#and i do think to austin a follow meAnS SoMethIng lol he doesn’t follow like half the elvis cast that he worker with for 2 years

[bcofl0ve]

@ the anon that wanted more auslivia chitchat my friend just pointed out he follows her brother on instagram 🧍🏼‍♀️

[dulcewrites]

Flew too Close to the Sun (Pt 3)

Pairing: austin!elvis x black oc (Faye)

Summary: Faye and Elvis’s relationship take a turn, much to the chagrin of her sisters. (Wc: 2k)

Warnings: power dynamics at play, manipulation/isolating tactics (on elvis part), allusions of drug use, Faye being naive

A/N: so I’m finally gotten to part 3. I’ve changed what I wanted pt 3 to be a couple of times, plus I had requests I really wanted to finish. so I’m sorry for the delay. I wanted to start picking up the pace for the story, elvis making his advances clear. I wanted the sisters to have a good foundation so then I (and Elvis lol) could start tearing away at it. But this is a slow burn type beat. Anyway i hope y’all enjoy. Please reblog, like, follow, and check out my other work 🫶🏽.

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Faye went back and forth between deciding if she should tell her sisters about the conversations she had with Elvis and Jerry. She even questions if she should tell them about the flowers, but in the end she decides against it. They were just a sign of kindness. She showed him some the night of the party, so he showed some back with the flowers. A simple thank you before a show and moving on from the whole thing will suffice.

At least that's what she thought would happen. Flowers were just the beginning.

Next came the earrings. Faye remembers the look sly look on Charlie’s face when he pulled her to the side and handed her a Tiffany & Co. bag; simply saying ‘from E.P’ and leaving her there confused. She knows Elvis is a generous man. But she can’t help the weird feeling she gets in her stomach when she opens the box to see sparking diamond earrings.

Flowers is one thing. Hell, the lingering glances she can feel him giving her is one thing. Earrings that cost more than two year’s rent is another.

Therefore, Faye concocts a plan. Try to tell Elvis the earrings are gorgeous, but she doesn’t feel right accepting them. She tries to tell him one night, but the Colonel has a strict ‘do not bother Elvis right before or right after a show’ policy. She also can’t seem to get a word in during the day with him constantly surrounded by his friends.

She wonders if she should tell Jerry, but something about receiving an ‘I told you so’ lecture or look is not what she needs right now. She’s received enough of those from her parents and sisters.

So, here she is standing at his door, Tiffany bag in hand. He had blocked off several floors in the hotel just for the staff and musicians. It’s a late night after a show, but she doesn’t know what other time she can do this. Faye takes a deep breath and knocks on the door.

She hears shuffling and the tv, and panics. She had been so worried about how to get in contact with him, she didn’t even think of what happens when they are alone in the same room. What do these earrings mean? How juvenile. A sudden uneasy feeling rushes over her, and Faye turns to walk down the hall. Maybe she can rush to see him tomorrow morning; give her the night to think.

“Faye?”

She visibly winces, and turns back around with the biggest smile she can drum up. Her eyes roam over a disheveled Elvis. His hair his flat on his head, eyes blurry and unfocused, robe barely tied but voice chipper.

He’s a.. good mood. Or least that’s what Faye takes from his oddly lackadaisical behavior. This could go better than she anticipated. She walks up to where he’s leaning against the door.

“ ‘Was hoping you’d come and visit me after getting the earrings,” his voice low, a dopey smile coming onto his face.

Faye doesn’t know what he means by that. She can barely look at him in the eye as she tries to hand him the bag.

“I don’t think I can keep these,” when she finally does look up at him, she sees confusion flash in his bright blue eyes. “I appreciate them really. I just don’t think I can accept something this…. expensive.”

She decides to say it’s way too much versus asking why he would even give them to her in the first place. Feeling nervous about the answer may be. He stares at her extended hand.

“I want you to have it,” he says sheepishly. “I was hoping it make this easier.”

Now it’s Faye’s turn to look confused. Make what easier?

“I haven’t done this whole courting thing in a while.”

Oh

Faye would be lying if she said she wasn’t flattered, and if she wasn’t his backup singer, she’d want this to happen. But all she can think about is Jerry’s warning and her sister’s plea for this job to be as drama free as possible.

