#IT WAS HOWEVER really funny when we were discussing skipping in english class and my teacher was like ur parents wouldn’t let you skip

[dreamertrilogys]

the moment i figured out i could pretend to be my mom and call myself in sick to school and they wouldn’t call my parents to let them know i was absent it was all over for me

[andmaybegayer]

Long Poetry Wallowposting

One of my favourite poems is William Carlos Williams’ “Red Wheelbarrow” (or “XXII” if you’re being dipshit about it), not because it’s an exceptional poem, but because of the circumstances surrounding the first time I read it.

In 2015 I convinced two of my friends to join me for a multidisciplinary academic competition thing. One of the rounds was the independent essay, which has an interesting twist: your team of three gets all three essay topics (critique a given essay, write an essay on a topic, and analyze a poem) and you have 30 minutes to discuss and split the topics before a 90 minute solo writing period.

(I could write another extended post about the bureaucratic shenanigans I went through surrounding that competition, someone remind me to tell that story sometime.)

I don’t remember what the other two topics were, but the poem was to analyze William Carlos Williams’ “Red Wheelbarrow”, a poem which looks like this:

so much depends upon a red wheel barrow glazed with rain water beside the white chickens

Now, I got roped into this competition by a teacher who I did not know and who gave us no more detail other than “Get a team of 3 together and I’ll vouch for you to skip a day of school and attend this competition” so we did not know that there was actually a published list of poems, books and artpieces that you should have studied before coming to this competition, including John Campbell’s “Hero with a thousand faces” and Jeff Koons’ “Puppy”.

So we were in for this Sight Unseen, No Background. We didn’t even know who Williams was.

Fortunately for me, my friends are horrible nerds. We’re not the dead poets society but we were still the kind of people who, bored in the back of english class, would write short poems and read each other’s shitty writing and who had fun proving that the integral of e^x was e^x and we took part in OTHER competitions and would show off obscure academic skills to each other and we thought that was cool. We were not lost at sea here.

So we stare at this for a second. With zero context, what the hell does this mean. Chicken is an implicitly funny word, of course, but that’s the 2000′s talking and this must be the 1900′s sometime. The enjambment is interesting but nothing crazy here, this isn’t e.e. cummings (not a fan by the way) and so, there’s really not a lot to look at. We spent ten minutes throwing ideas back and forth before almost simultaneously coming to the conclusion. This is just a scene, being described in poetry.

We discuss this idea for a few more minutes, and we allocate the actual writing of the essay to a friend (I messaged him about this to make sure I had my story straight) and then time was up, and we turned to our individual essays.

Reader-response analysis is a school of literary theory that is, some would say, kinda garbage. It asks the reader “what did that work make you think of, what did that work make you feel” and treats that as ground truth. The reader is an active element in this, and the way the reader feels is of course very flexible, leading many people to conclude that it is useless, since the reader is an unknown quantity here. Well, reader-response analysis is not actually garbage and can be a very useful tool in your literary toolkit if used appropriately. We all found we had the same reader’s response: a clear mental image of a scene. Maybe the floor is gravel, maybe it’s grass. There is a wheelbarrow leaned up against a shed, gleaming with the last drops of rain. A chicken pecks around nearby, with more close at hand. The smell of a heavy night of rain persists, the light is the bright cold glow of a wet morning that can shine without burning off the dew just yet.

So, that’s what we found. There’s no deeper meaning here. This poem is simply conveying to you the idea. We, of course, being dweebs, took it further. Attempting to find deeper meaning in this poem demonstrates an inability to take information at face value. Sometimes the pipe is just a pipe. Sometimes the red wheelbarrow is just a red wheelbarrow.

Turns out, that analysis is correct. At the time this was written, Williams was busy doing Imagism, which means he was being economical with words and precise with meaning. The poem is short because it needn’t be long. There’s some chickens and a wheelbarrow. The Wikipedia article for this poem is hilarious, there’s a section of quotes from people who believed there was a deep hidden meaning about a dying child Williams had cared for (he was a doctor) who had a red wheelbarrow as a toy. This explanation is nonsense, and I have rarely enjoyed reading someone being wrong as much as I have enjoyed reading phrases like:

At the time, I remember being mystified by the poem. However, being properly trained in literary criticism, I wondered what the real meaning of the poem was, what it was really about. ... What is left out of Williams' poem is the fact that when he conceived that image he was sitting at the bedside of a very sick child (Williams was a medical doctor). The story goes that as he sat there, deeply concerned about the child, he looked out the window, saw that image, and penned those words.

Of course you can't figure it out by studying the text. The clues aren't there. This poem was meant to be appreciated only by a chosen literary elite, only by those who were educated, those who had learned the back story (Williams was a doctor, and he wrote the poem one morning after having treated a child who was near death. The red wheelbarrow was her toy.)

and knowing that, you’re all wrong, get fucked. It’s just a wheelbarrow. According to Williams himself, he just saw this scene in a fisherman’s backyard and wrote a poem about the scene. I looked all this up the day after the competition, and I don’t think I’ve ever felt as good about a literary analysis.

Now don’t get me wrong, the curtains are sometimes blue for a reason. But in this case, absent any information indicating otherwise, the wheelbarrow really is just red because that’s what the author saw. In some cases you can draw additional meaning out of a work but it requires just as much discipline to read deeply as to prevent yourself reading too deep. We avoided the trap.

I think about this poem infrequently, maybe once every couple months. I can still recall it from memory. It is still an influential point of reference whenever I try to write something. I tried writing some Imagist works in high school, and I had those same friends read them. They thought I might prefer realism instead. Unfortunately it turns out that most of the time, I don’t find realism to be the best fit.

XXII by William Carlos Williams is a good poem, but maybe, not for you.

[hopeworldfan]

summary: you and yoongi have been best friends since you were kids, being hopelessly in love with each other was never part of the plan. aka, the typical cliche.

pairing: yoongi/reader

chapter one

word count: 6k+

genre: fluff, smut, angst, college!au, friends to lovers

warning: angst, depression, self-harm, suicide attempt, alcoholism, divorce

a/n: ive been working on this for a very long time and decided i had to split it up because shes a big one. let me know what you think!

The early hours of the morning had always brought a sense of comfort with them. The world was so quiet, so still, so peaceful. Being in the last year of your undergrad meant that you were intimately acquainted with the early hours of the morning; when the sun was just starting to shine through the blinds,  the birds were just starting to chirp, the world was just starting to wake. You wished you could enjoy it, enjoy the quiet, but you were six cups of coffee deep into your Psychology of Counseling textbook and more than ready to jump off a bridge if it meant you didn’t have to take your midterm in three hours.

“You need to get some semblance of sleep Y/N, you’ll be too tired to concentrate on your midterm if you don’t.” A soft yet stern voice commented from your doorway and you sighed before leaning back in your chair -wincing as what felt like your whole spine cracked-, before spinning around and squinting at your best friend.

“Did you know that our awareness of death is the source of zest for life and creativity and that we can turn our fear of death into a positive force when we accept the reality of our own mortality?” Yoongi just continued to lean against your doorway, fixing you with an unimpressed stare and you sighed. “This chapter on Existentialism is really putting me through it, the death stuff isn’t even the worst of it. Did you know that having some anxiety is perfectly normal-”

“Y/N.” He interrupted and you sighed again, sliding your reading glasses up to where they were sitting on your head and rubbing your face.

“If I go to sleep now I won’t wake up, and I don’t have all the details of the six propositions down yet. I just know Bridgette is going to make that the essay question.” Bridgette, formally known as Dr. Coddou, had emphasized them way too much for them not to be the discussion question, and the discussion was worth half the points on the midterm.

Your best friend, however, didn’t budge, keeping his arms crossed and giving you a reproachful look. “You have work right after your midterm, you’ll be dead on your feet if you don’t get at least a few hours. I’ll wake you up on time for your test, so get in bed.”

“You’re being such a hypocrite,” you mumbled but closed the textbook regardless. Arguing with Yoongi would be a useless venture, it always was.

“What was that?”

“Nothing Yoongi-oppa.” You smiled brightly while he rolled his eyes, noticing the small upturn of his lips.

“Okay koreaboo.”

“You like it.” You sang before collapsing on your bed, disgruntling the black cat that was already sleeping there. Despite your previous protests, you were out like a light the minute your head hit the pillow. Yoongi just fondly shook his head before walking over and gently removing your glasses from the top of your head and setting them on your nightstand.

The first time you met Yoongi was in the third grade. It was one of those weird, super vivid childhood memories that seemed engraved in your brain, right along with your fifth birthday party. The school year had been well underway when he was brought into class, something that already made his presence exciting. His family had just moved from Korea to the states and he stumbled through his introduction, not quite having a solid grasp on the English language. Your classmates had laughed, finding his struggle and heavy accent hilarious. It wasn’t funny to you though, even at such a young, impressionable age because your abuelita didn’t speak a lick of English and your own mom’s heavily accented Spanglish was often ridiculed at school events. 

He sat alone at recess that day and you were the first to approach him, a bright smile on your face and the offer of friendship hanging from your outstretched hand. Yoongi had been so incredibly shy at first, but you didn’t let it deter you. Instead, you stayed stuck to his side like glue, always with a bright smile and eager to help him learn English. By the end of the year, the two of you were inseparable and the rest was history. 

Yoongi kept a diligent eye on the time while he worked on the composition in front of him. He knew he was prone to getting lost in his work without caring about the world around him, but the last thing he wanted to do was lose track of time and be the reason you missed your midterm. Especially after insisting that you sleep and promising to make sure you didn’t miss it. You would never let him hear the end of it if he this up. 

Thirty minutes before your class, he got up and gently pushed open the door to your room. His breath caught in his throat when he saw you lying there. He’d seen you sleeping more times than he could count throughout the years, saw you lying there with your mouth wide open, drool on the side of your face, and the smallest snore coming from your sleeping form. It never failed to take his breath away. You never failed to take his breath away. There were no false pretenses when you were sleeping, no sign of the cheerful mask he knew you worse to make it through the day, the hardened armor you donned to protect yourself. When you slept there was a vulnerability you showed so rarely, even to him.

Yoongi had been in love with you for years. Maybe since that first moment in third grade, before he even knew what love was, but he knew you had a pretty smile and you were the first person to make him feel like moving away from everything he knew wasn’t the end of the world. There was just something so captivating about you, so endearing, it was unrealistic to think that he ever stood a chance. When you smiled at him, eyes squinted and barely visible, he knew without a doubt that he would do anything to keep that smile on your face, and that’s why he was okay with just being your best friend because that’s what made you happy. 

Still, it was moments like this that he took for himself; approaching your sleeping form and gently brushing his fingers against your cheek. You unconsciously leaned into his touch and his heart skipped a beat. He wanted nothing more than to kiss you. The number of times he’d fantasized about it, about pressing his lips against yours was honestly ridiculous, but he couldn’t help it. It was something he’d dreamed about since he was thirteen. 

You muttered something unintelligible in your sleep and Yoongi retracted his hand. He knew he had to wake up. He was being more than a little creepy and crossing a multitude of lines. The two of you were best friends, nothing more. 

“Wake up, Y/N.” He said, bringing a hand to your shoulder and gently shaking you awake. Your eyes briefly fluttered and you groaned, trying to snuggle deeper into your bed to catch a few more precious moments of sleep. Yoongi smiled fondly and shook his head. “Nope, you have to get up and go take your midterm.”

“Midterm!” You yelped, shooting up in such a panic that Yoongi instinctively took a step back. “I have to go take my midterm!”

“Relax,” he instructed calmly. “You have thirty minutes and I brewed a fresh pot of coffee.”

You sighed, letting your shoulders drop and willing your heart rate to slow. “Ay dios mio, whew, I’ve never wanted to kiss someone more in my entire life.”

His heart rate spiked at your words, eyes glued to your form as you stretched out on your bed, arching your back and groaning. Less than innocent thoughts were playing through his mind and he willed them away. You weren’t being serious, it was commonplace for you to say suggestive things, but a large part of him always hoped. 

“Do you work tonight?” You asked, finally getting to your feet and rolling your neck, wincing at the distinct popping. The question broke him from his reverie and he mentally slapping himself.

“No, I tried to but I’m already in overtime for the week so Jin wouldn’t let me.”

You pouted and lightly hit his shoulder. “What did I tell you about overworking yourself? Between the two of us, we make enough to pay the bills without killing ourselves.” Your eyes softened when you took a longer look at your best friend. The bags under his eyes were an even darker shade of purple and his skin was an even more ghostly pale than normal. Instinctively, you wrapped your arms around his waist and pressed your head against his chest. “You need to take care of yourself Yoongi, there ain’t no me if there ain’t no you, remember?”

The words were muffled against his chest, but the way his arms wrapped around your form was enough confirmation that he had heard. Being so sleep deprived made you overemotional, but that didn’t make it any less true. Over a decade of friendship made Yoongi a fixture in your life. When everything was crashing down, when everything was going wrong, when your abuelita and dad both died in the span of a year, when your mom turned to alcohol to numb the pain, it was Yoongi who was always there for you. He was the only stability in your life, and that was why you’d never tell him how you really felt, how you were desperately and hopelessly in love with him. 

“You’re sappy when you’re tired.” He commented dully as he gazed down at you, praying you couldn’t hear how his heart was ready to jump out of his chest.

“Please, I’m sappy all the time.” You shot back, pulling away to get on your tip-toes and place a soft kiss against his temple. He had to fight every cell in his body to keep from blushing at your show of affection because it was so common that it shouldn’t even affect him anymore. The man was convinced you were the most affectionate person he had ever met; it was something he learned early on, so he knew not to read into it. However, the temple kisses were the one thing he could never get used to. While the hugs, hand-holding, and cuddling made his heart race, there was something about the temple kiss that was so tender, so intimate, and he’d never seen you do it with anyone else.

