#and also he dates the other doug's sister for a while but she breaks up with him

[pruzan]

I don’t think I ever asked you, where did you get the idea/inspiration for your username?

it's a king of queens reference! pruzan is the last name of carrie's boss from season 2 to season 6. he's a complete idiot and kind of a weirdo, and he is sooo funny to me

[canonicallyobserving911]

Buck & Eddie: Rescue vs. Save

Buck’s only SAVED three people but he’s RESCUED hundreds because that’s his job.

I completed a post about the difference between Buck rescuing and saving people last year (linked here) and after 6x17 “Love is in the Air” aired, I wanted to mention this again with definitions to illustrate how Buck rescues people for his job but he saves the people he loves.

To rescue means to remove a person from a dangerous, dire and/or an unpleasant situation, i.e., fire, earthquake, downed helicopter, car accident, etc. and a person can be rescued by someone they don’t know (firefighter).  It’s a one-time event.

To save someone is a process and it’s not a one-time event.  It’s a relationship and the person doing the saving and the one being saved perspectives’ change as they continue to grow and mature together. 

In 6x15 “Death and Taxes”, after Buck said he met up with Natalia, Eddie said, “Seriously… dating someone you rescued, you know that never ends well” and he SPECIFICALLY used the word RESCUED instead of SAVED for a reason.

Rescued

Buck rescued Taylor, Ali and Natalia after they were involved in accidents the same way he rescued people during the Tsunami and whenever the 118 was dispatched to rescue people from fires, earthquakes and other disasters.  Also, he rescued Kameron from the standpoint of her needing somewhere to stay while she and Connor are on the outs but since Connor will be in next week’s episode, it’s highly unlikely Buck will end up with Kameron.  He’ll probably be instrumental in helping them save their relationship but he won’t end up with her because the narrative for 6B with regards to the sperm donation has been showing the complete opposite of that scenario.  Connor’s the father (Buck said that in 6x10 “In a Flash” and he said it again to Natalia in 6x17), therefore in 6x18 “Pay it Forward”, he will do just that, pay it forward when he helps Connor realize he has everything he needs with Kameron.

Saved

Buck has only SAVED three people over the past six years and they are Maddie, Chris and Eddie and he saved them because he loves them.  Maddie is his sister; he’s Chris’ legal guardian (in the event of Eddie’s death but soon he’ll be Buck’s stepson) and Eddie is his everything.  Buck saved Maddie after she killed Doug and he ran to meet her when she was injured and stumbled out of the woods in 2x13 “Fight or Flight”.  But he doesn’t have to save her anymore because she’s with Chimney and he admitted it to Sue in 3x14 “The Taking of Dispatch” when he said, “She has everything she needs” as she was hugging Chimney.  Chimney will be the one who saves Maddie now.

Buck saved Chris during the Tsunami after the first wave hit and he swam out to get him.  They came up out of the water together and he protected him because he loves him.  Chris saved Buck too during their conversations both before and after the Tsunami hit when he said, “You’re going to be ok kid” and when he told Buck about never giving up while they sat on top of the 136’s firetruck.  He saved Chris again in 4x8 “Breaking Point” when he gave him a safe place to run to when Eddie starting dating AF.  He listened to Chris and promised him he wasn’t going anywhere and he hasn’t.

Buck SAVED Eddie after he was shot by a sniper in 4x13 “Suspicion” when he crawled underneath a ladder truck (something that almost caused him to lose his leg and his career) screaming for Eddie to get his hand out.  He pulled Eddie to safety and treated his wound until they made it to the hospital.  Reminder the 133’s paramedic was in the back of the ladder truck with them but Buck wouldn’t let her help. Buck SAVED Eddie and Chris again after Eddie’s breakdown in 5x13 “Fear-O-Phobia”.  Chris called and Buck came to save both of them. Reminder, he stayed at the Diaz residence for several days until Eddie was feeling better and he called Bobby to help so that Eddie wouldn’t wake up alone. He loves them so much and he will do anything for them.

The point of this post is to prove that Eddie’s words in 6x15 were specific for a reason since Buck rescues people on the job but he saves his family, the people HE LOVES!

Therefore, Buck dating and marrying Eddie is plausible and likely since he didn’t rescue Eddie, he SAVED HIM!

[joes-sha-la-la-la-girl]

Love Bites: Chapter 12

Series Masterlist

Warnings: Smut

Tammy’s sister had managed to get all of Y/N’s stuff out and moved it into Tammy's place. Apparently, whilst she had been sorting everything out, Doug had come home but by that point it was too late, Tammy’s sister only had a couple of items left to get and they were all replaceable. Y/N had told her on the phone not to worry about what she couldn’t get, the singer was just grateful that she wouldn’t have to see Doug again. 

However, Y/N now didn’t feel safe going to Tammy’s after the tour was over. As Doug had seen Tammy’s sister moving the stuff out, Y/N knew that he would know where she was. She tried not to let any of that bother her though because now her and Joe could be as open as they wanted to be. 

The tour progressed without any problems for the next week. Both singers were happy that they could finally be out in the open without any worries of being caught.

They had a week off and both bands were booked into a hotel. Joe insisted that he and Y/N share, earning no protest from the Ultraviolet singer, or Sav for that matter, who usually shared a room with Joe and didn’t want to be shut out for hours at a time.

As it was their week off, Joe decided to take Y/N out for a date. The only problem was that he was not familiar with the area and had no idea where he wanted to take her. 

“Why don’t you just go on a walk with her?” Sav suggested when his best friend came to him for advice.

“Just a walk?”

“Well, she’ll probably appreciate something calm after being on tour with us for so long. And it’ll give you the chance to get to know her better.”

“I suppose that could work.”

“You also could find out what sort of stuff she does like for when you plan your next date.” Sav pointed out.

“Okay. A walk then.” Joe still didn’t sound convinced.

“Or don’t if you’re not interested.” Sav shrugged.

“You’re right though.”

“I always am.”

“Funny. I meant that it would be good so I can set up our next date. With that Joe left the room, going back to his and Y/N’s so that they could get ready to go.

*

“This is really nice Joe.” Y/N smiled as they walked around. 

“It was Sav’s idea really.” Joe told her, slightly bashful, that he almost turned the idea down.

“Well either way, I’m having a nice time. I don’t like to go too overboard with dates y’know.” She said, unknowingly giving Joe some ideas for their second date. He now knew that she didn’t like to make a fuss. Y/N had also told him what foods she did and didn’t like after Joe had tried and failed to subtly ask her.

“So how come you moved to London?” Joe asked as a short silence fell over them.

“For music I guess. Tammy and I grew up together and always had a passion for music. We used to put on shows for our families. Anyway, we both decided that we wanted to move to London to start a band and our parents didn’t think it would work.

“I met Doug about a week or so after we moved and started dating him. He was charming then mind you. We met Benji in the pub and then Johnny joined after Benji introduced us.”

“Wow. I’m sorry your parents weren’t more supportive.” Joe told her. Y/N just shrugged with a small smile on her face. 

“Worked out though.”

“I don’t know what I would have done if not for my parents. Def Leppard wouldn’t be about, that's for sure.” Joe grinned softly.

The two of them wandered around for a while longer, just talking about their bands and getting to know each other better.

*

When they got back to the hotel, they walked up to their room and stood outside the door.

“I think I am supposed to just drop you off with the promise of another date, but since this is my room too, may I come in?” Joe asked cheekily.

Y/N laughed and leaned up to kiss him gently. “Of course.”

Joe led Y/N into their room, not breaking the kiss. He ran his hands down her sides after he kicked the door shut.

“Jump.” He murmured against her lips before he helped her wrap her legs around his waist. Joe walked, with Y/N clung onto him, to their bed and carefully laid her down. He slipped the dress she was wearing off and was pleasantly surprised when he saw that she was not wearing a bra.

“Oh love, you’re so beautiful.”

Y/N blushed at the compliment and turned her head away from him.

“Don’t hide from me sweetheart.” Joe moved his hands to her face and made her look at him. He smiled at her before recapturing her lips in another passionate kiss. He then trailed his lips down to her neck, quickly finding the spot that made her moan.

When she let out the little whimper he was hoping for, he sucked gently. Y/N pulled away slightly, only to pull his t-shirt off of his head and move her hands down to his belt. Joe quickly helped her, wriggled out of his trousers and underwear before he then took off hers.

Y/N bucked her hips up as she felt his fingers ghost over her.

“Can I ride you?” She asked him in a tone he couldn’t refuse. Joe didn’t say anything as he allowed himself to be flipped over. Y/N reached over and grabbed a condom that was conveniently left on the bedside table. She opened it, discarding the rubbish on the floor and rolled it down onto Joe.

He couldn’t think of anything as Y/N started to grind on him, causing him to let out a groan. “Please love.” Joe begged, earning a smirk in return.

Y/N reached down and grabbed his cock, lining it up and then sinking down on him. Joe gripped her hips so hard that he left white finger marks, however, Y/N couldn’t care less about the future bruises as she adjusted to him inside of her.

Soon enough she started rocking, using Joe’s chest as leverage. One of Joe’s hands left her waist and went to her breast, squeezing it gently and rubbing his thumb over her nipple. 

The attention Jow paid to her breast caused Y/N to go faster. When she started bouncing, Joe let out a gasp and bucked his hips up in shock, going deeper than before. The two of them kept up that pace before Joe had enough and flipped them back around.

It was Y/N’s turn to gasp as she felt Joe start to pound into her. Putting her hands on his back, she dug her nails in, leaving red scratch marks in the process. Joe groaned again at the painful pleasure and leant down to kiss her again. 

The two of them moved in unison, absolutely lost in one another as they chased their highs. Joe could feel Y/N clenching and it brought him closer to the edge. Wanting to make sure she came first, Joe moved his hand down to thumb at her clit.

“C’mon sweetheart. Let go.” He encouraged, not sure how much longer he could last. With a loud curse, Y/N came, triggering his own orgasm. She captured Joe’s lips as he finished and the two of them collapsed together on the bed. 

“Good girl.” Joe cooed as he finally pulled out of her, hoping to sooth her whimper. Joe quickly moved to get the two of them cleaned up before he moved back to where she was lying. 

He climbed in bed with her and with one last peck the two of them drifted off to sleep, cuddled up.

Taglist:

@genxrocker

@elliotts-personal-property

@friccinfricks

@i-love-def-leppard

@vintagerocknrollgirl

[anathenaeum]

Benjamin "Ben" Florian

Notes:

Ben Florian is the son of Queen Belle and King Adam, who was once known only as “The Beast.” In my head-canon, he has an adopted younger sister named Sapphire.

Ben is holding a council meeting in his father’s stead. He is extremely anxious because it is his first time to hold a meeting. Despite encouragement from both Belle and Beast, the meeting goes horribly wrong and Ben loses his temper. In the end, Ben manages to find a solution to the problems and invites Grumpy to a one-on-one meeting, believing that it would be better that way and solves the situation peacefully. He then comes to believe in himself as the King that he is instead of the King everyone expects him to be.

Like Mal, he has a mystical dream. In his case, he finds himself the Isle of the Lost where he meets a strange girl with mischievous eyes and purple hair. While singing Once Upon a Dream on his date with Audrey, Aurora’s daughter, Ben realizes the relevance between the song and his dream.

This also explains the reason to why he feels pity for the children on the Isle of the Lost. Like them, he was born into his life, where everything was taken care of for him. Though he is proud to be his parents’ son and the future king of Auradon, he also felt trapped and started imagining how it would feel like for those children, who even had lesser choices than him. This prompts him to make the decision he does regarding the children on the Isle of the Lost.

Poised to take the throne, he makes his first proclamation and offers a chance at redemption to Mal, Evie, Carlos, and Jay when they are given a chance to attend Auradon Prep. Unlike his peers, he does not fear the trouble-making teens and embraces them as friends while he helps them navigate the unfamiliar land where goodness runs rampant.

One month, before being coronated King, Ben informs his parents of his first royal decree: to give the children of the Isle of the Lost a chance at redemption and to attend Auradon Prep. To ensure the safety of both his plan and the citizens, he decides to start small with the children who need the help most - Carlos, Jay, Evie and Mal.

He tries his best to befriend them and help, but his girlfriend Audrey is completely unwelcoming and takes him away, forcing Doug to take care of the tour and explanations.

Having been told how terrible Maleficent was in the past, Ben attempts reaching out to Mal the most. Because of this, he begins developing affection for her. He also helps get both Jay and Carlos on the Tourney Team. Unaware of the kids’ mission to steal Fairy Godmother’s wand, Ben is tricked by Mal into eating a cookie laced with a love potion. This actually proves helpful as this allows him to break up with Audrey and date Mal, finding they have more in common.

On a date, Ben swims in an enchanted lake, which removes the love spell from him. After Mal attempts to save him, thinking he drowned, he tells her that he can see her inner goodness is stronger than the evil she’s descended from. He continues faking being under the spell but genuinely shows love for her as the day of his coronation nears.

On the day he is to be crowned king, Ben rides in a carriage with Mal, who gives him a cupcake with the antidote in it. He eats it too early, then reveals that he has been free from the spell since their first date, and forgives her for her doing because he believed that she did not believe they could be together as long as he was with Audrey. When she questions whether he’d been faking his affection, he reveals that he’s truly in love with her as he gives her his signet ring. During the ceremony, Jane steals the wand to use its magic to improve her looks. Unfortunately, the wand unleashes a blast of magic that undoes the barrier around the Isle of the Lost, allowing Maleficent to escape and attempt stealing the wand. Ben talks Mal into listening to her heart, which subsequently convinces the others to do the same thing. They all decide to be good people of Auradon moments before Maleficent arrives and freezes everyone in the hall.

Ben is left happily surprised when the spell is undone thanks to Mal, Jay, Evie and Carlos, who used their combined goodness to shrink Dragon Maleficent to the size of gecko. They then proceed to celebrate their victory in the courtyard of Auradon Prep.

Ben is now in charge of everything in Auradon as its new king. Reports come in from various regions of the kingdom where unusual earthquakes and storms are hitting, and more disturbingly, a dragon has been spotted in Camelot Heights. Worried that they are in danger, the wizard Merlin asks for a petition to use magic. Worried that it would cause consequences, Ben instead decides to visit Camelot and observe the situation. He eventually finds out the monster is indeed a dragon, and many suspect it to be Maleficent’s doing despite her incarceration.

Ben returns to Auradon just as Mal and her friends are leaving for the Isle of the Lost to investigate matters of their own. Ben allows them to leave, putting faith in his girlfriend. After much investigation, Ben finds out that the dragon is not Maleficent, but from something else. He and Grumpy then investigate the Dwarf Mines, where he accidentally meets up with Mal’s team and the true culprit, Madam Mim. After a hard battle, Ben saves the day by pointing Excalibur (the sword borrowed from Camelot) at Madam Mim, forcing her to surrender. Merlin then sends everyone back to where they belong and seals the underground tunnel to keep the inhabitants of the Isle of the Lost from escaping.

Later, Ben goes to the Isle of the Lost to find Mal after he realizes she has left Auradon. Mal’s friends, Carlos, Evie and Jay, decide to go with him to help, but first they have to teach him their wicked ways so he can sneak around the Island without being recognized.

Verses:

The little prince: pre-Descendants and Descendants verse

King of anything: Descendants 2 and onwards

Road less traveled: any greatly-canon-divergent threads or AUs (can go along with any other verses)

AUs:

Borrowed babies: (Foster Care) foster brother

I solemnly swear that i’m up to no good: (Harry Potter) Hufflepuff fifth-year

There was an idea: (MCU) Inhuman who can shapeshift into a wolf

All that gleams and glitters: (Modern) plays football because his dad wants him to, but he would prefer to be in the library

Alternatively 1902: (Victorian) the heir to a fortune

Grow up with the land: (Wild West) the son of a widowed school teacher

Forward to victory: (World War II) volunteer soldier who lied about his age to get into the army

Starter Call

[mischiefbuckley]

I will be going to my local coffee shop later and after I finished some assignments and I’ll start writing this out… I have a solid idea of having Buck be apart of the 118 gang and he joins because his then boyfriend at the time: motorcycle guy was apart of the gang and then with some of Buck’s past prior to joining the 118 he’s alone with Maddie (basically fuck the Buckley parents neither Maddie or Buck speak to them) Bobby adopts him as a son in a way and even Athena as well alongside Maddie and even with him and his boyfriend at the time yk motorcycle guy breaking up a few months later Buck is still apart of the 118 family and he goes over to family barbecues and is Bobby’s right hand man alongside with Chimney so he tends to get involved in fights and confrontations with rival gangs and other situations around the city because of being apart of the 118 and Maddie is the one always patching him up after he comes back from the fights up until when Maddie starts seeing Chimney and they start dating and they decide to move in together (also Doug is already dead in this… I can’t even begin to think about writing a whole arc of that for Maddie the show has done plenty of emotional damage to my girl she deserves pure fluff and happiness in this story) but finally Buck moves out of the apartment that him and Maddie had been sharing at that point and he decides to get a house since he has plenty of money to afford it

so Eddie moves to LA and he’s a doctor and in this case he would know Maddie and Hen from work and obviously since Hen is friends with Chimney and Maddie is Buck’s sister that’s how they are all interconnected without Eddie realizing it and he’s dealing with the loss of his wife and caring for his son as a single father and after a fight with his parents well more specifically his mom (also fuck Helena Diaz) he decides it’s best to move away and he had gotten an offer at one of the top hospitals in LA so he decides to take the offer and move to LA with his son and his sisters and abuela and Tia all also live in LA so he’ll have some of his family there (okay it’s a crime that the show hasn’t brought on the Diaz sisters I wanna see Eddie as a brother… I’m also picturing Melissa Barrera as Sophia btw just still need to think about who for Adriana) they move in like right next door to Buck but Buck has only ever seen Christopher and Eddie’s sisters because Eddie has been working odd hours and also Buck and his odd hours with yk his duties of being apart of the 118 so Eddie’s sisters take turns watching Christopher when Eddie has a late shift while Eddie’s at the hospital but he hears a lot about Buck from Chris and Maddie and Hen and even Eddie’s sisters have commented on his looks and how handsome he is and one time at night before Christopher had to go to bed he looks out the window since he hears Buck’s car arrive and Buck arrives injured after the 118 took care of some business and Christopher tells Eddie about it cause he sees his arms covered with blood as he’s walking into his house and cause it’s finally the one time that they both are there Eddie offers to care for his injuries and play doctor… he starts asking him questions but Buck’s again very reluctant to answer and be honest with Eddie about how he got his injuries and Buck mentions that he works with his sister and his friend and Eddie is very confused until he puts two and two together and he finally realizes that this is “Evan” Maddie’s younger brother who’s in the same gang as her fiancé and Eddie just stays quiet when he comes to the realization because he doesn’t want to put his son in harms way and all so he tells Buck as he is leaving is to stay away from his son and his sisters and Buck is even left even more confused

Buck goes over to Maddie’s the next morning and starts ranting on about his hot neighbor and Maddie’s like “wait, Eddie Diaz as in the doctor that works at the same hospital I work at?” and I guess neither Buck or Eddie realized how close in proximity they had been within each other and now that Eddie’s put on a semi-regular schedule he’s seeing Buck more often but Eddie’s still working on himself and going to therapy for the whole losing his wife and coming to terms with his sexuality all around the same time and still his trauma from the military. So a few days later Eddie and Christopher were getting home on a Friday after school since it was Eddie’s day off and it was the one year anniversary of losing Shannon, so he decided to spend the day with his son to honor her memory together and it’s around Dia De Los Muertos when she passes (ik it’s not canon like this but for the purpose of my dea) so Eddie gets to show Christopher some of his culture (because Mexican Eddie is not shown enough on the show like make my man speak Spanish please and show more Mexican culture on the show please) by celebrating Dia De Los Muertos and he had planned to go over to his abuela’s house but she cancelled last minute because she wasn’t feeling well and his sisters had gone over to Texas to visit their parents so it was just him and Chris that weekend and as they both are getting home Buck is also getting home and Chris starts talking to him and Buck obviously can’t ignore him so they start talking as Eddie is annoyed and giving him the death stare and finally Christopher mentions how they haven’t been to the zoo yet and Buck mentions how he had taken Jee there many times and Chris is like why don’t we go today since abuela cancelled and obviously Eddie can’t say no to his son like today of all days so he agrees to go and they all get ready and Buck drives them all over since passenger princess eddie and they spend the afternoon together and as it gets dark they decide to go to dinner together at that point and they are all having a good time and as they are getting ready to leave Eddie excuses himself to go to the bathroom and Buck offers to just have him meet them outside by the car so yk Eddie goes to the bathroom and as he is leaving he makes sure to go and leave a tip with the waiter and she goes on to tell him “you two have an adorable son” and eddie kinda freaks out and realizes what he was doing like today of all days it being a year ago since he lost and here is the kicker Shannon has been his ex-wife because they had already been divorced prior to her passing away but Eddie never went out of his way to date a man after the divorce because of shame and guilt and also because of his parents because he had been attending therapy and was coming to terms with his sexuality and boom he loses his now late wife and he’s even left even more confused and frustrated and he gets overwhelmed at this point because he was having a good time with Buck that entire afternoon and it felt nice to be able to hangout with someone else that’s not anyone at the hospital and even have his son enjoy the day out as well and bam reality hits him yet again he kinda shuts out Buck after they get back to their houses and Buck is left confused because he thought they were finally getting somewhere and boom out of nowhere back to the same way they had been before that amazing afternoon together

Buck is annoyed with Eddie so a few nights later after the whole situation he goes over and knocks on his door and he’s like along the lines of what the fuck is your problem I thought we were having a good time and I didn’t even bring up anything about yk my affiliation in front of your son and again I thought we were having a good time what went wrong and Eddie can’t keep it together so he starts crying and tells Buck “that day that we hung out we were suppose to go over to my Abuela’s house to celebrate Dia De Los Muertos. My abuela cancelled on me last minute since she wasn’t feeling good and it was also the same day of it being the one year anniversary of losing my late wife” Buck is trying to grasp the information being presented and he doesn’t really know how to respond. He finally goes over and hugs Eddie and he starts telling him that he’s sorry if he intruded on that day he didn’t mean to and that they don’t even need to be friends

and that’s all I have for now I have some other ideas as well for further down the storyline but this would be like the general premise for the first few chapters again not sure how long this would end up being but that motorcycle scene really did it for me last night so lmk if anyone is interested I’m gonna start writing some of it later lmao

IF SOMEONE DOESN’T WRITE A FANFIC WITH BUCK BEING APART OF A MOTORCYCLE GANG I SWEAR I WILL BE WRITING IT

[aestheticsuwu]

