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beyondspaceandstars · 4 years ago

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The Military Dog Tag Dilemma

Relationship: Stucky x Reader Warnings: N/A, just fluff Summary: You just want to wear the military tags of both your men but Steve seems to run into some issues. A/N: I am also always a sucker for Stucky writing ok and this was my first personal attempt at it and i thought it came out well <3

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Bucky gave you his dog togs within weeks of establishing your relationship with him and Steve.

You loved to mindlessly play with them as the three of you cuddled up in bed, enjoying some pillow talk after, particularly long days. Steve spooning you from behind as you laid on Bucky’s chest, his arm thrown around you, running his fingers through Steve’s hair. Your fingers would fumble with the shiny tags, turning them over in your hand, watching the minimal moonlight hit them every now and then.

You didn’t know what it was about the tags that had you so captivated nearly every night. It felt so simple yet so intimate as you stared at your lover’s name and information engraved in them. While you weren’t exactly an expert on wartime, you knew the tags could serve as gifts to partners, assuring your heart to one another. The concept definitely drifted through your mind from time to time, but you never brought it up.

Bucky, however, seemed to be thinking the same thing. Wordlessly, one night, he slipped off the silver chain, tags clinking together musically, and slid them over your head. The coolness of them tickled your neck as the tags fell to the valley between your breasts.

You didn’t know what to say. Your heart was pounding as you ran your fingers around the necklace. Even Steve seemed a little shocked by the actions. But Bucky was fully pleased as evident by the cocky grin he wore watching you ogle at the gift. He had to admit — knowing you were walking around with his name dangling from your neck did something for him.

"Where are your tags, Steve?" You had asked after placing a loving, appreciative kiss on Bucky’s lips. Now that you obtained Bucky’s tags, it only seemed fitting you wore Steve’s as well.

Steve shifted. You looked up at him only to find him watching the wall across from the bed, seemingly lost in thought. "I-I’m not really sure, honey."

You let out a sad hum at the response. "Well, if you find them, let me know," you yawned, shuffling down in the bed to get comfier. "I’d like both of my men close to me all the time."

Since then, Steve had been on a mission to find dog tags. Going through archives, chain of custody notes, discarded boxes… Everything. There was just something about the entire thing that was driving Steve mad. He was honored you wanted to show off the claim your two lovers had on you but he was also deeply concerned about the fact that currently you only had Bucky’s to wear.

While Steve wouldn’t exactly call himself jealous in this situation, knowing you didn’t love him any less, the relationship was established the way it was and he felt you should still have something of his to truly show for it.

This led Steve on what felt like a manhunt for the "damn dog tags," as he kept referring to them when Bucky would check-in asking if all was okay. Nothing was really okay. He had looked high and low for them, going through every potential record in the database trying to at least confirm there was something to even look for.

He pounded his fist against the desk late one night. Steve had pushed you and Bucky to get some sleep, claiming he had some reports to look over before bed. You two had looked at him suspiciously but eventually agreed, planting loving kisses on his cheeks, and telling him not to stay up too late.

"I get cold without both of you there," you had mumbled with a sleepy yawn following. Your words almost made Steve give up for the night but then he caught a glimpse of the silver chain on your neck. Seeing you like that, using your tired, loving voice, he remembered what he was doing this for. It was you. It was all about you and your love for sentimental things.

He grudgingly agreed to be there in an hour and that seemed to please his two lovers. Except — it was way past an hour. The sky was close to daybreak when he hit the desk in frustration.

Pushing the folders away, Steve leaned back in the chair, sighing. Within seconds, footsteps came from the hall and Bucky appeared in the doorway, watching a frustrated Steve.

"Everything okay in here?" Bucky asked, leaning against the door frame.

"Yeah, yeah, everything’s fine," Steve nodded. "Go back to bed, I’ll be there in a bit."

But Bucky didn’t look the slightest bit convinced. He had a knowing look in his eyes which Steve tried to avoid by looking down at the now splintered desk.

"How are those reports going?"

Steve rolled his eyes, letting out an annoyed groan. Deep down he knew he couldn’t hide anything from Bucky but still, worth a shot.

He pushed all the folders away this time, leaving them at the very edge of the desk. "I did have dog tags, right?"

"That’s still bothering you, huh?" Bucky crossed the threshold into the office and made his way to one of the chairs in front of Steve’s desk. He took one of the folders and sat directly across from Steve. Casually, he thumbed through it, waiting for his partner to start talking.

Steve didn’t really want to get into it again as he had probably hounded Bucky about it all last week but acting like it wasn’t bothering him was getting him nowhere — obviously.

"Yes," Steve sighed. "I just want her to have something from each of us. It’s- It’s hard watching our girl…"

Bucky frowned, "I’m sorry, Steve. I should’ve waited to give them to her."

"No, Buck," Steve leaned forward, reaching his hand out. Bucky took the signal and leaned, placing his own hand in Steve’s. "You wanted her to have them. That’s your call. I just feel disappointed I have nothing to give."

"Well…" Bucky hummed, tilting his head in thought. Steve’s eyes furrowed, trying to get his partner to spit out whatever he was thinking. "What if we ordered you new ones?"

"Can you do that?"

"I honestly don’t know," Bucky chuckled. "But I don’t understand half of what you can do these days, so, I’d imagine there’s a way to get dog tags made."

Steve sighed, leaning back in his chair, disconnecting their touch. It seemed reasonable and would do the job except for the fact— "But they wouldn’t be in combat or- or from the actual military."

Bucky just shook his head. With an annoyed scoff, he said, "Do you think that really matters to her?"

"I guess not…"

"Steve, honey, I promise. It’s about the presentation, the show of it. Our girl is just looking for something personal from you to keep close to her," Bucky assured him. "Plus, I think we can get it updated and personalized. Maybe even write something nice just for her on the back."

Steve had to admit, his heart was jumping happily at the idea. He really couldn’t argue with anything and agreed to the plan. The only issue was — they were a bit out of touch with ordering anything online. You had always been the one to assure online packages and food deliveries arrived but now they had to take you out of the equation. While excited to surprise you, they were slightly unsure about ordering and had to enlist the help of the team who all turned out to be more than happy to assist once they explained their idea.

A few weeks later, you were laying in your shared bed, back against the headboard, body cozied up under the duvet. You were engrossed in a cheesy romance novel, waiting for Steve and Bucky to join you for the night. Eventually, the two came in, but they were still in their work attire.

You frowned at their appearance. "Aren’t you guys coming to bed?"

As you asked your question, you couldn’t help but note their unusual stance. The two men were side-by-side, standing at the foot of the bed, looking down at you. Bucky had his hands in his pockets while Steve appeared to be hiding something behind his back. You eyed them suspiciously.

"We will in a bit, doll," Bucky said. You watched him as he came around to the side of the bed. He sat down and leaned against the headboard, shifting right next to you, sneakily taking the book out of your grip. "But first, Steve has something for you."

"For- For me?" You asked, whipping your head around to face Steve. He had a bit of nervousness to him as he nodded, making his way over to the bed and sitting on the edge.

Silently, he handed you a small box. You eagerly accepted the item, turning it over and over in your hands. Giving it a light shake, the box made a jangling noise. "What is it?" You asked, wide-eyed looking between the two men.

Steve and Bucky both let out soft chuckles at your excitement. "You have to open it to find out," Steve said. He still had an air of anxiousness, running his hands up and down his jean-covered thighs, fidgeting.

To put your poor boyfriend out of his misery, you opened the box. At first, all you noticed was something slim and shiny. Eyes furrowed in confusion, you pulled out what appeared to be a chain. You could feel a slight heaviness to it — and then you saw it. Your jaw dropped as you tossed the box next to you. In your hands was another set of dog tags nearly identical to the ones you already had adorned on your neck — only this pair were inscribed with the name Steven Grant Rogers.

"Steve-," you gasped, staring at the tags laying in the palm of your hands. You were at a loss for words as you read the tag.

"Are- Are they okay?" Steve asked, his nervous hand came up to rest on your thigh, pulling your attention back to him.

"Are you kidding me?" You let out a breathy laugh. "They’re wonderful, honey, thank you so much."

"You’re sure?" He asked again. Bucky gave him a pointed look for his ridiculousness but that didn’t stop Steve from rambling. "I-I couldn’t find mine so, I got a new pair made. I know they’re maybe not as authentic or something but I still wanted-,"

"You had these made?" You cut in. "For me?"

Steve nodded, "You had Bucky’s, so, it was only fair you had something of mine, too."

You couldn’t hold your emotions back at his word. Tears began forming as you looked at your soft, loving partner. You let out little sniffles as you turned back to the tags, still soaking in their meaning. Bucky placed a light touch on your arm as Steve scooted closer, probably suddenly scared by your tears.

"They’re perfect, honey," you whispered as you looked back at him and leaned forward, placing a sweet kiss on Steve’s lips. He eagerly accepted, practically sighing from relief under your touch. "They’re going to go perfect with the tags from my other man." You mumbled and turned to now give Bucky a kiss, who felt very pleased to get a turn to lock lips with you.

Facing Steve again, you handed him the chain. He looked down at it, confused.

"Well, soldier, are you going to put them on me?"

Both of the men chuckled at your actions but Steve happily slid the silver chain over your neck, watching as the tags fell to your chest. Once they landed, they clang nicely with Bucky’s. It sounded like music to your ears.

"I love you both so much," you said, your hand mindlessly running over the pair of tags. "Thank you."

"We love you too, doll," Bucky said. Steve nodded in agreement.

Smiling, you gave them both quick pecks and said, "Now, are you guys coming to bed?"

Bucky scoffed, "How could we ever deny you?"

You giggled. "I don’t think you can seeing as last time I checked I was a special girl."

At your words, both their gazes dropped once again to the tags hanging between your breasts, seeming so at place there.

"You sure are, honey," Steve mumbled, placing a kiss on your cheek.

.・。.・゜✭・.・✫・゜・。.

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shorkbrian · 4 years ago

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Babysitter

Prelude - I do not understand how some people get turned on by spanking, but I still respect that kink. I could never lol I just think back to the days where I got spanked so hard I’d pass out or the wooden spoon would break haha.

Pairing - Bakugou Katsuki X Reader

Prompt - idk I just thought of babysitters being so flipping like “Im in charge here” and stupid and I feel like Bakugou would enjoy babysitting like someone just a few years younger than him cause he’d get such a rush of power.

Warnings - NSFW, abuse of power, noncon, spanking, degradation, slight misogyny. slight masochism?

Music - https://open.spotify.com/track/5E30LdtzQTGqRvNd7l6kG5?si=IG4WgPeSQf2_UzyLXMWR7g

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Your mom was overbearing.

Here you were, a full-grown adult, and your mom was yelling her thanks to your “babysitter” as she rushed out the door.

You knew she was a bit protective, a bit hyper-vigilant and akin to a helicopter parent. But it was hard to be mad at her for it, not ever since dad had divorced her. She was terrified of something happening to you, of loosing the last thing in her life that she cared about.

Still, it was hard not to feel a little bubble of irritation in your throat as you watched your “babysitter” wave to her as she climbed in her car. You didn’t need a babysitter, not at your age. And you especially didn’t need the gruff, surly man that had lived in the house across the street as your babysitter. You could take care of yourself, thank you very much.

And how come your mom didn’t trust you by yourself, but somehow trusted this Mr. Grumpypants that you had met a total of zero times. You had seen him once, when your mom’s car had broken down at her job and you had to go pick her up.

You hadn’t minded, rolling up to the curb to see your mother animatedly talking to some blonde man with a stick shoved up his ass, his handsome face grimacing like he just sucked on a lemon dipped in hot sauce. Apparently she worked with him, the younger man a security guard for the complex her office was located in. You watched as his bored red eyes slid from your mother, over to you through the car window, his brow furrowing. The bored look had disappeared, and he regarded you with… curiosity? Contempt? It was hard to tell what emotion was hidden behind his eyes, underlaid so strongly with irritation and anger.

Mom had gushed about him all the way home, telling you details you didn’t really care about. His name was Bakugou Katsuki, he was single, 27, and wouldn’t you know - he lived right across the street!

Well, if she trusted him, you guess you should too. Didn’t mean you had to like it though.

And you didn’t, huffing as Bakugou closed the door and you turned back to your game, mashing buttons and sitting forward as you tried to beat this level. It was ridiculous, your mom going over to his house a few days prior with a plate of cookies, asking the man if he wouldn’t mind coming and hanging out while she was away on some business trip. She had expressed her worry about leaving you - what if something happened while she was gone for a week? Someone could kidnap you and she wouldn’t even know until she got back!

Even when you politely reminded her that cell-phones existed, she was adamant; you were going to have someone big and strong stay in the house with you. It not only would keep potential burglars and thieves away, but it’d keep you safe, make sure you weren’t doing anything silly like staying up too late or eating too much junk food. It was embarrassing.

Some small part of you wanted to stomp your foot and whine at her, but that wouldn’t help you in trying to convince her that you were an adult. Once your mom convinced herself of something, nothing would be able to change her mind. Even when you pointed out that Bakugou was a strange man, she didn’t budge.

“I see him everyday at work!” She had pointed out. “Plus, he’s a security guard sweetie - his literal job involves keeping people safe.”

Bakugou locked the door, before glancing your way. You felt his eyes on you, but you didn’t feel like acknowledging his presence, by gracing him with conversation or any sort of interaction. The man moved on after a second, walking behind you and into the kitchen. You heard him rustle in the cupboards, the clink of glasses, then the sound of water filling a cup.

Right - your mom had kindly showed him where everything was. She had guided him through each room showed him the guest room which she had made up for his stay, even walking him through the kitchen and showing him the contents of each cupboard.

He came back into the living room with his backpack and cup full of water, settled himself down in one of the armchairs by the couch. You didn’t spare him a glance as he pulled out his laptop, threw on some glasses, and settled himself in for… well, whatever he was doing. You were just glad that the two of you didn’t have to interact with each other.

You continued playing your game, occasionally getting frustrated enough to mumble under your breath at the TV as your character died yet again. This was going to be a long week.

----

You were taking a gap year after graduating, relaxing before you threw yourself into college and working. Right now, your days were spent playing games, scrolling on your phone and laughing at memes, going to the pool for hours on end, the library, bike rides, hikes… lots of activities that kept your mind and body occupied. But this week? Bakugou threw off every plan you made.

It was the second day, and you had gotten up early to go swim and goof off at the community pool for a few hours. It was fun, you could tan a little, cool off, maybe see some cute boys your age.

When you got out of the water you had two missed texts from Bakugou.

Where are you

Tell me where the fuck you went

Instead of answering, you huffed, wrapping your towel around your waist. It took maybe fifteen minutes to walk home - you’d deal with your overprotective babysitter then.

He met you at the door, throwing it open before you could even touch the handle. His face was drawn tight in a scowl, the blonde crossing his arms as soon as you stepped inside and shut the door behind you.

“Your fucking phone die? Or are you just ignoring me?”

You shook your head, irritated with how big of a deal he was making out of this. You went to the pool all the time, you weren’t going to die. “I was at the pool, chill dude.”

“Oh, I thought you just popped out to go fucking parachuting!” He spat, uncrossing his arms to gesture at your body. “I can see that you went to the pool dipshit. Why didn’t you fucking tell me, huh? You normally run off on your mom without a damn word?”

You stared at him, curious to see if he would burst a blood vessel with how worked up he was getting. He didn’t seem like someone that knew what the word “relax” meant. Bakugou probably slept all angrily, arms crossed, lips pulled into a frown, eyebrows drawn low.

“Fucking hey, earth to idiot!” Fingers snapped in front of your face, and you recoiled, glaring up at the man in front of you. Before you could open your mouth, he huffed, rubbing a hand across his forehead. “Don’t fucking go anywhere unless you run it by me, understand? I don’t need you wandering into a fucking alley and getting stabbed or some shit.”

Snorting, you moved past him, not even bothering to answer. He was an asshole. Despite what your mother thought, you weren’t a child. You knew how to take care of yourself, you didn’t need some grumpy old guy bossing you around. Said man was grinding his teeth as he watched you walk away, headed for your room. It probably annoyed the life out of him that you hadn’t answered, but he didn’t say anything.

When you finished grabbing clothes for your shower, you came out of your room to see Bakugou leaning against the wall.

“So you’re being a little spoiled princess, not even talking to me? That’s rich. You know I’m gonna be here for the next fucking week - you better make peace with that.”

“Dude, I don’t know what you want. I’m fine, I do this all the time. Just leave me be, and I’ll do the same for you.”

Bakugou grumbled something under his breath, but your skin was getting dry and tight from chlorine, so you ignored him as you slipped into the bathroom, locking the door behind you. You could hear his feet stomping away, and almost giggled at the sound. It almost seemed like he was the petulant child that needed a babysitter.

It didn’t take you long to rinse off, get all the chlorine and salt off your skin. Drying off, you quickly realized you forgot a bra when you had grabbed clothes - which was fine, you would just wrap up in your towel and waddle back to your room. Plus, the bathroom was directly opposite your room, and Bakugou wasn’t nearby, you could hear dishes rattling in the kitchen, so that wouldn’t be a problem.

And it wasn’t, not until you were in your room, door closed, towel on the floor as you rifled through your dresser drawers for the bra you really liked.

“Hey princess, do you want-“

You only heard him as he opened the door, and by that time you were scrambling to snatch your towel up around your naked body. Bakugou choked on his words, face turning a flaming red before he slammed the door shut, giving you your privacy.

Heart racing, you sat down on the floor, too embarrassed for words. That was awkward.

“Why the fuck would you grab clothes, only to come back and change in your room!??!” Bakugou yelled from the other side of the door, a decidedly angry “thump” from where he banged his fist against the door.

“I forgot something, geez! Why didn’t you bother knocking?!?” You yelled back, your own face heating up.

“Holy fucking shit, just get some fucking clothes on, asshole. I’m makin’ pancakes and shit.”

Breakfast was an awkward affair, your gaze focused firmly on the perfectly cooked food on your plate. Bakugou was glaring at you between bites, obviously fuming. He was probably just as embarrassed as you were, but at least he wasn’t trying to make small talk.

----

Bakugou doesn’t appreciate how much time you spend playing video games, and it’s only the third day. He’s grumbled about it several times already, but you aren’t hurting anybody, and there’s nothing else for you to do, so.

It seems like the only thing Bakugou is willing to do is sit nearby, glare at you condescendingly, and mutter under his breath about how you spend your time. When you decided to run to the store to get groceries (there was a surplus of food in the house - you just wanted some air and time away from your “babysitter”) Bakugou had suddenly appeared, moving in front of the door and sneering.

“Are you trying to fuckin’ sneak off again? I won’t let that shit slide twice.”

You huffed, shrugging on your jacket. “Bakugou, I was going to the store. Contrary to what you think, I’m not eight years old, and I can take care of myself. My mom’s just a helicopter parent. You don’t even need to be here, honestly.”

The man scoffed, his face souring. “You’re literally a fucking child. Didn’t you just graduate highschool?”

Stepping closer to him, you squared your shoulders, eyebrows furrowing as you looked up at the blond. “Call me a child all you want - doesn’t change the fact I’m old enough to do stuff by myself. Now-“ you gestured to his body “-please move.”

“No.”

You crossed your arms over your chest. “And why not? You can’t just lock me in the house until my mom comes back.”

Bakugou’s head cocked, red eyes burrowing into your head. He grinned. “Why the fuck not? I’m in charge here, I get to make the damn rules. I say your ass stays here, and it’s going to.”

Clenching your jaw, you huffed, spinning on your heel. You weren’t going to be able to talk the bull-headed man into leaving you to your own devices. There was nothing left to do except shuck off your shoes, admitting defeat. It was so irritating - you didn’t need anyone looking after you, you were an adult! You were more than capable of handling yourself! Why didn’t your mom trust you? Did she think that you were too stupid to keep yourself alive and safe?

You left Bakugou at the door, grabbing a soda from the kitchen before flopping onto the couch in front of TV.

Sure, you could read a book, do a puzzle, browse social media. But right now, you were feeling particularly angry, violent. You wanted to achieve something, finish quests, accomplish tasks. So video games it was.

Of course, that meant Bakugou sauntering back into the living room, groaning as he saw you back in front of the TV. But if he wasn’t going to let you go out, then this is what you were going to spend your time doing. If he wanted to treat you like a child, then you were going to act like one. Show him how much of a brat you really could be.

You turn on your console, select the game you’re going to be playing for the next few hours, and settle further into the couch, making yourself comfortable. Reaching down to the coffee table, you’re about to grab the soda you had brought in earlier, but Bakugou beat you to it.

“Hey!” You whined, watching the blond pop the tab, take a long, slow drag of the carbonated drink. He smacked his lips and cocked his head, smirking down at you.

“You shouldn’t drink this sorta shit, ’s bad for you.”

“Why are you drinking it then?!!?”

Bakugou shrugged. “‘Cause I’m in charge here. I get to do whatever I fuckin’ want.”

Huffing, you gave up the argument, starting to push yourself off the couch. Bakugou was one of those people that got off on power trips, liked being the one to call the shots. The best course of action here would be to just ignore him and grab another soda.

“And where the fuck do you think you’re going? I didn’t say you could move.” The blond man was standing in front of you, making it impossible for you to stand. He was so irritating - you couldn’t wait for this week to be over.

“I’m going to get something to drink, since you decided to help yourself to my soda.”

He moved out of your way, clicking his tongue before flopping down into the armchair by the couch. You glared at him for as long as you could, until the kitchen wall hid his face from view. Ugh, he was such a jerk. At first he had seemed somewhat decent, but as he got more comfortable around you, the man was turning into a self-absorbed tyrant.

Whatever, you were only going to have a stupid “babysitter” for a few more days.

----

“Get off the damn game! Don’t make me haul your ass off that couch.”

Bakugou threatened. He wasn’t very intimidating, standing there vigorously brushing his teeth like there was something wrong with them. The blond had already asked you two other times, and you had ignored him on both occasions. You were so close to leveling up, just a few more points.

If Bakugou wanted to go to bed when the sun was still up, he was more than welcome to do so. You however, had better things to do with your time.

You saw him stomp away out of the corner of your eye, apparently giving up on trying to tell you what to do in your own house. Good.

If anything, Bakugou should be grateful that all you were interested was playing video games and going to the pool. You could be out getting in trouble, doing drugs, rebelling against the system or something - but you were here, chilling and causing zero trouble.

The sink in the bathroom ran, then clattering could be heard as Bakugou finished up his bedtime routine, putting his toothbrush away, washing his hands, yada yada.

He appeared back in the living room, arms crossed. His muscles bulged out like that, showcased by the sleeveless black tank top he was wearing. But you weren’t intimidated, it’s not like he was going to hit you or something.

“Alright, last chance. Turn the fucking game off, it’s your majesty’s bedtime now.” He sneered.

You ignored him.

“You seriously wanna do this princess?”

You stayed silent. Just a few more kills….

“Alright, you fuckin’ asked for it.”

The TV turned off, Bakugou yanking the cords out behind it.

“Dude, what the hell! I was so close to leveling up!!” You screeched, sitting up straight. Bakugou’s face was screwed into an angry frown, and he advanced towards you, walking with purpose. You were fuming, rising to your feet so you could get in his face, tell him off. He was acting like he was your dad or something, and he most definitely was not.

When the man got within an arm length of you, you immediately jabbed a finger into his chest, mouth opening to spit nasty words. Those words died when your hand was slapped harshly away, Bakugou still walking forward until he was crowding into your space. You tried to shrink back, but a rough hand latched onto the back of your neck, holding you still as Bakugou closed in on you, bringing your foreheads together.

“You are such a spoiled little princess. Think you can get away with shit, yeah? Never had a man in your life to put you in your goddamn place, that’s why, isn’t it?”

You blanched, still trying to lean backwards, away from his overwhelming presence. It was kind of scary, how he was all up in your face, how his fingers gripped the back of your neck so tightly, how his face was so close to yours that you could feel his warm, minty breath.

“Bakugou, ple-“

“Nah, shut the fuck up. We’re past any point where you could’ve begged for forgiveness. I am so sick and tired of your bratty little attitude. You keep testing my patience, being a little shit, acting like you own the damn place. You’re gonna show me you’re fuckin’ sorry princess.”

A hand wrapped around your waist, another on your thigh, hefting you up with brute strength and slinging you over his shoulder in the blink of an eye. The swift movement made your head spin for a second, but you quickly adjusted.

“Woah, what the hell man? Put me down!” Bakugou ignored you, spinning on his heel and marching towards the guest bedroom. “Dude, put me down right now, this isn’t funny anymore. C’mon, put me down, I get it. You’re in charge, and I gotta listen. You can let me down now. Please?”

Your pleading went unheard, even as it got more and more desperate the closer to the guest bedroom he walked. When you passed through the doorway, you kicked at the mans stomach, tried to hit his back - you had a faint idea of where this was going, and it was nowhere good.

Without ceremony, you were thrown on the bed, the air getting knocked out of you with the impact, your head bouncing a few times on the mattress. Bakugou turned, shutting and locking the door before he was back in front of you again, a vicious look on his face.

You scrambled backwards on the bed, holding out one hand as if to ward him off. “Okay, dude, wait, you don’t want to do this. Please don’t do this, you’re a good guy-“

“Shit, do you ever stop running your mouth? Calm the fuck down princess, I’m just gonna spank you ’till you cry, then we’ll be even.”

The idea was humiliating, embarrassing, degrading. But it was better than what you thought was about to happen. Bakugou grabbed your ankle, pulling you back towards him with a quick yank, sitting down beside you on the bed. The man patted his lap expectantly, before getting impatient with your hesitance and grabbing your hair, pulling you across his lap with a pained shriek from you.

“Now, here’s how this is gonna fucking go. You’re gonna sit there and take it, and you’ll be done once I say so. Now shut up.”

Without further ceremony, a broad hand slapped your ass, your shorts providing only the thinnest of barriers. You weren’t ready for the hit, so you lurched forward across the mans lap with a small cry. Another smack landed, and while you still weren’t ready, the sting wasn’t as jarring as the first slap.

