#This is to say that I haven’t found any solid evidence of the 40 babies which would be statistically unlikely from the 70 ish casualties in

[rotzaprachim]

this is definitely not the first time war has ended up on tumblr.net but it’s still wild to see people learn about the horrific haze of wartime reporting and chains of knowledge amidst a fandom-esque desire to be right all time time. “You can’t believe that all you have is witness testimonies, military reports and foreign news agents” girl how do you THINK information gets reported in a war

[cry-stars]

001 you know me I gotta ask for Clive/Flora :3

I was hoping you would... :D Thank you for indulging me, and I’m sorry for this essay ^^

when I started shipping it if I did:

Long story… I was playing through all of the PL games this spring for the first time in years, and found myself really liking Flora, far more than I’d ever liked her when playing the games as a kid. Then, when I got to UF, I found myself getting really attached to Clive as well. Not only did I love both characters, but I really liked their interactions; I’d been getting upset about how much Flora was left behind, and lo and behold, “Future Luke” tells Luke that Flora should be included on the adventure, and that she’s allowed to be excited, etc. 

Clive kept on sticking up for Flora, and they seemed to get along really well (not to mention all of the cute little moments they had together, like on the stairs to the Thames Arms), and I was getting really invested in their relationship. Then Clive went completely off the rails, and even though I knew this was coming, I honestly felt as upset and confused as Flora did. I wanted to hear his apology, and I wanted to see more out of a relationship that I felt had so much promise. 

my thoughts:

I absolutely love Clora; I haven’t been this excited about a ship in a long time. I adore both characters, and the similarities in their backgrounds are just perfect for writing about; they have so much to bond over. They have a really cute and wholesome dynamic in UF, before they really knew each other, and I love the idea of that continuing and developing into something deeper as they slowly get to know the real versions of each other. 

At first, Flora’s angry and confused, and Clive is lost in self-hate and regret; he’s just messed up so much already, and there’s no way that he can ever apologize correctly. But Flora just refuses to give up on getting the closure she needs, and just keeps on coming back until she gets it. They’ve got the perfect balance of in-game hints where the pairing isn’t pulled out of nowhere, and also open-endedness where there’s lots to explore as a writer. 

I think they’d definitely need a lot of time before ever starting a romantic relationship. While there were little hints at the ship in the game (I think), romance was the farthest thing from Clive’s mind at the time (I don’t think he’d ever been interested in anything of the kind before), and it was Flora’s first proper adventure. Their falling-out in the game really solidifies the fact that they need a lot of time to process things and get to know each other all over again. I’d want them to become good solid friends first before going anywhere near romance. After that, though... ugh, the mutual pining would be so good, ahhh...!

What makes me happy about them:

So much. I really love how on the surface, Flora is the “cute” one and Clive is the “prickly” one, but really, they aren’t that different. Flora has a lot of issues and a lot of pain in her past like Clive, and Clive also gets deeply attached to other people (especially his family) like Flora does. I think that they have so much potential to help each other open up and deal with the difficulties from their pasts, and support each other when the other is going through a rough time. And honestly, they’re just really adorable together. They’ve got such a nice mix of sweetness and angst, and I just love thinking and writing about them.

(Also they’re holding hands in one of the end credits scenes...! I so rarely ship anything with any canon evidence, so that, and all of Clive’s little “Don’t worry, Flora” comments in the game just make me really happy).

What makes me sad about them:

Hhh…. I just think that Clive messed things up SO bad. He messed up from the beginning. It’s not even just the kidnapping part; that could probably be (generously) explained by Clive suddenly deciding that he didn’t want Flora to get stomped by the Mobile Fortress (although he should have told her/just not used the Mobile Fortress, but okay). It’s that he was pretending to be “Future Luke” all along, and, due to Flora’s past of having people she cares about replaced by lookalikes (Dahlia replacing her mom, herself being replaced by Don Paolo (and Luke gleefully showing her the Flora mask on the train ride home!), and less traumatically, Don Paolo replacing the professor), I think that “Big Luke” suddenly turning into “Clive” would be really upsetting for her. 