“Elvis, I’m flattered,” Faye starts, brains moving a mile a minute trying to find the right words. “But it would be so inappropriate.”

Elvis shakes his head profusely, eyes wide.

“I’m the boss. I can decide what’s appropriate, and what isn’t.”

He isn’t wrong in that regard. He calls the shots; he can do whatever he wants. That’s the part that makes Faye a bit nervous.

“My sisters won’t like it,” she trails off before Elvis cut her off, sounding a bit frustrated.

“Did your sisters ask you before they started dating someone?”

“Well… no,” Faye’s voice gets a bit somber. The circumstances are different, but her sisters have always been unapologetic about their dating lives.

She’s happy her sisters are in love with their respective partners. Nevertheless, there is something scary about them moving on from the group to settle down. It’s always been the three of them doing everything together. She knows they feel like their clocks are ticking. They promise they’ll always be a group no matter what, but plans always change. How is she going to go on without them?

Faye feels Elvis’s hand come under chin to lift her head up.

“Darlin’, don’t you think it’s time to do something that makes you, and only you happy,” his voice is so understand and kind that it makes Faye release the tension in her shoulders.

She does want to do something for herself. She’s constantly trying to keep this group growing. A little fun won’t kill her, right?

“So, what did this courting of yours have in mind?”

A easy grin comes back onto Elvis’s face.

“After you officially accept the earrings, I think the perfect place to wear them would be on a date with me,” he says brightly, clearly happy Faye has had a change of heart. And God, is he smooth Faye thinks.

All she can do is smile and nod. A date, seems simple and innocent enough. If it doesn’t go well, they can go back to being colleagues. And if it does go well… who knows. Faye leaves Elvis’s floor with earrings and a date to look forward to.

“A WHAT?” 

Dawn’s voice travels through Faye’s bedroom. Faye rolls her eyes as she looks through her closet. Looking for a dress that says “yes, I’m on a date with one of the most famous men in the world but it’s no big deal”.

“I said a date.”

Shirley had not made a peeped since Faye broke the news to the two of them. Just sitting there on Faye’s bed, next to Dawn, staring off into the distance with a funny look on her face.

“What about his wife,” Dawn continues on, disbelief flowing through her voice.

That’s something Faye was curious about to till Elvis made it clear that him and Priscilla were done, and that their main focus now was co-parenting Lisa Marie.

“All taken care of,” Faye says curtly. The less ammunition she gives Dawn, the better.

“What’s his endgame,” Shirley finally contributes to the conversation, asking the question more to herself than her sisters. The question makes Faye turn from the closet, and she sees the wheels turning in Shirley’s head.

Dawn scoffs, giving Shirley a pointed look.

“I think we both know what endgame he has in mind,” Dawn gets up from the sofa. “I get you’re an adult, but please listen to me and don’t do this. Think about how this could end.”

Dawn turns to Shirley, throwing her hands up.

“You’re the oldest. Why do you always leave me to do this?”

This. She means running behind Faye like their mother would. Shirley doesn’t reply, she simply raises an eyebrow at Faye’s anger. Faye watches their staring stand-off with a bit of shock. Most of the time it’s Faye and Dawn going at each other.

“Neither of you are going to change my mind, so just lay off.” Faye huffs. And it’s true, she’s made up her mind whether they like it or not.

“You lie like a rug,” Faye laughs, and Elvis shakes his head with a smile.

“Nope, I was so nervous during prom I couldn’t dance.”

The date had been going so well. Honestly much better than even Faye thought it would. Elvis had rented out a steakhouse the night. She was a bit worried to be in such a large restaurant by herself with him. Well, them and Red West, who lurked on the other side of the restaurant.

After their laughter dies down, Elvis gets a serious look on his face.

“I know we agreed on no music talk,” he starts slowly. “But I am curious about what you’re going to do after the shows end.”

The question surprises Faye, mainly because she doesn’t know. She had hinted to her sisters that they should get right back into the recording studio with new producers and writers. She thought they were all on the same page, but lately it’s been the opposite.

“The girls and I keeping our options open.”

Short and open ended response that Elvis unfortunately sees through. He simply hums, and Faye can tell he wants to say something.

“What,” she narrows her eyes, and he shakes his head.

“Serious Elvis what?”

He sighs as if what he is about to say is hard.

“Have you ever thought about branching out… by yourself?”

