Ross, who has already downed a few pints.

The seven of you; him, Matty, Hann, and George, along with you and the girls, squeezed tightly into a booth to commit to your normal routine. If the guys were playing at a pub, you’d come a couple of hours before the show to have some drinks and chat shit. If they weren’t, you’d come to some pub anyway before heading to the venue. Beer was a part of the equation either way.

Weekend shows always brought the whole crew out. The audience had more bodies and their set had a bit more length. Smaller shows sometimes had your flatmates opting to stay home—busy with school and work or just not in the mood—but you never missed any.

You like to say you’re forced to, in order to keep the band’s Facebook updated with stills of every set, but truthfully, you never want to miss a show. You’d rather be in the crowd with your eye glued to your viewfinder than be anywhere else.

“I’m a classy woman,” you declare sarcastically, sipping your espresso martini leisurely. “Plus, I just got word that my application is being processed, as of a few days ago. Gotta save up for London if I get it, can’t be draining my bank account at every night out.”

“It’s always about London. Blah blah blah London, blah blah blah internship. Fuck off,” he drunkenly spits at your face. You laugh, not offended in the slightest since you’re used to his bluntness.

“By ‘fuck off’ he means ‘we hope you get it’, by the way,” Greta reassures you after flicking him up upside the head. It made Ross wince and whine but the alcohol in his system makes it hurt less.

It also apparently makes his reflexes slower, as you’re able to easily steal the glass from his hand to take a few large gulps to spite his comment. Ross’s jaw drops, newly offended, and moves with haste to snatch it back from you—though it’s now almost empty.

“You deserved that,” says Adam, chuckling and enjoying his full pint.

“Thank you!” you say and then clink your martini glass to his in solidarity. The rest of the group then add on and cheers you as well, leaving Ross to walk to the bar and fetch himself another beer, sulking.

“Can I just say, I’m not gonna pull a Ross and tell you to fuck off about London, but Gret can speak for herself about this whole ‘we hope you get it’ narrative,” George clarifies. “At a happy medium I will be happy for you but also very upset that you’d be leaving us.”

You smile at his sweetness through the fear that everyone might actually be upset at you leaving Manchester. It was hard enough to break the news that you were interested in an endeavour so separate from them. The sheer distance made it even worse.

Which is why you lied.

The internship Ross mentions is really in New York, not London.

Well, it could have been in London if you wanted it to be. ELLE Magazine has headquarters in both cities, and there are plenty of UK internships you qualify for. But, the program that calls to you is for international study—they provide housing for a year-long position (which is a paid one, thankfully), and you feel that the scene in New York is more exciting than anything in your home country. So, you apply.

But, change has always been difficult for you to accept; growing up and sticking to the same people, fantasising about the same career and carrying around the same camera. You enjoy your life being that same you.

And up until you discovered the internship, you planned to be just that. You like Manchester. You know Manchester. It’s comfortable, and has everything you need to make it in the industry. But so does New York.

The idea ignites a flame in you. Nobody would ever describe you as spontaneous, or as confident, or as a dreamer. You always feel diligent. Compliant. Following through with the plan that you’ve always had. But you want to be outstanding. Unpredictable, for once. Reaching for something so big that it’s scary.

You lie because you’re scared. What will people think of you if you fail? You think about telling the truth to the people you’re closest to and it makes you sick to your stomach.

How they probably think that you don’t have it in you to follow through with it. That you’re a good photographer in Manchester, and won’t compare in America. That you’ll be broke and back in England within months. A two and a half hour train ride of shame back from London sounded much less frightening than an 11 hour flight back from America.

Of course, they’re actually lovely about the ELLE internship. They have so much faith in you—maybe more than you have in yourself. But they don’t know that you’ll be packing up and moving 5 time zones over. And their loveliness doesn’t put your crippling anxiety to sleep, and doesn’t stop you from creating and keeping up with the London lie. It’s your safety blanket.

“Just think of it like this, George,” you begin. “Coming down and visiting me will give you guys an excuse to play some gigs and show all of the big London labels how badly they need to sign you.”

All four boys groan at the mention of record labels. They’ve been working their asses off trying to get attention from them and it hasn’t gone very smoothly so far.

“If the sad little indies in this city won’t bat an eye at us then I doubt any fancy London ones will give a shit,” complains Matty with an eye roll.

“For a man with such a big ego you can be so pessimistic,” Avni responds.

You’re sitting across from Matty, so you use your knee to shove his. Though his tone is confidently spiteful, you can tell that the band’s struggle to get signed sometimes gets to him.

He looks up at you since you gain his attention, and the two of you share a small reassuring smile. Matty’s knee shoves yours back. It softens his expression.

“I’ve got a multi-faceted personality, Avni,” he defends.

She raises her hands, accepting his statement as a fine enough rebuttal.

“At least the place is pretty packed tonight,” Ross interferes.

Everyone looks around and surveys the busy nature of the pub they’re about to play for. Ross has a good point, and the group’s excitement grows with the realisation. They could tell the energy would be great.

With the mention of why they’ve arrived in the first place, the four boys take note of the quickly lessening time before their set would begin. So, they finish off the last drops of what sat in their glasses and eventually begin to prepare.

It’s not long before you’re in an uncomfortably crouched position, waiting for them to come on and begin their first song. Gret and Avni stand behind you, drinks still in hand and chatting away. You adjust the settings on your camera, making sure to up the exposure to accommodate the dark pub lighting.

Small cheers and woops erupt from a few of the patrons who are familiar with the boys, and you raise your camera to your eye when the set begins. Every time it settles on Matty, you almost feel a sense of relief to have an excuse to watch his every move.

It paralyses you, how natural his body and mind present themselves through the music. You watch him through the haze of cigarette smoke that floated in the air, seeing his hands dance up and down the fretboard of his guitar. They move with urgency and make pretty sounds. His eyes close when he sings and you find yourself missing the brownness of his irises when they are, sighing in solace when they open back up.

You have to remind yourself to photograph the others. They’re naturals on stage as well—and you can’t deny their talent—but they’re humble in nature. And Matty isn’t. He makes the perfect frontman; overtly confident and spilling with an amplified arrogance. It’s so easy to capture him and have the photos ooze magic. You aren’t sure if the magic comes from you or from him.

When you’re satisfied with the amount you’ve taken, you relax to enjoy the show, quietly singing along to the lyrics to your favourite tracks. Your friends chat here and there but you stay engaged with the performance. You chase contact with Matty’s eyes, which are usually scanning the depth of the growing crowd, and have to suppress your smile when you succeed, stealing his attention for split seconds at a time.

And as quickly as it begins, it’s over. You detach yourself from your camera and carefully place it back into the bag that slings over your shoulder. Applause rings through the pub.

Everyone sticks around for a couple of hours after the show, as the boys ride on what’s left of their post-performance adrenaline—but your eyes droop with tiredness and they can tell. Clearly, the nap you took after getting back from work wasn’t enough to keep up with your friends.

“Falling asleep on us, are you?” notices Avni, poking at your cheek, sufficiently drunk.

You smile softly and try to shake some energy into yourself. “Not anymore,” you say, embarrassed that they can see through your attempts to hide the fact that you’ve been up for nearly 21 hours. You’re even too knackered to sip on your drink, and the copper mug sits full of a concoction of Moscow mule remnants mixed with melted ice in front of you.

“Quite the grandmother tonight, Y/N,” Hann teases.

You don’t tease him back because you can tell he just cares, and will probably suggest that you make your way home, knowing his sensibility. “Can’t help it. Been up since 5.”

“Fuckin’ ‘ell, 5 in the morning?! Doing what?!” asks Matty, who sat between you and the edge of the booth.

“Going to my job, Matty. Have you heard of those? Jobs? Or have you not, since you’ve never been able to keep a real one?”

The whole table ‘ooo’ at your burn and Matty shakes his head in disbelief.

“In my humble defence, I have been helping George deliver for Flame and Wok and they do pay me now. So yeah, darling, I have,” he defends matter-of-factly. “You know, I slept for 12 hours last night. Maybe more. And for some reason I think I’m just as fucking exhausted as you.”

You turn to him, confused. “I can’t tell if you’re trying to one-up me with how tired you are or if you’re bragging about how much sleep you got.”

“I’m trying to point out that you’re a trooper for still being up. And am also insinuating that I am very unusually tired and willing to leave if you come with. If everyone else wants to stay,” he clarifies.

Oh, you think. He’s just being sweet.

“Thank God someone finally offered. I’m dying here,” you whine. “You lot keep having fun for me, alright? I don’t want to start being known as the buzzkill.”

Matty scooches sideways to stand up and you do the same, slipping on your denim jacket.

“Oh, you will,” confirms George. You flip him off, and he laughs. “I’m joking. Get some sleep, love.”

You smile at the fact that underneath the sarcastic humour all of your friends share, is a synonymous deep care for each other. You’ve really lucked out. A sudden sadness pangs your mind when you think of the fact that you might be leaving them. You wipe it away before it can settle.

They all mutter farewells while you lean down to peck Avni on the cheek. You repeat the action for Greta, and then you and Matty begin heading out.

“See you at home,” he calls, waving. Everyone waves back, and then returns to their slurred banter and cold drinks.

He holds the door open for you and you step into the chill late night (almost early morning) air. You follow the pavement towards your building and walk side-by-side.

“I need to meet Wade before we get back, by the way. If that’s okay with you,” Matty admits. “He’s just waiting for me on the corner of Spears.”

Wade is Matty’s dealer, who regularly supplies him the weed that everyone often smokes together. At one point, you try to figure out a way to somehow split the cost by seven, but since Matty and George have a much more intense fixation than the rest of you, they agree to just pay for it themselves.

So, you’re complicit, and follow him a block past your flat to where Wade was waiting. You’re retrospectively thankful that walking an extra block is the trade off for free weed.

It’s quick; you both throw a casual ‘Hi, mate,’ to the dealer and a few seconds later you’re already turning back with your arm linked in Matty’s, who had the small baggy tucked into his pocket.

You climb the dreaded stairs together and reach your floor. It’s mostly quiet between you, due to your energyless states, but before you come to your door, you mutter, “Thank you for leaving with me, Matty. I know you would rather have stayed.”

“Don’t be silly,” he responds, “I know I’m crazy, but I actually am knackered. I should be thanking you for giving me an excuse to leave.”

A smile is shared between you and you unlock your flat, sighing in contentment at the lessening proximity from you and your bed. “You’re right about being crazy.”

Matty rolls his eyes, and you send him a look that tells him it’s okay for him to head to his flat. That you’re all good and safe in yours. But before he leaves, he stops to say one more thing.

