#and I read the summary and woof it's BAD. like if it were not the crow it could probably have been a fun time

[lesbianmaxevans]

31 DAYS OF HALLOWEEN 2024 ⤷ Day 1: Brandon Lee as Eric Draven in The Crow (1994)

[strawberryscribblesandwrites]

Vampires vs Bath time

Marko x reader x Paul

Summary: your two blond vampire boyfriends visit you and things get a little steamy ;)

Author's note: I might do full smut part two we shall see

A cool breeze ruffled my hair, the smell of the sea being carried by it. That was one of the few perks of living right near the boardwalk, the fresh smell of the salty ocean.

Another perk was that I was close to my boys.

Ah, my boys. How could I begin to describe my undead delinquents? Well you have David, the ring leader, charming sinister energy to him at first but once you get to know him he had a soft spot for his lost boys. Dwayne is the silent brooding type, he loves reading and riding his bike with the others. Marko and Paul, the messy mischief makers filled with a childish hyperactiveness to them.

When I first met my boys they were well they were kind of a mess, only washing in the ocean, living then with frizzy matted hair- they would occasionally use the public showers near the boardwalks, but after meeting them I was adamant that they should keep good hygiene, especially if we were to all be in a relationship. David and Dwayne followed my rule and would pop in to have a proper hot shower or bath.

Now, Paul and Marko.... would try their best to remember but they would often get caught up in their shenanigans.

My radio was playing a loud rock song that reminded me of a thrilling night in the cave. I danced around my room without a care until the sound of a shrill wolf whistle and catcalling made me jump out of my skin. Spinning around to face my open window, I saw none other than the pair of blonde vamps. Their faces and clothes smeared with thick blood.

"What the hell" I whisper shouted at them.

"Aww baby don't be like that, it was a good show" Paul said with a smirk while Marko was giggling like a mad man. "Hurry in before anyone sees you" I said, shaking my head trying to suppress a smile at their antics.

"Do not touch anything" I said sternly as they came through my window. I walked to my set of draws and got the pair some comfy clothes to chuck on while I put their blood-drenched clothes in the wash. "Let me guess you were playing with your food and got too messy?" I asked them over my shoulder. "You could say that” David said “We were starting to stink up the place" Marko mumbled, like a child being told off. "I think we could have gone a few more days before we needed a good wash" Paul said in a joking manner.

"Gross" I stated.

Putting the boy's respective comfy clothes on my bed, I turned to the pair to inspect which of them needed a more thorough approach. Looking at Paul, he didn't seem too bad. His hair was stiff, as were his clothes- covered in deep, sticky blood. But other than that he didn't seem too bad. Marko, on the other hand, had his shirt half ripped and his soaked jacket looked particularly crusty. His chaps had seen better days, not to even mention how his hair was stuck together, all matted with blood clots.

"Paul you're up first, Marko baby you need extra care. I swear if you boys continue this I'll start treating you like actual dogs and just put you in the paddling pool and hose you down" I threatened

"Woof" Marko said smirking causing Paul to explode with laughter

"Sugar, we aren't that bad" he said breathlessly between laughs. I just hummed in response, grabbing his hand and pulling him towards the bathroom. "Baby, you just stay there. You can read some comics on my desk, I don't mind you getting a mess on my desk chair" I told him over my shoulder.

Turning on the taps of my bath, I added some soap and set some shampoo, conditioner and body wash on the side of the tub.

"Strip" I said pointing to the bath.

"Oooh, no need to be so snappy. If you wanted me naked you should just ask nicely" he said in a seductive tone.

"Not tonight casanova" I told him, causing him to pout.

I walked out of the bathroom giving him his privacy to get in the tub. Waiting, till I heard him shout through the door he was ready. I opened the door to collect his clothes.

"Hey baby, do you think you can wash my hair?" he asked softly. "Of course I can sweetie" I smiled.

Popping my head back into my room after I had put Paul's clothes into the washing machine, I was met with the sight of Marko, with his feet kicked up on my desk engrossed in one of my many comics. I made my way back to the bathroom, knocking on the door and waiting for a response before making my way in.

Paul lay in the bath, his wet hair pooling around his broad shoulders, his face and chest absent of the blood that was there earlier that night. "Hey Paulie" I said softly as I kneeled by the bath. He gave me a sweet smile as he sat up giving me better access to his head.

I truly loved nights like these with my boys. Sure they were killers, but they were also the boys that always treated me with love and care.

Kissing Paul's shoulder, I leaned for the shampoo, squirting some on my hand and massaging it into his scalp, causing Paul to let out a soft groan, my nails raking across his head."Have I told you how much I love you?" Paul breathlessly groaned as I started pouring water gently over his hair. “I'm always happy to hear it baby” I said, kissing his shoulder again.

I continued rinsing his hair until it was free of soap, repeating the process with the conditioner. “I could get used to this” Paul sighed, as the water sloshed round the tub as he started to stand up. “Well, I'm glad to hear that because I would prefer it if my boyfriend didn't smell like a corpse when I see him” I chuckled, wrapping a towel around his waist before he stepped out of the bath. “Aww, don't you find the smell of rotting sexy babe” he teased, wrapping his arms around my shoulders, pulling me into his bare chest. “Hmmm. Nope. I don’t think it is” I joked into his chest.

“Come on pretty boy, Marko needs a bath and a good scrub” I said, kissing his chest, causing a deep rumble to spread through him.

“Your clothes are on the bed and the hair dryer is in my desk drawer” I said, opening the door of the bathroom for him.

I leaned down putting my hand in the now lukewarm water to pull out the plug and let it drain .

Leaning my shoulder against the doorframe of my room, I watched as Paul moved over to my desk where Marko was sat. Paul leaned over him to get to the draw, allowing Marko to quickly lean up and kiss his jaw. “You smell nice” he told him. “Thanks bud” he said with a soft smile, retrieving the hair dryer.

Moving back to the bathroom as the last of the bath water emptied out, I replugged it, filling it with hot water and more soap, waiting until the bath was full until I called on Marko.

After a few minutes, he hadn't come. I decided to see why he was taking so long, walking over to my desk and leaning down over his shoulder. “Marko baby, why aren't you coming to the bathroom?” I asked softly.

“Babe, this comic is bitchin’. Look!” he said, excitedly showing me the panels of two characters fighting. Chuckling, I kissed his temple. “That's pretty cool, but ya gotta get a wash baby”. He groaned as he put the comic down.

We both moved to the bathroom where the bath was almost full of hot water and soap. “Pass me your jacket” I told the blond vampire. He shrugged off his jacket with a sigh. Giving a quick thank you, I moved his jacket to the kitchen where I could hand wash it.

I knocked on the door of the bathroom and waited for the okay from Marko to come in.

“Hey” he said, as I entered the steamy bathroom. “Hi” I smiled.

Marko was sat up straight in the water. Unlike Paul, he hadn’t bothered to rid his face and chest of congealed and dried blood .

Kneeling by the bathtub, I soaked the washcloth in the water, bringing it up to Marko’s face and gently scrubbed his chin. “You're both such messy eaters, you know that?” I asked with a chuckle. “We can’t help it babe, we just get a lil excited is all” he stated with a smile. I chuckled slightly at his response.

Gently, I grabbed his chin and tilted his head back so that I could wipe the blood from his neck. Occasionally, I would re-wet the cloth until his neck was clear of blood. I placed a set of soft kisses on his neck, up to his jawline. Pulling away from Marko, I dipped the cloth back in the water.

“Why are you so gentle with us?” he questioned.

“What do you mean?” I asked, while tilting my head and smiling softly.

“Well, I mean, you’re so soft with us. You make sure we are clean, and I mean- well look at you. You’re cleaning a bloodthirsty creature of the night” he stated. “I mean, you wash Pauls hair, you give David massages when he gets worked up, you sit and read with Dwayne, and don’t even get me started on how soft you are with Laddie. You buy him allsorts. You treat us so well and I don’t understand why” he said bewildered

“Hmm. Well, the answer is simple” I said as I brought my soapy hand up to his cheek. “It’s because I love you all, so very dearly” I smiled sweetly.

Marko broke out into a wide smile. “Awww, babe. You love us? Ewww” He joked as he pulled me into a kiss.

Pulling away, I gave him a soft look.“Alright lover boy, I should really wash your hair now. It’s all matted” I said. Sternly grabbing the bottle of shampoo, I started to lather his hair. “It smells like you” he mumbled to himself as I continued the process of lathering and rinsing until there were no more suds in his hair.

Grabbing the conditioner, I gently raked it through his hair before grabbing a comb to get the knots out of his curly hair, being careful not to pull and hurt him. Once I was done running the conditioner through his hair, I rinsed it all out.

“Alright, I'm gonna give your jacket a wash. I’m sure you can handle the rest from here” I said. Standing from the bathroom floor, I moved to the door.

Before I stepped down the stairs I went to check on Paul, he was on my bed, towel still low on his hips as he read one of the comics Marko had earlier. He’d turned the rock music on my radio higher, seeming comfortable

I carefully made my way down the stairs with the rest of Markos clothes in my arms. I walked into the kitchen, putting his jeans and shirt in the washing machine and setting it away along with Paul's clothes. The sloshing sound of the washer filling with water engulfed the silent kitchen. Grabbing Marko’s jacket, I filled the sink with cold water and detergent then began gently scrubbing at the blood stains, carefully, so as to not ruin it. I hummed a random song I had heard from the radio earlier as I worked away to rid the jacket of all the blood soaking it.

I stiffened as a pair of cold hands made their way round my waist.

“What you doing down here all by yourself?” Paul hummed huskily in my ear as his hand made its way under my shirt.

“Ah! Paul baby, your hands are freezing” I squealed, trying to squirm away from him.

“Well, you can help me warm them up” He mumbled against my skin. Paul started to drag his lips slowly down my neck until he reached the junction where my neck met my shoulders. I hummed at the feeling of his soft lips on the crook of my neck, the sensation sending shockwaves through my body.

“I heard you and Marko in the bathroom” He whispered as he began kissing and nibbling back up my neck to my ear, causing me to let out a low huffy breath. “We love you too” he said as he pulled away, causing my hairs to stand on end.

Groaning at the loss of one of my vampire boyfriends body on mine, I turned to see his face lit up with a devilish smirk.

“Come on, Marks waiting” He informed, deciding I could finish washing markos jacket later. I dried my hands on a dish towel before following Paul up the stairs to my room.

As I entered the room I was met with the sight of Marko drying his hair with the spare towel I had given him earlier.

“Hey baby” He said joyfully with a smile. I chuckled at his joy. Paul had once again wrapped himself around me as he swayed to the rock music on the radio. He would occasionally place kisses along my neck.

Marko soon made his way over to us both. He placed one of his hands on my hips as he brought the other to my cheek to pull me into a passionate kiss.

The feeling of Marko’s lips on mine mixed with the feeling of Paul’s nibbling kisses and occasionally licking my neck made my head spin.

“Boys” I groaned at there attack as I pulled away from Marko for air, leaning my head back.

This only allowed the pair to continue their attack. Marko dove in, attaching his lips to the underside of my jaw.

Paul pulled away giggling. “Aww, look Marko, we have them melting” Paul teased, causing the other boy to pull away with a smile.

“You boys are the worst”. I groaned at the loss of their touch.

“You sure about that sugar?” Paul said as he tilted my chin to pull me into a passionate kiss. Marko trailed his cold hands from my hips up my stomach, the feeling of his cold fingertips trailing up my chest sent shivers down my spine, causing me to let out a moan into the kiss with paul.

Marko continued his path, his cold hand grabbed my chest with a dark chuckle. “Your heart is beating so fast baby. Do we really get you going that bad?” He said as he lifted my shirt and kissed my hip before he made his way up my stomach. The feeling of his soft breathing on my skin made my stomach muscles tense. It felt like the most heavenly torture.

He pulled away, making me internally groan. “You made them all whiney” Paul cooed in mock sympathy, causing Marko to giggle as he pulled my shirt off.

His nails gently dragged my hips closer to his face the cold tip of his nose hitting just above my hip made my body shiver in anticipation, Markos eye flitted up to mine then to pauls.

Paul's hand trailed up my chest his hand trailed up my chest to my his hands were soft as he moved my head slightly to the side and slowly licked up my neck before I felt the nipping feeling of his teeth dragging along the tender skin below my ear. Marko had pulled away from my hip his fingers digging under the hem of my jeans with a smirk “mmm hey paul do you think they are desperate enough” he rasped to the other vampire “nope” paul replied Marko breathily My room once filled with loud rock music was replaced by my own breathy wines and moans mixed with the raspy teasing giggles of Marko and paul they really did love teasing.

[kalliyen]

Brewing Romance

Pairing: Diluc x GN!Reader

Featuring: Diluc, Kaeya, Jean

Genre: Fluffff, Barista AU, Modern AU, College AU

Summary: barista au….un lang lol also diluc falls in love at first sight….yeah

Reader’s Pronouns: they/them

Warning: diluc is so down bad, kinda ooc mb…(not really) HES SO FINE WOOF WOOF slight kaebedo implied lawlwlwlwlw

Disclaimer: ⚠️ ONLY A WORK OF FICTION!

i. a change of pace

Diluc Ragnvindr wishes for a change of pace. Something different from his boring dull life as a college student who works part time at a nearby café.

It’s not like he needs the money or anything, his family is quite wealthy, but he decided to work for the experience. Also because his friend, Jean, forced him.

Not really forced him no, more like begged him to help her around the shop because they were very understaffed, and Diluc being the kind stoic soul he is, took pity in his friend and decided to accept her offer.

Unluckily for him, he didn’t know that his brother, Kaeya, also works at the café, if he asked Kaeya why, all he’d respond is with “To scout cute chicks!” But he knows Kaeya was just really ogling the blonde kid with bags in his eyes that sits in the back of the café, he noticed that Kaeya would always volunteer to give the man his order…..

ii. new face ?

It’s like as if the Anemo Archon himself heard his pleas for a new face, because a few days later he’s greeted with someone new.

Not like he recognizes every single costumer that comes and goes, but you stood out to him because damn….you were breathtaking.

When you walked up to the cashier he internally panicked, immediately putting Kaeya in his spot and disturbing his brother from ogling that blonde kid again.

“Hey?!! Bro what the hell was that for?!?!” Kaeya exclaims “Spot me. You take their order and I’ll make it. Alright?” Diluc states

Not getting another word in, and not wanting to question Diluc about his red face for now, he begrudgingly takes your order, still kind of looking at the blonde kid at the back (these brothers are so down bad what the hell 🔥🔥)

Diluc makes your order, still as red as his hair, because you ordered his favorite drink, and Jean noticed that he was making it with a smile on his face. ‘I guess he’s finally gone crazy.’ She thinks to herself.

Diluc hands you your order, looking down a bit, because he swear if he sees your beautiful presence again he might actually just combust.

You notice a ‘help wanted’ poster near the door and decide to ask him about it.

“Hey are you guys still looking for help? Cause I’d love to work part time here, if that’s alright.” You state. And Diluc’s brain actually stumbles into himself, he responds to you with “O-of course! We’d be happy to accept your h-help..You can ask the manager for the application form and she can schedule an interview with you” He finishes, and points to where Jean was.

“Thank you so much! Uhm….Diluc?” You read on his name tag. Taken aback, Diluc replies “O-of course! No problem. Happy to help.”

Kaeya was watching the whole scene from the cashier with a stupid smile on his face, god damn his brother was in for it hard.

iii. ARE YOU UP FOR THE CHALLENGE????? *vine boom*

On the day of your interview with Jean, you decided to dress up nicely and give it all you’ve got, like this is some big corporate job or something.

But hey, to you this was a big interview because god fucking damn did you need some spare cash, you don’t think you can live on processed food for another week even if you had to.

Jean doesn’t beat around the bush and immediately tells you that your hired, saying that you could start tomorrow.

Diluc over hears your interview and smiles to himself, he can finally work with someone he wants too!

iv. cupid works in mysterious ways

Even if you did work together, Diluc unfortunately does not have the same shift as you do. He works the lunch hours from 11 am to 3 pm, while you work from 8 am to 12 noon, which only alots one hour with you everyday, but he tried to make the best of those 60 minutes with you.

Though he was very nervous to approach you at first, he was the one tasked to help you work the coffee machine, and how the workflow goes.

Admittedly, he gets distracted by you sometimes, he just can’t help himself. The way your hair is kept neatly so it doesn’t get it your face, the way the apron hugs you form, making you seem more beautiful than you already were.

It’s not like you were stupid or anything, you weren’t oblivious to the obvious ogling Diluc does whenever he works with you. It brings a wave of heat to your cheeks, because to have such attractive man have eyes for you? You’d almost believe that you were the mc of a fan fiction or something.

Jean obviously noticed the tension you two would emit whenever you worked together, and how Diluc hesitated to greet you goodbye when your shift was over. So she arranged a new schedule for him, to be on the same work shift as you.

They weren’t as understaffed as before, having a good handful of employees that recently applied. Mostly because they wanted to check out the two hot brothers that worked at front. But hey, whatever keeps the business going am I right?

Before Diluc leaves by the end of his shift, double checking if he’s cleaned the machine thoroughly, Jean calls him into her office, Diluc obliges, not thinking much of it.

“Is there a particular reason you called me here Jean?” Diluc asks, while closing the door of her office. “Don’t worry Diluc, it isn’t anything dire. Just a slight change in your work hours.” She says while fixing the papers on her desk.

At this, Diluc’s ears perk up, “My shift? Change? What for?” To be closer with you, he hopes.

“I’ve decided for you to have the same shift as y/n, I sense that you have no opposition to this? Seeing as you enjoy your time on the job whenever they are present.” Jean states like it was to be expected. “Of course, I don’t have any oppositions. You are the manager after all.”

v. latte (he)art

To say you were surprised to see Diluc at work that early the next day was an understatement. You were ecstatic. “Diluc? what are you doing at work so early?” You ask, a smile threatening to form on your lips, trying your hardest to hold yourself back at the sight of him.

“Jean decided to change my shift, so I could work the morning hours, since that’s our busiest time.” And to spend more time with you, Diluc wants to say, but decides against it.

“Really? That’s great!” You start with a smile on your face. “Oh and uhm, I actually really needed your help with something. You know the latte art? Yeah I’m learning to do that now but it’s really hard, Kaeya tried to teach me but he completely gave up, I swear he just works here to ogle that blonde kid at the back”

“Of course I’d help you y/n, it’d be my pleasure.” Diluc says with a smile on his face. He looked very pretty when he smiled, you thought.

You and Diluc spent a few hours and countless cups of coffee, trying to get you to create an actually presentable output. But you just couldn’t seem to get the hang of it.

Profusely apologizing over and over again, But Diluc didn’t seem to mind, having been patient with you this whole time. He decided it was best for you both to have a slight break from the latter art.

But then you felt something warm on your hands, a cup of coffee and Diluc’s warm fingers, seeming to engulf your own.

You looked down at the cup of coffee, and then up at him, noticing that the cup held a cute heart in it, which made your own heart soar with happiness.

“Let’s take a break yeah? We can learn once you’ve collected yourself. Just enjoy this cup I’ve made for you for now.” Diluc hands you the cup, while leaving a loving yet hesitant kiss to your forehead.

———————

gbye i didn’t know how to end this……anyways enjoy 🤪🤪🤪🤪🤪

[all-the-things-2020]

Late Night Talking - Chapter Ten

Summary: The aftermath of the movie premiere.

Word Count: 3150+

Rating: PG-13

Warnings: mentions of parent death, issues with body image

Tag list: @rhoorl @avastrasposts @readingiskeepingmegoing @runningmom94 @gwendibleywrites

We slept late the next morning. It was after nine when I crawled out of bed to use the bathroom. Dieter was still passed out cold, lying face down with his face crammed into a pillow, his bare ass poking out from under the covers. I took a look at myself in the mirror and wished I hadn’t. My hair was sticking up in all directions and there were bags under my eyes. It was a far cry from my red carpet look.

I decided to take a shower and start over with my hair, rather than try to tame it the way it was. When I got out, I slipped into a pair of leggings and a t-shirt, deciding to forgo a bra, at least for the time being. It was going to be a lazy day, after all.

Dieter was still asleep. I leaned over the bed to cover him up and he grunted. “Why are you so obsessed with my butt?,” he mumbled.

”I’m not obsessed with your butt,” I told him. “I just didn’t want it to catch cold.” I tucked the comforter around him and patted his bottom. “Go back to sleep, Deet. You’ve earned it.”

”What time?”

”Doesn’t matter. Go to sleep.”

He didn’t argue with me. I knew the press junket had been stressful and tiring. He deserved to get some rest. 

I found my purse in the living room and pulled out my phone. I’d managed to remember to turn it off last night, so the battery was still at 65% when I powered it on. All my apps were lit up with notifications, but I went first to my texts. 

SAM: You look GORGEOUS!!!!

ME: Aw, thanks. It’s all thanks to the stylists. Did my hair and makeup and everything. Felt like a giant Barbie doll. LOL

It was close to midday back East, so I knew she was probably at work and wouldn’t respond right away, so I jumped over to Instagram. I followed the studio’s page and I knew they would have posted photos from last night. 

There were several pics from the red carpet, including one of me and Dieter. It was weird seeing myself all glammed up, standing beside him as he posed effortlessly for the camera. I could see that I was a bit stiff and awkward, despite the elegant dress and high heels. Still, I looked nice. Not bad for a first time, I thought. Then I started reading the comments.

She’s OLD.

Come on, girl, at least dye that gray hair. Woof.

Thought Bravo had better taste than that. 

Def a publicity stunt. Prob trying to hide that he’s gay AF.

If they think we’ll fall for that, he needs a new publicist. Lots of actresses they could have hired to help his image. Barf.

I think she looks nice. For a middle aged woman. 

There were positive comments, of course, many of them, but my eye went right to the negative ones. After all, most of the positive comments were simple heart emojis or “they look so cute” or other generic messages. The negative ones were more pointed.

I closed Instagram. Twitter would be even worse — there were so many trolls on there that I hardly ever posted anything anymore. Maybe tumblr would be kinder. I was wrong.

There were several posts under the hashtag “dieter bravo” that displayed one of the Getty photos from the night before and had commentary along the lines of “I’m glad he’s so happy” and “Aww, they made it red carpet official” but there was also lots that claimed to be insanely jealous of me for being beside him.

Oof, not to be that girl, but I could pull off a red carpet look better than that, just saying.

Not sure what he sees in her, but you do you, Dieter.

He looks AMAZING as always. Wish she’d worn something better.

She looks like she doesn’t want to be there. I’m sure it’s overwhelming and all but at least look happy to be next to him. I’d kill to be on the red carpet with him.

Ugh, I hate her, lol. Seriously, does anyone else think he’ll be back on the market soon? She is so not his type. Dieter fucking Bravo is a party boi.

I could feel tears stinging at the back of my eyes. It was silly — I knew they were making the comments out of jealousy or sheer assholery — but it was like being teased or excluded on the playground in elementary school. It still hurt.

Fortunately, my phone pinged with an incoming text.

SAM: Those stylists couldn’t have done it without something amazing to start with — YOU! I am so proud of you, chickie! You rocked that red carpet. And Dieter 🥵Don’t know how you manage to survive around him without spontaneously combusting. Dude is HOT.

ME: You don’t know how badly I needed that, chickie! Been looking at comments on social and people are brutal.

SAM: Fuck them. I’ve been bragging on you all day. Everyone thinks you look fabulous. Trolls gonna troll.

I smiled. Leave it to Sam to cheer me up. Then another text came in, this time from Simone.

SIMONE: Girl! You were on fire 🔥 last night. Your pic is all over campus. Kids are all planning to go see the movie with Miss Emily’s boyfriend this weekend. Eileen had such a sourpuss when I saw her, lol. 

ME: Thanks! Been seeing some haters online so glad the kiddos got my back. And I’m ROTFL over Eileen 🤣

SIMONE: One of my kids was IRATE over some of the stuff people were saying about you. She was going OFF! I didn’t even know she knew where the library was, lol. If a 15yo can see through their b.s., so can you.

“Hey.” Dieter came stumbling out of the bedroom with his hair sticking straight up and one hand in his boxer shorts scratching his ass. If only the fans could see him now!

”Hey yourself,” I said. “You need coffee?”

He nodded as he shuffled toward the kitchen island. “I got it,” he said. “You looking at photos from last night?”

”I was, but people are mean. Then I got a couple of texts that cheered me up.”

”People are fucking assholes online,” he said as he dumped water and coffee grounds into the machine. He slopped water onto the counter but didn’t wipe it up. He was messier than usual when he was only half awake. “First thing Carmen told me when she signed on was never read the comments.”

While the coffee was brewing, he fished his phone out of his pants, which were draped over one of the dining room chairs. He slumped onto a stool at the island and started swiping. “You looked so good last night,” he said. Then he yawned and scratched his head. “Anyone who says different has their head up their own ass or is just jealous. Or both.” 

The scent of coffee wafted through the air and a shaft of sunlight lanced through a gap in the vertical blinds. The kitchen was illuminated with golden light and Dieter’s hair became a halo of fire around his head, just for a second. Who gives a fuck what Prissy McDickface on Instragram thinks? I’m the one here with Dieter, watching him smile at pictures of us while he’s waiting for his coffee. And if Dieter could smile before his first infusion of caffeine of the day, I knew he was truly happy. Because of me.