Faye blinks. She stares at him for a second, waiting for the punchline. They’re the Williams Sisters. Emphasis on sisters. How can she be a sister by herself?

“You know what, forget I even brought that up,” Elvis breaks the silence.

“I don’t even know how I would do that,” Faye says truthfully, ignoring Elvis’s request. Though she hasn’t thought about it much, a solo career is something that she knew could be a possibility for all the girls.

“Well, if it’s something you ever want to consider. I know a lot of people who would kill to work with someone who has your voice,” he offers with a smile. “People here, people in Los Angeles, people in Memphis. Might be nice to make connections for yourself.”

Faye catches how he doesn’t mention Detroit, and remembers what he said in the hallway. She said yes to this date for herself, and it’s going great. Why can’t she meet some new people for herself? Nothing is set in stone. She sees marriage and babies on the horizon for her sisters, and where does that leave her?

“I think I just might take you up on that.”

[xhudgenssistersconfessions]

I thought long and hard if I even would post something about it but maybe some of you feel the same way, so here it goes: I feel like something has been off with Vanessa for quite some time. I can‘t name an exact date when something changed just that it did. I know that her fans and even some of her „friends“ think that she seems at her happiest but I am really wondering. I‘ve been crossing her paths several times in the past and then she was more carefree and „true“ to herself and others. For the last couple years (maybe it started after Austin or with her relationship with Cole) she‘s been more guarded and has been back to „manipulate“ some things. It‘s like she‘s playing a character, I don‘t know. But given her more recent past with Ashley and GG/Vince it‘s no wonder that she‘s hiding a lot more than she had in the past. Now I‘m rambling but it‘s hard to explain what I want to say…..I‘m stopping now.

This is so true and well said!!!! I really think this anon nailed it 💯 . I just wish she would do something for herself first and not for others. I also wish that she wouldn‘t have said yes to Cole for obvious reasons. The fact that she hid it for almost three months says so much. Maybe she is extremely happy with Cole but there‘s still so much baggage.

My two cents about Cole and her relationship with him: He‘s her „big man“ but is he really? Their relationship started off as a triangle, GG was always with them in the beginning. When he was still in the major league Vanessa would post stuff about him playing even when she couldn‘t be at the stadium with him. When she was there, there were always pics….just like this past week when he was drafted to the Rockies. We got something from the game against Milwaukee and we got something from Thursday night when she was at the LA Dodgers stadium with Oliver. But why wasn‘t there almost nothing when he played for Triple AAA? Wasn‘t he her big man then? And why would she hide an engagement for three months? I would get it if she wanted to get married first but anouncing it three months later? That‘s not her only time posting late when she‘s with him. I totally get that she doesn’t have to post anything at all when she‘s with him but why is she posting stuff weeks later and makes it seem like it was more recent? Maybe I‘m seeing things but it just seems so off.

But that's a really weird thing to say LOL, she doesn't do those things in return "Put Cole on the map" I mean he would be a baseball player with or without her, him being in the media now is a consequence and it's not like she is expecting him to do something in return like putting her as team coach (lol an example) I think it's all consequence, you mentioned Elvis she told Austin to audition but she said he was her best friend bigger inspiration and supporter, i think now it's kind of convenient for us to talk but i do think he did something for her or i want to believe he did because she said it herself. It's not fair saying "she gave Cole followers" is not something he was going for at first LOL. I agree with everything else I really don't think she had time to get over it alone because she doesn't like being alone she was made for long and intense relationships and she makes that person her world which doesn't mean she's overreacting and loves him less, no, it's just her way of loving, very deep. But I contested the text because like, even Oliver is in this? we don't know what he also did for her on off, these people were with her in the worst moment of her life (her dad passing away) Oliver doesn't need to create a company after her mame to have done something for her, and she knows it.

[sunder-soul]

hii what about Tom Riddle being fucking jealous about reader ?

So I got massively carried away with this one lol, apologies if this isn’t what you were expecting, my imagination went wild!

PART II AVAILABLE! 💖

･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ.  

Jealousy

Summary: Reader has to tutor an insufferable jock and Tom Riddle starts acting very strangely indeed. Wordcount: 1.8k Content warning: none.

･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ.

The Great Hall was bright and lively with morning sun and the chatter of students, spoons clinking against bowls and butter spreading on toast.

