#Roy does this little tiny nod

[jamtartandsunshine]

Nothing to see here, just a woman watching Roy Kent hug Jamie Tartt so tightly and getting just a little tiny bit emotional about it

[its-time-to-write]

I saw you asked for requests a few days ago. I was wondering if you would consider doing another part of the Kent!reader x Jamie fics.

I was thinking they do end up pregnant and its them telling everyone they’re pregnant . I can see everyone being so excited for them. And then Roy is just freaking out.

Since they’ve already discussed wanting to be together forever and have kids I can also see them deciding to get married before the baby is born in a small ceremony like Beard had.

I have quite a few requests about Jamie x reader having a kid, so if that ain’t your jam, maybe don’t read my next few posts😂 It’s totally my jam tho, maybe bc I’m suffering from baby fever again. thanks for requesting and for your patience!!

let’s fall in love for the night  

Jamie’s jiggling his leg up and down so fast that you’re surprised he hasn’t cramped yet. 

“Calm down,” you hiss, hand on his knee. 

“Can’t,” he whispers back. “Roy’s gonna fucking kill me.”  

You have no sympathy for him. “Yeah, and whose fault is that? Yours.”

Jamie shoots you a sideways glance. “Excuse me, this was a team effort.”

“Whatever,” you say. “I still say it’s your fault.”

Molly swoops by to refill your water glasses. “Dinner’s ready in a few minutes. Roy and Phoebe have been working very hard,” she says. 

She raises her eyebrows on the word very, and you’re sure that Roy’s patience is being pushed to his limits. He loves cooking and refuses to let anyone help him, but he also loves your niece and can’t deny her anything she wants. 

“Better go check on them,” she says, leaving you and Jamie alone again in the backyard. 

Jamie resumes the previous conversation and says, “Well, I wasn’t the one wearing that blue thing with the flowers.”

“Well obviously,” you shoot back, “it wouldn’t even fit you.”

Jamie’s stopped jiggling his leg and he places his hand on top of yours. “Oi. Has Roy ever actually killed anyone before, or does he just have serial killer eyebrows?”

You wrinkle your nose and ask, “Why the fuck would I know?”

“You’re his sister,” Jamie replies in Phoebe’s patented duh tone. 

“I’m his baby sister,” you say. “I’m even younger than Molly. If he’s killed someone, they’ve both conspired to make sure I’ll never find out. And hey, don’t make fun of the eyebrows. There’s a good chance this baby’s gonna end up with them.”

“Babe you don’t have ‘em,” Jamie points out. 

“I wax,” you say smugly. “Oh, Molly texted. Time to go inside.”

Jamie groans but lets you lead him to the table. 

—

All told, Phoebe didn’t do half bad. 

“Auntie, I did the potatoes all by myself,” she says. 

You look to Roy for confirmation. He grunts and gives a tiny nod. 

“Great job, Phoebs,” you say. 

Molly sets down her fork. “I’ve been thinking of changing my name back to ‘Kent,’” she says. 

“Brill,” says Jamie. 

“Fucking finally,” Roy says as he hands Phoebe some money. “For future words,” he mouths to her as she counts it before depositing what you’re pretty sure is 20 quid into her pocket. 

Molly says, “We’ll all be the Kents again,” and you can feel Jamie go stiff next to you.

“The fuck’s wrong with you?” Roy asks, and you turn to see Jamie’s gone completely pale. 

You pinch his thigh and he jumps. “Nothing,” he says hurriedly. “Well, not nothing. But, I dunno, don’t want to overshadow Molls’s good news, ya know? It ain’t important.”

You pinch him again. 

“Ok, it’s actually a little fucking important (sorry Phoebe, take it from Roy). But um, maybe you could help me babe?”

He shoots you a pleading look so you take pity on him. You’ve had more than twenty years dealing with Roy, so you’ll let Jamie slide this once.

“Right, so, we’ve been meaning to tell you- I’m having a baby,” you blurt out. 

Roy’s dinner roll gets crushed in his hand as his face goes bright red. 

“What,” he growls, and you’re not sure if you’re more terrified by the absence of “fuck”s or the fact that it was a statement, not a question. 

“That’s wonderful, love!” Molly says before Roy can say anything else. She’s not looking at him but you can practically feel him take psychic damage from the shut up and be happy you prick, message she’s sure to be telepathically sending him. 

“It’s Jamie’s, right?” she continues, taking a bite of salad. 

“The fuck kind of question is that?” you ask indignantly. “Who else’s would it be?”

“You don’t have to pay me for that one,” Phoebe pipes up. “I’ll give you a free tab of one hundred words because of the baby. If it’s a girl, you can have fifty more.”

You grin. “Sounds like a plan.”

“You’re probably going to owe her the fifty, Phoebs,” Molly says. She points to Jamie with her fork. “I mean, look at him. He practically screams ‘girl dad.’” 

“That’s- fucking- great,” Roy garbles out. “‘Scuse me.”

“We’re having a backyard wedding next Saturday, too,” you call after him. “So we probably won’t all be the Kents again.”

You wince as he slams a door from somewhere in the house. 

“He’ll come ‘round,” Molly says consolingly. “Remember how he was with Phoebe? And I was already married!”

You grip Jamie’s hand. “Molls, why can’t he just emote like a regular person? I mean honestly, did our parents fuck him up that bad?”

Molly raises a shoulder in a half shrug. “I don’t know, babe. Think he’s just like us, really, afraid of loving something so he just pushes it all away. And besides, you’re the baby of the family. We’ve always tried to protect you and keep you safe, and sometimes he feels like you’re out of reach.”

You ask, “He told you that?” and Molly just laughs. 

“Not in so many words,” she replies. “But you know how he is.”

“He’s an arsehole,” you grumble. “I’m going to go talk to him.

—

Roy is, predictably, in the backyard. Not many places for him to go and think properly. 

You find him sitting under the tree. 

“Oi,” you say, “budge over.”

He grunts and moves so you’re not quite in the dirt. 

“Can you be sitting on the ground?” he asks. 

“It’s been like three months,” you reply, “That isn’t long enough for me to get stuck places.”

Roy says, “hmm,” but doesn’t offer up anything else so you just sit in silence next to him, pressing your shoulder to his. 

“Why the fuck did it have to be Tartt?” he asks after a beat. “Could’ve been fucking anyone in the fucking world, and you fucking chose him.”

“You like Jamie,” you say in confusion. 

“I don’t,” Roy replies, “he’s a prick. And a fucking footballer. Why’d you have to go for a fucking good-for-nothing footballer? He can’t even be around for his family when they go through shit because he’s going to be busy scoring fucking meaningless goals or some shit.”

That stings for a moment, but you take a good look at Roy’s face. It’s stoic, but shit if you can’t read it like a book. Blood is blood, and you’re a Kent just like him. 

“This isn’t about him, is it. It’s about you. You think you did a shit job as a brother and an uncle so Jamie’s going to be a shit father.”

“I missed out on a lot,” Roy says hoarsely. “And before you say fucking shit, I’m not fucking crying. So shut the fuck about it.”

You grin and wrap your arms around him. “You’re the best big brother a girl could ask for. Took all my cues from you. And anyway, you’ve been there when it counts. Phoebe fucking adores you, practically attached at the hip you two. And yeah, Molls and I missed you when you were at Sunderland and Chelsea and wherever. But… you came back. We needed you, and you came back. So don’t go projecting your stupid self-image on Jamie, because he’s not like that. And you’re not either, you absolute fucking ape-armed frizzy-haired shit-faced twat.”

Roy huffs out a chuckle. “Ape-arms. Haven’t heard that one in a while.”

“Almost went with ‘camel knees.’ Haven’t used that since I was ten, but I thought it might hit too close to home these days.”

Roy laughs for real this time and tilts his head so it’s resting on yours. “Still fucking weird that my little sister’s having a kid.”

You say, “You’ll get over it. Oh, and don’t wear a goddamn T-shirt on Saturday.”

—

It’s rainy, so the backyard wedding becomes a living room wedding, because who really gives a shit? Richmond have a game tomorrow, but for today they’re in yours and Jamie’s house all dressed up (but still in trainers) laughing and smiling as Dani officiates what you’re sure is your dream wedding. 

It’s not the one you and Molly would’ve giggled about as kids when you sneaked from your bed into hers, but everyone you loves is here. 

For once, Jamie’s house almost seems too small.  

(Dani was the only person you two knew who was ordained or whatever. And hey, could you have picked a happier person for it?)

Molly and Keeley had gone out with you to find a white dress, Sam and Phoebe were the flower-people, and Roy walked you down the stairs to where Jamie was standing with Isaac by his side. 

“I’m not fucking crying,” Roy whispers in your ear. “It’s fucking allergies from being in this prick’s house for too long.”

“It’s my house too,” you remind him. 

Roy just sniffs, pats your hand where it’s tucked into his arm, and presses a kiss to your cheek.

All in all, it was pretty great. 

Gifts range from hair products to restaurant gift cards to designer baby clothes, including a tie-dyed onesie from Phoebe. 

“I have a matching one at home,” she explains. 

But now it’s the evening and everyone is gone except family. 

“Can’t believe my baby’s married,” says a beaming Georgie as she ruffles Jamie’s hair from their place on the couch.

“Can’t believe he attained his childhood goal of marrying into the Kent family,” Molly remarks. 

Jamie grins smugly. “What can I say, I’m a fucking goal-getter.”

You’re snuggled in Jamie’s arms, dress exchanged for a white sweatshirt and sweatpants set, courtesy of Rebecca. 

“I’d’ve had a poster of you on me wall if they made one, babe,” Jamie says. “Better sight than that hairy git.”

Roy just rolls his eyes and says “I’m getting another beer.”

“Can you bring me a piece of cake?” you call after him.

“Me too?” Phoebe asks, looking hopefully at Molly. 

Jamie pats your knee. “Don’t think he heard you, love. I’ll get it for ya. You too, Phoebs.” He shoots a wink in her direction, and she giggles. 

“Oi, grandad,” Jamie says, walking into the kitchen. “Did you hear your sister?”

Roy turns around from the fridge with a menacing look.  

“If she has a single moment of unhappiness, I’m going to fucking kill you,” he growls.

“Jesus, sorry,” Jamie says, hands in the air. “What’s got your knickers all in a twist?”

Fucking Jamie, never able to back down from a good squabble with Roy. 

They’re both keeping their voices down because they know if they got caught, no less than three people would be grabbing them by the ear and yelling. 

They might know this from personal experience. 

Roy says, “She’s my little sister. I’d fucking murder for her, and so would Molly. Always tried to make it easier for her when she missed our parents and shit, but it always fucking got to her anyway. Didn’t help that I fucked off to Sunderland at fucking nine, before she was even fucking born. She’s wanted a family of her own for fucking ages, and if you fuck this up for her they will never. Find. Your body.”

Jamie’s not sure Roy’s ever looked this menacing, which is saying something, because he’s Roy fucking Kent. He always looks menacing. 

So he nods and says quietly, “I ain’t gonna fuck it up, Coach. Had a shit dad too. Always wished he were around, except when he was then he’d get all fuckin’ angry and shit. But… still wanted him, y’know? Weird. Anyway, not gonna be like that with her. I want a family too.”

Roy looks straight into his eyes, looking for the barest hint of insincerity. Jamie’s gaze doesn’t waver. He’s not sure of much, but he’s sure of this. He’s sure of you. 

Roy says, “Right,” nods once, then claps Jamie on the shoulder right at his phone dings. 

Jamie pulls out his phone to a text from you that reads, pls stop fangirling over my brother. baby wants cake and so does ur mum

He smiles and tries to figure out how to balance three plates at once. 

[manias-wordcount]

Roy Mustang with reader who struggles to accept love or affection in general? Like someone who may have got hurt in the past and now struggles to accept someone’s love even if they want it.

Thank you!

Beside Yourself (Roy Mustang x Reader)

𝗔/𝗡: 𝗵𝗼𝗽𝗲 𝘆'𝗮𝗹𝗹 𝗱𝗼𝗻𝘁 𝗺𝗶𝗻𝗱 𝗯𝘂𝘁 𝗶 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗯𝗶𝗻𝗲𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗲𝘀𝗲 𝘁𝘄𝗼 𝗽𝗿𝗼𝗺𝗽𝘁𝘀 𝘁𝗼 𝗺𝗮𝗸𝗲 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝗳𝗶𝗰! 𝗲𝗻𝗷𝗼𝘆!

𝙒𝙖𝙣𝙩 𝙩𝙤 𝙧𝙚𝙖𝙙 𝙢𝙤𝙧𝙚? ⇒ 𝙈𝙖𝙨𝙩𝙚𝙧𝙡𝙞𝙨𝙩

𝙟𝙤𝙞𝙣 𝙢𝙮 𝙙𝙞𝙨𝙘𝙤𝙧𝙙 𝙨𝙚𝙧𝙫𝙚𝙧?

𝙗𝙪𝙮 𝙢𝙚 𝙖 𝙘𝙤𝙛𝙛𝙚𝙚?

You’ve been getting a lot of night shifts these past couple of months.

  It’s not every day, but it’s the same days. A neat little schedule at the very least. And for the most part, you don’t really mind. At some point, the hour turns and it’s only the quiet type that enter the library. The ones who know exactly which sections they’re going. The ones who don’t need your assistance. The ones who you only need to speak to just to let them know that it’s 10 minutes before lock-up. But lately…

  He’s been bringing you flowers at the end of your shift each day. Like clockwork. Never wrong. Never late. Never late. Like absolute clockwork.

  “Oh, um…T-thank you, Colonel Mustang,” You find yourself murmuring as always. Your eyes are downcasted as always as you accept them. Your fingers reaching out timidly, despite the sense of familiarity he now radiates. For a moment, your fingers tip brush against his, and still time you’re shivering and letting out a tiny gasp instead of pulling your hands away. The look on his face tells you it’s not intentional- because Colonel Mustang has been nothing but a complete gentleman towards you since the beginning- but you don’t miss how his smile turns just a little encouraging as you don’t immediately run away. “They’re…they’re very pretty.”

  “It’s Roy , sweetheart. You don’t need to use my rank with me. And of course,” He tells you gently, as if easing you into the compliment you know he was about to throw at you.  “I thought of you when I saw them. I figured the ones in your kitchen might be wilting by now with the cold coming in.”

You nod, heat rising to cheeks as you recall the moment you must have overshared to him while he was walking you to your apartment. You had a good day- you were excited. But you were also starting to talk too much. Share too much. Say things that you know people don’t really care to listen to. Including how the weather is making the African Daisies he brought you not too long ago die a little faster than anticipated.

  It should have felt good. It should have felt amazing . To be listened to. To have someone remember a spare detail you slipped out only a week prior. It does- it really, really does. But…

  You’re scared. 

  You just are. And no amount of flowers and walk homes is going to change that. Not for you, at least. Even if you so desperately want to. Even if you so desperately want it. Want him . But you’re scared. Just…way too scared.

  “Thank you…Mr. Roy,” You say again, trying your best to meet his eyes. But the look he gives you is a little too intense and almost too sweet for you to stand, so you advert your eyes very quickly once more and swallow down a nervous gulp. You don’t know what he sees in you. You really, really don’t. “We…we should get going. It’s…it’s getting rather late.”

“You already thanked me, sweetheart.” He reminds you with a chuckle, seeming very pleased that you used his first name like he had asked. It’s a chuckle that has your heart skipping a beat and your ears straining to hear one more time. And he’s nice about it- he always is. But instantly, you’re calling yourself names in your head and adjusting your grip on the long green flowers stems now safe in your hand, unbable to keep yourself still as the two of you start to walk down the street in the direction of your apartment. “But I’m always happy to hear when you enjoy my gifts.”

  You nod again, not trust your lips to form to the proper words and sounds in the proper order. 

  You’ve heard stories about him before you’ve officially met. The whole nation has, but you’ve heard stories about him- about the Flame Alchemist. And so you recognized him when he came into the library one night. You helped him find a couple of books and you told him that you had to lock up ten-minutes before closing. He made you so nervous. Knowing that a man with so much power and talent was sitting in a room with you and a lot of very flammable and very precious material was absolutely anxiety inducing. 

  But he waited for you outside the main door, and watched silently as you locked it behind you. He then asked if he could see again. And because you’re scared, but not too scared to know what it’s like to start to fall for a someone- you said yes.

  But then seeing you again turned into appearing at the end of your every night shift so he could walk you home. And that eventually turned into bringing your a couple of flowers wrapped up with a neat little ribbon every time he saw you. And now? He’s telling you to drop his rank and to call him by his first time. While occasionally slipping a hand around your waist when he wants to guide you somewhere he deems “ a bit safer for me to take you.”

  You coworkers took notice after a while. On the shift you weren’t alone, someone would always see him waiting just for you. Doting on you. Spoiling you. Some of them would gush and coo. Tell you. Others would tell you to be careful. That he’s a rabid flirt. That he’s a dangerous man. An uncaring one. Along with every insult under the sun.

But you’ve never seen it. He’s never showed it to you. Not once. Not even.

  Still, in your mind. You tell yourself that you have every right to be careful. That you have every right to scared. You’ve been hurt before. You’ve been burned before. You won’t let it happen again. You won’t. You won’t. You won’t. But…

  He falls in step with you tonight. He falls in step with you every night he walks you home. He peers at you light expression and he asks you about your day. And he pressesly gently when you’re slow to offer up anything that rubbed you the wrong way. He offers once again to look into the suspicious person who keeps showing up and leaving an hour before you close for the night. And he tells you that he doesn’t want you worrying your pretty little head about the news you hear regarding conflicts in other parts of the nation and in the back streets of Central.

  But he also asks if you still feel comfortable about the way he’s courting you. And he doesn’t say another word when you’re unable to hold his hand for very long due to all your fidgeting and the fear of sweaty palms driving him away. He just sees you to the front of your building and stands guard while you fish out your keys. He makes you promise that you’ll be careful on your walks to work. And that you’ll call him first if you ever need to get into contact with the State Military. 

  You just nod your head and fiddle with the flowers and keep your eyes on his polished uniform boots. He never once shows annoyance at your inability to speak to him normally. Never once falters with his little shows of affection. Never once treats you as anything less than a person worthy of all things soft and sweet. But you just can’t fully believe it. You just can’t fully believe that he isn’t here to one day leave you behind. To hurt you as you’ve been hurt before. To make you fall in love only to break your heart as it has been broken before. You just can’t fully believe it. You can’t fully believe him no matter how hard you try. No matter how hard you want to. You just can’t. You just can’t.

  “You have a good night, sweetheart.”

  Because you’re just not ready yet. You’re just not ready yet. But one day…

  “You too…Roy.”

  You hope to be.

[uc1wa]

18+ minors dni

tags: groping, stick and poke tattoos, roy (horny!!!)

roy harper, your boyfriend that you met in university, who was just a little possessive of you. the man who would never let you walk to class if your hand wasn’t in his. the man who’s never not accompanying you to your night out at clubs or bars, whose hands never leave your hips and whose mouth is glued to the side of your neck.

roy who, one day when he’s a little drunk—not of a substance, but of you, is laying in bed in nothing but his boxers with you in nothing but a pretty thong he got you, his big hands groping and rubbing all over your body.

his voice whispering a string of, "jesus christ, you’re so fuckin’ hot." and, "i could eat you alive, y’know that? fuck, i’m never giving you up."

he helps you turn so that you’re laying on your stomach while he’s sat beside you, he’s kneading your back, but can’t help to get distracted and move his hands to your butt that’s acting as an invitation to him.

the feeling makes you moan softly. after all, there wasn’t a day that roy was missing a training session in the gym and his masseuse skills showed it beautifully.

his eyes sparkle for a moment, a wicked thought coming to his head. "y’know stick ‘n pokes?" roy’s asking, and you hum in response, turning to look at your boyfriend who’s hands are full of your ass right now.

"wanna put one right here," his thumb presses and smoothes over the top part of your ass. "a little ‘r’, you’d look cute with that baby," he says while you giggle, nodding your head.

"want you to put one there," roy smirks, shifting his weight so that he’s leaning beside you, looking down at your face that’s centimeters apart from his. "want me to, baby? say please, be a good girl ‘n i’ll give you anything you want, baby."

his finger goes down to press against your bottom lip while you mutter a, "please, roy." with that, you’ve awoken something in roy that he won’t be able to contain until he’s done doing the task at hand.

roy is quick to stand up out of his bed, throwing on a pair of sweatpants and leaving his apartment door, running down the hallway to one of his neighbors who he knows does stick and pokes, and is asking for the supplies, promising he’ll return them.

your boyfriend’s returning to his room, finding you in the same position, except with your knees bent so that your ass was poking up from it place against the mattress. "fucking hell," he groans, closing his door and feeling a growing tightness in his pants.

"just—it’ll be real quick, baby, lay down for me ‘n then you can go back, okay?" because your boyfriend would never turn down an invitation, but that’ll be after he marks your skin as his.

