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applestorms · 1 year ago

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a few additional notes after finishing reading the book: (tbh you could probably just read this reblog if the above essay is too many words. not that this is much better, but, y'know.)

1. i've figured out that the big thing that might make aziraphale & crowley becoming fully human by the end of the series unsatisfying to me is the fact that we don't actually know what happens to humans when they die in the good omens universe (well, we can infer, but we still haven't seen it directly for heaven & have only had a few one-off jokes for hell). since so much effort has been put forth into setting up heaven & hell as these mutually horrible places filled with flawed bureaucracies, the idea that aziraphale & crowley would spend the rest of their human lives in peace on earth and then just die and get stuck in their respective nightmares anyways is incredibly unsatisfying to me. kind of a minor point that will probably get figured out fairly easily, but still significant enough to have been bothering me for a while.

2. i keep forgetting to talk about this, but w/ regards to crowley:

so my main point for section 2 of the above essay is that there are basically two different kinds of ethics/morality/whatever the fuck you wanna call it (my philosophy training is pouting at me for being so imprecise with the terminology here but this is a fucking tumblr post so suck it) in the good omens universe: Good & Evil (capitalized), which are essentially just placeholders that describe which side an action puts you in favor of Heaven or Hell, and good & evil (lowercase), the more complex realm of ethics/morality/whatever that originates from & primarily affects humanity/the lives of humans in some way.

this distinction is quite important to me, especially for aziraphale since i feel like one of aziraphale's key issues that he runs into most significantly at the end of s2e6 is his inability to separate goodness (the human kind) from Goodness (the heaven kind). one of the key things that distinguishes aziraphale & crowley from the rest of heaven & hell in my mind is the fact that they both have a much stronger sense of intuitive goodness (lowercase), which makes sense considering how much more in touch with humanity they've been.

while crowley to me seems slightly more consciously aware of this separation, i still don't think he's totally come to terms with the extent of the separation. my big guess for season 3 is that it's going to have to involve aziraphale & crowley getting in back in touch with humanity again. we can already see hints of this kind of thing at the end of season 2 with maggie & nina very bluntly saying that they can't just play around with their lives like they're meaningless dolls (or, more precisely, meaningful only in the context of this other big game between heaven & hell), and crowley is clearly listening more closely than aziraphale, but they both have a ways to go still imo.

i've said this a billion times by now but crowley is fucked up in a very legitimately traumatized sense. basically all of his reactions in the most tense moments for the last few seasons have been literal fight or flight responses- run away to alpha centauri, fuck heaven & hell, the only people we can trust are each other, aziraphale, etc. etc. etc. while crowley might be more aware of the difference between (human) goodness and (heavenly) Goodness, i still don't think he's been able to accept that he's capable of? allowed to be? an actually good person yet, regardless of the fact that we see him and aziraphale doing good (lowercase) shit in basically equal amounts, maybe even more if we account for the good deeds aziraphale does that may or may not also/instead be categorized as Good (uppercase) deeds (uh more on that later). he has a lot of lines following his good actions in season 2 where he fairly explicitly says "nuh uh no i'm not good i'm an evil wily serpent and even if you did tell people i did this they wouldn't believe you, sucker," which... may be true? or may be a leftover instinct to protect his own ass against the people constantly watching them, i'm kind of in debate with myself about what particular mental gymnastics he's looping his lil snake body through in this case.

regardless, i see a lot of hope for crowley in the ways that he can grow in both 1. his potential closer connection with humanity by the fact that he's choosing to go against both heaven & hell still- his glances at nina & maggie right before he gets in the car are still kinda up for interpretation if they're a goodbye or a promise to come back until we see the next season i guess, but i'd like to think he keeps in closer contact, if only to distinguish him from aziraphale who is definitely going to get fucked up & stuck in heaven somehow, and 2. his freedom from heaven & hell perhaps giving him some room to breathe when it comes to deciding what he wants to do for himself- personally, i think the fact that he was so (relatively) quick to take up maggie & especially nina on their advice once they started pointing out his shit to him is also evidence of the fact that he isn't feeling the constant watchful stare of heaven & hell anymore, which was a Major Factor that cannot go unforgotten as part of the reason why aziraphale & crowley weren't communicating in the first place, imho. at the very least, crowley's role throughout a lot of the story thus far has been leading aziraphale by asking him Questions that mix up his black & white Good vs. Evil instincts, so it would make sense that it might continue. also, thematically having the demon save the angel by granting him more humanity feels very on vibe with the rest of good omens, especially since we saw What Happened when the angel tried to save the demon by making him an angel again.

again though, i don't think that aziraphale is entirely wrong in this case either though. a lot of the fallout of season 2 comes from the fact that crowley kind of basically won the argument from season 1 when it comes to his judgement of heaven & hell. he's not wrong, they are both toxic as hell, but at this point running away just Is Not a happy ending for those two, not like it could be for gabriel & beelz who never had the same connection to earth or humanity in the first place. my guess is that while crowley is going to help aziraphale once again distinguish between goodness and Goodness and get back in touch with humanity again, aziraphale is going to have to help crowley see that running away and leaving heaven & hell, two incredibly powerful, reality-altering entities, in such a horrible state isn't really a great answer either. there's a quote from adam in the original book that really sums up this idea well to me:

"I don't see what's so triffic about creating people as people and then gettin' upset 'cos they act like people," said Adam severely. "Anyway, if you stopped tellin' people it's all sorted out after they're dead, they might try sorting it all out while they're alive. If I was in charge, I'd try makin' people live a lot longer, like ole Methuselah. It'd be a lot more interestin' and they might start thinkin' about the sort of things they're doing to all the enviroment and ecology, because they'll still be around in a hundred years' time."

(pg. 432)

again, this is why i (currently, at least, this could definitely change depending on how the trajectory of the show actually ends up going but it's gonna be Years and i need to get some shit out of my brain in the meantime) want a more concrete view of what shit after death actually looks like for humanity. aziraphale & crowley's main connection, the thing that binds them and separates them out from the rest of Their (respective) Kind(s), is their love of humanity- letting heaven & hell continue to stay in their current shitty state is just unacceptable if it hurts what is so clearly dear to the both of them, and that's where i think aziraphale's argument holds some weight as well.

2.1 good & evil vs. Good & Evil

minor clarification: i know i'm playing pretty fast & loose with the terminology here, but i do want to note that goodness & Goodness as i distinguish them in this context here, with the lowercase g for humanity and capital G for heaven, are not necessarily entirely separate things, and in fact are probably generally quite similar, motivating the confusion between the two that aziraphale seems to currently be struggling with at the end of s2 under my interpretation. i.e. the actions themselves might not actually be all that different, the vast majority of the time.

rather, what i'm trying to distinguish here is less between the actions themselves and more how they come to be declared as g/Good in the the first place.

essentially: an action is deemed Good in the heavenly sense if it is something that benefits heaven/is on the side of heaven, regardless of what the specific action is. spider-man helping an old, bedridden neighbor by buying her groceries for her would be considered a Good (uppercase) action not only because he's helping someone but because Helping Someone, Kindness, and Care for the Elderly are all things connected to the side of heaven- the action gets heaven points instead of hell points, so it's deemed Good. in this case however it may also be considered a good (lowercase) action, because whatever brand of human-based ethics you're using will probably deem taking care of others to be a good thing- the action itself is deemed good here, perhaps because of the effects it has if you wanna use more of a consequentialist pov here.

on the other hand, you get a lot of the moral ambiguity & ethical questions found & analyzed in good omens itself- letting adam kill all of humanity is ultimately considered a Good action if it means that it starts a war that heaven can win, even if it is absolutely not a good action in terms of how it causes all of humanity to die & suffer. this is why i say that Good & Evil in the heaven & hell sense are actually amoral, because they can entirely agree on certain actions (e.g. adam destroying the world) so long as the conclusion supports their side in some way.

actually, speaking of- aziraphale & crowley initially trying to kill adam is actually a really interesting case to me when considering everything in this context cause it shows how aziraphale & crowley are still figuring a lot of shit out when it comes to getting in touch with human lowercase good & evil. ultimately they don't end up killing adam, but that's largely because madame tracy stops them through her inability to help commit such an evil (lowercase) act, again the case of a human ethical sense winning out over the supernatural justification. aziraphale & crowley are still kind of on the same page in that they don't want to completely destroy humanity, but they haven't quite developed the same instincts perhaps, or the same hard boundaries that the humans around them have.

3. some other great quotes that i particularly liked while reading:

*Shadwell hated all Southerners and, by inference, was standing at the North pole. (pg. 218)

"It's like you said the other day," said Adam. "You grow up readin' about pirates and cowboys and spacemen and stuff, and jus' when you think the world's all full of amazin' things, they tell you it's really all dead whales and chopped-down forests and nuclear waste hangin' about for millions of years. 'Snot worth growin' up for, if you ask my opinion." (pg. 263)

"And as for that stuff about Heaven inevitably winning... Well, to be honest, if it were that cut and dried, there wouldn't be a Celestial War in the first place, would there? It's propaganda. Pure and simple. We've got no more than a fifty percent chance of coming out on top. You might just as well send money to a Satanist hotline to cover your bets, although to be frank when the fire falls and the seas of blood rise up you lot are all going to be civilian casualties either way. Between our war and your war, they're going to kill everyone and let God sort it out- right?" (Aziraphale, pg. 330)

But, to look on the bright side, all this only went to prove that evil contains the seeds of its own destruction. Right now, across the country, people who would otherwise have been made just that little bit more tense and angry by being summoned from a nice bath, or having their names mispronounced at them, were instead feeling quite untroubled and at peace with the world. As a result of Hastur's action a wave of low-grade goodness started to spread exponentially throughout the population, and millions of people who ultimately would have suffered minor bruises of the soul did not in fact do so. So that was all right. (pg. 365)

Newt did not smoke, because he did not allow nicotine or (until today) alcohol entry to the temple of his body or, more accurately, the small Welsh Methodist tin tabernacle of his body. (pg. 404)

and, of course:

Finally the guard's proving intellect found a word he thought he recognized. "What's this here," he said suspiciously, "about us got to give you faggots?" "Oh, we have to have them," said Newt. "We burn them." "Say what?" "We burn them." The guard's face broadened into a grin. And they'd told him England was soft. "Right on!" he said. (pg. 407-408)

morality in the world of good omens

so i wrote another (admittedly very messy) essay on good omens not long ago right after watching season 2 but after finishing that, rewatching all of both seasons multiple times, and reading through the book, i have a couple more distinct ideas to get out...somewhere...if only for my own sanity. this is me throwing my thoughts into the internet before i pop, if you will. just 3 sections, below the cut.

1. environment, characters, & transformative fandom creations

to start this post off a bit more broadly, i've been thinking a lot recently about transformative fandom and the reasons why we write fanfiction/create semi-original works in the first place, as well as why certain aspects of fandom (writing, art, analysis, etc.) will be more appealing to me for certain shows/series than others. correct me if you have a totally different view of this, but in my experience i've found that i tend to naturally gravitate towards different parts of fandom depending on what the original medium of the story was- podcasts tend to lead to some of the most interesting art trends, for example, since there's more room for interpretation and character design tends to be more of an ongoing community project than something set in stone like for a tv show with live human actors.

in my own observation, i've noticed that a lot of the really big & excitable fandoms, the ones that generate tons & tons of fanworks more naturally (a.k.a. just because of the story itself & not other factors like a pre-existing franchise or hype about new great gay representation, etc.) tend to surround stories that fall into a kind of "sweet spot" that makes the creation of fanworks really appealing. if you've ever wondered why there are so many ravenous artists bending over backwards to draw gorgeous fanart for stuff like homestuck or south park or even minecraft youtubers, it's likely because those stories all fall into a sweet spot for drawing, with character designs that are recognizable at a glance and yet still simple enough that there is plenty of room for personal creative touches. (think also, if you're familiar with such kinds of homestuck terms: hyperflexible mythologies, A4:1524, and/or this archive link cause the official thing is down now for some reason)

the conclusion i've come to is thus that even something as basic as the original medium of a story can dictate a lot about what kinds of fan activities are more common or popular within said story's fandom.

so, back to good omens- for me, this all relates back because of a question i've been messing with in my head recently, about why i've been less interested in fanfiction for good omens than i have been for the last few fandoms i've been, almost all of which have basically broken my ao3 bookmarks.

this question has been fucking with me for a while now, largely because i'm not entirely sure what's motivating it. a lot of times i can figure out pretty easily why i might personally not be interested in some parts of fandom, but that's not really the case here. from what i've seen this fandom seems to be pretty mixed in terms of age, & the writing that i have read is certainly no worse than i've seen elsewhere, perhaps even better in some places- and yet, i can't seem to get entirely into it, even getting frustrated as i can't find something to my tastes for an ao3 bedtime story as i've grown so accustomed. what caught me off guard is that this was an issue that i ran into while watching season 1 as well, back when the series was still quite popular but not blowing up like it is right now.

a lot of this may seem like (and likely is, at least in part) basic overthinking, but i mentioned it all here because the answer i eventually came to is reminiscent of my previous reflections above on the nature of fandom & how/why fanworks are created.

a couple paragraphs above, i used the example of art as an example of how fandoms that generate a lot of original artwork will often do the most when the original story falls into a sweet spot of character design, but notably i think that this sentiment applies to a lot more than just art. if you've ever seen the copious amounts of kpop & hockey rpf fanfiction that lives on ao3, it should be clear that this applies to writing too.

i wrote this essay a while back responding to an observation about the lack of a more extensive symbolic language in fanfiction & i've toyed around with the idea more since, particularly in considering the question of why a lot of what we see as the staples of fanfiction exist in the first place. in that post, my response largely revolved around an argument of why we create fanfiction- namely, that fanfiction is created as in tandem with deeper analysis of the original story/series, as a way of trying to practically apply character analysis to a new context.

the key part of that last sentence to me is how a lot of this revolves around character analysis (and shipping, but really it's the characters that motivate the shipping in most cases so. same difference).

i tend to instinctively separate fanfiction into two separate categories: fanfiction that is based out of the original world/canon of the story (including but not limited to fix-its, deeper analysis fics that take a scene & extrapolate from it, continuations, etc.) and fanfiction that takes the characters from the original story & plops them in an alternate universe/AU. while i separate these out as two distinct categories of fanfiction, i should also clarify that i don't think these two groups are necessarily equal in terms of number of fics- rather, the vast majority of fanfiction tends to be AUs, keeping the original characters & changing any & all aspects of the world around them. again, this may vary depending on the story & Vibe of the fandom at the time, stories like game of thrones or harry potter or homestuck might have a lot more in the canon category by nature of any major dissatisfactions the fandom has with how the original story was told, but in most cases AUs are more popular. this was a lot of the basis behind my argument that fanfiction is created as character analysis in fact, since the characters are the most important part that carries over from original story to fanwork, as well as can end up being one of the most debated/scorned parts when it comes to fandom drift (i.e. "that's out of character"/"he wouldn't do that"/and all other such arguments about fanon vs. canon characterization).

basically, my conclusion in this case was that i was a lot less interested in gomens fic largely because i have a really hard time separating the characters from the world in the case of this particular story. aziraphale & crowley being an angel & a demon and dealing with all of the bullshit of their world when it comes to heaven & hell are such integral parts of their characters in my mind that i have a much harder time getting behind AU fanfiction that plops them in a totally different context. it's just a much harder sell for keeping the characters in character for me. (i also tend to not like s2 fix-its just cause, idk they're just not my style, which is where a lot of the recent blast of energy has led us.) to clarify, this is not a judgement, just a matter of personal preference and a reflection of why, even if a lot of fandoms will look the same from the outside/involve the same things like art, fic, etc., an individual's mileage can vary wildly when it comes to how they interact with different things online.

*additional note, also for clarification: i do want to acknowledge that a lot of this depends on pure popularity as well, popular fandoms will often end up with basically everything in terms of fanworks just by nature of how many people are interacting with & thinking deeply about the story. my point here is more along the lines of the fact that even within the more well-populated fandoms, certain types of fanwork will often Stick Out more to me than others, or even be visibly much more common than in other fandoms, due largely to the original medium/structure of how the story.

so, speaking of aziraphale & crowley in more depth now- why does the world of good omens feel like such an integral part of their personalities when it comes to characterization? up next, let's talk about morality within the context of good omens' perhaps surprisingly secular take on heaven & hell.

2. the amorality of heaven & hell (ft. the crowley quote apples you know the one)

(warning in advance that this section may be a bit limited since i'm not going to get super far (or very far at all, really) into the whole religious-analysis aspect of good omens.)

i've been binge-reading the original pterry & gaiman book for good omens over the last few days and it's been very fun seeing all the slight changes between the tv show & the original. you can really see the hand of the original creators in how the tv show was translated, even just by looking at which parts made it and which parts were deemed worth cutting out. i suppose having one of the original creators right there helping build everything really helps make a book -> show translation work, since the ASOUE tv series was also pretty well received- something about knowing what's the core of the series & truly important to keep in, and having more time to tell the story itself?

anyways, i have a short list of notes that i've been taking as i read, conversations that stand out to me or footnotes that particularly amused me, but i keep coming back to one line that stood out to me quite early on. in context, this line comes from crowley during the conversation where he is first attempting to fully convince aziraphale about stopping armageddon, specifically when they're talking about exerting equal forces on warlock to make him normal:

"You're saying the child isn't evil of itself?" [Aziraphale] said slowly. "Potentially evil. Potentially good, too, I suppose. Just this huge powerful potentiality, waiting to be shaped," said Crowley. He shrugged. "Anyway, why're we talking about this good and evil? They're just names for sides. We know that."

(p. 67)

"They're just names for sides." if i had to pick one line to sum up the view on religious morality of this series, this would likely be it.

on the one hand, i tend to interpret a lot gomens' take on heaven & hell within the context of its political stance, something that is particularly obvious through a line from gabriel in s2e2 where he tries to clarify to aziraphale that heaven isn't trying to hurt job directly, but instead is just not stopping hell from doing horrible things to him. while there may be some additional nuance to add to this take within the context of british politics that i don't really know well enough to add about, i'm inclined to see this from the side of my own familiar american politics, which might hold some weight considering how long mr. gaiman's lived around here. point is, my current interpretation of that line is that it helps in more clearly establishing the analogy of heaven & hell as the story moves forward into newer seasons and thus more contemporary politics, equating heaven with mainstream liberal politics & politicians and hell with conservatives.

this stance seems to be emphasized even more in the tv show than the book which makes sense considering its been coming out more recently, and especially in season 2 which is still quite caught up in a lot of quarantine-based reflection. (the tv show puts a lot more emphasis on heaven & hell in general, actually, perhaps initially a byproduct of actually being able to see those environments in their entirety and all the angels & demons that populate them- but we'll get to that.)

the book takes a slightly different stance that, fittingly, seems more reflective of the time it came out. in particular, i was struck a lot more when reading the book by adam's rise (fall?) to power, and how much of it was motivated by a burgeoning nervousness/pessimism about climate change and the anxieties of younger generations that comes with inheriting an earth that feels so fucked up. honestly if anything it's only gotten more relevant in that respect, what with the current vibe on the internet & the hopelessness of the doomer gen z gang, but it also has a distinctly different flavor to me from the tv show, which i think is largely because it's less connected to Formal politics since again we see a whole lot less of heaven & hell as such distinct, bureaucratic entities.

instead, there is a very distinctly amoral aspect to heaven & hell that we get through lines like the one above and especially from characters like crowley. this is why i argue that good omens, despite having so many religious elements, is such a deeply secular take, especially when it comes to its ethics & morality- Good and Evil, notably with the capital letters in this case, has very little to do with actual actions and much more to do with the name that you stamp on top of said actions. heaven & hell and the angels & demons that we see directing and watching and generally fucking with aziraphale & crowley throughout the story are distinctly separate from humanity, and as we see even more as the story progresses, distinctly unaware about what it even means to be a human, in both a deeper philosophical & very basic and literal sense. Good and Evil is simply another name for the sides- and thus the true ethics is something separate, and based in a deeply human experience.

in my opinion this is also why aziraphale & crowley, lovers of humanity and also to some degree spokespersons of it from how much they've "gone native," tend to be so deeply at odds with both heaven & hell and always end up agreeing with each other over their own supposed sides. what makes aziraphale & crowley so distinctly different is that they ascribe to the same ethics & morality that humanity does, or at the very least are trying to figure out ethics & morality & How to Be a Good Person in the same horribly messy way that humans do, separating them from the black & white "this side Good & this side Bad," logic that the rest of heaven & hell instinctively ascribe to.

there's a lot of nuance here, which is also why i think there is such an emphasis on moral ambiguity (and love, but we'll get to that) throughout season 2. the story of job, grave robbing, & questionable attempts at matchmaking- aziraphale is working through a lot of Shit right now when it comes to trying to figure out what the Good thing actually fucking is, and i think it's key that a lot of that is motivated by crowley himself. crowley might'e been cast out of heaven for asking too many questions, but aziraphale is there & listening to them & giving them the serious thought they deserve, and that can't be overlooked.

sidenote: i couldn't figure out a place to shove this in, but i also wanna point out that a lot of this is tied to the idea of growing over time too. on the same page as the quote transcribed above is another line from crowley leading up to aziraphale's question that puts a lot of emphasis on the fact that warlock is going to be a product of nurture, not nature. again, this is an argument against basic black & white assigned-at-birth morality for the ability of humans to grow & change over time and be influenced by the people around them.

it's notable that despite adam's supposed origin as a Son of Satan, what really gets him to stop the apocalypse in the end is the fact that he doesn't really give a shit about all this big plans but instead just wants to hang around his friends. there's a lot of emphasis in the book placed on how beautiful & nice tadfield is as a place for a young kid to grow up, how well loved & fiercely protected it as as something beloved to adam. while he might be overwhelmed when faced with the full picture of how horrible the world can be, ultimately what he cares about is loving & taking care of the people & places that he grew up learning were precious, and the only way to do that is to keep growing & changing yourself within that world and trying to help it also grow into something better, not throw it all away just for the slightest chance that you could restart. a message worth taking the time to think about, at the absolute very least.

3. finding morality w/in humanity: crowley & aziraphale and speculation for s3

i have complicated feelings about both aziraphale & crowley throughout a lot of the show and especially in season 2. i think a lot of people, myself included, are inclined to see crowley as the voice of reason in this season, and for good reason- as i mentioned before, a lot of aziraphale's deeper questioning of the status quo and goodness (Goodness) as a whole is motivated by questions from crowley.

i kiiind of mentioned this in my previous essay, but to state it more clearly, my take on crowley is that he's arriving at the right answer for the wrong reasons, and, conversely, aziraphale is arriving at the wrong answer for... kind of also the wrong reasons but also slightly for the right reasons. let me explain.

crowley is clearly much more aware of the flaws in both heaven & hell than aziraphale is, which seems to be the basis behind a lot of his motivation in asking aziraphale so many questions in the first place. he's also, as maggie & nina point out in s2e6, deeply lonely, often running away or getting ready to fight literally anyone that isn't aziraphale (or humans, but that's a little more complicated). from his reaction to beelz & gabriel getting together, i think it's pretty clear that he still hasn't entirely given up on the whole alpha centauri idea, and it makes sense- as i said in that last essay, crowley basically won the argument at the end of the previous season when it comes to aziraphale & crowley, "making [their] own side," so he doesn't have much reason to face any of his personal fears until maggie & nina basically point out that they exist directly to his face. once they do point it out, however, he's very motivated to act & does so almost immediately, even after hearing what aziraphale has to tell him and being pretty thoroughly devastated by it.

my point here is that crowley is correct in seeing the toxicity of both heaven & hell, he's just flawed and largely motivated by fear (up for debate if that's all it is, but i certainly think it's a big part of it) in his desire to run away from it all. it's not quite armageddon, again he's going more flight > fight here, but he's still ultimately giving up and that's not a great conclusion.

on the other hand, as some others on this site have pointed out, aziraphale is certainly showing a lot of strength in his willingness to keep fighting & try to change things for the better, but it's not hard to see how that belief has been twisted. one of aziraphale's biggest flaw in motivation at this point imo is that he doesn't just believe in goodness but Goodness, the kind that's tied to heaven always being right & all actions being morally Good so long as they're done under the name of heaven, and that clearly also isn't great.

thus what i think the both of these two really need ultimately is that deeper connection to humanity, and the ethics born from humans interacting with humans. we can already see how strong these two are when they collaborate, even when they're doing their absolute best to be as subtle as possible, but what i think they need is to once again be grounded by humanity, not to get so caught up in the bullshittery of heaven & hell and Good & Evil, but once again find a goodness defined by the world that they mutually love so much and stick with it.

i keep tossing a question around in my head about whether or not aziraphale & crowley are going to end up human by the end of this series. it feels natural that they would, they're already so at home and in love with earth & around humanity, but i'm also not entirely sure if that would be a happy ending for them considering how long they've watched & loved the world as it's changed. perhaps taking this post into account is another push towards humanity as a happy ending, not running away to a cottage to get away from the world (i just can't see running away to a cottage to be together as as happy ending, sorry- it might work for beelz & gabriel but not for aziraphale & crowley), but choosing to settle down within that world that is so dear.

#gomens #good omens #astronaut rambles #just a few additional notes yeah idk why i always lie to myself about writing succinctly #this reblog is messier but also gets at some of my ideas better so there's your trade-off #i'll probably read this over again the morning but it's late now and i really should've been in bed like an hour ago so. posting anyway #brain just kept chugging though #when i start literally pacing back & forth rambling to myself about shit like this is when i know i *have* to start writing some stuff down #good omens meta #again this has the limitation of me not knowing my Religon Lore #sorry again for practically sleeping through sunday school #hopefully i kept the focus enough on good omens itself that this doesn’t feel like a Read on ethics in the bible or something #cause that is not a topic i’m prepared to talk about in depth #if my father’s ranting about interpretations of job following our watching of that episode in season 2 tells me anything #also sorry if it feels repetitive to say (lowercase) and (uppercase) all the time i wasn't sure how the good/Good distinction would work-#-if you're using something like a screenreader

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yourstru1y4ever · 4 months ago

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Day 19 - "I'll always be there for you."