*******************************************

The movie was a hit. It was number one at the box office that weekend, and Dieter spent most of Saturday afternoon fielding phone calls and texts from Carmen and his agent. He looked every inch a Hollywood star as he sat on a lounge chair beside the pool with his Ray-Ban sunglasses on and his phone up to his ear. 

“Yeah, set it up,” he said. “Can’t hurt to meet with them.” He looked at me over the tops of his shades and winked.

”Shit, I can’t believe all this,” he said when he’d hung up. “Carmen has ten journalists lined up to interview me. And half of them are from legit outlets, not just bloggers.” He laughed. “Who knew a twenty minute part would get so much attention?”

We had skimmed some of the reviews online and most of them had been positive. Many of them mentioned Dieter’s performance as one of the highlights of the film; several had used the phrase “Bravo’s back.”  

“And David has two meetings booked with producers this week,” Dieter continued. “I don’t want to get ahead of myself but this might be the thing to get the ball rolling again.”

“I hope so,” I said. I knew that Dieter really wanted to get back to the level he’d enjoyed earlier in his career, where he was taken seriously as an actor. He’d taken just about any part the last few years, just to keep the money flowing but while movies like Cliff Beasts might be popular with fans they weren’t taken seriously by critics. And he admitted he’d been phoning it in before he’d gone to rehab. This film was the first project he’d worked on since and apparently he’s done a very good job. 

“Just don’t get too famous and forget about the little people like me,” I added.

“I will never forget about you,” he said seriously. “And you are definitely not one of the ‘little people’ in my life. You’re huge, baby.”

“Yeah, that’s what some of the trolls online are saying,” I joked.

“Fuck them. I’ve been with skinny women and it’s like hugging a skeleton. You’re real, Em. Nothing fake about you. Which is one of the many, many reasons that I love you.”

******************************************

We had finally finished off the leftover Chinese food, so we decided to go out for dinner Saturday night. Nothing fancy, just a little hole in the wall Mexican place that Dieter was fond of, and not just because the food was good. The owners were very protective of his privacy and didn’t laugh at his clumsy attempts at Spanish. His father’s parents had been born in Ecuador, and he still had some distant cousins in South America, but Dieter and his family had only ever spoke English.

”My dad can get by pretty well,” he’d explained to me once. “He does business with one of his cousins who lives in Buenos Aires, and he sometimes visits his aunt in Santiago, but Freddy and I never learned. Hell, I took French in high school just to fuck with everyone. Freddy took German, of course.”

Although they’d come from Ecuador, Dieter’s grandparents were descended from German and Italian immigrants. “My dad’s grandpa Antonio Bravo married one of the Diefenbach girls,” Dieter had explained. “Huge Romeo and Juliet vibes there. The two families were rivals in the button business.”

My own skill in Spanish was limited to the Spanglish I’d picked up by osmosis from living in Southern California (like Dieter, I’d take French in school, because I thought it sounded fancy). But everyone at Ramon’s was friendly and very patient with our attempts to do more than just ask for what was on the menu.

”Buenos noches,” our waiter said as we sat down at our table, tucked away in the back. ”El jefe said you get free margaritas because the movie is doing so well.”

”Gracias,” said Dieter. “Um, dos platos de empanadas, por favor. Y los margaritas.”

”Muy bien! And my sister in law saw the movie last night. She said tell you she really liked it if I saw you.”

”Tell her thanks, man,” Dieter had exhausted his capacity for Spanish already. He was still running on fumes from the press junket. I could see it in his eyes.

After a delicious dinner of empanadas and enchiladas — not to mention two extremely generous margaritas — we went back to Dieter’s place and collapsed on the couch.

”If I went there too often, I’d gain thirty pounds,” Dieter said, unbuttoning his pants. 

“The food is amazing,” I agreed, glad I was wearing stretchy pants. “You want to put a movie on before we succumb to the food coma?”

”You read my mind.” He grabbed the remote off the coffee table. We were only about twenty minutes into Jurassic Park when I felt his head slump onto my shoulder. He was out. I maneuvered him into a more comfortable position so he wouldn’t wake up with a stiff neck. I never saw the end of the movie. I was tired, too.

**************************************************************

We lay in bed, both of us wide awake at two a.m. after our nap on the couch. “Whatcha thinking about?” Dieter asked, his hand idly playing with my hair.

”Not much. Just feeling cozy. How about you?”

”I’m thinking how I could get used to this,” he said. “Dinner, falling asleep on the couch, lying in bed talking about stuff … I wish you didn’t have to go back home tomorrow.” He kissed my forehead. “You know you can move in any time you want.”

”It’s tempting but it would be a hell of a commute.” 

“Quit your job. Get a new one. There are plenty of schools. You’d still be in the same union, right? Still get your pension?”

I rolled onto my back. “Deet, it’s not that easy. There aren’t all that many school library positions out there and they pay well enough that people don’t leave. Or they’re part-time at elementary schools. And other positions … yeah, I could do other stuff, but your retirement is based off of your final two years salary. If I took a pay cut, I’d get less so I’d have to work longer.”

“Jeez, you sound like my dad and Freddy. ‘Be practical, Deiter. Plan ahead, Dieter. Invest wisely, Dieter’,” he grumbled.

”I have to be,” I said. “I only have myself to rely on. You know my parents didn’t leave me anything.”

Dieter sighed. “You aren’t alone, Em. You have me.”

”For now,” I said. “I want to believe this is forever, Deet, I really do, but I just can’t jump off the cliff yet.” I sat up, hugging my knees. “I know you think I’m being too cautious, and I know it probably hurts you to hear me say stuff like ‘for now’ when you want to hear ‘forever’ but …”

He sat up and put his arm around me. “I get it,” he said quietly. “I get you. And you’re probably right. I’m too much like my mom. I need you to balance me out.”

”You don’t talk about her much,” I prompted. I knew she had passed away not long after he’d won his Oscar, but that was public knowledge.

He scrubbed a hand over his face. “Yeah, I’m still working through some shit in therapy,” he said. “My mom … she was an artist. Painting, sculpture, stuff like that. And that was the love of her life. Art. Creating. And once she created something, she moved on. She wasn’t interested anymore once a piece was done.”

I kissed his shoulder. “You don’t have to talk about her if you don’t want to,” I said. 

“When she and Dad got divorced, she moved to New York City,” he said. “That’s why I went there for college. But about two months after I got there, she moved to Europe. So I went there after I graduated. She was in Italy, so I went to Milan. Then she moved to Madrid, then Stockholm — god, Stockholm was so freaking cold — and then I got tired of following her and came to L.A.” He laid his head on my shoulder. “I was going to visit her in Switzerland after I won the Oscar. She’d actually called me and said she was proud of me. But I had a movie to do first and … it was a car accident in the Alps. She and her latest guy were on their way to Venice and a dude in a Maserati blew a turn and crashed into them.”

”Oh, Deet, I’m so sorry,” My own parents had been ill before they passed, so I’d had some warning, at least. 

He shook his head. “Hey, we’re supposed to be celebrating this weekend, not confessing our darkest moments. So let’s talk about something happy. Like my bank account after the movie earns out and I start getting some checks. We should go somewhere. Romantic getaway.”

”I do have a week off for Thanksgiving,” I said. My aunt always invited me up to her place for Thanksgiving and I always declined and ended up at some friend or co-worker’s Thanksgiving dinner. It was not my favorite holiday.

”Hey, see, making plans for the future.” He nudged me with his shoulder.

”It’s like two months away,” I reminded him. “Not that far in the future.”

”Baby steps, Em. Baby steps.” Then he kissed me and we stopped talking for a while.

******************************************

As I was driving home on Sunday afternoon, my phone rang. I usually don't like to use the Bluetooth, because it distracts me from the road, but I recognized the number. It was Sam.

”Hey, Sam, what’s up?” She rarely called; we both preferred to text. Our grown up version of passing notes in class.

“Just checking that you’re still alive after spending three whole days with Dieter,” she said. Her tone was joking, so I knew nothing serious had prompted the call. “Really, I just wanted to hear your voice. I saw the movie and it just doesn’t seem real that you and Dieter are … I mean, it sounds stupid, but I had to make sure you were still you.”

”I get it,” I said. “Hey, I’m on the freeway right now. Can I call you back when I get home? We can have a good talk. I’ll tell you all about the dress and the red carpet and … maybe you can give me some advice?”

”You better not be thinking of breaking up with him, Em. He’s the best thing that’s happened to you in a long time.”

”No, no, kind of the opposite. Shit, use your signal, you asshole! Sorry, some dude in a Tesla just cut me off. I’ve got to hang up. Talk to you when I get home, chickie.”

”Stay safe, chickie.”

I ended the call and tried to concentrate on the traffic. It was an incredibly long and tedious drive to make every day. There was no way I could keep my job and be with Dieter more than just on the weekends. And I would be foolish to quit for a guy I’d only known for a few months. Right? 

I shoved the thought to the back of my mind. Sam would help me figure it all out. She always did. 

[zeppeli-reelstallbun]

The Exception

Prologue - Chapter 1

[PAIRING] Bucciarati x Reader (afab-she/her) (multiple pov)

[SUMMARY] Your date was a disaster, and your expectations had already been low to begin with- but a good friend does what she must. Read the prologue first!!

[WC] 2.5k APOLOGIES they will not be this short in the future. These first two parts are plot important for setup reasons, unfortunately. Just didn’t want to put more than one pov in a single post yall

[!!!] language, concept is inspired by goodfellas, so a lot of dialogue and narration has been picked straight from that. not cannon accurate, google translated Italian, pulling things out of my ass in terms of locations and such, lmk if I missed anything,

[A/N] Woof, here’s chapter one as promised. They will be longer moving forward, I swear. Eh I don’t feel that bad, these were posted on the same day. Uhhhh yeah don’t know what else to say except that I got my nails done and now they’re a bitch to type with so that’s pretty cool. Also, merry early Christmas for those who celebrate :)

Also also, as someone who hates reading oc names in fics 99% of the time, the made up friend character means nothing to me and will be gone so soon. Toodles.

I can’t stand him. In fact, I’d call him obnoxious. He’s just sitting there, fiddling with his watch like this isn’t worth his time.

It had been like this the entire night, and you were beginning to wonder why you even agreed to join Lucia in the first place. It seemed like Guido was a decent guy, at least if you ignored his questionable taste in friends. Thankfully she was having a good time, sitting and laughing and leaning into his chest like she wasn’t hesitant to go out in the first place. Yes, your expectations had been low to begin with, but the behavior you witnessed at dinner was nothing but insulting. And then, before it was time to go, your date was rushing you out of the restaurant! It was ridiculous how he paraded you to the vehicle as if this were a successful night out, hand hovering over the small of your back until needed to open your door.

You didn’t feel like it was overdramatic to call this evening a failure. In fact, that word seemed a gross understatement even now.

If it weren’t for one exchange he initiated on the trip home, you might have believed the entire thing had been orchestrated to get you away from Lucia. At first, you were confused when he pulled up the driver's privacy screen; was he about to give you a reason to be concerned?

”I realize tonight wasn’t…” he paused, picking his next word carefully, “optimal.”

You didn’t give him a response, keeping your knees shifted away from him and your posture neutral.

He continued, “Mista didn’t invite me until yesterday. I already made a commitment to meet with my supervisor tonight, something I couldn’t change even if I wanted to. But he couldn’t really ask anyone else.”

“Lucia practically begged us to meet them again Friday-“ you began, getting ready to give him a way out.

“Guido wasn’t much better,” your date interjected. “I think he would have dropped to his knees if we told him it would secure a yes.”

In spite of yourself, a laugh escaped from the bottom of your stomach. He was witty, you realized. And worse, he delivered it in the same, dry tone he used in regular conversation. The combination left you speechless, if only temporarily.

“I won’t be able to pick you up,” he continued before you could object, “but I can take you home again, if you’d prefer. Can we meet at the restaurant?”

Fine. You thought as you nodded your head. One more chance. All things considered, I can give him the benefit of the doubt.

You didn’t think of anything else for the remainder of the drive. Not the fact that your date seemed to have a personal driver, nor the suspicion in meeting an employer so late in the evening. You were only focused on getting home and trying to put aside your personal frustrations for the next time you dined with Bruno Bucciarati. After all, he still took the time to walk you to your door. Did he factor this into his schedule? Did he plan to leave with time to escort me home instead of letting me third wheel?

But, you weren’t willing to think about that right now.

He hadn’t proven that he deserved it, at least not yet.

----- ----- ----- ----- -----

Guido was more than happy to drive you to dinner alongside Lucia, though you knew this was an attempt to gain your friend's favor more than anything else. Regardless, you appreciated the gesture. It beat walking halfway across the globe to reach the restaurant, which seemed to have been picked for its inconvenient location over anything else. Still, you wouldn’t complain. You didn’t need to worry about the transportation, and you likely wouldn’t have to pay for your meal again. He might have been closed off during conversation, but Bucciarati didn't even let you touch the check. Besides, it would be a challenge for the second dinner to go worse than the first one…

Perhaps that thought was responsible for your hesitance to admit he stood you up.

First it was five minutes. Then ten. Then fifteen, and you were escorted to your seats. Twenty, and the waiter checked in on the table. Twenty-five, and his friend explained that one more might be coming. Thirty, and you felt your hopes drop completely. Oh well, guess I dodged a bullet.

“I feel terrible. I don’t know where he is.” Mista finally said, confronting the elephant in the room. The waiter had taken their orders, it felt awkward pushing him back any longer. You had insisted the couple have some sort of date, you really didn’t care that things didn’t work out… It wasn't your fault Mista had unreliable friends.

“You know, he really liked you too,” he continued, turning to Lucia, “all he did was talk about her. He liked you.”

Sure. Maybe last night I could have believed that.

You were a trio instead of a double date that night. But you didn’t really care. Did you? Even second guessing that feeling of apathy made your stomach churn, why should it matter that one guy didn’t work out. Worse than that, however, Guido thought he was making things better by bringing it up every time he saw fit. What you thought would be simple enough to ignore instead continued to grow with each minute that passed. By the time dinner wrapped up, you considered yourself angry with the man.

With the same grating voice you had become accustomed to, Mista began to ramble again, “He should have called, I hope it’s nothing serious. He really isn’t like this, ever.”

“Then why don’t we do something instead of just talking about it.” You finally snapped back, dropping the fork from your hand. You’d had enough of the idle chatter, enough of the unimportant setup. It was time for Mista to put his money where his mouth was.

“What?” He asked, brows furrowing.

“Let’s go find him.” You were being dead serious, the extravagant wine in your system encouraging you to rip him a new one. “You know where he spends time, I assume.”

Pleadingly, you locked eyes with your friend, praying she would understand what you were telling her. He’ll do anything you say right now, he’s wrapped around your finger.

You don’t know why you even doubted her, she read your mind with ease. “Pleaaaase Guido-“ she whined, wrapping her arms around him while tossing her head back. “We could stay at mine if we’re out too late looking for him.”

Frankly, the tone of her voice left you impressed. I owe you big time, you said with your gaze. She rolled her eyes at you, unknown to the boy escorting them out. ‘Lord, you have no idea,’ you guessed she replied.

----- ----- ----- ----- -----

While you assumed Guido would be a careful driver at first, all notions of the concept had fleeted by the time you reached Napoli Centrale.

You had nearly been ready to give up. In reality, you had only been driving for upwards of an hour, but it felt like you were trapped in the car with the couple for days. The sun had long begun its descent, street lights now illuminating the water lined streets. There wasn’t a man on earth worth all this trouble, regardless of how pissed you were at him. You were about to voice your defeat, when your friend's date caught a glimpse of the less than subtle blue hair. You didn’t even have the time to voice an objection before the car drifted to an enthusiastic halt.

Guido had given you an entrance, his brakes squeaking enough to burn rubber and announce your presence to the entire block. Whatever you decided to say, it needed to match that urgency. There was nothing left to do but open the door and step out of the car, fists clenched so as not to show their trembling.

Unaware of the storm approaching, Bucciarai recognized the vehicle, if nothing else. “Mista, I don’t have time-”

“You have some nerve standing me up.” You cut him off, slamming the door behind you as you made your way to the paved entryway he was occupying. “Nobody does that to me.”

He wasn’t alone, you noticed. Fuck. “Who do you think you are, some big shot? Think you’re pretty enough to be a casanova?” The group of men around him loosened up, muttering a bit at the show starting in front of them. One even let out a laugh at his expense.

You savored the look on his face, the perfect mix of shock and awe. His mouth fell agape, but he quickly pulled himself together.

Turning to take one more look at his friends, Bruno stood to greet you. His legs closed the distance with ease, and he brought his hands as he spoke. “Take it easy. Slow down, all right?” He smiled convincingly, eying you up and down to gauge how pissed you might have been. “I forgot. I thought it was next week.”

You threw your head back, unimpressed as you spat, “It was Friday. It was this Friday. And you agreed.” What did it even matter? “Fuck off-”

He took a step forward as you began to turn away, reaching out to grab your wrist. Gentle, you noticed, despite the stern command in its nature. “Hey, we can talk about this,” he nearly asked, “take it easy.”

The group of boys laughed at him. Any variation of ‘calm down’ is universally frowned upon when confronting an upset woman, how Bruno managed to forget this was unfathomable. For his group of boys, this was the luckiest day of their life. Finally, something to hold over the perfect mafiosos head. For you, however, this was the final straw.

“Talk about it?” You asked slowly, furrowing your brows and tilting your head as if saying ‘that’s the dumbest fucking thing I’ve ever heard.’

“Talk to you after what you just did to me?” You were smiling, shaking your head as one of the onlookers let out an ‘oooooooh.’

“Forget it. I’m not talking to you about anything.” You finished, pulling your hand back. That’s when you noticed it -- the look in Bucciaratis eyes that left you second guessing your anger. According to his dark gaze, you were something between predator and prey. A challenge to be untangled. A delicious meal laced with deadly poison. You wanted to gag for even thinking something so cliche.

Unknown to you, it’s not often someone speaks to Bruno this way. Unknown to you, this sparked his interest more than anything else. Aside from his superiors, this behavior wouldn’t have been tolerated… In all honesty, he would have put a stop to it immediately if you were one of his boys. If you were anyone else, he wouldn't have dealt with you at all.

But, here you were. Some civilian girl somewhere in between the two, allowed to make a public mockery of his shortcomings. The boys sitting behind him did not take this lightly, this you recognized if nothing else.

“I thought you would stand me up. You looked bored. You didn’t say anything. What do you expect? Hmm?” You turned, rolling your eyes while shifting your weight. His grip on your wrist gave him one final point of leverage over you. Pulling you back towards him once more, the two of you locked eyes.

“Well-” he began, eyeing you up and down again, “let me make it up to you.”

It must have been the way his gaze lingered. Despite your anger, a part of you never wanted anyone to look at you with that same hunger ever again. Only him. You wanted to capture Bucciaratis' look of yearning, it had felt like you deserved to. You had gone through this much trouble to obtain it, after all.

But still, he didn’t deserve a solid answer from you. “I’ll think about it.”

“I’ll make it up to you. Next Friday,” he patted his jacket, taking a moment of composure to look for something, “I’ll pick you up at 8.”

Bold. Straightforward. It was a start.

“You’ll show up to my house at 8,” you corrected, beginning to walk back to Mistas car, “I’ll decide if you’re picking me up or begging.”

A chorus of laughter and mockery rang in your ears as you turned back to the car. If nothing else, that group of boys wasn’t going to let their friend hear the end of it.

----- ----- ----- ----- -----

This is purely self indulgent slop, also, im about to go get so baked in my childhood bedroom - wish me luck

[ry-ichi1]

The Old Picture

Summary: Two or Three years ago before the event, Scrooge finds Derya's old photo when they were in the Navy with their mysterious old friend while he wants to head home.

Wordcounts: ±2700 words

Tags: tbh idk what tags I have to put on this

Warning: mentioning death?

A/N: LAKSJDKJAKASMKA THIS IS THE FIRST TIME I MADE FANFIC. If anything is wrong or missing, please tell me because English isn’t my first language (thanks to Grammarly) and I’m bad at writing. Also, I hope you enjoy this story.

⊱ ────── {.⋅ ✯ ⋅.} ────── ⊰

Derya’s POV

Marley and Scrooge’s private banker and lender is gloomy like usual. I and Bob, who works there, tidy up all papers and prepare to go home because it’s already 6 P.M. now. Bob has already done to prepare him to go home and ask for his wages from Sir Scrooge. Again, he is always grumpy, especially when it’s almost Christmas Eve.

“Hey Derya, do you mind to come my home to celebrate Christmas Eve with my family?” offer him.

“Thanks for your offer, but I can’t join you this year” it’s because my brother, Henry, will come to my place. “I’m so sorry Bob” I feel bad for him, especially for his kids. They must be waiting for my story about when I was a pirate.

“Oh, it’s okay! No pressure on you. I have to go now, Merry Christmas Derya and Sir Scrooge!” he already step out from the door and meets his children outside. There are Kathy and Tiny Tim outside. They notice me and wave their hand.

I wave my hand to them as I peek out from the door. “Merry Christmas to you Bo­-”

“Yeah yeah merrily doo Christmas!” He slams the door.

I jump back as he slams the door. Yep, another of his normal behavior.

“And you!” He sees me annoyingly. “It’s already 6 P.M.! Why are you still here???”

“Well, I just want to head to my home, but…” I lend my hand to him as I smile slyly.

“Ughhh, okay this your wages and go home now!” He pushes me into the front of the door.

“Okay, okay! See you later and Mer-” he slams the door. “-ry Christmas” as I expected.

Ebenezer’s POV

“I swear to god why that person is still in my li-” I notice there is a small piece of paper on the floor. I pick it up and realize that the paper is a photo. I take a look at that photo “it’s that Derya?” I had never seen them in Navy uniform before and they were happy like they had no problems in their life. “And who is this man?” that question was already answered as I read their handwriting (I believe) that said, “Mar, 1823. Drinking with my friend Thompson!”. So, he is Derya’s friend named Thompson. What happened to their friendship? Wait… why do I care about it???

Prudence’s appearance makes me distract from that mind. She seems curious about what I am holding in my hand. “It’s just their photo with their dear friend and we have to go home now Prudence” I keep that photo in my coat and prepare to go home. When I reach the door, Prudence blocks my way. “Woof!” she looks at me with a serious face. “What?! You want me to return that photo now???” she nods. “Oh Prudence dear, we can do that later! We still have another day to return it!” she seems to disagree with my statement. Silence fills this room and she still doesn’t move from her place. “BAH FINE! WE RETURN IT TO DERYA NOW”.

She looks happy that we will go to their place. “I can’t believe I have to do this” I lock the door and go to their place. One question, where do they live? I never ask them where they live. What?! I’m just minding my own business! …, Okay only one way to know where they live and I kinda hate it.

“Excuse me sir, do you know where Derya Darenport lives?” this man looks familiar from behind.

“Oh! Derya? They liv- SIR SCROOGE?!?” It’s Mr. Jenkins. He looks scared to me, just like he sees a ghost. “Well, you know my debt-”

“I don’t ask about that, Jenkins. I ask about where Derya lives”

“Oh, right, well Derya lives around South London. From here, ….” He explains in detail.

“So, you said they live in a tenement?” I ask again to make sure.

“Yes, sir”

“…, thank you for the direction Mr. Jenkins”

“You’re welcome si-”

“Don’t forget to pay your debt, Mr. Jenkins. You know what happened if you don’t pay your debt, right?” I point to him with my cane.

“Ye-yes, sir”

“Good” I walk away with Prudence beside me.

Jenkins’ POV

He already walks away to head to Derya’s home. “Ain’t they already working together in the same place in 4 or 5 years? …, that man is so unpredictable”. I shake my head and go to my home.

Ebenezer’s POV

“So this place is where Derya lives huh…” the tenement looks dull. “Sigh...” I knock on the door and wait.

“I’m coming~” Finally the door is open. There is an old lady, whom I assume, is the owner of this tenement. “Oh, Mr. Scrooge! Come in” I step inside the tenement. “Is there any need or trouble that made you bring here sir?” she smiles in friendly.

“Oh, I have an important thing with Derya. So please, lead me to them”

“Ooh~, Derya lives on the third floor and-” she sees Prudence. “Also your dog can join us too” Prudence looks happy after hearing about it. “Well, follow my lead, sir”.

I follow her lead as she talks about herself (which I found out that her name is Eleanor Taylor) and the dwellers of this tenement. Speaking about the tenement, how bloody hell they can live in this stuffy place??? No, I’m not caring about them! Just- BAH HUMBUG!

“You know what, Derya always talking about you sir” she looks at me as we walk to the third floor.

“Huh, I bet they do hate speech about me, right?” How dare they talk about my bad thing to other people.

“Well… kinda, but most of it is interesting about you”

Interesting??? What does it mean??? Suddenly, My mind interrupts by the beautiful violin that plays the “Greensleeves” song. That soft melody soothes my mind and gets closer as I walk.

“Alright sir, this is Derya’s room” I never know they can play the violin. “Do you want me to call them sir?”

