#Narcovember

[drabbles-mc]

Just Like Old Times

Jake 'Hangman' Seresin & F!Reader

Written for @narcosfandomdiscord Book of Inception: fanwork that provides an origin story for a character that doesn't have one & "He made me who I am" & improvement

Warnings: 18+, language

Word Count: 2.4k

A/N: the way that the last week or so has gone really just zapped all the motivation and creativity out of me, so getting this written really fought me every step of the way lmao. but i will say, that thinking about Jake Seresin in high school was fun. giving him a brother was also fun. going three for three on these prompts was challenging and rewarding and fun. and now i want to revisit these two at some point because idk i have issues lmao

You knew from the second that you’d walked into The Hard Deck that night that he didn’t remember you. Part of you didn’t really blame him, high school being such a distant memory for all of you now. Not just in years, but in all the experiences you’d packed into those years as well. From one standpoint you understood it…sort of.

From another standpoint you couldn’t believe that he could look you in the face and not say a word, not have even the tiniest flicker of recognition. He had looked right at you, and moved right on along to the next person. No matter how much things changed, they always stayed the fucking same.

It wasn’t until everyone was sitting out on the beach after the football game that the two of you even had a real conversation. Up until that point everyone had been running circles around each other, and you had much bigger things to worry about than Jake Seresin’s recollections of you, or lack thereof.

You were mid-conversation with Bob and Natasha when you noticed that neither of them were really looking at you anymore. You searched their faces, trying to figure out what it was that they were looking at.

Natasha leaned back, palms sinking into the sand as she said, “Bagman, six o’clock and incoming.”

You rolled your eyes, still not turning around to look at him. “Man knows how to ruin a good day.”

You didn’t have to look back to know how close he was, the tilts of Bob’s and Natasha’s head spelling out that information for you. His footfalls were nearly silent on the sand. Without realizing it, the closer he got, the deeper you pushed your fingertips into the sand like you were searching for something to grip onto.

Suddenly you were cast in Hangman’s shadow as he stood directly behind you. You shut your eyes for a moment, the longest blink ever as you tried hard to bite your tongue.

“Ladies,” he said, and you didn’t have to be looking at him to know exactly what his face looked like. “Bobby.”

Natasha was squinting against the sun but she still pulled a bit of a face. “It’s a good day, Hangman,” she said with just enough warning in her tone. “Let’s keep it that way.”

He chuckled, and you could see from the movement of his shadow that he was holding his hands out. “Every day at Top Gun is a good day, Phoenix. Thought you would’ve known that already.”

You were hoping that it was just going to be a quick thing, an in-passing comment that he made because he simply couldn’t bring himself to walk by your little trio without saying anything. But of course it wasn’t. Somehow the shift went from Natasha making extremely thinly veiled comments to the effect that Jake should hit the goddamn bricks, to him plopping down on the ground right there with you. He wedged himself right there between you and Bob like he had been there the whole time.

It didn’t take very long after that for Natasha to find a reason to leave. And wherever Natasha went, Bob was only ever a few steps behind. That left it with just you and Jake and the ocean that was slowly beginning to calm in front of you. It was a scene that could’ve been a peaceful one if the man sitting next to you had any interest in that.

Legs bent and pulled up towards you, you draped your arms across your knees. You were staring out at the receding waves as you asked, “To what do I owe the pleasure, Seresin?”

You could feel him staring at you and you made a point to not return the gesture. “Where’d you say you were from?”

You shook your head. “I didn’t. Also don’t think you’ve actually asked me a question directly the entire time we’ve been here.” You cast him a glance. “Too busy giving Rooster a hard time.”

He narrowed his eyes slightly at you like he was studying you, but there was still a smirk on his face. The more time you spent around him, the more you wondered if that was just what his face defaulted to these days. He leaned back on his palms, legs stretched out in front of him.

“Wasn’t until I heard Phoenix call you by your last name earlier that I realized—”

“Wow,” you barked out with a laugh, unable to stop yourself. “You’ve been running drills and sitting in class with me for how long and it took until today for you to recognize me? No sense of déjà vu sitting two rows over from me and picking on other kids in class? Nothin’ jogged your memory even a little?”

He leaned back, brows meeting for a moment. “When did you—”

“The first night we all got here!” you said, gesturing emphatically at nothing.

The smirk instantly returned to his face. “I’m that memorable, huh?”

You rolled your eyes and shook your head. “Fuck off.”

“What? C’mon, you can’t be mad.”

“I’m not mad.”

“No?” he asked, chuckling like he knew better than to believe you. A lot of confidence in your character for someone who only remembered who you were within the last two hours.

“No. Being mad would suggest that I’m somehow surprised that you’re still the way that you are. And I’m definitely…not.” You sighed. “You’re still Jake Seresin. Only difference now is—”

“My rank? The number of confirmed kills I have?” he tried to fill in the blanks, cocky as he’d ever been.

You looked at him. “Only difference is now you’re old enough to know better.” You saw the way he rolled his eyes at you and couldn’t help but to say, “I don't get you, Jake.”

The look on his face let you know that it had been a long time since someone referred to him by just his first name, not his last or his callsign. There was something intimate about it in a way. You wouldn't have given it any thought if he hadn't flinched at it.

He recovered as quickly as he could, that air of nonchalance reappearing around him. “I'm no Mystery Man.” He held his hands out in a brief gesture, like an invitation to scan him over. “What you see is what you get.”

It wasn't untrue. Jake Seresin had never been the type of person who lived a double life. Who he was around you was exactly who he was around everyone else. Maybe when it was just him, when there was no one else in the room looking to him or expecting anything from him, he was a different person. Not that it mattered—the world was never going to know. Reaching as far back as you could in your brain for memories of him, he'd always been some version of the man sitting in the sand next to you. He was just looking a little more refined these days.

You had just been hoping, when you'd seen him again, that maybe he would've changed by now. Nothing would be different if he wasn't different, but it would've been nice if it could be. The longer you looked at him, the more you tried to un-blur all of the memories that you hadn't bothered to tap into in a long time.

“How's your brother these days?” you asked, diverting course just slightly.

The question was immediately met with an eye-roll. “Fine.”

You had to let out a quiet laugh at that. “Yeah? That good, huh?”

He shrugged. “You want the play-by-play or something?” He shook his head, looking out at the ocean instead of at you. “He's fine.”

“You two not get along anymore or something? I thought you were both—”

“I see him on holidays. We text on birthdays. He is off doing…whatever he does.”

You hadn't expected the tension. From what you remembered, the two of them had gotten along well enough. His brother was a few years ahead of both of you, in his senior year of high school when the two of you were freshman. But he'd always been nice, nicer than Jake had been anyway. But they ran in a lot of the same circles, played a lot of the same sports, and they seemed to have a relatively good time doing it. Judging by the way that Jake was avoiding looking in your direction, you were now wondering if you were misremembering it all.

“We're grown-ups now, you know,” you offered up finally. “If you don't want to talk about him you can just say that.”

He flipped it right back on you. “We're grown-ups now, I can answer questions about Tommy if you have them.”

You laughed quietly and shook your head. “I can see that. The answers you've given so far have been so thorough and paint such a clear picture.” It got him to laugh even though you could tell that he didn’t want to give you the satisfaction. After a moment you cleared your throat. “You guys just seemed to get along back then, is all.”

Now he was looking at you again. “Yeah, Tommy got along with everyone back then—still does.”

You hummed in amusement. “Guess that trait isn't a genetic one, then.”

He cracked a small grin as he swatted sand at you. “Funny.” There was a pause, and you were waiting for him to pick something else to talk about, or for him to just get up and leave. Instead, he gave himself a moment and then said, “Tommy graduated with a full ride, but even when he was gone somehow I was still…” he trailed off. “Navy was the first place I wasn't a legacy kid. No footsteps to follow. Just me.”

“Hmm,” you nodded, not sure what you really wanted to say in response to that.

He caught your uncertainty. “What?”

“Nothing, I just…you wanna say that your brother, your family, your whoever was why you were like that back then. Fine, I get that, kind of. But then why,” you curled your fingers into the sand, “are you still up to all the same shit?”

“I'm not—”

“You are.” The laugh you let out was dry. “I'm one of the only people here that you can't lie to about that. I knew you back then, and I know you now, and from what I've seen? Not much has changed.”

The pinch of his brows let you know that what you were saying was getting to him, whether he admitted to it or not. He tried to hide it, and was semi-successful at it—it probably would've fooled someone else. “If it ain't broke—”

You didn't let him get to the end of the sentence. “There's always room for improvement.”

You were used to laughing at your own little one-liners, but Jake laughing at them too was new, especially when they were at his expense. Whatever the two of you were doing in that moment, it was the closest to being friends that you'd ever been. It was still a stretch but it was something.

“I don't know, you stack my resumé up against anyone else's here and I'd say I'm about as improved as it gets.”

“I think the one thing that could definitely still do with some improving is your humility,” you rebutted with a laugh. You geared up to hear some comment about how there was no need to be humble if he could back up everything that he was saying. When he didn’t, you said, “And, if you feel like taking suggestions—”

“You got another one for me?” he joked.

You laughed. “Yeah, of course.” You cleared your throat. “You said it yourself that this is the one place where none of that other stuff matters, like it never happened. So maybe, when you get a chance, you should get around to dropping all the bitterness that goes along with the brotherhood rivalry.” You shrugged, offering a small smile. “Cocky doesn't pair well with the sad, ‘He made me who I am,’ shtick.”

He raised his eyebrows in surprise as he laughed. “You're meaner than I remember.”

“Yeah, that's because you don't remember me,” you said, the lift at the ends of your lips taking the sting out of your words.

The look of surprise didn’t fade from his face, neither did the amusement. “Damn.”

You still had a smile on your face as you stood back up. Brushing the sand off the backs of your legs, you looked at him. It was a strange feeling, caught between remembering how things were back then and knowing how they were now. A lot of things hadn't changed, clearly, but the circumstances certainly had. You wanted more of it to be different, but there was no saying it so plainly.

“You heading back?” you asked, standing completely upright.

He looked up at you from where he was sitting. Shaking his head, he replied, “Not yet.”

You cocked your head to the side, folding your arms over your chest. “Going to sit out here with your thoughts?”

He chuckled and shrugged. “Well, you did give me a lot to think about.”

“Don't think too hard,” you joked as you started to walk away, “otherwise smoke’ll start coming out of your ears.”

“Your concern is touching!” he called after you, laughing as he spoke.

Turning around to face him, you continued walking away. “Guess I'm just too sentimental for my own good!” you replied, throwing your hands up in apparent exasperation with yourself.

You could still see the grin on his face as you turned back around. Even with your back to him, you still found yourself smiling too. You knew better than to get your hopes up for much, but there was still part of you that was thinking that maybe there was still a chance for things to start changing before all was said and done.

There was still the very large possibility that things would continue to be the same as they ever were. You knew that. But, the same way you'd been wanting things to be different the first night you turned up at The Hard Deck, you still wanted things to be different now. It felt a little more attainable now than it had then. And, if nothing else, at least you knew that this time everything was going to be a bit more memorable.

(divider by @inklore 🩶)

TGM Taglist: @garbinge @proceduralpassion @cositapreciosa @justreblogginfics (If you want to be added to any of my taglists, please let me know!)

[narcosfandomdiscord]

Narcovember Prompt Roulette List

Saalud a mi gente! We in the Narcos Fandom Forever discord server are excited to bring another 30-day challenge: a multifandom event that we’re nevertheless calling Narcovember. Despite its name, this is open to ALL FANDOMS, NOT JUST NARCOS. Creators are encouraged to submit fanworks (fic, art, gifs, vids, op-eds) for any fandom your heart desires!

This event's format is a bit unconventional. Instead of a prompt for each day of the month, there's a Prompt Roulette Wheel and a Prompt Index (☟ below) featuring numbered items with three prompts each. Every day you'll spin the wheel. The number that comes up on the spin corresponds to a number on the index where you can then pick one of the three prompts.

So for example, say on day one, I spin the wheel and get number 8. I’d go to 8 on the index (titled These Damn Restraints). Of those three prompts, I like Yikes best so that's my day one prompt. Next day, I spin and get 14. I find 14 on the index (Decisions, Decisions, Decisions) and pick one of those for day two's prompt. And so on. Note: If, on Day 2, instead of 14 I got 8 again, I’d spin the wheel again to get a new number. If, for whatever reason, you don’t want to spin twice, you can choose another prompt from that "Book of" that you haven't used (e.g. Day 1, I chose Yikes. So Day 2, I’d go for, "Now you know why I never say anything.") Ideally, we think it’s more fun to not repeat index items, but ultimately it’s dealer’s choice. Aka we're not about to get real fascist policing, aint nobody got time for that.

Here's -> the roulette wheel. Or you can make your own! (Just make sure it has 30 slices.)

Use the hashtag #narcovember or tag us to submit your entries so we can reblog them! A note on the masterlist - bc of the Tumblr-imposed link limit, for now we'll only link the fic. BUT at the end of the month, there will be a comprehensive list with all the contributors’ blogs so ppl can find your other work easily. 

Happy spinning, everybody!

❖ Prompt Index ❖

1 — Book of Genesis

Fanwork inspired by someone else’s fanwork (be sure to tag the creator of the OG work!) 

“The fun begins here.” 

Ghosts

2 — Book of Fuck-ups

Righteous indignation glo-up aka fanwork that corrects a plot misstep or writing blunder that bugs the shit outta you 

“It’s not the what-ifs that fuck you up, so much as the what-might-have-beens.” 

Bite

>>>>>>>>>> more prompts below the cut <<<<<<<<<<<<

3 - Book of Stuff That Goes in the Junk Drawer

Fanwork inspired by a song and include why the song sparked the idea (was it the lyrics, genre? something you thought a character would like? etc) 

“It’s never too late to make history.”

Juice

4 — Book of the Uno-Card-Reverse

Fanwork based on your fav reverse/inverse trope**

“Evil isn’t always forever.” 

Mirrors 

5 — Book of Negative Spaces

Fanwork using a line from a diff show/movie as a prompt (e.g. line from Mad Men, “I don’t think of you at all” in a Narcos fic, line from Band of Brothers, “The only hope you have is to accept the fact that you’re already dead,” in a Hannibal fic, etc etc) 

“We gain more from our mistakes than our success, you know that?”

Pitch

6 — Book of (un)Consciousness

Fanwork inspired by a dream you’ve had (include 1-2 sentence summary of the dream at the beginning of the post) 

“Just dream with me.”

Technicolor 

7 — Book of Time-travel

Fanwork inspired by ancient mythology (Greek, Norse, aztec, celtic, etc. Bible counts as mythology, fuck it) 

“It’s only a matter of time.”

Constellation

8 — Book of These Damn Restraints

Fanwork that ends with 2(+) characters trapped in a phone booth with no way out 

“Now you know why I never say anything.”

Yikes

9 — Book of Fateful Conversations

Fanwork where the plot takes place entirely in the back of a cab OR where one character is the cab driver and the other is the passenger 

“You'd be surprised what you can live with.” 

Cursed

10 — Book of Nepo-baby Levels of Incompetence

Fanwork where character is in a profession they have no business being in with no prior training, so they fake knowing what they’re doing – like imposter syndrome except they’re just actually a fraud (e.g. Rust Cohle is a grief counselor, Richie Jerimovich is a hedge fund manager, Roman Roy is a beat cop) 

“And who hasn’t believed a flattering lie?” 

Evergreen 

11 — Book of Pit Stops

Fanwork that starts with a character hitchhiking and getting picked up by another character(s) 

“Tell me to stop, and I’ll stop.” 

Rush

12 — Book of Balancing In Between

Fanwork whose setting is a liminal space (e.g. empty swimming pool, bar or arcade after hours, airport terminal, church confessional, empty elevator, Twin Peaks black lodge, John Wick continental bar, etc) 

“Good things come in threes.” 

Wire

13 — Book of in Urgent Need of Assistance

Fanwork where a character wakes up on an empty submarine, 300ft underwater, thinking they’re the only person aboard until they run into another character(s) 

“One day I’ll wake up and it won’t hurt so much.” 

Desperate

14 - Book of Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

Crossover for 2(+) fandoms you have used before but 2(+) characters you’ve never used or vice versa 

“All we have are our choices.” 

Crossroads 

15 — Book of How tf Did We Get Here

Fanwork that starts off with 2(+) characters waiting in line at the DMV and ends in a completely different, totally unpredictable, why-and-how-tf-did-we-get-here place 

“There’s a moon a mile from here and nobody home.” 

Ambition

16 — Book of Locally Sourced

Fanwork that mimics a bottle episode, so the entirety of it takes place in a relatively mundane setting (e.g. the stockroom of a store, interrogation room, a hotel lobby, waiting room of a doctor’s office, etc etc) 

“Make yourself comfortable while you can."

Notebook

17 — Book of Inception

Fanwork that provides an origin story for a character that doesn’t have one in canon 

“It (he/she/they) made me who I am.”

Improvement

18 — Book of Mysteries

Fanwork where 2(+) characters have to escape a panic room. Depending on fandom, this can be like the innocent party version that you take your friends to for someone’s bday, or can be an actual doomsday shelter 

“I thought they were with you!?"

Endurance

19 — Book of Near Misses

Fanwork with 2(+) characters from the same movie/show/book who’ve never met 

“Looks like we missed our window.” 

Rattled

20 — Book of Sleight of Hand

Fanwork of partners (romantic, profesh, or both) running into each other unexpectedly while both are doing something criminal/something they know they aren’t supposed to do (e.g. burying a body, carrying out a heist, meeting someone they shouldn’t)

“You can't ask the truth from someone who trades in lies.” 

Brace

21— Book of Nerves of Steel

Fanwork where 2(+) characters do a B&E, but get stuck when the owner unexpectedly comes home, and they whisper-yell argue over how to get out

“You won't believe the day I just had.”

Cortisol

22 — Book of Identity Theft

Fanwork where 2(+) characters meet accidentally bc one has accidentally dialed the wrong number (e.g. Syd [The Bear] tries to call Carm to yell at him for Something Dumb He Did but ends up calling Cousin Greg [Succession] instead) 

“I'm not the one.”

Brand

23 — Book of Just Chaos™️™️™️

Cracked crossover/ship with 2(+) characters from very diff genres (e.g. Dwight Schrute [The Office] & Tommy Shelby [Peaky Blinders], Frenchie [The Boys] x Penelope [Bridgerton], etc) 

“You’re my idiot, forever.” 

Untouchable

24 — Book of Revelation

Fanwork where 2(+) characters are stranded in the desert and in a sick twist, must decide which one of them to leave behind in order for the other(s) to be saved

“I like that I don't have to worry about you.”

Rapture

25 — Book of Reciprocity

Fanwork where 2(+) characters play poker (or any card game that has betting) but the chips are magic and the winner gets extra years of life instead of money (e.g. say, in poker, green chips = $500, blue chips = $1k, red chips = $2k, black chips = $5k. In this scenario, green chips = 6mos, blue chips = 1yr, red chips = 2yrs, black chips = 5yrs, etc) 

“Fine, I'll do it myself.”

Quid-Pro-Quo

26 — Book of Abduction

Fanwork where 2(+) characters get kidnapped by a kooky cult, are thrown into the trunk of a car together and have to figure out how to escape

“Somebody has to be paying attention.” 

Spiral

27 — Book of Caretaking

Fanwork where a character accidentally shoots/stabs/otherwise maims another character and has to perform first responder, triage levels of first aid to save them (dealer’s choice as to whether it's successful bc yolo) 

“Don't make me take care of you.” 

 Ritual

28 — Book of Weaponized Passive Aggression

Fanwork where 2(+) characters attend a dinner party and witness that moment when a couple starts passive-aggressively arguing but not outright fighting in front of the whole table and it’s even more painfully awkward than if they just straight up fought OR the 2(+) characters are the ones arguing making everyone else uncomfortable asf

“I wish you the best and I hope you find it far from me.”

Attitude

29 — Book of the (un)Dead

Fanwork where a character dies and another character shepherds them to the afterlife like their own personal grim reaper

“We bury our dead alive.” 

Siesta

30 — Book of There's No Place Like ...

Back from the dead: a character came back wrong or right, but either way, no one else knows how to handle it

“Even if you make it, you’ll never really go home.” 

Homesick

**There will be a reverse trope list in another post for examples.

[our-future-is-up-to-us-2]

all of these are the prettiest things

Raaaaaaa another Narcovember fic! Originally just going to be a normal fic, but then I wormed the prompt in and we're back! Fic number 15 @narcosfandomdiscord

Prompt #20, Book Of Sleight Of Hand: Brace

Word Count: 1.1K

Relationships: Charles "The Jackal" Calthrop/Rasmus

Warnings: None

~ Read the fic under the cut ~

It’s always the quiet moments that draw them in. Peter sits about, examining blueprints, mulls over documents on his computer or phone, while Rasmus takes to watching him, or making some food.

At least, that’s when they’re not entangled in work, or each other. When the quiet moments come, things are gentle, and, as Peter disarmingly feels, very romantic. 

Rasmus hums to himself as he works, and every so often, they look up at each other, drinking in the moment, blushing and smiling like school kids. Of course, the feeling is not embarrassment, it’s the last thing akin to that. 

The Jackal supposes… Well, he doesn’t know what to suppose anymore, switching between architecture and transactions, Dark Core and a surprisingly plain email account. He’s still playing his game, still working through his job. He has not stopped being an assassin just because of Rasmus– 

And yet, and yet, he feels the pull, he feels both powerful and helpless, able to do as much or as little as he pleases. The taste of his lips, his body, all of him, is a powerful drug. 

Worse than that is his smile. Just a flicker of it, a small laugh, a stupid little thought that only Rasmus is amused by… Oh, how intoxicating.  

It’s the little things that make him want to drop those obligations and run. But his American hirer is counting on him, awaiting his shot against UDC. 

In a few short days, he’ll be off somewhere else. Whether it’s back to Spain, or coasting in London, awaiting a new target… 

His stomach lurches at the former. Wife and child, worrying about him, thinking about him constantly. 

Meanwhile, he’s here, in Estonia of all places, basking in the sunlight that is Rasmus. 

“I was thinking about this last night,” Peter says, and Rasmus looks up from the soup he’s started to boil, “Your name, Rasmus… Where does it come from? What sort of meaning does it have? Because Peter, god, it feels terribly ordinary.”  

And it’s not like Charles is much better. Far too regal. He notes. 