That was because you didn’t. It was selfish and stupid, but the temple kiss was the one thing you’d allow yourself. You could sweep it under the rug of showing platonic affection if anyone questioned it, but you knew that it was different. 

“Alright gotta blast, see you later Yoongles, don’t forget to feed Noodle!” You smiled, already halfway out of the door, your backpack sling over your shoulder and a full tumbler of coffee in your hand. “Love you!”

“Love you too.” He replied softly, but the door was already swinging shut.

Relief flooded through you as you handed in your midterm, giving Dr. Coddou a polite smile before jetting out of the classroom. There were other midterms to study for, other things to stress about, but that was for a later date. The only thing currently on your mind was treating yourself to your favorite takeout to celebrate before going into work.

“Y/N!” Someone called out from behind you and you immediately whipped your head around. “How do you think you did?”

“I’ll be pretty upset if I didn’t make at least a ‘B’, what about you?” Namjoon smiled down at you, shyly adjusting his glasses.

“I’m pretty sure I made an ‘A’.”

“Of course, you did, you’re literally a genius. I really only asked in the interest of being polite,” you teased, noticing the way his cheeks flushed the most endearing shade of pink. Namjoon was cute in a nerdy, bookworm, librarian way with his wire-framed glasses, grandpa cardigans, and adorable dimples.. The two of you shared a class together your sophomore year and were partnered together for a project. You really hit it off and stayed friends, though you’d never interacted outside the context of academia. It had been a surprise when you walked into your psychology of counseling class and saw Namjoon already sitting in the front row, being that he was a Philosophy major and you were positive psychology of counseling wasn’t required for that degree plan.  “I’ve been meaning to ask, but why did you take this class anyway? Planning on doing some philosophical counseling?”

Namjoon’s cheeks turned an even darker shade of pink. “Oh, uh, I mean, no uhm, I just well, I really like,” he paused and his eyes only met yours for a second before he looked away, his blush managing to deepen even more. “Psychology! I really like psychology! It’s really interesting.”

“Right!” You agreed enthusiastically, completely oblivious to the boy’s panic. “It’s all just so intriguing to learn about how people think and why. This chapter on Existential Therapy was so fun despite how much it blew my mind. I mean, our awareness of death being the source of our zest for life and creativity? Whew. Do you think you’ll end up with a psych minor?”

Namjoon just stood there with a dumb smile on his face, not realizing you had asked him a question. He’d been distracted by your rambling, the way your eyes lit up and you gestured wildly with your hands. It was the cutest thing he had ever seen. You were the cutest thing he had ever seen, and that was why he found himself in yet another psychology class that he had absolutely no need for.

“Hellooooo, earth to Joon?” You asked, staring up at him with your head tilted and one eyebrow raised.

“Oh! Uhm, yeah, I’ll probably end up with a psych minor.” He said in a rush, trying to downplay his embarrassment.

“Fun!” you glanced down at your phone and swore. “Shit, I have to get to work, see you later Joon!”

Namjoon sighed as you bounded away. Would he ever work up the confidence to ask you on a date? It didn’t seem likely.

Work was exhausting, per usual, but tips were decent so you weren’t complaining about that. What you were complaining about was just how bad your feet ached. Despite how many times you complained to Jin, he liked the uniforms the was they were, so you were stuck with stupid shoes that offered no support or comfort.

By the time you were gently closing the front door, it had to be close to two in the morning and you were ready to crawl under the overs and sleep like the dead since tomorrow was Saturday and you were off of work.

“Hey Noodle.” You greeted softly when the black cat made his presence known t you with a loud ‘meow’ before rubbing himself against your legs.

You were mid-yawn when you trudged into the kitchen, content to just drinking some orange juice because finding something eat would take entirely too much effort. It was by chance that you noticed the post-it on the microwave, Yoongi’s messy handwriting sprawled across it.

mac n’ cheese in here, just heat it up

Your lips upturned in a gentle smile. For all his talk, Yoongi was one of the softest, most thoughtful people you had ever met. His love language was in the small things. Sure, it was just mac n’ cheese, something that didn’t take longer than ten minutes to whip up, but it was ten minutes he knew you weren’t going to take. While the macaroni was heating up, you added a little something to the bottom of the post-it.

remind me to put a ring on it in the morning

Loud. That was your first thought as you were choke-slammed into consciousness. There was a very familiar, very loud voice carrying through your apartment and you groaned before grabbing your comforter and pulling it over your head, trying in vain to delay the inevitable. 

You weren’t the slightest bit surprised when your door was slammed open and the person squealed “Y/N-ie” before jumping on top of you.

“Ay dios mio, get off Hobi,” you grumbled, trying -and failing- to push the older boy off of you.

Said boy just laughed. “Not a chance! I haven’t seen you in so long. I’ve missed you!”

You stopped struggling, content to accept your fate of being squished. “I missed you too, Hobi.”

“Why don’t you ever call me oppa?” Though your head was still buried underneath your comforter, you could hear the pout in his voice and knew he was making a devastatingly cute face.

“If I call you oppa will you get off of me?”

“Yes!”

“Okay...Hobi-oppa.”

Hoseok kept his promise and promptly rolled off of you, grabbing the covers and pulling them off in the process. You knew you should probably be at least a little embarrassed considering Hoseok now had a pg-13 rated view of your body since you only ever slept in a big t-shirt and underwear, but modesty was never one of your strong suits. Instead, you rolled over in a desperate attempt to sneak a few more moments of sleep. “Nu-uh, you’re getting up and coming to get lunch with me, Jimin, and Yoongi-hyung.”

He was equally as unaffected by your lack of clothing, having gotten used to it. “Hobiiiiiiiii.” You whined.

“Don’t make me tickle you.”

That was enough to make you jump out of bed. He didn’t bluff when it came to tickling, something you knew all too well. The redhead cheered before pulling you into a tight hug.

Hoseok was the first friend Yoongi made freshman year and became your friend by association. You couldn’t help but laugh at the fact that Yoongi attracted extroverts like moths to a flame because Hoseok was the textbook definition and while you weren’t quite on his level, you were up there.

“Ah, good morning Y/N.” A serene voice greeted from the doorway and you glanced around Hoseok’s frame to grin at the fourth member of your ragtag friend group.

“Hey Chim.” While Hoseok was the first friend Yoongi made in college, Jimin was yours. The two of you shared a hellish 7:30 your first semester and bonded over wanting to die every morning and keeping each other awake during the lecture. The four of you meshed together unsettlingly well, and Hoseok and Jimin ended up as roommates before the end of freshman year. You privately thought it was hilarious that your three best friends were all Korean, maybe Yoongi was right when he called you a koreaboo.

You meandered over to Jimin and wrapped him in a tight hug before brushing past him and noticing Yoongi was nowhere to be seen. “Is Yoongi still sleeping?”

“Mhm. You know you’re the only one who can wake him up without putting him in a bad mood.” Jimin said lightly and you rolled your eyes.

“I gave you guys that spare key to use for emergencies, not to break in and force us to eat lunch with you.”

“Eating lunch with us is an emergency!” Hoseok protested.

“Ya, ya, ya.” Regardless, you were awake, and if you had to be awake, so did Yoongi.

Creeping into his room, your heart skipped a beat when you saw him lying there. He looked so content, so peaceful, it warmed your heart. You knew how deeply Yoongi hid things, how he always put his own feelings last when it came to the people he cared about. It was only through years of friendship that you were able to discern when he was putting up a front, when he was putting on a brave face for your sake. Both of you had baggage and issues and things that were hard to talk about, even with each other. However, at that moment, you knew none of that mattered to Yoongi, he was at peace, and a part of you hated to ruin that.

The other part of you wanted to jump on him the way Hoseok did to you.

That part won out.

“Rise and shine sleepy head!” You giggled, throwing your body on top of his and gently patting his dumpling-like cheeks as you straddled him. He groaned, the same reaction you had to Hoseok, and you shot him a beaming smile when his eyes fluttered open. “Good morning Yoongi-oppa.”

Something strange flashed across his face at your words but you were too busy poking his squishy cheeks to notice. “What are you doing?”

The question was entirely for his own sake because he was becoming increasingly aware of the position the two of you were in, something you were completely oblivious to. He could tell you had just woken up since you only seemed to be wearing a big shirt -one of his-, and a pair of underwear. That alone was enough to make his cock twitch, seeing you in his clothes always had an effect on him, especially when the only thing you paired it with was underwear. Then there was the way you were straddling him, knees on either side of his torso, completely unaware that your crotch was directly over his. Usually, he had self-control, he could squash down the indecent fantasies, but he was still only half-awake and all he could think about was how easy it would be to grab your hips and thrust up. He knew it wouldn’t take him long to cum, even if there were three layers -his boxers, the comforter, and your panties- between his cock and your pussy. God, the fantasy of you placing your hands on his chest and grinding down on him was too delicious. He already had an idea of what you’d sound like, the small whimpers, the soft gasps, he’d heard it all before when you thought you were being discrete late at night. He wanted to hear those sounds when he was the one causing them, when his cock was-

“Hobi and Jimin are here and forcing us to go eat lunch. You should be grateful I’m the one who woke up and not Hobi.”

Yoongi mentally slapped himself. His cock was growing harder and there was nothing he could do to stop it. He prayed to every god in existence that you didn’t decide to press down on him because there was no way you wouldn’t know his dick was hard. “You have my eternal gratitude.”

You giggled before pressing a soft kiss to his forehead and hopping off his bed. “Hurry up and get ready, I’m starving and I’m pretty sure I can scam Hobi into paying.”

Without waiting for a reply, you turned and danced out of Yoongi’s room, missing the way his eyes stayed glued to your barely covered ass.

“See, completely unharmed. He probably would have killed Hobi-hyung.” Jimin pointed out from the couch, happily petting Noodle and you rolled your eyes.

“Oh,” you paused, an innocent smile slipping on to your face. “Hobi-oppa?”

Said boy’s face lit up and you internally smirked. A part of you would have felt bad for scamming one of your best friends, but it wasn’t like he didn’t -frequently- do the same thing to you. When he hit you with a pout you were helpless. “Yes, Y/N-ie?”

“Well, since you’re my oppa and all, does that mean you’re paying for lunch?” You tilted your head and stuck your bottom lip out the tiniest bit in a pout. Jimin ducked his head to muffle his laughter.

“Of course, leave it all to me!” Too easy.

“This so good I am going to bust the fattest nut.” You moaned between mouthfuls of lo mein noodles.

Hoseok had decided on Chinese and you weren’t complaining, especially when it was on his dime. “I second that.”

“Here Yoongi, you have to try this.” You insisted, gathering a hefty amount of noodles on your fork and turning your body sitting next to your, expectantly holding the utensil up to his face. He gave you an unimpressed look but the smile on your face persisted and it only took seconds her him to cave and take the offered bite. “See! Amazing, right?”

“Feed me next Y/N-ie!” Hoseok pouted and you rolled your eyes before gathering more noodles.

“Here you go Hobi-oppa.” You teased and he gladly wrapped his lips around the fork.

“I, for one, still can’t believe that you can’t use chopsticks,” Jimin commented and you groaned.

The three boys were all using the provided chopsticks while you didn’t even bother opening your set. “Let me live Jimin.”

“Just saying.”

“I’m not required to know how to use chopsticks just because the three of you do! Stop peer pressuring me.”

“It’s really not that hard Y/N-ie.”

“Look, Yoongi’s mom spent many a dinner trying to teach me, I’m just hopeless!”

“It’s true, she’s a terrible student.”

You immediately punched Yoongi on the shoulder, but his gummy smile erased any thoughts about even pretending to be angry. Before anyone could say anything, your phone started ringing and you only hesitated for a second before pressing the device to your ear after seeing just who was calling you.

“Hola mamá,” you greeted cheerfully, ignoring the concerned look Yoongi shot your way. “¿Qué pasa?”

The smile on your face slipped when you heard the drunken slur of her words. It slipped even more when she popped the inevitable question.

“¿Cuanto?” You asked, trying to keep your voice even, to not ruin the atmosphere because this was the first time the four of you had been together in forever and you wanted to enjoy it. You didn’t react when your mom listed off the number, despite the sinking in your stomach. “Bueno...sí mama...esta noche...sí...te amo.”

“Back to our previous conversation, all I have to say is that learning how to lose chopsticks is a lot harder than it looks when you’re not born into the culture, and it’s also harder to learn as an adult because your brain has less plasticity.” You rambled, forcing a smile as you logged into your banking app to transfer the money to your mom’s account. Yoongi tensed and you knew he was watching you, could practically feel the disapproval radiating off of him when you transferred the amount from your savings to her checking. You knew he understood the short conversation you had; he’d picked up his fair share of Spanish throughout the years. It would be an argument later. You could already feel the headache.

The rest of the lunch was fine. Hoseok was even louder and more ridiculous than usual and Jimin kept reaching across the table to fiddle with your hands, your hair, your face, all in an effort to make you feel better, seeing right through the smile plastered across your face. They knew you too well for it to fool them. Yoongi, on the other hand, was silent, he was stewing.

“Six hundred?” He asked the minute the two of you were alone in the apartment, barely giving you time to shrug off your jacket. You just collapsed on the couch, feeling all your energy leave you in an instant thinking about how much you were going to have to work to make up the funds.

“And what about it?” You sighed, too tired to muster together any anger.

“That money is for grad school, what did your mom need it for? Couldn’t pay rent because she spent all her money on alcohol again? Couldn’t pay her light bill because she keeps funneling money into poker machines?” In a turn of events, you actually weren’t too tired to muster together any anger, because Yoongi’s cold words brought it right to the surface. Mostly because he was right.