“You really should rest up. I know everyone likes taking the piss out of how much you work—especially tonight—but it really is a lot. And I get that it’s for a reason and you’re saving up or whatever. I just hope you know that we won’t be offended if you don’t come and take photos of every single show we play. It’s okay to miss them, really. You’ve seen it a million times over. If it means you can avoid 20 hour days and draining all of your energy.”

“I like coming to your shows. I don’t feel like I have to. I just want to,” you insist while taking off your boots. “But thank you. I appreciate it. ‘S very sweet.”

He accepts your answer with a gracious nod and briefly wraps an arm around your shoulder to press his lips to your cheek, then turns to find his flat. You watch him walk down the hall and finally close the door when you hear his footsteps bouncing in the stairwell.

You have to suppress the giddiness you feel bubbling up and convince yourself that you’d feel the same way if any of the other guys had walked you home and said what he’s said—though you know that isn’t true.

Now washed up and in bed, you check your phone one last time before shutting your eyes. You see a message from Matty.

matty: Wanna to try out the stuff I picked up earlier?? It’s a new strain, needs opinions. I’ll be home all day tmrw just stop by x

y/n: beautiful

y/n: ill text when i leave x

You think about how nice a joint sounds after the long day you’ve had. So, you agree, and fall asleep soundly.

But when you wake up the next morning—far too early—to the scariest email you’ve ever received, you’re even more in need of a smoke. Because you’re about to have a panic attack.

You’re moving to New York.

You reread the congratulatory words maybe 30 times before you can bear to look away. Tears of both happiness and fear threaten to spill from your eyes, but you blink enough times to make them disappear.

The kettle is whistling in the kitchen and you can hear it from your room. It’s probably Greta. You wonder if she boiled enough water for you and Avni to make cups as well, since you’re usually up by now. You can pick apart two sets of footsteps. They’re both up.

What if they can hear that you’re up? What if your thoughts are so loud that they can hear those, too? You quiet down your quick breathing and hide yourself and your screen beneath your covers. Just in case.

You’ll have to start packing soon. Book a plane ticket. You’ve never booked a plane ticket by yourself. What if it’s hard? What if you can’t find your passport? You get up and rummage through your bedside table to find it. It’s exactly where you left it.

Eventually, after hiding out and panicking for what seems like a couple of minutes but is actually many hours, you let yourself cry. You let it all out in heaving sobs. The girls don’t hear you or question the fact that it’s past noon and you’re still in your room. They assume you’re catching up on sleep. But you’re wide awake.

You think about how bad you’ve been wanting this. You want it so bad. You would never be able to forgive yourself if you let your fear ruin it.

So, you compose yourself. Wipe your eyes dry and sniff up the snot. Get dressed, plaster a normal smile on your face. You ask Greta and Avni if they want to come to the boys’ flat with you for a smoke. You tell them that Matty’s got a new strain he wants you to try. They agree after asking if you’ve had a good night’s sleep. You lie and say yes.

y/n: heading over now

y/n: and bringing the others if u don’t mind

You need an excuse to have everyone in the same room again. An opportunity to tell them the news. You’re not sure how long you can go before it eats you alive.

matty: Course

matty: Door’s unlocked

Matty doesn’t mind, but is weirdly disappointed to know that it won’t just be you and him. He calls Ross, Hann, and George out to the lounge to let them know that everyone’s coming, to act like he meant for it to be a group thing all along. It’s nothing out of the ordinary, so the boys don’t question it.

To be fair, hanging out one-on-one wasn’t out of the ordinary either. He’s just worried that you might find it odd for him to like it better that way, versus seeing the other girls. So he keeps that part to himself.

Everything’s normal when you arrive. Matty explains that the joints you puff and pass are supposed to give you a more concise high. Less scattered but definitely less alert, and maybe more focused. He thinks it might be good for writing, or something. You’re not sure. You just inhale and let it happen and then think in circles about how to start mentioning what you need to mention. It blares at your conscience.

Thankfully, at the perfect time, Avni asks you a question about the cafe. Which you know you’ll have to quit soon. It’s the perfect segue.

She’s complaining about accidentally volunteering to organise an event for her colleagues before winter break came along. “Thought I’d just be setting up the place but now I’ve got to plan the whole program of honourees and even sort out the catering.”

“Catering? Fuck, that’s fancy,” sneers Ross.

“Right? I think I’ll plan it at an odd time so that I can just get coffee and pastries, or something,” Avni lazily says, blowing smoke out of the corner of her mouth. “Does the cafe do catering? Like big carafes of coffee and tea?”

“We do,” you answer with hesitance.

“Oh, gorgeous! Would you be able to ask your boss to sort me a few? So I can use some of my budget on other stuff?” she asks.

Your heartbeat quickens. Now’s your moment.

“I would, but—” You cough and bite at the skin on your fingertips to stall. “I—Um, I won’t be working there anymore. In December,” You finally sputter out.

Everyone’s in their own little world as you hang out; George busy mixing something on his laptop, Greta bringing over her latest crochet project to finish (hoping she doesn’t get too high and fuck up the pattern), the others making casual conversation and enjoying the company. But they stop when they hear the words leave your mouth, and there’s a moment of eerie silence when the gears in their heads grind to figure out what you mean.

“Have you been sacked?” asks Adam. You shake your head no. “...You’re quitting?”

You nod slowly, searching for some sort of release in each of your friends’ expressions, hoping they figure it out before you have to say it on your own and out loud, since you haven’t done that yet. But nobody says anything, and you can’t bear any more silence.

“I got the internship.”

A sense of shock blanketed the room before Ross finally jumps out of his seat to tackle you in an embrace. You grin, a wave of relief hitting you, and flipping the morale in the October air on its head.

“Are you fucking kidding me?! How long have you known?!” he screams in your ear, and you wince at the volume, though you can’t help but giggle with joy as your friends erupt in praise.

He climbs off of you and you stand so that everyone can have their turn wrapping their arms around you.

“I got the email early this morning and have not been able to function since,” You explain. “Genuinely had a panic and hid underneath my bed sheets for about 3 hours before I could face the fact that it’s actually happening.”

“We have to celebrate! I should go get a bottle of champagne. Someone come with me, please. Balloons? Streamers? Do you want a cake, love? I can get a cake,” Avni rambles, dragging Greta up from her seat and heading for the door.

Your cheeks hurt and your head spins.

“Please, Av, you don’t have to do all that,” you argue.

Matty’s the last to hug you so he leaves one of his arms draped around the back of your neck, standing close. He leans his head sideways and your temples touch. He leaves his head there.

“Please, Y/N,” Greta copies you. “You deserve it. None of us work tonight, why can’t we party?!”

“This buzzkill narrative is really catching up to you,” George buts in. “And don’t you want to spend time with us before you leave? There’s not much time left, you know.”

Your cheeks finally relax, and you’re brought back down to Earth. Fuck. He’s right. The room falls silent as they all make the same realisation.

You feel your nose get fizzy with emotion. You can’t move on and let them celebrate you without telling them the truth.

“Yeah, you’re right. There’s also one more thing you should know. About the internship,” you start nervously.

Everyone looks you in the eye but you can’t dare to meet anyone’s stare. They sense the lighthearted and energetic mood shift, and their mouths fall flat. Why are they not smiling anymore? But there isn’t anything left for you to do besides explain yourself.

“It’s with ELLE Magazine. They have a head office in London, and I applied through ELLE UK, which is why I said the position would relocate me there. But, in my offer, they gave me the option to intern there, or at the headquarters in New York.”

Your breath shakes as you inhale.

“And after some thinking, I’ve decided to choose New York.”

#thread of gold #matty healy #matty healy x reader #matty healy x you #matty healy x y/n #matty healy fanfiction #matty healy fic #the 1975 #the 1975 fanfiction #fanfiction

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whinlatter · 2 years ago

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underrated hinny moments that make my heart hurt: shell cottage 🐚

'They were all sitting in the living room when he entered the little hall, their attention focused upon Bill, who was talking. The room was light-coloured, pretty, with a small fire of driftwood burning brightly in the fireplace. Harry did not want to drop mud upon the carpet, so he stood in the doorway, listening...'

i just wanted to say a little bit about an underrated hinny moment from of my favourite chapters in deathly hallows, the wandmaker. i love this chapter (and the one after it, also at shell cottage) for so many reasons: the rich visual imagery of the survivors finding their way to the sea; the symbolism of harry preparing the grave by hand for dobby's burial, foreshadowing his own death '('deeper and deeper Harry sank into the grave...'); ron and dean silently joining harry in digging dobby's grave, three soldiers burying a comrade, and both dean and ron offering up items of clothes to dobby as a tribute for dobby's sacrifice... it's all just gorgeous.

but… the hinny moment tho. the hinny scene in this chapter is so tiny and quiet but it's also so sad and so good. ok let’s get into it.

the chapter begins in the immediate aftermath of dobby's death. ginny hasn't been mentioned in the past seventy pages, since early january, with the trio's visit to the lovegood house (the group arrive at shell cottage in mid-march). the last time ginny was mentioned, harry was in devon, looking out to the burrow, realising how close they were to each other, thinking of her but being glad of her safety away from him. that day, he also saw her painted face alongside the others on luna's bedroom ceiling (friends.. friends... friends...) of course, it's at the lovegoods that harry learns the tale of the three brothers, and hears about the deathly hallows for the first time. this is a plot point that, with hindsight, we know foreshadows harry's mortal fate. (on ginny and the intertwined plotlines of hallows/horcruxes/harry's death, see here).

this chapter, then, begins with the little group, having just arrived, confronting terrible tragedy. the scene is reminiscent of the last time harry crash landed, panicking and grieving, in a place of safety: the burrow, after the seven plotters rescue, after hedwig’s death. of course, in that moment, harry is met by ginny: he wants to hold her and find comfort in her; ginny holds his hand and stays close. as we’ll see, there’s a trend in the later stages of the series: whenever harry is grieving, ginny is close by.

harry’s not in devon, this time, but in the neighbouring county of cornwall (two parts of the U.K. with these important historic ties as the two counties out on england’s jagged south-westernly peninsula jutting into the same stretch of sea). as soon as the chapter opens, harry's mind makes a callback to the last time harry staggered from a loved one's body:

'It was like sinking into an old nightmare; for an instant Harry knelt again beside Dumbledore’s body at the foot of the tallest tower at Hogwarts, but in reality he was staring at a tiny body curled upon the grass, pierced by Bellatrix’s silver knife.'