Despite all of that, though, all Flora asked for was an apology--and then the two of them never get to talk again. I don’t know… I’m just sad that they seemed to get along so well before, and if Clive had been able to say sorry right then, maybe they could have parted on better terms than they did, just like Clive and the professor got to. Instead, we don’t get any apology or closure. Flora deserved an apology.

things done in fanfic that annoys me:

Ugh, SO many things. There’s about 100 stories with both characters tagged on ff.net, and I can only really recommend about ten of them. At best, it’s a generic “bad boy/good girl” dynamic, or Clive is suddenly super nice and Flora is incredibly ditzy, and at worst, Clive’s abusive. (please don’t read the earliest ff.net stories, no matter how desperate you get.) 

Admittedly, people are very critical of Clora at the best of times, so I feel like there’s a higher standard for it than there are for other pairings. I just feel like Flora often gets written as the “everygirl,” sort of as a reader-insert that gets to date Clive. Or, Clive is a total woobie who gets immediately forgiven by Flora with no resistance at all. Honestly though, as long as it’s obvious that someone is trying their best to keep them in-character and on equal footing, I would be happy to read anyone’s take on them. They are a difficult pair to write, I think, so I don’t expect anyone to get it perfect (since there really is no perfect way to write them).

things I look for in fanfic:

Ideally? Just like 10 Years. The slow burn, the hard work to earn forgiveness, the friendship, the attention to their similarities, the acknowledgement of both of their traumas… boy, I will never stop recommending that story. I’m so glad it exists; it’s given me so many ideas and it addresses all of the things that make me feel bad about the pairing. 

Outside of that fic… I just want acknowledgement of what Clive did wrong, him working to fix it, and them starting to understand each other and grow fond of each other. (Also… lots of angst and hurt/comfort, haha, but that’s me with every type of fanfic). Conversely, I’d like to just see them doing cute things together or going on an adventure without talking about the past constantly as well; once the apology is over, they don’t have to constantly return back to the past. I feel like Clora is a super good candidate for slow burn as well; I loved it in 10 Years and I’d love to see another take on it.

Who I’d be comfortable them ending up with, if not each other: 

Honestly no one… when I really like a ship, I can’t multiship without getting sad, haha… :’) 

My happily ever after for them:

I’ve got several different AUs for them, but for one of them, I’d like to see them get married and move to St. Mystere. They can work together and take over Bruno’s job of repairing the robot residents and take care of the village. They’d visit and be visited by the professor and the rest of the family frequently, but I think that they’d both be happier away from London. I think Clive interacting with the Reinholds would be really funny too, haha… I do have a longer story I still want to write too, though, so my ideas for a happy ending for them may change a lot as I write.

who is the big spoon/little spoon:

It’s a 60-40 split, with Flora being the little spoon slightly more.

what is their favorite non-sexual activity:

I think they try to learn how to be good cooks together. Flora was never good, obviously, but I think that Clive also only knows how to cook the basics (lazy rich kid). Once Clive starts living with the professor, though, he realizes that it’s pretty much going to be up to him to feed this family, because the professor forgets to cook, Flora’s bad at it, and Alfendi’s a baby. He starts to work at getting better, and Flora decides to practice more too, and they wind up competing with each other. They also use each other as test subjects for the food they want to give to the professor (it’s okay if they give each other food poisoning, but the professor? Perish the thought!) By the time Alfendi’s a little kid, they’re both half-decent, but still make fun of each other’s cooking, and Alfendi will pick a side with whoever he’s feeling more charitable towards at the time. 

They also have unscheduled midnight tea time at least once a week. Clive doesn’t sleep a lot, and Flora wakes up during the night quite often, so she often comes downstairs to find him pacing around, and makes a pot of tea. Sometimes she’ll go up again after having a cup, and sometimes they fall asleep on the couch together.

[howtoloseweightfastsafely]

The 10-second Trick That Can Slash Your Risk Of Cardiovascular Mortality By 37% (Most Traditional Cultures Have Done This For Centuries)

Did you know that people who ate less than 2 grams a day of this vital nutrient were 37% more likely to die of heart disease?