“What is he doing?” you whisper to Margot sitting next to you at the table.

“I think he’s attempting to show off,” she giggles back.

You were both watching Austin Varrowe, the Gryffindor Quidditch captain, obnoxiously demonstrate his Beater swing for a series of very bored looking Ravenclaw girls who weren’t paying him any attention in the slightest.

“Slughorn’s making me tutor that idiot,” you grumble.

“No way,” Margot grins, rounding on you.

“Yup,” you sigh, “can you believe it? Two evenings a week for the rest of the term… I think I’ll brain myself with a cauldron by Friday.”

Margot pats your shoulder sympathetically.

That evening, you reluctantly set off for the dungeons to meet Varrowe with your bag slung over your shoulder, but as you round a corridor you very nearly bowl straight into someone coming the opposite direction.

“Riddle,” you say, surprised, “sorry, didn’t see you there.”

Riddle takes a step back and tidily clasping his hands being his back. “You’re out rather late,” he said smoothly. “And in the dungeons, no less. Are you lost? The library is that way.” He nods back down the corridor.

You resist the urge to roll your eyes. Riddle was such a know-it-all. “I’m meeting someone, actually,” you say dismissively, checking your watch. “In fact, I better get going or he’ll think I’m standing him up.”

Riddle looks very briefly surprised, and then a cool look of disapproval settles on his fine features. “I don’t suppose I have to remind you that curfew is in two hours,” he says stiffly, “you wouldn’t be intending on breaking that, would you?”

You snort a laugh and step past him. “Thanks for the reminder,” you say sarcastically, “see you later, Riddle.”

You manage to get away before he can say anything else.

･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ.

“Varrowe,” you call, giving your friends a quick wave as you dash to catch up to him in the throng of students making their way to their next class. “Are you free tonight?”

“Oh – right,” Varrowe says, looking dispirited. “Sure. Seven o’clock?”

You nod and lean closer. “Please make sure you actually bring your textbook this time,” you mutter, managing to keep your exasperation off your face. “You do in fact need to read it at least once to pass the class.”

Varrowe grins and reaches out to ruffle your hair. “You’re smart,” he says loudly, “barely understood a thing you said last time.”

“Right,” you say through gritted teeth, trying to tidy your hair. “Well, see you this evening.”

“Sounds good,” Varrowe shrugs, wandering away.

You sigh. Slughorn better appreciate your sacrifice; tutoring Varrowe was the equivalent of torture. You turn on your heel to catch up with your friends, but once again you come face to face with –

“You have got to stop sneaking up on me,” you say dryly, “seriously, Riddle, it’s creepy.”

Riddle’s eyes slide from Varrowe’s retreating form to your face. “Is Varrowe the one you were meeting last week?” he asks smoothly.

The question surprises you. “Yeah, why?” you frown.

“And you’re meeting him again?”

You arch a brow at his decidedly clipped tone. “Yeah but don’t worry, I promise I won’t break curfew, I know that’s of the utmost importance to you –”

“An odd choice,” Riddle interrupts, something uncharacteristically irate in his voice, “Varrowe.”

You stare at him. “…Is he?” you ask pointedly, unable to think of anyone more in need of tutoring. Only yesterday Varrowe had lost his phial of Flobberworm mucus and had asked Slughorn if he could just use some of his own instead. “I think he’s the perfect choice.”

Riddle’s eyes flash. “I should be going,” he says curtly, “see you in class.” He gives you a single, stiff nod and leaves without another glance.

You blink after him, shaking your head in confusion. Riddle was acting very, very strangely.

･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ.

“So if you overboil it, it’ll turns green,” Varrowe said slowly, peering at the notes on Veritaserum on the desk between you, “but if you underboil it, it’ll get those weird lumps?”

“Yes,” you say with great relief.

“Is it better to overboil it or underboil it?”

You immediately regret having felt relieved. “It’s better to do neither,” you say flatly.

Varrowe heave a great sigh and carelessly leans back in his chair. “I’m too tired for this,” he complains. “Did I mention that we had an extra Quidditch practice this morning?”

He had. Six times.

You slide your things into your bag and stand. “You’re right, it’s late,” you mutter, “we can pick this up again on Monday.”

Varrowe gleefully stands too and is out the door of the Potions classroom in a heartbeat. “Are you coming to the game next weekend?” he asks you in the corridor outside, unsubtly flexing his shoulder muscles as he pretends to roll them out.