Pairing: Kento Nanami x Reader Word Count: 504 Content: Hurt/Comfort Tuna-Tober 2024 Masterlist <- check out the other fics posted this month!

A/N: Who said I could write for Nanami instead of Gojo?? No one?! Oh wait, I did hehe. My first Nanami fic lads; I do apologize for the abrupt ending! If you enjoyed please be sure to like, reblog and comment if you wanna see more!! - YoursTruly

Time seems to tick by slowly as you watch the news on the TV. He should be home by now, you think. You stand up and walk over to the kitchen, the food already cold on the stovetop. He told you about a mission that he was going on with one of the first year students, still it wasn’t like him to not tell you where he was.

You sigh, grabbing some containers to put the leftovers in. You should’ve expected him home late, but something feels off.

As you put the leftovers in the fridge you hear the front door opening and you smile with relief. “Kento welcome-” you stop and take him in. His coat and tie were off, and the right side of his shirt was covered in blood.

“What-?” You step closer to him, reaching a hand out. He takes your hand and kisses the inside of your palm.

“An unregistered curse,” He mumbles into your palm and he looks at you. “Ieiri took care of me, I’m alright Darling.”

You sigh, his explanation doesn’t stop your concern. “Special grade?”

Nanami nods, “Most likely.”

You hum and turn away from him, “Thank god for Shoko.” You walk back into the kitchen.

“The injury wasn’t anything serious,” He follows you and you avoid his gaze.

“That’s good,”

“Darling?”

“Dinner’s in the fridge, I need to-” You breathe, “I need to shower and get to bed. I have a mission in the morning.”

Nanami gently grabs your arm to stop you, “What’s wrong?”

“It’s nothing,”

“It’s obviously not nothing if you don’t want to eat dinner with me.”

“I already ate.” You lie.

Nanami takes your hand in his and pulls you towards him, “What is it?”

You look down to avoid his gaze but he tilts your chin so that you can meet his gaze. His eyebrows furrow, like he’s trying to read your mind. You close your eyes and look to the side.

“This always happens when you get injured from missions. You rarely call me when something happens and you always come home healed hours after you are supposed to come home. You never tell me what actually happened.”

“But I told you, it was an unregistered curse.”

“But that’s all I get. Not how it happened or anything like that.” You look up at him, “You’re always there for me Kento, and I want you to know that I’ll always be there for you too. You can rely on me too, I’m always here.”

Nanami brings his hand up to caress your cheek, brushing away any stray tears falling from your face.

“I’m sorry Darling, I didn’t want to worry you.”

“I’m always worried Kento, like you are for me when I go on missions.”

He brings his forehead down to yours, sighing, “I’ll tell you about what happened during dinner, please eat with me. I was looking forward to it all evening.”

“Okay,” You lean onto him and he gives you a chaste kiss on your forehead.

#tuna tober 2024 #kento nanami x reader #nanami x reader #nanami x you #jujutsu kaisen x reader #nanami fluff #nanami kento #kento nanami #jjk x you #jjk fanfic #jjk x reader

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sillyromance · 3 months ago

Text

Since I’m not a minor anymore, I guess I must renovate my introduction post. So, here we go!

Good day everyone! You can call me Triana, I’m 18 years old – and this is my non-sexual vore blog, although I can post non-vore content here as well.

I post different kinds of vore from safe to fatal, yet I write and draw only oral – no exceptions. Also, I hardly ever make cruel preds the main characters of my stories for personal reasons. If these criterias go along with your preferences, then you will be always welcomed here!

As for my DNI, I wouldn’t like to interact with:

- Weight gain/ food fetish community blogs.

- Exclusively gore blogs

- Exclusively sexual/kink blogs

Don’t get me wrong – I’m not against people who run such blogs. The only people I hate are those who commit crimes against love, kindness and humanity – any others are free to come!

Yet, if you're a NSFW/kink blog, remember: you can like, but please - don't reblog my works or follow me (those who had reblogged something before this rule occurred, you can keep the old reblogs, but no new ones, please)

If my personal boundaries are not respected, only then I will block.

I’d like to state that I’m not against minors in the community and they can visit my blog. However, I will always write warnings in heads of my posts if they include adult topics (explicit descriptions of physical traumas, for instance), so children and teens can stay away from it.

Also, I don't roleplay (at least, for now), and, as a shy and cautious person, I'm really suspicious about receiving messages. If you wish to chat with me, please, leave a short description of who you are and what exactly you'd like to talk about - I'll hardly answer you otherwise. ❗Forbidden topics: politics, religion, sexual preferences (everything connected with sex really)❗(they produce conflicts which I would NOT like to participate in). If I feel in danger chatting with you, I'll stop the communication and block! Sorry, but, unfortunately, it's very easy to get in a trap on the Internet nowadays...

Thank you for reading this until the end! Have a nice day and take care!

Master list:

Animations:

Optimus Prime vore animation

Non-vore animation Nyx x Dooku

Original characters’ backstories:

Sara Branton (TFP)

Alexa Branton and Sacura (TFP)

Nyx de Serenno (SW)

Sara Branton:

Ratchet and Sara (pictures)

Late at night (a comic)

Healing fueltank (a picture)

Alexa Branton:

Happy Valentine’s day (a picture)

Comfort (a comic)

To end this (a story)

Sacura

Trust (a story)

Butterflies in a stomach (a picture)

Please, hide me (a picture)

Portrait/ Sacura and Drift (pictures)

Nyx:

The best (a story)

Les miserables (a story)

Non vore animation Nyx x Dooku

I have never seen my master that angry... (a story)

The ignition of love (a picture)

Solitude (a picture)

Funny doodles

The glasses (a comic)

Vore prompts:

TFP: Optimus, Ratchet, Ultra-Magnus; TFE: Megatron, Bumblebee

TFP: Wheeljack; TFE: Starscream; TF RID: Drift

TFE Megatron (additional)

TFE Arcee

TFP Knockout

Flamewar

Aggressive affection

Stories (mostly a character x human!reader):

TFP:

You’ll be ready (TFP Shockwave)

*** (TFP Optimus)

The way to sort out problems (TFP Breakdown)

Homesickness (TFP Starscream)

TFE:

Once in the morning… (TFE Bumblebee)

Rescue Bots:

A giant space monster (Rescue Bots Blades)

The deal (Rescue Bots Heatwave)

G1:

Not alone (G1 Sunstreaker)

G1 Soundwave x female human!partner

Bayverse:

War and peace (Bayverse Ironhide)

Star Wars:

Light in the dark (SW Darth Vader)

Alice: Through the looking glass:

A deeper meaning (Alice: through the looking glass Time x OC)

Thoughts, talks, sketches:

Prey wakes up in an unknown stomach

Sympathetic Victorian-era vampire (Halloween thoughts)

Two knights

A king and a princess

A sad ghost

A “stalked” prey

A pred swallows their prey’s arm

“If you want to die, then let me be your grave”

Digestion (prey pov)

Dying prey/doctor pred

Draw 6 Predcrushes challenge

The first time (switch pov)

A pred decides not to hurt a prey, though they intended to before

Personal reason why I like willing fatal vore

Abused prey

Offering yourself to a pred

Introducing my self-sona.

Merger

Digestion (sick prey)

Aristocratic preds

Ask game answer 5

Ask game answer 4

Aske game answer 3

Ask game answer 2

Ask game answer 1

My first ask game

Transformers shows I’m familiar with

A pred and a prey who care about each other more than about themselves

Vore: a metaphor for reality

Gentleman preds (Dr Watson)

Scars on a pred’s stomach walls

The very first vore story

#safe vore #soft vore #extreme cuddling #sfw vore #vorefixation #swwh #nonsexual vore #vore blog #intro post

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iliveforyouilongforyouvesuvia · 2 years ago

Note

How would the M6 react to MC being drunk in front of them for the first time? The kind of drunk that changes MC's demeanor, and now they're all giggly and reckless

The Arcana HCs: M6 reacting to a drunk MC

~ I love this request. Also I know some of you are going to read this and wonder what the M6 are like when they get drunk, which is why I'll be reblogging the original creator's response to that question right after I post this! Love you guys - brainrot ~

- to set the scene-

It has been a very, very long Friday and you have never been more ready for the weekend. Unfortunately, by the time you make it back to your living space, you find a little note from your beloved apologizing because they're going to be back later than expected. You sigh, drop your bag onto the table, kick off your shoes and lean back to relax. You had picked up some spiked lemonade on your way back to try with them, but you figure a glass ahead of time wouldn't be too bad. You take a sip and are immediately disappointed by how little alcohol you can taste.

Half an hour and two large glasses later you can feel your head beginning to swim. Surely you aren't drunk, that stuff has next to nothing in it - until you check the label attached to the back and your eyes grow wide at the numbers you read. Just as the humor sets in and you begin to giggle you hear the door open.

"MC? I'm sorry I'm late ..."

Julian

Did he expect to come home to a drunk and giggling MC? No. Is he mad about it? Also no

He can't help it, the first thing he's trying to do is evaluate you. How drunk are you? Will he also be having a few drinks tonight or is he going to be staying sober so you can let loose?

He watches as you follow Malak around the house, trying to mimic his hoarse cawing

Water it is

Come to think of it, this is a fantastic chance to display his theatrical talents. He's always had a knack for comedy

You make one of the best audiences he's had in years. Even the jokes he doesn't deliver as well as he wants to are met with uncontrollable laughter

Will absolutely act out a comedy sketch in one of his stolen wigs, the plot getting increasingly ridiculous as he gets swept away in the moment

Will die of shame the next morning when you start quoting his amphibian-inspired Romeo and Juliette improv around the house:

"Forgive me, father frog, I got the warts from the toad. But how was I to resist him? His croaking was so passionate -"

Asra

When they opened the door and heard your giggles they knew it was a good night

And then he rounded the corner and saw your flushed face and lidded eyes and dopey smile and knew that you were apparently having a really good night

They're just pulling out a chair to pour themselves a drink too when they feel a draft and look up in time to see you marching out the back door

Now he's giggling as he jogs to catch up with you, wondering where on earth drunk you has decided to go at this time of night

The docks, apparently. Their story about Faust in the palace garden maze has inspired you to try the same thing

In the middle of the night

While you are not as sober as you should be to practice life-preserving magic

The problem is that Asra is your best/worst enabler, so if trespassing on the ships to jump off of their masts is what you want to do, then that's what the two of you are doing

Three, if you count Faust

You are absolutely going to get nauseated from all the floating and puke all over him

They had it coming for enabling you, but what they didn't see coming was you pulling them into the ocean for an impromptu bath

Nadia

She's never seen you so drunk before, normally when you drink with her it's at big dinners so you don't even get tipsy

She's wavering on how to respond. Should she partake in whatever delightful brew you've apparently smuggled into the palace?

Or should she dedicate herself to taking care of you instead?

Oh but now you're giggling and collapsing into her lap, asking her about her day -

She's telling you about this one meeting with a certain courtier and now you're interrupting her, arms flung wide as you go on a drunken rant about them

Well. She knew you tended to filter your thoughts in the palace, but she had no idea your opinions were this colorful. Or hilariously stated

Now she's reaching for the bottle of spiked lemonade and pouring you another glass. What other amusing judgments have you been hiding?

Muriel

Will spend the evening taking the most excellent care of you while she prompts you for more rants

Here, lie down in her lap, drink some water, let her give you a massage, and tell her more about your thoughts on the chamberlain's most recent outfit decision, and how it resembled a stoned flamingo

Happy to hear that you're happy, but a little unsure of how to proceed

Were you planning on getting drunk? Did something happen to make you want to get drunk?

Oh, the lemonade was stronger than expected? Ok

Wait no stop trying to climb him. He's not a tree. You're going to bump your head

Oh, now you're wondering outside and loudly singing. And Inanna's going with you because she thinks it's hilarious

He's enjoying this uninhibited side of you but he's concerned for your safety

And for the safety of all the natural wildlife that may encounter you in this state

Wait no don't climb that tree

When did you get so good at climbing trees? He's never even seen you try by yourself before and now you're a good twenty feet up???

Does he climb up after you? How will he convince you to come back down?

"... MC? If you come down, I'll cuddle you."

A moment of silence. Did it work?

All he hears is a faint "catch meee ..." from high above his head before you come hurtling down through the branches

He doesn't know how he survived all the heart attacks you gave him that night

Portia

Immediately inspecting whatever it is that got you so happy. She wants in on your secrets

Spiked lemonade? From that market stall? Haha, no wonder you're plastered

She'll have a little bit, but what she really wants to know is if you'll hear out her crazy ideas for your magic abilities

"MC? Is it possible to do magic while you're drunk?"

She's met with a lopsided grin and an unsteady flash of the funniest looking sparkles she's ever seen

Were those supposed to be ... in the shape of Pepi? Or a sea monster?

Oh, this is going to be so much fun

Takes you out into the garden because she needs to know if Cinderella's pumpkin coach can actually happen (one of her guilty reading pleasures)

You come up with some abomination consisting of several squash, a whole mess of vines, and one terrified rat

The two of you end up going on a joyride through the fields behind the palace, lurching violently in all directions

There is now a rumor of the menacing giggling cryptid that wanders through the fields at dusk, scattering chunks of ravaged gourd

Lucio

Party time? Party time!!

Already loudly praising your drinking habits as he starts gulping straight from the bottle

Maybe he would savor it normally, but you started without him so now he needs to catch up

He makes the same mistake you did, of not reading the label and assuming it was weak, and the bottle is empty in minutes

"You know MC, I'm kinda surprised something that weak got you that smashed ohhhhh wait a minute -"

He just stood up and is now swaying in place, startled by the headrush

And then he hears you snorting with laughter at yourself as you try to tell the worst dad joke he's ever heard

Normally at this point he'd be caught up in the frenzy of an out of control party, what's he supposed to do when it's just the two of you?

Except you told the punchline first, and then the beginning, but now you're kind of backtracking through the middle, and you're breathless with giggles, and he's laughing too

That's it, that's how the rest of the night goes, ruining all of your favorite jokes and laughing until you're nauseated and his mascara is streaming down his cheeks

#ask arcana brainrot #the arcana headcanons #the arcana hc #the arcana #asra the arcana #julian the arcana #nadia the arcana #muriel the arcana #portia the arcana #lucio the arcana #the arcana game #the arcana shitpost #the arcana fluff #asra alnazar #julian devorak #nadia satrinava #muriel of the kokhuri #portia devorak #lucio morgasson

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anakin-pilled · 1 year ago

Text

𝘨𝘰𝘳𝘨𝘦𝘰𝘶𝘴 - anakin skywalker x fem! reader (part three)

pairing: anakin skywalker x fem! reader

wordcount: 9.4k

warnings: no use of y/n, mentions of EDs, body dysmorphia/body issues, fainting, mistreatment, hospitalization, crying, reader being emotional, anakin being a reckless driver, half proofread bc i got lazy (will probably edit another day, its late af as im posting this)

rating: 18+

author's note: hi, i'm so sorry for the delay on chapter three! life got really busy and i found myself not having enough time to write, but now life has settled and i finally had enough time and inspo to finish this chapter. i literally forced myself to stay home this weekend and finish this chapter bc i'll be traveling this week and won't have time to write. i hope i made up for it by making this chapter longer than usual!! let me know if u have any questions or comments. reblogs, comments, and likes are greatly appreciated xx

creds to saradika for the divider!

You originally had no plans this weekend, but after much persuasion from one of your closest friends, you decided to attend some party that a friend of a friend was hosting. It was better than being locked up in your apartment all weekend, letting the thoughts of Anakin consume your mind and slowly pick away at your sanity. After all, it gave you the chance to dress up prettily, consume free hooch, and maybe find someone to get under and help you get over Anakin.

The water in your porcelain sonic tub was doused in a fragrant Crimson Jelly Spire oil and mixed with the fragile petals of a Jasmine flower. The combination of spice and sweetness left your skin refreshed and smelling good. The midday light of Corscant filtered through the windows and cast the nearly all-ivory refresher in an ethereal lighting. The water swished around you as you hugged your knees to your chest and laid the side of your cheek on top of them. You trained your eyes on the refresher’s ceilings before blowing a loose piece of hair out of your face. You ran this bath about an hour ago, but you had yet to get up because your mind was occupied by him. Staying away from Anakin was harder than you anticipated. Your mind recalled, for about the hundredth time today, two instances that happened over the last few rotations.

The first instance with Anakin left you unnerved and unconfident in your self-proclamation to stay away from him.

The benefit concert was only a few rotations away now, so you started practicing. Even though you were only performing songs that you already performed and rehearsed before, it still didn’t hurt to practice even more. This was going to be broadcast across the Republic, so you had to be perfect.

You holed yourself up in your practice room for the majority of the day. The only time you saw Anakin was in the morning when your protocol droid prepared breakfast. You told Anakin that you would be practicing with your team of dancers for the day, so there was no need for him to stay with you all day. You encouraged him to take the day off and reassured him that your practice suite was located in a safe building with 24/7 security watch. Anakin insisted that he at least drop you off. He could take the time to stop by the Temple and check in on Ahsoka’s training.

That was hours ago. It was nearing your twelfth hour of continuous practice and you were exhausted, to say the least. Your vocal cords felt raw from the amount of singing you did today, and the legs in your muscles were spasming from the constant repetition of your dancing. You dismissed your team members around two hours ago, you didn’t think they should be subjected to your perfectionist tendencies. One of them, a Pantoran girl named Chione, voiced her concern for you. Chione was one of your oldest dancers, she joined your team during your first mini-tour around a few Core planets and has never left your team since. You considered her one of your closest friends.

“Are you positive that you’re okay to practice on your own? You’ve barely had any food today. I don’t want you fainting with no one to help,” voiced Chione in a dulcet tone. She was always looking out for your well-being, especially because she knew how hard you could be on yourself. Chione was a source of bright life in your life and one of the most genuine people you’ve ever known.

“I’ll be fine, Chione. I had a heavy breakfast, and I’ve made sure to eat energy pudding bars and stay hydrated during our breaks,” you reassured your friend. She looked unconvinced, but you rushed her out of the room with a kiss on her cheek and a promise to send her a message once you arrived home.

Now that you had the studio to yourself, you decided to go through a few more drills and focus on the routines that you struggled with the most. You weren’t always a perfectionist. Back when you lived on Bar’leth, you were neither the smartest student in your grade nor the dumbest student–you were perfectly average. You didn’t feel the need to engage in your classmates’ cutthroat competition or push yourself more than you required. Even when it came to your musical prowess, you sang and studied instruments because you enjoyed it and it brought you happiness. If you were stuck on learning a certain composition or hitting the right note, you would always put in your best effort, but you never lost any sleep over it. You knew that if you were to put pressure on yourself, it would take the enjoyment away. Music was yours, without any strings, expectations, or attachments to soil your relationship with it.

That swiftly changed once you were signed a record deal with one of Coruscant’s most famous record labels, Interstellar Records. You didn’t even know it was possible to become famous at the intergalactic level. Most of the artists you listened to on Bar’leth were artists from your planet. The galaxy’s population is enormous–Coruscant alone has around three trillion people! You never imagined that your name would known anywhere besides Bar’leth. Yet, luck seemed to be on your side on that one fateful day.

The story of how you were discovered is quite simple. Your school hosted an annual festival for the anniversary of the formation of Bar’leth’s government. It’s a joyous holiday where students are encouraged to promote Bar’leth’s culture through food, traditional customs, and performances. Families and regular citizens flock to the school to join and watch the students at the festival. It’s a day you look forward to every year. Each class section is assigned to a particular event. The graduating class of that year is always assigned to open the festival with a choir rendition of Bar’leth’s national anthem. You were asked to lead the choir since the music instructor knew of your talent, which meant that you would be the main singer. Little did you know that one of the executives from Interstellar Records was at the school festival. One of his nephews attended your school, so that was his reason for being there. As soon as you got off the stage and the festivities started, you were immediately pulled to the side by your school’s headmaster who introduced you to the executive. He spoke to you about your talent, and how he believed that you could make something of yourself with proper training and a recording label to manage you.

That was five years ago, and a lot has changed since then. After finishing your last year of government-mandated education, you moved to Coruscant and began your career as a professional artist. Life suddenly flipped. Your upbringing on Bar’leth was humble. You came from a decent, middle-class family and lived in a standard home. Suddenly, you lived in a fancy Coruscant apartment with the former senator Sheev Palpatine, and you were always surrounded by a team of managers who dictated your schedule from morning to night. You were given vocal training, attended dance classes, and sat through etiquette and media training courses all while trying to produce your debut record. The first year of your career was marked by sleepless nights due to the sheer amount of activities on your daily agenda. Many times throughout the first year, you debated if this was a smart decision.

You continuously pushed yourself through it because dreams weren’t achieved by themselves. You had to work to make your dreams come true. This was just part of the process. At least that’s what you said to reason with your inner self to avoid any feelings of regret and anxiety. Yet, throughout that first year, you were also exposed to a darker side of the industry that you weren’t equipped to handle as a barely legal adult. When you signed that contract with the label, you also signed away any right to individuality and personal autonomy.

You had a certain image to uphold as a public figure and this image was controlled entirely by your label. You were like clay that they could bend at their will–constantly being prodded and

molded until you were nothing short of perfection. Your clothes were preselected each day, hair was only done in styles the label wanted, and pre-answered scripts were given for interviews. Worst of all, even your diet was dictated by the label. How much you ate, what you ate, and even when you ate was all at the discretion of the executives. They even went so far as to weigh you weekly to make sure you were staying on top of your weight. If you weren’t at their goal weight, they subjected you to intense periods of exercise. It was an abusive cycle that fundamentally altered your self-esteem. Slowly, you became a shell of the person you once were. You didn’t find enjoyment in your career anymore, something you were once so passionate and excited about. The harsh regime of your management extinguished that flame. All that mattered to you was if you were meeting your label’s expectations. You were consumed by the weight of their expectations. You drowned under their judgment, and each criticism was like a blaster shot straight to your heart. The executives weren’t satisfied no matter what you did. Practice hours went from a few hours of your day to half of your day. You slowly cut contact with your friends from home and lied to your family when they asked how you were doing. You couldn’t bear to tell them the truth. You were miserable.

Eventually, the constant overwork and abuse by the label became too much for your body to handle and one day you fainted in the middle of practice. The medic at the medcenter informed you that your body shut due to exhaustion and malnutrition. Due to you being one year away from being a legal adult by the Republic’s standards, the medic was forced to report this incident to the authorities. Holonet tabloids somehow got a hold of this information and leaked it on their celebrity gossip pages. This prompted an investigation from the Intergalactic Federation of Musicians, the trade guild dedicated to musicians, performers, and songwriters, who determined that your label was not properly upholding their side of the contract. The IFM fined Interstellar Records and voided your contract, which left you free and away from their abuse.

It took you a few months to recover from the whole incident. The best course of action was to move back to Bar’leth while you healed. Your career didn’t stop there, however. Right before the situation, your debut album was released. Hence, you were practicing for upcoming promotions the label scheduled you for. The release of your debut album was quiet–until your face ended up on the Holonet’s hot spot after the initial news broke. The people of Coruscant, and even some people from neighboring planets, pitied you. You never intended for anything to be this way, but the story that the tabloids ran against you worked in your favor. You, a young fresh-faced, and doe-eyed girl from a smaller Core planet, were a victim of the cruel entertainment industry. Everyone blamed the label, rightfully so, but the amount of support and influx of love from Coruscant’s citizens catapulted you into fame and stardom. The public wanted to see you win (until they didn’t). Other recording labels were knocking at your door, trying to get you to sign with their company You were hesitant, not wanting to experience the same trauma. Senator Palpatine offered his help in negotiating the contract bids as an apology for not noticing what you were going through before. After all, you were still living with him while you were still signed to Interstellar. You didn’t blame him as you hid your problems well. Regardless, it all worked out in the end as you were signed to a new label, under terms and conditions you saw fit. Four years have passed since you signed onto Nebula Music Group. Your fame instantaneously increased after signing with them. Gido was assigned your new manager, and you were extremely thankful for him because he played a major role in ensuring you were properly treated and supported by the label. Nebula Music Group had more trust and faith in you than Interstellar, so they allowed you more authority and creative liberties in the music-making process. Because of this, you could produce authentic, critically acclaimed, popular albums. Your last album, Last Words of a Shooting Star, broke a record with the highest sales of sound slugs in history for a female artist. You did mini tours around the inner and mid-Core planets. Despite your initial hardships, life was turning out better than you envisioned. You had a second chance at your dream. You liked to consider yourself fully healed from the situation, but that was far from the truth.

Take now for example.

In moments like this, when it’s only yourself and the mirror, your mind can’t help but flashback to the horrible treatment you suffered at the hands of those people. You know that no matter how much therapy or how far removed from the situation you were, a part of you was still stuck in the past.

Chione was right to be concerned. This wasn’t the first time you stayed behind and continued practicing on your own, often to the point of exhaustion and breaking down. She’s caught you in these moments before, where you were so focused on perfection that you failed to take care of yourself properly—staying dehydrated, skipping meals, and not sleeping just so you could devote more time to practice. You would gladly damage yourself for it. You couldn’t help it. Insecurity was embedded in your bones. You knew that as a young female in the industry, you had a short shelf life (or at least that’s what your previous label hammered into your brain). Once the industry deemed you expired, you would be nothing. Thus, you needed to be so perfect, that even past your expiration date, people would still want you. You were nothing without desirability.