"hurry up," you pout as he makes his way on the bed, his thighs straddling your own as he cleans the small spot of your skin, wiping it with a towel he grabbed on the way back to his room. "might hurt for a second, it’ll be okay baby. gonna be all mine after," he says lowly, concentrating on the needle that has ink on the tip and poking it into your skin until there’s a tiny ‘r’ on your ass cheek.

roy sits back once he’s done, grinning stupidly with his palm rubbing over the soft flesh, lifting it to smack it and watch it move. "my baby, whose baby are you, huh?" the red head asks, leaning over top of your backside, hands falling on either side of your frame and his lips coming to press against your cheek.

"’m your baby," you smile, and he continues to remind you of the fact till the sun rises.

[sadhours]

scumbag blues: 1) first it giveth

gator tillman x f!original character

contents: 18+ minors dni, sex work, mean!gator, slow burn, enemies to lovers, smut, oral (m receiving), p in v, rough, anal play, choking, lots of dirty talk, unprotected sex, lots of spitting

The sheets are fresh, it’s the first thing Gator smells as he and Daisy walk through the doorway. She leans against the closed door, locking it and batting her lashes up at him. Big blue eyes behind false lashes and a scattering of sun sprouted freckles dusting the apples of her cheeks and bridge of her nose. Gator feels a little dizzy at the sight but his dad doesn’t approve of her, tells Gator he better stop paying for her services but he can’t help himself. Winds up at the Inn at least twice a week. Bills fresh from the ATM tucked neatly in his wallet, burning a hole in his pocket. Gator’s hands find her hips, holding her in place while his body crowds her tiny one. He’s a good seven inches taller than her. He gets off on the size difference, likes knowing he can easily throw her around.

Daisy’s fingers find the zipper of his utility vest, her pink stained lips parting as she tugs it down and smoothes her hands under it, pushing it off his shoulders. Gator lets it fall to the floor, cringing at the thud it makes as it hits the hardwood. Daisy then moves her hands to make purchase over his chest, making his skin chill with goosebumps. She gently squeezes his hips, blinking up at him with those coquettish eyes. Turns Gator to putty in her hands like that. Wills himself to stop thinking about how much dick she’s ran through today. Tells himself she don’t look at those men the way she’s looking at him. Daisy promises so, has Gator believing it like it changes anything.

Roy wouldn’t let him and even if he did, Daisy ain’t gonna stop turning tricks. Her dad thinks this is an Inn, but they make money ‘cause his little girls turned it into a brothel. Her mothers scarce, like his own. Gator doesn’t ask her personal questions like that. They keep it professional. Though he knows it ain’t, knows Daisy brings him to her personal bedroom and not one of the rooms for rent. Lets her rest her head on his chest after and tell him about her dreams. Kisses her stupid before he inevitably leaves.

“S’nice dress you got on,” he mumbles, “Put it on just for me?” It’s a white one, short with big flowy sleeves and her cleavage just about pours from it.

“Bought it just for you,” Daisy replies, fishing her manicured fingers in his pocket and retrieving his lime green vape. She holds it up, “You know the rule.”

“Dumb fuckin’ rule,” he grumbles but takes it from her, taking a deep pull from the little box and tilts his head back to exhale the smoke out towards the ceiling. He passes it back to her and Daisy side steps him to put it in her desk. Gator’s got a not so good habit about reaching for it while they’re in the throws of passion, Daisy ain’t a fan of the acidic fruity vapor in her face during sex. So she made a rule, it stays in her desk drawer until after he’s paid her.

“Gator,” she scolds, furrowing her brows as she looks at him.

“I’m just saying,” he raises his hands in defense before trailing to the bed. He sits on the foot of it, clicking his tongue and nodding to the ground before him. Daisy complies, getting on her knees and starts unlacing his boots with her French tip nails and looks up at him with those big eyes again. “Good girl,” he praises, placing his palms on the comforter.

Sometimes he makes her lick ‘em but he’s feeling sweet tonight. She looks a little too innocent for that right now. So he just watches carefully, humming in approval when she gets one boot off and massages his sweaty, socked foot. Daisy smiles, flush rising up her neck which has Gator thinking this part gets her real excited. Has half a mind to reach between her legs and find out. Daisy rubs her face against his knee, bouncing a bit where she sits before she moves onto the other boot. She doesn’t spend as much time in massaging that one before she’s reaching for the button of his cargos, Gator moves to unclip the strap on his thigh but Daisy stops him.

“Keep it on for now,” she pleads, pulling his cargos down as far as they’ll go with the strap on.

“Yeah? Got yourself a cop kink?” Gator teases.

“More like a Gator kink,” she mumbles and immediately looks like she regrets it, eyes wide and cheeks ruddy. She bites her lip and moves her hand to palm him through his underwear. He can’t dwell on what she said for long after that, hot pleasure rising up his legs as his cock twitches from the attention. A long, low groan pushes from his throat and she shushes him. Her daddy’s bedroom is next to hers.

“C’mon, stop teasing,” he hisses.

Daisy raises a brow, lips quirking into a smirk before she’s nudging her nose against his clothed cock. Gator gasps and his hips lift off the mattress for just a second. And then Daisy sniffs and Gator’s a little self conscious, knows he’s been sweating in these cargos all day. But Daisy groans softly and takes another whiff, squeezing the bottom of his thighs and lets out a moan.

“You’re nasty, ya know that?” Gator exhales shakily and Daisy rubs her face against his boner and tells him he smells so good. Pheromones or someshit, he doesn’t know but he knows it turns him on that she likes his scent. His cock fills out even more and he grabs a hold of her head, pressing her face flush against his briefs. Daisy mouths at his length through the fabric, digging her fingers into his thighs. “You fucking love that cock, don’tcha, darling? C’mon, show daddy how much you love it,” Gator groans out, loosening his grip on her head.

Daisy takes a breath as she pulls away, immediately hooking her fingers into the waistband of his briefs and pulls ‘em down to get his erection out. Gator has to bite his lip to stifle the moan rising up his throat as she grips the base of him in her hand and licks a broad stroke up the underside of his cock. Daisy’s a real pro when it comes to head. Experience, Gator knows but she acts like she needs to suck it. Like she’s hungry for his cock. Daisy delivers kitten licks to his slit, moving her head with the motion before she wraps her lips around the head, giving a hard suck before taking him as far as he’ll go, hot and wet enveloping his cock. It twitches in her mouth and Gator pathetically moans out a “Oh, dear lord.”

He can feel her smile around the mouthful of him, has his hips rolling up on their own volition. For fucks sake, it feels so good. All the stress from work and his dad just dissipates like a switch. Gator’s sure that Daisy was put here on earth to service his cock, that’s what God made her for. And fuck, if he could marry her he’d do it in a heartbeat. Daisy pulls his cock out of her mouth with a pop before slapping it against her tongue and swallows before she asks him, “S’that feel good, daddy?”

“Yeah it does, sweetheart,” Gator bumbles out, “Get your mouth back to work.”

Daisy obliges with a giggle, running her pouty lips against the tip before slipping it between them. She sucks on his head, stroking him with her hand. Keeps her eyes locked on his face, like she’s eager to watch him fall apart. Like her whole self worth depends on whether or not she can make Gator cum. And he’s a fucking asshole.

“Aw, darlin,” he laughs softly, “You can do better than that, can’tcha?”

Daisy huffs through her nose, eyes squinting at him as she squeezes his cock in her hand but she clearly can’t help herself, as stubborn as she may pretend to be, she really just wants to please him. So Daisy sinks her mouth down on his cock, takes him until the head pushes against the back of her throat. She blinks quickly and Gator can see the tears prickling the corners of her eyes, slipping out and down her cheeks. Watches with his breath held as she exhales through her nose. He scoops her blonde hair up in his hands and holds it like a pony tail at the crown of her head, using the leverage to move her mouth as he pleases. Fucks her pretty little mouth until his balls are covered in her drool. Bucks his hips with it, reveling in the gagging sounds she makes around his length.

Gator’s real close to pulling her off, feels his orgasm is inching in quicker but it’s just too good to make her stop. He ain’t leaving here without filling her pussy though, it is what he pays for anyhow.

“Slower,” he whimpers out, hating the way it sounds on his ears but Daisy complies, pulls off of him and strokes him languidly in her hand. She blinks up at him, those eyes wide like she’s never done this before. The mortgage being paid for this place says something else though.

“Such a sweet girl,” Gator coos, “Do whatever you’re told.” He pats her bicep, “Up. Show me how wet y’are.”

Daisy flushes, standing up on shaky legs and lifts her dress above her waist. Her thong is white, slick soaked through and glistening on her thighs. Gator reaches forward and presses his fingers against the damp material. He moves them firmly up and down, Daisy rolls her hips into it and Gator lets out a low chuckle.

“Reckon you’re a good whore or… it’s only my cock that gets you soaked like this,” Gator muses, tilting his head as he pushes her panties to the side and gets his fingers against her folds. “Huh? You get this wet for those other fuckers?”

Daisy gasps, fingers grasping at the bunched material of her dress as she gazes down at his face.

“Answer me,” Gator demands when Daisy’s eyes glaze over from pleasure, his fingertips moving against her aching clit.

“No,” she whines, because it’s the truth. There’s bottles of lube hidden away in every single room. It’s nothing but men her fathers age and then there’s Gator. Handsome and around her age. Fucks her like he owns her. She won’t tell him he does. That she’s looking forward to their scheduled appointments. Cleans her room for him, wears clothes bought just for him and is soaking wet in anticipation. Hell, he’s the only client who gets to fuck her raw.

“That’s right,” he purrs, pulling his hand back and leans back against the bed, “Touch yourself for me.”

Daisy puts on a show, pushes her panties down mid thigh and spreads her lips with her fingers, giving him an eyeful of glistening folds. Rubs her pretty little clit in slow circles for him. Makes these breathy, quiet moans as she does it. Gator watches with an unimpressed expression that has Daisy insecure and eager to please. She slaps her pussy and inhales sharply at the way his eyebrows raise, moving to sink her fingers into her warm core. Fucking herself all slow and exaggerated, walls clenching around the digits and the desire to have his cock stretching them starts to get unbearable.

“Taste yourself,” Gator instructs.

She obliges instantly, shoving her fingers in her mouth and humming around them. Gator grins, eyes crinkling and Daisy clambers on top of him. Smashing their lips together desperately, grabbing his face and rocking her hips against him. Gator grabs her ass, squeezes it before delivering a harsh smack to the right cheek as he licks into her mouth. Daisy has a strict no kissing rule, but most of her rules go out the window when it comes to Gator. As much as she despises who he is, she’s overwhelmingly attracted to him. It’s carnal, animalistic the way they make out and rut against each other. Gator gropes her wherever he can, pressing his cock against her dripping cunt and rolling his hips. The most delicious slide, slick coating his shaft as he drags it through her folds. Their muffled moans fill the room as they writhe against each other. Daisy’s so goddamn wet Gator can feel it dripping down to his balls. He grabs her hair and tugs her back, breaking the kiss with strings of salvia still connecting their lips.

“Take that fucking dress off,” Gator demands, “Now.”

Daisy fumbles to pull the hem up and over her head, body exposed to him and his hands take advantage, smoothing down her sides and then back up to unclasp her lacy white bra. She tosses it aside and rolls her hips into him as his hands cup her breasts, thumbs grazing against her pert nipples. Daisy elicits a loud moan and Gator’s pinches her nipple and tugs it.

“Shh,” he scolds, “Don’t want your daddy knowing what an easy slut his little girl is.”

“Fuck,” Daisy gasps, hands moving to grab Gator’s wrist and forearm. His words produce a wave of euphoria laced shame, coating the length of his cock in even more slick. He uses her secret to blackmail her all the time, get dirt on her clients and get free services from her when he gets power hungry.

Gator hums, smirking up at her and says, “Does that make you wet? Screwing for money when daddy’s in the next room? Fuck, you’re such a whore. Picked the perfect profession.”

“Shut up,” she pleads in a moan.

“Ah ah,” Gator purses his lips as he smooths his hand up to wrap around Daisy’s neck, “I know you don’t wanna spend the night behind bars again. Soliciting a deputy and all.” Gator tsks, “Better behave.”

“Yes, sir,” Daisy gasps, feeling light headed with the pressure Gator’s got on her windpipe. Tells herself it’s part of the service, that she isn’t massively turned on by the power Gator truly holds. “I’m sorry, Deputy Tillman… I’ll be a good girl.”

“Music to my ears, darlin,” Gator drawls before giving a squeeze to her throat and letting go.

“How do you want me?” Daisy asks, breathlessly as her fingertips ghost down the swell of his biceps. She ignores the dumb tattoo peeking out of his sleeve.

“Ass up, face in the pillows,” Gator instructs and Daisy moves quick to get into position, thong still draped at her knees. Gator gets up, she can hear him undo his thigh strap and carefully placing it on the dresser before she feels him peel her underwear the rest of the way down. When she feels Gator’s hips pressing the globes of her ass, she knows he’s undressed. The tip of his cock grazes her fluttering hole, causing a whine to raise out of her throat and she pushes her ass back at him, desperate to catch the head of his cock in her hole and sink down on it. But Gator has other plans, grabs handfuls of her ass and spreads her cheeks before jiggling them in his hands. Watches her asshole flex from the motion and he spits on it, moving his thumb to spread his saliva against the hole she doesn’t let any other man touch. Hasn’t told Gator he’s the only man whose fucked her ass.

Gator spits again, uses it as lube to slip his thumb inside her asshole and groans lowly as Daisy’s toes curl.

“That’s it,” he coos, “Such a good little whore for me.”

Daisy keens, grabbing onto the pillows as she pushes her ass back at him. He spanks her with his right hand, so hard she’s sure she’s got an angry, red print of Gator’s large hand on it. Then he’s grabbing the base of his cock, swirling the head of it around Daisy’s clenching, dripping hole. He slips it in, but keeps it shallow. Just the tip.

“C’mon, Daisy,” he says condescendingly, “Fuck that dirty hole on my cock.”

Daisy’s head is swimming with just the tip, the notion that this is work completely vacated her thoughts. This is pure pleasure, all play and no work. Daisy fully believes in this moment that she exists to be used by Gator and God’s a real kind son of a bitch for giving her that purpose. She rolls her hips back, sinking down on Gator’s cock and he gasps. Her eyes are rolling back as he fills her up, all the way down to his tight balls. His cockhead presses into her g-spot so deliciously Daisy cannot hold back the guttural moan punching through her lips. He’s the only client to make her cum, to make sex enjoyable.

“Fuckin’ hell,” he exhales, “Tight little cunt, no matter how many dicks you take.”

His filthy words make both her holes clench around him. Gator wiggles his thumb and then uses the grip he’s got on her to drag her up and down his cock. He’s so thick and she’s squeezing him so tight. Can’t imagine not taking Gator raw. Needs to feel him without the stinky, thin layer of latex.

“Christ,” he moans softly, “Just keep squeezing that dick. You love it so much.”

Daisy fucks back against him, her nipples brushing against the bedspread as her tits sway with the motions. The sensation spreads hotly down her spine. The wet sounds of Gator’s cock sliding in and out of her cunt fill her ears, sprouting goosebumps over her skin as desperation starts to take over her. With each thrust of their hips, their skin meets with a sweaty slap and the tip of his cock brushes against her g-spot. Gator keeps letting out these low grunts, right hand gripping her hip tight enough to leave bruises. All the marks on her skin are left from him.

“So wet,” he chokes behind clenched teeth, “My little whore, all fucking mine.” He slaps her ass, “Yeah? I own this tight fuck hole, don’t I?”

“Yes,” she cries out, the slapping sounds of their skin gaining in tempo as Gator pounds into her relentlessly.

“Say it, bitch,” Gator seethes, moving her hand between her shoulder blades and pushing her harder against the mattress, “Tell me who owns this fucking pussy.”

Daisy turns her head, though her voice is still slightly muffled as she whimpers out, “You own this pussy, Gator owns me…”

“Damn fucking right,” he grunts. And just as he slips his thumb out of her ass to grip her hips, his radio goes off.

“Gator, do you copy?” that static laced voice rings throughout the room but the deputy ignores it, drilling into Daisy at breakneck speed, pushing involuntarily little yelps from her.

“Gator, you there?” Again, the voice comes through. “Gator,” in a singing tune.

“Fucking useless pricks,” he pulls out from Daisy and climbs off the bed. She sighs as she flips onto her back, rubbing her pussy as she watches his plump ass while he walks over to his vest.

“I’m fuckin’ busy,” he says into the radio and drops the vest, turning and grinning from ear to ear as he sees Daisy laid back, running her fingers through her folds as she eyes his hard cock.

“Fuckin’ busy or busy fuckin’?” The voice replies as Gator makes it to the edge of the mattress, stroking his cock while his eyes rake over Daisy’s body. “You with that whore again, ain’t ya, Gator?”

He rolls his eyes and climbs back on the mattress, gets between Daisy’s legs and slaps the head of his cock against her pussy, “Ignore ‘em, they’ll leave us alone.”

Daisy is used to what everyone says about her. Hell, the majority of Stark County Sheriff’s Department has paid for her services. She’d be amiss to ignore the realization that Gator talks about her to them, though.

“You tell ‘em about me?” she giggles, moving her hands up to play with her nipples while Gator drags the tip of his cock through her folds.

“Sure do,” he mumbles, “Tell ‘em you let me fuck your ass for no extra charge.”

“You get a flat fee,” Daisy admits, looking up to see his gelled back hair coming undone, the longer strands flopping out. He’s so frustratingly good looking, can’t help herself to grab his arms and pull his lips to hers. As Gator kisses back, he slips his cock into her hole which makes Daisy moan against his lips. Her legs come up to wrap around his waist and her arms drape around his shoulders.

He grinds into her cunt nice and deep before snapping his hips, head of his cock hitting her cervix in a way that has her body jolting and nails dragging down his back. Tears fill her eyes at the sharp sensation but Gator doesn’t relent, pounding into her pussy with abandon. Daisy has to bite his lip to stifle her cries but the assault makes Gator growl and break the kiss, pulling back and wrapping his fingers around her neck. Not applying too much pressure, but pressing her into the bed while he hammers his hips impossibly faster and harder, face all contorted in frustration and pleasure.

“Ya wanna bite me, bitch?” he grunts out.

Daisy whimpers, eyes rolling back in her head as Gator drills into her. Euphoria radiating all over her body as Gator slams against her g-spot repeatedly, turning Daisy into a drooling, incoherent mess as her voice attempts to apologize. Gator pouts, his thumb stroking her cheekbone as he slows his thrusts.

“Poor girl, make you cockdrunk already?” his voice is just a tad shaky, like he’s struggling not to fuck her into oblivion. “We just barely started, darlin.”

That’s another thing different about Gator as a client, the sex lasts hours. They usually do it more than once. Rest of her clients can barely last five minutes. Daisy wouldn’t complain though. Four hundred bucks for five minutes of laying on her back isn’t bad. Course, Gator gets a discounted price. Half off. It started because she actually enjoyed herself, had a rough time considering it work. Until he would leave, drop the cash on her dresser and not talk to her until he showed up for their next appointment. Gator makes her remember its work.

He drags his fingers down her arms before grabbing her wrists and pinning them above her head, leaning down to connect their lips again. Daisy whimpers against it, squeezing her legs tighter around his waist and trying to chase the europhoria she felt just seconds ago. If he hadn’t slowed down she would’ve came. Gator likes to take his time, really drag it out of her. He can’t do anything without making it convoluted and difficult. Which he proves by shoving his cock as deep as it’ll go, their skin flush and then stills his hips. Pants into the kiss, moves his free hand up to squeeze her tit again. Daisy flicks her tongue against his and he wraps his lips around it, sucking on her tongue as he attempts to penetrate her even deeper. Fruitless, his cocks into the hilt, balls pressed against her ass.

The kiss quickly devolves into the pair of them moaning into open mouths, Gator thrusts but barely pulls back. And his cock is so hard and firm, Daisy’s squeezing around it with all she’s worth. Fuck, they’re libel to get stuck like this. Animals in heat. Pleasure swirling around in her stomach, bleeding down to all her nerves. They’re as connected as they’ll ever be, in the most raw and guttural way they can be. She opens her eyes as he pulls back, whimpers when his cock goes with him and she’s left feeling empty. Gator spreads her legs, looks down at her cunt and let’s a line of spit drip from his lips to her pretty, fucked bright pink pussy.

“Think it’s time you earned your money,” he pats her thigh, “Ride me, cowgirl.”

Daisy knows she’s well earned her money as is but she isn’t gonna say no to riding Gator. Gains a bit of her power back in that position. She nods enthusiastically and straddles Gator once he’s on his back, smoothes her hands through his chest hair and grazes her fingertips against his nipples. It earns her an almost pathetic moan from the man and Daisy’s giddy on it. She grinds her slicked up pussy against his hard cock, the slide easy from how soaked he gets her.

“C’mon, now,” he quirks an eyebrow, “Get on that cock and show me what you’re worth.”

Daisy licks her lips, lifts herself up and grabs hold of Gator’s erection, the head easily catches on her hole and she sinks down on him. Her puffy lips fall open as he fills her, a saccharine moan pouring out of her. He hums, eyes locked on where their bodies connect.

Then he directs her, “Slow. Wanna see it all. Need to see your pussy swallowin’ that cock.”