⛓Ladies first, baby, I insist [I could be a better boyfriend than him ]⛓

Sam LaRusso x Tory Nichols

I will be posting all my work soon, since I might stop writing and making moodboards .

~~~~~~~~~~~

The universe works so many ways ,and outcomes are all different, She wouldn’t have expected it to go her way tonight.

The night was like any other night at a club. Packed with people dancing to the rhythm of the music and drinking to fulfill one’s enjoyment . It’s not a club without random strangers or couples who are practically had their tongue down their throats and grinding against each other.

Lust lingering in the crowded air. It seem people were inhaling desperately .

She had two of her close friends doing the exact same thing . She wish she had bleach for her eyes for every time it happened. Tory honesty thought they were 10 times worse than any sex deprived stranger , She really regrets introducing those two.

But nothing could ruin her night . She sat against comfortably in her booth , a half-empty glass in her hand , and her eyes focused on her .

The dim-light against her skin and the low cut dress made her look like the greatest sin and well Tory was up for adding her to her list.

It had been a month that the blonde made a choice to keep coming to the same overpriced club where the drinks were far from cheap and had a snobby-rich crowd. ‘Swayze force her to tag along, and she was not impressed until her eyes landed on her.

She is not usually like this. But something captivated her attention and there’s no going back ,and by now Tory doesn’t want it to. The girl wasn’t her type, far from it .

The petite brunette held her self like a princess , all soft and delicate . A sugary smile that would nauseate Tory if it was anyone else . Curly hair that framed her face perfectly .Blue eyes that made her want to take a leap and make a move, she would’ve but the beau has a boyfriend.

Every night she watches the couple order drinks , the guy would grab her to harshly and let her dance by herself and at the end ,the idiot would get all winded up and ruin her night and the brunette always runs after him with a prominent scowl .

You can tell the guy didn’t care about her, but himself . Tory would know how to treat her right. Having her around her arm , Showing her off to the world because that’s what the brunette deserved. She would treat her like a real princess and not like a side piece like the turd that she calls boyfriend.

Plus, My clothes would fit her. Bet she would look hot.

“ You know, Stalking isn’t attractive not even if it’s you.” Robby says breathless like he ran a marathon and all sweaty . He wipes his face with a towel from his bag and plops down beside her.

She pushes him away with a spare napkin making him laugh . Flickering her hair away with a bit of attitude, a habit she picked up on from her, ,” It’s not stalking. Im here with my best friend who has spent all night grinding up on his boyfriend while I sit here comfortably drinking and saving myself from the embarrassing sight and if it’s conveniently where I can -“

“Stare at Sam .” Robby cuts her off with raised eyebrows . It turns out they knew each other . She was like his step sister , Tory didn’t get to meet her when they were younger . At the time maybe Tory wouldn’t give her time of day since she was dating Aisha , who also knew Sam. Everyone knew her even Rickenberger ,but to be fair the guy knows everyone.

I’m I really the only one ? That can’t be . She been single multiple times and nobody even introduced her to Sam. And here she was introducing Robby to his boyfriend. ughhh .

“ She’s going to break up with the guy. She told me . I heard because Brian has a small dick or maybe because he treats her like shit , I don’t remember.” Robby finishes with a fit of giggles and topples over the table.

No more drinks for this little guy.

“No more drinks for you , Robby.” Doug helps Robby move off from the table and fixes him to lay back against the leather cushions . She watch how her friend stops giggling and gets a sad look.

He pokes his boyfriend chest with his finger .”I’m not Robby. I’m Baby !”

“Of course. You’re my baby. And I think is time to head back home.” Doug smiles fondly at his drunk boyfriend . Robby covers his face bashfully. He turns to look a her for confirmation , she agrees immediately .

“Give me your card so I can pay the tab.” She helps out her hand out .

“I pay all the time .”

“I introduce you to the best thing in your life .That’s a debt you will pay me for life.” She smirk triumphantly when she’s handed the credit card. It always work. Although right now Robby is not proving her statement right now . Acting like a kid trying to get out of showering.

She helps her short friend out of the booth and until she makes sure he’s glued to Doug hip like a koala ,she heads the other way to pay .

Finish dealing with the bill , she pockets the card and makes a turn to leave when she halts . She was five inches away from the brunette , all alone but a empty drink in her hand . Robby drunk words echoed in her brain . Everyone kept dancing all in their own world while Tory felt time stopped.

Take Swayze home. I have business to take care of.

She puts her phone away and heads towards her. Taking through her brain to come up with the right way to approach her . The female looked bothered, her usual bright smile and her stupid boyfriend didn’t make any appearance tonight . Maybe the new red dress that hugged her right , her hair straighten and red painted lips were the signs she ditched the loser.

Tory walked up to the bar , standing near her, her hand sought out to her wrist to grab attention and reluctantly letting it go to not scare her away.

“Can I buy you a drink .” For the first time , Tory is making eye contact with her and it felt thrilling .She hoped she wouldn’t get rejected but even if she did , Tory won’t give up. She would try next time .

“ No Thank you.” Sam stands up smoothly and her dress down her pale thighs and pushes back her hair away from her face. Tory pulls out her poker face to not show her disappointment , she nods and bites her lips but keeps her eyes on the shorter female .

She makes a move to leave but to her surprise Sam continues, “ But you can invite me to dance .”

The invitation sounded enticingly to Tory’s ears. She stands in front of her , she notice quickly their height difference , and Sam notice too . Tory pulls her by the wrist and she feels her smooth skin against hers , leading her to the dance floor .

Pulling her body closer , enough to feel her but not that close to make her feel uncomfortable but she is surprise when Sam pulls her in closer and wraps her arms around her neck.

“ I warn you I might not let you go tonight.” She whispers to the shorter female ear . Fixing a stray hair behind the same ear.

“ Then this might be your lucky night , Tory.” Sam grins with a gleam of mischief in her blue innocent eyes. Maybe Tory hadn’t been to subtle about her intrest but she didn’t give a fuck since now she had her in her arms .

She will show LaRusso what a better boyfriend she can be ,not like any other guy she had in her life. She will start with tonight. Making her regret not dumping the guy quicker .

[the-insomniac-emporium]

Wounded Love Pt. 2 (Lady Dimitrescu/F!Reader)

Fandom: Resident Evil: Village Rating: T? Maybe? Almost the exact opposite of the first one. Language, minor violence Genre: Fluff, mainly, with admittedly a little bit of humor? I blame my lack of sleep. And my adhd. Warnings: Implied cannibalism adjacent activities because guess what honey, this is a fucked up family, what do you expect of me??? Sure, they have breakfast in this, there's cute stuff, but c'mon, they don't eat flowers and oatmeal! Notes: Doubt it needs to be said, but this is a sequel to the good ending of part one. Also Cass has one line in this that might be OOC, or seem oddly placed, but admittedly this chapter is also loosely based on a dream I had, and I couldn't not include the few direct quotations I remembered, and she seemed the most likely to say the line. And yes, there will be a part 3, because I am weak and also kind of maybe made this one less plot-moving than intended.

{Wounded Love: The re-woundening}

Every step ached more than the last, even with Alcina supporting you. She had wanted to carry you down the stairs, of course, but you had insisted that you would be fine. Now you were just determined not to complain out loud. One yelp or cry and you’d be scooped up in her arms, surely to be carried for the rest of the day. As much as you appreciated your girlfriend’s assistance, you hated feeling useless, and hated putting a burden on others. So here you were, one arm wrapped around Alcina’s waist, limping ever-so-slowly towards the dining room.

Further ahead (unburdened by your injury) the three Dimitrescu daughters talk among themselves, voices hushed as they too headed for breakfast. It was odd to see them all awake, and socializing, as there was usually at least one who came to meals late. You couldn’t help but wonder if it had something to do with your condition… or the circumstances that had caused it.

Less than eighteen hours had passed since your fight with a stray lycan, and tension had been high since. While you hadn’t yet spoken to the sisters, you had spoken to Alcina, who had briefly mentioned their concern for you. Whether they actually cared about you as a person or just cared because you are dating their mother is unclear. Based on how they had acted while treating your wounds, though, you were inclined to think that they were fond of you. And seeing as Alcina had already vowed to get revenge on your behalf… well, you wouldn’t be surprised to learn that her daughters intended to assist.

“Careful on the last step, dear,” Alcina says, positioned as to catch you if you fell. It takes a little willpower to resist the urge to hop down the rest of the way. As long as you landed on your uninjured leg, it wouldn’t even be that bad. Still, irritating your girlfriend first thing in the morning felt like a pretty stupid thing to do. Instead you just nodded, slowing down even more, and took visible care not to trip. “Good girl.”

Well, you certainly couldn’t say that being careful didn’t have its rewards.

“I have my moments,” you replied, blush rising to your cheeks. Suddenly your pain didn’t feel so bad (at least until you took another step and winced). “Damn, who woulda thought that cutting a chunk out of my leg would make it hurt more?” The leg in question throbbed in pain, as if to prove your point, protesting the weight you put on it. Changing the angle at which you stood helped some, allowing the lower half of the limb to bear more of the burden.

“Dearest…” Alcina starts to say, looking like she was going to readdress her desire to carry you. For a moment you try to avoid her gaze, but she moves in front of you, making sure that you could still hold onto her for support. “I know how you feel, how you want, desperately, to be independent. When I was first… granted this gift, it took a long time to adjust. There was so much I had to relearn how to do, so much that I suddenly needed done for me.” A pause, a deep breath. At last you look up at your girlfriend, warmth in your heart, reaching out to hold her hand. “You have time, my dear, and plenty of it. More than that… this will not last forever. The more you push yourself, the longer your recovery will take. Now, please, allow me to assist. You have already proven how strong you are.”

“Oh, you drive a hard bargain… but if you insist, who am I to decline? Or, well, who am I to decline twice in a row?” You answer, somewhat begrudgingly. It wasn’t much farther to the dining room, you figured, so it wouldn’t be much of a loss to accept help. Or at least that was what you told yourself. Even with Alcina’s encouragement it was so hard for you to accept her help. After all, you were the one that worked for her. Never mind the fact that she was somewhat responsible for your injury- really, you were actively avoiding thinking about that.

It’s much easier to forget once Alcina carefully picks you up. One arm goes under your legs, the other under your chest, lifting you without any effort. You might as well have been a kitten or a child’s toy. The movement does, however, shift your injured leg in such a way that it aches. At this point you can hardly move the limb at all without it hurting, and even the slightest friction against the bandage makes your eyes water.

Apparently someone would be delivering some painkillers later in the day. You assumed it would be The Duke (whose name is apparently not Doug, as you had thought), seeing as he knew some special way to get to and fro without risking the same fate that had befallen you. Which, of course, made you feel a lot better. Getting someone else hurt would weigh on your mind forever.

Regardless, you were safe now, as was your strange, bloody little family. Before long you would even be enjoying a pleasant meal together. Certainly that would help get your mind off of your wound? For now, though, you were met with an unexpected impasse. The sort of impasse that really, really should have been expected.

“Why… is the doorway… so small?” You asked, jokingly, as you stare into the mildly embarrassed face of your girlfriend. It’s already hard enough for her to crouch through the gap normally. When she’s carrying you? Impossible. “Can we ask Mother Miranda for bigger doors? She gave you eternal life and also three kids, she’s gotta be capable of making bigger doors. Put me down, I’ll go call her and-”

“That won’t be necessary, dear,” Alcina cuts you off, not fully appreciating this part of your humor. Or maybe she had already asked for bigger doors, only to be told no?... Okay, yeah, it was probably the first option. With a sigh she sets you down, as gently as she can manage. Ready and raring to go, you start to hobble forward, only to find all three of the daughters waiting for you, just beyond the door. They’re grinning as they watch you, and Bela extended her arm to offer her help. “What appears to be the matter?” Alcina asks from behind you. Accepting your fate and Bela’s arm, you let the sisters guide you to the table, Cassandra holding your other side, and Daniela pulls your chair out for you. Honestly it’s pretty adorable. Evidently your girlfriend agrees, from the way she smiles as she follows.

“Thank you,” you say, more out of reflex than genuine gratitude. Again, you weren’t thrilled about needing this assistance. If the girls notice they’re at least polite enough not to mention it. They simply move to their own seats at the large table, eager to dig in. It feels… strange, to be here, on this side of things. Stranger still to realize you’re the only one intending to eat actual food. There’s wine in your glass, but it’s a much fainter red than those you’ve previously served to your girlfriend. Thank goodness, you think, after how raw my throat was yesterday, I really don’t need to taste any more blood.

Once Lady Dimitrescu sits down, the meal formally begins, with several maidens appearing from the kitchen. Several seem relieved to see you, although surprised, and one even gave you a brief smile. The smile did not last, however. It wasn’t unexpected, considering the nature of her job, the pressures that it put upon her. No one smiled at mealtimes. Well, no maidens, that is. They simply moved around, wordlessly, faces blank, doing exactly as instructed. Only a few days ago you had been among them, fear keeping you in line. Was it wrong of you to care for Alcina, knowing what she was capable of doing to others? Knowing what she might have, in another life, done to you?

A maiden places a plate of warm food, as well as a bowl of fresh fruit, in front of you. For a moment your eyes meet, but she looks away instinctively. Your heart threatens to break.

“This looks wonderful, thank you for your hard work, all of you,” you speak up, glancing at each of the women working so hard. There’s more you want to say that dries in your throat; you are valued, you are deserving, someday I will join your ranks again.

“You don’t need to thank them, they’re just doing their jobs,” Cassandra chimes from the other side of the table. Hearing her say that damn near makes you drop your fork. It’s not an uncommon settlement, particularly among older generations and the rich, but one that irks you nonetheless.

“They’re doing my job. They are taking on extra work, for no pay, because I am injured. Why would I be so cruel as to ignore them? Have I not toiled alongside them enough to call them my kin?” You ask, struggling to keep your voice even. Next to you Alcina is slowly cutting into her meat, watching the scene unfold out of the corner of her eyes, perhaps considering when to step in. On the other end of the table, Bela looks increasingly uncomfortable, as if silently willing her sister into silence. None of the maidens have reacted to what you said, likely too afraid of Cassandra to even consider speaking.

“Ooooh, this is much more fun than our usual breakfasts,” Daniela says, stifling a giggle. “Do you have any other thoughts you’d like to share? Preferably ones that aren’t about me.” At this, Alcina sets her utensils down, clearly intending to put an end to the discussion. Unfortunately for her, you were a bit… impulsive, especially considering the previous night’s activities had left your mind struggling to cope.

“Dead lycans smell terrible. Literally the worst thing I’ve ever smelled, easily, no question about it,” you answer, shrugging a little as you do. It’s such a simple thought that you almost don’t realize how the others at the table react. Until the clatter of silverware on the table catches your attention, that is. All three sisters are eying you with different expressions (Bela is confused, Cass is impressed, and Daniela looks shocked). But it’s Alcina’s wide-eyed stare that gets you to elaborate. “Should I have said ‘a dead lycan’? I only got one, so I guess I shouldn’t say they all smell bad. C’mon, though, they have to all smell bad, right?”

Suddenly Daniela shifts from shock to pure amusement, a fit of giggles overtaking her. You’re still confused, not sure what the matter was, so you just sip your wine and hope someone asks the right questions.

“You… killed the lycan that attacked you?” Bela finally says, after a few moments of her sister laughing, expression still incredulous. When you nod she sort of shakes her head, trying to clear her thoughts. “May I ask how you managed that?”

“Oh, you know, I just meh meh-” you mime a stabbing motion with your fork- “until the stupid thing stopped moving. I had to use a tree branch as a weapon, but then it broke after a few whacks, which actually helped because then I had two stabbing implements to, you know, stab with. That’s right around when it got my leg, and it tried to bite me. Thankfully it wasn’t very smart, so when it leapt at me I just hyah-” this time an upwards strike- “right into its neck. That didn’t kill it, but it was enough to slow it down, which allowed me to stab the other half of the branch into its skull. Made this horrible, horrible sound as it died. Seeing as we are eating, I will not imitate the sound. Not that I could, now that I think about it…”

Once again there’s silence. Even Daniela has quieted now, and is watching you with rapt interest, likely hoping that you’re hiding another story up your sleeves.

“So… did you guys actually think that I managed to run away from the lycan? Or were you under the impression that it simply got bored of me and left?” You ask, casually returning to your breakfast afterwards. No one says anything, at first, taking in your words as best as they can. A few moments later both Daniela and Bela resume their meal, as nonchalant as one could be in the current situation. Alcina, however, rests a gentle hand on your shoulder, meeting your gaze with a loving look.

“You will never cease to amaze me, my dear. But let us ensure you never have to… smell, or see, one of those wretched things again, yes?” She says, softly squeezing you as she does. You can’t help but agree, and nod eagerly, mouth too full of hashbrowns to speak. Still, there’s been a shift in the atmosphere of the room. It’s not that the family didn’t respect you before, as far as you can tell, but they evidently hadn’t expected you to prove as capable as you had. It brings a sense of pride to the forefront of your mind, making you completely forget about your injury for the remainder of the meal.

Unable to stop yourself, you insist on helping the other maidens clean up, and Alcina eventually agrees to let you wash a few dishes- as long as you stay sitting the entire time. The last thing you hear before you shuffle off to the kitchen is the start of a conversation between Cassandra and her mother.

“You picked quite a feisty one, didn’t you?”

“That I did, that I did…”

[carlosxhook]

The Law Of Total Madness ~ H.H

Pairing: Harry Hook x Reader (yes I wrote Got7 into this sue me) + (please don’t I’m broke 🤦‍♀️)

Y/N’s P.O.V

Being Chad Charming’s twin sister was an interesting occurrence, Ben being your best friend for your whole life and growing up around Chad expectation of the perfect sister was exhausting this was where you found your love for singing and dancing thanks to Ben. He also introduced you to your other best friend prince Yugyeom originally from Jypnation and 6 other his friends who made music together the 8 of you were always glued together, you stuck together and turns out it was good for you to get away from Chad he may of been your brother and yes you loved him but god was he unbearable! Even better the 8 of you talk in korean to confuse anyone trying to ease drop Princess love to be some nosey bitches, you were a hip hop dancing, princess role breaking rebellious free soul and Chad HATED that. Perhaps the icing on the cake was that you were secretly dating a Scottish pirate, the only son of Captain Hook, the love of your life Harry Hook. It happened when you and Ben were kidnapped with Ben after convincing him you should go with him for “protection” when really you just wanted to wag chemistry class they kept you and Ben seperate and you and Harry ended up in a long make out session about 15 minutes before the most epic battle you’d ever witnessed, Ben announced that after 6 months since Dizzy, The Twins and Celia came to auradon that 3 more vks would be coming over! Hoping it would be Harry, Uma and Gil you talked to Gil while ‘kidnapped’ you two were close it was nice he seemed genuinely like a good guy, it was nice that he’s loyal to his crew and today was the day they were to arrive. Ben, Chad, Mal, Carlos, Jay, Evie, Doug and I were all gathered around waiting for them to show them around and such, the limo pulls up and all three vks get out my chest gets tight thinking about seeing him again yeah we starting “being a thing” very quickly but I liked him a lot I knew that much “Welcome to Auradon” Ben smiles “Try not to break anything” Chad snarls and I smack him over the head earning a deep chuckle from Harry as he smirks at me “it’s very colourful here” Gil smiles he’s too pure omg “well I would love too stay and help but I promised NaNa I’d be at practice 10 minutes ago, it was lovely too see you all again.” I wave before running off towards the school dance hall and quickly issuing magic to get changed into a red crop top and some high waisted black shorts with black converse, damn I was too cute for my own good sometimes, poor Chad never got any magic my parents had me enchanted when I was little so I could protect myself.

Harry’s P.O.V

“I apologise for Princess Y/N’s departure she’s preparing for a very important event and competition as a representative for Auradon, if any of you need her she’s typically in the dance hall!” Ben hints looking towards me it’s not like her and I were seriously anyways, yeah I liked her, a lot but I’d barely say I thought about her. That’s a lie everyday that stupidly gorgeous girl plagued my mind and she just runs off before I can have her in my arms again, how selfish? Does she even still care about me, about us, we had a connection fuck I knew feelings and l..l...lov that l word made you weak, how pathetic I thought I had a happily ever after.

We go through the entire of auadorn and finally reach the Dance Hall we hear loud music coming from within and I peek in seeing Y/N practicing “let’s watch!” Ben opens the door and we stand at the back my eyes fixated on the gorgeous girl dancing her heart out, “she’s gonna win” Chad laughs at Gils proud statement “please who does she think she is this isn’t the isle she should be in a castle or locked in a tower” Chad snorts “I’m sorry say that again Princey” I growl “cool it” I hear Uma whisper “you wanna get found out huh” she follows. “He’s an ass” I mutter focusing back on the events in front of me Y/N walking towards us with a big smile “what did you think?” She asks as her sparkling eyes meet mine before Chad can even open his mouth I reply “Ye did very good indeed” winking at the now blushing princess “anyways” she chirps “we need 3 more female dancers to back up Yugyeom and I’s duo for the competition, because as much as I’d love too see Jackson, Mark and BamBam in skirts with wigs and heels... I don’t wanna frighten the audience” she giggles looking behind her at the 7 boys now making their way over once they reach us the throw Y/N a questioning look before speaking in what I can only assume in another fucking language.

Y/N’s P.O.V

I would be lying if I said I didn’t miss Harry I did and as much as I wanted to run into his arms and breathe in his scent and glory I know I can’t, I lean over to Uma to get closer to Harry “Hey Uma, I don’t know if ben told you but we are sharing a room, I’m barely ever in my dorm so don’t worry I won’t bother you!” I smile and she just scoffs she’s not the biggest fan of me I mean she did kidnap Ben and I after all, I couldn’t blame her though the Isle was shocking I would wanna get out too I am kinda thankful cause of it I found Harry. That was if he still even liked me, I heard from Mal he’s a player and no good that he flirted with anything that moved I mean one of the old exchange students Nana did that too, and he was harmless I was just hoping Harry’s flirting was too.

“Yugyeom, can we finish I wanna show em to the dorms?” I smile to the fluffy haired boy sweat dripping down his white shirt making it slightly see through “only this once ya, usually I’m the one to try cut practice shorty” he laughs “sweet, don’t forget we go all day tomorrow with the boys!” I point to our 6 other friends and wave shooting them a wink before turning around seeing everyone but the pirates had left “well I’ll shall show you to your rooms I guess” I lead the way to the dorms it’s a bit awkward and the silence burns.