of course, when dumbledore lay dead at the foot of the astronomy tower, it was ginny and ginny alone who was able to get through to harry, to reach him and guide him away. this time, things are different. harry has no comfort here, no ginny present to catch him and receive him in his immediate grief: he's distanced mentally from the others at shell cottage, both by the fact of his loss and by the thoughts of voldemort and his fate that plague him now:

'The sea was rushing against the rock somewhere nearby; Harry listened to it while the others talked, discussing matters in which he could take no interest, making decisions.'

once the grave is dug, the little group gather together to bury dobby. there's another callback to dumbledore's death here - this time, it's to the funeral:

'He forced himself not to break down as he remembered Dumbledore’s funeral, and the rows and rows of golden chairs, and the Minister of Magic in the front row, the recitation of Dumbledore’s achievements, the stateliness of the white marble tomb. He felt that Dobby deserved just as grand a funeral, and yet here the elf lay between bushes in a roughly dug hole.'

harry returns to the memory of the funeral to contrast dumbledore's grand send off with dobby's humble one. but also, on some level, he's mentally returning to moments that were defined both by loss but also by the presence of what was, by his own description, 'his greatest comfort'. last time he said goodbye to a loved one, ginny was at his side - until, of course, the funeral had ended, the goodbye had been said, and harry had acted on his decision to let ginny go and embrace the solitary path left for him ('I've got things to do alone now’).

harry, grieving dobby, turns to the same coping strategies as he showed at dumbledore's funeral. a death means distancing himself from others ('I've got things to do alone now'); it means forcing himself not to break down ('[he] could not bear to hear these things, nor did he think his resolution would hold if he remained sitting beside her'), and it means pushing aside thoughts of his own grief and concentrating on the task left to him ('Moving felt much more bearable than sitting still...').

harry asks for the others for a moment alone, which they grant him. he then marks his friend's grave. the text is now heavy with foreshadowing. we are told, now, that harry has had a realisation as he dug the burial plot, though the details of this realisation is kept from the reader: we know it is somehow linked to the hallows and horcrux distinction. harry thinks about it now as he walks from the grave back to the house, hallows and horcruxes at the forefront of his mind.

'...his mind full of those things that had come to him in the grave, ideas that had taken shape in the darkness, ideas both fascinating and terrible...'

we will learn, in the next chapter, that the decision harry has made is not to race voldemort to the elder wand. he’s chosen to go after horcruxes, and not the hallows; not to become master of death, but to remain the chosen one. it’s such an important moment for harry: he’s choosing who he will be, setting things in motion, making a gamble that distinguishes himself both from voldemort and, he thinks, from dumbledore. he doesn’t know it yet, but this powerful - and shrewd - decision will cost him his life. and whenever harry takes a step closer to his own death...

cut to the next paragraph. immediately after this enormously significant line - of pivotal ideas taking shape in the darkness - we have this:

the setting here is important. it's domestic, homely, safe, similar to descriptions of the burrow, a kind of modest, warm, familial comfort. harry stands on the threshold of a room which is described as 'light-coloured' and 'pretty', with a bright fire lit. throughout the series, of course, signals for ginny throughout the text are always about light (especially natural light and sunlight), warmth and fire: obviously we have ginny's 'blazing look', but also her 'glowing like the setting sun' (CoS), her eyes 'reflecting the firelight' (OotP), her 'red hair flying like flames' (HBP), how looking at her is 'like gazing into a brilliant light' (DH). the mentioned prettiness of the room is also supposed to help usher in mention of a character that, in harry’s mind, is beautiful and lovely to behold. harry stands apart from the room and from the others: his fears about the mud are also supposed to reinforce how removed he is from the rest of the gathered group. still, these little descriptions give us little clues that a mention of ginny is coming.

as bill addresses the people gathered in this firelit pretty little room, the part of his monologue that harry's ears prick to is the mention of ginny:

'... lucky that Ginny’s on holiday. If she’d been at Hogwarts, they could have taken her before we reached her. Now we know she’s safe too.'

the mention of ginny here is significant for two reasons. first, news that ginny is safe is the first small piece of comfort harry gets after dobby dies. standing outside this warm, safe, sheltered little room, harry receives news that ginny is out of harm’s way, as are the other members of the weasley family, whom he loves. now both the reader and harry get this little bit of light in the darkness, confirmation that ginny is safe, but also allows her to resume her role in HBP, as some tiny comfort to harry in grief, even in absentia. (honestly i just love the image of harry in the doorway, grief-stricken, covered in mud, listening in the corridor to this one little tiny piece of good news about the girl he’s in love with).

secondly, though, i love how this brief mention allows ginny to enter the narrative of these scenes that are, at its core, about harry’s ultimate destiny in the voldemort/chosen one/horcrux v hallows arc. even when not physically present, ginny stands in as this one flickering little warm light - a little fire, burning still - that anchors harry even when he is making these huge choices that will take him into such deep forms of magic and down so solitary a path where no other character can really reach him. it deepens this connection in the reader’s mind between ginny and harry’s fate in ways that makes him thinking of her as he dies make such deep sense. ginny isn’t a subplot extraneous to the chosen one plot: she’s bound up in it, in this rich, complicated, sad way, not as someone who save this character from his fate, but is essential to sending him off at peace with it. so often when harry is closing in on the truth about the horcruxes and hallows, mentions of ginny are close by (see the kiss meta above). ginny is that important.

'[Bill] looked around and saw Harry standing there. “I’ve been getting them all out of the Burrow,” he explained. “Moved them to Muriel’s. The Death Eaters know Ron’s with you now, they’re bound to target the family—don’t apologise,” he added at the sight of Harry’s expression. “It was always a matter of time, Dad’s been saying so for months. We’re the biggest blood traitor family there is.” “How are they protected?” asked Harry.'

obviously, harry is harry-ing here - he wants to apologise for the risk and danger posed to the weasleys (especially because the reason for the trio's capture was his fault), and he demands information about how ginny and the rest of the weasleys will be kept safe going forward. he knows ginny is safe: he wants to make sure she stays that way.

what's also significant about this moment, though, is that it reinforces this dynamic that runs throughout DH as a book, which is that at all times the reader knows exactly where ginny is. ginny spends the majority book off stage, yet we're told when she's on the train to hogwarts, when she's back home for christmas, when she’s back for easter and moves to muriel's etc. when harry doesn't know where ginny is, during the battle - when she leaves the room of requirement at his instruction but then appears to vanish - it’s therefore deployed to detonate a deep sense of panic, where we see harry confront the worst possible reality, one he is unable to even bring himself to process, the prospect of ginny’s death ('and he wanted to find the other Weasleys, and above all make sure, make quite sure, that Ginny was not—but he could not permit that idea to form in his mind—'). when harry eventually goes to his death in the forest - the ultimate thing he will have to grieve: his own life — of course, it's ginny he comes across in the grounds, waiting to give him comfort one last time, to send him on his way. (see the forest meta again for a more thorough explanation of this).

after this short conversation with bill, harry cleans himself of the dirt and mud of the grave at the kitchen sink. it seems so trivial but i'm just obsessed with the extremely slow pace of this scene. the tempo is so unusual for the series, and there's this extremely compelling domesticity to it, which continues this ongoing association with ginny and the burrow in the reader's mind. harry slowly and methodically washes and dries his hands as he thinks, again, of dumbledore and the hallows, in this setting that feels like the end of the earth:

'Dawn was breaking over the horizon, shell pink and faintly gold, as he washed, again following the train of thought that had come to him in the dark garden . . . Harry dried his hands, impervious to the beauty of the scene outside the window and to the murmuring of the others in the sitting room. He looked out over the ocean and felt closer, this dawn, than ever before, closer to the heart of it all.'

in the rest of the chapter, of course, harry will make some of the most important choices he’ll ever make. he'll choose to talk first to griphook over ollivander, a choice he recognises as making the ultimate decision to hunt horcruxes over hallows. the conversations with these characters will each inch him closer to the end of his quest, and of his life. and he’ll think about who he is — who dumbledore understood him to be — and throw back veils of understanding to see himself most clearly for the first time, the most significant epiphany scene bar the later discovery of his own death in dumbledore’s office.

'You gave Ron the Deluminator . . . You understood him. . . . You gave him a way back . . . And you understood Wormtail too. . . . You knew there was a bit of regret there, somewhere. . . . And if you knew them . . . What did you know about me, Dumbledore?'

i really love these lines on their own terms, but i just think this chapter, and harry’s time at shell cottage, are some of the most significant statements of harry’s essence as a character we get in the whole series. we’re seeing who harry has become and all that dumbledore knew that he was: the core elements of harry, the cumulative weight of the preceding years on his shoulders, and the person made and moulded by everything he has been through up to this point. he's seeing clearly now. in his grief over dobby, he finally masters the connection with his mind and voldemort’s, using his grief and his love as a barrier, and chooses who he will be.

so i just think it means so much that ginny is brought, quietly, into the frame at this extremely pivotal point. she’s a little driftwood fire in a warm little family home by the sea, a brief moment of pause and safety and sanctuary, before the end; not holding harry back from his fate, but giving him some strength, some comfort, as he embraces it.

(ps: the next time ginny is mentioned, in the next chapter, shell cottage, it happens during this sweet little dinnertime scene by the fireplace, with romantic undertones with fleur worrying about bill in his absence, right before remus bursts in to announce that his own wife has just given birth to their son, with harry surrounded by all this talk of little families... ok i'll stop i'll stop but honestly):

A strong wind gusted against the cottage windows as Bill and Ollivander set off into the night. The rest of them squeezed in around the table; elbow to elbow and with barely enough room to move, they started to eat. The fire crackled and popped in the grate beside them. Fleur, Harry noticed, was merely playing with her food; she glanced at the window every few minutes; however, Bill returned before they had finished their first course, his long hair tangled by the wind. "Everything's fine," he told Fleur. "Ollivander settled in, Mum and Dad say hello. Ginny sends you all her love...'

#this has been in my drafts for precisely one million years #dusted it off cos i was running my mouth about shell cottage earlier #it’s a mess but what can you do!#just a love letter to the shell cottage scenes honestly #seeing hinny in everything can’t be stopped #i’ve got seasides on the brain at the minute #pointing out foreshadowing and gasping is a full time job #meta #hinny #hp meta #harry x ginny #ginny weasley #DH #shell cottage

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soracities · 1 year ago

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where do you stand with living in the moment, feeling grateful, and how do you personally approach it?

It's interesting, I actually struggle a lot with staying in the moment even though I also tend to notice small things so easily--I could be having the worst day of my life but I will always notice the veins on a leaf, for example, or how light falls into the train carriage, or a patchy section of grass erupting between the footpath and the street.