“And so what if it is? What am I supposed to do Yoongi? Let her get evicted? Let her power get shut off? It’s my money, I can do whatever I want with it.” 

Your mom never did shake back from the alcoholic hole she fell into when your grandma and dad died and Yoongi resented her for it. It had broken you because you didn’t just lose your grandma and your dad, you lost your mom too, and Yoongi almost lost you. He’d been so caught up in his angsty teenage bullshit, hating the world because of his parent’s divorce that he didn’t notice. He didn’t notice when your smile became tight and forced. He didn’t notice when you started wearing long sleeves despite the unforgiving heat. He didn’t notice when the light started to fade from your eyes. It wasn’t until he broke down your bathroom door junior year of high school because of a goodbye text that he finally noticed.

Yoongi had never been one to cry, but he cried then, finding you crumpled on the floor, a knife in one hand and blood running down both arms from the cuts lining them. He carefully took the knife from your hand and threw it out of the room before sinking onto the floor next to you and wrapping your trembling form in a tight hug. He apologized as he cried, over and over again, for not realizing sooner, for not being able to take your pain away. It was then that he knew that he hated your mom because you were his sunshine, his light, and that was what she had reduced you to, because even then, the only thing you could manage to say besides ‘i’m sorry’ was ‘please don’t tell my mom’.

He hated that even now, even though you were so far away, she still had such a grip on your life. You were supporting yourself and supporting her. 

Though you understood why Yoongi felt the way he did, though there were times when you resented your mom, at the end of the day she was still your mom. She was the woman from your childhood who was full of warmth and laughter, and there were rare times when she still was, when the old her shined through in her even rarer moments of sobriety.

Yoongi wasn’t fuming, but you were. His anger ran cold where yours ran hot. “How much more are you going to let her take Y/N? That’s all she does.”

“She’s my mom Yoongi! Fuck! I’m not having this argument with you again!” You shouted, throwing your hands in the air and storming out. It was such a pointless fucking argument to have, the two of you would just run around in circles, getting angrier and angrier until you inevitably stormed off. The two of you didn’t argue often, you hated arguing with Yoongi, he was your best friend in the entire world, but you knew the topic of you mom would never be something you agreed on.

You weren’t paying attention to where you were storming off to, the destination wasn’t the point, you just needed to clear your head and get away from Yoongi. Somehow you ended up at a little park that you didn’t even realize was near your apartment complex, so you sat on one of the benches and groaned. It was cold outside, it was getting dark, you were alone, and you didn’t have your phone, keys, or wallet. You really were a genius.

“Y/N?” A soft voice called and you yelped, jumping up and ready to run if the person was going to try and murder you. “Sorry!”

Whipping around, you visibly relaxed when you took in the boy in front of you, cardigan and all. “Whew, you almost gave me a heart attack Joon.”

“I’m sorry,” he apologized again and you waved it off, finally noticing the white dog curiously sniffing your shoes. Your response was instantaneous, dropping into a squat and gently petting the dogs fluffy head.

“Who is this cute little baby?” You cooed happily, laughing when the dog playfully jumped on you, causing you to fall back on your ass while being assaulted with kisses. Namjoon was literally melting.

“Oh, uhm, his name is Rapmon.”

“Hi Rapmon,” you greeted cheerfully, planting a kiss on the top of his head before getting to your feet and wrapping your arms around your torso. It definitely wasn’t the smartest move to run out without grabbing your jacket when winter was right around the corner.

Namjoon noticed and immediately shrugged off his cardigan. “You should put this on before you get sick.”

“Ahh I can’t take that! You’ll be cold!” You protested.

“I’m wearing long sleeves, and my body temperature naturally runs high.” You wanted to put up more of a fight, but the temperature was dropping as the sun sank below the horizon, so you gratefully took the offered clothing.

“Thanks,” you smiled as the boy’s cheeks warmed, seeing you in his clothes having an enormous effect on him. “Do you live around here?”

“Oh, uhm, yeah, my apartment is right across the street actually.” He replied sheepishly and you whipped your head around to the fancy ass apartments across the street.

You couldn't keep the amazement from your voice. “What the fuck, Joon, those are so nice.”

“Ahh, my mom picked it out, they’re alright.” He said, clearly embarrassed. “What about you?”

“I think my apartment is somewhere around here, I wasn’t really paying attention to where I was going.” You admitted, it being your turn to be embarrassed. “I had a fight with my best friend and kinda just...ended up here.”

“Oh.”

The two of you just stood there for a solid minute, Namjoon trying to work up the courage to say something and you just not really knowing what to say for once in your life. It was Namjoon who finally spoke. “Do you...uhm...do you want to come up to my apartment? It’s getting dark and it’s cold out, once we bring Rapmon in I can drive you home...if you want.”

He trailed off, obviously flustered and you giggled. “I’d love to come up to your apartment Joon.”

It was exactly as fancy as you expected and you had to physically stop yourself from gawking like a tourist. However, you were doing a poor job and Namjoon secretly thought it was adorable how your eyes were the size of tennis balls.

“Alright, I can bring you home now.” He said after letting Rapmon off of his leash and grabbing his keys. You hesitated though. It wasn’t that you didn’t want to go home, per say, but you didn’t want to go home. Yoongi’s temper had a tendency to stick around, taking a while to defrost, and you didn’t have the energy to go another round.

“Is it okay if I just...chill here for a while?” You finally asked, nervously fiddling with your thumbs.

“Yes!” He answered immediately because he was ready to give you the world on a silver platter if that was what you requested, especially when you were standing in front of him in his cardigan.

“Thanks Joon,” you smiled, missing the blush that painted his cheeks.

You made yourself comfortable on his couch and he followed suit. It took a few minutes for the ice to break, but once it did, you couldn’t stop talking. Namjoon was hands down the smartest person you had ever met, and he had such interesting viewpoints on so many things. He was incredibly easy to talk to and you had to admit that he looked so fucking cute when he was rambling about a topic he was passionate about. It was the only time you’d ever seen him look confident about something and it was really hot. Namjoon had always been filed away as ‘cute’ in your mind, but seeing him in his element, completely at ease in his fitted long-sleeved shirt, hair in disarray from how he kept running a hand through it, well, you had a different perspective.

Almost unconsciously you gravitated towards him until your knees were touching and his cheeks were rosy, hyper-aware of the contact.

“What time is it?” You suddenly asked, realizing it was completely dark outside and you’d been talking for so long that your mouth was dry. Namjoon glanced at the watch on his wrist -it looked like a Rolex- and winced.

“It’s two in the morning.”

You immediately shot up, eyes wide in panic. Fuck. Yoongi was probably worried sick, you had stormed out without your keys, wallet, or phone and it was two in the morning and you weren’t home. “Fuck.”

Namjoon brought you home immediately, spewing apologized for not paying better attention to the time. You reassured him that it wasn’t his fault and you had gotten equally lost in talking to him, thanking him a million times for bringing you home. 

Your stomach was in knots as you climbed up to the third floor, just knowing Yoongi was going to be even more furious with you. God, you were such an idiot.

You’d only managed to knock on the front door twice before it was yanked open and you were pulled into a bone-crushing hug, letting out a squeak of surprise.

“Y/N.” Yoongi breathed and your heart clenched painfully at how relieved he sounded.

“I’m sor-”

“No,” He interuppted, still holding you tight against his chest. “I’m sorry okay. I know, I know she’s still your mom and that will never change no matter how much I resent her for the hell she put you through. I’m sorry, just please, fuck, please don’t leave like that again.”

His voice shook the smallest bit and your heart broke. He must have been so worried about you.

“Hey,” you said softly, wrapping your arms around his frame and gently rubbing his back. “I’m sorry Yoongi. It was really stupid of me to run out like that. I ran into a friend and we lost track of time, don’t think you can get rid of me that easily. You’re stuck with me for the rest of your life, sorry to tell you.”

He took a deep breath, his face still buried in your hair, and loosened his grip just enough for you to reach up and place a kiss against his temple. Just like that, everything was right again.

[fictional-worlds-are-exquisite]

i dunno, a grey bathrobe with a mouse face on the hood seems pretty fitting for a vampire. mine is bright pink tho and when i say bright i mean it's neon pink. my family hates it, literally anyone who sees it hates it. it's my favourite thing. the best buy i've ever made

your teacher is wild. they have run out of fucks to give. oh a ten year old is asking me for a frying pan? seems reasonable, let me go get one

oh and definitely. me and a knife? nope, would not recommend, -5000/10. it's why i don't cook. i mostly just bake stuff, because that usually doesn't involve cutting things up. i stopped counting all the times i had an accident with a knife, because i couldn't keep count. it's just that every goddamn time i take a knife in my hands i either cut myself or break the knife. sometimes both. i have however somehow magically avoided needing to go to the hospital every single time, so i'm not sure whether to call myself lucky or unlucky. (i'm still leaning towards the unlucky, because this sucks)

they told you about different sexualities in health class? that's so cool! i wish they did that here. i bet it would help a lot of people! also you were definitely very oblivious about your crush! but i can't say anything because me too. even now that i know i'm panromantic i still spent months thinking that those are most definitely platonic feelings i'm feeling for this girl. butterflies in my stomach? being just so goddamn happy when i'm around her? wanting to hold her hand? those are friend feelings right? (also she sometimes sends me nudes and i constantly mess up while trying to react like a normal person to them. one time i just replied asking whether she bought new shower curtains and then spent the next couple of minutes banging my head against the wall because even my asexual ass realised that that was probably the wrong thing to say)

anyways...

well, it's definitely different this year, celebrating christmas, but it's still fun, christmas eve went well and i'm pretty excited for christmas breakfast tomorrow, because it's always my favorite part! so yeah! thank you, that was very nice! ❤️

excellent, if halloween was a thing here i’d take that into account and add it to my vampire costume. halloween is not a thing here though so i guess i’ll just wear it down to the shops with some vamp teeth idk. also that sounds incredible. i love obnoxiously bright things. if it hurts people’s eyes then i’m doing something right. i am going against the masses and saying i love it.

i know right? he was from Germany, I think, and possibly quite new to the country and the nz education system (or at least, we...didn’t really learn anything that year...he just kind of let us play on the computers a lot...it must’ve been his first year teaching) so maybe he just figured that was chill in nz schools. a fair enough assumption considering the chaos of children.

oh geez. that does not sound good. at least you haven’t had to go to hospital yet though, that’s a plus. but it does sound awfully unlucky. it seems that whenever i come near a knife i find a cut on me afterwards. not like, a big cut. not even a cut that bleeds, normally. but just like the tiniest shallow cut ever. I have no idea how I manage it each time. it’s not b a d exactly it’s just alarming that i never notice it at the time. I also get a bit of double vision sometimes and I’ve noticed that when I’m trying to cut something precisely like vegetables I’ll struggle to see exactly where the knife is and well...I just go very slow and keep my fingers far away. I don’t trust my eyesight one bit. very impressive that you manage to break the KNIFE though, I’ve never done that. Bent many spoons real bad in my time tryna get ice cream but no knife deconstruction here. 

oh yeah! they did. I figured it was just a normal thing to teach in nz high schools and I was like wow. sure is great here! uhhh turns out no. Once I hit uni and took a gender and sexuality class and spoke with my classmates, it turned out that very very VERY few of them ever had that kind of thing brought up in health class. Hell, some of them were like we basically got taught abstinence (although they mostly then pointed to the religious nature of their schools, I guess that’s a trend). I was a little shocked some schools skipped sex ed that bad. Then earlier this year I did some research into the nz health curriculum for a presentation for an english class and like. it’s IN the curriculum. if you dig deep enough for this info. It’s just that what’s in the curriculum isn’t exactly compulsory. Which is a problem. Because then it only gets taught if the teacher decides to. For example, my younger sister (by roughly 3 years) attended the same high school as me but she never got any discussion of sexualities or gender identities or whatever in health class. It comes down to the teacher and I hate that so much. it SHOULD be taught to everyone, everywhere, it sure did help me. ANYWAY. i’ve already gone on this rant many times I will stop here

I’m glad it’s not just me in this boat haha. platonic...romantic...i mean who really knows the difference until it’s been 6 months and actually, now that you think about it, maybe there’s something funny going on here. o h n o. what lovely shower curtains! where’d you get them? oh n o. i feel like i’ve been sent a nude once before by a straight friend (who was a girl) who did not know I was queer and I was. how do straight people respond to this. respectfully i am looking only at your face so i don’t make you uncomfortable is actually not what i should be doing here, clearly. you...sure do have a body...good job! that’s...some good looking flesh! i- thank god this has never happened again. i would not be any better. 

I’m glad you still had fun and I hope the breakfast ended up going well! A Christmas breakfast sounds interesting. I feel that’s a whole different area of foods to make something nice out of, I’m so used to special lunches and literally nothing else, breakfast foods seem fun.

[bergeson-blog1]

( CARLA GUGINO, 48, FEMALE, LESBIAN ) EMELIE BERGESON was a TAX LAWYER from SUNDSVALL, SWEDEN. but now that they’ve found themselves in 1457, they’re a COLLECTOR OF DEBT. SHE is known to be UNDERSTANDING & OPEN MINDED, as well as CUNNING & PERSISTENT. they DON’T plan on sticking around. little do they know that their ROMANTIC soulmate exists in this era, and they happen to look like ELIZABETH HURLEY, LOGAN BROWNING, NICOLE KIDMAN, UTP.

aka hey hello, i’m new. well, my name is bunny, not new lol. i’m so funny, not. anygays, i hope y’all go easy on me cause i never really know what exactly to put down in intros so here goes nothing !