“Ah, no thank you, Mrs. Taylor, I will call them”

“Okay, If you need some help you can call me” she walks downstairs. “Also please again, call me Madam El” she disappears while she goes down.

I take a breath and knock on the door.

Derya’s POV

My “performance” was interrupted by someone knocking on my door. I hope it’s my brother. I open the door and I’m shocked. “Sir Scrooge! What are you doing here???” I see Prudence with him too. Ain’t this tenement didn’t allow to bring any animals here... Wait, how she can pass from Madam El??? And that’s how scary Sir Scrooge is??? Even Madam El let Prudence pass? Damn, Scrooge…

“Well…” he takes something from his coat. “I believe this photo belongs to you” he gives me a photo.

I take that photo and take a look. My eyes widen as I realize this photo is of myself with my dear old friend. “W-where you find it?”

“It fell on the floor” straight to the point.

“I- thank you, sir! This photo is very important to me” I hold my photo tightly.

“Huh! If you know that thing is important, you have to keep it safe next time you little magpie!” He still uses that “insult”.

“Okay, okay, yes sir land boy!” I know he hates that name. “And aren’t you have to go home now?” His home is far from here if I’m not wrong.

“To be honest, do you mind explain that what happened to your friend in that photo?”

Okay, that’s new for him that never care about around him. “Uhhh…”

“If you’re not ready to tell about it, it’s okay! Take your time”

“No, no, no, I’m okay with that” I look around first. “Let’s talk about it in my room, shall we?”

Ebenezer’s POV

“…, okay” did I just agree with it?

“Well, come in sir! Make sure you feel like your own home if you can” I rolled my eyes as I take a step to their room.

As I enter the room, the warm and cozy atmosphere meet me. Maybe their room is so small, but simple and not stuffy. Also, their usual scent, the ocean scent, is really strong in this room.

“May take a seat, sir” they pull the chair from the dining table that you can meet right after you enter the room beside their wardrobe. “Can I take your coat, sir?”

“No thank you, I keep it” I take a sit as they prepare the tea in their “little kitchen” on the right side of the dining table. Their room isn’t festive for celebrating Christmas Eve as I expect, but there is a small Christmas tree on the dining table. It is put in the pot and decorated with folding papers in a star shape with a big paper star on the top (which is very creative). “I like how you’re played the violin before” I break the silence between us.

“Oh! Uh…, thanks” They try to hide their bashful face while they serve the tea to me and them. “So, what made you interested in that photo?” They seem curious as they bring a chair to sit close to me.

“First of all, you never talk about him because he is your friend. Second, why did you quit from Navy? You look happy in that photo” as I finish asking, they laugh. “Wha- what’s funny about it???”

“Well, maybe I was happy like in that photo, but every happiness has tragedy after it” They’re right. “For the first question, He is already dead” their smile seem blue. Prudence walks to them to comfort them. They pat her “I’m okay”

“I’m sorry to hear that” I want to comfort them by patting their shoulder, but I might regret it if I do that.

“It’s okay, really” but their face says not okay.

“So let me guess, you quit from Navy because your friend died?” that reason is kinda ridiculous, but I believe they have more reason than that.

“Well, almost” they take a sip of tea. “I quit from Navy because I found out how sinner they are, especially what the higher position in the Navy did to my friend” they talk in rage but quietly. At the same time, their face is close to mine and our eyes meet each other. I never knew they have pretty eyes. Their eyes remind me of a ruby, not really red but- WHAT ARE YOU THINKING ABOUT??? FOCUS SCROOGE!

“What did they do to your friend?” I know this seems rude, but I have to do it to distract myself.

“Sigh…, they killed him like an accident” I’m shocked. “He died in un-justice way” they hold their anger. “He died in knowing their sins” they hold their anger tears. I‘m concerned about them now. “Because of them, he left his dear wife and a son I-” their tears can hold it anymore. My hand reflex moves to their shoulder to comfort them.  “I’m so sorry…, I shouldn’t cry over the past…” they wipe their tears.

“Take your time” I smile at them. What is wrong with me?

“Again, I’m okay” they put their hand on my hand on their shoulder. “Also, you should smile more! You look good with it” I try to hide my blushing face. I hope they won’t notice it.

“So, do you still mad about it?”

“Of course I do! I even want to have revenge on them again, but…” they look at me. “… I can’t do that because they are too powerful and I have to move forward” they smile sweetly. “Maybe the past makes me hurt, but I cannot brood over it forever and have to move on” I’m processing what they just said.

Someone just knocked on the window. Aren’t we on the third floor? There is no way people can climb on the wall. Derya walks toward to window and opens it a little. A crow enters the room with a paper scroll on its back. Oh, it’s a crow.

“Oh Sir Erebus, you must be tired, right?” they pat that crow and give some peanuts to it. Sir Erebus? Heh, What a funny name. They take that paper and read it as that crow flies to their head and sits on them. They look sad after they read it. “I guess I’m celebrating Christmas alone again…”

“What do you mean?”

“Henry, my dear brother, cannot visit me because he has some business” the grandfather clock chimes behind me. It’s already 9 P.M.

“Well, I think I have to go home now” I finish their tea and get up. “Thanks for your hospitality, come on Prudence” she gets up and follows me.

“Wait, sir!” they wear their coat. “Let me accompany you to the main door”

Derya’s POV

“Okay, it’s up to you” I think he agrees with it.

I close the door and follow him downstairs. Damn, his walk is fast as sailfish for his age. I tried to catch him up as we walk downstairs. Only silence between the two of us while we walk down. I dare look at him and think about what just happened in my room. Did he just care and smile at me? Also, I remember he just blushed when I look at him… HAH, NONSENSE! There is no way he do that such thing… or maybe…

“There is something wrong with my face?” he notices.

“Yes, there is! And you might hate it if I mention it” the wrong thing on his face is why he is so handsome.

“Huh, okay” He rolled his eyes.

We finally arrived at the main door of the tenement. We step out of the door and we meet breezing wind that bites our skin with the sky full of black ink and dancing tiny lights. “Sir, you can wait here while I find a carriage for you” I don’t care how he reacts to it, but that man needs it because his home is really far from here and it’s already night.

Not far from my tenement, I already find a carriage. “Ay, sir!” I run toward it. “Are you going to the center of London?” I ask the coachman.

“Lucky for you! My way to my home just passed there”

“Oh thank Neptune, would you mind taking that man to his home? He lives in there” I point to Sir Scrooge not far behind me. “And this is your payment, I hope this is enough” I took out my wages that gave by Scrooge before.

“Since this is Christmas Eve, I will take any payment you have” He winks at me.

“Oh, thanks for your kindness sir! Please wait, I tell him now” I walk toward Sir Scrooge.

Ebenezer’s POV

Did they just pay him with all their wages without thinking about themselves??? How do they survive if they do that every time?!

“I find a carriage for you sir! Now you can go home safely” they smile brightly as they are in that photo before. They lend their hand “Let me take you to the carriage”. I take their hand because it will be rude if I refuse it. We walk toward the carriage and they open the carriage door for me. “Before you go, …” I look at them. “… I know you will hate it but …” They take a deep breath. “Merry Christmas sir”

Derya’s POV

What did I just thinking about??? Wishing him that hate Christmas entire his heart?!? He stares at me. Okay, I’m totally fucked up now…

“Merry Christmas too, Derya” as he went in a carriage. I’m surprised by that words. Did he just Merry Christmas to me? I still stand in the same place because I’m shocked about what happened before.

Ebenezer’s POV

This carriage was already far from their tenement. I’m still thinking about what happened to myself before and their words.

“Well, maybe I was happy like in that photo, but every happiness has tragedy after it”

“… I can’t do that because they are too powerful and I have to move forward”

“Maybe the past makes me hurt, but I cannot brood over it forever and have to move on”

I take out my pocket watch and open it. “TO OUR HAPPINESS” written on it. I stare at it long and close it harshly.

“Humbug…”

[daveinediting]

I started out yesterday thinking about not having to read anymore. Not having to study anymore. I started out thinking about replacing the actual act of reading with summaries and analyses provided by ChatGPT. I started down the road of why make us read anything?

I mean it. Anything.

Why not instead teach us the prompts we’ll need to get the answers to questions we’ll ultimately face. After all, why learn Algebra in its entirety when maybe, during the course of your life, you only need to solve one kind of story problem. Why study Geometry in full when maybe the only formula you’ll need is the one for figuring out area. Why equip yourself with a packed toolbox when all you might need is a hammer? One you won’t need your entire life… only for the moment you need it.

Why equip ourselves with the sum total of human knowledge when we can submit a prompt when presented with one of Life’s many challenges?

Why not teach us to be badass at prompting?

Woof.

I just jumped off the cliff there, didn’t I.

Except how much of what I just described is how I live my life anyway?

I Google answers to things I don’t know right then.

How do I change a car battery?

What’s the recipe for Marzipan Rolls?

What’s the time difference between Seattle and Amsterdam?

Here’s something that’s completely on the nose:

At one point early in my career, I was a Chyron operator at a local broadcast station. The word came down from the Art Director that they wanted our on-air font to have both an outline and a drop shadow. Not possible through the Chyron software. 

But.

We could create custom fonts. And we could start a new one with the desired font style already outfiitted with an outline.

All we needed was the drop shadow.

Now, that drop shadow could be set manually. Absolutely it could. But something about the problem bugged the lead Chyron operator. The window for designing a new font was set on a grid. Any letter we were trying to make appeared on a grid and a drop shadow was essentially an offset version of the original letter.

An offset version...

Of the original letter.

An offset version.

It bugged him ‘cause this sounded like a math problem. Like…

Geometry.

Now, we both took geometry in school. High school, that is. At least, at least six years before.

I got good grades in it. So did he.

But we had no idea what to do with the problem in front of us.

So the lead Chyron operator tracked down his old high school Geometry teacher who reminded him about ye old slope/intercept formula: y = mx + b where y is the vertical coordinate on a grid, x is the horizontal coordinate on a grid, m is the slope of the line in question, and b is where the line intersects the y axis on the grid.

It’s a formula.

Its the formula the lead Chyron operator plugged into the computer we used for on-air polls. You entered the values for x and y of any point on the letter for which you wanted a drop shadow and the computer would kick out the coordinates for the corresponding point on the resulting drop shadow.

Something like that.

My point being neither of us knew the formula or what it was called even though at one point we learned it. We knew there was a formula. We knew it sounded like geometry. And that was it.

It took an actual high school Geometry teacher to fill in the remaining gap in our knowledge.

Today, of course, I’d just mess around with Google and get an answer pretty immediately.

So again. What’s the point of learning Geometry, studying it for two years, when at the very moment I needed the answer to a question right out of the Geometry I textbook, all I needed was a formula I would never need to know afterward. And if the answer is I didn’t need too know geometry at all…

Then how much else didn’t I need to know?

And how much better would it have been for me to be bad-ass at prompting?

Hmmmmmm.

I do have an answer in mind, by the way. It’s not definitive. No one’s obligated by it.

It is a choice, however.

A choice about who I am in the world.

A choice about who you are in the world.

No kidding.

I’ll come back to this tomorrow.

:-)

[jshookthighs]

Not So Perfect Timing - Lester Sinclair x GN!Reader

Warnings: Slight angst,(happy ending dw), self-doubt

Word count:  2532 (Woof I got carried away)

Summary: Lester’s been working a lot more lately and it’s not good for your mental health, but he’s got something really important to ask, he’s just waiting

A/N: Ok so I said I was doing Father Paul buuuut this was easier to right and I just kinda went crazy on it. I don’t proofread read so if you see any mistakes please let me know. 

Even in the middle of the sweltering heat of the Louisiana summer did you think the bed felt cold. After tossing and turning for hours you roll over to peer are the alarm clock sitting on the bedside table. Red daunting lights flashed the time; 12:32 am. Sighing, you turn to lay flat on your back, staring up at the blank ceiling. Out of habit, you slide one arm from your side and over towards the other side of the bed. It was empty…again. 

Lester had been taking on more jobs lately, not only that but the shifts were longer than usual, meaning that you had no idea when’d he come home. You never thought roadkill cleanup would be such a tedious job. When you do get to see your partner, he’s always dead tired and even cranky from a long day's work and often just retreats to bed with maybe a kiss on the cheek. 

You didn’t want to but after the second week of this new routine, you felt rejected and were starting to overthink everything. Like now in the quiet of your shared room, in your half-empty bed, your mind begins reeling at all the possibilities on why Lester is doing everything in his power to not be home. Is he mad at you? Does he not love you anymore? Is he secretly meeting another person? Does he hate you? Question after question makes your eyes begin to prick up with tears. You really knew how to cut yourself deep. 

All you wanted was to see his cute smile, hold his work calloused hand, and just hear his sweet southern accent just for a minute. You missed him. You missed him so bad it hurt. With the loneliness and the angst thoughts creeping up and swallowing you whole, you can’t stop the tears from flowing free down your cheeks nor the sobs that begin to violently wrack your body. You shake and weep until your chest aches and your face puffs up from just how hard you cried.  You wanted to be strong for Les, he was the one working himself to the bone, you just sat home drawing and cooking, and doing the chores around the little shack. But, this was weeks of pain that had built up currently exploding out of you.

You bring up both hands to cover your face, muffling the loud hiccups of sobs and gasps that take your breath away. This is the hardest you’ve cried since you first arrived at Ambrose. Instead of reliving that memory, you try to suck in enough air to try to calm down. Unknown to you, your cries were too loud for you to hear the front door open.

After missing the lock again, Lester shakes his head trying to ward away the sleep that begins to make his eyes droop. Almost there, almost to bed. The thought of his comfy bed and the more than likely sleeping you laying in it puts a little pep in his step. He’d been missing you lately. His pretty angel, his sweetpea. You’re all he’s been thinking about. That and how he had to keep working so hard to achieve his goal. 

He absolutely hated being away for so long and so often and hated even more how he had snapped at you a few times when he was dead tired. But, he can’t help but think that all that pain will be worth it, smiling while patting the little box in his pocket, ensuring it was still there. Yeah, this will definitely be worth it when he sees that gorgeous smile spread over your perfect face and (hopefully) hears you say “yes” when he asks you to marry him. All he had to do now was find the perfect time to ask you.

Sighing, Lester tries to insert the key again, and thankfully it finally goes in and he unlocks the door, pushing it open quietly in order not to wake you up. A little part of him wants to be selfish and wake you up just so he can see your eyes light up at seeing him home. The rest of him wants you to get all the rest you deserve, so just as softly he open it, Lester shuts the door with all the grace he can muster. Locking the door and toeing off his work boots, he lets out a puff of air, finally beginning to relax knowing that he’s home.

Home. He chuckles at that. He never really thought this little place was a home, not until you showed up. Before the shack was just a bed and a toilet, nothing more but a shelter to survive. But you, just existing in the space, completely transformed his view. This was something you both shared, a built structure that housed all your love for each other. Memories overfilled every room, both the good and bad and Lester cherishes every little one. Where once he had tried to leave the shack as often as possible, Lester now despised leaving home, despised leaving you. You had him wrapped around your finger and he absolutely loved it. 

A noise pulls him from his lovesick daydream. He pauses and listens, muscles tightening up in suspense and he wonders if he woke you. Again a noise cuts through the house. Worry grips Lester’s heart in a second. Were you crying? Panic now begins to well up inside him. Oh God, are you really crying? Before he can even register it, he’s already halfway down the hall, instinctually needing to comfort you. 

Wails and sobs begin to wither down into pathetic sniffles and soft gasps of air as you continue to cover your face, shutting out the rest of the world as you come back down to Earth. Half aware, you feel the bed sink to your left and a warm hand spread out over your back. Reality crashing back in, you nearly jump out of your skin at the new sensations and whip your head to the source of the pressure pressed up against your side. 

You don’t know if you’re dreaming or not but you find Lester’s face looking back at you, forehead scrunched in worry, and eyes filled with questions. “You ok, hun?” It’s soft and deep and so incredibly him. Without a second thought, you fling yourself deeper into him, wrapping your arms tight around his neck and squeezing like he’d disappear if you stopped for a second. The force of you sends him leaning back a bit. “Woah, angel! What’s goin’ on?” Lester tries to lean back a bit to check if you’re hurt or not but you snuggle in even closer, refusing to budge. You muffle a few words into his chest.

“What was that, sweetpea?” He asks softly, trying to calm you down to speak. Again you muffle into his shirt. He can’t help but chuckle at the situation, reaching one hand to stroke your head, petting in such a loving manner it almost makes you melt. “Sweetheart, ya’ gotta speak clearly. I can’t tell what you’re sayin’.” He tries again to look at your face. He’s successful because you finally remove your wet face from his chest. Instantly, Lester’s reaching out to dry the tears that covered your cheeks. The sweet gesture almost makes you cry all over again. Instead, you take a few deep breaths and sniffle away the snot that threatened to pour out your nose.

“Do you…still love….me?” You meekly push out the question, refusing to meet his eyes for the slim chance he actually says “no”. Immediately you're pulled tightly into his chest again but this time it’s him squeezing tight. “Baby, why? Why would you ever think I could ever stop lovin’ you?” Lester himself almost sounds like he’ll cry. He’s completely heartbroken. How could his angel ever question his love for them? Ever doubt that he was theirs for all of eternity? He quickly answers his own questions remembering where he had been the last couple of weeks. “Oh sweetheart, is it ‘cause I been gone so long? ‘Cause I haven't been home?” He grabs your shoulders, holding you back just enough that he can look you square in the eyes. He waits for an answer.

 “Yeah…” Your voice is small and quiet, beginning to feel awful about thinking so bad of Lester. The worry and fear and love in his voice made you realize that he’d never hurt you by cheating or that there’d ever be a chance he’d hate you. He glides his hands up your shoulders to gently cup both your cheeks. “I’m so sorry I made ya’ cry, I didn’t mean to be away for so long. Never meant to hurt ya’, sweetpea.” He leans in to kiss under your eye. “But I promise I’m done now with all them extra shifts, I ain’t gonna be workin’ any overtime from here on out, ok? He kisses you again on the forehead, now rubbing circles into your cheeks. 

“Why were you doin’ all that anyway?” You can’t help but ask, needing to know why he needed the shifts. You knew he sometimes complained about not having enough money to spoil you but you never thought he’d go out and work himself to death for a little extra cash. Hearing your inquiry, Lester hesitates. He couldn’t tell you, it was too soon! While trying to think of a good excuse, he hadn’t noticed that his face resembled that of a deer in the headlights. The long pause and the look he had made you suspicious. “Les? Why did you take all of them shifts?” You question just a bit harder, needing to know the truth on why he had made you both suffer missing the other for so long. It surely couldn’t be worth it and you were ready to point that out.

“I um… well I was uh..” Lester’s at a loss for words, he didn’t want to lie to you but he also wanted to ask you as you deserve. Wanted to ask you like you loved in those sappy romantic movies he watched with you with the big fancy dinner, lots of flowers, and just the perfect setting. However, his dream plan was crumbling before his eyes as he saw your lip begin to quiver again. He knew you hated being lied to and if he did, it would surely make you cry because you’d assume the worse which would not make any of this easier. “Baby, I don’t know if I should tell ya’.” He has to pry his eyes away from yours, not being able to stand the water welling up in them.

You reach up to cup his cheek, trying to tempt him to look at you. “Les, please.” You practically beg, not standing the secrets and the sneaking any longer. The misery in your voice causes Lester to shake his head and let out a tired, long sigh. “Do ya’ really need to know?” He tries one more time to deter you from ruining his little plan but the desperation on your face stops that right in its tracks. He sighs once more then reaches for the pocket of his faded jeans.

“Well darlin’, I wanted to wait ‘till it was the perfect time but I see now that I don’t think I can do that. I’ve been workin’’ so hard cause I wanted to get ya’ somethin’.,” He pauses to take a deep breath, “Ya’ know I love ya’, right? More than anything in the world? I love ya’ a whole bunch and well, I was thinkin’ that it was proper time that I uhh..” Again he pauses but this time to pull a small box out and places it delicately into your palm. Your eyes grow huge and your mouth falls open but you can’t say a word, too stunned to speak. Was this what you thought it was? Once again, Lester starts up. “What I mean to say is that I wanted to know if you’ll marry me?” He pulls on the lid so it reveals a small golden ring, your favorite stone shining in the moonlight as it sits perfectly on the band. 

In your speechlessness, Lester takes the time to chime in. “Now I know it ain’t much but I wanted to buy you a ring myself. If ya’ don’t like it then I promise I'll get ya’ a better ring if ya’ want. I'll pick up extra shifts, I'll sell some things, I'll do anythin’ to get you a ring you deserve, sweetpea. Just say you’ll marry me, ok?" Now it’s his time to look desperate. All the love he has for you is practically spinning in his eyes as he looks at you for your answer, prepared to do anything you say to make you agree. Tears well up once again in your eyes, but now they are of joy and love. “Oh Les,” you gasp, holding back the floodgates, “it’s perfect, you’re perfect! I…” You take in a shuttering breath and nod your head. “Yes.” You whisper it so that your voice won’t crack.

Lester’s face lights up, eyes wide. “Yes?” He asks in disbelief “Yes!” you shout throwing your arms around him again, only this time out of pure happiness. Strong arms reciprocate the embrace tenfold and practically rip you off the bed. Lester swings you in his arms around the room, giddy as a kid and a smile plaster on his face. Placing your feet back on the ground, he sweeps you right off them again as he leans down to connect your lips in a frenzied, passionate kiss. A kiss that steals the breath right out of your lungs. Hands flit from area to area. Up and down your back, around your hips, up to your sides. Hands tangle in hair, both of you trapping the other into kiss after kiss until oxygen is absolutely necessary. Pulling back, your foreheads rest together as puffs of air brush against each other's cheeks. Then in the intensity of it all, you break out in giggles. Pure joy radiates from you both, the air around light and easy, a drastic change from just a few minutes ago.

In your fit of laughter, you both end up tangling your legs together, tripping, and tumbling onto the bed. It creaks at the sudden addition of weight but neither of you cares. Catching your breath, Lester reaches behind him for the momentarily discarded ring box. Delicately, he takes the jewelry out of its container and gently slides it onto your ring finger. “That sounds right.” You whisper out loud admiring the gorgeous band. Confusion crosses your partner’s face for a moment but a smile spreads over his visage again “What sounds right, darlin’?” Your cheeks heat up to an impossible degree as you grow shy at getting caught. “Oh, ya’ know, your last name as mine.” Lester’s face practically glows and his smile threatens to stretch his face. “Yeah, it really does.” He leans in and your lips meet again softly like you had all the time in the world. And to you, you did.

[wiypt-writes]

Riding On

Ch23: Unnamed, Generic Baked Item

Summary: Fliss picks her wedding dress, whilst Frank has some great inspiration about a birthday present for his future wife…

Warnings: Bad language, 18+, Smut (NSFW 18+)

Pairing: Frank Adler x OFC Fliss Gallagher

A/N: This is totally dedicated to @sweater-daddiesdumbdork . But it’s still a f**kin’ biscuit!

Disclaimer: This is a pure work of fiction and classified as 18+. Please respect this and do not read if you are underage. I do not own any characters in this series bar Fliss Gallagher and the other OCs. By reading beyond this point you understand and accept the terms of this disclaimer.

Riding On Masterlist // Main Masterlist

Chapter 22

 “Mary, enough!” Frank’s voice rose and Mary glared at him, folding her arms.

“This is so unfair!” She exclaimed and Frank took a deep breath as he fed Alex another spoonful of porridge.

“You know what? You might think that, and I’m not even digging into the reasons why you’re wrong, but Fliss is already nervous enough about today and you kicking up a fuss over it is not going to help,” Frank levelled her with a look, “so get it out of your system right now, because if you’re still moaning when she comes down the stairs, you and me are going to fall out. Big time.”

Mary blinked, and then frowned. “What’s she nervous about? She’s only picking a dress.”

“Because it’s her wedding dress. It’s a big deal.”

“Which is why I wanna go!”

“And it’s also why you’re not!” Frank shot back, turning and feeding Alex some more as the baby had started to protest due to his dad’s attention being elsewhere. “Stack, you got bored within twenty minutes when they took you for your bridesmaid dress last week, so no, you’re staying here.”

“But-“

“It’s not open for debate,” Frank’s voice dropped even further, the warning tone unmistakable, “but feel free to carry on, see where it gets you.”

Mary was saved the trouble of responding as, at that point, Alex gave a loud yell and the bowl of porridge Frank had been feeding him from was knocked from his hands and landed all over the leg of his jeans. There was a pause, as Frank glanced down at the slop spreading over his thigh before he looked at Alex whose eyes were watering and seconds later a loud wail of frustration at the lack of food burst from his son’s mouth.

“For fffff sake, why?” Frank groaned, cutting the swear word short as he ran his hand through his messy hair, shaking his head.

“You know, I’m not much of one for all that fate and philosophy stuff,” his mother spoke as she walked into the kitchen, “but this, Frank, really does feel like straight up karma.”

Frank glared at her as he stood up and took the tea towel from the side and wiped at his jeans. “Fuck my life,” he muttered under his breath as Thor happily trotted over to the spilt porridge on the floor, cleaning it up with laps of his large tongue, Fred also hopping down off the seat at the breakfast bar to investigate the coveted, spilt human food.