You looked at yourself with hard eyes in the mirror. Your eyes landed on the deep, heavy-set eye bags under your eyes. A scowl appeared on your face. You then moved your eyes to your arms, which never seemed skinny enough for you. A knot formed in your throat. Lastly, you laid your eyes upon your stomach. No matter how many meals you skipped, what diet fads you went on, or what food you prematurely threw away to avoid finishing, your stomach never looked the way you wanted. A sigh escaped your throat.

It was futile to worry about these things now. At a time so late in the day, nothing good would come of it. You inhaled and exhaled breathing as if you were absorbing and releasing all of your previous negative energy. Putting on a fake smile that didn’t reach your eyes, you gave yourself one last look before continuing to practice.

The song you were currently dancing to belonged to the glimmick genre–a genre of music that was associated with frenzied sounds and rapid beats. As an artist, you were most comfortable with the sparkle-bop and pop genres. That was your domain, and it was the genre that made you famous. However, you wanted you wanted to experiment on your recent album to get out of your artistic comfort zone and reach a wider audience, so you included songs of different genres, with glimmick being one of them. Due to the nature of the glimmick genre, your song “Atom of the Pneuma,” required an intricate, fast-paced dance with movements that you were not familiar with. The choreography for this dance was sharp and pristine, contorting and bending your body to resemble straight, angular lines. Most of your choreography featured lighter dance moves, with flowy movement and softer forms. It was the reason you stayed later than the rest of your team–you wanted to hone on this particular routine before the benefit concert.

Your legs were bent, hands placed on top of your thighs as you caught your breath and prepared to replay the song just a few more times before calling ending the day. You got into position. The song started and filled the room with a pounding, rich techno bass that bounced off the walls. You began to move your body to the beat while your right arm was simultaneously moving it to create a pattern that extended from your body outward. Your head followed the beat as well, which left you slightly dizzy. You learned to block out any negative sensations when dancing, a practice you learned from the days when you danced on little sleep and little food. The unpleasant sensation went ignored until you spun your body around and lost your balance resulting in an unceremonious fall toward the hard wooden floor. You placed your arms to cushion your fall out of reflex, but the fall never came. A pair of large, calloused hands were placed on your waist, holding you steady. The hands gently guided you toward the floor, forcing you to sit.

You raised your face toward the ceiling, trying to see who it was that miraculously saved you from your fall. The bright lights of the practice room invaded your eyesight and you could only make out the fuzzy outline of the person. Tiny, black dots swirled your vision as you tried to regain your composure. The feeling was overwhelming. You could feel your breath quicken as you tried to calm yourself. This wasn’t the first time you have fainted from overdoing it, but it was never any easier each time. You hated the feeling, you hated the coldness that washed over your body, you hated how your vision failed you, and you hated the dull panging inside your head.

You shut your eyes, barely focusing on the person next to you. Your nails dug into your palm, the pain distracting you from the uncomfortable feeling and forcing you back into the present. After a few more moments, you opened your eyes again and turned your vision to the only other figure in the room. You could feel the warmth of their body next to yours–the warmth overpowering the previous coldness your body felt.

“Anakin,” you whispered.

“You okay there, pop star?” Anakin softly replied. “You almost took a nasty fall, you could have sprained your wrist or hurt your head. We wouldn’t want that before the big day, now would we?”

His brown curls gently caressed his face as he looked down at you. He was kneeling over you, eyes scanning over your body to make sure you were okay. You didn’t even hear him enter. How did he get inside? Access to this room was only allowed by people with logged fingerprints and/or other DNA indicators.

“Just give me a minute please.” You still felt lightheaded.

Anakin stood up and walked toward your practice bag and grabbed the container of water that was sitting next to it. He then proceeded toward you, sat next to you, and put the tip of the container to your lips. You titled your head back as you drank. After a couple of gulps, you answered Anakin’s question.

“I apologize if I frightened you. I must have overdone it and got lightheaded because of it. I assure you that I feel better now and can continue my practice,” You tried to stand up before Anakin’s hand caught your wrist and dragged you back toward the ground. Your response was cold and robotic. That’s because you were in a different mode right now, your more “professional” mode which consisted of one thing only–to never give up until you were blue in the fact. It was ingrained in you from your past training that even if you felt like complete bantha shit, you couldn’t stop practicing just because you felt slightly off. Perfection could never be achieved if you stopped every single time you felt bad.

“Just take a moment to relax. You nearly fainted. You’re only going to hurt yourself more if you continue to practice in this state,” Anakin reasoned. He pitied you because he knew the exact look of determination on your face.

“I can’t stop. The benefit is only a few rotations from now. I have to get this routine down, or else I’ll look like a fool on stage,” you argued back. You turned, but Anakin kept a firm hold on your wrist.

“Stop being stubborn and just take a quick break.” The seriousness in Anakin’s tone made you want to cry. His voice projected across the now silent practice room. You were already feeling bad from almost fainting and now you were being emotional too. You slipped to the ground and hung your head low as tears welled up in your eyes.

“I-I’m sorry,” your voice wavered. Putting in this state always puts you in a weird headspace. You swallowed the tight knot that formed in your throat. You didn’t want to cry in front of Anakin.

Anakin noticed the waver of your voice and how you refused to meet his eyes. He didn’t mean for his voice to come out so harsh, but he didn’t want you to hurt yourself either.

“It’s okay. You have nothing to apologize for. I didn’t mean for my voice to sound that way,” Anakin hesitated before putting a hand on your shoulder for comfort. He felt slightly awkward. He didn’t know you very well yet, so he didn’t want to invade your personal space, but he recognized that you needed some comfort.

“You should leave. You don’t have to deal with me. I know the Chancellor asked you to watch over me, but this is too much. I promise I’m fine. This isn’t the first time this has happened.” You don’t know why you let that small detail split to Anakin. Perhaps you just wanted someone else to know that you weren’t fully healed from your past. You tried to do your best to hide it from the rest of your team, only Chione being the most knowledgeable on the subject.

“I’m not going to leave you. It’s late and you should be heading back to your apartment. I came to pick you up. Gido said you hadn’t arrived home yet and that I could find you here.”

You sighed at Anakin’s response. There were a few moments of silence before you began speaking again. “I’m sorry. You’re just being a decent person, and I’m here trying to push you away. I don’t mean it.” You took a deep breath, “I just get in a weird headspace whenever I’m practicing sometimes.”

Anakin didn’t want to pry, but he could tell there was a deeper meaning behind your words.

You started speaking before your brain could even comprehend what you were saying. You were desperate to let out all of your negative feelings. “Do you ever feel like you’re not good enough sometimes? Like the whole world is waiting for you to trip and fall?” You glanced at Anakin with glassy eyes.

You continued to tirade. “I know my life may look glamorous, and it is. But no one ever talks about the dark side of being in the public eye, especially as a female. They treat you as if you’re some spectacle for their entertainment as if you’re not a living being with consciousness and feelings. Even those who are supposed to be there for you end up on the same side as the critics and haters.” Your chest was now heaving up and down as a result of your heightened emotion. “Even when I work my ass off to be perfect, so I can meet their standards and so they can finally shut the kriff up, they find another thing to comment on just to tear me down.”

“Yes, I understand the feeling.” And Anakin truly did understand. Anakin wanted to comfort you, he felt empathetic as he watched you cry. Do you remember how I told you how I joined the Jedi at a later age than most?” You nodded as you sniffled. “The Jedi council didn’t want to take me in at first…but Qui-Gon convinced them to take me in because he saw potential in me, potential as the Chosen one. Master Qui-Gon died before he had the chance to train me, so his Padawan, my former master, requested that he take me up as his Padawan. No Padawan had ever been trained at such a young age, but the council accepted his wish as a dying request from Qui-Gon.” Anakin still recalls that day–he was waiting outside the council’s room–in wonder at the grand pillars of the Jedi Temple. It was so grandiose and had a sense of holiness, two things he never witnessed on Tatooine.

“I had to work twice as hard as the other younglings to get up to speed. Most of them already had years of experience with the Jedi, they knew how to properly wield the force and the Jedi scriptures were ingrained into their beings by that point. Eventually, I surpassed the younglings and surpassed the expectations of the council. But even then, the council has never fully trusted me. I feel they’re always scrutinizing me, watching for my next mistake too. I’m not the most conventional Jedi, and I don’t always play by the books, but I’m a Jedi through and thorough. No matter how many times I prove that the council, or even my former master, they don’t believe in me. We’ve been fighting this war for Maker knows how long, and they still refuse to make me master, despite being the poster boy for this war.”

“Wow, Anakin…I didn’t expect that from you.” You honestly didn’t expect to find yourself relating to Anakin, you were on completely different sides of society. How could you, a pop star, relate to a Jedi? It comforted you in a way, to know that you weren’t the only person to go through feelings of inadequacy and frustration. “How do you deal with it?”

“When I was a Padawan in training, I didn’t deal with it most healthily. I was snarky (he still is), and rebelled against my master’s teachings. I was stubborn, hoping that if I showed off my power, I could finally be appreciated by the council. I was wrong to do that, it’s how I lost my right arm.” Anakin then slipped off his glove to show you the silver mechanical prosthetic. You gasped, not expecting to learn this information. Anakin continued, “I still like to show off, but as I matured, I realized that I didn’t have to define myself by the approval of others. I know that I am capable, and I will keep working hard until the council recognizes that.”

“You don’t deserve that. I know we only just met, but I’ve only heard remarkable things about you. The Republic wouldn’t stand a chance against the Separatists against you. I mean no offense to the other Jedi, they’re all vital to the war effort too, but we need someone who takes risks and isn’t afraid to be unorthodox. I don’t know much about the Jedi, but I know one day you’ll make a great Master.”

This heart-to-heart chat with Anakin was unexpected but welcomed. You appreciated that he was honest and open with you–someone who was practically a stranger still. He didn’t have to come all this way to pick you up nor did Anakin need to comfort you in an hour of need, but he did. However, Anakin didn’t let the conversation marinate too long, suddenly embarrassed at the information he shared with you.

Anakin stood up from the ground and reached his hand toward you. You accepted his hand and Anakin pulled you up as well. “Are you feeling better now?”

Despite the dried tear marks on your face and the incoming headache you were about to face, you told Anakin that you did feel better. You weren’t ready to divulge your entire past with Anakin just yet, but maybe one day the two of you could become friends. Did that count as an attachment? You weren’t sure.

“Let’s get you home, pop star.”

“Thanks, General.”

The second instance with Anakin was in an unconventional situation, but it brought a smile to your face when you recalled it. It was only the fifth day of him being assigned as your bodyguard. The incident at the practice room happened on his third day there. You wanted to speak to him more after that night, but you found yourself pulled in all directions by your management team. You supposed you should be thankful–you promised to stay away from Anakin. The only issue is that you didn’t want to stay away from him anymore.

Anakin walked into your living room after talking with Obi-Wan through his commlink. Obi-Wan was updating Anakin on his most recent diplomatic mission on a nearby planet. A heated conversation was taking place between you and Gido.

“You’re being ridiculous! It’s not even that scary and you can’t keep on relying on others to transport you places,” Gido said as he pinched his nose with a hand, a look of frustration on his face.

“Of course I can! I’m rich. I can just hire chauffeurs!” you taunted in reply. You knew your argument wasn’t sound, but you just wanted to vex Gido at this point. Deep down, you knew your manager was right.

“What about when you’re old and retired? Who’s going to help you then? Certainly not I. I’ll be dead!” He pointed an accusatory finger at you.

A glare embraced your face at Gido’s words. You scoffed before turning your body, not realizing that Anakin entered the room. He had to stop sneaking in like that. Those damn Jedi.

Anakin looked at you two with a curious look. Having joined the conversation toward its end, Anakin did not know what you two were talking about. Heat ran up your neck and toward your face as Gido explained with a deadpan expression.

“My dear friend here does not have her Republic driving license, despite being an adult. I’ve been telling her to get her license for years, but she always manages to procrastinate. And every time I tell her, she brushes me off her shoulder.” He pointed at you with an accusing thumb.

With a high-pitched tone, you defended yourself, “I know how to drive!... Sort of. Look, I just don’t like driving. The skylanes are always chaotic and the last time I visited the Ministry of Transport, it took me hours to update my identification and the workers were extremely rude. I’m not going back there if I don’t have to!”

“And I keep telling her, she needs to get her license. Kid, don’t be stubborn. Wouldn’t you feel more independent if you could drive around yourself?”

“Oh, stop bullshitting me, Gido. You just don’t want to drive me around because you hate the sky lanes as much as I do!” It was true. Gido groaned and mumbled every time he had to drive you places, complaining that he wouldn’t need to take you to run your errands if you had your own license. You couldn’t help it–you enjoyed dragging Gido along and you knew he secretly enjoyed spending time with you.

Anakin had a solution to both of your problems. Driving was one of his fortes. Obi-Wan and Ahsoka would disagree, but Anakin knew he was the best pilot in the galaxy. Yes, Anakin could be reckless, but there was never a landing or move he couldn’t pull off. The innate talent he had as a young boy flourished when he moved to Coruscant and began his Padawan training. Having access to much more refined and newer technology allowed Anakin to perfect the craft of piloting.

“I can teach you how to drive. I’m the best pilot in the galaxy.” The seriousness on Anakin’s face indicated that he wasn’t joking.

You gulped. The heating sensation returned. You began to shake your head from side to side with wide eyes. Your hands moved in front of you as if to mimic the movement of your head, waving off Anakin’s solution.

“I don’t think that necessary,” you protested.

“Actually, I think it’s very necessary. Only the Maker knows how long you’ll push this off. Anakin, would you mind doing this favor? I have a few meetings with the company, we need to finalize the last details for the benefit. Feel free to use her airspeeder parked outside–it’s one of the newest models,” Gido stated.

Anakin grinned. He really did miss his yellow Eta-2 Starfighter, but he would never deny the chance to operate new technology.

That’s how you found yourself outside sitting in a neatly parked J12 Twin-pod on your apartment’s landing platform. The airspeeder belonged to you, though you’d never driven it before. The airspeeder was one of the newer models on the market. The surface was wrapped with a special pink-tinted chrome wrap making the car look sleek and expensive. Gido, your chauffeur, and occasionally Chione, were the only people to ever drive it.

You looked out the window and saw Anakin approaching the passenger side of the airspeeder. “Karking hell, I’m really doing this,” you thought. You detested driving. It made your palms sweaty and shot your nervous system. To make matters worse, you would be stuck in the confined airspeeder with Anakin! So much for trying to keep your proximity from him. You were both scared and embarrassed. Here was Anakin, the most famous Jedi at the moment, teaching pathetic you how to properly drive. Surely he had much better, more important things to do–like lead a war planning meeting or something.

The passenger door opened, and Anakin effortlessly climbed into the passenger seat and sat down. Your back stiffened, and suddenly the airspeeder seemed tighter. You shot an uneasy glance toward Anakin, who only smiled in excitement.

After the other night in the dance room where you had that conversation with Anakin, you felt less apprehensive around him. He was more human to you and less of a mysterious figure, less of a pretty face who made you nervous. You still found yourself mousy and internally reeling in his presence, but Anakin was becoming akin to a friend. You started conversing more during mealtimes, slowly getting to know each other.

“Alright, pop star, first we’re going to start with the controls. You have to fire up the engine by flipping this red switch. After the flip is switched, check your mirrors to ensure you can view directly behind and on your sides. Be careful with your blind spots. You don’t want to get rear-ended because you forgot to check for it. Coruscant sky lanes are no joke. With an airspeeder as pretty as yours, I’d hate to see it get destroyed. ” Anakin pointed toward a red button near the right side of the console, located next to the steering gear. “You got that?” Anakin questioned with one eyebrow raised.

Once again, Anakin felt your energy through the force. It was way calmer compared to the first day, but he could still feel your energy buzzing. Perhaps you realized that his presence was nothing to fear.

“Go on. Turn it on,” Anakin commanded. Butterflies erupted in your stomach when you heard the baritone voice command you. It reverberated several times in your head. Anakin’s voice was manly, and extremely attractive. You felt jealous that his soldiers got to hear that voice every day.

You reached toward the switch and flipped it upward with a shaky hand. The airspeeder lit up from inside, indicating it had come to life. There wasn’t an initial turbo–this was one of the main features of this model. It was supposed to fly seamlessly through the air. You placed your hands on each side of the steering gears. Not knowing what to do next, you looked at Anakin for guidance.

Anakin stood up to stand directly behind you. He reached out his arms and placed his hands on top of yours. He then leaned down to the side of your face and explained, “I’m going to show you how you properly place your hands on the steering gear and how to move it while you’re driving.” Anakin moved your hands toward the middle of the gear.

“Have a tight grip on the gear. The tighter the grip, the more control you have over the speeder. The higher sky lanes get more wind traction, so it’s especially important to have control in those lanes.” You nodded to show you were following. Anakin suddenly turned the gear harshly to the left, “Don’t do what I just did. When you turn the gear harshly, you jerk the speeder. If you’re switching lanes or turning a corner, switch on your indicators so other drivers know which way you’re going.” Of course, Anakin never followed his own advice, but for your sake, he played it by the books.

It all felt too intimate. Your head was in a rush, which probably wasn’t the best state to be in while you were about to drive. Anakin’s hands engulfed yours. The difference between his callused hands and your perfectly manicured hands drove you crazy. You could see the veins exposed on his ungloved hand. The sight of the green veins made your stomach turn warm. Much like his face, Anakin’s hand was sculpted by the Maker themself. Not even the finest marble statues could compare to the piece of art that was Anakin Skywalker.

“...Lastly, when you’re making a turn, do not turn the gear all the way around. The speeder has a built-in function that automatically rotates it. If you turn it all the way, you’ll make a sharp turn, ruining the internal tachyon drive regulator. Do you think you can handle this? Gido told me about the last time you tried to drive.” The last time you tried to drive, it resulted in several fines and almost caused a crash–the tabloids were on your ass for weeks after that.

You completely spaced out while Anakin was speaking, too focused on your inner thoughts. Hearing the teasing tone of his voice brought you back. You hated being undermined. You would prove to Anakin, and Gido, that you can drive perfectly fine and that you have nothing to be scared of.

“I can you assure that not only can I handle this, but you’ll be amazed at how quickly I learn,” you sassed Anakin back. You were lying. You couldn’t handle this, yet you couldn’t look like a ditz in front of Anakin.

“Let’s start flying. Don’t be nervous. I’m right here if you need me.”

Anakin sat back in his seat and observed you as you started maneuvering the aircraft. He directed you toward a sky lane to merge into. “I’m going to guide you to a specific path where the air traffic isn’t so busy. It should be easier for you to fly since there isn’t as much chaos.”

You kept a strong grip on the steering gear. Coruscant Prime, Coruscant’s only sun, was shining bright. The Weather Control Network did a splendid job at keeping Coruscant’s weather optical today–it wasn’t too windy and the sky was clear. You took it as a positive sign.

The airspeeder flew steadily through the air. Anakin was surprised. The way Gido described your driving, he assumed that he would need to take control of the speeder earlier. You weren’t doing a terrible job so far. Aside from the occasional jerk or harsh turn, you managed not to crash so far.

Maybe Anakin thought too soon. “Watch out! Watch out to your right!,” Anakin exclaimed. You tried switching lanes, but the speeder behind you wasn’t slowing down to let you in. You narrowly avoided an accident at the last second by going back into your lane.

“Oops–I didn’t mean that,” you said with a giggle and a shrug of your shoulders. “How am I doing so far?”

“You’re not doing too bad, with some more practice, you should be able to get your license in no time. Why do you hate driving so much?”

While still focusing on the sky in front of you, you explained to Anakin, “I love Coruscant and all that it has to offer. But the sky lanes in Bar’leth are much calmer and less congested. I grew up used to that. Even after all these years of living here, I still can’t stomach the driving here. It’s horrendous! I much prefer to have someone else drive, that way the pressure won’t be on me. I know Gido’s right, I need my license, but can you blame me? We’ve already witnessed almost two accidents! How did you get so good at flying?”

“I’ve always wanted to be a pilot since I was a little boy. I used to tinker in the garage, building and modifying parts for my own podracer. I even won the Boonta Eve Classic on Tatooine,” answered Anakin.

“Why did you want to become a pilot?” you wondered. Anakin seemed like like an intentional type of person–his actions, thoughts, and opinions were direct reflections of him and what he felt inside.

Not many people outside of the Jedi temple knew Anakin’s true origins–that he was a former slave. The first ten years of his life were filtered solely through this lens, it came to impact much of his opinions on life, politics, and society. He didn’t like speaking about it and avoided the topic as much as he could. Anakin hated his life as a slave and he hated slavery with every fibre of his being. However, Anakin especially hated speaking about this past life now because every time he did, he was reminded of how he willingly chose to leave his mother on Tatooine. Anakin felt like he was the reason she died. He wasn’t strong enough or fast enough to save her from the Tuskens, but maybe, just maybe, if he stayed with his mother instead of leaving with Qui-Gon, Shmi Skywalker’s death could have been avoided.

Anakin didn’t respond to your question. When you looked at him, his face was scrunched up in a deep thought.

You were about to say something else when you saw something approaching the speeder from the corner of your eye. You quickly glanced to your left, only to spot a human male nearly hanging off the side of his airspeeder with a cam held up to his eye. You groaned out loud which caught Anakin’s attention. They came at the worst time possible. You were trying to learn how to drive for Kriff’s sake!

“The paparazzi are following! Can’t they just leave me alone” you ranted. You needed them to get off your trail, fast. You had a complex relationship with the paparazzi. You hated the way they invaded your privacy and fed the Holonet tabloids with material to gossip about. For every bad picture, outrageous rumor, and leaked news, there was a paparazzi behind it. They caused you so much pain. At the same time, the very nature of your career relied on the paparazzi to dispel news and reveal your current state of affairs through pictures. They were unofficial members of your public relations team. Every celebrity knew that they needed the paparazzi as much as they hated them. You couldn’t imagine what ridiculous headline they would come up with now.

The man got closer and closer to your speeder as he tried to record you on his cam. He was mere inches away from crashing into the side of your speeder. You started to panic and your hands lost your tight grip as you started to tremble. Even the slightest movement to the left would cause a crash, potentially sending both of your speeders tumbling below.

“Anakin, what do I do? I don’t know what to do! They’re too close,” you yelped. Any closer and the paparazzi’s camera would touch your speeder’s window.

“Stay calm, pop star. I got this.” Anakin’s tone was cocky. He had something up his sleeve. This wasn’t his first high-speed chase, and it certainly wouldn’t be his last. Anakin switched into General mode. His hands swiftly moved across the dashboard as he pressed a multitude of buttons and flipped several switches.

“What are you doing?!” You hated how high-pitched your voice sounded, the fear slipping out of your voice a squeak.

“Relax. I’m just taking control of the speeder. This speeder model is programmed so that in case of emergencies, the co-passager can take control of the speeder and drive it.” A panel opened on the console and an additional steering gear emerged into view. Anakin gripped the gear and turned it to the right. The speeder lurched to the right, putting more distance between you and the paparazzi.

No longer needed to grip the gear, you turned toward Anakin and shielded yourself by facing your back toward the window. The Holo Net wouldn’t be getting anything out of you today. Those insatiable nerfhurders had no boundaries sometimes.

“You better hold on tight. Things are about to get bumpy.” The only way to get these paparazzi off your trail was by speeding up and losing them in the endless zigzags of Coruscant. Anakin wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize your safety. He felt his fingertips buzzing with anticipation–the past few rotations with you have been enjoyable and peaceful, but he needed an outlet for his energy. Ever since the Clone Wars started, Anakin was constantly on the go, so his body and mind were accustomed to this. Fortunately for Anakin, flying was the best outlet for him.

“What do you mean? Anakin, I’m begging you. Please don’t do anything crazy. I get motion sick-” Your words were cut off as the speeder accelerated. “ANAKIN!!!,” you screamed. You then quickly shut your eyes again. You couldn’t bear to witness the scene in front of you. Even with your eyes closed, you could tell Anakin was driving significantly faster than what was allowed by the law.

The speeder weaved in and out of lanes. At one point, Anakin squeezed in between two speeders before hitting the turbo boosters. The paparazzi were still hot on your trail, but at least they were no longer directly next to you. You finally opened your eyes and saw that you were nearing the retail district, CoCo Town. Suddenly, the speeder nosedived toward the ground and you tightly clung to the gear in front of you for stability. The paparazzi were still chasing you, their speeder also diving below.

“Anakin do you have to be so reckless?!,” you shouted as Anakin laughed.

“My apologies–it was either that or let the paparazzi stalk you. Which one did you prefer? I didn’t have time to ask while you were panicking,” he replied in a sarcastic tone. You were about to rebuttal, but Anakin continued talking. “As soon as I land this on the ground, we’re going to get out and run. Let’s try to lose them in the crowd.”

The speeder lowered onto the ground and Anakin quickly parked the vehicle on a landing platform where several other speeders were parked. The doors unlocked and you both quickly stepped out. Before you could even completely step off, Anakin grabbed you by your waist and lowered you onto the ground. He then grabbed your hand and started running in the opposite direction of the speeder. You looked behind you, only to see the paparazzi had caught up and were now looking for you. After a quick scan, one of their eyes caught yours and they looked toward each other before running in the same direction as you and Anakin.

You could barely think about the paparazzi chasing you down as your mind relished the feeling of Anakin’s hands engulfing your waist. Anakin was a statuesque man, it made sense that his hands would be the same. Your skin burned at the touch. You shook your head to wane off the thoughts and redirect your focus in front of you.