｡･*･ﾟ☆ &&. RANDOM LIFE FACTS IN SORTA SPECIFIC ORDER —

raised and loved by not the standard household, emelie grew up with not one father but two named oliver & erik and her mother cecilia who adored their daughter as much as each other. however for many in the city sundsvall it was hard to get used to the idea of the poly amorous couple, it was very normal for emelie and anyone who pestered her about it in her childhood and teenage years she told off with ease. 

art was emelie’s weakest strength in comprehensive school unlike math and science, the girl loved languages just as much as the pythagoras' theorem and skipped the 5th grade with ease. she excelled at all three national tests that were her best classes; swedish, math and english. emelie became known as the most intelligent student, representing the school at the age of 15 for a year until she graduated.

before she even started college, she knew she wanted to trade into her father erik’s footsteps and become a lawyer. and so she enrolled into upper secondary education and dove into the national science programme, in order to get as much credit for her college application as possible. those three years she focused on taking up finnish, norwegian, french, german & polish besides school in which she is all currently fluent in. unlike me, so don’t be too hard on me please.

at the age of 19 the pride and joy of the bergeson family got accepted into stockholm university, moved into a shared apartment with three other young girls who she shared a bright law foreseeing future with, the four became best friends for all the years college lasted. 

with her endeared juris doctor (j.d.) in hand, a weeping family in front of her and her then best friends by her side, the brunette had her future envisioned, all in order by the amount of letters from law firms that were eager to get their hands on her that had formed on the kitchen table at home before graduation season even came around.

her father had been her first thought, of course, to come work for; but the slightest idea of mixing work up with her personal life, especially familial, frightened emelie too and for the first time; the once young girl now turned into a young woman faced a fear and anxiety attacks she had never faced before. 

her life had almost been entirely written down, from the very start she went to preschool at the age of 3, to many years later, where she no longer had to study her ass off day in, day out. always around by her family, even when she moved to stockholm there wasn’t a weekend she visited them or the other way around. and the fact she had every opportunity in the world now to go work at any firm that wanted her, turned from dream into a nightmare. emelie’s fright of both working with her family or leaving them became a frightening thought too scary to voice, so much that instead of talking to her beloved parents, she shut them out.

her once best friends had already made their choices by the time emelie came to face her own sorted out dream and future job. they were out of the country and after meeting with a therapist for multiple sessions; the truth came out. her interest in france was bigger than ever, but her fear for losing her family like she lost her best friends was major. her anxiety attacks were diagnosed and discussed with her family.

long story short; it took her another three months to completely settle down in an apartment bordeaux, france, fully funded by lex-port, a law firm that focused on lots of areas including tax.

flashing many years forward; she’s been nearly everywhere in europe to visit clients for the corporate in person, has always put her job first over everything and only once thought of starting a relationship. but when it became clear she’d always put her job first, a relationship just wasn’t going to cut it for emelie. so her preference went from seeking love and romance to friends with benefits from time to time and one night stands with women only. 

basically emelie is truly living her best life and doesn’t long for anything else in her life, not that she’s aware of at least, the awards she’s received over the years are stuffing the shelves to a point the eldest of them have to face the bottom of a box in the attic soon. in fact, she was preparing her latest speech for the very last time in her earbuds on her early morning run for the award show in the afternoon; piecing the last things together that made sense in the woman’s mind. some jokes here and there she could even crack a smile for at the crack of dawn. so ready to move the people she would be in a big room with in less than eight hours, she visualized everything to the point of the champagne that was bubbling in her glass.

except  — none of that became reality. the moment she ran into parc rivière, the same route she took every morning, get a piece of quiet and breath of fresh air in the abandoned park this early, everything she expected to happen that day; vanished into thin air.

finding herself in 1457, england, we (she and i both) have got no clue what’s happening next, so stay tuned to the ic posts!

[blackvelvetstories]

Some people are surprised at the friendship, Paddington and Aunty Ros share. For the two of them they could not imagine what it would be like without the other. Onlookers are lucky enough to join into the jokes and laughter they have whilst eating marmalade sandwiches together. But how did this unsuspected friendship begin…

Aunty Ros was on her way to Coronation Street, when she first met Paddington. In fact, that was how he came to have such an unusual name for a bear, for Paddington was the name of the station.

Rushing through the station, with her family after being late from the pre-planned time they discussed in the group chat. It was a cold winters day and the station was packed with people on their way to complete their Christmas shopping. Everybody was wrapped up, with hats, gloves and the biggest puffer jackets imaginable. Amongst the busy crowd of Londoners flying past, Aunty Ros spotted him first. Tapping Loretta’s coat, harder each time until she turned to attention to see what the fuss was all about. “A bear? In this busy station?” Aunty Ros looked at her daughter Loretta in shock. The rest of the family, not turned around yet, hear the conversation behind them “Are you pulling my leg, Ros. There is no chance a bear would be hear and everyone being so calm!”

The rest of the family turn around as they continue to laugh “So, where is this mythical bear you are talking about then?” They look around café hut, with people surrounding it with hot drinks in their hands. “Look over there, next to the flower display in the corner. Wearing a funny kind of hat”. The family continues to look around “Are you having us on, could this be a party hat that the bear has on?” As the family continue to chuckle together, Aunty Ros grabs Loretta’s arm which leads the family through the loiters holding their hot drinks. Moving over to the corner of the station, where all the flowers are located. “There, and you all didn’t believe me” Aunty Ros exclaimed enthusiastically, doing a little dance in celebration as the entire family stand in shock. As the flower pots, begin to move more and more, a small, furry object between the flowers emerges. Awkwardly, walking out from behind the flowers, holding an old school style suitcase that you would only see a hipster carry these days. Labelled in large letters, the suitcase read voyage to Coronation Street. Some members of the family, took a step back scared “Aunty Ros, you were actually telling the truth. I can’t understand how you managed to spot this bear from back there” They all starred at the funny looking bear with, its light brown fur, muddy red coloured hat, but with the smile from ear to ear. As the family stood, without saying a word the bear walked a step forward, whilst tipping his muddy hat to all, then clears his throat “umm, can I help you?” politely said in a shaky voice.

“Sorry…firstly is good morning” replied Aunty Ros, slightly confused on this introduction. “but more importantly, it should be us asking if we can help you” Aunty Ros gets closer to the bear “you look very small to be a bear”. Shyly looking back up at Aunty Ros “In your perspective maybe, but I am actually big for my race” proudly responding back. “Although, there is not many of us around, where I’m from for you to compare my size too”

“Is this anywhere close to here?” asked Aunty Ros. The bear moved in closer, putting his paws over his mouth before replying “Darkest SVG, but please keep this between us”. The family all look at each other, as some look around to see if an animal officer is on the search. “Why have you emigrated here?” The family responds inquisitively. “I used to live in Darkest SVG with my Aunt Lucy, but she had to go into a home for retired bears” quietly said the bear.

“You came all the way from SVG to here on your own and without a coat” exclaimed Aunty Ros.

“I didn’t believe I would need one in my travels. Aunty Lucy, said that Coronation Street was the best place to go once I am old enough. That’s why she taught me to speak the Queen’s English”

“How amazing, but you must be starving after all that travelling. Would you like anything to eat?” Aunty Ros asked, whilst rummaging through her bag. As she finds a tolberone in her bag to pass onto the bear. He reaches down opening his suitcase, where he pulls out a jar of marmalade. “Not to worry, I have my prized treasure wherever I go” he happily sticks a paw into the jar for a scoop of the marmalade. Amazed by the bears response, “So, what is your plan now?”. “I am off too Coronation Street, to enjoy the set my Aunty told me about so much. However, I have been stuck here for quite some time trying to figure out how I get there”. Aunty Ros turns around and looks at the family, looking into each of their eyes, appealing to their softer side. The family knows what Aunty Ros is thinking with the look in her eyes. They mumble amongst themselves before replying “Ok, he can come with us to Coronation Street. But you will have to vouch for him through the journey”. With the biggest smile, Aunty Ros turns to the bear and leans down to ask “Would you like to accompany us to Coronation Street? We are really fun when you get to know, you just have to be ready for the loudness.” The bear dropped its jar of marmalade on his suitcase in shock at the request. He quickly picked he small belongings up that dropped “y-y-yes please, it would be a pleasure to join you all!”.

“Right, we better make a move, Corrie is waiting for us” Aunty Ros replied giddily. As they made their way through the station, they went through formally introducing everyone in the family to the bear. “Now, we have got that all sorted, what shall we call you, little bear?” Aunty Ros asked. Another member of the family shouted from the back “What about Marmalade?”. Everyone remained silent for a second, before bursting out loud of the name. The bear interrupted the laughing to explain “I do have a name back home, but it I am not sure you can understand or repeat it” He then growled his name out, which as expected no one could understand. “Well, I think we have to come up with an English name for you that we can say, as I am not the best at these different names anyway” Aunty Ros chuckled. Aunty Ros then looked up as they stood in front of the stations sign. We will call you Paddington!”.

The bear repeated “Paddington” a couple time before walking with a little skip in his step “I love it, thank you”. “Can we call him Paddy for short?” a family member asked. “No, reminds me too much of the Emmerdale character and I am not a fan” Said Aunty Ros whilst pushing up her lip. The family and Paddington continued through the station, talking about the different sort of stories they had to get to know each other more. After a couple more, minutes of walking to the correct platform they search the train for the best seats where they could all be sitting together. As they walk through the aisle, people are seen staring at them, well mainly at Paddington. “Don’t worry about all the eyes watching you Paddington, they won’t harm you with us here” Aunty Ros patting him on the shoulder. “Oh, I thought they were giving funny looks to your nephew with the slightly large head” Paddington innocently responded. “Mummy, he really is a funny one, this Paddington. He easily fits into this family” Loretta laughs. Everyone continues to laugh. Paddington, who was the only one not laughing, not understanding what was funny at the point, walks on ahead.

An hour into the journey, a train attendant walks through with a trolley of food and drinks. The excitement in Paddington’s face raises immediately, as his stomach begins to growl. “Please can we get some bottles of water, 2 chocolate bars, a bag of skittles and some of those cakes” The family reel of the list to the attendant. Paddington jumps up “and, and some marmalade please” Paddington says with a big smile on his face. “Marmalade is only for the 1st class section” Sternly replies the attendant. Paddington drops back into his seat, with his hat dropping over his eyes to cover his sadness. “Don’t worry Paddington, once we get to Coronation Street, we will get as much marmalade as possible for you. “Aunty Ros sympathetically says.

Paddington does not reply, still upset that he was not able to get any of the marmalade. After a couple of moments Paddington, requests to go to the toilet. Loretta kindly offers to go with him to make sure he gets there and back safely. After waiting a while outside the toilet for Paddington, Loretta begins to knock on the door to make sure everything is okay. With no response and no sound heard inside, the door opens. But Paddington is nowhere to be seen. Loretta begins to panic and runs back to the family. Explaining what happened, the family quickly get out of their seats, setting a plan to who will be on the search team and who will remain here if he returns to this spot. “I know we are a loud family, but I didn’t think a bear would want leave us that quickly” says Chedwards. “Oh, stop it and carry on looking, something must have happened to him for him to disappear like that” said Aunty Ros worryingly. 30 minutes pass and no one has spotted Paddington anywhere. A ruckus is heard near the front of the train. Aunty Ros jumps up shouting “1st Class”. Remembering this was the only place on the train with marmalade available. They all go rushing towards the 1st class section, where screams and plates smashing are heard. As they enter 1st class, they see the chaos that Paddington has caused throughout the carriage. The passengers are cowering in terror, leaving the walkway clear for the ticket inspector to continue to chase Paddington up and down the aisle. “Come back here, with the marmalade you do not have a ticket to be in here!” shouts the ticket inspector. Whilst running away, Paddington is stuffing his face with as much marmalade as he can, leaving his sticky paw print all over the train. The ticket inspector finally, catches up to Paddington are minutes of him avoiding his grasp. “Gotcha, you pesky little bear. You will not be disturbing this journey for anyone else”. Paddington, still tries to run whilst the inspector has picked him up, but it is no use. “Please excuse Paddington, he just really enjoys marmalade. please let him go” Aunty Ros, pleads with the Inspector. The inspector does not make a move for a while as he continues to stare at Paddington in the air. “He is a danger to this train and it is my duty to keep everyone inside the train safe.” Firmly responds the Inspector. Aunty Ros takes a step closer to the inspector, staring right into his eyes. “Boys, can you go pick up my incense stick please I think this Inspector needs to be taught a lesson about forgiveness.” The boys in the family look at each other, scared for the inspector at this time. “Please inspector, we will pay for what Paddington has eaten and go back to our section and make sure he doesn’t move from his seat until we leave” the family begs to the inspector. The Inspector pauses for a moment, then slowly passes Paddington back to Aunty Ros who continues to stare him down. “Thank you, now will be going back to our seats” Aunty Ros responds. Aunty Ros sympathetically looks at Paddington, as they both give each other a smile. “Before we leave, can I have one last pot of marmalade please?” requests Paddington. The inspector does not say a word, but just points to the exit. As they walk out of the 1st class carriage, a little girl comes out of her row with a handful of pots of marmalade and holds them up for Paddington with a huge smile on her face. “Now, what do you say Paddington to the nice young girl…” Aunty Ros says whilst pushing him closer to the girl. As the girl’s face begins show her shyness, she quickly passes the marmalade to him and scurries back to her seat. Aunty Ros gives him another little push “Thank you, so much I cannot thank you enough for this!” Paddington expresses, with a smile bigger than the girls. The family continue to walk back to their seats, laughing at Paddington’s love for marmalade and the lengths he would go for it. “You have to be more careful next time, we were lucky the Inspector did not kick you off the train. Then you would have missed out on the wonderful marmalade that Coronation Street has to offer”. The family says on when all sat back at their seats. “I am sorry, I just couldn’t wait, especially with the smell of it flowing through this train.” Paddington apologetically replies.