“Might be ordinary, but it’s you,” The blond chuckles, “And I love that. I love you. As for me?” He ponders it for a while, trying to trace it all back. “Rasmus… Well, it means ‘beloved’ if I remember correctly… And I’m Estonian, so it’d have to be Nordic.” 

Every thought in Peter’s head proceeds to stop. The article he’s reading doesn’t even matter anymore. He goes as far as to shut his laptop, placing his hands over his knees. He then watches them as they shake. 

It all makes sense. Of course, it does. Every hit that The Jackal is after, there’s always a plan, a method to his madness. But this? Angel, beloved, Rasmus, staring at him as his face starts to pale. 

And even worse, he just… Says that. Three little words: Like icing sugar on a cake, like an afterthought. 

He loves me.  

***

The Jackal attempts to summon up a sentence, a smile, a nod, anything. 

Instead, he’s paralysed. Stuck there, having to brace himself for an impact that’s already made contact.  

He’s managed to quell his shaking, biting the inside of his cheek to compensate. The words run through his head at a million miles an hour: I love that. I love you. Rasmus? It means ‘beloved’... 

He runs a hand through his hair, mulling it all over now. There’s a part of him that’s ready for this conversation, ready to ask Rasmus to come over and  soothe him, but by the time he’s snapped back to reality, he’s already there. 

The blond sighs loudly, eyes downcast, but he reaches out for Peter’s hand, squeezing it. “That was probably poor judgement on my part.” He murmurs, “I’m not even drunk… Just– A lapse in the moment. But… It doesn’t mean it’s not true. I do love you, Peter. But you don’t have to say it back, because that’s scary, and that’s making a commitment, and, hell, you’ll be going in a few days–” 

“I know.” The Jackal practically whispers, and Rasmus is just relieved to hear his voice again. “I know. On my end, I guess… It was very sudden. And in my brain, it was like everything shattered and then pieced itself back together again.” 

He opts to rest his head on the other’s shoulder, keeping his hand in his as he closes his eyes. He takes a few deep breaths, the silence less overwhelming now, and he recalibrates. 

He’s The Jackal. A fucking world-class assassin. 

And whilst he feels the most human he’s ever been, it helps to remind himself of his purpose. 

He supposes he can keep in contact with Rasmus, just in case. Just in case things don’t work out, just in case he’s ever visiting Estonia when he’s free from the clutches of it all, just in case he needs a break from Nuria.

He’s already taking a long break from her, and yet, her insistence on being in his life, well… It’s natural, but feels overbearing. 

Rasmus is instead soft, comforting, electric, wild. A new journey in a place he’s never been, a new spark that he hasn’t felt for anyone, because his first and only love was declared by the fates to be a waitress. 

But, that doesn’t make a wife, well, the be all and end all. If he can be an assassin without worry, then what’s the harm of two identities? 

He opens his eyes now, nesting his head there, in safety. 

“It makes sense, though, Rasmus. Everything makes sense with you. Your name, your smile, your infectious levels of positivity, beard, eyes– I feel like I’ve fallen under a spell with you. If Rasmus means ‘beloved’, then I won’t just… Leave that unfulfilled.” 

Peter adjusts now, sitting upright and facing the other man, running  his free hand gently across his cheek. He sighs, thinks it over, just briefly, seeing Rasmus’ eyes so wide, so adoring… 

There’s no turning back on him now. Because, then, it’s not just betraying him, but also betraying a deep and joyous part of himself that’s been waiting to burst open again, into the light. 

“Yeah?” The blond exhales with a smile. 

“Yeah. I love you, Rasmus. I really do. And I’m sorry that I’ll be leaving in a few, but better to tell you now than never.” 

The blond leans forward and pecks his lips, carding his fingers through his brown hair, “God, I’m so glad you did. I didn’t wanna pressure you, but it feels right. It feels good. And even if you have to go, long distance works just fine, doesn’t it?” 

Peter chuckles and settles for a proper kiss, a heartfelt one, deeper, and the laugh is still rumbling through him. 

“Oh, beloved,” He says when they part for air, “Long distance, short distance, any distance. If it’s for you, it’s just fine.” 

And Rasmus is stuck there, speechless, blushing stunningly, and filled with nothing but adoration. 

[proceduralpassion]

𝐈𝐭'𝐬 𝐌𝐞 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐘𝐨𝐮 𝐅𝐨𝐫𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫

𝐅𝐨𝐫 @𝐧𝐚𝐫𝐜𝐨𝐬𝐟𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐨𝐦𝐝𝐢𝐬𝐜𝐨𝐫𝐝'𝐬 𝐍𝐚𝐫𝐜𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐞𝐫 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐧𝐠𝐞: 𝐑𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐞𝐨𝐮𝐬 𝐢𝐧𝐝𝐢𝐠𝐧𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐠𝐥𝐨-𝐮𝐩 𝐚𝐤𝐚 𝐟𝐚𝐧𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐜𝐨𝐫𝐫𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐬 𝐚 𝐩𝐥𝐨𝐭 𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐩 𝐨𝐫 𝐰𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐛𝐥𝐮𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐛𝐮𝐠𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐬𝐡𝐢𝐭 𝐨𝐮𝐭𝐭𝐚 𝐲𝐨𝐮

𝐖𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠(𝐬): 𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐨𝐟 𝐚 𝐤𝐧𝐢𝐟𝐞 𝐢𝐝𝐤

𝐖𝐂: 𝟏𝟔𝟒 𝐬𝐡𝐞'𝐬 𝐬𝐦𝐨𝐥 𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐦𝐢𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐲

𝐀/𝐍: 𝐃𝐚𝐲 𝟑 𝐨𝐟 𝐍𝐚𝐫𝐜𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐞𝐫 𝐚𝐤𝐚 𝐦𝐲 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐟𝐢𝐜 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐈 𝐬𝐢𝐦𝐩𝐥𝐲 𝐧𝐞𝐞𝐝𝐞𝐝 𝐭𝐨 𝐫𝐞𝐜𝐭𝐢𝐟𝐲 𝐂𝐨𝐧𝐧𝐢𝐞 𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐯𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐒𝐭𝐞𝐯𝐞 𝐢𝐧 𝐬𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐨𝐧 𝟐 𝐰𝐡𝐞𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐥 𝐒𝐌 𝐬𝐚𝐢𝐝 "𝐧𝐚𝐡𝐡𝐡 𝐦𝐲 𝐰𝐢𝐟𝐞 𝐢𝐬 𝐚 𝐫𝐢𝐝𝐚" 𝐬𝐨 𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐞 𝐰𝐞 𝐠𝐨

"Please don't leave."

Connie stops chopping the vegetables on the cutting board as she processes her husband's words. Steve walks over to her, softly grabbing the knife from her.

"W-what?" She stutters.

He grasps her hand into his.

"I feel like every day I'm coming home and giving you more reason to run from this place. Me, Javi, and everyone else, our backs are up against the wall right now, but we're so close. I know things are.. a lot right now. But just… don't run out on me."

Connie had been facing the kitchen counter initially, but she turned directly to Steve, folding herself into his arms.

"Steve," She starts, holding his face in her hands, "Olivia and I aren't going anywhere. Where you go, we go."

His eyes are closed as he nods his head so many times as if he's making sure to reassure himself. She stills his motion and brings him closer to her.

"It's me and you forever, babe."

𝐏𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐞 𝐥𝐞𝐭 𝐦𝐞 𝐤𝐧𝐨𝐰 𝐢𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐰𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐭𝐨 𝐛𝐞 𝐚𝐝𝐝𝐞𝐝 𝐭𝐨 𝐦𝐲 𝐍𝐚𝐫𝐜𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭 𝐨𝐫 𝐚𝐧𝐲 𝐟𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐨𝐦 𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐰𝐚𝐧𝐭.

Tag: @drabbles-mc @supersanelyromantic @ashlingnarcos @narcosfandomdiscord @mysun-n-stars

[axreliono]

an island lost at sea

Chris Feistl x Daniel Van Ness

For the @narcosfandomdiscord's monthlong event, ft prompt #16 from Book of Locally Sourced:

Fanwork that mimics a bottle episode, so the entirety of it takes place in a relatively mundane setting

Warnings: Language, mild mortal peril, incredibly light angst, set during S3 (specifically ep2)

Word count: 5.7k

A/N: This feels so silly but I absolutely had to write something for these two. Vanfeistl you will never leave my brain. Posting this at almost 3am so if it's bad... no it's not.

AO3 link:

- fic under the cut -

MINUTE -1

“Hey.”

It was far beyond the point at which Chris found he could still focus on his work. With the announcement earlier that everything was fucked and over before it had even started, it was a miracle he’d not walked out the door right then and there. Instead, he’d sat at his desk, mulling over Peña’s words for hours, trying to find reasoning, some kind of way out, any loophole, until everyone around him had left and taken the last of his hope with them.

“Hey.”

Everyone, that was, apart from Dan. Chris hadn’t told him what had happened. He was sure Dan would be over the moon at the news, which would only leave Chris to suffer alone. That was a worse fate than the one he’d landed himself in already, and so he had decided to say nothing, just silently packing away his things as fast as humanly possible, throwing open files and unlidded pens into his bag like his life depended on it.

“What are you doing?”

“Packing up. Going home.” Maybe in more than one sense. The job was done; what else was there to do? The Cali team was dissolved permanently. The career criminals they claimed to fight had won with nothing more than a handshake. Some deal. He slung his bag over his shoulder and bolted for the elevator, ready to be out of here and away, somewhere he could actually think.

Footsteps followed him across the empty office floor. The space was lit only with the dim glow of computer screensavers and lamps carelessly left on here and there.

“Hey, man, talk to me. You’re acting weird.”

Weird didn’t begin to cover it, but Chris kept his lips sealed shut, pressing the button and watching the numbers go up.

“Seriously.”

Chris whirled around to stare at him. “Seriously, back off.”

The elevator chimed and the doors opened. Chris stepped inside, expecting that to be the end, with Dan watching from the other side hesitantly. The doors started closing, peace almost in reach, only to be interrupted as Dan ducked in, the doors slamming shut behind him.

“What is your problem?” Chris hissed. He was too tired for this bullshit.

Before Dan could explain himself, the elevator juddered, leaving both of them stumbling. Then, it stopped dead. The two of them stood in silence, staring at each other, waiting for it to spring back to life and start moving again. Instead, the red light illuminating the buttons died.

Perfect.

MINUTE 1

Dan reached across and hit the bell button, and a piercingly loud alarm burst to life, filling the tiny metal box with its wailing.

“Why the fuck did you do that?” Chris asked, plugging his fingers into his ears.

“I panicked, okay?” Dan said, hitting it again. The sound didn’t stop. “Isn’t that what we’re supposed to do? To get someone to come and help us?”

“Okay, well, who in the office can save us?” Depending on the answer, they’d either be fine or utterly fucked.

Dan just stared at him, saying nothing. Chris mentally worked through the office, trying to remember who was actually around and only coming up with images of empty desks and logged out computers. Realization dawned on him slowly but surely, and his heart sank. Unless someone was in the toilets, or sitting in a side room with the lights off like some kind of freak, they were alone. Every other fucker had been sensible enough to leave on time, probably lured out by Duffy and Lopez’ promise of goodbye commiseration drinks. Which meant they were trapped in an elevator in an entirely empty office.

“Shit.”

Chris started banging on the doors, to no avail. Dan dug his fingers into the seam of the door, leaning back and straining as he tried to pull them open. They didn’t budge.

“Hey!” Chris yelled as loud as he could, but the sound was lost in the blaring of the alarm.

“I really don’t know if that’s the best solution to get us out of here,” Dan drawled, though the bite wasn’t as powerful as usual. He was hunched over the button pad, wincing as he scanned each one, as if there would be some magic opening code if he just looked closely enough.

“Like you’re doing better.”

Dan whirled around, looking incredulous. “This is your fault.”

“How is this my fault?! You must’ve fucked up the doors jumping in at the last second! Why are you even in here? You’ve never used this elevator in your life. Are you that desperate to piss me off?”

“Hey, fuck you, man.” Dan said, stepping away from the corner. “You’ve been in a bad mood for hours. Did you think I wouldn’t notice you spent three hours staring intensely at a blank document like you were trying to light it on fire with your mind? And tapping your pen like you were trying to bore a hole in the desk?”

“And so you follow me into an elevator?” Chris folded his arms.

Dan ran a hand over his face, sighing deeply. “Can we get the fuck out of here?”

Chris didn’t think so. They’d set off the alarm and nobody had come - not yet anyway. If there was anyone to come. Dan had tried the doors and stared at the instructions. Chris walked over, digging his nails into the gap on either side and pulling as hard as he could.

“I already tried that.”

Chris fell back, surprisingly out of breath. The doors didn’t even have a scratch mark, not a single sign that they’d been pried at, not moved at all from their original position, jammed solidly shut. Okay, so there was no way out of this shitbox metal cage they’d managed to trap themselves in. Fine. Surely there was another way out. Surely these elevators were designed for incidents like this. Maybe that panel on the roof…?

“I’m going to climb on your shoulders,” Chris said, rolling up his shirt sleeves. The hatch would likely have as little give as the doors, but it was better than wasting away in this stupid elevator until someone deigned to return to the office, likely tomorrow morning.

“The fuck you are.” Dan took a step back, looking at Chris like he’d grown an extra head.

“There might be a way out through the roof.”

“What, so we can scale the elevator cables like we’re spies in some action movie? We’ll still have to pry open a different set of jammed doors once we’re on the other side.” Dan looked Chris up and down in a way that suggested he did not believe they were getting up those cables. It would’ve been hurtful if it wasn’t true.

“We’re competent DEA agents. Surely we can work our way out of a trapped elevator.”

“Barely. And clearly not.”

Chris stared at him. His features were contorted into a hard, cold expression, not a single hint of hope mixed in with the despair he was trying so hard to conceal underneath. His hands had definitely started to shake, and despite his even tone, his words were getting harsher and more clipped with every minute that passed.

“You weren’t joking. You’re actually afraid of elevators.”

Dan didn’t meet his eyes this time.

“Oh my fucking god.”

Not only was he trapped in this elevator, he was trapped with someone potentially minutes away from a full-blown breakdown. The day just kept getting better and better.

“Are you fucking stupid? Why the fuck would you follow me in, then?” Chris snapped. He immediately felt guilty for how scathing his words sounded even to him, but everything felt like it was amplified ten times over in here, intensified by the fluorescent lights overhead and echoing off the mirrored walls. “You in love with me or something?”

A heavy silence fell over the two of them, punctuated only by the blaring of the alarm, persistent as ever.

“Actually fuck off,” Dan said, turning back to the keypad.

Chris watched as he pressed all the buttons in order, none of them reacting at all, nothing inside changing, and sunk to the floor. Maybe that was that. Maybe this was just his fate, the perfect cherry on top to an already shitty day. Dan eventually gave up, giving the keypad a final whack before joining him on the floor, curling in on himself in a ball.

“The elevator isn’t going to collapse in,” Chris said, though as soon as the words left his mouth, he wished he hadn’t said them. He had no real confirmation the universe wouldn’t immediately try to prove him wrong.

“And you know this how?”

Chris didn’t have an answer to that.

“You’re convincing yourself as much as you’re convincing me,” Dan said, a hint of smugness crossing his face, briefly extinguishing the fear.

“I am not,” Chris backed up. He wasn’t taking shit from a guy who chose to take stairs instead of the elevator every single day.

Dan just shrugged, shifting back into his corner. So he was perfectly able to cope when it came to jabbing at Chris, it seemed. “If we die in here, at least I’ll be able to say I told you so right before impact.”

Chris buried his head in his hands. This was going to be a long evening.

HOUR 1

The alarm died after an hour of assaulting both their ears, but with the near-deafening tinnitus that followed, it may as well have stayed on. All it meant was they were trapped in silence, and anybody who came into the office from this point forwards would never know they were in here. Chris had tried to think through every option, every possible outcome that could happen depending on what they decided to do from here, and came up with no better answers than to sit and wait. At the very worst, people would be in in the morning. Fucking with the mechanics anymore would only risk sending them to their deaths. So, with no feasible way out and his mind slowly dying off in the now silent, empty elevator, he started walking from end to end of the claustrophobically small box, bored out of his mind and succumbing to stress with every minute that passed. The elevator was exactly three and a half steps by five steps, he’d discovered. The numbers were now seared into his brain, not that they would help him at all.

“Please stop that.” Dan said quietly. He had his head resting against the wall of the elevator and his legs folded underneath him, as far as they’d go into the corner. It didn’t look anywhere approaching comfortable.

“Stop what?”

“Pacing.”

Chris stopped for a minute, and took a deep breath in, wooziness washing over him. He couldn’t be entirely sure he had been breathing properly at any point during the last hour. His reflection watched him from the mirror, already dishevelled and exhausted-looking. It could’ve been the harsh fluorescent lighting overhead, but Chris doubted it. He was wasting away in that office long before he walked in here. If he wanted to file reports and listen back to recordings all day, he may as well have been put on basement duty and locked away with all the evidence.

“Are you going to explain what the hell is up with you?” Dan said, pulling one of his knees up to his chest. “Or are you going to stand there all evening?”

“I’m quite enjoying standing,” Chris said, turning away from the mirror. “Getting my daily exercise in.”

“You could’ve got that easily if you’d taken the stairs,” Dan mumbled, furrowing his brows, but he no longer had the alarm to drown out his words and hide behind.

“Well, I didn’t, and for some reason, neither did you. So you better get used to the idea of sleeping here tonight.”

Dan was looking more and more weary with every second that passed. “You couldn’t pay me to fall asleep in here.”

Chris just sighed and turned back to pacing, unable to stop the nervous energy from rising up in him the second he gave it room to breathe. He didn’t like feeling helpless; his entire job was searching for answers and hunting them down until they came to fruition. In here, he had nowhere to go and nothing to work off. He wasn’t used to hearing his own thoughts. It had been a long time since he’d last let himself sit alone with them, and he was not about to start again now.

“Chris-”

The elevator suddenly let out a long, drawn-out creaking noise, almost a cry of pain. Both of them froze, eyes meeting each others’ in the split second before the elevator dropped suddenly, before jolting to a stop again. Chris let out an admittedly undignified scream, stumbling to grab onto the handrail as his stomach dropped from beneath him. He missed and tripped forwards, barrelling into Dan, both of them crashing into the wall and causing the entire box to shake. Chris looked up at Dan, their faces much closer than was comfortable. He’d gone white as a sheet, one arm grabbing onto the handrail as tightly as possible, the other curled protectively around Chris’ torso. Chris could feel his face heating up with every second that they were in contact, but he couldn’t bring himself to move in case the entire elevator collapsed under him.

“Oh fuck,” He whispered, heart jumping into his throat. Trust them to get themselves into this shit. “Oh shit.”

“I don’t want to die in this shitty evil metal box with you,” Dan said simply, voice quivering. “This is not what I had in mind.”

“Is my company that terrible?” Chris joked, but it fell flat in the silence between them and in the shaking of his own voice. There was only so much bravado could do to salvage a situation like this, after all.

“Can you be serious for one second? Just because you’re being pissy about this stupid Cali decision doesn’t mean we’re free to die in this elevator.” He shook his head, squeezing his eyes shut as if the conversation was physically paining him. “Jesus christ.”

Chris stared at him. So he knew all along and said nothing? Acted like it was all fine and to be expected, and that this wasn’t the blow of a century, the humiliation of the entire department that hot on the heels of such a big success with Escobar, they were giving up on Cali over nothing?

“You might not get it because your biggest ambition in life is paperwork and your own comfort,” he snapped, tearing himself out from Dan’s hold and backing away, “but I don’t know how to stand back and watch as the biggest cartel in the world hands over the keys for nothing more than a slap on the wrist when everything I’ve worked towards for years now, trying to painstakingly take them down, gets burned to cinders in an instant.”

Dan didn’t say anything in response, staring him down with that slightly pained expression of his, which told Chris nothing more than he’d just let his stupid big mouth run away with itself. The elevator creaked in agreement.

“My life isn’t over,” Chris clarified, turning away to look back in the mirror, more so convincing himself than Dan at this point. “I care about more than just this stupid job.”

“Sit down before you bring the entire floor down with you,” Dan said quietly.

Chris had the sinking feeling he’d crossed a line somewhere along the way, but he didn’t know when or how to even begin to fix it, so he just sat down in the far corner in silence, resulting to tapping his hands against his knees instead of pacing, in case he really did bring about their untimely deaths.

“Do you have to do that?” Dan watched Chris’ hands, frowning deeply.

“You get to pick one; the pacing or this.”

Dan sighed, like maybe. “Fine.”

Not sure where he went wrong, and still waiting for the inevitable moment that the elevator came crashing down around them, he kept tapping like their fates depended on it.

HOUR 2

“Can you please stop announcing every hour that passes?” Dan gritted out, burying his head in his knees. “This situation is depressing enough as it is.”

Chris shrugged. “It’s like keeping tally marks in prison. Gotta keep my eyes on the prize.”

“There are no prizes for dragging out every godforsaken minute in this place.”

Chris turned to him. It had been almost a full hour since the elevator last made a noise, and they had yet to fall through the floor and splatter across the reception floor, but they had equally not got any further along in getting out of here. He was really starting to doubt that anyone was ever coming back to the office, and had now got to the stage of truly wondering if the universe was personally conspiring against them specifically.

“You never answered me earlier,” he started. Dan looked up with a quizzical expression. “The piss question.”

The other man’s face went suddenly slack with horror. “Please tell me you’re not about to piss right now.”

Chris tried and failed to stifle a laugh. “I’m not. You just never gave me your answer, and now it’s actually pertinent.”

Dan looked defeated. He shuffled forwards, bringing his knees away from his chest. “There is never a socially acceptable time to piss in a trapped elevator.”

“Even if you got in to go to a bathroom on another level? Even if we’re stuck in here for 6 hours?”

“This is why I don’t take the elevator,” Dan muttered to himself.

“To avoid philosophical conundrums?” Chris pulled a face. Dan tried to reach across the elevator to swat at him, but missed by a few centimeters, instead just throwing his arm across the room. “Look, what else is there to talk about in here?”

“I already tried asking you things,” Dan said simply, withdrawing back into his corner. “Instead, you choose to talk about this.”

Chris sighed. He still hadn’t worked his way up to any kind of apology, but the air between them had cleared a bit in the last hour, probably helped along by the knowledge that they weren’t seconds away from perishing in here.