Anakin’s back was facing you, his wide shoulders moving up and down as you ran through the crowds together. His curls bounced with each step. You apologized to each person you bumped into, slightly embarrassed to be in a situation like this. Why did this have to happen to you? Couldn’t they have picked another celebrity to torment today? You heard from the jogan fruit vine that the Holodrama actress Alexis Cov-Prim was getting out of rehab today. Wouldn’t that be a juicer headline than you learning how to drive? You already had one bad story from driving, you didn’t need another.

Anakin made a sharp turn around and corner and dragged you into a store named “Madame Acantha’s Emporium.” You kept your head low as Anakin greeted the storekeeper. You didn’t want to risk being recognized again. As you looked around and observed the store, you noticed the store sold a variety of womenswear from dresses to accessories. Anakin scanned the store for any suspicious figures before turning towards you.

“Grab something to disguise yourself with. We can’t stay in here forever.” You started browsing through the racks of clothes, pulling out a large knitted sweater before walking over to the accessory area and picking out a pair of daytime spectacles and a vibrant magenta wig with a bob cut. Anakin couldn’t disguise himself as he was too big for the clothing sold here. That didn’t matter as long as you could disguise yourself.

You quickly walked over to the changing rooms before switching out your outer layer for the sweater. After putting on the sweater, you grabbed the only elastic on your wrist and tied your hair so the wig could fit on. Once the wig was secured on your head, you put on the daytime spectacles and walked out of the changing rooms. You rushed towards the cashier and quickly asked her to ring up the transaction before throwing your credit chip on the counter. The employee, a humanoid woman of a species you couldn’t name, quickly rang up the transaction before handing you a receipt and bidding you a good day.

You turned towards Anakin and asked, “Does this look alright? Do I look like myself?”

Anakin stepped closer to you and grabbed the sides of your face. He slipped some of the wig’s hair through his fingers before adjusting it so it sat properly on your head. His fingers lingered for a second before he nodded. “I can’t even recognize you. Let’s go before they catch up.”

Anakin walked out of the store first and scoped the street. He looked left and right before quickly going back inside. He grabbed you and shoved the both of you behind the first rack of clothes he saw. You were about to protest when you saw the two men from earlier, the one who was recording had his camera by his side. They went up to the shopkeeper at the cashier and began to converse with the lady, most likely asking her if she had seen anyone with the same description as you. While they were distracted, you and Anakin looked at each other and secretly decided to make a run for it.

You both ran out of the store and into an alleyway nearby. You saw the paparazzi running past the alleyway as you were catching your breath. Then, you started to giggle. The whole situation was absurd. You, standing in an alleyway, with a bright wig and sunglasses–obviously a terrible disguise–and Anakin Skywalker, the most famous Jedi at the moment, dressed in all of his Jedi garb with his lightsaber attached at the hilt.

“What are you laughing at?,” Anakin asked, one of his perfectly shaped eyes arched. You must have looked crazy.

“I’m laughing at the situation. I look like a clown,” you replied. “Let’s go, I’m hungry after all that running and chasing. Let’s get something to eat–my treat.” You then walked out of the alleyway together. Before you stepped into the public view, you turned towards Anakin, “Thank you, by the way. I don’t know what I would have done without you to save the day.” You gave Anakin a look of genuine gratefulness.

The both of you proceeded in the direction of the shops.

“Come on, pop star. I know a great diner that my old master loves. It’s called Dex’s Diner. Have you ever been there before?” Anakin asked.

The both of you arrived at Dex’s Diner and proceeded to order half the menu. You spent hours in the diner, the both of you enjoying each other’s company after the crazy events of the day.

You spent the same evening replaying all of the times Anakin touched you and how each touch made you feel.

You decided it was time to get out of your head and back into the present. If you stayed in the sonic tub any longer, you wouldn’t have enough time to get ready without feeling rushed. You stood up from the sonic tub and grabbed the plush white robe sitting on the table next to it. You then put the robe on and walked toward the mirror.

You grabbed the brush and started brushing through your hair to ensure that any tangles and knots were out. After deciding your hair was neat enough, you put the brush down and started moisturizing your body with your favorite lotion. You would let your hair air dry until you figured out how you wanted to style it. The lotion was made from the musk-rose plant and mixed with tiny hints of vanilla. When you were done moisturizing your body and applying your skincare, you walked out of the room and into the closet directly in front of the refresher.

To say your closet was huge is an understatement. When you finally earned enough credits to afford a high-rise apartment, the one thing you told your realtor was that you would not compromise on a small closet. The closet was lined with shelves and racks, each holding either your clothes or your shoes. In the middle of the closet sat an island, constructed with cream-yellow Selonian marble, that stored all of your accessories. A floor-to-ceiling mirror and lounging chaise were perched at the far corner of the room. You walked over to the shelf that held your dresses and began to sift through them. You felt the soft silks, thin taffetas, and the gorgeous gemwebs of your collection.

“Aha,” you muttered as your hand finally landed on the gown you were looking for. The gown, designed by one of the most in-demand fashion ateliers, was a floor-length, demicot silk-lined tight velvet black gown with a curved necklace. The upper half of the gown was pale pink and covered in a multitude of tiny sequins and pearl studs. One shoulder extended out into the shape of a single petal, which was also fabricated with sequins and pearls. You paired it with a pair of black gloves that extended to your mid-bicep. The dress was as much haute as it was a piece of wearable art. If there was one thing you loved about being wealthy, it was the clothes.

You laid your evening gown on the chaise before traveling to your vanity and beginning on your makeup. Since the gown was extravagant in itself, you decided that a more subtle makeup look would complement the overall look more. You wanted people to focus on the gown and all its intricacies and craftsmanship. After glossing your lips with a matching shade of pink, you finished your makeup and moved on to your hair. You settled on a suitable hairstyle and allowed your loose face-framing layers to enhance the shape of your face.

You looked at yourself in the mirror once more before deciding you were ready to go. You walked out of your room and towards the living where Anakin was waiting for you.

To be continued...

(Here is a link to the dress, which was designed by Miss Sohee. One thing I love about the SW universe is the fashion, so I wanted to include a dress that reflected that. Like, come on. Have you seen Padme’s and Satine’s outfits?)

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annab-nana · 1 year ago

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Tom holland and prompt 13 from List C please 🧡 (domestic list)

you got it babe :)

prompt: one putting on weight although the other is the one that is actually pregnant

warnings: not proofread, pregnant!reader, kinda short, talks of diets and changes in diets and gaining weight so if that is triggering for you, please don't read this, pregnancy hormones, use of pet names (darling)

❀ masterlist ❀

"is it good?" tom inquired, watching you take a bite of your burger. you had been talking about getting a hamburger since two in the morning when the initial craving hit and you were finally getting to eat it.

"so good," you responded after you swallowed down your previous bite. your eyes glanced down to his plate to see that his platter matched yours to a t.

from an outside eye, that probably wasn't too odd to see. it was just a man and a woman, both delving into a massive burger and fries. but you knew tom. he stuck to a fairly strict diet to keep in shape. he had his occasional cheat days, but he seemed to be having more cheat days than not lately. you didn't think he was wrong nor were you disgusted by this. you were just curious about the change.

"i am not judging you by any means, but i thought you were on a diet? like a harsh one?" you inquired before popping a fry into your mouth.

"i was," he prefaced, "but you know we're in everything together, even this pregnancy, so if you have to gain weight, so do i."

"tom, you don't have to do that," you spoke softly as you reached across the table to hold his hand. "the people need their spider-man," you joked.

his thumb rubbed over your skin so delicately, it almost tickled. his head shook lightly at you before he responded, "maybe, but you need me more."

"tom," you said in awe as tears lined your eyes, pregnancy hormones coming in a rush. "goodness, you know you can't be too sweet to me or else i'll cry."

"sorry, darling," he responded, a chuckle following his words before teasingly adding, "i'll try to keep the sweetness to a minimum."

remember to support writers & reblog :)

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#tom holland #tom holland x reader #tom holland blurbs #blurbs #anon #❀ nonnie ❀#winter wonderland sleepover ��*:･ﾟ

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shimmerandfists · 29 days ago

Text

In relation to the post I reblogged...OTP prompts Vijinx edition.

This is just for fun and my favorite interpretation of these guys, keep that in mind and if you have your own feel free to add it or join the fun and make your own! I'm going to write bad, I'm going to write sloppy 👍 It's a long list guys.

For clarity when I use Jinx I'm referring to any version of her where traumatic events have happened that makes Jinx into who she is. When I use Powder I'm referencing any version of her that had the support, love and circumstances to heal and be healthy. They're the same but different people you know, nature vs nurture and all that. 🤝

Upon rereading, there are nsfw questions I answered as a heads up.

If you see spelling and grammar mistakes no you didn't (sorry and also if you point them out I'll fix them and! Appreciate it)

1.) Genuinely they're probably both dogshit at cooking but Jinx might be a sleeper agent here. She could be a good baker and specifically better than Vi but Vi has mean grill dad energy. More than anything though they both have flop energy. They would learn the basics together and specialize in max. 5-7 specific recipes apiece that the other likes and they enjoy.

In a moment where they both have the space, time and peace to actually cook a meal...I think it would be Powder, Vi, and then Jinx in that order.

2.) That being said Jinx is definitely waking up at 2 AM to cook some kind of midnight snack. A midnight gourmand if you will. In these moments she both comes up with the most disgusting combinations and, rarely, inconceivable combinations that come out as delicacies.

3.) Jinx is definitely into PDA. All kinds and at any time. I really can't see her caring who does and doesn't see. In moments of jealousy or in new locations where no one knows them Vi would definitely be into it and reciprocate. Jinx would obviously initiate the most because of that. I think with Powder it'd be even between her and Vi in any scenario and both would get mushy when the other starts.

Picture a vacation on an ocean side port city, the second day into the trip after unpacking and adjusting to the newness of an unfamiliar and exciting place. They've already picked up something for breakfast and a local place to visit. They take a break in a rest area halfway to their destination set aside for people climbing the mountain the town sprawls across. Blocked from the stairs around a rock wall is a bench and a set of rails wrapping around the small ledge.

Jinx leans on the rails, Vi comes up behind her to wrap her arms around her waist and lay her head on one of Jinx' shoulders. Jinx places a soft peck on her cheek with nothing but soft love in her eyes as she turns back to watch the sun finally rise above the mountain peaks for the day. They stay like that, wrapped up in each other, lightly playing with the others hair and clothes and soaking in the morning rays for as long as they can stand.

4.) I can't think of any specific show (because I don't watch that much stuff) but I can really see them being into weekend watching some corny action style series with lots of explosions and "cool" guys. I think they'd love watching and rewatching the John Wick series and Baby Driver. Their weakness they'd never admit to each other, but it's so obvious, is loving romcoms. Princess bride is one that comes to mind.

5.) Vi is definitely the cheesier of the two and while Jinx/Powder gives her shit for it and teases her she loves it, and loves that Vi loves her like that. She thinks it's endearing, she does get embarrassed if Vi does it where others can see though and Vi definitely digs into that readily. It's rare she can embarrass Jinx so she takes full advantage when she can, especially in such a harmless way.

6.) They'd both be late for things, maybe not all the time but most of it. For Vi it's a comedy of errors that are never entirely her fault, something always comes up. For Jinx she gets lost in her own head/is bad with time management and/or doesn't care too much about it unless it's with someone she loves like Vi or Ekko. Even then she'd still probably be a couple minutes late. Powder is on time tbh I think she has the skills and luck to manage it. She's got her system down pat.

7.) Jinx is by far the clumsiest of the 3 for funny comedy reasons. Having shimmer in your blood probably isn't always convenient or productive for balancing. I'm thinking of the fight scene with Smeaches guys and her tripping on the octopus among other moments. Vi is fit and has the muscle control to stay upright most of the time and catch herself. Powder is just more careful than all three and rarely puts herself in situations where she could slip up.

8.) Vi is an old man. She's neither a night owl or morning dove she sleeps in as late as she can and goes to bed embarrassingly early. She would lean closer to a night owl if I had to choose, for late night outings at bars with friends if nothing else. Working out and staying fit helps her keep a regular sleep schedule for the most part.

Jinx/Powder are 100% night owls. There isn't anything quite like the midnight inspirations amirght guys? That sudden spontaneous energy and river of ideas and inspiration right when it's time to go to bed are hard to ignore.

9.) Purely for who they are and their hobbies/strengths, Vi would pack the lightest. Prison habits and not having stuff in general definitely helped Vi figure out necessities. Jinx and Powder being tinkerers and builders, I can't see them having anything less than at least 2 backpacks full of stuff at any one time. If they had to leave-leave, not just move around for the day or a week, canon wise they're all pretty light packers.

10.) I see them having too different of schedules from each other to make sure the other doesn't forget anything. I CAN see Vi leaving things out for Jinx/Powder to take with them for the day like warmer clothes if the weathers shit or some treat she picked up the day before. If they go on trips it's definitely Vi keeping the packing list short and efficient though lol. And making sure Jinx/Powder don't for get their phone charger or wallet equivalent to whatever she'd have. You know, I think Vi might just carry all their shit in her personal bags or pockets.

11.) When Vi leaves things out for Jinx/Powder she'd definitely add little notes. Suggesting plans for the evenings when they meet up and/or little love/appreciation notes. Jinx would leave as many notes as she could anywhere she could theoretically put a note on. The contents are just about everything and anything but mostly little love notes. Powder would leave notes irregularly I think, for special events she plans or on days she thinks Vi needs a little pick me up.

12.) Calling and texting oh man. I think they'd all prefer calling, it'd be easier for Jinx and Powder to talk with Vi while tinkering and Vi is sappy and just loves hearing their voice. I just think it's funny to make Vi an old man about stuff but she WAS in prison for like 7 years and I don't think texting or phones were a big part of her education. Jinx would overtext like crazy and sometimes the radio silence on Vis end would bug her until they talked it out.

It wouldn't be on Vi's mind to check her phone throughout the day unless she had a moment of down time. When she finally checked her phone there'd be 20 texts from Jinx.

Powder is worse than Vi about texting, irregularly, when she's really deep into an idea she goes hours without picking up her phone. For the most part she'd be pretty on top of texting and while she could rival Jinx' texting habits she filters herself a little to give time for Vi to reply. I think that's why they would all prefer calls, calls make themselves obvious and intentions/meanings and clearer over the phone. In the end they'd accept that when they're apart and they need the other they'll just call.

13.) They'd stay at home and go out equally! Date nights inside just hanging out, cooking and watching shitty tv together. Going out on the town and ripping it up is an every other weekend, if not once a month ordeal lol.

14.) If Vi has had a long day, it'd take heaven and hell to keep her awake for an entire movie at the end of the night. Jinx/Powder don't mind these nights too much. A sleepy and soft Vi is always a treat even if they have to wake her up to get her to bed.

When Powder/Jinx has too many late nights in a row they're out like a light within 20 minutes of the movie, it's almost predictable at this point. Has Vi used this to get them to have a regular nights sleep? Maybe. She has a suspicion they've caught on already and if Jinx/Powder end up falling asleep curled up on Vi everytime. Well, nobody is going to snitch.

15.) It would be so easy to say Vi cries at movies that aren't sad but it would definitely have to be Jinx. Her perception of reality isn't quite the same as most people's. There can be something so incredibly distressing and sad about a tin-can accidentally getting knocked off a counter, with the right lighting and the right music, that nobody but her seems to understand. Depending on the moment, Vi will sometimes rib her about it but she mostly takes it in stride even if she doesn't get it.

16.) Jinx tries to hog the covers but not even the shimmer in her blood makes her strong enough to wrestle them from Vi. Jinx/Powder always, somehow, getting completely covered by Vi and the covers anyway. If Vi is asleep near them there's some kind of homing system in her that finds them everytime. The only time this isn't true is if Vi is the one being held, little spoon or any other position

17.) Vi is way more competitive. No one from the outside looking in could judge who was more competitive. They both know Vi can't say no to a challenge even if she doesn't win every time, Jinx/Powder always give her a run for her money. Jinx/Powder likes that Vi can win against her though, when it's things she finds hot. Other times it's flat out frustrating and sometimes embarrassing.

18.) We've all seen Vi when she's drunk lol. She's touchy, emotional, and a bit looser with her movements and just existing in general. I would not say she's an angry drunk because if I had that rat guy dancing up on me after a lesbian situationship break-up, after fist fighting, in an overstimulating bar, I'd probably also punch him. She's normally soft when she's sober, when drunk she can be even softer to the point of mush at home.

Jinx/Powder. My girl drunk is a wonder. There's 2 scenarios if she can even get drunk with the shimmer. The first is she's incredibly useless and giggly. She may as well be dead weight and has to be lugged around everywhere even if she has control over her limbs. She is incredibly touchy, you can imagine being toted around isn't the worst thing to her. She's in surprisingly good graces and doesn't like to get drunk in public like this.

The second scenario is that she's motivated as hell and has the confidence of a god. She's never made more things in her life but in the morning when she wakes up she can't even understand them. They do work perfectly but what they're supposed to do is an unsolvable mystery. She's all over the place bouncing from wall to wall, an unmitigated whirlwind.

19.) Their biggest fight has to be just, I think with most people, misunderstandings. With the mental health of both of them they both have needs that aren't always clear, to others or themselves. Vi HAS to have trauma from her life, in the very least she's still recovering from the prison system and not even counting the unprocessed grief of what happened before and after prison.

Jinx did a lot of fucked up things. For the both of them this would be a major thing they'd have to work through together. Both how Vi views Jinx and how Jinx views herself.

20.) Wouldn't it be funny if Vi brought home a stray cat and Jinx/Powder brought home a stray puppy at the same time? They're both being cagey about something and the other can't figure it out, they suspect the other already knows about their adopted animal. It turns out they're both idiots and reveal them at the same time, only to laugh and keep them both.

They reminded the other of each other 😔. Stink Maw would be a really, really good name for a dog is all I'm saying.

21.) The time differences in each other's schedules was something they both had to acclimate to for sure. There is enough space in their shared apartment for them to figure out how to prepare for the morning and work on late night projects without disturbing each other. They figured out a system that works through many lessons learned and conversations had.

Vis biggest learning experience is what Jinx/Powder needs for their mental health. It isn't always easy and it isn't always straight forward.

Jinx and Powder had to learn the other side of that and know when to ask for things/communicate what they need. They both continue to learn and build patience, understanding and love for each other in this regard.

22.) Jinx and Powders love language would be touching, gifts and making time for Vi. Jinx' looks a little different than Powders for sure, it's louder and more boisterous. Unpredictable, it could be something small and thoughtful or something wildly impressive and grand. No matter what it is it always sweeps Vi off of her feet, sometimes literally lol.

Powder's could be described as consistent, thoughtful and sometimes silly but the size and scale are relatively the same every time. Sometimes it's a planned date night at the house with Vis favorite meal cooked, sometimes it's a bath drawn ahead of time for a night of recovering and decompression before Vi even gets home.

Vi's love language is touching, little touches and kisses. Acts of service and little, daily tasks that need to be done regularly but she takes care of it and enjoys doing it. Not only for the feeling of accomplishing things and running a well maintained ship but because she knows Jinx/Powder won't have to worry about it. One less thing on their mind if it was on their mind in the first place. Vi knows they can neglect basic care sometimes Jinx more so than Powder. Vi would include them in some of the chores to make sure they were part of the household, and to give them the opportunity to add in their own flair and taste.

23.) Given the circumstances, Jinx/Powder would initiate cuddly more but not by a wide margin. When the time makes sense I don't think you could keep them away from each other. Considering their history, they'd eat up as much physical reassurance that the other is there in the flesh as possible.

24.) Personally I love the idea of Vi being the protector, the big spoon if you will. Most of the time this is true but on the not-quite rare but uncommon night Vi is the small spoon. Jinx/Powder need to be able to protect Vi too, to comfort, reassure, and love her. Vi deserves the space to be held, and to be small, and to rest and let her guard down.

25.) This one can go in for way too long. Vi loves that they're so smart, she would kill to be able to see the world from Jinx/Powders eyes because she knows it would be like seeing a galaxy in high definition for the first time. She'd love the opportunity to see inside their head a little more intimately. She loves when they find something they love, how they get to be soft and unguarded. How they act around kids and how they seem to be on the same wave length. She loves their tenacity, to create and deconstruct something until they fully understand it.

Jinx and Powder love how soft hearted and kind Vi is. How strong she is both physically and emotionally, she keeps getting back up no matter what hits her. They both love and hate how she never, ever gives up on something she truly and deeply loves. She loves how cool and intimidating Vi can be, how big she can make her presence and on the other side of that coin, how lame and corny she can be just for them.

26.) JINX, Jinx/Powder easily. Vi thinks she going to get road rage one time only for Jinx/Powder to jump in before she can even think about what to do. They're rolling the window down, they're calling them every name under the sun, they're flipping them off and reaching over Vi honk the horn. Vi is mostly embarrassed if not a little frightened and a little turned on.

When they have to drive, Jinx is rarely behind the wheel. She knows Vi doesn't like her driving, and has openly said that in different words and that works out just fine with her. Driving is boring and yelling from the passenger seat is much more entertaining and she gets to be the DJ.

Powder's driving isn't great but it's good enough compared to what Jinx' would be she does some of the driving between the two of them. As crazy as she is with road rage she only changes her driving style a little bit, unnoticeable to anyone else on the road. Vi can see it and it cracks her up, it's never enough to be unsafe but just enough for Vi to see what she was going for.

27.) The most risky place they've had sex is in Vi's office during working hours, with clear glass windows and no blinds or curtains. It's a small workplace, towards the end of lunch. They had just finished redressing and fixing each other's everything when people started walking back in. A rival to that is behind the back of the curtains of the innovators competition, right before Powder was set to present her entry for the year. They may have cut it a little too close to the opening, there may or may not be rumors of Powder having a mystery girlfriend going around.

28.) Jinx/Powder is the food stealer. Easy. Vi orders extra food specifically for them to steal it from her. There's an allure to stealing food from Vi that Vi uses to her advantage to feed them. Sometimes Vi steals a bite or two from Jinx/Powder to even it out. Plus Jinx/Powder always order far more adventurous things than Vi normally would for a meal. This way she gets to expand her palette a little too.

29.) Their first date is an accident. An accident in the way that neither of them really realized it was a date until well after the fact. It was a normal outing for the both of them, normal for going out on the weekend to a newly opened sit down food cart/stand that promised to blow expectations out of the water. In the very least for the first or second week of being open.

Vi and Jinx/Powder knew to jump on early openings to get the best version of anything they had to offer. It was rare businesses like that stayed good for longer than a month. To take full advantage of the novelty of the situation they both put more effort into their usual outing attire. It just so happened that when they both did it, unplanned, that they looked like any two women out for a date night on the town.

When it comes up they both still laugh about it and look back at it with utter fondness. The way they acted bashful and giddy for no reason other than seeing each other in date-level clothing. Vi holding the curtain aside as a joke shared between them at first, sarcasm shifting into adoration when Jinx/Powder smoothed her hand over Vi's arm guiding her into the cart. Jinx/Powder holding Vi's arm from the entrance to the seats.

Both agree, they were too lovestruck and in denial at the moment to put a name to it but it was undeniably their first date looking back.

30.) I think the classic names they have for each other are nice. Pow-Pow, Pow, Vi. I did see someone have Vi call Jinx J and honestly I think that's really cute and I'm sticking with it.

31.) Their anniversary would be really intimate I think. They'd go to work, go do their chores, make sure everything is buttoned up and taken care of for the day. More so and with enough care that people notice it every year, they never tell anyone what the day means or what it is so anyone's guess is as good as the others.

When they finish everything, they grab each other and head to the top of the roof of their shared apartment. Not regularly accessed and near impossible for anyone not familiar with the parkour required to navigate Zaun, ensuring privacy for the evening. Extra blankets, snacks and some pillows for soft padding to lie down on, where they spend the evening and into the night enjoying each others company.

Talking about whatever they want, how the other's day went, and imagining a trip far away from the twin cities. Jinx brought sparklers, quiet and impressively brilliant for how small they were. A private show for the both of them to celebrate finding their way back to each other time and time again.

32.) You couldn't separate the two of them when they have a moment alone together. They can be apart, they aren't reliant on each other as they've proven very violently, with great effort that they can be independent. With all the reconciliation, work and effort, time and love that they've shared and put into healing on their own and finally back together they are going to put it to good use.

The time separated did them both good, they are loathe to admit it but realistically they needed the time apart to grieve all of the loss they experienced. While they couldn't do it together, they can appreciate and celebrate the other now and in the moment.

And that moment just happens to call for always touching the other, holding hands, being Vi's human backpack or front pack. Vi receiving a soft and loving shoulder and back massage, having her hair played with and combed through. You name it, they're doing it at any moment they can spare. Usually and almost exclusively in their shared apartment where their guards come down and no one bothers them.

33.) I don't think they get married! They might get each other rings, they might have an extra special day, they might even say vows in their own ways. Hushed, sincere and soul deep promises made during late nights.

I don't think they ever get married officially with paperwork or witnesses, or a celebration or anything. I don't think they'd even put a name to it, they would just know. They wouldn't need anything like that for each other, they never had.

I don't think Zaun had a big wedding culture, frankly. Seeing people together for life in whatever way made sense for them is just reflected culturally in both of them.

34.) Powder can be pretty easy to cheer up most days, some well thought out treats and attention spent on her usually peps her back up. On harder days a shoulder to lean on, a grounding arm around the waist, an open ear and longer, private moments spent together are what she needs. And rarely, ever so rarely, she needs some time alone to deal with her demons in as much peace as she can get.

Vi is pretty similar. Probably minus the treats but attention and reassurances go a long way with her on bad days. Quiet time to decompress and to hold or be held and ground her in the moment are what make bad days better. Other times having Jinx/Powder cheer her on or silently but supportively watch her go a couple rounds with her boxing sets takes the tension out of the day and anxious energy out of her body.