You very nearly roll your eyes. “Sure, I’ll be there.”

“Excellent,” he grins, “I’ve been working on this tag-team move with Procker that’ll really have Slytherin guessing, I’ll have to show you later –”

“Varrowe.”

The voice is crisp and cool, and it doesn’t take a genius to guess who it is.

“Riddle,” Varrowe says, looking disgruntled. “Why are you here?”

“I’m a prefect, if you recall,” Riddle says in a glacial tone, “patrols are part of my responsibilities.”

“How very fortunate indeed that you were patrolling this exact corridor at this exact time,” you say with a hint of sarcasm. “Merlin, imagine if we’d forgotten about curfew.”

Riddle’s dark eyes flash to you, and you impassively hold his gaze. “You should return to your common rooms,” he says delicately, “or I will be forced to give you both detentions.”

“Steady on Riddle,” Varrowe grins, “we’ve got half an hour yet, give us a second to say goodbye.”

Riddle wrenches his eyes off you and fixes Varrowe with a very cold look. “You will go at once,” he says in a dangerously soft tone, “do you understand?”

Varrowe bristles, standing taller and pushing his chest out in a way he clearly thinks is intimidating. Riddle looks utterly unfazed.

Sensing trouble on the horizon, you grab Varrowe’s sleeve and tug him back. “Come on, Varrowe,” you say quickly, “let’s go. You’ve got practice in the morning, right?”

Varrowe glares at Riddle who was yet to move an inch, his expression still cool and blank. “Right,” Varrowe growls, “yeah, let’s go.”

Varrowe turns and stalks off, not noticing that you don’t follow. Instead, you round on Riddle.

“Will you explain what the hell is going on?” you whisper angrily.

“Watch your tongue,” Riddle says sharply.

You glower at him. “So sorry – I mean, will you please explain what the hell is going on?”

His eyes narrow. “It would not be wise to antagonise me,” he says icily.

“Would it not?” you breathe, stepping closer. “What are you going to do, dock me points? Give me detention?”

Riddle’s eyes are dark and hostile, and something works in his jaw as he glares back at you.

“Back off, Riddle,” you snap, “I don’t know what your problem is with me, but seriously, drop it.”

“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” he breathes.

“Oh? You always threaten people with detention when they’ve done nothing wrong? I’m sure Slughorn will be overjoyed to hear that his favourite prefect is abusing his power like that,” you hiss, leaning closer.

Riddle visibly grits his teeth with fury on his face. A tense silence falls, and you suddenly realise that the two of you are standing far, far too closely together.

You step back at once, trying to ignore the strange feeling that swells in your stomach. “Goodnight, Riddle,” you mutter, turning to hurry away.

“Why Varrowe?” he says sharply, stopping you in your tracks.

You look over your shoulder at him. Riddle’s hair looks even blacker in the dark corridor, his burning eyes on yours, the flickering light from the torch on the wall beside him throwing shadows down his cheekbones. “What?” you frown. Now was definitely not the time to get distracted by Riddle’s good looks.

“Why Varrowe?” Riddle repeats stiffly. “He’s a simpleton.”

You blink. “Exactly,” you say slowly.

Something hostile flickers on Riddle’s face before he quickly tempers his expression back into composure. “I appear to have misjudged you,” he says coldly, looking away.

“What are you talking about?” you exclaim in exasperation. “Do you not understand how tutoring works? If he wasn’t absolutely thick I wouldn’t have to waste my evenings explaining to him that Cough Potions are for curing coughs and not inducing them.”

Riddle stares at you. The silence drags on.

You sigh impatiently. “I’m going to bed,” you grumble, turning away again.

“Wait,” he says sharply.

You wheel around, annoyed. “What?”

But your frustration is wiped away in an instant because Riddle is once again much too close. So close, in fact, that you can see the shadows his eyelashes are casting down his cheeks and the heat in his eyes as he looks down at you.

“You’re tutoring him?” he asks quietly.

You nod silently, your throat suddenly thick with nerves.

“That’s why you were meeting him.”

You nod again, unable to look away from him.

Riddle hums contemplatively, his expression smooth as his dark eyes roam your face. “Good,” he murmurs.

“Good?” you whisper.

