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igotbulletproof-insomnia · 3 years ago

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Adopting Bangtan 09

01 previous

AN UNLIKELY WEDDING

You bit your lip as you stared at your phone. You had an email from Jimin and Taehyung’s mother. Song Jieun was your old coworker who you had adored, but who also tricked you into taking care of her children so that she could get married without worry. Your respect and opinion of her had gone down significantly with that move, but you… didn’t exactly understand, but you did appreciate that she gave her children to someone who could properly take care of them instead of leaving them to fend for themselves which had seemed to be her original plan.

What’s wrong?” Seokjin looked up from the video game he was playing, ignoring the cut scene he had watched a dozen times before now to focus on you. You could hear the younger boys playing in their bedroom, the sounds of legos clattering and mouth-made explosions louder than what their closed bedroom door could block off. They were sounds that had become familiar in the past six months, sounds that used to be made by one child and were nowhere near this boisterous.

“Nothing,” you shrugged while you scrolled through the email a second time and tried to sort out your feelings. Seokjin’s stare burned into your cheek and rolled your eyes. “I mean it, nothing is wrong. Just…” You could feel your face twisting into a dissatisfied expression and tried to relax it back into something more neutral. There were times when you found you could rely on the eldest of your children, and times when you thought it was better to keep things to yourself, and you weren’t sure which one this was.

“Someone emailed me,” you hedge. “I’m just trying to decide how I feel.”

“That’s your worried face,” said Seokjin. “You only make that face about work and about us. But you also whine when you’re worried about work, so it’s about us, isn’t it? Which one of the kids is failing school?”

“No one is failing school,” you laugh. “Namjoon could be doing better, but I’m certain he just doesn’t care as much as his teachers want him to. Neither does Yoongi…. You know, as a teacher myself, I should probably be more concerned.”

“You’re appropriately concerned,” Seokjin reassured you. “Why should you worry about things you can’t control? You’re just going to age faster.”

“You’re going to stop calling me old one day.”

“Lying isn’t healthy,”

“Says the kid who lied his way into adoption.”

“I took advantage of my situation. That’s not lying, that’s cunning.”

“I didn’t raise you like this,” you say, standing.

“No, but that’s kind of the point, isn’t it? I’m raising myself, six kids, and my guardian. I can’t tell if I’m doing a piss poor job or not.”

“Language, Kim Seokjin!”

“Dinner, seonsaengnim!” he shouted back. The problem was, you aren’t sure if he successfully distracted you from your concerns or if you successfully distracted him from you.

===

Song Jieun’s email bothered you intermittently throughout the week. It’s not like you forgot she existed. You’ve received a hefty sum into your bank account every month for taking care of the boys, enough to make you wonder exactly why her new husband didn’t want to take care of them when he would probably be spending a lot less money if they were under his own roof. So no, Song Jieun wasn’t someone you forgot existed unlike like you could the rest of your kids’ parents, she just… wasn’t relevant. So it bothered you that she was trying to make herself relevant now, after six months of silence.

“You’re doing the thing again,” Seokjin poked your face. You startled, unaware that he had approached, but thankfully kept your coffee mug full. “What are you so worried about?”

“Nothing,” you say for the umpteenth time that week. “I’m not worried about anything.”

“You’ve been ‘not-worried’ since last Thursday,” Seokjin argued.

“So then why do you keep asking me what’s wrong?” You didn’t have to turn to see the weighted stare he gave you, you could feel it. That was the thing about your kids, all of them. They had a way of making you feel like you were the one in trouble, you were the one being raised instead of the other way around. Some days you were convinced that they were the ones keeping you around, explicitly for financial reasons.

“If you’re just going to insist on being stubborn,” Seokjin sighed. He poured two cups of coffee, one for himself and one for Yoongi, and turned the kettle on for Namjoon. The other boys would be zombie-walking their way into the kitchen for breakfast soon, so you and Seokjin set to work preparing leftovers from dinner a few nights ago.

“Song Jieun wants to visit the boys,” after a long, silent moment, you finally admit your concern. The kettle was puffing it’s pre-whistle warning, so you turned it off, sitting the pot on its wicker table mat until Namjoon made his way to the table.

“Who’s Song Jieun?” asked Seokjin. “Which boy? Not me, right?”

“No, of course not you, silly. You won’t even tell me your parents’ names. How am I supposed to know when they come to visit?”

“Trust me, they won’t,” Seokjin’s tone left no room for discussion, just a sad or regretful sort of resentment.

“If you say so,” you shrugged off your curiosity, familiar with how closed-off this kid got when it came to his home life before you. “Song Jieun is Taehyung’s mom and Jimin’s stepmom.”

“The coworker who tricked you into adopting them?”

“That’s what you got out of that?”

“Isn’t that what happened?”

“That’s besides the point,”

“That is the point.”

“What’s what point?” Namjoon shuffled into the kitchen.

“Our guardian is trying to decide if the twins should see their mother.” Seokjin answered.

“That’s not what I said,”

“That’s what you were going to say.”

“Everyone else gets nice, obedient, adoring children,” you grumbled. “I get sassy monsters who boss me around.”

“You raised us like this,” Namjoon said absently.

“I did not, you raised yourselves.”

“Same thing,” both boys speak in unison.

“I’m giving you two away.”

“Good luck living with Yoongi without us,” Seokjin shrugged. “You’ll be begging me to come back by the end of the week.”

“Joke’s on you, this is the end of the week.”

“My point still stands.”

“Okay, I quit, I won’t win this one,” you literally throw your hands in the air.”

“Good,” Jin grins at you in that cheeky way he’s mastered, taunting you.

“So what’s this about the twin’s mom though?” asked Namjoon. “I thought she…” he trailed off, but you understood what he was saying, or rather, what he didn’t want to say. I thought she didn’t want them.

“Yes and no,” you say. “She just… it’s… not exactly complicated, not if I were in her position, but… let’s just say, some people are stupid and not everyone has the same priorities.”

“Song Jieun chose to make herself happy over taking care of her kids?” Seokjin translated. “She didn’t want to take them to live with her new husband?”

“More or less,” You agree, taking note of the bitterness in his tone.

“You’re not allowed to get married,” Namjoon mumbled from the table.

“Excuse me?”

“You’re not allowed to leave us or get rid of us because you want to be married,” Namjoon repeated. He’s obviously still half asleep from the way he lays his head down in his arms, but your heart clenches just a little bit from the casual desperation he speaks with.

“If I were to get married,” you said, “my future spouse would know that they come in eighth place anyway. I’m not getting rid of you, even your original parents would have to fight me. God will have to fight me.”

“But you’re still not allowed,” said Namjoon.

“Drink your tea, you’re talking crazy,” said Seokjin. “Our guardian will have to actually date first, and we all know that won’t happen.”

“The disrespect, I tell you!”

It’s after breakfast and during the chaos of getting seven young boys dressed and prepared for school when Seokjin knocks on your bedroom door frame, wearing an anxious expression.

“... Can I talk to you for a moment?”

“What’s up?” you asked. Seokjin walked fully into the room and closed the door.

“About… the twins? I… I don’t know what you’re thinking about, and that’s valid, but… I think you should maybe let them see her?” Seokjin didn’t fidget like the rest of the kids did. He leaned against the door, arms crossed and focused his eyes fully on you. It was moments like these when you realized exactly how mature your eldest was, and you recognized that most of it wasn’t because of you. Namjoon and Yoongi were you. Seokjin had probably been raising himself for longer than he’s lived with you.

“Okay,” you said.

“I just… if it was me, I would want to know that she still cared, right? And she does, I guess. You mentioned that she sends them money, and she wrote you a letter asking forgiveness, so that has to mean something. I just don’t want them feeling abandoned like the rest of us. Not if they don’t have to.”

“I’m just worried that it will confuse them even more,” you admitted. “It took weeks before Jimin would talk to us openly. Jieun-ssi isn’t going to stay. She’ll come for an afternoon or a day, take the kids out, spoil them, and then bring them back here, and they’ll both be wondering why. And I don’t know how to answer that question.”

“With the truth, obviously,” Seokjin rolled his eyes. “You’re always straight-forward with us. Why should this be any different?” Because they’re younger than you were. Because they were given away, not abandoned. Because their parent still cares from a distance. Because I don’t like making you all cry. Because picking up pieces has never been fun.

“Yeah, I guess you’re right,” you said instead. “I’ll think about it.”

“Okay,” Seokjin nodded, and you can see him visibly deflate, relieved to be finished with the conversation. “That’s all I wanted to say. Don’t forget to take your lunch with you.”

“Make sure all the kids have theirs,” you countered.

“It’s funny because you thought I didn’t already do that,”

“I love you, Kim Seokjin,” was your response.

“I love you too, I guess.”

=======

Your talk with Seokjin gave you a new perspective, but you still felt apprehensive about everything. You just didn’t like the idea of hurting Jimin and Taehyung any more than they already have been. What type of guardian would you be if you just let them walk back into heartbreak? What if this was just a one-time visit and Song Jieun never came to see her children again? What do you do when the boys ask to see her again? You had been lucky that you only had to have one conversation about not being able to take the boys to see their mother in the last six months, but if Jieun could make the time and the trip to come visit, then what will be your excuse now? What if this visit was actually a prelude to taking the boys back home with her?

Oh.

Huh.

So that was the real problem then. You didn’t want the boys to leave you. As much as you groaned and complained about taking in so many kids -- usually just to yourself, but sometimes your stress got the better of you in front of the kids -- you loved them. Each one of them, you loved and adored them and the thought of any of them leaving you or being taken away hurt. Not only that, but where in the hell would any of those parents get off, what right did any of them have to come to you and even fix their mouths to ask you for “their” kid back? You had words prepared for each and every so-called “parent” of all seven of your boys, copies of your lost child police reports, drafts of parental rights transfer papers, the phone number for several NCPA lawyers, and a fist just itching to make contact.

But what if Taehyung and Jimin preferred to be with Jieun anyway? She is their mother. She raised them for years, even if she was Jimin’s stepmother. You’ve only had the “twins” as you and the older boys had taken to calling them, for six months. Why would they want to stay with you?

“Okay, but she didn’t say she wants to take the kids,” you told yourself against the slew of depressing thoughts. You retrieved your phone from your pocket and opened your emails. Finally pressed reply. “She just wants to visit. A visit is… safe. It’ll be okay.”

Probably.

=======

Later that day you received a new email. Song Jieun will be in town that weekend. Tomorrow.

It took a lot of effort for you not to swear and make plans to take the kids out of town.

=======

Song Jieun was pretty. She wasn’t particularly tall or “skinny” like what TV liked to portray, but she was hippy and had a cute face and short hair that she curled most days. She favored dresses with blazers or oversized sweaters and skinny jeans, with pale makeup and dark pink lipsticks. It was easy to pick her out at the cafe she asked to meet at. She sat alone off to the side, a coffee already in front of her, but two plates with fruit-decorated cakes were also placed nearby. You considered telling her that the boys weren’t allowed any sweets right now. It wouldn’t have been a lie, but it wasn’t the whole truth either. They weren’t allowed sweet things like cakes until after dinner and only when they behaved well. Still, you decided that was just your frustration and jealousy talking. You didn’t want to punish the two boys because of their mother, so you bite your tongue and hold your bitterness and let it go.

“Jieun-ssi,” you greet uselessly, as the moment Taehyung and JImin saw her they sprinted across the room to tackle the woman in hugs. Jieun’s smile stretched across her face and she cooed and made cute noises as she greeted her sons in return. You felt something creep in your chest that felt a lot like jealousy. But you weren’t jealous. You couldn’t be. You just hugged them this morning when they tried to tickle you awake. You held both of their hands from your house to the cafe. You had nothing to be jealous of, they were your kids now.

“How have you been?” Jieun asked when you sat down across from her. Jimin and Taehyung were already seated and digging into the cakes she bought for them. You barely had a chance to answer before your chatterbox was rattling off every activity he’s done for the last six months to his mother. Jimin grinned and threw in his two-cent’s worth every few minutes, but generally let Taehyung carry the conversation for him. And you, in spite of all of the emotions pressing on your chest and clouding your judgement and making you really, really want to shake Song Jieun, you enjoy yourself. You watch your boys -- your boys -- smile and chatter and sing and show off for their mother. You wonder if they’ll be okay going home, if you’ll have tears to clean up later, or arguments to break up, or just pieces to sort out and glue, but right now the kids are happy, and right now, that’s what you’ll enjoy.

=======

Taehyung climbed into your bed that night. He should have been asleep an hour ago at least, you’re sure, but he’s seemed to have a lot on his mind since this afternoon, and you’ve been letting the kid have his own space to figure out his thoughts. As hyper as he normally is, Taehyung is also prone to moments where he just sits and fiddles and thinks and you’ve learned that it doesn’t do any good to bother him about it.

“Can’t sleep?” Taehyung shook his head as he slid across the blankets to bury his face into your shirt. You curled an arm around his shoulders and held him close.

“Mommy…” Taehyung started and trailed off. “Is Mommy happy without me?”

It felt like your heart stopped with the words of his question, but you continued to brush his hair with your fingers. It was a difficult question to answer. You wanted to be honest, but you also didn’t want to hurt him. Unfortunately, there weren’t too many ways to answer without hurting Taehyung one way or another.

“What do you mean?” Taehyung was quiet for another short moment before he spoke again.

“Mommy… didn’t seem sad. And she said she’ll see us another time. And… she got married, but she didn’t want to keep me and Jiminie… So I started wondering… is she happy now? Happier than she was before when it was just me and her and Jiminie? Did we -- I don’t think -- I --” And the kid seemed to break then, all of the tears that hadn’t been shed for six months seeming to finally culminate into an emotional outburst. You shushed him, holding him just a little more tightly, and the fingers in his hair moved down to stroke his back. This was the thing you had wanted to avoid, and while part of you felt satisfied to be right, most of you just fought your own tears. It hurt to see one of your kids so hurt. You aren’t a stranger to crying children, but this emotional distress was something that never got better. You thought that maybe Jieun had talked to the boys beforehand, maybe Taehyung had dealt with his emotions before he came to live with you and that was why he seemed so well-adjusted. Clearly, Taehyung had just been living in denial, or maybe with the belief that his mother would come back for him “later,” that you were only a temporary home.

“This isn’t your fault, Taetae,” you murmured. “You didn’t do anything wrong. Sometimes… sometimes adults make hard decisions. We think we’re doing the right thing and… sometimes it’s hard to see if we’ve made the right choice or not.” You sighed, picking through your words super carefully. “I think… I think that your mother made what she thought was the best decision for both herself and for you and Jimin. She believed she would be happy with her new husband. But she did not believe you and Jiminie would be happy. So she put you somewhere that you could be. Does that make sense?”

“Yeah, but I’m still sad,” Taehyung cried harder.

“I know,” you said, “and that’s okay. I would be sad too.”

“I just want my mommy back,”

“I know.”

“I don’t want you to get married,” Taehyung said suddenly, long after his sobs had calmed down. Tears still fell, but slowly now. “I don’t want you to send me away too.”

“If you listen to your Jinnie-hyung, he says that won’t happen because I don’t date anyway.”

“Mommy didn’t date for a long time… and then she did. And then she got married.”

“I won’t get rid of you even if I did get married, Taetae,” you told him.

“You’re still not allowed to get married,” he argued. “Or date. You have to be mine forever and ever, okay?”

“No matter what, I will be yours forever and ever,” you agreed.

“Can I sleep here tonight?” Taehyung asked. “I'm comfy and you make me not sad.”

“Of course,” you said. “You’re comfy like a teddy bear, I don’t want you to go.”

=======

In the morning, Taehyung was bouncing off the walls, screaming as he chased Jungkook around the house. Jimin was curled into a corner of the sofa, giggling while he watched his brothers play and encouraging Taehyung in his antics. You could hardly tell that Taehyung had an emotional breakdown the previous night. You knew he was far from being “over” his feelings about his mother, he was only eight and the feelings were complicated. But he was happy for now and that made you happy. You’ll deal with the noise and the chaos and shout at the kids yet again about running inside where things were breakable including themselves as long as they kept smiling.

Surprisingly, it was Namjoon who came knocking at your door after bedtime that night. Similar to Taehyung, he didn’t speak or ask permission, just closed the door behind him and slid into your bed. Buried himself beneath the blankets and stuck his head beneath the pillow and tucked his gangly limbs into a ball. You were familiar with these moods, but haven’t seen one in years, not since you took in Seokjin. So you finished the chapter you had been reading, turned off the light, and sank down to lay your head on your pillows. Similar to Taehyung, Namjoon would speak when he was ready, when he found the right words to use to express his feelings.

“You really won’t get married, right?” Namjoon whispered beneath the pillow next to you. His voice was heavily muffled, but you’d been waiting for him to speak for some time. You just didn’t expect for him to continue a joke conversation from several days ago.

“What’s wrong with me getting married?” you asked.

“If you get married, you’ll have to get rid of us.”

“There is no world where I will give up any of you just to get married, Namjoon.”

“But that’s what happens, isn’t it?” said Namjoon. “Adults… if they aren’t married, but they have kids… they get rid of them so that they can date. Because kids get in the way. Because it’s stupid to take care of other people’s kids.”

“Why does it sound like you just called me stupid?” Your sarcasm probably wasn’t appropriate for the moment, but the words slipped before you thought about it.

“We’re really lucky to have you, we know that,” said Namjoon. “But that just means --”

“Namjoon, I’m going to stop you right there,” you cut him off before he finishes. You remove the pillow from his face so that he can hear you clearly, and card your fingers through his hair. “I didn’t create any of you. I didn’t ask for any of you. But I have you. And I love you. I adore you. I will tear apart skies, drain oceans, and vanquish God if it will keep you all safe and happy, okay? If your parents ever come back for you, I will press charges against them and make it so that they can never look at you, let alone hurt you ever again, do you understand me, Kim Namjoon? You and Yoongi and Jungkook and Seokjin and Hoseok and Taehyung and Jimin, you’re all mine. You’re my kids, all seven of you, and I will be damned if any lover or spouse, or anything at all, comes between me and you. I don’t say that because it sounds good -- although seriously, you have to admit that this is one of my better speeches,” -- at that, Namjoon giggled, the noise muted and soft, but a win was a win -- “but I say these things because I mean them. I will put a brick in the hospital for you, Joonie.” You hesitate, but continue anyway. “If it weren’t for you, I may have left the country at the end of that year. Teaching is fun, but I wasn’t super happy before. But then you asked me to take you home and you were so cute that I got attached almost immediately. I didn’t want to take you to the police and have them send you to your parents. I liked having someone to come home to. I liked taking care of you. Most people go get a pet or a lover when they’re feeling lonely, but here’s me, collecting kids like you’re pokemon cards.”

“No one collects pokemon cards anymore,”

“What, is Yu-Gi-Oh back in style?”

“What even is that?”

“The coolest card game ever. Period.” Namjoon laughs again, and you feel accomplished.

“It’s not that cool if I’ve never heard of it,” Namjoon argues.

“Joonie. I love you. But even I know you aren’t the coolest among your classmates.”

“I’m the coolest out of all my friends!”

“I won’t argue about that. I’m also sure that in your group of friends, ‘coolest’ means ‘knows the biggest words and has the best grades.’”

“You’re just jealous,”

“Absolutely. I wish I knew as many words as you do. Imagine how much fun I’d have fussing at you kids in Smart People language!”

“Why are you like this?”

“Please, other kids wish they had someone as cool as me taking care of them.”

Namjoon cuddled closer to you in the bed, laying his head on your shoulder and gripping your pajama shirt. You spend a few minutes massaging his scalp, a soothing gesture for you just as much as it is for him. After a few minutes, you begin drifting off, believing Namjoon is on the verge of sleep as well.

“Are you really okay?” he asks. “With taking care of all of us? You don’t… want to go back home?”