SMACK

SMACK SMACK SMACK

You tried to not whine, or cry, or make any noise, but it was hard. His hand was coming down with more force on each strike, and it /hurt/. You could feel your skin throbbing underneath your shorts, red and tender, and you were ready to be done.

Bakugou however, was not.

He kept going,

SMACK

Each hit harder than the last.

SMACK

You wanted to cry, trying to hold it in, just endure through the mortification of being spanked like a child.

SMACK

You couldn’t take it anymore, bursting into tears, skin burning, blubbering for Bakugou to stop, please.

The spanking stopped.

The two of you sat there, you sobbing, Bakugou rubbing the skin of your ass over your shorts. Somehow, that hurt just as much as the spanking did, so you reached a hand back blindly, trying to catch his wrist and push him away. As soon as you grabbed his wrist, Bakugou delivered another savage slap to your behind, making you immediately apologize and drop your hands, let him pet and stroke your ass at his leisure. It hurt.

You don’t know how long you both stayed there, Bakugou further irritating the burning, raw skin of your butt, you sniffling and calming down from the full-bodied sobs that had wracked your form earlier. It had been long enough that you barely flinched when Bakugou tentatively fingered the waistband of your shorts, twisting up the fabric, as if he were hesitant to go further, but obviously considering it. You didn’t flinched when a decision was seemingly made, and a hand started slowly pulling your shorts down.

You flinched when the fabric slid over a particularly sore welt on your ass.

“What are you doing??” You panicked, trying to rise up, move away. A hand between your shoulder blades held you down, Bakugou’s gruff voice telling you to stay still.

“I just wanna see how it looks, fuckin’ chill out princess.”

It’s not like you could argue, so off slid your shorts. You tried to protest again when you felt fingers hooking into the waistband of your panties, but another swift slap to your rear had you keening in pain, quickly falling silent. You could let him assess the damage, but that was it. If he tried to touch you further, you’d bite a chunk of his skin off, go find your phone and call the police.

With your lower half bared to the room, you squirmed uncomfortably, immediately stilling when Bakugou’s hand smoothed over the abused skin of your ass. He seemed fascinated by the damage he had caused, and you were sure that there were welts, maybe even bruises already forming. Your skin burned, and not in a pleasant way. God, it was painful.

There was so much pain, your skin somehow felt numb and on fire at the same time. You almost didn’t notice Bakugou’s hand dropping to your thigh, slowly beginning to wiggle it’s way upward, headed towards the little pink slit nestled between your legs.

When his hand made contact with your pussy, you flipped out.

Almost literally - you rocketed off the man’s lap so fast that you almost flipped over onto the ground, just barely catching yourself at the last second.

And then you were standing in front of the man, lower half completely bared, him staring at the space between your thighs, before slowly dragging his eyes upward to find your own.

You turned tail and ran for the door.

A problem with your aforementioned plan of calling the police, was forgetting that Bakugou was a security guard. His job was literally chasing people down, subduing them.

He had you pinned to the door in a matter of seconds, chuckling in your ear.

“Damn, I really was just only gonna spank your ass raw. You look goddamn delicious though, and it seems like you just haven’t learned your fucking lesson.”

You were hauled backward, a hand pulling your hair, the other wrapped around your waist. For the second time that day, you were tossed onto the bed, but this time you barely stayed for a second, already trying to scramble off the other side. But Bakugou was faster, his hand around your calf and dragging you back to him with an iron grip.

A scream tore out of your throat, and you kicked at the man with all your strength as you got closer, catching him square in the jaw. His head snapped back, but his grip never loosened, keeping you stationary while you tried to wiggle away.

His other hand came up to massage his jaw while he slowly rolled his head down to fix you with the most intense, hungry look you’d ever seen a human wear.

“Ohhh, shit. You don’t even know what you just did, do you princess?”

You gasped at his breathy laugh, the way his eyes seemed to light up. Within a second, he was on top of you, face inches away from your own. You could feel his dick, hard against your thigh.

“Wait, you don’t have to do this-think of the consequences! Please, I won’t tell anyone, just let me go, right now. You don’t want to do this Bakugou, please, it’s not gonna be good for either of us-“

He ignored your reasoning, instead focusing on ripping off your shirt, doing the same to your bra. You tried to stop him, hitting and punching, trying to sink your nails into his back, claw at his eyes. You even resorted to snapping your teeth at his nose when his face got too close, turning your head to sink your teeth into his forearm.

Bakugou just groaned throatily, his eyes fluttering shut. Immediately, you let go, not expecting that response. That was supposed to hurt, why wasn’t he yelling in pain? The man lifted his forearm, watching blood start to drip from where your blunt teeth had punctured his skin. He was breathing heavily, straddling your legs, hunched over you like a dog.

The next seconds were a blur, clothes coming off, his hands manhandling you onto your side, his deranged laughter and low, excited swearing filling your ears.

You found yourself on your side, Bakugou straddling one thigh, holding the other up with his arm. He was lining himself up with your opening, rough hand guiding his dick to nudge against your entrance. You screamed.

“Stop it! Stop it, please! You can’t do this! Oh god, stop, stop, stop, don’t-“

“I can do whatever the hell I want, princess.” The man spat, seemingly unaffected by the way you thrashed your body. You tried kicking the leg under him, but his weight anchored it firmly to the bed. You tried kicking the leg he was holding in the arm, but his tight grip just became painful, squeezing you into place. You tried to sit up, to reach out and grab him by the neck and squeeze, but the position you were in was impossible. He knew what he was doing.

You screamed again, a sound of pained, fearful anger crawling out of your throat. Bakugou just laughed.

“This wouldn’t be happening if you had just been good and listened to me. We could’ve gotten along.” He gathered the spit in his mouth, before crudely spitting onto his fingers. “I would’ve left you alone for now, I mean, I’m not a bad guy. “ Bakugou slapped his spit-slicked fingers down over your pussy, smearing his saliva along your folds, messily rubbing it in.

“I’m an upstanding citizen, I keep little crooks and stupid brats from running things their way, that’s all I’m doing.”

You yelled as a finger entered you, probing at your walls. “That hurts! Take it out, take it out! You’re disgusting, get off of me! Stop-!”

Bakugou kept talking, pointedly ignoring your panicked whining.

“Yeah, I’ve seen you before, and you’ve got a nice little body. But it’s not like I was just gonna up and hold you down. Good thing you’ve been giving me reasons all week though, being an absolute spoiled-ass princess, you’re so fucking annoying.”

Another finger joined the first, roughly jamming into your cunt, your juices beginning to flow and smooth the way. It was so stupid that your body was responding to this.

“I woulda never touched you, no matter how much I fucking wanted to, if you had just been good. I guess it works for me that you’ve been shit, huh?”

The man laughed again, leaning down towards your face to smile at you in a jeer, adding another finger to your aching pussy. The stretch hurt, it was too soon, but it felt good nonetheless. It’d been a while since you’d last messed around with someone.

When his fingers retracted, you gasped, face quickly blushing red. Another glob of spit was ejected onto Bakugou’s hand, and he quickly slicked up his cock with his own saliva, hissing as he first touched it.

As he lined himself up, you tried begging one more time. “Bakugou, Bakugou, please. Please don’t, you don’t want to do this. You can’t! Just let me up, please? Oh god, please, just let me go, I won’t tell anyone.”

He shoved the entirety of his cock inside with one, jarring thrust.

You screamed, voice cracking in the middle. The stinging pain of your ass was forgotten in the face of the jabbing, spiky pain in your lower abdomen. Bakugou hissed, eyes closed in bliss.

“God, you’re fuckin’ tight. You a virgin?”

Tears in your eyes from the unexpected pain of being filled so suddenly, you shook your head no. Bakugou clicked his tongue.

“Ah, I kinda figured. Slut like you probably can’t go a few days without a cock stuffing your cunt.” A thought seemed to cross his mind, and Bakugou’s eyes opened, peering down at you inquisitively, a slight twinkle in his eye.

“Is that why you’ve been such a demanding little princess?” You shook your head no vehemently, the pain slowly fading the longer Bakugou remained still inside you. “Holy fuck, that’s why you’ve been like this all week! You just needed a cock!” The man laughed before reaching a hand down to pat your face condescendingly. “Don’t you worry princess, I’ll give you what you need.”

No further words were spoken, despite how much you wanted to scream and yell and curse at the man above you. He immediately drew his cock back, before thrusting into you again, quickly finding a mind-numbing pace that didn’t allow you any time to think.

His thrusts were smooth, steady, fast - it was hard, no, impossible to stop yourself from moaning at how good everything was starting to feel, despite how much you didn’t want it to. It was even worse when Bakugou’s hand found it’s way to your clit, beginning to furiously rub the little button as he fucked you stupid.

“Yeah, you fuckin’ like that?”

You ignored him completely, turning your face against the covers of the guest bed. Bakugou just huffed, increasing his pace ever so slightly.

It wasn’t long before you were gasping, moaning on every other breath, trying to hold yourself back from begging the man to let you cum. You writhed underneath him, trying to arch your hips back to meet every one of his thrusts, ride the hand that was rubbing at your clit so nicely.

Your orgasm hit you out of nowhere.

It fizzed in your stomach, pleasure racing through you so quickly that you lost your breath, muscles locking up. It felt so good, you couldn’t breath, couldn’t move. Bakugou fucked you through it, smirking down as you obviously rode out your orgasm, his finger falling away from your clit before you could get overstimulated.

A few more thrusts, and Bakugou pulled out, quickly moving to straddle your chest as he quickly jerked himself off. His hand made the most lewd sound, squelching up and down his length that was drenched in your juices.

You were so blissed out from your orgasm, you almost didn’t mind when cum started splattering over your face.

You did mind, however, when Bakugou tried to rub it into your skin after he finished. A quick snap of your jaws towards his fingers made your point clear, and Bakugou backed off.

“We have plenty of time to work on you, seems like you still need to be put in your place by the man of the house. Spoiled little princess.”

——

When your mom got home, you barely kept yourself from sobbing in her arms as she hugged you. You wanted to tell her everything that had happened, what Bakugou had done to you - but that would just make her more paranoid, fearful.

She would lock you in the house and never let you leave. Plus it was embarrassing. “Hey mom, by the way, the babysitter you hired for me, your adult child, raped me after spanking me so hard I bruised, and I couldn’t stop him!” Wasn’t a sentence you wanted to utter. You were weak, and stupid.

Bakugou watched in the background, his backpack slung over his shoulder, ready to head across the street and back to his own house. Your mom kissed your hair, finally disentangling herself from your arms, moving to talk to the gruff blond. You stayed by the door, watching Bakugou with narrow eyes.

“We were fine - although, you were right in having someone come over. She’s irresponsible as hell, I don’t know what could’ve happened if I wasn’t here to stop her from doing stupid shit.”

Your mom threw you a disapproving glance, quickly turning to thank Bakugou for helping the two of you out. She pressed money into his hand, but he told her not to worry about it - he got to eat good food, sleep in a nice bed, and the wifi was better here than at his house. Your mom gave him a quick hug, and you watched his face sour, before he quickly moved away from her grasp.

“Just let me know if you ever need me to come hangout with her again - I think it’s good for her to have a strong male figure in her life. And my wifi sucks, so it’s a win-win for everyone.”

Except you.

Your mom clapped her hands together excitedly. “Oh, that’d be perfect! What a nice young man you are, I knew you were trustworthy.”

Your stomach soured.

Bakugou said his goodbyes, obviously trying to get out of the house and away from your touchy mother as quickly as possible. Your mother thanked him again, welcoming him over “at any time!” To use the faster wifi, as long as he wouldn’t mind hanging out with you.

Bakugou gave a gruff laugh, brushing past you on his way out the door. He turned, looking at your mother, then at you.

“I’ll be here to help out, don’t you worry princess.”

You slammed the door in his face.

He was never stepping foot in your house again, not if you could help it.

#katsuki bakugou #bakugou katsuki #bakugou headcanons #bakugou #bakugou imagine #katsuki bakugo x reader #bnha bakugo katsuki #yandere #yandere bakugou #oneshot #gross bakugou #uhh idk tags #tags?#yandere bnha

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rhenuvee · 4 years ago

Text

The Cute Guy (Fred Weasley x reader)

Request: Could you do a cute after the war Fred Weasley imagine where the reader is applying to work at the Weasleys’ wizard wheezes. And slowly Fred falls in love with her.

*I realized I’m an idiot for not doing this sooner so tell me if you’d like to be tagged in my future fics. I write for 3 fandoms so please specify which one!*

Announcement: In case you did not see what I put in the request guidelines, school is starting September 14th for me. You can still send in requests, but I will be a lot slower with requests.

—————————————

Fred remembered the day he hired you to work for Weasleys’ Wizard Wheezes. It was a couple of weeks after he and George decided to reopen the shop. He saw how invested you seemed in the products and how your happy-go-lucky personality would bring a pleasant type of energy to customers. That would’ve been his genuine answer.

But now with his head in a daydream as you talked with a customer, he wasn’t sure that was the only thing that made him hire you. He saw how your bright smile lit up the room and how contagious your laugh was. He saw how pretty you looked even in just a uniform you wore to work everyday.

The shop was doing pretty well today, no complaints or accidents. However Fred could feel something not right at the corner of his eye.

He turned to see his twin in a very exaggerated manner, resting his chin in his hands propped up on his elbows. Fred deadpanned knowing George was trying to copy him, obviously in a very dramatic way.

“Stop doing that you prat, you’re scaring the people.” said Fred pushing George. He scoffed in return of his twin’s pathetic insult.

“Me? Look at yourself.” said George pointing at Fred. The older twin grumbled, he was seriously conflicted. Each day he hid it, it seemed like his feelings for you grew more.

“Why don’t you just ask them out?” asked George coolly as if it was the easiest thing in the whole world. Fred rubbed his temple in frustration.

“Yeah, and why don’t I step on a nail while I’m at it?”

“Good idea, tell me when you do so I can take a photograph.” Fred was about to get mad at his twin’s ignorance, but laughed dryly at his response with him instead.

“Look mate, if you don’t make your move, someone else will. You’re going to be all miserable and gloomy that your bird was taken. And I won’t be in the mood to deal with you.” explained George. Fred was annoyed at his brother for making fun of him, but also because he was right. Merlin, what was he going to do.

Meanwhile, you were at the front of the shop fixing up the love potions display and Ginny had just walked in. You became friends with her after being introduced when you were hired.

“Hey (y/n)!” her cheerful voice rang in the store.

“Oh hi Ginny.” you said smiling and looking up from the stand.

“Want to grab lunch with me at that restaurant nearby?” she said grabbing your hand already leading you out of the shop. You partially stayed glued in place.

“Um, maybe I should ask Fred and George before going...” you said in their direction. It was kind of weird saying their names from your mouth. For the first week you called them Mr. Weasley and Mr. Weasley, but then you realized how old that must’ve made them feel after they told you about it. They were your bosses, you thought you had to address them formally!

“Who cares about them- she can go right?” asked Ginny quickly turning to her older twin brothers. Both turned their heads in sync and suddenly you felt warm knowing their gaze was on you.

“Of course love, we told you last time already.” said Fred almost out of impulse. You were busy blushing at the term of endearment to notice Ginny and George smirking and looking at Fred.

“Okay, let’s go then.” said Ginny smiling. You waved to the twins before heading out to lunch with Ginny. George did nothing but grin and click his tongue. Fred’s expression was nothing but confusion, however George knew what he was implying about the nickname he called you.

—————————————

“So tell me, what’s new in your life?” asked Ginny then taking a bite out of her sandwich.

“I’m a very boring person Ginny, you know that.” you said sighing and sipping your drink. It seemed like a spark was lit in Ginny as you could feel like she jumped in her seat a little.

“What about that cute guy you always talk about?” she teased. You facepalmed. Ever since that one time you went out with her and drank a little too much firewhiskey, you blurted out a bunch of randomness, and the cute guy was one of them. You have now learned to try and handle your liquor better.

“Oh god... you’re not still on about that are you?” you asked half serious and half pretending to be nonchalant so she could move on.

“I am.” she replied bluntly. You rolled your eyes.

She wasn’t entirely wrong. Unfortunately, the cute guy was none other than one of your bosses- Fred Weasley. Thank Merlin you didn’t say his name directly that night. But even so, you didn’t know what to do with yourself.

You applied to work at Weasley’s Wizard Wheezes because you genuinely loved their shop and admired how they brought smiles to people’s faces, even in dark times. And you knew the owners were the Weasley twins- but you did not know that getting a closer look at Fred would cause your knees to become jelly, or your eyes to look anywhere but his chocolate brown ones. And thus, it lead to him secretly being called ‘the cute guy’ by none other than your drunk self.

You snuck a look back at the shop which you could see from the restaurant window and sighed. Would a relationship with your boss be weird? Of course it would! I mean, you were the same age, yes- but why would he go for an employee? With looks as good as his and his charming personality he probably had lots of girls lining up for him.

“Oh my god...” said Ginny, which snapped you back from staring too long at the shop.

“Do you like my brother?” she asked almost frantically. Uh oh, she was onto you. You had to think of a a witty response to divert her from this conversation.

“You have... a lot of brothers Ginny.” you said trying to sound as normal as possible.

“I’m talking about Fred!” she said. She was close to stuttering out the phrase since she was so excited. You flushed red knowing she was right.

“Se he’s the cute guy! Oh this is great!” she clapped cheerfully.

“Don’t put words into my mouth.” you said turning your head away from her. In this moment you felt regret for the firewhiskey in the first place.

“Oh don’t be like that (y/n), besides he fancies you.” she said with a sly smirk.

“My own boss? Fancies me? You really learned from their pranking don’t you?” you asked putting emphasis. Fred fancying you was something you only thought about. She rolled her eyes again.

“Don’t tell me you haven’t seen the way he looks at you.” she said. You did not. Thinking that Fred looked at you like you were special would’ve been a dream come true. You kept your mouth shut this time, you wanted to hear more.

“Ever since he’s hired you, he’s been giving you goo goo eyes, like in that one muggle movie where those ladies fangirl over that arrogant villain guy.” she explains. You were confused, and you needed to get out of this talk.

“Goo goo- fangirl- arrogant vill- ah just, you know what? You’re wrong, and you know it.” you said shaking your head. Ginny just shrugged.

“Well next time go see for yourself.” she said.

—————————————

You didn’t bother to follow Ginny’s instruction, however you couldn’t help to make ‘goo goo’ eyes yourself. He looked really good in a suit- he wore a different one everyday, and he looked good regardless of how flashy the colour of it was.

Time flew by and you were exhausted, just one more hour and the shop will close and you can go home to your nice and comfy bed. Just a moment after a customer left, Fred came out of his office and went to the entrance door and locked it. You were puzzled, we were closing early?

“(Y/n).” he said looking at you and walking to where you were. You didn’t know what to think he was going to say, were you in trouble? You weren’t sure. George wasn’t with him.

“We’re gonna close early just tonight.” he said. God, seeing him really up close was making it hard for you to not check him out. His hair, messy as always, but somehow managed to look good. His eyes were dark and warm, a contrast to his freckles which highlighted his face.

“If you don’t mind me asking, why?” you said softly.

“Well you see, George and I, we...” he paused mid sentence. Little did you know they had a plan. George told Fred for both of them to have dinner with you so that he could get some type of courage to sort of deal with his feelings. George did not mind being a third wheel, not that he think you’d notice anyway. And you were a good employee so the reason was not completely a lie.

“We wanted- we thought...” he managed to get out. This was not like him at all. It was like he was rushing to say something but couldn’t.

“Merlin- (y/n) would you like to have dinner with me?” he said. Fred decided to just get it out. You were shocked, your eyes widened, and a slight pink tinted your cheeks.

“You know what, just forget-”

“I’d love to.” you said fighting a grin appearing on your face. Fred on the other hand did not hold back and had a huge smile.

“Then could I...” he trailed off. You were backed up against a shelf as his hand went to your waist. He was hesitant because at this point you both knew what was about to happen. The look in your eyes and the little nod you gave was enough for him to crash his lips onto you.

It took a little while for your mind to process what was happening- you and Fred were kissing. You let your eyes flutter shut and you kiss him back, Your hands move up to his shoulders. Even with his suit you could feel his toned muscles underneath.

“Evening.” said a smooth voice from behind. You both pulled away with faces flushed and breathing fast and looked behind Fred. You saw George leaning on the table on his elbows... except he was being very dramatic about it purposely sticking his hips way out to the side.

You both were speechless, I mean what were you supposed to say when your boss’s twin just caught you kissing Fred? After a minute of silence-

“Well, guess I’m not invited to dinner anymore.” said George sighing.

“No wait George, you can come too.” you replied quickly. George whistled and shook his head.

“Always too kind for your own good (y/n), no wonder my less attractive twin fancies you.” teases George. You and Fred both blush in embarrassment.

“You guys go ahead, I’m not willing to be a third wheel, I think I’ll throw up before we even start eating.”

“But-”

“I’ll throw up!” George repeated, and then saluted and headed back into his office. Your eyesight lingered in George’s direction for a bit before turning back to Fred, your hands still on his shoulders.

“You fancy me...?” you said asking for confirmation.

“Yeah I do, quite hard not to if you ask me, walking around the shop looking like you do.” he said smirking. Oh, he was complimenting you. You covered your wide smile with your hand.

“And you..?” he asked back.

“Oh- yeah I do, I think I have since that day I had too much firewhiskey and called you the cute guy-” you instantly shut your mouth now knowing what spilled out. The look in Fred’s eyes were getting more mischievous. The was no way he wasn’t about to get cocky at what you just said,

“The cute guy?” he teased rubbing his large hand up and down your sides and bring you slightly closer. You covered your face in embarrassment.

“I think the word you’re looking for is handsome, love.” he said with a grin. Oh god, he would never let you hear the end of this.

“Oh stop embarrassing me will you?” you said shooing him away.

“To be fair, I think you’re pretty cute yourself...” he said tilting your chin up to meet his eyes. It was almost like he was about to lean in again.

“-but you’re going to have to tell me more about that cute guy, darling.” he said leading you out to door to dinner. You shook your head at him, he was a troublemaker for sure. What did you get yourself into?

#fred weasley #george weasley #harry potter #fred weasley fanfiction #weasley twins #fred weasley fluff #fred weasley oneshot #fred weasley x reader #fred weasley one shot #fred weasley imagine #fred weasley fic #fred and george

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ickle-ronniekins · 4 years ago

Text

it was all yellow

request from nonnie!!! “hi love, wanted to throw out this request before camping ;u; only if you're up for it, for either of the twins: i'd love something fluffy inspired by one of my favorite text posts on this site: she guessed my favorite color first try.. but between me and u.. i didnt even have a favorite color until she yelled out yellow! she was hella excited n smiling like a little kid, so i told her she was right and i havent seen yellow the same since, its in everything. i could probably live in it now. 🌻”

pairing: fred x hufflepuff!reader

word count: 3k

A/N: love me a good cheeky fred. also this prompt was FUCKING adorable and i did try to incorporate the actual quote into my writing but some of it didn’t flow.. so i hope it’s still as good as you’d imagined?? also def listened to coldplay’s “yellow” whilst writing this x

tag list: @mintlibri @seppys-return-to-madness @how-do-life-does @fopdoodledane @fredd-weasley @iprobablyshipit91 @semmelsemi @cottageoflove @laneygthememequeen @snakesonaplane-7 @lupinsx @keoghans @helloallthethingsilove @waschbiber @dreamer821 @the-hufflepuff-of-221b @62442-am @wtfweasleyy @obsessedwithrandomthings @thoseofgreatambition @harrysweasleys @sleep-i-ness @shadowsinger11 @shadychaoticcollection @haphazardhufflepuff @afriendlyneighborhoodhufflepuff @hood-and-horan @letsfightsomeorcs @theweasleysredhair @purpleskiesstorm @hxfflxpxffs @wand3ringr0s3 @finecole @angelinathebook @highly-acidic | message me to be added, loves!

“Mr. Weasley!”

Umbridge’s voice is shrill, and it immediately pulls Fred out of his daydream-like state, but not quickly enough for him to turn his attention toward his professor and avoid making incredibly embarrassing eye contact with you. The entire class, much to his dismay, turns to glance at him -- you included. It’s unlike him to feel so insecure, so embarrassed, but alas -- here he is.

“Yes, Professor?”

“Is there a reason,” Umbridge hisses, the edges of her lips curling into a rather evil smirk, “that you’ve chosen to completely ignore me during the lesson?”

Fred considers this for a moment. He could take this opportunity to explain to his professor that yes, now that you mention is, there is a reason. A huge reason. He could then proceed to tell you about all of the overwhelming feelings that have seemed to take over him the last few weeks. It could be a grand gesture, couldn’t it? Scooping you up into his arms, sliding a hand around the back of your neck, telling you just exactly what keeps him up at night -- that adorable smile of yours, and the pineapple scent in your hair. It’d be all the castle would be able to talk about, wouldn’t it? Plus, to be able to ignore Umbridge even more and do something so utterly abysmal in the middle of her lesson and have the rest of the students cheer him on, well -- it’s something Fred’s always dreamt of.

“I’d love to see the look on Umbridge’s face if I ever chose to cause mayhem in the middle of one of her lessons,”

“Easy there, Freddie. Don’t want to go getting any more detentions, do we?”

“Darling, mischief is my middle name. I need to prank. My life depends on it.”

“That’s a bit dramatic, isn’t it? Just trying to look out for you, is all.”

“You’ve really got that Hufflepuff stereotype of ‘loyal’ down -- you know that, right?”

He supposes, when he thinks about it now, that you were right. You’re always right. He reckons it wouldn’t be such a good thing to cause such an uproar, especially since Umbridge is nearly always on his tail, and is one step closer to knocking Dumbledore out of his post as Headmaster. Fred doesn’t want to give her any more of an edge, does he?

Next to him, George brings Fred back, yet again, from another daydream with a quick kick to his knee. He grips the desk tightly and hopes that his face isn’t flushing bright red. Umbridge’s smirk grows even deeper, and Fred, ignoring his instincts to grab you and run out of the lesson right this instant, merely clears his throat. “No. There isn’t.”