Did you know that this nutrient is constantly blamed for stroke, heart disease, high blood pressure, and various other ailments...but research shows it does the opposite of what most doctors and the media tell us?

And did you know that this nutrient is literally sitting in your kitchen cabinet at this very moment?

Well, I'll quit teasing you.

This nutrient is gold ol' "deadly, vicious, blood-pressure rising" salt.

Doctors and the media tell us salt is causing heart disease, is slowly killing us from the inside out, increasing our blood pressure and causing all sorts of issues.

And big pharma sells us expensive pills and emergency surgeries (while making millions, at our expense)...when we could pay less than $5 for an annual supply of simple heart-disease-preventing salt.

You see, the whole "salt = heart disease/increased death risk" hypothesis is based on a very poor "if (this), then (this)" thinking, without accurate backup research.

Basically, "experts" (including the American Heart Association and its inaccurate sodium recommendations) say:

1. Salt causes a slight increase in blood pressure

2. High blood pressure is related to heart disease and stroke risk

3. So, if we cut out salt, then we'll decrease our risk of heart disease and stroke

Sure, that sounds great in theory.

But since when, in the history of time, has one single nutrient or one single "anything" caused the downfall of our health (or any other issue for that matter).

Long-term problems are almost always due to a combination of poor choices, but never to just one single choice.

Just as obesity is likely due to excess calorie and nutrient consumption and limited exercise and underlying issues in the body...heart disease, stroke, and increased disease risk is likely due to poor dietary choices and poor lifestyle choices and possible genetic predispositions, etc.

But, no, of course, the "experts" don't consider this. They just come out and say "salt = heart disease and stroke", and don't even think to look at our evolutionary upbringing and samples of modern-day sodium usage. (These "experts" are ridiculous.)

Thankfully, I've come upon some good info in my readings that should help make this all clear.

If I haven't mentioned it already, I'm a big fan of ancestral health/longevity researches like Paul Jaminet, Chris Kresser, and Stephan Guyanet. And, in some of their findings and writings, you'll see that salt is actually well-documented as a staple nutrient in various cultures and as a necessity in our diets.

Let's jump into the facts.

Here's the truth about salt (and its disease-preventing properties):

1) A comprehensive study of sodium intake of 33 countries found that intake averaged 3.7 grams (about 1.6 teaspoons per day), decade after decade.

a. This level correlates with what can be thought of as a certain "reward threshold". The thinking is: the level is uniform in all countries, regardless of the culture or cuisine, because without that 3.7-gram intake level, we just don't feel adequately satiated.

2) From a biological standpoint, renin and aldosterone hormone levels jump significantly once sodium intake is below 1.5 teaspoons per day, in a clear-cut sign of sodium insufficiency.

3) A Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) showed that sodium excretion of both over 7 grams per day and under 3 grams per day was directly associated with increased cardiovascular disease risk

4) The "sweet spot" in the JAMA study was a level of roughly 4 to 6 grams of sodium per day.

a. For those having under 2 grams per day, cardiovascular mortality risk was increased by 37%!!

b. FYI: The American Heart Association (AHA) recommends a max of 1.5 grams per day! This is even less than the 2 grams per day threshold. If we follow these AHA guidelines, our cardiovascular mortality risk will be even more than 37%.

5) A 2011 American Journal of Hypertension study found no solid evidence that a reduction in salt intake prevents heart conditions.

What this means for you:

Disregard the government/doctor recommended levels, which may cause sodium insufficiency and increased disease risk

BUT, don't go so high that you still end up damaging your body.

The "sweet spot" is 4 to 6 grams of sodium per day, or roughly 1.6 to 3 teaspoons per day.

Increase your potassium intake. 4,700 mg per day is recommended, whereas most Americans get half that number. Potassium and sodium go hand in hand and the former can often prevent internal deficiencies caused by the latter.

If you have kidney problems, you may be one of the few people who should worry about keeping salt intake down. Please speak to your doctor.

You've now got the information you need. It's time to make the changes!

Interested in losing weight? Then click below to see the exact steps I took to lose weight and keep it off for good...

