#amanda posting angela not committing to the bit ON HER STORY

[shesmore-shoebill]

AMANDA

[ofstoriesandstardust]

discovery

a/n: I posted the first chapter and was overwhelmed by the fact that people  actually liked it??? that I decided to ignore my homework that I definitely should be doing to write this. this chapter definitely plays more on SVU, so sorry for the name-drop of people you may not know if you aren’t an SVU fan

main masterlist | the choices we make masterlist | story description | what’s left of us | recognize you

summary: ADA Gray is thriving, just ask any of her fellow ADAs or the detectives at Manhattan’s Special Victims Unit. So shouldn’t the discovery of a brother she never knew about make her feel like her world is collapsing in on her?

warnings: reference to TUA canon death/murders, swearing

word count: 1,587

Elena laughed, holding the door open for Detectives Sonny Carisi and Fin Tutuloa to follow her in the building. Fin had just made a snarky comment that had caused Sonny to roll his eyes and for the blonde to start laughing. She waved to Angela, the woman who worked at the front desk of 1 Hogan Place. The detectives followed her to her office, where they were planning to meet Barba, Liv, and Amanda to discuss to the latest on one of their cases. It had been a complicated case, and a bit of a high profile one, so the DA had assigned both Barba and Elena to work on the case with the SVU detectives. Stone had been gone on vacation when it had happened, thus it was Elena’s case as she worked both Homicide and SVU cases. 

She approached Lucy, who had quickly become one of her closest friends after getting a job as an ADA. “Hey Lucy.” She greeted. The girl smiled. 

“You have a letter.” Lucy said, pulling a draw open and retrieving an envelope from inside. She turned in confusion, moving away from the office door to grab the letter from Lucy. At that moment, Barba, Liv, and Amanda approached the desk, ready for their meeting. “No Dodds?” Lucy asked as Elena grabbed the letter from her outstretched hand. Liv shook her head.

“No, he’s on a trip.” 

“How was court?” Rafael asked, and Elena shrugged. 

“It was court. You know the usual.” Elena’s eyes never tore away from the letter. It just had her first and last name written on, in a somewhat sprawling handwriting. “Lucy, who’s this from?” Elena asked, the curiosity rising in her voice. She sighed. 

“That’s the interesting thing.” Elena’s eyes flicked up to meet her friend’s but only for a moment. “Luther Hargreeves dropped that off. Wanted to make sure it got to you.” Elena’s head shot up. “Mhmm, that’s what I was thinking.” Elena shook her head. 

“Strange.” She said, moving to open the door of her office. The detectives followed her in and she moved to her desk, pulling off her jacket. It was an unusually chilly day in the city for almost June. 

“Wonder what Luther Hargreeves wants with you.” Liv said, setting a file down on the desk. Elena shrugged. 

“Maybe one of his siblings got in trouble again and he’s come to ask for your expertise lawyer help.” Amanda joked and Elena laughed. 

“Probably.” She said as she sat down, tossing the letter on her desk. 

“Man I still can’t believe both of them got off.” Fin said pulling a chair up to the desk. Carisi shook his head. 

“Wonder what the DA was thinking. Oh sure, we’ll just ignore the fact that these people committed crimes because they’re special.” Carisi said, the disgust evident in his voice. The Hargreeves cases had left a bad taste in everyone’s mouth, but especially in New York’s legal field and police officers. 

“Didn't you use to love Allison’s movies?” Amanda replied, shooting Sonny a look. 

“Yeah, but then her brother went and killed a cop. And got away with it.” Sonny said, as he sat down. “Plus, after that custody battle, what she did to her kid... she’s not someone I want to support.” Barba made a face of agreement as he sat down directly across from Elena. 

“Alright, the Taylor’s case. What do you have?” Elena asked, diverting their attention to the important matter at hand.

-

Elena sighed, pulling her hair up into a ponytail as her food cooked in the oven. It had been one of those days and she had just gotten back to her apartment, so pizza rolls for dinner it was. Barba often teased her for eating like a college student but she always shot back that at least she wasn’t shelling out a good chunk of money on sushi all the time. As her food cooked, she shifted through the files she had brought back with her, intending to do a bit more work before heading to bed for the night. The letter she had so quickly forgotten about from earlier in the day slipped out and she picked it up. She took a deep breath as her thumb slid through the top. She pulled the paper out and unfolded it. Holy shit. 