“Karma for what?” Mary asked, from where she’d successfully manage to distract Alex from his tears by waving his little stuffed lion at him, the baby making grabbing gestures towards it.

“His own spectacular ability to misbehave.” Evelyn looked at Mary as she handed Alex the toy. “You know, he once sat down in the middle of a supermarket and refused to leave because I told him that it was Wednesday and Wednesday does not begin with the letter S”

Mary roared with laughter as Frank tossed the dirty towel into the sink before reaching into the cupboard for another jar of baby porridge.

“Look, that big yellow feathered bastard on Sesame Street told me that day was brought to me by the letter S.” He looked at Evelyn, then to Mary who was still howling with laughter, Alex now joining in, all tears forgotten. “He lied.”

“That was a particularly furious melt down, Francis.” Evelyn grinned and Frank rolled his eyes as he got the replacement porridge ready.

“What did you do?” Mary asked.

“It was your Grandfather that sorted him out, darling. He threw Frank over his shoulder and carried him straight out of the shop. I don’t know what he said or did, but by the time I got back to the car Frank was quiet as a mouse.”

“I think he threatened to feed me to said big yellow feathered bastard.” Frank chuckled as he sat back down and offered Alex another spoon of porridge which the baby eagerly took, making little appreciative noises as he did so. “Did you not notice I never watched another episode?”

“Another episode of what?” Fliss asked, and Frank looked up smiling at her as she crossed the room, Alex’s noises getting more excited as he looked at his momma.

“Sesame Street.” Evelyn supplied as Frank gave Alex another spoon of his breakfast, as Fliss dropped a kiss first on Mary’s head, then Alex’s, before finally pressing one to Frank’s cheek

“I’m not even gonna ask.” She snorted, moving to pour herself a coffee.

“Probably wise.” Mary nodded and at that Frank laughed.

“First sensible thing you’ve said all morning.” He teased, drawing another glare from the ten year old.

“Shut up.”

“Erm, enough.” Fliss looked at her, then to Frank. “The pair of you are worse than he is.” She nodded to Alex and then turned to Evelyn, waving the coffee pot in a silent question.

“Oh, no thanks. I had a tea before.” Evelyn smiled.

At that point, Thor gave a little woof and ran to the utility room, as Verity’s voice rang out in greeting.

“Nanny V!” Mary ran to her, giving her a huge hug as Verity smiled, bending down to give her a hug.

“Hey Pudding!” She beamed, standing up, before she glanced around the room, smiling. “Oh, where’s my little man?”

“I suspect at home on the sofa.” Frank quipped, earning him a light slap round the head as Verity leaned down to give Alex’s head a soft kiss, the baby laughing and grabbing at her hair. Frank hastily un-fisted Alex’s fingers from his Nanna’s auburn locks and handed him the spoon to play with instead.

“You ready?” Verity asked, looking at Fliss. She nodded, taking a large gulp of coffee before setting the mug down on the side.

“I’ll just go grab my purse.”

As Fliss left the room, Frank looked at Verity. “She’s nervous. A little overwhelmed I think.”

“Yeah, well it’s getting nearer and this is a big deal to most girls.” Verity smiled. “Plus, we all know she didn’t get to choose her last one so…”

“Well, let’s do what my mother did to me.” Evelyn smiled, as she looked up from where she’d been examining her lipstick in a pocket mirror. “Ply her with enough champagne and make it fun. She’ll be fine.”

Verity smiled and Frank rolled his eyes. “The last time you two plied her with champagne she barfed all over the bedroom.”

“Well,” Verity smirked, “that’s your problem now, not mine. Lord knows I’ve cleaned up enough of her and Steve’s drunken messes in my lifetime.”

“Thanks V.” Frank nodded seriously. “Thanks, a lot.”

*****

 Fliss took a deep breath, zoning out as she rifled through a rack at the back of the room. Verity, Evelyn, Bonnie and Sian were all chatting away behind her but it was merely background noise as she scanned dress after dress, nothing catching her eye.

“Have you any idea on what you want?” A soft voice behind her made her jump and she turned to see the assistant, a slight, grey haired woman called Sofia who had been assigned to help them today.

“Nope.” Fliss sighed. “I’m sorry, I’m totally useless.”

Sofia laughed and shook her head. “Don’t worry about it Miss Gallagher, a lot of women come in with either no ideas at all or tonne of ideas that don’t work out. If you don’t know what you want, do you know what you don’t want?”

“Yeah, that’s easy.” Fliss nodded. “I don’t want anything huge, or full of tulle or, you know-” she held her arms out to the side. “-princess bride like. Did that last time, hated it.”

“In that case we can completely ignore these two racks!” Sofia smiled and Fliss grinned as she allowed the woman to lead her a little further round the room. “And that’s half the battle. So, have you been anywhere else before here?”

“Two other boutiques.” Fliss nodded. “And I found nothing.”

“You know, most people think it’s all easy and fun hunting for dresses but, well, I know when I was looking it was so stressful!”

“You’re not wrong.” Fliss stopped at one dress which had caught her attention. It was a plain, off white colour with a simple skirt and bodice with a little beaded detail and chunky straps. “I kinda like the cut of this one.”

“Ah, a trumpet cut.” Sofia supplied, nodding.

“But I don’t know about the neckline, it’s a little…”

“Boring.” Sofia smiled as Fliss snorted. “But, we’ll take it for reference.” The woman lifted it off the rack, placing it onto the rail she’d wheeled alongside them. “So where are you getting married?”

“St Pete’s Public Access.” Fliss smiled. “Which is another reason I don’t want a huge dress. I’ll melt.”

Sofia laughed. “Not to mention the sand getting stuck in it.” She grinned. “Okay, what about this one?”

She lifted a similar cut dress off the rail, this one with a slightly more detailed neckline and Fliss nodded. “Yeah, I quite like that.”

“And this one.”

As Sofia held up the third dress, Fliss paused, tilting her head to one side. “I love the back of this.” Sofia gushed, turning it round. “It’s so detailed.”

“It’s beautiful.” Fliss smiled, her hand reaching out to brush the detailed lace as she studied the garment in front of her.

“Oh, wow!” She heard her mum say and she turned to look at her, then Bonnie who held up the bottle of champagne, Fliss handing over her now empty glass. “Lissy, that’s stunning!”

“It’s gorgeous isn’t it?” Fliss beamed, taking the refilled glass off Bonnie with a thanks.

“The detailing.” Evelyn mused, before she looked at Sofia. “Is that a Nicolle Miller by any chance?”

“Yes.” Sofia looked at Evelyn, frowning, and Fliss turned her head to look at her future mother-in-law, raising an eyebrow.

“She’s from Massachusetts.” Evelyn smiled. “I’ve seen a few of her dresses from time to time, they’re quite recognisable if you know what you’re looking for.”

“My fiancé’s from Boston.” Fliss informed, and Sofia’s mouth made a little O of understanding before she smiled.

“Well, if that isn’t a sign then I don’t know what is.” She beamed. “Would you like to see it on?”

Fliss bit her lip, before she looked at her mum her gave her a huge smile. With a grin on her face, and for the first time that day, a feeling of excitement in her stomach she nodded. Handing her champagne over to Bonnie, she followed Sofia into the changing room at the back, and was soon out of her denim shorts and t-shirt, stepping into the dress. Sofia came in to help her do it up, and it wasn’t even half way fastened before Fliss simply knew this was what she wanted, not even caring it was the first one she’d tried on. Nothing was going to come close to this.

“It’s a little big, around the bust so just give me a second.” Sofia moved to the back of the cubicle and picked up a few clothes pegs, tugging the dress around so it fit right and Fliss smiled, smoothing her hands down over her stomach as she stood, admiring it.

It was hard to guess at the actual shape as its bottom dabbled somewhere between a trumpet and mermaid cut. Her hips were accentuated by the firm fitting cream colored, hand stitched floral lace sewn into a nude overlay. Her back and side panels were completely different. The creamy lace design covered her back and sides with just her soft and delicate skin underneath, the nude underlay that covered her breasts and behind a near match to her skin. It hugged her curves perfectly, the lace covered her shoulders and down her chest in a two finger width and came together in a beautiful heart shape neckline, showing off her delicate décolletage shoulders. It kissed her skin, allowing enough cleavage but much to the imagination as it elegantly, and yet still incredibly sexy, covered her body.

It was something Fliss would never have dreamed of getting married in before but now, well, it felt right. It felt like her.

She took a shaky breath, her vision swimming with tears before she locked eyes with Sofia in the mirror, the older woman giving an appreciative nod. “It looks gorgeous, Honey!” She then handed Fliss a tissue and Fliss took it, giving a little shake of her head.

“I’m sorry, I-“

“Don’t apologise,” Sofia waved her away, “it’s a big thing. Now, you ready to go show the rest of them?”

Fliss nodded and Sofia gathered up the train of the dress, and Fliss stepped out of the little room and into the main area of the boutique. As she moved into the room, the other four women turned to face her and Verity’s hand immediately flew to her mouth.

“What do you think?” Fliss asked, shyly. “I know it’s the first one I’ve tried on but I don’t think I want to bother with anymore, I love it.”

Bonnie raised her eyebrows, her mouth falling open. “Oh my God, Fliss.” She gasped. “It’s…”

“Stunning.” Evelyn nodded in agreement, as Sian gave a hum.

“Liss, you’ll knock him dead.”

Fliss gave a smile and then looked at Verity. “Mum?”

Verity’s hand was shaking as she moved it down, and she opened her mouth, before she closed it again, taking a deep and shuddering breath, Sian curling her arm round her shoulder.

“Oh, Lissy…” Verity sniffed, her face creasing up as the tears began to slide down her cheeks. Immediately, more tissues were offered as Fliss also felt her eyes watering at the sight of her mum crying in front of her.

“Mum, don’t!” She gave a little laugh and Verity shook her head, dabbing at her eye.

“I’m sorry, sweetheart but I never thought I’d be here with you, trying on dresses as last time…” She stopped herself as Sian gave her a squeeze. “And now seeing you there with that look on your face, in that dress, ready to marry a man you deserve to be with, well, this is all I ever wanted for you.”

By the time Verity had finished there wasn’t a dry eye in the room, even Sofia had shed a tear. Verity stepped forward and carefully pulled her daughter into a hug, before she stepped back, kissing her forehead.

“I love you, my baby girl.” She sniffed. “God, your dad is going to bawl his eyes out when he sees this!”

Fliss smiled, and Sofia then directed her onto a little box before she called over to another woman who headed across the room with a tape measure. As they took a few measurements for the alterations, Fliss was vaguely aware that her Mum and Bonnie were both taking a photo, but in all honesty her eyes were glued to her reflection in the mirror in front of her. And she wasn’t looking at her dress. She was fixated on the huge smile that was on her face, a smile that no matter how hard she tried, she couldn’t stop.

****** “Hey, Stack, how about we go outside for a little while?” Frank opened the door to the den. “Alex has gone down for his nap so it’s just us.”

“In a minute, I’m just looking at something.” She replied, her eyes still on her laptop as she lounged on her beanbag, Heartland playing on the TV in the background.

“Come on, you’ve been sat in here for hours.”

“Yeah but this is really cool.” She looked up. “I’ve been tracing Monty’s lineage again for my collage, and then I got looking at Heidi’s and dug into all this cool info on her and the other horses that she was bred from.”

Frank obliged as Mary gestured to him, taking a seat next to her on the floor as she moved the laptop so he could see it.

“So, this is Heidi, ‘Sandybrook Hideaway’.” Mary’s fingers pointed to the box at the left of the screen. “And this is Heidi’s dad, ‘Louella Inschello’ and this is her mom, ‘Tremontano Esmerelda’. I can go even further back and find like her grandparents and great grandparents all the way into the seventies.”

“How come Heidi had the name Sandybrook?” Frank asked. “And not Louella or Tremontano or whatever?”

“It doesn’t work like with humans.” Mary shrugged. “You can’t use people’s prefixes that don’t belong to you when you’re naming a horse. Fliss said that the people who bred Heidi made the prefix Sandybrook because of their farm being near the beach in England, and there was a brook running alongside the fields. That’s what all their horses then became called, Heidi being the first, look…”

She moved the screen along a little, and Frank traced the little line that ran from Heidi’s name to another box. “’Sandybrook Typhoon’, sire- Renkum Renogade, dam- Sandybrook Hideaway…” he trailed off before he looked at Mary. “Heidi had a baby?”

“Yup.” Mary nodded. “Fliss showed me photos of him on their website. He’s huge. And real pretty. He was a big, fancy dressage horse that one her friends used to compete and they kept him at the stud farm to breed from because he was that pretty, but he died three years ago. He broke his leg and couldn’t get better.”

“Ouch.” Frank grimaced.

Mary nodded. “I know. This was his last foal, look. ‘Sandybrook Cleopatra’. She was born in 2017, and check out her mom’s name.”

“Sandybrook Dirty Diana.” Frank smiled, and let out a chuckle as Mary smiled at him as she clicked on a small link which opened up to show a beautiful bay filly with four white socks and a white blaze. Her face markings instantly struck Frank as being very similar to Heidi’s even if she was a different colour.

“So this would mean that this one is Heidi’s granddaughter?” Frank asked.

“Yup.” Mary nodded.

“That’s pretty cool, Stack.”

“Mom thought so too.” Mary grinned. “She showed me how to do it as I wanted to check out Monty’s history. I asked her about Heidi’s and she showed me this and she was like, really smiling when she saw Cleo, she didn’t know they’d had a foal from Typhoon the year he died. And there’s lots of photos of Heidi as a baby too on their history page, and she has a really cool profile.” She took a pause for breath and Frank gently dropped his hand to the back of her head, smiling at her enthusiasm. “They added a bit last week to say she’d died and it’s kinda sad but also kinda nice. They thanked Fliss her for giving her a wonderful home and said there was no one better on the Earth for your horse to be sold to than an Olympic Gold Medal winner.”

“How did they know she’d died?” Frank asked. “Did Fliss call them?”

“She emailed them. She said she had also asked them about Cleopatra.”

“Asked about her? You mean to buy?”

“I think so.” Mary nodded. “She sold Bronson the other month and now Heidi is gone she only has Cap left.”

“Yeah, I know. She mentioned maybe getting another but I didn’t know she’d been looking.”

“I don’t think she has, it’s just because she saw Cleopatra. I mean, it would be cool if she did buy her.” Mary shrugged. “She’s a part of Heidi in a way isn’t she?”

“Yeah, suppose she is.” Frank mused. “So, was Fliss not sure about her then or…”

“She said she liked her.” Mary shrugged. “But she’s not for sale on the website so I don’t know what they said. They might have said no, or maybe it’s because she’s busy. You know what she’s like.”

Frank did, only too well. When it came to buying things for herself to enjoy, Fliss was actually very reserved. She didn’t think twice about buying stuff for the house, or for the family, or her work, but her own, personal things, she seemed to have a real reticence to simply splurge on, and he had a feeling that went back to when she’d been married previously.

As his eyes flicked over the details on the screen, an idea flashed in his head. And it was a crazy one but…

“What do you think she would do if we bought her one for her birthday?” He turned to Mary.

“What, bought her a horse?”

“Yeah.”

“This horse?” Mary pointed at the screen to the picture of the bay mare and Frank nodded.

“Yeah.”

“Probably call you a crazy asshole, start crying and say it’s the best present ever.” Mary looked at him and Frank chuckled.

“I can live with that.”

“You know, you better hurry up if you’re gonna do it. Mom’s birthday is like, weeks away!”

“It’s not until the end of July.” Frank replied. “We got nearly two months. Do you not think that will be enough time?”

“I don’t know, I’ve never shipped a horse over here from England!” Mary scoffed, before they shared a look, almost identical expressions of realisation crossing their faces as they instantly realised they both knew someone who had. “Poppa Bill!” Mary stated excitedly. “He’ll help!”

“Sure he will.” Frank nodded. “Right, you better get me the email address, Stack. And not a word of this to Mom okay? This is top secret.”

“What do you take me for?” Mary looked at him indignantly and Frank looked at her, raising an eyebrow.

“You really want me to answer that?”

Mary pondered for a moment before she snorted. “Not really.”

******

“So, did you have a nice time today?” Frank asked as they lay in bed later that night.

“Yeah.” Fliss smiled, snuggling further into his chest as his hand gently ran up and down her arm, his fingers softly tickling her skin. “I did.”

“Good.” He kissed her head. “I’m glad. You were so worried about it all.”

“That obvious, huh?” She sighed and Frank chuckled.

“To me, yeah.” He shifted a little to look down at her. “But that’s only because I know you so well.”

“I didn’t know what to expect.” She shrugged. “I was just a little overwhelmed at the thought, you know, of having to make the decision but when we got to the first shop, I dunno, I kinda realised that I’ve been making decisions about our wedding all along. And, when it came down to it, it wasn’t really that much different to when we picked your suit.”

Frank chuckled. “To be fair, Sweetheart, we’d been in the shop all of five minutes before you spotted the one you liked.”

“Hey, it wasn’t just me.” She protested, tilting her head to look at him. “You liked it too.”

“I do.” Frank agreed. “But I saw the look on your face when you saw it which is what completely sold it to me.”

A lightweight wool three piece suit dyed a stunning steel blue shade had fit Frank expertly. It made his eyes pop and the crisp white button down underneath offered a nice contrast. But what made Fliss fall for the ensemble was the tie. The flash of burgundy, sand, white and grey stood out against the white dress shirt with the stripes of blue pulling in the blue of the three piece. The tailor suggested a printed silk pocket swath with polka dots and paisley printed against a deep blue background.

Frank caught Fliss’ eye in the mirror as the tailor straightened the back of his jacket and arched his brow. She hastily released her lip from between his teeth and gave him a little sheepish look, and he bit back the snort at the fact he’d just caught her looking at him in the way she usually did when she was feeling a little bit ‘frisky’ for want of a better word.

“But I’m clean.” Frank joked, causing the tailor to look up a little, puzzled expression on his face and Fliss laughed.

“Yeah, well this is clearly your Professor look, not the dirty boat daddy one.”

At that the tailor scooted off, Frank watching him go before he turned to Fliss and shook his head. “You’re terrible, you know that?”

She shrugged and smiled as she looked him up and down appraisingly, stepping forward and smoothing her hands up the lapels of the jacket. “You look incredibly handsome, babe.”

Frank gave her a smile and leaned down, pressing a soft kiss to her lips. “You almost sound surprised.”

“Not at all.” Fliss shook her head.

A cough from the tailor interrupted them as he had returned with a shoe box and Frank gave him a nod as Fliss stepped back. Once he had laced up the shiny, burnt brown oxfords, Frank moved again to take in the final, finished look and took a deep breath, smiling.

He liked it. A lot.

“So basically, you picked the first suit you tried on and I picked the first dress I tried on.” Fliss snorted and Frank shrugged. “We’re getting married on the beach, having what is basically a barn dance with food trucks…are we taking any of this seriously?”

“Nope.” Frank shook his head and Fliss laughed again as he moved, rolling her a little so she was on her back and he was hovering over her. “But, I think both of us have taken life far too seriously for far too long enough, time for a little fun.”

“Well that fills me full of confidence since we’re writing our own declarations.” She teased and Frank arched his brow.

“You’re talking to an ex Philosophy Professor-”

“Assistant-“

“Whatever, the point is, I’m very good with words.” Frank smirked and Fliss scoffed. “I got you to go on a date with me, didn’t I?”

“That wasn’t down to your words.” Fliss shook her head.

“No? Was it my devastating good looks?”

“That and the fact you’re basically the best man I’ve ever met.” Fliss smiled. “Well, apart from my dad. And Steve. So you’re definitely in the top three best men I’ve ever met.”

Frank laughed and took a deep breath, before he moved, propping himself up a little on his elbow, brushing Fliss’ hair back off her face. “Joking aside, marrying you is something I’m taking very seriously. I can’t wait to say ‘I do,’ get that ring on your finger and finally call you my wife as well as the mother of my kids. But the minute that bit is done then, all bets are off. No stuffy formalities, no pointless, boring traditions, well, apart from the ones we decide we wanna uphold and absolutely no vowing to obey,” he looked at her as she took a breath, “which is a relief because, frankly, I don’t want to spend the rest of my life being bossed around.”

Fliss smiled, knowing full well what he was saying. That vow had been one that John had insisted on, and whilst she had never raised the issue to Frank directly, because in all honestly she didn’t feel she needed to, the fact he’d picked up on the way she’d subtly opted for the other vows when they’d had to pick them for the official, made her heart swell in her chest.

“So, I err, I also had another off the wall idea.” Fliss looked at him.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, I know we said we weren’t gonna give each other presents and stuff for the wedding, but, I thought…actually, forget it.”

“No, come on tell me.”

“No, it’s…”

“Liss!” He said, looking at her and she sighed, her eyes moving away from his, scanning the inked words just below his collar bone.

“Tatoos.” She whispered, looking back at him. “I thought, well, that we could get one each. Not matching as such, but you know, for each other.” Frank blinked and she snorted. “See it’s a dumb idea, I just really want another and well, that was another thing I was never allowed, and-”

“I didn’t say it was dumb.” Frank cut her off, shaking his head. “I think it’s a great idea.”

“You do?”

“Yeah, I do.” He nodded. “I’ve been thinking about getting another for a couple of months now, I want one for Alex, so having one for you too, well then I’ve got a full set.”

She smiled, her fingers reaching up and tracing the Taurus on his bicep, Mary’s star sign. “What you thinking of getting for Bean?”

“The time of his birth, and the date underneath all in Roman numerals. On my other arm.”

Fliss beamed. “I love that.” She pondered. “I thought about one for the kids too, maybe on my wrist but I don’t know what yet.”

“Well, l can speak to Jake.” Frank kissed her nose. “He’s fucking sweet at art, tell him what we want he’ll draw us a couple of designs and then we can go to the place I got my last one done and book in.” He paused. “So, where you gonna get the one for me?”

“Well, I errr think, I mean if-” She paused, looking at Frank as he waited for her answer and she realised that for a split second she’d been about to ask his permission. But as he simply looked at her, she licked her lips and smiled. She didn’t need to ask, she could just tell him. “I know exactly where I’m going to have it.”

“Show me.”

“So bossy.” She smirked, pushing on his shoulders and making him sit up. Biting her lip she lifted her cami top up a little, her hand pushing up her left breast and she traced the area underneath, just along her rib cage. “Only you will really see it then, well, other than when I’m in a bikini, I suppose.” She stopped talking as she spotted the familiar darkening in Frank’s eyes as he took her in, his eyes sliding up her frame to meet hers. She bit her lip, smiling as he crawled back over her, pushing her back onto the bed a little, her top still hitched up.

“You know,” his hands gently slid up her side, fingers tracing the spot she was talking about, “that area is supposedly quite sensitive.”

“Really?” She whispered, her eyes closing.

“Hmmhmmm.” He hummed, dropping his head, placing a soft kiss just there, and her breath hitched, before she emitted a soft little squeak as Frank’s lips were replaced by his teeth when he gave a soft nip. “Oh, yeah, definitely sensitive. You’re gonna need someone to hold your hand.”

“Luckily I know just the guy.” She sighed, his mouth now trailing a path across her body to her sternum.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah. I’ll take Steve.”

“You really want your brother there when someone’s tattooing under your boob?” At that she stilled and looked down at him. He paused, his chin resting in between her breasts and he gave her a quizzical look. “What?”

“Are you okay with that?”

“With what? Your brother being-“

“No, idiot!” She slapped his head lightly and he gave an ow of protest. “I mean with me having it there? I mean, if it means the guy there’s gonna see-“

“Are you okay with that?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“Then, yeah, I don’t give a shit.” He shrugged, his lips returning to her skin. “Now, can you shut up and let me give you an orgasm?”

“Just one?” Her voice was a breathy whisper as his lips traced their way up her neck and he gave a little growl, nipping at her jaw.

“Greedy bitch.” He mumbled, causing her to chuckle a little, before his lips met hers in a heated kiss. Her hands snaked into the back of his short hair, nails scratching his scalp a little as his tongue curled against hers in dominating swipes, a rumble in the back of his throat flowing into her mouth.

His hands curled around her hips, before they slid upwards and grasped at the top she was wearing which was bunched unevenly up around her chest. He pulled back and Fliss sat up a little to allow him to yank it off and he tossed it carelessly behind him, where it dropped somewhere onto the bedroom floor. His lips crashed back to hers with an urgency she met back movement for movement. Frank shifted, nudging her legs further apart with his knees, so he could settle in between them, his lips moving back to her jaw, down her neck, moving himself downwards, taking his time and lavishing affection all the way down her body. His hands curled round her knees as his nose skimmed below her bellybutton and he placed a soft kiss onto her tummy before he felt her tugging on his hair.

“Frankie, I want you.”

He peeked up at her, and arched a brow. “I thought you wanted more than one?”

“Changed my mind.”

“Fickle.” He muttered, as he sat up, pulling down her sleep shorts before he discarded his boxers, kicking them down his legs. He gently nipped at the inside of her thigh before he brushed his cheek and beard up her leg, smirking as he heard a tiny mewl from above. With a pace that was agonisingly slow he moved back upwards, his hands moving up the side of her body as he went, gently moving across, thumbs brushing over each of her nipples which were pebbled in anticipation. Fliss arched her back, inhaling sharply as her groin bumped against his, dragging a low grumble from his throat as she twitched underneath him, pressed up against where she needed him most. Taking her hands in his, his thumbs skated over her knuckles before he interlocked their fingers and pressed her hands down on the pillow next to her head.