Hours pass, as they get closer to Manchester and the excitement between the family increases. With each of them telling each other stories of their favourite moments watching it on TV and plan that they have for when they reach. “Will Norris be there? My Aunty talked so much about Norris in her stories, it would be great to meet him buy something from the shop.” Asked Paddington. “I am not sure, he will be there when we get there Paddington. However, I am sure you will be able to get some of the best marmalade you have ever tasted to take back with you.” Aunty Ros replies. Excited with the thought of the marmalade, Paddington cannot sit still, bouncing up and down with joy. “Aunt Lucy, said that every day, all they drink and eat in the Rovers is marmalade. Where the marmalade pours out of a tap right into your cup” excitedly says Paddington. The family all look at each other, holding in their laughter but not wanting to burst out into laughter in front of him. “I am not sure that it will be marmalade that flows through the taps, but I am sure you will be pleased with the marmalade they have on offer” cheerfully responds the family.

As the train pulls up to the station, everyone’s eyes are peeled out the window anticipating the train stopping. “Right everyone, pick up your bags. Can’t leave anything behind, don’t forget that suitcase of yours Paddington.” Aunty Ros calls out. The family journeys across Manchester to make their way to Coronation street. Seeing the sights along the travels, the family and Paddington walk around wrapped up in their coats, as Paddington skips on ahead. “Are we getting close to Coronation Street yet?” Paddington asks. The family reply, advising that it is not too far now, telling Paddington just to be patient.

Just before Paddington and the family finally make it to Coronation street everyone seems to have lost their excitement after travelling for hours to get here. Majority of the family are seen dragging their feet, with a considerable amount of silence throughout the group. However, as they see the famous street, everyone begins to get their second wind. Especially, Paddington who cannot control himself and starts to run through the set ahead of everyone. “So, this is where the magic happens.” Exclaims Aunty Ros, as they make it through to the main entrance. All amazed by the scenery, of what they normally just see on TV. The family goes through taking pictures in their favourite places around the set, acting out some of the scenes from the show. Laughing all around the set the tour guides taking other fans around, walk other with their sour faces “please can you refrain from being so loud, I can’t even hear myself think!” angrily says the tour guide. Everyone stops laughing for a moment as the tour guide walks back to her group of people. As he gets around the corner, Paddington jokes “I never knew we would get a chance to see Norris, Aunt Lucy couldn’t have described him any better.” The family burst into laughter, with the tour guide peeping his head back around the corner to give everyone a disapproving look. “can we go to Roy’s Rolls or actually Rovers Return please? I cannot wait to try some of their marmalade” Paddington giddily asks. “The family agree and head off to the Rovers first, as they open up the door, they marvel at how everything looks identical to on TV. Being a part of Corrie’s natural habitat, they walk around through and take a seat on one of the booths. “Can we use those taps to get some marmalade now please?” Paddington asks. “Sorry to say Paddington, but all those taps are used for pouring alcohol and not marmalade” replies the family. “But why are they in the Rovers so much then, Aunt Lucy says that they come in every day? Why would you want to come in here every day and not have marmalade each time?” answers Paddington confusingly. The family laugh at Paddington’s innocent response, as they make their way round to the front of the bar. “Can we actually test out some of the beer here, want to see if it is any good?” One of the Chedwards ask. With no tour guide in the room with them, they quickly rush round to pour a pint. The first tap doesn’t work, which they suspect is due it just being the sets off day. They try a second tap to no avail. Paddington walks round to see what all the fuss is about, as he walks to the tap on the side of the bar slightly lower down than the other ones, which allows him to reach it. Placing his mouth under the tap, he twists it open. “This is marvellous (gulp), I thought you said (gulp), that they don’t have (gulp), marmalade (gulp) in the taps here (gulp)” Paddington says whilst taking big mouths from the tap as marmalade pours down. Everyone stands back stunned by the marmalade. “Looks like Aunt Lucy, was telling the truth” Laughs Aunty Ros. The rest of the family look around for containers, to store some of the marmalade. After filling their boots with marmalade, the tour guide comes through the Rovers door. Caught in the act everyone panics, with the mass of marmalade that they have. Paddington is the first to bolt out of the door with his suitcase full of marmalade. “Stop, with all the marmalade. That is for the Corrie stars!” The tour guide shouts. The remainder of the family exist the pub, apologizing as they rush past the disappointed tour guide. “Well that was unexpected, never thought we would be so lucky with the marmalade. You must be so happy Paddington” Aunty Ros enthusiastically says. Paddington slowly nods his head with a mouthful of marmalade over his face. “Make sure you don’t eat it all now, save some for the journey back and when you go back home” The family says to Paddington, as he guzzles the remaining part of the marmalade in his hands. The family continue through Coronation Street, getting to see all the sights they planned at beginning. Laughing and joking with Paddington, who now feels like a part of the family joining. With the light diminishing and majority of the family all mulled wine out, it is time for them to leave Coronation Street. Which the tour guides seem the most pleased about, trying to put on a slight smile as they wave goodbye. “They are going to miss us, those tour guides. Well especially you Paddington.” Laughs Aunty Ros.

As everyone gets back on the train for the long journey back, they reminisce about the enjoyable short time that they have spent with Paddington. But at that point, it hits them this is maybe the last time Paddington is going to be with them as a family. The journey becomes silent as the family all sit wondering what will happen next with Paddington, if he must go back to the darkest SVG. As the train conductor calls out, for two more stops before they reach their destination. Aunty Ros builds up the courage to ask “If you have nowhere to stay or would like to stay with us for a little while longer. There is always space at ours for a little one?”. Paddington looks back at Aunty Ros surprised on the offer “…Of course, I could not imagine anything better!” Paddington responds.

***

Aunty Ros and Paddington happily make it back to Aunty Ros’s house. Aunty Ros was not sure if Paddington would be pleased with her home, thinking that he would be expecting something much more suited to his bear needs. However, as the door opens, and Aunty Ros leads him through. Paddington freezes at the door step, with his mouth left open. Aunty Ros’s face drops, excepting the worst in Paddington’s reaction. “It’s…” Paddington slowly says before being interrupted. “You don’t like it do you, I will be fine if you wanted to go back to the darkest SVG straight away?” Aunty Ros sympathetically says turning her back to Paddington, to not show her disappointment. “It’s wonderful! Aunt Lucy, would be delighted that I am in such a loving home” Paddington says with his eyes sparkling as they scan around the house. He is automatically drawn to sofas, where he carefully sits. Putting his suitcase down, the side. As the suitcase drops to the floor it hits the leaver, thrusting the legs of the chair up. “woah, never in all my bear years have I seen or heard of this” all giddily Paddington replies. As he pulls the leaver up and down, sending the chair flying in response. Aunty Ros is so pleased with his reaction, she does not know what to do but clap her hands in joy. “Ok, enough of that now Paddington. You are going to the wear out the chair and you have not been here for two minutes” Aunty Ros, says with a smile on her face, but with the added sternness. “Right, let’s get you cleaned up before bed. You must still be sticky with that marmalade over your face” As Aunty Ros says that, Paddington sticks out his tongue and licks all around his face. “All clean” Paddington replies with a big grin. Aunty Ros looks at Paddington, with a side eye whilst pushing up her mouth. “Paddington. I don’t know if it was Aunt Lucy who taught you that, but when in my house you are going to have to have a proper wash. With a scrubber and soap to really, get you clean” Aunty Ros says whilst patting Paddington head. After being all cleaned up, the two get comfortable in front of the tv. Aunty Ros switches on Coronation Street, to catch up on the ones that were missed previously. As they clink each other’s mugs of hot drink to cheers, they giggle at their matching nighties ready for another entertaining episode of Corrie. 

[scribbles-spills-the-ink]

Mockingbird| Connor x fem! Reader

A/n: All of my x readers contain a reader with a disability, sometimes the disability is important, other times it’s just an extension to the character. Abled bodied readers can still read/like/comment/ and reblog, of course.

Warnings: Cussing because Hank is in here, transfer aid (wheelchair), the reader being disabled is important to the chapter and the one somber moment is with them.

Style: fluff + angst 

Dedicated to- @kxylla

A/N: I think at one point the POV switches to first person by accident, if you spot it please tell me so I can fix it. Thank you!

Third Person POV:

The warmth of the suns comforting glow draped over you as you sat on your mint green couch, which was pressed against your bay window. Your wanderlust filled eyes deciphered each and every word that was tattooed onto the coffee stained page.

“Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read. One does not love breathing.”

Those words were highlighted in a bright pink and you smiled at the memory of when you did that. Of course you were reading To Kill a Mockingbird, by Harper Lee. It was the only physical book you owned, because it was your favorite, and with the Android Revolution that was brewing outside your window: it seemed appropriate. 

You paused your reading to take a sip of your warm coffee that rested on your stand by the bed, but just then, you heard a knock at your door. You sighed in disappointment and placed your plain book mark inside your book and gently sat it on the coffee table.

You slid into your wheelchair, smoothed out your yellow skirt, and fixed your cream colored crop top as to make yourself presentable for the unexpected guest. As you pushed it, the wheelchair made it’s way to the door gracefully and you opened it.

Connor and Hank stared back at you urgently, and it didn't take long for you to notice that Connor was drenched in blue blood.

“Oh my god!” You exclaimed with a hand over your mouth. “What happened to you-” You pulled Connor inside the house, and Hank followed suit. “-are you hurt!?”

“Ms. a/n, need I remind you that I am an android, therefore, I can not be injured?” Connor replied in a matter-of-fact tone.

You rolled your eyes as Hank answered you, “He’s not hurt, Y/n, there was a misstep on the mission and he got in the middle of it, but he’s fine.”

You sighed in relief before you continued, “So why are you guys here?”

“What?” Hank snickered. “Are we not welcomed at casa de y/n?”

You playfully glared at Hank, “That’s not what I meant and you know it, now stop pulling on my leg!”

“I believe that it's imperative to inform you that your leg is not being pulled.” You and Hank stared at Connor in disbelief, and sensing that there was a miscommunication, Connor looked up what you said.

“Oh, it was an expression,” He concluded. “why can’t you human’s ever speak literally.”

“Because it’s funny seeing you confused.” you jokingly answered.

Hank cleared his throat and stated, “We were hoping that you could wash up Connor’s clothes for him, and I was hoping that you could hold onto him for a bit.”

“He’s your android and your partner-” You remined him “-shouldn’t he be by your side at all times?”

“I should be,” Connor butted in. “but the Lieutenant seems to find one of my behaviors unacceptable.”

You snickered, “He finds all of your behaviors unacceptable, be more specific.”

“He fucking sleeps standing up!” Hank exclaimed and threw his hands in the air. “And when he doesn’t sleep, the shit head wanders around my house!”

“I only did that one time, Lieutenant!” 

“Do you know how fucking creepy that is!?”

You waved your hands up and down, indicating them to lower their voices, “Okay, okay, why are y’all yelling?”

“I can’t stand him anymore!” Hank pointed his hand at Connor. “Shit, he’s driving me insane!”

“Alright!” You exclaimed. “I’ll take him but I’m not going to be responsible for dropping him off at work, you better come get him.”

“Deal, as long as he’s out of my hair,” Hank muttered to himself, even though, Connor and I could her him perfectly.

I rolled my eyes, “You leaving?”

Hank had grabbed his coat and already had his hand on the door knob, “I’ve got fifteen hours without this asshole breathing over my shoulder, hell yes I’m leaving.” He said before he slammed the door shut.

With a snicker you shook your head and turned to Connor, “There’s a bathroom down the hall, take off whatever you need washed and I’ll give you some of my brothers old clothes.”

Connor nodded before he disappeared into the bathroom, and while he did that you wheeled yourself into your bedroom. Inside the closet were boxes of your brothers old clothes from the time when he lived with you, you really have to remind him to come get them, but they would work for now. 

You pulled out a large tank top which had ‘I Love Dogs’ printed on it- you laughed at how appropriate it was -and a pair of comfortable shorts. Before you were able to put them back, you spotted a figure from the corner of your eye. There, in the middle of the hallway, stood Connor shirt and pant less.

Heat rushed to your neck and face as you buried your face in your hands. For as smart as the android is during investigations he’s so naïve toward the real world it was unbelievable, and his lack of fear or humiliation didn’t help. 

“Ms L/n, I have removed the articles of clothing you wished to-”

“Yes, I see that!” You blindly felt around the bed for the extra cloths and reached them out to him once you found them. “Please, go and change back in the bathroom.”

You assumed that Connor had found out what had made you so flustered as he replied, “Why don’t I change in here?”

“Connor!” You squeaked and parted your fingers just in time to see the amused smirk on his face before he turned around. 

Once he left you lowered your hands and instead of be resentful, you laughed. You laughed because it felt more like an inside joke than anything else, and despite it’s undertones, it felt innocent. 

You grabbed the blue stained clothes from the arm of your office chair before you transferred from your manuel to electric wheelchair. Pushing the joystick forward you maneuvered through the house and to the laundry room.

You quickly threw his t-shirt in with the other whites and left his pants with the darks as you decided to wait until the morning to wash them. As you closed the washing machines’ top and left the room you spotted Connor near your reading spot, To Kill a Mockingbird open in his hands.

The orange and purplish sunset created a silhouette around his body and shadows along his face. The most entrancing, however, were his brown eyes, as suddenly brown wasn't and accurate way to describe them. They were warm and comforting like the sun that shined through your window, yet sweet and enticing like honey.