More than anything I think that, even if I struggle with staying centered, the thing for me is making sure I find these individual pockets to slip into and you really can find them everywhere: watching steam rise from a cup of warm milk, a slant of afternoon sunlight in mid-winter, tree roots buckling the tarmac along a footpath, overgrown patches of ivy, a flower stall in the middle of the high street etc. They don't even need to be traditionally "romantic" or pleasant or picturesque things, either: there's something in a moment of sympathy for a pigeon hobbling across the tram tracks with an injured foot, or the patterns made by paint peeling off a dilapidated door, or even the geometric cross-sections of electricity wires against the sky (whether blue, or pink, or grey).

It's not necessarily that I actively root myself deeply in these moments (as I said, actively quieting my mind is hard for me to do), but more that, because I always notice them, and because I always take note of myself noticing them, because I feel something for them, even just fleetingly, they create a kind of interruption to whatever was going on before. The interruption might last a second and no more, but I've noted it for that second. It doesn't automatically make a bad day go away, but it's a nice reminder that a bad day doesn't have to be all consuming. There's always going to be something new to see, even if you have seen it before because each time you see it is it's own unique event. I'll be going through it and see a pigeon huddled by a window as the bus passes and when it's out of sight I'll still be going through it, but I'll be going through it having just seen a pigeon and there is a kind of momentary lull in that for me. The easiest way I can describe it is like a dark and empty room where all you've done is lift a single blind. The room is still empty, but also it's not--does that make sense?

In any case when I am trying to stay present my favourite thing is to try and find some kind of immersive activity--this could be a small craft like origami or braiding bracelets, but my favourite is to just go on walks along the beach or through a park and pay as much attention to things as I can: the smell of vegetation when I pass the wild compost heap, or if the grass has been cut, or the gulls picking their way along the sand, or the faraway voices of people and dogs. Sometimes, if I really, really need to calm my mind I'll narrate everything I do: now I am walking up this hill, now I am crossing the grass, now I can feel the mud because it's rained, now the hill is steeper and my legs are pushing harder and I feel it in my thighs etc.

Gratitude, I think, is maybe partly tied in with the whole noticing every little thing--it's not a conscious decision, but I think it does open space for it in a way even if I'm not thinking "I'm so grateful I saw that toddler dressed as Sonic the Hedgehog". It's like the open blind in the dark and empty room again: there's space for something, even if the room itself doesn't change.

But like the rest, there are a lot of things I struggle with where I do need to train myself to be actively conscious of gratitude: I have a series of cue cards tacked over my bed and one of them is, literally, "choose gratitude, bitch ❤️" (heart included). The rest involves me not letting my inner voice doom-monger my life as much which is difficult, but I try. By far the most important to me, though, is trying not to counter the compliments people close to me give by going "actually, I'm really not" or something along those lines. It's not about whether or not I can see these things in myself (some days I can, a lot of days I can't) but about acknowleding that I can't dictate what others see or feel: rejecting their kind words is, in essence, the same as rejecting them, and I don't want to do that.

None of this is to say they have all been failsafes for me or that I don't struggle with things because I do--but they're the scaffolds I have and use the most and that make the world what it is for me. Granted, I think I've always been like this, even as a childhood (I was the very opposite of an apathetic teenager)--so maybe I'm always tuned up this way already and that makes it a little easier; but, again, it doesn't make you immune to the world or to your own troubles so while it isn't necessarily a conscious thing, the older I get the more aware of it I become, and the more intentional I try to make my approach to things, if that makes sense 🤍

#ask #Anonymous #notes from elsewhere

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impossiblesuitcase · 9 months ago

Text

Acts of Service

The five love languages are five different ways of expressing and receiving love: words of affirmation, quality time, receiving gifts, acts of service, and physical touch.

Carswell likes coffee.

Cress knows this. He always wakes up earlier than her—when one lives in a satellite, keeping track of day and night is unnecessary; Cress would wake and sleep by her natural body clock, except for those times Mistress Sybil would force her to pull all-nighters tracking down some unsuspecting Earthen politician. Thorne has evidently not rid himself of his military training and wakes up at 6 a.m. sharp despite all claims of needing his beauty sleep. She’s more of a quarter-past-8 kind of gal.

At least, that’s on the days he lets her sleep in. When they are on duty for an antidote run, he knocks on her door and calls her name sweetly at 7. It’s never a rude awakening.

No matter the time she finally rises, Cress comes out into the galley rubbing sleep from her eyes, inhaling the aroma of coffee that he has already drunk for the morning. Even when she has a cold or allergies and can’t smell a thing, she can always taste it on his lips.

———

“Stardust, it’s starting!”

Cress’s sleepy mind startles at the nickname. Somehow the resounding pops and crackles of fireworks painting the sky are not enough to keep her awake, but Thorne’s crisp voice can jolt her upright.

Maybe it’s the way he says it so excitedly. Maybe it’s the way she still feels giddy that—a tentative four months into their relationship—he’s already come up with names reserved just for her. This is her favourite—arising from when they’d been marvelling at the view of the stars from the Rampion’s orbit and he’d traced his thumb over her cheeks and told her that her freckles looked like a constellation.

Cress peers past heavy eyelids at the 9 p.m. sky. Blues and reds and oranges explode above her. It’s her first fireworks display. She’s been bursting about it all day.

She can’t keep awake.

She yawns for the umpteenth time and Thorne’s chuckling reaches her ear. He takes hold of her shoulders and guides her down to the grass. This is nice grass, cool and pillowy, she thinks as she lets herself be laid. Her thick coat cuts the breeze, and she’s so, so warm. It’s a poor view of the fireworks—only tails of the bursts are visible in the bottom left corner of her vision. Then none at all as she closes her eyes contentedly.

Thorne hovers over her and something warm settles on her lips. He pulls away. “Is that how you wanted it to go?”

“Mhmm,” she hums.

Cress told Thorne of one of her most treasured fantasies aboard the satellite, back when he was a mere crush: the two of them on a river bank, fireworks above and violins around and lips joined together. Tonight, the absence of swooning violins or singing rivers cannot steal the magic of his kiss. Now with her goal achieved, it seems her mind can finally rest.

“Wolf? Make sure she doesn’t get kidnapped while I’m gone, will ya?” says Thorne, voice drifting as he stands up high above her.

A grunt, and rustling as feet move behind her head. There’s lighter movement in the grass as more follow; Scarlet calls after Thorne, “You work her too hard with those shipments, Captain.”

Thorne doesn’t respond for a long, long time. Cress gives up on waiting for his answer. It will be a twenty-minute walk back to the Rampion, except Cress doesn’t have the energy to pick up even a butterfly. I’ll just rest my eyes for a minute, she thinks vaguely, two minutes and I’ll be stronger.

Something nudges her arm. She’s pulled upright.

“Hey, Stardust,” Thorne whispers, husky and low. “Drink this.”

He puts something to her lips. It’s warm and steaming. She opens her mouth and sweet liquid pours in as he tips up her chin.

She wills her eyes to open. He’s right before of her, crouched on the grass. The sky has darkened.

“Weren’t you going somewhere?” she murmurs between gulps.

“I already went.”

It takes a while for the coffee to kick in, even longer to realise that she’d been asleep for at least twenty minutes. Though the firework display is long finished, the afterimage lingers behind her eyes. Stunning, vibrant and infinitely better than in the netdramas.

She offers him the rest of the coffee, but he wraps an arm around her shoulder and pushes it back into her hand.

———

“Which one?”

“You choose.”

“Carswell.”

It’s 8 o’clock, and rather than enjoy his morning caffeine from the comforts of his ship, Thorne decides to venture out for his fix. New Rome is the perfect place for breakfast. It’s bright and dazzling with its winking fountains and fathomless ancient buildings. It’s more spacious than the claustrophobic streets of New Beijing or Los Angeles, but populated enough to tell them that they’re in the right place.

Every café is crooning their names in a soprano’s aria.

Cress can’t enjoy it. Six months post-revolution, Cress and Thorne are now under a contract beyond the American Republic to distribute the Letumosis antidote. They had an extra large shipment order in Manilla yesterday, and right as they were packing for a leisurely trip to Italy, Thorne Shipping Inc. was summoned for an emergency outbreak in Shanghai. They could handle a short detour.

It took six hours. Neither slept until 3 a.m. And yet Thorne decided to wake her up at bright and early 7:15.

“Crescent,” he mimics her reprimanding whine, “You decide.”

They’re situated in front of two cafés. They’ve stood here for a good three minutes mindlessly arguing their points. It’s an hour later than he likes his coffee, and Cress isn’t used to a grumpy Carswell.

(She isn’t used to getting annoyed with him, either.)

“I always pick! You’re the one who dragged me out here so early—you decide!”

“I want you to.”

Cress balls her fist. Glares up, up, up at him—is he straightening his back just to make her seem shorter?

“I’m serious, ba–” she catches herself before she calls him ‘babe’ as an insult. She’s attempted all manner of endearments—dear, babe, darling—but they all turn into popping candy on her tongue. When Wolf calls Scarlet ‘dear’ it sounds so tender. From Cress’s mouth, she worries she’ll sound like an old granny berating her curmudgeonly husband for tracking mud through her kitchen.

One thing is for sure, she won’t let the first use be in anger.

Thorne must interpret her pause for something sinister. He raspberries his lips, turning away from her, muttering, “It’s not like I’m asking you to leave the crown jewels on my doorstep…”

Her distraction slips back to irritation. “The last three places I chose, you hated!”

“I didn’t hate them—”

“‘An abysmal attack on my innocently-underserving palette,’” she air-quotes. “I don’t want to sit through another meal of your complaints.”

“Oh come on! You made bad choices!”

“I chose you, didn’t I?”

The ire flees his expression. “I’m tired, Cress." He rubs at his eyes, frustrated from this ongoing pull and slack. “Aces, and here I thought this would be a nice morning activity…”

Cress reels back on the stone pavement. She is ruining this nice morning? What about him? He woke her up when he knew she’d be exhausted. And when she agreed to come along even though she didn’t want to, because she loves him and chooses to look past his indiscretions, he’s nothing but difficult! All he had to do was choose one blasted café and—

Murmured Italian breezes past her ears. A posse of locals is seated under a pavilion ten paces ahead, witnessing the whole spectacle. They hide behind ceramic cups and focaccia and conspicuously gossip about the “lovers’ quarrel in the street.” These are the only words said in Universal; clearly intended for the lovers to hear.

Cress refocuses on Thorne, who has folded arms and bags under his eyes and an etched-in scowl.

Stupid. They are so stupid. They’re standing on public street in one of the most beautiful cities in the world nicking each other over coffee.