Read the previous article about "7 Steps To Reduce AGEs and Slow Aging"

Read the next article about "How To Clean Up Your Liver and Vital Organs"

Moving forward, there are several other articles/topics I'll share so you can lose weight even faster, and feel great doing it.

Below is a list of these topics and you can use this Table of Contents to jump to the part that interests you the most.

Topic 1: How I Lost 30 Pounds In 90 Days - And How You Can Too

Topic 2: How I Lost Weight By Not Following The Mainstream Media And Health Guru's Advice - Why The Health Industry Is Broken And How We Can Fix It

Topic 3: The #1 Ridiculous Diet Myth Pushed By 95% Of Doctors And "experts" That Is Keeping You From The Body Of Your Dreams

Topic 4: The Dangers of Low-Carb and Other "No Calorie Counting" Diets

Topic 5: Why Red Meat May Be Good For You And Eggs Won't Kill You

Topic 6: Two Critical Hormones That Are Quietly Making Americans Sicker and Heavier Than Ever Before

Topic 7: Everything Popular Is Wrong: The Real Key To Long-Term Weight Loss

Topic 8: Why That New Miracle Diet Isn't So Much of a Miracle After All (And Why You're Guaranteed To Hate Yourself On It Sooner or Later)

Topic 9: A Nutrition Crash Course To Build A Healthy Body and Happy Mind

Topic 10: How Much You Really Need To Eat For Steady Fat Loss (The Truth About Calories and Macronutrients)

Topic 11: The Easy Way To Determining Your Calorie Intake

Topic 12: Calculating A Weight Loss Deficit

Topic 13: How To Determine Your Optimal "Macros" (And How The Skinny On The 3-Phase Extreme Fat Loss Formula)

Topic 14: Two Dangerous "Invisible Thorn" Foods Masquerading as "Heart Healthy Super Nutrients"

Topic 15: The Truth About Whole Grains And Beans: What Traditional Cultures Know About These So-called "Healthy Foods" That Most Americans Don't

Topic 16: The Inflammation-Reducing, Immune-Fortifying Secret of All Long-Living Cultures (This 3-Step Process Can Reduce Chronic Pain and Heal Your Gut in Less Than 24 Hours)

Topic 17: The Foolproof Immune-enhancing Plan That Cleanses And Purifies Your Body, While "patching Up" Holes, Gaps, And Inefficiencies In Your Digestive System (And How To Do It Without Wasting $10+ Per "meal" On Ridiculous Juice Cleanses)

Topic 18: The Great Soy Myth (and The Truth About Soy in Eastern Asia)

Topic 19: How Chemicals In Food Make Us Fat (Plus 10 Banned Chemicals Still in the U.S. Food Supply)

Topic 20: 10 Banned Chemicals Still in the U.S. Food Supply

Topic 21: How To Protect Yourself Against Chronic Inflammation (What Time Magazine Calls A "Secret Killer")

Topic 22: The Truth About Buying Organic: Secrets The Health Food Industry Doesn't Want You To Know

Topic 23: Choosing High Quality Foods

Topic 24: A Recipe For Rapid Aging: The "Hidden" Compounds Stealing Your Youth, Minute by Minute

Topic 25: 7 Steps To Reduce AGEs and Slow Aging

Topic 26: The 10-second Trick That Can Slash Your Risk Of Cardiovascular Mortality By 37% (Most Traditional Cultures Have Done This For Centuries, But The Pharmaceutical Industry Would Be Up In Arms If More Modern-day Americans Knew About It)

Topic 27: How To Clean Up Your Liver and Vital Organs

Topic 28: The Simple Detox 'Cheat Sheet': How To Easily and Properly Cleanse, Nourish, and Rid Your Body of Dangerous Toxins (and Build a Lean Well-Oiled "Machine" in the Process)

Topic 29: How To Deal With the "Stress Hormone" Before It Deals With You

Topic 30: 7 Common Sense Ways to Have Uncommon Peace of Mind (or How To Stop Your "Stress Hormone" In Its Tracks)

Topic 31: How To Sleep Like A Baby (And Wake Up Feeling Like A Boss)