"I never knew you liked to read," Connor's silver voice broke through your daze of imagination. "To Kill a Mockingbird is a good choice, have you read it before?"

"I-I read it back in school," You answered nervously and tucked a strand of hair behind your ear, "and it- it was my favorite."

His goofy imitation of a smile cracked through his machinery mask, "Is this your favorite line?" He asked before he recited, "Until I feared I would lose it, I never loved to read. One does not love breathing."

A nostalgic smile appeared on your face, "Yes, it is, although there are many others in there."

"May I ask you a personal question?" Connor asked as he gently placed the bookmark in the book and then the book on the coffee stand.

"Go on."

"Why is that your favorite line?"

Your bookworm heart swelled at his question, as you had only wished for someone to ask you a question like this one. You had always wanted someone to discuss your favorite stories with, but didn't because of the fear of being labeled as a nerd or freak. Those were childish thoughts, but by time you learned that the opinions of others didn't matter, it was too late.

"Back in eighth grade" you tensed as the memories started to flood your mind. "I was just getting used to my wheelchair and one of the comments I got a lot was, 'it must be nice not having to walk everywhere.' I hated that, because those kids who said that to me, they had no idea how jealous I was of them."

You and Connor sat down on the couch as Connor waited patiently for you to continue.

"Then in English, we started reading To Kill a Mockingbird. The class had hardly gotten pass chapter one and I already knew that I was going to love this book, so I went out and bought my own copy. Then we read that line and it hit me so hard, because I knew what it felt like to have something you take for granted taken away from you. For Scout it was reading for me it was walking."

"Until you couldn't walk, you never valued being able to." Connor concluded as you finished your story.

You spared him a sad smile and nodded, "It was something I took from granted. I'm okay without being able to walk now, I just-" You paused for a moment to compose your thoughts and your memories. "-I just wish I did more with it while I could.” 

You and Connor sat in a comfortable silence for a moment until an interesting question came to your mind. "Is there anything you think you take for granted Connor? Anything you can't imagine a world without?"

Connor stared at his hands as he somewhat skipped over your question. "I don't think so Y/-"

He stopped mid sentence as he brought his eyes to meet yours. Your head was tilted in ceriousity and your eyes, while tired, still were sparked with wanderlust. The moon transformed your iris into a kaleidoscope and your face had never looked so soft, so kind, or so sweet.

On his temple his LED flashed rapidly between yellow and red as his next words tumbled out raw, and unfiltered.

"Maybe...maybe there is one thing."

[SOFTWARE INSTABILITY^]

[feelssogoodinmyarms]

songfic hernst of “we looked like giants” by Death Cab For cutie

Heyyyyy there uhhhhh it’s MONTHS late but I did it YEET

WC: 1622

TW: It gets kind of,,, nsfw after “Next thing he knew” and continues until “That day”. It’s not at all explicit but I figured I’d warn just incase. 

Maybe it was his smile, or the way he nibbled his pencil, or how his lips moved when he read, but something about Ernst that drew Hanschen in. The blonde could usually charm his way to the hearts of cute people, but Ernst was different. However, today was the day. Hanschen was going to ask Ernst out. Today he wouldn’t get distracted by Ernst’s pretty eyes or his laugh or anything. Hanschen tried his best to look confident as he walked to Ernst’s locker with his usual swagger.

“Hi!” Ernst signed as hanschen approached him. Ernst was holding onto his backpack straps and smiling. Hanschen could have melted right then and there but he forced himself to stay cool.

“Hi. How’s it going?” Hanschen signed.

“Great, actually! I got a 96% on my math test and Wendla made cookies. I think she’s in bio if you want to get some from her. How are you?”

“I’m great too. Well, not great because I-” Hanschen tried to flip his hair seductively but instead hit his head on the locker he was leaning on.

“Shit!” He yelled as his hand flew to his forehead.

“Crap! Are you ok?” Ernst signed before reached to touch Hanschen’s bruise.

“Yeah, I’ll be fine” Hans signed before gingerly touching his forehead again.

“Should we go get an ice pack?” Ernst asked.

“No no, it’s fine”“You’re still cute when you bump your head, you know” Ernst grew less concerned and more flirty.

“Thanks” the blonde boy couldn’t help but smile at that.

“You sure you don’t need me to kiss it or something?” Ernst signed, a coy smile on his lips.

“Oh god, you’re too nice” Was Ernst flirting with him? Was this progress?

“Well you are one of my closest friends” and just like that, Hansi’s heart sank again with the use of ‘friend’.

“Was there something you wanted to ask me?” Ernst signed, still smiling.

Right! What was it? God, Ernst was so hot. That sparkle in his eyes was so distracting, he was just so pretty… what was he going to ask?

“I forgot” Hanschen felt like an idiot.

“Well, see you Hansi!” Hanschen internally kicked himself when he remembered that he was going to ask Ernst out.

He gave a weak wave as Ernst walked away. God, that boy was amazing. Hansi could never tell if Ernst was flirting or just being nice. Hanschen was being played at his own game and it was driving him crazy. How could he have everyone in the whole school except for the guy he wanted?

Hanschen was still distressing over the encounter a few days later. When He saw Ernst giggling over something with Georg Zirschnitz, his anger surged. It was gross, how close together they were. What was so funny that a dweeb like Georg could be saying? Hanschen felt a burning in his chest and stormed over to the boys before he could rationalize the situation.

“Hi! We were just talking-“ Hanschen angrily cut Georg off before he could finish.

“Beat it, Zirschnitz” He snapped without signing.

“Jeez, ok. See you Ernst” Georg signed to the other boy before exiting.

“What was that about?” Ernst looked confused. Why would him talking to Georg piss Hansi off so much?

“Why were you talking to him, of all people?” Hanschen questioned, still angry.

“He was telling me a funny story. I know him from Bio. Why do you care?” Ernst didn’t need permission to talk to people from Hanschen. Well, he and Georg weren’t exactly talking. Georg was trying to flirt with Ernst in his own Georgish way. Ernst had flirted back a little just for fun. But why would Hanschen care?

“I don’t, I just-“ If Hansi had a crush on Ernst, he would care.

“Jealous, Herr Rilow?” Ernst teased.

Hanschen felt his face start to heat up.

“No” Oh he definitely was. Ernst could have squealed for joy and kissed him right then but decided to keep Hansi waiting.

“Really? Because you look pretty upset” Ernst was thoroughly enjoying the feeling of rendering Hansi speechless, especially like this.

Next thing Ernst knew Hanschen had pinned him to the wall of the courtyard. He silently thanked god that there was no one around. Ernst was terrified but still had the smallest bit of a grin on his face. He was loving how protective Hansi got suddenly.

Hanschen’s scowl turned into a sinister smirk before pressing his lips to the other boy’s. He pulled away after just a moment to see if Ernst was ok with his advances. Ernst took advantage of it and pressed Hanschen to the wall instead before reconnecting their lips. Hanschen sunk down on the wall as their kisses became slower and less sloppy. He let Ernst move on top of him and press his body into the soft grass. His hands had just moved to Ernst’s waist when they heard footsteps. Ernst quickly flung himself off of Hanschen and tried his best to look casual.

Luckily, it was only Moritz, who barely lifted his glance from his shoes to wave at the two boys. Still, it was a close call.

“What class do you have?” Hanschen signed after a moment. 

“English. I can skip it” Ernst knew that sounded desperate, but he was done with playing it cool.

“Are you suggesting that we get out of here?”

“That’s exactly what I’m suggesting, if you’d like to”

“God, yes”

The plan was to go back to Hanschen’s house. His parents worked late and Thea and Melitta usually went to friends’ houses after school. But when the boys found a secluded part behind the mountain passes on their way, they decided the urge to touch each other couldn’t wait any longer. 

“Are you a virgin?” Hansi signed when he felt Ernst’s hips start to grind against his. 

“In theory. I’ve never gone all the way but I’ve done stuff, if that’s what you mean” Ernst replied, trying not to blush at his own excitement. 

“Would you want to-“ Hans began. 

“Not today, not here, I couldn’t-”

“We don’t have to go all the way right now. I just wanted to know. I would never do that if you didn’t want to” Ernst smiled.

“Could we go back to what we were doing?” Hanschen smiled, genuinely this time, before his lips collided with Ernst’s once again. It was all hands fisted in each others hair and slid down the other’s pants, lip bites and moans, and want. 

“Is this good?” Hanschen was touching him and Ernst was savoring every second. 

“Yes” Was all Ernst could sign, nodding his head for more. “Oh 

god- please!” 

“Mmmm… oh Ernst, I’m gonna-“ 

It ended wrapped in each other’s arms, with just them and the warm breeze. That day they were awkward and too excited and unsure, but it was the first of many. Once, sometimes twice a week that’s what they did. They’d sign themselves out of classes they didn’t need to be in or leave at free period to go explore each other’s bodies. It was there, behind the hills, secluded by tall grasses and flowers, on his back, that Ernst started to learn what love was. How to make love, and how to feel it so deeply for another person. 

“I think I’m falling in love with you ” Hanschen signed one afternoon. It was a Sunday afternoon, they boys had been eyeing each other throughout the entire service. Ernst had made an excuse about studying with Moritz and ran behind the church to meet Hansi. 

“Really?” Ernst broke into the cheesiest grin and he didn’t even care. It was difficult not to melt with Hanschen’s head in his lap and the boy confessing feeling to him

“Yes” Hanschen signed as he sat up. “Is that ok? Because I didn’t know if you liked me like that or just enjoyed the sex? Because that’s ok, I don’t-” Ernst cut Hanschen’s signing off my softly pressing their lips together. Ernst smiled before answering Hanschen’s questions. 

“I’m in love with you too. I do enjoy the sex, but I love you for more than that. I love all of you” Hanschen smiled sheepishly. 

“I’m sorry, I’m usually not like this”

“Like what?” Ernst asked.

“At a loss for words, vulnerable, everything you make me feel” Ernst felt the same, but he didn’t need to say anything.The look on his face told Hansi everything.

“So where does that put us?” Ernst asked. The brunette already knew the answer, but the two had never discussed it.

“You mean in this relationship?”

“Yes. Are we boyfriends?” Just so they were on the same page.

“I’d say so, if you want to be”

“I definitely want to be” the verbal reassurance was everything.

“Good” the pair enjoyed the comfortable silence for a moment until Hanschen started to laugh.

“I’ve never had a boyfriend before” It sounded ridiculous to say.

“Really? But all the people you’ve screwed?”

“Sex doesn’t always equal romance”

“Right. Well it’s really not that hard. It’s pretty fun, actually. You know, holding hands in the hallway and sneaking into janitor’s closets’ to make out”

“You’ve done all that?” It was Ernst’s turn to laugh.

“No, but I’ve always wanted to”

“We can do that together”

Ernst smiled before kissing Hanschen and pushing him down into the soft grass. He closed his eyes and turned to memorize exactly how it all felt, from the hands in his hair, to the way Ernst’s warm lips felt like heaven on his, to the tingling in his hands and feet.

The world felt so small compared to what he had with Ernst. The two of them were like giants. The world was insignificant.

[theinkstainsblog]

I see it this way. To Kill a Mockingbird, The Great Gatsby, Lolita to name a few are harmful and problematic but for years and years the school system requires these books to be read by 14-15 y/os. Also, a lot of classics we're forced to read are pretty racist. I didn't know if at 14/15 if I had a choice to skip them, but I felt like I had no choice. Now schools try to ban books like The Hunger Games, The Scarlett Letter, even Harry Potter. (1/5)

But now we have something called “Banned Books Week” where libraries and schools put them on a shelf for us to read b/c it promotes analytical thinking and the government shouldn’t be allowed to censor books. Not to mention, if I read a problematic book in a college level English class, the only way to prove my point is by reading the source material. A college professor would laugh me out of university if I wrote my paper like this: “Lolita is problematic because my friend said so.” (2/5)

I’m aware that there are some people who read these books b/c they get the giggles from doing whatever they please, but I honestly think it’s important for discourse for people to read those books if the content isn’t triggering to them specifically. For instance, with Carve the Mark I have read multiple reviews by POC on blogs and Booktube who did not see the racism AT all (the chronic pain issue is another story). I’m a POC so I decided to listen to other POC. If I had just listened to (3/5)

two non-POC say, “It’s racist! Don’t read it!” I’d never know how those two opinions might have been skewed a little. The natural course of action would be to seek out the source itself and read the book or listen to more than two opinions. As it stands, the CTM doesn’t interest me at all so I haven’t read it, but I based my opinion on people who DID read it anyway and were people like me. I personally can’t listen to a handful of people claim something until I have the source or context. (4/5)

I wouldn’t read a problematic book just to be funny and try to offend people, but because I can’t know what I’m talking about unless I have more information. If I went to college and my professor asked me to write a paper on CTM and my paper said, “Based on my sources from Goodreads, this book is problematic, here’s *their* opinion, not mine” the professor would fail me. Anyway, that’s just my thoughts. I get where you’re coming from but I just wanted to offer another explanation. (5/5)

6. Sorry, last thing!! Obviously, if a book is blatantly homophobic especially if written by someone who is NOT queer and the LGBT+ community says so, I personally would NOT read that book. If it relates to race, as I’m a POC I just feel obligated to seek out more information b/c many non-POC have claimed racism when, I, as a POC did not see any (or vice versa). It depends case-by-case for me. I know this was long…

Hiya! No worries about it being long, I’m really interested by this sort of thing so I’m happy to discuss it. I do understand what you’re saying, and I don’t disagree that it’s good to try and get all of the information so that you can form your own opinions however I do want to raise a few points. 