Hi, 

My name’s Luther. Well, you probably already know that I guess. I’m sure you’ve heard about my siblings and I from our superhero days, if not from the days of Diego running from the police and Allison’s stardom. If you haven’t, then I guess I should explain it. My name’s Luther Hargreeves, and I’m Number One out of 7 from The Umbrella Academy. On October 1st, 1989, we were all born to women who weren't previously pregnant, all at the same time. There was 43 of us, in total, as we just learned. Our father, Reginald Hargreeves, who was a millionaire, offered large sum of money to our mothers for us and turned us into his superhuman crimefighting soldiers by the time we were teens. 

The reason I’m telling you this is because we recently found all our files with our information about our biological parents, which is how I found you. You’re my sister, my biological one. And, I’d love a relationship with you, if you want that. If not, please feel free to disregard this letter like you never read it. 

Luther

He left what she was assuming was his phone number at the bottom of the paper. Elena dropped the paper on to the counter, taking a shaky breath, gripping the counter. Luther.. her brother? Unlikely... and yet, not impossible. She had always felt there was something about her parents divorce they weren’t telling her. But still, she’d grown up low income most of her life, and had only become financially stable once she’d secured her job as an ADA. The DA’s office paid a pretty penny, thankfully. So the question was, where’d that sum of money go?

The real question was, did she want to reach out to him? She was curious about him, especially because she didn’t talk to her other siblings. He probably had million of questions about their family, rightfully so. But his family did not have a good reputation. Allison had had a very public and nasty custody battle that had dragged out everything. Vanya had killed her boyfriend, albeit the case seemed to scream self defense. Diego had killed a cop for goodness sake... but even then the facts of the case seemed so murky to everyone outside of Diego’s legal team and the investigators. Establishing a relationship with Luther, getting involved with that family, she might as well kiss her job goodbye. Jack McCoy, Manhattan District Attorney, had made it abundantly clear where he stood on the line of the Hargreeves. If he knew, well, it would be bye-bye to the best job she’d ever had and all the friends, the family, she’d made here in New York. The oven beeped, interrupting her thoughts. She sighed, moving to grab the food. What was she going to do?

-

She tried to keep her hands from shaking as she took a sip of her soda, waiting for Luther. It had taken a few days but she had called him early one morning, asking if he wanted to meet for lunch that day. He had agreed, and at the time she couldn’t help but feel a twinge of excitement that she was going to actually meet him. But as time passed and he hadn’t showed, she was starting to wonder if this was some sort of test from the DA’s office to see where her loyalties lied... or something. It sounded ridiculous, she knew that, but she couldn’t keep her brain from wandering. She glanced at the time on her phone again and sighed. He wasn’t late by any means, she was just ridiculously early. After hours, it seemed, which was probably only ten minutes or so, a large man walked into the restaurant and her heart skipped a beat. That had to be him. His eyes scanned the area until he turned to the hostess. The hostess led him to where she sat and he smiled at her tentatively as he sat down. The place was nice, situated outside, and it was a warm day, making the noise of New York City that much livelier as people walked past, enjoying the day. She’d chosen it specifically because of that, and the fact that it was out fo the way of the courthouse and precinct, meaning there was a low chance anyone from work would see her. She offered him a nervous smile as she took in his appearance. Large build, blonde hair (like hers), brown eyes (what color were her eyes again?), tall. She vaguely heard the hostess ask for what he’d like to drink and him responding with water. he turned his attention back to her. “Hi, I’m Luther.”

“Elena.” she said, nodding at him. She took in a deep breath, folding her hands. “I’m sure you have lots of questions.” He nodded. “Well, ask away.” He took a deep breath, seemingly trying to figure what to ask first. 

“So... DA’s office, huh?” She nodded. “And three siblings, can’t imagine that was a peaceful household.” She chuckled, shaking her head. 