Topic 32: The 8-step Formula That Finally "fixes" Years Of Poor Sleep, Including Trouble Falling Asleep, Staying Asleep, And Waking Up Rested (If You Ever Find Yourself Hitting The Snooze Every Morning Or Dozing Off At Work, These Steps Will Change Your Life Forever)

Topic 33: For Even Better Leg Up And/or See Faster Results In Fixing Years Of Poor Sleep, Including Trouble Falling Asleep, Staying Asleep, And Waking Up Rested, Do The Following:

Topic 34: Solution To Overcoming Your Mental Barriers and Cultivating A Winner's Mentality

Topic 35: Part 1 of 4: Solution To Overcoming Your Mental Barriers and Cultivating A Winner's Mentality

Topic 36: Part 2 of 4: Solution To Overcoming Your Mental Barriers and Cultivating A Winner's Mentality

Topic 37: Part 3 of 4: Solution To Overcoming Your Mental Barriers and Cultivating A Winner's Mentality

Topic 38: Part 4 of 4: Solution To Overcoming Your Mental Barriers and Cultivating A Winner's Mentality

Topic 39: How To Beat Your Mental Roadblocks And Why It Can Be The Difference Between A Happy, Satisfying Life And A Sad, Fearful Existence (These Strategies Will Reduce Stress, Increase Productivity And Show You How To Fulfill All Your Dreams)

Topic 40: Maximum Fat Loss in Minimum Time: The Body Type Solution To Quick, Lasting Results

Topic 41: If You Want Maximum Results In Minimum Time You're Going To Have To Work Out (And Workout Hard, At That)

Topic 42: Food Planning For Maximum Fat Loss In Minimum Time

Topic 43: How To Lose Weight Fast If You're in Chronic Pain

Topic 44: Nutrition Basics for Fast Pain Relief (and Weight Loss)

Topic 45: How To Track Results (And Not Fall Into the Trap That Ruins 95% of Well-Thought Out Diets)

Topic 46: Advanced Fat Loss - Calorie Cycling, Carb Cycling and Intermittent Fasting

Topic 47: Advanced Fat Loss - Part I: Calorie Cycling

Topic 48: Advanced Fat Loss - Part II: Carb Cycling

Topic 49: Advanced Fat Loss - Part III: Intermittent Fasting

Topic 50: Putting It All Together

Learn more by visiting our website here: invigoratenow.com

[the-winchesterboys]

Asshats

Soooo… I was inspired! I decided to go crazy and use ten prompts from this lovely post! Credit to @prompt-bank for the amazing challenge. :)

Dean Winchester x OC

One Shot - 1,922 words

“Asshats”

Prompts: (in no particular order)

7. “Well, that’s tragic.”

19. “You’re Satan.”

4. “I’m too sober for this.”

27. “No. Regrets.”

13. “I lost our baby.”

67. “You’re bleeding all over my carpet.”

20. “I don’t want to hear your excuses. You can’t just give me wet-willies.”

40. “The kids, they ambushed me.”

52. “There’s a herd of them!”

43. “I feel like I can’t breathe.”

“Hey, hey!” I called as I entered the room, “Damnit, you’re bleeding all over my carpet.” Sam managed an apologetic grin in my direction.

“Sorry,” he mustered, shrugging his shoulder as he rewrapped the bandage around his arm, cringing all the way through it. I rolled my eyes and rubbed my hands over my face, having absolutely no idea how to break the news to Dean.

“Em,” Dean sighed as he stood from his seat by the window, running his fingers through his hair and appearing more stressed than usual. “I think we need to talk about what happened back there.”

“Okay, no -” I interrupted him, shaking my head, “Definitely not. But what we do need to-”

“No, listen to me,” he cut me off without a second thought, “Look at us. We get it. We’ve been there. The job cuts deep sometimes. But you… You can’t just expect to go through something like this and not at least tell us what the hell happened.”

I wasn’t going through this, I wasn’t going to go into it. It wasn’t going to happen. I wasn’t going to allow him to do this.