“God, you’re beautiful." He mumbled leaning down and running his nose alongside hers before kissing her deeply. Fliss gave a little preen of delight at his praise, and he broke the kiss, his lips remaining on hers. “My perfect, Lissy.”

She responded by kissing him hard, a kiss which was broken when he slowly pushing inside her in a gentle, fluid moment, eliciting a moan from them both. He drew back a little and then thrust forward deeply, before he kissed her again, his hips finding a languid, rocking rhythm, his bottom lip nibbling on hers. Fliss rolled her body up taking him deeper, moans and gasps slipping freely into each other’s mouths as he slowly built up his rhythm, his fingers curling around hers tightly as he watched her, felt her shudder as he hit her spot again and again with every rut of his hips until she was writhing underneath him, begging him not to stop.

And he didn’t, not until he’d dragged two orgasms from her, and he’d almost managed a third when he knew he couldn’t fight off his own release any longer. With a whimper that was almost pathetic, he slowed down, his hand dropping between them to stroke at her sensitive nub, and with a hoarse sob she bucked violently as she came again, her walls tightening around him and with a choked cry of her name he let go, his release coating her walls and he throbbed inside of her as she pulsed around him. His elbows gave way and he pitched forward, his sweaty brow pressing into the crook of her neck as his chest heaved, both of them completely spent.

Fliss happily welcomed his weight on top of her as he caught his breath, both of them trembling in the afterglow. She flexed her fingers and he let go of her hands, and she slid her arms round him, fingers dancing up his spine. Frank gave a soft hum of contentment as he lazily raised his head, catching her mouth in a soft kiss before his nose bumped against hers.

He was in no rush to move, which suited Frank fine as he lay there, on top of her, slow kisses being traded before eventually he pulled back and she gave him a soft smile, which lit up her entire face.

“Was that enough for you?” He asked cheekily and she laughed, swatting at his back with her hand.

*****

The next week or so passed in a whirl of work and overseeing the construction at the yard. Frank was still mad busy, but he’d pushed his nagging feelings about his job to the back of his mind. He and Fliss had talked about it at length and he’d decided to wait until the wedding was done before he made a final decision. Whilst Fliss had told him she’d support him either way, he didn’t want to throw his career into turmoil whilst they had so much going on.

The yard expansion was progressing to schedule, despite a pretty nasty storm which had initially set them back a day or so, but Frank had to hand it to the guys Bill had recommended, they’d pulled the lost time back. And, to top it all off, he’d even managed to finish the final mechanical works to his boat, which meant now all he had to do was the cosmetic work. For that, he was happy to let Bill help, his future father-in-law very eager to lend a hand on Friday evenings, especially when the job came with a steady supply of beer.

It was win-win as far as Frank was concerned. Fliss and her mum would sit in the garden, drinking wine, dipping in and out of the pool whilst Mary was at Roberta’s, the four adults taking dinner together, which he always enjoyed, and it also meant he could rope Bill into his master plan for Fliss’ birthday. When he’d first told him his idea, Bill had grown a little emotional, admitting to Frank that seeing him care so much that he want to do something as thoughtful as that for his baby-girl was something he appreciated beyond belief. Frank also consulted Joanne, and between the three of them they now had a pretty watertight plan. Bill was lending Frank the money, for which Frank was grateful for as, whilst Joanne had helped him to the negotiating on the price for the animal, the transportation and associated veterinary fees were more expensive than the damned horse herself. Should the overall amount it was going to cost him go missing from their savings, Fliss was going to start asking questions and he wanted it to be a total surprise.

All in all, Frank was as settled and happy as he had felt in months. Life was good, and as the middle of June rolled round, the feeling in the Adler-Gallagher household was as relaxed and as happy as it had ever been.

“Awww you want a biscuit, Baby?” Fliss looked at Alex who was making grabby hands at the one she had in her hand. “Okay, here…”

She snapped the cookie into two and handed him a half. Alex looked at it for a second before he shoved it in his mouth, turning to look at Frank as he walked into the kitchen. The little boy raised his hands making cooing noises before jamming his precious treat back into his mouth.

“Hey, you got a cookie, buddy?” Frank smiled as Alex made a little noise of delight at the taste, and Fliss cleared her throat.

“He has a biscuit.”

Frank looked at Fliss, rolling his eyes before he moved and picked up the packet, pointing to the label.

“They’re cookies, Fliss.”

Fliss groaned. “Cookies are a specific type of biscuit. What he has there is not a cookie!”

“Look, Lissy, you’re gonna confuse the boy.” Frank looked at her. “Poor kid’ll be going to a restaurant and askin’ for a biscuit, expecting cookies, and then they bring him like biscuits and gravy and-“

“Don’t even get me started on those, Francis.” Fliss narrowed her eyes, pointing at him. “They’re not biscuits, they are scones.”

“The hell they are!”

“Oh piss off, Frank!”

Frank gave a loud laugh. “Hang on, are we actually arguing about this right now? Over what we call a certain baked treat?”

Fliss bit into one of the offending items and smirked. “Get it right and we won’t be.”

“You are such a fucking brat at times!” Frank shook his head as Fliss grinned and shrugged.

“So?”

“Just stating a fact, Sweetheart.”

“So am I. They’re biscuits”

“Oh for the love of-look,” Frank once again nudged the packet on the island, “they’re cookies and nothing you say or do is gonna make me call them anything else!”

“Nothing?” Fliss raised her eyebrows.

“Nope.” Frank folded his arms.

“Hmmm.” Fliss took a step towards him, her hands wrapping round his arms, pulling them away from his chest before her palms flattened on his pecs, smoothing up to his shoulders. “Call them biscuits, Sailor, and I’ll go down on you so fast you can’t even remember your own name.”

“They’re biscuits.” Frank replied immediately, the second she played that card, he didn’t give a shit what the hell they were called.

Fliss laughed, her hands sliding up round his neck. “Like I said, brains are in your dick.”

“Yeah, and now my dick’s gonna be in your mouth, Cowgirl.” Frank shot back, causing Fliss to snort. “Better get to it, I need to go pick Mary up in ten.”

“Hmmm, yeah, I didn’t specify when.” Fliss patted his chest and stepped back as Frank blinked, before he shot her a playful glare.

“You fight dirty.”

“Oh, Sailor.” Fliss tossed her hair over her shoulder as she moved back to the kitchen to move their used breakfast dishes from the sink to the dishwasher. “You should know this by now.”

“So, you basically expect me to drive down to St Pete’s now with a semi hard-on?”

Fliss looked at him. “It’s your own fault?”

“How is it my fault?” Frank laughed, incredulously.

“If you’d have just agreed I was right in the first place, then you wouldn’t have a problem.”

Frank blinked before he shook his head, turning to Alex. “Your momma’s logic blows my mind, Bean.”

“That’s the only thing that’s getting blown, Fliss quipped and at that Frank let out a loud laugh, “for now.”

She shot him another look over her shoulder and Frank groaned, knowing full well that if he didn’t leave he was going to end up pounding her over the kitchen island. And, as tempting as that was, he had places to be.

“Come on, Son.” Frank unclipped Alex from the seat. “Let’s go get your sister.” He reached over and grabbed a cookie from the packet. “Here, have another unnamed, generic baked item for the trip.”

**** Chapter 24

[with-love-anu]

Snowflakes

Pairing: Sirius Black x Reader Summary: This is just a fairytale kind, tooth rotting fluffy fiction written for blue days. Warnings: It’s just fluff, no warnings to give! Word Count: 1,331

“You take that!” the girl said huffily as she threw yet another ball towards her friends. They laughed out loud with glee and Sirius noticed he wasn’t the only one taken by playful scene in front.

(Y/n Y/l/n), the shy girl whom Sirius always seen stuck in some corner of the library or sitting by the fireplace in the common room reading a book, was giving a tough snowball fight to her friends not minding the neighbouring stares that everyone gave her. She was laughing, shouting, giggling. Her voice felt pleasing to his ears. Her cheeks were coloured red and she was breathless. She looked beautiful. Hair tangled and slightly wet sticking to the sides of her face as she tried to shield herself with her limbs from the ice attack. It would work, if she didn’t have to place a hand over her stomach to stop bending out in laughter. Sirius smiled widely, how could he not? There was innocence in her eyes and a mirth that made her look as candid as a child.

As she scooped up some ice in her hands and aimed it towards her friend.

SMACK!

Sirius felt an icy smash on his face and he recoiled back to steady himself. (Y/n)’s eyes widened and she felt transfixed to her spot as it dawned upon her that she had hit Sirius Black. The same elder Black brother on whom she had a crush on, since god knew how long. She realized that he was staring at her and shook her head as if to wake herself up. She quickly went towards him.

“Are you okay?! I’m so so sorry! I was hitting my friend and I missed. It went in your direction and I-“ she continued babbling unaware of the wide smile the boy was giving her. For Sirius, this was the first time she spoke more than five words to him. He found it hard to concentrate on what she was saying while his brain descended into a haywire with sirens blaring- “She’s talking to me!” He blinked.

“(Y/n) it’s fine, honestly!” Sirius said holding her hand to make her listen to him.

“Really?” She asked looking up at him. Sirius let out a small laugh.

“YES! You could hit me as many times as you want, I won’t complain, EVER!” Sirius tried to say with a smirk. Why did he have to be so nervous in front of the one girl he’s ever liked?

“Oh yeah?” (Y/n) said with a mischievous grin that made Sirius’s heart do a little flip. He gulped.

“Yeah.” He rasped.

He was hit with yet another ball of ice which went a little into his nose. He coughed and spluttered. It took him a moment to realize what had happened. He looked towards (Y/n) who was giving him a coy smile. He narrowed his eyes. He conjured a snowball and splashed it on (Y/n)’s face. Her eyes widened and she giggled.

“Oh you’re so on!” she tried and failed to say angrily.

Sirius and (Y/n)’s friends watched them spend the rest of the evening striking each other, laughing, giggling and toppling over one another. Anyone could see they were gone for good, running after each other like love-struck fools.

***

“(Y/n)! (Y/n)! Are you avoiding me?” Sirius as he finally caught up with (Y/n).

Over the course of several weeks after the fun-filled snowfall fight, they had become friends, much to everyone’s dismay. Their friends would face-palm and groan, because could they be more obvious? They would be seen cuddling in front of the fireplace looking at each other with so much adoration, that it could make anyone within a mile melt.

“Dennis asked me out!” (Y/n) blurted. Valentine’s Day was coming up and Dennis wasn’t the first one who had asked her. It was killing her that the one person she actually liked had not yet made a move. It was becoming utterly frustrating and had piped up in-numerous insecurities in her mind. She did think Sirius liked her back, but now not so much.

“Oh.” Sirius said in a very small voice. Of course someone asked her. She was beautiful, smart, funny, the whole deal. If Sirius hadn’t sucked it up and had the guts to ask her out this wouldn’t have happened.

“I said no.” She told him looking straight into his eyes. They lit up like a Christmas tree.

“Oh.” Sirius said trying and failing to keep the hopefulness out of his voice.

“I was waiting for someone else to ask me.” (Y/n) said looking straight ahead. She knew if she dared to look at him her confidence would waver. “But I don’t think he would. He seems too scared to do that. So, I’ve decided I’ll do it myself.”

“Oh. Okay.” She already likes someone. How could he ever think someone like her could want someone like him? He almost missed what she said just a second later. Almost.

“Sirius Orion Black, you are an excellent friend but you cannot possibly blame me for wanting more. I don’t want to be just a friend. I want to hold your hand just because I felt like it, kiss you, go on dates, do every single clichéd romantic thing there ever exists. Would you go out with me?”

Sirius’s face went through a whirlwind of emotions, but one that stayed was a big loopy smile that brightened his face. His eyes sparkled, and his cheeks were pink.

“Yes.” He said making (Y/n) smile just like him.

“Yeah?” she asked coyly.

“Well we do have to act on every clichéd romantic scenes that ever existed.” Sirius said with a smirk making (Y/n) giggle and blush. Sirius tilted his head and kissed her, slowly and sweetly. His lips moved along her soft ones making them plump and red, as Sirius tried to memorize the moment.

***

(Y/n) and Sirius went on several dates after that. They would be seen in the halls holding hands or with Sirius casually draping an arm around her. If anyone had doubted true love before, they could now see it in the silent conversations their eyes held, when the other was too tired to talk, the blush that coated their cheeks after they spent hours making love to each other, (Y/n)’s loss of mind and control for the first time in her life when Sirius ran to her from his childhood home covered in scars; her touch as light as feather as she healed him, Sirius’s shouts at her stupidity when (Y/n) fought against people who threatened first years, making her end up in the infirmary; Sirius then sitting by her until she recovered. It was simple, it was pure.

As they walked Hogwarts grounds years later to invite their professors to bless their wedding, they smiled at the little white flakes falling over them. (Y/n) picked up some snow into her hands and threw it at her soon to be husband and giggled.

“Snow fight?” she asked raising an eyebrow.

“Oh you’re on!” he said attacking her with a huge snow ball.

And after all these years, they felt like children again. Sirius ran after the one love of his life trying to catch her. He relished in her loud laughter as she ran away. He caught her by her waist and flung her in the air happily. She squirmed shouting, “Let me go! Let me go! Bad dog! Bad dog!”

“Woof!” he said playfully as he attempted to turn her towards him. What he managed was, making her and himself fall on the white ground with a plop. They giggled and laughed until they were both out of their breath. As those sounds subsided they turned to face each other. They smiled taking in the moment not wanting it to end. Sirius tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear.

“I love you.” He breathed.

“I love you too.” She said. There wasn’t a simpler thing in the world.

A/N: Let me know what you think!

[taeswurld]

Ace I [Good Morning Vietnam!]

pairing: bakugo x fem!reader

genre: humor, romance

TW: violence, cursing, angst, fluff

Summary: Shifting into My Hero was a total mistake, all those tiktoks you watched on a daily about shifting somehow convinced your brain to take part. Now the question is how to wake up, and most importantly, DON’T GET ATTACHED TO STUPID DRAWINGS!

A/N:

Hi! Welcome to ace! I’m a little new to writing, so sorry if I suck! But thanks for checking out my fic, and don’t be shy to send me a message or something!

{ACE MASTERLIST}

Jesus...

Did you always wake up to a headache this bad? It feels like ten million hammers are hitting your head all at once. 

You’ve GOT to find the tylenol. 

You slowly start rubbing your eyes, hoping there isn't any left over mascara smudge from last night. 

Why is the sun hitting so hard? And why is everything so quiet? 

Usually you would wake up to someone’s car alarm going off, or your lousy neighbors yelling at each other. 

Like seriously guys, just get a divorce already. 

You slowly open your eyes, only to see that your roof is different. Where’s the cheap little glow in the dark stars you had hanging up? Or the tangled Christmas lights you had up at the corners of your room, because they’re slightly easier to purchase than those stupid LED lights everyone has hanging?

You sit up and realize,

“Oh shit, this isn’t my fucking room.” 

You quickly jump out of the bed only to trip on a big furry pillow.

“Woof!”

Wait, that’s not a pillow, that’s just your dog, Hiro. 

“Bro what? What are you doing here Hiro? You know your not allowed sleep in my room. Why didn't you sleep in your cage buddy?”

Little backstory here, Hiro is a big ole husky with a icy blue eye and a honey brown eye. He tends to shed, a lot, so you don’t typically let him sleep in your room. Unless there’s like a thunderstorm and you feel kinda scared because you watched one too many “based on a true story” horror movies. You rescued him from a shelter, but before that he was a fight dog, and a pretty good one at that. You made a pretty big imprint on him, so he tends to be pretty territorial of you. He doesn't go anywhere without you, especially now with quarantine and all, so it’s no surprise he’s here. Usually, though, he goes to sleep in a cage he has outside.

“Where the fuck are we bud...”

You crouched down to quickly give him a couple of rubs, while trying to make sure he doesn't knock you over. He’s a pretty big and strong dog from all those fights he used to win, plus the walks you’ve taken him on, so the dumb mutt is pretty athletic. 

Well, as athletic as a dog can be.

He barks, and takes you out of your little trance to bring you back into reality. 

Where are you? 

It doesn’t look like your room, but at the same time, it weirdly does. 

There isn’t anything in here that would identify it as your room. 

No family photos, no photos of your friends, no baby photos, nothing. Not even little letter of your first name. 

But there's little knickknacks that totally identify as you. A couple of shitty paintings you made during quarantine, a few plants, a bookshelf with all your shitty books that you love reading so much, even though the pages are worn out and the covers are a little damaged. Little bit of jewelry, and a beanie. On your bed, there was a couple of blankets and two pillows. 

Scattered all around the floor were a couple of notebooks, pens, and chew toys. 

Weirdly enough, you seemed comforted in the room, but you weren't here to stay. You and Hiro need number one: breakfast, and number two: to find out where the hell you are before someone comes kick your ass because you didn’t attend your stupid online first period. Not to mention your head still hurts like a BITCH.

“Okay, you’re coming down with me, but you are not to make a noise, and when I say attack, please for the love of God attack because oh my god what i’m in a kidnapper’s house,” you grab his face and start squishing him, making a little bit of doggy drool come out. “Okay, yuck, but I swear to God Hiro you better have my back!” 

As if the dog understood you, he perked up and gave you a little bark. You huffed and grabbed one of the heavy textbooks off the floor. 

‘Just in case, for protection’, you thought. 

You open the door to meet with a familiar hallway. 

You’ve been here before. 

Hiro slowly goes behind you and then in front of you and starts growling to let anyone near know to back up and that he means business. You make sure to hold the textbook in a tight grip. Just in case anyone tries to surprise you. 

“I swear I’ve been here before Hiro, I just don’t know when...” 

Hiro barks as you let you know that’s he’s got you. 

You see an elevator, and decide to get inside before anyone has the chance to see you. 

“Yo! Y/N wait up!” 

You quickly look up to see a girl with a short, dark blue bob running towards you. 

You start panic at the thought of a person seeing you and press the button to close the elevator while Hiro starts growling to be loud and clear, 

‘Back the fuck up’.

The girl stops in her tracks are puts her hands up as if to say, ‘Alright, I’m backing down.’ 

The elevator closes but before it does, you see something that catches your eye, 

An aux cord is hanging off her ear. 

Just where the fuck are you?

[petrichoravellichor]

Title: A New Kind of Life

Wordcount: ~10k

Rating: T

Summary: What if, when Sam and Dean break into the Empty, Cas isn’t the only one they save? A post-15x19 fix-it fic in which Crowley gets a second shot at the redemption (and family) he deserves.

(Read on Ao3)

********************

Chapter 2 (of 5) (Ch. 1, Ch. 3, Chs. 4 & 5)

Days go by. Crowley remains in his room, keeping the door locked and stubbornly ignoring any attempts by Sam or Dean to gain entrance, although he does spare a breath to shout that if they want something to do, they can go ward the rest of the Bunker against further intrusions from certain Hell witches. In the end, the brothers leave him alone, and Crowley tells himself he’s glad. It nearly works; he is, after all, a very good liar, even to himself.

Then comes a newer knock, a softer one, followed by a voice Crowley recognizes as belonging to the new God-Kid, Jack: “Hello? Mr. Crowley? Are you still in there?”

And maybe it’s because he’s bored—it’s certainly not because he’s lonely— but Crowley decides to answer. “Why are you knocking?” he snaps. “Can’t you just blow the bloody door off its hinges?”

A beat of silence; then: “I...could, but it wouldn’t be very polite.”

Wouldn’t be very—?! Crowley gapes at the door; dear God, the boy really was Castiel’s son. Eventually, Crowley asks, “What do you want?”

“Do you know how to play chess?”

Whatever Crowley is expecting, it isn’t that. He goes to the door, unlatching the bolt and opening it a crack. “What?”

“Do you know how to play chess?” Jack repeats and holds up a battered old set. “I found this in the storeroom a while back, but I don’t know how to play, and neither do Sam or Dean.”

And it’s...strange. Crowley knows, logically, that this is the golden-eyed man he saw in the Empty, the supremely powerful being who is not only Lucifer’s spawn but also the new God; he knows this...yet somehow, as Jack stands before him and smiles almost shyly, Crowley can’t help but think Jack looks rather...small.

He frowns, opening the door wider. “What about Castiel?” Crowley demands archly. “Surely he’s familiar with what it means to be a pawn.”

Unfortunately, the jab appears to go right over the boy’s head. “He knows what all the pieces are called,” Jack says, nodding, “but he’s never played before. Have you?”

Crowley has. He actually rather likes chess, although it’s been some time since he’s faced a worthy opponent. As King of Hell, he’d of course been able to order other demons to play with him, but most of them were so abysmally bad at it that he’d stopped bothering after a while. “Why do you ask?” he says, instead of answering.

“Will you teach me?”

The request catches Crowley off-guard; he can’t help but feel it’s some sort of joke. “You want me,” he says slowly, “to teach you how to play chess.”

“Yes.”

“No.”

“Oh.” Jack’s face falls; he looks down. “Okay. Sorry for bothering you; I’ll leave you alone.”

Jack turns and begins to walk away, and the sight really shouldn’t bother Crowley...but it does. He feels a sort of painful pressure building in his chest, and suddenly, the thought of being alone any longer is downright unbearable. Bollocks...

“Wait!” Crowley calls, stepping out into the hallway as Jack turns to peer hopefully over his shoulder. “Just...wait. I’ve changed my mind. The answer is yes.”

Jack beams. “You mean it?”

And he looks so bloody happy that Crowley has to focus his gaze on Jack’s shoulder; looking too long at that smile feels like staring into the sun. “I said as much,” he grumbles. “What more do you want?”

“Can we play in the library? The lighting’s better there.”

Crowley flicks his gaze back to Jack’s face, fully prepared to say no, they’ll play in his quarters or not at all...but Jack is giving him these blasted, begging eyes that Crowley would bet good money were learned from Sam, and what actually comes out is, “Lead the way.”

*****

They take to having daily lessons in the library. Crowley demonstrates various openings and defenses, and when they progress to actual matches, he shows no mercy, checkmating Jack’s king in what feels like a record number of moves.

Still, what Jack lacks in natural ability, he makes up for with eagerness to learn and ample appreciation of Crowley’s knowledge, which is...actually rather nice, if Crowley’s being honest with himself; he can’t remember the last time anyone appreciated him for anything.

Sam, Dean, and Castiel look in on them from time to time, although Crowley pretends not to notice them. Once, he catches a glimpse of a woman Jack says is called Eileen Leahy.

“She’s Sam’s girlfriend,” Jack explains brightly as he takes one of Crowley’s pawns with his remaining bishop. “Sam brought her back from the dead after a hellhound killed her.”

Ah. That explains the dirty look...Crowley frowns, moving a knight to capture Jack’s bishop. He hadn’t been lying when he’d told Sam, years ago, that he hadn't known who Eileen was when he lent a hellhound to the British Men of Letters, and besides, they were the ones who’d decided to sic said hellhound on the woman, not him. It’s not his fault the bastards had apparently thought it sporting to use an invisible weapon against someone who couldn’t hear it coming. If Crowley had wanted to kill Eileen, he would have at least had the decency to use a weapon she could see. Still, what’s done is done, and Crowley does his best not to dwell on it. The topic of hellhounds is, after all, rather painful at present, given that he still doesn’t know what’s become of Juliet.

Not for the first time, Crowley curses himself for losing his temper with his mother before having learned the fate of his favorite hellhound. Was Juliet still in Hell, where he’d left her? Had she been well-cared for in his absence? What if one of his adversaries had harmed her out of spite? What if his mother had harmed her out of spite? Crowley has no way of knowing, not unless he wants to contact his mother again or just show up in Hell, and neither option inspires optimism. Rowena could very easily lie to him over the phone, and setting foot in Hell feels far too akin to walking into a trap: enough of Crowley’s enemies have probably survived the past few years that he’d be stabbed the moment he got through the gates, and for what? Only to learn that Juliet had been butchered years ago? At least as things currently are, he can still hold onto the chance, however slim, that Juliet is alive. If only there were some way to know…

Go on then, universe, Crowley thinks savagely, give me a bloody sign.

No sooner does the thought form than Crowley hears the click of paws against the Bunker's floor. He freezes, hardly daring to believe...but his hopes are abruptly dashed when a moment later, a tan, scruffy-looking mutt who is neither Juliet nor a hellhound enters the library. The dog pauses when it catches sight of him seated across from Jack at the table, then growls.

Jack looks over and smiles. “Hey, boy, it’s okay,” he calls soothingly, reaching a hand down to get the dog’s attention. “This is Mr. Crowley; he’s a friend. Come say hi.”

To Crowley's surprise, the dog scampers forward, apparently willing to take Jack’s word on the matter. It stops next to Crowley’s chair and sniffs him curiously until Crowley reaches out and hesitantly pats its head, at which point it starts wagging its tail and lets out a friendly sort of bark. The sound fills Crowley with a sense of unexpected warmth.