“I am home, silly,” you flick the side of his head gently. “I love you. And even if I wanted to go back to my home country, don’t think I won’t take each one of you with me. I said you’re mine. I mean it.”

“Okay.”

And it’s not that you don’t believe him, but you know your kid. You know he internalizes things and finds convoluted ways to take blame for other peoples’ problems, including your own. You know it will be a while yet before he truly accepts and believes you when you say you want to keep him and enjoy taking care of him. But you also know that he wants to believe you and he’s trying. You idly wonder if you’ll have to have some sort of discussion in the morning, an announcement over breakfast that no children will be displaced in the event of an unlikely wedding. You dismiss the thought, deciding it was more likely to incite panic and give you a headache more than anything else.

To find more of my child-bangtan fics, select the "Collecting Strays" tag at the bottom of this page ^_^

#bts #bts fan fiction #bts scenarios #kim taehyung #bts v #kim seokjin #kim namjoon #bangtan #kid bts #bts army #cross posted on ao3 #wow I just realized #kim line #reader insert #darkbalance #collecting strays

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slothspaghettiwrites · 4 years ago

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11. Cruising

Cruising - Sleepless in Stark Towers

Story Rating: Explicit, 18+ only

Warnings: anxiety, college stress, hurt/comfort, horrible parents, panic attacks, poor proofreading

Relationships: Tony Stark x Plus Size!Reader/OFC

Word Count: 3,132

Summary: The weekend is over. Tony drives you back to campus.

A/N: Am I the only with parents like this? 😅

<< 10. The Talk | 12. Couples Costumes >>

Steve and I exchanged phone numbers before I left on Monday.

Notorious SGR- Confirming you got my number Queenie.

You- yes 🤠

You- here is the recipe for those cookies

Now that Bucky was done creating a melodrama out of my life, it was a lot easier being around him. I wasn't sure why it was easy to connect with the super soldiers. On one hand, it could be because Indiana might as well still be living in the 30s or 40s with the state's religious and moral values. On the other hand, it could be because the other Avengers just really scared me.

When I was making breakfast on Sunday morning after Tony had gone to bed, Clint erupted from a vent in the ceiling, causing me to scream bloody murder, waking up everyone on that floor. Not only did I throw a bowl of fruit at him out of terror, but everyone else laughed. I assumed it was at me. I no longer trust Clint.

Later in the afternoon, when I was exiting Peter's room with my backpack of supplies to work in Tony's lab, Natasha cornered me. She demanded I tell her why Tony was following me on Instagram. I didn't know, I just posted my art and occasionally some memes on my stories. I wasn't special enough to be the one person he followed, if you asked me.

She then offered to kill my ex in a graphic and excruciatingly painful way for what he did to me. I never want to be on Natasha's bad side.

On Monday morning, when I emerged from the lab just before dawn, having fallen asleep on the couch and cuddled by Tony, Thor's booming voice filled the living area. He was watching highlights from the weekend's college football games. Apparently, he was very into sports, and well, when IU's game came on, he shouted and snarled at the TV like a wild animal. I didn't have the courage to tell him that not only was my dad the head coach, but my ex was also the rookie second-string offensive lineman they had playing this weekend. HIS EYES WERE GLOWING OKAY?! I'm scared Thor will electrocute me.

So yeah, when I wasn't working on my projects or homework in the lab with Tony, I hung out with Peter, Steve, or Bucky. They were safe, even if they could crush me with one hand. The four of us built another Lego set, this time a model of the Apollo 11 Lunar Lander rocket. Steve and I mostly talked about art while the other two did the building and talked about space exploration and sci-fi while they worked.

Shortly after dinner, I made the move to leave. Laundry wasn't going to do itself and I didn't want to be around everyone when I finally worked up the nerve to look at my midterm grades. I'd gotten the email late on Thursday evening and like anything stressful in my life, I was avoiding it. It had been wonderful forgetting for a weekend that I was a student and the stresses and demands that came with that. But reality was going to come knocking soon, and I preferred to be prepared for it.

Tony offered to drive me back.

I wasn’t going to say no to more time with him. Come on, I’m not that much of a dumb meatball.

Peter was though.

He could not have been more oblivious. Or maybe he was purposefully being a little shit. He’d seen the hickey on my neck. He must know. How else does someone get a little oval bruise on their neck?

“Oh, I’ll come with you guys then. Aunt May says she wants me to get a good night’s sleep instead of patrolling tonight,” he smiled, duffel bag of dirty clothes hanging from his hand with his backpack draped across the opposite shoulder.

He was already in the elevator, waving goodbye to the other Avenger’s before I could think of a good excuse to make him take the subway or web himself home. The three of us stood together in silence as we rode down to the basement level of the tower. I didn’t even know this place had a basement.

When doors opened to reveal a long line of shiny, expensive looking cars, I couldn’t hold in the low expletive that came out. Tony squinted at them before scanning his thumbprint next to a small case on the wall. The metal door swung open and revealed rows of keys. He plucked a set of keys from a hook then looked at us.

“Are you going to fight over who gets to sit shotgun?”

“What?” Peter scoffed, shuffling on his feet towards the cars.

“Yes,” I said at the same time, already clipping the chest strap on my backpack closed.

“I can feel myself going gray,” Tony muttered, clicking the unlock button for a car seven spaces away.

I sprinted to the car, but not before casting a glance over my shoulder at Tony, who had a smirk on his face at our antics. Peter won, easily. The passenger seat already pulled forward for me to slide in the cramped back seat of the sports car when I slowed to a jog, huffing and grumbling at him for cheating.

“We can find a spider to bite you if you want,” he suggested.

“Jesus,” I groaned climbing in. “Don’t even think about that spooky spider shit fam.”

“You’re such a scared cat,” Click, shove, close. “What are your plans for Halloween this year?”

“Same as every year since I was told I couldn’t go trick or treating, watching The Addams Family.”

“You could at least watch a scary movie,” Peter turned around to face me.

“You’re both coming to the party,” Tony slid smoothly into the driver’s seat.

"What party?" I asked, buckling up and trying to pretend like I'd been to any kind of party that wasn't hosted by my dad's side of the family.

"Seriously?" Peter grinned at him like it was Christmas morning.

"Yeah, May was cool with it since it's a Saturday night."

"Can I bring MJ? We have a couple's costume."

Ever the hyperactive puppy, Peter practically bounced all the way out of Manhattan, excitedly explaining his and MJ's costume. That didn't stop me from thinking Tony drove a bit like a maniac. I couldn't decide if it was because of the sports car or because he wanted to show off, but I decided I wanted it to stop. It's not a race, we're stuck in traffic at the bridge anyway.

"You drive like a bat outta hell," I commented as he gunned it onto the expressway.

"This is how New Yorker's drive."

"You drive like a grandma," Peter accused me.

"The speed limit is there for a reason," I poked his shoulder.

"So you could teach Pete to drive?"

"I don't have a death wish, Tony," I leaned forward, resting my cheek on the shoulder of Peter’s seat. “I see why you have a driver though.”

We dropped Peter off shortly after that comment. I climbed out of the back seat, knowing Tony was getting a full view of my ass and only caring a little bit. We exchanged a quick hug and I promised to come over for dinner soon before school got way too busy. As I was climbing back in, I noticed how people stared at the car.

“What kind of car is this?” I asked, buckling myself in as Tony peeled on to the street.

“It’s an Audi R8,” he placed a hand on my thigh, just above my knee. “This alright?”

“People were looking at it, I don’t know cars,” I placed my hand on top of his, keeping it on my leg.

“What kind of car do you drive?”

“I drove a 2007 Ford Ranger, but I sold it before I moved. College is expensive and I couldn’t exactly just park it outside my building,” I laughed.

“You drove a truck?” Tony looked at me, an amused smirk on his face.

“Eyes on the road,” I squealed.

“JARVIS can drive the car,” his other hand moved to rest on his window. A light in the steering wheel flashed on and the car immediately slowed down to the speed limit. I also noticed it signaled when we passed another car. At least someone had road etiquette. “You okay?”

“I’ve been avoiding my midterm grades,” I confessed. “Not worried about my art classes, but I need to keep a certain GPA for my scholarship and… well yeah, I’ve been avoiding it.”

“I’m sure they are fine.”

There was a slight flicker behind his sunglasses, his eyes no longer looking at the road ahead of him or me, but what was behind the lens.

“So how are they?” I asked, nervous and amused.

“I’m not sure what you were nervous about. You’ve got A in everything but your calculus class, which is a very solid B. You did great, Babygirl.”

“Fuck,” I threw my head back against the seat and covered my eyes, dislodging my glasses. No, no, no. Deep breathes, c'mon you stupid bitch.

“That’s not the reaction I thought I would get for accessing your emails,” Tony looked at me now, pushing his sunglasses up his forehead. “What’s up?”

“What? No. Petey told me you did a whole search on me. It’s stupid to think you can’t just do computer magic. I watched the video from the senate hearing, which was amazing by the way. I’m just a complete fucking idiot,” My voice cracked, stress I hadn’t been willing to think about consumed me now.

Fuck. Just fuck everything. That wasn’t good enough. God this was awful. How was I going to explain this to my parents? I can already hear their comments in my head. Are you going to be average like everyone else? What are you gonna do when you fail at art? We expect better. Why do you keep letting us down?

I could feel Tony’s stare. Even as my eyes clouded with tears I can see the almost scared look in his wide eyes. I was being a fucking psycho again. That wasn’t okay. I needed to calm down. I can’t be like this in front of people, especially not Tony. That isn’t fair to him.

“Sorry, I’m sorry, sorry,” I took in a shaky breath, but it got caught at the back of my throat. The exhale came out just as wobbly. “I know that that seems like a good thing, but it isn’t. It has to be an A, or I can’t stay in New York.”

The car pulled over, JARVIS announcing that my heart rate had skyrocketed and that it appeared I was having a panic attack. The music stopped and the air conditioning was turned up a level. The goosebumps on my skin twitched to life as I began to shiver.

“Look at me, Honey,” Tony pulled my hands away from my neck. When had I wrapped them there? “You need to explain what’s got you so worked up? I can’t help if you don’t tell me.”

“My parents only agreed to cosign my student loans if I got a 4.0 GPA. They check my grades. My scholarship doesn’t cover the cost of everything, so I can’t stay if I don’t have those loans,” I breathed, avoiding eye contact even as he rubbed small circles around my hands with his thumb.

“That seems like they’re setting you up for failure, Baby.”

“No,” I shook my head, eyes squeezing shut. “I can’t fail. It’s not allowed.”

“Get out of the car, c’mon you’re switching me seats,” Tony unbuckled and removed himself from the vehicle. I did the same, just slower and more confused.

He was already at the passenger door when I popped it open. I pulled myself out of the vehicle. I wasn’t going to fail at the one thing he asked me to do. I was going to force myself from the car even if it was the last thing I felt capable of doing. Every part of me was shaking. There was nothing I could do to force down the tears, I knew that, but that didn’t mean I wasn’t going to try and stop them.

I was ashamed. Not only because I was crying in front of Tony, again, like a stupid baby, but because of just how dumb he must think I am. I couldn’t even pass basic calculus, and I had to take another math class next semester. He must have thought I was pathetic.

Tony wrapped his arms around me, forcing my head on his shoulder. I clung to him, my hands aching in the cold October air. The zipper of his jacket dug into the front of my sweatshirt. I kept saying sorry as more tears fell down my face. He rubbed my back. A soothing gesture that felt so foreign to me. Neither of my parents were affectionate, saying that was just the way they were raised.

“You sure you wanna deal with a fucking hot mess like me?” I hiccuped.

“You’ve yet to see me on a bad day, Sweetheart. This is nothing,” he assured me, placing both hands on my face. Warm palms guarded me for the autumn wind and wiped away the last stray tears. He brought my forehead to his lips, resting them there for a few moments before he pulled away. There was a tender, almost sad, look in his eyes, but that was quickly replaced with a Tony Stark™ smirk.

“Now hop to it, we are going for a drive.”

I started driving us south, with no destination in mind. The Audi handled a hell of a lot different than the truck. It took a good amount of my concentration to control it and focus on the absolutely insane drivers of New York. We sat in silence, not even the radio on. The street lamps and car lights blinded me as we passed them. Tony was still wearing his sunglasses. When I merged us onto a highway, I relaxed. My arms fell from the 10 and 2 position and one hand rested on the base of the steering wheel, while the other rested on the gear shift.

“You are an excellent driver, Sweetheart.”

Well that went straight to my head. Heat rose on my cheeks and a small laugh rumbled through me.

“I used to drive everywhere,” I sighed. Highway signs flashed a series of streets, restaurants, and tourist hot spots. Increasing the speed gradually, merging into the farthest left lane, and finally letting loose on the gas. “There isn’t much to do where I am from, and when my parents got to be too much, this is what I used to do.”

“Drag race down empty highways?”

“It ain’t racin’ if you’re alone,” I let my drawl slip, peering over at Tony.

“It’s like you’re a totally different person,” his hushed, dramatic tone was lessened by the laugh that followed.

“Nah, ya get made fun of enough for sounded slow and dumb, you change it,” I murmured, tightening my accent and slowing back down and merging into the right lane. Where I was supposed to be.

“Isn’t your mom from New York?”

“Yeah, but I sound just like my dad,” my phone rattled in the cupholder. “Speak of the devil. Is it that late already? Can you put in the car speaker?”

“You want JARVIS in your phone?” He countered.

“I thought he would be already,” I glanced at Tony, genuinely a bit surprised and mostly just happy he hadn’t done what he did to Peter to me. There were things that I would rather explain in person to him.

JARVIS pushed the call to the car speakers, the small screen in the dash lighting up with my dad’s contact information. A picture of him, decked out in his IU gear and headphones around his neck appeared in the center of it.

“Hey Fabio, how are you?” Tony looked at me and mouthed ‘Fabio’ to me.

“You watch your boyfriend play yesterday?” His slow, mumbled drawl that matched mine filled the car.

“I told you we broke up last week Dad,” I frowned, taking an exit off the highway. I couldn’t look at Tony.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” I could just picture him rolling his eyes. “You young people break up all the time. He’s just really torn up about it. Can’t focus on school, he nearly failed all his midterms, the kids a complete mess.”

Of course he almost failed. I had stopped 'helping' him on his papers and homework the moment we broke up. Any of his work that I still had on my computer I deleted. I pulled us into a near empty parking lot. Tony unbuckled his seat belt and leaned further back, seemingly content to just listen.

“So bench his ass then Dad, I don’t care. We broke up.” This was the last thing I wanted to talk about.

“Watch your mouth young lady,” he enunciated as his voice dripped with venom.

Tony looked at me, raising his eyebrows. I couldn’t decide what was more embarrassing, the fact that I flinched or that he scolded me.

“Am I on speaker phone?” He asked. Abort, abort, abort.

“Look Dad, just like last week, if you don’t wanna talk about something else, hang up the phone.”

“Pete’s sake, you’re just like Mother,” he sounded annoyed and he was taking it out on me.

“You know I don’t like it when you say that,” I softened my voice but gripped the steering wheel.

“And you didn’t answer my question.”

“Yes, you’re on speaker phone.”

“So are you doing your art stuff?”

“No,” that was all I was gonna tell him.

“That’s a first, then what are you doing?” He asked. “Mother says hello, hopes you’re enjoying your new church.”

Tony snorted. Obviously I wasn’t going to church. I hated church.

“Who’s that? If you’re with someone you shouldn’t answer the phone. We raised you better,” he scolded again.

“It’s fine, he’s fine with it. Everyones fine,” I rushed.

“Smooth,” Tony whispered.

“He?” My father bellowed. “Where is this boy? Put me on video.”

“In a car Dad, can’t put you on video. Oh no, we are going under a tunnel soon, byeeeee.” I scrambled for my phone and ended the call.

“You handled that horribly,” Tony laughed. “I’m not gonna lie, it was like watch an on fire dumpster.”

“You know what, next week when he calls me, you can answer the phone. Have all the fun with that you want. I will sit and watch you struggle.” I folded my arms together and stared at him.

“It’s a date, Babygirl.”

#a sloth writes #tony stark x ofc #tony stark fic #tony stark x you #tony stark x reader #tony stark #tony stark fanfic #tony stark fanfiction #iron man fanfic #iron man x reader #iron man x ofc #iron man fic #iron man #sleepless in stark towers

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fallingappleshurt · 4 years ago

Text

Do y’all wanna see the VERY BASIC outline for my AU based off the Project Pink story, this shit that I wrote while sleep deprived

Too bad have it anyways

(I will be adding a lot more to this AU and might change some stuff but here are just the basics, god I’m tired)

ANYWAYS Finding a Home

There aren’t really any set age ranges or stories in place for this yet, it’s more just a brain dump word vomit thing

Techno:

-A really good student even though he procrastinates all of the time

-He really likes to read

-Has really big boxy glasses that are too big for his face (He’ll grow into them eventually)

-He has claimed himself to be Wilbur’s protector of sorts, making sure he doesn;t do anything too reckless or stupid and overall just trying to help him

-He has stopped Wilbur from doing so much stupid shit, you don’t even know

-They have been through about 6 foster homes before being placed with Phil

-They were split up once but after a few weeks Techno got sick of his home and met up with Wilbur, who hid him for two days before getting busted

-They put Techno back in the same home but he ran away again, he saved up money and stayed in a gross motel for a day then in a park for another before being found

-Finally he was placed back with Wilbur and they were put with Phil

-Techno is obsessed with space, absolutely star-struck (haHA) by it

- The different planets and their environments, stars, comets, he thinks it’ll all super interesting

-He has those shitty glow in the dark stars on the wall next to his bunk

-Once he and Wilbur snuck out to the woods at night and climbed up a tree to star gaze away from city lights

-(Majority of their ‘delinquent stuff was before they met Phil)

-He and Wilbur would spray paint animal faces on water tanks and abandoned properties

-They spent half of their childhood in a kind of crappy neighborhood with weird streets, trashy houses, and the town was overall just dumpy

-They would wander around and explore some of the closed off or abandoned houses just to see what was there

-They couldn't do this any when they were placed with Phil, who lives in the suburbs

-They can still cause chaos, somewhat, where he works

-Techno and Phil go to the library everyone, it’s become a tradition

-Techno likes pigs, enough said

Wilbur:

-Dirty crime boy

-Has definitely hidden from the cops before, nothing that serious

-Really likes to play the guitar

-He has fairy lights hanging around the top bunk of his bed, there was nothing to hang them on so he taped them to the wall

-He is actually really good with spray paint

-Phil got some old wooden boards for Wilbur to paint on instead of private property, cause, ya know

-He gets is paint from some rando at school

- He really likes to adventure and sneak around

-Half of the stuff he does gives Techno a heart attack

-Wilbur is okay at school but he doesn’t really like it but for some reason he is really good at science

-He’s mad there isn’t a guitar option for the band or orchestra

-At an old foster home he would steal an older siblings guitar to practice with, he did this so much to the point where they would have to lock it away so he couldn’t get to it

-So he learned to pick locks

-So they had to hide it in different places

-He really likes the ocean, especially coral reefs and sea animals

-He wants to scuba dive some day!