You said that when it comes to books critiqued for racism you might read them anyway as a person of colour, but not if it was a book critiqued for homophobia. I think that’s a super important distinction to make there - because that’s you wanting to find out for yourself something that impacts your own lived experience. I don’t see that as harmful in any way, it’s you that’s being affected by it so you have a right to do whatever you want regarding that. It’s great that you listen to the LGBT+ community as well though, that’s what I’d love to see more of - white people listening to people of colour on issues impacting them, cis het allo people listening to LGBT+ people on issues impacting us, able-bodied people listening to disabled people and so on. 

The issue with buying them just to find out for yourself what’s going on is that the publishers don’t know or care why you bought it. All they care is that they got your money. And if they get enough money then they’ll publish more books like that which is really the opposite of what we want. People can write whatever they like of course, I can’t stop them but I hope the aim for most of us is to get better and better representation.  So it’s best not to buy these books if you can and prevent that from happening - but especially if you’re not the person impacted by them as I said. That’s why I personally feel it’s best to avoid the most harmful books as much as possible.

On your point about books like Lolita and To Kill A Mockingbird being potentially problematic, I don’t disagree with you however I think we have to take older books a little differently to books being written now. Attitudes at the time were different and - while that doesn’t make them right or okay in ANY way - we have progressed since then. Classes should discuss problematic elements and dissect them absolutely. But someone who writes something problematic now is a far far different problem than older books with outdated views.

Of course, all books (and films and shows and people) are problematic to some degree. It’s impossible not to be. When I say I found a book problematic I genuinely mean that the premise is narrative is so inherently flawed or harmful that it’s just not redeemable. As opposed to a book that only has one or two problematic lines in it in which case I would draw attention to those lines to warn people who may be hurt by it, but I would not discourage people from reading it.

Also, I do think it’s important to consider that even within a community or marginalised group, we all have different experiences and while we personally might find something okay, that doesn’t mean it’s not still harmful. Personally, I have read Carve The Mark because unfortunately I had ordered it before I heard about the issues and I made an effort before reading to read as many reviews as I could find (positive and negative) by people of colour. What I found was that while some weren’t offended or hurt by the issues, the issues being talked about definitely were there. Just different people take offence to different things. And I think that’s the case for a lot of problematic books - the issue is there, it just might not affect everyone. 

Similarly, this is why I don’t like own voices books being critiqued as problematic - for example, I’ve seen reviews of a book by a bisexual author being called problematic because the bi main character is promiscious. Because everyone even in a community is so different we also have different ideas of what good rep looks like. And while being promiscious is a bi stereotype I’d like straight people to stay the heck away from, bi promiscious people do exist and them writing their own stories shouldn’t be critiqed for that. 

At the end of the day, these are just my views and I’m not gonna jump on you if you disagree or if you read a book that I found to be harmful. I just want people to be aware and critical of these issues. Sometimes problematic fiction can cause real life harm or at least mirror it - black people being portrayed as violent savages in Carve The Mark does nothing to help black people being perceived as violent thugs in real life for example. If people choose to read it anyway then I can’t stop them, but ideally, I’d at least like them to be aware of those issues so they can discuss it and minimise the harm caused.

And that is why I never shut up about representation.  

[augustinjapan-spring2017]

Day 88: I’m being social?

Today was actually a very interesting day! In Japanese we learned a new grammar point called transitivity pairs. Basically they are verbs where one is used if you cause the action yourself (so if I turn on a light) vs if the action occurred on its own (so if a light turns on automatically). Today was also the first day our student teacher taught in class. She went a little fast due to her nervousness but otherwise she did really well!

I had a bit of a break reading at the library and then grabbed some lunch with Trisha. After lunch, I meant to just spend the entirety of my break just on my laptop. However, three Japanese students suddenly came up to me and asked if I was busy. I said no and they asked if they could sit down and talk with me for a while. It was about 1:40pm when they sat down and they ended up staying and talking with me until my next class at 3:00pm! All three of them were 18 year old freshmen that were in the study abroad program (in the sense that they are intending to study abroad sometime during college). We chatted about our classes, hobbies, pets, siblings (or lack of in my case), favorite foods, music, etc. They were fairly good at English and it was really cute to see them try to discuss with each other how to say something, even pulling up google translate sometimes to help them. I even brought out my Japanese kanji worksheet at one point and together they helped me read it and I helped them translate the sentences into English. Eventually, two other Japanese girls came to join and I was just with this group of 5 Japanese students while I was the only international student. It was a lot of fun! By the end we all took a selfie together and exchanged Line accounts to message and maybe get together again in the future. Even if we don’t end up doing that, it was a really nice experience and I’m glad they joined me on my break.

After that I had Koto where my group mates and I finalized our plans for karaoke and we practiced the long song throughout the entire class. The only big thing that happened (which was kinda scary for me!) was that one of the koto’s strings snapped while I was playing! Luckily it didn’t hit my hands or face (my pick must have been the final pressure on it when it snapped), but it still scared me and it was in the middle of the song too! I was a bit nervous to play the rest of class but luckily nothing else like that happened.

In Religion in Japan I was abandoned by all three of the classmates around me so I was just awkwardly sitting my myself. I talked a bit with the girl I befriended on the Tenrikyo trip but otherwise I was all alone... Dylan and Jacy apparently had decided to skip, but luckily the other girl (her name is Brianna) came in about 15 minutes late. I caught her up on everything and she told me that she had gotten lost on her way back from Kyoto, which was why she was late. By the end of a long class where we talked more about the general beliefs of Buddhism, I was definitely ready to head home. I parted ways with Brianna and was about to walk back on my own, when she suddenly came running to catch up with me. Apparently the girl she had been waiting for had already left and she wanted to walk back with me. It was the first time we’d walked back just the two of us, and since up til now she was closer with Jacy and Dylan, we hadn’t had the chance to talk much. It was really nice! She’s super nice and funny, and we had a great time just talking all the way back to the Seminar Houses. I think I may have made a new friend! Overall, today has been a surprisingly social day for me.

After walking back, the rest of the evening was spent making soup with Trisha for dinner and chilling out. Tomorrow is karaoke!

(prev) 14 April 2017 (next)

[wordsofphandom]

What I Wouldn’t Do - A Phanfiction Part II

At a book signing, Phil, a succesful author of children’s books, meets the five-year-old Dylan and his gorgeous single father Dan. Though they are instantly drawn to each other, certain issues, let alone a lively five-year-old complicate things for Dan and Phil, and they have to find out just what they would - or wouldn’t do, to be together.

parent!phan / fluff/ angst/ singlefather!Dan / children’s author!Phil / Dil Howlter (kind of)

Wordcount: 4.2k Warnings: none

Part II

A week went by, but Phil didn’t hear from Dan and on Sunday, he was beginning to think he never would. Nevertheless, he found himself doing sketches of the same two characters: a white kitten with red and brown patches and a striped tomcat. He drew the kitten playing in autumn leaves, while its father kept a watchful eye on it. He drew them drinking milk from the same bowl and cuddling on a velvet pillow. You didn’t have to be Sigmund Freud to know who he was really drawing. However, Phil never drew himself into the pictures. He had a meeting with his agent on Thursday, and they discussed the possibility of doing a Lion and Lioness Movie. An American major studio was keenly interested in buying the rights, but it was difficult for Phil to sign them away. If they did make a film, Phil would want to be involved, and he knew very little about animation. When he was still thinking of nothing but Dan and Dylan on Friday, Phil decided to drive up north and spend the week-end with his parents. In these cases, distance was always a good idea. He had a wonderful time and when he came back, he was almost ready to forget about the Howells. On Tuesday afternoon, however, his phone rang. And it was Dan calling. Curious, he answered the phone. “Hello?”

“Hey, Phil. It’s Dan. Dan Howell, Dylan’s father”. “Of course, I remember you” Phil said, bemused. “Right… uh, listen, do you have any plans on Friday afternoon?” “This Friday?” “Yes” “No, I don’t think so… why d’you ask?” “Because I have a problem, and I’d like to abuse your offer of being Dylan’s friend. My boss scheduled a meeting on Friday from 4 to 5 pm, so I can’t pick up Dylan from school. None of his friends can take him, and I really don’t want to ask Jess… so I thought that maybe you could pick him up and bring him home?” “Yeah, I’d love that” Phil said. “Do you want me to take him to my place or bring him to yours?”. “Our place, I think. Or you could go to the park for a while… It’s going to be very easy, and it’s just for a few hours”. “Sure, don’t worry” Phil said. “Just tell me where and when to pick him up and I’ll be there. Does he have a key for your flat?” “He’s five” retorted Dan. “So, no?” “He’d lose it on the playground, or when he’s running, or something… And anyway, I don’t want to burden him with that responsibility yet”. Phil felt stupid. “Of course” he said; he should have thought of that. “The neighbour has a spare key. He’ll let you in”.

On Wednesday and Thursday, Phil was nervously looking forward to his time with Dylan. The last time he’d spend the day with a five-year old had to be years and years ago, when Phil had been a child himself; unless, of course, you counted last Sunday. So, what were him and Dylan going to do? In preparation, he called his Mum and discussed the matter with her. Also, he bought some picture books and a Children’s-Experiments-Box, as well as a football, because he didn’t know what Dylan was into and he wanted him to have a good time. When Friday had come, he packed all of those things into a big bag and took the Tube to Dylan’s school. Dylan was overjoyed to see him. The first to leave the class room, he ran out of the door and hugged Phil’s legs enthusiastically. “Phil!” he squealed. “Hello, Dylan” Phil laughed and somewhat awkwardly petted his head. “You got your things?”. They collected Dylan’s reading bag and his coat. Phil also made Dylan wear the woolly hat and the scarf, although Dylan insisted that Daddy never cared about that. “I just don’t want you to be cold” Phil explained, but Dylan just shrugged. “I’m never cold” he explained. They left the school and visited Dylan’s favourite play ground on the way home. In the wet and muddy park, Dylan met a few of his school friends and Phil waited with some other mothers at the side. But just as the conversation got too awkward (“Are you Mr Howell’s brother? A friend? His boyfriend?”), Dylan asked Phil to play with him, which Phil gladly did. Dylan loved the new football. He appointed Phil goalie and he and his friends kicked penalty-shots. Only when both Phil and Dylan were thoroughly cold and dirty, did they walk home. Dylan was holding Phil’s hand and skipping along the way, all the time chatting about his school and his friends. When they arrived, they got the keys from the middle aged guy who lived in the flat above Dan and Dylan’s; Dan would be home in an hour.

For homework, Dylan was supposed to read a picture book, so Phil gave him one of the new ones he’d bought and went to prepare supper. He had brought ingredients for both pancakes and Spaghetti Bolognese. “Which do you prefer?” he asked Dylan. The little boy looked up from his book. “Pancakes, please” he said. “May I flip them?”. His question made Phil chuckle. “I have to make the batter, first”. “Okay” Dylan went back to his book. When Dan came home, Phil and Dylan had made a big stack of pancakes, had squeezed some lemons and had set the table for three. “Wow, it smells delicious” Dan commented when he came in. He gave Dylan a kiss on the head. “Did you have a nice time with Phil?”. “Yes!” Dylan shouted. “Look what he got me!” he handed him the picture book. Dan studied it. “That was really kind, Phil” he looked at him “You shouldn’t have”. “It’s nothing, really”. “Still, thank you very much” Dan said. “Dylan, did you say thank you?”. “Thank you, Phil!” Dylan said again. Phil smiled at the both of them. “You’re very welcome” Yet the atmosphere was somewhat awkward. “Shall we eat?”.