“I’m too sober for this,” I grumbled, pushing past him for the kitchen. I trudged to the fridge, pulling two beers from the shelf and handing them both to a frustrated Dean. His eyes bore into mine and I refused to hear what he was saying, turning instead to the third beer waiting to be opened by yours truly. “You know, you owe me for last week. You should just let this go.”

“Owe you? For what?”

I gave him a hard stare. “You know.”

Sam’s laughter in the background cued an immediate expression of understanding to fall over Dean’s face, and I could only narrow my eyes further at him.

“Oh come on, that was hilarious,” he chuckled, the serious face he’d been wearing broken momentarily by a soft smirk. I loved when he looked like that; but I shook away the lighthearted moment and headed back to my small front room. “And after a case like that, we deserve to have a little fun. Don’t you think?”

“I don’t want to hear your excuses. You can’t just give me wet-willies.” The daggers that were flying from my eyes were apparently not enough for the tall, bow-legged hunter sharing the room with myself and his injured brother to stop his antics, sitting himself on the edge of the bed to face me.

My studio apartment wasn’t much, but these two made it feel even smaller - especially with Dean in interrogation mode. Not to mention the knowledge that I’d have to tell Dean what I’d done looming heavily over my head.

“How you holdin’ up, Sam?” I chanced another subject change, but the gaze of the man sitting across from me was burning against my skin.

“I’m alright. I keep thinking about something one of those kids said to me,” he groaned, his hand going to his head, “He kept saying, ‘Flea markets don’t carry fleas, you know?’ and he said it like it was the most awful thing in the world. So now I can’t get it out of my head.” The case we’d been working this week was… strange to say the least. All I can say is that it’s made me rethink wanting kids.

Children are terrifying.

“Okay, Miss Change the Subject. Focus.” Dean set his hands on my knee, leaning in, and I felt strangled. I felt trapped. I felt like the air was being sucked away from the space around me. But I held my own, sitting with my shoulders square to his and feet planted firmly to the ground.

“I told you, Dean. No need to dwell on it. I’m good.”

“I don’t believe you,” he murmured, squeezing my knee, “Seriously. Sam and I lie enough to know what it looks like.”

I sighed heavily and shook my head. “No, Dean.”

“Emily -”

“I said ‘no’, Dean!” This was starting to get annoying, and I could feel my fingers tightening around the beer bottle in my palm as he took a breath and huffed it out.

“This is ridiculous, we just -”

“Damnit, Dean -”

“What about this whole thing is so hard for you to -”

“I lost baby, Dean!” Alright, well. Wrong use of changing the subject. Totally wrong.

He froze. Stared at me and leaned slowly back.

“What do you mean?”

Across the room, I could feel Sam stop what he was doing, his eyes no doubt wide as he watched the exchange between the two of us.

Perhaps admitting to one horrid crime was not the best way to get Dean’s mind off of a wholly different issue.

“Emily, so help me God, if you mean what I think you mean -” He stood, his eyes enraged, shoulders raised, and I knew I’d made a grave mistake.

“I lost baby - she… I…” It wasn’t so much that I lost the Impala that made me so horrified to be telling him, but rather… how I lost her. “The kids, they ambushed me,” I blurted, standing across from him now with my hands planted at my hips as if I still held any type of ground whatsoever.

But of course, Dean lost his shit. “Where!? WHERE?” His hands were flying above his head and I couldn’t stop this from unfolding further, my hands were at my temples, my eyes squeezed shut.

“All I kept thinking as it was happening was, ‘Oh god! There’s a herd of them!’ and then that was it! They threw me out and… Well. We never found the nest, so…” I frowned, my hands over my face.

“You…” he started, “You… You’re Satan!” His finger was pointed at me, his face incredulous.

“Nope, that’d be me,” Sam offered, trying to break the tension with his unabashed grin, but Dean just turned to look at him with shoulders slumped and face entirely unamused.

“Sam. Don’t start.” The words were simple, and then Dean was back on me.

“Oh god,” I said as soon as I saw his face, “I feel like I can’t breathe,” I mumbled, making my way to the kitchen to wash my face and cool off.

“Well, that’s tragic,” Dean sputtered, following me and ignoring his pitiful brother stuck without help in the front room. “Do you have any idea what we’re about to have to do to get her back?”