-Techno learned a bunch of ocean facts and will randomly spew them at Wilbur

-He enjoys it

-Wilbur likes to listen to Techno talk about anything like books, shows, movies, anything that he is interested in and will listen to Techno talk about it for hours, it’s especially interesting when he’s passionate about the topic and Wilbur can see him getting more excited and into it

-Techno has books that’d read outloud to Wilbur when they were younger, sometimes when they can’t sleep, he’ll read out loud again

-Wilbur really likes stickers and has a box of them but doesn’t know where to put them so they just stay in the box

-He keeps collecting them though

-He teaches Tommy the guitar every Thursday

-He will randomly walk up behind Techno and rest his chin on Technio’s head

Phil:

-He is the manager of a mall (BEAR WITH ME)

- He has fostered kids before but never adopted before Techno, Wilbur, and Tommy

-He is good at handling chaos, thank god, and isn’t really phased by half of the stuff his kids do

-He gardens, he randomly started one day and found out he has a green thumb

-He also is a good cook and spends time trying to teach the boys how to cook, or at least not set the kitchen on fire

-Techno and Tommy show promise but Wilbur might be a lost cause for cooking

-He has a heart tattooed on his left wrist

-The bucket hat is something he wears when gardening

-He bought Wilbur his first guitar and a song book to go with it, later on he got Wilbur a notebook so he could write songs or anything he wanted to

-He takes Techno to the library every week, the first time they went Techno only got a few books but the next time he got like 16 and some of them were thick boys and Techno couldn’t carry them all

-He has taken all of them to the aquarium and Wilbur almost lost his shit trying to see everything

-Techno read all of the fish information tablets and Tommy liked the interactive pool where you could poke rocks and shit

-He brings them to work with him sometimes and lets them wander around the mall, praying to god they don’t set shit on fire

-He is really patient with Tommy but once they got comfortable with each other he had no problem teasing him, all of the boys really

-He really likes birds and has a bird feeder in the tree in their backyard

Tommy:

-Gremlin

-That’s it

- He is super energetic and bouncy

-He has trouble falling asleep sometimes because of this

-He is loud and can be rude but means well

-He wasn’t super interested in a lot of things but he loves legos, even if there aren’t any specific things he has to build, he just likes to make giant towers with them and sets them up around the house

-They have all stepped on so many legos, oh so many legos

-He’s really smart but has a hard time focusing so he gets help from Techno and Wilbur, and Phil, sometimes

-His knees are constantly scraped

-He made friends with a kid named Tubbo from school, they became close friends really quickly

-Tubbo and Tommy switched bandanas, Tommy gave Tubbo his red one and Tubbo gave Tommy his green one (YES I’m going THERE)

-Tommy doesn’t let anyone else touch it

-None of the others actually knew about Tubbo, they’d ask who gave him the bandana and he’d say some girl from school or something

-After awhile Tommy wanted to see Tubbo outside of school so he lied and said he joined a club then would go hang out with Tubbo after school at a park

-This went on for weeks until Techno and Wilbur got suspicious, Wilbur actually cut class and followed Tommy, who was still in elementary, like 5th grade, at the time and got out earlier, and saw him meeting at a park

-He didn’t find this to be that bad and told Techno but not Phil

-Eventually Tubbo got to meet the rest of the family but that wasn’t until sixth grade or so

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yuta-nakamots · 4 years ago

Text

Groove - k.ji

Pairing - Idol!Jongin x Choreographer!Reader

Genre - Fluff

Warnings - None

Summary - You are a choreographer chosen to work with Jongin for his upcoming solo album. He’s an idol and you’re not, it’s as simple as that until you find yourselves dancing between the lines of business and something more intimate.

Word Count - 6k

A/N - This is the reworked version of ‘a dance to remember’ which I wrote when I was about 15 years old. That piece itself is based on a dream I had about EXO. This essentially is a fic written about a fic written about a dream so I’m sorry if it seems kinda disjointed.

When you were younger, you had discovered that you had an immense passion for dance and you had begged your parents to let you join the small dance studio near your school. Even if it was just an average dance school it wasn’t uncommon for the bigger entertainment companies to recruit backup dancers or choreographers from studios like yours, which is how you had met a handful of idols before. Each month, you had to go in and perform a short piece that you created in order to keep track of your progress. Normally, the room these progress videos were shot in are empty aside from you, the company director, and a couple of cameras set up to catch multiple angles.

However, this time around, there was a man standing next to your director. As you entered, you quickly greeted and bowed to your director and did the same to the guest. He was wearing a chocolate brown hoodie and light blue jeans along with a pair of rounded glasses and a face mask. He was quite tall and looked almost intimidating until you met his eyes that were warm and inviting but awfully familiar. Not wanting to be weird, you quickly turned around and made your way to the stereo equipment to plug in your phone and start the music. You finish your recording quickly and respectfully thank your director before leaving the studio to head home, your thoughts still preoccupied with the stranger who you were confident you had met somewhere before.

A week later, you received an email from the director: Good evening Y/n, From your video we recorded earlier this week, you’ve been recruited to work with EXO member Kai as a choreographer for his upcoming solo album. Congratulations on this achievement! We are looking forward to what you will create this time around. I will give you more details on this after your regularly scheduled class today.

The warm brown eyes that were all too familiar flashed inside your mind as you thought about all of his performances that you had watched before, wanting to learn from him and his style. The eyes of the stranger that had stood next to your director the day you recorded your video. No, it couldn’t have been him, you thought to yourself, there’s no way an idol would come to our dance studio. You shook your head to break yourself out of your imagination as you got ready to head over to the studio and teach your class.

You were going through your text message as you entered the room your class was in and walked right into your director. You immediately back up and profusely apologize, freezing once you recognize the person he was previously talking to. “Oh, y/n, this is Kai from EXO! I was just telling him how he should stay to watch you teach this class so he can get a taste of what your style is like.”

Kai looked from your director to you, offering you one of his signature smiles that have been known to melt hearts. “I’d love to” was all he had to say to make your stomach drop to the floor and your hands start sweating.

As you taught your class, you felt an intense stare on you the entire time, glancing over at Kai only a few times, finding him looking right back at you, causing you to suddenly jerk your head away only to hear Kai let out a quiet giggle from the corner he was sitting in. Eventually, you learn to ignore his presence and you continue teaching your class and wrapping up as you normally would. As your students begin filing out the door, Kai eagerly gets up and strides over to you. “Hey, y/n, I really liked the energy of that class and the genre of the piece you taught, I’m looking forward to working with you!” he said, the edges of his eyes crinkling as he smiled at you, “if you don’t mind, I’d like to get your number so we can talk more about the album” and he offered you his phone, already open to a blank contact page.

You quickly wipe your hands on your shirt before grabbing his phone, entering your number and handing it back to him with a shy “thank you, I look forward to working with you too”.

Later that night, you got a text from an unknown number.

Unknown > y/n 10:15pm: hi y/n, this is Jongin! ^^

You type a simple greeting back to him as you add him to your contact list and slip into bed. He immediately responds and starts asking questions about you, which you brushed off as him just being friendly. Your conversation continues for another half hour, consisting of mostly him asking about you and your interests accompanied by various cute emoticons until you finally grow tired of it.

y/n > EXO Kai 10:49pm: Why do you keep asking about me? What if I want to hear more about you?

EXO Kai > y/n 10:51pm: because I want to get to know you better （⌒_⌒）

10:51pm: I like to have a connection with the people I’m working with. even more so now, since this solo album is something new and special to me

10:52pm: besides, you can hear about me all the time from the fansites and media

His response makes you pause and set your phone down for a bit as you realize that there’s more depth to Kai and his personality than you thought. Wow, not only is he an amazing performer, he has a kind heart and values his relationships, even if they’re only for work purposes. You were shocked, to say the least. From your experience working with idols, yes, you did get to know each other but they didn’t ask you about your hobbies or favorite foods like how Kai did. This just added to your list of reasons why this man is out of your league. No, he is not out of my league. We are not even in the same sport. He is an idol, he will not date you, stop it, you thought as you reprimanded yourself. However, you picked up your phone to message him back and continue your conversation, even though you dozed off not even five minutes later, failing to see the new texts you received from Kai.

EXO Kai > y/n 11:03pm: y/nnnnnn

11:03pm: where did you gooooo >.<

11:04pm: ah, you must have fallen asleep

11:04pm: rest well y/n, goodnight (￣ε￣)

The rest of your week passes by uneventfully with you going to university and teaching your classes as usual. The only new addition to your schedule was a sort of ‘date’ with Kai on Thursday afternoon, your free day during the week, and also the day you were scheduled to meet with the other staff working on his album to get a sense of what kind of image they wanted. He had texted you asking if he could treat you to lunch at the SM Cafe after your meeting which you agreed to.

By the time Thursday comes around, you’re already feeling worn out from school, barely even able to put together an outfit and settling for a simple black t-shirt and jeans. You took the bus to the company building since you didn’t know where to park and you figured it would save gas anyways. The meeting was a nice refresher, as you were interested in the ideas the staff was putting out and you left the meeting feeling reenergized with tons of ideas flying through your head. You met Kai at the cafe as you had promised, finding him easily due to his large frame. “You look nice, y/n” he commented, as you sat down opposite to him. You said a shy ‘thank you’ back while turning and looking out the window, hoping he didn’t notice the blush that had begun to show up on your cheeks.

Lunch goes smoothly as he allows you to ask him questions this time around and he tells you about his hobby of playing with legos and putting elaborate things together to give to his nieces and nephews or how he has given up learning how to bake. You don’t miss the way his hands brush yours when you pass him a napkin after some of the coffee he was drinking spills out the side of this mouth or when both of you reach for your phone before it falls off the table. Maybe it’s because of all the times you’ve daydreamed about him after learning one of the dances he’s done, but to you, this ‘casual lunch’ is beginning to feel more and more like a date. Luckily, you two finish eating quickly and he asks if you’d be willing to show him some of the ideas you have so far. You eagerly told him yes along with a few details from the meeting and how you’re really excited to further refine them.

Once both of you are in a practice room upstairs, you and Kai decide to sit in the middle of the room and talk about possible concepts and stories that could be portrayed, however, the conversation quickly strays off-topic due to Kai and his seemingly never-ending curiosity when it comes to you. “What do you do besides dancing and teaching your own classes?” he asks, looking more like a troublesome toddler than the idol you were supposed to be working with.

You push that thought aside before responding, “I’m currently in university, majoring in business since I’m set to take over the dance school from the director.”

Kai keeps his eyes glued to you while you speak, the only movement coming from his fidgeting hands. After you finish speaking, he looks down in his lap before shyly speaking, “sometimes I like to think about what I’d be doing if I wasn’t an idol, you know? Would I have joined a dance studio like yours? Would I be in college right now? Would I have a girlfriend? Would I maybe even have a child?” He paused for a bit and ran a hand through his hair while moving to lie down. “I genuinely think that if I weren’t an idol, I’d still be in school. Being with animals and kids gives me so much joy, I’ve often thought about being a veterinarian or an elementary school teacher. Though they are drastically different, I find both of them to be so appealing” he said, letting out a sigh at the end of his sentence.

“Do you ever think that you’d be happier doing those things rather than where you are now?”

Kai looked over at you, not noticing you had laid down next to him as if both of you were outside looking at clouds. “Maybe...however, I’m still satisfied with the path my life took. Yes, there are drawbacks to being a public figure but I’m happy with all the experiences it has given me.” Sensing how the mood has become a little too serious for his liking, Kai decides to ask you another question. “Who’s your favorite member in my group?”

You let out a laugh, dumbfounded by his sudden question. “I’m not saying this just because you’re here, but it’s you and has been for a while now” you said sheepishly, keeping your eyes locked on the ceiling to keep yourself from looking at Kai and showing him your now pink-tinted cheeks.

“For a while now?” he asked, quoting your words. “How long have you been a fan of us?”

“Since your debut,” you said, throwing your hands on your face to hide your embarrassment before exclaiming, “ah, this is so awkward, I can’t believe I’m telling you this.” Fortunately, your embarrassment didn’t last long thanks to your roommate who had just sent you a text. You gladly moved away from Kai to check your phone, inwardly thanking your roommate for saving you from what could have become a shameful memory. Oh shit it’s already past 10? you thought to yourself, shocked at how quickly time passed while you were with Kai. “My roommate was just asking where I was since it’s getting kinda late,” you told him, “normally I don’t stay out this late since I have class tomorrow morning so I should probably get going now, especially since I have to catch the last bus which comes in a bit, I think.”

You stood up, but before you could so much as take a step towards the door, Kai stopped you. “I can drive you home” he offered, to which you vehemently refused, “you’re my choreographer and I’d hate for anything to happen to you when you haven’t even taught me the dance to my own song yet” he said, giving you the puppy eyes you’ve seen countless times through videos of him.

You can tell that he’s being sincere so eventually you accept his offer, but something about his words doesn’t sit quite right. You had told each other so much about yourselves and shown such an embarrassing side of yourself to him, yet he only regarded you as his choreographer. Because that’s what I am, you thought, trying to shove those thoughts out of your head, I’m nothing more than just his choreographer, a work acquaintance. This is simply a relationship based on our work together. He is an idol and I am his choreographer. Nothing more, nothing less. You internally slapped yourself for getting riled up over his words when he was only trying to be nice.

Once you were in his car, you told him your address as you put your seatbelt on. The ride home is mostly silent aside from little side comments made between the two of you, like when he tells you about how he and the members once went to the samgyeopsal restaurant you passed earlier and how Chanyeol proceeded to get absolutely wasted to the point where the members played rock paper scissors to decide who would be taking care of him for the night.

Time, again, seemed to pass a little faster than normal when you were talking to Kai and laughing with him. When he pulled up in front of your apartment building, you unbuckle your seatbelt and began to thank him, “Kai-”

“Why do you keep calling me that?”

“Calling you what?”

“Kai.”

“...Because it’s your name?” At this point, you were beyond confused as to what Kai was getting at.

“It’s one of my names, but it’s not MY name. My name is Jongin. Yes, Kai is my name as well but that’s who I am on stage...please, just call me Jongin from now on” he let out, sitting further back into his seat once he realized how aggressive he sounded.

“O-oh, okay. Goodnight Jongin.” Though you were used to saying that name while talking to your friends about his dancing or when they showed you pictures of him, this time it sounded foreign. Almost even forced, as if you shouldn’t be saying it.

Once you unlock the door and walk into your apartment, you receive a text from him.

EXO Kai > y/n 10:36pm: I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have snapped like that, it’s just that being called Kai all the time makes me feel disconnected from people, you know? It’s like people see me only as Kai the idol and not Jongin, a regular person.

10:37pm: Kai is the side the fans and the media see and want while Jongin is just the sad guy behind the mask

10:37pm: Sorry, I probably shouldn’t have said that either. I’m just making this worse aren’t I?

You see the bubble pop up again, showing you that he was typing but before he can send you another message, you text him back.

y/n > EXO Kai 10:38pm: Jongin, it’s fine. I may not be an idol but I get what you mean

10:39pm: I didn’t know that even something like your stage name could have such a restraining feeling for you, and I’m sorry about that. But thank you for opening up to me

You see that he read your message but you don’t see him typing a response so you lock your phone and start your night routine, eventually forgetting to check your phone.

When you woke up the next morning, you saw that Kai, no, Jongin, you reminded yourself, texted you around midnight but you didn’t open his message until lunch when you were done with most of your classes for the day.

Jongin > y/n 12:16am: Goodnight y/n. I’m sorry I’m not the idol you always looked up to, but thank you for listening to me and respecting me as a person. Thank you, see you next week. I can’t wait to see what you have choreographed for me (⌒ω⌒)

And there it was again, the way he speaks so fondly towards you yet he still brings it back to work. You had to remind yourself that the relationship between the two of you is only because of work and that no matter what, you cannot develop feelings for him. It’s not like he’d have time for me anyways, I’m nothing special compared to those other girls he’s dated, you thought to yourself.

You spend the rest of the week doing your usual activities along with choreographing for the title track of Jongin’s album. Though the company sent you just the demo of the track, you could already tell that this sort of song was definitely his style. Sexy yet sweet. Hot but undeniably cool.

A month had passed since Jongin first confided in you about his idol dilemma. After teaching Jongin and the rest of the dancers the choreo you made for the title track, you were no longer needed quite as often in the practice room, which resulted in you seeing Jongin less as his preparations started to stack up in his schedule. He still made it a point to take you out for lunch or dinner, which surprised you since he didn’t necessarily need to keep up a relationship with you now that your part in the album production was over. It was at those times when you were reminded of the instance when he was dropping you off, that he’s human and has friends he hangs out with, you just might have gotten lucky and become one of them.

Your text message chat with him went back and forth between you two talking about the choreo and the comeback to deep late-night conversations like how Sehun saw a cockroach in the shower one night and ran out butt-naked, screaming. Just like your chat, your relationship with Jongin became more confusing as the line between business and friendship blurred even further. Jongin texts you late on a Wednesday night to come to the ‘cloud’ room, which you had mistakenly called it once after watching one too many of the old SM dance practice videos, tomorrow around noon. Similar to when the incident with his name occurred, his message didn’t have the cute emoticons you were used to him sending. You wondered if something in the choreo needed to be changed last minute and sent him a simple thumbs up to let him know you’d be there.

You spent the rest of your Wednesday night reanalyzing the choreo you made, trying to find any flaws that would have resulted in Jongin texting you so seriously and asking you to come in person instead of sending a video along with his questions as usual. By Thursday afternoon, you had a few things in mind that you could easily smooth over and your mind was flooded with different combos and formations to use as you walked through the building to the practice room you told Jongin you’d meet him at.

You entered without knocking since usually the whole team is at work and you don’t want to disrupt whatever they’re working on, so you quietly stepped in and closed the door but you yelped when you heard a loud bang from the area near the sound equipment. Glancing over, you spot Jongin with his balled-up fists on the table and realized the rest of the team wasn’t here. It was just you and him, which led to you being even more confused as to why he had asked you to come in. After hearing the noise you made, Jongin’s head perked up and found you, “oh, y/n, you came.” His tense features immediately relaxing into a loose half-smile where you could see just how tired he was. “I need help on the main part of the chorus. No matter how many times I do it, there just isn’t the right feeling with it and I don’t get it” he said, almost whining.

You sat against the mirror, watching him do it a few times until you got up and stood next to him, facing the mirror. “Jongin you’re treating it way too strictly. This is the chorus, not a dance break, just groove with it, have fun with it, you know?” You danced the part to further show your point.

“Groove with it? What do you mean ‘groove with it?’” He asked, confusion clearly evident on his face and in his voice.

“Relax and think about the song itself. Think about the meaning, the style of it, not the choreography” you responded. He did as you showed him and looked at you for approval. “Good, but keep that same intensity in your eyes from earlier.” He did it again, staring straight into your eyes through your reflection in the mirror, almost sending shivers down your body. You smiled to acknowledge that you liked it and Jongin’s face lit up, seeing as he finally perfected what he deemed to be the ‘killing point’ of the dance, as he had said when you first showed it to him.

After another hour, you and Jongin had gone over the entire dance and worked out any remaining questions he had for you. Just as the two of you were getting ready to leave and head over to the cafe, Jongin called out your name, coming to stand next to where you were packing up your bag.

“Hey Y/N...I-uh-wanted to tell you that I-um-I think-” he began, before you interrupted him, not wanting to hear him stuttering anymore.

“Jongin, do you want to go over something again? Is that what’s bothering you?”

“N-no, it’s just that I think, uh, I think I really like you...r dance...yeah...I really like your dance, the one you made for me in my album, uh haha yeah thank you.” His cheeks and ears started turning pink as he quickly turned around to go gather his things.

Did he just say what I thought he said, you asked yourself, no, he couldn’t have. There’s no way he’d say that. All it would do is hurt his career anyway, he wouldn’t do that. You silenced your thoughts and left the practice room with him to get dinner.

You ate with him at the cafe but your conversation didn’t seem to flow as naturally as it normally did. He kept looking at you like he wanted to say something but never did. The normal playful touches you usually shared weren’t there either and you hated yourself for noticing these things. This was probably just his way of nicely ending our relationship since he probably won’t be working with me again in the future.

As you both made your way down to your cars in the parking lot, Jongin stepped in front of you right after exiting the elevator, looking down at his feet like a little kid would when they’re being scolded.

“Y/N I’d like to thank you for working with me for my solo debut, it really means a lot to me,” this is where you think he’s going to just thank you and say goodnight, but he doesn’t, “I’d like to ask you if you’d come to the first broadcast next week Monday. I know you have class but I won’t be going on until later. You don’t have to if you don’t want to because I know you’re really busy being a student and all but-”

“Jongin, please, I would love to.” You said, saving the both of you from his endless ramblings.