“You knew why I’d been acting off,” Chris’ tapping got louder and more desperate, echoing off the metal walls. “One minor screw-up, not even close to the shit that went down with Escobar, and it’s over. Why even hang around here? We may as well pack up and go home if we’re going to let them pick their own punishment. I don’t get it. No matter how many times I’ve raked over it, I can’t understand why they’d pick this of all the options.”

Dan was watching him with one of those indecipherable looks of his again, somewhere between concern and pity. Chris wasn’t sure he liked it. It made his skin itch.

“They agreed a surrender deal with the Colombian government. There’s nothing we can do to interfere with that.”

“They’re some of the most powerful figures in Colombia. Don’t act like they don’t have all the connections needed to force their way out of this mess entirely unfairly but entirely unscathed.”

Dan ran a hand through his hair, some of the dark strands coming loose and hanging over his forehead. He looked so different in here, in the dim light, blazer abandoned and tie hanging loosely around his neck. More like the man he’d caught glimpses of in the corners of dark bars and rowdy office parties, more like the man he was always trying to provoke out of that impenetrable shell of his. The atmosphere between them was always shifting; it was hard to pinpoint where it would go next when the ground beneath their feet had never quite been steady. They never talked about it, of course, but “back to normal” felt less like the truth every time it happened. Everything managed to lead to something new with them. The prospect usually excited Chris, but here, trapped in this lift with no way out and no next step in sight, it terrified him.

“I’m not happy either,” Dan said simply. “I do give a shit, you know? This is just as much of a blow to me as it is to you. You know the last thing I want is to be sent home, let alone empty-handed. But what do we do? I’m not going to meddle with an entire government. We don’t have the same power as the CIA.”

Chris snorted. “The DEA always gets their slice of the pie, too, you know.”

“So maybe we will this time, too. But my point stands; that isn’t up to us two. We’re nobodies.”

Chris knew he was right. He wasn’t in any position to make decisions like that; he was barely more than an admin lackey at this point. He might’ve been a respected detective in Arizona, but here, he didn’t even have a partner, let alone enough power to oversee these kinds of decisions.

“They’re not even going to have their businesses confiscated,” Chris said quietly. “I can understand them not wanting a repeat situation of Escobar, but Cali pales in comparison to the shit he got up to. Why give them so much?”

“Quiet doesn’t mean dormant,” Dan warned. “They keep a lot under wraps, I’m sure. Doesn’t mean people don’t suffer, definitely doesn’t mean people wouldn’t suffer if they were provoked.”

Chris shifted around, turning to the wall and trying to picture the pinboard in the office splayed across the room. “Gilberto owns enough legitimate businesses to get into bed with politicians. That’s his entire social circle. One of them has got to be involved.”

“Do we know anyone specific? Anyone connected to higher government?”

Chris shook his head. He couldn’t visualize the whole board. “Not without the files.”

“Well, funnily enough, I don’t have them. So now what?”

Chris opened his bags. He’d just sort of thrown things into it in a huff. There were a few files, a few loose sheets that had slipped out of them, too. Mainly the financial stuff Eddie had faxed over after Cornerstone. But maybe, deep within encoded transactions and offshore accounts, there was something, one name or company or link that’d expose the entire thing. Fuck Peña and his instant dismissal. There was something here, Chris just knew it. He just had to find it. He spread the files across the floor, crawling between them on his hands and knees in case the entire thing came falling down.

“Some office,” Dan joked, watching but not making a move to get involved.

“It genuinely isn’t half bad. Get me some tape and some red string, and we’d be set. It’d be quieter than the main office.”

Dan quirked up a single eyebrow. “Not to mention how tiny it is in here, the lack of computers, the fact that we can’t get out and the ever-looming threat of falling two stories.”

Chris couldn’t say much in response to that. “Okay, fine. Fair point.”

It wasn’t the best setup, that much was true, but it was a distraction from his wandering mind, and a welcome one at that. Another hour in silence would kill him off, and he was already starting to feel the effects. Dan shuffled over to him, turning to try and read the files before sitting himself down next to Chris and reaching across to help him unpack the files. Just like that, the last of the tension in the air was gone, both of them wordlessly sorting through the paperwork he’d abandoned as useless earlier in the afternoon, positioning banks together into stacks, handing each other papers of interest, all with a silent agreement and occasional one-word clarifiers or accidental brushes of their hands, moving in perfect synchronicity. The files slowly emptied, dispersed across the floor, forming a mosaic of evidence, but it still didn’t add up. Without more information, without feet on the ground and eyes in the sky tracking when, where and how they were getting all this through, it was useless. No matter how they pieced this together on the elevator floor, no matter the order or the theories, it wouldn’t change the course of events, and the intel would sink to the bottom of a drawer somewhere to gather dust.

Chris bashed his fist into the side of the elevator. Dan only had time to shoot him a concerned look before the elevator juddered, making an ear-splitting creaking noise.

“Chris…” Dan warned, backing up very slowly.

Chris was immediately back in his own corner, hugging his body against the metal walls as tightly as he could. “…Sorry?”

Dan was clinging to the handrail so hard, his knuckles were turning white. “Please, please just sit back down.”

Chris mushed all the files into one big, messy pile, sheepishly shoving them back in his bag before carefully inching back down into a sitting position again. So much for that. They were no further ahead and only closer to an untimely death. What a waste of time.

“Look, you’re not wrong to be doing this,” Dan said. It was uncanny how much he seemed to be able to read Chris’ mind nowadays. Chris wasn’t sure how to feel about it yet. He wasn’t used to being an open book - most people saw him as a noisy but ultimately empty vessel, and that wasn’t such a bad thing as far as he saw it. “This data is useful. We can keep track of the accounts from the office just fine.”

“But what’s the use of that without people to pin actual crimes on? They’re just a bunch of numbers.” Chris buried his head in his hands. He was tired of this shit now. He just wanted to be home, where he could sleep off the terrible day and try again tomorrow.

“All we need to do is find one case. One example of laundering, drug money going through a legitimate business,” Dan explained. “Catching just one of the four leaders in breach of their deal could send the entire thing up in flames.”

Chris froze. He slowly lifted his head to meet Dan’s unwavering gaze. He didn’t seem at all rocked by this information.

“What?”

“They have to cease all illegal operations, right?” He gestured to the file poking out of Chris’ bag. “Maybe it’ll be harder to catch them doing that on the ground, what with their airtight security and eyes everywhere, but we find one dodgy transaction from the comfort of our computers, and we have all the ammunition we need to start the manhunt again.”

It took all of Chris’ energy not to jump up to his feet right there and then. “Laundering in Panama, undeclared offshores in Gibraltar…”

“Financial crimes are still crimes.”

Chris couldn’t stop himself from grinning. They’d found it. A key out of this clusterfuck. Sure, it relied on a lot of luck and good fortune that never seemed to be on their side, but it was something.

“See?” Dan flashed him a smug kind of half-grin. “Not worth throwing your shit around over, after all.”

“Oh, fuck off.” Chris felt a little breathless at the prospect. “We have to get the hell out of here.”

“Well, yes, hasn’t that been your aim from the start…?” Dan started, but Chris was already rising slowly to his feet and tiptoeing as gently as he could towards the door. “What are you doing?”

“Getting us out of here.”

Dan backed up into his corner again. “Absolutely not. You’ve got us into enough shit in this death box already. Get away from those!”

Chris was trying to pry open the doors again, with just as little success as the first time around. “Get up and help me.”

“And if you send us falling to the ground?”

Chris shrugged. “I’ll buy you a nice headstone.”

Dan looked at him for a second, face crinkled up in distaste, before he eventually pulled himself up using the handrail, looking far beyond disappointed. “You won’t be alive to buy me one, asshole.”

Chris rifled through his bag. Surely there was something in there that could pry these doors open. A particularly thin pen? A stray mouse mat? Anything? His search was cut short, though, as Dan brandished something shiny in front of his face. Chris backed up to take it in. A shoehorn, in all its metal glory.

“Why do you own a shoehorn?” Chris said, excitement causing him to immediately bypass the ‘thank you, I owe you my life’ or the ‘how did you know exactly what I needed?’ . Dan rolled his eyes.

“Do you want it or not?”

Chris took it, slotting it between the doors. “Grab the scissors from my bag. We’ll need some kind of counter action, right? Torsion or some shit?”

“Stop pretending you have any idea about physics.” Dan reached in. “These are going to snap instantly.”

Chris just waved him over. “You get the top of the door.”

Dan sighed, positioning himself on the other side of where Chris was crouched and reaching up to jam the scissor blades into the gap, his arm digging into Chris’. God, this elevator was far too small.

“On three.”

“This won’t work.”

“Two. One. Now.”

Both of them strained against the doors, the elevator rattling as they pulled at them. There was a non-zero chance this sent them both on a quick trip down to the first floor at full speed, but Chris was just about ready to lose it. It was about time they got the fuck out of here. The doors creaked and strained, small dents in the metal appearing but no real gap appearing between them. It looked like it wasn’t going to work. After all that, they might actually be stuck here overnight.

Suddenly, the shoehorn in his hand started bending, and the smallest gap, only a centimeter at maximum width, opened up. Chris reached into his bag with his free hand and jammed it with a fountain pen, then moved around to start prying it open with his fingers.

“It’s going to crush your hand, you fucking idiot,” Dan yelled, grabbing the shoehorn and placing it right under the scissors, pulling the other door away from Chris’ fingers until he was red in the face. The doors kept denting, not moving any further, until they suddenly flew open, throwing both of them into the walls at the side before the entire box shifted down again before jolting to a stop.

Chris stared at Dan, gasping for breath and dizzy. Dan looked no better off, eyes squeezed shut and sweat beading on his forehead. Chris dared to roll over and peer out of the newly opened door, waiting to be met with the dark inside of the elevator shaft, and instead staring out onto the reception. He looked down. They were maybe three inches above the ground at most.

“Dan…”

Dan slowly opened his eyes, then quickly darted forwards to take in the scene. “You’re fucking joking me.”

The day wasn’t done with them yet, though. Before either of them could say another word, none other than Stoddard walked right through the front door, humming to himself, only pausing when he saw them sprawled across the floor of the lift, both staring up at him.

“Hi?” He said, looking them up and down.

“Hello.” Dan said, as if everything was completely normal. Chris could barely bring himself to grunt a greeting.

“Are you guys… okay?”

Chris nodded, letting his head collapse to the floor. “Yeah, yeah man. So fine.”

Stoddard just stood there, still staring at them. Chris just wished he’d fuck off already, but he didn’t have the energy to say that. Instead, he forced himself to his feet, dusted himself off and stepped out onto solid ground. He’d never really valued fresh air quite as much as he did now, inhaling like it was his first breath in 26 years. Dan followed him out, looking about as frazzled as he felt.

“I… gotta go pick up some files.” Stoddard said slowly, still watching the two of them suspiciously.

“Party over?” Chris asked.

He shook his head. “I’m just going home.” He stared at the lift expectantly, then back at Chris and Dan where they stood in front of the doors. Chris could have explained what had happened over the last two or so hours to him, to warn him off the inevitable failure he was about to experience, but in his exhausted, elevator-fevered brain, he just stepped out of the way.

“After you.”

Stoddard shot him a final, poorly-concealed, concerned look before stepping around him and up into the lift, dented doors and all. Chris wasn’t sure whether he was just unobservant or if he truly did not care anymore. He couldn’t bring himself to care, either. He turned to Dan.

“So? Shall we get started?”

Dan was watching some unfixed spot on the horizon, clearly in a world of his own. Chris jabbed him in the ribs, and he jumped, finally making eye contact.

“Yeah, alright. But we are taking the stairs this time.”

Chris took one last look at the lift as the doors inched shut behind Stoddard, wobbling the whole time. “Obviously. I’m never getting in that piece of crap again.”

“I’ve been telling you this all along,” Dan said, lips quirking up at the corner.

“Well, I’m sorry, okay? Stairs stay on top. I’m sorry I ever doubted you. Is that what you want to hear?”

Dan’s mouth quivered as he clearly tried to repress a smile. He nudged Chris in the arm, though not with enough force to be convincing. “Ass. Come on, then.”

They headed towards the stairs, climbing up them like their entire futures depended on it - because maybe they did - as the distant sound of a familiar alarm ringing to life followed them up.

DAY 0

[hausofmamadas]

Until The Day You Don't Come Back

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Pairing: Andrea Nuñez & David Barrón (+ some implied Dinarrón)

Prompt: "All we have are our choices" and Crossroads - for @narcosfandomdiscord Narcovember - #14 Book of Decisions Decisions Decisions

Word count: ≈ 4.2K

Note: shoutout to the homie @rerorero-my-cherry whose discord tonteria, talking about skipping off to Mexico to escape fascism somehow sparked the idea for this fic and I can't even explain how or why😂

TWs: Canon-consistent violence, descriptions of violent acts, smoking

There was no possible universe in which he was brought here by conscience. So naturally, she was dying to know the real reason they were meeting now under this bridge... Andrea gets a mysterious call from a potential new informant one day with information on notoriously corrupt politician and money launderer, Carlos Hank Gonzalez. She agrees to a late-night meeting on the US side of the border, so she can get all the tea, and boy is that tea scalding. (This ended up entirely too long but here you go world.)

⁂

Andrea checks her watch. Almost midnight. The road is quiet, cars passing by every fifteen minutes. The thinnest nail clipping of the moon is out and her informant is over a half an hour late. The lone street light flickering on the overpass above feels like a doomsday clock urging her to cut her losses and go home.

Really, loitering at this fork in the road under a highway bridge isn’t the most sensible idea, not when people were being gunned down in the streets in broad daylight and the cartels were using the bodies of their victims to send telegrams to each other. At least she had enough sense to insist the meeting take place on the US side of the border where her death would at least be investigated should things end badly. Just a few miles from Tecate, she’d found an unmonitored stretch of border the gringos hadn’t fenced off yet a few months ago and had been using it to touch base with informants.

It’s for this reason Salgado is always telling her she’s a clever girl with no sense. And also that if she’s senseless enough not to listen to him, as La Voz’s editor and her boss, he makes no bones about using it to his advantage. And he had - a series of groundbreaking stories about the hipódromo, Carlos Hank Gonzalez, and the AFO were enough to prove her senselessness enough of an asset, no matter how much of a danger it posed. Until the day you don’t come back, he’d note ominously.

But if not her, then who? The job was easier to do if you knew you were already dead. She did. She also didn’t think about it too much. Plus, this lead was too big to pass up. The call with the tip-off had come directly to her desk, an anonymous insider allegedly high enough in the AFO to know all about Gonzalez’s dealings not just with the Arellano family but with Amado Carrillo Fuentes in Juarez; news she wasn’t yet privy to but that made enough sense to catch her attention. And that’s how she ends up on these back-country, dirt roads in the middle of the night.

Of course, she knows it could be a trap too - she’s senseless, not stupid. She knows full well this little rendezvous could be no more than someone making good on a bounty for the head of any journalist from La Voz. She couldn’t even bring herself to revel in the I told you so, when the street edict came down from the AFO after Salgado enacted the policy of removing writers’ names from the bylines, even if she did tell him it was a short-term solution to a long term problem. It was even shorter than they bargained for because within a week of implementing the policy, the AFO had branded anyone who came in and out of that office fair game. Normally she wouldn’t pass up the opportunity to retroactively gloat, but this time it didn’t seem fair. Salgado did his best to protect them and it earned the whole staff a scarlet letter. But who’s fault was that really? So she left well enough alone, like she never had an opinion on the matter to begin with.

So yeah, the prospect of this being a trap had occurred to her. More than once. And the longer she sits here, leaning against the hood of her station wagon, checking her watch, the more the possibility keeps rearing its ugly head. Right on cue, the sound of footsteps crunching on gravel has her going for the handgun in her waistband and spinning around to greet the void of what she hoped would be empty space under the bridge.

“Hello? Who’s there?” She does her best to breathe, keep calm, as she anchors the gun in both hands, aiming for the shadows.“Dejate ver. Muestrate si no quieres tomarte una bala en el culo.”

A pair of raised hands are the first things to emerge followed by a modestly dressed man with a clean-cut crop of dark hair, dark eyes, and a sharply drawn mustache that gives him the look of a French nobleman caught in the wrong timeline. Her stomach drops several floors and liquifies into a puddle on the ground as it sinks in, just who he is. She’d give anything not to but there’s no eradicating the sense of recognition.

So this is it then. The end of the line.

She’d pictured it just like this. In fact the scene is so familiar, she feels the distinct impulse to laugh at just how much of a cliche she’s about to be. Because as much as she can acknowledge the possibility - meeting a grisly, undignified end, painted somewhere on the streets of a city she’s fought for and loved, just another macabre telegram - she’s also struck by the kind of shame that accompanies shattered hubris. That, somewhere along the way, she mistakenly bought into a brand of exceptionalism she always hoped to avoid, one might call it downright American. Rationally, she’s known the odds, even accepted them. And yet somehow it was still something that only happened to other people.

What a fool. She’d kick herself if she wasn’t about to die. Or maybe … How fast could this guy move? How quick could his hands be? Maybe she’d turn her gun on herself, get a shot off before he could get his out. Take things on her own terms. Not that she can even see a gun. But she doesn’t need to, to know it’s there, tucked in his waistband right at the base of his back.

After all, he is the AFO’s top sicario, David Barrón Corona. One of the most lethal men in Tijuana. Maybe all of Mexico. She’s only ever seen him at a distance, through a telephoto lens or in grainy photographs developed thereafter, but she could recite a list of his exploits from memory like a kid in some perverse spelling bee: the shootout at Christine’s, the airport massacre, the assassination of Ocampo, the shootout at the Belmont cafe. The man’s resume is a mile long and filled with nothing but death.

In her experience, meeting monsters like this tended to be unsettling for how boring and anticlimactic they always seemed to be. He appears no different. Just a man walking on two legs, with two eyes to see, and those eyes aren’t even crazed or rage-filled or brimming with hate. Whenever she came face to face with someone like him, it tended to incite within her a twinge of irritation that they couldn’t do everyone the courtesy of coming with some kind of warning label.

One of her hands drops and she walks toward him, gun drawn as she cocks the hammer and fires a warning shot into the ground next to him with an ease that surprises even her. He barely flinches. It’s obviously not his first rodeo. Which, yes, is to be expected but the stillness of him is still downright chilling.

His posture is relaxed, hands up in an effort to suspend hostilities. She’s decidedly unmoved in her hostility.

“Y’know,” he attempts to reassure her, “if I wanted to kill you, ya estarías en el piso, desangrándote en la tierra,” but it looms more like a threat.

It catches her off guard though, how much softer, gentler his voice is than she expected. It’s almost enough to disarm her entirely until she remembers all the coroner’s reports and crime scene photos she’d come across in her research. His handiwork. Well-executed executions, meted out with such quiet indifference he could’ve been telling them a bedtime story. This is who she’s dealing with.

“O sí? Pues soy yo ya quien tiene la pistola. So start talking, cabrón antes que te dé por el culo,” she flicks her wrist, pointing the gun barrel at the gravel disturbed by the first shot, “with another one of those.”

He chuckles, “Usually when people, civvies especially, say that,” making sure to keep his hands up, careful not to make any sudden movements, “no les creo. Pero a ti? A ti te creo.”

“Arre. So, if you’re really not here to kill me, fuiste tu con quien hablé por el telefono?”

He gives a stiff nod.

Andrea cocks her head to one side, examining him in the flickering street lamp light. He’d be handsome were it not for the vacuum in his eyes, no warmth, no life, yet here he was, breathing and blinking and talking all the same. There was no possible universe in which he was brought here by conscience. With what she knew, he was likely immune to that particular plague. So naturally, she was dying to know the real reason they were meeting now under this bridge, at this dirt crossroads, near the dirt town of Tecate.

“Do I, uh, have to keep these,” he looks right, then left, at each of his arms, “up the whole time?”

She considers the risk for a moment, ultimately deciding to let him but refuses to drop her gun. His hands come swinging down by his sides apparently unbothered by the fact that he remains caught in her crosshairs. Yeah, clearly not his first rodeo. Not even his second. Or third.

He meets her eyes but says nothing and the silence starts to feel like a third party in the conversation that just won’t shut up. Andrea taps her foot impatiently but he doesn’t seem to get the memo that this is the part where he’s supposed to do the talking.

“Alright.” She exhales crossly, rolling her eyes. “What did you want to talk about? On the phone you said something about Hank and Juarez?”

“That’s right.” Barrón takes a few steps closer, hands now clasped together at his waist, no more troubled by the gun than when he was further away. “He’s been working with Amado since he took over. Cleaning his money.”

“I don’t understand. Wasn’t he already doing that for the Arellanos?”

He nods.

“Wait, but that doesn’t make any sense. Why would he align himself with warring plazas?”

Looking down, Barrón shrugs, “That’s above my pay grade,” kicking a rock across the dirt, dust trailing behind it like a tiny, terrestrial shooting star. “I’m not that high on the food chain.”

She regards him skeptically, brows crinkling.

His tongue clicks against the roof of his mouth, “I can only guess,” seeming to take the cue this time. “He’s probably too high-profile for either plaza to fuck with, so big homie can afford to do business with both. But I doubt Sr. Kingpin Accountant accounted for the heat it’d bring back on him with all the, uh– y’know, scrutiny.”

Grinding her teeth, Andrea snorts. Scrutiny was both a succinct and delightfully vanilla way of saying, ‘global attention thanks to all the bodies of the streets.’ But the implications of Hank laundering money for Juarez were big. He might be playing the plazas off each other, biding his time until a victor emerges, one he’ll be all too happy to chuck right under the bus the minute the political machine decides it needs to offer up its next sacrificial lamb to the gringos. Standing there, trying to put all these new pieces together, Andrea suddenly remembers the pack of cigarettes in the pocket of her flannel and wishes she’d thought to smoke one before they’d started talking. She can’t afford the distraction of lighting one up now, what with having to keep the gun in place.

“Alright, so he’s doing business with both plazas. How the hell do you know this? You said it yourself, you’re not that high up on the food chain.”

He seems to bristle at this, throwing her a sideways glance through half-lidded eyes, face overtaken by a dangerous, far-away look that spooks her even more than the gun at his back. “Why would you need to know that to write your little story.”

Interesting. Something personal, perhaps. She’d get it out of him one way or another. But later.

“Well,” she grips the gun even tighter, knuckles going white and she hopes that by keeping her voice level, he can’t sense how scared she is, “it’s not going in an article per se. But for reasons that I hope would be obvious? I can’t identify you as a source. You’ll have to remain anonymous.”