Without warning, Cress seizes his elbow and yanks him away from the onlookers, blindly crashing through the closest door.

Thorne almost bangs his head on the awnings. “Cre—!”

“Two large coffees, please!” she yells.

The door chime tinkles, the only other sound in the establishment. Her voice is much, much louder than she’d realised.

Only one table is in use. The patron snarls a condescending, “tourists,” and returns to his port and cappuccino. The green-haired, bored-eyed barista glares at them.

“Uh, two large coffees, one black, one with milk and sugar, per favoure,” Cress stammers. She all but drags Thorne to a quaint corner table and collapses into a chair, hiding her face behind her hands.

The netscreen is quietly murmuring a morning newsfeed. Thorne sits opposite her with a heaving sigh, apparently not pleased to have won the argument.

Or, now she’s thinking about it, maybe he is just tired.

Cress lowers her hands. Breathes deeply. Her exhaustion sloughs away to make room for embarrassment. Yes, she had been irked to be woken so early. Now his intention—“a nice morning activity”—makes her heart ache. She scavenges her mind for something to say to ease this ludicrous tension they’ve boiled up as Thorne stares blankly at the netscreen.

Part of her wishes Scarlet and Wolf hadn’t left the Rampion to return to their farm. Scarlet would’ve straightened the two of them out by now.

Minutes pass in contemplation. Shaking her head to clear her inhibitions, she begins, “Carswe—ah!”

Cress gasps and clutches a hand to her chest. The barista has materialised beside her.

“Your drrinks-ah,” she says, her accent heavy and laden with apathy. The cups are dropped carelessly onto the table.

“O-oh,” Cress emits shakily. “I didn’t see you.”

A slight curve to her lip makes Cress wonder if the woman did that on purpose.

“Thanks,” Thorne says before sticking into his drink.

Cress reaches for hers, sips, and hisses at the heat. The barista stares at her.

“It’s lovely,” Cress compliments. Another scorching sip. The barista knocks the table with her leg. “Y-yes?”

The woman holds out an ID scanner. “You pay?”

“Oh!” Cress places down her cup and flashes her wrist under the scanner. After double-checking the transaction, the woman raises an eyebrow and clips away.

Cress leans over, whispering: “Don’t you pay after?”

Thorne chuckles, already brightening with only a few sips. “At restaurants, yes. Cafés, you usually pay before.”

“Oh.”

Steam wafts up to her face. Cress tentatively blows on her coffee and risks a gulp. The heat paralyses her tongue. Frowning, she returns the cup to the table and leans back in her chair.

A beautiful, lilting voice reaches her; the woman on the netscreen is showering them in an operatic solo. If Cress closes her eyes, it’s just like her time in her satellite. L’amore mi fa dimenticare ogni cosa brutta, she sings.

“Too hot?”

Her eyes flutter open. Thorne has his thumb pointing at her cup.

“A bit.”

Thorne takes her hand; she entwines their fingers, but he laughs, says, “Hang on,” and pries away. He ties her fingers around the creamy beige handle of his cup. “Mine’s cooler.”

There’s at least half left. After a cautionary sip, it is indeed a safe lukewarm. She expects him to take hers in turn. Instead, he holds the corners of the mahogany table with his hands.

“Look, Cress,” he says suddenly, anxiously, “I’m sorry I woke you up. I just thought…I don’t know. I was thinking with how excited you were to come here, I figured you’d want more time to explore before we’re sucked into antidote runs. It was inconsiderate of me.”

Her feet curl in her open-toed flats.

The singer is reaching the crescendo, her words muddied with vibrato and indistinguishable. One word, though, pierces through—clear as a firework in a cloudless night sky.

Like stars from her satellite but brighter. He’s here, with stubble on his chin and milk foam in the corners of his mouth.

Heart blazing, she leans forward, forgets the exhaustion, forgets the petty arguing, the onlookers' scrutiny or the massive shipment to deliver after lunch.

“Thank you,” she tests, and with a breath to prepare, “amore.”

His hands fall. He’s startled—a raised brow, a slight gaping. Where has that smooth man of hers gone, who can match any cliché flirt with a money note that will ring in the lucky woman’s head for years to come?

(She likes this version better.)

A breath later, Thorne grins. He takes her hand under the table, squeezing.

In all her favourite Italian operas, there are only a few words she can recognise or translate. But always unmistakable is love.

He’s pretty unmistakable to her, too.

———

“Ugh, you’re so annoying!”

All their friends are laughing, but Cress’s laughter has a head-on collision with her heart.

It’s their first reunion on Luna since the revolution ended—all nine of them here. Everyone except Cinder and Iko is heavily jetlagged. That, and gorging themselves on Scarlet’s decadent chocolate cake has done a number on their solemnity. Exhaustion and sugary drinks and dancing and party games makes them all act like a litter of five-year-old’s.

Thorne is the worst of the bunch. He ties Jacin’s shoelaces together and writes ‘Captain is King’ on Cinder’s dining table for the maids to discover tomorrow. But he focuses most of his efforts on his sweet, unsuspecting girlfriend. Stealing food off her plate, balancing coasters on her head. It’s once he picks her up and tosses her onto his shoulder during her delightful conversation with Winter that she knows to exact vengeance.

She whines until he sets her down and races over to the drinks table, grabbing the slippery cubes from the ice bucket. Then she approaches him all nonchalant and taps his shoulder, and when he leans down to meet her, she shoves the ice down his shirt.

His girly shriek makes them all howl with laughter. And then—staring at her, something indiscernible but strong on his face—he says it.

You’re so annoying.

A day later, Cress pulls Iko into her guest suite.

“How do I fix this?”

After five seconds of observing her anxious pacing, Iko takes Cress’s wrists and eases her onto a futon. “Fix what? You were messing around, Cress. He isn’t mad at you.”

Her hands come up to claw through her hair. “He said he hates me!”

“He didn’t say that.”

“He meant that.”

“Not in that way. It’s an expression. I tell Cinder I hate her when she switches the stilettos I chose for her to boots. I don’t mean it literally.”

Of course. Even Iko, an android, is better at deciphering human interactions than Cress is. Her formative years of total isolation are becoming less and less recurrent in her memories, not when she has skyscrapers and thunderstorms and kisses and best friends, but in moments like these, one thing is certain. She is a total dunce.

“Hey,” Iko says as if hearing her thoughts. “I didn’t think he was upset. He was smiling and laughing!”

“That could be a sarcastic smile,” she grumbles. “A ‘what did I get myself into?’ smile.”

Iko’s sympathetic look is definitely a ‘you’re overthinking it’ smile. “Why don’t you just ask him? I don’t think your relationship is solely contingent on you not putting ice down his shirt.”

Ask him. Yeah, because Iko probably thinks he’ll tell her that he didn’t mean anything by it. That he’ll say he still loves her. But a creeping vine of insecurity grows around her heart. What if this event is just part of a build-up of little things, quirks and idiosyncrasies that a socially inept, awkward satellite girl can’t rid herself of and a reasonably-minded Earthen can’t become accustomed to?

You’re so annoying.

Iko fists her hands on her hips, surveying the pristine suite. “Listen Cress, I know I’ve sold myself as a relationship expert. ‘Truth is, my romantic education is mostly from netdramas.”

“Mine too.”

“And so you would know how often characters have misunderstandings that are blown way out of proportion. Can you say that you’ve never said anything to him that he could have misinterpreted?”

She wants to snap a “No,” but her conscience brings one remark to mind.

“I chose you, didn’t I?”

Iko sighs (which is apparently something she can do). “I don’t know what Thorne meant. I don’t live in his head—don't want to; I imagine it’s a lot of ‘Rampion, Cress, ‘I’m amazing’.’ But maybe he’s meaning something different than what he’s saying.”

Cress buries her fingers in the plush futon, willing this hopelessness to leave her. “Like what?” she asks, voice small.

Iko crosses the room and plucks the singular pink rose from the vase on the windowsill. Thorne brought it along from Earth so Cress would have “something from home” while on Luna. How peculiar that her place of birth has become foreign soil. Thorne knows that about her. He knows a lot of things about her.

“Maybe the meaning is lying right in front of you,” says Iko, twirling the flower between her synthetic fingers.

You are so annoying, Cress tells her brain. Why can’t you figure this out?

———

Netsearch: which napkin does one cough up their stomach into when fine dining—the left or the right?

“Are you all right, Cress?” Kai asks, brow furrowing.

It doesn’t matter how sweet and sincere he is, those words are arsenic coming from emperor-high-spice-tolerance. Lunar shells didn’t get flavourful food. They got nutritious sustenance necessary for continued existence. Spice was a luxury.

Her response is something akin to a wheeze, frantically shaking hands and blind grasping for liquids.

Something lukewarm and heavy is placed in her hand. The green tea, fresh and steaming from the pot mingles poorly with her already burning mouth. She downs the entire stock anyway.

“Pace yourself,” Thorne coaches. He’s ready with the teapot when she relinquishes the china cup and refills it.

“Could’ve used that warning earlier,” she croaks out, wiping her mouth with the satin napkin.

Kai is genuinely apologetic, if a little amused under that congenial placidity. “We can get you some ice water or milk if you’d like.”

Don’t mock me further.

With a terse, “No thank you,” she picks up the noodles with her chopsticks and dumps them into Thorne’s bowl. She’s only a little comforted by the fact that it’s only the three of them in the dim yet stunningly ornate dining hall. At least her dignity will die quietly.

Thorne returns the pot to its setting. “You should really consider changing your menu, pal. My girlfriend will forgive you for burning her guts ‘cause she’s so nice, whereas your girlfriend…”

“Cinder is”—a cough—“lovely,” Cress reprimands. Thorne nudges her hand towards her cup. She dutifully takes a sip, placating the embers in her throat.

“I will take that into consideration,” Kai acknowledges regardless. His hands fold over one another a little uncertainly and he mumbles, “I don’t want to scare her off…”

Thorne darts his attention away from watching Cress drink to watching the emperor. A glint forms in his eyes. He flagrantly leans across the immaculate place settings, wrinkling the tablecloth and asks, “So when is the lovely lady coming here?”

Kai picks up a prawn and sheds its shell. “Next month.”

Thorne picks up a prawn in tandem, but tears the shell away with his teeth and spits it onto his plate. A little snark towards Kai’s perfect etiquette, maybe to establish himself as Captain and therefore the one in charge, though he isn’t the one seated at the head of the table.

When Kai isn’t around, Thorne is the paragon of proper prawn etiquette.

Cress giggles at Thorne’s little power play but plays it off with a, “I’m so excited! We haven’t seen her in so long.”