When he finally meets your eyes he gives you a look full of cuteness and adoration be exclaiming, “Really?!”

“Yes, really.”

“Promise?!”

“Yes, Jongin. I promise I will be there.” He hugged you so tight you thought you were going to suffocate but before you could, he released you and skipped off in the direction of his car while happily giggling to himself, “goodnight y/n” he yelled, “see you on Monday.”

You slapped yourself for blushing at his cute outburst. He’s an idol, you’re not supposed to feel this warmth in your heart that yearned for him to hug you again, yet your mind constantly wandered to him during your whole drive back to your apartment.

As you were lying in bed, just about falling asleep, you got a text from Jongin.

Jongin > y/n 9:08pm: SHE SAID YES! (＠＾◡＾)

9:08pm: oh shit

9:08pm: sorry, that was meant for Baekhyun hyung

9:09pm: we were talking about a special girl (＃＞＜)

Your heart immediately dropped. It’s probably another girl he’s dating, seeing as how he’s dated other girl idols before. You knew that you shouldn’t be upset but you just were. It was at that moment that you realized your feelings towards Jongin. You quickly sent a simple ‘haha okay’ back, but his message left you wondering about the lucky girl he was talking about, hurt that you didn’t know who it was. He has no obligation to tell me anything, I’m only his choreographer, you told yourself, probably for the millionth time now.

Ever since that night, you hadn’t initiated a conversation with him though he still texted you occasionally. Sometimes it would be a goodnight message, other times it was just his late-night thoughts about how dogs would wear pants or what kind of sounds a koala makes. You didn’t want to admit it but that one text bothered you for the rest of the week, and as it got closer and closer to his first performance, the more you didn’t want to go. Almost as if Jongin was reading your mind, you received a text message from him.

Jongin > y/n 7:45pm: y/nnnnnn I can’t wait to see you tomorrow -\\3\\-

You were going to send another thumbs up again, but opted for a more cheerful ‘good luck!’ since you knew how much this meant to him and how hard he worked for this and you didn’t want to let your own feelings get in the way of his achievements. It’s not like you were going to be involved in his work much longer once his promotions ended. Maybe it was for the best if you just kept your feelings to yourself so he could go back to being just Kai, the idol, to you, and not the sweet and playful Jongin you had gotten to know and the one you had, unfortunately, fell for. Going to sleep that night was a huge struggle for you, constantly asking yourself if you were going to see him tomorrow or not. Eventually, you fell asleep before reaching a clear answer but knowing you’d have to decide tomorrow anyways

The next morning, you woke up to the sight of sunlight already filling your room, which was not a good sing. You quickly checked your phone and saw that you were already half an hour late to your first class along with noticing Jongin had sent you another message around 6AM though you didn’t read it since your first priority was to get to school. You turned your phone to Do Not Disturb mode and rushed through your morning routine, getting to school just as your second class was starting. After running in five minutes late and profusely apologizing to your professor, you took your normal seat in the back of the room, letting out a sigh of exhaustion.

Your lecture ended faster than you expected and as you waited in the line at the cafeteria you finally pulled out your phone to go through your notifications and saw that Jongin had sent you two more messages.

Jongin > y/n 6:13am: I’m so excited, i could barely even sleep! Good morning y/n, today’s the day! ＼(≧▽≦)／

Jongin > y/n 10:20am: We’re in the cafe ordering sandwiches to eat at the recording studio later. What do you want to drink? I can’t remember if it was the honey lemon tea or the honeydew milk tea (>_<)

10:25am: y/nnnnn please answer meeeeee (╥_╥)

You couldn’t resist his cuteness and texted him back.

y/n > Jongin 10:27am: honey lemon :)

As soon as you hit send, you froze, realizing you had dug yourself into a hole, ultimately forcing yourself into going to the studio he would be performing at later. You were brought out of your dazed state when the person in the back of you cleared their throat loudly and you noticed it was your turn to order.

After you had ordered and received your food, you sat down and ate your lunch quickly, wanting to go to class and get your mind off of Jongin who was walking around up there as if he owned it.

The rest of your day went by quickly and as you got into your car, you let out a long sigh, not wanting to believe that you’d be going to the recording studio to support the man who not only held your heart in his hands but also unknowingly crushed it.

Once inside the studio, it was quite easy to find Jongin’s room, seeing all the staff rushing around with their SM lanyards on, similar to the one you had on. You walked into his room, expecting to be greeted by a loud Jongin, but instead, you were met with the blank stares of his fellow members, Chanyeol, Baekhyun, and Sehun. Baekhyun was the only one who acknowledged you while the other two simply looked back down at their phones, thinking you were another staff member. “Ah, so you must be the wonderful y/n that our Jonginnie is always talking about! That idiot is always telling us about you, we were just wondering when we’d be able to meet him. He may fall in love quickly but he does have good judgment if you know what I mean.”

Both of the other members immediately perked up upon realizing who you were as your cheeks turned a bright shade of pink after hearing Baekhyun’s words. “J-Jongin talks about me?”

Baekhyun let out one of his big laughs before responding, “All the time! I can’t believe it took him this long to ask you out.”

If it was even humanly possible, you swear you turned even more pink. “Oh, we’re not dating. I think you’ve got me confused with another girl.” Your mind flew back to the text Jongin had accidentally sent you and all your emotions were about to come flooding back to you.

At that moment, Jongin entered the room and walked right into you. Baekhyun caught you, preventing you from what would’ve been an embarrassing fall, however, he only took it as an opportunity to push you right back into Jongin’s arms while yelling, “Ya! Kim Jongin, you idiot! I didn’t raise you to be such a coward, just ask her out already!” He then proceeded to bulldoze both of you out of the room and close the door while Chanyeol and Sehun only laughed while recording the whole thing, probably to send in their group chat later for the others to see.

Once both of you processed what just happened, you and Jongin looked at each other and he immediately released you from his hold and looked at the ground. You took this moment to appreciate his stylists for doing such a good job. He was wearing a full navy blue suit, similar to the legendary red one he wore in the Love Shot music video, further accentuating the light brown contacts he had in his eyes. He brought his hands to your shoulders before taking a deep breath and meeting your eyes.

“Y/n-”

“Jongin-” you both said, at the same time.

“Oh, sorry, you go first.” You blurted out, your heart already racing.

He lightly squeezed your shoulders before saying, “I don’t know how much they told you in there but I suppose you probably already know that I...like you.”

The look on your face told him otherwise. “Weren’t you texting Baekhyun about another girl? A ‘special girl?’ That text you accidentally sent me instead of Baekhyun...” You trailed off at the end, thinking about how stupid you must look.

Jongin dropped his hands to your waist as he threw his head back in laughter before looking back at you. “No, you silly, we were talking about you. You told me you’d come to my first performance, remember?” Everything began to come together for you and you couldn’t believe that Jongin, the perfect man in front of you, had been talking about you to his members and that he likes you. Jongin saved you from further embarrassment when his hands trailed off your waist to find your own hands as he intertwined your fingers and pulled you closer “I’ve tried so many times to do this but I was always too scared of what would happen.” Your eyes locked with his gorgeous hazel masked ones that made it even harder to look away. “I really like you but I didn’t know if you liked me back which is why I never had the strength to ask you out. I was afraid of rejection, but at this point, I don’t think I have much else to lose with what Baekhyun hyung just did. It’s okay if you don’t like me back, I just want-”

As usual, you had to stop his endless rambling, but this time you did it with a quick kiss on his cheek. “I like you too, Jongin.”

Your eyes briefly met his before he enveloped you in a bone-crushing hug. His lips next to your ear, whispering the words he never thought he’d be able to say to you. “Will you be mine?”

“Only if you’ll be my boyfriend.”

He let you go only briefly so he could cup your cheeks and land a light kiss on your lips, both of your eyes fluttering closed, only to reopen suddenly at the sound of the other three members cheering from the doorway, all of them holding their phones up and recording the scene in front of them. You tried to pull away from Jongin but he only grabbed your waist and pulled you even closer.

“Jongin what are you-” you began, already having experienced enough embarrassment for a whole lifetime.

“Shhhh, just follow my lead,” he muttered before kissing you again “come on, just ‘groove’ with it” he said, between kisses, imitating your own words, igniting a fire in you as you remember teasing him with it during one of your most intimate practicing sessions together and you started kissing him back, moving your lips with his, much to the members’ disgust.

“Ewww” Sehun whined, right before Baekhyun and Chanyeol made simultaneous coughing and gagging sounds.

Hearing their reactions, Jongin’s lips finally left yours, a playful smile on his face before pulling you into another hug, this one full of warmth and affection. “Thank you y/n, thank you for giving me this chance. I’ll make you happy, I promise.”

You pulled back to face him, “thank you too, Jongin. Maybe it’s just our thing to ‘groove’ together” you said, bringing a finger up and playfully booping his nose.

He rolled his eyes at you before pushing your head back into his shoulder and letting you both enjoy the feeling of each other’s embrace, momentarily forgetting about the other three men standing in the doorway until they started making repulsive noises again.

140 notes · View notes

louhooo · 5 years ago

Text

A Rainy Day

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Reader

Summary: Everyone loves coming home to a home cooked meal, especially if you love who made it.

Word Count: 3.7k

Warnings: Swearing, alluding to adult themes, FLUFF

A/N: Domestic!Bucky is my favorite Bucky and you can’t change my mind. Also, naming kids is hard so be gentle with me.

The soft patter of rain on the window lulled Bucky out of his sleep. The bed was soft, and warm, and smelt like you. He reached his hand across the bed, searching for your warmth, but was only met with emptiness. He patted his hand up and down the mattress, a frown growing on his face.

He finally accepted defeat and rolled over, only to see that it was, in fact, true.

You weren’t in bed with him.

His eyes drifted to the bathroom door in your bedroom, the slightest sliver of light peeking through. Bucky stretched as he sat up, squishing his toes into the soft rug under the bed. He stood and crept into the bathroom, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. His steps were purposefully heavier in the morning, a courtesy to you and your easily startled nature.

The door creaked open and his eyes landed on you as you rubbed lotion onto your face. Your eyes flashed to his and a soft grin spread on your face.

“G’mornin’, baby.” He grinned at your reflection, his flesh hand running across your back as he walked past you.

“G’mornin’.” Bucky lifted the toilet lid and proceeded to relieve himself. “You’re up early.” You arched a brow and turned your head to look at him.

“It’s Thursday.” His brows pinched and he looked over his shoulder at you. Was Thursday important? He couldn’t think of–

“Oh, right, yeah, you’ve got that presentation with Stark today.” You grinned at him amusedly and went back to getting ready. Sometimes Bucky made it difficult to not make any jokes about his old age. He finished up and went to the sink, caging you in between his arms as he washed his hands. The silk of your robe felt nice against his bare chest.

“Ya know it’s easier to do this if I move, right?” Bucky grinned into the crook of your neck and pressed both of your bodies against the edge of the vanity.

“You sure? I feel like I remember you saying you liked it better this way…” You crossed your eyes in the mirror, and a smirk danced on his lips.

“That was almost six years ago, James. I was young and didn’t know any better.” Bucky chortled, his breath fanning your neck. He finished washing his hands and stepped back, freeing you to finish getting ready.

Bucky picked up the hand towel and dried his hands, “I guess I’ll remember this the next time you do it.” You ignored his comment, but a small grin played on your face. He hung the towel back up and sat on the lip of the bathtub. “What’re you gonna wear?”

You pointed your head to the side, still focused on applying your concealer, “Just a black dress with a blazer. Last time I wore a ‘fun’ dress to one of these things, none of the board members listened to my opinions unless they came out of Tony’s mouth.” Bucky remembers that dress. It was yellow and picked up a little when he spun you around the kitchen.

“You remember their names?” You glanced at him and chuckled.

“I do, but I’m not telling you when you have the ‘murder stare’ goin’ in full force.” Bucky relaxed his face.

“No, I don’t.” You grinned and coated your lashes with mascara. Bucky sighed and wiggled his toes. “Want me to make dinner tonight?” You grinned and looked at him in the mirror.

“Do you need my help?”

“Nope. I’ve already got my sous chef. Two technically, but the other one kinda just watches. We keep them on staff for morale.” You giggled and turned around to face him, your hands resting back on the sink.

“Whatcha gonna make me?” Bucky motioned you closer until you were standing between his legs. He picked up your arms and wrapped them around his neck, his own going to rest on your hips.

“Any suggestions?”

“I’m sure whatever you make will be delicious.” You grinned dopily at one another, the feeling of dread creeping up in your thoughts at the idea of leaving to go to work.

“Boiled cabbage it is then.” Your nose turned up and Bucky’s chest rumbled with laughter. He heard the door down the hall creak open and he sighed contently.

“I’ll bring home dessert if you promise not to feed us anything that’s boiled.” He chuckled and nodded.

“Okay, I can agree to that.” You leaned in and kissed, your fingers interlacing into his hair.

“Might even have a dessert just for you, too,” you spoke against his lips. Bucky growled and squeezed you tighter.

“Mama?” Your lips disconnected –far too soon if you asked him– and you disentangled from Bucky.

“Good morning, baby,” you cooed while stepping towards Henry to pick him up. You hugged him to your chest and inhaling his hair. “How’d you sleep?”

“Why were you and daddy kissin’?” Bucky chuckled and stood up from the bathtub and kissed Henry’s cheek, brushing his curly brown hair back out of his face.

“’Cause daddy and mama like to kiss.”

“Why?”

“’Cause a lotta grown-ups do.”

“Why?”

“’Cause–”

“Bucky.” A mischievous smirk spread on his face as his eyes landed on yours. Your gaze shifted from him, back to the person in your arms. “How ‘bout dad takes you downstairs to eat breakfast so mama can finish getting ready?” Henry’s head shot up.

“Can–Can we have legos?!” You both grinned at him and Bucky nodded. You were sure that the amount of frozen waffles you bought a week was enough to keep the business running for, at least, another decade.

“Yes, we can have legos. Let’s go get your sister first.” Henry switched to Bucky’s arms and you watched your boys leave before returning to the sink to finish getting ready.

Bucky nudged open the door next to Henry’s and peered in to see Annalise standing in her crib with a big smile.

“Hi, baby girl,” Bucky smiled and felt the daily twang at his heart when she smiled back. He switched Henry to his metal arm, propping him on his hip as he reached in to grab Annalise. “You hungry, sweet pea?”

“Daddy, I wanna watch Paw Patrol.” Annalise snuggled into his side as he shuffled out of her room and down the stairs.

“Only for a little bit, okay?”

“For, like, five?” Henry held up his hand in front of Bucky’s face, making Bucky chuckle as he set him on the sofa.

“How ‘bout three fives?” Henry’s eyes went wide at the ten additional minutes. Bucky grabbed the remote and very carefully adjusted the settings until it was the one he needed. He still didn’t understand why there were so many buttons if he really only needed, at most, seven. The sound of Ryder directing the team of dogs filled the living room.

“Thanks, daddy!” Bucky grinned and left Henry to his own device as Bucky went into the kitchen to get breakfast started.

“Let’s get you changed and you can help make legos. Whadya say, little miss?” Big eyes stared up at him, giving him the same look you give when you aren’t ready to start the day. He kissed her cheek repeatedly, making her giggle, “I’ll take that as an ‘Okay, Daddy! Whatever you say, Daddy!’”

“I should be home by five, but I might be able to ditch out sooner.” You were racking your brain for an excuse as to why you should cancel going to the lecture today. And Bucky could tell.

A soft kiss to your forehead quieted your worries. “We’ll be fine, baby. Don’t worry so much.” A dubious, yet anxious look was cast his way, but he just grinned. “I promise.”

A small sniffle from Annalise sent your instincts into overdrive. “I think she’s got a cold. I should–”

“No,” he grabbed your black raincoat and bag and opened the door, “Go.” You stared at him and scoffed.

“James.”

“Y/N,” he parroted back. The silent stare down lasted another minute before you sighed and gave in, accepting your purse and coat into your hands. “I will take as many pictures as I can, and I promise a two hour nap from everyone in the house.” Your shoulders schlumped and you nodded.

“Videos, too.”

“Videos, too,” he nodded. You took a deep breath and kneeled to kiss Henry and Annalise.

“Bye, babies. Mom will be home tonight, okay?”

“Okay, bye, mama, I love you!” A quick peck, and Henry zoomed off to find something more exciting than his sappy mother, who seemed to cry at everything lately. Annalise clung to your neck when you went to kiss her, so you stood, hugging her tightly. Bucky let you stand there for a while until it looked like your grip was only tightening.

“Okay, sweet pea, mama’s gotta go. Give her a kiss and tell her ‘bye’.”

Annalise pulled back and kissed your lips, “Bye, mama. I wuv you.” You gave a pitiful look to Bucky who only shook his head gently. He took your daughter and tucked her into his side as he kissed you.

“Good luck today, baby. I love you.” You sighed and rubbed your baby’s cheek and then husband’s jaw.

“Thanks. I’ll call you on my lunch. I love you, too.” A few more sentiments were exchanged before he finally got you out the door. Bucky glanced down at Annalise.

“Should we go get your brother and get dressed?”

“Can we go to the park today? Mama said we could go to the park today.” Bucky came into the living room and plopped onto the couch beside Henry, Annalise still in his arms.

“That was last night, honey. We didn’t think it would rain today.”

“Can we go if it stops raining?” He batted his lashes and Bucky sighed.

“If it stops raining, we can go.” Henry cheered, and Annalise joined in just to copy her brother. “But before we do anything, we all have to get dressed and clean up the kitchen.”

“Why?”

“Because you and your sister are gonna help make dinner tonight to surprise mom.”

“Why?”

“Because it’s a nice thing to do and it’ll make mom happy.”

“Why?”

“Because,” Bucky exhaled, “No. I’m not falling into that trap again.” He stood up and held out his hand for Henry, “Up and at ‘em.” Henry stood on the sofa and Bucky scooped him up.

“Who’s Adam?” Bucky chuckled and walked everyone upstairs. Henry was deposited at his door, left in charge of getting himself dressed, and Bucky went to change Annalise. Once Annalise was dressed in a pair of black stretchy pants and a rainbow t-shirt, Bucky left her alone to quickly get himself dress. Had he of know Steve’s strict routines on the team would have only prepared him for having kids, he wouldn’t have complained as much.

Two minutes later, Bucky was dressed in jeans and a grey Henley, with his hair pulled back. He peeked in on Henry, who had on shark swim trunks and a Christmas sweater.

“Henry?” He hummed and looked over his shoulder. “What’re you wearing?”

“Clothes,” he answered matter-of-factly.

“Yeah, I see that. But you can’t wear swim trunks, bud. It’s too cold out and we aren’t going swimming.” Henry pinched his eyebrows together and stared off into the distance to think.

“Well, can I wear them if it’s warm outside?”

“Sure. For now, let’s wear long pants.” Bucky reached into his dresser and pulled out a pair of jeans and handed them to Henry. “Do you need help?”

“No, I can do it.”

“Okay, I’m gonna get your sister.” Bucky stood in the door way, just out of sight, and watched as Henry struggled with pulling the trunks off. He was getting ready to step in and help, when his leg was finally freed and the trunks were thrown into the dirty clothes basket. Bucky grinned and opened Annalise’s door only to see her hair was out of its ponytail and was stark nude. She smiled up at him and continued to play with her blocks oblivious to the inner turmoil her dad was currently going through.

When everyone was dressed (again), Bucky put everyone into rain boots and rain coats and loaded them into the car. A dinner can’t be made without ingredients, after all.

The racecar grocery cart was wheeled out– the blue one goes faster, ya know? – and both kids crawled into the car to “drive” it.

The saying, “Don’t go grocery shopping hungry,” should have an addendum: “Or with small children who are tall enough to reach the junk food.” Each trip down an aisle only added more unnecessary snacks into the cart, that he was only made aware of at checkout when he put three boxes of fruit snacks on the conveyor belt.