Riddle’s lips curve into a small smirk, his head tilting slightly, and you absolutely do not blush at the sight. “Weren’t you going to bed?” he asks silkily.

“Worried about me breaking curfew, are you?” you say with a flicker of a taunt, trying to ignore your heart pounding quickly in your chest.

Riddle’s smirk grows. “I told you not to antagonise me,” he says smoothly as he steps in even closer, so close that his robes graze against your arms and you can feel warmth radiating from him as he looms over you.

“I don’t know,” you whisper, “seems to be going pretty well for me so far.”

Riddle’s eyes flick between yours, and for a single burning moment the tension is so thick that you can hear your pulse thrumming in your ears, your gaze dropping to his full lips and seeing his do the same to yours – and then just like that, Riddle steps away.

“Goodnight,” he says evenly, “I trust you can get back to your common room without supervision.”

You nod blankly but Riddle is already turning away and disappearing down the dark corridor, melting into the darkness. You stand there a moment frozen in place, your cheeks burning and your heart still racing as the cold air rushes in where his warmth had been brushing up against your skin.

Riddle was acting very, very strangely indeed.

･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ.

PART II AVAILABLE! 💖

[90spumkin]

P.S. If This is Spencer, I’m Sorry

Summery: When Spencer tries to reach out to an old flame, but gets her voicemail. He wasn’t expecting it to include him.

A/N: okay so I’m not a huge country music fan, but I love the song Austin by Blake Shelton. I probably didn’t do the song justice, but I tried. The voicemails kind of go a long with the song, but of course I changed them. It is obvious I was never meant to be a song writer lol. Anyways, I hope you all enjoy this!

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Fem! Reader

Warnings: swearing

Word Count: 1184

Spencer wasn’t someone who was known for having much luck with the ladies. Most of the time they overlooked him, especially when he was friends with guys like Derek Morgan. However, Spencer wasn’t envy of this fact he just took it in stride. But Spencer has had partners some his friends knew about and some that were not so well known.

Y/n was one of those not so well-known partners. Spencer had met her on a case in Austin, Texas. She had been the lead detective on a cult case and had been the one to suggest they needed the BAU’s help.

During the case Spencer didn’t pick up on the social ques very well, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t notice every smile and every time her arm or leg brushed against his. Derek and Emily of course teased him about it, but Spencer just wrote it off as them just teasing like normal.

It wasn’t till the end the case Spencer thought there might be something there. The team was staying another night due to the case wrapping up so late. Y/n had suggested the two of them go get a bite to eat together. Spencer agreed and to this day would say it was one of the best nights of his life. They had laughed and cried, ending the night wrapped in each other’s arms. That next morning when Spencer woke to someone banging on his door, he realized he was alone. Y/n had snuck out sometime while he was asleep, and Spencer never saw her again.

A few years later they were called back to Austin for another case. Spencer couldn’t help but to ask about y/n. His heart cracked when he was told she had transferred to another state and had not told anyone exactly where. This didn’t settle right with Spencer and he rolled everything over in his genius mind. Played back that night over and over. Analyzing her behavior down to every detail.

It was around noon on a Tuesday when an idea hit him. It was a paperwork day and Spencer had been done for about an hour or so already. He rushed to Penelope’s bat cave as fast as he could without raising alarm for the other profilers in the room.

“You want me to do what?” Penelope looked like Spencer had just walked in wearing a clown suit…again…that’s a tale for another time.

“I need you to find y/n /y/l/n phone number. The detective from the cult case in Austin, Texas a few years ago.” Spencer was trying to keep his voice from becoming too high pitched but failing tremendously.

“I’ll tell you what boy wonder. I’ll do this favor for you AND keep it a secret from the others, as long as you tell me everything that happened between the two of you.” Penelope smirked knowing she was going to win this one. Spencer gave in and told her everything, which made the goddess of gossip’s heart hurt for the boy genius. He really liked this girl.

As soon as Penelope dug up y/n phone number Spencer didn’t waste any time. It rung several times before going to voice mail:

If your callin’ about the add it’s over.

If it’s Tuesday night I‘m shopping.

If your selling insurance, please don’t. I’m not buying.

If it’s anyone else, please wait for the tone.

P.S. If this is Spencer, I’m sorry.