“When did you lot get a dog?” he asks, glancing back at Jack as the dog lies down at his feet.

“A little over a week ago,” Jack replies. “Dean found him after Chuck made everyone disappear. His name is Miracle.”

“Miracle,” Crowley repeats, looking down at the dog, which yawns back at him, apparently settling in for a nap. “Of course.”

After they finish their lesson, Crowley starts to return to his room, only to hear Miracle trailing after him into the hall. He turns to regard the dog with a frown.

“If it’s treats you’re after,” Crowley says, “I haven’t got any.”

Miracle cocks his head, seeming to consider him for a moment, then pads over, tail wagging and eyes bright. “Woof.”

Crowley arches a brow. “You don’t take no for an answer, do you?”

“Woof.”

“Right.” Crowley sighs. “Well, come on, then,” he says, turning and continuing the rest of the way to his room, Miracle trotting alongside him. “You’re no hellhound, but I suppose you’ll do for company.”

And to himself, with grudging approval: Well played, universe. Well played.

*****

More days pass. Crowley spends most of his time in his room, leafing through books borrowed from the Bunker library with Miracle curled up at the foot of his bed. The dog comes to visit him more often than not, scratching insistently at the door until Crowley lets him in. Having him around doesn’t make Crowley’s anxieties over Juliet fade away, but it does lessen the sting of her absence, if only a little.

Jack also stops by with increasing frequency, and Crowley honestly still doesn’t know what to make of him. Lucifer’s blood flows in the boy’s veins, and by all accounts, that should make Jack terrible beyond reason, a vicious, manipulative creature whose only goal is to bring about the downfall of mankind in the most horrible way imaginable.

Instead, Jack sits cross-legged on Crowley’s bed and talks cheerfully about Star Wars or whatever other interest has his attention that day, and his only vice seems to be an insatiable sweet tooth. During one of his visits, he asks about Crowley’s life before they met, and there’s something so maddeningly sincere about the way he does it that Crowley finds himself telling Jack more than he means to, about himself, about Hell, about his mother...

By the time he finishes, Crowley feels raw and a little embarrassed at having said so much, but Jack just smiles softly. “It’s okay, Mr. Crowley,” he says. “We can be more than the people we come from; my dads taught me that. We can choose to be good.”

Crowley isn’t so sure about that, at least not as far as he himself is concerned. His soul is about as damned as a soul can get, and besides, his choices have a nasty habit of blowing up in his face. Still, it’s...a nice thought, if nothing else.

He’s still thinking about it later that night, long after Jack’s gone off to Heaven for a bit to do whatever it is he and Amara do up there. Crowley’s sitting in the dark kitchen having a cup of tea—cheap stuff that comes in a bag, unfortunately, but at least there’d been a kettle—when Castiel appears in the doorway, an almost-silhouette against the soft glow of the hall light, and peers in at him through the darkness.

Crowley stares stonily back. Apparently, his assessment of the shift in Dean and Castiel's dynamic had been correct: Castiel is barefoot, wearing a t-shirt and sweats that were probably once Dean’s or maybe still are. Crowley can practically smell Dean’s scent on the clothes even from where he sits, and the low-quality tea does nothing to chase the bitterness from his mouth. Who would have thought that all it would take to tear away whatever final shred of heterosexuality Dean Winchester had been clinging to all these years was a deathbed love confession followed by a romp in the Empty? Not that Crowley cares a whit about that; he doesn't, not even a little bit, not at all.

“Hello, Castiel,” he says darkly. “Out for a stroll? You should try the dungeon; from what I recall, it’s lovely this time of night.”

Castiel raises an eyebrow. “I wouldn’t know,” he says evenly, “having never spent the night there.” Then, before Crowley can think of a suitable comeback, Castiel gestures at an empty stool on the other side of the table. “May I?”

Crowley shrugs. “This is your home, not mine. You don’t need my permission to do anything.”

“Even so, I’d like to have it.”

“Then consider it had. I’ll take my tea elsewhere.”

Castiel frowns. “There’s no need for that.”

Crowley lets his eyes linger on Castiel’s shirt, on Dean’s shirt, then snaps his gaze back to Castiel’s face. “Not for you, perhaps.”

Silence. Crowley is hyperaware of the clock on the wall, ticking out each passing second as they stare each another down, and he half hopes Castiel will charge, practically dares him to. Crowley’s not stupid—he knows his odds against an ordinary angel aren't particularly good, let alone a former leader of garrisons—but at the moment, he doesn’t care: worst-case scenario, Castiel kills him and he goes back to the Empty. Maybe if Crowley's lucky, he’ll actually get a funeral this time.

Eventually, however, Castiel’s shoulders relax, and he sighs. “You should know,” he says, quietly, “I bear you no ill will over our past grievances.”

Crowley bristles; for a second, he considers getting up and throwing the first punch himself. He isn’t sure what Castiel is playing at, but whatever it is, he’s not in the mood for games. “Of course you don’t," he growls. "They all worked out in your favor.”

Castiel regards him carefully. “You’re referring to Dean.”

“I’m referring to everything!” Crowley snaps, nearly shattering his cup as he slams it down on the table. “Haven’t you noticed, Castiel? Your choices are lauded, held up as grand examples of what one does for love, and mine?” He lets out a mirthless laugh that comes out closer to a sob. “Mine end with me on the business end of an angel blade, dying for a world where I’m not even missed, not by Dean or anyone else.”

No sooner does he say the words than Crowley feels like he can’t breathe. Which is stupid, because he doesn’t need to breathe, hasn’t for centuries, but the feeling’s there all the same. The place his heart would be if he still had one aches; it’s as though a well-healed scar in his chest has been sliced wide open and now Crowley’s choking on all the blood. He blinks back the bitter tears he can feel prickling at his eyes, staring fixedly down at the tabletop and wishing it would swallow him whole.

Eventually, he manages to get himself under control, and by the time the choking feeling subsides, Crowley is more exhausted than angry. Maybe Dean should have left him in the Empty after all, he thinks tiredly; it would have saved a good deal of heartache.

Through it all, Castiel remains silent; when Crowley finally looks up at him, he’s surprised to be met with something strangely akin to pity. Ordinarily, it would be infuriating, but right now, Crowley just can’t find the energy to give a damn; he slumps forward over the table and sighs. “What is it you want, Castiel?” he asks listlessly. “You came here to say something, so by all means, say it. There’s nothing you can take from me that I haven’t already lost.”

For a moment, Castiel lingers on the threshold; then he steps into the dark kitchen and sits across from Crowley at the table. Crowley waits, expecting to be told off...but when Castiel speaks, his tone is surprisingly, solemnly gentle.

“I wanted to thank you,” he says, “for the interest you’ve taken in Jack. What he’s been going through lately...facing Chuck, rebuilding Heaven...it’s been a great deal of change very suddenly. He’s trying so hard, and Sam, Dean, and I are supporting him as best we can, as is Amara, but it's still an incredible burden for a child to bear.” Castiel smiles sadly. “Especially when it’s so easy for others to forget that he’s a child.”

As he listens to Castiel speak, Crowley thinks back to that day in the Empty, at the cosmically powerful golden-eyed being who shielded him, shielded all of them, from the surrounding darkness. Jack is powerful in ways Crowley can only begin to imagine...but he’s also more than that. He's the boy who knocked timidly on Crowley's door and asked to learn chess, the boy who sits on the edge of Crowley’s bed and talks to him and smiles in delight when Miracle chases his tail. He’s curious and well-mannered and kind and—

And God, Crowley realizes with a start; bloody hell, when had he grown so fond of God?

“But, as I was saying,” Castiel says, snapping Crowley out of his thoughts, “the time you’ve been spending with him, treating him like he’s anyone else, giving him space to just be himself...it’s been good for him.” A pause, then: “You’ve been good for him. And while you and I have had our differences—”

Crowley can’t help it; he snorts. “That’s putting it mildly,” he says, and Castiel actually cracks a smile before continuing:

“—and while you and I have had our differences, Jack’s happiness takes precedence over all of them. He’s my son, and you matter to him.” He looks at Crowley intently, then adds, in a tone of absolute certainty, “And he would miss you if you were gone.”

The weight of Castiel’s words nearly knocks Crowley to the floor. He’s never mattered to anyone before, and now...now he matters to God. Crowley swallows; he doesn’t know what to say.

Castiel seems to understand, though. They sit in silence, and it’s not exactly amicable, but it’s not strained, either. Like for the first time since Castiel entered the kitchen, there’s enough space in the room for both of them.

Eventually, Crowley clears his throat. “There’s still some water left in the kettle,” he says, “if you’d like a cup of tea.” Then, because he doesn’t want to appear too agreeable, he gestures despairingly down at his cup and adds, “although what passes for Earl Grey according to Winchester tastes is, unsurprisingly, questionable at best.”

And Castiel, to Crowley’s surprise, smirks. “Leave that to me,” he says, rising and heading over to the cupboard. “I know where Sam hides the stash Rowena gave him for Christmas.”

[ilguna]

Metanoia - Chapter Five (f.o)

Summary: you will be crowned victor of the 75th hunger games.

Word Count; 4k

Warnings; swearing

NOTES: i give reader a last name to fit the world.

–

It’s really funny how they set a uniform to wear for the private session with the gamemakers. They haven’t really done that before, and you know that because of your years of mentoring. They don’t have a set outfit that they want the tributes to wear. Sure, they have guidelines, but nothing this strict.

It’s a tracksuit jacket that goes up to your throat. You zip it up all the way, squinting at yourself in the mirror, because this wouldn’t have been your first choice for a uniform. You don’t look too terribly bad, it’s just the fact that you’ve never worn something so… hideous.

Despite this all, you pull your hair out of your face again, it’s even messier than it has been the past three days for training. Progressively, you’ve begun to care less about what you look like. You’ve been zeroing in on as many skills as you can gather like a hoarder. You spent the first day just training, and the last two days learning the useful stuff. The shit they don’t teach in the academy.

It was a good couple of days, even if you were forced to make conversation with the hogs of the stations. The good news is that Cecelia is much more tolerable than Woof. Woof is incompetent, the man will die in the bloodbath. He doesn’t move fast, he doesn’t think straight, and he’ll be a target for you.

You weren’t expecting very much out of him in the first place. He goes right onto the list of the other imcompetent competitors. The list has tripled past your expectations. These games are going to be a walk in the park.

Brutus is already waiting in the main room when you get out there. He’s got an orange in his hand, already peeled. He looks up when you enter, and without a word, stands and heads for the door. This afternoon, Neysa and Edmond will be nowhere in sight. You haven’t seen Theo in days, but that’s no matter.

Neysa and Edmond will be consulting with the stylist to make sure that the interview outfits are matching. Amias is already working with whoever is working with Brutus, but it’s for more understanding. Neysa knows what you would like to wear, and Edmond will have an idea for what Brutus would like.

Brutus holds out a single orange slice.

You prick it from his fingers popping it in your mouth. When you bite down, the juice explodes in your mouth. It’s sweet, a little tangy. You don’t pride yourself with oranges, since they’re such a rare thing to come across in District Two. You guys might be rich and a favorite, but it doesn’t mean you get everything that you desire.

The elevator brings you down to the same floor you’ve been for the past three days. The ride is short, the doors open, you guys step out and head towards the room where you’ll be waiting to be called in. This shouldn’t take very long. After everyone gets inside the room, it’s only three people before it’s your turn.

Walking in, there’s only a couple of people here already. A few of which you’ve actually talked to, during your time of rotation in the training room. Cashmere and Gloss already sit by the wall up front, so you allow Brutus to go in first, since you’ll be sitting on the end of the row.

There’s three rows of four to fit all twenty-four of you in here. The way that things are laid out in here kinda make sense, but you wish that they had allowed District Two to be up against the wall. You’d rather be leaning against the cold concrete while your body is beginning to heat up.

You’re not mad, you’re not embarrassed, this is something that doesn’t belong to you again. It could very well be nerves, again. Since it basically feels the exact same as it did last time…

Maybe the jacket is too much, because there is no reason why you should be feeling like it’s ninety degrees because you’re anxious. You unzip it, and then slip out of the jacket. The second that it’s done though, there’s a whistle behind you.

Gloss turns to look to see who it is, but it doesn’t take a genius to know who’s going to keep harassing you. It’s Finnick, and he’s probably just come in here with Mags. You haven’t turned around since you got inside, mainly because you don’t care who comes in or out. You just want the room to be full already so this show can get started.

“Welcome to the gun show.”

“I really can’t wait until I can knock your fucking teeth out.” you roll your eyes, even if he can’t see it.

Finnick laughs, “I’m not that bad.”

“You are that bad.” you say, “I still don’t know what your goal is.”

“I thought we could be friends.”

“You thought wrong, my friends are sitting right here.”

Brutus snickers but doesn’t say anything, you can practically hear him ask, ‘we’re friends?’

If he’s thinking that, then so are Cashmere and Gloss, but they’re clearly smart enough not to say anything about it. At least they have some intuition that’s telling them that you don’t want to be talking to Finnick. And the best way to escape a conversation is to set grounds, even if they are lies.

“Who says you have to stop there?” Finnick asks.

“For fuck’s sake, just leave me alone.”

If Finnick has anything else to say, he gives it up. The silence is instant, and you welcome it in with open arms. Besides from the occasional ‘whoosh’ of the automatic doors, or the whispers of tributes talking to each other, the room is quiet. 

In no time, the room is full of all the tributes, and Gloss is being called in for his evaluation. As the clock ticks, you can feel yourself grow more anxious. It’s like a bottomless pit in your stomach, or as if you’ve been told that you’re being broken up with. It’s more of a grief feeling.

It’s awful, you don’t like it.

You look down at your wrist, reading over the words again. You run your thumb over them as if they’ll wipe off easily. Of course, they don’t budge even in the slightest. The whole idea of soulmates is crazy.

It’s a dumb concept. Who says that you have to end up with them, anyway? There’s plenty of people that you know, that never followed the rules because they didn’t care. There’s also the fact that you never know if that person is actually alive. It’s not like they fade after the person dies. They’re still as brand new as the day you got them.

You always thought that you’d be able to just overcome it, but with your repelling personality, no dice. That’s fine, you don’t like anyone, anyway. You’ll be content enough to live out the rest of your life in District Two, with two kids--Tanith and Zavian. One who won’t leave you alone, and the other won’t bother to visit.

You won’t be alone forever, you have them, and the occasional person who’s ballsy enough to visit you in your big, old, grand house. And if you can find a single animal you could get as a pet, you’d consider having them around, too. Turn your whole house into a zoo, like the old man that used to live next door, back when you weren’t a victor.

His house was overflowing with animals. Dogs, cats, he had two horses, a cow and a mule in his backyard. In his house were the chickens, goats and pigs. His house was covered in hay and smelt like piss and shit because he never cleaned it. He was too old and too stupid to be running something like that. However, you think he got taken down two years after your win. You went to visit your old house for a few things that you’d remembered that you wanted to move in and the house was just… gone. Like a controlled fire had taken it out.

You can’t say that you feel bad for him, he’s the entire reason why the street smelled so bad. In an upper-class neighborhood like yours, you’re surprised the neighbors hadn’t taken him out any earlier. He’s also the reason why you never opened the windows or doors for more than ten minutes… and why you never went in the backyard, either.

Brutus’ name is called. You fist-bump him, “Good luck.”

“Thanks.” he says.

Cashmere passes him on the way in, she gives you a dainty smile, and then continues her walk out of the room. It’s Brutus, and then it’s you.

“Is The (Y/n) Rosecelli nervous?” Finnick asks.

“I’m not.”

“You’re bouncing your leg like you’re trying to get it to fall off.” 

You hadn’t even realized it. You stop immediately, leaning into your hands as you rub your face, “I’m not nervous, someone else is.”

“Someone else?” 

You look over your shoulder at Finnick, “As much as playing stupid looks on you, don’t start now.”

Finnick is quiet, and then he sputters out a laugh, “You have a soulmate?”

“Everyone does. Mine just happens to be emotional, which is a total drag.” you hiss, “I don’t need to be feeling like this right now.”

The urge to bounce your leg again is like an itch, and you can’t help but to give in.

“I heard taking deep breaths are a fantastic way to calm yourself down.”

You ignore Finnick, it’s not your emotion. You’re confident. You’re excited. You’re enthusiastic. You’re calm. You have nothing to be worried about. You’re going to do great.

You can feel it all start to cease.

You’re an amazing fighter. You’re going to get great scores. You know what you want to do. You’re going to win. You’re the best one here.

One deep breath in, slowly letting it out, it’s like the anxiety wasn’t even there in the first place. Your leg stops, you cross them to ensure it, and continue repeating things to yourself. A much needed ego boost to keep your hands from shaking and your mind from collapsing.

Whoever your soulmate is, you’re beginning to hate them. They’re fucking up basically everything. It’s embarrassing, and you’re never embarrassed.

“Wow--”

“Zip it.” you snap, eyes focused on the door.

“District Two, (Y/n) Rosecelli. Report for individual assessment.” the voice over the intercom says.

You uncross your legs, throwing your jacket over your arm as you stand. You move out of the aisle and head towards the door. On the way in, you see Brutus with a grin on his face.

“Good luck.”

“Thanks.” you say.

You pull the jacket on now, zipping it up to your throat, because the room is air conditioned. With no one being in here, it makes the room colder. There’s no body heat to be worrying about. Even with the jacket on, you can still feel the cold air through it. 

You stand in front of the gamemakers, looking up at them. Plutarch Heavensbee--the new head gamemaker after the last one was killed. Word travels between mentors and victors like disease. Obviously it had to do something with the berries that Katniss and tried to eat. The fact that they were inside the arena in the first place was heinous enough. But to use it against the gamemakers, and Crane allowing it to happen…

“You have ten minutes to present your chosen skill.” Plutarch says.

You give a quick nod, wandering over to the nearest hologram station. You got to play around with it on the first day, and realized that going up to the hardest mode wasn’t even hard. It was medium. You broke a sweat after doing it for the third time in a row, and the gamemakers have definitely seen you mess with it before.

They have to assess you over a period of days, not just one. The private session is designed to show off anything that you wouldn’t want the other tributes knowing.

Which is exactly why you skip over all the regular throwing stations, and head right into the bow and arrow one. They have their own tv holograms that they’ll be able to watch you from. 

It’s not a skill you necessarily like. It helps with distance fighting, but since bow and arrows have been associated with Katniss, you’ve basically faded this into nothing. However, you pick up the bow, playing around with the strings to test the tightness. A quiver of arrows is pulled over your shoulder after.

You program the game easily, but before you step in, you turn around and fire an arrow just to see how awful the bow is. It’s not too bad, it’s actually fairly similar to the one they have at the academies. These ones are just tighter because they’re brand new.

You go inside after that. The holograms start off fairly easy. Now that you’re inside, you can see why it was so easy for Katniss to know where they’d be coming from before they were generated. The way that the orange beams move is a clear giveaway.

It takes one arrow for each person, always the center of the chest. If they’re moving, then you make an exception for the head, since it’s the next best thing to wipe someone out immediately.

You can feel yourself go into concentration mode. The beam moves, you spin around. You release the arrow at first chance, nailing the hologram. You grab another arrow, the beam moves, you spin around, release the arrow, get the hologram. Over and over until it’s finally done.

You wish you had some sort of watch so you could know when your time is up, but you decide that this is enough. You place the bow back where it came from, as well as the quiver, which has three arrows left. The arrows inside of the station will be cleaned up by some poor avox, it’s not your job.

You step right in front of the gamemakers again, waiting for them to dismiss you. When they do, you thank them, and then leave the room. You can hear them call in Beetee next, and you pass him on your way out too. Just before you also leave the little waiting room, Finnick and you make eye contact.

And on his face is a half-smile, half-smirk.

--

You plop down on the couch, leaning back against the cushions. Caesar Flickerman introduces the name of the game: tribute training scores. The entire couch is full. From right--where you’re sitter--to left, it sits Amias, Neysa, Edmond, Brutus and Brutus’ stylist. On the adjacent chair sits Theo.

He won’t look in your direction, it’s humorous.

Caesar starts it almost immediately, beginning with boys. Gloss lands himself an eleven, and Cashmere gets herself a ten, which makes you wonder how badly she messed up during her session. She’s supposed to be a career, not some average moron. Anyone with basic capabilities can get a ten.

Next is Brutus, he gets a nice eleven, which makes you all cheer for him in excitement. You want to hold your breath for your own, but you realize that’s not a reaction you would have. So, instead you give a big smile and lean back, crossing your arms. Confidence will get you out of this.

“District Two, (Y/n) Rosecelli with a score of eleven.” He gives a big smile, and you give a look to Brutus.

“And that is how it’s done!”

Brutus laughs, the two of you lean over for high-fives before going back to watching Caesar. Beetee and Wiress get boringly sad and average scores, but there’s not much to expect from them either. They didn’t do anything that would be entertaining over those three days. They get sevens.

The smile fades from your face once Finnick comes up. Your face straightens out and you lean forward. Brutus notices this, “Interested?”

“I gotta know how easy he’ll be to kill.”

“District Four, Finnick Odair with a score of eleven.” Caesar says, “And District Four, Mags Flannagan with a score of six.”

Finnick’s score is no surprise, but you are a little worried over Mag’s. She could have at least gotten a seven considering she did just about the same that Beetee and Wiress did. You suppose it makes sense in a way, though. She’s not going to be a good fighter, and they have to consider that too.

At least you and Finnick are on the same playing field, but he’ll be torn between protecting himself and Mags. You don’t really want to be the one to kill her, but another matching pair of District Four skulls on your arm is just too tempting.

You bring your arm over, looking at it as Caesar announces the next scores. You’ve got quite a collection. You didn’t kill any of District One’s tributes, but you did kill your district mate because it had come down to you two. If you want to keep traditions, Brutus would have to go on too. You wonder if he knows that part of your history.

It skips over District Three, but you got both from four. None from five or six, but you got the doubles on seven, the guy from eight and the girl from ten--oh, and the girl from twelve that had ran into the cornucopia like a dumbass. The total comes out to eight, which really is quite a lot.

Except that year a ton of people had ran into the cornucopia, more than usual. The girls from ten and twelve, and the boy from four had run in. As for the other five, that same day you took out the boy from eight. Your allies had taken out others, since they wanted at least something they could take credit for. 

Four on the first day, and the other four in the span of a week. You were the one with the most kills, you were showered with gifts. No one really stood a chance, not even your district mate. You kept track of the tributes throughout the entire game by carving lines into your arm. The second that the twenty-second guy was dead, you turned on your mate immediately.

It was too quick, it had taken the gamemakers by surprise. The way you turned, grabbed his head with one hand and used your sai’ to stab right through. He crumpled to the ground like a sack of flour, and you stood in the middle of that field, waiting for your crowning.

An entire minute of silence, which made you doubt that you were the winner. You had to count the cuts on your arms to double-check. You had done it each time after you’d heard a cannon, it should be accurate. And while you waited for them to announce your win, after you were sure it was yours, you made that final line.

Obviously they had wanted some fight, looking back on it. The final two should have been easy entertainment, and even sentimental, considering you guys were both from District Two. But there was no hesitation, you were already exhausted from fighting the last guy, and you just wanted it to be over with.

The reason behind why you’d chosen to wipe out the District Four tributes is funny, in some sick way. Of course, your games were right after Finnick’s, and you absolutely hated the way he won. Using his nets to drag people into the water and then uses his trident on them.

It’s the entire reason why you spared nothing for either of the four tributes. You didn’t even fuck with them a little bit like your allies had wanted. You killed them, and you made sure that the cannon had gone off before you’d even bothered to move on. You were so paranoid that they would try something like Finnick had done, again.

As much as people don’t want to admit it, you pay attention to things. Your brain is always turning. You’re keeping track of things, remembering plans and techniques. If you come up across anyone inside of the games, then you’ll know how to act. What they favor more in fights and all that. Not to mention, people like the morphlings and where they like to hide in the trees, what they’re looking for specifically.

It’s a whole ‘nother reason why you’re a perfect candidate. You’re prepared.

Anyway, districts five and six both get that same average score as three. Johanna Mason lands herself a nice ten, and her district mate Blight gets a nine. Not surprising for Johanna, but it is for Blight. Normally guys get higher training scores--and that’s not a sexist thing either.

It’s how your first games went. You had gotten a nine, and it must have been something you’d done during your training days. Unlike other districts, the careers aren’t really told to keep from showing off their skills. In fact, you’re encouraged to. It’s an intimidation tactic to weasel out the weaklings.

And you’re typically ordered to pick your favorites that look like good allies, and after private training day--which is then when you’re able to see the score--you send a formal request for them to be in the alliance. It’s a whole thing, more trouble than it’s actually worth, and it doesn’t happen very often because of it.

District eight through eleven get mainly average scores, there’s a few who stand out more than the others. And then it hits District Twelve.

“District Twelve--” Caesar’s face twists unexpectedly, “--Peeta Mellark, with a score of twelve.”

“What?” you nearly yell, pushing yourself up into a better seating position, “How?”

“That’s--”

“District Twelve, Katniss Everdeen with a score of twelve.”

“That’s impossible.” the blood must have drained from your face, and there’s a faint feeling that overcomes you, “No, no--no!”