Jinx, like the other two, has different days with different needs. Silent days are hard, because Vi has a better understanding of the weight that Jinx carries with her and that Jinx is the only one who can fight her own battles when they're in her head. The only thing she can do these days is give her what she needs and what she asks for within reason. Usually it's simple things that help her take care of herself like water, basic food and some time together on the couch in relative silence.

On days she's down right angry Vi will set her up with her training equipment if she isn't feeling like punching things. Unsurprisingly, when you're used to just blowing shit up to release tension you still need to get that explosive energy out one way or the other. This was what they found accessible and worked well, mostly, on days like these. Sometimes, on days it just doesn't work, Vi will help Jinx find a good spot with all the materials she needs along the way to blow up some shit in the fissures. These days are far and few between, and they're work shopping scenarios she can do this more regularly with more productive results.

35.) We get a pretty clear picture of what Jinx/Powders taste in music is. I couldn't put a specific name to the genre but it's pretty cool music. Rock? Pop? Indie x genres? All three and something altogether different. She's added some different genres peppered in but they're relatively obscure and can best be described as noise lol.

Vi would like classic, annoying workout playlists lol. Thinking YouTube playlist "Top 100 workout songs of all time" kind of shit. She's not pigeon holed though, she also likes dad rock, shitty pop songs, some cheesy ass country songs mixed in along with some bangers like old town road. She's a women of culture and Jinx/Powder flips her endless shit about her music taste. Endearingly of course, she can't listen to those songs anymore without thinking of Vi.

36.) I've been loving these questions because it isn't who is the most of anything with these two. They're both equally protective, it looks unique for each one.

37.) Oppenheimer vs Barbie. I still haven't seen either one so I'm taking a shot in the dark. I think they'd both want to watch both for a lot of different reasons. Women are the primary reason for both movies and both ladies. Based on reviews I'd say they would both prefer Oppenheimer but would still like moments and make references to Barbie scenes for fun.

They may or may not have Barbie themed halloween costumes, there's so many to choose from who's to say.

38.) Oof. They'd be so good with kids but would they choose to adopt one is the real question. Could Jinx ever, ever overcome the feelings of personal fault for Isha's death? People can argue all they want until they're blue in the face on this one but! It wasn't Jinx's fault Isha died, even if she still holds on to guilt for it.

Maybe the cat and/or dog would be a good start. To help Jinx see evidence that she isn't a Jinx, that not everything dies because of her existing around them. Instead, with better circumstances, a better world and a safer environment things thrive when she is around. She makes things bloom, she bursts with color and life that only she can show people and it's infectious. I still don't know if they could go through with it on purpose or if a kid falling into their lives again like Isha did would be too much for Jinx.

Maybe it would have to come from Vi in the way the kid would have to fall into Vi's life, on Vi's time. She introduces and brings the kid into both of their lives, with some weight taken off Jinx because the kid isn't Hers yet it's Vis. I can't imagine it would be easy, Vi couldn't give up on the kid and Jinx would never ask her to. It would take time for Jinx to come around, to take them in as her own kid again. She'd love them all the same but putting that hurt to rest would be hard and take time.

39.) LOL. Uh yeah they'd get along with each other's families for obvious reasons because they're kind of gone in one universe and they are each other's family in the other. It begs the question if they would ever be out about it with their alive family though.

Weirder things have happened in Zaun tbh, weirder things have happened in the world. I'm not about to come up with real world defenses here. After all the absolute shit they've been through together, the time spent growing up apart from each other independently, and their ages at this point I think they would eventually tell people.

One by one and privately. It's never a big thing but slowly, ever so slowly they let everyone they deem important know. You can guess there are parties completely unsurprised by this. There are many they don't tell.

40.) Vi shops for gifts for the holidays well ahead of time and they're normally smaller things but meaningful. She isn't rich but she is thoughtful and in addition to the gifts, if there is something she can do for people, fix something, or spend time with them she makes plans as a gift. If there isn't anything obvious to give or help with she can get a little stressed mainly because that person is Jinx/Powder.

When she already spends time with her and fixes everything when it breaks ASAP she doesn't know what else to give her. She always figures something out, Jinx/Powder helps her figure it out of course, but it ends up working out.

Jinx/Powder always, ALWAYS manages to be the best gift givers. They have an uncanny way of remembering or knowing what people mentioned wanting or needing. She also isn't rich but she is artistic and innovative, if she can't make it, create it or fix it she finds a way to procure it.

She still hasn't lost her tricks of the trade from Zaun and if there is an...unagreed upon trade between her and a shopkeeper when they aren't looking...well. No one is any wiser to it, it might be because the shopkeeper was in need of such a thing anyway.

And!!!! Woof!!! That's it guys. If you made it this far thanks for reading my scrambled narrative and thoughts. If you have any of your own ideas feel free to discuss, jump in or comment. I love reading peoples own interpretations of things and it adds to the creativity of it all.

#vijinx #so first off #I know its MOURNING dove before anyone jumps in #but it was too good to not use morning dove #vs night owl #secondly I am NOT a writer #by trade by choice by anything and I hope it's both not too obvious and also very obvious #im tagging this for people who have it black listed #im trying to respect yall!#incest tw

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intheorangebedroom · 2 years ago

Text

Pleased to meet you, epilogue

Summary: It's the dawn of a new life for you and Frankie, amidst the ruins of your former respective lives. He made a promise to you, and to himself: that he would fix everything. But can everything be fixed? Are you ready to let go, and let him? And how will you deal with your homesickness?

Pairing: Frankie Morales x Gabrielle Tourneur (OFC)/French fem!Reader

Rating: disgusting fluff & explicit fifth 🔞

TW: non-descriptive allusions to past abuse and self-harm

A/N: Dear orange besties 🧡 Happy Frankie Friday ❤️‍🔥 This is the end. I am sorry it took me so long, and if anyone is still hanging in the orange bedroom, I am sorry this is so long. It's most likely bad planning on my behalf; it's also because Gabrielle was never meant to stay. I'm so scared I'll never be able to write anything else because this story fucking drained me. It's one thing to smash the keyboard and reblog unhinged gifs, but I'm very uncomfortable expressing my feelings publicly, mainly but not only on account of my ass getting very gothic, very fast. So if I've hidden some dedications at the end 🧡 But I want to say here, to anyone who's ever read and/or interacted with me and/or this story (likes, comments, reblogs, asks): THANK YOU 🧡 From the bottom of my gothic orange heart. Thank you 🧡 I really hope you like this. *presses post now and runs to hide*

Word count: 20k (I– listen, I'm sorry)

[prev] * [series masterlist]

Epilogue: Songbird

Summer

The summer is laced with sawdust. It’s everywhere.

In your nostrils, the blond, warm, toffee-like scent blending with the smell of the overworked electric sander’s gear. It’s in the sound of his boots scraping the kitchen tiles when he comes in through the backyard screen door to get a beer in the late afternoon sun. It’s in the texture of his tanned, freckled skin, soaked in with his sweat, catching at your fingertips when you run your hands over his forearms, before you lead him to the bathroom to get him cleaned up.

It’s in the longer curls of his hair, on his cap and all of his clothes, and more often than not, it’s on your clothes too, when you join him outside the toolshed, to make sure he’s wearing the protection goggles you bought, and the dust mask he takes off the minute you look the other way.

And you don’t know it yet, but you will forever associate it with his kisses. Languid, unhurried, they don’t lead to anything more than simply kissing. His hold on your body loose, his large hands spanning the expanse of your skin, his plush lips teasing yours, tongue swirling inside your mouth. You float together for what feels like hours, until you’re left deliciously disoriented.

And no matter what you do, it always ends up in the bed, dusted between the celadon sheets he chose for you. It scrapes at your shoulders and the round of your ass when you arch up from the bed, bucking your hips into his face.

But that’s August.

July is spent mostly at your place.

Your first days together are lost to the haze of your brain. Wrapped in the hushed, draped atmosphere of your small apartment, you let him take all that he needs. His lips only ever leaving your lips for your skin, sucking in harshly, leaving new marks, his kisses more teeth than tongue.

His body moulded around yours, inside yours. Sweat, spit, spend and slick. His palms relentless, roaming your body. Restless fingers digging into your curves.

On Monday morning, the drive to the bookstore is tense and silent, his brow deeply creased, that tick of the jaw you haven’t forgotten. But there’s a life for you, here. One that you are looking forward to living. One you have to be able to afford.

In short, you need to go back to work.

Out in the street, by the double-parked truck in front of the store, his emotions bleed into his kiss, fingers threaded in your hair holding you still in their grip, his bite on your lower lip nearly drawing blood, and you have to whine yourself out of it.

You offer Suzanne a short apology, disarming in its sincerity.

“I’ve been very ill, but I’m better now,” you say, and she silently nods because it is quite plain to see. You are better. There is life in your face and light in your eyes. She can’t possibly miss the marks on your skin, but as usual, she chooses to keep to herself and you carry on with your tasks and your day, quietly humming.

Going through the backlog that built up during your absence, your mind wanders back to his kiss, its urgency contrasting with your relief. Beyond the tiredness weighing down your bones, deep down, you had been waiting for him. Like you always did. Sitting at the pitch-dark bottom of your exhausted heart, the knowledge that he’d be coming.

When you leave the store in the late afternoon, you find him there, standing across the street, arms folded over his chest, his tall figure, dark and intense, leaned against the truck’s hood.

Goosebumps break out along your arms when you step together into your apartment, chilled air hitting your skin. On one of the bedroom window sills, the ancient AC unit is softly droning. Behind you, Frankie leans down to kiss the raised skin on your nape, whispering, “I fixed it, hope you don’t mind.” Not giving you time to answer, he nips at your neck and tugs at your shirt, but you turn around and stop him with your searching gaze.

“Please, Frankie, talk to me.”

The night slips away in whispers, two quiet voices rising from under the baby-blue sheets in the cool darkness. What went down at the bar, who said what, how he got hit. When he’s done, you press him further than you think yourself able to handle, for his sake, but all he gives you is, “I don’t regret anything” and “I will fix it.” You believe him.

In the silence between his words, you lie still. You listen, you understand. His needs, the proximity of your body and the soothing contact of your skin, to be cooped up with you in the smallest possible space for as long as it takes for him to absorb the fact that he hasn’t lost you. That he never did. That he never could.

So, the days pass. Sweat, spit, spend and slick. Stifling heat and sleepless nights.

You bite your tongue every time you look at his weary face, every time you want to argue that the daily three hour commute to his workplace is far too long. He’s not flying yet. So you let him.

Until July 23rd.

Off on weekends, he picks you up on Saturdays, but today is Thursday and a quick shudder of panic runs down your spine when you step outside into the scorching heat and find him parked there. You scrape your knuckles in your haste to roll down the iron shutters, but it’s only when you join him that you realise what’s different: he’s waiting inside the truck.

Elbow propped on the door through the rolled down window, he starts the engine as soon as you get in and the entire hold lights up with his smile.

“Hey baby, how was your day?” he beams from underneath the brim of his cap, “Wanna go for a ride?”

When he pulls out an hour later onto a Brooklyn street you don’t recognise, your heart is pounding too fast, already. You have a notion of what this might be about, but you can’t bring yourself to hope you are right, even when he turns to look at you with that smug grin you haven’t seen in a long while.

“Where are we?” you rasp, your voice cracking around the words.

“Climb here, baby, you’ll get a better view,” he smiles, tilting his head down and slapping a hand on his thigh. His smile deepens, to his dimple and to his eyes hidden behind his aviators, at the familiar, tell-tale sight of your pulse thrumming wild under the soft skin of your neck.

But your chest feels too heavy, it’s pinning you down, tears prickling your eyes at what you’ll see, so he unfastens your seatbelt, then his, and reaches to haul you onto his lap with that easy strength, that surprising softness.

The steering wheel bites into your lower back and you can’t peer out the window, instead you crumble onto his chest, your fingers twisting his shirt and your face buried in his neck, your own personal safe place. And anyway, you don’t need to look, you know what’s out there.

A tall brick building, its brown facade streaked with iron fire escapes.

A dry sob quakes your frame, and you feel the pressure of his large hands on your back, their warmth flowing through you. You remain limp in his embrace until he can talk around the memory choking him. That of a young man, driving up to basic training in his sister’s VW, wondering where he would have taken you if you only had more time to spend together. Daydreaming on the promise of later.

More time then. Now years to erase. Rewrite and live again.

“Alright baby, alright,” he breathes into your hair, “how ‘bout we go to Coney Island?”

It’s bright and busy and loud. It’s rowdy teenagers laughing over the crashing ocean’s waves. It’s neon rainbows and blaring pop music and kids’ high-pitched screams on convoluted rides. It’s his hand splayed wide and protective in the small of your back, steering you through the crowd. It’s cotton candy on his lips, and sticky sugar on your fingertips; it’s a black and white photo booth stripe underneath the Wonder Wheel, split up in two, the upper half tucked inside your wallet, where a torn paper with faded ink used to be.

It’s your life, now, and for the second time, you’re not standing warily on the outside.

That night, he drives back to his place. That night, he’s out of the truck in a beat and you barely have time to climb down before he grabs the back of your head and the swell of your ass. He tastes of candy apple, sweet and sour, licking into your mouth, and his scent fills your lungs. He carries you inside with your arms around his shoulders, fingers digging into the strong plane of his back.

That night, in many regards the first, you don’t make it to the bedroom. He puts you down in the living-room and he throws a couch cushion on the floor, shoving you down onto it, kneeling between your thighs, tugging roughly at your clothes and you scramble on the smooth leather to undress him.

Leant over you, his grip on your wrists a bruising one as he pins your arms along your sides, fucking into you at a blinding pace, sweat dripping down his sideburns, your legs entwined around his, your breasts bouncing with each thorough trust.

“Fucking look at you,” he grunts, again and again and again, and you come so fast, so hard, your back arching off the leather at a painful angle, but he doesn’t slow down. He fucks you through your high, and when you come down he’s already asking for “another one, give me another one.”

—

The phone keeps sliding down between your sweaty fingers. You swap hands, waiting for Dolores to pick up through what feels like a thousand ringing tones.

The relief in her voice is audible, which confirms what you expected: she’s heard about the fall-out between you and Rosie. And soon enough she’s scolding you as if you were still the schoolgirl she first met 20 years earlier, and you realise you missed the mother nearly as much as you did the daughter.

“Dolores, I just need to find out if she’s working next Tuesday. We need to talk, but I’m scared she won’t answer if I just call her. I need to see her, Dolores.”

Her voice drops to a conspiratorial tone.

“Just come home for dinner on Monday night, ok?”

You get there half an hour early and wait, sitting on the edge of the couch, the back of your thighs sweating on the crocheted quilt draped over the cushions.

A whole month without talking to each other, the longest ever you’ve spent without communicating in a way or another. Even back when you had no money to spare for transatlantic phone calls, you had never let such a long stretch of time come between you.

You shoot up at the sound of her keys in the lock, looking at Dolores with sheer panic, and it doesn’t help that she reciprocates your look.

Rosie darts inside the cramped apartment, grumbling in Spanish about parking in the Lower East Side, and stops short on the living-room threshold at the sight of you.

Your rehearsed speech remains stuck in your dry throat. She crosses the room in two strides, dropping her bag to the floor, rushing to hug you with all of her strength.

You breathe in her scent, shea butter, white musk, eyes shut to hold back your tears.

“Oh, Gabbi! I thought you went back home, I got so fucking scared,” she whispers, and under your clenched fists, her back is heaving.

Home. Did you always have so many of those?

There’s a lot to unpack, but neither of you will let the other one talk, let alone apologise. Strongheaded as ever, Rosie, however, makes sure you listen. The panic that triggered what she calls her “disproportionate reaction.” The guilt and regrets behind her silence. Her misplaced pride.

Atoning has always been easy for you, too easy, in fact, but you offer her words that have never passed your lips before. Words you now feel confident enough to fathom, and pronounce out loud: “I do need you.”

The two of you speak in turns until Dolores sits you down at the dining table, and then you keep talking with your mouths full. She’s cooked enough food to feed you both for a month, but you still eat most of it.

It’s past 11pm when the chatter subsides. Stifling a yawn, she offers to drive you home.

“I’m not sure, Rosie,” you start, uncertain, apologetic, “it’s quite the detour. He lives way up north,” you add as a way of explanation.

“And is he going to succeed where we all failed and get you to drive your own car, Gabrielle?”

You giggle with sheer delight because everything is different but nothing has changed, her beautiful black eyes alight with a mischievous flicker when she pulls out her phone to type in your new address.

—

“Wouldn’t it be cheaper to just buy a table from Ikea or something?” you risk, putting on the construction gloves he’s handing you. You look down at the solid oak planks sticking out of the truck’s tailgate the two of you are about to carry to the backyard through the kitchen.

He huffs and pauses dramatically, with an ostentatious roll of his eyes.

“It would be cheaper, Gabrielle, but it wouldn’t be good. My girl is not eating off some cheap wooden melamine in her own home.”

Considering his frugal lifestyle, you were surprised to find out money is not really an issue. His pilot income, while not extravagant, is still sufficient by most standards, and it adds up to his veteran pension, making for a comfortable living. However, you know there are monthly installments for the mortgage. There’s food, electricity, gasoline and all this goodman premium quality wood.

You’ve offered to pay him a rent and share the common expenses, which has earned you another huff, followed by a sarcastic, “sure, I’m gonna have you pay fucking rent. How about you keep your money and get a car, big girl from a big city?”

The suggestion punctuated by a nonchalant wink, before his plush lips found the slope of your shoulder, with a sharp scrape of teeth.

You’re Alice, falling down the white rabbit hole, discovering him all over again, only everything feels safe because you know you’re landing in your own private wonderland.

His quiet confidence, his occasional cockiness. His deadpan jokes quietly delivered under his breath. And the deeper you dive, the more you learn, the more you melt.

His humble selflessness, his kind attention to others. His practical, methodical, efficient thinking. His sharp mind and keen eye. His determination. What little remains of the hermetically sealed lid, and the hard shell underneath the soft one. The limits to his patience, too. A threshold not to be crossed, but only where others are concerned.

His playfulness when he whispers filth into your ear at the most unexpected moment, in the most inappropriate places.

It’s all intoxicating, unknown yet familiar.

You’re like a flower seed that has lain dormant for years, finally blooming under his benevolent care.

Nights are short and the right kind of exhausting, and you’ve never felt better. You dress in colourful shades: daffodil yellow, marigold orange, poppy red.

As soon as you moved in, at the end of July, it started with shelves for your numerous books to join his collection. Most of the novels in two editions: one in French and one in Spanish. The Master and Margarita now standing in view, next to Le Maître et Marguerite.

More shelves in the bedroom closet for your clothes and shoes, and a large standing mirror to check your outfit in the morning.

Electric shutters installed on the bedroom window, so you can sleep in the dark – your shocked gasp met by another soft huff, when you found out about the price.

And one Sunday morning, a dusty cardboard box he brought in from the garage. The orange curtains flowed out of it in a musty puff of air, dust particles floating in a sunbeam and you smiled at each other in silence, crossed-legged on the hardwood bedroom floor.

You closed the distance between you to straddle his lap, the position quickly becoming a habit to deal with just about anything, from joy to frustration to fear to contentment.

At the bottom of the box sat a green plaid shirt. He pulled it out as you wrapped yourself around him.

“Doesn’t fit me anymore,” he murmured against your temple. “You can have it back, baby.”

You handwashed the shirt and the curtains with unnecessary care, and helped him hang the latter on the bedroom window.

They clashed violently with the rest of the room, and you stood in silence, wrapped in their orange glow, Frankie’s chest pressed to your back.

Just like your grandmother, his mother was a seamstress. She’d sewn them.

“It was her favourite colour,“ he’d said. And he’d never mentioned her again.

You looked at them, unsure. Hadn’t you already lived too much of your life in the past?

“The colour’s really– loud, Frankie. Are you sure about this?” you murmured.

He lowered his face into the crook of your neck, as he so often did, and his lips brushed at the shell of your ear, the thin hair on your nape standing with the rush of air when he spoke.

“I can’t wait to fuck you in this light, baby.”

He pressed his body harder at your back so you would feel just how much he meant it, expertly unfastening your button fly, his hand inside your jeans shorts, travelling down your belly where heat spread in its wake like a wildfire.

You leaned back into him, closing your eyes and smiling at his appreciative grunt when the tips of his fingers met the dampness pooling in your sensible underwear.

“You’re gonna sit on my cock now, Gabrielle. I want to watch you come in the orange.”

Afterwards, as you basked, naked, sated, exhausted, in the familiar glow, you tried and failed to affect a casual tone to ask him about the one thing that had been taunting you since you’d first been in this room, back in June.

“Why is this bed so big, Morales? How many women have you fucked in here?”

He’d scrunched up his face, feigning hurt before flashing his dimple.

“Believe it or not, just the one with the French accent.”

—

Some time around mid-August, you come home from work to a faint smell of fresh paint hanging in the house. The loud, now familiar buzzing rumble of the Makita guides you to the small office next to the master bedroom, where you find him looking dishevelled and bright, his grey t-shirt stained with white paint, the power-drill cooling in his hand.

The walls are clean, freshly painted in a luminous white. Underneath the single window overlooking the backyard, where he’s hung the blue drapes, a small wicker sofa is covered with a plastic screen he hastily lifts off and starts folding. Your two Modotti prints hanging on each side of the room, one over a tiny desk where he’s placed your laptop and a round cactus in a blue china plant pot, and the other over a breathtakingly beautiful mahogany display cabinet, that already contains all your photographic treasures.

“I didn’t make this,” he explains sheepishly, tilting his chin toward the piece of furniture as you run your fingers over the sophisticated marquetry work. “Izzy helped me find it. D’you like it, baby?” his left hand twitching nervously, the plastic screen creasing noisily.

You shake your head awkwardly in the middle of the cosy room. It looks like you. A refuge of your own. Love and gratitude swelling in your chest, laying heavy on your lungs. At a loss for the proper words to express a feeling so simple and earnest.

“Frankie, I never… I never had anything so beautiful. Why– what is this all for?” you murmur, your voice unsteady.

“For when you need space,” he simply answers with a sweet, puppy-eyed face.

—

With early September comes the relief of cooler nights, and Frankie launches himself into yet another building project: lounging chairs for the backyard.

“Who taught you how to do all that?” you keep asking, and he grins bashfully, the shadow of another dimple on his left cheek, his answer always the same.

“I don’t know, baby, I just taught myself.”

Of the two wide, sturdy chairs he’s crafted, you only use one. Evenings are spent stargazing, sipping beers and talking, your bodies intertwined, sunk into each other’s scent. Oblivious to the street noises, hiding away in a world of your own.

When you join him in the backyard with two beers on a chilly Friday evening, nothing indicates it will be any different. Until you lay your head on his chest and feel the constricting tension inside it.

Is it because of your insatiable fascination with everything that touches him? Curiosity killed the cat, your mother would always tell you, enough that you ended up living your life forever treading on the edge of most relationships.

Is it because he found his own equilibrium readjusting your imbalance?

Whatever the reason, from the moment you curl up into Frankie’s side, you can tell something’s off.

Pressing yourself closer to him, you slide your hand under the hem of his t-shirt and bring it to rest over his scar, grounding him with your touch.

Only then, Frankie starts talking.

His childhood in San Diego, growing up with a hot-tempered sibling and the shadow of a mother, her melancholy, her obsession, her passing… all the way back to his parents getting married. The happy memories only borrowed, reimagined through faded photographs. Absence, forever unanswered, hanging over him like a chiming mobile. The father he never met.

Holding your breath, intently listening to a story he had so far only ever told in scraps, you’re struck by the realisation that both of you grew up without a father. Gone, already, before you were born.

Under the canopy of the purple urban night sky, Frankie, at last, confides in you about his ghosts, his fears, his rage. About the strangeness of moving through life with questions in lieu of bearings, of being older than his father will ever be.

And when he’s done talking, when his words have run dry, you take the hand he runs over his face and bring his palm to your lips. You hold on to it tight for balance as you climb on top of him. Vulnerability altering his face and it carries you back to a windy Brooklyn street on a forever ago Monday morning, it slices through your heart, bittersweet, sharp-edged. You once felt so helpless to erase the crease of his brow. But that was forever ago.

You lower your lips to it, and with a kiss you absorb all the pain it withholds. In the still of the night, in the near darkness, a fleeting light glimmers in his dark eyes, the sliver of a swelling tear.

You cup his face, and you whisper, “I’m so proud of you, Francisco Morales. My man.”

He sucks in a sharp breath. It trickles down your spine.

You tug lightly at his shirt and he offers no resistance, sitting up and letting you slide it off above his head.

Another kiss to the side of his nose, to the edge of his jaw, to the heart-shaped bare patch of his beard. Down along his neck, and he’s the pliant one, for once. Over the slope of his shoulder and to the dip between his collarbone, his suprasternal notch, where you lick and linger. Your palm pressed to his scar.

A scrape of your teeth over his nipple and you feel him thicken between your hips, until his hands grab hold of your legs and he rasps, “Not here.”

He carries you back inside your home, through your kitchen and down the hallway to your bedroom, your legs hitched around his waist. Lays you down onto the bed where he spent too many nights avoiding sleep so he wouldn’t dream of you.

In the heat of your mouth, under the caress of your hands, with the sway of your hips, Frankie is whole again.

—

Autumn

Your happiness makes him giddy. A grown man, a veteran, and every time he looks at you, shuffling over to the bedroom, a dance in your steps, or when he hears you sing along some classic rock tune as you prepare coffee on Sunday mornings, he’s fucking giggling.

He’s done some things he would have deemed ridiculous, no, downright crazy, only a few months ago. He’s picked his T-shirt from the laundry basket after you’d slept in it a couple of nights, and wore it to work. He washed his hair with your shampoo to carry the scent of you; he kept it long because you asked him to. He’s taken this colourful thing you tie your hair with, and wore it on his wrist all day, breathing it in every time he’s alone.