“I don’t think we ever stopped fighting.” He laughed. 

“Try six.” He joked, and she laughed freely. 

“I couldn’t even begin to imagine.”

[jess-oh]

Reflection

aaaaaaaaahhhh i did too much today and didnt have enough time to dedicate to my schoolwork!!! Ahhhh!!!!

I FORSURE need to do my moodboards for Publication Design tomorrow and post my articles for negotiation skills and developing a marketing plan. And then after that... i want to do as much as I can. That includes reading for GD III, gathering information online before class on Wednesday, reading and annotating the physical article for developing a marketing plan and so on. I really hope work isn’t too busy tomorrow so I can just get everything done but even if it is, I’m going to just try and stay in the computer lab at school until I finish everything! I just gotta focus and get everything done at once so that I’m prepared for the week! It’s not that I’ve been procrastinating but I’ve been really busy with a lot of other things! I essentially have no time over the weekends anymore so Monday will be my “safe” day from now on until the end of October! Probably! EEEEEE! I do want to stay up and get some of this stuff done but I also know that it’s better to get a good night’s rest and be on time for work! Ido want to be more committed this year and do a better job at faithfully serving my customers with a smile and a good attitude! Haha. I have high hopes for the year so far!

I woke up at Esther’s this morning around 7am and 8:30am. Around 8:30am, I started reading 1 Samuel a bit again before preparing for the day by brushing my teeth and changing my clothes. I decided to wear my jumpsuit! I was kinda worried that it’d be awkward spending so much time with Esther but it wasn’t! I didn’t ask overly intrusive questions and just stayed surface level but we were still able to learn more about each other through that! I learned about her parents&siblings, her views on pets, her apartment, and so on. Very lighthearted and casual! And she bought me an iced blonde americano today! So kind and generous! It was actually a little bit awkward bc she insisted that she would pay but I confessed that I was just going to my backpack to take out my glasses so that I could see the menu. From her tone and offering, it seemed like she was willing to pay anyway and maybe I shouldn’t have assumed it. I felt kinda bad. Anyway, Johnathan picked us up and then we went to go get Daniel Kwon and had a pretty good time in the car ride to church! It did fall silent at times but overall, it was pretty fun! I only wish we could’ve talked more with Daniel bc he was pretty quiet the whole ride after. He does usually keep to himself anyway but still. I felt bad. But we listened to Johnathan’s experience with drum corps and I shared about my internship and we joked about the Bible quiz and discussed all the great parts of Crazy Rich Asians and so on so forth! I was actually really happy to finally have a positive conversation about that movie bc I feel like I’ve just been constantly trying to defend it from the backlash and criticism but I could finally openly discuss it with other people who enjoyed it and it was honestly so great! At church, I signed up to be a mentor for Kidsland and then hurried into service! I sat towards the front behind Johnathan, Esther, and Daniel and was soon joined by Amanda and Angela. I’m really happy Angela and I are starting to get along better this year! I don’t feel so afraid of her constant judgment anymore and I think she’s been accepting me more too. I’m glad! Amanda and I had a great time together as per usual during service and whilst eating together. I’m really blessed to have her in my life and I think we’re going to grow really deep in our relationship with Christ together. Thank you for sending her into my life, God! Even just eating with everyone and welcoming in someone we met over the summer felt so great! Just being able to casually share life together with them all! I was really sarcastic and enthusiastic and unapologetically me and it felt so great! Oh back to the service, the sermon today was sooooo good! P. William challenged our faith and how without God, we are nothing. We should constantly be seeking God like a treasure and be so willing to give up everything for Him! We need to surrender all that we are at His feet but far too often we do so but then want to take it back and solve our issues by our own strength and that’s just not how it works! And that kinda felt like the first “sign” today. I should always keep my eyes locked on Him bc as much as I may study, it’s worth nothing if He is not at the center of my heart. The worship was really good too and my hands and arms just kinda lifted by themselves but I wasn’t thinking about how I sounded or how I looked. I was just so happy and blessed to be serving God! Honestly, a small part of me hoped that Jason saw me but I did my best to just cast out those thoughts and focus on God and I think I did pretty well! Now fast forward to the Bible competition! We didn’t do as poorly as I thought! There were definitely things I could have studied more but my guesses were sometimes right and overall, we did pretty well! We were third place until the very end when we bet it all and lost it all LOL. But we did much better than I thought we’d do! Especially considering how little we all studied! But I do think our study session from last night really helped us retain some more information! Like the story about God and how many times He called Samuel! Esther originally thought it was three but I remembered it being four and bc of that conversation, I had confidence that it was definitely four bc we even checked the Bible for evidence! P. Josh was the pointkeeper and his pride in us was really encouraging! Just by how big he would write our score on the board or whenever he smiled at our joy in winning. It was really nice! I made mistakes at times but by trusting and working together, it actually all turned our pretty well! I wish it could just stay like this but I know Johnny and Christine are returning soon and I am excited to serve with them but I’m also kinda afraid that it’ll ruin our current dynamics! I’ve been having such a great time with everyone and I wish it could just stay like that forever.