“Yeah, Dean, I do, I lived it already,” I moaned out my frustration, towel drying my face and leaning back against the counter to face him. He kept his distance, the anger in his eyes evident as I managed a smile that meant to calm him down. It didn’t work the way I wanted it to.

“That’s what I was talking about, Em. We’ll get baby back, that’s the other issue. But you and I - we need to figure out what happened to you back there. Or this whole, hunting together thing, it just isn’t going to work.”

I frowned heavily at that. I stared at him, questions in my expression.

“Sam and I, we’re messed up. Yeah. But when shit goes down in the field, we tell each other why. We make sense of it as a team so that we can prevent it from happening again. We need to know why so that it never causes that problem again.”

I had choked on the job. Stopped cold. Frozen solid. I would’ve been dead if it weren’t for Sam and Dean, stopping the evil freaks in front of us in the nick of time. Sam had been cut by one of them, and Dean barely rolled the two of us out of the way before my throat was cut clean in half. And… the minutes after were filled with a horrible silence as I struggled to figure out what to say. How to phrase it. How do you say thank you for being saved, when you weren’t sure you wanted to be?

I bit my lip as I stared up at him, letting out a long, slow breath. I gingerly tucked some hair out of my eyes and behind my ear, shaking my head.

“I’m sorry,” I mumbled. “I never meant to put you two in harm’s way.”

“We know that,” he said, sighing and coming to rest back against the counter next to me. “And I’m sorry for pushing so hard. But… that was bad. It hurt you.”

“I’d say Sam got it worse,” I chuckled dryly, hanging my head.

“I don’t mean physically, genius,” he retorted, the dripping sarcasm enough to make me look up at him in half-amused surprise. “Something broke.”

I hated that he was right; that he seemed to know that he could get to me, despite the wall I lived behind. Everyone else in the world had gotten the memo - Emily is a solid rock. Leave her be. But Dean refused to.

“My sister,” I sighed. “One of them was my sister.” He took a moment, neither of us looking at each other. “I haven’t seen her in so many years. She was so young when she…” I shook my head, tightening my arms around my middle.

Dean was quiet, respectful; but I could feel him listening.

“I lost her when she was very young. She was what sprung my father and I into the life. And I just… I don’t know. Seeing her there like that -” I felt his hand gently take mine, squeezing it softly. I turned to look at him. He was listening so intently, sympathy written into his features, understanding in his eyes.

“I didn’t know how to feel, Dean. I was stuck. I almost wanted her to… Whatever. It’s stupid, but. You two were there. You knocked sense into me. Thank you.”

He smiled softly, sadly, nodding his head. “Thanks aren’t exactly in order; you’ve saved our asses plenty of times.”

“Plenty!” Sam shouted from the other room, causing a small chuckle to leave my lips. A weak smile remained on my face as I held Dean’s gaze.

“Listen,” he said. “We’ve got your back. That’s how this thing works. We stay honest with each other, and that’s how we keep going.” My hand slipped from Dean’s as he led us back into the other room, the both of us sitting next to Sam and picking up our beers.

“That sound like a deal?” He lifted his beer for a cheers.

I grinned, clinking my beer to his, and then to Sam’s. “Total honesty? Sure. I suppose I could make that deal.”

He laughed and glanced to Sam; Sam’s brows lifted mischievously, and Dean turned back to me. “….what?”

“Alright then; total honesty - what’s that tattoo you’ve got say?” A blush immediately flooded my cheeks, and I narrowed my eyes at the both of them. “You know, the one right by your hip, with the -”

“Hey! It says ‘No. Regrets.’, assjack,” I snapped back, rolling my eyes playfully as I took a healthy swig of my beer. Dean snorted, drinking his own as his brother shook his head.

“No regrets? Oh trust me, there’ll be regrets,” Sam laughed, “Just like I regret this brand of beer you have stocked in your fridge. I mean, no one likes this stuff, where did you find it?”

My foot kicked him under the table, laughter leaving our lips as I shook my head. “Shut up,” I mumbled, the smile not leaving my lips.