“You don’t gotta do that on my account.”

Practically gagging on disbelief, she manages to sputter out, “For you? What are you kidding?” before regaining her composure. “I mean– well frankly, you’re a criminal, a killer at that, putting a rival cartel in the headlines, so it’s more an issue of self-interest. Now, I know doing something like this does nothing but put you at risk but my readers won’t know that. So, telling me how exactly you found out about all this would lend you more credibility as a source. O sea significa que podemos confiar más en lo que me has dicho.”

This seems to wound him privately somehow like he’s taken it worse than the bullet she’d fired. But whatever it stirs in him is gone before she gets a chance to interrogate it further.

No less relentless, it is enough for her to ease up on her delivery. “So do you have proof? Something concrete that I can take back to my editor?”

His hand goes in his pocket and he begins digging around for something. Andrea’s whole body stiffens and she takes a step back, arm straightening to retrain the gun on him more decisively. If he notices, he doesn’t show it as he continues fishing around in his pocket until he finally brings out a few folded documents along with a bag of rolling papers. He takes a pre-rolled cigarette out of the bag, popping it between his lips while reaching out to pass her the documents. A few hesitant steps forward, she lowers the gun slowly snatching the papers from his hands quickly before scurrying back again. Her head bobs up and down between watching him and trying to read what’s on the page in front of her.

“What are these,” she flips through a few pages, “business licenses?”

“Among other things.”

She skims the first document and for the first time she feels like this whole thing might not be a trap. Fixing him with the coldest, most I-will-kill-you stare she can manage, “I’m taking a big risk, doing this. No me hagas arrepentirme o te arrepentiras, lo prometo,” she flicks the safety on and puts the gun in her waistband, in front so he knows she still has easy access.

Bowing his head, Barrón agrees, "Noted," cracking a small smile, something akin to respect or maybe admiration and it’s the first time his face displays any emotion. It puts her a little more at ease.

Both hands now free, Andrea combs through the documents, a few loose, the rest stapled together, some with carbon copy backings, and skims for the highlights - important phrases, dates, places, signatures - until she finds a signature at the bottom of a business license for an aeronautic manufacturing company.

“A shell company,” Barrón confirms her suspicions before they’re even fully formed. “Makes specialty parts for small planes. Like Cessnas.”

She flips to the next page, documents showing ownership stakes in the casino at the hipódromo along with two of the Arellanos’ discotheques. Flipping through the rest, it’s more of the same, SEC and CNBV registrations for shell corporations, licenses for legitimate businesses, and share certificates, none of them bearing Carlos Hank’s name but nonetheless tying him to both Tijuana and Juarez by a signature almost as important: Carolina Vera. His lawyer. She was all over these documents.

Speechless, Andrea’s head rises slowly to look at Barrón. When she said proof, she wasn’t expecting it to be this monumental. The cynic in her kicks up, wondering if it isn’t just a more elaborate trap designed to lull her in a state of submission before the jaws snap shut for good.

“It gets better," he says, examining his zip-o lighter before flicking the top back and forth a few times with his thumb.

Which reminds her, in desperate need of a cigarette, Andrea folds the papers up and sticks them in the back pocket of her jeans and then feverishly digs around the pocket of her shirt for her pack. Once retrieved, she flicks her lighter several times, sparks flying at the end of the cigarette in her mouth, until finally a little bloom of flame appears out of the corner of her eye to light it for her. He's a smooth motherfucker, she'll give him that, although strangely, there was nothing smug about it. He brings it back, cradling the flame with his other hand to light his own. After a first drag, Andrea dips her head back, a cyclone of smoke pouring from her lips while she exhales in relief.

“How,” snapping forward again, she takes another drag before asking, voice thick, each word encased in smoke, “does this get any better?”

“I have another source.”

“What? Who?”

“Cristina Palacios Hodoyan.”

“No me digas." The shock has her nearly wheezing the words and her eyes are wide, almost feral with curiosity. “You know where she is?”

He smirks. “Who do you think hid her?”

“What? So– but wait, so you didn’t—y’know. Her sons?”

Suddenly he can’t meet her eyes and she can’t wipe the image of the bridge from her mind - the row of lifeless bodies strung up, punishment para los soplones, whose biggest crime was usually no more than bearing witness to things she never agreed to see in the first place. That Alex and Alfredo were more involved in the extracurricular activities didn’t change the fact that they were just boys.

Perhaps trying to get a read on Andrea or maybe just hoping to fill the silence, Barrón offers, “Everyone assumed- and for good reason. But that time wasn’t me. I was in San Diego, trying t–”

“Save it.” With one look, she skewers him, eyes narrowed, mouth tight, not here for his bullshit. “Vete alaverga con esa ‘that time.’ How many other times was it you, huh?”

Meeting her eyes again like he recognizes his mistake, he responds matter-of-factly, “Plenty,” head held high, no attempt at contrition, false or otherwise.

Still, she’s expecting him to plead his case, so she waits for the explanation, the mental gymnastics, the cognitive dissonance, the rationalization for every single horrific act of violence wrapped up in that plenty. After standing there, watching each other in silence for who knows how long, she realizes there won’t be any of that. And up sprouts the tiniest kernel of respect that she already hates for being there. But she can’t help it. David Barrón could be called a lot of things but a hypocrite wasn’t one of them. She rolls her eyes because christ, who needs heroes when the bar is this high.

She mumbles to herself, “There’s a fire sale and everything must go,” but before he can voice the look of pure confusion on his face, she’s onto the next question, something tugging at the back of her mind since he first stepped out of the shadows of the overpass. “So, what’s in this for you? Why are you telling me all of this?”

Gaze shifting off to the light polluted horizon, he goes quiet. Eventually he just says, “That’s a big question.”

If this was a television interview, the broadcast would’ve been cut for all the dead air between them but she just waits, hoping he might give her just a little more, something to put this whole bizarre night into perspective.

“It’s just—” he shakes his head, “the way I come up—” putting his smoke to his lips and taking a pull so long, she wonders if maybe the question hasn’t short-circuited him a bit.

“Gettin’ into all this,” he waves his hand around at nothing in particular, a party streamer of smoke left behind its path, “wasn’t really a choice for me. Not like how it is here. Now in this new– whatever. Era. It wasn’t supposed to go this way. We were supposed to legitimize. Climb outta this ditch, not dig it deeper.

“This? What do you mean?”

“The game,” he huffs in a moment of frustration, the only emotion he’s let escape so far. “Used to be no civvies, no bystanders, no regular folk. If you was in the game, you get popped on the street, well okay, you knew what you signed up for. But all this other– truth is, man, I’m just tired. Tired of the game, the life, tired of doing all this shit just to be someone’s second choice.”

It was the most he’d spoken the entire time and she didn’t want to interrupt for fear he’d clam up again and go back to nods and one-word answers, but she’d have to start asking some follow-up questions if he didn’t start putting some names to these pronouns.

“I tried to save him, y’know, for her.” He keeps going, face fixed with a thousand yard stare so vacant and icy, he might’ve had the surface of the moon in his eyes. “But I couldn’t. Maybe I didn’t want to. She knows I tried but maybe she knows that too.”

“Hm.” Crossing her arms, one hip cocked out to the side, Andrea examines the end of her cigarette before holding it off to the side and tapping it with her finger. “So the rumors were true. You and Enedina.”

“I thought it’d be different.” Barrón turns back to her, flashing a nihilistic smirk that reveals how broken he is. “But the things she’s asked me to do,” he shakes his head, “I don’t know. The game ain’t in me no more. And this last one, well—”

“This last one?”

“Your editor. He was greenlit.”

It takes a moment to register. When it finally does, Andrea feels like someone’s pressed pause on reality only to start playing it again in slow motion.

“Y— you mean, my—? uh, Salgado? Ramon?

“Pues, sí.”

“You’re certain?”

“Mhm. My next mark.”

“Hijoueputa,” she mutters. “No es posible.”

Stamping his cigarette out in the dirt with the heel of his wingtip, he nods. “Best believe it.”

“Well— so what? Are you still gonna go after him?” Andrea’s getting more panicked by the second, her fingers finding the grip of her gun.

Chuckling, Barrón puts a hand up in gentle protest, “Nah, chill.”

For some inexplicable reason, she listens to him.“Fine. So, what’re you gonna do then?”

”Something I’ve never done in my whole life.”

“What’s that?”

“Miss.”

Andrea appears to take some comfort in this as her shoulders drop, a breath escaping that she didn’t even know she was holding. Remembering her cigarette, she takes a last drag while noting dryly, “You know, you can never go back.”

A blank look from him is the only response she gets.

“If you do that— y’know, miss. The minute I talk to Cristina, the minute I write this, they’ll probably figure out it’s you. You can never go back.”

Barrón just shakes his head, resigned. “No, ma’am.”

“No? What, no? If they find out you’re my source, they’ll kill you.”

“Of course. I know how they’ll do it too.” He says it with a twinge of pride that reminds Andrea exactly who she’s talking to. “It’ll be someone I know. I’ll see it coming. They’ll want me to see it coming. Cause they know I know.”

Despite this reminder of who he is, what he’s done, she can’t quash that kernel of respect that’s been planted. Even if he wanted to atone, he had enough respect not to insult her by trying to. Nor did he feel sorry for himself that he probably didn’t deserve to. It was a display of accountability she rarely saw from someone as morally bankrupt as he’d had to be. Until now anyway. And this makes her feel, in spite of herself, almost sorry for him. “You’re not scared?”

“Sure. Wouldn’t you be?”

“Well, of course,” she shrugs, twisting the filter of her cigarette until the cherry and remaining tobacco fall out before tossing it behind her. “But I w–“

“But you wouldn’t deserve it. And it’s true, I got it coming. Made my own bed as they say. But I can still be scared. Even if I know, at the end of the day, all we have are our choices.”

Andrea smirks, crossing her arms, looking down at the ground to push some dust around with the toe of her boot, unsure what to say next. When she looks back up, he’s already walking away, hands in his pockets, leisurely like he’s got nowhere to be, back to the shadowy spot under the bridge he came from. She wondered if his car was parked there or somewhere else. Or maybe he’s just some visiting ghost of Christmas past and she’ll wake up from this dream.

”Hey,” she calls out.

Just before he reaches the edge of the void, he spins around on his heels, hands still in his pockets, eyebrows raised, and waits.

“For what it’s worth– well, you do have it coming. But … I hope you find your way to some peace somehow.”

The unexpected happens then. He smiles. But this time it travels up his face all the way to his eyes, lighting them up. It might be as rare as a passing comet. So there are signs of life, after all.

═

taglist: @narcosfandomdiscord, @drabbles-mc, @ladygoatee, @rerorero-my-cherry, @narcolini, @ashlingnarcos, @complete-nonsequitur, @tofuwildcard, @bellinitini, @when-did-this-become-difficult

[ao3feed-tedlasso]

when you know who's callin'...

https://ift.tt/EutyCdx by JaJaJa3510 But, there are two instincts in the manager’s head: One, to run all the way to the office, or two, to call someone via… One of those red boxes. Or, Ted's most memorable experience using a phone booth. Words: 2199, Chapters: 1/1, Language: English Series: Part 13 of Narcovember 2024, Part 5 of Ted Lasso Fics Fandoms: Ted Lasso (TV) Rating: General Audiences Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Categories: M/M Characters: Trent Crimm, Ted Lasso, Coach Beard (Ted Lasso) Relationships: Trent Crimm/Ted Lasso, Coach Beard & Ted Lasso Additional Tags: Pre-Slash, Getting Together, Love Confessions, Fluff, Romantic Fluff, Awkwardness, First Kiss, Phone Calls & Telephones, i love tedependent so SO much, not related to canon in the slightest, i don't know how phone booths actually work SO just enjoy it for what it is, Title from an Arctic Monkeys Song, Dialogue Heavy, Feelings Realization, Bisexual Ted Lasso, yeahhh he be having that crisis TM, Fluff and Humor source https://archiveofourown.org/works/60730825 November 21, 2024 at 02:05PM

[drabbles-mc]

Missed It

Bradley "Rooster" Bradshaw x F!Reader

Written for @narcosfandomdiscord 's Book of Abduction: "Somebody has to be paying attention."

Warnings: 18+, language, established relationship, fluff

Word Count: 1.5k

A/N: despite the name of the prompt, no one is getting abducted in this fic 😂 idk what it is about Bradley Bradshaw but whenever i want to write a fluffy fic with that man i put him in the kitchen alongside his partner. don't ask me why my brain always goes there because i just Don't Know lmao

When the two of you had gotten everything set out on the counter to make dinner, you had been asking yourself why you didn’t cook together more often. Most day-to-day things you tackled together, things like grocery shopping and laundry. Even so, whenever one of you was cooking, it was always just one of you. You could try to chalk it up to work schedules or one of you not bothering to ask the other for help because it was just part of the routine now, but there was no actual reason for it.

Things had been going fine for the first fifteen minutes while you were prepping everything. You couldn’t help but to rag on him a little bit about his knife skills, remarking that it was pretty impressive that he managed to do all of that without chopping the tip of his fingers off like you’d thought he would.

He’d laughed and shaken his head at you, but it didn’t pry his focus away from what he was doing. If anything, now he was even more determined to stay dialed in and not mess up in front of you—he didn’t want to give you the satisfaction of getting exactly what you were waiting for. His competitive streak followed him home form the base, but he was fortunate in that most times you found it to be a little endearing or at least amusing.

The two of you playing chef was going fine until you’d started to sauté everything together in the pan on the stove. For the first two minutes you were perfectly focused on that while Bradley busied himself getting the bowls and silverware. The two of you were moving around each other without any issues, each in your own lane, until you felt him stop and linger behind you.

Turning your head, you saw him looking over your shoulder, watching as you deftly moved the noodles and vegetables around in the pan. You laughed, raising your eyebrows at him. “Can I help you with something, Bradshaw?”

His eyes drifted from the pan on the stove to your face, and once he was looking at you, a smirk immediately pulled at the end of his mouth. “No, but looks like I could help you with something.”

You rolled your eyes, but still smiled. “And what’s that?”

He nodded towards the pan. “You missed one.”

The laugh you let out was equal parts humor and sarcasm. “I missed one?”

“Yeah,” he replied as plain as ever.

You made a brief gesture towards the pan that was sizzling nicely on the stove. “Where? I would love if you could point it out.”

“If you can’t see it,” he shook his head admonishingly as he placed his hand on your hip, “then I don’t think I can help you.”

You turned the rest of your body to follow your head and Bradley made sure his hand didn’t stray from your hip as you did so. Once you were facing him, your back to the stove, you held out the chopsticks that were in your hand. Pushing them towards him, you lifted your eyebrows in a way to wordlessly communicate that he was more than welcome to take care of it himself.

He held his hands up, palms facing you. “No, no. You said that I could help with the prep and then you’d handle this part. Your words. I wouldn’t wanna take that away from you.”

The false sincerity that he said it with got you to break your silence with another laugh. “Yeah, okay. I’m sure that’s what it is. Chivalry, or whatever your approximation of that is.”

“I’m very chivalrous.”

You cocked an eyebrow. “Is that your final answer?”

He mirrored your expression. “What else would it be?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” you dragged the word out for all it was worth before pointing at him aggressively with your chopsticks. “Maybe you don’t want to admit that you still haven’t learned how to cook using chopsticks.”

He waved you off as though you’d said something ridiculous, but he didn’t reach for them to prove you wrong. That’s how you knew you had him, because if there was one thing that Bradley Bradshaw was always going to do, it was take advantage of an opportunity to be right in any debate that the two of you got into a home.

“Go ahead,” you held your hand out, palm-up with the chopsticks resting across it like a peace offering. “Prove me wrong.”

Bradley looked at your hand, and then at you. He saw the smirk that was on your face, and even though he was shaking his head at you, the warm smile that was crossing his face was giving you a different message entirely. While Bradley might’ve been the one out of the two of you known for being stubborn, especially outside the four walls of your shared apartment, you knew how to give him a run for his money on that. More often than not you were happy to go with the flow, but when you decided that you were going to pick a point and stand on it, Bradley hardly ever stood a chance. Lucky for him you usually only used those powers in small, silly debates like the one you were currently in.

“I don’t have to prove anything to you,” he finally said, grin splitting a little wider.

You barked out a laugh, head dropping back as you did so. “Really?” Instead of giving you a verbal response, he just kept the smile on his face as he shrugged at you, like he was daring you to try something else. As tempting as it was to take the bait, you shook your head at him. “You know, I tried to be so nice and invite you to cook with me. And this is what I get!”

“Invite me?” he parroted back incredulously, trying not to laugh. “Invite me to cook with you, my own girlfriend? In our own kitchen? In our own apartment?” Taking his hand off of your hip, he pressed it against his own chest with the type of dramatics he saved just for you. “How did I get so lucky?”

You were both breaking down into fits of laughter as you said, “Keep asking your—”

The rest of your sentence was drowned out by the sound of the smoke detector in your apartment going off. Both of you looked around, and while it wasn’t bad at all, the alarm in your apartment had always been on the sensitive side—luckily your neighbors had yet to complain.

“Shit!”

“Fuck!”

You both cursed at the same time, still laughing as you each made yourselves busy trying to get the alarm to shut off again. You turned off the stove, moving the stir-fry pan to the cool burner at the back of the stove. Bradley swiped the dish towel off the counter and went over to stand underneath the smoke detector. Unfolding the towel all the way, he flapped it in an attempt to get the smoke to dissipate enough for the incessant beeping to stop. It only took about thirty seconds for it to stop, but it felt like so much longer when the noise wouldn’t abate.

Once it did, Bradley tossed the towel so that it was draped over one shoulder. “You’re welcome.”

You laughed as you checked to see if any real damage had been done to what the two of you had been planning to eat for dinner. A few noodles on the bottom of the pan caught the worst of it, but it wasn’t unsalvageable.

“This is why I cook alone,” you said as you tentatively turned the stove back on, using your chopsticks to pick out the few pieces that were just a little too crispy to keep and tossing them in the trash with expert precision.

He chuckled as he walked up behind you, his chest pressing against your back as he loomed over your shoulder again. “What’s that supposed to mean? Like this happens to you all the time.”

You shook your head at him. “Well somebody has to be paying attention, and clearly we can’t—”

“If I remember correctly,” he interjected, and you could feel the tickle of his breath against your skin as he spoke, “this all got started because I was paying attention.”

You hummed in amusement. “That’s how you remember it, huh?”

He nodded before pressing a quick kiss to the side of your head. “Yep.” Another kiss. “You’re welcome.”

You could feel the way he was leaning in for another kiss, and before he could you reached behind you with the hand that wasn’t holding your chopsticks and playfully pressed your palm to his forehead, lightly pushing him back away from you.

“No more distracting me—we’ll set off the smoke alarm again.”

He laughed as he took a step back, leaving a small gap between you. “Worth it.”

Top Gun Maverick Taglist: @garbinge @justreblogginfics @proceduralpassion (If you'd like to be added to any of my taglists, please let me know!)

[drabbles-mc]

Perspective

Bishop Losa x F!Reyes!Reader

For @narcosfandomdiscord Book of Balancing In Between: Fanwork whose setting is in a liminal space (i chose the carniceria after-hours)

Warnings: 18+, language, light angst, emotional hurt/comfort, reader is the oldest Reyes sister

Word Count: 2k

A/N: MAAAAAAAAN it's been a while since i've written for Bishop and i simply just love giving him complicated relationships with Reyes Women.

You knew better than to sit with your back to the door no matter where you were or what time it was. But, after how the last few weeks had gone you were too tired to think about it. You were too tired to think about it, it was two in the morning, and out of all the places in the world to sit with your back to the door you figured that Felipe’s shop was one of the safest. So there you were, camped out at one of the small tables inside the shop with your back to the door.

It'd been a long time since you made a point to notice the sound of motorcycle engines. It was like having the fan on at home or the window down in the car as you drove, noise that you heard but never really listened to. The sound of the bike engine went in one ear and right out the other, but the shifting lights and shadows of the singular headlight coming through the front windows of the shop are what caught your attention. Then you heard the rest of it.

Taking a deep breath, you wiped at the tears in your eyes, the ones smeared across your cheekbones. Raking your fingers back along the sides of your head, you tried to take breaths deep enough to get your heartrate and your breathing back on track.

The sound of the engine went away, the light streaming through the window went away too and sent all of the shadows running with it. You sat perfectly still, and within seconds, right on cue, the bells above the door chimed as someone pushed it open.

The pacing of his strides gave it away before he even opened his mouth to speak. “Shouldn’t turn your back on the bad guys, querida,” he said, resting his hand on your shoulder.

Something about the feeling of the callouses on his palm against the exposed skin of your shoulder was more comforting than usual. Reaching up, you threaded your fingers with his. “Only bad guys who come here tend to be pretty good to me, so I think I’ll be alright.”

His hand fell away from your shoulder as he walked to sit across from you, and you begrudgingly let his hand slip out of yours. Leaning back in the chair, you watched as Bishop sat down across from you. Once he sat, he immediately leaned forward onto the table, hands resting in the center of it close enough for you to hold if you wanted to.

There was something so familiar about the way he looked in the patchy light coming through the windows from the streetlamps outside. It reminded you of when you’d first met, first really gotten to know each other. A lot had changed since then, and it reminded you of all that too.

“What’re you doing here, Obispo?” you asked, mirroring his position but not taking his hands in yours again just yet.

“You weren’t home,” he offered up simply.

You chuckled. “And why were you—”

“Because you didn’t stop by the clubhouse.” He pulled his phone from his kutte and tossed it onto the table. “And you didn’t answer your phone.”

Tears were gathering in your eyes again but you still smiled at him. “Something going on that I should know about, then?” you asked, already knowing the answer.

Bishop looked at you, studied the expression on your face. He could see the puffiness of your eyes, the way that the tears beginning to creep over the edge were not the first ones that you’d shed for the night. He saw the tiredness in your eyes, even though only the smallest traces of light were hitting your face.

“Why here?” he asked, completely avoiding your question.

“What?”

He made a tiny gesture, a flick of his hand motioning to the expanse of the shop. “Why do you end up here at three in the morning when shit goes sideways?”

You chuckled. “It’s only two in the morning, first of all.”

“You know—”

You pointed to his kutte. “Can I?”