After that, Jason graciously drove us all downtown and dropped Amanda, Angela, and I off at the Arc since Angela moved there! Amanda took a bus straight to the mission conference thing she invited me to and I went to 623 to see if it was open so that I could work on some homework! It was closed! D:

Then I took the red line and 15 bus home and immediately peed! I had to so bad! I’m so glad the restroom is so close to the front door! But unfortunately by that time, I only had about 10-15min to rest and I wanted to get a lot of homework done today! Thinking back on it, I’m a little disappointed bc I passed by macapartments earlier on my way to the conference and could’ve easily picked up my textbook! No wait. I remember now. I was going to go but they close at 5pm on Sundays and it was past that time. Riiiiight. But yeah! So I watched a couple videos, tried to quickly figure out how to resize the resource guide, and then I left for the conference! Googlemaps told me it would take me about 23min to walk there but it actually took about 30min, even with me rushing! But then again, I got confused and kinda lost at one point so that makes sense. I did debate on just bailing out bc my decision to attend was so last minute too in favor of doing homework but ultimately, I told Amanda that I would go so I went. And it was so good! Grace Kim, a missionary that recently went to Turkey, shared about her testimony and why missions are so important and her own journey getting there! And as interesting as that was, I was just really surprised by the community after! Everyone was so genuinely welcoming and I was glad to meet them all! I’m excited to go back again next week and see them all again! I want to grow in my faith with them! I know that I’m committed to investing and serving at Lakeview but the people I met today were the people I imagine when I think of church. They were diverse and welcoming and so kind! I really got along with this girl named Amy and we shared our testimonies and how we got to Vision School and just hearing how passionate she was for the Lord now in comparison with how she felt before was so amazing and interesting to learn about! She’s really the one that made me want to join Vision School and maybe even serve as a missionary with her! I really think we can grow deep in our relationship with Christ together! And I am so excited to see her again next week! I should’ve gotten her contact info today but I’m sure I’ll see her again! But the conference was kinda “sign” two! Especially when Grace, the speaker, said our biggest blessing should be Jesus and we should want Him to come now! If we want Him to come later, the things of this world have become idols. My biggest concern in going on a one year mission trip to a different country was the fact that I would be so close to getting my degree and would rather finish that and not mess up the credits that I have already earned and delay the trip for later. But we can’t procrastinate on God! I got to talk to Amanda during the break about her heart in going to Egypt for a year and she shared how she heard from God that when she is turned away from Him, everyone that she would have met and reached out to are also turned away and they all start walking instead towards death. And yeah, she could go to the same place and just delay the trip but there would still be people that she could have reached but never did because of her priorities. And that thought scared her more than anything so she decided to go for those people that she could reach! And it was really interesting to hear about her faith in that! I was also touched by how Grace said Muslims never question Islam and are blind followers and are taught to never question anything and are blind followers as a result. But because we do question things and have a deeper understanding of Christianity bc it isnt something we were just forced to know, we can show them the right way! And the fact that someone else finally told us to question Christianity to find more answers was so reassuring and nice to hear! I think I can dedicate my Sunday nights every week to these lectures and I’m excited to be spending more time with Amanda and maybe even going on a short term or long term mission trip! Who knows! Regardless, I’m excited.