Holding onto his thighs, she leans back and slowly lifts her hips. Up until just the tips inside. She watches Gator’s expressions intently, his brown eyes blown wide with this hazy lust in them. Cheeks flushed and breathing heavily. His lips are swollen from the kisses.

“Take that cock, baby,” he mumbles out, sounding so delightfully dazed.

Baby. The word goes right to her head, makes her stomach fill with butterflies. Daisy complies, sinking back down on it and repeating the languid motions a few more times before she can’t take it anymore. Needs it faster and harder. Gator turns into a bumbling puddle, moaning out as he encourages her, “That’s it, yeah. Fuck yourself on my dick. Oh, yeah…”

“Gator,” she whines out, milking his cock with her tight cunt. Bouncing on his cock, squeezing his thighs for leverage. Her eyebrows pinch together and her mouth hangs open, chasing that burst of ecstasy only Gator can give her.

“Yeah, you filthy little slut,” he seethes, teeth clenched as his eyes dance around from their sexes up to her eyes and down to her tits.

Daisy huffs, moving a hand so she can rub erratic circles against her throbbing clit. Balancing herself on the one hand still plastered on Gator’s thigh. Feels the way her legs burn from exertion but she’s too focused on chasing the orgasm teasing her insides. Rides him like a woman gone mad. Gator’s moans turn breathless and border on whimpering, be it by her cunt quickly working his cock or her animalistic determination to get herself off, it’s doing something to him.

“Really workin’ for it, yeah?” Gator babbles out, “Gonna make yourself cream all over my cock, baby?”

“Feels so fucking good,” she heaves through pants.

“Mmm,” Gator’s hands snake around her hips, his own legs spreading which makes Daisy falter and she lets out a frustrated whine. “Don’t stop,” Gator tells her, fingers digging into her skin.

He begins thrusting up at her, the pair of them relentlessly humping each other. It’s a little sloppy, but the force of Gator’s hips pushes her over the edge. Intense waves of absolute heaven rippling through her, mouth open in a silent scream as she writhes against Gator. Vision gone absolutely white, riding out her orgasm blindly. Gator growls a laugh while he watches, reveling in the way her face scrunches and contorts as her body starts to buzz all over. He’s following close behind, before Daisy’s orgasm even finishes she feels his hot, thick seed filling her and leaking down the sides of his cock. Makes her cry out, body collapsing on top of him as he wraps an arm around her and fucks up into her, emptying all he’s got in her sore, used hole.

“Gator, Gator, Gator,” she chants breathlessly in his ear, tears trailing hotly down her cheeks as the aftershocks of her orgasm have her rolling her hips against him. Imagines he’s her husband. Imagines this is a marital love. That when they’re out in public they don’t hate each other.

He hums, pressing a sloppy kiss to her cheek before he’s pushing her off of him. Daisy lays on the mattress beside him, panting as she tries to catch her breath. Gator’s panting too, turns on his side and grabs her hip to pull her close. Drapes his arm around her as his lips find hers and they share lazy kisses.

“You let anyone else cum in ya?” he wonders aloud, lips dragging along hers. He hopes not. Can’t be too sure of her answer anyhow. She is a working girl after all. He pays her to be what he wants her to be. He still fantasizes about knocking her up, telling his dad he’s got no choice but to be with Daisy and keep filling her up with babies. She’s on birth control though, has that chip in her arm he hates so much.

“Gator,” she sighs as she presses her hand to his jaw and kisses him softly, “You’re the only one I let fuck me raw. Therefore… you’re the only man who's nut in me.”

He cringes, “Don’t talk like that. S’not ladylike.”

“Haven’t you heard? I’m not much of a lady,” she kisses him again, can’t stop kissing him.

[wroteclassicaly]

Having a baby with best-friend Gator and he’s scared to meet and hold his baby for the first time.

Boots make noise as they drift down the hallway slowly, his palms sweaty as he swipes them across his camo, jugular constricting upon a harsh swallow. When he comes into the room, he takes off his hat immediately, peering, brown eyes wide and scared, and he sees you nursing her. You look up at him, not having expected his appearance so soon. Roy had him out of town and he was on his way back as fast as he could be, last you heard. He admits relief it took a while, but guilt because of fear.

And you say it’s okay. He cautiously brings a chair up by the bed and is terrified to look. You reassure him.

“You know me. I mean, there’s a new girl here, but she has your eyes, she knows your voice, so… Nothin’ we can do about that now. She’s pretty chill though.”

This causes a smile to quirk his lips. His hands are trembling, watching you gently maneuver the swaddled bundle into a little jostle, patting her butt lightly as she continues to feed. “Gator, you don’t need to be afraid of her. She’s just a baby. She’s your baby.”

Pain prickles across his chest, beneath the layers he wears. What if he looks at her and feels hollow? What if he’s made of the same dead nothing as Roy? What if he can’t hold her right, hurts her? What if she gets scared in his arms?

You sense this, however, interjecting. You reach with your free arm, grasping his wrist. This gets him to tilt his glance a little more. Your voice is gentle, calm. “Hey, you’re her dad. You’re not yours, do you understand me?”

At that moment your daughter chimes in with a little whine, stirring in your arms, her tiny fist popping free of her blankets. Gator has no choice but to look now. And when he does stare at her, it’s not fear. You watch the mossy embers in his eyes mist over, his nose crinkling. You whisper in encouragement.

The moment that brown eyes meet brown, Gator feels something overwhelming happening, something he isn’t sure he can ever name, ever know if he’ll be able to handle sanely. He realizes in seconds flat, that it’s love for an extended part of him, something he made with the most important person who has ever been in his life. He loves his child. And you, you’ve never been more in love with him than this moment of watching him realize what he’s truly capable of feeling.

“She’s so pretty,” he says, gently letting a hand reach out and a finger brush along her soft, chubby little cheek. “She looks just like you.”

Your heart flutters at that, both of you sharing this immeasurable look, as he glances up at you. But a soft fussy set of cries break it apart. She’s let go of your breast, most likely needing to be burped. Gator looks distressed.

“What’s wrong with her? Did I scare her?”

You chuckle lightly, reaching on your beside for the burping cloth your nurse had left behind. “No, I think she just swallowed too much air and needs to burp. Don’t you, little girl?”

“Oh.” He’s nodding. “Do you… Should I go?”

“Please stay?” You answer automatically, your own chest feeling the pressure. “I just need some time with my family.” You let it slip out and don’t realize, but Gator does, and he won’t forget that.

You work to get the baby over your shoulder with the rag, but neither shoulder calms her, and switching positions to burp don’t work either. You begin to feel anxious, frustrated with yourself, calming down in time for Gator to ask you, “Can I try?”

You’re awestruck, but automatically grant him with a yes. He jumps up first, a slight panic to his tone. It amuses you. “Wait! Let me clean my hands first.” He gets back to you after (throughly) scrubbing his hands.

Then reality sets in. Oh, shit. He has to care for a human? Will he know how to? You’re bringing him back into the room when you scoot over a little and ask him to sit beside you in the bed.

He’s more gentle than you’ve seen come from him, watching as you hand him the rag, following your instructions to place it over his shoulder, and you’re lifting a tiny little body with his nose and his eyes, placing it into his massive hands. An imagine forever seared on your mind. She’s crying in quicker paces now, and he almost forgets how to breathe, but you’re still there.

“Over your shoulder. One hand on her head, support her body with your spare. That’s it. Jesus, your hands are insane compared to her head, Gator.” He gently eases her chin over his shoulder, keeping her head secure with one massive palm, letting it glide down to support her body, the other starting to pat her back at your insistence.

There’s about a minute more of her fussing, stretching over him, and then she lets out the cutest little sound you’ve ever heard. Gator laughs, patting her through the burp, bringing her away, his hand under her tiny head, his forearm lying beneath her small body, spare palm keeping her cradled and balanced to his chest. She calms down almost immediately, blinking up slowly at him, her little tongue poking out between her lips.

“Look at you. You’re scaring the shit outta me right now, but we’ve got this, I think.” Another baby noise comes from her, as if she’s responding, and his thumbpad caresses her tiny ear, astonished confidence clear in his voice. “Yeah, we’ve got this.”

And what you’re thinking right now?

Baby number 2, baby number 2. When? Gator is a dilf now. I made him a dilf.

[player1064]

Footy RPF Fictober, day 2 - injury

also available on ao3

MINDLESS NONSENSE!!!! also side-note writing about Gary having tight muscles that need a massage is making me very aware of how tight MY muscles are. massage roller save me....

carraville, set vaguely while they're off on one of their little trips to film the overlap on tour

---

Jamie hauls a limping Gary out of the lift and into his hotel room, lets him put his weight on him as he gingerly lowers himself to sit down on the bed with a wince.

What a drama queen, honestly. They’d been spending their afternoon off of filming on the beach with Roy and Wrighty – a chance to relax, but of course Gary Neville’s not relaxed a day in his life and he’d started getting antsy after a few minutes on a sun lounger.

Jamie’s also not much for sunbathing, so he’d found them a frisbee and they’d been playing around with it when Gary had suddenly done a weird little hop mid run and gone ‘ooh, fuck, I’ve done me ‘amstring’ in that squeaky little voice of his.

So now: Jamie’s left Roy and Ian at the beach (not that they’d notice if he was there or not anyway) to bring Gary back to the hotel, tease him a bit about being an old man with a broken-down body, and then get back to enjoying his day.

But Gary just looks so miserable, like he feels guilty for not being a twenty-something anymore, like he’s just personally ruined their whole trip, and Jamie feels – well, he should try do something, shouldn’t he?

“D’you want me to—” he gestures vaguely at Gary’s leg, not sure if he should say it. If it’s allowed. “I mean, I do an alright massage, if yer –"

“Oh.” Gary blinks. “Oh, I – ha. Thought you were just gonna give me an ibuprofen and leave me to ‘ave a nap or something.”

“Oh,” Jamie echoes. “Yeah, no, that – makes more sense, doesn’t it? I’ll just –” he looks around the room, all of a sudden feeling slightly desperate. Does he even have any ibuprofen on him? Does Gary?

“Massage sounds nice, though.”

Gary isn’t looking at him as he says this, is fidgeting with the starched white sheets on the bed instead. Oh, Jamie thinks again. Oh, he’s not used to asking for help.

A memory hits him, unwelcomed, of a summer’s day a lot like this one. But instead of the warm sands of Italy he’s on the battered grass of Melwood, instead of Gary sitting awkwardly at the end of the bed like a child waiting for a telling-off it’s –

He shakes the thought off.

“Go on then,” he replies, nodding towards the bed. “On your front. And off with those shorts, eh Gaz?”

Jamie’s never felt right using that nickname for Gary, but it’s a necessary evil. ‘Cause otherwise he’d just be a man asking another man to strip for him. So: Gaz it is.

Gary rolls his eyes but he shifts his shorts off – he’s got black boxers on underneath, big fucking surprise. Jamie could’ve told you that without even needing to look; he’s pretty sure it’s the only kind of underwear he owns.

Jamie goes into the bathroom to fetch the hotel-brand body lotion trying to pass itself off as fancy, then he hovers awkwardly at the edge of the bed, kind of half-kneeling half-standing next to Gary as he tries to work out how to do this in the least questionable way possible.

“Where’s it worst?” he asks, cringing at the way his voice cracks, just a tiny bit. Probably not even noticeable.

Gary hums in thought. “Hamstring,” he says simply.

Well, duh.

He eventually realises that Jamie’s not making a move because he needs more information, so he takes another second then says, “uh, think it’s the centre muscle. Maybe six inches up from my knee.”

Jamie spreads his hand over the back of Gary’s thigh, runs a firm line over the muscle with his thumb. “Here?”

“Hmm, bit lower maybe.”

Every muscle in Gary’s thigh is tight, left unattended for god knows how long. But Jamie knows it when he’s got it, feels the hard knot of muscle that makes his whole leg twitch when he presses into it. Slowly, slowly, he starts working at it, tries to stay gentle so he doesn’t put Gary off when he’s just barely started.

“Mmph,” Gary says, his voice muffled by the pillow, “you’re not bad at this, y’know.”

Jamie digs his thumb into the muscle hard, just ‘cause he can. It twitches involuntarily under the pressure, and Gary lets out a displeased, squeaky sort of hum. Then, after a few seconds, he watches smugly as the tension holding Gary’s entire body rigid starts to fade, as he relaxes back into the mattress.

“I’m serious.” Gary tries to twist around and look at Jamie, moving to prop himself up on one elbow. Jamie pushes him in the shoulder so that he lies back down. “D’you take a class or  somethin’? Don’t think I’ve had a half-decent massage since before I retired.”

“Bloody cheapskate,” Jamie mutters. Because of course Gary would never go out and pay for a massage. Though to be fair to him that’s probably less because of the cost and more because it’s never occurred to him that he might need one. “No classes, no. What, you think I can’t just be naturally talented?”

He can practically hear Gary rolling his eyes. “Just tryin’ to make conversation, James. Makes it less like I’m just lying half naked in a hotel room while another man feels me up.”

“Steady on, lad. There’s a long list of people I’d rather be feelin’ up right now than you.”

“Mmm,” Gary says. He sounds softer than Jamie’s used to, less frantic. “You do this for Nicola? She’s into her running, right? Bet she appreciates havin’ a masseuse at her beck and call.”

Jamie freezes, just for a moment. The sun beaming through the windows is warm on his back, and if he closes his eyes he can almost convince himself that he’s some other place, some other time. In his memories it’s always summer, warm and hazy and sweet. God, Carra, no wonder the girls all like you so much.

He shakes himself back to reality, back to Gary and his troublesome hamstring – or rather now his calf, because as Jamie works his way down his leg he’s realising there’s not a single relaxed muscle in his body. Typical Gary, of course.

“Not for Nicola, no,” he says, all light and conversational like. “She’d rather go to a professional. No need to risk my meaty hands making things worse.”

“Oh, right.”

Who, then? Gary kindly doesn’t ask. After all, he’s the expert in half-truths, in talking his way neatly around a subject until you forget the question ever crossed your mind.

Gary’s still built like a defender. Solid, stocky. Thick thighs that were never going to make him a sprinter but could get him in the air, could win him his fair share of tackles. There’s a faded surgery scar on his knee, a few more scattered over his ankle, his foot. Jamie’s not sure he could name a single footballer that doesn’t have scars like that.

Is all this really worth it? he’d asked once, a few lifetimes ago. He’d got a call from Mo, late evening, and he’d gotten straight into his car and driven half an hour to find him home alone, lying on his plush carpet with his face twisted in agony. And the only person he’d tried to call was Jamie. He always used to call Jamie.

Don’t be stupid, Carra, he’d said. He’d been trying to sound confident, cocky, but it had been through gritted teeth as Jamie tried to ease his leg back to a useable state. Of course it’s worth it. He’d let out a cry of pain that shot right through Jamie, that made him want to fold in on himself, then he’d looked him straight in the eyes and said it again. Of course it’s worth it.

“Sometimes,” Gary says now, interrupting the scene in Jamie’s mind, “sometimes, when it’s really cold I still feel an ache in my foot.”

Jamie’s nowhere near his foot, so he’s not sure why he’s bringing it up at all, but then –

“Becks used to get the same. An’ it’s so stupid, isn’t it? The things that make us – but every time I feel it, I wonder if he’s feeling it too. And I wonder if he’s thinkin’ the same about me, d’youknowwhatImean?”

The Foot, the papers used to call it, and The Foot’s Best Friend. Jamie kneads his fingers into Gary’s calf, thinks about all the times he’s gone through the same motions a on slimmer pair of legs, wonders if Michael ever thinks about calling him again when he’s in pain. Feels a twinge of guilt that he doesn’t ever really think about Michael at all.

He clears his throat. “That any better?”

Gary shuffles to sit upright, stretches his leg out like he’s testing it still works after such a grievous injury as the minor hamstring pull he’s suffered. “You know what, I think it actually is. Thanks, Carra. Maybe I should keep you on retainer, eh?”

“Not enough money in the world, Gary, this was a one-time offer.”

[puppiesandnightlock]

LINK: Cause you're a nightmare that i've not been dreaming of

Summary: It's all come down to this one event. Their friends have planned out the perfect moment and all Damian and Jon need to do is say the words. Easy as pie.

ft. Jason and Roy as chaperones, road trips, Ferris wheels, and some really cheesy fireworks confessions

“Alright, Squirts, listen up, for those of you who don't know me, my name is Jason and that’s Roy.”

Jason was turned around in the driver's seat, going over introductions. The man next to him had a trucker cap on and was wearing a dark red tank top, showing off the full sleeve of tattoos running up his right arm. 

He waved, propping his chin up next to the headrest on the passenger’s side. “I’m going to do a quick roll call, just to make sure we are not missing anyone. Once we get that, we’re good to go.”

A cheer went up, and settled quickly as Jason began naming people. Damian offered an earbud to Jon, who took it, settling back and shutting his eyes.

Skylar and Akira were scribbling onto the sketchbooks they’d brought, Kathy and Maya were behind them, dictating what they thought should go on it. Colin was avidly asking questions to the driver's seat.

“We’ve got a four hour drive, and we’re only making two pit stops, this is the last offer i’m making before i start the car.” 

No one got up and the car started the radio being flicked on and soft music filling the car as they started on their journey.

Within thirty minutes, Jon had conked out against Damian’s shoulder, still with the shared earbud in one ear, the other in Damian’s. The boy himself was half asleep, head leaning on the glass of the window. Colin had propped his phone up and was playing a random downloaded movie, Akira and Skylar sharing a random game of tic-tac-toe. 

After the second hour and a half, they were beginning to get rowdy. Jon was arguing with Akira about some inane topic that was probably not legal, Colin was playing keep away with Damian’s phone and backpack, Maya was hissing at them all to shut up as Kathy had fallen asleep in the midst of their chaos somehow.

The car screeched to an abrupt halt and they all yelped, grabbing onto another or a part of the car. Roy turned to the back, Jason tapping his fingers impatient on the steering wheel. 

“Alright, that’s much better. Colin, give the bat brat his stuff back, Jon and Akira, both of you are wrong, it’s much easier to do the third option. Keep the noise to the minimum if you would all like to stay alive on this trip, because my husband is much less nice than he seems, contrary to appearances.”

“Yes sir.” Six kids chorused back at him. 

“Not a brat.” Damian grumbled. 

“Kind of are.” Jon poked his cheek. “What’s with the Bat part though?”

From the front of the car, Jason snorted. “Oh boy, now that’s a nice story.”

“Jason, please don’t-”

“You all know Batman, right?”

They all nodded, the tips of Damian’s ears burning red and he attempted to hide himself in Jon’s shoulder.

“Baby Damian was obsessed with anything Batman, for some unknown reason. Every single one of his toddler pictures have him in some kind of Bat reference, and he had this little bat hoodie with ears he’d wear all the time, and put the hood up and would say “I’m the Bat!” in this tiny little squeaky voice.”

The car had gone up in laughter, and Jon had put an arm around Damian, whose face was now burning in embarrassment. 

“Shut up, oh my god.” The plea was muffled, and his older brother paid absolutely no attention to it, continuing on.

“Went on until he was maybe eight, and then he got back into it because of a show that would play on cartoon network? And I don’t think it’s ever returned to that level but there is no one in this family who does not call him a nickname without adding the bat.”

“That’s adorable .” Jon said, Damian groaning and attempting to disappear. Skylar agreed with the sentiment, Colin, Akira, and Maya attempting to quell their laughter. Kathy was sneakily snapping a picture of Jon and Damian in their position, since the words that accompanied  had been less than platonic.

It tapered off into a quieter buzz, most of them being occupied by a phone balancing on the drivers headrest and playing a random movie.

By the time they arrived at the Brandens’, all of them were either sleeping or half-asleep. Before Jason could stop the car and make the announcement, Maya hissed ”Wait!” silently and urgently.

In the backseat, Jon and Damian were curled into each other, Damian on Jon’s shoulder and Jon’s head on top of his, hands loosely intertwined.

”shit, SHIT, someone take pictures!!” Six phones were promptly whipped out, all taking care to turn off the flash and taking pictures from different angles. 

“Send all of those to me,” Jason instructed, turning off the car. At the motion, they stirred, everyone in the car whipping around to give some sense of normalcy as if they had not all been cooing over them.

“Oh.” Jon sprang away from him. “Sorry, sorry, did I crush you?”

“I’m not as weak as you innately believe me to be.” Damian grumbled, ears flushed pink as he looked out the window, their hands still resting together. “I’m perfectly fine.”

“oKay, on that note, we’ve arrived. Please disembark from the vehicle in an orderly fashion, and do not slam any of the doors or you will have a very unpleasant return.” Roy got out first, opening the driver’s seat door for a very pleased looking Jason.

They clambered over each other to get out, sighing dramatically as they all stepped out. “Freedom!” Colin shouted, jumping up and down a few times.

“My legs went numb.” Akira muttered, holding onto the side of the car. Skylar patted their arm sympathetically, backpack jangling.

“This is pretty big.” Maya looked at the surrounding farmland appreciatively. “How much of this is your folks?” 