“So Y/N” Gil cuts the air “what’s this competition?” He smiles coming and placing an arm around me I hear Harry growl but I just let Gil rest his arm on me “well it’s a multi-kingdom performance competition, we must sing and dance and the winner’s kingdom hosts a massive party and a heap of important musical performers come for all necks of the woods too play and come watch!” I smile getting excited just thinking about it “Yugyeom and I have a duo, I have a solo and so does he, then a boy group performance and then a girl group performance if we win 3/5 of the categories Auradon will host its first ever K fest, it’ll be amazing!” I stop abruptly “our duo performance is gonna be the best we’ve ever done, and we’ve done a lot” I chuckle “anyways this is the boys dorm 701 Gil and Harry are here and then just down the all at 690 is where Uma will be if y’all need her. Your belongings will be inside for you if you need anything please don’t hesitate to ask” I turn around and walk to my room Uma in tow “so Y/N, been a while huh?” She laughs “indeed it has, how’re you feeling about all this?” I ask pointing around “it’s where I’ve always wanted to get my crew, I got Gil and Harry here, now I need to work on the rest” I see a glint of sadness in her eyes “I’m only really here because I care about those boys and they don’t deserve to rot on an island, yeah they’re dicks and trouble but they’re loyal to me so I am loyal to them, they fight for me so I fight for them. Always!” I was shocked Uma was really caring I didn’t expect this side of her “I’m only telling you this because I know you and Harry are a thing” she pays my back “wait we still are?” I ask hopeful “yeah, the moment he gets you alone he’ll be all over you like a hungry wolf, watch ya back” she laughs I take a deep breath “thank you Uma I wasn’t sure he even still knew me” I lay on my bed and my stomach grubmles “girl you’re so busy dancing you don’t eat” Uma scolds “come on” she grads my hand “were getting you some food!” Running out the door she takes me too the kitchen and starts making food “I used to have make chips all the time at the shop, so hopefully Auradon sir makes them taste better than the grubby isle ones” she scoffs “Uma, can I ask something?” I nervously fiddle “sure princess what’s up?” She says cutting up potatos “Did Harry’s father ever abuse him?” She seems taken aback “it’s just I remember telling Harry I’d stay behind he just had to pretend he had me at sword point, and he said he’d never even pretend to do such a thing because he wasn’t his father.” I wipe a few tears I was confused was Harry harmful “Harry gets his father’s temper or therefore lack of, he had outbursts, I’m sure he’ll still have them, yes to put it shortly his father before he was in the crew would often abuse him. But it wasn’t uncommon, not in the isle love is a weakness.” “Then am I weak for loving him no matter what Uma” why was I even opening up to her “no because I think you could be good for him, just don’t turn him” she jokes “or I’ll use this” she holds her shell out “yes captain!” We laugh. “Maybe finally having a roommate won’t be so bad aye” I smile as she cooks Uma might actually be a really great friend and she knows more about Harry than anyone else maybe Hook and I could work.

*The Next Day*

“Those boys I swear are always late” I mutter to no one in particular “now what’s a gorgeous girl like you doing standing ‘ere all alone?” My heart jumps hearing his voice again “Hi Harry” I turn around smiling “ye know isle got boring without a princess to kiss” she smirks “is that so, awe Harry did you miss me” I joke about he moves closer “believe me or not love, I actually did. Let’s say you left a bit of a mark on me so to speak” I giggle “now come here babe” I pull him in for a long and heated kiss “Lovely doing business with ye princess” he smirks spinning around and walking out. What the actual fuck was that, what is he playing at I’m not just some toy, I turn on the music and start dancing to Bonnie & Clyde by Dean nothing can distract me not even Harry.

Harry’s P.O.V

I fucked it up I panicked and played fuck boy player again the confident fascade is what I’m know by I must keep it up, show no emotion, no weakness. Sorry princess. It’s just how I am.

I walk to uma’s room and knock on the door “yeah what” I hear her shout “it’s me” and like that the door flies open “Where’s Gil?” She questions “running round with Jay apparently they’re besties or whatever I’m just letting the dog loose” I plop myself down on the princess’ bed “geez Auradon beds are comfy” I sigh “I don’t think your little girlfriend would appreciate your smelly leather and metal scent over her sheets” Uma jokes “not me girlfriend” I point out “I’d watch it if I were you then, she gushed on about that Yugyeom boy for a very long time, of she ain’t yours surely she’ll be his I mean they’re never not together.” As if on cue in walks Y/N “Hey Uma did you see where I put my tablets, the ones with the orange jar, I’ve got a massive headache.” She rubs her head still unaware I’m laying on her bed “yeah left hand side of the bathroom counter top” she smiles did I miss something what are they all of a sudden so... friendly...

“Thank you so much oh and by the way I’ll be back late tonight so don’t wait up I’ll sneak in, Yugyeom and I have to rehearse til late cause Ben wants to come watch us and make sure it’s all good” I watch as she leaves then I close my eyes and drift off too sleep surprisingly.

“Harry wake up omg” I hear as I open my eyes too see Uma standing above me “what?” I ask rubbing me eyes then picking up me hook “get off of Y/N’s bed and wake up she’s gonna be here soon” she scoffs “surely she wouldn’t mind a handsome looking lad in her bed waiting for ‘er” I laugh.

Y/N’s P.O.V

“Ben I don’t really understand?” I question “you want us... to kiss?” I point between Yugyeom and I “yes the chemistry is there I’m telling you it’s the winning touch, the performance is so dynamic it just needs the big ending, it’ll leave everyone shocked, stunned and more importantly it shows how well you work together.” The king smiles “are you sure this is a good idea?” He’s gone crazy completely mad oh this is not going to end well “let’s call it a day you two need to eat and back again tomorrow for more practice” Ben smiles holding the door open for us both, “he’s not serious right Y/N” Yugyeom whispers “I hope he’s not, but something tells me he is, it’s fine gyu we are the best this is nothing!” I smile placing a hand on his shoulder “what about that boy?” He asks in a small voice “we aren’t dating he made that very clear, who cares this is our dream we are so close!” I smile side hugging him and briefly laying my head on his “fighting!!” I smile before grabbing his hand and walking to my dorm he always walks me to the door of my room when we practice late “Thanks Yugyeom!” I smile “let’s work hard tomorrow!” I hug him really tightly saying goodbye and open the door to find Uma working on something and Harry asleep on my bed “I don’t remember ordering a strange man in my bed, Uma I think this ones for you.” I point to the pirate passed out on my bed “he’s been like that for hours, I don’t think he’s sleeping at night” Uma shrugs “I’ll be back I have to go try round up Gil watch the scot” I laugh before going to change clothes in the bathroom I walk out no more than 10 minutes later and he’s still there snoring away. “Harry I told you if you were struggling to come find me” I play with his hair and carefully remove the hook placing it right next to my bed I grab the spare blanket from the cupboard and put it over him and when I go to walk away I hear “Please, just stay with me love” he says almost way too soft “I’ll explain later just please” I notice he’s shaking must be nightmares or ptsd “it’s okay Harry I’m right here, I’m always gonna be okay” I smile placing a soft kiss on his forehead and jumping into the free slither of bed he’s left much for my surprise he moves and pulls me close with his arm around my stomach before I know it I’m fast asleep.

Harry’s P.O.V

I woke up and there she was in my arms and it felt right, it felt like nothing could ruin this moment until once again I panicked I’m not used to feeling this I grab my hook and leave her all alone, pangs if guilt hit me but I ignore them I’m a pirate the best one I don’t need feelings they make you weak and I will never be weak. I will make my father proud he will call me his son and I’ll finally have a family, I don’t need some stupid princess to distract me.

Y/N’s P.O.V

I woke up alone in my bed with nothing left but the memory and slight scent of metal and the ocean, or was it leather? Doesn’t matter now he used me again and I let him, I need to watch myself no distractions that would discredit all of Yugyeom and I’d hard work I’m letting Harry ruin this for me. That being said another day another practice T-minus 1 week until we gotta rock this competition he’s obviously gotta work himself else I ain’t here for his amusement ugh, today there’s a big school meeting where we perform some songs as a taster for the school and our sister school (team) Ateez High are sending over their recruits to perform, I can’t wait we have had these prepared forever so we got this in the bag.

{Might do a series on this one, kinda proud my first imagine for Harry Hook x Y/N reader I had to add something kpop okay just bear with me! Got a few requests so I’ll be getting right into them⚡️��}

[bisexualbuck]

To Be Loved, To Belong

Day One of the Evan Buckley Week 2020! The prompt was “That’s my family” + fluff

Summary: 5 times Buck almost tells his family what they mean to him.

+1 time he does.

[Read on AO3]

(Full text under read more)

1. Maddie

Buck will never blame Maddie for cutting contact with him while she was under Doug’s hold. Anytime she tries to bring it up and apologize, he tells her he knows it’s not her fault.

Because it isn’t. It has never been and it never will be.

He is only glad that she is free of that abusive relationship and that she is making a new life for herself. Every time they see each other, he feels the same endless pride for his sister who survived, who made it out, by herself.

Having her in his life again after so long is something he will never tire of. Growing up with such an age difference could have prevented them from being as close as they are, but the way they were raised made sure that they did.

Something that Buck can say, is that Maddie raised him more than their parents ever did. He is so thankful for her, although he would never tell it to her face, unless in very exceptional circumstances. She is still his sister and it’s his obligation to annoy her as much as humanly possible.

He smiles at the sight of Maddie laughing with Hen and Athena. He loves these moments, with all of the people he cares about, together in the same place.

Maddie has made herself a place in this group of people effortlessly, and sometimes it feels like she has always been a part of their little family.

Family.

Yes, this is a family. His family.

The thought is so sudden that it makes him want to weep.

All his life, that’s what he has longed for. A family. To be loved. To belong.

Growing up, it was only him and Maddie, with their parents around, not invested. A family by blood but not by love. It had been enough for the two siblings, because they had no other choice.

But now, Buck isn’t as alone anymore.

He has a family and he can share it with his sister.

They have made it. They have built themselves a true family, a family that they have chosen and that stays and that loves, not because they feel an obligation to, but because the choose to.

Every day these people make the conscious decision to love one another and to be there for each other.

Buck has never thought that he could have that, and now he has.

He is so happy he could cry.

“Earth to Evan.” It’s Maddie. He didn’t even notice her until she spoke, too deep in thoughts. “What’s got you looking so thoughtful? That’s never a good thing.”

It’s you, he wants to say. It’s this family that we’ve made.

We’ve made it, Mads, he wants to say. We’re not alone anymore.

This is our family.

Instead, he smiles and says, “Nothing. I’m just happy.”

“Oh, Evan,” she hugs him, and he thinks maybe she has heard the words he could not find. “I’m happy too.”

He knows she is. It’s like he can finally be at peace, knowing that his sister is safe and loved like she deserves to be.

.

2. Hen

Hen opens the door seconds before the bell has even finished ringing.

“Thanks for coming on your day off like that. I owe you one big time.”

Buck shakes his head, offering a smile. “You don’t owe me anything.”

Her face is soft as she looks at him, and he almost squirms under her gaze. He is getting better at accepting open testimony of affection but he is still not quite there yet. Some part of him might always be waiting for the other shoe to drop, for people to leave him.

“Still,” she says. “Thank you. Our sitter called sick last minute and Karen and I both need to be present for the meeting.”

“Hen,” Buck cuts, gently. “It’s fine. You know I love the little dude. I’m just gonna help Denny with his homework, as you asked, and maybe we’ll watch a movie if we have time. It’s all fine.”

Karen chooses that moment to arrive, holding Nia in her arms. She rushes to Buck’s side and gives him a quick kiss on the cheek.

He takes the chance to pull a face at Nia, and is proud to make her giggle. He laughs too, and continues playing with her for a few seconds, only stopping because he knows that Karen and Hen have to get going.

“She’s so cute, guys. I’m so glad for you.”

“You’re too sweet, Buck,” she says and he blushes. Karen has always intimidated him but she is also kind and loving, and like every vaguely parental figure in his life, he craves her approval. “We’ve left some cash for dinner in case we run too late.”

She bids him goodbye after one last reminder that Denny needs to study for a coming history test.

Hen stills at the door, Nia’s diaper bag in her hands. She gives Buck one more thankful look and he wants nothing more but for it to stop because he has never known what to do when he’s being thanked.

Especially since he has no problem helping out. Denny is a good kid, as smart and kind as his mothers. It really is no trouble spending one afternoon with him.

“How can I thank you, Buck?” Hen asks.

You’re family, he wants to say. You never have to thank me.

“Go to your meeting,” he says instead. “We’ll be fine.”

She is gone with one last smile, and Buck spends a great afternoon with a great kid, his heart full of love for this family that he belongs to.

And when Hen and Karen come back with Nia, Buck stays for dinner, grateful to share the moment with them, grateful for them.

That night, he falls asleep with a smile on his face.

.

3. Chimney

“Could you at least try not to end up in the hospital so often?”

“Like you can talk, Mister I-Spit-In-Death’s-Face-On-The-Regular,” Buck shots back easily, glad that the effects of the anesthesia have worn off. “The hospital’s given you a loyalty card yet?”

Chimney laughs the comment off and he comes to sit next to Buck’s hospital bed, choosing instead to punch him lightly in the shoulders. He is carrying a bag that smells like delicious Indian food.

“Here,” Chim says. “Hospital food sucks.”

“Thank you, man,” he breathes out as he takes the plate Chim is holding out to him. “I owe you my entire life.”

“No, thanks, I’m not interested.”

If Buck wasn’t too busy wolfing down his meal, he would have found something to retort. He has not eaten in hours, ever since he woke up this morning, feeling like hell. He had driven himself to the ER – which Bobby gave him a earful for on the phone when he found out – where the doctors told him what he had already guessed.

His appendix was inflamed, and he needed to be operated.

It’s a small operation and he would not even spend the night at the hospital. In fact, Chimney is here to pick him up as Buck will be discharged soon enough.

“How are you feeling?” Chim asks when Buck is done with his food.

“Honestly, I’m fine,” Buck replies and he puts his hand on his belly. “It’s nothing. I’ll be back to work in no time. You won’t even have time to miss me too much, baby.”

He gives Chimney an exaggerated wink and – okay, maybe he is still feeling a little bit the anesthesia.

“Baby?” Chim laughs. “You’re the worst. Why the hell do I even keep you around.”

“Well, we work together and you’re basically my brother-in-law at this point, so it’s not like you have choice.”

Chim gives him a long look, amused but Buck can also read tenderness in it.

“Sure,” he says at last. “The fact that I’m dating your sister is definitely the only reason I’d come to see you in the hospital on my day off. It’s not like you’re my friend or anything.”

Buck blames the meds again for the way his eyes feel not as dry as they ought to be.

He almost says it, then.

You’re my family, whether you’re dating my sister or not.

Thank you for coming two hours before they release me to keep me company.

He doesn’t say it.

“You have great taste in friends then,” he jokes instead and neither mention how is voice sounds a little too wet.

“That’s debatable, Buck.”

Chimney stays until Buck is released, and he stays some more when he drops Buck off at his place. He stays until Buck’s showered and tucked in bed, though he makes sure to tease him the whole time.

Buck feels like he will never get used to people so openly caring about him.

He hopes it never stops.

.

4. Bobby & Athena

Bobby’s face lights up as he notices Athena coming up the stairs, and he hurries to drop the towel he has been using to dry the dishes. Buck snorts and picks it up to finish cleaning up, Bobby cooked for the team anyway, he should not have been helping out Buck in the first place.

“Hello, Buckaroo,” Athena calls when she sees him, and he beams at her in return.

“Hey.” He puts down the last plate and turns fully towards the couple. “ You’re having a good day? Cap’ made cookies so my day is going great.”

“Why do you think I’m here?” she jokes.

Bobby pretends to look hurt but the glint in his eyes betrays him, “I’m going to pretend I didn’t just hear that.”

Buck is suddenly hit by the image of Bobby, more than two years ago, breaking down as he asked for help.

To see him smiling, joking with his wife, warms Buck’s heart with more emotion than he could voice. Both Bobby and Athena have been through so much and they found one another and built themselves up, they have become each other’s pillar of strength.

He admires them so much – loves them dearly, and he is bursting with the need to say it.

I love you two like you’re my actual parents.

You’re the family I’ve searched for my whole life.

Buck swallows it all down. Maybe one day, he will find the courage to say it out loud.

“I’m not sure there’ll be any cookies left though,” Bobby says with a sorry smile. “I didn’t know you were gonna drop by. I would have kept you a few otherwise.”

“It’s fine,” Athena assures. “This wasn’t planned, I was just close-by.”

“You can have mine,” Buck blurts out. “I’ve kept a few for later but I’ve already had too much anyway.”

“Oh, Buckaroo,” she says, looking sincerely touched. “Aren’t you the sweetest?”

He blushes and ducks his head. She laughs at him, gentle, and pinches his cheek.

If, at the beginning, someone had told him that he would hold Athena in such high esteem, he would have laughed. They did have a rocky start, but he is glad that they are past that now.

She goes to get the cookies he has set asides, he expects Bobby to follow suit but he stays behind, giving him a pointed look, not saying anything at all.

“What?” Buck breaks.

“I know you haven’t had any cookies, Buck.”

It’s true. Since it was his turn to do the dishes, he kept his for afterwards. He shrugs, not knowing what to say.

“You’re a good man.”

Buck feels warm with the praise but his first reflex, as always, is to dismiss it.

“It’s just cookies,” he says.

“I’ll make another batch tomorrow,” Bobby promises, a soft proud smile on his lips.

“You don’t have to – ”

“I know.”

With that, Bobby goes to his wife, and Buck feels right at home, in his station, surrounded by his family.

.

5. Eddie & Christopher

Buck jumps at every chance he has to spend time with Eddie and Christopher. He feels bad about it at times, like he shouldn’t intrude so much.

The one time Buck tried to bring it up to Eddie, the only answer he received was a heavy stare and a promise of, “You could never intrude, Buck.”

He has to remind himself those words whenever he feels like he should leave, let the two spend a day just together. But it’s so hard, and he is to selfish.

And he loves them so much.

It’s so easy to be with them too, they welcome him into their family with opened arms, and he can’t help but feel complete with them, like this is what he has been searching for, and now that he has them in his life, he does not have to look anymore.

He loves them. And he knows they love him, but he still worries that he doesn’t mean as much to them as they do to him.

“Are you okay, Buck?” Christopher asks him and Buck jolts with the knowledge that he has been lost in his thoughts for too long.

Eddie, thankfully, is getting them ice cream and as such has not been able to notice Buck’s slight change in mood. Good, because otherwise he would drill him until Buck gave in and told him about his insecurities.

“I’m good, buddy.”

Christopher is a smart kid, and he is clearly not fooled by Buck’s answer.

“Dad says you should tell people if you’re sad.”

“I’m not sad,” Buck protests. “I’m happy. You make me happy – you and your dad.”

It’s the truth. They make him happy. He smiles at Christopher, the kid that he wishes could be his, the kid he wants to help Eddie raise.

He lets that joy spread through him, warm his body and his soul. He will take whatever he can take, and he will be happy with it.

He already is.

Christopher seems satisfied, he smiles brightly at Buck who can do nothing but to smile back just as brightly.

“What’s got you two so happy?” Eddie asks as he comes back, holding three cups of ice cream. He is smiling too at the sight of his son and his best friend so joyful.

“We just are,” Christopher says – simple as that.

Eddie’s face does something very complicated that Buck can’t follow, his emotions changing fast before settling on a tender, soft expression.

“So am I, then.”

It’s not until Christopher has wandered off a bit, not far enough that they can’t see him, that Eddie brings it up again.

“So what was that about?”

“What was what about?” Buck asks, his gaze locked on Christopher.

How much he loves that kid. Buck wants to be there for him for as long as he lives, if they will let him.

How much he wants. Going back to his flat at night, to its empty rooms and its heavy silence – he hates it. He wants to stay with them, always, he wants to wake up next to Eddie and fix Christopher his breakfast and bring him to school.

He wants. He longs.

“Buck?”

The words are right there and he has to bite his lips to keep them in.

I love you. I’m in love with you.

I love your kid like he’s my own

You’re my family.

I want this, all of it.

“He said it,” Buck says at last. “We’re just happy.”

Eddie gives him a curious look but he does not press.

“You deserve to be.”

“So do you, Eddie.”

“I am.”

Buck breaks the eye contact first, feeling himself blush. Eddie nudges him with his shoulder and they share a laugh as they watch Christopher coming back to them, going as fast as his legs will carry him.

He is happy, truly, and that’s the only thing that matters.

.

+1

It’s all of them again, something that happens both often and yet too rarely.

There’s no particular reason for it, except that they could all make it, and it’s a wonderful sunny day in Los Angeles.

And they all love each other.

Because this is a family, and that’s what families do.

He does not think he could ever get tired of the thought. They are all there, sitting outside in the sun, having finished a great meal, the kids are playing close, their laughter filling up the air.

Every person that he cares about, in the same place, at once. What else could he ever ask for?

He feels a hand on his shoulder. He blinks, getting his head back into the present.

“You’re alright, Buck?” Bobby asks.

He is. He is happy.

He wants to say it, out loud, with pride.

He does not want to fight the urge back anymore. He wants to say these words he has been carrying with him for so long.

Because he has been able to say it to other people but never to them. He owes them the truth.

“I never thought I’d have this.”

Everyone’s attention turns to him, the words blurted out too loudly not to.

“What do you mean?” Athena asks, not unkindly.

He hesitates.

“A family.”

There’s a beat of silence. Buck looks away, but now that he has opened the damn, the words can’t be stopped. They rush out his mouth with desperate precipitation.

“I mean, Maddie and I, we had a family, sort of. Our parents, they’re – well, they’re not great.” He knows he is rambling but he can’t bring himself to stop the inflow of words. “And I thought it was always just gonna be just the two of us, but now like, I look at all of you and it’s just – I know, I tell myself, these people, here, that’s my family. Our family.”

He pauses. “Is that a weird thing to say? I’ve made it weird, right?”

“No, Buck,” Hen reassures from where she’s sitting across from him. “Of course not.”

“And you’re right,” Chim continues. “This is a family.”

If Buck could see himself in a mirror, he would probably be all red, with eyes too shiny.

Some part of him, the part that has always been ready to run, to let people go before they can abandon him, wants to run away from the moment. There is too much emotion all around, too much sympathy in everyone’s gaze as they look at him.

Eddie’s hand finds his under the table and squeezes, and Buck turns to see his boyfriend giving him a loving smile.

“Yeah?” Buck asks, softly.

“Yes.”

Buck looks up, he catches Maddie’s eyes and in them, he reads the same gratitude for these people, for that new chance at a family that they have been given.

Bobby raises his glass.

“To family,” he says.

“To family,” they all echo.

Eddie’s hand in his, his family around him, this is where Buck belongs.

Life has never been so kind.

[name-me-regret]

If The World Was Ending 2/?

If The World Was Ending Chapter Two: Worlds Apart

Read on AO3.

- ~ - ~ - ~ - ~

“Here we stand Worlds apart, hearts broken in two, two, two Sleepless nights Losing ground, I'm reaching for you, you, you

Feeling that it's gone Can change your mind If we can't go on To survive the tide love divides

Someday, love will find you Break those chains that bind you One night will remind you How we touched and went our separate ways...”

~Separate Ways (Worlds Apart) - Journey

- ~ - ~ - ~ - ~

Where did all the water go?

Buck kicked and flailed desperately, not knowing which way was up or down as he was turned over and over in the water, his lungs burning from lack of air. He might have given up as he felt the darkness creeping in as he felt himself get hit several times by debris, but only one thought kept him fighting to get to the surface, Christopher. Finally, he broke the surface as he took in a desperate gulp of air, hand grabbing at something, anything to anchor himself and luckily managed to get a string of lights that had been strung from one roof of a building to another. That gave him an idea of how deep the water was, and knew it would be too much for a little boy with CP.