Thorne swallows loudly and wipes his mouth on his white sleeves. “Are you excited, Kai?”

Kai tenses, just briefly. The nearby servants approach the table and remove the dishes, even those untouched. A new line of servants set delicate sashimi before them. The pots of green tea are whisked away and replaced with fresh ones.

“Your Majesty,” Thorne drawls, hands cupping his chin. “I’m waiting.”

Mr. Immune-to-all-levels-of-Scoville is furiously red at the mention of the moon queen. He unhouses the pot of jasmine rice and forks up a large bite, eating it too quickly for an emperor. He swallows and grumbles, “That’s one way to describe it.”

Catching Kai’s notice, Cress picks up her tea and tosses an indicative look between him and the drink as she sips. Kai blushes further, seizes his own cup and swiftly downs it, tempering the redness. Well, sort of. He then becomes remarkably interested in spearing salmon onto his fork.

She tries to hide her grin. Something tells her that Kai is as desperate to see Cinder as she is to see him. It’s never voiced, but when Cress and Thorne go to-and-fro from Earth and Luna to drop off and pick up the Letumosis antidote the first thing out of either monarch’s mouth is to ask about the other.

And Thorne is plucking the teapot from the table and…refilling her cup again.

———

Carswell does like coffee, doesn’t he?

He consistently orders a large, even an extra large, wherever they are in the world. Cress sticks with a small because too many jitters make her stomach roil.

Soon a pattern emerges. He orders these drinks this size and drinks half, a third, sometimes even just a quarter, and then he’ll set it in her lap and ask her to finish it for him. It absolutely stumps her that he doesn’t just order a medium. One time, she offered to swap her small with his large just to see if he could get through it. Even then, he saved most of it for her.

(She begins to ask waitresses for sugar packets in advance because there’s only so much bitterness she can take.)

And it’s not just coffee! At restaurants the rim of his cola glass gets smudged with her lip-gloss when he insists he’s quenched. At his parents’ house his favourite maid Janette tells him that she still stocks the raspberry lime cordial that he guzzled in his childhood. He drinks it with nostalgic reverence and then insists Cress tries it. She can’t fight the disgusted pinch in her nose when she dares a sip, yet the proud look on Janette’s face guilts her enough that when Thorne leaves it to her, she gulps down the rest.

She wants to tell him it’s an egregious waste of money. It has to be a leftover earmark from his abundant upbringing. Cress wants to ask and starts to ask and doesn’t. She doesn’t want him to think her ungrateful—after all, he’s giving them to her, not throwing them away. It’s not like he’s doing anything wrong. As they pass the seven month threshold of their relationship she gains more confidence; she’ll tell him off for his shameless humour, or his attempts to evade responsibility, yet this never manages to leave her tongue.

How can he read her as easily as his favourite net-toons, and yet he’s illegible to her?

———

Thorne is beet red. That’s what Cress would say, although she’s never actually seen a beet before.

She can hear his feet scraping along the rocky terrain. The path was smoother at the start of the hike—now, two hours in, only the most intrepid explorers attempt this winding, steep route.

Her satellite workouts hadn’t prepared her for the desert, but the desert prepared her for this. She’s in better shape than she thought if the lack of wheezing and steadiness in her calves means anything.

Laboured breathing travels behind her. He’s given up trying to disguise it.

Cress glances back. Thorne is watching her each step carefully.

“Amore—” she begins.

“I’m fine,” Thorne pants, rough and breathless.

“At least let me take the bag—”

“It’s heavy. It’ll tire you out.”

His curtness makes her face forward again, pondering over some other excuse she could use to get him to take it easy. Looking ahead allows the scenery to recapture her attention.

Yosemite National Park is the most awe-inspiring breath of nature she’s ever seen. Every blink of the eye is too long; she just wants to stop and paint canvases of every angle of the towering peaks and glittering lakes. The high-definition panoramas that used to spread over her satellite walls are pathetic when compared to the plant-perfumed air and rich soil.

Thorne set a whole day aside for it. They’re well prepared—caps and full-length clothes to cut the glare, hiking boots and nutritious snacks for the journey. Thorne had reminded her repeatedly that morning to fill up her water bottle and had done it for her while she busied herself applying sunscreen.

“Did you fill up yours?” she’d asked, meeting him in the galley. She caught her reflection in the mixing bowl on the counter and jumped. The white cast of the sunscreen rendered her a ghostly geisha.

Thorne had been busy stuffing a third muesli bar into her rucksack. “Last night. It’s already packed.”

She scrubbed at her cheeks. “Where’s your bag?”

“In the podship. I’ll carry both of them.”

His backpack had been in the podship, and he was carrying them both. But thirty minutes into the hike, they’d taken a pit stop and he found no drink bottle at all. It had fallen out of his bag in the podship dock.

They are nowhere near a store of any kind, passing travellers have no extra bottle to spare, and their podship is parked a forty-five-minute flight away from the Rampion.

He refuses to drink any of her water. It’s a four-hour round-trip, and they’re only just halfway through.

Cress fiddles with the buckles on the straps as they crest a hill, thoughts overtaken when a trickling catches her ears. She screeches to a halt.

“Whoa!” Thorne lurches up behind her, arms spread out to catch her. “It’s steep, Stardust,” he warns. “Don’t go stopping that quickly.”

Cress beams, too distracted by what lies ahead. At the bottom of this bend is a sparkling blue river.

She darts her eyes back at him again. Drops of sweat are joining the redness.

“Time for a break?”

The river is cool and rapid under her hands. She uses the drops to slick back the strands of hair annoying the side of her neck. Thorne quickly dumps the backpacks onto a tree root and falls to his knees by the river. He cups water to his hands and splashes his face.

Cress nudges him with her water bottle.

“It’s yours.”

“Amore,” she intones, “I’m not thirsty. I’ve been drinking as we walked. You, on the other hand, haven’t had a drop since breakfast.”

He sighs deeply and sits up. “How much do you have left?”

“Half.” Actually, more like one-third.

“And we’re halfway through. Save that for the rest.”

She scoffs, disbelieving. How could it be so frustrating for him to be so considerate? Why couldn’t he just take her drink when he obviously needs it more than her?

Cress unscrews the lid and holds it up to his mouth. “Carswell.”

He bats it away sternly. “I won’t have you getting heat stroke again.”

They hold a staring contest for several seconds. Three. Four. Five.

“Fine.” She stands, brushing twigs from her knees. “I think I heard a spring up that hill. This water is muddy, but it’ll be clean up there.”

The water sloshes around the bottle as she trudges away. She realises, with a start, that the lid is still unscrewed and now some is spilling onto her fingertips. She hastily seals it.

Can’t waste a drop.

The spring is hidden behind a tree and requires a rather impressive uphill jump past a boulder to reach. She crouches by the burbling stream and tips the bottle to it. It’s clear and cold and she crosses her fingers that it’s not full of parasites. Their water bottles have in-built filtration, so she doesn’t worry too much.

Questions hound at her. Despite his stubbornness, she’s always known Carswell to be self-preserving. His skincare products are all fragrance-free, paraben-free, alcohol-free. He drinks soy milk because it’s better for his digestion and he only buys high-grade 90% cocoa chocolate because the cheap stuff is “for weaklings, Cress.” He cares about his body, he takes care of his health, so why won’t he now?

The water overflows in her bottle, trickling down her arm and soaking her long-sleeved shirt.

“I won’t have you getting heat stroke again.”

She still remembers it. Out in the desert, consciousness slipping away, the burning soles of her feet and unshed tears from his rejection. He’d given her all the water, and that was truly the only reason she was still breathing today.

Drink it all.

I’ve had my fill.

Her knees sink to the mossy ground.

He asked Wolf to guard her while she was off-guard. He carries both backpacks so it’s not heavy on her shoulders. He walks behind her in case she trips and falls.

He always gives her his drinks, even when he’s in desperate need of water.

Cress screws on the lid and scurries down the hill, not even taking caution on the boulder manoeuvre. Thorne is still by the river, flushed even to his neck.

“Carswell!”

He startles. “What’s wrong? Did you trip?”

She collapses in front of him, one leg drawn into the water. It takes a moment of panting to catch her breath. “Thank you.”

It takes him a moment to process her words. “For what?”

“For always taking care of me. For always making sure I’m safe. But, Cars—you can’t take good care of me if you aren’t taking care of yourself.” She picks up his hand and holds out the bottle in the other. “I’ve had my fill.”

Recognition flits past his eyes, and finally, finally, he accepts the bottle and drinks.

Cress leans forward, resting her head on his sternum. His free arm encircles her. They’re still both hot and sticky. They don’t separate.

He polishes off the bottle. “I just…” he starts, voice smoother than the parched before. “I want to make sure you’re okay.”

“I know. And I am.”

Her hands curl into his, tightly intertwined. She presses a kiss there. “You’re still hot.”

A surprised snort. “Um, when have I ever not bee—”

Steadying her core, Cress springs to her feet, gripping him fiercely and using all her well-watered strength to fling him forward. He cries out as he somersaults right into the water.

“Wha—Cress!”

She jumps right in after him.

———

Cress stands behind the countertop in the galley, humming as she breads chicken and sliced eggplant. She dips them first in the flour, then the eggs, smothers them with crumbs and lays them on a baking tray.

Arms wrap around her waist. “Dinner?” Thorne enquires.

“Yep!” she chirps. “Scarlet’s recipe. You know, I never knew cooking could be so fun and rewarding!”

“Mm. Remind me to teach you how to make my world-famous L.A. sub.”

A scoff. “You have a world-famous recipe?”

“I am famous, and therefore any dish I make is—by relation—famous.” Then he cranes his neck, peering over her shoulder. “Wait, eggplant?”

“I like it!”

“The chicken is right there.”

“Eggplant is a great meat alternative, it’s healthy and low in calories,” she parrots, remembering Scarlet’s detailed instructions. Some notes on the recipe she had to translate from French—Michelle Benoit’s cursive script.

“You’re so weird.”

She glances up at him. His nose is scrunched in disgust, but—seeing the shift in her eyes—softens.

“Hey, I don’t mean that in a bad way. You’re weird and I love you, and I love that you’re weird.”

Her mouth parts in an o. Then he’s pecking that mouth, squeezing her shoulders and trotting off to the cockpit. “Here—let me switch Darla to standby. I’ll come help.”

She returns to her work, trying to recall the process. Was it eggs first, then flour? No, flour first and…

Maybe the meaning is lying right in front of you.

Cress smiles.

(Loved,

Loved,

Loved.)

———

Cress likes coffee.