After supper, Dan checked whether Dylan had done his homework and invited Phil to stay for a movie. They cuddled up on the sofa – Dylan between the two men – drank hot chocolate and watched Howl’s Moving Castle. During the scary scenes, Dylan alternated between Dan and Phil to hide his face against. After the film was over, it was bed time for Dylan. “Can Phil bring me to bed? Please, Daddy, please” he pleaded, giving both Dan and Phil huge puppy dog eyes. Dan chuckled. “You’ll have to ask Phil. Maybe he’s got plans for tonight”. “May you please stay, Phil?” Dylan said, concentrating his efforts on Phil, whose heart melted a little bit at the sight of the pouting boy. “Yes, I can stay” he promised. As the day had been long and exhausting, Dylan fell asleep quickly. Technically, Phil’s job was done now, but the thought of his empty flat in Islington made him sad. “Would you like a glass of wine?” Dan asked. It was a relief that apparently, Dan didn’t want him to leave, either. “Yes, please” Phil said. So, Dan opened a bottle of red wine and they sat down on the couch again. Casually, Dan swung his legs over Phil’s lap. “Did you have a nice day?” he asked. “Probably the best I’ve had in weeks” Phil admitted. Dan grinned at him. “You’re your own boss, how can you even have bad days?” “True, I never really have bad days… I just rarely have a day as good as this one”. “That’s nice to hear” Dan took a sip from his glass. “I can tell that Dylan had a really good day, too”. Phil beamed. “Next time, though, please don’t buy him stuff” When Dan realized, that Phil’s smile had shrunk a little, he hurried to say “Don’t get me wrong. I think it’s so kind of you to give him a present, thank you again, I just wouldn’t want him to get used to it, you know what I mean? He shouldn’t see you as, I don’t know, his fairy godmother”. For a brief moment, Phil pictured himself in a blue cloak with a wand. The idea was funny, but Dan was right. “I get it” he said. “Thank you” Dan said, “that seems to be all I’m saying, today”. “I don’t mind” Phil answered, teasing “You wouldn’t, would you?” Dan grinned, before his expression got a bit more mellow “I’d forgotten how nice it is to come home to someone that isn’t five years old”. “How long has it been?” Phil asked. “Since uni – I used to share a flat with a couple of friends. Well, I did live with Jess for 6 months, after Dylan was born. But that was only aggravating”. “What were you studying?” Dan laughed dryly. “Law” he said curtly. “Wasn’t one of my brightest ideas”. “You didn’t like it?” Phil asked. “I hated it. I mean, Criminal Law was interesting, but Corporate Law was literally killing me. I dropped out when Dylan was born, so I could work full time. But, honestly, that was just an excuse... How about you? Did you go to uni?”. “Yes, I did. I studied English Literature and Linguistics in York. When that was done, I didn’t feel ready to find a proper job, so I did a Master’s degree in Graphic Design here in London”.   Looking amused, Dan shook his head. “What?” Phil wanted to know. “It’s just… Is there anything you’re not great at?” Dan said. “Of course!” Phil exclaimed, his cheeks reddening. “Oh yeah, like what?” Dan counted down on his fingers. “You’re a fantastic story teller, a great artist, an intellectual with two degrees, the best kisser I’ve ever had, you’re good with kids and an overall wonderful person”. Phil’s face was positively burning now. “I’m rubbish at most sports, I don’t play an instrument and if you ever saw me dancing, you’d never think I was perfect again” he said meekly. “Shut up!” Dan laughed. “And for the record; you’re a great kisser, too”. They looked at each other. Dan’s lower lip was dark from the wine; his eyes were sparkling. Never had anybody looked as kissable as Dan looked in this moment. But then, Dan lowered his gaze and the moment was over. To cover up his disappointment, Phil emptied his glass. “More wine?” Dan asked, but Phil shook his head. “The Tube is closing soon… I think I should probably go home”. “Yeah, I guess you’re right…” Dan said, yawning. Reluctantly, the two of them got to their feet. While Phil was packing his things, Dan was yawning even more, which gave Phil a bad conscience. Of course, Dan was tired; he had had a long day; Phil should have gone home and let him sleep hours ago. “When will I see you again?” Phil asked, before he left. “Don’t know. May I call you again, if I need someone to pick Dylan up from school?” “Yes, of course! Please do!”. Dan smiled. “And may I call you, if I need you to spend time with me, too?” “You absolutely may” Phil said. “Thank you, Phil” Quickly, Dan kissed him on the cheek. “You’re the best”.

The next morning, Phil slept in. He prepared oatmeal and coffee and had breakfast in the living room, watching animes on his TV. At around noon, he went into his study and took another look at the tomcat and kitten pictures he had drawn after he had first met Dylan and Dan. He really liked the characters and fuelled by an intense happiness he felt since yesterday, he drew some proper character studies. The kitten, he decided, should be called Felix; playful, excitable but also somewhat pragmatic. The father he called Maximilian and he changed his fur colour to black, with a white belly, paws and snout. Maximilian shared his son’s pragmatisms, but he was more resigned. Also, he loved his son very much. Characters always came easy to Phil, but the story he wanted to tell was often more difficult to come up with. Were Maximilian and Felix street cats? Did they live with a family? In a shelter? He drew them in various surroundings and scenarios, but nothing really stuck. Phil didn’t mind; it was always useful to try out loads of things until he figured out what he wanted. Just as he put away the sketches, his phone started ringing and instantly, his heart beat picked up. Maybe Dan was calling. But, alas, it was his agent. Hazel had been with him from the very start. When he had finished his first book “The Little Lion” shortly after graduating, he had contacted about half a dozen agents, but only Hazel had been interested. Since then, they had worked on every project together. “Hey Phil” she said. “Have you had any more thoughts about the movie rights?”. “Not really, to be honest” he admitted. “Well, how about that: 20th Century Fox would like to invite you to their headquarters in L.A. to discuss the offer. 3-day trip, all expenses covered, no strings attached. They really, really want to make this film”. “And when do they want to schedule this trip?” Phil asked. “At your earliest convenience” Hazel said and Phil could clearly hear the air quotes she would have made if they were having a face-to-face conversation. “Hmm, do you think I should do it?”. “What, the trip or the movie?” “Both, I guess…” “I’d say do the trip, hear them out, then decide. And if you don’t want to sell the rights, you still got a free trip to L.A.” Phil looked out of the window; the sky was grey and miserable and it was drizzling. “Okay, I’ll do the trip. Do you want to come?” “I’d love to! I’ll check back with them if that’s okay, though… When do you want to go?”. They picked out the weekend before the first Advent, so that the trip was to be in three weeks. In the remaining weeks, Dan kept his promise and asked Phil to pick up Dylan from school twice. Both times, Phil and Dylan had a wonderful time, but because it was always on a school night, Phil never got to stay as long as he did the first time. Sadly, he saw very little of Dan – he usually left right after Dan came home, and Dan had yet to ask him to spend time with him, like he had said he would. It was the day before he was to fly to L.A. when it finally happened. Phil had spent the afternoon packing his suitcase and looking forward to sunny Californian weather, when his phone vibrated in his pocket. It was a text from Dan:

jess is taking dyl home tonight and i’m worried crazy distract me

Without hesitation, Phil picked out a video he had saved and send it to Dan; a compilation of baby animals doing cute stuff. The video lasted ten minutes; enough time for Phil to find his trunks and his goggles. He reckoned it would not be extremely hot in California, but maybe the hotel had a pool. When the ten minutes were up, Dan texted him again.

Cute but not long enough wanna go for drinks tonight?

There was nothing Phil would like to do better, so he texted back enthusiastically

I’d love to!!! When and where?

half seven ish? is there a pub you like near you i'd like to get to know your london

Phil knew exactly what Dan meant when he referred to “his London”. The city was so vast and so multicultural that you often had to only walk a few hundred yards to be in a completely different world. And the thought that Dan wanted to see his was wonderful to him. He texted him back the name and address of a cosy, elegant pub that, above a variety of beers, ciders and wines, served also quite a lot of food and snacks. Suddenly, he felt nervous. Time with Dan alone. It was almost like a date, wasn’t it? Of course, they hadn’t specified it to be, but for the first time, they were meeting just for the sake of it. And there was no Dylan to think about. Phil felt glad for it, and then guilty for that. He loved Dylan, it was just that, well… At quarter to seven, he opened his closet and looked through his clothes. He wanted to look good today, he wanted Dan to notice he had made an effort. So, he put on one of his nicer shirts and dark jeans. At a whim, he also put on a bow tie and a jacket, but then took off both. That was too much effort. Finally, he combed through his hair once more and left his flat. It was five past seven, and since he didn’t want to be this early, Phil decided to make a detour to the park. Luckily, he had his mobile and his headphones with him, so he walked twice around the park pond, listening to music. When he arrived at the pub 20 minutes later, he felt relaxed and happy. He only had to wait for a short while until Dan arrived, too. They hugged each other as they said hello, then went in. “Did you find it well?” Phil asked. “I always get lost when I go somewhere new”. Dan laughed. “’Course you do. But, yeah, I found it well - I used my phone”. They found a nice secluded place in a corner; on the table, two tealights were burning. “Can I get you something to drink?” Phil asked, while Dan was studying the menu. “Yeah, thanks”. So, Phil got himself a raspberry cider and a lager for Dan. They started talking about their respective weeks, though Phil neglected to mention that he would fly to L.A. in the morning. For some reason, it seemed like a bad idea to him. “Oh, by the way” Dan said and retrieved a piece of paper from his shoulder bag, “Dylan wanted me to give you this. He was quite jealous I get to see you tonight and he doesn’t”. “Aw, thanks” Phil took the paper. It was a drawing that Dylan had made, showing what was probably supposed to be himself and Phil, playing football. “That’s so sweet, tell him I said thank you”. Dan took a large gulp from his drink. “He’ll be fine at Jess’s, right?” Pitying him, Phil put his hand on Dan’s. “Of course he’ll be”. “She’s such an awful mother!” “How long has it been since he’s seen her?” Dan thought for a moment. “I think he last saw her on that Sunday when we met you. I haven’t allowed her near him since then… But, you know, she is his mum”. “If I were her, I’d put a lot of effort in this meeting, then… I wouldn’t want to mess it up, again” Phil said. “Yeah, let’s hope that’s the case” Dan smiled meekly. “Why did you have Dylan in the first place?” Phil was genuinely curious, but when he saw how Dan’s smile, however small it might have been, vanished, he quickly added: “I mean, I’ very happy that you did. Dylan is wonderful…” “I get it” Dan shrugged. “Remember I told you Jess was just the rebound? Well, we didn’t last long and when she discovered she was pregnant, she didn’t tell me for weeks… When a friend finally told me, it was already too late for an abortion” “Oh” Dan chuckled. “My mum was fuming when she found out. When I told her I’d drop out of uni, she wanted to sue Jess”. “And did she?” “Nah, she didn’t. And she still doesn’t like Jess, but she adores Dylan”. Phil chuckled. “My mum wants grandchildren, too”. “Oh yeah?” Dan asked, grinning “Why haven’t you complied yet?”. “I never met anyone I wanted to have kids with” Phil shrugged. “But I think I’d be a great Dad”. “I think so, too” Dan smiled warmly, making Phil’s heart skip a beat and butterflies flutter in his tummy. They were being playful, Phil knew that, but he still got his hopes up. For the first time he realized, he not only wanted to be with Dan, he also wanted to be Dylan’s dad. The palm of his hand was still resting on the back of Dan’s, but before he could squeeze it, Dan pulled it away to take a sip from his bottle. There was something nervous about him all of a sudden, and he avoided Phil’s gaze. It seemed fairly obvious to Phil that Dan was, for some reason, uncomfortable, so he changed topics. “Video games” he said. “What about them?” Dan asked, surprised. “You said you liked them. Got a favourite?” As they were discussing video games, the tension eased. After about an hour, they ordered another drink and shared some chips, their conversation having drifted to books, films and TV shows. So far, Phil thought, the evening was going swimmingly. There had been that awkward moment, and they hadn’t ventured into that area of conversation again, but the butterflies from earlier hadn’t disappeared. “Hey, so” Dan said, having emptied his second beer, “why did you pick out this pub?”. Phil shrugged. “I like it here, don’t you?” “Sure” “Besides, it’s close to my flat…” Lifting his head a bit, Dan smiled at him. “May I see it?” “My flat?” Phil swallowed dryly. “Yeah…” “’course, we can go now, if you want to…”

They grabbed their coats and headed into the street. Despite the cold, Phil felt warm, in fact, he felt like he was burning up; probably because Dan was walking right next to him, their hands brushing occasionally. The building of Phil’s flat was old but grand; when it had been renovated last, a small elevator had been installed, which they used to ride to the upmost storey. They stood so close together that Phil feared Dan could feel the heat radiating from him. Luckily, they arrived at the fifth floor soon enough and Phil led Dan through the curt hallway and into his flat. Kitchen and lounge were a single large, open-spaced room with a glass front on the backside of the room. “Wow” Dan said upon entering. “The view’s amazing”. London’s lights were glimmering; the night sky was velvet. “If you go to the window and turn your head left, you can just see the Shard” Phil said. “Can I take your coat?” “How very gentlemanly of you” Dan grinned, his eyes sparkling, but he took off his parka and gave it to Phil before he went to try and see the Shard. “I never realized you could make so much money by writing children’s books!” he mumbled, not taking his gaze of the view. “Yeah, uh, most people don’t… I’ve just been very lucky” Phil explained, turning his back towards Dan to put both of their coats into the closet. Facing him again, suddenly, took courage. But when he did, Dan was smiling at him apologetically. “So” Phil cleared his throat, “do you want something to drink? I’ve got water, Ribena, coffee, tea, coke, wine…?” “Yeah, wine’d be great” “Red or white?” “Uh, red” Phil got the glasses and uncorked the bottle, while Dan sat down on the couch facing the window. “Do you get someone to clean your windows or do you do that yourself? Oh, thanks” He took the glass from Phil. “Yeah, no, my landlord hires a company to do that every two months” Phil sat next to Dan carefully. For a while, they just sipped wine from their glasses, their gazes meeting occasionally. “So, your kitchen is nice” Dan commented. “Do you like cooking?” “Uh, sometimes…” Silence again. It was surprising to Phil how awkward they suddenly were. What had changed when they came to the flat? “With an open room like this, you probably do a lot of hoovering, don’t you?” Phil shook his head. “What’s going on?”.

In a swift move, Dan put his glass onto the table, leaned in and kissed Phil on the mouth. The kiss was heated and intense and it made Phil’s heart beat faster and all the blood in his body rush towards his crotch. Forgetting he was holding a wine glass himself, Phil leaned in closer and promptly spilled wine over himself and Dan. “Ah, shoot!” They pulled apart a bit. “I’m so sorry, Dan!” “It’s fine” Dan murmured. Slowly, he started unbuttoning his shirt. Phil’s eyes followed Dan’s fingers for two buttons, then he reached out and helped him, revealing Dan’s smooth chest underneath. Almost in awe, Phil slid his hands over the newly exposed skin, then planted a kiss just above his collar bone. Surprised, Dan breathed in deeply. While Phil’s lips were working their way up towards his neck and his Adam’s apple, Dan busied himself by unbuttoning Phil’s shirt. They kissed again, slowly but deeply and Dan swung a leg over Phil’s lap. Placing his hands on Dan’s hips, Phil pulled him onto his lap completely, so that Dan was now straddling him. They grinded into each other, both rock hard, and Phil kissed Dan’s neck again, sucking and almost bruising. A moan escaped from Dan’s lips. “Phil!” He cupped Phil’s face, making him look at him directly. They stared into each other’s eyes for a second, and briefly, Phil feared that Dan wanted to stop. “Show me your bed!” Dan said instead.