“CHRISTOPHER!” There’s a throbbing in his head, likely from being struck by something and his ears were ringing, but he can’t concentrate on that. He has to find Chris. The string of lights holds his weight and he’s eternally grateful since the seawater is pulling at him as it tries to drag him away, looking around frantically for any sign of Chris.

Buck inhales to try and scream the boy’s name again and winds up with a mouthful of water as he chokes, trying to spit it out. “BUCK!” His head whips around, searching for the boy. He almost sobs in relief when he sees him, clinging to a cement post “HELP! BUCK!” It breaks the man’s heart at hearing how scared he sounds.

“CHRIS! HANG ON! STAY THERE!” He let’s go of the string of lights without hesitation, trying to swim and watch where he is going, but it’s hard with the current and all the debris in the water. Mostly, he’s being dragged and he can only try and kick and paddle his legs and arms to get closer to Chris. He reaches out a hand for the boy. “CHRIS! GRAB MY HAND!”

He misses and he tries to stop his progress before he gets pulled away too much. Then his heart stops when he hears Chris scream and he goes under. “NO!” He jumps back into the water, fighting the current with everything he has, and this time does sob as he catches the boy as they both surface. “I got you! I got you!”

Now he had to get them to safety.

- ~ - ~ - ~ - ~

Tony is working on the welding one of the arms of his latest suit, Mark 44. He’d had the idea after the Mandarin Incident when Bruce had come to visit him (more like sleep) after everything had been resolved. Banner always talked about being afraid that he would lose control of the Hulk, so Tony had started the idea of the Hulkbuster Armor, or the Mark 44. He’d run it by Bruce and he’d been all for it, if only so he could be stopped before he hurt someone. That’s what he had been working on for the past month, as well as completing the Mark 43 and finishing testing on it. He’d also repaired some of the armors that had been salvageable after the Battle on the Norco.

He’d planned on initiating the Clean Slate Protocol, so he could show Pepper how serious he was that he wanted to make things better between them. Then he’d remembered what he’d seen on the other side of that worm hole and what might be coming. So, he’d held off on it, and instead sent the suits back to the underground lab in Malibu. The house had been destroyed, and instead of rebuilding the house, he’d just left it as a sort of underground bunker/lab. Regardless, he’d promised her that he would get the Extremis out of her, and try not to obsess too much on his job.

It had been alright for a while, but then it had ended, as Tony knew it would. A break, she’d called it, but Tony knew what that meant. Well, it wasn’t like he hadn’t expected it after everything. He was a piping hot mess, and he really hadn’t expected her to stick around. As for the Extremis, it would always be inside of her, but he’d managed to neutralize most of it. Tony knew that if she ever got angry enough it would manifest a bit in her skin, but mostly in her eyes. He was going to make sure to have JARVIS record the next time there was a board meeting. He’d love to see her put the fear of Pepper in those old geezers. It would be a video that’d go into his personal files, along with a video of Steve Rogers trying to navigate a computer.

As he welded the next piece, it was another person that was on his mind; namely Evan Buckley. If there was ever a blast from his past, it was him.

Tony hadn’t spoken to the man in almost a year, and hadn’t seen him in nine years. The last time was that charity event where he’d used his mom’s concealer to cover the black eye that Charles Buckley had given him. Of course Tony had noticed, because he’d been close enough to do so.

They’d dated for about a year, and besides Pepper, it had been one of the healthiest relationships he’d ever had. Especially when you compared it to what he’d gone through with Tiberius Stone and Sunset Bain. Evan had been eighteen and Tony had been twenty-two years old, a year after he’d taken over Stark Industries. Tony wouldn’t say he had been in love, since he was still figuring out what that even meant, but he knew that with Evan, it could be possible. It had ended though, because of Evan’s father.

The man was greedy and had been trying to profit from SI for years, but his homophobia had won out when he’d found out that Tony and Evan we’re dating. He’d forbidden Evan from seeing Tony, but not before he’d beaten his son black and blue. Maddie was eight years older than him and had already married Doug as soon as she’d turned twenty, leaving him all alone, for six years. So, there had been no one to defend Evan from the monster.

Tony had wanted to give the bastard a taste of his own medicine. He’d have even thought of asking Rhodey to help him, and he would have agreed on principle alone. Also, Rhodey really liked Evan, and he had even tried to convince him to join the Air Force when Tony had finally gotten them to meet. The only reason he hadn’t done anything was because Evan had damn near begged Tony to leave it alone. He’d told him that he was going away soon anyways. If it had been anyone else, he’d have done it anyways, but since it was Evan, he’d very reluctantly let it go.

And true to his word, he’d left as soon as he had his high school diploma in hand. Tony knew he’d applied to schools all out of state (and Pennsylvania was right next to New York and the Buckley manor was close to the state line), but he’d never told him which school he had decided on. Evan was just gone one day with only a letter left to him. He’d gotten a phone call from him two months later to tell him that he’d started at UCLA. Tony would have gone to see him then, but Obie had insisted he stay in New York and complete his deadlines. However, one deadline had turned into one more and one more, and then a charity ball, or a fundraiser, and by that point he had surrendered completely to his addictions and hook-ups.

It was almost three years before he looked Evan up, and it was to learn that he was no longer at UCLA. And it would be six more years before he saw him again, and in that time he’d been kidnapped in Afghanistan, gotten shrapnel in his heart and became a goddamn superhero. He’d just revealed himself as Iron Man when he finally saw Evan, on television on a news report of a rollercoaster accident, and damned if Evan Buckley wasn’t the firefighter they were interviewing.

Tony had seen the pain on his friend’s face (even if friend wasn’t the right word to describe their relationship), and knew he had to get in touch with him. That turned out to be two weeks later when he was in California for some SI business. He’d managed to get his cell phone number from his personnel file with the LAFD. Their firewalls had been atrocious, or maybe it was because they were no match for JARVIS. At least he’d gotten him to ‘patch’ up the hole in their defenses, as well as a backdoor someone had left behind. Tony wondered who’d want a backdoor to the LAFD.

He’d called him to catch up and see if their schedule’s coincided so they could meet. The man had been shocked but excited to hear from him, however, he was about to start a 24-hour shift and Tony wasn’t in town for more than a day. So, they had missed each other again. This time they’d kept up a bit more before the demands of their lives had once again left them incommunicado, and that had been almost two years. He’d learned during that time that he was seeing a woman almost twice his age.

Tony hadn’t liked it, since the balance of power in the relationship was not good. He felt like Evan was giving more than she was into the relationship, even if she couldn’t be blamed for having a sick mother. So, he hadn’t said anything, since Evan appeared to be smitten. Besides, Tony already knew how it was bound to play out, and while it was a harsh lesson, it was one that Evan needed to learn on his own. Tony couldn’t shield him, and Evan had always been so independent that he wouldn’t have been able to shield him even if he’d tried.

He was like Tony in that regard due to similar childhoods; growing up with a father that only saw you as a constant disappointment, and a mother that was much too “proper” to stand between her callous, bastard of a husband and their young and innocent child. That was most likely the reason Tony and Evan had clung to one another, and for that year together had been their only support.

For Buck, he’d been alone longer, six years since his sister had left to marry the first man that showed her any interest. As for Tony, Rhodey was in the Air Force, had joined straight out of MIT, but for the past eighteen months had been stationed at Yokohama Air Base in Tokyo. At the time Tony had also taken over SI, which was the only legacy his father had ever been proud of; besides Captain fucking America.

Tony groaned at the memories that resurfaced from talking to Evan, and it was very distracting. Their relationship had been a rather decadent one, and one he wouldn’t mind reliving once again. Which is why he had to stop these thoughts right now. Evan was obviously jonesing on this Eddie person, and he didn’t want to get in the middle of that.

“Sir, need I remind you that you’ve been up for almost 40 hours, and it would be optimal you get some sleep before your 1pm meeting,” JARVIS drawling in his crisp British voice.

The man sighed and waved his hand. “Alright, save it all, J,” He staggered to the couch and collapsed on. “Wake me up in two hours.” Tony yawned before he closed his eyes.

It seemed like he’d only just closed his eyes when the alarm went off through the penthouse. Tony jackknifed up in the couch, looking around to see if there was any danger, and it only took a second more to realize what that alarm meant. He guessed he was missing his 1pm meeting, and hoped Pepper wouldn’t be too angry.

He sprang to his feet, all sleep gone from his face as he pulled up the hallographic screens. “What have you got, J?” Tony was already pulling a t-shirt over his tank top that he deemed was clean enough. He doubted that he’d have enough time to shimmy into his flight suit, which was a shame since it was the most comfortable thing to wear while wearing the armor for long periods of time.

“A tsunami has just hit Southern California, sir.”-

[crazybagelbitch]

Part 3, they definitely can’t hide it anymore when Maddie pops and baggy tops aren’t hiding it enough anymore so she suggests telling buck in a public space during a firefam party/meal.

It’s about damage control.

Telling Buck in public instead of in private makes her heart hurt and she knows it’s not entirely fair, they both do, but she’s very wary of his potential reaction and fears how things would go if it were just the two of them. She knows she couldn’t stop him from going off on his own to confront Chimney, or what he would do to his temporary captain the next day at work...

She can’t fault Buck for being protective of her, she can’t, but... sometimes the strength of his emotions overpowers his ability to see nuance for the time being. She understands, she does but, Chimney is her baby’s father and someone whom she loves deeply, and she needs to shield him from a potential “unwise” reaction from her brother.

She decides to do it before anyone’s drunk yet, figuring alcohol could only make a potentially volatile situation even worse.

Maddie grabs Chimney’s hand, practically yanking him to stand up with her by the end of the table.

“We have some news,” she blurts out indelicately, grabbing everyone’s attention effectively and Hen must pick up on her nerves, because the other woman nods encouragingly at her.

“Maddie and I are having a baby,” Chimney finishes for her, figuring that he should at least do that much when Maddie keeps opening and closing her mouth, trying to find the right words, “she’s about um, eighteen weeks along so we’ve known for a while, but there just never seemed like a right--”

“Are you joking?” Buck asks, and Maddie winces at the anger in his voice. She knew, she knew it was coming, but some foolish corner of herself was still hoping he’d jump straight to excitement just like Hen did...

“No, Buck, we’re not,” she says as steadily as she can, feeling like she could choke on her own tongue, “I-I’m sure you’ve noticed I’ve been wearing looser clothing lately, can’t really hide it anymore...”

She trails off, gesturing to the very loose, baggy dress she’s wearing and she can practically see it all clicking into place in her brother’s mind by the look on his face.

“Congratulations!” Athena is the first to break the silence, getting up and hugging Maddie and she’s really so grateful for her, because the more people who are happy about this, maybe then the more quickly her brother will come around.

“Congratulations? Mads, you’re... you and Chimney... nineteen weeks means...”

“Buck, Chimney and I are both adults.”

“They’re both adults,” Bobby nods, reaching out to put a hand on Buck’s shoulder, “and I know that this is probably surprising, but a baby is--”

“Don’t wax poetic at me about the miracle of having a baby, Bobby,” Buck snaps, standing up from his seat and Maddie immediately steps in front of Chimney, as Hen also gets up from the table so she’s ready to intervene if necessary, “Chimney got my sister pregnant, didn’t even have the decency--”

“It takes two to tango, Evan. Chimney and I are both adults, like I just said.”

“So adult that you have to do all the talking for him? That he can’t just own up to--”

“He doesn’t have to own up to anything. We made a decision together that one night and then when we found out I was pregnant we made another decision together that this baby is what we both wanted, even if things are less than ideal.”

“Less than ideal? Less than ideal, Mads? He befriended your ex-husband and almost got you both killed, and before all that apparently got you pregnant when he wasn’t even-- wait, are you even together now? He got you pregnant and he’s still not doing the right thing and--”

“It isn’t the 1950s, Buck!” she can’t help but shout.

“Buck,” Chim starts quietly, and Maddie wants to tell him to just shut up because no matter what he says, it’s just going to make her brother more angry, “we’re taking things slowly, okay? It’s not that I don’t care about your sister or have feelings for her at all. It’s just that things that were traumatic before we knew she was pregnant still are traumatic now, and we didn’t want--”

“Don’t talk down to me! You got her pregnant and you won’t even date her? I thought you were better than that.”

“Buck,” Maddie sighs, coming forward to tentatively grab his hand, “Buck, please? I-I’m happy so can’t you at least try and be happy? I know it is a lot and is weird and complicated but... we’re adults who made a decision together, a-and we’re still dealing with... everything that happened with Doug.”

“Because he befriended him! Really, Mads? This is the kind of guy you want to--”

“Leave her out of it,” Chimney barks, “you want to be mad at me? Fine, I get it, but your sister doesn’t need any of your judgment. She needs you on her side.”

“Don’t you dare try and--”

“Okay, Buck, Chim is still your captain at the moment so maybe let’s go outside and calm down for a minute before we get ourselves in trouble,” Eddie suggests, trying to pull on Buck’s arm but he shakes him off.

“Couldn’t imagine a worse captain. Already were terrible and--”

“Watch it,” Hen practically hisses.

“Buck, please?” Maddie whimpers, tears starting to fall from her eyes, “I-I can’t ask you to be happy and change y-your mind right this second but... people here wanna be happy for u-us and I wanna be happy, too, and you hurting Chimney isn’t gonna... j-just go calm down with Eddie for a bit, please?”

“Fine,” Buck spits, and there’s a combined exhale of relief from multiple people.

And that relief is exactly what Buck takes advantage of to give Chimney a good hard shove into the wall before he storms out into Bobby and Athena’s backyard.

[aion-rsa]

The Best Horror Movies to Stream

https://ift.tt/36P7Are

Updated for October 2020

The world of streaming horror movies can be an overwhelming place.

Let’s say you’ve got your Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu and HBO Max subscriptions all set and ready. Now you want to get terrified with the best horror movies you can find in time for Halloween. But there are so many options! What’s a horror addict to do?

Here you’ll find the master list. That’s right, we’ve hand-selected only the absolute best and most terrifying horror movies available on all the major streaming services and combined them here for your streaming (or screaming) pleasure.

Be sure to let us know if you make it through all 31!

Apostle

Available on: Netflix

Apostle comes from acclaimed The Raid director Gareth Evans and it’s his take on the horror genre. Spoiler alert: it’s a good one.

Dan Stevens stars as Thomas Richardson, a British man in the early 1900s who must rescue his sister, Jennifer, from the clutches of a murderous cult. Thomas successfully infiltrates the cult led by the charismatic Malcom Howe (Michael Sheen) and begins to ingratiate himself with the strange folks obsessed with bloodletting. Thomas soon comes to find that the object of the cult’s religious fervor may be more real than he’d prefer.

Apostle is a wild, atmospheric, and very gory good time.

The Blackcoat’s Daughter

Available on: Netflix

Some kids dream about being left overnight or even a week at certain locations to play, like say a mall or a Chuck E. Cheese. One place that no one wants to be left alone in, however, is a Catholic boarding school.

That’s the situation that Rose (Lucy Boynton) and Kat (Kiernan Shipka) find themselves in in the atmospheric and creepy The Blackcoat’s Daughter. When Rose and Kat’s parents are unable to pick them up for winter break, the two are forced to spend the week at their dingy Catholic boarding school. If that weren’t bad enough, Rose fears that she may be pregnant…oh, and the nuns might all be Satanists.

Read more

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A24 Horror Movies Ranked From Worst to Best

By David Crow and 3 others

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Katharine Isabelle on How Ginger Snaps Explored the Horror of Womanhood

By Rosie Fletcher

The Blackcoat’s Daughter is an excellent debut directorial outing from Oz Perkins and another step on the right horror path for scream queens Shipka and Emma Roberts.

The Cabin in the Woods

Available on: Amazon Prime

A remote cabin in the woods is one of the most frequently occurring settings in all of horror. What better location for teenagers to be tormented by monsters, demons, or murderous hillbillies? Writer/Director Joss Whedon takes that tried and true setting and uses it as a jumping off points for one of the most successful metatextual horror movies in recent memory.

Like you would expect, The Cabin in the Woods features five college friends (all representing certain youthful archetypes, of course) renting a….well, a cabin in the woods. Soon things begin to go awry in a very traditional horror movie way. But then The Cabin in the Woods begins doling out some of the many tricks it has up its sleeve. This is a fascinating, very funny, and yet still creepy breakdown of horror tropes that any horror fan can enjoy.

The Changeling (1980)

Available on: Shudder

A classic haunted house ghost story that frequently makes horror best of lists The Changeling sees a bereaved composer move into a creepy mansion that’s been vacant for 12 years. Vacant that is, except for the spirit of a little boy who met an untimely death…

An unravelling mystery with a sense of intrigue and pathos that draws you into the narrative, all the way to the sad and disturbing final act revelation.

City of the Living Dead

Available on: Amazon Prime

Italian horror director Lucio Fulci kicked off his famous “Gates of Hell” trilogy with this gruesome, crude but surreal 1980 gorefest, in which a reporter (Christopher George) and a psychic (Catriona MacColl) struggle to stop those gates from opening and letting a horde of hungry undead into the world.

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Movies

The Horror Movies That May Owe Their Existence To H.P. Lovecraft

By Don Kaye

Movies

How Relic Explores our Most Primal Fears

By Rosie Fletcher

Fulci loosely based the movie on the works of H.P. Lovecraft, vying for the latter’s brooding atmosphere while indulging in his own trademark splatter. The results are somewhat slapdash but a must-see for Italian horror fans. Followed by the much better The Beyond (1980) and House by the Cemetery (1981).

The Dead Zone

Available on: Amazon Prime

The Dead Zone strangely remains both one of Stephen King’s more underrated movie adaptations as well as one of director David Cronenberg’s more unsung efforts. Yet it ends up being among the best from both author and auteur, while also providing star Christopher Walken with one of his most moving, complex performances to date.

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TV

Upcoming Stephen King Movies and TV Shows in Development

By Matthew Byrd and 6 others

Movies

Jason Blum Promises “Faithful” New Adaptation Of Stephen King’s Firestarter

By Don Kaye

Walken’s Johnny Smith awakens from a coma to find out he’s lost five years of his life but gained a frightening talent to touch people and see both their deepest secrets and their future. Whether to use that power to impact the world around him is the choice he must face in this bittersweet, eerie and heartfelt film, which found Cronenberg moving away from his trademark body horror for the first time.

Doctor Sleep

Available on: HBO Max

Let’s be up front about this: Doctor Sleep is not The Shining. For some that fact will make this sequel’s existence unforgivable. Yet there is a stoic beauty and creepy despair just waiting to be experienced by those willing to accept Doctor Sleep on its own terms.

Directed by one of the genre’s modern masters, Mike Flanagan, the movie had the unenviable task of combining one of King’s most disappointing texts with the opposing sensibilities of Stanley Kubrick’s singular The Shining adaptation.

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Movies

Doctor Sleep: Inside the New Overlook Hotel

By John Saavedra

Movies

Doctor Sleep Ending Explained

By John Saavedra

And yet, the result is an effective thriller about lifelong regrets and trauma personified by the ghostly specters of the Overlook Hotel. But they’re far from the only horrors here. Rebecca Ferguson is absolutely chilling as the smiling villain Rose the Hat, and the scene where she and other literal energy vampires descend upon young Jacob Tremblay is the stuff of nightmares. Genuinely, it’s a scene you won’t forget, for better or worse….

The Evil Dead

Available on: Netflix

1981’s The Evil Dead is nothing less than one of the biggest success stories in horror movie history.

Written and directed on a shoestring budget by Sam Raimi, The Evil Dead uses traditional horror tropes to its great advantage, creating a scary, funny, and almost inconceivably bloody story about five college students who encounter a spot of bother in a cabin in the middle of the woods. That spot of bother includes the unwitting release of a legion of demons upon the world.

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Movies

Evil Dead Movies: The Most Soul Sucking Moments

By David Crow

Movies

Living with the Cult Legacy of Evil Dead

By Hannah Bonner

The Evil Dead rightfully made stars of its creator and lead Bruce Campbell. It was also the jumping off point for a successful franchise that includes two sequels, a remake, a TV show, and more.

A Field in England

Available on: Amazon Prime

2013’s A Field in England presents compelling evidence that more horror movies should be shot in black and white.

Directed by British director Ben Wheatley, A Field in England is a kaleidoscope of trippy, cerebral horror. The film takes place in 1648, during the English Civil War. A group of soldiers is taken in by a kindly man, who is soon revealed to be an alchemist. The alchemist takes the soldiers to a vast field of mushrooms where they are subjected to a series of mind-altering, nightmarish visions.

A Field in England is aggressively weird, creative, and best of all clocks in at exactly 90 minutes.

Fright Night

Available on: Amazon Prime

Screenwriter-turned-director Tom Holland lets a jaded, smarmy vampire named Jerry Dandridge loose in suburbia and watches the blood spurt in this beloved ‘80s horror staple.

Chris Sarandon brings a nice combination of amusement and menace to the role of the bloodsucker, while Planet of the Apes veteran Roddy McDowall is endearing as a washed-up horror host recruited into a real-life horror show. Much of Fright Night is teen-oriented and somewhat dated, but it still works as a sort of precursor to later post-modern horror gems like Scream.

Green Room

Available on: Netflix

Green Room is a shockingly conventional horror movie despite not having all of the elements we traditionally associate with them. There are no monsters or the supernatural in Green Room.

Instead all monsters are replaced by vengeful neo-Nazis and the haunted house is replaced by a skinhead punk music club in the middle of nowhere in the Oregon woods. The band The Aint Rights, led by bassist Pat (Anton Yelchin) are locked in the green room of club after witnessing a murder and must fight their way out.

Hellraiser (1987)

Available on: Shudder

Directed by Clive Barker based on his novella The Hellbound Heart, Hellraiser is an infernal body horror featuring S&M demons who’ve found a way out of a dark dimension and want to take you back there.

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Movies

Michael Myers vs Pinhead: The Hellraiser/Halloween Crossover That Never Was

By Jack Beresford

Movies

Ranking the Hellraiser Movies

By Jamie Andrew

This is the movie which introduced chief Cenobite Pinhead (played by Doug Bradley) – who would return for seven more Hellraiser sequels. But the first is of course, remains the edgiest and the best. Hellbound: Hellraiser II is also available.

Hereditary

Available on: Amazon Prime

Between Hereditary and The Haunting of Hill House 2018 was a great year for turning familial trauma into horror.

Written and directed by Ari Aster, Hereditary follows the Graham family as they deal with the death of their secretive grandmother. As Annie Graham (Toni Collette) comes to terms with the loss, she begins to realize that she may have inherited a mental illness from her late mother…or something worse.

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Movies

Hereditary: The Real Story of King Paimon

By Tony Sokol

Movies

Hereditary Ending Explained

By David Crow

Hereditary is terrifying because it asks a deceptively simple but truly creepy question: what do we really inherit from our family?

The Hills Have Eyes (1977)

Available on: Shudder

Wes Craven’s 1977 cult classic sees an extended family become stranded in the desert when their trailer breaks down and they start to get picked off by cannibals living in the hills. It’s brutally violent but it also has things to say about the nature of violence, as the seemingly civilized Carter family turn feral. The film was remade in 2006 but the original is still the best.