Henry watched bashfully from behind the steering wheel and Bucky gave him a “dad look” and explained to the cashier that he wasn’t buying any of the fruit snacks to prove a point. Which sucked because the dinosaur one’s were Bucky’s favorite.

The groceries were carried out to the car and Bucky buckled everyone in for the drive home.

“It’s not raining, so can we go to the park now?” Bucky looked at Henry through the rearview mirror.

“Not right now, bub. We’ve got cold stuff that can’t sit out for too long.” Bucky’s heart broke as he watched Henry’s face drop. “But, hey! If it’s not raining after we make dinner and have lunch, we can go and have naps later.”

“Mama said we had to take naps today, though.”

“We will, just a different time than usual. How’s that sound?”

“Okay, daddy.” Maybe Bucky should have gotten the fruit snacks. No. That exact line of thinking was got him banned from grocery shopping last month. Then he had to suffer with the “healthy snacks” you insisted on buying. Yuck.

Bucky caved when they got home, and everyone got an Oreo before they started to make dinner. Henry and Annalise were both in giggles when he told them not tell mom, that it was a “secret treat.” He took a video at Henry’s insistence.

Hot Stuff: It’s supposed to be a secret, but… [video attached]

My Girl: OH MY BABIES!! LOOK AT THEIR CUTE FACES!! 🥺

After their faces and hands were washed, Bucky got everything out that they needed to make lasagna. It was his ma’s recipe, and it was one of your favorites. He got a pot of water boiling and held Henry so he could help put the uncooked noodles in. Annalise lost interest when it came to helping cut the vegetables in the food chopper, instead opting to play with the plastic containers in the bottom shelf.

“Mama’s gonna love that I helped, isn’t she?” Henry loved impressing his mom just as much as Bucky did. He grinned at him.

“She sure is, bub. She might even make you cook all of our meals!” Henry’s eyes went wide.

“But I can’t touch the stove! Or-or use a knife!” Bucky winked at him.

“I’ll help ya out.” Henry giggled and leaned against Bucky’s leg, the fatigue of waiting for the dinner to be ready starting to kick in. “Okay, now we just have to put it together, and it’ll be ready for the fridge.” Bucky set him on the counter showed Henry what order the layers went. Annalise, not appreciating being left out, tugged on Bucky’s jeans until he picked her up and she “helped”, too.

The pan was covered in tin foil and placed in the fridge, and pots and pans were set in the sink to wash. PB & J’s were made and the Barnes’ sat at the kitchen table and ate it happy chaos. After everyone was washed up again, and dressed back in their outer gear, a loud crack erupted outside. Bucky opened the door and the three of them watched as it started pouring rain. The tears followed, next.

Your phone started ringing and you grinned at the name. You answered the FaceTime and were met with a wall of tears, your grin dropping immediately. Bucky sat in front of the computer, looking slightly frazzled with both kids in his arms, both sobbing.

“Hey, what happened?” You soothed, shutting your office door so the sound was contained. 

“We were getting ready to go to the park, but it started to rain.” You closed your eyes and sighed. Bucky pointed his head to Annalise, “This one’s just tired.”

“Mom shouldn’t have said anything last night, huh?” Bucky raised his brows and you sighed again. “Henry, baby, can you look at mom?” He sniffled and turned his head towards the screen, still partially tucked into the security of his dad’s neck. “I’m sorry it started raining, that really stinks.” Henry nodded his head, his bottom lip still trembling. “Here, let me check on my computer and we’ll see how long it’s gonna last.” You quickly pulled up the weather and looked at the radar. You grimaced.

“Does tomorrow look better for the park?” The look on your face said ‘no’.

“Oh! Look at that! Sunday it’s supposed to be 75 and sunny! That’ll be a perfect day to go to the park!”

Henry sniffled and turned more towards the screen. “How many until Sunday?”

“Well, today’s Thursday, but it’s halfway done, so we’ll only count half of it. And then there’s tomorrow, then Saturday, then it’s Sunday.” Henry pinched his brows, trying to calculate a timeframe he still didn’t quite understand.

“And if it’s gonna be nice on Sunday, we can pack a picnic and eat at the park so there’s more time to play. How’s that sound?” Henry looked up at Bucky and played with the collar of his shirt. Annalise shifted and snuggled further into Bucky’s neck, her crying having worn her out. A quiet ‘okay’ was mumbled and you and Bucky sighed in relief.

The call lasted a few more minutes before Tony interrupted and stole you away. You blew three kisses and said goodbye, disconnecting the call.

Bucky took both kids upstairs, setting Henry on the rocking chair in Annalise’s room while he changed her diaper and laid her down. He kissed her goodnight and she rolled over, snuggling with her stuffed animal. He lowered the lights and carried Henry out and had him go to the bathroom before tucking him into his own bed. Bucky brushed his hair back and kissed him goodnight.

“Daddy?”

“Yeah, bub?”

“Can you lay with me?” How could he say no to that? Bucky grinned and shut off the lights before lying next to Henry. He laid on his flesh arm, tracing his small fingers up and down the gold lines on his metal arm. Henry’s breathing started to soften and he fell asleep, his hand still on his dad’s arm. The steady rhythm of the ceiling fan made Bucky’s eye’s feel heavier and heavier, until he stopped fighting the urge and settled into his own sleep.

After they woke up and all snuggled on the couch, Bucky placed the lasagna in the oven and took the kids outside to play. It had stopped raining, and just because they couldn’t go to the park, didn’t mean they couldn’t play outside.

They all took turns jumping into puddles, and Henry was fascinated with all of the worms that made their way to the driveway during the rain. Neither kid wanted anything to do with them when Bucky asked if they wanted to hold one, but once he held one in his hand, they both were okay with that arrangement.

You texted him that you were on your way home, and were stopping at the bakery to get dessert. Bucky reminded you that he was promised his own dessert and you replied with a winking emoticon that made him smirk at his phone.

You pulled into the driveway twenty minutes later and were greeted with hugs and kisses from your welcoming crew. Henry wanted to know all about what you and Uncle Tony talked about today, and Annalise didn’t want to let you go (even when you needed to use the bathroom). When Bucky pulled the pasta dish out of the oven, you gasped and walked further into the kitchen.

“Lasagna?” You turned to look at Henry, who stood eagerly waiting for your reaction. “Did you make this?” Henry nodded enthusiastically.

“I did! Daddy said we were his ‘Soup Chefs!’ I did most of it though, Annie just played.” You laughed and bent over to kiss his cheek.

“That’s okay! I’m glad that you helped dad. I bet it tastes delicious.” Henry nodded, very assured that his creation was going to be the best thing you’ve ever had.

“Okay, Henry, go wash your hands.” He left to go use the sink in the bathroom and Annalise wiggled until you set her down to join her brother. You grinned and walked up behind Bucky as he washed his own hands, wrapping your arms around his waist. He chuckled, “Now, this feels familiar....” You laughed and rested your cheek on the muscles of his back. You only had another minute before you’d have to go stop the kids from playing with the water, so you enjoyed the moment.

“I love you.” Bucky grinned and lifted up his arm for you to move under it, your arms still wrapped around his waist. He kissed your lips and hummed.

“I love you, too.” You gave another peck and untangled from him to gather up Henry and Annalise for dinner. “Where’re my sous chefs? We gotta cut this lasagna!” Innocent giggles erupted from the bathroom and you smiled and helped the kids dry their hands.

No one seemed to love fatherhood more than Bucky. He loved the sticky fingers on his face, and the constant calls for you or him when it was bedtime and the kids “needed just one more kiss.” He even loved (it took him an hour to get there) when Annalise got ahold of purple glitter and dumped it all on the cream carpet in the living room. He was still finding glitter six months later, and it always made him chuckle.

You’d wait until he was sitting to tell him he’d have a third sous chef early next year. Hopefully he wouldn’t faint like the last two times.

#Bucky Barnes x Reader #Bucky Barnes x You #Bucky Barnes x Y/N #Bucky x Y/N #Bucky x You #Bucky x Reader #Bucky Barnes #Dad!Bucky

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celmation-gibson · 5 years ago

Photo

The First Drawing to post for this New Decade, and it's the Best of the Movies that I've seen in the Cinemas, and one I've heard of for a while. So here are some Favorite Characters of mine that were fun to Draw, along with the Reviews for the Films.

Missing Link - My First movie to see in the Cinemas of this Year, and it's another Laika Classic, and despite being a Box Office flop, It did receive some very Good Reviews from Critics, and even my Foodtown Boss' Grandchildren saw the Film on a Thursday(?) and they Loved it, so I figured I give this film a watch, and I was amazed at the Final result, An Amazing sight to see that some Folks out there don't know what their Missing. It was directed by Chris Butler, who was co-Director of Laika's other projects 'ParaNorman', and it had an Amazing cast such as Mr. Zach Galifianakis (Felix of 'Bob's Burgers' & Lego Joker of 'the Lego Batman Movie'), Zoe Saldana(Avatar, Gaurdians of the Galaxy), & Hugh Jackman (Van Helsing & Wolverine of the live-Action 'X-Men' films). And once again, the Folks of Laika really did some good Work & Commitment in Making this Film, especially when I loved the Film's settings & Landscaping, and the Action Sequences are Phenomenal, especially in those Action sequences when the Ship rotates with the People in it when it was Struck with the Storm's Big Wave, and How Suspenseful it was when the Characters are dangled into Ice blocks or big icicles, and how shocking on how the Villains' defeat of Lord Piggot-Dunceby, his neurotic right-hand man Mr. Collick, and Bounty Hunter Willard Stenk were killed in Cold Blood, cuz I knew that that Ice Bridge in the Film was gonna Break in a Sequence. Plus there were some Cute Humor in the Film as well, especially after when Mr. Link/Susan Roared at a Dog during a Bar Fight, and after a Moment of Silence, the Dog just attacked on of his Men and the Bar Fight continues (that's when most kids in the Auditorium laughed at that part), and how Susan literally thrown some Objects over the Wall. And I'm always fascinated with Cryptozoology creatures such as Bigfoot, Abominable Snowmen, & the Loch Ness Monster, even when they make me think about that 1970's film entitled 'the Mysterious Monsters'. And even if the film was Distributed by United Artists (a Subsidiary of MGM I suppose), it's kinda Weird now now that it was released on DVD and Blu-Ray from 20th Century Fox, even after Disney's Conquest, but can we still call ML a Non-Disney film, even if some MGM films are being released by FOX under a Contract?

Godzilla: King of the Monsters - Well me and my dad certainly love Giant Monster movies when we were Young, and I certainly remember renting every Godzilla movie on VHS back when Blockbuster was still around, and we certainly enjoyed that one 2014 'Godzilla' movie, unlike the 1998 Matthew Broderick one, so we decided to give this new kaiju movie 'Godzilla: King of the Monsters' a viewing pleasure, not to be confused with the 1956 Americanized 'Gojira' movie starring Raymond Burr. And i gotta say that it was an Epic Thrill-ride of our Lives, even the monsters we were familiar with were Amazing, Godzilla being all greatly Huge and Buffed-up as always in the USA, Rodan looking a-little Sinister lookin', Mothra playing out like the original 'Mothra' movie, starting off as a larva hatching from her Egg, then Evolving into a beautiful Butterfly-like Moth, then King Ghidorah was so Menacing in this one, and being like Lizzie in 'Rampage', he was such a "Pain-in-the-Ass" character, even once being Nicknamed 'Monster Zero', either that Nickname was also used in Japan, or used for one of Ghidorah's old film appearances in the US, that was double-billed with 'War of the Gargantuas'. I even like how they referenced some stuff from Warner Bros. & Legendary Films' 'Kong: Skull Island', as that films along with the 2014 Godzilla, and this Film are all in the same Universe, Monsterverse that is. And how surprising that there are other Kaijus in this Movie that I'm not even certainly familiar about, like that one Arachnid-like featured titan, or the Giant Ape Body/Mammoth Trunk beast, or another Muto(?), and I am wondering if the Demolished Boston at the end of the movie is gonna be the new 'Monster Island'. The human characters were good, I mostly like every member on the character Dr. Mark Russell's team, they seem likable, and the Cast was great, even after looking at the film's Poster befor we went inside the theater, I saw the familiar name of Thomas Middleditch, the same man who did voices in 'Captain Underpants' & 'Bob's Burgers', doing a Live-action role, and while writing this review, I've discovered some other actress who starred in this film include Sally Hawkins, who starred in the previous 2014 Godzilla movie, and also in Guillermo del Toro's 'the Shape of Water, and the woman playing the daughter in this film, also played in 'Stranger Things' as Eleven. And also I love on how the film as a Newer Version of Godzilla's approach-like film that was used in the old films, and even the end Credits have Cover version of Blue Oyester Cult's classic hit 'Godzilla'. And one of the Film's story plot is Fascinating, like how this Earth was once ruled by Giant Titans, until us small Humans have taken over while most of those Titans went Extinct and hiding in the Earth's Spirit.

The Secret Life of Pets 2 - Well, Illumination has done it again, as it Amuses me once before with 'the Grinch', 'Despicable Me 2', 'the Secret Life of Pets', & 'Sing', they have released a Sequel to my Favorite Secret Life of Pets movie that I saw in theaters back in 2016, and now have it on DVD. And when I heard that the Original voice for Max got replaced with a Guy I know of who has a Great Career in Animation, I was like "Whuuut?", but even after reading what Happened to that one Guy, i figured I'd give this Movie a Watch, since I'll like Patton even more. And I gotta say, this Sequel does have some Cute and Lovable moments in the Film, and those Subplots in the Film are Wonderful, leading up to a Story on how to save a White Tiger cub from a Wicked Ringmaster (voiced by Funny voice man, Mr. Nick Kroll(Sausage Party, Sing, Captain Underpants). And Snowball is more luvable in this one as he is in the first Film (Kevin Hart is so Wonderful!), even teaming up with a Cute/Funny character such as Daisy, a Shih Tzu voiced by Tiffany Haddish (who just did a guest voice role in 'Bob's Burgers'). Also with a Cute story on how Max & Duke's owner fall in Love with a Fun Gentleman and have a Kid together, and I love how the Dogs raised the Boy up, by helping him to Crawl & walk, and have Good Animal Instincts, which makes me think that what if my Sister & her Husband had a Pet Puppy that could be a good a Good Companion to my Little Layla niece. And some of the Parts in the Film have Good humor in it, like did I just heard a Cow say "Rat Turd" in front of an auditorium full of Young children? Plus Mr. Harrison Ford(Han Solo in 'Star Wars' & Indiana Jones) was great as a character named Rooster, who tries to Man/Brave up Max and a few characters, after Max has devoted his Life to Little Liam, which led to the Funny Collar on his head. And I'd figured there was something Familiar about that Young Lamb Cotton's voice in the Movie, as he is voiced by Mr. Sean Giambrone, the voice of Jeff in 'Clarence' & Shermy in the 'Adventure Time' series Finale.

Abominable - Well, Dreamworks has done it again, a new film from a Creative Team was made and about to be released soon, and when I saw the Previews of it for the First time, I thought I wasn't too interested in it, especially with the humorous Blueberry gag parts. But after a while, and see that if it looked cuter as Dreamworks' previous film 'Home(2015)', I thought I give it a go, and hopefully it look way better than that one Weird-Looking film in 1995 called 'to catch a Yeti' starring Meatloaf. But for the 'Abominable' film, since the Movie was getting Good Feedback from Reviewers and Viewers, I was Lucky to watch the Film for myself. The Characters were Cute and Funny, almost like the ones from 'Home', especially with Ethnic Protagonists. And the settings and Designs of Asia in the Open Fields, Forests, and Cities are really nice, wishing I could visit and/or live there. And the Great story is like an E.T. Extra Terrestrial thing, expect that the Heroes goes with the Creatures on an Adventure of a lifetime to bring back the Creature to his Beloved Family that they Tried to protect from any threats what's-so-ever. And there are some Amazing plot Twist among the Villainous Characters, like just when you thought the villain was actually an elderly Man who has been hunting Mythical creatures for rewards, but it turns out that the True Villain was actually a Nerdy Woman who thought was a seemingly-gentle Scientist just doing what's right for the World, who almost Barely looks like a geeky version of Kari McKeen of Disney/Pixar's 'the Incredibles', and when she let down her Hair, she may look like a Devious version of Merida of Disney/Pixar's 'Brave'. The Effects in the Movie is Super Nice & Super Awesome, especially in the Yeti's Humming effects, some Action Sequences, and that one moment when the Heroine's Father's Violin broke, the Yeti fixes it by using his own Hair for the String replacements, and I know from that Moment, with Yi's Musical skills and the Yeti's Powers combined, and when the Hearts are Full, and the Heavens are listening, Magic is bound to happen. And for the one other part when the Heroes are Gazing into the Stars, they say that the Stars could be our Ancestors watching over us, and that if we don't see any Stars in the Sky, there will be always there for us, almost like even if for some Folks lost their Love ones, they will always be there, even if we can't see them. But I'm glad i enjoyed the Movie, and I know that some Tween kid group enjoyed it as well, laughing at some Funny Parts in which i enjoyed, sometimes with the Woofing Snakes, "WOOF, there it is, WOOF, there it is".

the Addams Family - Well, a another Fantastic new Animated feature has been made, and it's based off of what I remember from my Childhood, cuz I do remember watching the early 1990's Live-Action movies of the Creepy Family starrring Christopher Lloyd and Christina Ricci, before I knew who some of the Actors were, and I remember the Animated Hanna-Barbera Kooky series on Cartoon Network a while back, even making a Spooky Guest appearance in 'the New Scooby-Doo Movies', but I haven't watched much of their old Ookie Live-action series, and the Family I'm talking about is 'the Addams Family'. And I've read a while back that an Animated CGI feature is gonna be released soon, and I knew back there that that would be interesting for me to see, so I've waited several months for the to be released in Cinemas, and I finally got a chance to do so. It was a Fun and Entertaining movie, and surprising it was made Directed and made by the same team who did the 2016 R-rated Animated film 'Sausage Party' starring Seth Rogan & Kristen Wiig, and the Character designs for the Film were to be based off the old design from the Original Addams Family comics in the old days, and with modern help from Mr. Craig Kellman(Hotel Transylvania, Madagascar). And the voice cast is amazing, we got Mr. Nick Kroll(Captain Underpants) voicing Uncle Fester, Chloe Grace Moretz(Kick-Ass) as Wednesday Addams, Finn Wilfhard(IT, "Beep, Beep, Richie") as Pugsley Addams, Charlize Theron(Kubo and the Two Strings) as Morticia Addams, Bette Midler(Hocus Pocus) as Grandmama, Snoop Dogg as Cousin Itt, Elsie Fisher(Despicable Me) as Parker Needler, even the film's co-director Mr. Conrad Vernon as Lurch ("YYYOOOOOOUUUUUUU RRRAAAAANNNGGGG?!", LOL!!!), a priest that presides over Gomez and Mortica's wedding, the spirit that haunted the abandoned asylum that Gomez and Morticia move into (who often threatened them to get out, much to the family's delight, which i find those Parts to be entirely Hilarious, even in the Theater's Booming Stereo), and Dr. Flambe, a Devil-like relative of the Addams family with fire-like abilities. And the Film's Story is very cute, even with the Film's Opening Scenes on the Origin story of the Addams Family and their "Creative Differences" with other Societies, and it gives me some Good comparisons with Sony's 'Hotel Transylvania' as Creepy Creatures who have lived through the Centuries and Years soon get into Modern times and how other people dealt with Beings like the Monsters of HT and the Addams Family and their Clan. And it would be nice if my Parents were watching the Film with me in the Theaters, cuz during the Film's Ending, me and the people in the Auditorium got a chance to sing-along with the Film's Theme Song, and everyone was Snapping their Fingers to the tune. So If you wanna celebrate Halloween in a Great and Wonderful way, I think that this film is for you, and for all you Goth, Emo, and Young-at-Heart Artists out their who would love a Creepy Treat, and just can't wait to get it on DVD. Klaus - To come clear, I've heard about this movie, and I've even seen some Pencil Tests of it way back then, but I've actually never seen the whole thing, or catch it in a Selected Theater, but I really did see the Film's Trailer. And I would say for a 2D, Hand-Drawn, Frame-by-Frame, Animated feature, these people tried to Improve something for the Classic Animation with their Coloring and Shading type Technique, and even though It's a wonderful Improvement, I wouldn't expect some folks to use this kind of thing more often for Future Celmated Features. As for the Voice cast, I already know who Mr. J.K. Simmons is, but I was surprised to read that the voice man for Mr. Jesper Johansson, is also the guy who played the Villianous Gideon Graves of 'Scott Pilgrim vs. the World' movie.