They’ve synchronised their body clocks and now both wake at 7:45. On weekends, he’ll sleep in well past 10 and she gets to be the one doing the waking up. They have their morning coffee together, and she’ll stick with water and tea for the rest of the day. Carswell still brings her refills, but he now orders medium-sized drinks and finishes them himself.

She thought him impossible to read, yet Carswell, more often than not, speaks through his actions. She learns that when he rests his hand on the bench next to her thigh he wants her to hold it. Realises how needlessly grateful he is when she restocks his hair gel without him asking.

Maybe he’s starting to understand her a little better too. He starts to explain why he does things. He tells her now that he wants her to choose the restaurant even if he won’t like it because Sybil never let her have any control over her life. He tells her that he’ll say things sometimes by instinct that he doesn’t mean, and sometimes, the things she says hurt him too. He tells her he doesn’t regret a second of being with her.

It’s an equal rate of exchange: she’ll take a sip from his cup because it puts his mind at ease, and he’ll assure her that he loves her because she craves the reminders.

Cress loves coffee, and more importantly, him.

———

Notes

Thanks for reading. Just a note: I have adjusted Cress's age in this fic so that she is 18.

Read a deleted scene from this here

@cindersassasin @hayleblackburn @spherical-empirical @just2bubbly @gingerale2017 @slmkaider @luna-maximoff-22 @cosmicnovaflare @kaixiety @wassupnye

#tlc #the lunar chronicles #lunar chronicles #carswell thorne #cress darnel #cresswell #prince kai #emperor kai #linh cinder #tlc fanfiction #the lunar chronicles fanfiction #cresswell fanfiction

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idontknowreallywhy · 8 months ago

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Estera Ch 35 - Ten

What went before

It’s been a while! Ironic that in March of the OCs I have throughly neglected my dear OC but I shall try to make up for it! This one fought me (while I’ve written tens of thousands of words for further down the line 🙄) because I wanted one chapter to achieve too many different things and I rather lost confidence in myself to make it work or even to continue with it at all. (Every scrap of credit goes to @sofasurf for giving me a metaphorical shake and waving snippets of her excellent future chapters to bribe me).

The end result is… again… I have broken one event down into more than one chapter. Hoping there is the right balance of fluff and angst to suit those still reading (thank you xx)

Here we ponder whether one can be homesick for somewhere that is no longer your home, there is an addition to the gallery, Scott has a wobble and the giant floof introduces us to his favourite Thunderbird…

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Bez stood guard at the front door, clearly determined to give the earliest possible warning of their visitor’s approach. It had been five minutes since Estera had heard the unmistakeable sound of VTOL engines through the open window which told her he’d decided to leave the jet somewhere nearby, maybe at the fancy golf club where such things didn’t stand out as so unusual. That was 15 mins walk away on normal-human-length legs, so she could probably expect him fairly imminently.

She gave up on the article she was staring at in a futile attempt to stop herself thinking too much and dumped the tablet on the coffee table with a little more force than intended before getting up to pace around the room. Maybe moving would help? Bez glanced over before returning his serious gaze to the door handle.

The intensity of his expression was offset rather by the little blue polka dot bow tie she had attached to his collar to mark the occasion. It had been 5 years to the day since she collected a tiny ball of puppy floof from the breeder and finally made her apartment feel like a home. Because on that particular day it had been exactly 5 years since she’d seen the last place that felt that way.

And thus today, dziesięć. Ten.

Ten years since she’d opened the back door in the morning to stand barefoot in the grass. Ten years since she’d taken a deep, rejuvenating breath of the air rolling off the Tatra mountains.

Ten years since she’d sat on the back porch with a cup of coffee, stealing a few moments to listen to the excitable call of the woodlark, one of the few privileges the militia hadn’t managed to take from them. The yellow-painted structure had been plagued by woodworm even then… it was probably long gone now. In fact, she didn’t even know if the house was still there. That felt wrong. Even if she knew she could never go back to it… surely she should know? But who could she call to ask? Nobody was there anymore…

Ten years since she’d held a meaningful conversation in her native tongue. Bez didn’t count.

Ten years since she‘d started to feel the constant need to justify her presence by being useful, by being an asset to her adopted country. Ten years since she felt like she truly belonged anywhere.

Ten years since she’d hugged her parents and promised to live.

She sighed and walked over to their photo on the wall for the third time that morning and pressed her palm against it. Then rested her forehead on the back of her hand. It felt as though she was fighting through the fuzzy layer that time was beginning to paint over her mental image of them, trying to fix the happy memories somewhere safe. Somewhere accessible. The memories before that day. Before the war and all the horrors that had brought.

Ten years too since she’d found and lost a hero within minutes and gained an imaginary soulmate.

Ten years since she should have died. Maybe in some ways the old her had. Ten years since her life had changed forever anyway.

Her gaze shifted to the new photo, framed in blue, that she had recently added to her gallery. Yes, and in the last few months… everything had suddenly changed again. But this time in an indisputably good way. Because the imaginary hero had somehow shed the imaginary bit and become her friend. The two of them grinned manically out of the hasty selfie - hair dishevelled, flushed with adrenaline and drenched in seawater but vividly, irrepressibly alive.

She couldn’t help smiling back. He was hero to lots of people, but friend was infinitely better.

Bez, who had quietly padded over to sit close beside her whined quietly and rested his big head on her hip.

“Quite right, Niebieski, enough introspection.”

He huffed a non-committal response before an ear twitched and he flung himself towards the door, his claws skittering on the tiles, and resumed his supervision of the door handle.

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Elevator was out again, Scott noticed. He rolled his eyes and then took the stairs at a run… just because. He found himself counting them in groups of ten. Ten ten ten ten ten ten ten… and… hmph, two more. If she’d only lived on the 5th floor that would have been far more satisfying. He took a moment to calculate how much height each individual stair would need to have added to fix this… would that make the rise too steep? Maybe if they could reduce each by 20% and add four more to each flight?

Huh, he was clearly more on edge than he realised if he was compulsively doing math. He recalled frantically focusing on trying to disprove Goldbach’s Conjecture while refusing to visibly react to the agony of…

No. Stop it. He was here so that he didn’t need to lose himself in thinking about it. So that neither of them did.

He looked over at her door. He was technically a few minutes early, did that matter? He decided not and braced himself to withstand 60 kilos of furry, drooling enthusiasm. Bez, the big, fluffy, friendly dog who was most definitely not a half-starved killer. He was a different creature in every way and Scott was definitely getting better at forgetting the nightmare dogs. Much better actually.

It was all good. Even the bark he was about to hear was different - deep and booming and safe. Not snarling and howling. All good.

Scott raised a hand to knock but froze as an unexpected noise reached him… the scratching of claws on stone. They prowled relentlessly outside, waiting... Daring him to even try… He gasped out loud as his lower back slammed painfully into the bannister at the top of the stairs and he grabbed it tight, trying to ground himself. His vision blurred.

A voice drifted through the fog, the same sibilant quality of speech that haunted his nightmares and he was nearly overwhelmed by nausea before he heard a joyful laugh and knew… with a rush he knew… that it wasn’t there it was… here. It was her language, her’s and the dog’s, not… not theirs.

He gripped the bannister hard as the door opened and his friend looked up at him, the smile sliding off her face and her hand slipping from the dog’s collar as it surged towards him and… and skidded to a halt a metre away, ears raised, head tilted.

“Niebieski, Noga!

Scott? What’s wrong?”

The dog returned to heel immediately and sat down, looking up at him with that same questioning head tilt. Scott blinked the sweat from his stinging eyes, cursed himself for overreacting and was about to apologise when he realised Estera had gone… what? He shook his head in frustration and was about to call after her. Except she was already back and lugging a huge beanbag which she placed just to his left away from the top of the stairs. He rubbed his eyes with the back of a hand, it was passing he didn’t need to sit down. He was about to thank her for the thought but reassure her it was unnecessary when his knees decided for him and he sank into the thing, vaguely noticing the loud scrunching noise of the filling reshaping around him. He leant forward to rest his forearms on his bent knees… scrunch again. The noise drowned out the whistling and the barking and he wriggled a little to make it happen a third time. Then all was quiet.

“I’m so sorry.”

“Don’t be daft, Scott.”

“It’s so stupid.”

“No it’s not.”

“I’m sorry…”

“Just breathe for a minute, Blue.”

He did that. Precisely 60 seconds passed. 13 breaths, a couple more than would be usual. His comm pulsed quietly and he triple-tapped it to answer the enquiry in the affirmative. His head was much clearer now. He tried to relax his shoulders and looked around. Bez was nowhere to be seen. Estera was crouched next to him though, humming quietly. She smiled reassuringly as he looked at her and made to stand.

“I’ll just drop him round to George and Edith’s then we can go inside.”

“No! Don’t. Please.”

“It’s really not a problem at all.”

“No, it wasn’t his fault. I… something just took me by surprise. It’s not a problem.” Scott took a shaky breath and sat up straight. “I don’t want it to be a problem. I want to say hello.”

She frowned at him.

“I really do. Please bring him back.” Scott put as much confidence into the request as he could muster with the result it sounded more like a command than a request.

“Do Mnie!” She called quietly. He knew that one - Come! He focussed on practising the pronunciation in his head.

Bez poked his head out of the front door, his mouth full of some huge green cuddly toy. As Scott repeated the command the dog walked slowly forwards and placed the toy in front of him before lying quietly down next to his mistress.

Scott reached out cautiously and patted Bez on the head and murmured his thanks for the gift of… err… whatever the giant green drool-soaked plushie monster Bez had deposited at his feet was meant to be. Some kind of chunky lizard? A turtle with a zip on its belly? The dog looked at the toy and then back at Scott. Waiting for something?

Ah. He needed to physically accept the gift. Ugh… but he could literally see dog-spit-bubbles gleaming on the fuzzy surface. Shudder. Come on Tracy, you’ve dealt with grosser things in Gordon’s bedroom…

Acting with the kind of caution he’d exercise towards potentially explosive toxic waste, Scott picked the item up with a thumb and forefinger, and dangled it as far from his body as possible to inspect. It spun slowly in the air to reveal a very familiar yellow, red and white pattern on the top side and his jaw dropped in delighted surprise.

The shape, he could now see, was almost recognisable but it had been significantly squashed and white stuffing was poking out from several holes. Other sections had evidently been firmly re-stitched together which only emphasised how the rest of the original seams were on the point of bursting. The tail was hanging on by mere threads. Bez sat up tall on his hind legs and looked immensely proud of himself.

“Oh Bez… whatever would Virgil say?”

Now the adrenaline was dissipating Scott felt the overwhelming urge to giggle.