“Bit farther down, I'll take you by the boundary line sometime, there’s a nice little place me ‘n Jon would go play as kids.” Kathy pointed to a place in the unseeable distance, coming a bit closer to her.

“That sounds nice.” Maya said, trailing off into a silence until Jon came running out of the car and slinging an arm around Kathy’s neck.

“Ooh, i have missed this place. Our treehouse still up?” 

“All of our hideouts are alive and kickin’.” Kathy said, “You should take your boy down to one of them sometime.”

Jon looked around, before dipping his head down and mumbling, “Not my boy.”

“Not yet .” Kathy poked him in the stomach, and as he doubled over, ruffled his hair, dashing off with a laugh.

“HEY!” He took off after her, the two of them laughing. Damian came up besides Maya, watching them chase each other.

“You know, I don't think I've really seen him act like this.” Maya remarked. Damian only smiled, mind flooding with flicks of moments and the sound of childlike laughter.

“It’s not something he had much reason to be like, I suppose.”

“It’s cute.” She nudged him. “Puppy-like.You like puppies, don’t you?”

“It is… endearing. ” The last part was much quieter. “It feels wrong. But right, at the same time. The feeling is…new, yet curious. And not entirely unpleasant.”

“You two will figure it out.” Maya smiled, pushing his shoulder a bit. “I’m gonna go and get ready, we’re going out to the fair today.”

“Okay.” He brushed his hair back, watching his small group of friends, eyes trailing after Jon’s form, his laughter keeping the soft smile on his lips. 

“You know, I think we have a history of this kind of thing.” A voice came from behind him, wiping the smile off of his face in place of a scowl. 

Jason came up behind him, Roy playfully putting the hat he was wearing onto Damian's head. 

Stupid older brothers.

“So I heard.” Damian drawled, turning to look pointedly at the both of them. “Tutoring, boy on the wrong path and a nerd. Except I was just better, not a nerd.”

“Fuck you, i was a cool nerd.” Jason crossed his arms. “Had an A in P.E. and everything.”

“You were also a scrawny little shit who carried books everywhere, had glasses for a short amount of time and could quote Jane Austen at the drop of a hat.” Roy set his chin on Jason’s shoulder. “Sorry, babe.”

“Well, you married this nerd.” Jason sniffed, before turning to Damian. “ You were like four, you can't tell me shit.”

Damian scowled. “You’ve simply come along to antagonize me, haven’t you?”

“That, to intimidate your friends and future boyfriend, and because ask yourself, would any of them have been any better?”

“Richard would have.” 

“Dickhead and Wallance would have played showtunes the whole time, been sickeningly in love, and would have shown all of your baby pictures and embarrassing stories within the first five minutes of the drive, especially if he saw you and Jon.”

“Whatever.” He huffed. “Will you both be escorting us to the fairgrounds?”

“Yeah, and we’re leaving in thirty minutes, so change if you want to, baby bat.” Jason took the hat off and ruffled his hair, causing Damian to squawk and swat at him, before glaring at them both and leaving.

They all met back up in front of the car, dressed in a new pair of clothes and eager. It was about 12:30 by the time that they managed to make it to the grounds, seeing as they’d left early in the morning.

“Okay, ground rules before I unlock this car.” Jason and Roy turned around, and everyone but Damian snapped to attention. 

“You have our numbers, I have yours, and if all else fails, you have a Damian. I don’t expect you to actually stay with us, but please try to stick together, if not a buddy system or something. Try not to get banned, maimed, or sick within the first four hours.”

He turned off the car and grinned. “Oh yeah, and have fun.”

That startled a cheer from them, and the doors unlocked, everyone filing out of the car. They elected to stick together as one big group until they found something that would separate them, Jason and Roy following behind before stopping at a concession stand and losing sight of them.

“Okay, so Colin, Kathy and I are gonna go check out the roller coasters,” Maya said. “Akira and Skylar are at the booths and Damian and Jon…”

“Are playing the games.” Jon finished.

“And I’m going to kick your ass, Kent.” Damian smirked.

“I’d like to see you try.” Jon shot back. Colin and Akira mimed gagging, the other three rolling their eyes.

“Take your weird flirting away from here, go, shoo.” Kathy pushed them away, both boys flushing as her words caught up to them.

As they left, their hands swung between them, just barely touching. They all shared a looked, the thought of absolutely hopeless running through their minds.

“I can't take this anymore.” Maya sighed. “I give, what time are those fireworks?”

This was driving them both insane . Jon glanced down, Damian’s hand brushing up against his for the millionth time. He wanted to reach out and grab it, but how would the other react?

He’d done it before, but now it felt different . He wasn’t leading him anywhere, and he wasn't gonna do the platonic hand holding thing he and Kathy had researched in middle school.

His eye caught on a shooting game, and grinned. There we go, he could challenge Damian, they’d chill, and bam, awkwardness diffused. 

“Hey, D, betcha I can get a higher score.” He pointed to the game, watching as Damian’s gaze went directly to the plush puppy hanging on the side of the booth.

Perfect.

“You’re on, Kent.” 

They raced to the game, slapping down their payment. The worker at the booth seemed rather amused by their playfulness, starting up the game.

“What the hell?” Jon squeaked as Damian began shooting with an insane accuracy, looking over to the side to grin, still getting the target.

“This is unfair !” He pouted. Plan foiled . 

“Tough luck, J.” Damian pointed to the plush he wanted, shoving it at Jon. “Carry. Let’s go find another thing for me to kick your ass at.”

He huffed, accepting it anyways. The booth worker laughed, shaking their head. “Wow, if I didn't know any better, I'd say you’re whipped.”

Jon sighed wistfully. “If only he knew that, too.”

He chased after Damian, the both of them challenging each other to various games. Jon managed to win a small kitten, presenting it to Damian, who looked away laughing.

“I’ve already won several, Jon. I don’t think you should add more.”

“You should win something for me, then.” He said, half playing. “Then you'll have less.”

“Okay.” Damian looked surprisingly serious, taking his hand and pulling him down the aisle. “Your wish is my command, my Prince.”

Jon flushed at the sincerity, giddy at the hand-holding. “Would this make you my Knight?”

“I suppose I would.” 

“Then, onwards, brave Knight, and pick your prince the most delightful of plushes.”

After a few minutes, Jon had a white puppy plush that he affectionately named Krypto. They fell back into the silence, dropping off the rest of the plushies at the car, before looking at the sky.

“It’s sunset. The fireworks will be starting soon. We should probably find the others.” Jon said, the puppy plush still under one arm. The kitten he’d won for Damian was peeking out of the bag the other boy had over one shoulder.

“Probably.” Damian threaded his fingers with Jon’s, swinging them idly between them. It had seemed completely natural, and suddenly, something clicked.

He needed to do something about this, and he needed to do something about it now. It was terrifying, the very thought, but if he really thought about it, nothing they’d done for weeks, months by now, really qualified as strictly platonic. 

Damian was blunt, unclear with his emotions, and a jumbled mess on the inside of his cool, put together and prickly persona. 

He could do this. Anxiety would not best him.

They met up in front of a picnic bench by the ferris wheel, the sun dipping deeper and the dark night coming to overtake it.

“All of you gremlins accounted for?” Roy asked, Jason besides him as they shared cotton candy.

“Yes sir!” Akira and Skylar had a large bag of kettle corn between them, Colin sneaking handfuls every few minutes.

“You guys empty every booth or what?” Maya grinned, Kathy poking her in the side to subtly motion to their intertwined hands.

“Dami here kicked my ass in almost everything.” Jon grumbled.

“Could have warned you against that.” Jason grinned, also taking note. “Anything interesting happen? Life changing developments we should know?”

“No.” Damian scowled, following his gaze and attempting to hide their joined hands. “What are we doing now?”

“Well, I think the ferris wheel is still open. We could catch that before the fireworks begin,” Colin began, everyone catching on.

“Yeah, sounds like fun!”

“You two should go ahead of us,” 

Damian and Jon were ushered onto a cart, and strapped in before they could say anything, being shot thumbs up and teasing grins. 

“What the hell?” Jon squawked as they were lifted into the air. “Jesus Christ, you swear the world was going to end if we didn’t get on this thing.”

“We’re friends with imbeciles.”

“Oh, have I been elevated to not-an-imbecile?” 

“Ugh.”

Damian shoved him playfully, and the silence settled in. Suddenly, they were much more aware of the atmosphere, high up on a creaky metal wheel, spinning them into the darkening night sky.

“The stars are nice. You can’t see them this clearly from the city.” He said quietly. Their hands found each other again, and tentatively, Jon leaned his head on Damian’s shoulder. 

“I’ll bring you down here again, we can go stargazing and you can tell me your smart people stuff.”

“It’s basic astronomy, Jon.”

“There are a bunch of things that I don't have the patience to memorize.”

Damian laughed, resting his head on Jon’s. “Hey, Dami?”

Jon’s voice came in a shaky whisper, his hand growing clammy. This had been building all day, and Jon was sure he’d explode if he didn’t say something soon.

“Yeah?”

“Gotta tell you something.”

Damian lifted his head up, and bit his lip. “I have something to say to you as well.”

“You can go first.” Jon squeaked, looking down and suddenly finding the railing of the cart extremely fascinating.

“Wouldn’t you prefer to go?” the pitch of Damian’s voice began rising and he coughed, willing it back down. “You began, of course.” 

Shit.

“Ah, um, okay.” Jon breathed in. “So, we’re like, friends, right? And uh, gonna be real, at first, I don’t think we like each other much? Well, i mean, i definitely liked you, or like, the look of you which explains a lot when we think about cause holy shit i was a douche-”

Damian’s quiet laughter startled him from his ramblings, and with pink cheeks he looked up, seeing the light of the ride shine on his face, ears tinged pink. 

“You are…very cute.” 

Jon made a noise that in any other situation, would have severely wounded his pride, but right now the words were playing on repeat in his mind. 

“That-that’s not fair!” He whined, taking his hand from Damian’s to use both to cover his burning face. “You can’t do this to me!”

“I think I can.” Damian whispered into his ear. “Might I pick up where you left off?”

Jon only nodded, still hiding his face in his hands. Damian shook his head, just slightly, and shut his eyes. 

Okay. Don’t chicken out, Wayne. You’ve been waiting. You can do this.

“Hm. You were correct, with your earlier statements. We did not like each other very much. But we’re friends now, and every new thing that I find out about you draws me closer. A bit back, I believe that my affections may have begun to stretch a bit further than, say, strictly platonic.”

He paused, exhaling and attempting to quell his thoughts in a way that made sense. Jon lifted his face from his hands, eyes wide and hopeful.

Jon was dreaming, right? Was this some kind of dream?

"Judging by your poorly thought out speech, I was wondering if you might return the sentiments. Of course, it's perfectly acceptable if you don’t, i do not wish to force you into something or make you feel obligated-"

He was the one rambling now, but for the love of all that was holy, Damian could not shut himself up . He had one hand rubbing the back of his neck, the other still resting in his lap. The ride came to a stop at that moment, a whistling noise signaling the start of the fireworks began sounding. They were at the top, swinging a bit.

Jon grabbed his free hand, giving an affectionate, “Damian, shut up .”

Damian clicked his jaw shut and Jon cupped his face with his other hand. “I’m going to kiss you now.”

“Okay.” he whispered, shutting his eyes. Their lips met as the night sky burst into an array of color, hand in hand. Damian’s arm went around Jon’s neck, and his hand dropped to the smaller boy’s waist, bringing them closer together.

It was clearly inexperienced, but as they broke apart, stupid grins on their faces, that couldn’t have mattered more.

Jon leaned down, forehead resting on Damian’s, the sky still exploding behind them as the wheel cracked, signaling their movement.

“If that wasn’t clear, I really like you.”

“I ‘really like’ you too.” Damian hesitantly leaned up, pressing his lips to Jon’s again in a chaste kiss, pulling away and covering his mouth, quiet laughter escaping him.

Jon caught it, pulling it away from his face and into his own. “I keep telling you to stop doing that; it’s adorable and you shouldn’t hide it.”

Damian huffed, looking away but squeezing his hand gently. They got off the ride, walking towards the hill where the rest of their friends and Damian’s family were seated, gasping over the fireworks. They came up behind them, quiet enough not to disturb them. Jason noticed them, however, sending a subtle wink and smirk their way.

They were all seated under a tree, and Jon leaned against it, sitting down and opening his arms. Domain leaned back against his chest, Jon’s folded hands resting on Damian's stomach as the show went on. 

Once it began winding down, the others took notice of their presence, and their positioning. Upon asking the question, Damian pulled Jon down by the collar of his tshirt and kissed him, letting go just as quick. 

A cheer came up between all of them, whoops and jeers being thrown playfully at them. “Operation Damijon is a success!” 

The two chose to ignore that last statement, settling into each other. They had their friends, each other, and a blossoming relationship.

Really, what more could they ask for?

[reinvent-and-believe]

7 for Roy x Jamie. Also, I adore your writing! ❤

7. love at first sight

--

“Well, I can’t say I’m surprised,” Georgie says, looking at the pair of them from across the dinner table with a crooked little grin that means trouble, a grin Roy’s intimately acquainted with on a slightly different face. “Love at first sight, weren’t it?”

“Mummy.” Jamie is the palest Roy’s ever seen. “Do not.”

“Don’t be rude to your mum,” Roy scolds, his full attention fixed on that familiar grin. He rests his arms on the table and leans in. “What were you saying, Georgie?”

“Well look at you, coming to my defense,” she teases. “Can you believe it, my Jamie ending up with such a gentleman?”

“It’s lovely to see,” says Simon, setting a tray of fresh cookies down on the table and giving Roy a genuine little smile.

Roy doesn’t know much about Simon; Jamie’s not talked about their history, other than to hint that a teenage Jamie Tartt was as much of a fucking terror as one might imagine and Simon was a prime target. But Roy likes him. Likes how he looks at Georgie like she hung the fucking moon. Likes how easily his love extends to Jamie.

“Mummy.” Jamie’s blushing now, a deep, fast-spreading red. It strikes Roy, not for the first time, that Jamie’s fucking gorgeous when he blushes. 

“Love at first sight? Is that what you said?” Roy asks.

Jamie elbows him. “You ain’t helping.”

Fuck football, this is Roy’s favorite game now. “Who says I’m trying to?”

“Right then.” Georgie winks at Roy as Jamie rubs his forehead. “It must have been, what? 2006? When did you move to Chelsea, Roy?”

“2005."

“2005.” She nods. “Chelsea were here playing City, so of course we had it on telly. And all the announcers could talk about the whole game was the new hot player at Chelsea, making quite a name for himself after only a few games. So of course the camera cut to him over and over, I swear half the game was a closeup on Roy Kent.”

“Mummy, you have got to stop,” Jamie groans.

“This one,” she reaches across the table and pats Jamie’s hand, even as he scowls, “was all of eight years old. You might be a gentleman, Roy Kent, but you’re also a bit of a cradle robber, aren’t you?”

It’s Roy’s turn to freeze. “Right.”

“I’m 25 years old, Mum, I’m fucking grown,” Jamie huffs in an exasperated voice that sounds suddenly 15.

“Of course you are, love.” Her smile loses its bite, fond and soft. “I think you’re lovely together and I’m thrilled for you two, swear down. But I am gonna give this one shit about the fact that he and I would have been in school at the same time and you were eight when he got his big break.”

“Fucking hell,” Jamie says as Roy says, “Fair enough.”

“So Jamie was just a tiny thing, sat in front of the telly as close as he could get, eyes wide. After the first half, he stood up and looked at me with that little look he gets. You know the one. When he’s made his mind up about something and you’ll be wasting your breath if you try and stop him.”

“I know the one.” Roy puts a hand on Jamie’s knee and squeezes gently.

“He turned to me and said”—she pauses for dramatic effect before starting the recitation—“‘when I grow up, I’m gonna be a pretty footballer like Roy Kent.’”

Jamie buries his head in the curve of Roy’s neck. “This is not a cute story,” he insists.

“Keep telling yourself that, love,” Georgie coos sympathetically. “And so began the Roy Kent years. What does he ask for for his birthday? A Roy Kent poster. What do we have to get when we check out at the shop? That magazine with Roy Kent on the cover. What’s he want for Christmas? A Chelsea kit, for Christ’ sake.”

“Now, Georgie, you’ll embarrass him,” Simon chides mildly.

“Yeah, that ship has fucking sailed, man,” Jamie pouts. “When Roy leaves me because he thinks I’m a fucking stalker, it’s gonna be all your fault, Mummy, is that something you want to live with?”

Georgie shakes her head, laughing. “Roy, you’re not allowed to leave Jamie over my cute story. Got it?”

“Got it.”

“I’m just saying,” she says, sitting back and looking at her son with a love so palpable it makes Roy ache, “it’s not like this is exactly a surprise. If anyone knows how to go after what they want, it’s my Jamie.”

It’s fucking weird, hearing about little Jamie’s crush, but it's not like he didn't know most of it, and it's not like they’ve ever really had the most normal of relationships; Roy accepted that pretty early on. He puts an arm around Jamie, smiling when he immediately curls into Roy. “Well, I think you set your sights too low,” he says with a gentle brush of the lips against Jamie’s temple. “You turned out to be a way prettier footballer than Roy Kent.”

“Uh, yeah, obviously,” Jamie scoffs, rolling his eyes, but the corner of his mouth twitches towards a grin as he pulls Roy into a kiss.

[westgateoh]

Just a little something I wrote for the Roy Mustang & Maes Hughes tag on AO3….

It’s the wall of heat that yanks him from his daze, the fire so hot that the air visibly ripples, like tiny waves on a small, country pond, and they wash over him and startle him into seeing the world again. It feels like it’s the first time sound has crashed into his ears.

“Roy!”

It’s Maes, shouting frantically and stumbling over crumbled cement and glass to get to him, and his eyes are wild behind his cracked glasses until he settles on Roy. He blinks and frowns at what he sees, and Roy doesn’t really know what that is, what he looks like. He knows he’s stood amidst the rubble and his bright blue coat is singed black at the sleeves. He knows sweat drips down his face into a cut on his cheek from a window blowing out from his own flames. It stings and he wipes at it, smearing blood across his face.

“Are you hurt?” Maes says, but the noise of the battle swells, shouts and gunfire and more glass breaking and a cry from someone now buried beneath the walls of a crumbling building. Roy can’t hear anything except his heart pounding in his ears and isn’t that funny? He’s stopped the heartbeats of dozens of innocent people in the last ten minutes, but his is loud and booming, almost drowning the other sounds around him.

“Roy,” Maes repeats. “Are you hurt? We have to get out of here.”

“I’m not finished, yet,” Roy growls. He steps forward a couple of steps, Maes’s fingers slipping off his shoulder, and scans the scene for Ishvallen soldiers hiding in the mess or trying to get away. There. He aims his arm, runs a quick calculation, and snaps, feeling the flame fly from his hand, and the ripples of heat blow his hair back like a hot wind. A gunshot rings out and Maes shoves Roy off his feet, both of them crashing to the sharp stones of the ground. Maes aims and shoots, and a grunt and crash tell them that he hit. Dust fills Roy’s mouth and he coughs, trying to get it out, get it out, breathe again, but he coughs and coughs and maybe he never will. Finally, he staggers to his feet and pulls Maes up, too, and they stumble backward and weave their way through the detritus and back to their retreat position on the far side of the empty, ruined square.

Maes leans against a wall and bends over with his hands on his knees, coughing. “Fuck,” he breathes, finally. “What a mess.”

Roy leans back against the smooth stone wall and closes his eyes. Everything is suddenly quiet, except for rocks crumbling as the dust across the square settles. He can taste the fire from a minute ago, can taste the dust still on his tongue, can tastes the blood from his face and from the people who lie motionless, littered amongst the debris from the buildings Roy just burned to the ground. Maes sucks in a loud breath and stands pressed against Roy’s shoulder for a moment.

“Roy?” Maes asks, and Roy opens his eyes – he’s standing hundreds of feet away from the destruction, but he can feel every inch of it reaching to the dead bodies he can’t really see from here, but whose sightless eyes seem to bore into him even at the distance.

He nods absently, still not looking at Maas, just at the blasted area.

“Fuck, that was a big one,” Maes says of the target Roy obliterated, of the people he burned, crushed, killed. He says it with a kind of dark awe in his voice, like he can’t believe Roy managed it, this level of destruction. Roy can believe it. He knows deep down that as long as he gives more and more of himself to the battle, he can do more and more destructive things – a sick equivalence that non-alchemists would never really understand.

Except maybe Maes does understand. Maybe he looks at Roy standing against this wall and sees how bits of him have disintegrated, melted away with each snap of his fingers, how he’s losing more and more of himself with every battle. Maes knew him before all of this started, after all. He knew Roy when he was whole, when he stood with confidence that what he was doing was for a greater good. Maes had shared that justification with him, following orders along with Roy and following Roy into this hell that is Ishvall.

Maes is losing parts of himself, too, with each fight here. Roy watches how each battle steals a bit of him each time, a little of the energy, a little of the bounce. Roy reaches a gloved hand out to wipe blood from Maes’s forehead where something cut him earlier.

“I’m okay,” Maes says quietly.