And sorry if I didn't catch 'IT: Chapter 2' like I did with the first one, But I'm hoping o see some more clips of it online. And I Never had interest in seeing the 2019 'Child's Play', though I still like Ms. Aubrey Plaza & Mr. Mark Hamill. And I had no interest in seeing 'the Angry Birds Movie 2' since I'm never a Big Fan of Thurop Van Orman's creativity. And lastly, I didn't felt like seeing the 'Spies in Disguise' movie ever since Disney's Horrible Conquest of the whole 20th Century Fox media.

#2019 #movies #best of #the addams family #wednesday addams #mothra #godzilla king of the monsters #klaus #susan link #the missing link #everest #abominable #the secret life of pets 2 #snowball #daisy #my artwork #drawing

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starker-stories · 5 years ago

Text

The Cold, Chapter 2 - The Messages Series

This chapter on AO3

By @thestarkerisobvious and @starker-stories

New chapters in the series post every Thursday.

All links are to AO3. You don’t need to be a creator to have an AO3 account. You can have one solely as a reader. But to read anything at all in this series, you can just be an anonymous reader and/or commenter.

The best way to keep up with The Cold is to subscribe to the story on AO3. And the best way to keep up with the Messages Series is also to subscribe. Click on the ‘subscribe’ button on each of the above links.

Tags: Tony Stark Feels, Peter Parker Feels, College Student Peter Parker, Established Relationship, Anal Sex, Oral Sex, Tony Stark Still Has Arc Reactor, Arc Reactor Kink, Peter Parker is a Mess, Spider-Man powers, Communication, They Finally Communicate!, And Fuck Of Course Look at Who It’s Written By Of Course They Fuck, Avengers Compound

The entire Messages Series. All links are to AO3.

Messages Unsent (complete & posted)

Nothing More Than A Machine (complete & posted)

Tomorrow (complete & posted)

My Virgin (Revisited) (completely & posted)

The Cold (completely written) posts every Thursday

Untitled Book 6 ( in progress )

Untitled Book 7 ( in progress )

Chapter 2: Fencing Left Handed

As they neared the compound Peter asked him for the time, then resumed his position leaning against Tony’s arm and tracing patterns on his sleeve. He took a deep breath.

“Okay, so, things have been changing with me. Like, a lot. I’ve wanted to talk to you about it for months, but there was never a good time. That’s not your fault, there were times I could have brought it up but I… like I told you, when I had to chose between sex and talking, I always chose sex. And it’s hard to talk about. I guess it’s... I could have tried to talk about it over the phone or emailed you... anyway.

“I guess I’m… scared. That you’re going to say ‘Oh Well, Yeah, That’s Just Growing Up’ and I don’t… and that’s stupid…”

“Please don’t do that,” Tony reached over and brushed his fingers over Peter’s hair, interrupting him. “Nothing you feel is stupid, Pete. Nothing you say is stupid. Nothing you’re going through is stupid, okay? A self-deprecating exterior can turn quickly into an interior one. I’m kind of an expert at tearing myself up with that.”

“Ok, but it is stupid. Like asking to be treated like a virgin in your bed and then still being too proud in the middle of it. Now I really wanted your advice and I’m also afraid of getting it… fuck.” He pressed his face into Tony’s arm.

“I won’t say it’s ‘just growing up’, whatever it is,” Tony said. “At fifteen you were more of a grown up than a whole lot of people I know.”

“Okay… okay.” Peter’s shoulders sagged for a moment in relief. Then he took a deep breath and tried. Again.

“Did you ever… “ He sat up in the seat. “I mean I know you didn’t because you went to MIT way early… so maybe you don’t. Because in the old days they let you skip grades. They wouldn’t do that with me, they had a whole long talk to May and Ben about it and I understood, at least I tried to. I pretended I did. But high school was like…

“In high school I stayed as busy as I could, with band and academic decathlon and all my totally illegal chemistry studies, and I guess it was okay. Not nearly as okay as it was when I got the spiderbite and I really had something to do, had a million brand new things to learn and a real reason for all those illegal chemistry studies, that was a good thing. That made it so much better. But every time I walked into class…

“Okay I know you hate it when I do this but I don’t know how else to describe it. You know that old movie where the man becomes the Dread Pirate Roberts and now he’s the best fencer in the world and he meets the OTHER best fencer in the world and they are both fencing left handed and they’re both going at it hot and heavy and they both tell each other, one at a time, that they’re not really left handed? Because both of them were trying to take it easy on the other guy, because they both know they’re the best and that’s just the kind of Good Guys that they are? I saw that on TV and that really stuck with me. That you don’t have to be the best in the business, the smartest guy in the room, the whatever. The big shot. You can play it dumb and maybe write your notes backward to slow yourself down or read your textbooks upside down or maybe never study for a test so when the test comes you aren’t the first one finished and faking writing down answers so your neighbors won’t feel so bad. You can fence left-handed. So you won’t be an asshole. Be like Westley and Inigo Montoya and give everyone else a break.

“So I did that. I fenced left-handed and invested most of my time in massive Lego sets and told myself it was the right thing to do. And then the spiderbite happened and I got a whole new life and that was amazing and then you came into my life and that was the best thing that ever happened to me. And all my schoolwork came in a distant third but at least it was slightly interesting the way an old video game can be interesting. If you haven’t played it in years. You know, for about half an hour.

“But I didn’t worry about that because I was going to Columbia. And when I got to Columbia it would all be different. And I could go to real classes that were really hard and I could finally just start fencing regular.

“And Tony?”

He took a deep breath before he looked at his lover.

“It’s not getting harder. I spent my whole first semester going… wait… what? The fuck? And then I thought no, no, this is okay, this is all freshman crap. This is supposed to be like this. Not everybody gets through all four years, right? Except instead of like boot camp where they are trying to get rid of you maybe… I don’t know… maybe they water it down to make you feel good about yourself and ramp up the info later… I don’t know what I thought. And now I’m well into my third year and I don’t get it Tony… when does it get hard? The best part is doing my assignments online — I do them in my dorm room with the keyboard upside down just for fun. Swear to god I’ve been doing my Differential Equations work hanging from my dorm room ceiling because that’s how I test the dissolve-time of my new web formula. And there is so much group work, I mean it’s just fucking constant. I should be glad because it does slow me down but really all it does is give me more time constraints which interferes with my patrols. Homework, at least, I can do from New York rooftops. I can’t do group work that way.”

He laughed ruefully, gazing out the helicopter window. “At least none of this is pissing my professors off. I stopped righteously fighting to NOT be the first person in class done with the work. Fuck that. Now I just turn it in when I’m done and get on with my real job.”

“Don’t ever be ashamed of being the smartest person in the room, Pete. What’s happening with your education, that is a whole ’nother conversation we need to have at a later date. Because it’s wrong, avoidable, and most of all, solvable. I can fix it with a phone call, but I doubt you want me to do that,” Tony said, smiling. “What I’ll do instead is teach you how to fix Columbia. Because, as brilliant as you are? Your professors should be pissed off at you.”

“Okay… okay,” Peter groaned. He pulled Tony’s arm around him and snuggled into his shoulder. “Don’t swoop in and save me just yet because there’s more. I know that sounds like the main thing but it isn’t.. and I’m not ready to… there’s more. This is what this weekend is about… you can swoop in and save me later, absolutely, and then we’ll have awesome sex to celebrate. But please…”

He looked through the window, glaring at the view instead of glaring at himself. For weeks, for a month really, he had planned this conversation, and now that it was here he was doing everything he feared the most — sounding pitiful.

“Please just let me… this is hard.

“There’s… something else.”

Peter took a deep breath and tried again. The fields around the compound were coming into sight, maybe this would be easier to explain if they were walking down there? Peter craned his neck to see the landing pad from the window, judging the distance before he started speaking.

“People at Columbia, they aren’t… bad. The average person walking around Columbia isn’t bad. They’re just slow. I don’t know… maybe I’m just pissed off that Columbia isn’t everything I dreamed it would be.

“But the criminals of New York City? They’re just the same as they’ve always been. Only I’m beginning to… they’re starting to look different to me now.”

He sighed, almost growled, in frustration. Tony dealt with international terrorists, and here Peter was about to complain about street-level thugs. At least the landing pad was getting nearer, but now he feared this wouldn’t solve his problem. He wasn’t sure he could bring himself to use the term ‘The Cold’ out loud, not with Tony. It made sense in his head, but it sounded ridiculous now.

“Remember when you called that press conference to announce to the world that I was the newest Avenger? And I asked you not to at the last second? Because I told you ‘someone has to look out for the little guy’? That was stupid. That was…” he choked on the hated word, but he forced himself to say it. “That was naive.

“On the streets when I’m patrolling, god, I used to get so… pissed. It seems so distant now. I was filled with all this righteous indignation, this anger that someone would pick on the ‘the little guy’. Now, I’m beginning to think that ‘the little guy’ is probably a piece of shit too.”

He didn’t have to say anything else after that. They had arrived.

The helicopter landed itself. New-Cap came to meet them. Tony and Peter stepped off the landing pad, as the helicopter was powering down, to where they could hear Sam. He asked why they were there. Tony didn’t know, so he didn’t answer, leaving his question hanging. He figured Peter would say, but when he didn’t either, Tony didn’t fill the void. It wasn’t unexpected of him to simply ignore whichever Avenger tried to engage him. To not speak or do something until he was damn good and ready to, rather than explain and justify himself to one of them.

Peter, usually ever-cheerful and friendly, looked decidedly uncomfortable. His eyes kept scanning the distant, grassy fields beyond the central cluster of buildings. When Sam asked again what they were doing there, with a little more annoyance in his voice due to Tony’s disregard, Tony simply said, ‘we’ll be in later’, and guided Peter in the direction of his gaze, letting him take over their destination as soon as they’d left New-Cap behind.

As they walked, it seemed like it wasn’t a serious conversation that was going to happen, but that Peter needed to talk about something difficult. The location might’ve been less than desirable, but being there to listen to whatever was bothering Peter? That was exactly what he wanted, what they had talked about a couple of days ago. Tony’s defensiveness fell away. He slipped his hands casually in his pockets as they walked companionably side by side across the lawn, heading out to the farther fields of the compound grounds.

“The else?” Tony asked, trying to bring their conversation back to where it ended when the helicopter landed.

Peter nodded, but didn’t answer that question. He seemed to be looking for something in what was nothing but open fields. Tony remembered, before the fall of SHIELD and the Avengers’ split, he and Cap and Fury discussed expansion plans into the empty land. But things happened. Then the world was gone. His world was dust. Tony walked away from all things Avengers.

“Where are we headed?” Tony asked.

“I don’t know yet. I’ll know it when I see it. Thanks for this, by the way. Sam’s an asshole now. I don’t remember him being an asshole.”

“It’s not Sam, I don’t think. It’s the position. But I don’t know Sam. The only thing I know about him is that when he rolled in flight, Vision’s beam went straight through where Sam should’ve been and knocked out the War Machine armor’s arc reactor and Rhodey fell to the ground.” Tony stopped talking for a bit while they walked together. It was irrational to blame Sam. Of course he’d try to avoid the hit. But irrational or not, he blamed him as much as Vision.

“Sam and his inherited shield and his inherited HYDRA assassin can go…” Tony shrugged. “I don’t give a fuck,” he finally said, shaking it off, literally, with a shrug. “They’re not why we’re here. So they’re a distraction. Irrelevant. We’re here because here is where you wanted to be. I’m here because you have something you need to say and I want to hear it. Pete, I’m interested, okay? In you. In everything about you. Even if I have to hear it here.”

“Ok. I’m not… god I’m not trying to be all mysterious, really. I just need some… distance. There it is,” he said with a sigh of relief. “It’s still there.”

They had rounded the south wall of the main building Peter seemed to find what he was looking for — although it looked mostly like an empty field to Tony — and they set out.

They walked for some time in silence.

What Peter had told him in the helicopter was important. But it was clearly not the ‘why’ for why they were there.

“Peter, if all that was wrong was what’s happening at Columbia… or your feeling frustrated by the lack of challenge in your life… or even the inevitable disillusionment of realizing that the world is massively full of blurred shades of grey… we’d be talking about this in bed.”

Peter only nodded.

Tony paused and they walked a little farther. “There’s something else. And… if you think you’re ‘stupid’ for feeling a certain way… you’re not.” He paused again briefly. “I would love to know what’s going on with you. Baby, you are the most important thing in my life. There’s nothing going on with you that I don’t want to hear about.”

“What if it was bad?” Peter’s voice was small, breathless. Looking at his feet.

“Still want to hear it. Just as much.”

“I’m getting cold, Tony,” Peter’s voice broke on the word. “Really cold.”

That puzzled Tony. It was a bright, sunny day, and for early autumn, quite warm. “We can head indoors, if you’re cold.” His brow furrowed. There was something about the way he said the word ‘cold’. “That’s not what you mean, is it?”

“It’s me, Tony. It’s not Columbia or the Gangs of New York, it’s me. It’s in me. That’s why we’re here. I’m changing. I know it’s not just in my head. I need the training ground equipment to quantify some things… and I guess that will make it Avengers business. I don’t know, maybe it is Avengers business, at least it will be. But I needed to tell you first. I’m not… the same. And it’s affecting everything.”

Peter veered them right and Tony saw what they were headed to, a white berm that stood alone in the field of green.

“With MJ and Ned, we can still relax and goof off… they’re not studying the same things I am so it’s easy not to… let them notice but… they’ve noticed. I guess I don’t make the same kinds of jokes I used to. And word on the street is New York has noticed too.

“I used to talk to criminals, I guess I was famous for it. I mean you’re the king of Snark and Banter but I guess I did pretty good. And I couldn’t help NOT lecture them. But I never hit them, because I’d hurt them, that’s why the webbing. But god I can’t talk to them anymore — I don’t feel like making jokes. I feel like punching them — so I just stay away from them. Tony, I can’t trust myself to get close to any of them now. If I need to take someone out I have to do it from a distance, sometimes from a block away, if I’m any closer I have to, I have to web them up and keep moving. I can’t stop to talk. I’m not… safe anymore. Everything’s changed.”

#Starker #Messages Series #Messages Cold #Von writes stuff #thewitchway writes stuff

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etraytin · 4 years ago

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Quarantine, Day 170-171

August 28-29

So the story here is that I started writing a journal entry last night and realized I was becoming literally incoherent from falling asleep at the computer, so I went to bed. Luckily, it saved as a draft on my computer, so here is that draft, followed by today's entry: "I am writing the journal very late this evening because I have been busy with Projects. Project one is, of course, the continuing weaning of the kittens. After a day and a half of introducing them to the idea of kitten food as food, I am now presenting it to them at mealtimes, stimulating them so their bellies are empty, and then leaving them with the food for half an hour before coming back with the bottle. They are very displeased with the lackadaisical service around this joint, but Robinton is already eating slurry and wet food very well, and Sebell pretty well. No appreciable progress from the girls but they are still gaining weight so that is good.

Tonight's other project is my terribly illegal effort to acquire geolocked Canadian podcasts from the CBC. =O Way back in the day, I listened to a Sunday Edition series called 20 Pieces of Music That Changed the World. It was an awesome series, super interesting and explored a lot of types of music that I had never thought much about the wider societal impact of. Unfortunately, when I went back for a relisten, it had been geolocked because they played a lot of complete tracks of copyrighted music in order to examine and analyze them."

So that's pretty much what happened yesterday, or at least enough as to make no nevermind. I was so tired because I had stayed up nearly all night on Thursday between a virtual response Red Cross call and a fanfiction read-along for one of my favorite authors that unfortunately was in Pacific time. It led to a very sleepy day, but sometimes you just have to do something slightly unwise simply because it is fun and you haven't had enough fun lately. Plus I felt pretty smart about staying up so late when the Red Cross called at 2am and I was already awake and at my computer. Go me, so alert!

Today was a generally good day in which not a lot happened. The kiddo has gotten two nights of good sleep after we decided that all electronics will spend the night in my room so as not to provide temptation in the wee small hours. He's also back on his lower-dose medication but it is obviously helping. Today he was able to play with Legos and concentrate on Minecraft, plus he also cleaned the bathroom for the first time in ages. (His bathroom and bedroom are worth quite a few internet points to keep clean, and are a good indicator of his general motivation level.) During Power Hour, we picked out a family-friendly Minecraft server from a list so that he could do some multiplayer Minecraft even though I can't get it to run on my computer. He really enjoyed himself a lot!

For my own part, I spent a lot of today on the kittens, where weaning is proceeding at a fairly good pace, with two kittens doing great and two kittens extremely reluctant. I can live with this because Sebell and Robinton now require very little bottle at all, saving precious formula resources for the little girls. I'm halfway through the last of my Breeder's Edge formula after I got a number of extremely generous donations in May when I had Rosa and Jackie. That formula has lasted me through those two, the Gaang, and these four, so it went a long way but now it's nearly gone. I think I can probably beg some off the people at the spay/neuter clinic if I have to, but that might get complicated because they have a zillion kittens right now too. The further I can make my supply go, the better! I've got plenty of wet food though, so the boys can absolutely chow down on that to their fat little hearts' content.

(And hey, if anybody would like to throw another can of formula my way, it's on my wishlist on Amazon, it's the Breeder's Edge Foster Care Formula. It's expensive as hell, but it works _so well._ You should see the poops on these guys!)

I also made a small amount of progress on cleaning, though tomorrow's project is definitely going to have to be laundry. I got through several more episodes of illicit Canadian podcasts as well, very exciting! I also played a lot of mindless little app games and set a terrible example for my child, but we did stay in the house, safe and socially isolated. Good job, us! Got to talk to MIL on the phone a little and she is doing better, starting walking practice and eating much better than she did in the hospital. It's very good news! My husband reports that the neighbor kids have taken it upon themselves to pick Nana's blueberry bushes and bring him most of the proceeds, so he has something like eight pints of fresh blueberries to do something with. Not a bad problem to have, really!

#quarantine #foster kittens #weaning #illicit canadian podcasts

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poetatertot · 5 years ago

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It’s Not So Bad (In LA): part three

The thing about living with the person you’re avoiding is that there’s no way to avoid them.

Jiang Cheng makes it exactly fifteen hours before Wei Wuxian is in his space again. He does his best to ignore him, but Wei Wuxian isn’t someone you can just ignore. He exists in a perpetual state of noise.

Like a goose, Jiang Cheng thinks, watching him squawk and drop the remote.

“Jiang Cheng, can you get that?”

He looks back at his computer. “No.”

“But it’s closer to you.”

“And you have arms. Use them.”

Wei Wuxian sighs loudly. Jiang Cheng watches him roll off the couch like an undignified slug and wriggle his way towards the remote.

The bridge, a-Cheng. Mend the bridge.

“You know,” he says, testing the waters. God, is he going to regret this? “I might.. Um.”

Wei Wuxian peers up at him from the carpet.

“Lan Xichen,” he tries again. His voice is already sticking in his throat. “He’s very..”

“Handsome?” Wei Wuxian supplies. “Dashing? Eye-meltingly gorgeous?”

Jiang Cheng’s face burns. “Shut up.”