There was a pause, and the look on Bishop’s face let you know that he was contemplating holding out on you until he got some answers from you, but he’d never been good at turning you away. Reaching back into his kutte, he pulled out his pack of cigarettes and lighter. You watched as he went through the motions that were so second-nature to him now, placing it between his lips and sparking the lighter, waiting to make sure it’d catch. He pulled one drag off of it before holding it out to you. You let your fingers touch for a second longer than necessary before taking it.

The inhale that you took off the cigarette in your hand was the steadiest one that you’d taken for most of the night. You tried to savor it, the steadiness and the burn you felt. Closing your eyes, you let your breath sneak back out one calculated centimeter at a time.

Finally opening your eyes again, you found Bishop still staring at you, that same unique mix of anger and concern in his eyes that never truly seemed to go away. “The worst thing happened here,” you said, quieter than you intended.

Bishop’s frown deepened in a way you didn’t know was physically possible. Nodding, he kept his voice just as quiet as yours as he said, “I know.”

You brought the cigarette back to your lips for a moment to buy you some time. “So now, when other bad things happen, sometimes I’ll come here. Get some perspective…or some shit like that.”

The tacked-on ending got weary but genuine chuckles out of both of you. “Right. Some shit like that.” Bishop took a moment to light up a cigarette of his own. “Still don’t like it.”

You hummed in amusement. “You don’t have to.”

“I do if you’re gonna keep comin’ here.”

“Only if you’re gonna keep comin’ after me.”

It was a sweet moment, one of small smiles and tendrils of smoke making it even harder to get a clear picture. But you each knew how the other looked even in pitch black darkness. There was a warmth about it, separate from the scorch down the back of your throat. You almost wanted to reach out with your free hand to take his.

But then the moment passed. Pressing the knuckle of your thumb across your brow, you asked, “So, did you come hunt me down tonight to tell me something that I already know?”

His expression faltered. “I didn’t think—”

“You didn’t think I would’ve known by now that my brother got shot?” Ash fell from your cigarette onto the table, a mess you’d be sure to clean before Felipe found his way back to the shop again. “You didn’t think that between the hospital, and his girlfriend, and my other brother that’s part of your fucking club,” your palm slammed down on the tabletop, causing it to rattle, “You didn’t think that with all of that, I wouldn’t find out?”

“Querida, I—”

“Ah-ah,” you shook your head. “You didn’t come here to break the news to me, Obispo. When you called me a few hours ago? That was to try and break the news. And you were still too late on that, by the way. But the rest of it? Showing up to my house? Here? You only go that far when you know you’re up shit creek with no fucking paddle in sight.”

Neither of you said anything then. The longer you looked at Bishop, the less you felt that you knew what he was thinking. If tradition held, he was probably trying to come up with excuses for a few things: why EZ got shot, why he wasn’t the one to tell you, and why there wasn’t blood running down the streets of Santo Padre yet. You didn’t need the laundry list for it all, but you’d played games like this with him enough now to at least be curious about the answers.

The same thing happened when you found out Ezekiel had killed a cop and was going to prison, and when Angel was joining the club, then again when Angel was looking down the pipe at eighteen months in Chino, then again when you heard that not only was Ezekiel getting out of prison, but he was getting out of prison and funneling himself right into the club alongside his brother. The same song and dance again and again over the years, and to think that neither of you would’ve had to learn the steps if Bishop hadn’t found you here, alone in the shop in the middle of the night, scrubbing at the floor because you were convinced that the last of your mother’s blood still hadn’t been washed away after the police department left.

Clearing his throat, he started again. “I didn’t think that you should be alone.” He paused, waiting for you to start right up again. When you didn’t, he continued, but tentatively. “I’m sorry that you head to hear it from…” he trailed off, realizing that you hadn’t said through which avenue you found out.

“Gaby,” you filled in the blank, shaking your head as you remembered the sheer terror in her voice.

“I’m sorry about that.” He sounded genuine as he was saying it. Before the scoff in the base of your throat could make its way out, he said, “I am. But would hearing it from me have felt any better? Would you have ended up,” he gestured to the carnicería with both hands this time, “anywhere else?”

You chuckled, a bitter sound. “You almost had a decent apology going for a second there.”

He took a deep breath, and you could see it on his face that he was actively fighting the urge to say the first thing that came to his mind. “I am sorry. And I am fucking here. And if you ask me to do something for you right now, I’ll do it.” He waited for you to look him in the eyes again. “What do you want right now?”

Pulling every last bit you could from your cigarette, you snubbed it out. Smoke cascaded from between your lips as you sighed. Leaning forward, you dropped your head into your hands as you tried to wrap your head around Bishop’s question, about what your answer to it was.

“Where’s Ezekiel?” you asked.

“Out of town. Gaby’s with him.”

You nodded, hands dropping back to the tabletop. “Right.”

He covered one of your hands with his. “What do you want right now?”

You focused on the warmth seeping from his palm into the top of your hand. You zeroed in on the way he dragged the pad of his thumb across your knuckles. Looking at his face, you felt yourself getting pulled underneath the waves of desperation in his eyes. He always looked so sad, and so earnest about it. And the undertow of it all always seemed to get you.

Turning your hand, you interlocked it with his. “I don’t know.”

“Thought this place was supposed to give you some perspective?” he asked, a twinge of a smile on his face.

It got you to laugh if nothing else. Giving his hand a gentle squeeze, you said, “Maybe I just gotta sit here a little longer.”

He nodded. “Okay.”

He squeezed your hand before standing up. You tilted your head to the side as you watched him walk deeper into the shop. “What’re you doing?”

He crumbled the last of his cigarette into the small trash can by the bookshelf. Picking it up, he brought it over to the table where the two of you were sitting. “Cleaning this up before you forget,” he said as he swiped the butt of your cigarette and the ashes from it into the trash can. Once he brought it back to its rightful spot, he sat down across from you again. “And I’ll sit with you.” He watched as the tears started welling in your eyes again. “And I’ll bring you home before Felipe comes back.”

You managed a smile, and despite all the mess and the hurt, you felt a little bit of relief at his offer. Nodding, you gave a soft but sincere, “Thank you.”

He took your hand in his. “Whatever you need.”

(divider by @silkholland 💞)

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[drabbles-mc]

Desperate

Jax Teller & OC Claire Morrow

For @narcosfandomdiscord Book of In Urgent Need of Assistance: "One day I'll wake up and it won't hurt so much." and Desperate

Warnings: 18+, language, angst, smoking/weed, mentions of injury/violence, Jax Slander

Word Count: 3k

A/N: Claire Morrow IS my Roman Empire. i think about her constantly. i have yet to come up with a longfic plot for her, so for now i just keep putting her in angsty little one-shots and calling it a day

By the time they had gotten back to her apartment, Claire hadn't been expecting Jax to wait around for her. It would be far from the first time that he stormed out of her place before they got the chance to talk about everything that was going on. Sometimes she wondered if it was a purposeful move on his part—a way to avoid having to tell her things that he didn’t want her knowing, or hearing about things that he wanted no part of. Other times she simply didn't believe that her brother was that smart.

But there he was, sitting at the tiny table that was in her kitchen. He heard her as she entered the room, but he didn’t turn to look at her. It wasn’t until she was sitting on the chair kitty-corner to his that he deemed to look at her at all. It was the first time in a long time that she had seen anything resembling sympathy on his face, more specifically sympathy that was meant for her. Must've been the bruises littered across her cheek that was catching the light.

She pulled one leg up so that her foot was resting on the edge of the seat of her chair. Wrapping her arms around her bent leg, she rested her chin on top of her knee. There were plenty of things that she wanted to say, but past experiences with everyone in her family had taught her that the second she opened her mouth, their tirades would come. So now, she waited.

“What the fuck were you thinking?” Jax finally asked, taking his baseball cap off and tossing it onto her table as he did.

Claire didn’t answer right away, feeling like the question was more rhetorical than anything, like Jax was just coming out of the gate with that to tee himself up nicely for the rest of his rant about what exactly he thought she had been thinking. She sat silently, not breaking eye contact with him even as she reached for the joint and lighter that were on her kitchen table.

Jax raised his eyebrows. “Nothing? You got nothin' to say for yourself?”

“Oh, sorry,” she said, sarcasm etched deep into her tone as she placed the joint between her lips. Flicking the lighter, she spoke around it, words muffled but still plenty clear enough for Jax to hear what she was saying. “Didn’t sound like a question you really wanted my answer to.”

“I can't wrap my head around it. So please,” he held his arms out slightly, “explain.”

Claire nodded but she didn’t get around to answering his question right away. She inhaled deeply off the joint in her hand, letting it crawl down the column of her throat and linger there for a few long seconds before allowing it to slip out as smoke between her lips. For a brief moment she contemplated extending it in an offer to Jax, but thought better of it quickly and kept it for herself.

“It's been an absolute shitshow on set,” she told him, making a point not to look him in the eyes as she did.

“Since when do you care what happens at the fucking porn studio?”

She gestured towards the door angrily with her hand that was holding the joint. “Since Luann asked me for some fucking help!”

He scoffed. “So you thought—”

“I thought,” she cut him off, “that I would help out since all anyone in the club ever does is show up to gawk at the girls. I helped her shoot. I helped her edit. Then all this shit with Georgie started popping off and all the girls started freaking the fuck out.”

“We took care of that.” Jax said it like it was a declaration.

Claire laughed in his face before taking another drag. “Yeah, and then Lyla came in with her nose nearly broken. So, you know,” smoke came out in tendrils with each word she said, “Luann started to think that maybe whatever you did, didn't work.”

“So she asked you?”

“No. She didn’t ask anyone, but I knew that she really didn’t want to ask you again.” She saw the way that indignant confusion went across Jax's face. “Come on, Jax. You guys have been treating her like absolute shit throughout this whole thing. And then you act like you're doing her a favor.” She shook her head, tone dropping to a mutter. “Par for the fucking course.”

“What's your fucking problem?”

She shook her head, kicking off with a lie before getting to the truth. “I don’t have a problem. And now, thanks to me, you and Luann and all the fucking girls at Cara Cara have one less to deal with too.” She stood up. “You're welcome.” She turned and headed for the fridge.

Jax watched from the table as she dug around in her refrigerator. When she popped back up into view again, she had a box of takeout in her hand. Swinging the door shut, she grabbed a fork from the drawer. She tucked into her food without even bothering to heat it up. Even if the day had been a better one, she wouldn't have put that minimal amount of time into prepping the food for herself. She paid no mind to the way that her brother was looking at her as she shoveled one forkful of rice after another into her mouth. Now that her adrenaline had runs its course, all those pesky little sensations like hunger and exhaustion and pain were starting to creep back in.

Silence settled between them again as Claire stood and leaned back against her counter while Jax stayed seated at her table. As Jax watched her, he couldn’t quite remember the last time it was just the two of them existing alone together like this. One of them was always traveling with a crowd—usually Jax. And, more often than not, wherever Claire was, Clay or Gemma wasn't far. It was never just them, and as Jax continued to sit and watch her, he didn’t know what to make of any of it.

He fussed with his cap that was still on top of her table. He knew that there were things that he wanted to say to her, but now it all just came through like static on the radio, one thought not discernible from the next.

“Do you realize,” Claire spoke up, some rice still tucked in her cheek as she spoke, “that everyone just is doing shit to try and keep you happy? Or,” she scoffed, “the closest thing to it?”

Jax shook his head. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

“Right now, specifically, I'm talking about Luann and the girls. They've been losing it but didn’t want to tell you because they didn’t want you getting upset again. They all feel like they owe you. And you,” she paused, looking at the container of food in front of her, unable to look him in the eye as she said, “you eat that type of shit right up.” She pushed rice around with her fork. “You always have.”

He shook his head, working overtime to not consider the fact that his sister was absolutely correct in everything that she was saying. He didn’t want his world put off-kilter so much. “You're insane.”

Claire scoffed, finally looking at him again. “Yeah, it's in the fucking genes.” She took another bite, granting herself a brief reprieve before asking, “You really going to sit there and pretend you don't know what I'm talking about?”

Jax had no problem lying, to anyone really, but especially to Claire. He'd done it outright and by omission their entire lives. The levels of success varied, but it never stopped him from trying. But now, for some reason, he found himself having a hard time faking genuine denial with her. Maybe it was because for the first time in a long time she was being honest with him too. Real honesty, not the type she usually doled out that was cloaked by layer after layer of sarcasm and well-timed jokes.

He rapped his knuckles lightly against the top of the table as he tried to figure out what he wanted to say. “I don't—"

“Forget about Luann and the girls. What,” she huffed, setting her food on the counter and going back to where she'd been sitting before, “what about me?”

He shook his head in confusion. “What about you?”

She jerked her thumb over her shoulder towards the door. “I'm the one who went and took care of shit tonight, Jax. I'm the one who rolled up to Georgie's fucking house with a crowbar and—”

“A fucking crowbar? Jesus Christ, Claire—”

She continued on like he hadn't spoken. “And you still haven't asked me if I'm okay.”

He gestured to her face. “I can see the answer to that.”

She shook her head, disgust on her face. “Don't do that.”

“What?”

“You know what.” She let that statement hang in the air. “They do all that shit to try and keep you happy. Mom does, the club does. And, as much as I hate it, so do I.”

Jax laughed before he could stop himself. She almost had him. Until those last three words, he was taking everything that she was throwing at him. But that was just a tad too far for him to believe. For as long as he could remember, she'd been a thorn in his side and she loved every second of it. He'd chalked some of it up to typical younger sibling things, the kind of stuff that Thomas probably would've done too if he'd gotten the chance. But then the rest of it? It felt like jealousy, maybe, or even just a desire to nettle him for pure enjoyment on her end. Sometimes he chalked it up to the crazy she must've inherited from Gemma.

But in that moment, the look in her eyes almost seemed heartfelt. If he'd been anyone else he would've taken her at her word but he knew better. He'd watched her grow up, seen the way that she was always so easily able to get what she wanted from Clay and Gemma. Jax and his happiness were the furthest things from her mind.

“You've never given a shit about that.”

Propping her elbows harshly on the table, she raked her fingers back through her hair. It still wasn't completely dry from the shower and left a traces of residue between her fingers. “I've never been able to figure out how to do it, but that doesn't mean that I've never given a shit.” Looking at him, she felt the familiar burn of tears growing in her eyes. “For a long time I tried so hard to just get you…get you to fucking like me. When we were kids I tried so hard. And then I stopped because it wasn't working and you were so mean. I stopped and I tried not to care anymore and I tried to give up. I just kept telling myself, ‘One day I'll wake up and it won’t hurt so much.’ But it never happened. It still does.” She shook her head, just as much at herself and the emotions welling in her chest as at Jax. “And when Luann asked me for my help at the studio, I thought that maybe that would do it, you know? And maybe if I took care of Georgie and you saw that I can pull my weight, then maybe you'd get around to caring about me.”

“It's not—”

“You know how much it sucks, how…how fucking pathetic it feels, that some days I’m trying as hard as those fucking Crow Eaters to get you to give a shit about me? You know how sad and desperate that makes me feel? You talk all that shit about family with the guys in the club, those people you call brother just because they have the same piece of leather on their backs. But then, when it comes to your real actual family…this is all you have left for me? Those guys might be in your club but you're my brother.”

He could tell by the tremble in her fingertips that those were words she had been sitting on for a long time. They'd burrowed and made a home deep down in her chest and she had been content to leave them in hibernation indefinitely. He felt bad, angry too. It wasn't the first or the last time that she made him feel like an idiot, either.

Claire couldn’t make herself look at him. Real vulnerability was something that was so hard to come by in their family, and now that she felt the sinking pit in her stomach she started to understand why. There was a tiny part of her that wanted to take it all back, but it was too late now—she was probably better for it.

He'd never given much thought to whether or not Claire cared about being liked, by him or by anyone else. She certainly never acted like it was a concern of hers. Plus, in his mind, when it came to family it didn't really matter how much someone liked you, because at the end of the day they loved you and that would always outweigh everything else. That's how their family always ended up back in the same messes—no matter the anger, they would always show up at the eleventh hour. What else mattered?

Claire sniffled quietly as she tried to wipe at her face as casually as possible. “Now look who has nothing to say,” she forced out. Leaning back in her chair, she said, “Next time, just fucking say thank you and ask if I'm okay. It's a, a decent place to start.”

The discomfort that was burning a trail down the back of Jax's neck was telling him that this was one of those times when he should be apologizing, but that type of thing had never been his strong suit. This was one of the few times that he wished he was a little better at it.

“This isn't the kinda shit you should be handling on your own,” he told her, voice gentler than it'd been so far as he nodded towards the bruises on her face.

Claire could see it on his face that he was trying. And if she had been less exhausted, if she'd been in a more forgiving mood, she would've given him credit for that. But the Morrow in her was getting the best of her and she wasn’t about to hand him any kind of participation trophy after everything that had happened.

“You're telling me that if I'd called, you wouldn't have sent me to voicemail?”

He sank back in his chair as though her words had physically pushed him away. “This what you're always thinking about whenever you call me?”

She shrugged. “I don't know. Usually it doesn't…” she trailed off, wanting to find the right words. “The stakes felt higher this time, I guess.”

Quiet washed over them again. Claire switched back and forth between looking at the tabletop, and looking at her brother. She was fairly positive that Jax hadn't ever let her go this long uninterrupted. It felt like the first time she was ever able to lead a conversation with him. She had no idea what good it would do, if any, but it was something at least. Part of her was still just stuck on the fact that he had stayed and waited. It wasn't necessarily any great feat, but for Jax it was something close.

“I'm glad you're alright,” he said with a nod. When Claire nodded back at him in response, a small smirk crossed his face as he said, “I'm glad you beat Georgie's ass, too.”

Claire didn’t want to, but she found herself laughing with him for the moment. It helped shed some of the weight that had been crushing her chest. “It felt kinda good. Lyla's busted nose is nothing compared to what his looks like now.”

Jax chuckled and for a moment they seemed like a pair of teenagers, talking to each other about the things they could never tell their parents. It was the kind of moment they never had when they were actual teenagers. It was refreshing in its own way, even if they were still avoiding the gaping wound of a problem between them.

“Did you tell Luann?”

Claire shook her head. “No. Did you tell Clay or—”

“Hell no,” he stopped her sentence short. “Neither of us would hear the end of it. I'd lay low ‘til those fade.”

She grazed her fingers over the slightly raised skin of her cheek. “Right.”

The exhaustion of the evening was starting to hit Jax, too. It felt useless to ask, but he still did. “Need anything?”

She shook her head. “I'm good.”

“You sure? I can stay.”

She laughed, and the sound was as humorous as it was sad. “Don't. It's fine.”

Jax frowned but he didn’t fight her on it. Reaching to grab his baseball cap of her table, he spoke as he pulled it down onto his head. “Alright. I'm gonna head out, then.”

Claire nodded, watching him as he walked around the table. “Night.”

“Night.” He rested his hand on her shoulder for a moment as he walked by. “Call me tomorrow, let me know how shit goes at the studio.”

“Sounds good.”

Jax paused when he was halfway out the door of her apartment. “Claire?”

She raised her eyebrows, and Jax saw every ounce of tiredness that she was weighing on her. “Yeah?”

“Thanks, and…” he trailed off, knowing how he should end the sentence and still not able to say it.

There would be time for more fights about it another day, so Claire let this one go for the sake of her own sanity. “Yeah. I'll call you tomorrow.”

She wasn't able to fully slump back in her chair until she heard Jax's bike start up and then fade into the distance. Once it was silent in her apartment and on the lot again, she all but melted into the seat of her chair, wanting nothing more than to go to bed and disappear under the covers, but feeling like she couldn’t make the last of the trek to do so.

(divider by @thecutestgrotto 💞)

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[drabbles-mc]

Pick-Up

Jesse Pinkman & Ignacio "Nacho" Varga

For @narcosfandomdiscord Book of Near Misses: fanwork with two characters from the same show who have never met

Warnings: 18+, language, no plot just vibes

Word Count: 2.2k

A/N: do you ever think about the fact that these two never got to meet? because i sure do!!!!!! i feel like there is more down the line that i would like to do with these two in a different story. but for now there's this! also my first time ever writing for Jesse so 🫡

“Yo!” Jesse banged on the safehouse door. “Open up!”

He didn’t hear anyone calling back to him, didn’t hear any movement from the other side of the door at all. Letting out a deep sigh, he started to make his way around the house. All of the curtains were covering the windows, all the locks on them secured. The only car in the driveway was his own, and for a moment Jesse couldn’t help but to think that maybe Mike had sent him off on some sort of wild goose chase. Punishment for whatever he’d done most recently that had annoyed him.

When he wound up back at the front door again, Jesse was about to turn around and walk off. He’d been through enough bouts of hazing and pointless trips. What he didn’t want, though, was to get into deeper trouble because he didn’t do what he was supposed to. There was still always the off-chance that this was all legit.

Standing halfway between the front door and the car, Jesse took out his phone and dialed one of the four numbers that were programmed into it. Bringing the phone up to his ear, he let it ring. His shoulders slumped, head tilting back as he waited to be sent to voicemail, to a voicemail box that probably wouldn’t even let him leave a message.

“What?” Mike’s voice came through on the other end of the line, as unamused as he ever was.

“Did you even send me to the right place?” Jesse asked.

“Did you go to the right place?” he rebutted.

Jesse rolled his eyes, able to picture perfectly Mike’s expression even though the two of them were miles and miles away from each other. “I think I can match a house number and a street name.”

“Okay, then, you’re in the right spot.”

“Does your guy know I’m coming, then? Because I’m out here banging on the door and—”

“Did you really think that banging on the door was the best course of action? For a man that’s currently a fugitive and on the run from—”

“Alright, alright. So,” Jesse shrugged, “what, then?”

“There’s a number in your phone that you’ve never had to call before.” He paused, a meaningful silence that lasted just long enough for Jesse to put two and two together on his own. “Call it.”

Jesse opened his mouth to respond, something along the lines of, “How was I supposed to know?” or “Why wasn’t that part of the directions?” But before he could say anything the line went dead. He huffed before navigating his way through the umpteenth flip phone that he’d had and gone through.

He hovered over the contact saved into his phone as only NV. He looked back up at the windows on the front of the house, hoping to catch some movement in the curtains and getting nothing. Finally, he hit the dial button.

When the person on the other end of the line answered, they didn’t say anything. Jesse could hear the faint waves of static, but no breathing, no voice. “Look, I’m gonna wait out here for five more minutes and then I’m turning around and going home. I’m only out here because Mike—”

“Mike sent you?” the man on the other end of the line finally spoke up at the sound of a familiar name.