No one has ever hit twelve. Twelve is the highest and one is the lowest. People have gotten close to twelve, clearly. You’ve got an eleven and a few others do too, but twelve…

“What did Katniss say to our alliance invitation?” Brutus asks, “Neysa!”

Neysa looks worried too, “Uh--Haymitch told me that she said no, or that she was at least thinking about it.”

You allowed Brutus to send in that request after watching Katniss shoot those arrows, but it was only Brutus that was asking. You weren’t included in it. Had Katniss said yes, she would have been dragged into the alliance altogether, whether you like it or not, you would have had to make friends.

And there’s a very good reason as to why she probably said no. It’s the alliance thing with Finnick, isn’t it?

You pucker your lips, “Neysa I need a moment with you.”

She looks over at you, Caesar Flickerman has long since been forgotten. She nods a little bit, everyone else in the living room looks confused as to why you couldn’t have just said it in front of them too.

You bring Neysa as far as you can manage without making it suspicious. Even then, you’re dropping your voice to a whisper, and turning your back to the living room so Brutus won’t be able to read your lips.

“What is it?”

“Tell the District Four mentors that I want to be allies with Finnick,” you say before you can catch yourself and change your mind, “And I don’t mean for him to join us, I mean for me to join them.”

“Them?” Neysa looks suspicious.

Shit, “Finnick and Mags. What else would I have meant?”

It was a smooth recovery, enough to get her off your back.

“You’d just leave everyone like that?” Neysa doesn’t like this, you can hear it in her tone of voice, “It’s just as much of a dumb idea as running solo is--”

“I just want to see what he says, I don’t have my mind set in stone.” You give her a look, “Neysa, come on.”

“Fine, but you will tell me your plan if it works out like you’re envisioning.”

“I wouldn’t dream of leaving you out of the loop.” You tell her.

“Is there anyone else?” she asks.

You think for a moment on who would be dumb enough to accept but smart enough to do it too. A light bulb then goes off, “Peeta Mellark.”

[fanficimagery]

Pull Me Closer

Summary: Imagine moving in across the street from Scotty Sire.

Words: 5.5K  Warnings: Language. I adore Kristen with all my heart, but for the sake of this imagine were just going to pretend Scotty is single.

Moving states away felt like a breath of fresh air, especially after the passing of your last living grandparent. Things were tense, even more so after the reading of the will, and the three bedroom home in California was calling your name. The front and back yard was spacious enough for your dog, and the pool and hot tub out back were perfect for you.

Before the move you had your personal belongings and some furniture you couldn't live without shipped to your new home where the house's occasional caretaker put it in the house for you, and even ordered some stuff online from a nearby warehouse that delivered directly to the house. Thankfully the caretaker put everything in their respective rooms, and even had the pool and hot tub set up for your arrival.

So pulling up in your Jeep Wrangler with the windows rolled down, you park in the driveway and stare up at the three bedroom home that is now all yours. Reaching over into the passenger seat, you rub your hand over Rocko's back- your fully grown black and gray Great Dane.

"Welcome home, Rocko. Lets go check it out."

Rocko quietly woofs as you exit your Jeep, quickly rushing around to the passenger side to open the door for your dog. He jumps out, tail wagging as he immediately sets out to sniff the entire yard. You then make your way over to the mailbox where your house key is hidden, your attention being stolen by raucous laughter from across the street. There are a group of boys, a couple of them filming as others run around with paintball guns.

"Whoa. Check out that horse!" The exclamation makes you chuckle, you grinning when you see their attention is on Rocko who's now standing at the curb and staring at the boys with a slightly wagging tail.

You whistle and gain Rocko's immediate attention. "Lets go, boy. Inside!" As you start to make your way towards the house, Rocko leaps into action and follows after you. You push the key into the lock and the door opens easily. Sighing in content, you scratch Rocko between the ears. "Home sweet home, pup."

After scoping out the neighborhood and getting a feel for it, you finally find yourself comfortable enough to jog around in order to get some sort of cardio in. The kids around the block especially love it when you jog with Rocko in tow and you soon find yourself fitting in.

And even though you've been in your new place for about a week and a half, today's the day the neighbors across the street have finally made themselves known.

You and Rocko are walking up to your mailbox when two boys jog across the street. You feel messy and gross because you'd been running around with Rocko for quite some time, but the boys are all smiles. Rocko quietly woofs in excitement and you scratch him between his cropped ears.

"Whoa," the tanned, dark haired individual muses. Only then do you realize he's got a camera in hand. "He's intimidating up close."

"Don't worry. He's a sweetheart. Rocko's just excited because you're new." Both guys seem to ease up at that, the dark haired one stepping up to Rocko and petting him, taking video.

The silver haired, red beaded guy chuckles. "Sorry about him. He's easily excited by dogs. We, uh, we live next door and figured we'd finally come over and say hi. I'm Scott."

"And I'm Todd," Todd says distractedly, leaning down to kiss Rocko before moving back at the last second, laughing.

"Y/N. And nice to finally meet you guys. I think you're the only ones I hadn't met."

Scott sheepishly rubs the back of his neck. "Sorry about that. We're usually home, but our friend needed some content for his vlog so he flew us out to Vegas and-"

"And it's been a party non-stop," Todd says. "Good times."

You laugh softly. "Your friend vlogs?"

"We all do, but David's got more of a following than us."

"Oh. That's cool," you admit. "I, uh, I actually post videos too, but nothing crazy or as frequent as those famous Youtubers do."

"Oh yeah? What do you post?"

"I cover songs that I can vibe with." Todd immediately looks up, pointing the camera at you and Scott. "And I do unboxing videos of some of my fanmail. I love opening up sketchy mail."

"Look, guys," Todd says, "Scott's found his soulmate."

You snort and Scott faintly blushes, glancing at his friend and shaking his head. "Dude, shut up." Then he looks back at you, smile a little wider and a little nervous. "I sing too, but I mostly post videos of the stupid shit me and my friends get up to."

"Why do I get the feeling the shit you and your friends get up to is off the walls insane?"

"Because it is," Todd tells you. "David likes to shoot us with a paintball gun when we least expect it."

"What?"

"It's fine. We get paid, so it's all good."

You chuckle in disbelief. "If you say so. I'm going to have to look you guys up on Youtube now."

"Do it," Scott agrees. "Just look up David Dobrik. We're all tagged in his videos."

"I will." You rock back on the heels of your feet, whistling shortly to catch Rocko's attention. "Well it was good to finally meet you both. I should, uh, I need to shower and eat," you say while slowly backing up the sidewalk into your yard.

"Wait, what?" Todd says, looking up in a hurry. "That's it? We don't get a name in return to look you up on Youtube?"

You and Scott both laugh. "Just look up Halsey on twitter. She tweeted out my latest cover of her song Graveyard a couple weeks ago."

"Halsey tweeted you!" Todd practically shouts. "Shut the fuck up."

"I'm serious." You suddenly can't stop laughing at Todd's excitement, he pushing the camera into Scott's hands so he can take out his phone and get on Twitter. "And on that note," you say when you see the app open up, "I'm gonna go. I don't like seeing people hear me sing for the first time. It's awkward."

"If you ever need anything, we're right across the street," Scott says.

"Ditto. My door is always open," you return.

Telling Scott and Todd your door was always open was probably a mistake, but after the first week of Todd walking in without so much as a head's up, it quickly became the norm. Todd usually showed up, asked about your day, and then spent the rest of the time laying with Rocko. Scott, however, greeted Rocko and then spent the rest of his time with you talking about music.

And within that week, they learned you were a great cook, but couldn't bake to save your life, and unfortunately found out you walked around the house semi-nude. For some reason you were more embarrassed about Scott seeing you in a t-shirt and underwear than Todd, and then quickly realized it wasn't really a big deal to them. Well at least not to Todd, but he still took pleasure in teasing you and giggling like a little girl when Scott would get defensive on your behalf.

And after the boys realized your house was a no-pants zone more often than not, Todd found it okay to strip down to his briefs when he needed a nap, Scott sometimes doing the same after sheepishly smiling and cuddling up with Rocko.

          - X - X - X - X - X -

You're unloading box after box in your driveway, your fan mail having arrived at your new address. Several of the boxes are rather heavy and you're unsure about how exactly you're going to get them inside, but a voice shouting from across the street makes you sigh in relief.

"Need some help?"

You turn around, shielding the sun from your eyes, and wave over Scott. "Yes, please!"

Scott jogs across the street, Todd following at a slower place with three other guys. But from binge watching numerous Youtube videos, you realize it's David, Zane, and Heath.

When Scott gets a glimpse at all the boxes up close, he grins. "Went a bit crazy shopping online, did you?"

"No." You huff a laugh. "It's mail from all my subscribers."

"Mail?" Todd asks, slinging an arm around your shoulders in greeting and pulling you into his side. "Does that mean you're going to make an unboxing video soon?"

"Yeah. Today."

"Sweet. I'm sticking around for that." You shrug, chuckling as Scott rolls his eyes. "By the way, meet our other friends. This is David, Heath, and Zane. Boys, this is Y/N."

"Oh hey! You're the singer," David muses, camera in hand. "Is this cool?" He then quickly asks, gesturing to his camera. "You're really good, by the way."

"Thank you and yes." You blush and Todd pinches your cheeks as he mockingly coos at you. He pinches a little too hard and you retaliate by shoving him off of you and punching him as his friends laugh. Scott then brings you into his side when Todd starts poking at you and you practically melt against him. "I've recently starting watching your guys' videos and can I just say that y'all are fuckin' wild?! Holy shit!"

"Ooh, girl," Heath then says. "That cover you did on Sam Smith's Stay With Me gave me the chills. My girlfriend Mariah is in love with your voice."

"I really liked Bad Liar by Imagine Dragons," Todd grins.

You laugh. "You guys really did go through my videos, huh."

"Duh." David giggles. "Scott and Todd couldn't shut up about you, so we had to look you up."

"Oh god."

"Mhm," Zane hums, cracking up a moment later when he can't take himself seriously. "Is it true our boys walked in on you in your underwear?"

"Jesus Christ. Did you guys really have to tell them that?"

Scott squeezes your shoulders. "Don't blame me. That was all Toddy."

Rolling your eyes, you let the smile continue to grace your lips to let the guys know you're not really upset about it. "To be fair, it was a Calvin Klein sports bra and boy short underwear. I also had a flannel shirt on, but it was left unbuttoned, and I never know when Todd is just going to barge in. It really wasn't that big of a deal. I was more startled than anything else."

"So let me get this straight," Zane says, glancing between you and Todd. "Todd saw you practically naked and he didn't try to hump you?"

You snort and then shake your head. "Nope."

"Baby!" Heath then coos at Todd, he and Zane sandwiching their friend in a hug. "You're growing up." You all laugh, David capturing it all on his camera.

"Well if you four are done," Scott says, "Y/N needed our help. Let's get this inside for her."

David's the only one who doesn't help, he being reluctant to put down his camera. You understand, even if his friends give him grief for it. "By the way, guys, don't mind Rocko. He's a gentle giant."

"Rocko?" Heath wonders.

David opens the door for all of you, he cursing quite loudly as Rocko lets out the deepest woof in his arsenal. You, Scott, and Todd all laugh.

"Rocko, my man." Todd enters, setting down his box before being distracted by your dog.

"I swear Todd only visits to eat my food or play with Rocko," you say.

When the guys all notice your set up in the living room and find out you do unboxing videos of your fan mail, they all ask to stick around. You don't mind the company, so you let them, even letting David continue to video for some content he can use in his own vlog.

Once everyone is settled, it's only you, Scott, and Zane in the actual shot. Heath and David sit off the sides, but close enough to be caught in frame should they want to be, and Todd sits behind the camera as he lounges with Rocko who's resting his head on the boy.

Your fan mail is nothing spectacular, the items ranging from band tees to posters to fan art of you and Rocko. And after each box is opened, you make sure to thank the person who sent it by giving them a shout-out. There are also boxes of snacks, which Heath and Zane seem really excited for, and you treat them to your favorites. There are some specialty candy that's only made in Texas that you make the boys all eat, but only Scott seems fond of the cherry flavored gummies that are covered in chili powder. The other snacks from Texas come from a store named Buc-ee's, and David, Heath, and Zane become quite fond of the Beaver Nuggets.

More mail is opened and you laugh as you open several packages just meant for Rocko- toys, treats, and even shirts made specifically for your Great Dane.

"We are seriously going to have to plan a trip to Texas just for Beaver Nuggets," David says, popping yet another caramel-coated, crunchy puff corn into his mouth.

"See. They're good, right?"

"Mhm." He eats a few more before asking, "So, Y/N, what's the weirdest thing you've ever received?"

You immediately blush and the guys all perk up. "Oh this is gonna be good," Todd muses.

"Fuck you." The guys all laugh and you sigh when you realize they're awaiting an answer. "Just.. hold on." You shoot a quick outro clip, thanking everyone for the mail and that you'd have a new song cover coming soon. Just as you're saying goodbye, the boys all squeeze in and wave at the camera. Laughing, you tell Todd to cut the camera off and then tell them what they want to hear. "So the weirdest thing I received was a box full of lingerie and sex toys."

"WHAT?!" Heath nearly shouts, Zane giggling at his side.

"And what's weird is that guy had my size down perfectly. Like if I had tried the lingerie on, it'd have fit."

Scott quirks an eyebrow at you. "If?"

"Yeah. There we no tags on the underwear and all the sex toys were out of their packaging. It was super sketchy!"

The guys all laugh at your grossed out expression. David leans forward, camera nearly in your face. "Now I think the question is, is would you have kept the sex toys had they been in their proper packaging?"

The room goes oddly silent. "Well.."

"You hesitated!" Todd screams, cackling.

You grab a pillow, chunking it at him. "A girl has her needs, you dick! But still, I don't know. Sex toys from a fan is still super weird."

"Baby," Heath coos, "lingerie from a fan is weird. Sex toys is crossing a line."

You nod in agreement and eventually get up to head to the kitchen. The boys all follow as you start bringing out food to eat, and Zane's whistle of appreciation catches your attention.

He's looking out into the back yard, David and Heath by his side. "No offense," Zane starts, "but how are you affording a place like this?"

You chuckle as you scoop some ice cream into a bowl. "It's been in the family for quite a while. I actually inherited it last month when my grandfather passed." The guys go quiet and you glance at them, smiling as they suddenly seem uneasy. "It's okay. My grandfather lived here up until his wife passed away. He moved closer to his family where he then proceeded to lose both his children. When my mom died, I was his only grandchild who continued to have anything to do with him and even moved him in with me when he got sick. I didn't even know this place existed until the reading of the will where he left me everything- this house and his money."

"Damn. I bet everyone else was pissed," Heath says.

"Yep. Hence the reason I'm here now. I got tired of listening to them belittle me, so I packed up myself and Rocko, and here we are."

"Well they sound like assholes," David tells you. "And I, for one, am glad you're here. Scotty is too."

"Dude."

Scott's sudden look of disbelief at his friend sends you into a bout of laughter, you holding your hands up when he nudges you in retaliation. Scott purses his lips to keep from laughing and you quickly wink at him before picking up your bowl of ice cream and moving on.

"Don't pretend I can't hear you," you say while hip checking Zane out of the doorway from where he was muttering something to Todd. "I saw the dry ice video. You guys are not fucking up my pool."

"No, but Y/N, just hear us out..!"

Weeks soon turned into months and you can't believe how much Scott and Todd have changed your life. Scott was a little tamer than Todd, which is probably why you were more drawn to him, but the boys were still wild. You had thought you kept the teeny tiny crush you developed on Scott under wraps pretty good, but when you were eventually introduced to the rest of their friends, Todd made sure the guys knew you were off limits less they wanted to step on Scott's toes. And because you were clearly holding out for their friend.

The girls were just stoked to have another female in the group, and you found yourself being asked on shopping trips and to attend hang out sessions more times than you ever were asked back in your hometown.

You went out with the entire group a total of two times when Scott asked you and you found they were just as crazy as they were in their videos. The first time you kept yourself limited to two drinks in order not to get out of hand, but the second time you were encouraged to let loose. Needless to say, your new friends saw you being a hot mess and you knew you'd never live it down. You had become Zane's favorite drinking buddy, right next to Heath.

But tonight is a night of peace and quiet, you staying in with Rocko and quietly celebrating your birthdays. And since you're not that fond of cake, you had found a bakery that was dedicated to making cakes for pets and ordered one for Rocko. Then once the sun has gone down, you get the cake out of the refrigerator and place four sparklers around the cake. You quickly tug a party hat on over your head and manage to get one on Rocko without him pawing it off, and then light the sparklers before grabbing a bottle of wine in your other hand. After quickly posing for a picture, you blow out the sparklers, take them out, and let Rocko devour his cake.

Once you've got yourself a glass of wine poured and have made yourself comfortable on the couch with some of your favorite movies queued up, you post the picture to your Instagram with the caption: Happy birthday to us! For the last four years, I've been honored to share my birthday with Rocko. All I need for this special day is the love of my fur baby.

Along with the picture of you and Rocko, and his cake, you post another picture with it that's of Rocko laying his head on your lap. After posting, you set your phone aside and settle in to watch movies.

           - X - X - X - X - X -

You're in the middle of Jeepers Creepers when your doorbell rings, you startling and then shushing Rocko when you startled him as well. Pressing pause on your movie, you get up to go answer the door. And when you swing it open, you're met with Scott's beaming smile and two cupcakes in hand- one cupcake with a lit candle shoved in it and the other with a dog treat shoved in it.

"Scotty," you chuckle, immediately melting and leaning bashfully against your door.

"Happy birthday, Y/N." He then leans his head in through the doorway, saying, "Happy birthday, Rocko!", to which Rocko woofs in response.

"What are you doing? I thought you were filming at David's tonight?"

"My bit was over with about ten minutes after I had gotten there," he says. "Now come on. Make a wish and blow out your candle."

You can't stop smiling, but you do as you're told. You stare at the flickering flame, make a wish, and then blow it out. Scott mock cheers. "Thank you. I've got beer in the fridge and Jeepers Creepers on TV if you want to stick around."

"Sounds like a plan."

After gesturing him inside, you huff a quiet laugh as he readily kicks off his shoes. As you head for the kitchen, you hear him call out to Rocko and feed your dog his own treat. You then return with a beer for Scott and another glass of wine for yourself, and take a seat on the other side of Rocko since he had snuggled up to Scott himself.

Ten minutes into the movie, you can't help but look at Scott again. He meets your gaze and grins, light from the TV reflecting off his nose ring. "I'm really glad you came, Scotty."

"Yeah? Me too."

Nearing the end of Jeepers Creepers 2, you can't help but take a quick picture of Scott and Rocko as they sleep on the couch. You have no idea how Scott is able to take so much of Rocko's weight on his arm, but he does and he looks quite adorable.

The picture gets posted straight away with the caption: I take back my earlier statement. All I need on this special day are my two favorite boys [heart eyes emoji] #WeakInTheKnees

You're floating in the middle of your pool, Rocko lounging on his own float not too far away as music fills the back yard from a portable speaker sitting on a nearby table. Your hands lazily sweep through the water at your sides to keep your float moving, and your eyes flutter open at the sound of a cat-calling whistle.

David stands at the edge of your pool, camera in hand and pointed directly at you with Jeff and Todd at his sides. Raising your hand, you flip off David's camera and then laugh when you hear Jeff say, "Man, Nerf is never allowed here. He'd be so jealous of Rocko's life."

"One of these days, Wittek, I'm gonna kidnap your dog and hold him hostage for a couple days. He ain't ever gonna wanna go back home to you."

"Keep dreaming, Y/L/N."

Todd suddenly whoops as he strips off his shirt, jumping into the pool a moment later. David laughs and when Todd doesn't immediately resurface, dread fills your stomach. David is still giggling and before you can say anything, you're yelping as your float is upended and you're rolling into the water.

Resurfacing and spluttering on water, you splash Todd's laughing face. "You're a dick, Toddy."

"You love me."

"Fuck off."

"Well not as much as you love Scotty."

David and Jeff laugh, and you splash him again. "Will you stop saying I'm in love with him?"

"Why? It's true. You're both just too goddamn oblivious to notice it."

"Oh I notice it," you say as you continue to tread water. "We're just- we can't escape the tip-toeing stage."

"Well escape it," Jeff says. "The sexual tension is killing us."

"God I hate you guys sometimes." Swimming over to the edge of the pool, you accept Jeff's helping hand. Then sitting on the ledge and accepting the towel David passes over, you ask, "So what's up?"

"Scotty's birthday is coming up. We need ideas," Todd says. He swims over, pulling himself out of the water and sitting next to you.

"Well I would offer up my pool, but I've seen how out of hand your parties tend to get. I don't want you to break my house," you say, chuckling.

David opens his mouth to deny the statement, but then shrugs and giggles. "Yeah."

You take a moment to think about it, clicking your tongue on the roof of your mouth. "What are you guys doing for music?"

"Not sure yet. Shouldn't be too hard to find a decent DJ."

"I think I might know someone. Someone pass me my phone." Jeff looks around until he spots it, grabbing it and giving it to you. You bring up your text messages, shooting off a series of texts back to back. "I'm not sure they'll agree, but if they do-"

"Who's they?" David asks.

"Some friends I knew from before they blew up," you say. Your phone dings and you read the texts coming through, smiling. "So my friends are actually in town for a few weeks. They're down to DJ and perform a bit of live music if you want them."

"Well who are they?" Todd wonders.

"If I tell you, not a word of this to anyone. Clear?" All three boys nod. "I know them as Alex and Drew, but they're more famously known as the Chainsmokers."

"Shut the fuck up," David immediately blurts. Todd and Jeff laugh. "Are you serious right now?"

"Yeah." You pull up the texts, showing them to your friends. "They're down to party. They like to surprise people so they'll probably wear masks or something and play some remixes. Then when things really get going, they'll go live."

"Holy shit." Todd is still laughing. "This party is gonna be dope!"

"Now I'm kind of jealous," Jeff chuckles. "Why couldn't you be my neighbor first?"

You scoop up some water in your hand and fling it over your shoulder. "Shut up." Then looking back at David and Todd, you say, "They'll need a stage to set up their shit. Is that do-able?"

"Uh yeah!" David nods.

"Cool. I'll help you plan some more later, but now I need some ideas. What is a good birthday present?"

"Sex."

"David!" Todd and Jeff laugh, and you attempt to splash water at David. He easily sidesteps it. "I'm serious"

Todd smiles. "Honestly? Sing for him. You know he's been wanting to hear you sing live instead of watching your videos."

"Ugh. I rather seduce him." David high fives you and you laugh directly into his camera. "If you put that in the vlog, I'm gonna drown you, Dobrik."

A week and a half later, it's Scott's birthday. Todd has managed to keep him busy all day, but not after you walked across the street to deliver him a birthday cupcake. Scott had beamed when he saw you, and then hugged you and pressed a kiss to your temple as Todd cooed from around the corner.

You had then proceeded to set up all day, laughing at everyone's reactions when Alex and Drew showed up to set up their area with turntables, lights, fog machines, and a few confetti cannons. You only expected some lights and music, so you thanked them profusely for going all out to which they assured you only the best for the guy who apparently held a special place in your heart. You had blushed that they picked up on that and then sighed when David, Natalie, and Zane overheard and continued to tease you throughout the entire day.

You got ready with all the girls at David's and then arrived at the small warehouse where the party was to take place. Alex and Drew wore light-up masks to conceal their identity until later in the party, and the guests started to show up by the carload.

Scott's started texting you about ten minutes ago, skeptical of Todd's motives and vague answers of where they were driving to. You had anticipated that, so you took a few selfies at your house and at David's beforehand to send to him so he wouldn't suspect you were in on anything. It worked.

You get anxious when you realize Scott and Todd have finally arrived, and the whole crowd of guests go silent. As planned, Todd enters first because there was no way Scott was going to when Todd didn't answer his questions, so it's only after Todd ducks out of the way do the lights flick on and everyone shouts Surprise!

Confetti rains down, and horns and sirens blare. Scott is beaming, hugging all his friends who are the front of the group. When he gets to you, he points an accusing finger in your face before wrapping you up in a hug. You laugh and squeeze your arms around his waist until he lets you go.

You're about to hang back as everyone crowds him, but he grabs your hand and the smile he flashes you has your stomach turning. He squeezes your hand and tugs you closer to his side, and you get the feeling that he doesn't want you to wander off too far from him.

The music is a hit with the crowd, as you expected, and Scott seems to be having a good time. The alcohol is flowing, David is directing bits here and there for the vlog, and everyone is having a good time on the dance floor. But soon enough a cake is being wheeled out and the entire crowd is singing happy birthday. Scott is bashful through the whole thing, he blowing out the candles and dodging the first handful of cake that Todd attempts to smash in his face.

"Alright, alright, alright," Alex says from behind his mask. "You guys throw an insane party, but let's kick things up a notch." The crowd cheers as horns blare over the speakers, but you can see the confusion in numerous faces. The masks finally come off and the crowd erupts louder. Scott's eyes widen and he looks at you in surprise. "We are the Chainsmokers and thank you guys for coming out to Scotty's birthday bash."

The music restarts, fog and confetti blasting as the music comes back on.

"Who the fuck got the Chainsmokers?" Scotty asks.