Roy meets his gaze and nods. “Yeah. Me, too.”

He’s not okay, of course. Later, as he lays on his cot in the grey tent he and Maes share, he starts to tremble as he replays the battle in his head like he always does. His breath stutters, he rolls onto his side facing the flimsy wall and clenches his eyes shut. Even though they’re inside and it’s nighttime, the dust of the hot midday never really settled and he coughs into his pillow as flames dance behind his eyelids. He sucks a ragged breath in over his teeth and wishes that his body would stop reliving the afternoon. Isn’t it enough that it plays like a movie in his head? It was in the dark of the tent after a battle when he first realized that the first snap of his fingers always brings screams, the second brings rage, and the third brings silence – silence that echoes louder in his head at night.

When Maes puts his hand on Roy’s shoulder and says a quiet “Hey,” Roy flinches, hard. His cot squeaks and Maes runs his fingers through Roy’s hair saying, “Shhh. It’s okay, Roy. It’s just me. You’re gonna be okay.”

Maes’s voice is always soft, lilting, and without its usual bluster when they’re alone in their tent. It was the same in the dorms of the academy, like his voice just didn’t work the same way when they were alone. They’ve been in Ishvall two months now, and Roy is burning to ashes here. The only salve is Maes, his voice and hands soothing Roy every night, rubbing his back and whispering assurances until Roy manages to fall into a fitful sleep. When they wake in the morning, it’s Maes who always sits up first and says, “Maybe this is the last one.” He says it every day, even when they both know it’s not true, a false hope in the fiery storm of the war, but they both realize early that a false hope is better than no hope at all.

[fanficfanattic]

Goal, Chance and/or Away (purely taking words from this football commentary rn lol)

I am once again impressed with the gems my recent word challenges have excavated. Six fic snippets under the cut.

Goal

1. From a fic where a newly returned Jamie sees a man drug a lady’s drink at a bar and intervenes. But without context it just looks like Jamie got in a bar fight.

He knows it plays into the idea that he is a prima donna, a moody little bitch, feels like its proof that he’s more trouble than he’s worth. But he can’t help laying in bed; with the team that can barely stand him downstairs watching a movie, while he’s been fucking grounded to his room like the child Roy always said he was, and feeling desperately alone.

He hadn’t cared about being alone, before Ted. During most of his time with Ted, even. His dad had always made him either actively drive people away or that was just the practical application of conforming to his demands. He’d been used to it. It was all he’d ever known.

And then Keeley said he should stop battling the people trying to help him. And he sacrificed the reminder he’d taken from home, of home, when he left it. And danced around a bonfire after Roy Kent said he was right about something. Dani had thrown his arm around him. He’d sung with the lads…

It was fun, and it made it hurt even more when the next day he’d gone back to how it had always been. He didn’t tell Ted how much time he’d spent fantasizing about what it would have been like to have gotten to stay. To develop those tiny first buds of friendships.

To have never relegated Richmond. To be playing in the now with his teammates but versions of them he’d grown alongside for months. Who never got extra pissed at him for shit talking them on tv, and destroying their Captain’s career, for sending them down.

To be trusted. Before, the only thing a team had cared about was wether they could trust him to score. Which was still technically true. But they hadn’t ever wanted more from him, and he certainly hadn’t been putting extra out there for free. Besides he hadn’t trusted anyone else much either. Maybe Man City to be good players and to work together towards a common goal. And Richmond to pass him the ball to score the first time around.

Now he trusted Dani to smile at him even when no one else would. He trusted Jeff to subtly nod, but not more than that, because he had greeted Jamie when he returned before realizing how mad everyone else was at him. Not that Jamie blamed him. He’d gone out of his way to message the man saying the small nod was probably better for both of them.

He hadn’t realized it until the moment Ted didn’t even let him talk that he’d trusted the man to be fair. He talked a good talk, but he had trouble walking the good walk, and was pretty lousy at both when it came to Jamie.

2. Now that the team has been gelling, and Roy understands how Jamie’s mind works more, he’s got a plan to run circles around West Ham.

“Kent, the fuck mate! You said you could keep in position!”

“Fuck you Tartt! Maybe if you weren’t-“

They had been yelling about the play in the heat of being pissed off at each other. Jamie had telegraphed the pass to Roy very clearly. And the defender who was supposed to be on the left, loosely marking Sam, tore off to be another line of defense between Roy Kent and their goal.

Unfortunately for them, even when Roy and him had been out for blood against each other, they’d have never been that stupid. Jamie doesn’t even twist his body fully the way it should be for the kick. It still rolls smoothly to Sam who buries it in the back of the net from his completely cleared lane.

Chance

1. From the Investigative Journalist epic.

“…for as long as I remember, when I heard people say things, I always thought they meant it however the worst possible way is. But a lot of people say it while meaning it in the best possible way turns out.”

“And how does this relate back to you thinking people are rude when they talk around a subject?”

“Oh, yeah, I’m trying to do that more.”

“What more?”

“Identify when I’m doing that kind of thinking that what someone is doing is the worst version it could be. So, society probably isn’t trying to be rude by talking around things. I think it’s accidentally rude.”

“Do you mean incidentally?”

“What’s the difference?”

“They both mean something happened by chance. Accidental implies that the thing happened by carelessness while incidental indicates it would still happen this way even if people were taking care.”

“I think people want to believe it’s that last one but I believe it’s more often the first one. Cause I can be the same way. I normally don’t think much before talking, and if I did that more, I’d say things differently or maybe not say anything at all.”

2. This is also from the platonic a/b/o fic I didn’t realize had so many scenes already sketched out. The scenario is that James had a shady doctor prescribing Jamie pills that included an (i fucking guess) untraceable dynamic suppression med. When his dad is too busy to deal with a refill, Jamie asks Richmond’s med team to prescribe him a new vitamin pack.

“Oh that bastard. I’m gonna kill him this time, Simon, I am!”

“Georgie, c’mon, let’s focus on Jamie now and murdering later, yeah?”

“Fine, fine! So doctor, what about that? Like I believe his father would hurt him, cause that’s his way, but the how doesn’t make any sense. With vitamins?”

“Well, we don’t know if there is anything different between the vitamins his dad got for him and what we provided here. The best way to find out is with a blood test.

And you’re Jamie’s medical health proxy. So-“

“Yes, you’ve got my. You need to do a blood draw? Run tests?”

“Yes ma’am. You’re granting permission for the draw?”

“Yes, of course. What the fuck. How-how soon will you know? Does he have to go to hospital? It’ll take us almost four hours to get there. Do we-“

“Georgie, she can’t answer any questions if you don’t give her a chance, love. Take another deep breath for me, okay? In and in and in. Hold and hold and hold. Out and out and out. Okay, again.” And after she kept at it, he addressed the doctor again.

3. From that evil fic I teased about. I’ve played coy about what happened before now but you caught me! Rebecca walks onto the practice pitch ‘without Jamie’, Ted notes to himself.

“Jamie’s parents were in a car accident this morning. That’s why I called for him. His mother is being held overnight for observation and is quite understandably shaken. She called Man City to get a hold of Jamie, and when she explained what was going on she was able to talk with Pep. He promised he’d talk to Jamie so she could rest.

And then he called me directly.”

It was silent for a moment, and she was tempted to look around to better gauge player reactions. She kept her eyes on Ted, instead, because his was both more important and certainly more interesting. As she’d begun her story, he’d paled alarmingly.

And he failed to spill forth some folksy American tale to talk circles around everyone. Instead he hoarsely asked only one question.

“And his father?”

It gave away a weakness he had, which Rebecca was sure he neither realized he’d done nor that it was one. And why would he be worried about that, she reminded herself, when he also doesn’t realize he’s in game of your making.

“Ah, I should have been more precise in my language. His biological father divorced his mother when he was still an infant, I’ve been informed. It was his stepfather that was driving and took the brunt of the impact. He died on scene.”

She didn’t say it icily or meanly. She just said it without warmth. And that impacted the players more than she’d thought possible. Unfortunately it took time for her to understand that, because at the moment everyone just appeared to be in shock.

Ted didn’t ask anymore questions, and the silence was getting uncomfortable even for her.

“Well, since she took her late husband’s last name, there is a chance this won’t make the papers without the name Tartt attached. Still, if it does, Keeley made some excellent points about how we want to look. So no one go on your socials until she’s spoken with you.

Back to training now.” And she turned to walk away, not once looking back.

Away

1. ^ Chance #3

2. ^ Goal #1

3. I shamelessly stole this idea from a fic where Ted has Jamie stay with Roy in a similar manner as hockey players sometimes do? Apparently. So season 2 Jamie returns to Richmond. And Ted cooks up a thing where Jamie is going to room with Sam. Help them get their differences settled. And then…and then James Tartt shows up.

Jamie sort of unthinkingly says “Oh, Ted knows about me da’”. And Sam is sure that Jamie must have misunderstood what happened until he hears about Ted walking away but sending the soldier. And the conversation Jamie and Ted had in the Crown & Anchor.

[its-time-to-write]

chapter 6

table of contents i love you still

You’re no stranger to Jamie’s internet presence, extensive as it is. But even though you know what comes up when you type jamie tartt babies you still think it should have come with a warning. 

There’s picture after picture of him meeting toddlers, holding babies, signing tiny footballs and just generally being great with kids. 

It’s complete shit. 

He looks so natural with all of them, making them laugh as he smiles for the camera.

You’re tired. You should be asleep so you can be rested for the next day but you just can’t. You move from the chair in Clare’s room to your room, where you push open the doors to the balcony. You prop her monitor up on a chair just in case and take a deep breath. You’re playing a dangerous game, you know that, and the stakes are higher now. But the more you think about it, the more you convince yourself it could work if only you could absolutely trust that Jamie wouldn’t leave again.

“Damn it,” you whisper. You’ve already let him back in.

You sit and watch the mist roll in for another hour before doing your best to fall asleep.

Clare wakes up just before seven so you’re out the door for coffee by 8:30. You’re rushing for no particular reason, but everything feels urgent now. You walk to get coffee for you and Madeline, still feeling the need to look over your shoulder. You can’t shake the idea that someone’s looking at you until you spot a man across the way, staring. 

It takes you all of two seconds to recognize Roy Kent. 

You smile, nod, and turn away but the hairs on the back of your neck prickle. He knows, a voice whispers, but there’s no way he does because no one knows. No one knows except Madeline and Jamie and your parents who live all the way in Spain because they can, so there’s no way Roy Kent also knows that the baby you’ve wrapped to your chest is actually a mini Tartt, despite the fact that she does not have his last name. Just his whole face structure, apparently.

The walk to Madeline’s feels slower than normal but you finally let yourself into her flat and onto her couch.

She’s scrolling on her phone while a woman does her hair and another does her makeup.

“Madeline,” you say, no preamble, “I need you to tell me I’m an absolute idiot.”

“No,” she says without looking up from her phone. “I’m not psychic. Do something stupid and then I’ll reconsider but everyone knows you’re the one with the braincells in this relationship.”

“Madeline,” you plead, and she finally looks up.

“Babe. We both know you’ve already taken him back in your head. And we’ve never spoken about it because I was giving you your space to come to terms with the fact that you’re fucking hung up on him and most likely will be until the end of time. I can’t entirely blame you because he can be amazing. But when he’s shit, he’s shit. It’s just a matter of time before you’re back together and if he knows what’s good for him, he won’t fuck up this time, but...” she trails off.

“But he doesn’t always know what’s good for him,” you finish. “Fuck. I’m so fucked.”

Madeline shrugs. “Maybe.”

“The fuck do you mean, ‘maybe’?”

“Hold still,” whispers the makeup artist so there’s a moment of silence before Madeline says, “It’s entirely within the realm of possibilities that he is turning himself around from grimy little footballer to respectable athlete. Don’t you think it’s at least worth noticing that his ex-girlfriend vouches for him?”

“Mads, what the fuck,” you groan. “You’re supposed to tell me to date a rapper. Or move to Milan. Or marry a millionaire. Not say that there’s a chance this will work.”

Clare fusses in your arms so you stand up and start swaying her back and forth. “Bean, give me your thoughts on this look,” Madeline says, so you walk over and hold Clare up. She sneezes, and you laugh.

“That means she likes it,” Madeline says. “Look, Bean is so little she won’t even remember if her dad leaves again. Then at least you’ll know, you know what I mean? You’re going to give him a chance anyway, so might as well do it while she’s small and has no sense of object permanence.”

You laugh with a bit of resignation. Madeline’s right, as per usual. “I promise I won’t be overbearing when he leaves.”

Madeline grins. “You can be as overbearing as you like as long as you keep bringing me coffee. Don’t know what I’d do without you.”

“Funny,” you reply, “I was going to say the exact same about you.”

Madeline smiles her most angelic smile. “I’m a fucking saint,” she says. “Hey, are you staying for the interview? Bean can nap upstairs if you like.”

You shake your head. “No, she’s been waking up crying and you don’t need that in the background. I think we’ll walk around for a bit, the fresh air’s good for her and I really want some tea.”

Madeline says, “I have tea,” and you amend, “I’m going to want tea that I don’t have to make.”

Madeline snorts, and the two of you lapse into silence. You’re quiet for the rest of the time it takes for her to finish getting ready (twenty minutes), help her choose which outfit (the dark grey one), and then pass her Clare for some photos before heading out the door. The day feels less ominous after seeing her, so you head home to get Clare’s pram in hopes she’ll fall asleep.

You almost don’t want to go out again by the time you’ve changed and fed her, eaten lunch, and re-bundled the both of you up but Clare seems like she’s not going to sleep without a fight, so you sigh and head out the door again.

You head to the Richmond green, thankful that the sun is shining despite the brisk air. Clare’s passed out after one lap so you look for a bench in the sun. You sit and watch as people jog by and kids kick a ball around.  It’s a nice day. Maybe you’ll call Madeline and see if she wants to come over for dinner once she’s done working.

No, she has a dinner with some of her collaborators. You’re on your own tonight, unless you call Jamie. Your nose wrinkles involuntarily at the thought. He might not even want that, so you’ll let it alone.

A man walks along the path with a little blonde-haired girl. No- it’s Roy Kent. You didn’t know he had a daughter but then again, he certainly wouldn’t be the first in that situation. 

She clearly likes him by the way she’s bouncing up and down as she pulls on his arm. It seems despite his reputation as Chelsea’s hard man he has a soft spot for whoever this child is. You duck your head as if he’ll recognize you, even though you know he won’t.

“Uncle Roy, when are we going to Keeley’s?” you here the girl say as they get closer and you file that away. So it’s Uncle Roy, then. You miss his answer as Clare fusses so you gently push her pram back and forth and murmur, “Go back to sleep, Bean.”

Roy and the girl’s footsteps stop. Right in front of you.

Roy looks into the pram and then at you. You have no choice but to meet his gaze and fuck, he definitely knows. But how the actual fuck did he find out?

“Nice baby,” he finally says and you don’t reply.

“I’m Phoebe,” says Phoebe, in an apparent attempt to dispel the tension. She’s a smart kid, you can tell, and the last thing you need is some random child blabbing your business all around London.

You say, “I think your Uncle Roy already knows who I am,” you say, and Roy doesn’t even look a little fucking guilty.

Of course he knows, Keeley had all but put together a Powerpoint presentation by the morning.

“Your friend knows my girlfriend,” he says, and it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that Keeley fucking Jones has struck again. She always was a bit too nosy for your taste.

You frown, sigh, and say, “Why don’t you have a seat?”

Roy sits on the far end of the bench with Phoebe in the middle. You’re both watching each other carefully, as though one of you could snap at any moment.

“What do you want?” you ask, voice sharp. “It can’t be money, I can’t imagine you’re hard up. Are you misguided enough to ask me to disappear before I ruin your golden boy’s career? Because believe me, I’m not trying to start anything. He’s the one who came looking for me, for your information.”

You don’t stop rocking Clare’s pram. It’s a calming motion for both you and for her because unfortunately, there’s no easy escape route here. 

Roy asks, “You worried he’s going to end up like his fucking dick of a father?” and Phoebe (who has been pretending like she isn’t listening) scribbles furiously in her notebook.

That is not even close to what you expected him to say. You just look at him, eyes wide. “I-” you start, then stop. What the hell are you supposed to say to that?

You’re no stranger to James Tartt. Jamie had come home more times than you’d care to count with a bruised eye or a split lip, and it wasn’t until the third time you were putting ice on his face that he finally told you why. 

“Jamie isn’t like that,” you tell Roy. He has to know Jamie isn’t like that. He works with him. He has to.

“How the fuck do you know?” Roy asks, but it’s more bemused than anything. 

“He’s never done anything even close to what James has done,” you say, and it’s true. It’s not even a stretch of the imagination, Jamie never raised his voice or his hand at you.

It didn’t stop him from breaking your heart, but that’s neither here nor there. 

Roy shrugs. “You never fucking know, do you? Who’s to say it’s not fucking genetics or some shit?”

That pisses you the fuck off. Jamie’s no saint, but you believe that deep down he’s good. You believe he wants to be good.

So you smile, look Roy directly in the eyes over Phoebe’s head, and say as cold as you can, “Fuck you. You don’t know what you’re talking about.” You stand. “We’re leaving.”

Roy says, “Oi,” but it’s softer than the horrible things he’s been insinuating about Jamie so you turn back to him. 

“He’s not fucking horrible,” Roy says quietly, and almost as though it pains him to get the words out. “He’s a right little shit, but the prick’s had a rough fucking time of it lately. Go fucking easy on him, because no one else fucking does.”

You raise an eyebrow.

“I’m not fucking saying he doesn’t fucking deserve it, but I am fucking saying he’s not a world-class prick and if you fucking were going to give him a fucking chance, it’s not the fucking stupidest thing I’ve fucking seen.” 

Roy seems as though he’s hit his limit for both speech and sentimentality, and you’re no stranger to his rivalry (hatred?) with Jamie so you take his words for what they are. 

You nod. “Don’t tell him you saw me,” you say and Roy almost smiles. 

“Fucking don’t like to fucking talk to Tartt more than I fucking have to,” he replies. You smile back at him and as you leave he says, “She really fucking looks like him,” and you nod. 

Fuck.

next chapter

[shivvroys]

hold me like water (or christ, hold me like a knife)

shivlina oneshot | severance au

cw: suicide attempt, some mildly dubious consent

around 9k words

read below or on ao3

this phantom life sharpens like an image

but it sharpens like a knife

-

“Hi, Rose.”

The woman standing in front of her bears no resemblance to Siobhan Roy, save for the way her eyebrows scrunch in confusion. Her shoulders are hunched in on themselves, and she’s looking at Karolina like she’s begging for an extended hand—for a shaky tendril of trust to cling to.

“My name is Karolina.” she continues. “I just want to talk a bit about how you’re coming along. I know everything must still be very confusing for you.”

“Karolina—is that, are you…” the woman looks down at her fidgeting hands.

“No. I’m not.”

It’s the only thing she can bring herself to say. What could she tell the other woman (Shiv? Not-Shiv?) that wouldn’t make what they’re doing seem even more inhumane?

No, my brain hasn’t been torn apart and filed away into neat little boxes. I have a past beyond a cold fiberboard desk and a present that doesn’t stop at a threshold. I can’t even begin to understand what you must be going through but I’m here to twist it into whatever I need it to be.

If you reach your hand out the most I can give you is a pen to sign the press release.

Not-Shiv—Rose—nods absentmindedly, her eyes darting around the grey walls of the room they’re in. Karolina had asked for a private room to talk in, but the whole thing is starting to feel less like a semi-formal interview, and more like an interrogation.

Karolina looks down at the bullet points she’d prepared beforehand, and cringes at how sterile they feel.

Have you accommodated to the working conditions?

How easy do you find it to concentrate on your tasks?

What does a working day look like for you?

Do you get along with your colleagues?

Do you still feel who you are—is it all gone? Does it feel like a void or a locked door? Is there freedom in that?

Sighing, she rearranges her notes.

She’d read Shiv—Rose’s report. Out of everyone involved in the trial, she’s had the most difficulty adapting. A broken pair of speakers, a guard who’d narrowly missed having his eye gouged out. Karolina supposes that must be the remnants of Shiv they hadn’t managed to untangle. A tiny chip could only hold back so much of Siobhan Roy’s stubbornness.

“Rose, I know you’ve had a…rough time adjusting to the program. It’s perfectly normal, given—”

“Is it?” the other woman cuts her off. “How would you know, Karolina? Who gave you your name?”

For a split-second, the glint in her eyes becomes strikingly familiar, sending a shiver down Karolina’s spine.

“Right.” she clears her throat. “Let’s begin, shall we? What does a working day look like for you?”

-

As time goes on, each visit to the severed floor begins to weigh down on Karolina. Each week she marches into Logan’s office and has to look Shiv in the eye and tell her just how miserable she is. How much fear and pain can still linger in a person even when you’ve stripped everything away. How Karolina’s grown a perpetual nausea watching all of it unfold.

“She doesn’t trust me.” she says, during one of their updates. At least she’s managed to keep herself from glancing at Shiv every time she is mentioned. “Her answers are always neutral or positive, but the defiant behavior is still ongoing. We can’t risk putting out a statement at the moment.”