“Yeah,” Jesse said, rolling his eyes. “Sent me because he’s too busy doing other shit, I guess.” He paused, waited for the man to say something else, and when he didn’t, he said, “Four minutes, dude.”

Jesse waited for a response but it never came. Once more he was faced with a dead phone line and he briefly wondered if there would ever be a time in his life again when people actually gave him a response of some kind before hanging up. A simple “Got it” or “Thanks” would work in lieu of a real goodbye, but he never seemed to get anything these days.

He stood there and continued to stare at the front of the house. He watched the windows, the curtains still not showing any kind of movement. He wasn’t really close enough to hear the sounds of any scuffling around inside but he still strained an ear just in case. Another minute had almost ticked by, which never really felt like a long time until Jesse was standing aimlessly in someone’s driveway, and the front door still hadn’t opened.

Finally hitting the point where he felt like he’d either been set up for failure, or was about to fall into some sort of trap, Jesse shook his head and mumbled a quiet, “Fuck this,” to himself before continuing the trek back to the car.

Just as his fingers wrapped around the handle of the car door, he caught movement out of the corner of his eye. Turning in the direction of it, he saw a man walking out from behind the house. He had a bag slung over one shoulder, and a gun clutched with both hands pointed at the ground. Jesse’s face scrunched in confusion as much at the gun as at the state of the man in general.

Mike hadn’t told him much of anything about the errand that he was on, which was typical. He definitely hadn’t given Jesse a description of the person that he was supposed to be transporting which, looking back on it seemed like just as much of a security measure as it was a liability but there was nothing that he was ever going to be able to do about that.

Whoever this guy was, he certainly wasn’t dressed like a man on the run with the exception of the gun in his hands. He didn’t fit the bill for a guy who had been hiding out in a safehouse for who knows how long. Even though his shirt was dingy and wrinkled now, Jesse could see that on a better day, it was nicer than anything that was in his own closet. The boots on his feet weren’t the kind made for the types of treks they would most likely find themselves on.

There was no shortage to the number of comments that crossed Jesse’s mind to make as the man walked closer to him. The one he settled on, however, was emphasized with a perplexed look as he said, “Dude, what are you doing?”

The man mirrored his expression, though there was more annoyance etched into his features than Jesse’s. “What?”

Jesse nodded towards the gun that he was holding. “What are you doing? It’s just,” he held his hands out, gesturing to the space around the two of them, “just us. Gonna pop your ride out of here?”

He kept both hands on the gun still, however the muscles in his arms lost a little bit of their tension. “If you’re my ride,” he said, giving Jesse a pointed once-over as he did, “then yeah, sorry if I don’t wanna just take my chances.”

“You think Mike would send me all the way out here just to—”

“Even if you’re not here to kill me, I don’t exactly trust that you’re gonna be able to stop someone else who wants to,” he explained. He didn’t want to say it, but he also wouldn’t put it past Mike or anyone in their business to send someone all the way out to where he was just to get rid of him. Whoever this kid was that Mike sent didn’t seem like the kind of guy he’d send for that kind of job, but he knew better now than to say things like never.

Jesse rolled his eyes. “Whatever.” Finally reaching and pulling the door open, he said, “Get in. Or don’t.”

Jesse had hardly sat down in the driver’s seat before turning the car back on. He was half-expecting whoever this guy was to turn around and walk back towards the house. Jesse wouldn’t have stopped him. Leaning across the console, Jesse stared out through the passenger window to see what the guy was doing, and found him doing another scan around them before finally opening the door and getting inside.

He watched the man as he set his bag on the floor between his feet. Jesse contemplated offering for him to throw it in the back seat, but the gun still being held in one of the guy’s hands was telling Jesse that the level of trust probably wasn’t quite there yet.

“Jesse,” he said as he shifted to reverse.

“What?”

Jesse looked at him before continuing on to look over his shoulder to back out of the crumbling driveway. “My name is Jesse. This is, you know,” he put the car into drive, “the part where you tell me who you are, what makes you so special.”

He stared at Jesse skeptically for a moment as he started off down the road. The car rattled slightly, filing what would’ve been deafening silence otherwise. He sat and he stared until Jesse turned to give him a quick glance before locking back onto the road. “Dude, it’s gonna be a long-ass drive if you’re just gonna sit there and stare at me in silence.”

He narrowed his eyes just slightly before finally saying, “Nacho.”

The chuckle that Jesse let out at that was reflexive. It was far from the strangest nickname he’d heard, and given the circles that he’d found himself running in lately he should know better than to laugh. But he couldn’t stop himself. He shook his head slightly as he reined in the other laughs that wanted to sneak their way out, an undeniable smirk on his face.

“Nacho,” he repeated with emphasis that was only amusing to him, “right on, yo.”

Jesse sat and waited for another moment longer, wondering if Nacho was going to have anything to say in response to that. He wasn’t looking for the guy’s life story, but he was wondering if Nacho was going to divulge anything about why they were in their current situation. Maybe even say how he knew Mike, or why Mike gave enough of a crap about him to have someone go out and fetch him, but didn’t give so much of a crap to come out and rescue Nacho himself. He’d settle for anything, but as Nacho settled back in his seat, gun still in his lap, Jesse knew that he wasn’t going to get any information that he didn’t pry or dig for.

“Right,” Jesse muttered under his breath. Not wanting to just listen to the rattling of the car on the road, and since his temporary partner didn’t seem to have anything to say, Jesse reached and turned the radio on to fill the void.

Music blared from the speakers for about forty seconds before Nacho shook his head and reached forward to shut it off. Nacho scoffed at the noise, and Jesse rolled his eyes at the lack of it.

Silence persisted for another minute or two before Jesse started to improvise, drumming his hands on the steering wheel. The rhythm didn’t feel familiar to Nacho, and he wondered if Jesse even had something in mind or if it was just stream of consciousness at this point. Nacho turned and looked at him as he drove and decided that there was no forethought happening there.

“Turn it back on,” Nacho finally said with a shake of his head.

“What?” Jesse asked, looking over at the man in the passenger seat.

“The radio.” He leaned so that his elbow was propped on the tiny ledge built into the car door. “Turn it back on,” he repeated as he propped his chin in his hand that wasn’t holding onto the gun.

Jesse rolled his eyes but he did as instructed, just glad to have something aside from his own thoughts to listen to. “Alright.” With both hands back on the wheel, he still found himself tapping his thumbs against it but it wasn’t audible. Eyes still trained on the road, he said, “Should’ve known that Mike wasn’t sending me to pick up anyone fun.”

“I—”

“If you’re looking for fun I think you’re looking in…the worst places possible.”

The sound Jesse made next wasn’t quite a chuckle, just that short, sharp exhale through his nose to prove that he’d heard and understood what Nacho was saying whether or not he agreed with it. Something about the response made it all click for him in a way, why Mike had sent Jesse out to the middle of nowhere to pick this guy up. Nacho might not have been in the divulging mood, probably wouldn’t ever be based on what Jesse had seen so far, but he didn’t need to know anything else to see how the web tangled itself together.

Leaning back in the driver’s seat, Jesse reached to turn the volume up two more notches before letting his hand fall onto the center console instead of back on the steering wheel. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Nacho give another shake of his head, but neither of them said anything to the other. The ends of Jesse’s mouth curled upwards as he continued on down the road, preparing for a long, quiet drive back home.

[drabbles-mc]

Confidential

Franky Rogan x OC Evangeline Reyes

For @narcosfandomdiscord Book of Negative Spaces: Fanwork using a line from a diff show/movie as a prompt (i used: "let it rip" from The Bear)

Part of the Not My Brothers’ Keeper Universe

Warnings: 18+, language, light angst

Word Count: 3.6k

A/N: i missed them! i just want them to chitty chat forever. i want franky rogan to be pining always.

Franky hadn’t had it in him to stop by her shop since their last run in. The days had gone by so quickly and yet now that he was sitting in the driver’s seat of his patrol car with the engine still running, every single one of the seconds that had passed since he last spoke to her seemed to cascade over him like a mountainous wave.

Reaching over, he grabbed the folder that was sitting on the passenger seat. He was busy enough as it was when he didn’t have favors looming over his head. This particular favor, though, and the person who was asking for it, made him keep a little busier than usual. He could’ve still tried to make the time to stop by, but it would’ve been hard to look her in the eyes when he didn’t have anything in the ways of answers or explanations. She was kind, and she would’ve given him that look that asked all the questions so she wouldn’t have to say them out loud. But they were questions that he still wouldn’t have answered, and then all the look in her eyes would convey was sadness. And he couldn’t be the reason for that again.

He had the answers now, though. Or, at least, he had answers that would get them to the next set of questions. He had no idea what any of it meant. As he flipped through the papers, he wondered if Ezekiel was even going to know what any of it meant. Franky knew that the right thing to do probably would’ve been to show EZ what he’d found since EZ was the one who had sent him looking for it in the first place. That would’ve been the right thing to do, but what Franky was doing now felt a hell of a lot better than being right and he was willing to settle for that. EZ wouldn’t even have to know.

Looking out the passenger window, Franky saw Evangeline’s car parked in the driveway—she always took Tuesday’s off. Or, at least, if she was doing work she was doing it from the comfort of her living room. He stayed seated as he gazed out across her lawn, across the deck that branched off from her house. He remembered when they’d bought the house. It had always seemed exactly like the kind of place that she would settle down in.

Before he thought about it too much more, he cut the ignition and pushed the door open with the ball of his foot. The walk up the driveway was a short one, and Franky easily jogged up the few steps onto her porch. Taking a breath, and skimming through the papers in his folder one last time, he reached forward and gave a few firm knocks on her door.

Despite knowing that she wouldn’t just instantaneously appear, each second that passed while he waited there had him looking around, trying to find ways to fill the time like it was hours he spent there instead of seconds. He was gearing up to knock again when he heard her voice coming from the other side of the door. She wasn’t speaking to him, but sheer force of habit had Franky leaning in to try and see how much he could hear of whatever conversation she was having without him.

“It was good to hear from you,” she said as she undid the locks on her front door. “Don’t be a stranger, alright?”

Franky couldn’t hear whoever was on the other end of the line, but he did see a few moments later when Evangeline briefly peeked from behind the thin curtains that covered the glass panels on her door. He did his best to offer a smile, one that at concealed at least some of his nerves in a convincing manner. He pretended not to see the shift in her expression when she saw him, the small smile that had been on her face taking on the weight of worry.

Pulling the door open, she stood in the space that she’d created. Leaning against the side of the door, she gave him a purposeful once-over. “Hey, Franky.”

It felt good to hear her say it. Felt good in that silly, almost stupid way it felt good when she would give him a smile and a wave when they were back in school, when she was just being nice to him because he was Ezekiel’s friend. The why of it all hadn’t mattered to him back then, seems like it didn’t matter a hell of a lot more to him now.

“Evangeline, hey,” he responded, relief in his voice that wouldn’t have made sense to anyone else but her. He glanced over his shoulder out of habit before focusing on her again. “You got a minute?”

She pinched her brows together, trying to figure out what he was there for without having to tread into the waters of that conversation with him. “It’s my only real day off, you know.”

He managed a weak smile. “I know. Wouldn’t bother you if I didn’t think I needed to.”

Part of her knew that she could drag it out if she wanted to. She could’ve kept him standing right there on her porch sweating it out for the rest of her day off if that’s what she felt like doing, and he would’ve let her with no real complaints. But she didn’t like how things had been since their last conversation anymore than he had, so she pulled the door open wider and motioned for him to step inside.

“Next time I’m going to make sure you have a warrant,” she said, a little bit of the levity back in her voice.

“Only thing I’m looking for here is you.” Franky should’ve wiped the smirk off his face when he said it but he didn’t have a chance in hell at that.

Walking deeper into the house, she motioned for him to sit at the table, one that would’ve been big enough for family dinners if her family had been into that sort of thing. It was in the perfect spot, catching all the sunshine that came in through the sliding glass doors that lead out into the rest of the porch. Franky watched as she went into the kitchen, grabbing a couple of glasses from the cupboard before getting the pitcher of iced tea out of the fridge. He sat down, placing the folder on the table while somehow feeling like he should’ve been hiding it away even though it was half the reason he was there to see her.

“So,” she said as she filled both their glasses, “what’s going on?”

He knew the question was coming and yet he still felt flustered when she’d asked. All the words that he wanted to string together were jumbled in his head as he sat and watched her. Even when she was home, even on her days off when she didn’t think that anyone but her own reflection was going to get a look at her, she still looked beautiful. Denim shorts that were frayed along the bottom, an old t-shirt that she’d pulled apart and stitched back together to make something new out of it, a ponytail high enough up on her head that it swished with each step she took. Even if he’d come in with a clear and concise story to start with, she would’ve knocked him off-kilter anyway.

It was the sound of her setting the glasses down on the table in front of him that got him to snap back to attention. He blinked a couple times, dialing back in. Evangeline sat down in the chair next to him, studying him as she took a sip of her drink. She knew him well enough to know that she was going to have to ask again. There was comfort in those small consistencies.

“Are you getting someone into trouble or out of it?” she asked.

That got him to smile, even if there was a little bit of uncertainty in it. “I’m…not sure. Was hoping you might be able to help me figure it out.”

She nodded towards the folder. “State secrets in there or something?”

Franky knew that maybe it wasn’t the time for humor, but the two of them had a hard time escaping that. He allowed himself a small smile as he said, “Somethin’ like that.”

Reaching out, she pressed her fingertips onto the folder but didn’t try to pull it towards her. “This have anything to do with what EZ was talking to you about before?”

He nodded, not quite ready to let her take it from him yet. “Yeah. I’ve got…I don’t know, Evangeline. Doesn’t make any sense to me.”

She hummed in thought. “And you think it’s going to make sense to me? This very secret business that neither you nor my brother wanted to tell me about?”

He drummed his fingers on the folder. “This isn’t my busi—” he started and stopped, trying to figure out what exactly it was that he wanted to say. “Whatever this is doesn’t have anything to do with me. I just went digging. That’s,” he shook his head, “that’s all EZ asked me to do.”

She tilted her head. “He doesn’t know you’re here, does he?”

“Hell no,” he replied, laughing for the first time in what felt like a while.

She returned the favor with a genuine smile. Despite all of the mess and the tension, there was something about that that felt familiar, almost comforting. “Alright then, Officer Rogan.” She pulled her hand away, leaning back in her chair like she was giving him space for his next big trick. “Let it rip. I wanna see what kind of classified documents you’re bringing into my house.”

Franky had a smirk on his face as he shook his head, but he still pushed the folder in her direction to open. Once she pulled it the rest of the way towards her, he finally reached for the glass that she’d set in front of him. He took a sip, glancing around her house as he did. He could count on one hand with fingers left over how many times he’d actually been inside her house, past the threshold of the doorway. There usually wasn’t much of a reason for him to be. It felt warm, comfortable. It seemed like everything she touched was like that.

But when Franky looked back over at Evangeline’s face while she was flipping through the pages he’d brought, all the warmth was gone, her face almost pale as her eyes racing across every line that was typed out in front of her. He’d shown up hoping that, at the very least, it would ease some of the tension that had been lingering between them since he last saw her. Best case scenario, she’d tell him that this was all some wild goose chase on EZ’s part, or club things that she didn’t know anything about and wanted to keep it that way. Now, though, seeing the look in her eyes, he was wondering if he was creating a whole new slew of problems between them.

“Wh-why,” she cleared her throat, taking a sip of her drink before looking at Franky and trying again, “Why’d Ezekiel want you looking into this guy?”

“You know him?” Franky asked, dodging her question, feeling more like a cop than he usually did when he was sitting next to her.

She started to nod, and it dissolved into a shrug. “I don’t know him. I, I met him once.” She couldn’t peel her eyes away from the photograph in front of her. “Why was my brother asking you to look this guy up, Franky?”

He shook his head. “Didn’t say.”

“You didn’t ask?” The words came out sharper than she’d meant for them to. She caught it immediately, her expression softening as she shook her head. “Sorry. I just,” she held up the slip of paper that had Happy’s mugshot on it, “I sat next to this guy and had a beer with him.”

He was better at hiding his surprise with other people, but his eyes always said it all with her. “Jesus—”

“Is all this true?” she asked, shaking the seemingly endless list of crimes on his rap sheet. Evangeline was many things, but naïve had never been one of them. She knew that the types of men who found their way to clubs like the Mayans, or the Sons of Anarchy, had all done things. They had done things the same way EZ had done things that landed him in prison for all those years. She knew that, it weighed heavier on her chest than she ever liked to admit. But knowing it and having it all spelled out in black and white in front of her were two completely different things.

He wished that he could give her the answer that she wanted while also not telling her a lie. Knowing that those two things couldn’t coexist in that moment, he nodded. “Yeah. If anything they probably…” he trailed off, instantly wishing he hadn’t started expanding on his point, but he wasn’t going to be able to backpedal now, “probably missed a few things along the way.”

She set the paper back down, staring at it for a few seconds longer before shutting the folder. Even though there was nothing but a blank manila cover staring back at her, she was still picturing it all in her head. She tried to peel it all apart in her head, reorganize it in some way that would make sense to her. For a brief moment she wished that she could think the way that EZ always seemed to, not just with his flawless recall but the way that he could treat things like jigsaw puzzles, finding out how to perfectly fit them together to create just the picture that he was looking for. Franky had just given her someone’s entire life story and she had no idea what she was supposed to do with any of the information that she was now privy to.

Franky watched her, wishing not for the first time that he could read her mind. He could see the worry on her face, and the confusion. There was a tightness in her jaw that wasn’t usually there, her brows pinched together harshly, not in the focused way they would be when she was working. He was regretting that what had started off as a show of good faith was now turning into something else entirely.

He wanted to reach out and take her hand in his but he stopped himself. He kept his hands busy instead with taking the folder back, getting the feeling that it wasn’t something she had any interest in keeping even if he’d offered it to her.

“I ruined your day off, didn’t I?” he asked, just enough humor in his voice for her to know that he was doing his best with what he had.

It got her to smile, got her to look him in the eyes. “You? No, you didn’t. Your folder full of classified information? Maybe a little, yeah.” She slumped back in her chair. “I have no problem blaming my brother for that if you don’t, though.”

Franky chuckled and nodded in agreement. “Works for me.”

Reaching forward, Evangeline reached and grabbed her glass of iced tea. Taking a long drink from it, for a moment she wished that she had spiked it with something stronger. Cupping the glass in her two hands, she stared down into it for a moment before looking at Franky again.

“Talk to me about something else.”

He raised his eyebrows slightly. “What?”

“You came and played bad cop with all of that,” she motioned to the folder in front of him. “So now you need to play good cop and tell me something else.”

He laughed. “I don’t think that’s how good cop, bad cop works.”

She took another sip of her drink before setting the glass back on the table. Leaning forward, she propped her elbows on the tabletop and rested her chin in her hands. “Give me some good news anyway, Rookie.”

The answer was always going to be yes, or as close as he could get to it whenever she asked him for anything. Whatever she wanted to hear, he’d tell her. He’d always do that for her, but after he’d seen the look on her face just a few short minutes before, he was willing to say damn near anything.

“Lizzie asked about you the other day,” he said, smiling as he looked out the glass doors and then back at Evangeline again.

Her expression instantly warmed at the mention of her. “Yeah? How’d my name come up? Talking to your niece about me now?”

Franky laughed and shook his head, lying to himself that he didn’t feel warmth creeping up his neck towards his face. “Nah, alright, calm down with all that. She was the one asking.”

Her smile grew a little wider. “What was she asking about?”

“She’s got her quince comin’ up.”

Evangeline laughed, partially because she couldn’t believe how old his niece was already, but also because she knew how much of a to-do it was all going to be if Lizzie’s mother had any say in it at all. “Your brother must be so excited.”

Franky smiled and nodded. “He’s trying to pretend that it’s all her mom but,” he shot Evangeline a knowing look, “he’s not foolin’ me.” The two of them shared a laugh at that before he continued. “She’s gotta get her dress soon, and she was wondering if you’d do all the, you know,” he made a motion with his hands, like he was gesturing to a gown that wasn’t there.

Evangeline was almost doubled over with laughter. “Alterations?”

He laughed and nodded. “That, yeah.”

She playfully swatted at him. “Franky Rogan, how long have we been friends and you couldn’t remember the word for alterations? That’s,” she gestured around like she was at her store instead of her house, “that’s half my job!”

He held his hands up in surrender. “Sorry, sorry. That’s my bad.”

Her laughter quieted into a hum of amusement. “The answer is yes, though. I’d be happy to work on her dress once she picks one out.”

He nodded. “I’ll make sure to pass along the good news.”

The conversation tapered off into comfortable silence as the two of them continued to sit at her table. Franky was vaguely aware of the fact that he should probably leave, but he had no real desire to. It also didn’t seem like Evangeline was in any big rush to send him away. He was fine enjoying a good thing while it lasted.

Evangeline could feel Franky looking at her as she looked out the sliding glass door. She could see her porch, her lawn, Franky’s patrol car parked alongside the road at the edge of her yard. Her grass was longer than it should’ve been—if Felipe came over at any point within the next week he would get the lawn mover out of the shed and take care of it himself, chastising her the entire time he did. The mental image of it made her smile. Then she brought herself back inside to the reality she was in, with Franky Rogan sitting at her kitchen table with her.

She wished that she could sit there and pretend that this was just a social call, like all those other times when Franky would pop by the shop under the thinnest veils of excuses she’d ever heard. She enjoyed those, even though she liked to give him a bit of a hard time about it in the process. It almost felt like those times, but the folder on Happy Lowman was still resting on her table.

Franky could feel it, too, the little bit of tension left looming in the air. Different than how it’d felt last time he saw her, different even from how it’d felt when he had first shown up. This was the kind of tension that he couldn’t just make dissipate by apologizing—that would’ve been so much easier.

She walked him back to the door, not looking at the documents that were tucked underneath his arm. As she pulled the door open, she asked, “Are you gonna tell EZ that you stopped by here first?”

He stepped out onto the deck before turning around to face her again. He studied her expression for a moment. “You want me to?” When she shook her head in response, he asked, “You gonna talk to him about any of this?”

She nodded, pressing her forehead against the side of the door. “Eventually.”

He frowned. “I’m sorry.”

She shook her head. “It’s…it is what it is, Franky.” She saw the way that he was going to try and apologize again, or try to come up with explanations that neither of them could really put too much stock in, so she beat him to the punch. “Call me when Lizzie wants to come by, alright? I’ll make sure my schedule is clear for her.”