“Good,” Umbridge hisses again, turning her attention back toward the board. “Now, to continue..” Fred relaxes a bit and slumps in his seat, feeling rather grumpy, but his spirits lift almost immediately, and his insides seemingly twist into a tight knot when you send him a soft smile from across the room.

-- -

Fred is shaken awake, only to be face to face with a very cheeky looking George, who then proceeds to throw a notebook straight into Fred’s cheek.

“Oi!” Fred shouts, coming to, bringing his hand to his jaw. “What the bloody hell was that for?”

“You do realize it’s the middle of the day and you’ve fallen asleep directly in the middle of the courtyard, yes?”

Fred kicks the younger twin with his foot, and George and Lee begin to laugh. Fred had been having quite a lovely sleep, thank you very much, and is now annoyed that his brother and friend had chosen to wake him. As he sits up from the bench, adjusting his loose tie and rubbing the sleep from his eyes, Lee offers, “You talk a hell of a lot in your sleep, mate.”

Much to his horror, Fred freezes. This whole talking-in-his-sleep thing is relatively new -- he’d never, ever done that before. It seemed to have happened to him a couple of weeks ago, when he began repeating the days’ events -- ones that included you -- over and over in his mind before falling into a peaceful, and rather deep, slumber. It seemed to have happened when he started to look at you in a new light.

“And what exactly was I saying?” Fred asks, trying to shrug off his nervousness.

George and Lee both suppress a laugh and share a cheeky exchange, and Fred feels his heart leap into his throat. “Oh, you know.. mumbling on about lessons, and things. Bits of parchment you need to finish. Normal musings.”

Fred sighs rather dramatically before relaxing again. He hates this whole being-on-edge thing that comes with having a massive, over-the-top crush on you. “Oh,” George continues, his grin only growing larger, “and something about Y/N being the colour of sunshine, or something?”

As Fred’s eyes widen with embarrassment, George and Lee’s laughter only seems to grow louder and it echoes across the courtyard. This grabs your attention from across the way, and you smirk at Fred. You seem to be working on a bit of homework -- you’re leant against a large tree with your bag and robe next to you on the ground. Your hair is pulled back and you’ve got the end of your quill in your mouth, as if you had been pondering something right before you met Fred’s gaze.

“Thank Merlin she wasn’t over here, or you would’ve scared the poor girl away,” Lee says in a mocking sort of voice, which only seems to intensify Fred’s nerves.

Fred can’t help but fall into a bit of laughter with his friends too, even though the mere fact that he’d been talking in his sleep, about you, in the middle of the courtyard, makes his entire body hurt. ‘Thank Merlin’ is right.

-- -

The colour of sunshine. Ugh. How could he have been so painfully cheesy? Fred thinks about this all day long -- through every lesson, through every stroll down the corridors, through every bite of the evening feast. He can’t simply believe he’s said this out loud, even though it’s true. The truest words that have ever come out of his mouth, even. You are the colour of sunshine.

Simply bright and beamingly so -- the most beautiful of yellows.

You, he reckons, are pure warmth -- enough to soothe him on even the coldest of days.

“You know,” your voice, now closer than it seems, makes Fred jump and snap out of his own thoughts, much to George’s amusement, “this whole not-being-able-to-eat-with-your-mates-from-other-houses thing is simply stupid.”

“Why don’t you go and give Umbridge a piece of your mind, eh?” George asks you.

Your grin deepens, but you shake your head and begin to shovel dessert onto your plate. “It’s her own fault if she doesn’t notice a Hufflepuff amongst a group of Gryffindors. She’s supposed to be the Hogwarts High Inquisitor,” you say a bit stuffily, as if to imitate the woman in question, “is she not?”

“Brilliant,” Fred replies as he finds his voice. “An uncanny impersonation.”

You flip your hair over your shoulder and Fred notices a dimple appear on your cheek. He finds himself lost in your eyes as you peer at him softly over the top of your teacup, which you’ve brought slowly to your lips.

Fred’s happy to hear when you bring his all time favorite thing about the magical world into conversation and does his very best to hide his ever-obvious feelings. “Rumor has it McGonagall and Dumbledore have been pleading with Umbridge to let Gryffindor play Quidditch this year,” you tell the twins.

They peer at you with confusion. “What?” they ask together. Fred continues, “Why? What’s she going to do -- ban all teams except Slytherin? Then they’ve got nobody to verse,” he lets a laugh escape his lips.

George huffs a bit before sipping his tea. “She’s such a bloody idiot. No, I will say it louder, Ron,” George shoots his younger brother a look as Ron closes in on himself a bit, “she’s a power-hungry, egotistical toad who has no business running a bloody school.”

“The truest statement,” you point at him and then bite into your cauldron cake, “but no worry -- she’s apparently agreed to the whole Quidditch thing. Now you two’ve just got to smack the bludgers straight at Crabbe and Goyle’s heads. They’re certainly large enough -- should be easy targets.”

Fred cannot help the enormous laugh that escapes him due to your joke; in fact, he’s sort of surprised it’s only gotten the attention of half of the Great Hall, because it seems to have echoed throughout the entirety of the large room, reverberating off of the walls. Unfortunately, though, Umbridge notices and makes a beeline right toward the Gryffindor table. You turn to Fred and George, shrug your shoulders a bit and proceed to roll your eyes at the very pompous “hem-hem” that is too disturbingly sweet and high-pitched in your ears. “Miss Y/L/N,” she says in her most mocking tone of voice, “please correct me if I am mistaken but I’ve assumed by the yellow color on your robes that you are a Hufflepuff and not, in fact, a Gryffindor, as you’ve so decidedly claimed yourself.”

You turn toward her, a very large grin painted across your face, and simply reply, “No need for corrections here, ma’am.”

“Good,” Umbridge says curtly before turning on her heel. “Best return to your house table, then, before we slip you lot into detention, yes? I do hope it was worth the embarrassment, Miss.”

Embarrassment? Please. You stand up from your seat and chug the rest of your tea and pop the rest of your cauldron cake back into your mouth. You lean against the table, reaching across to the other end to grab yourself another pastry, and get as close to Fred as you possibly can. He notices a bit of a twinkle in your eye, something that’s suddenly driving him absolutely mad, when you say to him and only him, “Definitely worth it.”

A very cozy feeling sweeps itself through Fred’s bones.

-- -

The Gryffindors are lucky to have such two stealthy beaters on their team, because Fred and George know the ins and outs of the castle like nobody else. This comes in handy after a playful, late night match between Gryffindor and Hufflepuff, when the twins are able to sneak the entire Hufflepuff team, and even a few spectators, into the Gryffindor Common Room.

And as if he isn’t excited enough already at the pure theatrics of this entire thing, Fred finds himself smiling even more so at the sight of you, nestled in a corner with a few others, a Butterbeer clutched tightly in your hands, your cheeks rosy and flushed.

He’s reminded of a few weeks ago when he snuck into the Hufflepuff Common Room with you -- very late at night --

“Don’t you trust me?” you’d asked, taking his hand in yours.

His heart had skipped a few beats, if he was being honest.

“Merlin, it’s bright in here!” Fred had exclaimed when you’d both entered. The inviting colours had swirled around him. “How you people get any work done is beyond me. I’d never be able to focus --”

You’d laughed and shoved him. “Fred, you can’t focus, regardless.”

He’d just shrugged and sat down next to you near the fire. The entire room was empty except for the two of you. “I’ll give you that one. It’s just -- it’s so much different from our common room.”

“Well, it’s bright yellow. Plus, it feeds to all of the ‘Puffs' personalities. What did you expect, silly?”

He’d smiled at you, nestling himself comfortably against the edge of the couch. I haven’t seen yellow the same since, he’d wanted to tell you, especially because of the golden colour of your hair. “Nothing more, nothing less. Besides, I’ve got to say -- I’m rather fond of it, actually.”

His heart had nearly constricted at the feeling of you placing your head onto his shoulder. He’d been happy you couldn’t see the shock rising on his face in that of a crimson red colour, since you’d been so focused on staring into the flames. He’d suddenly felt warm -- incredibly warm. He’d willed himself to believe it was the fire, and not the feeling of your soft hair brushing against his neck. “Oh yeah? Yellow your favourite colour, and all?”

I could get lost in it, actually. Fred had to force himself to swallow over his own nerves a few times before he’d been able to say, “You could say that.”

Now, in the Gryffindor Common Room, he darts past a very confused looking Neville and plops himself down next to you, completely ignoring the fact that he’s interrupting your conversation with the others. “Hey,”

“Well hi,” you say, turning your attention toward him. He can smell the pineapple scent of your shampoo and is nearly sent into a dizzying overdrive, but he does his best to focus on the feeling of the cold glass in his fingers. “Great match.”

“Even if we did beat you guys?”

“Yeah,” you reply tersely, “Hufflepuff’s saving their strength for your actual match so they can kick your arses.”

Fred laughs haughtily and scoots a little closer to you on the steps as the others around you both disperse and head off in their respective directions. He can hear the steady pounding of his own heartbeat in his ears and decides to take a leap of faith. “Maybe. Although I will say -- you’ve got to be more careful with your leering, love.”

“Meaning?”

“Pretty sure you didn’t take your eyes off of me the entire time. You were full-on staring.”

Fred notices the pink on your cheeks seemingly deepen a bit, but you don’t let on to any embarrassment. He grins at you. “Perhaps I was. And if you’ve noticed, it means you were watching me back,”

His smile only grows at your mock voice. He replies with the same tone, “Perhaps I was.”

“You can’t do that during an actual match though, sir,” you tell him, bringing your goblet to your lips and sipping significantly, “otherwise you’re going to be distracted and I reckon you’ll be hit with a bludger, don’t you?”

Fred twirls his goblet in his hands, desperately trying to read your face and your tone. He’s having a hard time deciphering. “You do make a good point.”

“Besides,” you continue, a small smirk making the edges of your lips curl, “we can’t have you getting distracted. Although, I understand how difficult it can be -- considering I’m the colour of sunshine, and all.”

It takes a moment and a laugh before Fred’s registered what you’ve said, and you glance back down at your goblet, giggling into it a bit, and he shakes his head before turning to look at George and Lee, who seemingly have been watching you two this entire time, because they immediately glance away and immerse themselves in conversation with others around them.

“And we know how brilliantly blinding sunshine can be, don’t we, Fred?”

Someone’s playing very loud music and Fred wonders how Umbridge hasn’t caught you all yet. Or perhaps, he thinks, maybe the booming just sounds louder in his own ears.

“Almost as blinding as love, d’you reckon?”

Fred feels that warm, homely feeling take him over yet again -- but this time, he knows it’s not from the butterbeer, or the raging fire. He doesn’t even try to pretend. It’s all from you.

“Yeah, yeah -- tease all you want,” he says as confidence engulfs him. He reaches out and tucks a piece of hair behind your ear.

You place your goblet down on the step next to you. “I wasn’t teasing,” you say very matter of factly, “so much as I was trying to get you to kiss me, actually.”

He purses his mouth into a very smug smirk and watches as your eyes dart down to his lips, and you bite down on your own. He leans in, the rest of the music and chatter surrounding you both seemingly drowned out by the steady pounding of his own heart, when --

“Oi, Freddie! C’mere, mate!”

Clearly Ron’s incapable of seeing that we’re in the middle of something, Fred wants to tell you. Instead, he pulls away slightly and whispers to you. “Want to sneak up to the Astronomy tower?”

“So late at night? How very scandalous of you.”

“Well it’s why you fancy me in the first place, isn’t it?”

He grabs your hand as you paint a very mischievous look on your face, and is about to stand up before you tug on the collar of his shirt with your free hand, pulling him back to you and pressing your lips to his in an electrified climax.

You try to part, but he pulls you closer to him and slides his hand down your leg. A soft moan emits your lips, and Fred wonders if he’d be able to sneak a Hufflepuff girl up to his own dormitory this evening. “Sorry,” you reply, biting down on your lip again, sending him into a complete tizzy. You whisper cheekily, “Just couldn’t wait.”

He smirks at you, hoping his giddiness isn’t blatantly evident in his exuberance, and pulls you to your feet. “Actually..” you say, playing again with his collar, “instead of the Astronomy tower, how about we head to the Room of Requirement?”

“No? Don’t want to look up at the stars, be all mushy, fall asleep in my arms?”

You actually snort through your laughter, rolling your eyes at him. “Yes, yes, of course I do, you sap. But I reckon we should save that for an actual date. Right now, I’d kind of just like to snog you for a few hours, if you don’t mind.”

He shakes his head at you with admiration. “What has gotten into you?”

Another hair flip from you sends warmth through Fred’s veins. “C’mon, Weasley,” you say, tugging his hand, the yellow fire reflecting in the light of your eyes, “don’t you trust me?”

#fred weasley #george weasley #fred and george weasley #weasley twins #fred weasley x reader #fred weasley reader insert #fred weasley imagine #fred weasley fanfic #fred weasley fanfiction #weasley twins fanfiction #weasley twins fanfic #weasley twins imagine #hp imagine #hp fanfic #hp fanfiction #lee jordan

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alarawriting · 4 years ago

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52 Project #30 (Writeober #15: Mortality): Everybody’s Happy As The Dead Come Home

Ever since my mother died of breast cancer a few years ago, I’ve been making time to go visit my elderly father about once a month. That may be conjuring up the wrong image in your head, so let me clarify. My father’s over 70, but he still has a lot of the energy he had as a younger man. He works as a consultant for the big corporation he spent his entire adult pre-retirement life working for, for about three or four times as much money, and he enjoys it. He’s got an active social life, spending time with friends he had shared with Mom as a couple, and new friends he’s made from his bereavement group or his consulting work. And my sister, the baby of the family, lives with him, and my two younger brothers come to visit him a lot more often, since they live a lot closer than I do. So if you’re imagining a lonely, stooped old man pining away in a house that smells like stale cat food – that’s not my dad, and I can’t imagine it would ever be.

I arrived late on a Friday night, as usual. My sister met me at the door, and actually looked me directly in the eye. Stephanie’s autistic; she never looks anyone in the eye. “Eleanor,” she said, and that was another strange thing, because she almost never calls anyone by name… unless she’s doing it for emphasis. “When you find out, don’t say anything about it,” she said.

“About what?” Most of the time Stephanie makes sense, but every so often she says something that sounds like her mind has jumped ahead in the conversation without realizing all the missing pieces she never bothered to say.

“You’ll know,” she said. “And you’ll want to ask ‘why’ and ‘how’, and I’m telling you that you can’t do that. Don’t ask any questions. Just come talk to me after you’re done.”

“Done with what?” I asked.

And then a voice called me from the TV room. “Lennie? Lennie, is that you?”

Only my mom and dad are allowed to call me Lennie. And that was a woman’s voice. I froze in place.

“Go see her,” Stephanie said, and headed off to her room.

I turned toward the TV room, slowly. “Lennie! Come out and see me!” my mom’s voice called.

I didn’t know whether to be terrified, or to start crying and fling myself into her arms. I walked very slowly, very cautiously, to the edge of the kitchen, where I could see my parents in the TV room. Both of my parents. My dad was smiling.

“Lennie!” my mom said, standing up. She hadn’t been able to stand up without help for months before she died, but here she was, standing up easily. She didn’t look any younger than she had when she died, but she looked healthier. The extreme thinness she’d suffered from at the end after it had metastasized and she’d barely been able to eat was gone; her flesh was filled out, her skin as taut as you could expect from a woman her age, and healthy-looking. Pale, but her natural paleness, not the weird, sallow, almost yellow color it had been at the very end.

“Mom?” I whispered.

“Come here. I need a hug,” Mom said, sounding exactly like she always had – joking, but there was always that note of truth under it. She didn’t wait for me to make my way to her – she never had, not until she was too ill to get up – but came straight for me and gave me a hug, and she smelled like herself. Not like a rotting corpse, not like ozone or nothing or whatever a ghost is supposed to smell like.

When I was a kid, my brother Jeff and I watched the miniseries version of “The Martian Chronicles”. In particular, he was always impressed (and terrified) by the part where the astronauts meet their long-lost loved ones, who turn out to be Martian shapechangers luring them to their deaths. I always wondered, if the people they saw on Mars were dead, how did they fall for it? How did they not know that dead people could not somehow be on Mars?

As I held my mom, who’d been dead a few years now, I understood. They’d wanted to believe. I wanted to believe. Stephanie had warned me not to ask anything – no “how are you not dead”, “how can you be here”, “why are you alive,” nothing like that. I assumed that was what she’d meant, anyway.

“Mom, I’ve been trying to trace some of my past that I’ve forgotten. Do you remember the name of my third grade teacher?”

“Huh.” My mom seemed to be thinking about it. “I think it was Mrs. Wilder, but I’m not a hundred percent sure. Second grade was Ms. Jenner, right? And fourth was Mrs. White?”

“Yeah,” I said. I didn’t, in fact, remember my third grade teacher’s name, and neither did my dad. The Martians in the story had been telepaths; they’d been able to perfectly impersonate the astronauts’ loved ones because they could read the astronauts’ minds. Now I had a piece of information whose answer I didn’t know, and no way to easily confirm it unless Jeff remembered; he was only two years younger than me and had had some of the same teachers. But some of the people I had friended on Facebook were high school classmates, and a tiny number of my high school classmates had also been with me in elementary school, and might remember my third grade teacher’s name.

“I haven’t seen you in so long,” my mom said. “What’s going on in your life?”

“Oh, you know,” I said. “Things are going okay. Mom, if I’d known you were here I’d have brought the kids.”

“You can bring them up next time,” Mom said.

This was so weird. My mom was definitely dead. I had seen her body in the coffin, lying in state, looking nothing like she had in life. But here she was, impossibly, and I was holding an almost normal conversation with her. “Have Jeff or Aaron come over since you’ve… been here?”

“Jeff was here last weekend,” Dad said. “And Aaron lives next door, so he’s been over nearly every day.”

My grandparents used to live next door. When they died, my mom and my uncle inherited the house. My uncle bought out my mom’s share and rented the house out, and my youngest brother ended up renting it. My other brother lives in an apartment down in the city; I’m the odd one out, living in a completely different state, with a husband and kids.

So all of them had known, and none of them had told me. I expected Stephanie and Aaron to never tell me anything, but I was more than a little irritated with Jeff.

“Let me go drop off my stuff,” I said, since I was still carrying my bag.

I went back to Stephanie’s room, which used to be my room, a long time ago. The boys used to room together, but my room was too small for Stephanie to share with me, and she had needed a lot of space of her own… so they’d converted the loft in the garage into a bedroom. It had never been warm in the winter, though, so as soon as I moved out, Stephanie had moved in.

Stephanie was, as usual, on her computer. I shut the door behind me. “Okay. What the hell is going on?”

“She’s not the only one,” Stephanie said, without looking away from her computer. “I’ve been doing research. They’re all over the place. There’s no explanation yet, and apparently none of them will talk about it. I asked Mom and she said I was really rude, and sulked and was really passive-aggressive.”

“So we’re not worried about Mom turning into a Martian shapechanger or vanishing, we’re just worried that she’ll get mad?” To be fair, making Mom mad had always been a thing worth avoiding at all costs. “When did she come back?”

“I don’t know exactly, but presuming that she came to see me right after she came back, it would have been Monday around 3 pm.”

“And no one told me? You have my email address!”

“…It just didn’t feel right, telling you something like this in email. I felt like I should wait for you to be here.”

“And Jeff didn’t? And Aaron didn’t?”

Stephanie shrugged. She still didn’t look away from her computer. “They probably felt the same way.”

“Does Dad… know? Like, does he even remember that Mom is dead, or does he think this is normal?”

“I didn’t ask him.”

I sat down on her bed. “Steph, I’m asking you to make an informed guess. Has he said anything to you that would either suggest that he’s aware this is abnormal, or that he isn’t?”

“I don’t read minds, but I haven’t heard anything from him one way or the other. He’s very happy, though.”

“I got that impression,” I told her. I went to the guest room, which used to belong to the boys, opened up my laptop, and sent Jeff a question on Facebook about my third grade teacher.

Mom appeared while I was debating whether or not to also ask him why the hell he hadn’t told me about her. “Lennie, don’t hide in your room. Come out and talk to me and your dad. You need to catch me up on your life!”

Part of me wanted to break down crying. Part of me wanted to run to the car. Part of me was annoyed the way I always used to be annoyed when my mom wanted to spend time with me and I had stuff to do. And part of me hated myself for being annoyed by my mom for any reason at all. She was back from the dead and I wanted to hide in my room? But I wanted to hide in my room because I wanted to do research to figure out if this was really my mom or not. And what had Stephanie meant by “all over the place”? People all over the place had returned from the dead? Why wasn’t this all over the news?

What I said was, “Okay, mom,” and I went out to the TV room to talk to her.

***

Here I was, having a completely mundane conversation with a dead woman.

Yes, my husband was doing well at his consulting business. Yes, my oldest daughter was doing well in college. My youngest daughter had a rough spot a few years ago but was doing better. The daughter in the middle was putting a lot of time into her music, and was getting really good. I didn’t mention that my oldest daughter had gotten a diagnosis of autism like her aunt, or that my middle daughter was failing all her subjects because all she cared about was music, or that my youngest daughter was openly bisexual and dating a nonbinary teen in her class, because those would be fraught topics around here. My mother would be openly disapproving of the failing in school – as was I, but I wasn’t here to listen to a lecture about what I should be doing differently to make sure Rhiannon passed her classes – and she’d be what she thought counted as supportive about the other things. Are you sure it’s a good idea for Janie to have an autism diagnosis on her medical record? Lots of people will discriminate against her, just ask Stephanie, it’s not a good thing to admit to the world. And if Lori wanted to date a person who claimed to have no gender, good for her, but was she sure it was a good idea to admit to the world that she was bi when the world is so prejudiced? Blah blah blah. No. I wasn’t going there, not with my mother back from the dead.

All the questions I wanted to ask. How? How was she back? Why? Was there an afterlife after all? What was it like? Are you absolutely sure you’re not a telepathic shapechanger who wants to eat us? Is anyone else coming back or is it just you? But I couldn’t do it. My mouth wouldn’t make the words, and I felt like Mom being alive was a soap bubble that might burst any moment. If I said she was dead, would she disappear? I couldn’t take the risk.

Now I knew why Jeff and Aaron hadn’t told me. The compulsion not to talk about it, the fear that talking about the circumstances of her death and her apparently-no-longer-deadness would cause her to stop being no-longer-dead. I wouldn’t be able to tell my husband about this, or my kids, not unless they came here. Not without feeling like Mom might disappear if I did.

Which was probably how Stephanie had gotten away with it, in the beginning. If this was some kind of emotional pressure, something emanating from the presence of a dead woman... Stephanie was typically immune to emotional pressure. Or pretended she was, anyway. She hid behind her monotone and her face that barely expressed anything until she couldn’t, and then she’d go and have a meltdown in the bathroom. But she wanted to please Mom. We all wanted to please Mom. So if Mom had told her she was rude for mentioning the death thing, Stephanie would be unable to mention it again. Because she wouldn’t want Mom to think she was rude.

This felt very much like I was in an episode of the Twilight Zone. Dead mother back to life, check. Weird inexplicable pressure not to talk about it, check. But Mom clearly remembered things that had happened shortly before her death, and showed no evidence of knowing about anything that had happened since, unless it was public knowledge. She talked about interests the girls had had three years ago, interests they’d all outgrown since. She talked about my plan to remodel my own garage – I had completely forgotten that was even a thing we’d planned at one point, because I’d lost my job shortly after Mom died and then the money wasn’t there for the remodel. She didn’t know I was working with my husband in the consulting business now, which a telepath would obviously know because it dominates my life nowadays. Obviously a Martian telepathic shapechanger would have to pretend not to know things that supposedly happened while they were dead, but if I’d forgotten about the garage, what were the odds a telepath could pull it out of my head? There had to be more accessible thoughts in there, after all.

I didn’t know what to ask Mom. How do you feel? That was always a good one, back in the day, because Mom’s chronic illnesses meant there was always something she could complain about, but she wouldn’t do it until she was asked… she’d just quietly resent the fact that no one had asked her. But did dead people still feel things? Would that intrude on the topic I wasn’t supposed to talk about? What’s going on in your life? Oh, nothing much, Lennie, I’m back from the dead, how about you?

So I talked about myself. I was learning to work leather and I’d made myself a wallet, but I left it at home, I could bring it to show her next time. I was also learning to repair dolls. The girls had all abandoned theirs and I felt bad about it, so I was cleaning them up and repairing them and putting them in dioramas. Mom was very interested in both topics, and asked if I could repair some old dolls she had up in the attic. I was pretty sure I’d already done it – if it was the dolls I was thinking of, Dad had given them to me right after Mom died, and they were the ones I’d learned on. But was it safe to talk about? Dad wasn’t saying anything; had he forgotten he gave me the dolls, which was entirely possible, or did he think it wasn’t safe to talk about either?

I’d wanted for three years to be able to tell my mom that she was wrong about all the weight loss advice she’d given me because now it had come out that scientists had never proven that fat made you fat and the low-carb diets were probably better for you than the low-fat ones, but I didn’t know if she could still eat. Also, my mom was back from the dead and I wanted to start an argument with her about a topic I’d always hated when she talked about? Didn’t I have anything better to do? That really kind of made me a shitty person, didn’t it?

When Mom had been dying, I couldn’t talk to her about the future. I didn’t know how to bring myself to talk about things she’d never see. I’d never known how much my conversations with her consisted of me talking about future plans until I couldn’t any more. Now I couldn’t talk about the future or the past, at least not the past three years, and large parts of the present had to be left out too, because I didn’t know what would remind her that she was dead and make her go back to her grave. Even though, logically, I knew that was unlikely to happen because Stephanie had done it and had just gotten a rebuke that that was rude.

At the same time… I knew I had to say something that Mom could talk about, because if I just talked about myself all night, later on she’d probably make some passive-aggressive remarks about how everything always had to be about me. In desperation, I asked her if she’d seen anything good on television lately.

“Oh, I haven’t been watching anything in a while,” Mom said. “It’s been so long since I felt well enough to go anywhere, so I’ve been going for walks, and your father and I have been taking trips to museums and historic sites. We’re going to be going up to Boston next week.”