He, who’s never been late anywhere, can’t make it on time to work anymore, despite waking up earlier than ever before, because he can’t tear himself away from the sight of your tranquil, sleeping face.

And in the evenings, he brushes your hair. He’s discovered a birthmark on your nape, a little red fleck hidden in your hairline. On some days, he can’t think of anything else, counting down the hours until he can see it again. Press his lips to it, eyes closed in rapture.

He doesn’t give a fuck how it looks, or what his friends or anyone would think if they knew. He’s longed all his life to experience that blissful balance with you. The one you two settled in so rapidly, with such ease.

By 4pm, he’s done with his working day and he drives home. This once was a dreaded hour, but not anymore. Evidences of your presence are scattered all over the house.

In the bathroom of course, your French cosmetics and lotions neatly aligned in the small cabinet, two towels, two robes. The small room constantly smells of you.

In the bedroom, in the way you leave the bed open when you leave after him in the morning, the comforter folded over, in stark contrast with his military bed-making habits.

In the living-room, whatever book you’re currently reading lying on the coffee table. Framed pictures of you and Rosie smiling at him from the bookshelves.

Foul smelling cheeses in the fridge. Your tin mug drying on the rack next to the sink. Two knives, two plates, two forks.

A house that feels like home, at last.

Instinctively, he understood your need for independence and learnt to navigate it. A big girl from a big city indeed, he’s known it all along. You’ve only had yourself to rely on for most of your life. And he gets it.

So in spite of his primitive impulse to provide for you in every way, he refrained from protesting when you expressed the will to pay for food, and gas whenever you get the chance. You can be stubborn, if you need to be. He’s learnt that too.

You sometimes go to the movies alone, or visit art exhibitions, and there are the occasional girls' nights out in the city.

When you come back home afterwards, it’s a real treat, one he can’t get enough of. He feasts on your buoyant tales of what you’ve seen, experienced, discovered or learned, on your eagerness to share it with him. He could listen to you for hours. He does.

Some other times, however, you feel small, your anxiety crawling back out from within, settling to the forefront. You’re still the same girl he met, vulnerable, incredibly courageous. Seeking his reassurance.

And he’s equally happy to make sure you get both space and safety. The single most important purpose he could ever be entrusted with.

Out in public, in the street or amongst friends, you two never hold hands. There’s a modesty about you and him.

Still, it’s always his hand in the small of your back before crossing the street or going through thick crowds. It’s brief, stolen knowing glances, fingers intertwined under a diner’s table.

When you think no one is watching, you tuck yourself into his side, his large hand gripping your hip. As if you can’t live in the open, yet. As if you’d rather hide your happiness from the rest of the universe, lest it be taken away again.

And there are his eyes; they always find yours. Watchful and intent, years of training and acquired instinct put to use to protect you, keep you close.

But your behaviour doesn’t matter, anyway. The organic pull between your two bodies is far too obvious to conceal.

He hasn’t stopped, he never will, leaving marks on your skin. Blooming flecks of his love peeking out just barely from under the collar of your shirts, for you to carry and never forget you are his. You squirm in his hold when he pulls in your skin, hard suck, sharp teeth, squirm and whine in pleasure-plain.

He brands you. He admits it now. His love flushes your blood to the surface of your skin. He does that to you. You let him.

Something alien, unbridled, something he can only identify as pride has him puff out his chest whenever he sees you in his clothes.

As if he hadn’t built rows of shelves to accommodate yours, it seems you’re always wearing his. None of his plaid shirts are safe, you even wear them to work, only to change into one of his t-shirts the minute you come home.

He pretends to mind, knowing you love that game. Only one day, in early October, you dig up a military tin trunk containing his army stuff in the garage, and you start wearing the things you find in there too.

The first glimpse of you in a green jersey has his stomach turn. Too upset to speak, he watches you leave with it for the day, willing his disapproving glances to be eloquent enough.

But a portrait of him in his dress uniform pops up on your desk, next, in a brand new fancy frame. And a little over a week later, on a Sunday morning, he walks in from the backyard to find you in a US Air Force shirt, one of his early ones, and the fact that it actually suits you, fits you like one of your own thrift store swag, oversized in just the right way, has his temper simmer.

He walks straight to the stove where you’re cooking scrambled eggs, his boots thumping heavily on the tiles. A sweet smile curls your lips when you turn around to face him. However sweet, it doesn’t stop the words from shooting out of him, nor contains the anger in his warning.

“Ok look, I don’t want you to wear those– things, Gabrielle. I don’t want any of it to touch you, entiendes?”

The Spanish slips right out of him, but you hold up your smile, and hand him a mug of freshly brewed coffee.

“I really love the Morales name tag,” you simply state.

He grabs the mug by reflex, thrown off by your unfazed reaction. Raising on your tiptoes, you place a kiss on the bare patch of his jaw.

“I’m proud of everything you ever did, Francisco,” you add in earnest. “But I’ll take it off, if you don’t like it.”

The blunt honesty of your answer immediately deflates him, and he swallows thickly at the first sliver of your skin when you unbutton the shirt to reveal your naked breasts.

—

Familiarity hasn't killed this miracle. Even when, in the intimacy of your house, you’re never more than two feet apart. Skin on skin from the moment you rush home at night until the moment he ruefully passes the door in the morning.

On his lap is where you sit most of the time, and he fucking loves it, sliding his hand underneath the hem of your clothes, pecking kisses in the curve of your neck, under your ear, where the scent of you is heady, feeling the weight of you shift against his body when you talk.

Your hand on his thigh when he drives, his arm on the back of the seat when you take the wheel. Brushing your teeth side by side before bed. Curled into his chest, slouched on a pile of pillows to watch movies on his computer (he’s offered to buy a television, but you declined). Your legs propped over his when you read together on the couch.

At night, in the ridiculously oversized bed, your bodies lie entwined. You need him around you to fall asleep, need him to crush you with his weight, and he wouldn’t have it any other way.

“You run so hot,” you mumble with delight, seconds before tipping over into unconsciousness, your voice heavy with your day.

You taste so good, he murmurs against that spot he likes too much under your ear, his kisses rippling in shivers along your skin; you taste so good, he moans into your mouth, never sated, never pulling back first; you taste so fucking good, he grunts into your cunt, pinning you down on the rumpled linen.

You’re here, at last, for him to love and to revere, for him to taste, taste, taste.

He had you in his truck, pulled over to the side of the road in a rainstorm, on the way to an upstate farmers market. He had you in the garage, against the hood cooling down. He had you in a bathroom stall in the Guggenheim, his mouth fastened over yours to keep you quiet, his fingers buried inside your cunt.

He has you in the storage room in the back of the bookstore, more often than he should, when Suzanne’s not there on Saturday afternoons and he can’t wait for you to come home. When you come around him, he calls you his good girl.

He had you in your room; you sat him down on the wicker sofa, rucked up your pretty dress and rode his thigh clad in raw denim, “Remember the first time you made me come, Francisco?”

He gripped your ass so forcefully your skin bore bruises for days, and you gave him that sound, that two-tone moan, straight into his ear and then you dragged your teeth along the column of his throat. He flung you down on the carpeted floor and fucked you limp.

He had you in the bathroom, more times than he can count, and in there, whether rough or languid, he always fucks you with a delightful, ironic revenge.

He ate your cunt on the dining table like you were the main course in a fancy dinner, and then he flipped you over and fucked you so hard you cried out his name.

He brought your shoulders up against his chest, clasped his hand over your mouth and fucked you harder.

You bit his fingers and clung onto his arms, your nails carving lovely pink crescents into his flesh, your entire body jerking when you came again, your cunt gripping him and you sobbed as he filled you up.

He dropped to the floor, exhausted, chest heaving, drenched in sweat, and you crawled over him, curling into his side.

When he fucks you with such feral rage, you’re soft for days afterwards, as if relieved by the reminder of his intensity. And just like with everything you need, he’s only too happy to provide.

“Frankie—” you breathed out, but you trailed off and you hugged him tighter, and he thought you were about to say it, those three little words you spoke daily in a million different ways but never with actual words.

But you stopped short, once again.

He often wonders if you’ve ever told them to anyone. To Rosie, you might have, even Will, perhaps. To Ben, he’s now certain you didn’t.

He can’t tell why it’s so important to him to hear them. After all, he’s never pronounced them either. Not in English. Not when you’re awake.

But this isn’t only about a shared feeling. He knows your family never taught you how, and the thought makes his body ache.

—

In the weeks leading up to Halloween, you grow more and more excited, decorating the house, scheming about matching costumes. It doesn’t even occur to him to deny you any of it, he’d dress as a pink bunny if you asked him to. Even though, given what you have labelled “your fascination for all things morbid,” he can tell a bunny isn’t in store.

Here he is, falling in love with you all over again. Your childlike enthusiasm, your unabashed enjoyment, your bubbling excitement. These are the things he lives for.

At long last, he gets to introduce you to his sister on Halloween’s eve. Out of town for most of the summer, Izzy’s invited over you for dinner, but the evening doesn’t play out in the least the way he thought it would.

You pretend otherwise, but your silence betrays your nervousness on the drive to Manhattan. His doesn’t talk either, tense and anxious until you get out of the truck and he can splay his hand on your back, feel you loosen under his touch.

For weeks, months, he imagined the two of you vibrantly sharing your similar views on politics, when in fact the interaction remains polite and policed, at first, nearly distant.

Until you zero in on a couple of old pictures displayed in his sister's apartment, in the hallway to the bathroom.

Izzy’s entire demeanour shifts. She’s delighted to provide you with embarrassing anecdotes on “babyface Frankie.”

“Look at this lanky teenage boy,” she grins, and Frankie, a grown man, a veteran, Frankie feels his heart skip a beat and trip over the sight of your wide eyes filling with tears.

Back at home, in the dark bedroom, you open up. Tucked under the comforter, wrapped in his arms, with your head resting on his chest. Those are the moments in which the words you had to swallow down all your life come easy.

“It’s because of the dead,” you begin. “It’s almost like a promise. That they can come back and walk amongst us for one night. I know it’s childish of me, but I would— I would like to see my grandparents again. Especially now. I can’t even lay flowers on their grave.”

He pulls you in closer. Waits for you to keep going, hoping you will. Guessing you are being mindful about his own ghosts. Adamant not to press, he simply gives your hip a light squeeze.

When you resume, your voice drops lower. And you tell him everything.

Your mother got pregnant during her senior year in high school, and sought an abortion her mother didn’t let her get. Taking you in when you were born, she watched as your mother left home in rebellion.

“It was wrong of her. My mother had the right to decide,” you say in a little voice, and the implication makes him physically sick, a foul taste sitting in the back of his throat at your resignation.

You go on to describe your happy, albeit short years with your grandparents. The orange curtains, summer vacations by the ocean, your grandfather teaching you how to read a map and ride a bike.

And how it all ended abruptly with your grandmother's death.

You had to go live with your mother, then, and as you briefly recount some of your most difficult moments, you make excuses for her. It wasn’t that bad. I was too sensitive as a kid. I wasn’t her choice. She was only 23 then.

Your father had long bailed, and again you provide reasons and excuses. You chuckle sadly when you mention two half-sisters. “Strangers,” you say.

You’ve long severed ties, with all of them, and it’s probably better, you say. For your mother, anyway. For you too, you have to believe. Some days, some days still, you can’t help it. You look her up on social media. Just to see. Make sure she’s ok.

Frankie listens. His heart bleeds inside his hallowed chest. Pieces of you falling into place to the muted sound of your voice, your words crawling under his skin.

I’m sorry.

Please.

I never had anything so beautiful.

And when your voice dwindles at the evocation of a step-father coming into your life when you were seven, when you finally fall quiet, what Frankie hears in your silence makes his inside curl and burn up with a vengeful rage.

But you’re done talking for the night. You circle his waist and soon, your breathing evens out, your body easing into sleep with little, jerky movements.

Frankie lies in the opaque darkness of the room, clenching his jaw until the physical pain takes off a bit of the edge. Eyes wide open to the memory of the first time he touched your breasts, on loop in his brain.

Is the man still alive? You certainly are wise to keep that part to yourself. You really do know him well. Because that would be the one kill he would never regret.

The following morning, he stays in bed until you wake up, and you don’t question his presence, even if he should already have left.

He follows you into the bathroom, steps with you into the tub and washes your body, towels you off, brushes your hair.

You let him.

—

“How old is Santi, again?” you ask from the bedroom.

Frankie spits the mouthwash into the sink and straightens up with a heavy sigh.

You know how old Santi is. But there’s something else on your mind, something that’s been eating at you, causing you to be distracted since the invitation to the party arrived in the mail. Something that’s compelled you to avoid eye contact since you came back from work, today. Something you’re keeping to yourself, probably trying to protect him, if he had to guess.

“He’s turning 37, baby,” he answers, imperturbable, buttoning up his worn denim shirt, leaving the last two buttons open.

“Oh yeah, right. Yovanna told me she invited Rosie,” you continue, “but she didn’t mention who else’ll be there—” you trail off.

There it is. Who else will be there. Or rather, who won’t be.

“Too many people for comfort, that’s for sure,” he chuckles, stepping out of the bathroom to join you.

Standing in front of the large rectangular mirror he’s built for you, you’re fiddling with the little strings tying your dress at the waist, and the sight of your silhouette in profile has his breath hitching. You don’t often dress up, but tonight you’re wearing a black wrap dress that looks like an oversized smoking jacket, with a plunging neckline and a whole lot of leg.

You wore dresses all summer, short or long, but as the days got shorter and the air got cooler, you went back to jeans and pants only.

“I don’t like tights,” you explained once.

And whatever you wear is fine; he can snap your fly open with two fingers, but seeing your legs clad in the sheer black material does something to him. Something that shoots straight to his cock.

“Damn, baby,” he whispers, and it’s all he manages.

“I don’t know,” you wince, “I have those smart black trousers, perhaps I should chan–” but you fall quiet because he’s come to stand behind you, his broad frame towering over your tall one, his head dipping into your neck.

His mouth stops half an inch short of your throat, and the magnetic pull it exerts on your skin lifts his lips in a satisfied grin. He draws back, the movement imperceptible, and it’s as though your skin reaches out. Like witchcraft.

“Frankie, would you like me to wear fancier clothes?” you ask in a small voice, finally looking him in the eyes through the looking glass.

You lean your head back to rest against his shoulder, and he reaches for your legs, his palms lightly trailing down over the smooth fabric.

“No, baby” he starts, and he watches the goosebumps breaking along your neck at the sound of his voice. “What I want is irrelevant, you wear whatever makes you feel good. Only tonight, I won’t mind if you decide to wear that,” he finishes.

His calloused fingers span up your thighs, catching at the thin material, all the way to your mound. The tights press into it, and it’s fucking delicious. When you close your eyes, two of his fingers travel downward along your constrained folds, and the low grunt that rumbles from his chest is met by a whimpering sound you can’t hold back.

His left hand slithers under the side of your dress to find the swell of your breast, teasing your nipple with his thumb.

“We’re gonna go to this party, and everyone there will be looking at you in this dress. Your breasts… your legs… your eyes… your smile…” a stroke over your seam with each word whispered into your ear, and your eyes flicker, you buck into him, “and I’m gonna look at them looking at you while I decide how I’m gonna ruin you and these fucking tights the minute we come home.”

He dives into your neck, pressing his plush lips to your soft skin, giving it a hard suck for good measure.

Santi and Yovanna’s place stands out from the row of neatly aligned houses. Light pouring out from every window, music, warmth and laughter spilling into the bleak November night.

His hand finds your back when you climb out of the truck and join him on the sidewalk. You’re wearing shiny black heels he didn’t even know you had. They make you taller, slightly shifting the familiar landmarks of your body at his side, and he thinks the entire party will be able to see it on his face.

Pride, like the sun reverberating over the surface of a placid ocean.

It’s that ability of yours to overcome your fear, to go headstrong against it. He won’t ever get over it. You’re more courageous than some men he’s fought alongside, and he often wonders if this could be the main reason why Will held you in such high regards.

And yet, you’ve chosen him to be the one who gets to hold you when you can’t be brave. Most of his life now revolves around being worthy of that.

But tonight, you carry your head high.

All of Pope’s friends and colleagues will be here, save for three of them, and their absence will, most certainly, noticeably stand out.

Yovanna personally called Frankie to inform him she had taken it upon herself not to invite Tom. Ever the suave diplomat, Santi kept loosely in touch with him after the incident at the bar. But he knows from Santi that Yovanna strongly disapproves of the lasting bond between them.

On the subject of the Millers, however, Santi remains tight-lipped. Frankie assumes they still hang out on a regular basis, probably on Friday evenings, at the bar, where himself has become persona non grata. And he bears no resentment for that, not towards anyone.

However, and even if he would never admit it to you, he misses the two men. He misses the bar, and perhaps most of all, he misses the fight nights. Benny’s jokes and Will’s expressive silence.

He’s texted Benny. Back in September, for his birthday, and his message remained not only unanswered, but unread. He tried again, a week later, and then a third time, to no avail.

He tried Will, next, and the phone rang out for what felt like a whole minute before he got sent to voicemail. The next morning, Will called him back during his morning commute. A smooth move for a clever man, Frankie thought. He hung his head as he listened to the short, non-committal voicemail that didn’t require any follow-up. Not exactly a rejection. Definitely nothing of an invitation.

He can tell you miss him too. Miss them. Small telling details permeating your daily life. You change the station every time CCR comes up on the radio. A wistful sigh that punctuates your impressions of an art exhibition.

So when the invitation came, he picked up his phone again.

But he knows your presence tonight implies a choice on Pope’s behalf. You’re smart enough to have it figured out, and he doesn’t need to ask you how you feel about it. He hears it in your short replies, sees it in the taut line between your shoulder blades, feels it in the tight squeeze of your small hand around his —a first, in public.

And yet you step into that party with your chin up and he wills his confidence to seep into you through his touch, to convey it with the pride lighting up his eyes whenever they set on your beautiful face.

Trust me. I will fix it.

The front door is open and you step together into the crowded living-room, where the furniture has been taken out or pushed against the walls to make space.

Santi rapidly walks up to you to greet you warmly. Beaming, clean-shaven, sharply dressed in a black suit, black shirt, no tie, he looks perfectly at ease in this social setting. But then again, he’s at ease everywhere, whether it is a luxuriant jungle or a parched desert.

Behind him, Yovanna flutters from guest to guest, shining bright as a Tuscan summer sun with all the standing lamps bouncing over the golden sequins of her short, long-sleeved dress. In his peripheral vision, Frankie catches your relieved smile. When she rushes to hug you, you hand her the bottle of champagne you bought two days ago.

“I don’t know the first thing about champagne,” you’d said, “I just took the most expensive one,” an apologetic shrug he eased up with a lingering kiss.

Yovanna takes your jackets, complimenting your outfit, and you slowly small talk your way through the crowd over to the other side of the room, where a bar has been set up and a young woman with short dark hair and tattooed hands mixes drinks. Frankie recognises her from the bar, where she sometimes works as an extra.

He watches over you, intently, through the endless parade of familiar faces coming up to him for a chat. Veterans, friends, vague acquaintances, and nearly all of them enquire about Benny’s whereabouts.

Your tense body feels small, pressed up against his side, and your grip on your glass is white knuckled. Every so often, he gives your waist a discreet but hard squeeze, and flashes you a reassuring wink.

Rosie walks in about an hour later, cheerful and bright in her deep-green jumpsuit, moving with confidence through the room to join you and turning heads along the way, as if it were her own birthday.

A quick peck on your lips, on Frankie’s, and she turns her attention to the barmaid to order a mojito. You untangle yourself from him, and begin to sound more like yourself as you chat with your friend. Soon, you’re too absorbed in your conversation to notice his glance darting toward the front door across the room every time someone steps in.

A couple of hours into the evening, the alcohol helping, people get loser and louder, and Pope cranks up the stereo. Frankie hangs down his head to hide his grin at the familiar, aggressive playlist, that Yovanna promptly changes.

Rosie has left your small group and is chatting animatedly with a young officer he’s seen working with Will at the VA, confirming Pope’s invited everyone he’s ever met.

You’ve already had two whiskeys while he’s still sipping on his first beer, when he feels your hand travelling down from his side and sliding into the back pocket of his jeans.

Your gentle grasp on his ass broadens his dimpled smile, and he basks in your gaze for a brief moment, before he turns to you.

“You’re so pretty, Francisco Morales,” you whisper, and he gets the feeling that you waited for him to look at you to tell him just that.

“Ok,” he chuckles, “are you drunk?”

“Just a little bit,” you concede. “But I don’t need to be drunk to appreciate what I see.” Your voice drops along with your smile when you continue, “I— I look at you, and I can’t believe you’re mine. Are you really mine?”

Frankie takes your glass and puts it down on the bar next to his bottle, so he can grip your hips and steer you toward the wall. You may be a couple of inches taller than usual, but he still towers over you, and his broad shoulders hide you from the rest of the room.

“I’m yours, baby,” he murmurs. “All yours.”

His lips brush your cheekbone, and he cherishes the slight tremor of your skin under the tickle of his whiskers. It is new. It belongs to your new life together.

“Would you still ask me to leave with you?” you ask again, bunching his shirts with shaky hands.

“I would ask you over and over again a million times, Gabrielle,” and he presses his forehead against yours, “I wouldn’t change anything. Except for the rain.”

He places his palm over your collarbone and his thumb comes to rest on your pulse.

His fingers slide and curl around your nape. Time stills, fading out the sounds and lights of the room around you. He presses his lips to yours, pulling you flush to his chest, and you immediately open up for your man.

The smooth, malty taste of the whiskey blends in with yours, it goes up to his head and shoots right down to his cock as he licks into you with the same need and hunger he once did on the fire escape, swallowing your doubts along with your moans.

He does want to leave with you, he wants to leave with you right now, spare you the pressure and the plastered smiles, take you home, brush your hair, feed you. Massage your body from your feet up to the crown of your head, rub your legs through those goddamn tights, feel your slick dampening them, have you come in them once, twice, if he can pace himself, watch your legs twitch in pleasure in the sheer black fabric.

But he has to wait. Wait just a little longer. There might still be a chance.

His self-control wears thinner yet when you push away from the wall to mould your body into his, when you whine as you meet the growing bulge in his pants, your leg hitching up along his. Is it a trick of the mind, that he can feel the smoothness of your tights through the thickness of his denim?

Fuck he can’t give in, he has to wait, stall for more time, the injunction coming from the back of his brain, barely reaching his consciousness.

He’s already fucking your mouth with his tongue when Pope’s voice rings out on his right, music and lights leaping back into focus, like sandpaper grating his senses.

“¿Qué haces, pendejo? Jesus! Get a room! It’s not that kind of party.”

Frankie quickly pulls away from you with a gritted “fuck,” but not so far that you can’t bury your face into his neck.

Pope’s smug laughter drums on his nerves, adding to his frustration, and he’s about to lash out when he feels you giggling.

As if summoned by Pope’s sarcasm, Rosie appears beside him.

“They’re unmanageable,” she quips, “you just can’t leave them unattended.”

“Oh, yeah, you’re one to talk!” you retort with a smirk.

Drawing away from you, he’s reaching for your glass when he sees your features drop. Your eyes widen, strained on the front door, and in an instant, it’s all over your face. Your mouth falls open, you suck in a sharp breath. He doesn’t need to turn around to check what —who— you’re looking at. He knows. He understands. He no longer has to wait.

Rosie and Pope see it too, whipping their heads to the left to follow your gaze, but you're already walking forward, quick, steady steps. Frankie pivots slowly, in time to see you fling yourself into Will’s open arms.

Oblivious to the couple of men coming to greet him, he picks you up with ease, splayed fingers across your back, and one of your heels drops to the floor. He closes his eyes, for the briefest moment, squeezing you tight in his brawny embrace.

Frankie doesn’t hear you, but he catches his friend’s answer, spoken through a wistful, brotherly smile that transforms his entire face.

“I missed you too, Elle.”

—

The dam breaks. The minute he parks in the driveway, the fucking dam gives.

“Keep your seatbelt fastened,” he orders and he kills the engine.

With a quick, deft gesture, he unbuckles and slides next to you over the truck’s bench, caging you with his upper body, sinking his face into the curve of your neck to inhale, deeply. His breath pushes back out of him with a grunt like a threat. It rumbles in his chest first, before it rattles inside his throat and fans over your skin. Your skin that raises and reaches out for him. It’s your scent, your smell, and he wants it to be his.

In your sitting position, your folds feel denser, trapped inside the black nylon material of your tights, and you grab the door handle when he starts rubbing fast circles over your clit, threatening grunts into your neck, scraping teeth, lapping tongue.

You come in a matter of minutes, head shoved into the headrest, lips pinched to bite down your throaty moans, breathing heavily through your nose, the windows blurred with a transluscent fog.

He carries you inside, swung over his shoulder, it’s playful but it’s not, it’s a want, it’s a need, a fire that flares in his loins, a dam that finally gives.

He tosses you onto the bed and you bounce with a little shriek. He takes off his boots and climbs onto the mattress, kneeled before you, strips you down to your tights, knocking your hands away every time you try to undress him, until you understand what he needs and you lay back on the bed, become soft and pliant and let him take it.

There’s an indentation at the base of your throat where he sank his teeth while you came under his hand in the truck, and the heat in his loins settles down a bit.

The nylon of your tights brushes smooth and sleek when you rub your legs together, pressed knees, shifting hips.

Framed by the dark halo of your hair, your face looks pale and eerie, like the slippery ghost he used to dream of, sunk into a restless sleep after rage-fucking women he did not see.