The phone fell to the floor. Spencer couldn’t believe it. It had been so long and only one night. Penelope picked the phone up off the ground and hung up.  No words were passed between the two just a much needed hug.

Spencer spent the next couple of weeks running the voicemail over and over in his head. What was she sorry for exactly? For leaving that night? For breaking his heart?

He made the decision that he wasn’t going to call her again. He couldn’t have his heart broken again. All these years he told himself it was a meaningless hookup, maybe that would work again. And it did work, for a few days.

He somehow talked himself into calling her just one more time. He was in such a frenzy about the end of her voicemail that he just had to talk to her. It took him two hours to get the courage to call her. He wanted to say the right thing and not screw it up. He dialed her number and waited patiently for it to start ringing. Before it could finish ringing a full ring Spencer hung up. He hadn’t thought that maybe she was in a different time zone then him, she could be sleeping.

So Spencer waited till about 8 am the next morning to try calling again. It rung a total of three time when he heard y/n’s sleepy voice say, “Hello?”

Spencer freaked, hung up, and threw the phone down on the coffee table. She had answered and Spencer had wussed out. He ran his hands through his hair in frustration. He was acting like a crazed teenager to afraid to call his crush. He was a grown fucking man, why couldn’t he just talk to her?

He made the decision that afternoon at lunch to try calling again. Once again Spencer listened to her ringtone before getting her voicemail once again:

If it’s Friday I’m working.

If it’s Saturday I’m sleeping, and if nothing happens

I’ll be dead to the world till Monday.

I’ll call you back… maybe.

P.S. If this is Spencer, I’m sorry.

This time Spencer left a message saying, “Hi this is Spencer Reid. I- umm- I can be reached at

702-555-0103.” He hung up not saying another word, hoping that maybe she’d call him back. He tried not to get his hopes up, he knew it was a long shot. Just because she said his name in both voicemails didn’t mean she actually wanted to talk to him. His brain came up with many logical reasons and situations to why she would say his name followed by ‘I’m sorry’.

When Monday rolled around Spencer was full of nervous energy and anxiety. His friends just thought it was from his extremely high coffee indulgence and cut him off. He actually had to beg Emily for ‘Just one more cup. Please!’.

He tried not to check his phone to often. Especially since his beloved profiling team was already on edge about his anxious behavior. Even though with his best efforts, Spencer couldn’t help but jump and all but dive for his phone when it started ringing. This of course caught the attention of his teammates and he just tried to ignore them all as he checked to see who was calling. He answered and this is what he heard:

If you were callin’ about that night I’m sorry.

I would take back my leavin’, I promise.

I should’ve listened to my heart and stayed a little longer.

I think I know where I belong now.

Again, I’m so sorry.

And by the way Spencer I might love you.

*

*

*

@criminalmindzjunkie​ @brooklynxnicole​ @hendersonsshadow​ 

[leupagus]

On being a boss

Piggybacking off my earlier comment about how politicians are employees; I don’t think enough people realize that that means we are their bosses. And while I know many folks who are reading this have never thought of themselves has being in a position of authority over anyone, the minute you become an eligible voter, that’s literally what you are. There are different names for it—voter, constituent, stakeholder—but it all means the same thing. You’re a boss, baby.

And that means you need to be an effective boss.

Think about how authority figures in your life have influenced you, either well or badly. Did the PTA meeting between your parents and your teachers always fill you with dread? That’s how politicians feel about polls. Do you hate getting summoned into a boss’s office to get reamed over something you did wrong? That’s how politicians feel about town halls. Did you get absolutely devastated over losing a job or not getting a job you really wanted? That’s how politicians feel when they get beaten in elections.

I’m not saying this to encourage you to have empathy for politicians—although honestly maybe remembering that they’re human beings once in a while wouldn’t kill some of you—but rather to show you how to be effective at getting your employee to do what you want.

Now, obviously there are some big differences in terms of scale; you are, please remember, not this politician’s only boss and almost certainly not their most influential. And politicians also listen to people who aren’t their bosses, like their donors or their family or their friends or their party leaders or the companies they came from pre-political career or the ones they want to join post-political career (they call it the revolving door for a reason). Those people aren’t their bosses, but they have pull all the same. So there’s that.