“I have a client up there,” Dad said, “and they want me to do a training thing. And I was telling them, no, no, Boston’s too far, but I remembered how much your mom loved Boston, so I asked her if she wanted to go and she said yes, so now we’re going. We’re going to fly, though. The days I was willing to drive that kind of distance are long over.”

“You could take the Amtrak.”

Dad made a dismissive gesture. “It’s gotten so expensive. Flying’s actually cheaper.”

“When are you going?”

“Next Wednesday we’re going to fly up there,” Mom said, which said something about her opinion of the future, at least. “Your dad’s got his presentations to do on Thursday and Friday, and I’ll wander around the city, and then we’ll spend Saturday seeing the sights together.”

“There’s this fantastic restaurant I went to last time I was up there on business,” Dad said, “and I checked their web page, and they’re still open. So we’re going to go there.”

So Mom could eat. Or Dad wasn’t afraid of talking about eating with her, anyway. Maybe ruled out vampire, but Martian shapechanger was still on the table.

I didn’t literally believe my mom – or the entity that appeared to be my mom – was a telepathic shapechanger from Mars like in The Martian Chronicles. But it was obvious that something so far outside the norm that it was only imaginable by making references to fantasy and science fiction was happening.

I tried, very carefully, “How have you been feeling, Mom?”

“I’m great!” She laughed. “I haven’t felt this good in ages. Sugar’s under control, I can see pretty well, none of the usual aches and pains… I’m doing pretty good!”

Did she remember she had died of cancer? Did she even remember that she’d died?

It was 2 am before I got to go to bed.

***

6 am and I was up and out the door before there was any chance of my mother or father being awake, assuming my mom even slept anymore. But at the very least, she was in her bedroom with the door closed and no view of the driveway I’d parked my car in.

Do I sound like a terrible daughter when I tell you I’ve never visited my mom’s grave? I haven’t been back there since the funeral. I always knew my mother wasn’t really there – that if any part of her had still existed in any form, it wasn’t trapped in a coffin under six feet of dirt. It made it somewhat difficult to find the graveyard, though, because I couldn’t remember where it was, or its name, or which church it was associated with, and it wasn’t exactly like I could ask my mom. When I finally found the place– it wasn’t that hard in the end, my parents live in a small town and there aren’t many graveyards – it took me half an hour to find her grave.

It seemed undisturbed. But if Mom had been back from the dead since Monday, that would have been time to fill in a grave. I went looking for the caretaker.

They get to work early in the graveyard caretaking business, I guess; I found him pushing a lawnmower over on the other side of the graveyard.

“Can I help you?” he asked.

“This is going to sound stupid,” I said. “But I got an email from a jerk I used to know in high school claiming he was going to dig up my mother’s grave, and I just wanted to make sure nobody’s touched it.”

“Nobody’s touched any of the graves, ma’am,” he assured me. “Aside from a couple of funerals we’ve had this week, no one’s done anything to disturb the ground here at all.”

“Thanks,” I said, “that’s reassuring. He was talking like he was actually going to do it, but I guess he was all talk.”

“Well, if anyone comes by and disturbs any of the graves, we’ll have them arrested,” he said.

I had my answer. My mother had not climbed out of her grave. Which seemed impossible anyway, now that I knew enough about the funeral industry to know exactly how hard it would be to smash a coffin open, let alone dig through six feet of dirt. I couldn’t rule out her turning immaterial and floating out of her grave, but my mom had seemed very material and biological when she’d hugged me. I’d always thought of ghosts as something that were almost never solid enough to interact with the world, if they even existed.

***

If I was going to get up this early, I was going to get a pancake breakfast at the diner. My parents still think sugarless cold cereal is a reasonable thing to eat for breakfast. They were always night owls; I made myself breakfast and school lunch every morning but the first day of school, every year after about third grade. I was also a night owl, once I didn’t have to get up for school anymore, but I used to make my girls a lunch every night and store it in the fridge for them. Now they’re too old and too cool for Mom lunches. They’re eating something, but it might be cafeteria food, lunch they pack for themselves, or for all I know sandwiches from 7-11 or Starbucks with their allowance.

The point is, I hardly ever get a nice breakfast, because I am hardly ever willing to wake up early enough to cook myself one, and my parents certainly weren’t going to. So I went to the diner.

Normally I don’t talk to anyone at a diner, beyond smiling at them and telling them my order in an upbeat, cheerful voice because waitresses get too much shit from too many people for me to add to it inadvertently. Also because I don’t want them to think I’m eating alone because I’m a sad, lonely bitch no one would love; I want them to know I’m doing this because I really, really enjoy not having to socialize. But today I had something I needed to know.

“I’m a writer,” I told the waitress, “and I’m doing research on ghost stories in the area. Have you heard anything, you know, Halloweeny or spooky? Ghosts appearing, dead people walking around, poltergeists, that kind of thing?”

“Can’t say I have, but I’ll ask around, see if any of the girls know any good stories,” the waitress told me.

And then she took my order back to the kitchen, and I surfed the net on my phone while I waited, and then I got my pancakes, and I ate them. I was chasing the last blueberry around on the plate when another waitress approached me. “Stacy told me you were collecting creepy stories for a book?”

“From the local area, yeah.”

“I don’t know if this is the kind of thing you’re looking for, but… my cousin says that a lady on her street, her husband died a few years ago? But she just saw the guy walking with the lady down the street, having a conversation like the guy never died.”

“Do you think you’d be able to give my email to your cousin and have her reach out to me? That sounds like exactly the kind of story I’m looking for.”

“Uh, sure.”

I gave the waitress my email address. This was probably going to come to nothing; I doubted the waitress would even remember to give it to her cousin. But it’d be really good if I could get the details from someone who knew more about it.

***

Jeff’s more of a morning person than I am. I got a response on Facebook, but I had to wait to get back to my parents’ house, where my laptop was, to read it. On mobile, Facebook will only let you read messages if you have the app, which tells Mark Zuckerberg exactly where you are and what you’re doing with your phone, all the time. I don’t have the app. Sometimes this means I can’t read messages on mobile, but I prefer that to having an evil data empire know everything about my movements.

My parents weren’t awake when I got home. Or they were still in their bedroom. They used to do that a lot. Mom’s desk was in there, and Dad had a laptop… which he usually used on Mom’s desk, since she died. I wondered where her machine was, and if she had made a thing about it once she came back.

“I’m not sure I remember what your third grade teacher’s name was… I can barely remember my own third grade teacher. Were they the same? I can’t remember. I think my own teacher’s name was… Wil-something? Wilber? Wilkins? You’d be better off… well, you’re at the house now, or are you back at your home? Kind of important to know, because I could give you some advice about who to ask, but it’d be a different thing if you were at Dad’s house.”

He meant, “You’d be better off asking Mom, but I don’t know if you know Mom is back from the dead or not.” I was pretty sure, anyway.

I responded. “I’m at Dad’s house. Wondering how I’d be able to tell the difference between someone who’s real and a Martian shapechanger. Could the name have been Wilder?”

Five minutes later I got my answer. “Mom isn’t a Martian shapechanger. It was the first thing I thought of, so I checked.”

“Why didn’t you tell me?” I asked.

That answer I didn’t get until half an hour later. “I… just didn’t feel right, talking about it in an impersonal medium like the internet. I know you have a cell phone and I probably even have your number somewhere, but I remember you’re not the biggest fan of actual phone calls, so I didn’t want to disturb you.”

I replied with my phone number and the message “Call me.”

And then I had to sit by my phone, doing nothing important, nothing that would engage my attention in any serious way, waiting for him to call. Which took twenty minutes, despite the fact that I could see that he was online.

Finally the phone rang. “You raaaaang?” I answered in my best parody of The Addams Family.

“I’m pretty sure I must have, or you wouldn’t have known to pick up,” Jeff said. “Of course, I might have buzzed. You could have your phone on vibrate. Or maybe I sang, depending on what you have for a ringtone.”

“’You saaaaang?’ doesn’t have the same je ne sais quoi to it.”

“Wow, how long has it been since I heard someone put je ne sais quoi in a sentence? I think we’re old. I think that’s an old person expression now.”

“What’s going on with Mom?” I asked, quietly, in case anyone might be in the hallway to hear me.

Jeff sighed. “I don’t know what is, but I can tell you what isn’t,” he said. “Stephanie confirmed that she eats, sleeps and goes to the bathroom normally, and I confirmed all of that for myself. The toilet in their bedroom is still broken enough that they don’t flush it unless they have to.”

I winced. That was a level of detail I could have done without. “So, not vampire or undead. How did you solve the Martian thing?”

“On Monday, Dad woke up and she was laying next to him in bed. If the goal was to kill him, it would have made more sense to do it then, before he woke up, than to put on this whole elaborate performance.”

“You’re taking me too literally. I’m not worried about aliens trying to take our family off guard so they can kill us. There’s any number of things they could be up to, and they don’t have to be aliens. Invasion of the Body Snatchers. The Stepford Wives. My Little Pony.”

“…My Little Pony?”

“There’s creatures called Changelings that feed on love. They impersonate ponies and take the love that other ponies feel for the ones they’re impersonating, as food.”

“Kind of psychic vampires mashed up with Martian shapechangers.”

“Yeah, but without the telepathy, so they’re not as good at it as you’d think. It’s a children’s show; they have to telegraph to the kids that these aren’t the real ponies. In real life, anyone who did something like that would be more competent.”

“How much verisimilitude do we need, though? She’s got moles in the same places Mom had moles. She’s missing a toenail just like Mom. Things I didn’t consciously think about, things I might not have remembered if you asked me to describe Mom.”

“That just means that if it’s not Mom, it has the ability to rummage deeper into our memories than we’re consciously aware of. That’s why I asked you my third grade teacher’s name. I genuinely don’t remember. Mom would, I’m pretty sure. Dad wouldn’t and Stephanie and Aaron were both too young.”

“I’m not sure I remember, but when you said Wilder, that sounded like it could be right. Do you know anyone from elementary school? Some of them went to high school with us.”

“I have some Facebook friends from high school, and maybe one or two went to the same elementary we did, but I haven’t been able to locate any actual people that I remember from elementary school. They don’t have a Classmates.com thing that works for elementary—”

“It says it does.”

“It lies, there’s nowhere to enter your elementary in your profile. All it lets you put in is high school, and it’s from a drop-down, not even freeform.”

“Huh. Guess I never tried it. I’m still in touch with anyone I cared about from back then.”

“I literally don’t care about anyone from back then, but that makes it hard when you’re trying to figure out your third grade teacher’s name.”

“If she can probe our memories,” Jeff said, “then nothing you or I know, or ever knew, would be safe. You’d have to come up with something to ask her that Dad wouldn’t know, or me, or Aaron, or Steph, or yourself, but that you know Mom would know and that you know someone else who would know it too.”

“I could ask Mariana for something.” My mom’s close friend and high school classmate was one of my Facebook friends. We don’t generally communicate directly with each other, but I follow her posts.

“That’s a good idea.” I heard the sound of a whistling teapot in the background. “That’d be my hot water for my oatmeal. If you get anything from Mariana, can you tell me about it?”

“Yeah.” I’d wanted to tell him about the story I’d heard in the diner, but no one got between Jeff and his oatmeal. “I’ll talk to you later. Probably online. Voice is making me paranoid.”

“I know what you mean. Do you need me to come up this weekend? I could make a day trip tomorrow.”

“That might be a good idea. I want to talk to Aaron, do you know what schedule he’s on?”

“He works nights now, so you’ll want to get him around 2 pm or so.”

“All right. Enjoy your oatmeal.”

“I will!” he said, putting a ridiculous amount of emphasis into it as a joke.

***

Before I could finish writing a message to Mariana – before I could really start, honestly, because how could I explain why I needed what I needed without admitting Mom was back from the dead? – someone knocked on my door. It was Mom. She was wearing one of her usual kind of shapeless but colorful nightgowns, and her hair was not brushed, so it was kind of a wreck. I noticed for the first time that it was grey. Mom had always dyed her hair since she started going grey, and it had still been auburn when she’d died. I’d never seen it fully grey. “Your dad and I are going to the arboretum,” she said. “Do you want to come?”

“Since when have you been into trees, Mom?” My mother had always been fascinated by history, and to some extent natural history like dinosaurs, but I’d never seen her express an interest in nature per se.

“I never was, much,” she admitted, “but the world is so beautiful. I was always more interested in the way humans shape the world than the way it came out of the box, but things like arboretums, Japanese gardens, zoos and aquariums… they’re made of nature, but they’re made by humans, and they say something about the people who chose to make them the way they are. And you know that your dad has always enjoyed nature.” My dad was interested in science, in general, and considered the natural world part of that. He was not exactly the kind of guy who would go camping.

In the past, I would have said “no, thanks.” I was never all that interested in nature myself, certainly not trees – maybe beautiful rocks or interesting landscapes, but looking at trees wouldn’t have seemed interesting to me. I still didn’t care much about trees… but my mom was back from the dead. I’ve gone much stupider and more boring places than an arboretum with her in the past, and now… if this was really her, if she was really alive again, I was going to spend all the time with her that I reasonably could.

“Sure, I’ll go,” I said. “I’ll take my own car, though. Just give me the address.” I always took my own car if I possibly could, because I’d get carsick if I wasn’t the one driving. “Should I ask Stephanie if she wants to come?”

“Sure, you can ask. I doubt she will, though.”

Stephanie, however, surprised me. “Yeah, I’ll go with you. We’ll meet Mom and Dad there?”

“Yeah.” Dad had texted me the address, so I pulled it up in my GPS. “About half an hour from here.”

In the car, she asked me, “Have you found anything out? I know you were looking into the whole Mom thing.”

“Jeff thinks she’s really Mom. We have a plan to get Mariana to give us a question that we don’t know the answer to, but that Mom and Mariana both would, so we can confirm she really knows things and isn’t just reading our minds. And a waitress at the diner said her cousin has seen what looks like someone else coming back from the dead.”

“It’s all over the place, actually,” Stephanie said. “I’m finding reports from everywhere.”

I glanced at her. “Why wouldn’t this be making the news, then? People coming back from the dead!”

“I feel like maybe no one wants to go on the record.” Stephanie looked out the window. “Nothing on Twitter or Facebook. No pictures of dead people on Instagram. I’m seeing things on Reddit and Tumblr – places where people use a consistent pseudonym, not like 4chan, but where that pseudonym can’t be tied to their actual identity. I’ve posted about it in both places, but I can’t make myself tweet about it.”

“Any idea why not?”

“It—” She shrugged, hands exaggeratedly widespread and head canted forward slightly. “It just feels wrong,” she said. “Like… we’re getting away with something. There’s a natural law we’re breaking here. I can post as toomanymushrooms or u/catonahottinroofsundae and no one knows who I am, but if I post as Stephanie Robbins and I tell everyone that my mom Suky Robbins is back from the dead…”

“What if that brought it to the attention of, what, some kind of authorities?”

“Yeah, pretty much. And even if I was just posting under my own name… I don’t have to say Mom’s name. I don’t have to put a mention to her Facebook in a post. But everyone knows my mother’s name, or they could find out from my name if they wanted to.”

“And you think maybe there are a lot of people with these weird feelings?”

“I don’t think so, I know so. A lot of posts explicitly talk about the fact that they can’t bring themselves to say anything in public, or talk about it with their real names on it.”

“Are they all parents?”

“No. It’s all kinds of people. Best friends, siblings, spouses, children… the only pattern I see is that nobody died a long time ago. It’s all, ‘my brother who died last year’ or ‘my aunt who died two years ago’ or something. Longest I’ve seen anyone talk about was a son who died five years ago.”

A thought occurs to me. “I can add something to your pattern, though.”

“Yeah?”

“You’d expect that, even if everyone with a resurrected relative feels this sense of dread about telling anyone about it with their name attached, because they feel it will, I don’t know, maybe cause the dead person to disappear back into their grave… you’d think somebody would do it anyway because they don’t care. Someone whose alcoholic abusive father came back and they wish he’d go away again, someone’s asshole brother, someone’s former best friend who betrayed them. But so far, no one has. How many people have you seen talking about this?”

“It’s hard to say because no one’s using their real names. Someone might post from their main blog and their side blog, or maybe they have a different name on tumblr vs reddit but they posted to both. But I’ve tracked thirteen separate names, and of those, I can tell for a fact there are at least nine unique ones because they talk about different people.”

“Thirteen isn’t ‘all over the place’.”

“I didn’t mean all over the Internet, I meant people coming from all over. I’ve tracked the UK, California, North Dakota, Ontario, France, India and New Zealand. Nobody’s tagging their posts and no one is willing to contribute to a master list, so it’s hard to find anyone outside of the people I follow or the subreddits I’m in, and I don’t know where everyone comes from. But it’s geographically widespread. I suspect it may also be happening in other places where people don’t generally speak English or maybe don’t have Internet access.”

“And what’s their sentiment? Like, are people frightened? Upset? Excited? Weirded out?”

She took a moment to think about it. “They’re happy. People are happy it happened. Weirded out, yes. But happy.”

“No whacked-out conspiracy theories about how it’s the contrails raining down adenochrome or something?”

“Not from the people it’s happened to. There was one flame war I saw where a religious person was saying that the person whose sister was back from the dead had to repudiate her. She’s not really your sister, she’s a demon from Hell sent to trick you, et cetera. And the person whose sister was back turned out to be just as religious, and they threw a holy fit. Literally. A holy fit.” She giggled. “A whole lot of stuff about how the righteous were coming back and Jesus had granted some people eternal life and this was that, and how dare you call these beings demons when they’re obviously blessed by Jesus himself and you’re the kind of person who would have called for Jesus’s crucifixion if you’d been alive then, and all that kind of thing.”

“Did anyone else who’d had returned people say anything?”

“This was Tumblr. None of the people who have had returns are communicating with each other in any way I can see. I reached out to a few on Tumblr private messaging but no one has answered. The only places I’m seeing conversations about it between people with returns have been on Reddit, because it has a forum structure. Tumblr is more like a whole hanging web of disconnected strings.”

“Still, you’d think that someone would be publishing a news article about it. Even if no one is willing to go on the record with their real name…”

“Maybe it’s not enough people. Nine unique instances, maybe up to thirteen, maybe more in places I haven’t surveyed. It’s not like I have access to literally all of Tumblr, after all. But that’s all I can confirm, and what if there isn’t any more?”

“If anyone came back from the dead I would expect the news to take notice.” I turned onto the final road; the arboretum was at the end of this stretch. “I went to the graveyard today. Mom’s grave hasn’t been disturbed. I checked with the groundskeeper. So either Mom’s body floated ethereally through the grave dirt, and her coffin, or her original body is still in there and whatever she is now, it’s not the same as what she was then.”

“It’s too bad we can’t have her exhumed,” Stephanie said.

“It probably wouldn’t tell us much anyway.”

“She’s younger-looking than she was before. Not by much, and the grey hair hides it, but she’s healthier-looking and less wrinkly. And I don’t see any evidence that she still has diabetes, or that she’s taking any pills at all. I haven’t seen her take any insulin shots, or anything.”

“Huh.” She wasn’t restored to her youth, or her hair wouldn’t be grey and there would be no wrinkles at all. She wasn’t restored to what she was at the moment of death, obviously. She wasn’t restored to what she’d have been at the moment of death without the cancer that killed her, if she didn’t have diabetes anymore. I felt like there had to be a pattern here I wasn’t seeing. I really wanted to talk to some of these other people having this experience.

I pulled in to the arboretum’s parking lot. Mom and Dad weren’t there yet; Dad doesn’t drive like an old man, but he doesn’t drive as fast as he used to, either. “Do they do this kind of thing a lot? Arboretums, parks, et cetera?”

“They don’t usually invite me, and I wouldn’t usually come if they did, so I don’t know. They do leave the house a lot.”

Dad’s car pulled in, and he and Mom got out. For the first time I could remember, Mom was actually moving a bit faster than him. Both Mom and Dad were the kind of people who walked quickly everywhere they went, but for a long time, Mom was slowed down by her various illnesses. Dad was still healthy for his age, but he’d slowed down a good bit since Mom’s death – grief was hard on his health, it seemed – and now Mom seemed healthier than he was.

“Did you know there are people who come here from all over just to see our leaves in the autumn?” Mom said.

I did know that; it was typically a factor in making it hard for me to come visit during the autumn. “I think it’s the mountainsides. There’s leaves turning colors all over the country, but not on mountainsides.”

“In California they don’t even consider these mountains,” Mom said. “They call them hills when they come visit.”

“No respect for the elderly,” Dad said.

“Yeah, these young mountains think they’re all that, but wait 100,000 years and see how tall they are then,” Stephanie said.

We strolled around, looking at the trees, reading what it said on the plaques in front of them. American Elm. Yellow Birch. Eastern White Pine. I’d seen trees just like these my whole life, and a good number of them, I’d never known the names.

“You never think about how beautiful the world is,” Mom said. “We’re all rushing through it, trying to accomplish the next thing. Or entertain ourselves. Read a book, watch TV. So few of us really want to interact with nature.”

“Careful, mom, your hippie roots are showing,” I said, teasing.

“I think if my generation had remembered what we were back when we were the hippies, the world would be better off.”

“We didn’t forget, Suky. The hippies were always big news, but you know as well as I do how many people our age just wanted to go punch a clock, buy a house, vote for Ronald Fucking Reagan… We thought we were the generation that would change the world, but it wasn’t our generation, it was us. People like us, who wanted to see a better world and weren’t content to just live like the sheep our parents were… but there’s people like that in every generation. And they’re always outnumbered by the assholes.”

“Actually, they’ve done a study,” Stephanie said. “The reason generations get more conservative as they get older is that at every point, the poor are more likely to die than the rich, and the rich are more conservative than the poor. So by the time you get to middle age, a lot of the people looking for social justice and diversity are dead. And there’s a lot more dead by the time they’re elderly.”

“I don’t buy it,” my dad said. “There’s entirely too many stupid poor people in this country who are brainwashed into supporting causes that help out the rich people and screw themselves over. They’re not living longer than anyone else in this country. The math doesn’t work.”

“Let’s not talk about politics,” Mom said. “I think we all know there’s something more important we ought to be discussing.”

“Mom?” Stephanie said, and looked at her, which is not a thing Stephanie does very often.

“Suky?” Dad said.

I didn’t say anything. I watched as Mom looked up at a tree and said, “It’s time we dealt with the elephant in the room, don’t you think?”

“Are you going to tell us about—” I couldn’t say anything more. I couldn’t bring myself to make the words.

“About the fact that I was dead, and now I’m not?” She looked at all of us. “I think we should talk about it, yes.”

It felt like there were eyes, watching us. I wanted to yell to my mother, to tell her not to talk about it, that someone might hear… but who? And why would it matter?

“Is that something you’re okay with, Suky?” Dad asked.

“I’m fine, but I’m getting the impression the rest of you aren’t,” she said. “Why haven’t any of you brought it up, except Stephanie, the once?”

“Well, you told me it was rude,” Stephanie said.

Mom sighed. “I guess I did. I’m sorry. This isn’t really easy for me either.”

She sat down on a bench, and Dad sat with her. Stephanie and I sat on a short stone wall around a tree. “I suppose I should start by saying, I don’t really know much more than you do. I don’t have any memories of being dead. I woke up in bed, next to your dad, on Monday morning, and for a while I couldn’t remember how I’d gotten there… I assumed I went to bed the previous night, but I couldn’t remember what had happened the night before. I couldn’t pin down anything I remembered as to exactly when it happened, not in the recent past. And when your father woke up, the shock on his face and the fact that he kept asking me if I was really here made me think, wait, the last thing I remember was that I was in a hospital dying of cancer, so why am I here now?”

“So you don’t remember any kind of afterlife?” I asked.

She shook her head. “I believe I had some sort of existence, but I don’t remember anything about it. When I wake up, I have flashes, feelings that I dreamed something about it, but I can’t hold it in my head long enough to write it down or even talk about it. It just… disappears, leaving behind only the memory that something was there a few minutes ago.”

“You know how unlikely the idea that an afterlife exists is, scientifically, though. Right?” Dad said. “Consciousness is an emergent property of a trillion neurons working together. Imagining that there could be some sort of construct that exists outside the brain and body is like imagining that a video game character could be waltzing around in front of us.”

“And yet I’m here,” Mom said.

“Time travel or a Star Trek transporter with some modifications would make more sense than something supernatural, like an afterlife,” Dad said stubbornly.

“It doesn’t matter,” Stephanie said. “If Mom doesn’t remember…”

“Have you had a medical exam?” I asked.

Mom laughed. “I don’t have health insurance anymore. I’m dead, remember? I can’t even begin to figure out how we’re going to address getting me a legal identity again, and to be honest… I can’t know I’ll be around long enough for it to matter.”

“None of us know that,” I said, “about ourselves or anyone else.”

“True, and it’s going to be hard to travel if I don’t have a legal identity. So I suppose I’ll have to address it eventually, if I last that long.”

“Thank God your state ID hasn’t actually expired yet, or there’d be no way we could fly to Boston. The passport’s expired,” Dad said. Mom had been legally blind when she died, so she’d had a state ID rather than a driver’s license.

“Is there any reason you might not? Aside from the things that could kill anyone?” I asked.

Dad said, “Your mother and I discussed… when she first appeared, I found it nearly impossible to talk about the fact that she’d been dead. When she broached the topic, I could talk about it to her, but I couldn’t tell you kids.” He shrugged. “My working theory is that there’s some kind of alien experiment going on or that time travel is somehow involved, but the fact that none of you kids were able to tell each other about it until you knew the other one knew suggests to me that someone with the ability to directly affect human emotions or thought is, for some reason, making it hard to talk about this. Maybe that means it’s a short-lived experiment.”

“Maybe I escaped from hell and no one wants to talk about it for fear the devil will take me back,” Mom said, but she was laughing. Mom had never believed in hell. Dad was an atheist; Mom definitely had strong spiritual beliefs, but they were kind of a package of woo that included reincarnation and ghosts, even though she’d been raised Catholic.

“There are others like you,” Stephanie said. “None of them have talked about it themselves, but family members or friends have talked about it online, under pseudonyms. I haven’t found any evidence that anyone has mentioned anything under their real names.”

“A lot?” Mom was surprised.