Everyone looks at you and you shrug. "They're friends of mine. I cashed in a favor."

Scott's eyes sparkle. "Thank you."

"Don't thank me yet, babe. The night is still young."

           - X - X - X - X - X -

The crowd is still hyped an hour after Alex and Drew had lifted off their masks, and then they're even more hyped when they realize the Chainsmokers are performing live. You, Scotty, David, Toddy, Natalie, Jeff, Heath, Zane, and Mariah are up on stage, and when the song switches to something a little slower Toddy looks at you expectantly. You wink, but make no move as your friend starts to perform the beginning of their hit song Closer. You can see Mariah lip syncing to Heath and you move to the beat next to Scotty, making him dance with you along to the lyrics. He obliges you, chuckling in amusement, and then pulling you closer to him when the beat drops.

Moments later, a microphone is pressed into your hand and you fight off a smirk when you see Scott's eyes widen as you bring the microphone up to your mouth, leading him towards the middle of the stage. "You look as good as the day I met you. I forgot just why I left you; I was insane."

Todd and Zane scream off to the side, holding onto one another. David records the entire thing and you can see your friends from the corner of your eyes as they get hyped up over you serenading Scotty.

"So baby pull me closer in the backseat of your Rover that I know you can't afford. Bite that tattoo on your shoulder." You mock bite at his shoulder and Scott laughs. "Pull the sheets right off the corner of the mattress that you stole from your roommate back in Boulder. We ain't ever getting older."

The beat drops and you're all set to start dancing, but Scotty surprises you. He grabs you by the back of your neck, reels you in, and presses his mouth against yours. Your friends, plus the crowd who you hardly even know, all erupt louder in excitement. Your left hand grasps onto his hip, the other still gripping tight to the microphone. Lights are flashing, confetti is raining down, and you pull back from Scotty to see his bright eyes shining down on you.

Heart pumping furiously, you bring the microphone back up to your mouth to sing, "We ain't ever getting older!" The beat drops yet again and this time it's you who brings him down into a kiss.

Scotty laughing against your mouth sends you into a fit of giggles, and when you eventually pull apart because of all the jostling your friends are doing, he keeps you close enough to mutter, "Best birthday ever," in your ear.

[jaehyun-eclipsed]

Before I Met You | Twenty-One

Next Update: ~January 10, 2021

Pairing: NCT (Jaehyun, Lucas, Mark, Jaemin, Johnny) X Reader/OC

Genre: Romance, Angst, Coming of Age

Summary: Four. There were four people before I fell in love with you… Here are their stories.

Before I Met You Masterlist

Prev | Next

The following day, I woke up and began packing to go home for winter break. Jia had left early this morning to catch a flight back to Beijing, so I was left to my own thoughts about the upcoming lunch outing with Johnny.

I threw on some black jeans, a brown off-the-shoulder sweater, and black knee-high boots. I was finally able to go back to my norm of taking the morning to do my hair and makeup after showing up with minimal effort during finals week.

Yes, I wanted to look cute for this “date,” but I was also just happy to not look like I had just rolled out of bed before going out every day.

I meet Johnny in his room and walk out of the house together with Hendery who was on his way to the airport.

“What are you doing here, Y/N?” Hendery asks.

I’m taken by surprise because I thought Hendery knew Johnny and I were hanging out today, but quickly realizing that Johnny didn’t mention it, I’m not sure how much to tell him.

“Oh, um, Johnny and I are just hanging out today. I think he needs to drop off a book and then we’re gonna grab some food.”

“Oh.”

We wish Hendery goodbye, parting ways as he gets onto a bus heading to the airport. I follow Johnny to drop off his book and afterwards, we opt to grab lunch at my favorite Korean place near campus. The restaurant is basically empty midafternoon with the exception of a few students celebrating the end of finals.

“So, you’re not seeing anyone?” Johnny asks.

I shake my head. “No.”

“Why not?”

Because I’m me. I get involved with people that seem to have weird issues and the person I’m currently interested in has a girlfriend, and yet, I’m still hanging out with him.

Shrugging, I press my lips together before finally saying, “Haven’t found anyone I’m interested in, I guess.”

“What are you looking for then?”

“Someone respectable and smart. Someone I can talk to about anything,” I say. “Someone who isn’t going to have a problem with me having guy friends.”

“Having guy friends?” He quirks an eyebrow. “That sounds so specific.”

“Believe me, when you have guy friends whose girlfriends hate you, you learn quickly that you’ll need to find someone that doesn’t have severe jealousy issues.”

“Your guy friends’ girlfriends hate you?”

“Something like that.”

Johnny scrunches his face in confusion. “Why?”

I shrug. “I suppose they see me as a threat. Not really sure why. It’s not like I want to date their boyfriends.”

At least, that’s been true until now. Though, it’s not like I’m going to do anything to actively steal him. None of this, “you should leave you girlfriend and be with me.”

“My girlfriend doesn’t want me to have girl friends,” Johnny says.  

“Oh.”

I wonder why. If I knew he acted like this around other girls, I guess I might understand.

“Does she not trust you around other girls or something?” I ask.

Ah ha. That was a loaded question.

“I guess so. She talked to all her friends and they said the same thing: boyfriends shouldn’t have any other girl friends besides their girlfriend.”

“That’s kinda…” —I grimace— “I don’t know how I feel about that. I feel about that. As long as you aren’t flirting with other girls, then I don’t see why you shouldn’t be able to have other girl friends.”

“That’s what I said!” he exclaims.

Except, I’d argue that you are flirting with other girls, but that’s none of my business.

“Does she have other guy friends?”

“I don’t know. She says she doesn’t.”

I turn away briefly, hoping he doesn’t notice my look of skepticism. That sounds like a lie.

“Does she go here?”

“No, she’s going to a community college in Santa Clara. She’s trying to transfer to a CSU in SoCal.”

So that’s why we never see her around.

“How long have you been dating?”

“Almost two years.”

“So you met in high school?”

“Yeah, she went to a different high school, but my friend introduced me to her and we used to meet up to study a lot during the school year.”

“Oh that’s nice. Do you see her often?”

“Like every few weeks when I go home or during breaks,” he says. “Do you want to see a picture of her?”

“Sure.”

Johnny pulls out his phone and shows me a picture of the two of them at a park. She’s decently pretty—a six and a half at best—but nothing particularly special.  

My eyes narrow at him as puts his phone away and begins looking through his menu. Maybe he’s not trying to hit on me if he’s being so open about his girlfriend? But that doesn’t explain everything else that’s happened unless he’s just naturally flirty. I highly doubt that.

“I think I’m going to order bibimbap,” he says to me, putting the menu on the table.

I nod in acknowledgement. “I’m going to order the sundubu-jjigae. It’s cold out.”

“Do you want to do anything afterwards?”

His question catches me off guard. After learning more about his girlfriend and seeing how comfortable he is talking about her when prompted, I’m surprised he wants to continue hanging out. But perhaps this really just is a friendship.

“Was there something you wanted to do?” I reply. 

He shakes his head. “What’s your favorite place around here?”

“Um, there’s a bookstore I like that’s a few blocks from campus…”

“Great! Let’s go there afterwards!”

After finishing lunch, we make our way to the south side of campus, surprised to come across a small street fair on the same street as the bookstore. The booths are decorated with fairy lights, creating a very cozy and romantic atmosphere at twilight. We browse the novelty soaps, keychains, and various trinkets briefly before squeezing through two booths to get to the bookstore.

“What kind of books do you like to read?” Johnny asks, trailing behind me as I browse a recent release table.

“Mm, mostly young adult fiction leaning towards the adventure side. I like dystopian novels. You?”

“I like reading nonfiction. I don’t really like fiction.”

“That’s a shame.”

I grab a recent release and begin flipping through it.

“Oh what’s this?” Johnny asks from behind me.

As soon as I turn around, a brown dog puppet is two inches from my face. Johnny is smiling down at me and moving his hand inside the puppet to make the dog look like it’s talking.

“Hi Y/N, my name is Coffee Bean! Will you read me a story?”

My mouth is agape in amusement, part of me unsure how to respond. I chuckle nervously and put down the book in my hand, and quickly scan the table next to me for the closest children’s book.

“Um, do you like If You Give a Mouse a Cookie, Coffee Bean?”

Coffee Bean nods his head enthusiastically. “Yes! Woof!”

I force a nervous smile, still uncertain as to how to respond to this other than to play along. I read a few pages of the book and look up at Johnny. “Do you really want me to keep reading?”

He laughs. “No, it’s okay.” He turns to Coffee Bean. “Did you like that Coffee Bean?”

“Yes!” Coffee Bean turns his head back towards me and presses his mouth against my cheek. “Thank you!”

I smile at him and begin walking towards another section of the store. That was weird. Cute, but weird. Sighing heavily, my mind flashes back to our discussion earlier about Johnny’s girlfriend. He clearly was very comfortable talking about her in front of me. Realistically, it probably would’ve been better for me to completely drop the idea of the two of us ever dating and stay away from Johnny because I didn’t want to get in the way. I’d certainly never want my boyfriend to do something like this.

Y/N, you are going to get hurt if you continue to hang out with this guy. This never ends well when you get involved with a guy who’s already in a relationship. He’s obviously not going to leave his girlfriend. And even if he did because he wanted to date you, wouldn’t it be a bad idea? He could do the same thing to you.

Johnny suddenly appears next to me. “So, it’s six o’clock. What do you want to do? You want to watch a movie?”

I blink several times, surprised yet again by Johnny’s continuing desire to hang out today. Most of everyone at the house has left, so I suppose it only makes sense. If we went back to the house and parted ways, there wouldn’t be anything for us to do on our own. I’d probably just sit in my room and watch a movie by myself.

“Sure… I guess. What do you want to watch?”

“Didn’t you mention that you recently watched some movie… Sally something?”

My forehead creases. “You mean, When Harry Met Sally?”

“Yeah! Let’s watch that!”

What? He wants to watch a rom-com?

Okay, movie and that’s it. You shouldn’t hang around him anymore and after today, you won’t even need to see him.

“Okay then. We can watch in the piano room,” I say. “I don’t have an HDMI cable to hook up to the TV, but the couches are comfy.”

He hums in thought. “Can we just watch in your room? It’ll be more comfortable.”

Um, there must be something about a guy wanting to hang out alone with you in your room to watch a movie, right?

“Like, we sit on the bed?” I ask.

“Yeah.”

I bite the inside of my lip. “Okay.”

“Okay! I’ll bring snacks!”

“This is my blanket now!” Johnny grabs my fleece blanket and stuffed dog off my bed and begins hugging it. “This is mine now too.”

He jumps up onto my bed and crawls into the corner, wrapping himself in the blanket and hiding the plush underneath. He cracks into a wide grin and I can’t help but begin to pout a bit, feeling rather protective over my stuffed toys.

“So what do I get?”

“I brought pistachios and cookies,” he says, gesturing over to the snacks he placed on my desk. “You can have those.”

I glance at the packages and then turn back to face Johnny, dissatisfied with the consolation prize. I pout again. “But I’m not hungry. I’m cold.”

“Hmm,” he hums, pretending to ponder as he holds a playful smile on his face. “Okay, I guess I can share with you.”

I scoff in amusement. “Share? That’s mine!”

A cheeky grin makes its way onto his face. “You said you were cold. It’s easier to stay warm if the blanket is already warmed up!”

I roll my eyes and bite back a smile as I go to set up the movie on my laptop. Slowly, I make my way onto my bed and Johnny trades me my laptop for my blanket. I make no comment as I wasn’t keen on sharing my blanket in the first place anyway.

Before leaning against the back wall, I turn to look at him. “Do I get my dog back too?”

He smiles and shakes his head. “No, I think he likes me better.”

“Okay, fine,” I say, letting out a huff and crossing my arms as I move to sit up against the wall.

Our arms are touching, which is to be expected since we’re attempting to share a twin-sized bed. I’m a bit distracted, not really focusing on the movie, but rather on the predicament I see myself in. Clearly, Johnny has no problem with taking my personal belongings or sharing a bed with me. Originally, I thought we would sit up against the wall length-wise, giving both of us plenty of space not to make any physical contact with each other. But instead, Johnny had other plans and also wanted to use my pillows. So here I am, watching a rom-com with a guy that I happen to like and find very charming, is very kind and playful, but I am very uncertain as to where I stand.

After a while, Johnny hands my dog back to me and I pretend to be unfazed by the famous fake orgasm scene in the movie. What an awkward thing to watch with a guy I barely know.

When the movie ends, I shut my laptop and hop off my bed to put it back on my desk. Johnny crawls over to the other end of the bed, lies on his side and hangs his legs off the foot of my bed. I seat myself back against the wall and pull out my phone.

“So now what?” I ask.

“Um, you said that you’re good at giving advice, right?” Johnny responds.

I lift my head up from my phone and turn to look at him. “Uh, I mean, my friends ask me for advice a lot. So maybe?”

It’s quiet for a moment as Johnny contemplates whether to ask me for advice and how to formulate his question. My thumb scrolls through Instagram, though my mind is somewhere else as I wonder about what Johnny could want advice on. Life? Career? School?

“I’m not really sure what to do about my girlfriend,” he finally says.

That’s not… that’s not what I want to talk to you about.

“What do you mean?” I ask, keeping my gaze on my phone. 

“I’m… not really happy with her.”

I swallow nervously. “Why not?”

“You know how I told you earlier that she doesn’t like me having girl friends?”

Can’t imagine why.

“Yeah?”

“It’s stuff like that. She gets upset with me and it’s hard to talk to her. She doesn’t really apply herself in school and doesn’t have a lot of ambition.”

I keep my facial expression neutral, but I’m already not impressed with this girl.

“Just out of curiosity, what do you parents think of her?”

He shrugs. “My dad doesn’t care and my mom keeps asking me when I’m going to get a doctor or lawyer girlfriend.”

“Sounds like your mom doesn’t really like her.”

“Well, my mom likes her, but…”

“She wants you to find someone she thinks is better,” I say, finishing his sentence.

“Yeah,” he admits sheepishly.

Yeah, so basically she doesn’t like your girlfriend.

“What’s her name?”

“Minji,” he responds. “We’ve already broken up twice.”

God, he sounds like Siwoo.

“Why?”

“Because she didn’t like my friend Hyoyeon.”

“Who’s she?”

“She’s my friend from high school,” he says. “She’s two years younger and we were friends in band.”

“Did you like her or something?”

“What? No!” he says emphatically. “She’s like my little sister, but we hung out a lot together.”

I take in the information to create a coherent story. “So… Minji was jealous because you spent a lot of time with Hyoyeon and Minji got angry or something… and you guys broke up because of that, right?”

“Yep.”

“Why did you get back together?”

“The first time was a year ago and I missed her so I thought we could make it work. Then a couple months later, we got into a fight and I broke up with her again, but then I thought I made a mistake so we got back together,” he says. “So what do you think I should do?”

I sit there, staring at my bed spread, trying to figure out how to respond. There is a conflict of interest. I am obviously interested in Johnny and would definitely like for him to be single so that I can date him, but I also do not want to tell him that he should break up with his girlfriend because I’m afraid that I can’t be totally objective in this situation. Personally, if this had been Siwoo, I would’ve told him to break up with her. Perhaps Siwoo is not the best example, but that’s what we have to work with. Johnny’s not happy with Minji and he’s obviously flirting with another girl he likes more. What’s the point of prolonging it?

What’s with me in having guys with girlfriends being attracted to me?  

Either they’re unhappy or unsatisfied or I just have a lot more power than I thought. The other explanation is that they’re just assholes.  

Wow, Y/N, now you just attract assholes? That must say something about your personality.

Attempting to be as objective as possible, I decide to say the most neutral, yet important, thing I can.

“People don’t change, Johnny.”

He tilts his head. “What do you mean?”

“If you’re upset with the jealousy and the lack of ambition or whatever, that’s not going to change,” I say. “People only change if something drastic happens that causes them to be different.”

“So… are you saying I should break up with her?”

My eyes widen. “No, no,” I say quickly. “I did not say that. I’m just telling you that people don’t change. So it’s up to you whether or not you think it’s something you can handle.”

He’s quiet for a bit and then turns to look at me. “Do you really believe that?”

“Believe what?”

“That people don’t change.”

I nod slowly. “Yeah.”

“But I’m different now from a few years ago. I know a lot of people I grew up with who are different now.”

“Fundamentally, people don’t change. Yeah, you might pick up some new habits here and there, but generally, it’s hard to change unless you know there’s something you need to change,” I say. “And acknowledgement is only the beginning. You have to want to change too. If you don’t, then it doesn’t make a difference.”

“So, you don’t think Minji is going to change at all?”

I’m hesitant to make any comments specifically concerning Minji. So I give another open-ended answer. “If she thinks something needs to be changed and wants to, then maybe.”

In thinking about it, Siwoo is the perfect example here. No matter how many failed relationships he gets into, he never changes his behavior. Get together with one girl, cheat on her or treat her horribly, break up, feel bad for about two seconds, rinse, repeat. Somehow, it never fazes him.

I often wonder if there’s one girl out there that would break his heart enough that it would cause him to change. Even a little bit.

“I’m going to break up with her,” Johnny says after some time.

I look at him and say nothing.

“Yeah, I think it’s time to break up with her,” he says again.

“It’s your decision.”

He sighs. “Yeah, I know. I’m supposed to see her on Monday, so I’ll do it then.”

I remain silent and keep my facial expression neutral. If Johnny actually follows through with it, I’d be happy. But I don’t want to be the reason he breaks up with her. That’s not my place.

“Thanks,” he says and smiles. “You are pretty good at giving advice.”

“Oh, yeah,” I remark. “Sure.”

I put my phone down and lie back onto my pillow at the head of the bed. Crossing my arms across my chest, I close my eyes as a sudden drowsiness overcomes me. I hear some shifting at the end of the bed.

“Are you tired?” Johnny asks.

“Mm, a little,” I mumble.

A blanket is gently draped over me and I hum a quiet “thank you.” Everything is still and peaceful, but I can tell that Johnny is watching me.

And then he asks me a question.

“What if I told you I like you?”

My eyes shoot open in shock and Johnny is smiling down at me, a hopeful look etched into his features. I stare at him for a moment and knit my eyebrows together, having been rendered speechless by his confession.

My lack of response causes a bit of a panic in his eyes and he asks another question.

“Is that good or bad?”

Trying to remain calm, I close my eyes as if his question hadn’t just shocked me.

“It’s okay…” I respond.

Though my eyes are closed, a small part of me is laughing inside, half-aware that my unenthusiastic and non-idealistic response is not how he anticipated this to play out.  

“So…” The unsteadiness in his voice is detectable. “What about you?”

“I do,” I answer simply.

“You do what?”

“I do like you.”

I open my eyes again and there’s a shy smile on his face.

“I think you’re really cute and I enjoy spending time with you and I want to keep spending time with you,” he continues.

He climbs up towards the front of the bed and lies with his back against the wall. I feel an arm reach around my waist.

“You—you can’t do that,” I say.

Johnny slowly removes his hand. “Why not?”

“You’re still with someone else.”

My voice is unsteady and I don’t trust it. But quite frankly, I’m not sure I trust my own judgment either.

I shut my eyes again, unable to fight the fatigue. A few moments pass before Johnny speaks again.

“Can I stay here?”

Y/N, you know that he shouldn’t.

“Yes.”

He pushes himself up off the bed and climbs over me. His feet land on the floor with a thump and he flips off the light switch. He quickly climbs back onto my bed and places himself where he was before. I’m on the edge of the bed and there’s about a foot of space in between the two of us. I hear him shuffling around and suddenly there’s a hand lightly resting on the exposed skin of my waist.

“No, you can’t do that,” I say more forcefully. “You’re still with someone.”

He quickly removes his hand this time and then says, “I think I’ll leave you alone then.”

He climbs off the bed again and I remain still until I hear the door open and close. Then I’m alone.

I slowly sit up. There’s a thin stream of moonlight peering in through the missing blind. Looking around the room, there’s enough light to see that Johnny had left his bag of pistachio nuts and the package of cookies on my desk. Biting my lip, I decide to go brush my teeth and wash my face, but when I look at my reflection in the mirror, I feel scared.

What are you doing?

What are you supposed to do with this confession?

Hell, you confessed yourself.

There’s a part of me that feels excited that a boy of interest has returned my affections, but suddenly I’m finding that I don’t know how to process it. I’ve had plenty of confessions before, but this is different and I don’t know why.

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Before I Met You Masterlist

Masterlist

[sazandorable]

First lines meme

Rules: List the first lines of your last 20 stories (if you have less than 20, just list them all!). See if there are any patterns. Choose your favorite opening line. Then tag 10 authors!

(nabbed from @si-siw​, as usual i don’t like tagging people but feel free to grab it :3)

/!\ TMA and RQG spoilers, lots of Elias ships.

1. Playing with fire (TMA):

At eleven years old, Agnes wants to touch Ronald Sinclair like she wants to touch someone else’s stuff.

2. Particular (TMA):

Jon does not like boys.

WOOF that’s already one of those that really doesn’t do well without the whole context x’’’D even though it is isolated in the text.

Both of those were for the TMA Mspec Week so both are an immediate (start of) exploration of the mechanics of those characters’ desires.

3. This Was A Triumph (RQG)

Sasha stays in Paris.

4. fragments of decidedly [REDACTED] nature (ch7) (TMA)

Martin is crying before the end of it, which is pretty typical, honestly; he allows the tears to flow partly because it makes Elias happy, partly to have evidence.

5, 6, 7, 8, 9. Marginalia (ch28, 27, 26, 25, 24)

Martin is alone on New Year’s Eve.

 “World domination.”

The thing with the hands and the sharp smile is distracted, though, that might be a lie again, might be a trap, just to make her hope and then laugh in her face again, but, but she’s been good at seeing through it, she always finds the right mirrors, always finds the right turns, she hasn’t found the exit but it’s just a matter of time just a matter of time just a matter of time until she gets out, the thing that sometimes pretends to be a man told her there’s no exit but it was lying, wasn’t it, isn’t it always

“No worries, boss, I won’t tell on you,” Tim proclaims with a proud grin, which, weirdly, makes Elias laugh.

They find out many new things about each other, in three weeks; some good, some bad.

These and number 4 were 3-sentences New Year’s microfic (the Helen one runs on and is all just 1.5 sentence technically), and it’s funny to see how half of those lean harder on the blunt minimalism and half immediately get super long and rambly.

10. the void is getting closer (Golden Sun)

The first Felix sees of Prox is the abyss.

11. Transmission (RQG)

C’est étrange, d’accueillir de parfaits inconnus et de les installer dans le foyer vide.

Pas super heureuse de celle-là mais punaise je me suis battue avec pendant des heures, y a 3 ou 4 versions très différentes de ce petit machin.

12. this will be our year (TMA)

On the third day (since they woke up), Martin distractedly looks out the window of the gallery and goes, “Huh!”

13. keep close (and your enemies closer) (TMA)

The man interviewing Martin stares through him like he knows.

14. Nightingale Floor (TMA)

The first time he comes inside Elias’s house, Martin’s trainers squeak on the gleaming floorboards.

15. Cheirophilia (RQG)

Zolf Smith has big hands.

That’s it that’s the fic (actually it’s a lot longer and deeper than that and i’m v happy with it. but this sure is a Exactly What It Says On The Tin moment huh)

16. When Passions Are Happy To Sit Quietly Together, Not Colliding (RQG)

 “You don’t have to hide it, you know,” Hamid stresses three days later, sounding frustrated and perhaps a little insulted, and Zolf doesn’t bother looking up from his book to answer: “Not hidin’ anything.”

... again... (This was a 5-sentences one so it gets a pass for being much ramblier and more complex.)

17. A little sincerity (RQG)

It’s busy, after the resurrection.

18. La maison (TMA)

The house is more of a small mansion, really.

19. Le phare (TMA)

Martin has been having trouble sleeping, lately.

20. Cinderella (TMA)

Obviously, there’s a great many things they’ll have to address and deal with, and about eight different red flags setting off alarm bells in Martin’s mind.

Hmm. So I sure have a tendency for the short bluntly establishing isolated intro line (that often makes it to the summary), but not that much, actually. Not even 50% are really learning hard into that. 10, 14 and 17 are cases of my favourite way to use those, casually establishing things that sound like they should be getting a lot more emotion and development. Some of those do explore it later, some of them do not.

Outside of length-restricted microfic, I don’t do much of in-medias-res (even though i love it), but tend to do a lot of establishing by implying or referring to things that haven’t actually been stated yet (“stays in Paris”, “before the end of it”, “On the third day”, “The first time”, “three days later”, “after the resurrection”, “The house”, “lately”, “Obviously”), which is also something I really like in reading. Some of those are only possible due to the fact that this is a fanfiction referencing events the reader is already familiar with (and that’s a huge reason why I love fanfic), but not all!

And only 2 or 3 are really very rambly! Most of them because I was on a number-of-sentences restriction. But I also manage to keep a lot of those very short and dry. I used to be a lot ramblier. Some of these are even normal, unremarkable average sentences. Amazing.

(Also whoah, hadn’t realised I’d posted 20 things since the Archives Sim :O I keep feeling like I didn’t write much this year but I did write a LOT in 2020...)