Wei Wuxian sits up so fast he nearly collides with the coffee table. “Oh my God,” he breathes, crawling up onto Jiang Cheng’s chair. “Don’t tell me! You want my help after all? Is this real?”

“Get off of me!” Jiang Cheng smacks at him. “Your breath stinks like shrimp chips!”

“My baby brother is finally coming to me for love advice!” Wei Wuxian cackles gleefully. “Ling-er? Ling-er! Call the press, your uncle—”

Jiang Cheng slaps a hand over his mouth. “Would it kill you not to be annoying for five minutes?”

“Yes,” Wei Wuxian mumbles behind his palm, and then licks him.

“Forget it!” Jiang Cheng tries shoving his brother off, but Wei Wuxian is an octopus coming in for the kill. He’s holding onto Jiang Cheng tight enough to cut off blood supply. “You’re obnoxious—I don’t even know why I bother!”

“Because you looove mee,” Wei Wuxian sings, grin splitting wide. “I’m your favoritest brother in the whole wide world!”

Jiang Cheng glares at him. “You’re my only brother.”

“I know!”

Wei Wuxian’s laughter rings out around them as Jiang Cheng settles back into the cushions. If he’s not going to move, they might as well get comfortable. Squirming only makes Wei Wuxian more insufferable.

Annoying. But then, wasn’t he always?

Silence settles between them. Jiang Cheng can feel Wei Wuxian’s eyes on him as he surfs the web for a second-hand car stereo, but he won’t break the peace. Cold as he might be, he doesn’t like the distance arguments bring—the awkwardness, the walking on eggshells. It doesn’t suit them.

Wei Wuxian is all he has left, after all.

“I didn’t mean to push,” Wei Wuxian murmurs after a while. They’re both examining a promising model on eBay. “I just want you to be happy.”

“I am happy,” Jiang Cheng replies. And he technically is. He has a roof over his head. He has a strong nephew with a promising future. He has a job, and a car that mostly works.

“But you could be happier,” Wei Wuxian says, reading his mind. “It shouldn’t always be about surviving paycheck to paycheck. I..” He bites his lip. “I want you to live.”

It hurts. It fucking hurts, needling down into Jiang Cheng’s insecurities and jabbing furiously. Because he isn’t living, is he? This life they share—working, eating, sleeping, Jin Ling’s schedule fit into the cracks—is something, but it isn’t what Jiang Cheng had hoped for. It isn’t what either of them had hoped for.

It takes every ounce of strength to quell his pride. He can’t even look at Wei Wuxian.

“I don’t know how,” he admits. How to move on. How to become the After instead of the Before. How to mend the gaping, infected wound in his heart that’s persisted for so many years.

“Then let me help you,” Wei Wuxian says.

And really, what else can Jiang Cheng do but say yes?

☁️

The plan is simple.

“You didn’t need to come with me.” Jiang Cheng sets Zidian into park, ignoring her wheezing. “I could have done this alone.”

“And chicken out at the last second?” Wei Wuxian snorts and turns around. “Come on, Ling-er. It’s time to get your uncle a date.” Jin Ling salutes from the back seat.

The family meeting they’d had the night before was embarrassing, to say the least. Jin Ling pulled out his poster paper and markers. Wei Wuxian got them meeting snacks. Jiang Cheng had to sit in the armchair—or, as Wei Wuxian renamed it, The Hot Seat.

“So what do we know so far?” Wei Wuxian tapped his marker on his lip. “Any takers?”

Jin Ling raised his hand. “Coach smiles at him a lot.”

Jiang Cheng flushes. “He smiles at everyone! And—why are you helping with this?”

The look Jin Ling gives him is a little too much like Wei Wuxian’s. They really need to stop hanging out alone together.

“Okay, okay.” Wei Wuxian writes down open to approach. “What else? Oh, I know! He seems like he’d be too polite to turn down a date. That has to count for something, right?”

“Wei Wuxian,” Jiang Cheng grits. “I don’t want to corner him!”

“Nonsense. It doesn’t count as cornering if he wants to go!” Wei Wuxian writes down another point. “And.. let’s see. He asked about you when I picked Ling-er up—”

“He did? Why didn’t you say anything?”

“Because I didn’t think anything of it!” Wei Wuxian huffs. “Stop interrupting! You’re not even helping.”

Jiang Cheng sits back, thoughts swirling. “What.. what did he say?”

“I forgot.”

“Wei Wuxian!”

“When can we be done?” Jin Ling asks. “I want to go play with my Legos.”

After a bout of arguing, they move on to approach. Whatever that means.

“Wear that purple shirt I bought you last Christmas,” Wei Wuxian says. “When you ask him. It goes really well with your complexion.”

“And the doggy socks!” Jin Ling chips in.

Purple shirt. Doggy socks. Wei Wuxian stands back looking satisfied—and frowns. “Oh, wait.” He adds another point: Wear extra deodorant.

“Are you saying I smell?”

“I’m saying you’re a hormonal guy!” Wei Wuxian ducks under a thrown pillow. “You get sweaty! It’s a known fact—back me up, Ling-er!”

“It’s true,” Jiang Cheng’s nephew nods. The traitor. “He got all sweaty just looking at Coach.”

Jiang Cheng sinks into the cushions. “You guys are awful.”

But here they are anyway. Thursday morning, packed in Zidian like they’re on a family mission. Jiang Cheng even wore the doggy socks.

“Wait, no,” Wei Wuxian says. “Take a deep breath. You look like you’re going to pass out.”

Jiang Cheng feels like he’s going to pass out. “Is this even appropriate? I mean—he’s a-Ling’s coach!”

“And you’re a handsome guy who’s going to miss his shot after tomorrow! Come on, a-Cheng. Don’t fail me now!” Wei Wuxian explodes out of the car before Jiang Cheng can strangle him. “Ling-er! Grab your backpack!”

They shuffle through the front doors in a pack: Jin Ling at the front, Jiang Cheng in the middle, Wei Wuxian at the back. Jiang Cheng suspects this is so he can’t escape into the bathroom. Not that he would do that. Would he?

Oh god, he thinks. I have to pee.

“Good morning!” Mianmian chirps. Her eyes flit over them. “Oh, the whole crew! How sweet.”

“Good morning Mianmian,” Wei Wuxian sings, because he has no shame. “Your nails are looking lovely today.”

“And so are you!” She winks. “8-12’s are out on the blacktop today. Do you have any questions?”

Wei Wuxian leans in. “Yes, actually. You said Lan Xichen’s been working here for years, correct? Just how long would that be?”

Mianmian taps her pen to one cheek. “Oh, let’s see. He started taking on summer camps while he was still in college, I think? It was three years before I was hired, so that makes it six years now? Yes! Six years.” She smiles. “You can really tell he’s a schoolteacher, watching him work. The kids just love him.”

A strangled noise rips out of Jiang Cheng’s throat. A schoolteacher? The image of Lan Xichen in a sweater vest and tie pops into his brain. What must he look like standing at the board? Grading tests at his desk with his hair falling around him? Rolling up his sleeves to—wait.

Wei Wuxian slides him a little smirk. Jiang Cheng doesn’t want to know what kind of expression he’s wearing right now. “I see. Thanks, Mianmian.”

They make the torturous walk down the hall. Jiang Cheng’s never been so damn sweaty staring at macaroni art in his life. Is this what hell is like?

Wei Wuxian practically kicks the doors open. “Lan Xichen! We’re here!”

I’ll kill him, Jiang Cheng decides. I’ll kill him and then drive Zidian into oncoming traffic.

Coach Lan Xichen has never looked so good. Or has he? Jiang Cheng doesn’t know. He’s the most gorgeous man on Earth as far as Jiang Cheng is concerned, especially in those skinny jeans and that soft blue polo that brings out his eyes, and—is that a headband?

Jiang Cheng really needs to pee.

“I can’t do this,” he hisses frantically in Wei Wuxian’s ear. Jin Ling is already bounding across the blacktop to hug Lan Xichen’s leg. “This is crazy.”

“No, you’re crazy for throwing your chance away!” Wei Wuxian snipes back. “Here we go!”

“No, wait—”

“Lan Xichen!” Wei Wuxian calls. He walks right up, all white teeth and messy hair, and slings his arm around Lan Xichen’s shoulder. Jiang Cheng wants to bury himself alive. “Do you have any plans this evening?”

Lan Xichen, to his credit, doesn’t flinch away. He does give Wei Wuxian a bemused smile like he’s questioning his sanity. “I spend my evenings walking my dog and making dinner. So, yes, if that counts?”

“Wow, Jiang Cheng! Did you hear that? He has a dog!”

Jiang Cheng can’t take it anymore. He runs up, yanking on Wei Wuxian’s other arm. “I’m so sorry,” he manages, tugging furiously. “He’s adopted, I swear.”

Lan Xichen actually laughs. Jiang Cheng’s legs promptly turn to jelly. “It’s not a problem,” he says, smiling. “Do you like dogs too?”

Jiang Cheng nods dumbly. “I—yes. Little dogs. Big dogs. They’re amazing.” Oh god, somebody shut him up.

“Can he come and see yours?” Wei Wuxian butts in. “You know. For dog purposes?”

“What?” Lan Xichen asks.

“What he means—” Jiang Cheng pinches Wei Wuxian’s forearm until he squeaks and jerks away— “is that. Um. Can I..”

I can’t do this.

“Can you..?” Lan Xichen echoes, nodding. He’s so undyingly patient. Jiang Cheng could kiss him.

Do not think about kissing him!

“What I mean is. Um. If you want. Would you..” Jiang Cheng sucks in a shallow breath. “Wouldyouliketogogetcoffeeafterthis.”

Lan Xichen blinks once. Twice. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I didn’t catch that. Could you..?”

Forget jelly, Jiang Cheng’s legs are going to disintegrate entirely. Why didn’t he just go to the bathroom?!

“Coffee!” he blurts. “I want to take you to get coffee!”

Silence.

Lan Xichen stares open mouthed. Wei Wuxian looks positively gleeful, all raised eyebrows and poorly-covered giggles. The kids already on the blacktop are all looking over. Jin Ling has his face in his hands.

This is it. Jiang Cheng is going to pack his bags and move to Canada, or maybe Newfoundland, some place where nobody can ever find him ever again, because if he has to take one more second of this he’s going to—

“Alright.”

Jiang Cheng’s internal screaming cuts off. “What?”

Lan Xichen smiles, then: soft, that dangerous dimple appearing, eyes crinkling into two crescent moons. His cheeks are pink and it’s such a nice contrast from the blue shirt that Jiang Cheng is almost distracted by what he’s saying.

“I’ll have coffee with you—although, is it alright that I order tea? I fear coffee and I don’t mix well.”

Lan Xichen could order a pint of vomit and Jiang Cheng would be over the moon. “Yes,” he squeaks. “That’s—um. That’s fine.”

“Excellent.” And then Lan Xichen smiles again, wide and bright like that first day they’d met, and Jiang Cheng is so far gone he’s practically on Saturn. “I’m afraid I have to get back to the kids now, but perhaps we could discuss this over text..?”

Text. Text.

Jiang Cheng pats his pants frantically before realizing it’s tucked into his shirt pocket. “Uh. Here.” He nearly drops it in his haste to pass it over. “You can put your number in as a new contact.”

There’s a moment of suspended reality where Jiang Cheng is watching Lan Xichen use his shitty purple keyboard phone and Wei Wuxian is watching Jiang Cheng have a mental breakdown. Then Lan Xichen is passing his phone back, smiling, and Jiang Cheng really needs to pee, but he’d rather piss himself than break this moment.

“There,” Lan Xichen says. “I’ll be expecting your call.” He nods at Jiang Cheng and then Wei Wuxian, dimple popping. “Have a good day Jiang Cheng, Wei Wuxian.”

“See you later!” Wei Wuxian chirps with a wink. It’s all Jiang Cheng can do to wave.

They make it through the hallway, out the door, and into Zidian before Jiang Cheng finally realizes he has lungs and needs to breathe. He exhales shakily.

Wei Wuxian beams from the passenger seat. “See? That wasn’t so hard, was it?” He flicks on the radio. It’s still staticy and terrible—the new radio doesn’t come for another few days—but soft vocals warble out above the mess, determined to shine through. He begins singing along.

Jiang Cheng smiles into the rearview mirror as he backs out. There’s no need to worry, Jiejie, he decides. Maybe everything is going to be okay.

Wei Wuxian is melodic in a way that once made Jiang Cheng jealous. Now, he can’t help but join in. He has a reason to sing again: a real-life, honest-to-god date with Lan Xichen.

The clouds are burning away to bare blue sky. The trees are all in permanent bloom, green leaves and bright buds in the lazy summer breeze. The world is warm, waiting for Jiang Cheng to join it, and god is he ready to.

It really isn’t so bad in LA, he thinks, and drives home to plan for his date.

Thank you so much for reading! I’ve combined and edited all three parts and added an extra scene (yes, the actual date) on AO3. You can find the linking post here.

#mdzs #mo dao zu shi #jiang cheng #lan xichen #xicheng #mdzs fic #potato writes

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breakingmllc · 4 years ago

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Slant Sit Up Lean Forward Ask Questions Nod Your Head T Shirt

Get born treasure and come follow me when he heard as he became very sorrowful because he Luke 1818 and there are Jesus was asking this man who is rich and successful would you give it all up to follow me would you forfeit for a Slant Sit Up Lean Forward Ask Questions Nod Your Head T Shirt few years in order to have much more for eternity instead of building a career would you spend your life building 19 Jesus wants to be first and foremost in your life you want to be front and center as he should be. He asked Sherry color here’s your twisted Sherry rotating special this one has parts on so this is one of the new LED lights guys this slight changes depending on the leaning also different lights on this headlamp will eliminate depending on which way strikes cheerleading the bike this was that the effects got seats in a day or bars on it Doesn’t have the stage for awnings at the scene he ported heads said this was God the screaming of mufflers they change the mufflers this year guys this radio mufflers is not a lot better this year so those of you who always is kind of a Smith screaming of mufflersand and aftermarket granite you find this year that the screaming of mufflers a little better yes answer question Mario Lego yes the 114 comes on this bike so based on the motor they did this this lady is a 117 I hear here’s another cool thing guys are like they had these bad genes for the campfire cover you can put in the displacements so you know 42 motor workand nobody knows what’s in there so now you got a tag you Miller for a 114 or 117 or whatever it is no sexy some nights I was kinda done that in a light to do that last year Apple car play that’s a good question Glenn Watts I got a look into thatand I honestly I’m not an expert on the infotainment system yet it’s aligned in one day I gotta get my hands on its on their on the current Latina system I consider myself a pretty dang good that had two bikes with it on their but the new system I don’t know yet know that the LED Denny colitis definite standard guys to answer that question here is this is a PNA nothing set partsand accessories paint set guys so this is called the grandstand I ordered this pink stat on a road glide this year so if you guys follow my channel you will see any building not meet our technicians building a road glide with this grandstand pain I there’s no news on an iron guys irons exact same bike they just change the pain on the spike of assassin accessories on it this is a road king special by the way that the new day maker headlamp my bike Henry Lenny about the Santos man data gaskets the the delights in the slam is a rotating standard in the Connecticut green this was all decked out in parts accessories so you barsand everything on it these bikes will roll out the new there is currently guys they should be your dears right now we we had bikes arrived yesterday the day of the announcement these bikes are shipped out to dealers kill the green that youand sorry greens for that so here’s the stuff on any trikes guys so you got a new braking system here so you got the links brake system with ABS traction control you have a traction control on these bikes now guys so I’m in a ride in a try committed to a big in depth review this year guys on the trikes to be looking for that family commenting all the new the brakes on the breaking ABS braking systemand the new traction control as well on his bikes here’s a free Wheeler this is the salts Bonneville salt pearl so I know old dirty biker today guys I apologize there’s another TRICARE try to buy for you system yes the door locks so I have a rawhide deluxe over here I’ll show you a quick though yes but I do lots answering digital locks this is the rawhide years like the rawhide to me now Ellis a root beer I agree with the comments there is one new actual model this year guys really got asked the question it’s right here to steal this the one new model is to recap on what’s new guys there’s someone you model that makes DL the specialsand the altar limited the road but also all went to 114 this year that’s new to infotainment systemsand all the bikes have infotainment system are new there’s a brand new infotainment system this year guys know it does not retrofit back to the old models here is a billiard blue slant OF this one yet Ryan just has the Akronand there’s no model name is called an ethics VR of those kind of weird to good question robot special colors you have memorized you guys I think it’s black billiard blue industrial gradesand himand I think those like that Connecticut green in a Blue Max setting are the colors I could be wrong that I like is a level of colors memorize yet yet a new headlight that rotates that’s a PNA bike arts using a PNA partand accessory parts you can only buy that the parts catalog it does not come stock on any bike but somebody none timeand let me know he is want to see the me know he is on a see here is a rocking serious Iand I answer the question via the new infotainment system cannot be retrofitted back to the old model bikes unfortunately so if you want yeah by 2019 yes I had amount videos all the videos that you see much as I do all that 100 is 1 million questions what bikes you want to see let me know thank you I appreciate it thank you guys closer guys thing on himand he went on the videos here pretty soon I think I got my stuff John Maxwell’s okay on my channel I have a video with him up maybe tomorrow afternoon or something three glide see Bob CVO altar versus road glide on the s’more robotand streetlight stuff gorse orange like a fat boy hoping to have all those guys here’s a robot special in the billiard blue is billiard blues nice guys gave you in the colors I order a lot of it’s really nice you is that still reflects guys think together the right is at a production viewer does not exist anymore guys I’ll be testifying guys new bikes soon the first by comeand try to do it then you ethics VR vacuum to read you a lot of my reviews this year guys because the specials all have a 114and are now I agree Nathan John that you should move to LA work at Laidlaw’s I agree so somebody asked for that still reflects color with find a I know I know I’m gone is the bunch of the colors on the streetlight over here okay so here’s that silver flux you about 1000 people watching right now so. I want to hear what all of you think to review the results of it on Thursday actually Thursdays going to be our twitch show where we do the entire show on twitch so that should be a new thing that we do good night everybody you have a good night and I everybody I want to up the ending so I’m switching your way for actually I you’re right Billy you know what guys I Billy brought up something else before he rage quit I have I you know what I’m glad you brought this up before he rage quit Billy because you distracted me by the way I have time now I have to do push ups and other stuff on a wartlike ground view up we put on the floor we would be doing pretty you how many when he going to do 10 yeah I can do it 10 push ups yeah I can do it unsatisfied I can do 10 push ups and I to zap myself he remembered and he distracted me with like it’s rage quit and move that thing back you pull to do it like her and yeah I don’t have the extension will you do dang well here hold on source sorry Jeff

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spideyspoods · 5 years ago

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minor inconvenience

Pairing: Peter Parker X F!Reader

Request: Combined @astrospideys & @spideypeach ‘s milestone celebration prompt (”a kiss. for good luck.”) with an anon request! “Hello dear! If you don’t mind can you write about peter and his childhood bestfriend being more than friend, but Peter is in dilema because he realized he wanted more but he doesn’t want to put the reader in danger because he’s spiderman. You can decide whether the reader knows Peter is spiderman or not. Thanks a lot!”

A/N: I’m truly sorry to everyone that this is so late, school’s been kicking my ass. However, I’m kind of proud of this one so I hope you enjoy! :)

Warnings: Fluff.

Word Count: 2k

---

Peter Parker wasn’t one to get distracted during school. In fact, he prides himself on being a great student; one who rarely failed tests. However, he’s noticed that his mind starts to wander whenever he’s around Y/N L/N. They’ve known each other since they were in the first grade and have practically been attached at the hip. Their friendship grew stronger as the years progressed, but Peter couldn’t help but yearn for more.

He remembers May teasing him about how close they were ever since they started to hang out. He’d constantly deny her claims by calling her ‘just a friend,’ but do friends feel their heart leap at the mere sight of the other? Peter’s been stuck in his own thoughts, thoughts of her, for the past few months trying to convince himself that it wasn’t a crush. However, his heart said otherwise.