He smiled. “Thank you.”

“Should be thanking you,” she joked as he started to backpedal away from her doorway, “since you’re out there talking me up and drumming up business.”

He laughed and shook his head as he turned around to continue walking away. “Bye, Evangeline!”

She was grinning in a way that he could hear in her words as she said, “Stay safe out there, Officer!”

(divider by the lovely @saradika-graphics 💞)

Mayans MC Taglist (please let me know if you'd like to be added to any of my taglists!): @darqchilddaydreamz @garbinge @justreblogginfics @withmyteeth @cositapreciosa

@narcolini @hausofmamadas @artemiseamoon @proceduralpassion @fanfic-n-tabulous

[drabbles-mc]

Here On Out

Benny Cross x Kathy Cross

Written for @narcosfandomdiscord Book of These Damn Restraints: "Now you know why I never say anything."

Warnings: 18+, language, angst

Word Count: 1.8k

A/N: I have been wanting to write another Benny/Kathy fic for a hot minute now and I'm so so glad that the prompts gave me the inspo for this little heartbreaker! in my head this is a missing scene from the movie, but if that's not your jam you can pretend it's an AU lmao. I just. I think about them so much idk

The ride back to the house after his last conversation with Johnny felt longer than usual and yet still not long enough. He went through the motions like it was business as usual, even though it was anything but. He cut the engine near the end of the road, rolling quietly until he landed in front of Kathy's house in an attempt to not wake her or the neighbors up in the small hours of the morning.

All the lights in all the windows on the street were out, except for the bedroom light in Kathy's window. Benny knew that she was probably still going to be awake when he got home, but part of him had been hoping that she wouldn’t be. It would make all of this so much easier.

He dropped the kickstand and swung his leg off and over the bike in what seemed like one fluid motion. Everything about it was second nature now. He padded quietly up the stairs until he was on the front porch. He lingered by the door for a moment, chin tucking down towards his chest as he took a deep breath. He allowed himself to linger there for a few more seconds, soaking up the last of what would be the latest in a long series of before’s.

There was the Benny that he was before he came to Chicago. There was the Benny he was before he became one of the Vandals. There was the Benny he was before he married Kathy. He thought that he'd run out of them, that the rest of his life was just going to be a permanent state of after.

But he found out that he had at least one more in him: The Benny he was before he left her.

Once he got up those stairs and went down the hall and through the bedroom doorway, he would be moving into a brand new after. He didn’t know what that was going to feel like, didn't know if he was really ready for it. Didn't seem like he had much of a say in the matter, though.

Finally, he opened the door. He left his jacket and boots on, but still shut and locked the door behind him. Out of habit he went to reach for the pack of smokes he had but he fought the urge—he wouldn’t be staying long enough to enjoy one before he had to turn back around and leave again.

The stairway was dark but he could still see the warm yellow light that was coming from down the hall. One hand tracing against the wall, he made his way upstairs. The silence of the house felt heavier than it usually did, or maybe it was just him that felt heavier.

When he reached the doorway, it was to find Kathy awake with a book open across her lap. The duvet was pulled up and covering her legs, her hair falling down around her shoulders while one hand toyed with a stray lock of it while she read. Messing with the rings on his hand, Benny lingered just outside the room so he could steal a few more seconds of looking at her like that before he shattered the façade of it all.

“You just gonna stand there then?” Kathy asked, only lifting her eyes from the pages in front of her when she asked her second question, “Gonna stand out in the hall all night like some kinda creep?”

Benny let out a laugh, or the closest that he ever really got to it, that sharp breath out through his nose. Shaking his head, he crossed the threshold into the room. “No.”

Even as he was walking into the room, he didn’t really know what his plan was. He knew how it all had to end, but he had no idea how he was going to get there. Living that way had served him just fine so far. At least neither of them had the anger in their voices that they'd had in their conversation earlier. It all had given way to exhaustion now.

He went over and sat down on Kathy's side of the bed. He could see the confusion on her face, wondering why he wasn't getting ready to come to bed with her. She closed her book and set it off to the side, hands resting in her lap as she stared at him, watched him as he looked back and forth between her and the window.

“Everythin' alright?” she asked. Before he could try and give an answer, she said, “How'd it go with Johnny?”

Benny shrugged at that, frowning slightly. “Fine. Took care'a some things.”

Kathy scoffed quietly and shook her head as she repeated the words back to him, annoyance in her voice. “Took care'a some things. I was tryna talk to you before, you know. I had somethin' to say and you just,” she gestured vaguely to the doorway, “went right on ahead and took off. No goodbye, no nothin', but apparently it was real important. Now you come back at,” she turned and looked at the clock beside her bed, “God. And all you can tell me is you took care'a some things? I can't keep doin' this, Benny, you know? I can't—”

“I know,” he said, interrupting wherever the stream of consciousness was threatening to take her next.

His reaction gave her pause. “What?”

He nodded, looking down at his hands for a moment. “I know. That you can't, you know,” he forced himself to look at her, “can't do this no more.”

Kathy’s eyes were wide as she slowly shook her head while processing through what he'd just said to her. “Okay. So…so what's that mean, then? What's that mean you know I can't do this no more? ‘Cause, come on, Benny, you must'a been knowin' before this, you know? You must'a known back when all that happened that there was no way that I could just keep—”

“You wanna leave.”

Kathy stumbled on her words for a moment. “I never said that.”

Benny sighed, staring down at the seams of the blanket for a moment. “You want me to leave the club.”

“That's not the same as me wantin' to leave. But if the only way to get you outta all that mess is to leave, then, then yeah I'll do that, y'know. If that's what it takes I'll do it. Hell, Benny, I'll pack my bags right now and we can leave tonight.”

He shook his head. “You don't gotta do all that.”

Kathy reached for his hand. “I will, though. If it gets us away from all’a this mess I'll do it.”

Benny almost went to pull his hand away from her but stopped. He soaked it up, the soft warmth of her palm as it seeped into the top of his hand. He reached with his thumb, running it along her fingers.

He studied the way that their lands looked layered and tangled together like that as he tried to choose his next words with the utmost care. “You don't gotta do all that,” he looked her in the eyes again, “’cause I'm leavin'.”

Kathy froze. “What?”

He nodded. “Yeah. I'm, uh, I'm gonna grab a couple'a my things, and I'm just gonna go.”

“Benny—”

“That's what you want.”

She squeezed his hand tighter. “That's not what I want. I want—”

Benny felt an unfamiliar tightness in his chest. He tried his best to ignore it. “What you want,” he shook his head, “I can't give you that.” Finally, he pulled his hand away. “Leavin' is the best I can do for you, Kathy.”

Tears welled up in her eyes. “C'mon, Benny. Don't do this. You always say you're gonna do this but you never—”

“And now I am. It's, uh, it's better this way, y'know?” His frown stretched deeper. “I ain't ever gonna be what you really want, so I might as well just go now.”

Kathy sniffled, pressing the heels of her palms to her eyes for a moment to get the tears to go away. “This what you really want, then? This what you really think you should do? After everythin' and all'a this…”

“Now you know why I never say anythin'.” He wanted to reach out for her again but he stopped himself. “All it does is break your heart.”

The chuckle that Kathy let out was weak and sad, matching the small smile on her face perfectly. Tears were already back in her eyes again. “ No one better at it'n you.”

He didn’t know how to apologize for some of it without apologizing for all of it. He wasn't sorry about the club, but he was sorry for what it'd done to her. He was sorry for the hurt she was going to feel when he left, but he wasn't sorry for leaving. She was always the talker, always the one that could pick things apart down to each little bone that made up the skeleton. Maybe after he was gone she would be able to peel it open and see the intricacies for herself. Once she was done being sad, once she was done being angry. It might be awhile.

“I gotta go, Kathy.”

Benny said the words with such finality that Kathy didn’t even try to argue. She didn’t get out of bed to try and stop him from shoving some of his clothes into a bag. Instead she sat there, twisting the blanket between her fingers and gnawing on the inside of her cheek. Benny tried not to keep looking over at her, knowing that it wasn't going to change or help anything if he did. He could look into her big, sad, brown eyes all he wanted but it wasn’t going to do anything but break both their hearts more.

When he was done, and he closed up the bag where he'd stuffed all of his clothes, he felt a wave of familiarity wash over him. He'd rolled into Chicago with nothing but his bike and a bag, and now he was leaving with the same thing.

He paused by the foot of the bed and looked at Kathy. She looked small and sad and part of Benny just wanted to slide into bed beside her and hold her but he'd given up the right to do that the second he told her that he was going to leave.

She sniffled. “I still love you, y’know.”

That got a crack of a smile out of him. Walking over to her side of the bed once more, he leaned down and pressed his lips to her forehead, the kiss reaching her through her bangs. He pressed his forehead against hers for a brief second, and then pulled away.

His boots sounded heavier on the hardwood as he left than they had when he'd arrived. He fought the urge to turn back and look at her, knowing that this was just another after now.

When he got outside to his bike, he allowed himself to look up at the bedroom window. The crushing weight on his chest got a little lighter when he saw the bedroom light go off.

(Divider by @silkholland 💞)

The Bikeriders Taglist: @garbinge @narcolini @hausofmamadas @xxanaduwrites @sirbogarde (If you'd like to be added to any of my taglists, please let me know!)

[proceduralpassion]

𝐖𝐡𝐢𝐬𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐍𝐢𝐥𝐞

𝐅𝐨𝐫 @𝐧𝐚𝐫𝐜𝐨𝐬𝐟𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐨𝐦𝐝𝐢𝐬𝐜𝐨𝐫𝐝'𝐬 𝐍𝐚𝐫𝐜𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐞𝐫 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐧𝐠𝐞: 𝐅𝐚𝐧𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤 𝐢𝐧𝐬𝐩𝐢𝐫𝐞𝐝 𝐛𝐲 𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐦𝐲𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐲 (𝐆𝐫𝐞𝐞𝐤, 𝐍𝐨𝐫𝐬𝐞, 𝐚𝐳𝐭𝐞𝐜, 𝐜𝐞𝐥𝐭𝐢𝐜, 𝐞𝐭𝐜. 𝐁𝐢𝐛𝐥𝐞 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭𝐬 𝐚𝐬 𝐦𝐲𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐲, 𝐟𝐮𝐜𝐤 𝐢𝐭)

𝐖𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠(𝐬): 𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐝𝐫𝐢𝐧𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐠, 𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧/𝐝𝐢𝐬𝐜𝐮𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧 𝐨𝐟 𝐝𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐡

𝐖𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐂𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 𝟐.𝟐𝐤

𝐀/𝐍: 𝐃𝐚𝐲 𝟐 𝐨𝐟 𝐍𝐚𝐫𝐜𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐞𝐫 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐈'𝐦 𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐚𝐧 𝐅𝐁𝐈 𝐟𝐢𝐜! 𝐀𝐥𝐬𝐨… 𝐦𝐲 𝐟𝐢𝐫𝐬𝐭 𝐙𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐚𝐜𝐞 𝐟𝐢𝐜 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫!! 𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐭 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐍𝐚𝐫𝐜𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐞𝐫 𝐰𝐚𝐬 "𝐟𝐚𝐧𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤 𝐢𝐧𝐬𝐩𝐢𝐫𝐞𝐝 𝐛𝐲 𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐦𝐲𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐲 (𝐆𝐫𝐞𝐞𝐤, 𝐍𝐨𝐫𝐬𝐞, 𝐚𝐳𝐭𝐞𝐜, 𝐜𝐞𝐥𝐭𝐢𝐜, 𝐞𝐭𝐜. 𝐁𝐢𝐛𝐥𝐞 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭𝐬 𝐚𝐬 𝐦𝐲𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐲, 𝐟𝐮𝐜𝐤 𝐢𝐭)" 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐈 𝐝𝐞𝐜𝐢𝐝𝐞𝐝 𝐭𝐨 𝐰𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐞 𝐚 𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐫𝐲𝐲𝐲𝐲𝐲𝐲 𝐀𝐔 𝐟𝐢𝐜 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐢𝐬 𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐲 𝐦𝐮𝐜𝐡 𝐫𝐞𝐦𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐝 𝐟𝐫𝐨𝐦 𝐭𝐡𝐞𝐢𝐫 𝐥𝐢𝐟𝐞 𝐢𝐧 𝐍𝐘𝐂 𝐚𝐬 𝐬𝐩𝐞𝐜𝐢𝐚𝐥 𝐚𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐬. 𝐈 𝐟𝐞𝐞𝐥 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞 𝐈'𝐦 𝐬𝐤𝐢𝐫𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐨𝐧 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐥𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐦𝐩𝐭 𝐛𝐞𝐜𝐚𝐮𝐬𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝐢𝐧 𝐬𝐩𝐞𝐜𝐢𝐟𝐢𝐜 𝐝𝐨𝐞𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐭 𝐚𝐝𝐝𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐜𝐢𝐞𝐧𝐭 𝐦𝐲𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐲, 𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐒𝐄𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐒 𝐰𝐢𝐥𝐥, 𝐬𝐨 𝐈 𝐡𝐨𝐩𝐞 𝐈'𝐦 𝐬𝐤𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐛𝐲 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐧𝐞𝐬𝐭 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐞𝐜𝐡𝐧𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐞𝐬 𝐥𝐨𝐥. 𝐑𝐞𝐠𝐚𝐫𝐝𝐥𝐞𝐬𝐬, 𝐈 𝐡𝐨𝐩𝐞 𝐲'𝐚𝐥𝐥 𝐞𝐧𝐣𝐨𝐲. 𝐈 𝐝𝐨𝐧'𝐭 𝐡𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐚 𝐬𝐞𝐭 𝐰𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐬𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐝𝐮𝐥𝐞 𝐟𝐨𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐨𝐫 𝐚𝐧𝐲𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐠, 𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐈 𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐞𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐛𝐞𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞 𝟏𝟎-𝟏𝟐 𝐜𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬, 𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐛𝐥𝐲. 𝐏𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐞 𝐥𝐞𝐭 𝐦𝐞 𝐤𝐧𝐨𝐰 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐠𝐡𝐭𝐬 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐨𝐟 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐬𝐞, 𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐯𝐞 𝐤𝐮𝐝𝐨𝐬 𝐢𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐥𝐢𝐤𝐞𝐝!

With the sunset comes coolness after a blazing day. And still, Tiffany finds herself invigorated. Filled with so much passion that her happiness bursts at the seams of her. It's been so long and she can't remember the last time she's felt this heavy stream of inspiration flowing through her.

It might've been when she first joined the FBI. She had all these aspirations of hunting down the worst of the worst when it came to criminals. Giving victims' families peace and making the world a safer place. It was a service she felt like she was doing, but it was also something that gave her purpose. Filled her with meaning. Buzzed her with an energy that meant that life was worth living to its fullest. It was a burden until it wasn't.

And she doesn't let herself be stapled down by society's way of shoehorning people into one path and one path only. Life had different colors, different seasons.

Egypt brought a new season for her.

***

"I think we should stop seeing each other."

He's prepared for the shocked expression that paints Gemma's face. He still winces internally because he hates that he's now planted tears in her eyes.

"Y- you want to break up with me?" She stutters.

"It's not you-" he curses himself before he even registers how quickly her gaze turns from sadness to ire.

"It's not me? The old and tired 'it's not you, it's me' cop out? Really, OA?!"

"That did not come out right. I'm sorry," he says.

Gemma backs away from the hand he uses to reach out for her, "Then, what is this really?? I deserve, at least, an explanation."

He takes a deep breath and in that moment, her eyes veer from him and looks at what's behind him.

"Why do you have so much luggage out? You're going somewhere?"

"Can we sit? Please?"

Begrudgingly, she follows his lead and they're eye to eye, sitting across from each other in the penthouse they live in together.

"I'm going back to Egypt to spend some time with family. A lot has happened this year and I'm starting to feel… dillusioned. With life. With my job." The "with you" remains unsaid but they both hear it clearly in the echoes that linger between them. "I haven't been sleeping. I'm unfocused at work. I.. I don't feel like myself."

Gemma's eyes water again because she can't deny that she hasn't noticed.

"I had dinner over at my mom's last night and she just… knew. I try to be upbeat and leave all that stuff out of my mind when I'm there, especially when it's the only time I get to see my nieces and nephews, but she confronted me after everyone else left and… Well, I haven't cried that long and hard for a really long time."

His shoulders still feel worn down with the weight of his problems, but they feel lighter from yesterday. His umi had held him in her arms like he wasn't 6'5" and twice her size. When they finally parted from their embrace, OA felt like he could breathe again without the achiness.

"Mom's hugs have super powers," Zahra, one of his sisters, used to say when they were young.

OA continues, "We had a long talk about everything I've been feeling. How unhappy I feel, no matter how hard I try. She made a suggestion. Says I should consider taking some time off from work and visit my relatives in Egypt. To take a minute to enjoy life beyond the swiftness of NYC. I reminded her that I haven't been since-" He finds himself at a loss, just like last night, trying to remember his last time in the country where his ancestry lies. "It was definitely before I joined the FBI, possibly even before I did my stint with the DEA, so we're nearing the ten year mark for sure."

They both look at his luggage by the door. Gemma with frustration and OA with resoluteness.

"It sounded right in the moment. Doing anything else actually feels wrong in a way, I can't explain it. I don't know if I'm supposed to be searching for something or simply putting a pause on my life here. I've made up my mind, though. I put in for a temporary leave this morning so that I could have time to fill out the paperwork for an extended sabbatical. My flight's in three hours."

Everything's moving too fast for her and she seeks out for the stability he's always provided for her. She moves to sit on the coffee table and grasps his shoulder.

"OK, but that doesn't mean we have to break up. It's not like you're gonna be gone forever."

Her voice weakens towards the end of her statement and she wonders if it sounds as unsure as she heard it in her head.

"I don't know how long I'm gonna be gone. I don't even know if I'm gonna want to come back to the same life as before. My mind feels like it's floating and nothing feels certain anymore, Gem. And that’s not fair to you to have to wait by the sidelines until I figure all of that out."

She's crying in earnest now and OA can feel his own tears begging for release. He kisses her forehead as she curls into him, clutching onto his shirt.

"I'm so sorry."

***

"I humbly request forgiveness for underestimating how entertaining American card games can be."

Mikail Salahuddin has to slightly stand and raise his voice in order for Tiff to hear his goofy banter. There's too much joyful glee and good-natured ruckus on the restaurant's outdoor patio for moderately-leveled conversation to be heard.

"We humbly accept!" Clarke Dulles, who's sitting next to Tiffany, shouts back at him.

Dinner has long been over, but the drinks continued and somewhere, along the way, a deck of Uno cards hits the table. As the only two familiar with the game, Clarke and Tiffany take initiative in teaching the rest of the group how to play and chaos ensued from there.

"This game is lethal all on its own, I'd never think to incorporate alcohol into the mix," Tiffany says to Clarke as the first round ramps up.

"Yeah… I'd be worried about breaking up long-time friendships tonight if everyone here weren't practically strangers," Clarke jokes.

Maybe strangers wasn't the most accurate depiction, but everyone here was acquaintances at most.

A full-out cards tournament has found itself underway and as the rounds continue, the final round is between Clarke and Firdus, the youngest and meekest of the group, but apparently not someone to be messed with when it comes to color/number strategy and swift hand movements. She beat Tiff out in the last round, who's still salty about that damn "Draw 4+ card" that fucked up her chances of winning it all.

Firdus is fast but Clarke has experience on her side and she throws down the "Uno! Uno Out" combo in the fraction of a second.

Tiff and Clarke give each other two-handed high fives that forms into a hug with Clarke slightly lifting Tiff off the ground. They're both tall women yet their embrace is by no means clumsy.

The rest of their table also celebrates Clarke's win, complete with good-humored digs about her having the advantage. Somewhere amongst the mayhem, Tiffany hears her name being called. She looks away from her group, searching for the source. Almost immediately, she finds herself looking at a face she hasn't seen in well over a year.

"OA?"

He walks closer to her as Tiffany veers further from the group.

"What are you doing here?" She asks, astonished at being face to face with someone she'd never thought she'd see again.

OA's face mirrors the same. He chuckles, "I could ask you same thing. I thought you moved back to Georgia."

"Well, I did, kinda. I went back to school, and well…"

Another round of Uno had started at her table and loud cheers once again sprang from their eclectic party.

"You want to-?"

"Should we-?"

They intercept each other's questions and stop. Their laughter intermingles.

OA speaks again, "I have a table over in the corner."

***

Tiffany made eye contact with Clarke and mouthed a "be back later" before following OA to a cozier corner on the outdoor patio. They sit face to face at the small rounded dining table.

"This is a such a surprise," Tiff remarks. "I never thought I'd run into you, here of all places. Which I guess is kinda weird since you're Egyptian, but still."

OA chuckles, "No, it's fine. I didn't really expect to turn up here anytime soon either. I'm super curious about you ended up here, though."

"Yeah, like I said, I went back to school. I'm in a grad program studying archeology."

"Archeology.." He muses. "Wow."

This time, it's Tiffany who snickers. "A surprise, I know. I went through a phase of being obsessed with tombs and artifacts, as a kid. This is me fulfilling a childhood dream of mine, I guess. I go to UGA, but a spot opened up for a study abroad program last minute, and I applied."

She throws her hands up as if to "and here I am."

"Wow." OA says again, still stunned. "I mean, you look happy."

He also wants to add "beautiful" to the end of his assessment. She's always been attractive, but he watched how the toll of Trevor's death and the aftermath that followed stole some of her light. She had stopped cracking jokes in between their work assignments on those mundane desk days. She came in to work with bags under her eyes that even coffee couldn't lift. She always had an excuse to dip out of her social gatherings after work. The glow of who she was had lessened, and even though he was distraught when she announced that she was leaving the FBI and moving out of NYC, he had hoped that she would find it again. The spark of radiance that made people gravitate to her.

As OA pored over her, he knew that she found it again. That passion and aura that rubbed off on anyone in her closeness. She also seemed more at peace. Relaxed.

Her face dazzled with felicity. Her skin had a lustrous sheen that accentuated the soft features of her. Her slinky blouse and flowy pants gave off comfy and casual vibes and the incoming sunset behind her served as the perfect backdrop for the perfect picture of contentment.

"I am happy," she muses. Then her head tilts, almost like she's assessing him. If she can tell that he is by all means not content, she doesn't say anything. She merely asks, "So what brings you to Egypt? Visiting family?"

OA nods. "Yes, actually." He doesn't want to confide in his own problems, especially when she seems at such bliss, but she's always been disarming. "I needed to take some time away from work. Get away from all the noise and just… think."