He parts your legs with his frame, spreads your hips with his breadth. The nylon is dense and brushes louder under his calloused palms and digits, heavy and hot and underneath, your skin too is burning.

The need to feel you is too heavy, the scent of you heady, he wants it to be his, his scent oozing off your skin, organic evidence that you’re his. He slides off his t-shirt, unbuckles his belt to ease off the pressure of the scorching hunger, it burns in bright anger between his hips, he doesn’t know how to tame it.

He crawls above you, dives onto you, teeth and tongue and spit and need, scraping your earlobe, your jaw, your lips, biting into the column of your throat, biting new marks and new indentations, would you still ask me to leave with you?

His in every scenario, every dream, every reality.

Between his lips, the hardened peak of your nipple is hot, still cooler than his mouth when he wraps it around the hard bud and sucks it in, squeezing your other breast, calloused palm, calloused fingers, his.

His teeth find your hip, the soft swell of your flesh, the hard bone underneath and you writhe and arch up into it, his name rumples your lips, the K rips from your throat, ripe, hot, thorny.

His forehead presses through your tights and into your belly, the little swell of it below your navel, sweat dampened curls of his hair leaving a sweat dampened spot, his scent permeating the fabric, infusing your skin.

He pulls back, calloused fingers hooked under the back of your knees catching at the nylon, sliding your calves over his shoulders, smooth fabric, hot skin, bright need. He spits on your clothed cunt and rubs it in, blends his saliva with your slick, hot, liquid, sticky.

His strokes are not gentle, they’re rough and needy, your fingers gripping his wrist to ease the roughness and he frees it with a twist, strong hand raising your arms above your head to pin them into the soft mattress. His face right above yours, sweat beading at your temples, on your pinched brow, his sweat dripping into your mouth, opened slack, your tongue pulled out and greedy.

You come as rough and hard as his strokes, your head trashed back, corded neck, folded in two, twitching legs like squirming snakes of nylon wrapped over his shoulders.

His forehead pushes down on your collarbone, infusing you with his sweat and his scent, where he can feel your orgasm blazing through your bones and your flesh and your skin.

The heat grows brighter between his legs, angrier, consuming, swelling along his cock, thickening. The urge to taste, and he pushes up from your heaving chest, releases your arms, your fingers a frantic scrabble over the white sheets. He’s pulled back in, instantly, drawn to the wet spot between your legs, dark and leaking nylon covering your cunt.

He dives in to cup it in his mouth, too hot and burning, to taste it, claim you, and it’s a bite, instead, rough and needy, and you jolt, his name scratching your throat like sand, “Frankie!” and he sucks in, rough and needy, saliva and slick, too hot and burning, would you still ask me to leave with you?

He sits back to undress your legs, the nylon a smooth drag along your skin when he peels it. He’s holding his breath, holding his spit, the taste of you and him swirling around his tongue, coating his palate.

His mouth travels up your leg from ankle to hip, in bites and licks, your skin hot, hot and smooth and tense between his lips, hot skin and hot lips, and he bites into it, sharp, unrestrained.

He sees it flicker across your face and in your eyes, wide and glazed, the moment you register what he’s doing, when he twists the sheer black fabric around your wrists, tugs on it, elastic, raising your arms above your head, shuffling along your body, your head caged between his thighs, and ties it to the headboard.

He hears it from the outside, the voice that comes from the back of his skull to ask you if “You ok with this?” and when you nod, the voice insists.

“Words, Gabrielle,” a warning and a need.

“I’m ok, I want it, please–” you breathe, sand in your throat.

“You don’t ever have to say ‘please’ to me.”

He steps off the bed to get rid of the rest of his clothes, eyes strained on you, hot and flushed and tied up and burning under the dark halo of your hair, bruises and marks of bright red scattered over your skin, you can leave all the marks, high-pitched two-tone moans of your want and your need carving his chest, his.

“Fuck, you’re so wet,” more growls than words, kneeling between your spread legs, spread folds shining and slick, pressing on your knees, down on the mattress with both hands, calloused palms, calloused fingers, smooth, burning skin.

The back of his two middle fingers slides along your seam, liquid and sticky and it’s an easy glide into your pretty cunt, hot and burning, deep and slow and then rough and curling, dark eyes sunk into your dilated pupils.

“Wanna taste how good you did for me, baby?”

You nod and he growls, curling deeper inside, so you nod again and you “Please, please Frankie please—“

“Don’t fucking say please to me, Gabrielle, I’ll give you everything you need,” and he pushes his fingers into the heat of your mouth to smother the word, calloused fingers, hot tongue gliding and swirling, a sharp bite of your teeth and he hisses, would you still ask me to leave with you?

“I got you, I got you,” more grunts than words, and he lines himself up, doesn’t wait and sinks in, sinks his thick cock into your tight cunt, down to his base, rough and needy, sweat dripping down his back, high-pitched moans.

Large hands framing your hips, keeping you still under his thrusts, bruising, sliding over your belly where he’s shoving his cock into you, Frankie, can you feel yourself inside me? Slowing down just enough to feel you trembling around him, soft walls, warm cunt, grinding deeper inside under his palms.

“You feel so fucking good, Gabrielle, I can feel your sweet pussy fucking squeezing me,” his eyes drawn to the odd angle of your shoulder blades poking under your skin.

His hands find the headboard, bracing forward, lying heavy into you and he thrusts in and out, rough and needy, your legs bracketed around his waist, your knees hitched along his torso, hot, smooth burning skin, sweat dripping, “oh god, Frankie.”

“That what you needed, baby? For me to fuck you like this?” ramming into your cervix, tight cunt clenching, hot, wet, his.

Your head pressing into the pillow, you push away from the comforter, clutching his cock, hard and thick and ramming, and you nod, and you remember, you say “yes, Francisco,” and he’s fucking losing it, pounding harder, sinking deeper.

Calloused fingers curled around the headboard, white knuckled, taut muscles shifting under his skin.

Your high rips through you, through a cry, two-tone moan, eyes rolling, empty bound fists clenching, arms jerking against their binding, hot tight cunt gripping him in its endless flutter.

“Frankie, Frankie—“

“That’s it baby, just like that,” growls and grunts and words, “just like that.”

Years spent and wasted wishing he could carry you inside him, before he started wishing he could rip you out like a poisonous seed.

Your heartbeat pulsating under his chest and your cunt thrumming around his cock, the air you draw in gulps filling his own lungs, limbs entangled, sweat on sweat. This is as close as it gets to slicing his chest open to fit you inside it.

Static fills his brain, the room spins around him in orange waves and he comes like a whip, hot, liquid and sticky, pumping his seed into you, further, deeper, teeth clenched, eyes shut, a hissed curse in Spanish, through waves of orange.

His.

—

Winter

Everything you once dreaded, everything he once hated, you are now looking forward to experiencing, side by side.

It’s not your first Christmas with Dolores and Rosie, but it’s the first time you don’t feel like a rescue puppy, stepping inside the camped apartment with your arms full of presents and your man at your side.

Everywhere you go, you feel legitimate.

Everywhere he goes, he feels at ease.

For once, Izzy’s in town for New Year’s Eve, and he doesn’t think twice before accepting her invitation to what she promises will be a quiet and cosy family dinner at her place.

She ends up so drunk, Frankie has to put her to bed before you can go home.

Fairly tipsy yourself, you sober up fast when he carries you over to the bedroom and bluntly declares he’s going to fuck you into the next year.

“Which one?” you joke, “cos technically it’s already next year, big man Morales.”

“2050, baby,” he answers with a cocky grin, unbuckling his belt. “Now get naked and spread those legs. I wanna see everything.”

January brings snow and icy northern winds along with the prospect of flying again, his six-month probation drawing to an end.

And one evening, it brings you home late, freezing cold, and particularly irritated.

“I had to wait 15 minutes for that damn bus because of the snow,” you fume, hanging your damp coat on the wall rack by the door. “How does this fucking country get so fucking hot in the summer, and so unbearably cold in the winter?”

He briefly considers arguing it’s not as much the whole country as just some states, but he wisely opts for compassionate silence.

You turn to face him, pointing a menacing index in his direction.

“You know what, America? You win. I’m getting a fucking car.”

“Don’t call me America in front of Izzy, if you wanna live long enough to drive that car,” he advises you with a raised eyebrow, his smile widening to his dimple.

He takes the following Tuesday off, and the two of you head back to Autoland, where a blond woman about your age welcomes you and introduces herself as Julie.

A brief conversation is all it takes to ascertain that Julie is far more competent than Gary could ever dream to be, but the sheer idea of having to explain what you’re looking for once again prompts you to enquire about him.

“Oh, Gary’s in jail,” she tells you with a hint of a smile. “Embezzlement. Didn’t end well,” she adds, and her lips stretch into a satisfied grin.

Twenty minutes later, you leave the dealership with a decent bargain and a pre-owned Ford Fiesta in forest green.

It’s only when you come home the next evening, your hands warm and your clothes dry, that Frankie measures just how relieved he actually is.

And you won’t admit it, in fact, he’s fairly certain you make a point of complaining about finding a place to park near the bookstore, but he can tell you’re happy too. Happy and proud, because the following weekend, he catches you calling Will to tell him you’ll be picking him up at his place to drive together to the Met.

A four-month hiatus hasn’t altered the tightly woven fabric of your relationship with Will. You fall right back into your cosy routine of monthly trips to the city to visit exhibitions, followed by drinks and endless talks at McSorley.

Emboldened by his blunt questioning habits, you don’t walk on eggshells the first time you find yourself alone with him.

“How is Benny doing? Does he know we’re seeing each other, today? How does he feel about it?” you ask after quickly gulping down your first half-pint.

His steel blue eyes dive into yours and you do your very best not to shrink on your wooden chair.

“Benny’s fine, ok? He’s good. He–” he seems to consider his next words before he continues, “We had a few conversations about it. It’s not easy, he doesn’t really wanna talk. I told him about your history with Fish. He’s still a bit angry, but he’s coming around. I think deep down he understands.”

He pauses, and when you don’t say anything, he keeps going.

“But I don’t think he’ll be able to hang out with him for another couple of months, at least.”

Hang out with him. No mention of you, there. As often with Will, what lies within the silence matters as much as his spoken words.

You get it. You can’t have it all. But you are genuinely relieved to know he’s doing well. And that there’s hope for the two of them.

It doesn’t occur to you that you only hear what you want to hear.

—

The first banging noise jolts you out of sleep. You sit upright in the bed, dishevelled, confused, not quite awake. Your heart is pounding painfully inside your rib cage, pulsating in your eardrums.

Instinctively, you reach for Frankie. Your hand fumbles under the comforter, only to find an empty spot where he should be lying next to you, and you whip your head around to his side of the bed.

It’s the middle of the night, yet it’s not as dark as it should be. The living-room lamp is on, casting a feeble light inside the bedroom, enough for you to distinguish Frankie’s dark silhouette standing awkwardly by the bed, slowly opening the drawer of his night stand.

Another rattling sound comes in from the kitchen. Metal on tiles. Your sleep-dazed brain identifies the noise as that of one of the bar stools being dragged across the floor. Frankie tilts his head in your direction and silently brings his index finger to his lips.

Now you’re wide awake.

Panic trickles down your lungs in icy streaks at the realisation that someone has broken into the house, but it doesn’t compare to the horror that seizes you when Frankie stealthily pulls out a gun from the open drawer.

He’s still looking at you, the yellow glint from the hallway reflected in his ink-black eyes, his finger pressed to his lips.

Before you can process what’s happening, Frankie’s moving toward the corridor, his gait precise and absolutely silent, broad shoulders hunched and tense in his downward hold of the gun with two hands. You want to protest, tell him to stay here with you, but your entire body has gone rigid, disconnected from your brain. You’re glued into place.

Eyes opened so wide they might pop out of your skull, you watch him disappear into the hallway, and in the dead of the night, you can hear the door of the fridge being opened.

Years from now, you will still remember thinking that this is a fucking nightmare.

You brace yourself for gunshots, a fight, more clatter, but it’s Frankie’s voice that comes in next, resounding into the January night, angry, loud and… surprised?

“What the fuck, man?”

It snaps you out of your trance. Untangling your legs from the heavy comforter, you climb down the bed and slip on your sleeping shorts before you dash towards the kitchen, and you’re still walking down the short hallway when you hear him.

“Oh fuck, ‘m sorry, Fish, ‘d’ I wake you up?”

Benny’s booming baritone. Audibly shitfaced.

You see Frankie first, standing in his black boxer briefs, his gun hanging from his hand. Following his angered stare, your eyes fall on Benny, who’s tall silhouette is partly hidden behind the opened fridge door. His face peeks out from above it, a nasty-looking bruise blooming red and purple around his right eye, accentuated by the angled shadows.

His gaze is unfocused, dazed, and when he sees you, an unfamiliar melancholy blurs it a deeper shade of blue. He closes the fridge, a tall boy of IPA in his hand, and he straightens up like a little boy at Sunday school, his lips curling around a drunken smile.

“Hey, baby. How are you?” he slowly slurs.

“Jesus fuck,” Frankie grits, hanging his head, and your mind reels, you’re not sure how to handle the situation. In fact, you have no idea how to deal with it.

Walking up to your man, you curl your fingers around his forearm, and the tension you find under your touch does very little to temper down the alarm flaring in your chest. Your hand slides to his wrist, his own hand a tight grasp around his weapon. You don’t dare lower your eyes to it. And it’s probably just a trick of the mind, the way you can see it shine from the corner of your eyes under the crude ceiling light.

You don’t dare look at Frankie either, so you keep your eyes strained on Benny, who’s swaying on his legs, and ask in a shaky voice you don’t recognise, “Hey Ben. What are you doing here?”

“He still got a spare key,” Frankie growls in his direction, and you hold on to his wrist a little tighter.

“Won my fight, tonight,” Benny drawls with pride, as if this were a perfectly rational explanation for his presence in your kitchen at 3 am, and, visibly satisfied, he proceeds to crack his beer open.

“And how the fuck did you get here, Benjamin?” Frankie asks, his tone so aggressive it makes you jump.

Benny takes a long sip before he simply shrugs, “Drove my car, the fuck is this question…”

“Oh god,” you breathe out, and between your clutching fingers, Frankie’s muscles loosen.

Finally looking up at him, you’re shaken by the emotions playing across his face, far more complex than the upfront annoyance in his voice.

Frankie himself is not sure how he feels.

Relieved, at first, to find Benny instead of someone else, something worse. Fuck knows he could have shot down a stranger on sight, had they tried to come anywhere near you, and he’d rather you never see what he’s capable of with a gun.

Why, then, is he shaking with anger? Is it, deep down, the relief to see him at all? Could it be because Benny came to see you, and not him?

Most of his jealousy and resentment towards his friend had been drained out of him when you curled up on his naked chest, back in your apartment, over half a year ago.

He’s well aware of the lasting affection you continue to harbour for his friend, that the concern plainly etched on your face at the moment only serves to demonstrate further. And if it’s not exactly pleasant to think about, his confidence and the daily evidence of your shared love sweetens that bitter knowledge.

What’s a lot more difficult to stomach, however, are Ben’s lingering feelings for you. He can’t blame the man, he himself never got over you, and he had fifteen years to try to.

“He’ll come around,” Will had promised. Only Ben’s little stunt tonight makes it impossible to ignore any longer the one thought he has so far deliberately avoided. He broke his best friend’s heart, with a self-righteous determination, without an ounce of regret.

Benny takes a step in your direction, beer dripping on the tiles from the can, askew in his bruised hand, and Frankie sighs heavily.

As you release his arm to go to Benny, he tries to slide the gun in the back of his jeans before realising he’s in his underwear. He sets it down on the kitchen table, where it hits the wooden surface with a muted thud.

“Aww baby, I really missed your face,” Benny mumbles as you grab the can from him, handing it to Frankie.

“Ok, let’s get some water into you,” you answer, holding his shoulders straight to deflect the incoming hug.

You lead him to the couch on the other side of the room where you sit him down, while Frankie fills up a tall glass with tap water, and you wait for him to join you to whisper, “We can’t let him go home like that, baby.”

Benny’s muttering incoherently, and Frankie bends over him, taking his legs to pivot him into a sleeping position, his feet sticking out of the couch.

“No, of course, not. He’s gonna sleep here. I’ll drive him home in the morning.”

He lets you take off Benny’s sneakers while he returns his gun to the night stand drawer, but when you don’t come back to the bedroom, he can’t resist the urge to go see what’s going on.

He’s still in the hallway when he stops short at the scene before him. You’ve draped a plaid over Benny, already fast asleep, and you’re threading your fingers through his hair. A token of your affection, a tender gesture he saw you demonstrate before. In public. You lean down to place a soft kiss on his forehead, and when you stand up and turn around, your eyes find his, instantly.

He doesn’t wait for you, he can’t, not when he knows you’re seeing right through his gritted teeth, right through the nauseating guilt sitting at the back of his throat, and he goes back to bed, where you soon join him.

He opens the comforter to let you in next to him, and as you slide underneath it, you tell him, “Scoot over, Frankie baby, tonight I’m the big spoon.”

—

If there’s one thing Frankie has always envied Ben for, it’s the speed at which he pulls through any type of hangover. Mild, brutal, soul-destroying, it makes no difference. The man’s up at the crack of dawn, and by 8am sharp, he’s out the door for his daily run.

Maybe it’s the age difference. But Frankie was never this prompt to recover, even when he was younger. Maybe it’s good genes. He’s seen Ironhead getting shot and still complete the mission with dashing excellence.

Today, however, as Frankie leaves the safe-heaven of your body, warmly tucked under the duvet, and walks into the living-room with a pack of Tylenol, a little after 6 am, he finds Benny quietly snoring.

His bruised eye has turned a violent shade of purple, bloody crusts flacking around his injured knuckles.

Frankie knows exactly who Ben was up against last night. A bulky giant of a man, a force of nature, a major household name in the MMA circuit.

He’s been keeping track of Ben’s defeats and successes. This victory is one that counts. Important enough for him to get hammered in celebration. So important, he had to get behind the wheel and come to tell you about it in person.

It’s another two hours of aimless silent roaming around the house, brooding, mulling over what he’ll tell him when he wakes up, if anything, before he decides to start cooking breakfast.

When Benny begins to stir on the couch to the clanking noise of the frying pan, Frankie focuses on the stove, keeping his nervousness in check. In his peripheral vision, Ben sits up with a hissed curse, and gulps down two tablets with water.

He’s just done lacing his boots when Frankie places a plate of scrambled eggs and bacon in front of him on the coffee table.

Keeping his eyes to the floor, Benny mumbles in a thick voice, “Thanks, but I’m leaving.”

Frankie’s answer shoots out of him before he can think it through. “She’s gonna want to know you ate something.”

Benny tilts up his head toward him in slow motion. He meets his eyes with a cold, hard stare, and Frankie wouldn’t be surprised if he leapt from the couch to take another swing at his face.

He holds up his gaze, until Benny lowers his head and starts eating up. Cleans up his plate in complete silence and drinks up to the last drop the mild coffee Frankie’s prepared for him.

And when he’s finished, he gets up without a word and walks towards the front door to pick his jacket from the floor. Fiddling with the breast pocket, he pulls out a keychain and places it on the kitchen table as Frankie observes him, jaw cocked to the side, arms folded over his chest.

His hand is on the doorknob when Frankie speaks again.

“You had 5 hours of sleep, man. I don’t think you’re sober enough to drive,” he says, pushing up from the counter.

“Yeah, right,” Ben huffs, “I’m not leaving my car here. Not coming back to pick it up.”

“Alright, let’s take your car, I can ride the bus home,” Frankie says, grabbing his cap from the coat rack.

—

Somehow, he can always tell whether you’re awake or asleep if he’s with you inside the house. Today, he knows you hear them leave together.

The drive is tense, to say the least, Ben’s leg bouncing up and down nervously as he shifts, restless, in the passenger’s seat, darting sideways glances at him, most likely waiting for an opportunity to lash out.

But the early Sunday traffic is fluid, and Frankie a smooth driver, leaving him nothing to grasp.

When Frankie pulls out in front of his house, Ben’s out of the car before he kills the engine.

In turn, Frankie unfolds slowly from the low seat. The crisp January cold bites his cheeks when he gets out and locks the door. He risks a glance in Ben’s direction.

“Hey, Ben, wait up,” he calls, white puffs of his breath swirling from his lips.

Benny stops and reluctantly turns around to face him.

“Congrats on your win, last night,” he offers.

Ben answers with a dismissive, “Sure,” and Frankie throws him the keys across the roof of the Mustang.

He snatches them mid-hair in a smooth catch. A bittersweet reminder of their past synchronicity. Their ability to communicate wordlessly.

“You wanna talk about it?” Frankie asks quietly.

“What, the fight? Which one?” Benny sniggers.

“Ok,” he nods, ducking his head under the brim of his cap.

Ben takes a step towards his front door, but immediately turns around.

“You wanna know what really hurts?” he barks, his loud baritone thundering in the empty street. “Why didn’t you say anything? After that first night at the bar? You let me fucking parade her to you, guys, and you didn’t say shit.”

“Yea, I don't know, Ben,” he whispers, hanging his head. “I’m sorry. I really am.”

“That’s all you gotta say? I’m sorry?” Ben retorts, crossing his arms.

“Look, it’s complicated—“ he starts, but Ben interrupts him.

“I was supposed to be your best friend, that’s pretty fucking simple to me.”

“Ok, listen,” Frankie counters, raising his head and looking straight at him, “I don't know what you know, or what Will told you, but I thought she’d forsaken me. I guess I didn’t see the point of telling you. And by the time she–” he reconsiders, tongue darting to lick his bottom lip, careful not to imply your responsibility, “by the time I found out what really happened, it was already too late.”

“Yeah, well, it still doesn’t add up, Fish,” he argues, prepping his forearms on top of the car roof. “If a girl ghosts you, why wouldn’t you warn your best friend?”

Because she’s not that kind of person. Because she seemed happy with you and you with her. Because I never quit loving her.

Because I could never give her up.

“Like I said, man, it’s more complicated than–” he tries again, but Ben cuts him off, again, adamant to get it all off his chest, and if his tone is not exactly aggressive, it’s not particularly friendly either.

“Ten years. Ten years we’ve known each other. We went through fucking hell together, and you still fucking chose her over me. Twice.”

“Yea well, I went through another kind of hell for losing her, Ben, you just gotta take my word for it,” Frankie states with a pointed finger at him and a warning in his rising voice that Ben seems to hear, because he leans back just a bit.

He softens up to add, “But it’s done. So now what?”

“Fuck, Fish,” Benny answers, softer, “if it was that bad, why’d you never say anything? You never mentioned her, not once! I’ve seen you wasted, high as a kite, buried in pussy and you don’t share that?”

“No, Benjamin, I do not share that. Not with you. Not with anyone.”

He marks a pause, inhaling the cold morning air to maintain control before he can continue.

“Look, I'm sorry I did you in like that. I let you down and I feel shitty for handling the whole situation like I did. You were my best friend. You still are. But I’d do it all over again to get her.”

He winces at his poor attempt at an apology.

Benny remains still for a beat before he leans again over the car roof, joining his hands.

“So it’s like, true love, and shit?”

“Yea. True love and shit,” Frankie nods.

“Well, this I understand,” Ben concedes, unusually quiet. “She’s something. You lucky son of a gun.”

—

Everything you once dreaded…

Well, you’ve always dreaded January. It once freed you from Éric, but you still associate the dark, short days with loneliness, and a fast, spinning downward fall into depression. This year, however, you haven’t thought about it once. Not until this morning, that is, when the looming dread rose anew, expanding inside your constricted chest, hindering your breathing.

The fluffy duvet drawn up to your chin, you’ve lied still as the dead, your ears strained to the sounds coming from the other side of the house.

You fully woke up when Frankie left the bed, depriving you of his reassuring heat, after three hours oscillating between sleep and consciousness, always acutely aware of his unnaturally stiff body lying wide awake between your arms.

You mentally followed his barefoot stride, amplified by the early morning peace, the events from the previous night flooding back to your tired brain like rising waters.

Listened to nothing but silence for an excruciating long time, the growing tension emanating from him thrumming along the walls all the way to your hiding place.

Hiding, is what you were, and once more your mother’s reproachful tone rang out in your head, “tu ne fais que t’enfuir.”

“I’m a big girl from a big city,” you murmured to yourself. You were not hiding, they needed to talk, you were merely giving them the necessary space, but nothing you told yourself could ward off your anxiety.

When you walked into the living-room, after they’d left, you scrunched up your nose at the acrid smell of alcohol. And something else. Something you didn’t want to remember, so you pulled the curtains and opened the two large windows to let in the brisk winter air.

That’s when you noticed his phone, face down on the console by the front door, where he leaves it when he comes home.

You disposed of the leftover coffee in the sink and prepared a fresh pot, strong, to your taste.

While it brewed, you folded the plaid and straightened the couch cushions. You cleaned the stove and washed the dishes, wiped them dry and returned them to their cabinets.

When there were no more traces of Ben’s presence in your home, you stood by the counter, staring blankly at the microwave, double dots blinking between the red digits.

Now, it’s nearing 11am. You’ve been alone for three hours.

Uncertain about the distance between Frankie’s house and Benny’s place, you’ve no idea whether Frankie’s absence is too long or perfectly normal. You could put your mind at rest, even just a bit, if you only checked it out on your phone, but the idea itself irritates you. You’ve lived here just a few months shy of three years. When will you be as capable of navigating the city as you are in Paris, going about the metro and streets on sheer instinct, visualising entire neighbourhoods and calculating routes without the support of technology?

Driving your own car is bound to achieve that, you tell yourself, stepping gingerly into the tub.

Why does the entire house feel colder when he’s not there? This is nothing unusual, he’s rarely home when you get ready for work on weekdays, and it’s a beat before you realise you’ve left the living-room windows opened.