“So far I count between nine and thirteen unique individuals, plus Eleanor heard a rumor that someone who might live in town might have come back. We don’t know any details, though.”

“We need to find them,” Mom said. “I need to find them. I have a second chance at life, and I’m not ashamed of it. I won’t be silenced about the fact that I exist.”

“It might not be the best idea, Suky,” Dad said. “There are a lot more crazies out there than there were when you died—”

“—there were plenty of crazies then, Dee—”

“—right, and even then it wouldn’t have been a good idea. There might be some religious nut job who thinks that if you were dead you should stay that way. Or someone else thinks that you know how you came back, and wants to force you to tell them.”

“Those are valid points,” Mom said, nodding. “And to all of those people who might want to harm me because they think I shouldn’t be alive or they think I know how I came back, I say a hearty ‘fuck you.’ I won’t be silent because there are crazy people in the world. I’m not afraid of death, not anymore.”

“You’re going to risk Eleanor’s kids?” Dad asked sharply.

“I agree with Mom,” I said, standing up. “Nobody should have to keep quiet about the fact that they exist. But I have to tell Will.”

Stephanie made a face. My family doesn’t like my husband. They have justifications, but in the past few years, since Mom died, Will’s gone to therapy and has done a lot of work on himself. Mom was the only one in the family ever willing to forgive anything, though, so I’ve never tried to get them to change their minds.

Mom said, “Well, is he still a total asshole?”

“He’s… been trying not to be. He’s in therapy, and we’re doing couples counseling, and he’s working through a lot of baggage from his upbringing.”

“Why not tell him to bring the kids up and join you here, then. Coming back to life, might as well start a clean slate and see where things go from there. And you’re right, he needs to be involved in the discussion. Your girls, too. They all are old enough to understand what’s going on here, and what could happen.”

“You know I will never stand in the way of anything you want,” Dad said, which is the kind of thing Dad says rather than “I love you”. Things like, “If they ever fail to respect you, I will smite them” – talking about us and our treatment of Mom – or “You have always been my worthy opponent.” Yes. Sometimes my father talks like a comic book character.

“I don’t know if it’s a good idea,” Stephanie said, “but I know you taught me to be who I am to the world and fuck anyone who gives me shit about it, so… same principle. I don’t think you could be you and lie about who you are.”

“And we need to involve Jeff and Aaron,” Mom said. “I’ll call them and get them to come here.”

“We turned off your cell phone ages ago,” Dad objected.

“Dee, we still have a land line. I know we do because I hear it ring, and sometimes you even answer it.”

“Oh. Yeah, that’s right, we do.” Dad shook his head. “This world where everyone carries around their phone in their pocket all the time… it’s strange how you get so used to a technological or societal change that you forget that you did it a different way for 67 years.”

Nothing ever stopped my mother when she wanted something strongly enough, if she believed it was right. I hadn’t even thought of the considerations my father brought up before he talked about them, but I’ve never believed it’s okay to hide in conformity and live in fear. I didn’t think Will had ever believed in doing that, either, and my daughters had grown up going to political protests.

“We need to find out more about these other people,” I said to Stephanie on the way home. “See if we can contact them directly, find out if any of the actual returned people are planning on going public like Mom. We could coordinate if they are. Strength in numbers.”

“The religious right are going to crap their pants,” Stephanie said, laughing. “A Deist who believes in reincarnation, is married to an atheist, and has a gay son, came back to life. Jesus Christ hasn’t got a monopoly anymore.”

“That is probably going to be the most fun part of this going public thing,” I said.

***

So now I don’t know what will happen. My husband’s driving up from home with our girls, my oldest younger brother’s on a train, and Mom’s been looking up contact information for journalist friends she had once, checking which ones are still alive, using Facebook – we never deactivated her account – and my dad’s LinkedIn. Stephanie’s found two other people who have family members who came back from the dead, and one of them’s been willing to talk to her in private messaging on Tumblr.

I still have a hard time telling anyone who doesn’t already know, but it turns out, I can write about it without feeling the pressure, the fear. Don’t know if I can post it, yet. I guess we’ll see. I’m hoping that if I can get more information from more people who’ve been through something similar, maybe we’ll find a pattern, a point of commonality… maybe even an explanation for why we all feel this pressure not to talk about it.

Tomorrow we’re all going to talk about whether we’re going to do this or not, but I know my family. What my mom wants, she gets, if it’s possible and if it’s ethical. My husband and my kids are going to be in favor of her going public, and my brothers won’t stand in her way any more than my dad would. So we’re going to do this. The thing we’re really going to talk about is how to keep ourselves safe when we do.

Everything in the world is going to change. I just don’t know exactly how yet.

***

Obligatory notes because I’m so fucking late with this piece:

I have fucked up royally. I went into this without an outline and about 6,000 words in I realized I had attempted to consume a ball of energy larger than my head. This is going to end up being novel length, most likely. I struggled really hard to find a place I could reasonably end it as a short story, and yeah, it is absolutely not an ending. No followup on the Martian shapechanger thing, new idea is brought in and then treated like it’s the climax, protagonist is almost entirely reactive and passive. As a short story, it’s shit.

Unfortunately I found this out after I was already late. Not going to bore everyone with why this was a week late except that it’s allergy season and I’ve been exhausted lately. So there was no time to try to write something else. I hope you found it entertaining, if somewhat frustrating; it’s shit as a short story because it’s plainly a piece of a novel. Which I’m not going to write real soon because I have like 3 novels ahead of this one in the queue, but if I live long enough it will get done.

It’s kinda cute that story #30 falls on the 30th now because I’m late and story #31 is the last of my Spooky 5 Halloween-appropriate stories. But not cute enough to justify how late this is.

BTW, while this is not as autobiographical as “Radio” from Inktober, it is heavily drawn from real life. I altered some things because this is fiction, but the mother and the father in this story are pretty close to real life. Except that my mother hasn’t come back.

#52 project #writeober 2020 #alara's october 2020 prompt fics #spooky5 #late!

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just-an-anxious-mess · 4 years ago

Text

Double Standards (Part 2)

Part 1

Trigger Warning: Mentions of toxic parents, transphobia, mentions of past abuse, dead naming, wrong pronoun usage, low self esteem, unhealthy coping mechanisms, ableism, seasonal depression, thoughts of suicide and self harm. The Remus angst train will not be stopping.

They sat in their room trying to ignore their spiralling thoughts. They should have known better than to slip up and make a comment about their gender identity at dinner.

They'd known it wouldn't go down well and yet they'd still said something. Remus blamed it on their impulsivity and desire to feel validated for once.

Things had started off ok at first. They'd been forced out shopping with their mother and had come across another enby in the wild which had been great. They'd had a discussion about preferred pronouns while their mum and Roman had been in earshot.

Roman had of course been a complete ass the whole time round the shops and Remus was still furious about the leaves incident but they managed to hold themselves back from doing anything rash like breaking his nose which they felt was incredibly nice of them.

The individual at the checkout had given Remus a sudden boost in confidence and rekindled their motivation to correct their parents when they slipped up.

With this new energy they corrected their mother and the three of them (Remus, Roman and their mother) also ended up having a conversation about the LGBTQ+ on the journey home.

All in all things were going good and when they got home they decided to take the cashiers words to heart.

They had told Remus that their 5 year old cousin respected their pronouns and name more than their parents and so with this knowledge in mind Remus decided to talk to Patton.

"Hey Patton? My name is Remus now and instead of saying she or her when talking about me, I'd prefer you to use They and Them."

Patton had looked up at them with barely a moments hesitation and replied "Ok Remus."

Remus felt like their heart was going to burst at Pattons words and they couldn't fight the enormous smile that spread across their lips, especially as Patton continued to use Remus instead of their deadname.

Then dinner happened.

Everyone was sitting around the table as usual when Remus's mum used their deadname when speaking to them. Remus sighed but felt a little reluctant to correct her in front of their father, unsure if his infamous temper would explode at Remus 'backchatting' their mum.

Patton of course spoke up then, slipping up slightly thanks to hearing the deadname being used.

"It's Remus."

Remus was surprised when Roman spoke up on their behalf and was immediately suspicious, frowning slightly at his sudden jump to their defence.

"I call you Remus but mummy calls you [Deadname}" Patton stated, looking directly at their mother.

"That's because I named her after a friend of mines younger sister who died while I was pregnant with her."

Remus winced slightly, already having heard this story many times before. They avoided eye contact with their mother as she continued.

"The names I used to name her carry significant meaning to me so if I forget to call her Remus it's because of that. My friends sister was only 13 when she died and I swore to name you after her in her memory."

Remus just managed to stop from sliding down in their seat, guilt and shame suddenly weighing heavily on them as they thought on their mothers words.

Maybe they should have chosen something closer to their mothers friends sisters name? Maybe then there wouldn't have been as much issue with the whole nonbinary thing?

"I don't even know why you changed your name to Remus anyway? Names shouldn't define your gender. You didn't have to change your name, besides they're pretty much the same anyway."

Remus stared at Roman in shock and horror as they registered his words and felt sick as their mother made a noise of agreement and everyone seemed to just carry on with dinner as if nothing had happened.

When dinner ended Remus made a beeline straight to their room where they proceeded to think and overthink everything that had just happened.

All the stuff their family said weighed on them heavily to the point where they stared off into space for a bit as a horrifying thought crossed their mind.

What if they were faking all this? What if they weren't really nonbinary and it was just all a ploy for attention?

Thoughts of a similar nature bounced around their head, driving them mad with panic and making them rethink everything.

Stressed and in disarray Remus paced up and down, shaking their hands in a way similar to how they usually stimmed.

Eventually they sat down at their computer and tried to distract their buzzing mind with YouTube or music. It didn't have much of an effect.

Eventually they contacted Logan and let him know what had happened. As usual he was logical and spoke sense, even when Remus wasn't in a state to really register it.

His words somewhat reassured Remus. For now.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Still feeling down from what had happened a couple days previously Remus didn't make as much of an effort to correct Patton or Roman anymore but sometimes their brothers would remember on their own.

Remus spent a lot of time trying to figure out why their parents seemed to have such an issue with their identity but there wasn't really anything they could come up with except their parents were just stuck in the way they'd been brought up.

Things eventually reached boiling point at dinner a few nights later.

Dinner always seemed to be the catalyst for shit hitting the fan. It was probably because that was the only time the entire family was present in the same room for extended periods of time.

It all started with Roman doing an impression of Stitch. It wasn't terrible but it was mildly annoying to Remus's ears. They'd rather eat dinner in peace.

"are you doing a Nelson Mandela impression?" Their mother asked, grinning like she'd made a hilarious joke.

"What? It's Stitch from Lilo and Stitch." Roman and Remus said at the same time, sharing confused looks which became exasperated as their mother continued.

"It sounds exactly like Nelson Mandela, you racist." She laughed, loud and grating on Remus's ears as she nudged their father who was also grinning.

Roman glared at the two of them and tried to again reiterate that it was an impression of Stitch.

"You're a racist, it's exactly the same as Nelson Mandela's voice." their father said, speaking over Roman which was a sure fire way to set off his infamous temper.

"I'm not racist! I don't even know what he sounds like, I was just doing an impression of a cartoon character. Not knowing that my Stitch impression sounds like..."

"That's how racism starts, ignorance!" both their parents were laughing now and Remus wanted nothing more than to shout for them to stop but they kept their mouth shut, something Roman had never learnt to do as he once again spoke up.

"Out of everyone here, you guys are the most racist. You continuously use outdated terms and words that are considered offensive in our current time period."

"Oh we're racist are we?"

"Yes! You're the least PC people in our whole family."

Their mother scoffed while their father was still grinning and shaking his head in disbelief at Romans words.

"The whole family? Even grandad?"

"Yes actually, at least grandad doesn't say anything homophobic or too racist in front of us."

"Actually I think it's the fact that you pretend to be better than him but you're on the same level when it comes to outdated and offensive comments and words."

For once Remus and Roman were working together to try and stop their parents from being as bigoted and offensive.

Perhaps it was the fact they were actually working together or maybe it was just because they had no response, the dining room fell into a slightly uncomfortable silence.

After a few moments of silence their mother spoke up once again, eyes locked onto Remus.

"are you going to change your middle name too?"

"wha..?" Remus was completely caught off guard by the question.

"Are you going to change the middle name? I mean it has sentimental meaning and your nan was so happy when i told her I was using her middle name for yours. You were her first grandchild. so are you going to change it?"

Remus struggled to come up with a response, feeling like they were being interrogated and put on the spot.

Once again Roman came to their defence.

"You can't pressure someone into going by a name they don't identify with by telling them it has meaning to you. It has meaning to you but it's not how they identify and it's selfish to expect them to stick with it just because of your feelings about the name."

"I named her after my friends little sister who died!"

"Yes, we know, you keep saying but it's still not fair to Remus to basically emotionally blackmail them into sticking with a name they don't identify with."

Remus watched their mother and brother in shock, a warm feeling in their chest at the fact Roman was sticking up for them in such a way.

The warm feeling was immediately replaced by dread as their father spoke up, his grin still in place but it quickly disappeared.

"I'll say whatever the fuck I want to. If you don't like it then you can fuck off. It's my fucking house and I'll fucking say what I fucking want to. And Remus is a stupid fucking name. You're [Deadname]. Don't like it? Then move out!"

With each word their father said the room grew more and more tense and Remus felt their eyes prickling as the dread was replaced with hurt at the knowledge their parents would clearly never accept them as they truly were.

They remained silent, staring down at their plate, trying to ignore the few tears starting to trail down their face.

They focused on shovelling food into their mouth, anticipating the end of dinner when they could make a bid for freedom to their room and breakdown in privacy.

As subtly as they could Remus wiped their eyes, determined not to let either of their parents see just how much their words had effected them. Plus Remus didn't want to give their father an excuse to have a go at them for being weak/overreacting.

Eventually both parents left the table and Roman and Remus were alone in the dining room with the task of clearing up.

Roman was still furious at the conversation during dinner and kept trying to talk to Remus about it but Remus was very aware of their mother being in the other room and the fact Roman tended to get louder when talking about something he was passionate about so they shushed him and made a point of reminding him of where they were.

Eventually Remus was able to escape back to their room and that's when they fully allowed their walls to crumble.

The reality of what the disastrous dinner conversation meant hit them full force and for the first time in a while old urges began to plague their mind.

They collapsed into their computer chair and sobbed silently into their hands, a skill they'd had to learn out of necessity many years ago due to various things.

The little voice in their head they thought they'd finally managed to silence began whispering and Remus clenched their hands into fists in their hair, trying their best to ignore it as it seemed to get louder.

The temptation to give in was overwhelming as the fact they could never safely be their true self around their parents began to really sink in. Then a small spark of hope hit them as they remembered someone who had always been supporting them and fighting their corner, no matter what.

Logan.

In a last ditch effort to rid themself of the old self destructive urges they sent Logan a message and filled him in on how dinner had gone.

It didn't take long for Logan to respond with an optimistic message about getting them out of there as soon as possible and reassuring Remus that their name was just as beautiful as their last and that their father was being an asshole.

Remus felt slightly better but their thoughts were still spiralling and they couldn't ignore the awful feeling welling up inside them as a question filled their mind that they had no answer to.

Why can't they accept me?

They sent Logan this question, still wiping tears from their face as they waited for his response.

Logan replied and Remus scowled, ignoring the fresh tears that spilled down their face as they told Logan that he couldn't promise that they would accept them eventually, that's not how life works.

Logan tried to bring up the fact that Remus's parents had accepted their sexuality but Remus scoffed and pointed out that the real reason their parents had 'accepted' their sexuality is because they were with Logan so for all intents and purposes they could kid themselves that Remus was straight as they were with a guy.

Logan told them that they'd do anything and everything they could in the future to use Remus's name around them as much as possible until they couldn't help but use it themselves.

Remus didn't think that would work but didn't say that, instead choosing not to reply as they couldn't think of anything else to say. Instead they began blasting music at full volume to try and drown out their thoughts.

They lost themself in their music and even began drawing, an old coping mechanism they rarely used anymore but it was a much healthier one than the one they were trying their hardest to ignore.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The next few days seemed to pass without much incident, the explosive dinner being forgotten and ignored by everyone as if it never happened.

Of course it was all Remus could think of as they went through the motions of everyday life, wincing every time Patton called them Remus instead of getting the warm feeling of validation because they were terrified their father might get angry again at the reminder.

There was a moment when Remus was trying to escape to their room and their father wanted them to come back downstairs and so he shouted "Oi! Woman!"

Remus felt a wave of revulsion wash through them and grit their teeth to fight down the urge to scream, instead standing at the top of the stairs and answering like nothing was wrong.

As time passed the intrusive thoughts seemed to increase in regularity, every trip downstairs they had thoughts of throwing themselves down them, washing their hands they held their hands under the hot tap as long as they were able and sometimes out of nowhere the urge to scratch at their skin until it bled would overwhelm them.

They managed to fight through these situations by reminding themselves of Logan and their friends but there were a few close calls where they only just kept themselves from doing anything.

It didn't help that it was starting to get closer to the time of year Remus dreaded most.

Christmas.

They loved winter but Christmas and all the things that came with it was a nightmare.

It was a time they couldn't help but associate with awful times.

So many years they'd spent in their room crying over some sort of family crisis or just generally feeling unwanted and they came to hate it more and more as the years went by.

This year would probably be just as bad as ever as things had really took a downturn this year.

Losing people was never easy but Remus seemed to lose everyone around this time so there were various dates they dreaded in November and December.

It was also the time of year their mental health always plummeted and intrusive thoughts of times when they'd almost succeeded with something drastic were plentiful.

They didn't remember the exact dates of those moments but they didn't need to.

Luckily they had Logan and Virgil and Janus to fall back on. Without them Remus dreaded to think what might have happened.

They were in a better place mentally now than they had been and they had several coping mechanisms in place that were relatively healthy.

Nothing particularly big happened in the next week or so but there were a few small instances which did start to add up, causing Remus's stress levels to reach almost breaking point.

They felt frustrated and ashamed that such tiny things could effect them so much and though they tried their best to ignore the minor inconveniences they started to pile up.

It started with a simple thing. Remus's parents suddenly started to buy a different brand of soft drink than usual due to price which was all well and good but Remus was used to the other one, the cheaper one tasted Wrong and Different and they felt slightly on edge.

The next thing was bigger and pissed Remus off a considerable amount. Their mother was already wrapping things for Christmas for their two youngest brothers and she had as always gone overboard with three black sacks full of wrapped gifts which she then handed to Remus.

"Wait what?" Remus asked, having zoned out midway through the conversation and making their mother huff in annoyance.

"I said go put these in your room somewhere Patton won't find them."

"But I don't have anywhere to put them!" Remus exclaimed indignantly and frowned as their mother raised her voice angrily.

"Where else do you suggest they be put? There's no room in mine and your dads room, Romans room also has no room and they can't stay down here. Just clear up some of the junk in your room and you'll have plenty of room."

Remus growled and muttered under their breath and reluctantly dragged the bags up to their room where they turned in circles in a frustrated moment of panic as they struggled to figure out where they could put them.

Despite what their mother had said they didn't actually have much room and while their room wasn't spotless it wasn't a complete mess like both parents liked to claim, it was just a very lived in space.

Eventually Remus ended up shoving the bags down the end of their bed and decided that if Patton saw them when he did his usual thing of bursting into their room then it wasn't their fault.

Still the bags at the end of their bed made them feel restless, the unfamiliar objects invading what they had considered their safe space but even without the bags of presents Remus was struggling to consider their room their safe place with each passing day.

The next change was a very large one. Despite only having it for two years Remus's parents had decided to get a new couch which had thrown Remus into a spiral of thoughts, none of them good. The different couch was larger than their previous ones and meant that when it came time to put the tree up there wouldn't be room where they used to put it, yay another change!

It would have to be put in front of the living room window where it would be very easy for Patton to bump into it and smash the glass decorations.

This thought sent Remus down a dark path of imagining laying in the wreckage of broken glass.

They shook this off and tried their best to stay as together as possible.

This worked slightly until the day the new sofa arrived.

Everything was hectic and there was lots of shouting from both parents which resulted in Remus falling back on an old coping mechanism.

To avoid breaking down in front of either parent Remus shut off their emotions. Or at least enough of them so they didn't end up crying.

The issue with this particular coping mechanism was Remus found it difficult to go back to 'normal' so to speak.

They were sort of glad that they were still able to block their emotions when their help was demanded with the tree.

The various decorations their mother had collected over the years usually would cause a torrent of various emotions but they remained rather unaffected through the whole process.

The snide comments and little digs barely registered as they monotonously helped decorate the tree.

The final decoration to be placed on the tree was a new one as it was every year due to family tradition. This year however it was a tribute to their mothers mum who'd died a few months back.

Their mum was instantly in floods of tears and Roman placed a hand on her shoulder, looking close to tears himself.

Remus watched as the decoration was placed on a branch and both clung to each other, teary eyed and sniffing.

Remus blinked a few times to try and escape the numb state they'd managed to get themself in but it was no use.

Their father in a rare moment of understanding gave them a small nudge and then lifted their hand and placed it on their mums shoulder.

They left their hand there for a few seconds before patting awkwardly, completely out of their depth right now. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The next few days they found themselves incapable of getting out of bed. They were tired all the time and would drift in and out of sleep throughout the day, only getting up to do housework.

Their thoughts were full of worst case scenario and thoughts of what they'd do if they didn't have Logan and Virgil and Janus.

None of them were good and all their thoughts seemed to have become twisted and dark.

It was reaching a point where even talking to their friends and Logan was becoming difficult.

They knew that isolating themself from such supportive individuals was a bad idea but they couldn't seem to stop. There were no brakes on the self destruct train.

They were managing to refrain from various things but as the month of December progressed they knew it would only get harder.

Tag List under the cut:

General tag list: @mcfreakin-childproof-caps @amethystdarkwolf @patchworkofstars @kitkat-doodles @unikornavenger @dolphin-squirrel @sympathetic-deceit-trash @starryfirefliesbloggo @cakercanart @neonb-fly @kaymischief25 @punsterterry @aprilthevene @theoddkidnextdoor @fuckingemoace @i-sold-my-soul-to-thefandom @im-so-infinitesimal @sea-blue-child @thecatchat @iris-sanders-athena @saphael-malec102 @smedenn @corkeecoderyt @sopi-montezzz @illogicaldeath @deadpanstar @theanxiousfander @lesliealiceinwonderland @wicked-universe @anxious-is-the-name @a-black-pegasus @erlenmeyertrashofsandersides @ace-the-weekly-doodler @luarpice @novusavis @the-life-ofa-troubled-ace @heck-im-lost @nerdy-as-heck @pansexual-cat @ravens-rambling @echomist13 @myownhappilyeverafter @im-a-sexy-mouse @xx-fandom-potato-xx @bisexualellaphants @redundant-statements-for-400 @noahlovescoffee @akl1 @love-ya-to-the-moon @misty2-0 @cdragontogacotar @shad-ster @chemicallyimbalancedromance @ivescottthis @flag-spinning-demiboy @moonstonefox12 @stupidfangirl107 @teegankitty @stormastrote @skylerskywing @oonagh-una @ab-artist @lydialightwood-bane @remythehero @amberrose80q3 @official-spookifers-child @amazonprimebox

#just an anxious mess's fics #remus sanders angst #intrulogical #tw ableism #tw suicide mention #tw self deprecation #tw mentions of self harm #tw suicidal thoughts #tw toxic family #tw deadnaming #tw depression #tw seasonal depression #tw loss

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histrionic-dragon · 4 years ago

Text

End of Leverage Season Four

The Radio Job

Parker, then Eliot, stepping up to talk through the plan when Nate’s gone. :) They’re all comfortable leading the room now and I love it.

Eliot lecturing the goons! He really compulsively complain-teaches to everyone, doesn’t he.

Hardison is having fun with all the random stuff in the patent warehouse. (LATER: So is Parker! And not Hardison’s not. But cool stuff.)

...Is Eliot mostly letting these guys beat him up? He didn’t know they were loose. On the other hand, it really sells it to the FBI guy. --Oh, he totally was. Heh.

Exploding Christmas lights! So “radio play” is exactly what it sounds like, but given that Nate assigned it to Hardison and Parker, it’s also got elements of Home Alone in it. Got it. -- Aw, why did they kill the robot butler? Boo.

FBI guy is having fun with this role.

Oh, Nate’s dad. He summoned people! With talk radio!

Doctor Who music! “Bowties are cool!” Ahahaha. I see you, Hardison. Also, I would love a time travel episode of this show. --Given that he got that bowtie from somewhere in the patent warehouse, I’m assuming it’s some kind of device. What kind of device is it?

More explicit spoilers and bad news below the cut.