Horror of Dracula

Available on: HBO Max

Replacing Bela Lugosi as Dracula was not easily done in 1958. It’s still not easily done now. Which makes the fact that Christopher Lee turned Bram Stoker’s vampire into his own screen legend in Horror of Dracula all the more remarkable. Filmed in vivid color by director Terence Fisher, Horror of Dracula brought gushing bright red to the movie vampire, which up until then had been mostly relegated to black and white shadows.

Read more

Movies

Bram Stoker’s Dracula and the Seduction of Old School Movie Magic

By David Crow

TV

BBC/Netflix Dracula’s Behind-the-Scenes Set Secrets

By Louisa Mellor

With its penchant for gore and heaving bosoms, Horror of Dracula set the template for what became Hammer Film Productions’ singular brand of horror iconography, but it’s also done rather tastefully the first time out here, not least of all because of Lee bring this aggressively cold-blooded version of Stoker’s monster to life. It’s all business with this guy.

Conversely, Abraham Van Helsing was never more dashing than when played by Peter Cushing in this movie. The film turned both into genre stars, and paved the way for a career of doing this dance time and again.

The House of the Devil

Available on: Amazon Prime

Indie horror auteur Ti West’s low-budget creepfest is a homage to 1980s horror yet plays it straight; he sets out to make a movie with the feel of genre films from that era without making self-aware in-jokes and references — and he mostly succeeds.

But The House of the Devil is also the definition of a “slow burn”: very little happens for much of the first hour (save a jolt here and there) and then the third act explodes into a paroxysm of murder, gore and Satanic horror. That makes the film feel a little off-balance, although in the end it all becomes quite unnerving.

House on Haunted Hill

Available on: Amazon Prime

What would you do for $10,000? How about surviving a night in a mansion haunted by murder victims and owned by a psychotic millionaire? Seems like a party trick until people actually start dying.

Vincent Price is the master and mastermind of a house that suddenly makes everyone homicidal—but the real pièce de résistance is what dances out of a vat of flesh-eating acid.

Some vintage horror never dies, and this 1959 classic is immortal.

Hush

Available on: Netflix

In his follow-up to the cult classic Oculus, Mike Flanagan makes one of the cleverer horror movies on this list. Hush is a thrilling game of cat-and-mouse with the typical nightmare of a home invasion occurring, yet it also turns conventions of that familiar terror on its head. For instance, the savvy angle about this movie is Kate Siegel (who co-wrote the movie with Flanagan) plays Maddie, a deaf and mute woman living in the woods alone. Like Audrey Hepburn’s blind woman from the progenitor of home invasion stories, Wait Until Dark (1967), Maddie is completely isolated when she is marked for death by a menacing monster in human flesh.

Further, like the masked villains of so many more generic home invasion movies (we’re looking square at you, Strangers), John Gallagher Jr.’s “Man” wears a mask as he sneaks into her house. However, the functions of this story are laid bare since we actually keep an eye on what the “Man” is doing at all times, and how he is getting or not getting into the house in any given scene. He is not aided by filmmakers who’ve given him faux-supernatural and omnipotent abilities like other versions of these stories, and he’s not an “Other;” he is a man who does take his mask off, and his lust for murder is not so much fetishized as shown for the repulsive behavior that it is. And still, Maddie proves to be both resourceful and painfully ill-equipped to take him on in this tense battle of wills.

The Invitation

Available on: Netflix

Seeing your ex is always uncomfortable, but imagine if your ex-wife invited you to a dinner party with her new husband? That is just about the least creepy thing in this new, taut thriller nestled in the Hollywood Hills. Indeed, in The Invitation Logan Marshall-Green’s Will is invited by his estranged wife (Tammy Blanchard) for dinner with her new hubby David (Michael Huisman of Game of Thrones). David apparently wanted to extend the bread-breaking offer personally since he has something he wants to invite both Will and all his other guests into joining. And it isn’t a game of Scrabble…

Intense, strange, and not what you expect, this is one of the more inventive thrillers of 2016.

Midsommar

Available on: Amazon Prime

It’s hard to categorize Midsommar, Ari Aster’s follow-up to his absolutely terrifying horror debut, Hereditary. Part straight up horror, part The Wicker Man, and part anthropological study, Midsommar seems to occupy many genres all at once. Aster himself called it a “break up” movie. But whatever genre Midsommar is, it is a brilliant, and at times deeply disturbing film.

Florence Pugh stars as Dani, a young woman trying to heal in the wake of an enormous tragedy. Dani follows her boyfriend, Christian, and his annoying friends to an important midsummer festival deep in the heart of Sweden. Christian and company are there partly to get high and have fun and also partly to study the unique, isolated culture for their respective theses. To say that they get more than they bargained for is an understatement. But Dani may just end up getting exactly what she needs.

Night of the Living Dead

Available on: Amazon Prime, HBO Max

George A. Romero’s 1968 zombie classic The Night of the Living Dead messed up the minds of late ’60s moviegoers as much as it messed with every horror movie that followed. Shot on gritty black and white stock, the film captures the desperate urgency of a documentary shot at the end of the world. It is a tale of survival, an allegory for the Vietnam War and racism and suspenseful as hell freezing over.

Read more

TV

The Walking Dead vs. Real-Life Survivalists: How to Prep for The Zombie Apocalypse

By Ron Hogan

Movies

Night of the Living Dead: The Many Sequels, Remakes, and Spinoffs

By Alex Carter

Night of the Living Dead set a new standard for gore, even though you could tell some of the bones the zombies were munching came from a local butcher shop. But what grabs at you are the unexpected shocks. Long before The Walking Dead, Romero caught the terror that could erupt from any character, at any time.

They’re coming to get you. There’s one of them now!

Nosferatu

Available on: Amazon Prime

Nothing beats a classic, and that’s exactly what Nosferatu is. As the unofficial 1922 adaptation of Bram Stoker’s Dracula, this German Expressionist masterpiece was almost lost to the ages when the filmmakers lost a copyright lawsuit with Stoker’s widow (who had a point). As a result, most copies were destroyed…but a precious few survived

This definitive horror movie from F.W. Murnau might be a silent picture, but it’s a haunting one where vampirism is used as a metaphor for plague and the Black Death sweeping across Europe. When Count Orlock comes to Berlin, he brings rivers of rats with him and the most repellent visage ever presented by a cinematic bloodsucker.

Read more

TV

13 Essential Dracula Performances in Movies and TV

By Tony Sokol

Culture

The Bleeding Heart of Dracula

By David Crow

The sexy vampires would come later, starting with 1931’s more polished vision of Count Dracula as legendarily played by Bela Lugosi, but Max Schreck is buried under gobs of makeup in Nosferatu making him resemble an emaciated cadaver. Murnau plays with shadow and light to create an intoxicating environment of fever dream repressions. But he also creates the most haunting cinematic image of a vampire yet put on screen.

Pet Sematary (2019)

Available on: Amazon, Hulu

After the classic Stephen King novel of the same name and Mary Lambert’s 1989 movie, what could there possibly be left to say about Pet Sematary? Quite a lot actually! Directors Kevin Kölsch and Dennis Widmyer breathe new life into this old tale…not unlike a certain “sematary” itself.

Read more

Movies

Pet Sematary Ending Explained

By John Saavedra

Movies

On the Set with Pet Sematary’s Producer

By Nick Morgulis

Jason Clarke stars as Louis Creed, an ER doctor from Boston who moves his family to rural Ludlow, Maine to live a quieter life. Shortly into their stay, Louis and his wife Rachel (Amy Semeitz) experience an unthinkable tragedy. That’s ok though as neighbor Jud Crandall (John Lithgow) knows a very peculiar place that can help.

Phantasm

Available on: Amazon Prime

Director and writer Don Coscarelli has said that this 1979 cult classic was inspired by a recurring dream — and we believe him, since Phantasm has the surreal, not-quite-there feel of an inescapable nightmare from start to finish.

With its bizarre plot about a funeral parlor acting as a front to send undead slave labor to another dimension, the iconic image of the Tall Man, killer dwarves and those deadly silver spheres, Phantasm was and is like no other movie of its era.

Poltergeist

Available on: Netflix

Before there was Insidious, The Conjuring, or a myriad of other “suburban family vs. haunted house” movies, there was Poltergeist. Taking ghost stories out of the Gothic setting of ancient castles or decrepit mansions and hotels, Poltergeist moved the spirits into the middle class American heartland of the 1980s. With a smart screenplay by no less than Steven Spielberg (and, according to some, his ghost direction), Poltergeist finds the Freeling family privy to a disquieting fact about their new home: It’s built on top of a cemetery!

You probably know the story, and if you don’t you can guess it after decades of copycats that followed, but this special effects-laden spectacle still holds up, especially as a thriller that can be enjoyed by the whole family. Fair warning though, if your kids have a tree outside their window or a clown doll under their bed, we don’t take responsibility for the years of therapy bills this may inflict!

Ready or Not

Available on: HBO Max

The surprise horror joy of 2019, Ready or Not was a wicked breath of fresh air from the creative team Radio Silence. With a star-making lead turn by Samara Weaving, the movie is essentially a reworking of The Most Dangerous Game where a bride is being hunted by her groom’s entire wedding party on the night of their nuptials.

It’s a nutty premise that has a delicious (and broad) satirical subtext about the indulgences and eccentricities of the rich, as the would-be extended family of Grace (Weaving) is only pursuing her because they’re convinced a grandfather made a deal with the Devil for their wealth–and to keep it they must step on those beneath them every generation. Well step, shoot, stab, and ritualistically sacrifice in this cruelest game of hide and seek ever. Come for the gonzo high-concept and stay for the supremely satisfying ending.

Sweetheart

Available on: Netflix

Don’t let the name fool you, Sweetheart is very much a horror movie. What kind of horror movie, you ask? Well, after a boat sinks during a storm, young Jennifer Remming (Kiersey Clemons) is the only survivor. She washes ashore a small island and gets to work burying her friends, creating shelter, and foraging for food. You know: deserted island stuff.

Read more

Movies

Dog Soldiers: The Wild History of the Most Action Packed Werewolf Movie Ever Made

By Mike Cecchini

Movies

The WNUF Halloween Special: The Making of the Most Fun Found Footage Horror Movie Ever

By Gavin Jasper

Soon, however, Jenn will come to find that the island is not as deserted as she previously thought. There’s something out there – something big, dangerous, and hungry. Sweetheart is like Castaway meets Predator and it’s another indie horror hit for Blumhouse.

The Tenant

Available on: Amazon Prime

Roman Polanski, in addition to being a creep and outright sex criminal, has a grand fascination with apartments, directing an unofficial “Apartment Trilogy” with Repulsion, Rosemary’s Baby, and The Tenant. And it’s not hard to see why. There is something a little strange about dozens if not hundreds of relative strangers all calling the same place “home.”

1976’s The Tenant is the culmination of Polanski’s obsession with communal living and in some ways is the creepiest. Polanski stars as Trelkovsky, a paranoid young file clerk who is on the verge of succumbing to the constant dread he feels. Things are exacerbated when Trelkovsky moves into a Parisian apartment and discovers the previous occupant killed herself. What follows is a tense and trippy exploration of fear itself.

Texas Chainsaw Massacre (1974)

Available on: Shudder

You’ve probably seen this one already, but this founding father of the slasher genre is a bit of a fairy tale when glimpsed at the right light. Some dumb kids wander into the wilderness, far away from the safety of civilization, on a trip to their grandparents’ home.

Read more

Movies

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre: How Low-budget Filmmaking Created a Classic

By Ryan Lambie

Movies

The Real Texas Chainsaw Massacre: How Ed Gein Inspired Classic Horror Movies

By Tony Sokol

But instead of reaching their destination, they wind up on the dinner table for the “Other,” who in this case is a redneck family of cannibals with a crossdressing serial killer who’s weapon of choice has an electric motor that makes a sweet hum as its blades tear into your flesh. When viewed like that, it might be worth seeing all over again, eh?

Under the Shadow

Available on: Netflix

This recent 2016 effort could not possibly be more timely as it sympathizes, and terrorizes, an Iranian single mother and child in 1980s Tehran. Like a draconian travel ban, Shideh (Narges Rashidi) and her son Dorsa (Avin Manshadi) are malevolently targeted by a force of supreme evil.

This occurs after Dorsa’s father, a doctor, is called away to serve the Iranian army in post-revolution and war-torn Iran. In his absence evil seeps in… as does a quality horror movie with heightened emotional weight.

Underworld

Available on: Netflix

No one is going to mistake Underworld for high art. That obvious fact makes the lofty pretensions of these movies all the more endearing. With a cast of high-minded British theatrical actors, many trained in the Royal Shakespeare Company, at least the early movies in this Gothic horror/action mash-up series were overflowing with histrionic self-importance and grandiosity.

Take the first and best in the series. In the margins you have Bill Nighy and Michael Sheen portraying the patriarchs of warring factions of vampires and werewolves, and a love story caught between their violence that’s shamelessly modeled on Romeo and Juliet. It’s ridiculous, especially with Scott Speedman playing one party. But when the other is the oft-underrated Kate Beckinsale it doesn’t matter.

The movie’s bombast becomes its first virtue, and Len Wiseman’s penchant for glossy slick visuals, which would look at home in the sexiest Eurotrash graphic novel at the bookstore, is its other. Combined they make this a guilty good time. Though we recommend not venturing past the second or third movie.

Us

Available on: HBO Max

Jordan Peele’s debut feature Get Out was a near instant horror classic so anticipation was high for his follow-up. Thanks to an excellent script, Peele’s deep appreciation of pop culture, and some stellar performances, Us more than lives up to the hype.

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Movies

Us: How Jeremiah 11:11 Fits in Jordan Peele Movie

By Rosie Fletcher

Movies

Us: Jordan Peele’s References and Influences

By David Crow

Us tells the story of the Wilson family from Santa Cruz. After a seemingly normal trip to a summer home and the beach, Adelaide (Lupita Nyong’o), Gabe (Winston Duke) and their two kids are confronted by their own doppelgangers, are weird, barely verbal, and wearing red. That’s just the beginning of the horror at play for the Wilsons and the world. Fittingly, Us feels like a feature length Twilight Zone concept done right.

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[inawickedlittletown]

Next To Me (1/6)

Summary: Buck and Eddie started off in different places but eventually they ended up in the same. Eventually, they ended up in love. 

Buck had never had a friend like Eddie before. Someone that burrowed under his skin and wrapped around him and became a part of him — like an extra limb, someone he couldn’t do without.

Ship: Buck/Eddie

Words: 4,199

Notes: This is far from my first fic, but it is my first fic in the 9-1-1/buddie fandom. I binged the first two seasons a few weeks ago and got caught up on the current season, read a few fics, and here we are. 

I wanted to write something that explores Buck and his past but also a realistic take on Buck/Eddie within the canon. As I wrote, I figured out that for it to work I would need to look at Eddie's past as well and so this fic was formed. 

Title comes from the Imagine Dragons song: Next To Me. 

Masterpost

Read on Ao3

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Chapter One

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The thing was that he always liked guys. Buck was an equal opportunity lover because people were people and a lot of people were hot. Girls were easier sometimes. A bit of smiling, some flirting, and most of them were welcoming him with open arms and Buck was not afraid of using anything at his disposal to close the deal. Even, on two occasions the ladder truck. Thinking back on that made him cringe. With guys there was always the awkward moment where Buck had to figure out if the guy that caught his eye was actually gay or bi. His gaydar was faulty at best. Worse, or equally as bad, when other guys looked at him they saw a straight guy. It was very rare for anyone to actually peg his sexuality before they got to know him. 

For a long time, Buck was all about the one-night stands. The quickies anywhere. Even sometimes in the view of other people. That was just easier. After all, it was his experience that the people he cared about always hurt him after some fashion of time. It happened with his parents, with his sister, with the boy he loved back when he was in high school, and perhaps even everyone that he considered giving a shot to. Keeping people at a distance was easier. 

Then, he became a fireman. 

His mother always wanted him to be a doctor or, if not that, a nurse like his sister. She had hopes that if it wasn’t a medical field that he do something that meant something. In other terms, she wanted him to have money and success. His father had probably cared at some point, but as early as the age of ten, Buck had known that his father didn’t like him. His parents should never have been parents. They were the kind of people that had kids because that was the next step after getting married and buying the house in the suburbs complete with the white picket fence.

If they had cared even a little, they might have bothered to be bothered when Buck announced that he was leaving Pennsylvania. His sister had been long gone since then to put up a fight. Buck had packed up his clothes and a few other odds and ends into his car — the one single thing he was taking that his parents had given him — and then he was on the road. It was only once he’d made into another state that he called Maddie to let her know his plans.  

“Hey, Mads,” he said. “So, I left home. Not sure where I’m going but I had to go.”

“Evan, oh my god. What—”

She only ever called him Evan when she was shocked or when she wanted to put a point across. After all, it was Maddie that first started calling him Buck since using Buckley felt weird considering it was her own last name and she didn’t like the name Evan. She had used it so widely that aside from their parents everyone knew him as Buck. 

“It was time. They were driving me crazy, Maddie. I just figured I’d let you know.”

There hadn’t been a plan when he left. Buck hadn’t even known he wanted to be a fireman, much less what he might do with himself. He picked up odd jobs on the road but never stayed long anywhere. He was nineteen and for the first time he felt free. Maddie called him every day, urging him to at least go to college. It didn’t matter where. She would even pay for it. He turned her down every time. The only thing he’d been remotely interested in was joining the Navy. The Navy Seals to be more accurate. It seemed sort of unattainable to him at first so he put it off to keep living the life of the free spirit. 

Back in Hershey, Buck had had a few friends. One of them was the boy he’d sort of but not really dated — the one that in the end turned out to be an asshole anyway. Most of the other friends had gone off to college but they kept in touch and if Buck happened to be near their schools if they’d gone out of state he went and visited. That was how he wound up catching up with Matt and meeting Matt’s new friends and joining them on a Spring Break trip to Mexico. 

When they all left to go back to school, Buck decided to stay behind. He managed to score a job at one of the bars and Mexico was just nice. The weather was gorgeous, the people were friendly — the locals more so than the tourists. There was also plenty of money to be made. Buck had taken Spanish in high school and it was enough to get by until he really started to pick up the language. The swear words came easy. 

It helped that Mexican girls and boys were not shy when it came to flirting with him and willing to teach him Spanish. He learned more than just Spanish during his stay. 

A full year went by before he noticed it. Buck stayed for another six months before a call from Maddie meant he actually had to go back home. She was getting married. 

It was somehow easier to face his parents and Maddie when he returned for her wedding. He didn’t like Doug much but Maddie was happy. It was possible their parents didn’t like Doug either but he was a doctor and they seemed like they were in love. Maddie was happy. 

Afterwards, Buck went back to Mexico and because he could, he travelled through Central America down into South America. He stuck mostly to the coast working at bars and restaurants  as well as other places and for seven months or so he just wandered. By then he was fluent in Spanish. He got back to Mexico eventually and then Maddie finally convinced him to go to school. She wanted him to at least have his Associate’s Degree. She worried about him. Then again, that was probably exactly what big sisters were supposed to do. 

“You can’t keep being some sort of vagabond with no home, Evan,” she said over a phone call.“There has to be something you want to do. Maybe school will help you figure it out and if not then you have a plan B to fall back on.”

Maddie had always been smart and Buck figured he’d listen to her. She was there with Doug and his parents when he graduated from Community College and Buck ignored her when she tried to push him to continue his education and instead, he spent some days with the family before leaving again and this time he was headed for California. 

Mexico had taught him that he liked nice weather and the West Coast seemed like the best option. He was far enough away from his parents and he and Maddie kept in touch. Emails and phone calls and texts. Eventually, though, they both just stopped trying. She was busy with her job and her new married life and Buck was content with his life. Buck wouldn’t lie and say that it didn’t hurt when she started to ignore him. 

California was different from Mexico and most other places. Buck rented a room and then found a job at a popular bar. His time in Mexico had given him skills with preparing drinks so he was hired after Buck showed off some of his skills. California was also where he felt the most alone. 

He had friends. Sort of. The kind of people you met up with at a bar from time to time. Not the kind you texted if you needed help or in an emergency. Drinking buddies, acquaintances met through his roommates. No one dependable and no one that would miss him if he disappeared. Not that Buck was even looking for real friends. The ones he’d had before from school all had their own lives and things going on and Buck didn’t think he even really missed them. 

Working at the bar also meant meeting a lot of different people. Buck hadn’t known it at first but a few celebrities stopped in from time to time. Mostly, though, the bar drew in other types. The creatives — producers and other executives looking to find their next big star. Some of them approached Buck. After a while he could tell why someone was looking at him from afar. Some of them were general looks of someone wanting him in their bed. Other times, it was the speculative look of someone that thought he looked like he would fit their next film. Buck turned them down every time. He didn’t turn down the girls or the guys hitting on him. 

It did bring along more trouble than it was worth. Buck was working in LA. He was a bartender without the stars in his eyes waiting for his big break, But everyone else around him — that was why they were there and the jealous looks thrown his way grew tiresome. 

Buck started looking for other jobs. None of them lasted more than a few months. 

He took a receptionist job at a gym for a little while. Then, he was a valet. Then, he tried and failed as a personal assistant. For a while he went back to bartending before he found himself working at a child care place. That was probably one of his favorite jobs. Buck loved kids. He loved the way they saw the world and how much the little things mattered and made them happy. Maddie told him he should be a teacher on the rare phone call they shared. 

Buck was considering the idea until he remembered that old dream of his. Joining the Navy Seals. It felt like the right time to revisit that idea. 

He lasted about five minutes. The training was horrible, worse than anything he’d ever gone through and yet somehow, Buck managed to do it. They didn’t even bother with you unless you were already at peak physical shape and even then the training was hard. He did everything right. His superiors thought he was good and Buck just kept pushing himself. 

He didn’t tell anyone what he was doing. By then contacting Maddie had gotten harder and harder. She didn’t call him back or respond to emails. Occasionally she texted but it gave him nothing. Buck stopped reaching out. He was all alone, so he buried himself in what he was doing. 

Bootcamp had seemed like the hardest part at first, but then came the real eye opener once he was in Pre-BUDS and it was made clear that he had to put his emotions in a box and lock them up tight. There was no room for that as a Navy Seal. Buck couldn’t do it. Even if he had wanted to, he was basically told he didn’t have it in him to be one. 

He left, just a bit dejected, certainly a little broken, and in the best shape of his life. The training had done something to change him — just a bit. But it didn’t mean that Buck knew what came next for him. Mostly, it meant that he appreciated things a little differently. Things like his emotions and his ability to care. It didn’t exactly stop him from picking up a gorgeous dark haired man a few days after the fact and falling apart under his touch in an unfamiliar bed. It also didn’t stop him from leaving the next morning knowing perfectly well that it was a one time thing. 