He wanted to confess his feelings for her so badly, but there was a minor inconvenience to his idea. Y/N had no idea that he was Spider-Man. Despite telling each other everything, he failed to mention his alter ego. It’s not like he wanted to hide it, he just didn’t want to endanger her.

So with that, the bell rang as Peter headed out the door and to his locker. “Parker!” a voice called out. He turned his head and found the girl of his dreams stepping towards him. Her eyes seemed to sparkle, vibrance and sunshine practically radiating off of her. “We’re still on for tonight? Your place?”

“I don’t know, I was thinking of going to Delmar’s,” he trailed off, jokingly. She feigned a pout, crossing her arms. “Rude. To think I was going to bring you some gummy worms-”

“Hm, I guess that sweetens the deal.” Y/N rolled her eyes at the pun, “What? Is my own presence not enough for you?” It is. Peter’s mind went foggy, trying to recover from his thoughts. “I’m joking! Now get to class, I’ll see you later.” She nodded, “I’ll let Ned know. Later, nerd.” Y/N turned before disappearing into the midst of students and left Peter with a lovestruck look. He had completely forgotten Ned would be joining them.

---

“Hey, you know how we’re studying tonight with Y/N?” Peter asked, poking at the tray of food in front of him. Ned nodded, taking a sip of water. “You mean like we always do every Thursday?”

“Well yeah, but this time it’s different. Would it be able to be just me and her tonight?”

Ned quirked a brow, “Why? Wait a minute,” he gasped “are you finally dating? Why didn’t you tell me earlier?” Peter’s eyes bulged out his head, frantically shaking his head before hushing his friend who may have been a bit too loud. “Because it hasn’t happened yet! I was kind of trying to make that happen tonight.”

“No worries, I got you. I’ll let her know that something came up. But you owe me.”

“Anything!”

“Help me rebuild the death star.” Peter shrugged, that wasn’t too bad.

“Wait rebuild?!”

---

The minute Peter got home, he ran to his room. He took in the sight of opened drawers and papers strewn across his desk. He glanced at his watch. 5 PM. She’d be here by 7. He huffed, knowing that he had a lot of work to do.

---

May set her purse down by the couch and slipped off her shoes. “Peter, I’m home!” Silence. At first she didn’t think anything of it, before seeing that the living room was in pristine condition as if it was a hotel. “Peter?” She opened the door to his room that was now organized; every single item had its place. “I’m not complaining, but is there something going on?” Peter turned from the mirror and to his confused Aunt, “Y/N is coming over.”

“She always does, but this cleaning thing is pretty foreign for you.” Then it all clicked in her head. “Are you finally going to ask her out?” Peter’s eyes wandered to the wall, still extremely focused on adding the right amount of gel to his dark locks. “What no it’s not like that,” he turned to his Aunt “but if I was going to ask her out...does my hair look okay?”

---

His phone buzzed, and he saw a notification from Y/N.

On my way! :) Attached was a photo of her holding the large bag of gummy worms to her head. He smiled to himself, that was definitely her new contact photo. Right as he locked his phone, he got a call. “Requiring back up! Robbery three blocks away-” Damn it. He let out a sigh, but slipped his suit on. “May tell Y/N that I’m going to be a little late!”

“You haven’t told her that you’re Spider-Man yet?”

“No! I just- it’s complicated. I gotta go!”

---

Y/N knocked on the apartment door to reveal Peter’s Aunt. She smiled, welcoming her in. “Hey, Y/N! Peter said that he’d be running late but feel free to make yourself at home. I have a few errands to run, so you’re in charge!” Y/N shot her a thumbs up. “Don’t worry, Peter running late isn’t anything new anymore.Thank you, May!” She breezed out the door and Y/N set her things down in Peter’s room. “Wait a minute.” Peter’s room was actually neat?

In all ten years of knowing him, he had never been one to tidy up. Not that he was a slob, he just lived in organized chaos. Without the clutter on his shelves, she could finally see the photos in the picture frames. There were a few of him and Tony, courtesy of the Stark Internship, one with Ned, an older photo with May, but one stood out the most.

A photo of her with Peter during their freshman homecoming. Neither of them had a date, and May thought it would be cute for the two of them to go together. Little did he know, that was the day Y/N started to fall for Peter Parker. Sure she had always loved him platonically, but something changed in high school. His chocolate eyes were always gentle and the way his brows furrowed whenever he concentrated was enough to make her swoon. The only thing stopping her from admitting her feelings was the reason that she was sure he didn’t feel the same. Not only that, but what if it made things awkward? So she compromised, keeping her feelings to herself.

Minutes turned into hours and Peter still wasn’t back yet. It was already 10, and Y/N decided to make herself comfortable. Surely he wouldn’t mind if she borrowed one of his sweatshirts?

---

Peter slowly opened his window, before jumping into his room. For some reason, everyone decided to commit crimes at the same time. He froze, seeing Y/N lying in his bed sleeping. He frowned, feeling guilty that he left her all alone. Peter scrambled for his clothes and looked around. Now where was the sweatshirt he left out?

“What the hell?” he heard a groggy voice call out. Y/N was now wide awake, staring back at him. A spandex suit clung to his legs and his face paled.

“Okay-”

“I knew it! So you are Spider-Man!” she exclaimed in glee.

“No- wait you knew?”

“Well I thought you were and I asked Ned, but he said no very unconvincingly. So there’s that.” Of course she knew.

“I’m sorry for ditching you, wait is that my sweater?” He smiled to himself, and winced before clutching his side. Y/N choked, but noticed that he was in pain. “Yes, but I don’t think that matters right now. You’re literally bleeding and oh-” Past what just happened, she noticed that he was shirtless. Her eyes lingered longer than they should have, before dragging him to the bathroom to find rubbing alcohol.

The wound burned, but the mere sight of her seemed to dull the pain. “You know this reminds me an awful lot about the first time we met.”

Peter sat down on the hardtop at school, with a small lego set in front of him. He had just watched his first Star Wars movie with his Uncle Ben last week, and ever since then he had been enamored by each of the characters and spaceships. For his birthday, he got a small tie fighter lego set and he brought it to school so he could assemble it during recess. He didn’t have many friends, but he was okay with that. A fellow group of first graders approached him and snickered, “Where are the rest of your friends? Oh wait, you don’t have any!” followed by giggles. He ignored them, it wasn’t anything new after all.

“I’m talking to you, dork!” The kid in front of him let out a yell before letting his small foot crush the legos underneath. “No!” Peter whimpered. The pack of bullies started to laugh even harder before they heard a high pitched voice yell. “Stop it!” A little girl with pigtails stomped towards them, “You’re not being nice! Leave him alone!” The blonde kid scoffed, “What? Are you friends with this dork?” She stood in front of a frowning Peter and crossed her little arms, “He’s not a dork! He’s my friend! Go or I’m telling the teacher!” At that, they all scrambled. The little girl turned back to Peter who sniffled. “Hey, I’m Y/N! Can I help you build your spaceship?” Y/N smiled wide, showing off her missing front teeth. Peter wiped away his tears with his sleeve, “Okay, do you watch Star Wars?”

“Yes! It’s my favorite! Do you want to be friends?”

“Yeah.”

Both of them were brought back to reality, a smile dancing upon their faces as they remembered what had happened years ago. “You were cute back then.” Y/N smirked, “Are you saying that I’m not cute anymore?” Peter tensed up. Uh oh. “No, not at all! You’re not cute,” her face fell “That’s not what I- You’re very pretty.” He dug himself in a deep hole. “Well thank you, Parker-”

“You’re also really nice, and funny, and smart. You’re a great person, Y/N.” He huffed out. Now or never, right? On the other hand, Y/N looked down, trying to hide the child-like grin on her face. “I wasn’t aware that it was compliment time-”

“I think I like you. Well not think, I know I like you. I have for a while.” He felt her touch slowly slip away. Great, he thought, you screwed it up. “Did I make you uncomfortable? I’m sorry-” Y/N got up to quickly press her lips to his. It was short, but he could feel the passion and intensity.

“You talk too much.” Their heartbeats echoed in their ears.

“Wait so you like me?” She nodded, a blissful smile on her face. “For the longest time, I just thought you didn’t feel the same way.”

“I didn’t say anything because I didn’t want you to get hurt because of my job.” He stated, looking into her eyes. “That’s a risk I’m okay with taking.” He tentatively kissed her again, resting his hand on top of hers. “I really like you, Y/N.”

“I like you too, Peter Parker. Now, just because you’re cute doesn’t make up for the fact that you haven’t helped me study for the physics quiz tomorrow.”

---

Y/N and Peter strolled through the halls hand in hand. They approached Y/N’s next class; physics. Both of them stopped by the door with a smile. “Relax, you’ll ace this.” Peter spoke. She bit her lip, “You’re just saying that.” He grazed her hand with his thumb before planting a kiss on her cheek. “Not that I’m complaining, but what was that for?” she smiled.

“It was a kiss. For good luck.”

“That’s cute, I’ll catch you later.” Y/N entered her class, while Peter stood in the hallway. “When did that happen?” Ned called out, but Peter was too enthralled in his own bliss to answer back.

He fell for her hard, and he was okay with that.

---

Thank you for reading! Feedback and comments are appreciated, but not required! My taglist and requests are open as well! :)

Taglist: @parkeret @savedbystark @harrysbbby @cutiepiemimi13 @leelee--thebaek @softrdj @happylittlesuns @lovertony @anolddayslover @astromilku @ninja-boss-barbie @hollandsthot @laic2299 @euphoniumpets

#astropeachcelebration #peter parker #peter parker x reader #peter x reader #peter parker fanfic #peter parker fluff #peter parker fic #peter parker imagine #peter parker x y/n #peter parker x you #peter parker reader insert #avengers au #avengers fanfic #spiderman fanfic #spiderman x reader

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andrea-c4c · 5 years ago

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Week 26: Merry Week-Before-Christmas!

December 16 - 20, 2019

What a week to head into the holidays!

I think I summed it up pretty well with my tweet, but to give just a touch more detail-

On Monday, we had a few team meetings and sync-ups, and then in the afternoon Maddy and I headed over to the Old City Hall to volunteer to help set-up for the OneTeamGov Unconference.

If you haven’t gleaned from some of our photos, Maddy has wonderful penmanship, so she was put to work on signage:

If you haven’t attended an UnConference before, there are no speakers or topics selected in advance. It’s generated by attendees on the day. After an initial collaborative activity, the agenda was populated with topics attendees wanted to discuss. This isn’t an event to sit back and doze off - I mean listen. Everyone is expected to participate.

Tuesday started bright and early for me as I was also volunteering for registration. After that, I was free to attend sessions through the day. Maddy volunteered to facilitate and note-take at sessions, as did others in our NextGen family: Robyn, Ali and Giselle.

It was pretty cool to see all the engaged, forward-thinking public servants at the event, and I was a bit surprised that I recognized so many of them!

There were some common themes across several of the sessions, and sometimes it was difficult to choose what to attend. There were quite a few on remote and flexible work arrangements. I chose to attend the following:

All teams across gov communicate in the open about their successes and failures on a centralized platform

Keep humans at the centre of design + delivery (in and out of government)

Lego Serious Play

Increase opportunities for generating, testing, implementing solutions, coming from the ground up/grassroots

It was an inspiring, albeit tiring, day!

Then on Wednesday, we fellows met in the GCCoworking space to retro (our first in close to 6 weeks - sorry Maddy!) and talk about our work.

I’ve been working on creating a service blueprint for a service that doesn’t have a centralized booking tool, so we talked through my design. This is in addition to the ux research and design we’re doing for our prototyping efforts, so I’ve been feeling some pressure of having a lot on my plate. As I was worried about it being refined enough for a group review later in the week, Mike gave me a helpful reminder. The purpose of the meeting was to gather feedback - I didn’t have to go crazy trying to make everything perfect and in a final state. Get things in a state to elicit feedback, and then spend more time refining it afterwards. Thanks, Mike!

The time away from the office was a nice chance for the three of us to re-connect and just make sure we’re still feeling positive about our direction and what we hope to achieve through our fellowship. Time is ticking, and we need to be sure we’re working on what’s most critical. #constraintsBreedCreativity

I also got a giant copy of the existing Service blueprint of the travel journey, to post up in our work area. If anything, just the sheer length of this is a clear sign we have plenty of opportunities to improve this experience!

On Thursday Maddy and I spent the morning over at Courts Administration Service, shadowing some of their financial folks to get a better sense of their current financial processes related to travel. It can be easy to think only of the traveller as we’re working on a solution, but we have to be sure that we are considering the other parties and processes involved. Getting a glimpse at what goes on behind the scenes can really change how we approach a problem.

Then we headed right to a Service Blueprint review with some members of the NextGen Travel team, as well as some other partners that are working on blueprints. It was a chance for us each to show our work, and some of the ideas we’re exploring. I wish we’d had more time to really dig in and poke at each others’ concepts, but there was just too much to go through! The meeting did help me feel like we have a solid concept and are on the right track. I’m glad I took Mike’s advice and didn’t worry about spending time making a perfectly polished deliverable.

Also! I published a mammoth blog post on the Code for Canada blog about prototyping. I appreciate Luke’s patience in reviewing and editing it!

Then came Friday..

We attended the Digital Services Branch Executive Committee to present our work. We talked about the design sprint that was held back in October, as well as some of the prototypes we’ve been working on. Despite the fact it was THREE O’CLOCK the FRIDAY before the HOLIDAYS, attendees were very engaged in our presentation. It helped that Chief Information Officer Tammy LaBelle framed our work and its importance, but I was pleasantly surprised at the thoughtful questions we received. It was a great wrap-up to lead us into the Christmas break.

But, we weren’t quite done - the bulk of the NextGen Travel team (who weren’t already off for the holidays) met for drinks at Queen St Fare to kick off the weekend and Christmas break.

After a drink or two, Mike leaned over and said to Maddy and I “you know, I think if this were the end of our fellowship, and that was our final presentation of what we’d done, our fellowship would have been a success”.

I still get goosebumps thinking of that a couple weeks later, and hope we can continue to feel that sense of accomplishment and impact through the remainder of our time.

-Andrea, UX Design Fellow

#codeforcanada #codeforca #servicedesign #pspc #travel #fellowship

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raisingsupergirl · 5 years ago

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Grilling: The Next Generation

I'll admit it. I'm a total porch jockey. Anyone who drives by my house on the weekend will likely see me sitting on my back deck working on my computer (like right now), smoking my pipe (like right now), or grilling (like yesterday). But my favorite of these is definitely grilling. And as I said, I participated in that favorite past time yesterday, but it was a whole new experience for me. Why? Because, for the first time in nearly a decade, I cooked on a new grill, and the experience was bittersweet. You see, the last grill I bought was eight years ago when my wife and I first moved back to Missouri from Virginia. Since then, my humble Kenmore gas grill has given me countless memories and mountains of delicious food. But nothing is meant to last forever, and grills are no exception. I knew I would have to say goodbye eventually, but I had no idea how much it would affect me.

It was a slow fade. First was the electric igniter about five years ago. No biggie. Matches did the job just fine. Then the heat shields crumbled. An easy replacement. Grill covers came and went, and I saw the creeping rust and increasingly unstable base as endearing character traits. Even it's inability to get over 400 degrees was just a minor nuisance. But when the warming rack literally fell in half, I knew it was time to say goodbye to my old friend. Thus began my search for a replacement. And gosh, did I have a hard time deciding.

As I said, I'd grilled exclusively on gas for the majority of my adult life, so it's what I was comfortable with. I knew the hot spots. I knew its strengths and weaknesses. And I loved the ease of use. But I was ready for a change. And so, I had two options in mind: a pellet grill or a dual gas/charcoal combo. I researched countless brands and variations online. I pestered my co-workers and patients for a solid week (bless their patience). And still I was no closer to deciding. It was like comparing apples to oranges. But in the end, a couple of factors led me to a decision.

Remember when I said the electronic igniter was the first thing to go out on my gas grill? Well, as much as I loved the diverse options of a pellet grill and the idea of getting that delicious smoked flavor with the push of a couple of buttons, pellet grills right now rely heavily on a slue of electronics. Igniters, thermostats, and augers, oh my. So much so that most have some form of motherboard to control their fancy gizmos. And even though I keep my grills covered religiously, they do sit outside all year. And I really hated the idea of having to replace essential components. For me, simpler is better.

The second factor was the wood pellet itself. It's the fuel that makes pellet grills possible. They pack all of the flavors of various wood chips for a fraction of the cost because they're essentially the sawdust byproduct of furniture manufacturers. They're waste that's put to good use, and they wind up being cheaper than charcoal and even gas. But the little secret that Traeger doesn't want you to know is this: you don't need a pellet grill to use pellets! Throw a handful on top of your charcoal and you get all of that smoky goodness without the fancy technology. But what's that you say? The mess and time that charcoal requires doesn't compare to the quick, easy use of pellet grills? Well, yes, that's true. But that's what ten-dollar smoker boxes are made for. Fill one up with pellets and throw it on top of your gas grill. Problem solved (okay, not completely. I'm aware that it's hard to replicate the raw smoking power of a pellet grill or a dedicated smoker, but my solution is a reasonable one).

So now that I knew I'd be happy with a duel-fuel grill, all that remained was to pick a brand and style. There were only a few that I found with the massive amount of cooking surface that I wanted, and the variations between them were negligible. In fact, as I compared, it seemed that most used a lot of the same parts. Like, the exact same parts. So much so that it got me wondering if they came from the same manufacturers. I couldn't find any proof online, but the fact remained: instead of comparing apples to oranges, I was now comparing apples to apples. And I was ready to stop comparing them and start grilling them (if you've never grilled apples, you're really missing out). So after work last Thursday, I felt like a Viking returning from a successful conquest when I brought home a $300 Char-Broil side-by-side with 1,000 square inches of cooking surface. And then I pulled it all out of the box on Friday and felt like a child staring at a 1,000-piece Lego set.

But I didn't let it intimidate me. I put on some tunes, cracked a cold one, and got to work, knowing all of my efforts would soon be worth it. And four hours later (after assembly and rubbing the whole interior down with margarine to "cure" everything), I stood back and admired the newest member of the Winch family. I mean, sure, it was already past dinnertime, which meant we had leftovers, but I was ready to break that bad boy in the next day. And the anticipation was more exciting than Christmas Eve.

Needless to say, my Saturday was a day to remember. One thousand inches of cooking surface. The left side was what I knew: clean, even propane. And the right was unexplored territory: raw, unbridled charcoal. And things got out of hand in a hurry. Waaaay too much charcoal and pellets. My chicken was burning within minutes, even with the vents closed and the charcoal basket as low as it would go. But I adjusted. I buckled down and harnessed the storm. And it was glorious. Every inch of that cast iron was filled with meats and veggies of the most heavenly varieties. And everything landed on the plates with better flavor and texture than I've been able to attain for years. And the critics agreed.

And I think that's the main reason why this has all been so important to me—my family. They always look forward to Daddy's grilling. It brings them joy, and they tell me as much. And for any husband or father, having a family's praise is the ultimate joy. It's what it's all about. All the hard work. The long hours and the time away from those loved ones. It's all worth it to see them appreciate you. And grilling has always been a surefire way to win over their hearts.

As I said, nothing is meant to last, and I know the grill I bought won't outperform a Weber or a Traeger. But when it does finally collapse into a pile of rust, maybe I'll want something different. Maybe the pellet grills will have more options and lower price tags. And until then, I'll honor the memory of my trusty Kenmore by creating new memories with my Char-Broil. So from my porch to yours, happy grilling.

#grilling #barbecue #traeger #webergrill #smokedmeat #pelletgrill #gasgrill #charcoalgrill #momblr #dadblr #mumblr #'merica #summer #char-broil #dual-fuel

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