Oh no! The barrels will explode, right? ....*Sniff* Being melodramatic to the extreme is clearly a Ford family trait. Right to the end. No. :(

Oooh, and Nate’s hurt, but he’s mad.

~~~

(I guess the bow tie was just a bow tie.)

The Last Dam Job

In which Nate basically says, “Hello. My name is Nathan Ford. You killed my father. Prepare to die.”

“My team! I know who they are!” --No, he knows who they were. They have all changed. And I don’t just mean that Parker can grift now, although that matters too--I mean they are different people because of each other, and they will make different choices and act differently under pressure, and he does not know them that way.

Parker in a short dark wig! Huh. That really changes her look a lot. (Clearly I’d be an easy mark.)

Oh crap. Latimer’s trying to get them all. But Parker brought a rig, because she’s the best. “Whee hee hee heeeee!” “Where’s Parker?” (Parker, on top of the van) “You heard the man! GO!”

“He upped the crazy. I didn’t think he could do that.”

Dubenich--how will they hurt him? He’s in prison. --Oh. He’s out again.

“Someone we don’t trust.” I thought Sterling, but Quinn--huh. Oh, Eliot’s having fun with this “job offer” negotiation/beating people up thing.

Parker and Archie! “This is my daughter.” Aww! <3 (Also, I can just imagine later: “Dad, did you have an affair? Do you have a secret other family?” “Oh, no. I simply have a secret life. You see, I am a thief, and she’s my protege.” “OK, early stages of dementia, you should really consider that assisted living place.”)

Aaaand Chaos. Asshole.

“This is it,” he says like a cheerful tourist to the squad of armed goons.

They left whatever’s on the board on purpose, right.

BATCAVE! And they still have the portrait!

Let Archie fuck Chaos up.

“Can I hit him?” “Which one?” “Either one.” “See, it’s not just me.”

Eliot and Hardison are a distraction. I see. Nice.

“I don’t know how Eliot does this.” (i.e., not kill the annoying hacker)

Are those those balls that absorb water? Are they--are they toilet clogging the dam? --Oh no! Spreading invasive species! That’s bad, guys. Yes, screw Dubenich, but not the planet.

“At least your muscle guy had an exit”--yeah, because Eliot is better!

Hardison calling Archie “sir”--being nice to his girlfriend’s dad. :) And Chaos is being an ass about it. TASE HIM! WHOO!

“This must be how Eliot feels all the time. I just wanna hit something.”

He didn’t blow up the real sword--he’s using it to cut cake instead. Archie, you mad goof. Definitely see how he and Parker are family. (She was probably always like that, but he’s the type who appreciates that.)

Lovely moment with Eliot and Nate. I...I have thoughts about this, about how Eliot sees his role on the team and the scope of what protecting people means, that I will probably put in a separate, much shorter post.

“Who are you?” “Well, I’m definitely not Eliot.” --And Eliot tackles Dubenich.

Oh, Quinn tossed Eliot the gun to do his thing! --Wait. Whoa, oh, Eliot. You don’t have to protect your people this much. Poor man.

If Dubenich has any brains, he understands now that they’re not ‘his’ team. That Eliot wouldn’t consider shooting someone to save someone on his team from doing that themselves. They matter to each other and it has changed them.

Eliot and Quinn are friends. That surprises me, but it’s fun. It also explains all the Eliot/Quinn fanfics I’ve been seeing that I assumed were written directly after the Season One finale, when a new character was introduced and then there was no new content, so people just went nuts shipping Eliot with the one dude who almost beat him up. This makes more sense.

...So, either Dubenich genuinely surprised Sophie, or she was expecting him and planted something on him and/or Latimer and that was the whole point. Maggie! OK, that’s even better than planning to get caught. I love that she and Sophie are friends. Nate clearly doesn’t....heh heh heh. They can roast him even more now.

No one noticed that all the stuff Parker took wasn’t in the vault when they went and stuck the (fake) sword in there? Hmm. Well, they were in an awful hurry.

“I do care.” “How does that feel?” “Weird. But I’m getting used to it.” <3 <3 <3

And right after that, Parker is the one who tells Nate that they have each other’s backs. Not Sophie, not Hardison--not Eliot, he’s already said his piece--Parker. They. change. each. other.

Is the dam going to collapse?

Where’d Latimer come from? Was he ever really in the Cayman Islands?

What’s Nate trying to do? I am not sure he’s really planning to kill either of them. Is he trying to get them to confess and record it? Or does he also really not know what he’s going to do?

“My son would be ashamed of me if I killed anyone. --My father, on the other hand, would buy me an ice cream.” And then he looks over and--his family, the one he has now, they wouldn’t want him to kill anyone. They’re watching.

They both fall. Not too surprised.

“Two words. Eliot signal.”

#Leverage #Leverage season Four #The Radio Play Job #The Last Dam Job #Eliot Spencer #Parker #Alec Hardison #Nate Ford #Sophie Deveraux #Jimmy Ford #Archie!#so many people #Leverage episode reviews #Leverage liveblog

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krreader · 5 years ago

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call me maybe.

pairing: jeon jeongguk x foreign student!reader fandom: bts warnings: language genre: fluff word count: 1.6k+

summary: these things didn’t happen in real life. there was just no way. you wouldn’t let yourself think otherwise.. not even if Jeongguk tried his hardest to convince you that this wasn’t some sort of joke.

a/n: so, because I felt a little weird doing this with a high school student, you’re a college student in this story who does a semester abroad. just to make that clear lol. also, why do I feel like I might make a part 2 for this :’)

You still didn't know how your friend managed to get you into this fan meeting, but now that you were here and staring at the faces of the seven boys that you used to admire from afar, you couldn't care less anymore.

To be in the same room as them was definitely a once in a lifetime experience.

To talk to them, probably even more.

You felt a little odd, because the people in this room all seemed like they were such die-hard fans and you, despite really liking them and their music, couldn’t help but feel like you didn’t deserve to be here..

“Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god,” your friend who stood in front of you started bouncing up and down, “They are right there you guys! Right there in front of us!” this is exactly what you meant. Die-hard fans.

“Can you please calm down? We don't want to look like total fangirls. The calmer we are, the better,” another one said and tried to smooth out her hair.

You were a group of four, you were the last one, had decided to watch your friends go first and boy, was that a good decision.

It was so nice to watch them interact with their favorites, it was so.. fulfilling somehow? To see them so utterly happy and while it was also a little cringy at times, you still smiled throughout the whole thing.

In fact, you were so busy watching them that you completely forgot you were waiting in line as well until one of the managers kindly asked you to step forward.

With a quick apology you walked up to the first member.

Your Korean wasn't perfect yet, but it was enough to hold a conversation and it didn't matter who you were talking to, Jin, Tae, Yoongi.. they all understood and encouraged you to at least try. They didn’t laugh when you made a mistake and you were sure that you weren’t always using formal Korean correctly, but they didn’t mind at all, they were just very kind.

You thought you'd be nervous once standing right in front of them, but all of them had a talent of making you understand that you had no reason to be. When they realised your nerves were getting the better of you, they reached out to touch your hand, always kept eye contact with you and never once made you feel like you being here annoyed them.

It was going incredibly well.. until you were standing in front of Jeongguk.

“Hi,” you smiled a little. The beginning was always the most nerve-wrecking.

However, unlike with the others who immediately said hello back and started up a conversation with you, Jeongguk just stared at you, then gulped down hard and shook his head a little.

Did you.. do something wrong?

“Hey,” he cleared his voice after it came out a little shaky, “Your name is.. (Y/N)?”

“Yeah..”

“Where are you from?” it was hard for him to keep eye contact, he quickly started to sign your album and seemed to take his time with it, unlike the other members.

“(Y/H/C). I'm doing one semester here.. maybe two if I really like it.”

“A.. year then, huh?” finally he looked up at you, staring directly into your eyes again. And it seemed like he let out a breath he had been holding.

Was he okay?

“Yeah, I arrived about three weeks ago, so this is a nice start,” you tried to break the ice, “I loved your recent comeback, seriously. You did so great.”

“Ah.. thank you,” finally, he started smiling, “Which school are you going to then? If.. that's not a secret,” Jeongguk chuckled.

“Not at all,” you smiled, “It's Hanyang university.”

“Oh, wow.. you’re a smart one, aren’t you?”

“Wasn't easy to get in, but I'm glad I managed,” you grinned from ear to ear.

Jeongguk was going to say something else, especially now that you two seemed to have a topic to talk about and he was just beginning to really smile and laugh, but Namjoon was already waiting with a smile and the manager were impatient.

So instead he said, “Well then.. see you around, (Y/N).”

You didn't think much of it that day. You were sure that he said that to everyone. Why wouldn't he? This is like their go-to line to make their fans feel good and like they were special, you weren't naive to think you actually were.

But.. well..-

one week later

“(Y/N), wait up!” your friend caught you just before you left the main building, “Are you going to the library?”

“A little later, I need to run home real quick to get something first.”

“Alright, I'll be waiting for you there, then. I'll text you where I'm sitting.”

“Sounds good,” with a smile you left, your book pressed against your chest as you made your way down the stairs and towards the exit of the campus.

But you didn't get very far.

You weren't exactly day dreaming, but you still weren’t prepared when someone suddenly appeared in front of you, making your book fall to the ground.

“Sorry, I didn't see you,” you didn't even look up, you just crouched down to pick up your things and were going to continue walking.

But he also crouched down to help you.

And even though he wore a hat, you could clearly see who it was.

“Oh.. my god?” your eyes widened.

“Please don't freak out, I know this is probably super creepy and weird, but I just had to try..-”

“Try.. what?!” for fuck's sake, this was Jeon Jeongguk and you were just casually meeting him here? “What are you doing here?!”

“Listen, I don't usually do this.. not even with girls that work with me, so I know this is a risk, but I can't stop thinking about you and I think I'm going mad.”

You stared at him with an open mouth, then started to look around, making Jeongguk furrow his eyebrows, “Okay, where's the camera? This is really funny, ha ha, stupid (Y/N), let’s pull a prank on her and post it on YouTube so everyone will see how stupid she is.”

“This.. isn't a joke,” he got back up when you did, “The reason I was so weird at the fan sign was because I.. liked you. And I know that's weird to say when I don't even know you, but I'd like to.”

The more he said, the lower your jaw dropped.

Was he actually serious? Did he really think you were that daft?

“Listen, I don't live in a Cinderella fantasy and I'm not twelve years old anymore. I'm not stupid enough to know that whatever this is, it's not real. Pull that prank on your delusional fans, but I’m not one of them.”

“But that's exactly why I'm here,” Jeongguk gently pulled you along with him, to a spot that was a little less busy, “Usually the people that come to our fan sign are die hard fans. I know that the moment I'd give them my number, screenshots of it would be on social media. I know that the moment I’d compliment them, they’ll twist my words in their heads and make them think I now want to marry them.”

“You don’t know me. You have no idea whether or not I'd do that too,” you crossed your arms in front of your chest.

“Would you?”

You were taken aback, then shook your head, “Of course not.”

“Then I'm right about you. You went there by coincidence, didn't you? You probably got a ticket from a friend? And you like BTS, but you're not obsessed with us? You like our music, but you know that we're just people like the rest?”

Why was it feeling like he was calling you out?

“So what?”

“So go out with me.”

This was the weirdest situation you’ve ever been in. Seriously.

First and foremost, you were still convinced that this was some sort of joke, that the moment you'd say yes, he'd be like: 'Surprise, you got pranked, I'd never go out with you, bye'. But at the same time, you were curious..

“How did you even find me?”

“You told me you studied here.. I just waited and hoped you’d leave through the front exit.”

“How long did you wait?”

Jeongguk shifted his weight from one foot to the other, “A.. while.”

“And.. why?”

“Why what?”

“Why are you doing this?”

“I told you.. I think I like you. I can't stop thinking about your smile, I can’t stop thinking about your life or your perfume and I know that all sounds so weird. I don't take a lot of chances in my life and I regret it every time I don't. But I want to stop doing that. I want to take a leap of faith this time.”

So, so, so stupid, (Y/N). Don't fall for it. This isn't real. There is no way this is real. It doesn't matter that he's looking at you like this, this is most definitely a prank, it’s way too cheesy to be real.

You just opened your mouth when you could hear a friend from afar yell: “Yah! (Y/N)! You said you were going home, what are you doing?! Are you skipping our tutoring session today?”

Jeongguk instantly started to panic, grabbed the pen and notebook out of your hand and scribbled something inside it, then pushed it back into your hands, “Please don't let me be wrong about you..”

And with that he ran off.

“Who was that?” your friend asked as soon as she was right next to you, both of you staring after the guy.

“A very strange man.”

“Ugh, I hate those,” she rolled her eyes and hooked her arm with yours, “Anyways, let's get lunch.”

You had been staring at his number for days now, over and over again.

You had ripped it out of your book once and thrown it into the trash can, only to pull it back out five minutes later.

You couldn't do it.

Something inside of you told you not to throw it away.

Maybe it was foolish hope? Most definitely.

You had expected a clip of your encounter with him to be online by now, titled with: ‘Jeon Jeongguk tries to get date with fan’ but there was nothing of the sort.

You kept checking, every single day, but there was absolutely nothing.

You sighed deeply and fell back onto your bed, the piece of paper in one hand, your phone in the other.

“Fuck this. What did the kids used to say? You only live once. Might as well make a fool out of myself.”

And so you dialed the number, with each peep your heart sped up, full on thinking that you'd end up with an old lady on the other end yelling at you why you were calling her in the middle of the night and that she had to get up early the next day to watch the newest home shopping episode.

But no old lady answered.

“Hello? Who is this?”

“Uh.. hi. This is.. (Y/N)?”

Then it was quiet.

For a long time.

You almost would have ended the call if it weren't for that soft voice, so full of disbelief, yet happiness: “You actually called..”

Oh, fuck.

#bts imagine #bts x reader #jungkook imagine #jungkook x reader #jeongguk x reader #jeon jeongguk x reader #jeon jungkook x reader #jeon jungkook imagine #jeongguk imagine #bts #bangtan boys #bangtan sonyeondan #bangtan #reader #requests

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jasonrae117 · 4 years ago

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Night at the Wayne Casino

Part 4

Damian looked the part, he may have stolen a few pointers from the years spent around Jason and Richard, but he was ready to finally get the information he wanted directly from the source. He wore a perfectly tailored Stefano Ricci silk dress shirt in a deep navy, with a few of the top buttons unfastened. He paired it with fitted black pants, a black leather belt with steel hardware, and matching black leather Tom Ford dress shoes. If he was going to attend a party, he was going to make sure everyone knew who he was, if they didn’t know his face, they would know by the sheer cost of his shirt alone.

He was good at commanding a room, it wouldn’t be a problem for him to be the center of the party and get exactly what he wanted. It would almost be too easy, it was a setup for the woman and she would have to play right into his hand.

Damian decided that he would arrive right on time, which was considered early according to Jason. He wanted to scope the place out for details and have a plan in place. He was familiar with all the layouts of the rooms already, it was more to figure out the best vantage points when the place would be filled with bodies. It also gave him a chance to take his time ordering a drink. He often wasn’t a fan of alcohol, especially when he considered himself to be on the job, but he had to play the part. He had to admit that it did ease his nerves a bit.

Something about confronting the woman that plagued every waking thought, and dreams, made something close to excitement bubble within him. He’d finally be able to find out how soft her skin truly was, and if it matched what his brain had envisioned it to be….as part of the act to get her alone so that he could get a confession from Raven.

As the next hour came to pass, he had seen no sign of his target and it was beginning to look like a failed mission for him. He had endured countless women sliding their hands down his arms and some braver ones traveling up his leg. Unfortunately for them, there was only one woman’s hands Damian wanted on him.

No. Damian shook his head trying to clear his thoughts. Perhaps he should have stopped at his second drink, especially since it was bourbon.

The man he stood next to now was droning on about a business idea he wanted to propose to Bruce, but instead of listening, Damian took this opportunity to reflect on his thoughts and feelings for once.

These past few days had proved to him that he was still mentally weak. He let lust seep into his mind and alter what his gut was telling him. When he had seen Raven with Tim, he was furious and regretfully jealous. He had a split second of insanity catching himself wishing that it was himself that had snuck Raven into the security room to taste her skin on his lips. He now came to terms that it wasn’t jealousy but in fact shame in himself, not that he couldn’t get the woman, but rather he let his hormones sway his judgement. And that he wasn’t mad at Tim for being with Raven, but mad at himself that he had almost listened to him and turned his back on his gut. He laughed at himself, this woman was good, he just had to prove it.

Maybe he was just in denial about his feelings?

Damian grunted at his conflicting thoughts and realized that he had gained the attention of...whoever was talking to him. He finished what was left in his glass and addressed the man “Excuse me, my drink seems to be empty and I’d like to get some fresh air now.”

“Oh, sure. We can go outside, I still have to show you our advertising pitch.” The man began to pull out his phone, clearly not catching Damian’s hint.

“Sir, what I mean is-”

“Hold on a sec, it’s right here. You can go grab us some drinks and I’ll meet you outside. I just gotta set up the slideshow.”

Damian cleared his throat. “What I was trying to imply was that I’d rather not discuss business at a party with someone who clearly isn’t important enough to schedule an appointment with my father. I certainly don’t want to be bothered with having the expectation that I’ll actually relay this foolish proposal to him either.”

The man burned red and apologized profusely. He hurried out of the room at almost lightning speed. Damian sighed in relief and scanned the room once more before pinching the bridge of his nose in frustration. Maybe coming to this party was a bad idea, Raven wasn’t here and he had accidentally made eye contact with a woman at the bar and she began to head his way.

Damian rolled his eyes and weaved through the crowd in hopes to lose the woman and escape to the large and lavish balcony.

The cooler night air alleviated some of the irritation from the lack of activity this party had provided him. It helped to let the fresh air carry away his conflicting thoughts as he contemplated his next move. The better part of him wanted to leave and see if there were any files that needed to be looked at or, better yet, see if Raven had actually been planning to hit the casino when he was busy in this stupid suite. However, his gut was telling him to stick it out and that she would show. Parties in Vegas were always in full swing for hours and he hardly spent two at this one, odds were that she’d spend the time getting primped to seduce more information out of weak-willed men.

The more formal time of the party seemed to have passed as the lights in the suite were being lowered and replaced partially by strobe and colored ones in addition to the increased volume of dance music. People were now flocking to the open space in the middle of the suite and swaying closely to one another. Damian despised dancing and more particularly the modern club dancing being displayed in front of him tonight.

Though he was outside, the music could still be heard clearly through the open doors and thus everyone’s conversations got louder chipping away at last bits of his patience. I’m doing this for Raven...for the team and myself. Right now I look unapproachable, this won’t do. Damian took a deep breath with his eyes closed to focus himself and will the headache away that was imminent. He turned back to the party and made his way to the bar to replenish his drink, at this point in time a little less sobriety would be welcome.

…

Damian glanced down at his watch and noted that three hours have passed since he arrived and by his estimate that the party wouldn’t be over for another three or so hours. He had circled the perimeter many times and had yet to see any trace that she was here or was coming at all. For a moment he thought that Jon was pranking him by sending him to a party under the guise that it was a lead on Raven when it was perhaps a way to get him ‘out more’ like he had always said was his personal mission. However, he knew Jon wasn’t foolish enough to waste his time like this and Jon, himself, was the one to tell Raven about the party and get her the invite.

Jon had come to his room while Damian was getting ready and had told him what he left out in their previous conversation. Damian was furious at first, thinking that Raven had gotten into Jon’s head but Jon insisted he did it to give Damian a chance to observe her without interference from Tim. Of course this was after Jon went on about Raven’s beauty and that if Tim and Damian ended up striking out, he would throw his name into the hat for her affection, which earned him a rough punch to the shoulder. As much as Jon’s teasing annoyed him, he had to admit that his plan was brilliant...if only she showed.

He was yet again stuck in a conversation with another rich and beautiful woman. Had he not been here for work, he may have considered sleeping with her to release his tension and frustration. The conversation hadn’t been particularly exciting, but at least she wasn’t overtly throwing herself at him or touching him inappropriately. She had been talking about a new restaurant opening on the other side of the strip where they specialized in vegetarian and vegan options, which actually sounded interesting, but a flash of long pale legs caught his attention.

He could have imagined it, wishing something was there to make this all not seem like a waste of time, but there she was across the room inspecting the suite’s occupant’s book collection. He was ashamed to admit that he could identify her even though she was bent over and all he could see was her full backside and those perfect legs of hers that popped out of the ruched green skirt. She stood up and turned around, a book in one hand and a small glace in the other, her identity officially confirmed and the heat that rushed to his face dissipating. He mentally scolded himself for spending too much time staring at her ass during all of the previous encounters and the security footage he had re-watched a few times, though it had proved to be useful after all. He had to tell himself that to keep himself from feeling like a pervert.

His intention wasn’t to ogle her while he was watching the footage, he wanted to see if she had patterns or accomplices. But he found himself having to rewind it multiple times because he kept getting distracted by the sway of her hips or the way all of her outfits seemed to cling perfectly to her body.

The woman next to him cleared her throat and crossed her arms over her chest. "You should stop staring at that slut over there and focus on me. She's probably some cheap escort, nobody that's worth your time." She placed her hand on his arm and smiled at him. Oh if she only knew.

"And I suppose you're worth my time?" He faced her.

"Of course, I'm hot and rich. Plus the way I get my money is clean and I don't have to be a whore to get it." She laughed and flipped her fake blonde hair over her shoulder. This woman was unbelievable and it was getting on his nerves, he was grateful he was here on duty so he wouldn't have made the mistake of sleeping with her. Who the hell did she think she was talking about some other woman like that, much less Raven.

"Is that all that matters to you? Looks and wealth?" His eyes narrowed and he pulled away from her.

"Yeah, what else does there need to be?"

"Tt, tell me, how do you get your money?"

"From my father. My family is rich and understands that I don't need to waste my time with work."

"Hmm, I see. You're what? Twenty-four? And you're still sponging off your family, what happens when they decide you're too old?"

"Uh..I marry a hot rich guy. That's why I'm talking to you." She was so nonchalant about her answers it was pathetic.

"How unfortunate for me. I think I'll go talk to that woman over there since I'm fairly certain that she's not an escort."

"Whatever, she's sure as hell not as rich as I am! Why waste your time?"

"The thing is, you are not rich, your father is and you're just an over processed leech. There's more to life than just looks and wealth, besides she's far richer in beauty than any surgeon could ever make you out to be. And I could tell that she's significantly more interesting in the twenty seconds I've looked at her than the fifteen minutes I wasted talking to you."

She was silent and looked at him incredulously. Clearly no one has set this woman straight before.

“Now I suggest you find some other man to sell yourself to, maybe they’re foolish enough to entertain you, or at least smart enough to get you to sleep with them before they get too annoyed by your shallow superficiality. “

“Asshole.” She scoffed and spun on her overpriced heels disappearing into the crowd.

He hoped none of this would get back to his father. Though he wasn’t working, he had been in two confrontations already and it could reflect poorly on the resort. He was well within his right to set those two straight and honestly the company was better off without their patronage, but that didn’t mean Bruce wouldn’t frown upon his treatment of guests since he still had an obligation to uphold a certain image of the Wayne name.

Damian turned back to the space in front of the bookshelf where his target had been moments before. However, she was no longer there and he cursed himself for losing sight of her. He scanned the room for what felt like the hundredth time that night and finally spotted her outside against the railing. He took another brief moment to observe the outfit she had chosen tonight, a forest green tube dress ending just below mid-thigh. The dress had a circle cutout on both sides revealing the bottom of her rib cage to the top of her hips, it was dissected by a gold metal band that matched the metal choker around her neck and the cuff on both of her wrists. Her hair was straightened and flowed past her shoulders and even from his distance, it looked like silk. Her beauty never ceased to intrigue him, even without the flattering clothes, she was a walking goddess. That’s why she is so dangerous.

He had just noticed the two men that were on either side of her. One had his hand on her waist while the other had his arm behind her holding on to the rail. Why was it that every man was attracted to her like moths to a flame? Wherever she went, there always seemed to be at least three pairs of eyes on hers, one of them always his. Even now, there were a handful of men ready to swoop in the get shot at trying to woo the ethereal beauty. It pissed him off and he felt just the slightest bit of jealousy.

He couldn’t just interrupt, it would be suspicious, and she didn’t seem to mind the company of the two men. He had to wait, maybe she was plotting something and these two men were informants. Raven seemed to be good at only talking to the people that could give her useful information, although these men didn’t work at the casino and he didn’t recognize them as anyone important. Perhaps she was in a similar position as him and being plagued by unwanted attention. He had to play it cool, bide his time and he would get his chance.

For the next hour, Damian kept within a ten foot radius of her and kept trying to think of ways to intercept her before the next imbecile tried his luck with her. Much like the trail of men she left in her wake, he too was unlucky in his endeavor. That is until he noticed her heading to the bar for another drink. He still carried his almost empty glass and polished off the last sip before hurrying to the bar and getting there just before her.

He signaled the bartender to come to him when he had a moment and patiently held his glass. Sure enough Raven had filled the empty spot beside him and set her glass down. He forced himself to not instinctively look at her as he focused on the lines of expensive alcohol on the wall.

“Damian? I mean Mr. Wayne.” He looked down at her to see surprise written on her face.

“Miss Roth. “ he nodded.

She let out a short laugh. “I guess every employee knows my name here.”

“I guess you’re a popular woman.” He allowed a smirk to rise on his lips.

“I’m not sure if that’s a good thing. Sounds a bit scary to have the head of security know you by name at a casino you haven’t been to before that’s at least fourteen hours from where you live.” She chuckled and played with the cuff on her wrist.

“You haven’t exactly been a normal guest here either.” Her face turned red at his words and to what he had been referring to.

“Uh…I suppose not.” Raven looked away and shifted awkwardly. The bartender approached them and Damian gestured for her to order first. “Bourbon on the rocks please.”

“Make that two.” Damain cut in and the bartender nodded pouring them their drinks. Damian handed him money to cover both of the drinks plus a decent tip.

“Thank you, but you didn’t have to.” She took a small sip.

“I didn’t, but I wanted to.”

A soft smile graced her lips and she put her glass back down. “So, this didn’t strike me as an event that would require security.”

“That’s because it doesn’t. I am not on duty”

“Oh, I didn’t think this was your kind of scene.”

“Why is that Miss Roth?” Damian faced her and leaned his side against the bar top.

“Well, being the head of security and all and you’re always so...serious when I’ve run into you. Kind, but serious. But I suppose you kind of have to be that way, intimidating.” She looked up at him and her indigo eyes locked onto his emerald ones.