Her eyes are sympathetic, like she has a glimpse into his suffering. He supposes she has considering her reasons for her own departure. Still, she doesn't push.

"How long are you here for?" She inquires.

OA shrugs, "Not really sure, yet. I landed yesterday. Not the best timing, though, because today's my aunt and uncle's anniversary. I'm staying with them, but I felt bad about encroaching so I've just been exploring the city all evening. Stumbled upon this place and had dinner inside."

Tiff looks back to her table. Clarke has her back turned while on the phone, while the rest are finishing yet another Uno game.

"Well, if you don't mind a bunch of rambunctious archeology and anthropology students, you're more than welcome to come join our table. I think we were about to order basbousa for dessert."

OA's eyes widen. "Wowww. You're in Egypt, for who knows how long, and you're laying claim to my favorite dessert."

Tiffany bursts out into laughter. "If it makes you feel any better, I will say that I have yet to eat any as good as that Egyptian restaurant you took me to in Queens."

"That's because they probably mass produce and freeze theirs at a busy restaurant like this. That place in Queens was a mom and pops. Sister Hamdi probably made it fresh every single day."

"Mmm, so what you're saying is I need to find someone who can make it on the spot." Tiffany jokes.

OA throws his hands up, "Come by my aunt's one day and I'm sure she'll be whipping it up in the kitchen by the time I open the front door."

They both laugh together and OA looks on at Tiffany with wonder.

What were the chances he would ever see her again after she left the city? And yet, here she is again. He knew that she had her own thing going on here. She was probably focused on her study abroad program and finding joy in a new field. Still, he didn't want this to be the last time they saw each other again. Just when he's about to suggest, seriously, that she come over for dinner one evening, one of her friends pops up.

Tiffany looks back and notices Clarke standing over her. She looks like she's just seen a ghost, her heart beating fast and her steps slightly off tilt.

Tiff immediately stands up to steady her. "Clarke, what is it?"

"Our professor.. She's dead."

𝐀𝐠𝐚𝐢𝐧, 𝐈 𝐡𝐨𝐩𝐞 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐠𝐮𝐲𝐬 𝐞𝐧𝐣𝐨𝐲𝐞𝐝 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭. 𝐈'𝐯𝐞 𝐚𝐜𝐭𝐮𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐲 𝐰𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐭𝐞𝐧 𝐬𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐥 𝐙𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐚𝐜𝐞 𝐨𝐧𝐞-𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐭𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐚𝐫𝐞 𝐬𝐢𝐭𝐭𝐢𝐧𝐠 𝐚𝐬 𝐝𝐫𝐚𝐟𝐭𝐬 𝐢𝐧 𝐦𝐲 𝐝𝐫𝐢𝐯𝐞, 𝐛𝐮𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐢𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐟𝐢𝐫𝐬𝐭 𝐨𝐧𝐞 𝐈'𝐯𝐞 𝐞𝐯𝐞𝐫 𝐩𝐨𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐝 𝐬𝐨 𝐈'𝐦 𝐬𝐮𝐩𝐞𝐫 𝐩𝐫𝐨𝐮𝐝 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐩𝐲 𝐭𝐨 𝐤𝐞𝐞𝐩 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐙𝐢𝐥𝐥𝐚𝐜𝐞 𝐜𝐨𝐦𝐦𝐮𝐧𝐢𝐭𝐲 𝐚𝐥𝐢𝐯𝐞 𝐠𝐢𝐯𝐞𝐧 𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐪𝐮𝐞𝐞𝐧 𝐓𝐢𝐟𝐟 𝐡𝐚𝐬 𝐠𝐨𝐧𝐞. 𝐒𝐡𝐞'𝐬 𝐬𝐭𝐢𝐥𝐥 𝐢𝐧 𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐭𝐬 𝐭𝐡𝐨 <𝟑

𝐏𝐥𝐞𝐚𝐬𝐞 𝐥𝐞𝐭 𝐦𝐞 𝐤𝐧𝐨𝐰 𝐢𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐰𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐭𝐨 𝐛𝐞 𝐚𝐝𝐝𝐞𝐝 𝐭𝐨 𝐦𝐲 𝐍𝐚𝐫𝐜𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐦𝐛𝐞𝐫 𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭 𝐨𝐫 𝐚𝐧𝐲 𝐟𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐨𝐦 𝐭𝐚𝐠𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭 𝐭𝐡𝐚𝐭 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐰𝐚𝐧𝐭.

𝐓𝐚𝐠: @narcosfandomdiscord

[drabbles-mc]

Untouchable

Herman Kozik x OC Tawnie Trager

For @narcosfandomdiscord Book of Just Chaos: untouchable

Warnings: 18+, language, violence, blood/injury, hurt/comfort, takes place during s2

Word Count: 3.6k

A/N: this pair of crazy kids is BACK! i haven't written for them in so long and I've honestly missed them so so much. this is a switch-up from the usual fun vibes that i usually write for these two, and i lowkey wanna write another part for this, but i'm not gonna make promises i can't keep lmao. hope y'all enjoy!

Tawnie had always been a bit of a magnet for trouble. Whether she was out there actively looking for it or not, it always seemed to find her regardless. She never seemed bothered by it—all part of being a Trager, was what she would always chalk it up to. There was no way that someone could be raised and live under the same roof as Tig and not have a habit of landing themselves in hot water.

For years, she was ducking in and out of scrapes. When she was a teenager, just being young and reckless with her friends, the fallout of it was always manageable. But she wasn’t a teenager anymore, and the stakes these days were much higher than they’d ever been. Getting mixed up in the wrong things now no longer just meant that someone would have to post bail and get stared down by Deputy Hale.

In Tawnie’s defense, she hadn’t been the one who started it this time. All she had been trying to do was go to the liquor store and grab a few bottles of things to bring to the clubhouse for the party later. It should’ve been a trip that took all of five minutes, maybe closer to ten if she got distracted looking at all of the labels in some of the aisles. Regardless, it shouldn’t have been a situation that ended with anyone getting hurt.

The shop’s plastic shopping basket was hanging in the crook of her arm, a couple bottles of the vodka brand that she liked laying on the bottom of it. She understood why they bought the cheaper stuff for the clubhouse, because it wasn’t as though the guys ever paid attention or gave a shit anyway. That didn’t mean that she wanted to feel like she was drinking lighter fluid, though.

She was reaching to grab a whiskey bottle off the top shelf when she heard a man’s voice behind her. He wasn’t loud, and with the way that he’d said, “Hey,” she didn’t even think that he was talking to her.

When he said, “Hey,” again, she could tell that he was standing right behind her. “I was talking to you.”

Tawnie wrapped her fingers tightly around the neck of the whiskey bottle she had been trying to grab. Pulling it down off the shelf, it dangled by her side as she turned around to face whoever it was that was trying to talk to her.

She had turned around with her usual air of confidence, and it didn’t falter as much as maybe it should have when she had to crane her head back slightly to look up at who was speaking to her. Seemingly unperturbed, she cocked an eyebrow. “I don’t work here—I can’t help you.”

The man looked her up and down, and Tawnie wasn’t sure if he was sizing her up or trying to figure out what he was supposed to say to her at that point. Whatever his motives were, Tawnie had to assume that he wasn’t trying to figure out a pickup line to use on her.

“You’re Trager’s kid.”

Her grip tightened a little more on the bottle. Narrowing her eyes slightly, she replied, “Let’s say I am—who the fuck are you?”

She didn’t recognize him, and he wasn’t wearing a kutte or anything else that would place him with an MC. Him knowing the connection between her and Tig, however, was enough of a red flag for her to know that whatever this man wanted, it probably wasn’t really about her at all.

“Big talk for someone who doesn’t know who they’re talking to.”

“If I don’t know who you are, then I have no reason to talk small.”

Tawnie had spent enough of her life putting on acts depending on who she was in a room with, so keeping a look of indifference on her face while her heart was hammering inside her chest was nothing new. The man was larger than her, and she had to assume that his jacket pulling tightly in certain points along his shoulders and arms wasn’t because he purposely bought it a few sizes too small. But they were also still on SAMCRO turf, and they were standing in the middle of a liquor store, so she had a little faith that if nothing else, those two things would still work in her favor.

She didn’t turn her back on him as she went to side-step and get around him. Even so, she wasn’t able to get very far. The second that she wasn’t pinned between him and the rack of bottles behind her anymore, he reached out and snatched her by the arm closest to him, the one holding the basket.

He let out a low laugh as he shook his head. “Oh no,” he tugged her back towards him, “you’re not going any—”

Whatever line of threats he was planning on saying to her never made it past the base of his throat as she swung her other hand with everything that she had, the whiskey bottle colliding with the side of his head. She heard him grunt in pain, and she saw the way that the bottle started to show some minor cracks along the side of it, but even so it didn’t force him to release the grip that he had on her arm. She felt the way that his fingertips dug into her even more, blunt nails starting to break the skin, and with a yell that was a little louder now, she swung the bottle at him again one more time.

This time when it hit the side of the man’s head, the bottle fully shattered. Glass shards went everywhere, the neck of the bottle breaking and slicing into Tawnie’s palm. Between the liquor and the broken glass pieces that were digging into the side of his head, the man released her with a string of curses. Without a single moment of hesitation, Tawnie dropped the basket to the floor and sprinted towards the front of the store. Before she even got to the end of the aisle, the owner who had been at the register appeared to try and see what was going on. He held his hands out like he was asking her to stop and talk to him, but rather than abiding by that, Tawnie shoved right past him, leaving blood from her palm smeared across his shirt in the process.

“Tawnie!” the shop owner called after her. His shouting didn’t even cause a falter in her steps. She sprinted out the front door, the bells chiming on it giving a strange air of whimsy to her departure of such a horrid scene.

She didn’t even feel herself digging her car keys out of her jeans pocket as she ran down the block to get to her car. Quickly unlocking the door, she flung herself inside the car. Jamming the key into the ignition, she tried not to think about the way that she was leaving bloodstains on everything that she was touching. She pressed her foot down hard on the gas pedal, speeding down the street.

The road took her right past the liquor store again, and she could see the store owner yelling at the man who had just tried to attack her. She didn’t take her foot off the gas, but she still tried to get another look at the mystery man’s face as she sped by, his facial features now streaked with whiskey and blood. He looked like he could’ve been anyone, no tattoos or scars to speak of. She went to tighten her grip on the steering wheel from nerves and was instantly greeted with a sharp jolt of pain across her palm that shot right up to her shoulder.

Eyes still on the road, she leaned and felt around on the passenger seat for the burner phone that the club had given her. She always felt a little idiotic having a second phone, especially when she communicated with several of the club members on her regular one, but times like this seemed like the perfect reason to use up some of the minutes that were on there.

Up until the point when she was about to hit the call button, she’d had every intention of calling her father. She knew that it was something that he needed to know about, and it was something that he would probably be the one who handled it in the end. But right before she hit the button with the tiny green phone etched into it, she stopped herself and started over again.

Picking the second person on speed dial instead, she pressed the phone to her ear. With each ring that she had to wait through, her hands trembled more and more. With her holding her hand up, the blood from her palm was starting to trickle down her wrist and the rest of her arm, and it felt like a burning sensation even though she knew that wasn’t what was happening to her.

Right when she thought she was about to burst into tears or steer her car clean off the street into a random storefront, she heard the click of someone answering on the other end of the line.

“Hey, T,” Kozik’s voice came in calm and smooth.

“H-hey,” the short word still managed to get stuck in her throat on the way out.

There was a pause, and when he spoke up again his tone had shifted. “What’s wrong? Where are you?”

“I’m on my way to your place. You’re home, right?” she felt the way that her bottom lip was starting to quiver and tried to ignore it, tried to keep the last few shreds of composure that were keeping her together.

There was rustling on the other end of the line as he said, “I will be in ten.”

The feeling in her chest was as close as she could get to relief in the given circumstances. “Okay.”

“I love you.” Even with all of the uncertainty surrounding whatever the situation was, there was no waver of questioning in his voice when he said that.

Tawnie let out a short breath, one that she had been holding without meaning to. “I love you too.”

She hung up without any more of a goodbye than that. Snapping the phone shut, it dropped into her lap as her hand began trembling violently. The adrenaline of the situation could only blind her for so long, and the ache of pain was getting worse as the minutes ticked by. This wasn’t the usual type of trouble that she had to call anyone about. This trouble, this danger, felt too real and far too close to home.

Any other day, she would’ve been worried about how Kozik managed to get there not even a minute after she did, his bike skidding to a stop in the driveway. He practically threw his helmet once he took it off. Before Tawnie could blink, he was on the driver’s side of the car and opening the door for her.

He was halfway through asking her if she was alright when he saw the blood all over her. His eyes popped open wide, and he was fighting the urge to just climb into the car with her to check her over. The sight of her like that raised a million questions that he desperately wanted immediate answers to, but he stopped himself.

“C’mon,” he said instead, leaning in to loop his arm underneath hers and across her back, “let’s get—”

She flinched away from his touch, not quite ready for the sensation of someone else touching her. It was impossible to miss the pained look on his face, but she didn’t have it in her to apologize. Even on her best days, sorry was not a word that came easy to her. Right now, though, an apology was the last thing that Kozik was looking to get from her.

He stepped to the side and allowed her to get out of the car on her own. “Let’s get inside.”

He walked behind her as they made their way up the short driveway that landed them just off to the side of his house. His neighbors had learned quickly that even if they wanted to be nosey, it was better for them if they weren’t. Still, he walked behind Tawnie and checked their surroundings, also looking to see if anyone had followed her to his house that he needed to worry about.

Reaching around her, he unlocked the front door and pushed it open for her. She silently walked inside, wishing that she felt a little more at ease now that she was with him and safe inside his house, but she couldn’t manage it. It was the first time in a long time that Kozik had ever seen her so quiet.

With her good hand tightly gripping the wrist of her injured one, Tawnie made her way through the house to the bathroom. Kozik followed her, wanting so badly to reach out and try to comfort her with a hand on her shoulder or the small of her back but knowing that it wouldn’t be any help to her in that moment.

She was about to crouch down to open the cabinets under the sink. “Is it—”

“Sit,” he said, motioning to the toilet that had the lid down. “I got it.”

Tawnie nodded, doing as he instructed. Kozik tried not to think about how tight her grip was on her own wrist, or the look that she currently had in her eyes that he didn’t know how to piece apart. He busied himself with turning the sink on so that the water could start to run warm while he got the first aid kit out. Grabbing a clean washcloth from the drawer, he got it damp with warm water and held it out to her in an offer, thinking that she might want to wipe off her arm and what she could of her hand herself if she didn’t want him touching him.

“Thanks,” she said, nearly mumbling as she started to scrub at the blood that was quickly drying on her skin.

He nodded and got into a kneeling position in front of her as he waited for her to finish. She tossed the bloody rag into the sink. She looked at her own hand for a moment, taking in the damage that was done in earnest for the first time since it’d happened.

“Fuck,” she said, her voice steadier and clearer than it had been before.

With the first aid kit open on the floor beside him, Kozik held his hand out in a wordless question to allow him to see what the damage was and what he could do to help. Tawnie hesitated until she looked him in the eyes and remembered where she was and who she was with. Then it came easy, offering her hand out to him to inspect. His touch was gentle despite the callouses on his palm and fingers.

“Jesus,” he said, trying to hide the reaction under his breath but failing.

Tawnie let out a weary chuckle. “Promising.”

It got Kozik to crack a smile, hearing the sarcasm come back into her voice like that even if it was just for a moment. The relief that it brought him was momentary as well as he got back to looking at the state of her hand. The cut was deep—deep enough to need stitches. And while he could do a lot to help take care of her, that was one thing that was outside of his area of expertise.

Looking up at her from where he was kneeling, he gave a small shake of his head. “This is deep, T.”

She wasn’t sure what she was supposed to be saying to that. “Okay?”

“You’re gonna need stitches and I,” he chuckled weakly, “I can’t do that. I can call—”

“I don’t wanna see anyone right now,” she stopped him before he could get to the end of his thought.

As much as he didn’t want to argue with her in the state that she was in, he also didn’t want things to get worse for her because she didn’t want to get her injuries taken care of. “You gotta get this looked at by a doctor.”

“Am I gonna bleed out before tomorrow?”

“No, but—”

“Then just wrap me up for now and tomorrow I’ll give The Good Doctor a call, alright?”

She phrased it like a question, but Kozik knew her well enough to know that there was only one answer that she’d accept. With a sigh and a nod, he started rooting around the kit he had for disinfectant and the waterproof bandages that he could wrap her hand up with.

He waited until he was about to start really cleaning out her wound before he asked her any questions. “So do I get to know what happened?”

Tawnie shook her head, not in a denial of an answer, but as though now as she was thinking back on it, it seemed so ridiculous. “Some guy came at me when I was at the liquor store today.”

“What guy?”

She shrugged, instantly followed a wince as he flushed out the cut on her hand. She tried to pull away from the pain but Kozik tightened his hold on her so that she couldn’t. It was going to feel way worse before it started to feel any better—they both knew that.

“Some random guy,” she finally said, gritted out through the pain. “Knew Tig’s my dad.”

Kozik raised his eyebrows. “What’d he look like?”

Tawnie was fighting the urge to clench her hand into a fist. “Big fuckin’ dude. Took two hits to the head with a whiskey bottle before he let me go.”

He nodded knowingly. “That explains the hand.”

She shrugged. “I was working with what I had.”

“Did he say anything to you?”

Tawnie shook his head, watching him as he placed a few gauze pads on her palm before getting the roller bandage ready. “Not really. He asked me about being Tig’s kid, then he tried to grab me up. I hit him before I got around to asking for his agenda.” She hissed quietly as she felt the bandage putting pressure on her injured hand. “He wasn’t wearing any kind of kutte. I couldn’t see any tattoos but he had long sleeves on so who fuckin’ knows.”

“I’m sorry you’re getting caught up in all this, T.”

That time when she tried to pull her hand away, it wasn’t because of the physical pain. It got Kozik to look up at her. “What’s all this? Something going on with the club?”

He shrugged to try and make it seem casual, but the slightly panicked look on his face let her know that he definitely just said more than he was meant to. “Not…I mean…it’s the club. There’s always something going on.”

She scoffed. “Is this something the type of something that has random men coming after me in the middle of a store?”

“I—”

“Who the fuck are you guys getting into it with now?”

“Who were we getting into it with last time you asked?” He saw the look on her face and immediately backpedaled. “Sorry.” Clearing his throat, he continued, “You remember those guys who came by the clubhouse and were giving Clay a hard time about the guns?”

Her face contorted in confusion. “Them? Still?”

Kozik shrugged, like he didn’t get it either. “I know.”

“What the hell does any of that have to do with me, though? I don’t help you guys sell your fucking guns.”

He nodded. “And we are all safer for it.” He taped the roller bandage in place and sat back on his heels. Letting his expression grow serious once more, he said, “I got a feeling they’re going after people who are close to the club.” He rested his hand on her knee. “You do match that description.”

“That’s such bullshit.”

He wasn’t going to try and disagree with her, especially since he knew as much as anyone that she was right. “I know. But that’s…that’s how they operate. No one’s untouchable.”

She let out a sigh, and Kozik watched in real time as the exhaustion started to set in as the last of the adrenaline ebbed out of her. “I hate it.”

“Me too, T.” He rubbed his thumb back and forth on her knee. “You wanna shower? I’ll grab you some clean clothes?”

She nodded. “Thank you.”

Moving his hand from her knee to the sink counter, he used it to balance while he rose back up to his feet. “You call your dad yet?”

She groaned as she stood up as well. “No.”

He chuckled at her reaction. “Want me to call him?”

She chuckled. “You wanna throw yourself in front of that moving bus?”

Leaning in, he kissed her on the temple. “I’ve been run over by that bus before. I’ll be fine.”

“He’s gonna come over, you know,” she called after him as he walked towards the bathroom door.

“Wash the blood off yourself, then.”

She chuckled and shook her head as she watched him go. He was about to pull the door shut behind him when she grabbed his attention one more time. “Hey, Koz?”

He paused, leaning back so that he could see her. “Yeah?”

She gave a small nod. “Thank you.”

He smiled, that soft, boyish charm shining through despite how the day had been going so far. “I always got you, T.”

(Divider by @saradika-graphics 💕)

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Inverted Tropes List (for Narcovember #4 - Book of Uno-Card-Reverse)

✸ childhood sweethearts -> childhood enemies/rivals

✸ friends to lovers -> enemies to lovers OR lovers to friends

✸ mutual pining -> mutual passive aggression OR one-sided pining

✸ arranged marriage -> shotgun divorce (but for any reason) OR unarranged, even ill-advised marriage (passionately in love but it’s a shitshow or marrying causes couple to fall out of love)

✸ fake dating -> everyone is convinced you aren’t dating

✸ sharing a bed -> too many beds

✸ mind-control/brainwashing -> reverse psychology (brainwashed feigns victimhood to control captor)

✸ Mary Sue -> Mary Sam (character who can't do anything right)

✸ first time -> last time

✸ amnesia -> faking a fugue state I call this The Walter White

✸ huddling for warmth -> escaping to cool down

✸ love at first sight -> hate at first sight OR love at first kick/punch

✸ opposites attract -> birds of a feather

✸ deus ex machina -> diabolus ex machina (out-of-nowhere-win for Good!Guys vs out-of-nowhere win for Bad!Guys)

✸ star-crossed lovers -> star-crossed haters (unable to destroy each other due to fate and circumstance)

✸ will-they/won't they -> they will (or won't) like, immediately

✸ coming-of-age -> arrested development

✸ in vino veritas (drunken confession) -> in siccus veritas (we-are-not-drunk-enough for this confession)

✸ fix-it fic -> fuck-it-up fic

✸ royal AU -> serfdom/peasant AU

✸ high school/college AU -> nursing home AU

✸ fairytale AU -> nightmare AU

✸ miscommunication -> too much communication

✸ missing scene -> altering scene from canon

✸ true love's kiss -> true hate's kiss (only kissing the person you hate will save them and/or you)

✸ kidnapped by mafia boss -> you kidnap a mafia boss

✸ love triangle -> subverted jealousy (letting loved one go with other person bc you want them to be happy)

✸ sex!pollen -> strife!pollen (powder that makes ppl physically/mentally/emotionally repulsed by one another)

And anything else I haven't thought of! Feel free to put your own spin on these as well because a few of them can be inverted in different ways and I definitely did not list them all.