“How hard is it to gain her trust—she’s a blank fucking slate. Do they even understand the concept of trust?”

Shiv crosses her arms, eyebrows furrowed, and Karolina briefly wonders if Shiv is aware of her own body, if she understands that the person they are talking about isn’t just a shadow, a trick of the light that resides anywhere other than inside herself. She wonders if Shiv can feel her, somewhere deep within herself, if she hears the scratching at the door.

As far as Logan is concerned, he looks at her like he always does—as if the fact that she’s even brought up a problem without immediately providing a solution to it is a testament of her incompetence and a waste of his time.

Between the two of them, Karolina feels like an accomplice to a murder.

“Maybe if we were to bring someone, um— a professional, maybe it could help?”

“What, a fucking therapist?” Shiv scoffs. “How’s that going to work? ‘So, tell me about your relationship with your parents.’ ‘Um, I have no idea because my memory is three weeks old.’”

“I just mean someone who can make her feel more comfortable. Ease the adjustment period.”

“No.” Logan finally decides to join their conversation. “I don’t want more people on this. Tight fucking lid.”

“Well, we have to speed things along.” Shiv declares, with all the finality of someone who doesn’t plan on lifting a finger to help. “We can’t show up to the launch and tell our shareholders our innovative program’s showing great results—if you just disregard the faint screaming coming from the basement.”

Logan nods, two sides of the same cruel coin.

Karolina suppresses an eye-roll, busying her hands with the pen she’s holding. “Okay. Then can I at least suggest a less—formal setting? I think the environment is contributing to the distress.”  

Logan shrugs, already wiping his hands cleans of the situation. As if it isn’t his daughter scratching SOS's into her arm with bent paperclips. As if the person whose fate they’re disregarding isn’t at least physically in the room with them, locked away in a forgotten synapse. As if the woman in front of Karolina doesn’t wring her hands the same fucking way when she’s anxious, doesn’t narrow her eyes when she smells bullshit from miles away, doesn’t breathe and sigh and blink the same fucking way as the scared woman begging to be freed from that Orwellian nightmare. Begging to become someone, to become real.

That’s all she’d been talking about during their interviews. Being real. Asking Karolina questions about the real world that Karolina’s had to evade, for fear of interfering with the subject’s perception of their own existence. Asking her for any form of individuality, for anything she can hold that didn’t come in an onboarding package. That didn’t have a filing number or a code to scan.

“Do whatever you need. Just get it done.” Logan grunts, with a dismissive wave. “I don’t want Matsson’s suits sniffing around my fucking panty drawer.”

“I’ll handle it.”

Karolina nods, like she’d ever asked to be involved in this whole inevitable gross violation of human rights. If anything, the only thing she’s glad about is the access to information it gives her, for when she’ll have to put out the fire that’s already starting to smoke up their entire building.

“We apologize for breaking virtually every international human rights convention, but we really would rather employees stop moaning about their depressing lives around the water fountain.”

That had been Shiv’s initial reaction to the project. Karolina wouldn’t dare to ask what had managed to change her mind so radically in just a couple of months—doesn’t spare a glance to the faint shadow on her ring finger, or the striking silence left by Roman and Kendall’s absence, one currently bankrupting their LA studio, the other having disappeared off to some island with warm beaches and relaxed attitudes towards Class-A drugs.

Seeing it from both sides, though, having to take that goddamned elevator and talk to those half-people—Karolina feels something within herself slowly being ripped apart.

Karolina hears it in her dreams a lot—that elevator. A faint hum, then a soft ding, and she finds herself suddenly lost, feels a heavy fog envelop her mind. The walls are too bright, and her reflection keeps melting away as she tries to catch a glimpse of herself on the cool steel of the elevator doors. In the dream, she walks along miles upon miles of empty corridors, and names everything she knows—street names, distant cousins, names of birds and brands of cereal, until the only things she can name are the dark carpet flooring, the bright walls, the feet walking along the corridor. Until she looks down at her hands and wonders whose body she’s seeing.

Each time, she wakes up and checks her alarm twice, then walks into the kitchen and checks that the stove isn’t on. When she gets back into bed, she checks her phone again—just to make sure she hadn’t forgotten to set her alarm.

-

“Hello, Rose.”

The woman wearily takes in the room.

“What is this place?” she says as she settles down on a couch opposite Karolina.

“I thought it might be nice to have a less—formal place to have our meetings.”

She’d initially asked for a room with warm lighting, maybe a plant thrown in for some semblance of life. Naturally, Logan had provided her with more than enough resources, essentially turning her calming space into a fucking rainforest.

“Are these real?”

They both turn to assess the various plants covering the room.

Karolina huffs an embarrassed laugh, shaking her head. “I’m actually not sure.”

Sensing an opportunity, she gets up, signaling for the other woman to follow her. She does, cautiously approaching Karolina as she singles out a Monstera leaf.

“Rip a bit off. See if it’s real.”

Rose looks at her with wide eyes, reaching a tentative hand to caress the plant.

“Won’t it wilt?”

Karolina doesn’t react at first, but it takes all of her strength not to gawk at the image of Siobhan Roy being concerned about the safety of a house plant. Instead, she gives the other woman a small smile, before pressing a finger into the plant’s pot, feeling the wet soil.

“It’s real.”

“Hm.” the woman nods. “Pretty.”

Before she returns to the couch, Karolina catches a faint scratch mark peeking out from under Rose’s shirt collar.

“Sorry if I sound like a broken record, but how have you been, Rose?”

Rose shrugs, sticking her hands under her thighs and keeping her attention on the various items of décor some intern had probably picked out of an IKEA catalogue.

“I only filed forty-two resignation requests this week, so…”

“Okay.” Karolina jots down forty-two on her notepad, before realizing she isn’t here to actually act as a therapist, and the only thing she needs from Rose is confirmation that whatever bullshit she’ll put in the press release won’t come back to bite her in the ass. She drops the notepad entirely, crossing her fingers over her knee instead.

“That’s good.” she urges the woman to continue.

“Can I just ask—” she starts, gesturing to the room. “No one else has to have these meetings.”

“Right.” Karolina nods. “Well, seeing as you’ve had a harder time adjusting, we thought it might be beneficial to talk to…” she hesitates, trying to come up with a reasonable explanation. “…someone.” She squeezes her knuckles together tightly, hoping her face doesn’t betray the disappointment in her own lie.

“So, you’re like my counselor?” Rose frowns.

Karolina cuts her off with a tight smile. “No. Just someone…to talk to.” A part of her wants to ask Rose’s monitors if they could throw her a bone and erase this entire day from the woman’s mind, too.

“Good. ‘Cause you haven’t counseled me for shit.” Rose laughs, which might be the first time Karolina’s seen her show any sort of positive emotion, except for one of their first meetings, when Karolina had briefly asked her about the incident regarding the guardian’s eye.

It’s unsettling, how much and simultaneously how little of Shiv she sees in that smile, how much room it takes up on her face, how nicely the light settles in the lines laughter has carved into her cheeks.

-

Shiv grows restless. As the resignation requests diminish in frequency, and the size of Rose’s behavioral report stagnates, Karolina senses the woman’s weariness at being left in the dark. Knowing that there is a part of her that continues to exist outside of her conscious control is beginning to take a toll on Shiv.

“How’s my corpo twin? Haven’t had to scrub any sharpie off of my torso in a while.”

As usual, she barges into Karolina’s office, feigning disinterest while tapping her fingers rhythmically against the back of a chair or fiddling with Karolina’s pen holder.

Karolina blinks. She’s equally horrified and in awe of how much Siobhan insists on detaching herself from the war being waged inside of her own mind.

“Good. I think we’re making some valuable progress.”

“Uh huh.” Shiv nods. “And—what, is there some sort of observer-lab rat confidentiality?” she frowns, sensing Karolina’s apprehension.

“No, it’s just—” Karolina pauses. She gets the sense that the equation Shiv’s using is a double-edged sword. That her own role in this project changes depending on which floor those elevator doors swing open to. “I thought it might be, I don’t know, a bit uncomfortable—for you?”

Shiv sizes her up, zeroing in on her face like a microscope lens twisted into focus. She crosses her arms, perching on the edge of Karolina’s desk. Her hip almost bumps into Karolina’s laptop.

“Why would it be?” she asks.

Although her brain is intact, Karolina feels her own mind being split apart. She looks up at Shiv, her head illuminated by the harsh neon light coming in from the hallway while her hands are tinged amber by Karolina’s desk lamp—a half-frozen, half-burning divoženka.

And Karolina would answer her call, which is what scares her the most. She’s gone too deep, dove headfirst into this cruel experiment and now finds herself enticed by the prospect of taking a closer look at the thread that separates Shiv from Not-Shiv—wants to follow that stitched line and see where the two cross over and where they break apart. Where the medical technician had carved out who gets the anger and who gets the fear, who laughs and who scowls.

Do the lives inside this woman stumble over each other, strain and push against the other for space, like twins in the womb? Or do they lay curled in on themselves, picking at the wound where another half should be—aching with the phantom pain of the other.

Would Shiv know to follow the same trail along a Monstera leaf? Would her fingers instinctively know to hold it lightly?

“Right, sorry.” Karolina clears her throat. “Here are the notes I’ve been keeping. We have some promising answers about the workflow, though there’s still a lot of questions about their tasks, which seems to be a collective issue—most subjects have asked why they’ve been assigned the work, and what the gathered data is used for.”

Shiv narrows her eyes but decides to drop the subject, choosing to halfheartedly leaf through Karolina’s notes instead.

“Nice handwriting.” she murmurs.

“Thank you.”

-

“What’s it like up there?”

Karolina sighs. They’ve had this discussion too often lately, and she’s began to find it increasingly hard to put up any defense in front of those sad, crystalline eyes.

“Come on…” Rose whines, puffing out her cheeks. “All I have is that stupid fucking calendar. Aloha from the world’s fakest beach!”

It’s a lighthearted comment, but it stirs something dark and uncomfortable in Karolina. Down here, she realizes, there aren’t even any windows to let some fresh air pass through. The staff has had to switch out a plant every week, as they’ve kept on dying. The only light Rose has ever known has come from a bulb, a wire in the wall connected to the living beast that is the Waystar enterprise and its newly acquired parasite, Gojo.

Rose, like her above-ground twin, drives a hard bargain.

“Can you at least give me something? From out there?”

“I think it’s best if we just focus on right here.” she tries to convey as much sympathy as she can without revealing too much of just how fucked up Rose’s out there is.

Rose doesn’t let her continue. “Please, Karolina. You said you were someone I could talk to…so talk to me.”

“Of course. But I’m here more as a listener, than—”

“And what do I have to talk about!?” she crosses her arms, throwing daggers at Karolina. “I know how to sort files into boxes and that whoever owns my body won’t let me fucking die. That’s about everything I have to talk about—everything I know about the world.”

Karolina bites her lip, avoiding the other woman’s gaze. “I’m sorry, Rose.”

The apology only seems to fuel her frustration. She rises from her cross-legged position on the couch to start pacing the room, occasionally stopping to assess one of the plants.

“You work for them, too, right?”

Karolina nods. “Yes, I do.”

“And they pay you?”

“They do.”

“What’s the first thing you buy when you get a paycheck?”

Karolina laughs without meaning to. It’s almost…endearing—to have one of the world’s richest people ask her what she buys when a paycheck comes through, as if it’s an event she believes should be celebrated.

Rose tilts her head, frowning at Karolina. “What?”

“Nothing, sorry.” she looks down, trying to suppress a smile. “I don’t really keep track of that, I couldn’t tell you.”

Rose lets out a disappointed huff, running her finger along the braided trunk of a pachira. The money tree. She contemplates Karolina’s answer, carefully preparing her next approach tactic.

“God, I fucking hate that constant buzzing.”

Despite the tiny speaker blaring soothing nature sounds, the humming of the lights is the only thing bouncing off the walls. They both turn their heads to look at the neon light fixtures and the colonies of dead flies trapped in them.

Were those the only animals she’d ever seen?

Unlike Shiv, Rose wears her misery right on her sleeve, and the shadows under her eyes seem to grow in waves as another drop falls into her already overfilling bucket. When she lowers her head to meet Karolina’s gaze, there are tears gathered in the corners of her eyes.

“I can’t live like this. This isn’t a life.”

All Karolina can do is stare at the other woman. Clutch her hands together in repentance and give her the smallest grace she can manage—to look at her and acknowledge the living, breathing person standing in front of her. To make Rose as real as the plants surrounding them, and hope that the fact that life is slipping away from them both is proof that there is life there to begin with.

She only tears her eyes away from the other woman when she feels her phone buzz in her pocket. It isn’t anything important, but as she dismisses the notification pop-up, she remains still, weighing the device in her hand. The audio speaker in the corner of the room lets out a high-pitched noise as the audio loops for the hundredth time.

“You’re right.” she says, looking up at Rose. “That noise is driving me crazy. How about some music?”

Rose’s eyebrows shoot up, her mouth falling slightly open.

“Real music?”

Karolina nods, letting out a shaky breath. She opens her music app, before extending the phone out towards the other woman.

“Your pick.”

Rose tentatively grabs the device, cradling it in her hands and carefully moving her fingers across the screen. It only lasts a moment, though, before her teeth grab at her bottom lip, and she’s furrowing her brows in concentration as she scrolls away through the app.

“I don’t know any of these.”

“Just pick whatever looks interesting.”

She watches her scroll back and forth for a few minutes, before standing up and taking the phone back.

“Here, let me.”

Unfortunately, Karolina finds herself facing the same kind of pressure, as she realizes this is the first time Rose has heard any real music, save for the occasional droning instrumental they use for ambiance. In these conditions, it’s easy to understand one’s urge to gouge someone’s eye out. Sighing, she opens a random suggested playlist and hits the shuffle button.

Let fate and malicious algorithms decide.

Whatever moment she’d imagined as Rose’s first exposure to real music, it doesn’t exactly come to life as the fucking Eurythmics start blaring from her phone’s speaker, moaning about angels playing with hearts.

“Shit, sorry. Let me find something better.”

As her hands move rapidly to look for something more appropriate, she feels Rose’s fingers wrap around her wrist.

“No, leave it.”

As the music swells, Karolina watches Rose close her eyes, quietly humming along as she learns the words to the chorus, her hand still wrapped around Karolina’s. It breaks Karolina’s heart to watch how such a small and insignificant of a gesture can light up the other woman’s face like a divine act.

When the song reaches its bridge, and a loud saxophone takes over, Rose finally opens her eyes, mouth widening into a shocked grin.

Karolina can’t keep the corners of her own mouth from rising up into a wide smile.

“You like it?”

Rose nods, grin not leaving her face until the song fades out, returning them to the chorus of neon lights and AI-generated chirping.

She flashes Karolina an exaggerated frown, even pouting slightly. “Another one?”

A very hard bargain.

As Karolina looks down at the phone, trying to pick another song, she realizes Rose’s hand is still wrapped around her own.

-

It all starts to fall apart on a Friday.

The date isn’t the significant part, except for its marker as the end of an interminably long workweek, and the beginning of a wasted weekend.

Logan had been riding her ass all week, demanding a first draft of the launch presentation for his precious project. On top of that, he’d also expected her to make a very scathing expose disappear, while also putting out some of Gojo’s fires, now that their own comms team had been left with an Ebba-shaped hole to fill.

What begins the end of it all is a glass of water. Perilously perched on the edge of a coffee table, Karolina doesn’t even notice it until it’s too late. She’s listening to Rose talk about how frustrating the repetition involved in her tasks has become, while Nina Simone croons softly in the background.

Since that day, Karolina had let Rose fiddle with her music app during every meeting, choosing a couple of songs that she’d then dissect with Karolina, before they’d let the music keep playing in the background while they carried on with their mandatory discussion.

“I really don’t get it. Why would they need people to have no memories just to sort some files into boxes? It’s all bullshit.”

As Rose continues to pour out her anger, thumb worried between her teeth, Karolina finds an unsettling feeling of déjà vu wash over her. She’s not sure if it’s that, or the mountain of pressure building on her temples that prompts it, but as she starts to drift away from the conversation, sinking into a mindless buzzing, her tapping foot bumps into the table, knocking that damned glass of water down.

She only gets startled back to reality when she sees Rose rush across the table to catch it. She misses it, and the glass shatters into tiny shards, the water splashing Karolina’s ankles.

Before she can fully comprehend what’s happened, she sees the other woman lean down to pick up the broken pieces of glass, her knees almost touching the mess on the floor. She reaches a hand out to stop her, grabbing her arm.

“Don’t, Shiv, there’s glass—”

“Shiv?”

 She drops Not-Shiv’s arm like it’s scorching coal.

“I meant there’s shards everywhere.” She clears her throat, not daring to meet the other woman’s eyes as she busies herself with picking up the biggest pieces of broken glass.

“No.” Rose cuts her off firmly. “No, that’s not—you said Shiv.”

“I must have misspoke. I meant to say there are shards of glass—”

Roses fixes her with an incredulous stare. “Bullshit, Karolina!”

All Karolina can do is shake her head and try to suppress the dreadful heat rising up her neck. She can mould her face into whatever mask is needed to placate Rose, but she can do very little to stop her hands from shaking.

“Is that me?” Rose whispers. “Is that her? Shiv?”

Whatever mask she thinks she’s wearing crumbles as Karolina looks up to meet Rose’s wide eyes.

She’s had to deliver bad news thousands of times during her time at Waystar. News about world wars, about deaths and lawsuits and every kind of fucked up event in-between. But never like this, never to the person that’s been wronged. Never having to face her own guilt, staring down at her own fingerprints on the bloody knife.

“I’ll get someone to clean all of this up.”

She doesn’t give the other woman time to reply, heading straight for the door. Before she can open it, though, a slender had wedges itself between her and the threshold.

“I’ll tell them.”

“What?” Karolina frowns.

The fractured image of Siobhan projected inside of Karolina’s mind grows even blurrier as she takes in Rose’s sharp glare and set jaw.

“I have a feeling this was a major fuck-up for you, Karolina. I’ll tell.”

They stand there, locked in a stalemate, unmoving for what feels like ages. Karolina quietly runs through every possible scenario this could evolve into, and the only conclusion she reaches is that she’s fucking exhausted. That if Shiv wants to invent new and creative means of self-flagellation she should do so without collateral. That one million a year is really only minimum wage when you’re in the devil’s pocket.

She takes a deep, steadying breath, her chest almost bumping the other woman’s. She’s never noticed just how many freckles are scattered across her face, from the bridge of her nose, and all along her temples. There’s a tiny one, barely visible, just above her lip.

“It’s Siobhan. Your—her name.”

-

“Is she planning a coup or something?”

“I’m sorry?”

Shiv shakes her head, throwing the file back on Karolina’s desk.

“What—two weeks ago she was biting security guards, and now she’s mindless drone of the month?” her eyes narrow as she scrunches her face. “It doesn’t make sense.”

Karolina doesn’t answer, letting Shiv run herself ragged coming up with as many theories as she needs to, before settling on whichever one she finds most satisfying. Over the past few months, she’d unwillingly come to learn much more than she’d ever wanted about the inner workings of Siobhan Roy’s mind—both sides of it. When Shiv found something to toy with, it was best to let her tire herself out, before quietly stepping in to unravel whatever tangle she’d gotten herself stuck in.

Karolina continues working, occasionally nodding or humming along to Shiv’s rambling. She almost wishes it was harder to hide the reason for Rose’s sudden complacency from Shiv. That there was some deep, visceral connection between the two, and Shiv could feel the quiet misery slowly draining the life out.

She knows it’s all temporary, this state of suspended existence—that feeding Rose morsels of her life above ground will only sustain her for so long. That Karolina only has so much information to give her until she’ll hit something raw and ugly and painful. Things she doesn’t feel she has the right to share—that  she’s only ever been a passive observer to.

“Are you fucking her?”

“Excuse me?” Karolina’s eyes snap up to meet Shiv’s smirk.

“Oh, so you were actually listening, and I wasn’t talking to myself like an idiot?” she frowns, twisting a pen between her fingers.

She doesn’t wait for Karolina to respond as she gets up from her chair and drops the pen back in its holder, narrowly avoiding knocking the whole thing over.

“Keep your eyes on the prize, Karolina.”

She silently watches Shiv strut out of her office and only lets out an incredulous laugh when she’s back home, wine glass in hand and staring dumbly at the tiny digital clock above her stove.

-

Goddamn self-fulfilling prophecy.

It’s her own goddamn fault, for letting Rose drag her up to dance. Rose’s song of choice doesn’t leave much room for actual movement, but it’s nine pm on a Tuesday, so Karolina decides to indulge her. That’s how she finds herself holding the other woman while lazily swaying to Steely Dan like two drunkards refusing to leave the bar after everyone’s already gone home.

As the song slowly starts to fade out, Karolina starts to pull away, until a soft hand settles at the base of her neck, keeping her in place. The look in Rose’s eyes spells trouble in bright neon letters, yet the only thought Karolina can conjure as the woman leans in to kiss her is that her cheeks turn the warmest shade pink when she’s flushed. 