He cleared his throat to repress it and then bit his lip, not wanting to offend the giant animal by laughing in his face. His body shook a little as he shuffled forward and reverently placed the mutilated toy back down in front of its owner but he kept his cool. Said owner eyed him and then promptly picked up the toy and put it more decisively on top of Scott’s shoes.

“Goodness you are highly honoured Scott, he won’t let me near Thunderbird Chew! I’ve had to sneak her away while he sleeps to carry out routine maintenance in the dead of night and… err, Scott? Are you ok?”

Scott knew he was a lost cause even as he crammed a hand into his mouth to suppress the laughter. Bez looked at him with evident concern but it was Estera’s smug expression tipped him over the edge and he threw his head back and cackled.

Thunderbird Chew! He absolutely had to tell Virgil…

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#thunderbirds are go #thunderbirds #thunderbirds fanfiction #scott tracy #tb estera #estera #thunderbirds oc #idontknowreallywhy fanfic

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mydarllinglover · 9 months ago

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Stars Collided || Six

Anakin and Lovisa layed in the grass, watching the clouds, neither one had spoke, in a while, just enjoying each other’s company, but that’s when a thought had entered the Princess’s mind.

"When this threat is over, and I go back to the palace, will I see you again?" She asked him.

"Why? Trying to get rid of me, already?" He turned his head to look at her, the corner of his mouth raising.

"Perhaps." She played along, as her own lips turned upwards.

"Oh! You wound me princess!" He pretended to stab his heart, as he rolled away from her, dramatically.

"Hey!" She laughed, rolling after him, but as she got close enough, he had pulled her on top of him. "You're an idiot." She slapped his chest.

"And you look wonderful, from this angle." His hands moved to hold her back, and her waist.

"Only this angle?" She asked, teasingly, as she moved to sit on top of him more comfortably.

"M'lady, you look phenomenal, no matter the angle, the time of day, or the setting, but particularly right here, may be one of my favourite times to see you."

"I grow more and more confused, everytime you open your mouth, wondering how on earth you became a Jedi, when you could be writing poetry."

"Well, princess, I have many talents." He smirked.

"Oh, really? Well, enlighten me." She pushed. Lovisa had the deepest urge to know every single thing about this man, as her hands rested beside his head, keeping her up and looking at his perfect face.

"I can fix things, and I build stuff, very talented with my hands." He squeezed her waist, as he said this, and she could swear his eyes even lit up, as she blushed. "And I'm a damn good Jedi, it's disappointing you've never seen me in combat, then I know you would never be able to resist me."

"You're awfully full of yourself." She chuckled.

"No, your highness, just confident."

"Ani, stop with the titles." She rolled her eyes.

"I'm sorry, Lovisa, but I'm rather nervous, having the kings daughter on top of me, right now, y'know, if anyone was to discover us, right now, I'd probably be hung."

Lovisa looked around the vast land of space, not a person was in sight.

"Well, then I guess it's a good thing that nobody is around, then."

"Oh, my, you are truly scandalous, what would people say?" He gasped.

Lovisa laughed at his dramatic tendencies, before kissing him, softly, she needed another fix, too many hours had passed since last night, and he was just too intoxicating to resist, it was almost insufferable.

Anakin's eyes fluttered shut instantly, as he followed her movements, taking everything in, memorising it.

"See, you couldn't even last a day, I knew you found me attractive." His eyes were still closed, as his head fell back down, in the grass.

"You're lucky, that's all you've got going for you." She lied.

Anakin then rolled over, so that he was now on top of her.

"Admit it, you find me irresistible, and charming, you think I'm extremely funny."

"Oh yes, the funniest thing you do, is when you don't even mean to, when you think you're being taken seriously, that is hilarious." She rolled him over again, so she was back on top.

"That's it." He pulled her against him, and they ended up rolling down the hill, laughing loudly, until eventually they came to a stop, and miraculously, Lovisa was still on top.

She kissed him again, and she didn't pull away anytime soon, and neither had he.

His hand moved from her back, to intertwine in her hair, keeping her head close to his.

As the days in their solitude went on, Lovisa and Anakin often spent their days together, whether it be layed in the grass, his head in her lap, as she read aloud to him, or he'd watch as she painted the beautiful sight of the lake district, which he was elated to discover that she was a phenomenal artist.

But Lovisa kicked herself, when she realised that Anakin had been right, because watching him practise with his sword, had her thoughts whirring so much, that she couldn't even make sense of what they were.

She found that she couldn't even keep her eyes off him for a second, she even forgot to blink, until her eyes were tearing up, and stinging.

And he hadn't even noticed, not at all, he was too deeply rooted into his movements.

She was starting to wish she had been a Jedi, just to watch him at this all day, everyday.

When he had finally put it down, he didn't have a second to even move, before she pounced on him, kissing him hard and desperately, and of course he was quick enough to catch her, and meeting her needs.

They had also spent their time, sneaking around the castle, from her sister, and the staff, making out in dark hallways, refusing to get caught, but not being able to resist the temptation.

A small inkling in Anakin's mind made him think that's what was fuelling the fire in their intimacy, the thrill of them getting caught was what made it even more exciting, for Lovisa, but he pushed it away, instead telling himself, that she really did like him, and her title and his job was just an obstacle in their happiness.

Twelve days had passed, when the two walked into the dining room, for dinner, Padme and Senator Rush Clovis were sat at the table, their handmaidens were where they were normally supposed to be, stood at the wall, waiting to be needed.

"Hello, Lovisa" Rush smiled at her. "And you must be the Jedi, looking after our beloved Princesses."

"I am, sir, senator, my name is Anakin, Anakin Skywalker." He introduced himself.

"What is he doing here?" Lovisa asked Padme, staring at the man.

Anakin subtly guided the girl to the table, and he sat down beside her, but made sure to keep his distance, like they normally did, around people.

"Rush was kind enough, to come see me." Padme told her, a warning in her eyes. "We just missed each other,

terribly."

"Its barely been a week." Lovisa pointed out, bluntly.

"Lovey, its nearly been two weeks."

"No, it hasn't." She shook her head.

"Yes, it has." She laughed, unsurely.

"Well, why did he come, why not Mother and Father?"

"Can you not be so quizzical, and just be happy for me?" She almost begged her little sister.

"You know, Lovey, I actually have a friend, that asks about you, often, He's also an senator, I would love to set the both of you up, with your parents permission, of course." Rush spoke to her, a smile on his lips.

Lovisa could feel the jealousy rolling off of Anakin, wow, he must be really serious about me, she thought.

She picked up her glass of strawberry milk, and sipped it, slowly, until eventually, she was just sucking air through her straw, making that god awful noise.

"It's all gone." Padme told her.

Reluctantly, she set it down.

"Rush, that will not be necessary, I have no interest in associating myself with anyone who has the power to fix issues that they act ignorant to, I have no desire to date, either." She told him, bluntly.

His face dropped.

Anakin wanted to impale himself on his own sword, when he had mistakenly made eye contact with Lovisa's sister, who had instantly darted to look at him.

She knows His head screamed at him. No, she doesn't, calm down, It also said.

"May I ask again, why are you here?" Lovisa asked "Senator Rush Clovis?" She made a point to call him by his full name, a reminder to him, to use hers, only people she cared for, got to shorten her name. Not even Anakin had called her that, yet, and she had his tongue in her mouth, more times than she’s ever even spoken to Rush.

"Well, Princess, I actually had something I wanted to ask your sister." He nervously looked around, as he scratched the back of his head. "If we could have some privacy" He looked to Anakin.

"The Jedi stays." Lovisa decided. "He is here for our protection, you know, someone is out there, after the both of us"

"Yes, well, I doubt anyone is going to attack you in here" He teased. "It is only I, and I can assure you, that you are safe with me."

"I haven't ruled you out, yet."

Padme continued to glower at her sister.

"So, whatever you have to say in front of me, you can say in front of my Jedi."

"My Jedi" Anakin's inner voice screamed.

"Very well." He cleared his throat. "Padme, my love" Rush then pushed out of his chair, as he stood in front of the oldest Amidala sister, taking her hands in his, then he dropped to one knee.

Lovisa's eyes bulged out of her head, as she watched what he was doing, he was taking her sister away from her.

"Will you make me the happiest man on the planet, and marry me?" Rush asked, opening a small box, containing a ring.

Lovisa hated that it was beautiful.

"Say no, say no, say no, say no, say no, say no!" She chanted, mentally.

"Oh, Rush!" Padme gushed. "Of course I'll marry you." She kissed him.

"Ahem!" Lovisa coughed, loudly, forcing them to pull apart. "Not only have you ruined my appetite. But you also leave me with a question."

"Which is?" Padme asked, annoyed that her younger sister was ruining her big moment.

"How are you supposed to get married, if you're to become queen, and you're a Senator? I'm pretty sure that's not allowed" She knew full well it wasn't allowed. “Are you planning on quitting your position?” She turned to the man.

"Funnily enough, we've discussed this." Padme replied. “With Mother and Father.”

"You have?" She furrowed her brows.

"Yes, and I decided that ..." She grabbed Rushes hand, as she took in a deep breaths. "I'm giving up my heritage to the throne, instead, I've also been offered a seat, as a Senator, so that I can still be involved in Naboo, Father offered me it."

"What?" Lovisa gasped. "But, Padme! You're next in line! If you're not to be queen, then who will?! It won't be in our family anymore, what will happen to the Kingdom, You're throwing your whole future away for what?! Some guy?! Being in love?! Why the hell would you even think about throwing your life away for a man?!”

"Lovey, The crown will still be in our family, because you will reign." Padme reminded her, "I'm passing over the job of being the heir, to you."

"No!" Lovisa stood up. "How could you do this, without even consulting me! I'm not fit to be queen! That is not my role. You were born for it, conditioned for it, I can't take your place."

"Well, you have to." Padme shrugged. “Father agreed, he’s already decided.”

"How long has this been planned?!”

“A while.” She answered, casually.

“What?!” She threw her hands up in the air. “You all knew, and no one told me?! Why would no one tell me?! This is unfair!”

“Because Mother knew this was how you would react, Father was planning to do it, but, I didn’t exactly know I was being proposed to, honestly Lovey, you are ruining my big moment, you’re being rather selfish.” Padme folded her arms across her chest.

They both had forgotten they were not alone, until now.

“I can't be queen, I've made too many mistakes in my life."

"Lovisa, You're 19." Padme rolled her eyes.

"I don't need judgement from you." She scowled, standing from the table. "Ani, Ahsoka."

"Yes, your highness." They both said, at the same time, following after her, each earning a glare from the girl, as they side eyed each other.

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