Afterwards he wandered around the country for a while like he’d done when he first left home. Maddie still didn’t answer calls or emails or texts but Buck wasn’t in any state of mind to let himself really worry. On Instagram she posted pictures of herself and Doug. Always smiling. She looked happy. When he left a comment, she never responded. 

Eventually, Buck made it back to California and the job at the childcare place welcomed him back. That was when it happened. One of the kids swallowed something and choked. Buck was the one to call 9-1-1 while one of his coworkers tried and failed to make the object fall out. The firefighters and paramedics arrived in minutes and Buck watched as they worked, getting the marble dislodged and checking the little boy over until they were satisfied he’d be okay.

The next time he was in an emergency was almost a year later. It was at the beach. It was late afternoon and the lifeguards were gone. Most people at the beach were staying on the sand, enjoying the late afternoon sun. A few kids kicked around water at the very shore. Then, they all heard shouting. A couple of teenagers were out in the water and one of them was caught in a riptide. Buck had been a lifeguard back when he was in high school, just a quick way to earn some money over the Summers and get to stare at pretty people. He wasn’t CPR certified anymore, but he knew what to do and there was no one else running to help them. So he ran, going in the water and swimming out to help, adrenaline rushing through him right up until the very end when he had the boy back on land and he was starting compressions. Others were trying to help and someone had called 9-1-1 but by the time they arrived the boy was already throwing up water and coughing as air finally made it into his lungs again. 

“You might have saved that boy, kid,” one of the paramedics said and touched his shoulder. “Good job.” 

“I — thanks,” Buck said. 

“You know, there’s always a need for first responders. We could use someone like you.”

And it was like a bell going off in his head. He’d never considered it before but it made sense. He wasted no time going for it. 

It was the best decision he ever made and maybe it was his experience with the Navy Seals or his sheer determination that made the entire process surprisingly easy. 

The written exam wasn’t hard at all and the CPAT was even easier. Buck was still in good shape from his Navy Seal training even a year later and everything they threw at him was not all that difficult. He could see some of the others straining but most of them had clearly prepared and were pushing themselves to do it. It was satisfying to be able to do it all. Even the psychological test turned out to be easy. 

He ended up at the fire academy really learning his stuff. A few months later he was a probationary firefighter and he was hired and assigned to an LA Firehouse. Fire Department Station 118. 

When he first joined the 118, it was just like any other job. Not in the sense that it was somewhere to work and somewhere to be but in that all the other firefighters saw him like everyone else always did. Some guy a little too cocky and a little too interested in literally anyone that crossed his path. That, after all, was something that didn’t change. Buck was still having sex. Lots of it and with anyone that seemed interested. 

Dating apps — or rather hookup apps — were sometimes the easiest way, but Buck still went out to bars to pick up a girl or a boy. He didn’t disclose his sexuality to anyone at work. He’d never had to before at the other places and it didn’t feel like something that he could just bring up not even when he found out that Hen was a lesbian with a wife and child. It was just that bisexuality came with a stigma and Buck was already not prone to labels. He also...well, he didn’t know how to talk about it and since it didn’t change who he was or how he did his job, Buck just kept it to himself.

For the first time in any job, though, he found people that he actually liked. Captain Nash in particular was someone he warmed up to quick. Enough so that he invited him to a Springsteen Concert a month into being a part of the 118. Buck felt comfortable with them and everyone welcomed him in maybe more so on a personal level than as a fellow firefighter. They all teased him about how much of a flirt he was. 

Buck hooked up with people all over town and somehow it was just a string of girls one after the other and none of them left an impression and Buck didn’t really care for or about them. It was like scratching an itch. 

It was once it started affecting his job that Buck started to think that it might be a problem. And he just had no idea why he was even so reckless and stupid especially when it was a job that he loved and possibly the happiest he’d been in ages. He shouldn’t have done anything to threaten that and yet something made him rebel. It made him thoughtless and when the girl he was talking to was offering to put out if he got to her within a certain amount of time — a near impossible task — it was a challenge he willingly took. He just drove off with the ladder truck and didn’t even consider how it might be a problem until he was back and he could see it on everyone’s faces that he’d screwed up. 

He did it again not a few days later, telling himself he was going to get away with it and that either way he’d still have one more warning to go before it became a real problem. By then, of course, Buck had it almost figured out. He had a problem. He self diagnosed as a sex addict. 

The thing was that he just wanted it all the time. With anyone. Mostly girls. Girls were somehow easier. Sometimes they were the very same girls that he met out on calls. Sometimes it was the girls that were impressed by his uniform. Chim was not wrong in saying that it made a difference and not just with women but with men too. He’d seen quite a few checking him out while on calls. 

Buck hadn’t actually expected for Cap to fire him. His whole world seemed to fall apart after that. 

Buck knew he was welcome on the team, but he also knew that they were all wary of him. He didn’t blame them. After all, they were all supposed to have each other’s backs and for that they needed to have trust and that didn’t come overnight. He needed to prove that they could trust him and Buck could admit even to himself that sometimes he rushed into things without thinking. It was lucky he had people around him that were experienced and knew better than him and that stopped him from making mistakes even if they also judged him for it. 

One thing that he noted almost immediately after getting assigned to the 118 was that everyone did seem to care about each other on a deeper level than co-workers. They were friends. They were family. Buck had never expected to be a part of that and yet there was a part in it all where he fit. The youngest firefighter of the house and possibly the most reckless...they all liked him even if they were still getting used to him out on calls. 

Buck loved his job. He loved the adrenaline and everything that came with saving a life. The first few calls had been nerve wracking and Buck hadn’t been fully prepared for what they were and yet he’d managed to jump in and help alongside everyone else. So being fired...having Captain Bobby Nash look at him that way...it felt like his life was being torn apart. Worse, after it happened he realized that it wasn’t just the job he loved, but everyone he had gotten to know there. Bobby, Hen, and Chimney especially stood out and he didn’t want to not see them every day.  

Getting a second chance when he thought he wouldn’t was eye opening. It made him change. He wanted to show them that he did deserve to be there and after a little while, he realized that they did know that. Bobby seemed to trust him more and the rest followed suit. Buck didn’t want to let any of them down. 

Unlike with anyone else he’d met since leaving Pennsylvania, Buck finally found people he could be himself with — be accepted by. Buck found himself sharing parts of himself with them — things that he’d always just kept to himself before. He told Bobby about the sex addiction thing and followed that up with talking to him about anything and everything because Bobby was just easy to tell things to and he didn’t judge Buck, either. He mostly seemed amused. He also tried to offer advice where he could. 

Before Buck knew it, he was part of the gang. One of them. They were more than co-workers. They became a pseudo family that he didn’t know he needed or wanted. Bobby was probably the one that Buck felt closest to — he saw the older man almost like a father...or at least what he had wished his father had been. 

Buck also found himself with a relationship. Abby was wonderful. Buck usually went for people his age or thereabouts so it was a little strange that Abby was seventeen years his senior. She just had such an amazing vibe about her and youthfulness that Buck loved. She was the first person in a long time to keep his interest even when they weren’t having sex. Abby changed him. Or maybe everyone did.

Having people that cared about him and that became his family...it made a difference. He didn’t need to fill a hole with meaningless sex. He had other outlets and other ways to express himself. Bobby had started teaching him to cook and Hen let him babysit from time to time — only when no one else was available. Chimney was hurt and recovered and came back and Buck appreciated life more after knowing he could have lost a dear friend. 

When Abby left, it was Chim and Hen that took him out for drinks and made it just a little better. Bobby and he had a talk about it the next day and it occurred to Buck that they were all trying to make sure he was okay and that they all thought he and Abby had broken up. 

In truth, looking back on it later, Buck supposed that a break up would have made more sense than how the next few months went with him living in her apartment convinced that one day she was going to just surprise him and be there waiting for him when he came home. It never happened. He’d sunk deep into denial about what Abby leaving really meant. 

He was kind of crushed by it in the months that followed her leaving. Work kept going and having something to do and to keep occupied with helped even if arriving back at Abby’s empty apartment always made his shoulders slump. 

Buck could tell that Chim and Hen were a bit surprised by how little interest he showed anyone else. It was as if they had been expecting Buck to just move on from Abby like he had with all those others and start picking girls up on calls again. Occasionally some of them did catch his eye — cute girls and boys alike. But Buck wasn’t that guy anymore. He’d been ready to settle down with Abby and he didn’t want to regress and use people like he had before. 

“You’re going to have to move on sometime, kid,” Chimney said one night while out at the bar.

“But, I don’t. Abby is coming back.”

Or maybe she wasn’t. Buck didn’t want to think about that. It was just that when they did get to talk that she never gave him any time frame. She sounded happy, though, and it was almost a relief to know that even if he wasn’t a part of making her happy even if it did leave him a bit bitter. Somehow, in spite of the whole Abby thing, Buck felt settled in his life and he had a new goal to achieve, getting chosen to be on the annual fireman calendar. 

Buck had started working out more specifically for it, focusing on a goal weight and goal percentage of fat on his body. Only one firefighter was chosen per station and Buck was going to be it. 

Then, Eddie Diaz showed up. And Buck hated him.   

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

Next Chapter

Notes: The next chapter should be up in a few days once I tweak it a bit and will focus on Eddie's side of things. As of right now I am planning on this being 4 chapters long but that could still change. Let me know what you think of this first chapter. 

If anyone wants me to tag you in future chapters let me know. Thanks for reading. 

[hetalialoverwrites]

Mirror Mirror on the Wall

Part 10

First  -  Previous  -  Next

        In science class, Evie was rummaging around in her bag looking for something, panic growing as she found she couldn't find her mother's magic mirror. "Looking for something?" Mr. Delay asked before holding up the mirror. Evie's eyes went wide, "Sir, why do you have that?" Evie asked, narrowing her eyes. "Hm. Thank you Chad, it is gratifying to see that someone still respects the honor code. It will be my recommendation that you are expelled." Mr. Delay had a hint of pride in his voice. Evie looked at him for a moment, her eyebrows raised before smiling sweetly, "And it will be my recommendation that you are fired for rummaging around in a student's belongings. If Chad did it, that he be expelled for stealing. I also consider you taking my family's precious heirloom as theft, Mr. Delay. And if you do not return it after the exam is finished, I will call the police and talk to Headmistress Fairy Godmother about you stealing something so valuable to me." Evie went off simply, a sweet smile on her face as she did so.

        "And you can't expel Evie! You have no proof of it. And I heard Chad trying to make her do his homework for him so if you want to expel someone for cheating, expel him!" Doug stood up for Evie. She smiled slightly at him, "Exactly. Now, try not to make any hasty decisions." She added, fire in her eyes as she watched the professor pale since her mention of the police. "Are you threatening a teacher?" Mr. Delay sputtered. Evie tilted her head, "Threatening a teacher? Absolutely not, I'm threatening a thief who holds a priceless magical heirloom in their hands." She corrected. Mr. Delay cleared his throat, trying to save face, "If you can pass this test, I will return your property and let the matter drop." He smiled at her. Evie didn't respond but knew that he would take her silence as an agreement.

        After Evie finished her exam, she waited in class for Mr. Delay to grade it as everyone filed out. The professor handed her the paperback with the grade, a B+ as well as her mirror. "Now I'm sure that this whole matter can be dropped." Mr. Delay sighed in relief. However, it was short-lived as Evie packed her bags and glared at the professor, "No, actually it won't. I will be going to Headmistress Fairy Godmother about your threats to keep my property and the illegal way you ended up getting it. Count yourself lucky you didn't break it. As I said before, it is priceless and nothing you could ever do or pay would be worth it." She walked to the door and paused for a moment before turning to the professor, finishing, "And I will be talking to her about your blatant prejudice against certain students." And with that, she left the paled teacher to where he sat, going to the Headmistress. 

        After a talk with Fairy Godmother, she was assured that this will be investigated, as Evie had many witnesses and no teacher or student was supposed to be stealing someone's property. Evie remembered the way Doug had stood up for her and went to go thank him. She found him at lunch, sitting at one of the picnic tables. She snuck up behind him and held her paper out in front of him, leaning over his shoulders. "For the first time, it's like I'm more than just a pretty face." Evie smiled. Doug turned to look at her, a grin on his face, "A shocker, huh?" "You were pretty great in there." Evie complimented, sitting down next to him. "So were you," Doug replied, looking back at her paper. "I bet I can get an A on the next one without my mirror." Evie pointed at the paper happily, belief strong in her voice. "Well then maybe we can get together and-" "Yeah, let's get together." Evie agreed immediately. "There you are! I have been looking for you everywhere!" Mal exclaimed, dragging you behind her by the arm as you hid your face. "What's wrong?" Evie asked worriedly. "Ben asked her out on a date," Mal smirked, pulling your hands down to show your blushing face. "He had flowers and everything..." You whined. "Shouldn't you be used to all this attention since your last boyfriend?" Evie asked, smiling as she stood up. "He never gave me flowers! Or sang me songs or was this adorable!" You hissed at Evie, mentioning something you shouldn't. Doug looked amused as Mal and Evie laughed, Evie bidding Doug a goodbye before whisking you off to the dorm room.

        You were sat down at the table Evie works at so she could start applying makeup to your face. "So, what should she wear?" Mal asked, walking over to your dresser. "Something light because it's really warm outside and we can't have her sweating." Evie continued as she went in to put some light makeup on your eyes. "How around a nice reddish amber color?" Mal asked, pulling out a dress that would go up to your knees and looked lightweight. "No, her hair and eyes are amber already. Maybe something different?" Evie suggested, to even bothering to look at the dress Mal had. Shrugging, Mal continued to look around before she notices a light-colored dress, "Hey (Y/n), isn't this your favorite color?" Mal asked holding it out for you to see. You looked over and nodded when Evie pulled away. The dress Mal had was backless like all your other things, but it was more floral and had nice designs on it. It also went down a little bit passed your knees and you knew just what shoes to wear with it. Evie turned around and her eyes lit up, "Perfect! Grab the matching shoes too!" "How do you know I have matching shoes?" You asked Evie suspiciously. Evie smirked at you, "It's your favorite color and I saw you wearing those shoes inside the house back on the Isle before. There is no way you brought that dress and didn't bring those shoes." She rolled her eyes playfully like it was obvious before going in with some blush. "Evie, careful on the blush, we don't want to scare him away." Mal joked as she walked over. 

        You smiled a little, "Not that I could..." You laughed a little. The girls gave you a sympathetic look, knowing you too well after all these years. "My mom taught me how to apply blush before I could talk, upward strokes." Evie continued, not letting you think on the spell anymore. "You know, our mom never did teach us makeup tricks before... Never really big on it." You pointed out. "And Mal was never going to learn the craft." You teased, getting a playful push when Evie stopped working on your face for a moment. "Yeah, we were never going to make a makeup sister." Mal nodded, sitting next to Evie and watching her work. "Well, now you two do. We are family after all. We grew up together in the same house, been friends all our lives, and now we are leaving together too. And that includes Jay, Carlos, and all our parents. We are family whether they know it or not." Evie said sternly. You and Mal openly gaped at her before hugging the girl, "Thanks, Evie." You both whispered. Evie smiled and hugged you both back before pulling away. "Alright! Just some highlight and then you can go get changed!" She chirped, putting on the finishing touches before having your change.

        While you were changing, you heard Evie and Mal talking, "We need all the family we can get if we don't pull this off. My mother is not a barrel of laughs when she doesn't get her way." Evie sighed. "...Are you afraid of her?" Mal asked softly. Evie paused a moment, "Sometimes. But not most of the time. I love her, you know? Besides, I've seen the way your mom put her in her place when we were younger, she has calmed down quite a lot... Are you afraid of your mom?" Evie asked. "I just want her to be proud of me... I mean, I know that she loves me and (Y/n), but... I don't know, I feel like she is never proud of me. But I know that when we do this when we get her off the Isle, she will be so proud of us." Mal finished with a faint smile. Taking that as your cue, you stepped out from where you were changing, "How do I look?" You asked, twirling a bit for them to see. You were met with gasps and a small squeal of glee, "Come look! Come look!" Evie rushed you, taking your hand and pulling you over to the mirror. You gasped at your reflection. "I look pretty." You breathed. Evie smiled along with Mal, "You always look pretty." Evie complimented. Getting an idea, Mal flicked her hand and her green magic whisked around the place, shutting all the curtains tightly and locking the door. And then you saw your reflection change. Your horns were showing and so were your wings. Your eyes brimming with tears, "I... I love it..." You breathed, beaming as you twirled around to look at yourself.

        Evie smiled brightly and you hugged her tightly, "Thank you!" Evie hugged you back just as tightly before pulling away and dabbing your eyes to rid them of tears. "You look gorgeous." Evie praised, taking your hands. Mal smiled in quiet happiness before making your horns and wings disappear once again as a knock rang through the room. Evie squealed and pushed you to the door excitedly. Gulping a moment, you looked back to see that your wings had disappeared. Taking in a deep breath, you unlocked the door and opened it. Ben stood there in front of your door, staring at you with a dazed expression, wearing his letterman's jacket and holding two helmets. "For the first time, I understand the difference between pretty and beautiful," Ben said with a soft tone. You almost laughed at the cheesy line, instead deciding to smile at him. "I hope you like bikes." He smiled a bit, handing you a helmet. You breathed a laugh before walking outside with him, waving to your friends who were left giggling in the dorm.

[angrylizardjacket]

let us cling together {Roger Taylor}

aka: we only see each other at weddings and funerals

A/N: aydtd 'verse. my grandfather died on Friday and yesterday was his funeral, and this came to me. I just want to appreciate the concept of family, not all family, because sometimes family is shitty and terrible, but sometimes they're pretty alright. Anyways. death and funeral tw !!

1. Douglas Clarke

Ash isn't invited to her father's second wedding, not that he would know where to send the invite. Her parents had split in the early 80s, polarised by the fight between Minnie and Ellie, their youngest twin daughters. What followed was a messy divorce, both parents sinking deeper into their alcoholism, and, according to a disgusted Minnie, their father dating a slue of co-eds from the college where he taught. By the time he has one stick around long enough to marry, the only family member Ash is speaking to is Minnie, and Minnie's close to not even going herself.

"Mum's right furious Oscar was invited, but she's also right furious she wasn't," Minnie tells Ash over coffee. Ash, thirty-two and secretly high, nods, before taking a long sip of her hot chocolate, "honestly the woman plays jump rope with her indignance, she'd be insufferable either way." Minnie sighs dramatically, swirling her own mostly finished drink.

Their father's new fiance is the same age as Minnie, only twenty-four, and it's one thing on the considerable laundry list of reasons most of the family is considering boycotting the wedding. Minnie has her own personal reasons, mostly relating to her twin sister marrying her ex and bringing him, and their children, to the wedding, but Ash just nods sympathetically, and tries not to act as out of it as she feels. She hasn't been legally disowned, but for all intents and purposes, she was no longer a Clarke.

Minnie rants and rambles about the family Ash has forsaken, and Ash finds herself grateful that she doesn't have to deal with any of the drama anymore.

A few weeks after the wedding, Ash and Minnie go for coffee, and Minnie brings a photo of the wedding party.

Ellie's had twins. Their older brother, Oz, is clearly going through a divorce. August was their father's best man, and the new bride looks smug.

Ash is glad she dodged that bullet of an event.

The marriage doesn't last long in the grand scheme of things, but it doesn't end how Ash had expected it to. At thirty-five, she's touring with Queen again, with Roger again, and the last thing she expects is a call from her sister to say her father died in his sleep.

It's not as if she's celebrating, she's not heartless, she's just... not sure where she fits into the picture. Minnie invites her to the funeral.

She doesn't give an address. She watches, blank faced, as his wife chokes on her eulogy, and Ellie, there to support her, reads for her despite her own tears. They read off the names of his family, his relatives, and Ash's name at the end sounds almost begrudging as it leaves Ellie's lips. It's here that Ash finally learns his wife's name, Lynn, and she contemplates how strange it is that she'd never learnt it before.

It's here Ash learns a lot of things. Unsure of her emotions as she sits alone at the wake, not crying, not doing... anything. She's not even high but everything feels like static in her mind.

"Ashley?" Everyone calls her Ashley here, it makes her skin crawl. Her only goal is to not get in a shouting match, and so far she's managed to avoid her mother, and August, so she's doing pretty well.

It's Lynn, who hugs her like she's family, and introduces Ash to the little brother she didn't know she had.

Douglas Jr is two. He doesn't have Lynn's eyes, but Ash can't remember what her father's looked like.

"I bet that pissed Oz off to no end." Ash says without thinking, and Lynn's face reflexively scrunches. Ash hasn't even spoken to Oz, she's barely spoken to anyone apart from Minnie, who still wasn't speaking to Ellie or their mother.

Lynn doesn't know what to say, and leaves before Ash can say anything to the kid with Lynn's blonde hair and painfully familiar bright green eyes.

The next person to sit with her is a ginger teen trying to hide the fact that he's eating a brownie.

"Hi," Ash, frowning a little, greets the boy with flat confusion. He looks familiar, but so does everyone, Ash is just as likely to be related to any of the gingers present as she isn't.

"Huh?" Mouth full of brownie, the kid looks surprised that she even acknowledged him.

"Who are you related to?" Ash asks, because is Ash knew anything, it was that her father barely tolerated his own children as children, and no child would come to a wake of their own accord. Maybe Ash should pay more attention. She doesn't want to be here.

"Os-" the kid swallows his food before starting again, "Oscar Clarke; Doug was my grandad." He explains, and Ash can feel her voice freeze in her throat. She looks at the kid, really looks at him, and sees her brother in his eyes, his cheekbones, his lanky frame.

"You're," she hesitates, frowns, tries to remember what Minnie told her, "you're Allen?"

"Who are you?" The kid scowls, and quickly takes another bite of his obviously stolen snack.

"I'm Ash... ley. I'm Ashley." She says, and it sounds strange, it's the first time she's used that name in over a decade.

"Oh." Allen seems a little confused, and he shoves the rest of the cake just as a young girl hollers his name.

"Allen you're a thief and a rotten feckin' -"

"Jackie!"