Thank you God for blessing me with this blessed day! I am so grateful for all that you are and all you have done. Thank you.

#TEAMATCHA#

[shesmore-shoebill]

i loveeee disaster/pining!amanda in amangela HOWEVER i pitch you this: disaster/pining!amanda in courtmanda. amanda who shouldnt be surprised that courtney’s very flirty/affectionate but somehow Always Is Suprised when the energy is directed back at her. courtney who sees a blushing/stammering amanda for the first time and is absolutely delighted (and maybe a little bit surprised) that They were the one who caused that reaction

AUGH COURTMANDA MY BELOVED. Excellent timing sending this to me right before we got fed with fantastic Courtmanda in the new FNAF video.

That said: OOOH disaster/pining Amanda in a Courtmanda context. HMM.

Okay, preface: I'm going to say a lot of things here. Again, this is all personal RPF characterization and is not supposed to actually be about the real people. Its about the RPF alternate universe versions I've decided on.

So from what I have in my head, disaster/pining Amanda doesn't look the same as it would for Amangela, because where Angela doesn't usually lean into the kissing/flirting bits with the same level of enthusiasm/isn't the type to initiate them, at least with Amanda, (hence why flirting back would be so jarring). Like you're saying Courtney (and Amanda tbh) is the kind of person to:

1- Flirt incessantly with people for the bit,

and

2- If challenged, would COMMIT to the bit with zero hesitation

and

3- Willing to kiss a friend, no worries.

So in my head, with their existing dynamic it seems less likely for Amanda to be completely caught off guard by just the fact of Courtney flirting/flirting back. (TBH I think its fun to have their dynamic already have an inherent flirtiness to it, that in Courtmanda universes can lead to Confusion or Hijinks. See this post). So to really SELL it I feel like there has to be an extra level to it that turns the existing dynamic on its head. Catches Amanda off guard or some extra flavor to the obliviousness. And I find it VERY fun to have the disaster part of this be Amanda committing harder to flirting if she's panicking about Courtney, because Courtney would commit BACK, and that kind of escalation always opens up fun in stories. AND, at the point where Amanda does get completely flustered/tongue-tied the payoff is that much more significant.

And there's a few fun ways this can go, trope-wise, I think. Courtney dials it up and Amanda was fine about it before (ignoring her feelings) but the ramp up in intensity flipped SOMETHING in her head she can't ignore angmore, and now Courtney is flirting and Amanda is panicking/flirting back with a definite edge of panic and Courtney can. Tell. For angst or more plot, the fact that the affection is already there can cause confusion! Misunderstanding! What's joke flirting and what's real? What's a bit and what isn't? Even if its not a bit for her, is it for them? etc. Plenty of fun ways to take the Courtmanda disaster dual flirting dynamic.

That said, the "already always flirty Courtmanda" is just a personal characterization thing on my part, and this is RPF, none of this is real, so we dont need to do that. If we don't commit to their existing dynamic already being flirty the imagery of a flustered Amanda and deeply pleased Courtney is still SO good. Amanda flirts with everyone and Courtney flirts back and Amanda goes. 😳. Courtney as a fun silly little guy and Amanda as a charismatic force laying on the charm with everyone but Courtney does something back and Amanda loses it a little. Flirts weird. Gets goofy. Little compliments get to her. Something something the rpf extension of Amanda constantly calling Courtney cool or complimenting her style in random places in videos. And Courtney continues to be affectionate because they just ARE affectionate and Amanda (also known affectionate person!) is losing her cool over it way more than she should be. Oh man. I do love this concept actually.

(For angst route- miscomm! misunderstanding! Amanda going "Oh Courtney is like this with everyone, it doesnt mean anything". Courtney taking Amanda's slightly strange reactions as 'oh she doesnt like me doing this/feel this way'. Ah shit I've just swapped the Amangela dynamic).

Anyway. Lots of fun potential here. Love the Courtmanda dynamic. Maybe a fun plot idea regarding S&B filming and Amanda seeing a new side of Courtney that shifts her world a little bit.... 👀 hmm.