“Rose, we can’t.”

Karolina lowers her head, though she makes no move to break the embrace, her hands resting on Rose��s hips, Rose resting her forehead against hers.

“Says who?” she whispers.

“It’s not right. Siobhan—”

Rose scoffs, raising her head. “Do you know how many bruises I’ve found on our hips? Do I have any say in that?”

“I can’t—” Karolina sighs.

“I love you.”

Karolina snaps her head up, staring blankly at the other woman.

“What?” she laughs softly. “No, you don’t.”

“I do.” Rose presses. Her brows are furrowed, but her face is the most open plane of life Karolina’s seen. “I think I do.”

Karolina shakes her head. She brings a tentative hand up to cradle Rose’s jaw. “You barely know me.”

“I know you more than I know anything in the world.”

“Rose.”

What a terribly small world to live in.

Karolina knows her words might have more of an impact if her hands could let go. Instead, she turns her gaze as her fingers grip Rose tighter—all her conviction tangled somewhere among the green leaves surrounding them, fading away like the tail-end of a love song.

“Fine, I don’t love you. But I want to kiss you. And I think you want to kiss me.”

There it is, that familiar look of untamed resolve. The shiny pin to their homemade bomb.

“It doesn’t matter what I want.”

Rose shakes her head, eyes narrowed in confusion. “Yes, it does, Karolina.”

She knows it’s only the size of the room—the shoebox of a life they’re keeping this woman captive in, that’s made her cling to Karolina like this. That’s made Rose see her as this big figure, this center of some imagined Universe.

In a way, they are both only as alive as they’ve made each other—only as alive as these four walls will allow them to be.

It’s never going to survive those elevator doors, anyway.

Karolina leans forward. 

-

With the stress of the project’s impending launch, Siobhan’s frustration heightens. It doesn’t help that Karolina suddenly finds it nearly impossible to maintain eye-contact with her, and some important meeting seems to spring up every single time Shiv steps foot into her office.

What she fails to consider, in her flawless avoidance strategy, is Shiv’s determination, and her willingness to track Karolina down all the way into Waystar’s execute suite communal bathroom.

“Hey.”

She turns her head sharply to see Shiv hovering near the sinks. “Shiv, hi.”

Karolina side-steps her, feigning focus on washing her hands. Stalling, she performs the task as if she were scrubbing in to perform surgery.

Shiv pretends to make for the door, before turning around as if remembering something. “Oh, just real quick—how long have you been fucking her?”

Karolina freezes, hands clutched together under the water stream, praying for some form of divine intervention. Some perfectly timed rapture.

“I’m sorry?” she doesn’t look directly at Shiv, staring at her reflection in the bathroom mirror instead.

Shiv takes another step towards her, reaching to close the running tap. “Mhm. Are you?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, Siobhan.”

Shiv reaches behind her to grab some paper towels from the dispenser, which Karolina rips out of her hand with more force than she intends.

“See, I thought that might’ve been the case for a while, too.” Shiv tilts her head. “But it all makes sense now—the resignation requests suddenly disappearing, all those cute little quotes you’ve been feeding my dad. All quiet on the severed floor, sir!”

“I’m just doing my job.” Karolina swallows a nervous tremor.

“Uh huh. Well, you’re doing something.”

As Shiv steps even closer to her, Karolina finds herself frozen in place, hands gripping the dirty porcelain sink. Her head feels unmoored, and she doesn’t know how Shiv manages to twist her around until their position is reversed, and it’s Karolina’s back resting against the sink, Shiv’s body keeping her trapped in place.

“I can assure you, Siobhan, nothing is—”

Shiv cuts her off, reaching a hand towards the collar of her shirt. “How’d you get that bruise, Karolina?”

Instead of letting go, Shiv starts trailing her finger along the exposed skin of Karolina’s neck. Where Rose’s touch felt like a cool, cleansing breeze, Shiv’s feels like molten lava, like hot iron branding every inch of Karolina’s skin. 

“I—that’s…” Karolina mumbles, finding it very hard to concentrate as Shiv’s mouth replaces her hand, leaving feather-light kisses across her neck, and all the way up to the back of her ear.

“Let me guess, hair straightener? Come on…” Her breath is hot in Karolina’s ear, leaving goosebumps all along the back of her neck. “It’s still my body, I know when I’ve been fucked. And your perfume lasts longer than you think.”

There’s a fleeting thought running through Karolina’s mind that this is fucked up on levels that she isn’t sure even Hell is equipped to handle, but Shiv’s hands are heavy and precise like scalpels as they roam all over her body, and the only thing Karolina can do is let them.

All she can do is stare into Shiv’s eyes and tighten her grip on the sink as the buttons of her pants slowly come undone.

“Muscle memory, right?” Shiv grins, whispering into her hair.

She barely makes any noise as Shiv fucks her against the dirty bathroom sink, her breathing almost lost among the incessant buzzing of the neon lights. As a small act of mercy, Shiv lets Karolina lean her head against her shoulder, their bodies forming a shield over this looming death sentence. This small death.

Karolina comes with a heavy, shuddering breath, a hand reaching up to grab Shiv’s forearm. As Shiv withdraws her hand from her body, the lack of warmth brings Karolina back to reality, and her legs begin to shake for an entirely different reason. Instead of washing her hands, Shiv pops her fingers straight into her mouth, locking eyes with Karolina. Once she’s satisfied with the show she’s putting on, she takes them out and pulls Karolina into a messy, forceful kiss—all teeth and angry grunting.

Finally, she lets go of Karolina, moving around her to actually wash her hands.

“She’s got good taste, I’ll give her that.” she doesn’t spare a glance in Karolina’s direction.

“Siobhan...”

Shiv cuts her off. “You’re off the project.” She dries her hands, waiting for Karolina to meet her gaze before continuing. “You know, you could’ve just asked.”

Later that night she emails Shiv the latest draft of the launch statement, along with firing a text to her assistant to have all of physical her note files sent over to Ms. Roy’s office. She could scan her own damn files. After she’s scrubbed her computer empty of any trace of the Janus project, she empties an entire bottle of wine and stares out her window at the skyline until the sun sets and the only thing she can see is her own reflection on the glass pane.

In a way, she feels grateful for the lack of choice. For the ease with which she’s able to sever all ties to this entire fucking mess. She lets the guilt pool inside of her like a bowl of hot soup, settles into it cozily as she gets into bed—whatever nightmare she has that night, the only thing that lingers from it by the following morning is a gasping breath and a hand grasping at the dark.

-

She hears about it from Greg, of all fucking people. He corners her in the staff kitchen, practically galloping with excitement. She tunes most of his droning out, until the words ambulance and severed floor tumble out of his mouth.

“Greg, what are you talking about?”

He blinks, gawking at her.

“Oh, man, they—uh, I thought you might have heard? It feels kind of, um, big? In terms—well, from the media perspective of it. It sound kind of…like, an event?”

Karolina resists the urge to smack the stale croissant out of his spidery hands.

“What happened, Greg?” she grits her teeth.

“It’s Shiv. Well, kind of? Her innie, um, she—well she kind of attempted, well—not suicide, but so—”

Karolina doesn’t let him finish the rest of his sentence before storming out, calling every contact she has on the severed floor. She doesn’t have to fish much for information, because soon enough, Logan’s calling her into his office, furious and aghast, ordering her down to the severed floor to tie up any loose ends. Nothing gets out past that goddamn elevator.

She makes the journey like a man on death row heading down for his final sentencing—her head held high and numb hands frozen into fists. She doesn’t expect there to be a bloodbath down there, but the stark white walls burn her eyes as the elevator doors swing open.

She’s greeted by one of the security guards, who talks her through the event in more detail than she feels able to stomach, then makes it a point to say how great it is that there were no witnesses, except for the monitor who walked in on it.

They reach the interview room just as the cleaning staff is making their way out, which eases some of the dread rapidly building in Karolina’s stomach. The room looks just as it had the last time she’d been there, save for some new plants. Life had a habit of desperately trying to escape this god forsaken place.

As Karolina takes in the room, instructing the security guard on how to handle the impending murmur of the rest of the project participants, she spots it. The letter opener. Shiny and smooth, tucked just under the couch Rose would always occupy during their meetings, where she’d last held her, humming Burnin’ for You in Rose’s hair and indulging in some half-baked dream of an easy life, a kinder life for the both of them—just until the song ended.

She barely makes it to the toilet in time for her body to purge all those fucking dreams away.

Later, when her doorbell rings in the middle of the night, her first thought is that it might be the FBI, a thought that washes over her with much more relief than it should.

“Hi.”

Karolina grips the door frame, trying to suppress the shiver that runs through her. It isn’t the police knocking on her door to demand payment for her crimes, but a much crueler executioner.

“How did you get my address?” she whispers, words barely having the strength to reach past her frozen lips.

Shiv smiles, shrugging almost playfully.

“Maybe I had you chipped as well.” she raises her eyebrows, before crossing her arms and feigning a shiver. “Are you gonna let me in, or what? I’ve got, like, blood loss anemia—I’m fucking freezing.”

“Come in.”

Karolina steps back, almost hitting the wall as she lets Shiv pass through. As they make their way into the living room, Karolina starts turning on every light, not trusting Shiv to not vanish into the cold air of the night.

“Why are you here, Siobhan?” she asks, once they’ve run out of steps to take, and are forced to face each other again.

Shiv tries to shrug nonchalantly, which only makes the bandage peeking out of from under her right sleeve stick out like more.

“Well, everyone keeps saying they don’t know how this fucking mess could’ve happened. And you’re the only one who stuck her finger deep enough in the pie to make it talk, so...” she pulls at her sleeves until her hands are covered entirely. “Thought you might shed some light on the situation.”

Karolina swallows down the shame burning at her core. “I can’t help you, I’m sorry.”

Shiv raises a pointed eyebrow at her, delighting in Karolina’s discomfort. “What, she not that into pillow talk?”

It almost feels like nothing’s changed, and they’re still in Karolina’s office, Shiv toying with her stationery and trying to get a rise out of her. Like it could have ever just stayed that easy.

“Siobhan…” she sighs. “You can’t keep doing this.”

She isn’t sure if she means to Rose or to yourself.

Shiv scoffs, shaking her head and taking an angry step towards Karolina. “How the fuck is any of it my fault?”

She looks smaller, dressed in an oversized sweater and jeans. And younger, her face bare and paler than Karolina would like to see her. There’s an ache in Karolina’s chest that makes her heart skip a beat, as the images of Shiv and Rose keep blurring in her mind. As the stitches start coming apart.

“What did you expect to happen when you force humans to exist in a cubicle?” she sighs, crossing her arms. “She’s miserable, Shiv. She kept trying to tell you.”

Shiv frowns, breathing out a cruel laugh.

“She doesn’t fucking exist, Karolina. That’s not a real person, it’s just—I don’t know, a fucking black hole in my brain.”

Her hand slices through the air, emphasizing her every sentence—each motion flashing the strip of gauze wrapped around her hand.

 “Am I a real person, Shiv? What makes me real to you? The fact that your father needs me to clean up his messes for the public eye?”

She knows bringing Logan into the discussion is a low blow, but she’s gone too deep, stuck her hand out too far into the flames to pretend she doesn’t enjoy stoking them.

Shiv shakes her head. “That’s not—”

“That black hole is a part of you, and she’s begging for your help.”

“It’s not really a plea if you’re holding a weapon, is it? Sounds more like a threat.”

Karolina doesn’t know when it’s happened, but Shiv is standing right in front of her, red-rimmed eyes peering into hers like a blind animal—seeking comfort with bared teeth and shaking legs.

“Sounds like you’ve got a lot in common.”

Shiv doesn’t respond, looking down before raising her bandaged hand and holding it out between them.

“Wanna see it?” she whispers.

She looks up, daring Karolina.

“I…” Karolina hesitates briefly, before nodding. “Okay.”

It’s not guilt that makes her accept, but the rapid rise and fall of Shiv’s chest. The shaking force of her set jaw. The way her eyes seem to beg Karolina to say no. To turn her back on this ugly wound and confirm its shame. Make it something to be hidden.

Karolina refuses. Despite the murmuring thrum of her heart, she looks down at the torn, broken flesh of Shiv and shows her she still sees a whole person.

She takes the outstretched hand and cradles it as gently as she can. She ghosts her finger along the angry stitches, trailing the length of it. Then, she continues up the length of Shiv’s arm, up to her elbow—the length of life that still remains untouched.

Shiv looks on blankly, though Karolina can feel the tiny goosebumps erupting along her arm.

“She didn’t hit an artery, so…” she finally says, locking eyes with Karolina. “Still in business.” she gestures crudely with her middle and ring fingers.

The serious expression on her face as she does it sends Karolina into a fit of laughter, carefully trying not to distress the injured hand in her grasp.

“Siobhan.” she admonishes.

They laugh quietly for a moment, before she watches Shiv’s face fall as her shoulders start shaking more frantically. Her breathing falls into quiet sobs, and it isn’t long before she collapses on Karolina’s shoulder, right arm cradled between them. Karolina doesn’t whisper soft encouragements into her ear, or kiss her head, but she holds Shiv until her breathing evens. And when she feels the trembling force in her arms subside, Karolina takes the bandage and gently wraps Shiv’s wrist again, holding onto it for a second before letting her go.

-

Far be it for a man like Logan Roy to let something as insignificant as his daughter’s near-death get in the way of his project’s launch.

The minor setback gets dealt with swiftly and efficiently, the only trace of it gone with Friday’s garbage collection.

That’s how Karolina ends up being stuck smiling at shareholders and sweating through silk as the bright projecting lights split her brain in two, Logan and Mattson having spared no expenses for their beloved pet project. The giant rotating gold coin stirs a wave of nausea in her gut, a tilt-a-whirl of horror.

She’s managed to sneak backstage, half-heartedly checking the teleprompter for spelling errors, when she spots Shiv exiting the bathroom much more distressed than she’d looked going in.

She doesn’t move from her spot, raking her eyes over the text while tracking Shiv’s silhouette out of the corner of her eye. She convinces herself it must just be nerves, until she hears soft humming coming from where Shiv was getting her make-up touched up.

“Must be talking to an angel…”

Karolina’s head snaps up, her eyes immediately meeting Shiv’s in the mirror’s reflection. She tries to blink her doubt away, chalking it up to her own nerves, until she hears the stage manager call out for Ms. Roy two times, before coming up to touch the woman’s shoulder.

“Ms. Roy? We’re ready for you to go up in five.”

She blinks, jumping a bit in surprise. “Oh, sure. Thanks.”

Karolina takes a step towards her. “Shiv?”

The make-up artist disappears off to the bathroom, leaving them alone. As she looks into the woman’s eyes, Karolina feels the same sharp glare stare back, the same clenched jaw, spots the same freckle—barely visible, just above her lip.

“Siobhan.” she tries, though her voice is already shaking. “Rose, don’t. Please.”

The stage manager enters the backstage area again, not sparing a single glance in Karolina’s direction. Instead, she motions for Shiv to be ready in three minutes, then exists as quick as she’s come in.

Rose just keeps smiling at Karolina, red-rimmed eyes daring her to stop her from what she’s about to do. Daring her to let it happen.

“It almost felt like a life—that room, with you. But I have to do this. I’m sorry.”

She doesn’t kiss Karolina, or hold her hand. Instead, they just look at each other for the remaining seconds they have left. There’s a part of Karolina that aches to stop all of this, a pavlovian instinct straining her muscles, wanting nothing more than to call every number in her phone and make this all go away. Start drafting the press release, touch base with her contacts at every major outlet and push their official statement, control the fucking narrative.

Instead, she banks the moment like that shiny gold coin looming over her head. She knows she’ll never see Rose again—not like this, anyway, so she takes in every twitch of her mouth, every shaking breath, every particle of that ephemeral life.

As Rose makes her way out to the stage and takes the microphone, Karolina stares into her own reflection and tries not to flinch. The audience soon erupts into chaos, and Karolina closes her eyes, only to find that the noise echoes in her ears less like an explosion, and more like a firework.

-

She doesn’t know when it’s become a common occurrence—Shiv showing up at her door in the middle of the night, but she’s loathe to admit that the house doesn’t feel palpably colder every time Shiv isn’t there.

This particular night, they’re sitting at the kitchen island, Shiv bringing a hand to run over her shiny new excision scar every couple of minutes.

Karolina doesn’t berate her, though the look she flashes Shiv is enough to still her movement and bring her hand back to the stem of her wine glass.

“How do you feel?”

“Weird.” Shiv shrugs, eyes not leaving her glass. “I don’t know—feels like I drank too much and I’m starting to remember getting into a sloppy bar fight.”

Karolina busies her own hands by twirling her glass, looking at the bottom of it like it had any wishes to grant. “Is—are all of her memories…”

Shiv cuts her off. “Not all of them.” she clears her throat, still avoiding Karolina’s gaze. “But some random, quick flashes—mostly of you, actually.”

“Siobhan…”

Shiv raises her head, finally meeting her eyes. “Were you in love with her?”

Karolina feels her eyes start burning as she lets the question drip down her throat like bitter medicine. It’s a strange feeling, looking at someone and wanting to hear the truth. Stranger yet, wanting to tell the truth.

“It felt that way.” she finally says.

She isn’t quite sure if the looks Shiv gives her is that of understanding, if there’s some part of her shadowed mind coming to life under Karolina’s confession—some remaining flicker of Rose. But she looks like there’s something she wants to tell Karolina, a half-remembered thought she can’t shape into sentences.

“Sorry for your loss, I guess.”

Karolina shakes her head, taking a slow sip of her wine, letting the cold liquid soothe her straining throat. “It’s not my loss to feel, but thank you.”

Shiv nods, then hangs her head back down. A hand reaches up to rub at the spot the scar is in, which Karolina softly bats away as she rises to open another bottle.

“Hey, uh, I’m also sorry for—the bathroom, a while back? That was kind of fucked.”

Karolina’s hand stills mid-air, the bottle shaking from the effort. “It was a very…complicated situation.”

“Uh huh. Well, sorry if I—”

Shiv raises her thumb to her mouth, teeth biting anxiously at it. 

“You didn’t.” Karolina says quickly, before drawing in a deep breath. “Well, it’s…complicated.” she sighs.

She reaches for Shiv’s glass, their fingers touching as she fills it up. Shiv steals a quick glance, before lowering her hand to cup both of them around the glass. Even in the dim kitchen light, the scars on her right wrist shines like the quick glint of a knife’s blade.

Emboldened by Karolina’s admission, Shiv lets a small grin take root at the corner of her mouth.

“Right.” she says, taking a sip of wine. “And it would be very stupid to complicate it further, right?”

“It would.”

“Yeah, I thought so.” she nods mournfully.

Karolina picks up her own glass, but doesn’t back down. Instead, she crosses the kitchen island separating them, until she’s staring down directly at Shiv. The scar on the side of her head is barely visible beneath Shiv’s hair—a tiny thing, thin and red. An angry mark of the soul’s unwillingness to be halved—a mark she hopes will remind Shiv that there is a force within her still aching for freedom. That she is not made to fit in a cage.

 Karolina resists the urge to reach out and touch the scar. Instead, she focuses on Shiv’s heavy gaze, the warm flush spreading across her cheeks—the tiny freckle above her pouted lip.

“Shiv, is there something you want to ask me?”

Shiv peers up at her through bare lashes, one hand rolling the stem of her glass around, while the other reaches out to pick at a loose thread on Karolina’s sweater.

“There is, actually. Who the fuck still listens to Eurythmics?”

[bluejaysandblackbats]

It Takes A Village

Fandom: YJ98, Flashfam, DC Comics

Summary: After witnessing Bart murder someone, his friends scramble to cover Bart's tracks and stumble upon an international scandal as a result.

(Minor background: Bart took a gap year, and Conner did two years of community college. This starts shortly after Bart's 19th birthday. So, Conner and Jenni are 20, Bart and Cissie are 19, Tim and Cassie are 18, I made Greta 17 for the sake of the fic, and Judy is 15. I decided to make Owen 22 and Thad 16 for plot reasons. Clark and Conner are brothers in this fic, and Clark is 12 years older for the sake of this fic, so he's 32.)

Chapters: 6/?

Characters: Bart Allen, Conner Kent, Judy Garrick, Jay Garrick, Joan Garrick, Cissie King-Jones, Cassie Sandsmark, Tim Drake, Greta Hayes, Jenni Ognats, Thad Thawne, Owen Mercer, Meloni Thawne, Clark Kent, Wally West, Linda Park, Courtney Whitmore, President Thawne

Relationship(s): KonBart, CissieCassie, WallyLinda

Additional Tags: Serial Killer AU, No Powers AU, Angst, Dark Comedy, Bart Allen Kills in This Fic, Minor Thad Thawne, Separated in Childhood, Some Smut in This

Chapter Six: Heavy

Bart slept in such a deep sleep that it unsettled him. His exhaustion wouldn’t let him wake long enough to come out of it. It felt like he was dying. He started to sweat as sunlight poured into the room, wrapping him in the summer heat. Beneath his skin lay an overwhelming terror almost worse than the rage. He lacked the energy to muster anything more than a whimpering breath, so he lay there in a slumber that felt physically heavy. The weight on his chest held his body in place. He wanted to toss and turn until he had no choice but to awaken. It wasn’t until Roy jostled Bart awake, talking him out of a deep slumber that he was able to pull free. “Hey, are you okay? I couldn’t let you sleep through lunch,” Roy stated. 