“Am I intimidating Miss Roth?” Damian leaned into her space just a bit, his heart beating just a bit faster. He watched as her eyes glanced at his mouth before darting back to his eyes as a blush danced across her cheeks.

“Are you trying to intimidate me Mr. Wayne?” She cocked her head to the side and raised an eyebrow, closing the distance a bit more.

“Among other things…” His hand reached up and brushed her dark hair off her shoulder. The action had occurred subconsciously but he reveled in the feeling it gave him watching a shiver run through her body.

“And would those other things be in violation of your work?” Raven’s left hand moved from her drink to his forearm that rested on the bar. He glanced down at her delicate fingers dancing along the thin silk of his sleeve.

“I believe I told you that I wasn’t working right now.”

“Mm, so you did. Tell me, what are these ‘other things’?”

Damian leaned into her to whisper directly in her ear. “I’d like to tell you… or show you somewhere in private, where every other man in the room isn’t glaring at me because I’ve been able to keep your attention for longer than five minutes.”

He pulled back still keeping within her space and noticed her breaths coming in more shallow and the blush from earlier still stained her face.

“How would you know that nobody has been able to talk to me for longer than five minutes?”

“It’s a special skill of mine to observe, especially the activity involving a sort of target.” He smirked at her again. She was falling right into his trap and he didn’t even have to lie.

“Where do you suggest we go then? I’m sure you’ve come up with a plan while waiting for your turn.” She took a step into and he could smell her perfume, sending his mind into a haze.

“My suite is just two floors down.”

“Lead the way.”

He took her hand and briefly admired the way it felt in his. He was starting to feel excited and for once, nervous. He questioned himself and his sanity when he invited her to his suite. He never brought anyone in there, but here he was heading to the elevator with one of the most puzzling women he has ever come across. He was aroused by her and also infuriated with her. When they had reached the elevator and it had opened up the pair stepped in and as soon as the doors closed, his hands were on her waist and hers were on his chest. Their breaths were heavy and there was an intensity in their gaze.

He leaned down to kiss her and if the descent had been longer he would have been able to, but before he knew it, the door opened again. “Fuck.” He had lost control. He grabbed the back of her thighs and hoisted her up. She let out a small squeak in shock but wrapped her legs around his waist and her arms around his neck. He pressed his lips to hers and began walking to his room. Her lips matched his with equal intensity as she pulled on his collar and tugged his hair. When he reached his door he didn’t break contact and simply reached into his back pocket that held his key card and inserted it with ease into the handle.

The green light flashed and he ripped the card out and threw the door open and kicked it shut behind him. He moved his mouth down to her neck and kissed her pulse down to the juncture of her shoulder. Her moan encouraged him to squeeze her thighs which made her grind into him. Her skin was softer than he imagined and he couldn’t contain himself any longer. The tightness in his pants begged for her.

Damian laid her down on his bed and withdrew from her, taking in the unforgettable sight in front of him. She was breathing heavily and her neck bared marks from his assault on it moments ago, her lips were parted and red and her lust-filled eyes were trained on him.

“Damian?”

This was not his plan or intention...or maybe it was. For the first time, he didn’t care about this case, he had denied every emotion he felt and dismissed it as some trick she was playing, and maybe she was even playing him at this moment. But just for tonight, all he wanted was to accept those feelings, that passion, and investigate her, all of her.

#night at the wayne casino #casino au #Damian Wayne #raven x damian #damirae #raven #raven roth #more parts to come #its getting hot in here #Teen Titans

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harrysgoldrush · 4 years ago

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chapter 2: styles v vegan contract

masterlist

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part 1

Y/N Y/LN.

In her final year of law school and already planning on getting her LLM in Environmental Law and Politics. A true force to be reckoned with. Tom had told him that much the moment he closed the office door behind him.

Tom’s office was one of the bigger advisor’s offices on campus, with his desk pushed up against the left wall furthest from the door with two mismatched embroidered chairs that he had stolen from the Tisch School of Arts last year. A giant bookcase covered the whole back wall with books sitting on top of each neatly organized row. The right side of his office was occupied by a worn leather couch that had only fit through the narrow door by some miracle. There was a coffee table with some of the school’s different magazines and newspapers and a small black fridge that always had sodas and Tom’s leftovers.

Harry could imagine her taking naps on that sofa, falling asleep as she plotted her next protest, asking Tom for advice while he answered emails. She wouldn’t even knock, she’d make a beeline to the fridge to grab water. Except she hated those bottles. What did she do instead? Maybe she would finish Tom’s salad for him, his wife always brought him one for lunch and he only ever ate the “exciting” parts before he tucked it away in that fridge.

“Harry, she’s in two of your classes this semester,” Tom had laughed, setting his reading glasses down on his desk as he sat back down. “Your Public and Private Governance Seminar and International Trade and Investment Law and Policy Seminar. Those are small classes, I’m surprised you two haven’t met before.”

Sinking in his chair, he held his back closely as he defended, “We have met before. Last week at Sloan Energy.”

“Ah,” Tom hummed, clearly entertained at Harry’s reaction. Scooting his chair closer, he closed his laptop so he could look directly at him. “She’s been leading that protest for a while now, I think it will be six weeks this Friday.”

“Is there any way to stop her?”

“From protesting for Green Energy? No.” Taking a deep breath, he rubbed at his neck and added hesitantly, “I suppose you could always talk to her? She’s reasonable enough, she just switched advisors this semester because she wanted to make Mark’s workload lighter; he’s semi-retired now.”

Tom went on to check in with Harry about his internship and how his classes were going so far but Harry could hardly focus, feeling himself drift towards the question of the hour: how could he convince her to move the protest?

From the short interaction he had had with Y/N and Tom’s high praise, he was beginning to think that he was Sloan Energy’s last hope. Why else would they turn to him, an intern, when they had a whole team of more than qualified lawyers? And why had Tom thrown him to the wolves, knowing that another student was leading a whole movement against the company?

Before he could ask, Tom was standing up and shaking his hand. “You’ll have to keep me updated on Sloan Energy and the protests. I’m eager to hear what happens.”

“Yeah, Tom I will. And thanks again for telling me about the internship.”

Tom was quiet for a minute, his smile frozen and his eyes narrowing before he nodded. “Of course, Harry. Jeff Azoff is an old student of mine. When he reached out about looking to hire students, I immediately thought of you. Pays a lot more than that paralegal you’ve been working for since your first year here.”

As Harry was leaving the office, he was surprised to see a new blue bin right next to Tom’s trash can. A single plastic salad bowl sat in it, still dripping water as if it had just been rinsed clean.

“Is this new?”

“It was a gift, actually. Just got it last week.”

The first thing Harry did after his meeting was text Sarah and Mitch, asking what they knew of Y/N Y/LN. Walking briskly down the hallway, Harry’s searches on Instagram and Facebook proved to be a waste of time. Twitter was useless, with only a few pictures of protests with faces blurred and no mention of her. As he waited for the elevator, Harry opened a new note on his phone and began to type down everything he knew.

Studies Environmental Law

No social media.

Protests when not in class

In my governance and policy seminars

Meeting tonight????

Throughout his Financial Regulation seminar, Harry could hardly focus as their guest speaker outlined the history of finance regulation in the US, wondering how he had never noticed her in his classes. In the sea of sleek and professionally dressed law students, she was like a rainbow colored rocky shore. The only thing standing between him and a guaranteed job after graduation was a strangely dressed classmate.

As soon as they were dismissed, Harry unlocked his phone, relieved to see that Mitch knew her pretty well, having dated her old roommate last year.

She was always really weird about showers. Her and Katie got into this huge fight at the end of the year because Katie had bought a Keurig and I guess that’s bad for the environment. When Y/N got mad about it, Katie locked herself in the bathroom and ran the shower for an hour. By the time she came out of the shower, Y/N had moved out.

Definitely weird.

Sarah had had class with her before and seemed annoyed at Mitch’s response.

It’s called being environmentally friendly, Rowland. Y/N has been practicing zero-waste since high school. She’s not weird, she’s thoughtful. My first year when I was dehydrated, she took me to the hospital and went to all of my classes for me to take notes. If I wouldn’t be risking arrest and my degree, I’d be protesting with her. She’s a better person than both of you combined. If she wasn’t so busy, she’d be top of our year easily. Why are you asking about her, Harry?

Ignoring her question, Harry put his phone away and kept walking, though he wasn’t entirely sure where to go. He hadn’t been able to convince Tom to give him her schedule although he could probably ask Jeff. And what was that meeting later tonight? Was it with Sloan Energy? Was that why they weren’t expected at the office today?

He wasn’t complaining, in fact he was beyond thankful to have a night to catch up with his studies and term papers, knowing he wouldn’t be getting much sleep either way.

Deciding to get a coffee to keep him warm while he plotted, Harry ducked into the Starbucks across the street and stood in line, making awkward eye contact at an old professor of his who was sitting with a much younger woman. Looking away quickly, his eyes landed on a basket with a sign that said ‘Reusable Cups $3.99’.

Suddenly, he felt inspired.

Pulling his phone out again, he quickly typed into his search engine ‘is coffee or tea better for earth?’ with a surprising yet logical result. Grabbing two of the reusable coffee cups, Harry smiled widely at the barista.

“Um, just one coffee black. And whatever your healthiest hot tea is.”

Soon, Harry was walking briskly towards Sloan Energy, hoping Y/N wasn’t at her meeting yet. He had only seen her a few hours ago with her bright colors and worn fabrics but as he got closer to the building, it felt like it had been years since he heard her familiar voice, thanking the small gathering around her through her red and white megaphone. The hot drinks in his hand had managed to only spill minimally on the frantic trip across The Village, surviving the packed subway and crowds of tourists.

She was easier to spot now that he knew where to look. The crowd was smaller than it had been the day before, with a few slowly easing out of the group to get somewhere warmer. As Harry made his way to her, he was glad he didn’t have his internship today; he blended in much better with his dark jeans and black zip tie shirt with NYU School of Law embroidered on the chest.

He waited as she informed the group of tomorrow’s meeting times before approaching. It was just them now. Y/N didn’t seem too surprised to see him as she lowered her megaphone and walked towards him, one eyebrow raised as she took in the two white reusable cups in his gloved hands.

“What is this?”

“Green tea,” Holding it out to her, he pulled it back just as quickly and examined the two cups before holding out the other one. “This one’s green tea. Thought you might be cold.”

“No, I meant why are you bringing me a drink?” When he didn’t respond, she asked with a cautious smile, “Did you poison it or something?”

Shaking his head, Harry glanced towards the main doors of Sloan Energy as she took the drink from him, taking a sip before humming. “It's good. Thanks. Harry, right?”

“Yeah. Harry Styles.”

Looping her free hand through the wrist strap of the horn, she wrapped her bare hands around the warm mug as she looked up at him. “Well can I help you, Harry Styles? Or do you just like to watch?”

“Do you want to maybe grab a drink?” He asked, feeling colder with every second he stood under her cautious gaze.

“Besides the one you just gave me?” Smiling, she glanced at the watch on her wrist that looked more like a piece of wood before she cleared her throat and took another sip of her tea. “I have a meeting in an hour so I probably shouldn’t be drinking yet.”

Harry could feel his shoulders droop unintentionally and watched as her eyes widen before she added quickly, “But I’m starving. Have you eaten today?”

She had taken them to a vegan place only a few minutes away, leading them to a table without hesitation, leading Harry to believe she had probably been here a few times before. He was beginning to notice how attentive Y/N was, from the corner of his eye he could see her casually observing him as he read the menu above the counter.

“Hope you don’t mind vegan, I always come here when I’m in the area.” She suddenly apologized as she dug through her backpack, taking out a much smaller back with her name sewn into it. “Their fries are really good, they’re air fried. The salads are pretty good too.”

They were quiet, with her eating her guacamole burger as he used the bamboo utensils she had handed him once he sat down with his salad.

“Don’t worry, they’re clean.” She had explained when he gave her a curious look. They’re safer than actual utensils, they last long. Better for the earth than those plastic things they give out here. Don’t even get me started on the metal stuff.”

The bag she had pulled out of her backpack had turned out to be a pouch with handkerchiefs, bamboo straws and bamboo utensils. The clinking he had heard earlier in her bag turned out to be mason jars.

“So, you just bring those with you everywhere?”

“Pretty much. I’m just doing my part to lower our carbon footprint. I bring my own containers and utensils mostly. Some places around here are getting better. Chloe, the manager, uses plates that are made of recycled materials and then recycles them again when they’re used.”

Nodding, Harry stabbed at his salad thoughtfully. “So why are you protesting Sloan? No offense, but don’t you have better things to do? Like study?”

“Why do you intern there? Aren’t there less morally corrupt businesses you could work for?”

“They’re one of the most successful energy companies on the East Coast--” He began but her sharp laugh was back, cutting him off quickly.

“And one of the most environmentally harmful energy companies in the US. It’s 2019, who uses coal anymore?”

“It’s not that harmful to the environment, it’s a natural resource.” He was glad he had paid attention to his Oil and Gas seminar last week. He only hoped she hadn’t. “Mining and burning the coal doesn’t harm the surrounding earth.”

“Uh, ever heard of global warming? They’re burning fossil fuels that are destroying the atmosphere. It’s not just cows.” She had been paying attention. Finishing off her sandwich, she took her final sip of her tea and looked at him expectantly.

“What?”

“Just say that they’re paying you a shit ton of money to intern. You don’t need to defend them to me, I’m not going to change my opinion until they change their system.”

Sighing, Harry nodded, not knowing what else to say.

“Are you going to tell me why you’re here then?”

He set down her bamboo fork, a sign of defeat. He hadn’t prepared as much as he should have.

“I need you to move your protest.”

“Because?”

“If I get you to move your protest from their front doors, they’ll give me an actual job on their legal team once I pass the bar.”

“Oh.” She hadn’t expected that, her voice laced with pity and uncertainty.

“Yeah.”

After an excruciatingly long pause, she nodded. “Okay.”

“What?” Harry was more than surprised as he watched her shrug and wipe at her hands with the dark red cloth she had laid over her lap when she had started eating.

“I’ll do it.”

“But?”

“I have conditions. Obviously. Do you have any paper?”

He shook his head and watched her begin to dig through her backpack. “What? Are you drawing up a contract or something?”

“Yep,” Pulling out a pen and an old flyer for one of the first protests with the words ‘recycled paper’ stamped on it, Harry watched as she began to write messily on the black back side of it. It was bright yellow and her pen ink was a dark blue, her handwriting long and looped which he found fitting. “Today’s the twenty-fifth right?”

When he hummed in agreement, she continued. “Okay. This contract is between Y/N Y/LN and Harry Styles. Y/N Y/LN has agreed to move her protest permanently from outside of Sloan Energy on the understanding that Harry Styles will educate himself on eco-friendly behavior and practices zero-waste to the best of his ability. Styles must also make an effort to change Sloan Energy from inside, beginning with recycling bins within the building. Once he is hired, Styles is expected to push for green energy. How does that sound?”

“That sounds like I’m doing a lot more than you.”

“Do you want them to hire you or not? I’m doing you multiple favors here, Styles.”

“Can I read it over and get back to you?”

She nodded before quickly scribbling something at the bottom of the contract. After she slid it across the table, he realized it was her number.

“So we can meet outside of my protesting hours should you Don’t think your bosses would be too happy to see you fraternizing with the enemy.” She was smiling now, one full of mischief that made him feel like she was letting him in on a big secret. Harry couldn’t help but smile back, not quite sure what he might be agreeing on.

As she packed up, Harry was tempted to ask her where she was headed, but she beat him to it; it was like she could read his mind. “Don’t follow me this time, okay? Twice in one day should be enough for you, my own apartment is lucky to see me once.”

He didn’t see a point in disagreeing with the girl as she left the small café. Looking around, it was as if all of the charm of the room had vanished with her, the pink walls now looking faded, the table sticky, the chair uncomfortable cold.

By the time he got home, it had only gotten colder. His roommate, Ed, was an aspiring musician who had decided tonight was the perfect night to hold a private concert in the shower, his only audience being the last of their cold water. Shivering, Harry simply changed into warmer clothes and sat at his desk, putting on an old rock station before he got to work.

Jeff had asked him yesterday to begin looking into Energy Law and he had a paper due in two days that he had yet to start. Choosing to begin on the latter, Harry got to work, cranking out three pages before he remembered the folded up flyer in his coat pocket. Deciding now was as good as ever to stretch his legs, he walked back to the living room to grab it from the coat rack, his eyes tracing over her handwriting that reminded him of kindergarten teacher.

Adding her number, he typed out a short text and paused for a moment. If he texted her, that was it. He’d be agreeing to do whatever it is she laid out in this contract of theirs. Still, if he wanted the job, he knew he had to at least try.

hey, it’s harry. how was that secret meeting of urs?

Returning to his desk, Harry was surprised when his phone pinged. He didn’t take her for a quick responder. His smile fell when he saw it was a text from Jeff. He never texts, he was an email addict. He had a template for almost anything.

What the hell did you do, Styles? Y/N Y/LN just left the office. Moving the protest to washington square.

Before he could respond, his phone pinged again, her contact name flashing at the top of the screen.

have you decided when you want to meet to sign the contract? :)

tags: @berrynarrybanana @brwnskin-bunnyteeth @harry-is-my-medicine @detroitkiwis @theresthingsthatwellneverknow @fromyourstrulyh @cassiopeiaskies @ggaayyyong @mortumnoctis

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firelord-frowny · 3 years ago

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I’ve talked a little bit about how at least one ~negative aspect~ of white supremacy/racism that impacts white people is that it can be SO DIFFICULT to avoid being Accidentally Racist over something that really shouldn’t have been that deep, and WOULDN’T have been that deep if not for the pervasiveness of white supremacy in america, and this bit about the lil country band Lady Antebellum and the controversy surrounding their name illustrates that pretty well, I think:

The band members have always said that the band's name was chosen arbitrarily, complaining about the difficulty of choosing a name. Inspired by the "country" style nostalgia of a photo shoot at a mansion from the Antebellum South, they said, "one of us said the word and we all kind of stopped and said, man, that could be a name"[40] and "Man that's a beautiful Antebellum house, and that's cool, maybe there's a haunted ghost or something in there like Lady Antebellum."[41] Haywood concluded, "[We] had a lady in the group, obviously, and threw Lady in the front of it for no reason. I wish we had a great resounding story to remember for the name, but it stuck ever since."[40] The name was always controversial, with a critic in Ms. Magazine writing in 2011 that the band's name "seems to me an example of the way we still — nearly 150 years after the end of the Civil War, nearly 50 years after the Civil Rights Act; and in a supposedly post-racial country led by a biracial president — glorify a culture that was based on the violent oppression of people of color".[41][42]

On June 11, 2020, joining widespread commercial response to the George Floyd protests,[41] the band announced it would abbreviate its name to its existing nickname "Lady A"[43] in an attempt to blunt the name's racist connotations.[1] The band members stated on social media that, never having previously sought the dictionary definition of the word "antebellum", they now consulted their "closest black friends and colleagues" so that their "eyes opened wide to the injustices, inequality and biases black women and men have always faced and continue to face every day. Now, blind spots we didn't even know existed have been revealed."[44] Fan response was mixed, with many decrying virtue signaling or even disparaging the protests.[41]American Songwriter said, "Given that the world knows what that A stands for, to many this change does little more than add extra insult to this ongoing injury."[45]

The next day, it was widely reported that the name "Lady A" had already been in use for more than 20 years by Seattle-based African American activist and blues, soul, funk, and gospel singer Anita White. The band again admitted ignorance of any prior use, which White called "pure privilege". Interviewed by Rolling Stone, White described the band's token acknowledgement of racism while blithely appropriating an African American artist's name: "They're using the name because of a Black Lives Matter incident that, for them, is just a moment in time. If it mattered, it would have mattered to them before. It shouldn't have taken George Floyd to die for them to realize that their name had a slave reference to it. It's an opportunity for them to pretend they're not racist". A veteran music industry lawyer observed that such name clashes are uncommon due to the existence of the Internet.[46][47] The band members contacted White the next week to apologize for having inadvertently co-opted and dominated her name,[48] saying that the Black Lives Matter movement had inspired them to a collaborative attitude. They nonetheless required retaining the same name, though she believed dual-naming is inherently impossible.[49]She said "We talked about attempting to co-exist but didn't discuss what that would look like"[48] because the band members would not directly respond to that explicit question three times during the conversation or in two contract drafts. She soon submitted a counteroffer that either the band would be renamed, or that her act would be renamed for a $5 million fee plus a $5 million donation to be split between Seattle charities, a nationwide legal defense fund for independent artists, and Black Lives Matter.[49]

On July 8, 2020, the band filed a lawsuit against White, asking a Nashville court to affirm its longstanding trademark of the name. The press release read: "Today we are sad to share that our sincere hope to join together with Anita White in unity and common purpose has ended. She and her team have demanded a $10 million payment, so reluctantly we have come to the conclusion that we need to ask a court to affirm our right to continue to use the name Lady A, a trademark we have held for many years."[50]

On September 15, 2020, White filed a counter-suit asserting her claim to the Lady A trademark and rejecting the notion that both artists could operate in the same industry under the same brand identity. She is seeking damages for lost sales and a weakened brand, along with royalties from any income the band receives under the Lady A moniker.[51][52]

Like????????? this REALLY didn’t need to be a thing.

And one thing I think black folks and other poc need to chill out with is dismissing any white person’s attempt at Being Better in how they move through a white supremacist world in a way that seeks to undo or at least not exacerbate white supremacy. I can TOTALLY believe that, in their white ignorant bliss, this band really did choose their name without realizing for a moment that it might leave a fucked up taste in some people’s mouths. Honestly like... antebellum IS a cool sounding word lmfao and if it wasn’t so heavily associated with slavery-era america, i’d wanna name something antebellum, too!

And like, yes, it’s true that it ~shouldn’t have taken george floyd’s death~ for anyone at all to suddenly decide that they want to go a little bit out of their way to denounce or at least not seem to promote racism in some small way. But it did. And it does. And every fucking time there’s a gross act of violence and injustice acted out on a person of color in front of the world, there’s always going to be a brand new white person out there who Sees The Light for the very first time. That doesn’t mean their new perspective isn’t genuine, and it doesn’t mean it happened All Of A Sudden. If anything, it was something they’d been thinking about for a long time, but didn’t know how to address it, or what to say, or who to say it to, or how to talk about it in their own community. OBVIOUSLY that problem is WAY LESS BAD than, ya know, actually experiencing racism, but it’s still a real thing that some white folks go through, and being mad about it isn’t going to make it NOT a real thing. it shouldn’t have taken george floyd’s death. it shouldn’t have taken trayvon martin’s death. it shouldn’t have taken the instatement of one of the most vile human beings to ever assault the face of the earth for This Person or That Person to finally want to make a positive and public change, BUT IT DID. It always does. That, unfortunately, is How It Works.

And so, this band adjusts it’s name in an effort to not seem hostile. OBVIOUSLY it’s not a grand show of solidarity. OBVIOUSLY it’s not meant to convince anyone that they’re Super Amazing White People Who Will Stop At Nothing For Racial Equality. It was literally just a small, simple gesture. They’re just modifying their image, because they were no longer comfortable with knowing how that word makes a lot of people feel. Bc like... let’s be real: probably a solid ZERO of their fanbase would have given a shit if they’d just left the name as it was. Nobody who’s going to a Lady Antebellum concert was pouting about the name. And if anything, they prolly stood a better chance of LOSING fans for ~being politically correct~ than gaining fans for changing their name to something less annoying.

And it JUST SO HAPPENS that the slight lil adjustment they made to their name steps on the toes of an existing artist, and it JUST SO HAPPENS that this artist is black, and is also an ACTIVIST in social and racial justice.

Oops.

And so, obviously people don’t interpret it as an honest mistake. Instead, it’s a result of white privilege. And I mean like??? ok, maybe it is. But I ALSO had never heard of Anita White until I read this fucking wiki page lmfao. So like... my ignorance isn’t due to no white privilege on my part. Maybe it’s a consequence of a white supremacist culture that wouldn’t glorify her and celebrate her and put her name everywhere... but that’s a different thing from privilege.

So now not only are the bands efforts to adjust to a world that’s becoming more aware of racial injustice being dismissed as disingenuous or too-little-too-late, but now they’re ALSO being accused of Using Their White Privilege to trample all over an artist they’d never heard of.

i DO think that after finding out the name was already taken, and after talking with her about it and determining that she wasn’t interested in sharing - as is her right - they should have just said “ok, sorry, thanks for talking with us about it” and picked something different. i think it’s kinda ridiculous that they think they should sue her and i think she’s HELLA right for suing their asses right back, and I hope she gets her damn money.

But I’m also cognizant of how emotionally/psychologically upsetting it can feel to have to just Change Your Name after so many years of living with it. It makes sense that despite their desire to adapt and choose a new name that doesn’t make people cringe, they still want to try to hold on to the feeling that THEY associated with their own name. “Lady A” seemed like a happy medium: They can remain Who They Are while also showing that Who They Are is someone who’s not trying to glorify a disgusting era of history. But if “Lady A” isn’t an option... what’s left? What else could they call themselves that wouldn’t feel like a totally new, alien identity??

So, I understand how, on an emotional level, they want to fight to keep it.

But uh. They really need to just Be Sad about it and let it go. Just consider it one of the small, upsetting sacrifices that white folks may sometimes have to make as we ALL struggle and stumble through this fuckin long-ass road of Making The World Less Terrible For People Of Color, and move on.

But yeah, like.

It’s fucking ridiculous that this was even an issue, and it was only an issue because of racism!!!!! If white supremacists didn’t manufacture a culture that oppresses people of color and glorifies the pre-civil-war era SPECIFICALLY for the good ol slavery, then perhaps people could wax poetic about the artistic and environmental aesthetic of that era without it being assumed that they Must Be Racist. Bc like??? idk if yall know this lmfao but i LOVE????? colonial american music. like, the kind of stuff with that Ashokan Farewell vibe. I think it sounds beautiful. And i really fuckin love the black spiritual music that was developed in that time. and i think so much of the architecture and fashion was so???? Nice. Just pleasant! But I can’t even get myself to fully enjoy it because of all the fuckin connotations that have been stuck to it.

A band should be able to name theirself a name without it being such a goddamn fucking cultural crisis.

But they can’t! And it is!

Thanks, White Supremacy!