The water runs over your face, set to scalding hot and high-pressure, and you wish it could drain out your thoughts. Perhaps, if you’d see them floating at your feet, you might be able to sort out your feelings.

When he pulls out in the driveway 20 minutes later, he steps in through the front door to find you sitting by the kitchen table, arms crossed and shivering in one of his sweaters. There’s little to no difference in temperature between outside and the room, he notes with a frown, and his eyes land on the table in front of you, where his black gun stands out against the clear wooden top.

He stills, fingers on the brim of his cap, elbow raised mid-air.

He’s in so much fucking trouble.

“Hey, baby, how–” he starts, before you cut him off sharply.

“Are you ok?” you ask, more briskly than you intended.

You clear your throat, willing your hoarse morning voice to sound softer when you ask again, “You’re not hurt or anything, are you?”

“No, baby, I’m good,” he answers, taking a few long strides towards you. “I’m sorry, I meant to call you before I got on the bus, but I think I left my phone here. And the ride home took forever, I don’t know how you had the patience to…”

He trails off, standing in front of you in his jacket, awkward and rigid. For the first time ever, he’s not certain of what you need. And something tells him he’d better step back until you’ve expressed it yourself.

The tension hangs heavy between you, but once your eyes have scanned his face and confirmed he’s alright, your lungs open up just a notch.

Unfolding your arms, you lower your hands onto your lap, rubbing your clammy palms dry over your denim.

His eyes quickly flicker to his gun and back to your face, and he takes another step closer.

“Ok,” you shoot, straightening up in your chair, your gaze plunging into his, “can you please tell me why we have a gun in the house?”

It’s not the question that’s driven you mad since they left the house earlier, but this one is considerably easier to formulate.

His demeanour shifts immediately. He straightens up, planting his hands on his hips.

“Listen, baby, it’s perfectly legal, alright? I got a permit, and you know I know how to use it.”

He has the good sense not to point out the gap between your respective cultures, fully aware of your position on the matter of gun control anywhere in the world, but you’re standing up already, stubbornly facing him.

“Whether or not you got a permit doesn’t make any goddamn difference to me, Frankie. I want it gone.”

He lifts off his cap, slowly runs his fingers through his hair, and you falter.

This is not going the way you imagined, you didn’t intend to come at him with such aggressiveness, and your tone doesn’t reflect your confusion, certainly none of your fears, it only gives away your conflicted feelings.

Sucking his teeth in, he tilts down his head, and his eyes disappear.

“The gun’s not going anywhere, Gabrielle,” he hears himself state, and his point-blank refusal to comply derails you completely.

“What kind of threat is there that requires that you keep this thing in here?”

“Intruders, burglars, some junky high on bath salts…” he enumerates, shaking his head.

You mirror the movement before you counter with what you expect to be a foolproof argument.

“And what if Benny did something stupid? He was drunk, what if he’d jumped you, for a joke? What if you’d hurt him?”

Frankie's head shoots up, dark eyes devoid of all light staring you down with a hard gaze that has you swaying on your feet. He’s never looked at you like that, except… Except that first night at the bar.

And like that first night at the bar, he can’t stop his mind from reeling into the wrong direction, despite your face telling him something entirely different.

“Is this what this is about? You’re concerned I might have hurt him?”

“Of course I am!” you answer, puzzled by his reaction. “Look, I’m sure you don’t need a gun. If ever someone breaks in, you can probably subdue them–“

“That’s Ironhead’s thing,” he cuts in.

“Well, you can knock them out, then–”

“That’d be Ben,” he all but spits out.

“Oh for fuck’s sake, Frankie!”

You throw your palms up in irritation, tears gathering at the corner of your eyes that only fuel your exasperation.

Back in June, in his truck, he’d told you that he’d been too quick on the trigger, more often than not. Is that what you’re hinting at? Are you doubting his ability to keep you safe?

“Gabrielle, just drop it, ok? I’m asking you to drop it,” he warns, his voice a low threat that brooks no argument, and in turn you dig your heels in.

“I can’t just drop it, Frankie, I’m sorry but–”

“Please,” he grits through his clenched jaw.

Something gets stuck in your throat. You’re trying to breathe underwater. It’s escalating too quickly.

You try to blink the tears off your prickling eyelids before they start running down your cheeks, you want to stab your nails into the back of your arms and draw blood, but the urge to touch him overthrows everything and you place your hands on his chest, palms down, splayed fingers, anchoring your body to his, grounding him to yours.

“Frankie what’s happening, are we fighting?” you articulate around a repressed sob.

His hands go to yours instinctively, covering them entirely, and he can’t tell which one of you is shaking, can’t explain how what he means to say is so far removed from the way he expresses it.

“No– no baby, no we’re not fighting, I just need you to understand–” he tries, but it’s too late, your words spill out in moving waves.

“Please, I don’t wanna fight, please, Frankie, I’m sorry, I’m sorry Benny barged in like that, I’m sorry, I don’t want him to hurt you anymore, I don’t want you to hurt yourself—“

“Baby, I’m fine, I’m ok,” he says, comprehension downing on him as your first tears roll down in rivulets to hang from the line of your jaw.

He closes the distance between you, cupping your face to rub them off with a stroke of his thumbs, standing so close your eyes flicker between his.

“I’m sorry I overreacted—”

“Fuck no! You didn’t over— hey, listen to me Gabrielle, you didn’t overreact, I did,” he says, holding your head up when you try to hide.

Your hands slide underneath his jacket and find the plane of his back, you bunch up his t-shit in your fists.

“You just gotta let me watch over you the way I know how, baby, that’s all I ask, that’s all I need, for you to let me take care of you. I know you’re a big girl from a big city—“

“Oh but I’m not,” you cry, pressing your face into his neck, your next words muffled against his collarbone, “I’m scared, you left the room and I got so scared, and I don’t know if I’ll ever fit in here, there’s always something to remind me I don’t belong—“

The spectre of your departure resurfaces and Frankie hisses a sharp breath, a Pavlovian reaction to a pain stimulus. He focuses on the shape of you between his arms, the scent of you enveloping him, the taste of you only a kiss away.

Broad hand cradling the crown of your head, he leans into your ear, his voice dropping to a low, soft murmur.

“Last night was scary. You’re exhausted, we both are. We can talk about it later, ok?”

“Don’t leave me, Frankie, don’t leave me alone, I need—” you sob. “Merde, I feel so fucking stupid.”

His lips brush a smile against your temple, eyes closing at the contact of your skin.

“Hey, I got an idea,” he says. “How about we take a trip to Paris, this spring? You can show me around the city? What do you say?”

He’s been thinking about it for a while, but has so far found himself physically unable to discuss it with you. The whole idea could backfire. What if going back there reminds you of everything you still miss?

You’d said a purpose. And a goal.

Between his large cupping hands, your face feels like an evocation, and he’s drawn in, endlessly, on a loop, back to you, to your skin.

To the way it trembles between his pursed lips. A peek of his tongue to harvest the salty beads of your tears, to swallow the fear and sadness he vowed to see disappear, and you cling onto him with a murmured plea.

“Take me to bed Frankie, plea–“

“Don’t you fucking say it,” he growls, and he crashes his mouth onto yours. You open up for him, sliding the thick jacket off his frame, knocking the worn-out cap off his head.

—

The weak January sun, white and crisp through the treasured curtains, fills the bedroom with a hushed shade of orange, weaving together past and present.

His first thrust inches into your tight warmth slow and measured, and he pauses between your hips to let you adjust.

His hand a gentle grip around your jaw, he turns your face to the side and traces open-mouthed kisses down the column of your throat, a tender suck at the base of your neck, a hard bite on the slope of your shoulder, it makes you writhe underneath his body, crushed into the mattress by his weight, and you keen, legs bracketed around his waist, knees folded high around his torso, heels digging into the meat of his ass, urging him deeper.

You need him rough and you need him now, you want to feel sore tomorrow and the day after, you want his girth remodelling you into the shape of him, only him, forever him.

But he controls the pace. Attuned to your reactions and the sensation of your clenching walls around him, clutching him, blending pain and pleasure, your entrance catching along his length.

He shifts above you, tilting your head further to the side, the hardened tips of your nipples a soft drag against his skin, and you can’t breathe with his chest crushing your chest and he knows it, knows you want it this way. He moves inside you. Just a bit, not enough. You moan and you hear it through your need, through your want, like you’re running a fever, like a tiny, needy animal.

“Shhh baby,” he purrs in your ear, forehead to your temple, “I can’t move, I have to open you up for me.”

The words scorch your skin. You burrow your nails into the taut muscles of his back, eyes shut so tight under your pinched brow you see stars, his lips raising goosebumps all over your body on their trail along your jawline.

“Frankie Frankie Frankie–” you say Frankie like you say please, and your cheek sinks deeper into the pillow.

“Shhh, you're gonna get it, baby, you're gonna get it.”

Your hips buck against the restraint of his mass, and it slips out of you, inaudible, weak and quick, too quick for you to stop it.

“You looked so hot with that fucking gun, I–”

He stills with your earlobe trapped between his teeth, licks it better before he lets go.

“What did you say?”

The unwilling confession, making sense of your earlier fury. You shy away from the truth, a whining “non” stuck inside your throat, you try to hide from it, from him, the heels of your hands covering your eyes when you breathe out, “Nothing.”

His smile curls into your skin through a scrape of his whiskers, and he sinks into you, sudden, rough, deep, all the way down to the centre of you.

You bite down your moan, pleasure-pain, head trashed back into the pillow, clenched teeth corded neck, pinned down underneath the overwhelming weight of him and everything he means to you.

“I heard you,” he groans, grinding into your heat, “I heard everything.”

Everything you once dreaded. The contour of your fears, retraced, redefined. Innocuous, beyond the confines of his arms.

—

Spring

“Can you fly this plane?” you whisper excitedly, adjusting your seatbelt.

His eyebrows disappear in the overgrown curls hanging low on his forehead. He stills in his seat to stare at you.

“Baby, it’s a Boeing 767.”

“So yes?”

The stewardess announces the imminent take-off for Roissy-Charles-de-Gaulle, her words nearly unintelligible through the buzzing noise of the overhead speakers.

“No, I can fly military aircraft, like C-12 Huron or MH-60 Black Hawk or–”

“So you could probably fly this one too?” you cut in.

“No, Gabrielle, I can’t,” he huffs in disbelief.

“Have you ever tried?”

The crease between his brow deepens, his eyes searching yours, scanning your face for any trace of teasing.

“I– what? ‘Course not!”

“Aha!” you exclaim, triumphant. “So you probably can. You just don’t know it.”

He watches you bend forward to place a thick book in the seat-back pocket in front of you, and shifts his hips once again, trying to accommodate his breadth into the seat, before his eyes fly back to your face.

His heart leaps into a painful somersault, like a punch in the sternum that radiates up to his neck and down to his gut. Backlit by the plane’s oval window, your dark profile looks like the Victorian cutout portraits in your treasure cabinet, and it’s like he’s known you his whole life and the ones before, like he’d find you in every reality he’s ever known, and all the ones he hasn’t.

He lowers down his head, remembering to breathe. Something settles down inside him. A gnawing anxiety that had been steadily flaring since he’d book the tickets. He’d find you. In every reality.

“Do you really need to be this fucking cute?” he mutters.

“I’m not cute, Frankie, I’m serious! Now tell me, how do you feel about spending the next 7 hours crammed into this seat?”

A flash of pink as the tip of his tongue peeks between his parted lips. A wink.

“It’s ok. I’m used to fitting into tight spaces.”

—

Small.

Everything looks small.

The entire city has changed. New, modern infrastructures, subway lines extensions, bicycle lanes everywhere, roadworks on every corner and a new mayor.

All of it, small.

The streets are too narrow, the ceilings hang too low, the cars look like toys and the buildings like doll houses frozen in time because nothing measures up to Frankie’s height, breadth, or dimple.

The man shrunk your old world when he expanded your horizon.

You walk down the streets that saw you becoming who you are through happiness, loss and pain, strutting about like you know something no one else does.

The Airbnb you picked is on the south side of the place Gambetta. The Marais was appealing. More expensive but more central, fancy but not too much, but you finally decided against it. The 20e arrondissement is your neighbourhood, your home. It’s where your grandparents are buried.

There’s something incongruous, bordering on comical, about playing house with him in the tiny, typically Parisian apartment overlooking the Père Lachaise. The kitchen’s a corridor, and there’s no way for him to fit comfortably inside the shower cubicle. The bed is a full size, and if you knew not to expect anything bigger, Frankie’s eyes widened in bewilderment at the doll-sized bedding.

“Gonna break that thing,” he grunted, testing the mattress.

The first time you step into the métro, you take in the particular stench, and the realisation that you missed even that pulls at your chest with a sharp pang. But the nostalgia is smothered by the sight of Frankie squeezing into one of the narrow seats of the line 3.

The first couple of days are spent sightseeing the touristic landmarks of the capital, following the military schedule you’ve drafted. You don’t even try to hold back as you recount the many anecdotes behind every famous church, park or building, giving him what you self-derisively label, “the leftist historical tour of Paris.”

If there’s one place where you’ve always had enough space to be you, unapologetically so, it’s with him.

Here, you don’t need any maps, apps or directions, and Frankie diligently follows, listens, asks follow-up questions that prompt more thorough explanations, drinking up your self-confidence.

Sure, Paris is nice. But it’s not the buildings he's looking at.

His big girl. Growing up on her own in this big city.

Hiding, yet standing tall on that fire escape, your heart rabbiting under the pulse point of your neck, bravely withholding his gaze. Leaving the party with him, your smaller hand squeezing his bigger one as he parted the crowd for you, for the two of you.

He’s only ever had eyes for you. From the very beginning.

With his preference for modern art in mind, you’ve arranged the third day around the visit of Beaubourg, then the MaM halfway across town, which will bring you near the Eiffel Tower, you announce over breakfast, and that’s when he gently puts his foot down.

“Baby, take me to Orsay, will you?” he asks softly. “I wanna see that blurry painting you told me about. Don’t take this the wrong way, but I don't really give a— I don’t really care about the Eiffel Tower and all that stuff. I’d rather go to the cemetery. Or see your high school.”

You look up from your tartine, a toasted piece of bread stuck in your throat that you try to gulp down, and you stare at him blankly. A fixed, intense gaze that has him flinching, creasing his brow, has he fucked up the whole thing now?

“You wanna see my high school?” you repeat, and when he nods, you add quietly, “Do you really need to be this fucking cute, Morales?”

Your high school, your university, the bars in Pigalle and Ménilmontant where you hung out as a student, your favourite bookstores, antique stores, bridges, museums, artist’s studios, paintings…

It’s been decades since you’ve walked the narrow, quiet lane where your grandparents rented a three-room apartment. Years of repressed emotions have confused your recollection, and you breathe uneasy and short because you don’t recognise the grey stone building where you supposedly spent your first years.

Frankie holds your hand. You lean into it.

Later, walking in silence towards the family grave along the pebbles alleys on the east side of the Père Lachaise, you keep your head down and the tendon in Frankie’s jaw is pulled taut, ready to snap.

But his gaze, strained on you, is warmer than the late March sun that draws pale, ephemeral patterns under your feet through the lush green foliage of the century-old chestnut and lime trees.

His arm wraps around the haunched slope of your shoulders. It’s heavy. Grounding. He draws you in to his side, and pecks a kiss on the crown of your head, your hand sliding inside the back pocket of his jeans.

You look up at his sharp profile, and he’s more beautiful than any of the works of art you’ve shown him this past week, more beautiful than anything you’ve ever seen.

The bare-patch on his jaw calls to your lips, but instead you reassure him, “I’m good, Frankie,” because his bashful, dimpled smile makes you, because in his arms, you are.

The sprawling, romantic necropolis has remained the same to you, a place of solace, a refuge, a hideout.

The wardens are blowing their whistles to signal closing time when you reluctantly leave the cemetery. It’s cold now, the sun has given up and recessed behind pearly grey clouds.

Back in the small rental, Frankie follows you to the cramped bathroom when you go wash your hands. He watches you, leaning against the sink counter, crossed ankles, crossed arms. Tense muscles and knots.

“Where’s your mother now? Does she still live in Paris?”

Your eyes dart to the door frame on your left, on instinct, but Frankie’s massive frame is preventing any form of deflection or escape. Your body stiffens, you focus on your hands.

“Last I heard, they moved to a new fancy apartment they bought in les Batignolles. That’s in the 17e arrondissement,” you add, like that means anything to him. “But I’m not taking you there, Frankie, I can’t.”

“Not asking you to, baby. I want to know if he is still around.”

Your chest hollows under his words, hands clutching the beige towel. The faded scar tissues on the back of your arms itching like a million microscopic blades picking them open.

Everything you never said, never told anyone. Everything you convinced yourself never really happened, or wasn’t really that bad. Everything you kept inside, thickening the walls of your heart, weighing you down, because the only person you needed, and who you asked for help, had called you a liar.

Under his creased brow, his eyes are black as midnight sky. They’re looking straight into you. Contemplating that thing you lost, like a constituent piece that fell off and you replaced with something else. Aloofness, distance. Orange curtains.

He pushes himself up to his intimidating full height and you recoil involuntarily, but he doesn’t let you. He grips your face with both hands, his palms scorching your cold skin, and between them, you’re fully exposed, bared, left with nowhere to hide, nowhere to bury your secrets.

“I will hurt anyone who tries to hurt you, Gabrielle. Do you understand? Say that you understand.”

His words are quiet. Firm, steady, collected.

“I understand,” you whisper, and you clasp his wrists so you won't feel the ghost weight of his gun between your hands. “I want you to.”

He nods.

“You are mine.”

You nod.

You know you are.

—

Everything looks smaller.

Shrunk down by his height, breadth and smiling eyes.

The city hasn’t changed. But you have. You know something no one else does.

—

The day before you fly back, you meet for lunch with Laura outside the Hôtel de Ville.

She hadn’t minced her words –she never does– expressing her disappointment when you’d announced you wouldn’t come back at the end of your hiatus. But everything has long since been forgiven.

Sitting across the dark-haired woman in her early fifties, you chat excitedly over sushi you forget to eat. Crammed into a ridiculously tiny metal chair on your left, he feels the bespectacled gaze of your former boss scrutinising him.

Within hours after you landed in Roissy, your accent had thickened. Today, it has reached an all-time high. It’s the longest Frankie has ever heard you speak in your native language.

Your voice sounds higher, in French. You speak so much faster, with a lot of hand gestures punctuating the throaty sounds cascading from your pretty lips. He focuses on his chopstick skills, trying his very best to ignore the growing bulge in his pants.

It’s clear the two of you are more friends than colleagues. You had described her as your mentor. And from the dynamics he observes, there is obvious mutual respect. Which partly explains your instant hatred for Tom.

Laura thinks you look different. You might have put on some weight, you say. She shakes her head, grinning knowingly. That’s not what she meant.

Under your shirt, nested in the curve of your neck, sits a bruise in the shape of his teeth, blood underneath the surface of your skin blooming like a red peony.

The waiter clears the dishes and Frankie walks up to the counter to pick up the tab.

Laura leans closer to you over the narrow table.

“Je comprends que tu n’aies pas voulu rentrer [I understand why you didn’t want to come home],” she starts, and with a tilt of her chin towards Frankie’s solid figure, she adds, “Bien joué, Miss Tourneur [Well done, Miss Tourneur].”

She gladly agrees to give Frankie a tour of the Bibliothèque, a historical institution situated on the fourth floor of the central city hall. In the elevator, your heartbeat gallops up your throat. The life you chose, the life you once led.

The spacious reading room’s concave wooden ceiling is like the upside-down hull of a ship. When you step in, you’re overwhelmed by the faint musty smell of old books, mingled with that of the dusty carpets. You missed that too, but the feeling no longer tears at your chest.

A few former colleagues come to greet you, and you watch Frankie and Laura from the corner of your eye as she explains, in her approximate English, what your work as a librarian entailed, praising your skills and knowledge.

Frankie watches you too. He knows he’s doing a poor job of concealing his pride. He couldn’t care less.

Before you leave, you lead him up to the rooftop of the building through narrow metal stairs. Culminating at a 48 metres height, in the very heart of Paris, the vantage point offers a breathtaking 360° view over the urban canopy of tin roofs.

“Whenever I’d get a chance,” you tell him, “I’d come here for my lunch break.”

“Hiding again?” he grins.

“Hiding again,” you admit, “but not only. I’d look up at the clouds, and if I was lucky enough to see a plane fly by, I would pretend you were flying it.”

Years of chasing the shadow of him, years of searching for traces of you.

—

“Thank you for bringing her back!”

Rosie’s attempt at casualness is not fooling either of you. Frankie flashes a mock military salute and hauls the luggage into Rosie’s car trunk, hiding his grin behind the decklid. In all fairness to Rosie, he wasn’t so smug himself, on the day Pope drove you to the airport.

It’s not a long drive from Newark, but the car progresses slowly through the late afternoon traffic. The New York City skyline stands out in orange hues. Everything is too big again. Too large. Too tall. But it’s fine. Everything’s on scale.

The keys to the house jingle in your hand before Rosie exists the New Jersey turnpike, and you’re first to pass the front door, Frankie heaving the luggage behind you.

You’re so exhausted you could sleep for days, but you’ll have to open the store tomorrow at 10am.

Frankie goes straight to the bedroom and you hear the heavy thud of your suitcase hitting the floor, followed by the softer one of his rucksack.

When you join him, bringing two glasses of water, you find him lying on the gigantic bed, arms sprawled, staring blankly at the ceiling.

On scale.

“Did you enjoy yourself?” you ask him, crawling onto the bed next to him, curling into his side. His arm wraps around you.

“I sure did. That tour guide really knew her shit. Easy on the eyes, too.”

You chuckle tiredly, his chest rising and falling slowly under the palm of your hand.

“Could we go to Rome, next year?” you ask.

“We can go wherever you want, baby.”

“Even— even San Diego?”

He pauses for a beat before he answers.

“Sure. Anywhere you want.”

You scoot closer to tuck your face into his neck, and you lie together in silence for a little while. A pleasant heaviness is slowly claiming your weary limbs.

“Why does the trip back always feel longer?” you mumble.

“What are you talking about?” he shakes his head, a smile in his voice, “You slept the whole flight.”

Your cheek resting against the slope of his shoulder, your hand on his thigh, one day he would tell you, that being airborne with you had been the best part.

“It’s true,” you shrug, “I guess I just couldn’t wait to come back home.”

***

Bonus: Frankie & Gabrielle 🧡

Source

****

Dedications 🧡

Kelli. You started all this, but where do I start? I don't know if you remember the first letter you ever sent me, and what it said, and I don't know if you remember when I first told you about this orange bedroom idea, last summer. But I do. You’ve held my hand, like you always do. Your guidance and validation and support saw me through. Because you’re impossibly generous, with your time and patience and advice, you’re unbelievably kind, intelligent, talented and insightful. I’ve learnt so much from you already, about writing, about myself. You inspire me to reach higher. It's exhausting, but I love you for it. Oh yeah, and you beta-read this fucking monster too! Everything that is good in me this story, is good thanks to you. You turned my black heart orange. Kelli, I love you 🧡 @frannyzooey

Dreamy bby, my purple beauty, my beloved, my angst master genius, how many times have I come to you crying and whining and complaining, telling you I was giving up? Please don’t answer, it’s too fucking embarrassing. You kept my head above water, with love, kindness and humour. What did I do to deserve you? Beats me. Also I'm sorry but I love you more. Ha! Thank you 🧡 @dreamymyrrh

Ren, you’ve pulled me out of the ditch in a heartbeat more times than I care to count, because you are a genius and a wonderful friend. You are the reason I found a home in this fandom. You are my Reine, and I adore you. Thank you 🧡 @the-ginger-hedge-witch

Nicole my love, I know I’m repeating myself, but you are the first person ever to read the first chapter of PTMY. I sent it to you for your opinion, but really for your encouragement because I was absolutely terrified, and you delivered, you always do, you beautiful, beautiful friend. Thank you for your investment in this story and its characters. Watching you go from team Benny to team Frankie to team Benny and team Frankie again is seriously one of the greatest achievements of my life! Thank you 🧡 @nicolethered

Cee my darling. You gave me the final push to press post and you haven’t stopped encouraging me and supporting me since. You've lent a patient and kind ear to my doubts and fears, you’ve given me the most thoughtful feedbacks a friend could ask for, you let me stand on your shoulders, you give me strength to stand up for myself. In many ways, I carried on because you gave me the validation and self-confidence I so desperately need(ed). Thank you 🧡 @fuckyeahdindjarin

Deadmantis. Girl, Frankie really owes you one, because Gabriele stayed mainly thanks to you! I owe you an even bigger one for the love you’ve given them, and the orange bedroom. You know them like no one else. Your asks have fuelled me, they still do. I could never repay you, but please know that I am infinitely grateful to you. Thank you 🧡 @deadmantis

Lua. You rascal. You gave me the levity I so badly needed in a thick river of ANGST. I’m very selfishly hoping you never stop making me guilty by dropping Benny into my ask box. A million thank you 🧡 @pedrit0-pascalit0

And to my two favourite Anons, 🍻 and 🥖, I fucking love you to pieces. Thank you thank you thank you 🧡🧡🧡

****

Taglist (thank you 🧡): @elegantduckturtle @mashomasho @lola766 @flowersandpotplantsandsunshine @nicolethered @littleone65 @bands-tv-movies-is-me @the-rambling-nerd @saintbedelia @pedrostories @trickstersp8 @all-the-way-down-here @deadmantis @hbc8 @princessdjarin @harriedandharassed @girlofchaos @gracie7209 @mrsparknuts @mylostloversbookmarks

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