Ash, even after all this time, knows that voice. It's been sixteen years since she'd seen her brother in person, and he's changed so much overall, but the longer she looks, the more she recognises him.

And he's coming towards her.

"Mind your language Jacks," Oscar tells the girl who yelled, and who was now, sulkily accompanying him to where Ash and Allen were sitting, "we'll get you more brownie, biscuit." He assures, before fixing Allen with an exasperated look. "You could've just asked Nan for another-"

"Nan would rather feed me Pop's rotting left foot-"

"You're so gross," Jackie wrinkles her nose, and Ash actually laughs. Oscar finally, finally looks at her.

"Hi, sorry, I'm -" he offers his hand, but falters, brow creasing in a frown.

"It's been a while, Oz," Ash swallows hard, and Oscar, gentle, tall Oscar, who had already spent a considerable amount of time with his eyes tear stained, notices his vision clouding at the sight of his little sister.

"Ashley."

He looks at her like he can't believe she's real, and for the first time all day, Ash cries. He's different, now almost forty, with wrinkles, crows feet and laugh lines, and so many freckles. His hair is shorter than she remember it, but he still keeps his beard to stubble.

It still feels the same when he hugs her.

She's stiff, conflicted, in her mind there's a disconnect; she's missed him so much, but she still hears him, all those years ago, calling her a homewrecking who're. She doesn't hug him back.

"Who's she?" Jackie whispers loudly to Allen, who shrugs. Oscar's smiling gently as he pulls back, and he wipes at his eyes.

"Jackie, Allen, this is your Aunt, Ashley." He explains, and something catches in Ash's throat.

"Auntie 'Ashley-Who-We-Don't-Talk-About'?" Jackie asks, matter-of-factly, and Ash actually laughs a little at that, though Oscar looks a little guilty.

"Ashl-" he chokes on her name, "Ace, these are my kids, Allen and Jaquelyn."

Ash greets the children, smiles and shakes their hands, and a strange little silence falls over them. No-one knows quite what to say.

"So," Ash finally breaks the silence with a sly smile, "Douglas Junior is a thing." Oscar laughs, loud and bright and so familiar.

"I'm just glad I dodged that bullet."

2. Mikayla McGreggor [nee. Clarke]

Minnie marries a highschool history teacher named Oliver, and Ellie's not invited.

Ash knows from being on the peripheries of Minnie's planning that the family is being a pain to organise, between Ellie being banned, Lynn not wanting to come if their mother was coming, and their mother kicking up a stink about everything and nothing every five minutes. Ash, for her part, is easy comparatively, and just works diligently away where she agreed to alter the wedding dress.

The most stressful part of the situation is that Ash is heavily pregnant, and most of her family don't even know. Though she exchanges letters with Oscar now, and he knows she's engaged, she won't give up her connection to Queen for the lingering fear that it might be used against her somehow. Old habits die hard, after all.

Ash isn't part of the wedding party, not out of malice, but of consideration; neither Minnie nor Oliver wanted go put her under any sort of stress. So Ash happily sits in one of the back rows of the church, Roger by her side, watching proudly as her sister gets married.

The wedding itself was fairly dry, though the reception was quite the party. Oscar's the first to find Ash after everyone had finished eating and the band had begun playing. He's halfway through introducing himself to Roger before he finally looks at him, looks at Roger's charming smile and how he'd extended his hand to meet Oscar's, and his voice dies in his throat, eyes going wide.

"Roger," he introduces himself easily, "a pleasure to meet you."

Oscar regains his composure easily, though Ash still thinks she should have warned him. Or Roger, maybe. Though Roger knew what he was getting into, he actually thought it was rather funny.

The reception is a ridiculous family affair; Ash's mother corners her in the bathroom to slur her way through calling Ash a whore for being pregnant and unmarried. It appears their family's painfully traditional values did not die with their father. Much to both Ash and her mother's surprise, Ash isn't actually bothered. Ellie crashes the party about an hour and a half in, in the middle of the maid of honor's speech, to give a tearful apology, to which Minnie bursts into tears and accepts on the spot.

"I like your family," Roger says with the barest amusement.

"That makes one of us," Ash grimaces, taking another sip of soda, though it is sweet to see Ellie and Minnie spinning around the dance floor like they did when they were kids. Minnie's new husband looks so damn endeared by the sight. Roger's smile only widens.

"Your nephew has my poster on his wall," He actually sounds proud, and Ash can't help but press a smile to his shoulder.

"I wouldn't be surprised if he got them off of Oz," Ash snickers, leaning into Roger who had his arm around her. "Thank you for coming to this with me, Rog," Ash's voice turns gentle, as does her smile when his gaze meets hers. He kisses her softly instead of answering, his hand coming to rest on her round belly, and Ash, for the first time in her memory, feels content while surrounded by family.

3. Ash Taylor [nee. Clarke Mercury]

Ash doesn't invite her mother to her own wedding. She doesn't invite Lynn either. All her siblings (and their spouses and their children) are invited, and her mum's right furious, even moreso when she learns that Freddie's mother is going to be giving Ash away.

Freddie himself is gaunt and sickly, but he stands proudly as Ash's best man, tears welling in his eyes as he smiles brightly at his surrogate sister as she walks down the aisle. Minnie is Ash's only bridesmaid, while Brian and John stand, beaming, behind Roger.

Astrid, Ash and Roger's first daughter, all of four years old, chaotically and haphazardly throws her flower petals like grenades where she leads the procession down the aisle, and wears her empty basket like a helmet for the duration of the ceremony. Meanwhile, the newborn Cate was carried by John's eldest, who also took responsibility.

The wedding, as well as the reception, is a star studded affair, and Ash's little and painfully Scottish family is more than a little overwhelmed. They all know in a roundabout way that Ash is well connected, but they'd never really realised the extent.

She's midway through a conversation with Oscar when Bernie Taupman kisses both of her cheeks and thanks her wryly for keeping John Reid off the guest list.

"That was for Freddie's benefit as much as it was Elton's," she answers, and Bernie snorts a laugh, while Oscar's gone starry-eyed. Oscar had recently come out to the family, which almost made Ash cry. He'd been so worried that she was angry or disappointed, until she quickly blurted that she was bisexual. She knows the look in her brother's eyes all too well, and he apparently had the same taste in men as Ash. Even if Bernie wasn't interested in men like that, it was still polite to introduce the two of them.

"Bern, this is my older brother, Oscar." She introduces fondly, and Oscar's expression fades to a grin as he holds out his hand.

When Doc McGhee passes on best wishes from Tommy Lee 'well, all of Motley Crue, but especially Tommy', Ash laughs lightly, thanking him, while Minnie and Jackie take a moment to fangirl once he leaves.

"I didn't take either of you for Motley fans," Ash admitted. Minnie shrugs, says she likes all sorts of music, and Jackie explains that Allen's going through a metal phase, and so she was to, by virtue of him always blasts his music loud enough for the whole house to hear. Ash had noticed that; he'd recently shaved his head, pierced his nose, and put a safety pin through his ear, though Ash quite liked the look on him.

Speaking of Allen, he was deep in conversation with Rob Reiner, just as starry-eyed as his father as he picked the director's brains.

"So how did you meet Ash and Roger?" The kid finally asks, and the renowned director smiles a little.

"I asked Ash to work on Spinal Tap with me-"

"No way! Ash worked on Spinal Tap?" Allen almost gasped, and Reiner nodded, endeared by the excitable teen.

It's here that the family comes to realise that for all they have gotten to know her since she'd allowed them back into her life, they don't know what she does beyond a vague mention of 'costumes'.

Ash doesn't notice her family's growing respect the more they integrate themselves with the other guests, she's too wrapped up in enjoying the night with Roger.

4. Oscar Clarke

Like almost all deaths in Ash's life, her brother's comes as a shock. Freddie passed almost a year and a half ago, and her son was born barely a month ago, and at three in the morning on a Sunday, she receives a distraught call from Ellie.

She'd known Oscar was sick, but he never liked talking about that sort of thing. Perhaps he was trying to protect her, but she hadn't even known he was in hospital.

Jackie bawls at the funeral, and won't let go of Allen. Their mother, Oscar's ex-wife, was kind-faced and gentle as she hugged each of Oscar's sisters in turn. Their mother was nowhere to be seen, a bigot to the last.

Ash and Roger sit in the front row, reserved for family, and Minnie is holding Ash's and Ellie's hands so tight it's painful, weeping silently. It doesn't feel real, it feels like she's moving in suspended animation, like moving through honey, nothing makes sense. Jackie is audibly sobbing where she clings to her brother's arm while he delivers a choked up speech about his father's life. Allen looks so much like Oscar.

Astrid and Cate don't quite know what's going on, but they know to be quiet, and baby Barney, barely a month old, starts screaming halfway through the eulogy, and Ash feels it deep in her bones. Roger offers to take him outside, but Ash shakes her head, standing and walking him outside. Ash holds Barney close as she rocks him. And that's how her sisters find her, crying quietly, clutching her son as his own cries subside.

The three women sit in the grass and take quiet solace in each other, their family having gotten just that bit smaller.

[telli1206]

The Wedding Date - Chapter 3

Snow White is getting married. Let the week-long festivities begin! Evie can’t wait to celebrate her sister’s upcoming nuptials. There’s only one little problem: she’s supposed to bring a date, and her mom's expecting a MALE date. Evie hasn't told her yet that she prefers girls (ok, she's afraid to tell her)! She’ll be damned if she lets Snow’s wedding be the moment that her mom finds out her secret and ruins Snow’s special day. So to avoid the issue, Evie convinces her friend Jay to join her and pose as her date/boyfriend to keep her mom off her back. That should be easy enough to fake for a week, right?

And it is, until two distractions show up. Namely, Mal and Carlos.

Chapter 1 on Tumblr is here

Chapter 2 on Tumblr is here

Also posted to AO3:  http://archiveofourown.org/works/23281867

The Trail

Their trip ended quickly when the bus pulled up to a long stretch of beach, lined with horses of all different colors, saddled and ready to ride. The beach riding path is open and sunny, along smooth sands and calm waters. The beach eventually makes way to an open wooded trail, lined with trees and colorful foliage; a beautiful trail for a morning ride. 

In that short drive Jay had fallen asleep on Evie’s shoulder, snoring loudly. When the bus finally comes to a complete stop, she leans over a little to make sure he’s asleep, then firmly flicks him in the nose with two fingers. Jay startles awake with a snort, wide eyes aimed at Evie, who is covering a giggle with her hand. He narrows his eyes at her but can’t hide his smirk, so he just nudges her to get up.

As they step off the bus, Evie’s eyes immediately flicker upward to the tied and saddled horses. She can’t stop the tiny shudder flaring up her spine at the sight of the tremendous animals. She grabs for Jay’s hand, giving it a tight squeeze when she feels his palm rest in hers.

“Still not a fan of horses, Princess?” He asks, in almost a teasing voice. He can’t hide his concern though, as he pulls on her hand and tilts his head to look at her. “Are you gonna be ok?”

Evie bites her lip, still gripping Jay as she stares pointedly at the brown and white spotted horse in front of her. She inhales sharply, and forces herself to loosen her hold on Jay.

“Yeah.” She breathes. “Snow loves horses. Always has. I can do this for her.” She turns to meet Jay’s eyes. “Besides, you won’t let me get hurt, right? My knight in shining armor,” she adds with a wink.

Jay unlinks from Evie and dips down in a bow, taking her hand in a gentlemanly kiss of her knuckles “But of course, Milady,” he drawls, in his most formal-sounding voice. 

She bows her head with a giggle and swats his shoulder. “Thank you, Sir Jay,” she jokes. Still, when she sees the rest of the guests start to approach and mount the horses, she starts to stiffen again.

Jay straightens up and drapes an arm over Evie’s shoulder, walking her slowly towards the horses. They stand there for a moment so she can take a few deep breaths. Suddenly, an abruptly loud sigh behind her has her spinning on her heel.

Grimhilde approaches them, carefully pulling on red leather riding gloves, and Evie pushes back an eye roll at the spectacle. Her mom has a never ending need to be fashionably prepared for everything, but despite the occasion and need for comfort, she refuses to look like anything but a perfect lady. She used to force the same idea on Evie growing up, so she can’t even imagine how disappointed Grimhilde must be at the sight of her in tennis shoes right now.

“Darling,” Grimhilde pauses in front of Evie, eyes trailing her outfit from top to bottom. Evie’s frozen under her stare. Her face looks emotionless like always, but Evie’s in tune enough with her mom to know the criticism that’s about to follow.

“You can’t honestly still be afraid of horses, can you? I thought that was going to just stay a silly little childhood issue. When we grow up we mustn’t act so fearful, it’s not an attractive look.” She purses her lips as she brings her eyes back to her gloves, pulling and smoothing them over her fingers.

Evie huffs quietly, fisting her hands as she tries to respond in a calm voice. “Well mother, I think it might have something to do with that first riding lesson I took when I was eleven. When I stepped too close and Beauty fractured my foot? I was in a boot for six weeks.” She tries to gently unclench her jaw. “That’s not something you easily forget, when a large animal shatters your bones.”

Grimhilde walked up to the spotted horse closest to them, reaching out to stroke his side softly. “Please, dear. It was a tiny break. It was such a shame you insisted on ending your lessons, too. Horseback riding is a skill saved for true ladies and gentlemen.”

Before Evie can argue, Grimhilde waves a hand out to one of the employees helping with the guests. “Young man!” He turns her way. “If you would please?” She asks, gesturing up the horse to its back. 

He runs a step stool over to her, offering her a hand as she steps up to the horse. She mounts easily with a smooth and quick swing of her legs, propping herself upright on the horse with a tight grip of the reins.

She tilts her head down slightly, opting to look at Jay instead of Evie. “I’m so glad she has such a strong man like you now, Jay. You’ll take care of my weak and timid little flower, won’t you?”

Evie crosses her arms across her chest, unable to hide the stern furrow in her brow. Her mother really knows how to get under her skin. But Jay just uses his arm on her shoulder to press Evie firmly against his side. “I’ve always got her, Ms. Grimhilde. But you should know, there’s nothing timid or weak about her. Her strength and determination are two of the things I love about her.” Jay smiles, looking only at Evie, ignoring Grimhilde’s gaze.

Grimhilde looks straight ahead for a moment, then closes her eyes with a small nod. “That’s good to hear, Jay, thank you. Please keep her safe on her horse then. I’ll be up ahead of the line with Snow and Christian, but I’m sure I’ll see you both at the picnic later.” She straightens her back and directs the horse ahead, leaving Evie and Jay alone.

“Thanks, Jay.” Evie smiles as she rests her head on his shoulder. “That was really sweet of you to say.”

“Of course, Eves. It’s all true anyway. Don’t let your mom think you’re anything but a badass, because she’s wrong. End of story,” Jay says with a grin.

Mal makes a sudden appearance in front of Jay and Evie, surprising them. “Hey! Ready to ride some horses?” She says with a big smile. 

While she was only dressed in a simple black t-shirt and jeans with her high tops at breakfast, Evie notices that she must have added a purple and green leather vest before they left, which matches what Evie would have envisioned the brazen girl’s usual style to be like, more so than anything Evie has seen her in yet. Mal’s eyes flicker to Evie, offering a coy smile when she sees the girl’s eyes are already on her, and then walks up to a black horse next to them.

“Of course, your purpleness,” Jay said with a smirk. “Were you able to wake up the beauty queen?”

Mal turns back and gives Jay a sideways glance. “I don’t think I’d be standing here if I tried to leave without her, would I?” She chuckles.

Evie laughs and shakes her head. “Yeah, you really do know Audrey.”

Mal turns to Evie with a cunning smirk, and Evie can feel her heart flutter. Mal tilts her head back to gesture behind them. Evie and Jay turn to see Audrey getting on a horse, Chad boosting her up. Aurora and Phillip are near her, gracefully mounting two horses fluidly and with ease. Just by looking at them, you couldn’t deny they were skilled at this activity.

“I’m going back over there to ride with them. I haven’t spent much time with my Aunt and Uncle yet, and riding used to be one of the things we did together all the time when I was staying with them.” Mal turns her eyes down, humming quietly with a smile, lost in her thoughts for a moment. But she recovers quickly with a curl of her lips when she looks back up to Evie. “That’s not to say I love horseback riding, but I’m pretty good at it, so it can be a fun time.”

Jay is instantly distracted when he sees two people passing behind Mal, and the black and white curls that he’s become acutely aware of for the past two days come into view. Carlos and Doug are approaching two horses, getting ready to mount them. While Doug flips a leg over easily, Jay notices Carlos struggling. Looking at Mal and Evie still smiling at each other gives him an idea.

“So, you’re a good rider Mal?” Jay says, eyeing her. 

She scoffs. “Yeah Jay. Are you a good listener? Because I think that’s what I just said,” She keeps a smile on her lips as she glances at him, conveying her teasing sarcasm.

Jay snickers and nods his head “Touche.” He points to Evie and places the hand once on her shoulder on top of her head. “I’m only making sure because this lovely lady of mine is anxious about riding right now. She’s never had much luck with horses.” He lets his eyes drift behind Mal to make sure Carlos isn’t on his horse yet, then looks back to her. “Do you think you could get her up and show how to sit and hold the reins right? Maybe give her a few tips for the ride.”

Jay could almost roll his eyes when he sees both girls glow with wide eyes at his suggestion. These lovesick chicks make it too easy. “Sure thing,” Mal replies. “But why aren’t you helping?”

“I...have to take care of one thing. I’ll be right back though, so we can hit the trail together ok?” He turns his head to Evie with a reassuring nod. 

Evie has no doubt what that one thing could be, and she’s eager to have more time with Mal anyway so she shakes her head at him, a little too eagerly. When she sees Mal looking she stops, then looks right at Jay with a smile. “Absolutely, babe. See you in a minute.” She leans forward for a tiny peck before Jay drops his arm and walks away quickly, straight past Mal.

Mal spins her head to sneak a glance to where Jay is headed. Evie shakily stutters, trying to direct Mal’s attention back to her.

“S-s-s-so, do y-you think you can help me on this...thing?” Evie grits her teeth, approaching a black and white spotted horse tied up next to Mal’s. Mal whips her head back to Evie, quirking a smile at her as she walks closer. Evie feels herself tense as Mal steps in front of her. She shivers at Mal’s arm brushing against the small of her back, her palm then resting there firmly. She pushes on Evie gently, giving her a warm smile before the force turns Evie toward the horse.

“Ok, you know how to mount right?” Mal asks. Evie keeps her mouth shut tightly but nods. “Great. Put your foot up then. I’m just going to give you a little hand.” Evie follows Mal’s instruction mechanically, her brain still registering the warm hand touching her. Mal pulls it back to let Evie mount, but her focus is not on her foot in the stirrup and it slips out, causing her to stumble back, arching her spine and waving her arms for balance. Mal grips a hand on her shoulder while the other grabs Evie’s arm, steadying her. “Ok, whoa! Hold on.” She pulls Evie back and waits for her to settle back onto her feet. “Are you ok?” Evie stands back upright, exhaling deeply.

“I’m fine, sorry about that. I swear I can do this,” she replies, laughing lightly. On her second attempt her foot connects with the stirrup, and she reaches up to grip the saddle as she swings her leg over. She feels Mal’s palm touch her side as she lifts off the ground and she smiles to herself, the tiny act making her feel calmer and safe. 

"There it is!” Mal cries, a little too loudly. A few guests turn to look her way, and she ducks her head quickly, a little embarrassed at the outburst. “Uh, good job Evie. I knew you could do it.” Her praise elicits a wide smile from Evie, and Mal tips her head back up to smile back. “Let me just, get on my horse now, and I can give you a few tips while we wait for the ride to start.”

-----

Jay walks quickly towards Carlos, watching as he stumbles off the stirrup for the third time. He’s dressed very simply today in a fitted red t-shirt and jeans with black and white high tops, but Jay had barely taken notice of anything except how fucking great those jeans fit him. His resolve is extremely low at the moment because of that little detail that’s clouding his mind. 

Once he sees Doug successfully mount his horse and turn away briefly to talk to another guest, he knows he has the perfect opportunity. Jay comes up quietly and gets close behind Carlos, tucking his head in next to his ear. “Need a helping hand?” He whispers.

Carlos yelps, jolting forward in surprise. He turns around abruptly with his hands out and eyes blown wide open, but drops his hands and sighs loudly when he sees Jay. 

“Jay!, You almost gave me a heart attack!” He says, clutching at his chest.

Jay snickers and offers a small shrug. “I’m sorry, Carlos. I just couldn’t resist.” Carlos just shakes his head, finally letting a tiny smile turn on his lips. Jay feels his heart thump in his chest. The pure excitement from simple interactions with Carlos was enough to get him racing, but every time he makesCarlos smile it feels like the most intense and exciting adrenaline rush. It was enough to make Jay crave that feeling all the time.

“So, how about that helping hand? I think one good swing and we can get you up there,” he says, waving at the horse’s saddle.

Carlos smiles shyly and nods, eyes pointing to the ground. “That would be great, thanks.” He looks back up at Jay through thick, dark lashes. Crap, he really hopes Carlos can’t hear him swallowing the huge lump in his throat.

“Alright, just put one hand on the saddle here while you put your foot in the stirrup. That should give you enough leverage to swing the other one up and over,” Jay explains, gently grabbing Carlos’ wrist to direct him to the saddle. He keeps one hand steady on the horse’s upper body as Carlos places his foot in the stirrup. Carlos’ small frame is easily blocked from view with Jay standing in front of him, and as Carlos lifts and starts to swing, Jay swiftly reaches up to palm a wonderfully firm backside and hoist it onto the seat. While he manages a little squeeze, his hand shoots back down in less than a second, leaving Carlos on the saddle looking speechless, mouth hanging open.

“See? Easy peasy.” Jay smiles, trying to keep his action from being plastered all over his face in joy. He can feel his own face burning now, a searing combination of embarrassment and excitement taking over the colors of his face.

Carlos looks down at him, silent, and Jay can see there's a pink creeping up his face too. As enjoyable as Carlos’ blush is to Jay, he does feel a tinge of regret for upsetting the boy because he can’t keep his own urges under control.

“Um, is everything ok here?” Doug questions. He’s trotting his horse up next to Carlos while boring his eyes down at Jay.

“Yeah man, we’re fine. You can chill,” Jay says, staring back at Doug and refusing to avert his eyes. He knows he's failing at hiding his irritation, but he’s not sure he even cares. Doug should really just mind his own business.

But Doug doesn’t really seem to care what Jay has to say. He lets out a contemptuous snort, then pulls his eyes away from Jay and turns to Carlos, who still looks visibly stunned. “C? You ok? Did he do something?”

Jay balls his hands into fists, digging his nails deeply into his palms. He bites his lip in anticipation, fearful of what Carlos will say. Did he go too far? Probably, especially if Carlos doesn’t feel the same. He can feel his heart drop into his stomach. He’s not prepared for this to be the last time he flirts with Carlos. 

“N-no.” Carlos squeaks, barely audible. “I’m fine. This damn horse was just such a pain to mount. Jay stopped by to offer a helping hand,” he tells Doug, with a quiet, breathy laugh.

Jay’s mouth dropped open in shock. Carlos didn’t tell Doug what he did? He looks up at Carlos, who’s offering a small smile to him. Jay sighs and hints a smile back, dropping his shoulders and relaxing.

"Ok, fine. I guess that’s nice of him,” Doug sneers. “But Jay, I bet your girlfriend could use some help? Probably a good idea not to keep her waiting.”

“Thanks, Doug.” Jay replies through partly clenched teeth. He keeps smiling at Carlos, refusing to acknowledge Doug. “I’ll see you on the ride.”

He turns back to walk to Evie, his chest feeling like it might burst. Carlos hadn’t ratted him out to Doug, and he even smiled after covering for him. That has to mean Carlos is at least a little interested in him, doesn’t it? Jay hasn’t felt this hopeful since first laying eyes on the beautiful freckled boy. He resists the urge to skip back to Evie, eagerly anticipating what the rest of this day might bring.

-----

“Princess...I don’t want to push you, but do you think we could maybe go a little faster? I’d have better luck walking.”

Evie’s whole body is stiff. Her hands are limp and unmoving, with the horse’s reins laced between her fingers. She’s not coaxing or encouraging her horse to move, so he just barely walks along the path, even stopping occasionally to graze on the tiny shoots of grass that pop up along the beach path. The tight, toothy smile on her face is obviously fake to Jay, just trying to hide her fear of the dangerous animal she’s currently perched upon.