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tired-college-student-writing · 4 years ago

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Here we go Loopty Loo

Summary: Graduation was supposed to signal the final time they all spent time together at UA, to show they have all grown into the Heros they dreamed of being.

It was supposed to be, but when has anything ever been easy for class 1-A?

Pt1 (HERE)

Pt2

___________________________________________

Loop #82

___________________________________________

Aizawa blinked sluggishly as he pulled his head from his podium and gazed across the classroom with critical eyes. The entire class appeared to slowly be waking up, some at their desks, some from the positions on the floor that they had collapsed into when their sudden lapse of consciousness hit.

Now, Normally, Aizawa would be on high alert in a situation like this, especially on the first day with his new first years, but this was different.

“I get to start with you guys this time,” Shinso piped up, staggering to his feet from where he had been laying in front of Momo’s desk, “Look like all 20 of us are here so no Gen Ed to worry about, or trying to hide anything from someone.”

“That’s a relief,” Mina sighed leaned back, in her seat, “Last time it was such a pain trying to act surprised at the LOV crashing things for Mei’s sake.”

“Momo,” Aizawa cut in, “If you will.”

The girl simply nodded and turned her back to the class as Sato and Shoji moved to stand with their backs to her, blocking her from view entirely as she pulled her shirt up and created the usual items, a large collapsible whiteboard and an array of colorful markers.

Deku silently handed her his lunch in exchange for the items as he and Iida quickly set up the offered materials.

“We all know the rules,” Iida started, writing a large 82 at the top of the board and quickly listing off the rules below, “but I’ll restate them anyways if you would like to complain about this take it up with Sero who forgot to inform us that he was a descendent of All for One in Loop #24 and ended up leaving the LOV quirkless after they tried to kidnap Denki.”

Aizawa simply zoned out at this point, knowing he’d be called in to inform the room of the changes he could recall at the end. It was ritual at this point, though they still could not figure out why they were looping.

When they had first started no one had said anything. Confused past their limits on why they felt like they were doing everything over again, trying hard not to change anything. It wasn’t until the third loop did they realize that while the rest of the world seemed to run as it always did, the nineteen teens and teacher were reliving the years the hero’s spent at high school over and over again.

Mineta seemed to be the only student in 1-A not to remember their previous loops, which made it easier kicking that annoying little grape to the curb the second he could justify it. Luckily during the third loop, Midoriya outshone his original first assessment making it easy for Aizawa to expel the lowest ranking member of their class. When Shinsou had made it into their class before the Sports festival that loop the boy had looked nearly sick.

On the fourth loop, they realized why when he was placed directly into their class at the beginning of the year and he nearly had a panic attack. Not that they could blame him, they had all gone through a similar fate earlier in the loops. Since then they rarely saw Mineta, but having the exact same class every time was never a guarantee.

In fact, there seemed to be very little rules to this whole looping business they have found themselves in.

The class was often the 20 that they had currently, but not always, sometimes having one or more of them fighting out from the Gen Ed classes, or even having another student placed with them.

They were often awoken on the first day before the first Quirk Assessment, but sometimes they wake up earlier, though rarely do they wake up after the assessment. While they had awoken as early as Aizawa’s third year in UA, leaving all of the students forced to grow up from age two with teenage memories, the latest they had ever woken up was after Deku and Bakugo’s first fight.

They almost always were planning their respective roles as students and teachers in UA training to be heroes, quirks, and appearances intact, but every once in a while…

“The Bakusquad have all switched quirks,” Mina called once the rules were listed, “I have Electrification, Denki got Hardening, Katsuki got Acid, Hanta got Explosion and Eijiro got Tape.”

Tenya nodded, “I believe that the Dekusquad is the same, with the exceptions of Tsu and Izuku, seeing as I have zero gravity. Shoto and Ochaco?”

“Endeavor was very mad when my exhaust pipes popped out,” The still split haired boy said with a slight grin, “He was sure I’d be his perfect child with my appearance.”

“How pissed is he going to be when I use Half-Cold Half-Hot during the SPorts festival?” Ochaco asked, letting ice and fire form on her hands, curiously on the opposite sides to Shoto.

“Enough that we’ll want all the pictures,” Izuku chimed in, “I still have One for All, so no need to worry about that. Anyone else switch?”

Turns out that yes, this was a quirk shuffling loop. Shinsou, Kyoka, Ojiro, Momo, Toru, and Sato all kept their quirks the same, but while Koda and Shoji had kept their appearances, the tall boy now possessed Anivoice while the shy boy could transform all his limbs and even spout additional limbs if he wished.

The other switch that made the entire class start laughing however was when Dark Shadow made an appearance, only for the source not to be the blushing emo bird-like they all expected.

No, the shadow appeared from Yuga, the boy still twinkling with mirth as Fumikage mumbled the confirmation that he possessed Navel Laser.

Slowly the entire classroom came back to each other, after all this wasn’t the oddest thing they’ve had to deal with during the loops. No other relevant information surfaced, as the students voiced other minor changes they could remember.

Finally, they turned to Aizawa with a single question on their mind. He decided to draw it out some.

“Seems like I’m dating Tensei this time,” He hummed, “I also have a ring stashed away, but worried it would be weird to propose with Tenya in my class.”

Iida snorted, “Interesting, We’ll talk about how to ask him later. Now answer the question, sensei.”

“What question?”

“Oh come on Sensei,” Denki groaned, “Do you still have erasure?”

“Ah,” He hummed, scratching his cheek in thought, “Nope,”

Before his students could start pestering further, the door swung open and All Might popped in, “I AM HERE!”

“Yagi!” The teens cheered as the hero powered down, his thousand-watt smile not dimming in the slightest.

The skeleton of a man had apparently been looping with them from the start, even though it took them much longer to notice then it probably should have, even if the kind man had forgiven them entirely too easy for leaving him on his own until they all noticed in the twelfth loop. Now he was practically Aizawa’s co-homeroom teacher, encouraging all of the students to call him Toshinori, though they usually stuck to his family name as they did with Aizawa.

Izuku squinted at him, always the first to notice the difference with the older man, “You’re not quirkless.”

Heads snapped up as the blond man let out a full belly laugh, “Nope, it looks like the previous users shuffled quirks around a tiny bit, my boy.”

“Neat,” Aizawa said from behind the current #1. The man yelped, coughing blood slightly making the excited whispers from the students cease as they slowly turned back to where Aizawa still leaned against the podium on the other side of the room.

“Oh shit,” Shinsou mumbled, only to jump as another copy appears behind him, smacking the back of his head lightly.

“Language.”

“Copy,” Iida hummed, jotting it down, “Though it seems to work different then Ectoplasm’s clones. Anything else we should know?”

One copy of the homeroom teacher shrugged, “Hizashi named me Agent Emulation this time.”

The one still leaning on the podium gave a slight smile, “I like Eraserhead better, but oh well.”

“Oh you’ve almost finished,” Toshinori said reading over the list, “This should be an interesting loop.”

“Just need your contribution, Toshi,” The clone next to All Might hummed, “So which of the six or seven quirks do you have on top of One for All?”

Instead of answering, the blond wrapped an arm around the clone and started floating towards the ceiling, earning a startled yelp as the Aizawa wrapped around him in shock.

Midoriya smiled sadly at the display, “Float, Nana’s quirk.”

After so many loops, there wasn’t much the group didn’t know about each other, so no one commented on the late-mentor, as Yagi slowly sank back to the floor with a chuckle as the clone dissipated in his grip with Aizawa pouting at the front of the room.

“Anything else to add?” he grumbled with no real heat.

“Oh!” Yagi said as if remembering, “I’m married in this go around!”

“Ooooh,” Toru cooed, “Who is it? Is it David or Tsukauchi this time?”

Yagi laughed a little uncomfortably, “Actually it’s Atsuhiro Sako, better known as Mr. Compass. It seems neither one of us is aware of the others… activities.”

“WHAT!?”

___________________________________________

So this is just a fun little story I’m gonna have fun with. Each chapter will be a loop or multiple loops exploring similar topics and just being all around fun and slightly cracky.

Feel free to suggest an idea if you have one!

#bnha #boku no academia #aizawa shoto #yagi toshinori #midoriya izuku #bakugou katsuki #iida tenya #todoroki shōto #mina ashido #all of class 1-a #execpt for the grape #time loop #AU

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moonlightdreamzz · 5 years ago

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Send Off :: Jung Jaehyun

Request: “Could you write a Jaehyun x black reader where it’s a rainy day before he has to leave for a while? We can literally do anything I just need it in my life. It doesn’t have to be super long either I’m sure you’re busy.”

A/N: I live for this content. YES! 🤩

Whew, you hated rain. I mean how could anyone enjoy something that was so overly loud, made you uncomfortably wet, and was guaranteed to get you sick in some way, shape, or form.

You had made so many plans today. Frozen yogurt, a little pre-tour shopping extravaganza, and to end it all, a nice dinner; candlelit to be exact, where you and your boyfriend could relish in all the memories you had made this past year. Well—soon to be year. Although there was no real humor in such a sad case, you always jested and celebrated like it was your anniversary before he had to leave for awhile. Otherwise you would miss it.

So why today, out of all days, did the sky have to crack open? Seriously, you couldn’t believe the way the sky taunted you, laughing at the fact that it ruined your plans.

Everything was currently annoying you. Your coffee brown bonnet that shielded your protective hairstyle from getting frizzy too fast, seemed like it was creating isolation from you and your pillow. The plaid pajamas that you were gifted many Christmas’ ago? Made your legs itch to the extreme, so much so, that you slipped them off and threw them to the other side of the room. You wanted to go back to sleep in hopes that when you woke up, the sun would be shining, but you couldn’t stop tossing and turning.

“It’s going to be like this all day; dark and gloomy.” A raspy voice whispered, placing his large hand on your soft belly, giving it a smooth rub.

Jaehyun was always a mind reader when it came to you. In this moment, you probably weren’t all that difficult to read, but still, you were never less than impressed with his abilities.

“Are you serious?” Your body unconsciously curled up as if you were an child. This only made him want to hold you tighter, as he was now making sure your back was directly on his chest, and his breath could make your ear tingle.

“Unfortunately. Well, unfortunately for you should I say.”

“What do you mean?”

“I know you had plans for us today. Probably too many.” He chuckled, even though you could sense he still hadn’t even opened his eyes. You just knew his eyelids were still a pinkish color, resembling the boyish feeling he felt whenever you touched him, but actually meaning he had slept well.

“I just wanted to make sure you had fun.” Your voice began to quiet down as you continued, “We’re not going to be together on our one year anniversary, and this is going to be the longest we’ll be apart. I’m just...I’m not fucking with it, dawg.”

“Dawg?”

“Yes, dawg.” You breathed out, getting a light chuckle out of his chest.

“Well, dawg, maybe I can teach you a little something today. What do you think about that?” His hand moved from your stomach, to your “wonderous” legs. That’s what he always referred to them as. He would always play with them, gently slapping them just to see them bounce back at him. He loved to rub up and down your thigh as if he would be able to taste your supposed flavor.

Now his lips were pressing soft kisses down to your shoulder, starting from your earlobe. “Even without sunlight, you’re still glowing. And all mine too.” He groaned, clearly getting riled up. Unfortunately for him, you felt yourself dozing off. It didn’t take him long to figure this out, as he stopped all his rubbing and sweet nothings to call out your name. His favorite word.

“Baby?”

Of course you weren’t hearing it, as your lack of slumber was finally hitting you at such a perfect moment.

The last thing you felt was his head burying itself in your fluffy bonnet, taking a deep breath to intake your scent. He always tries to guess what grease or oil you used the previous night, and this morning his guess was argan oil. Before he came home, he remembers how excited you were about the so-called pure smell of the thick liquid, and he could now understand why. It wasn’t too long before he fell asleep as well. How could he not when your bodies were so close?

The cycle repeated itself once more, except this time, you felt much more energetic. Although you didn’t mind your current position, if Jaehyun wanted to do backflips around the house right here and now, you’d probably agree.

The rain was still splattering on your newly installed roof, courtesy of your neighboor, but it wasn’t bringing you anger anymore. Jaehyun always was able to calm you down, and make thing that upset you seem childish and simple.

He was right. You two were very much so capable of staying in.

The black sheets that you two had purchased months ago were so warm, and the heat radiating off of his chizzled body was even better, but you two needed to eat. Your room was always going to be complicated, yet simple, and every morning you couldn’t help but to look at the splattered paintings hanging that represented different parts of your personality. Obviously it wasn’t morning anymore, but the routine didn’t change.

You pushed all of your braids that were too excited to be set free back into its overnight home, before you set off into your kitchen.

“Hey Siri.” You whispered, alerting her that you had a request. “Play Megan Thee Stallion.”

You grabbed all of the utensils you needed, while she shuffled through all of her magnificent works. Siri decided on Big Ole Freak, and you couldn’t be mad in the slightest. Your inner seducing manner was coming out slowly as you sung along, swaying your hips along to her sharp bars, but you were still beating the pancake mix perfectly.

Truthfully, by now you should’ve been able to sense his presence in a room. I mean—he always could for you. It didn’t matter where you were, the size, or how many people were there; his eyes would always find you.

And even now, his dimple smiled brighter than his teeth could while he watched you have the time of your life, singing to one of your favorite artists. When he would see you even remotely look in his direction, he would sneak back around the corner.

“Hey Siri.” He finally spoke up, clearly scaring the absolute shit out of you because you fell straight to ths ground; a habit you had formed long before he fell in love with you, or even saw you from the first time. “Play some Frank Ocean.”

Even while you sat on the freshly polished wooden floors of your kitchen, you shined brighter. You glowed more angelically. He always thought it was the cutest thing when your laugh caused you to throw you head back, and he could properly see the way your cheeks accentuated your face.

“How do we go from Meg, to Frank babe? It doesn’t go together.”

“Anything goes together if you says it does.” Mid sentence, his hand reached out to yours, pulling you up and straight into his uncovered chest. He quickly kissed your plump lips, and you could tell he was willing to forget about your trials of cooking breakfast if he could have you.

“Mhm—eat first.” You giggled, pulling away, but not even fighting when he pulled you back into his strong arms. His kisses were now making your entire face wet, but you didn’t mind for him.

“Breakfast at 12pm? I think I’d prefer to have you.”

“Nope. Nuh uh.” Your finger managed to break free, finding a place on his chest. “The rain may have ruined my plans, but you? No. You’re supposed to be on my side.”

“But that’s the thing...I am. I’m trying to give you what’s best for you. Plus, you may not want me now, but the minute I walk out that door tomorrow morning who’s going to cry? Me or you?” He taunted with a smirk.

If you could blush, you would. Regardless, your cheeks were tingling and as you always did when he used such bold word choice, you burried your face into his chest.

As if your head was more comfortable than his memory foam pillow, he rested his cheek onto of your bonnet.

“Argan oil.” He finally guessed out loud, prepared to mentally slap himself if he was wrong.

Your head lifted from his chest, with your mouth now in the shape of an O. “How did you know!”

“Because I’m a good listener.” He whispered gently. His eyes were buried deep into your soul; a place only he was invited to. A place he built from the ground up. His favorite place to be when he felt unsafe, or uncertain. Or even when he was happy and didn’t have a care in the world.

“Well, they do always say that good listeners should be rewarded.” You looked up onto your colored ceiling.

His laugh echoed through your home, making it even more comfortable and soothing than it already had been. “What do I owe you? Frozen yogurt? Stallion tickets? A new wig?”

“No Stallion tickets. Too expensive.”

“But the other things—

“Would be great. You’re such an amazing boyfriend.” You cooed, pressing your own kisses to his face now. “I’m kidding.” You breathed out. “What would be really great was if you cleaned this up.” You pointed to the sad attempt of breakfast that laid on the table. “And I’ll be waiting for you.” You scooted past him, feeling his blush and intense smile even though you couldn’t see it.

“Oh do you drive me crazy, Y/N.” Was all he could say, slapping your behind with a clear echo, before promptly turning around and getting to work.

#nct #nct 127 #nct jaehyun #kpop poc #poc kpop #nct ambw #ambw kpop #kpop black reader #black reader #jaehyun #nct imagine #nct imagines #nct scenario #nct scenarios

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fixxofvixx · 5 years ago

Text

POSSESSION - TAEKWOON AU - CHAPTER 10

Greetings and salutations!!! I hope everyone is doing well~ Our state extended our stay at home order so it looks like I'll continue my life as a hermit. Which, let's be honest, wasn't much different from my normal day-to-day.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy the chapter. We learn a little bit more about Leo's past. Please let me know what you think!💖

🏰🏰🏰🏰🏰🏰

"You....what?" Leo looked genuinely shocked. His hands paused on the bandage he was working on.

"I....trust you....I think."

"You think?"

"I....can't help what my mind does sometimes or what I dream. But I know....I feel a bit more comfortable when you're around. Like I know who to go to for help. Does that sound bad? I sounded better in my head." A soft pink tinted your cheeks in embarrassment.

"I understand what you mean. I will gladly accept it. But first we need to take care of these." He motioned to the various cuts on your torso and arms. He seemed uninterested in the fact that you were laid out, half-naked before him.

"Do demons carry.....things?" He looked at you to explain further. "Can you catch things from them like with the Wracken blood. They can't control me if they scratch me, right?"

"No, you should be okay. I think that one just wanted to kill you anyway. You did good thinking of the pendant."

"I was scared out of my mind."

"I'd be more surprised if you weren't. It takes a great deal of courage to fight in spite of being scared. You'd make a fine warrior." Coming from him, that was quite the compliment.

"I.....think I'll just stick to healing." You couldn't imagine yourself out on the battlefield, along side him and the others.

"Fair enough. Although, sometimes the healer needs healing."

You nodded and told him everything to do. He gathered all the supplies and followed your instructions professionally. He didn't say much other than asking questions about what was next. His fingers skimmed over your skin lightly but didn't try to touch you otherwise. While he was working, you mind wandered back to something Alek had said.

"Leo..."

"Hmm?" He was working on a bandage on your arm but didn't stop.

"Alek told me about your weapons and how you like to enchant them."

"It's a little extra insurance for defense. I spent a lot of time learning how to do it."

"How long did you take to learn about making knots?"

"Not long I--oh."

Without thinking, you smiled at his face. He looked panicked for a half a second and it was odd to see. He was always so cold and composed and he was clearly caught now.

Leo removed his hands from you and backed away a step.

"It's finished, I'll get you some clothes." He spoke quickly and left the room just as fast. You stared after him with your mouth agape. Was he mad that you knew or was he embarrassed? You weren't necessarily upset that he'd lied to you, just intrigued as to why.

You struggled and winced as you sat up. You took a look at the bandages that Leo had done and they looked good. You had suspicions that he had experience in healing as well. There was certainly more to the man than he let on. It hurt, but you brought your knees up to your chest as much as you could. Although you were aching all over, you felt exposed.

After a few minutes, Leo came back into the room with what looked like a robe. He handed it to you and you noticed that it wasn't yours.

"I didn't know what you needed so I brought that until you can get back to your room. It's mine but it's clean." You nodded and pulled the robe around your shoulders and put your arms through.

"Thank you, Leo." He nodded his head once and reached forward to pick you up. You tensed in embarrassment and he stopped. "Y-You don't have to do that. I can probably walk."

"If that's what you want." He backed away but didn't leave the room.

"Why did you ask me to tie the knots?" You asked so abruptly that Leo held a momentary look of surprise before the ice froze his features again. He sighed and finally answered.

"I was trying to think of a way to talk to you. When you're working on something, you talk freely. I figured that having you work on something would lessen your fear around me. I also needed a way to give you the dagger. I had already decided to give you a weapon but I assumed you would outright refuse given your spike in fear when I take out my weapons."

"Oh."

"I apologize for lying."

"It's okay. You're right, working on something helps me. I'm sure it's annoying."

"It isn't. We all have our quirks, some worse than others."

"What quirks do you have?" You carefully swung your legs over the table and inched towards the edge.

"Some would say I have problems with controlling my anger or that I take things too seriously." He helped you down off the table and stood beside you. "Are you sure you want to walk?"

"Yes, you've had to carry me too much lately." His robe was long and you had to hold the bottom up keep from tripping.

"I don't mind....if it's you."

"What?" You turned your head up towards him, your eyes widening.

"You're not as annoying as you think you are. You can rely on us if you need to. I can get Jaehwan to help if you prefer....or Hakyeon."

"No, I'll just walk. It will help with the soreness. You know, just for the record, eventhough it's hard for me to ask for help......I don't mind.....if it's you." You suddenly had a revelation that Leo seemed more.....human today than usual. It made it easier to open up.

"Oh."

"Leo..."

"Yes?"

"Later....after we get Hongbin back and things settle down...maybe...um...you could teach me how to use that dagger you gave me?"

"I can do that. However, I would suggest that you learn as quickly as possible despite what is going on. You might need it. Alek isn't finished and he has plenty of cards up his sleeves. You need to have some as well." You reached Leo's room and he followed you in.

"He's going to try to kill me...for doing that to him, isn't he?"

"Yes."

"Do you think he knows where Hongbin is?"

"I'm certain he does." He was looking around the room. Perhaps he was worried about Akek still being in there.

"Perhaps if we use me as bait, we could find out."

"What the hell did you just say?" An angry Leo turned to you and stalked towards you. Your breath hitched in your throat as you backed up against the wall. With nowhere to go, you swallowed hard, wondering why he was so mad.

"I-I said maybe we c-could--"

"I heard you! Are you insane? Have you completely lost your mind?! Did that demon hit you on the head?!" Your hands started to shake as this was the first time Leo had ever actually raised his voice at you in anger. Images of your nightmares were flashing in your head and you had to break eye contact with him.

"What's going on?" Hakyeon walked in with a concerned look on his face. He took in the scene before him and promptly grabbed Leo and took him out of the room. He didn't say anything to you but soon after, Jaehwan peeked his head into the room. You were unable to move. Fear had locked your body down.

"Y/N?" Jaehwan spoke softly as he approached you. Your body tensed as he came closer and he stopped when he noticed. "Y/N, do you want to sit down? Did you two have a fight?"

Fight? No, that usually implies two people were participating. You didn't know what this was.

"I-I....." you looked up at Jaehwan will tears threatening your eyes, "what did I do?"

"Tell me what happened."

It took a while but you were finally able to explain everything to Jaehwan.

"Ah, I think I know."

"Tell me." You needed to know what happened. You were just starting to feel comfortable around him and now all that disappeared.

--‐------------

At the same time, Hakyeon was dragging a still-seething Leo behind him. When he got a good way down the hall he pushed him so he slammed into the wall slightly.

"What the hell is wrong with you?!"

"I...couldn't help it. I just got so angry." He ran his fingers through his hair in exasperation. He resorted to pacing to relieve his anger.

"Why?! Why in the name of hell would you corner her like that? Do you want her to continue fearing you?"

"She....she said she wanted to use herself as bait. Hakyeon....I can't lose her too." Hakyeon's face changed to instant sorrow. He knew now.

"Leo, she doesn't know you like we do. None of us would ever suggest that, but you know how she is. She thinks she's expendable."

"Well, she isn't."

"We know that.....you know that. But she doesn't. Instead of explaining to her why that was a bad idea, you snapped. Do you think she'll just brush it off? You were doing well earlier."

Leo looked up at Hakyeon. Hakyeon knew how much you meant to Leo. He only hoped that you were able to forgive him.

"She smiled at me, Hakyeon. An actual smile......how do I fix this?"

"Go back in there and apologize and then explain."

"But, I don't know if I can."

"If you care about her like you say you do, then you're going to have to. Put away the cold facade for a while and talk to her, REALLY talk to her.'

-----‐-‐--------

"Jaehwan......you said you would explain."

"I know but the more I think about it, the more I think it should be Leo to explain."

"I-I can't--"

"Yes, you can. He just got angry for a bit, he's not the person in your nightmares, trust me."

"I--"

"Y/N."

Your entire being froze when you heard Leo's voice coming from your door. Jaehwan quickly left your side and you almost clung to him before he could go out the door. Jaehwan put his hand on Leo's shoulder momentarily, hoping to give him the strength he was going to need. You hadn't moved from your spot earlier. Only now, you were sitting on the floor, clutching the ends of the robe Leo had given you. Leo came over silently, not even his boots made a sound on the wooden floor.

"May I sit?" The question surprised you since you assumed he would just do as he wanted.

You nodded once and he settled himself on the floor directly in front of you. His long legs crossed and he knees were only inches from yours. You couldn't look at him. You focused on the laces of his boots.

"Y/N, look up at me."

You quickly glanced up at him and the look on his face made you stop. He looked so sad. You expected anger to still be etched into his face. But, now, he looked....remorseful.

"Good girl. I want you to look at me while I explain. First of all, I'm sorry." He kept his voice low. "Also, please know that even if I get mad, you will never come to any harm whatsoever. I need you to remember that. I didn't mean to get so angry but there is a reason behind it. I shouldn't make excuses but I want you to know why. I ask that you let me explain without interruptions."

You knew it wasn't easy for him to talk so much so you decided to hear him out. You gestured for him to continue and he looked relieved.

"There was this girl...she was amazing. She was kind and brave. She would fight tooth and nail for anything she believed in. She was a little thing, probably couldn't have been much over five feet although she was only 2 years younger than me." Leo's face was something you'd never seen before. He looked as if he was remembering something he held dear. You felt a sudden pang in your heart that made you take a deep breath. It was a foreign feeling and you chose not to dwell on it right now.

"She was also willing to do what she could to rid the world of demons and other creatures. Perhaps she was too dedicated. She always had a convincing plan and she made it difficult to say no. She decided on her own that if she wandered through the woods as a helpless woman, the demons would gather and we would be able to kill a vast number of them at one time. She set herself up as bait."

Oh.

"It didn't work. It wasn't an army of demons that came for her, it was one. He abducted her before we could reach her since we were spread out around her. When we found her....." His voice cracked and your heart along with it. He took a deep breath and you saw his body shudder. "There wasn't much left and it was clear what he'd done to her...what he'd forced on her...she..."

Without thinking, you reached your hand out and curled it around his cheek. His breath tickled your wrist as he struggled with his emotions. He looked into your eyes, begging for you to understand him.

"She was my sister."

Your gasp was loud in the room. You bit your lip trying to control the tears. Your body moved on its own and, in a second, your arms were wrapped around his neck. He reciprocated and curled his arms gently around you. He let out a breath in disbelief that you were hugging him.

"I'm sorry, Leo, I'm so sorry. I had no idea. I shouldn't have suggested that. I just wanted to help. I understand why you were angry."

"But I shouldn't have yelled at you." His voice was so close to your ear and he held you like you might break. "I could have just told you but I just got so angry because..."

"Because, what?"

Leo leaned back and looked at you.

"I don't want to lose you, too."

#taekwoon #vixx #vixx fic #vixx au #taekwoon au #leo au #taekwoon fic

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