Bart clutched Roy’s shirt as he leaned forward, pressing his forehead into Roy’s sweatshirt. “Hey, are you sick?” Roy asked. 

Bart shook his head, still shaking as he held onto Roy. “I couldn’t wake up,” Bart breathlessly whispered. 

Roy awkwardly patted him on the back. “Yeah? Traveling probably messed up your rhythm. You didn’t sleep for a whole two days… Give yourself a minute to wake up,” Roy replied, “Don’t panic. Breathe.” Bart released Roy’s shirt and nodded.

“Okay… Sorry, I—.” 

“It’s okay. You don’t have to apologize. It happens. I used to feel like this when Lian was a baby. Those all-nighters used to kick my ass,” Roy chuckled. Bart took another deep breath, and Lian burst into the room with a smoothie. “Hey, pumpkin.”

“Daddy, try this,” Lian offered. Roy climbed down and took a sip. 

“Mmm, mango and pineapple… But why is it green?” Roy questioned despite knowing the answer. 

Lian took a sip and tapped her chin. “There’s no lime,” Lian answered. 

“No. There’s no lime… What does Mommy put in her smoothies for protein?” Roy asked as he picked her up and took another sip. 

“Spinach?” Lian asked. 

“Yup. Yummy, isn’t it?” Roy grinned. “Bart, come down and eat breakfast… Or drink it… We’re drinking breakfast today.” 

Bart slid down the ladder instead of walking down the steps on the opposite side. “I’m gonna brush my teeth. I’ll be out there in a minute,” Bart replied as he wiped his brow. “Actually, I’m gonna shower.”

“Okay, we’ll be here,” Roy nodded. 

**

The water pulled Bart to consciousness and his phone vibrated. Once… Twice. Three times… Phone call. Bart groaned as he turned the water off and wrapped a towel around his waist before getting out of the shower. “Hello?” Bart asked. 

“Bart… I—. Please don’t hang up,” a little voice peeped. 

“I won’t. I just got out of the shower so can you sit on the phone for a second while I get dressed and brush my teeth?” Bart asked. 

“Okay… You aren’t putting me on speaker, are you?” the tiny voice asked. 

“No. I won’t put you on speaker,” Bart answered as he put on his pants. “I’m gonna put the phone down, but I’ll uh—. I’ll—. One second. Sorry, my brain’s still asleep.” Bart finished getting dressed, pushing his hair back before brushing his teeth. After a few minutes, he rinsed his mouth and picked up the phone. “Good morning, Thad.” 

“Good morning… Hey, Bart… I um—. Did you know who I was?” Thad questioned. “When I called… Did you know when you answered the phone?” 

“No, I didn’t. I’m happy to hear from you, though,” Bart answered. The truth. Thad’s call meant that his probation was over. “Why didn’t you tell me? I went to the house, and you weren’t there. I wanted to surprise you.”

“I’m sorry. I—. Bart, I’m scared,” Thad confessed. Bart tensed, clearing his throat as he anticipated a lengthy explanation. “Bart?”

“I’m here. I’m listening to you. What are you afraid of?” Bart questioned. Their conversations were mostly straightforward and unemotional but something felt different. Bart was overflowing with emotion, and Thad craved it. Bart could hear the frightened desperation in his brother’s voice. “Is it me?” 

“No. Well—. Yes. But, I’m not—. That’s not what bothers me. Do you ever dream about the building? Do you ever dream of the two-way mirror? I have so many nightmares about it. I knew about you… When we were—. They used to show me photographs of you. They told me that you were my enemy—.”

“I don’t dream about it… But, I don’t like to think about it. I know our experiences were different—.”

“Are you afraid of me?” Thad questioned.

“Afraid that you’ll kill me?” Bart questioned in reply.

The question prompted a moment of silence between the brothers. “I don’t want to kill you anymore. I don’t—. I don’t know if you can love me knowing that I was raised to despise you. It’s taken a long time to accept you, but I think—. I called you to hear your voice. I wanted to know—.”

“You can come and see me whenever you feel like it. I know it doesn’t mean much, but I’d let you kill me if it could prove I loved you,” Bart whispered. Thad laughed, taking it as a deadpan joke, not realizing the complete transparency Bart offered in his statement. 

“No. I wanted to tell you that I understand now. It wasn’t your fault… And I love you. I can finally say it. I’m scared because I have to confront the truth. We were prisoners. As different as we grew up, we are brothers in suffering as well as blood,” Thad explained. 

Bart choked down the urge to vomit as he realized what that entailed. “What do you do with the anger?”Bart questioned. His hands shook as he fixed his hair, and he held his phone between his ear and shoulder. 

“I let myself feel sad. I don’t feel like I have the right to do it, but I get so sad that I forget I was ever angry. My doctor says I have PTSD and I suffer from depression amongst a slew of other things. Sometimes, I pretend I’m diagnosing you. I like to compare it in my head… And when I do, I get sad… I feel like I’ve left you behind. I don’t want to leave you behind. I want you to get help, too,” Thad replied. Bart sniffed. “Does it bother you that I said that?”

“Yeah… But only because it’s true. I—. I wanna continue this conversation later on… But I have to eat breakfast… And Thad? I love you too—.”

“Wait! One more thing. I promise I’ll be quick… Does Grandma like me?” Thad questioned. Bart chuckled.

“Grandma loves you so much. If she knew about you sooner, she wouldn’t have left you. That’s the thing about Grandma. She’d do anything for us,” Bart reassured him, “You should call her. I think she’d like to know that you think of her.” 

“Someday… Maybe,” Thad replied, “Bye, Bart.” 

“Bye, Thad,” Bart whispered before hanging up. He left the bathroom and joined his friends in the kitchen. Lian sat on Roy’s knee while they drank their own smoothies. Bart searched the fridge for something to eat, but he felt Cissie’s eyes on him. 

“Did someone call you?” Cissie questioned. 

“Mhm… My little brother called. I told him we’d talk later,” Bart replied. “I was bummed that I didn’t catch him in person, but I’m glad we talked this morning.” 

“Oh, how’s he doing?” Cissie questioned. Bart pulled the cake out of the fridge and cut a piece for himself 

“He was worried about something. I think it’ll be okay, but I’m gonna call him later on to talk about it… Oh, while I’m thinking about brothers, Owen might stop by today,” Bart announced. 

“Seriously?” Cissie asked. 

“That’s awesome, Bart. Are you looking forward to seeing him?” Greta questioned. 

“Yeah, it’ll be my first time meeting him in person if he shows up,” Bart replied as he checked his notifications. 

OWEN: in the elevator. are you awake???

BART: YES. I’ll meet you at the elevator. Hold on

Bart pulled his shoes on before rushing out the door. He ran down the hall to the elevator and leaned against the wall. The elevator opened, and Bart stood on his tiptoes as three people out of six exited the elevator. “Hey, you must be—.”

“Owen,” Bart interrupted excitedly. Owen smiled, lugging his sleeping bag and backpack. Bart took his bag. “I live with my friend Cissie now. You know about Roy. He’s Dick’s friend, and he’s—. He’s leaving this afternoon. Greta’s another friend of mine. She doesn’t live with us. This has been a hectic week, but I was hoping we could spend time together. I wanted to see you,” Bart rambled on and on. Owen made him nervous because he had a fairly normal upbringing for most of his life while still carrying their mother’s blood. Owen was everything Bart and Thad could’ve been… But they all suffered from the same emptiness. They were all displaced children searching for a way home. 

“Bart, I wanna show you something. Mom said you don’t talk to her much. She says there’s no need for you and me to hide anymore. We’re adults—.” 

“It’s not easy… Knowing I can’t see her in person,” Bart confessed. “Do you like Mom so far?” 

“Yeah. I like Mom. She sent pictures. Baby pictures. I was surprised that she had any pictures of me. I figured she’d have pictures of you, but I thought she’d have thrown mine away… Like maybe she would’ve wanted to get rid of any sign that I was there,” Owen replied. 

“Mom never throws anyone away. She preserves and protects… That’s all she knows. Keep us alive. Keep us away,” Bart whispered, “Before we go in—.”

“I know. I want it to stay private, too,” Owen interrupted. Bart smiled. 

“Okay… Good. They know you’re my brother. I’m—. Can I hug you? Is that weird? I really wanna hug you, but I don’t want to freak you out,” Bart nervously stated. Owen grabbed Bart by the nape of his neck and pulled him into a hug. 

Bart embraced his brother fully as he forgot their reality for a moment. Owen felt normal. So normal it felt contagious. Bart led Owen to his apartment and opened the door. “We thought you forgot something in the RV,” Roy chuckled without looking up. 

“Oh, no. My brother’s here. Owen, that’s Roy and his daughter, Lian. The one with the long hair is Cissie, and my friend in the tan sweats is Greta. Guys, this is Owen. He’s my older brother,” Bart introduced. Owen went around the room, shaking hands. 

“Nice to meet you guys,” Owen grinned. Bart took Owen’s sleeping bag into his room, leaving Owen alone with his friends. 

“So, what’s Bart like?” Owen asked. 

“Super sweet,” Greta answered without hesitation. 

“Lovable, but he’s got a little bit of a temper when people mess with his friends,” Cissie added. 

“He’s in his head a lot, but he’s a great kid. They’re all great kids,” Roy replied. 

Lian finished drinking her smoothie before answering. “He knows all the road trip games… And he knows how to skateboard,” Lian added. Owen smiled. 

Bart’s expression dulled as he watched Owen talk to his friends. “Hey, Bart…What did you have planned for today?” Owen asked. 

“Gotta get groceries and set up the LED lights in my room,” Bart answered. 

“I’ll go with you if you’re ready to go right now,” Owen whispered. 

**

Owen popped a CD in instead of listening to the radio. “Can I ask you something? You speak Interlac, right?” Owen questioned. 

“Yeah, I do. Did Mom say something to you in Interlac?” Bart asked in reply. 

“Mhm… Here, can you read this? She sent a few pictures that weren’t in English. I was wondering if you could read them for me. She means well, but I don’t want to ask her… She might stop sending things if she thinks I don’t understand,” Owen replied as he gave Bart his phone. 

“This first picture with the lavender paper. That’s your birth certificate. You were born at two-oh-eight in the morning. April fifteenth. Nine pounds two ounces… The second picture in the photo album next to your baby picture is a note. It says, ‘I will always remember how soft he was. He will always be my baby. Mine.’ Um… Owen, are you okay?” Bart asked. Owen’s jaw was tight as he stared at the road ahead. 

“Mhm… The other two… What do the other two say?” Owen asked. 

“The third one… It’s a copy of a list for your adopted mother. Mom put your birthday down and told your adopted mother everything you liked. ‘He’s not fussy. If you put him on his tummy and rub his back, he’ll calm down. If he doesn’t eat, don’t panic. Sometimes he just wants to be held while he eats. He’s social. Talk to him. It might be confusing to him at first, but keep saying his name. Tell him you love him. I know he is heavy but he likes to be held. Even if it’s for a little while. His laugh is breathy. It isn’t asthma. If you think he’s laughing too hard and not getting enough air, cover his eyes or blow on him. Owen is a sweetheart.’ And uh… The fourth one is a letter to your adopted mother. ‘Thank you for the picture but please don’t. My heart aches for him. His absence tears at my insides. It will kill me. Please. No more pictures. I love him. I miss him. No more pictures.’ Owen—.” 

“Fuck,” Owen gasped and tears fell from his eyes. 

“It would’ve been—. I hate what the president did to our family. Owen, I—. I’m so angry that we couldn’t be together—.”

“Well, I’ve got you and Thad now. I know our family isn’t complete, but—. Bart, we have something now,” Owen interrupted as he collected himself. “I’m learning to let go of the anger for how things should’ve been. I know it’s hard, but I want you to try. I’ve only been your big brother for a little while, but you’ve gotta take my advice on this one. That anger’s a distraction. You’re never gonna be happy if you spend every day being upset at what should’ve been.” 

Bart nodded, his jaw tight and his stomach in knots as he stared out the window. A rough hand on the back of his head, startled him, pulling him back into the moment. “I thought you didn’t like me… That’s why I’ve been putting off meeting you. You seem cool, though,” Owen stated. 

“It’s nice to have an older brother. I didn’t expect you to be as big as you are,” Bart replied.

“Guess I’m your big brother,” Owen chuckled. 

“Big brother,” Bart repeated in Interlac. “I can teach you the language if you wanna learn. I taught Max a little, and he’s old.” 

Owen snorted. “How old are we talking?” Owen asked. 

“I don’t know… As far as I know, he’s been alive for everything. He’s like a million years old,” Bart joked. Owen laughed. 

**

At the end of the day, Bart went out with Owen and they sat on the beach, drinking together. “What are you doing?” Owen asked. 

“Getting crossed,” Bart answered as he pulled a plastic baggie out of his sock. Owen chuckled. 

“You do this, right? Like you’re not gonna freak out or something—?” 

“I do this,” Bart interrupted. He lit up his joint and took a hit. 

Owen took a sip of Bart’s drink. “Fuck, this is battery acid, Bart,” Owen choked. Bart took another sip of his drink. 

“This is what I usually drink,” Bart replied. Owen’s eyes widened. Silence fell between them for several minutes, and Bart took off his shoes, digging his heels into the sand. “Yup… I’m done.” Bart held the bottle to his forehead, almost falling backward as Owen supported his weight. 

“Yeah. You’re definitely done. D’you wanna go home?” Owen asked. 

“No… I miss him,” Bart mumbled as he took his phone out of his pocket. 

“Wait, hold on. Who are you calling?” Owen questioned as he grabbed Bart’s wrist.

“My boyfriend. It’s okay. He won’t be mad… I just wanna—. I’m gonna tell him goodnight,” Bart replied. Owen nodded and let go. 

Conner picked up on the first ring. “Hey, Bart. You okay?” Conner asked. 

“I miss you… I wanna say goodnight,” Bart mumbled. 

“Okay… Baby, are you drunk?” Conner asked. 

“Yeah… But I think—. Hic. I think you are the most beautiful boy in the world,” Bart replied. 

“Thanks, babe. I think you’re beautiful, too. Where are you?” Conner asked. 

“The beach… My brother is here. He’s so nice. Do you want to talk to my brother?” Bart asked. 

“I would love that,” Conner gently whispered. 

Owen took the phone, and he rustled a hand through Bart’s hair. “Yeah… No, he’s okay… I’m letting him chill for a minute until he’s ready to go home… No, we’re not driving… Yeah, he’s great. You’re his boyfriend… No, you sound like an okay guy. Take good care of my little brother… Yeah. Alright. Goodnight,” Owen replied before hanging up. 

“Hey, Bart? Ready to go?” Owen asked. Bart nodded. 

“Are you gonna visit me again after this?” Bart asked. Owen nodded as he put Bart’s shoes on and helped him up. 

“Sure… Hey, you never told me you had a boyfriend… Did you think I wouldn’t understand?” Owen asked. 

“It’s new,” Bart replied as he grabbed Owen’s arm. “Gonna fall…” 

Owen laughed, holding onto Bart. “Don’t fall. Come on,” Owen smiled. 

“Can we… Can we get boneless wings?” Bart asked. 

“Everything’s closed, Kid—.” 

“It’s late… Isn’t it?” Bart asked. 

“Yeah. It’s late. We’ll eat a big breakfast in the morning. How about that?” Owen offered. Bart chuckled. “This is a steep hill.” 

Bart laughed the entire way up, and Owen ended up carrying him the rest of the way because he started to stumble and lag behind. “Am I heavy?” Bart asked. 

“No. You’re not heavy,” Owen replied, “You know what? I had fun tonight.” 

Bart grinned. “Me too,” Bart mumbled, “I’m gonna miss you when you leave.” Bart tightened his grip.

“I’m not that far away… I’ll come back. I promise,” Owen reassured him. 

When they got to the apartment, Owen took Bart’s shoes off. Roy and Lian were long gone. Bart leaned forward, mumbling incoherently. “What’s that?” Owen asked, half-amused by his brother’s incessant rambling. 

“I wanted to go home. I wanted to go home,” Bart murmured in Interlac. 

[shadowqueen402]

Prim And Proper Origins: Part 23

Part 20 is here:

Part 21 is here:

Part 22 is here:

Time goes by for everyone. People change and things happen, regardless of whether you want them to or not. Primrose, now a fully grown adult, was well aware of this.

However, that didn't mean that she was happy. In fact, all of the anger, bitterness, jealousy, and resentment that she felt for Esme ever since high school came rushing back to her upon coming back to Scotland with Roland.

As soon as she was walking down the streets of Scotland to visit her parents, she saw them. Roy and Esme. They were casually walking in a different direction, smiles on their faces. But what infuriated her even more was when she saw the gold bands on their left ring fingers glistening in the sunlight.

Primrose remembered that day. That day where Roy anmounced his engagement to Esme. She even remembered when she tried to stop their wedding but got kicked out. Primrose hated how all of her attempts of having Roy to herself failed.

As she gazed at the happily married couple, she saw something in Esme's arms that confused her. It appeared to be…a soft pink swaddle blanket. Does this mean that they started a family? Primrose angrily thought.

Primrose's thoughts were confirmed when she took a closer look at the blanket in Esme's hand. A tiny little sleeping face was seen poking out of the blankets. Primrose wanted to scream in anger. I can't believe Roy started a family with that imperfect prostitute! I will not stand for this!

"Hey, Primrose?" Roland asked. "Are you okay? We're by your parents' shops." This snapped Primrose out of her thoughts. A fake smile appeared on her face.

"Oh, everything's fine," Primrose said to Roland. "Just had some random thoughts run through my mind. But we should go see them." She made her way to her mother's shop. Roland nodded and followed Primrose inside the shop.

During the ride home, Roy looked at his wife after stopping at a red light. "Mo leannan, I will say that I love the name you chose for our daughter," Roy said.

"Yes," Esme said. "The name Aria suits her well. I can't wait for her to meet her aunts, uncles, and grandparents. They're going to be fawning over her, that's for sure."

"Especially my brothers." Roy smiled as the light turned green and he started driving again. "Owen has dreamt of being able to teach his future niece or nephew how to fend for themselves." He let out a light-hearted chuckle. "I can pretty much see that happening someday."

"So can I." Esme smiled at the thought. "We'll give her the happiest life she could ever have." The married couple held hands with each other as they drove all the way to their new home.

If only they knew what would happen later on…

If only they had realized just how far Primrose was willing to go…

I don't own Madame Prim, Roland, or her family.

Roy, Esme, Aria, and their family belong to me.

[survivoirs]

x. @cryptidsdad

That was a lot of information to get all at once. It was also the most words that Roy had ever said, willingly, at once to him.

Robert took a moment to simply stare at the other man across from him. It was almost like he was considering something before the corner of his lips quirked up into a little smirk. "Are you actually asking for my help, Kent?" He leaned forward just a tiny bit to openly eye the other. "I would say that you should actually ask but it sounds like all that already hurt to say." Spoken like he wouldn't be the same way if the roles were reversed.

But, despite what some people may think, he was not a complete asshole. He was going to help Roy ��� Especially because he liked Phoebe, too, and knew that the other man was trying to do his best by her. "Does she like any specific flower or color? That's a good place to start. With their actual meanings, I think sunflowers or daisies would be the best choice. They typically represent admiration and bright futures. Maybe carnations but those have so many meanings so it's iffy."

It was rather comical at this point, how often Roy and Robert seemed to more or less 'hang out' or at least run into each other when they were aiming to. Roy didn't even know this guy's last name or have any way to contact him and yet it wasn't hard to check a few of the usual places depending on the time of day to figure out where Robert was probably hanging out.

Given it was still technically morning, Roy found Robert at the little café he frequented to get his caffeine fix. Before Robert and he could exchange some sort of greeting in the form of one of their silent nods (or in Roy's case, light growled nod) Kent was rambling off more words in one go that he generally ever did as soon as he'd dropped down in the chair across from the other man.

Are you actually asking for my help, Kent?

Oh boy. Roy's thick brows knit together and he growled in annoyance, or perhaps a warning not to push it. Fortunetely, for the both of them, Robert did start to be more helpful and Roy felt the anxiety loosen in his chest a bit -- only to tighten back up at the question itself.

"Well..." His mind was racing, trying to think of if Phoebe had a favourite flower or not. He listened to the few the other listed and he just wanted to scream. "Fuuuccck -- Roy hissed softly, leaning back into the chair with his arms across his chest. "She's fucking eight. Her favourite colour is probably pink --- but she also likes yellow -- and red -- and blue but more like a light blue, none of that navy crap. --- But it's not quite light blue," he muttered, tapping his fingers against his bad knee in thought before he smacked his hand on the table and pointed his finger at Robert a bit triumphantly. "Periwinkle blue to be specific. I remember her saying that before. Fucking eight and fucking Periwinkle blue, Christ." He shook his head in disbelief.