Jay watches the last couple of guests trot past them and sighs. Evie’s horse has stopped to graze again, and they’re going nowhere. “Didn’t Mal give you some riding tips? I thought she was going to help you out.”

“She diiiid, but I’m still nervous!” Evie groans. “What if I fall off and he tramples me, Jay? Those hooves hurt, trust me on that!”

Jay inches his horse closer to Evie and places a hand on her saddle, leaning into her. “C’mon Eves, don’t you trust Mal? She told you herself she’s a good rider. Just give it a try. And I’m right here with you if anything goes wrong.” He pats her horse gently and then pushes himself off, giving her a little room.

Evie sucks in a deep breath, and closes her eyes as she exhales. She lets her body relax as she lifts the reins and pulls back on them lightly, squeezing the horse with her calves at the same time. “Go.” She says in a firm voice, and the horse immediately breaks into a trot. Jay smiles happily as he urges his horse to follow.

“That’s my girl!” Jay exclaims. “Mal definitely taught you some moves. I’m guessing your time together went well today, huh?” He asks with an arched eyebrow.

Evie steals a look his way, biting her lip. Thinking back to every moment with Mal so far can always bring a smile to her face, and Jay leans forward when he notices her happy glow. “Damn, that well? Nice going, Eves!” He grins and flashes a thumbs up at her.

Evie just shakes her head, suppressing a giggle. “It’s not like that. It’s not like anything special happened. We just talked, and she helped me on my horse.” She looks up at him, expression turning serious. “She’s just...amazing, Jay. She’s beautiful, obviously, and so, so witty and smart. She’s got such a personality too, so bold and outspoken. At the same time, she was really gentle and kind with me today, trying to help me get on the horse and ride. And she was really excited for me when she saw me facing my fear. It was so sweet. She’s amazing.”

“If I were to guess, I’d say you were amazed by her, Princess,” Jay replies, snorting with laughter.

“Hilarious,” she drawls, rolling her eyes. “Ok, I get it. I know I’m not being so articulate. She flusters me Jay. I can’t help it. And you know what? That really worries me. My mom’s going to see through me in no time.” She looks ahead to the trail and cranes her neck, trying to spot her mom or sister. Despite not seeing them nearby, she still lowers her voice. “This weekend will end in disaster if my mom so much as gets the idea in her head that I might be into girls,” she whispers towards Jay.

Jay shakes his head at her. “I think you're giving your mom a lot more credit that she deserves for being observant, Eves. Unless it’s about her, does she really notice anything?” Evie pauses to think, eventually nodding in agreement to Jay’s point. “Listen, I get why you’re doing this, the pretending with me. To avoid the drama with your mom, for the sake of your sister and her wedding,” Jay says with an exasperated huff. “But you need to stop worrying about making other people happy and remember that you deserve to be happy too, ok? Don’t let the best girl you’ve ever met slip through your fingers because you’re worried about your mom.”

Evie shrugs sadly. “It wouldn’t be the first time I let someone go because I was worried about her approval,” she mumbles. “But you’re right. I’ll keep spending time with Mal. I only have this week to really see if there’s something there, so I’m not wasting it.” 

“That’s the spirit!” Jay practically shouts, making Evie almost jump off her horse. She shushes him and smiles, shaking her head.

“Forget about me for me, and tell me what happened with Carlos back there? Did you talk to him more? I remember someone telling me they would stop flirting and just focus on talking if I needed them to...” she says, narrowing her eyes a little as she looks at Jay.

Jay drops his head away from Evie’s prying eyes, silently chewing his bottom lip. He curls his fingers instinctively, as if he thinks Evie can guess what they last touched just by looking at them. He finally sheepishly meets her gaze, unable to hide the guilt on his face. 

“Jayyyyyy!”

“In my defense, have you seen him? It’s not like he makes it easy to keep my cool.” Evie keeps her eyes locked on Jay. “Eves, he’s got, like, the fucking DEFINITION of bedroom eyes, ok? And lips that were made for kissing. And don’t get me started on that tight ass of his..:” he commented in a lowered voice.

Evie’s eyes are now blown wide with shock, mouth hanging open. “Tight ass? Jay, tell me you did NOT…”

Jay turns away quickly, rubbing his neck with one hand. “I’m weak Eves. I’m sorry.”

“Oh God, what happened?” Evie definitely couldn’t hide the worry now. “How obvious were you? Fucking hell, Jay!” Fear slowly creeps up into her. Now she can’t shake the idea that he might have been caught by someone at the wedding. 

“Calm down Princess, Carlos almost didn’t even notice that I did it, I was discreet. But I may have gotten a handful when I helped him on his horse,” he says, a smile curling on his lips at the memory.

“Well great for you, but what if someone saw you? My mom knows everyone here, it could still get back to her if you were caught,” Evie replies with a frown. 

Jay winces, realizing he may have been rash with his actions. “Dammit, I didn’t think of that. I’m sorry. I promise though, no one saw me, I’m positive. Shit, I swear I’ll be more careful.”

Evie rubs her face with one hand, but instantly regrets the move, grabbing the reins tightly again. “More careful, how? Please tell me you’re not going to try anything else with Carlos. What happened to talking to him, getting to know him better?”

“I still want that..” Jay paused, trying to choose his words. “...but I can’t fight the tingle.”

Evie just stares at him, utterly confused. “The tingle?”

“You know, that fiery feeling. That urge...to touch someone you’re attracted to. It’s not just about sex. I swear, Evie!” He adds, responding to the quirk of her eyebrows. “You just, you feel that you need to have that contact with them, so you can feel that they’re real. For yourself, because you almost can’t believe it.” He looks down at his hands, flexing his fingers and examining his palms. 

“Wow.” Evie breathes, stunned by his words. “Jay, that’s almost poetic. Romantic even.”

“Really? Thanks,” Jay says, smiling warmly at her. But a flicker in his eyes suddenly turns the smile into something eerily smarmy. “Does that mean you wouldn’t object to me getting some action? Maybe I can entice Carlos into our room for a little makeout sesh...or even some over the clothes activities,” he suggests with a shimmy of his shoulders.

“And there’s the old horny-as-fuck Jay we all know and love. Welcome back.” Evie says, tilting her head at him with an overstated eyeroll. 

“So, I take it that’s a no then?” He pouts out his lip at her, doing his best to look pathetic.

“What do you think?” Evie huffs. “Do you really think no one would notice if you took someone else besides me into our room? C’mon Jay, be serious. Don’t you think I’d be doing the same with Mal if I thought I could get away with it? We’re NOT taking that risk. You know better.”

“Fine, little Fun-sucker,” he teases, giving Evie a little smile.

“Whatever.” Evie sits in silence for a moment, thinking. “Don’t you think, if you don’t let your dick get in the way, you might discover that you actually really like him?” Evie asks, glancing at Jay. “I think you should give Carlos, and yourself, the chance you really deserve, to see if there’s potential. For a REAL relationship. Maybe, just maybe, Jay, he’ll be the one that makes you drop those awful pickup lines and gets you to finally ask someone out like a real gentleman.”

Jay sighs and turns to her. “Yeah, I know Eves, ok? I’ll try, but no promises. You know this is totally not, my, you know...comfort zone.” Evie smiles, nodding slowly in agreement.

He looks ahead on the trail, then gestures to Evie. “Now that you’ve successfully cockblocked me, do you think we can try to catch up? I can barely see anyone else, they’re probably already into the woods by now.”

Evie brightens, flashing a smile at Jay. “Oh! I can do this! I’ve seen this plenty of times in movies. Watch!” She dips forward in her saddle, almost into a racing stance and squeezes her legs again while she whips the reins.

Jay’s heart drops. He can already see what’s about to happen and it’s too late to stop it. “No, Evie, wait! Don’t -- ”

“Go!” 

A sudden jolt forward throws Evie back into the saddle, slamming her butt down hard. She squeals in surprise, her eyes snapping shut when she registers the pain. They fly back open quickly when her body starts bouncing rapidly. The beach scenery is zooming past her, and she can faintly hear yelling behind her. The wind whipping in her face is making it almost impossible to hear anything but her own heart pounding. 

She looks around for Jay, only then realizing he must be the one yelling. She’s coming upon the rest of the guests quickly, and she tenses when she sees all the horses blocking her way. Her horse veers off, and she catches her breath as she feels the bump of the uneven earth when the horse leaves the smoothness of the trail and clambers into the woods.

She feels the close brush of shoulders and hair as she whips past, which urges her to find her voice and start screaming. But her sounds are taken so quickly in the rush of air as they fly through the woods. She can see and feel branches and leaves tearing through her hair and whipping at her face. She’s too paralyzed with fear to try any other commands, so she just grips the reins as tightly as she can, closing her eyes again and silently wishing for Jay to get to her already.

-----

“Fuck! Fuck fuck fuck fuck fu--EVIE!”  

Jay whips the reins on his horse, breaking into a gallop as fast as he can after Evie. He knew immediately when she started leaning forward into race mode this wasn’t going to end well.

Her horse took off like a shot. Jay barely had time to understand what was happening before she was already halfway down the beach, about to overtake the other guests.

Jay’s a decent rider, but he’s never had to race a horse before, and now he’s frantic to get his to move faster so he can catch the black spotted one pulling away from him, his friend perched on top frozen in panic.

When he hears her scream his heart only races faster, and he jams his calves against his horse’s sides to coax out more speed. When he approaches the largest crowd of riders he spies a flash of purple, and in a desperate effort shouts to her. “Help! That’s Evie!” He speeds past the group, hearing someone (Audrey?) shout, “Go! You’re faster!” He breathes a tiny sigh of relief when he hears another set of hooves coming up behind him.

Mal flies by him at lightning speed, closing in quickly on Evie. In a few seconds she’s already close enough to reach for her reins. Jay focuses on getting to them to help, but in an instant he’s upon them, Mal having already calmed Evie’s horse down to a trot. He hears Mal speaking slowly in a calm voice to soothe the animal as it slows its stride.

“It’s ok girl, you’re ok. That’s a good girl,” Mal coos, petting the horse’s mane once she brings it to a full stop. Her eyes shoot up to Evie when she hears a tiny hiccup. Mal stares, brows furrowed in concern, when she sees the girl’s eyes wide and brimming with tears, a look of sheer terror fixed on her face.

Uncertain of what to do, Mal chooses to continue her coos, but instead directs them at Evie, trying to soothe her too. “It’s ok, you’re ok.” She reaches forward to place a hand over Evie’s, shocking her back to life. She looks down at her covered hand, quiet and observing. When she looks back up to Mal, her lips turn lightly into the beginnings of a smile.

“That’s a good girl,” Mal coos again to Evie. She bursts out into giggles, and soon Mal joins her, neither breaking eye contact with the other.

Jay watches the entire rescue with a wide grin, the fear ebbing away to warmth at Evie’s current joyful state.

“Mal, you weren’t kidding about being a good rider. Damn,” Jay comments, offering her a high five. “You’re probably the best I’ve seen.Thanks for saving our Princess here, she really had me worried.” He looks to Evie with a tinge of sadness in his smile.

“You’re too sweet, babe, but I’m fine.” She says, reaching her free hand out to clasp onto his for a brief second, her other hand still underneath Mal’s. “But yes, thank you Mal. You saved my life.”

“It’s nothing, no big deal,” Mal dismisses the praise with a wave of her arm. “I’m just glad you’re ok. Now, are you NOT going to take off anymore like you’re in some wild west movie? Or do I have to escort you back to the picnic to make sure you stay safe?”

Seeing the rest of the group approaching them now, Jay gets an idea.

“Actually, Miss Purple, I think it would be a great idea if you could escort her back.”

Both girls gape at Jay, mouths hanging open. “I-I’m sorry?” Evie asks, utterly confused.

“Princess, this is not your sport, ok? You are so lucky you didn’t get seriously hurt just now. I think you’ve had enough for today.” He tilts his head and touches her shoulder reassuringly. “Mal’s a fucking awesome rider. If she’s ok with taking you back, she can make sure you’re safe and hopefully give you some advice on your...technique,” he chuckles. 

Evie sighs, shrugging her shoulders in defeat. “I guess you’re right. It’s probably better I go back anyway, I think I’m still shaky,” she stretches a hand out in front of her, noting the tiny tremors that are still visible. “If Mal doesn’t mind, I’m all for it.”

Mal nods, leaning forward to reach for Evie’s reins, helping to turn her horse around. “Sure thing. I wouldn’t want the Princess to get into any more trouble,” she adds with a wicked grin as they start a slow pace back down the path.

-----

Jay waves as Evie and Mal head back to the picnic. The guests start closing in on his location along the trail, and he can see Snow’s confused eyes looking up to him as they approach. Her mouth hangs open, still a little stunned at what she had witnessed. Christian sees her distress and addresses Jay for her. 

“Everything ok? Evie’s good?” 

“Yeah, little hiccup. Princess thought it’d be a good idea to try to race. Don’t think she had any idea she could go that fast.” He says with a loud snort and a smile. “She’s fine though. A little freaked, so Mal offered to take her back for a little rest.”

Snow visibly relaxes, sinking her shoulders and offers Jay a pleased smile. “Thank goodness. Thank you Jay. Were you going to file in line and join us for the rest of the ride?”

He nods, craning his neck to act like he’s casually looking for an opening. His smile spreads wide at the white curls he’d hoped to find, immediately turning his horse into line next to the cute freckled boy who’s already flashing him a bright smile.

“Jay!” Carlos chirps. He startles at his own high-pitched enthusiasm, and tries clearing his throat. “I’m glad you and Evie are ok. Everyone saw what happened.”

A genuine look of relief reflects through his dark brown eyes as he surveys Jay. Jay returns the looks with a sincere smile. He  can’t ignore the stirring feelings pooling in his stomach when he’s with Carlos, and in his mind he silently thanks Evie for convincing him to keep his raging hormones in check and give himself the chance to learn more about the boy. 

A head pokes out from behind Carlos, with the same discerning glare that’s been glued to Jay for days. He resists the urge to curl his lips in anger at the sight.

“Yeah, really glad she’s ok, man. I’m glad you and Mal got back to her in time.” Doug looks back to the route Mal and Evie just took. “So tell me, why is Mal taking her back? Seems to me that should be her boyfriend’s job, right?”

“That’s what she wanted Doug. What do you want me to tell you?” Jay says with a shrug. “I think she didn’t want to spoil my fun.” He avoids Doug’s eyes, instead turning to Carlos with a wink. Carlos smiles coyly, but then turns away, keeping his eyes along the trail.

Jay hears Doug huff and can’t resist a little smirk. This little game with Doug is becoming deliciously satisfying to him.

The group starts to circle back around to make the trek back to the beach for the picnic, and there’s a comfortable silence for a few minutes as everyone situates themselves to the new route. Once steadily moving, Jay casts a side glance to Carlos, mouth feeling a little dry as he attempts normal conversation. At least, normal to everyone else. Communication without flirty comments or pickup lines are not considered the norm for anyone that knows Jay.

“So, Doug. You’re still studying architecture, right?” Doug perks an eyebrow at his question, but nods his head. “How’s school going?”

“Good…” He answers slowly. His look is quizzical, not trusting where Jay is going with this. But he decides to continue. “Midterms were a bitch, but I actually think my finals won’t be too bad. I just need to make sure my final building project is submitted on time, but I’m in a good place.”

“That’s great to hear, man. Glad things are going well.” He turns to Carlos, resisting the urge to trace along his smattering of freckles with his eyes. “So, Carlos. What are you in school for?”

Carlos visibly perks at the question, his eyes glowing bright with excitement. Wow, is he this geeked just because I asked about school? Jay doubts he’s ever seen anyone get so excited when being asked about their education. His reaction is damn adorable, so Jay doubts he’d forget ever seeing something like that. Cool it, Jay. Focus on talking.

“I’m studying to become a veterinarian.” He says with a big smile. “So right now I’m finishing up my Bachelor’s Degree in biological science. Once I graduate I’ll be getting my Doctorate in veterinary medicine.”

“Finishing your degree?” Jay was a little taken aback. Carlos seemed to be slightly younger than he and Doug, by maybe a couple of years or so.

“Yeah, Carlos is wicked smart,” Doug tells him. “He graduated high school at sixteen.”

“Wow.” Jays stares, obviously impressed. “And you’re an animal lover then? I mean, obviously, right? You can’t be a vet and not care about animals, can you?”

Carlos giggles at him, causing the cutest nose wrinkle. “I mean, you probably can, but that’s not me. I love animals. In fact, someday I hope to open my own veterinary clinic.”

Jay has never seen Carlos so bright and happy, and he loves it. He leans forward to give him a light pat on the knee. “That’s great Carlos! Helping animals like that is noble. You’re a really impressive guy.”

Carlos drops his eyes down as his beautiful pink flush dusts his cheeks. This time Jay is proud of the flush, because his honest opinion of Carlos is what caused it. Carlos impresses Jay more and more every time they talk.

The path opens back up to the beach, and they can see the torch lights and blankets already laid out, pink petals strewn across cloud blue blankets, with a few pink peonies settled in the center of each. 

The guests all start to slowly shuffle their way to the rows of fencing where the horses were originally tied, white suited attendants patiently waiting to help secure the harnesses properly for each horse.

As they approach their original destination, Doug turns to show Jay a tiny sneer. “Well thanks for the company Jay, but I’m sure your girlfriend could use some help. Jay flinches and sneers back. Doug’s favorite word must be girlfriend now, he’s spat it at him enough for Jay to wonder if he knows any others.

Jay waves Doug a way, holding back his look of disgust.“Dude, she’s been back, remember? I’m about to go check on her, but I doubt she needs my help. Mal’s got the horse thing covered way better than I could.”

Doug rolls his eyes as he swings his legs to dismount. Jay just takes a flying leap down and sticks his landing perfectly. 

He rushes over to Carlos, who’s dropping his legs over to one side already and waving around his foot to try to locate the stirrup. “Need some help?” He purrs, touching a light hand to Carlos’ side.

Jay pulls back when he feels Carlos stiffen under his touch. He twists back onto the horse, sitting for a moment, his face now impossibly red.

“N-no. I’m ok. I probably shouldn’t be getting another helping hand.” Jay can’t hide the instant look of disappointment on his face. “Doug’s right, you should probably be checking on Evie. Your girlfriend needs you.”

Carlos dips his head silently, then returns to his dismount. Jay watches him, reaching up a hand to rub at the back of his neck. 

“I...guess you’re right. I’ll go find her. I’ll see you at the picnic though?” Jay steps back a little as Carlos finally lands on the ground. When he looks up he sees how close he landed to Jay, their chests only inches apart. His eyes widen in surprise but he doesn’t step back. He quietly nods to Jay, locked into his eyes until a hand grabs Carlos by the arm and pulls him.

“Yeah, see you later Jay.” Doug snorts at him, dragging Carlos along, who offers Jay a final glance and smile before taking Doug’s lead. Jay sighs dejectedly while watching them go, then marches off to find Evie.

——-

“Ok Princess, we’re almost back. Let’s try one more command,” Mal says with a grin.

Evie smiles proudly and nods at her. They’ve been practicing the entire trip back, and she’s surprisingly happy with how much easier riding a horse has become to her in just a few short minutes. Her fear has quickly faded underneath an eagerness to succeed at each new command. It might be partly to savor the impressed looks that Mal’s been throwing her way, but she’s not caring to understand the reasons for now, only focusing on each new lesson as they’re given.

“So, start to tighten your entire body. No, no, don’t squeeze anything,” Mals says as she sees Evie press her legs together. “The point is the horse not feeling you respond to its movements, which starts to signal to him that you don’t want him to move.”

Evie tries what Mal says and notices the horse starting to slow. She can’t resist widening her smile. “It’s working! I’m doing it!”

Mal nods, smiling brightly. “Yeah, you’re doing great.” She looks up to see how close they are to the horse drop off. “...ok, it looks like we’re about ready to stop. Now, I want you to firmly hold the reins, pulling back as you say ‘whoa’ to him. Keep your upper body straight, the only movement he should feel is the reins.”

Evie does as she’s told. “Whoa!” She states firmly and pulls the reins, marvelling at how quickly the horse comes to a halt. She can’t break from her wide toothy smile, and she looks at Mal flushed and beaming with pride.

“I did it! I can’t believe it. I rode a horse today. And I don’t feel freaked out or afraid! Well except maybe for that minute I thought I was going to fly off and get trampled, but now I feel great! This was actually fun” Mal shakes her head at Evie’s rambling, smiling to herself as she jumps off her own horse, grabbing the reins to give to a waiting attendant.

Mal then walks up to Evie’s horse and takes the reins from her hands, giving them to another attendant to hold. She looks back up to Evie with a warm smile, offering her hand. Evie can feel her face burning. She’s sure her flush is now dark red as she accepts Mal’s hand, turning herself on her horse and sliding off to jump down. Mal’s other hand shoots up to her waist as she descends, steadying her to land on her feet. Evie and Mal stare at each other for what feels like minutes, Evie’s enthusiasm gradually softening to admiration as she looks into Mal’s beautiful green eyes.

She shakes out of it when she squeezes her hand and feels Mal squeeze back. She pulls back quickly, dropping her hand to her side with an embarrassed chuckle. “Let’s...go see if we can find a good place to sit for the picnic,” she says, pointing at the blankets laid out on the beach.

They walk slowly, side by side, stealing glances at each other. “You know, you’re a great instructor.” Evie offers through a sideways look. “Have you ever considered teaching? You have the patience for it.”

Mal scoffs at the suggestion. “No one’s ever told me I’m patient before.”

“Well, I never felt rushed. And you never made me feel like you were frustrated either. Which is amazing because I’m a FREAK when it comes to horses.” They both burst out laughing. “I’m serious though,” Evie comments as their laughter dies down. “I’m not easy to teach, and you were great. You have real talent as a teacher.”

“Thanks,” Mal says, her smile warm and appreciative. “I have thought about it, but not with horseback riding, actually. That’s really just a skill I picked up, not a passion of mine. I spent a lot of time with my Aunt Rory and Uncle Phil growing up, so they occupied my time with riding. Audrey loves it, so they were hoping we might bond over it.” She giggles a little at the idea. “We actually did, if I’m being honest. Even though I’m better than her at it, she still feels like she can brag to others. She says she taught me everything I know. And as long as she has bragging rights, you know she’s happy.” The girls laugh and nod to each other. Both understand Audrey’s drive to be or have the best of everything. 

Mal purses her lips in thought. “I think, if I were to teach anything, it would be art, but I’m not sure I’d be good at it. I think I’m much better at creating my own with that then trying to explain to others how to do it,” she comments, chuckling to herself.

“Well I bet you could teach art. I haven’t seen any of your work yet, but I’m sure you’re good.” Evie smirks, not meeting Mal’s gaze.

Mal perks an eyebrow, “Oh yeah? What makes you so sure?”

“At breakfast, I could see the passion in your eyes when you were buried in your sketchbook. You were really absorbed in your work. People who are that intense about their art are always ridiculously talented.” Evie finally turns to look Mal’s way, surprised to see a light flush on her cheeks. “Besides,” she adds, “anyone actually considering teaching art must really love it.” Mal nods at that, a small snicker escaping her lips.

“Well I’m not sure that would make me a good artist or teacher, but I’ll let you see some of my art soon enough. Then you can tell me if you were right to give me such high praise already.”

“I’d love that,” Evie replies with breathy excitement. “But I already know I’m not wrong.”

Mal smiles and tips her head down as they walk, leaning to bump into Evie’s shoulder. She stumbles with a giggle, bumping Mal back even harder, and she jerks her head up in surprise at Evie’s strength. 

Suddenly, a high-pitched squeal has both girls shooting their gaze forward.

”Evie!!” They spot a colorful girl running towards them, with auburn curls piled high and arms outstretched. She squeals once more right before she pounces on the blue-haired girl.

Evie oomphs as the wind is knocked out of her, feeling tiny arms gripping her tightly just above her waist. She smiles as she pats the auburn hair, then leans forward to wrap her arms around the small girls back, encasing her in an awkward hug.

“My Dizzy,” she coos, planting a soft kiss to the top of her head.