But even though the scale is different, all of us, no matter how young (including the 12-year-old who’s stumbled on this post) have had to deal with the pressures of multiple authority figures wanting us to do completely different things RIGHT NOW. So think back on those situations and consider what choices you made in those moments. Whose “orders” did you follow: was it the boss who would be most upset if you disappointed them, was it the boss who would retaliate the most harshly if you crossed them, was it the boss who would reward you if you pleased them, was it the boss who wanted you to do something that you yourself already wanted to do/planned to do anyway?

That’s not a trick question, I promise; chances are that your answer changes based on a shitton of variables. And because politicians are human beings, they also have different answers to that question. Sometimes they go with the people who gave them the most money in the last election (although that happens less often than you think, and way less often the more powerful a politician gets, for obvious reasons). Sometimes they go with the people who agree with them. Sometimes they go with the people who voted for them. Sometimes they even go with what they sincerely believe is right (anybody rolling their eyes at this wasn’t paying attention during the political massacre that took place after Dems rammed through the ACA in 2009; there are a dozen or so people whose political careers ended because they voted for it).

So as your politician’s boss, you have to figure out what tactic is most effective to get your employee to do what you want, because as nice as it sounds, you can’t just fire them every time they piss you off. So think about a politician whose mind you want to change—your Congressman doesn’t want to support climate legislation, let’s say. Look at her record and her interviews and past elections: what’s influenced her over the years and what’s changed her mind. Then you know where the pressure points are.

Of course you, by yourself, can’t make your politicians do whatever you want every time; not even whatever boogeyman people conjure up like the Koch brothers or Bill Gates or George Soros can do that (and believe me, a lot of them have tried). But, you do have more power than you think: you can attend a town hall and confront your wayward politician, you can volunteer for promising opponents, you can call her office and find out if her staff take in-person meetings (less common these days but my mayor does do zoom calls, lol). You can even run for something yourself; it’s really not as stupid as it sounds, especially if you’re not the only one in the field, because more people running is always a good thing. These are all time-consuming and energy-consuming options, and I know we’re all exhausted. But we’re also bosses, and we’ve got to do what we can to ensure our employees do the best job they can.

Besides, politicians change their minds based on their voters’ influence all the time—Bernie Sanders, for example, is a principled opponent of the US’s foreign policy and believes we should withdraw from the “forever wars” that we’ve been embroiled in for decades. But he also championed the construction of the... uh, not-exactly-practical F-35 fighter jet, which over the years has cost almost as much as the entire COVID relief bill that just passed. Sanders didn’t support it because he’s a hypocrite or a warmonger in disguise; he supported it because it brought crucial, desperately-needed jobs to Vermont, and he genuinely cares about his constituents. Sanders has also credited the influence of his constituents on his championing of queer rights and gay marriage, before most other politicians were sticking their necks out in support, because the people who spoke with him changed his mind. And while you can argue that Sanders is unique amongst politicians, he really isn’t; Biden himself came out in support of gay marriage just a couple years afterward—in an election year, no less, and I remember the absolute panic that set in about whether or not his radical notions would cost Obama reelection. (It’s weird thinking that it’s been a little under six years since Obergefell, isn’t it???)

Every day we’re seeing politicians getting pushed one way or another by their voters; the mayor of Austin had to go to court to defend his city’s mask mandate, for example, and Florida cities are fighting to keep their own mandates going despite their shitty governor doing everything he can to undermine them. (There are other examples but it’s Saturday morning, what do you want from me.) They can be pushed, and they should be.

To write politicians off as evil monsters who are doing a bad job because they’re just amoral is to ignore your job as their boss; if you want your employee to work for you, you’ve got to figure out why they aren’t (or if they aren’t, which: I could go into that whole thing but this is already longer than my dick). And then you can decide whether to push your influence, which you do in fact have, to either change them or replace them. It’s up to you. Go be a boss, baby.

[incarnateirony]

Gotta admit, I'm a bit anti Jarpad. Just because he comes off as entitled. BUT given how he and his wife have their hands in the fans pockets EVERY SINGLE DAY, I'd have thought he was far more minted going forward than Jensen. Neither have anything to worry about.

Corollary of that is Jarpad seems to know how to spend, his wife dresses in 10 grand of clothes daily and he wears 200k of watch on his wrist. Investment watches are usually kept pristine, not worn daily. His wife wears a 1.5m engagement ring. They frequently put pictures of the house on her blog and it's stuffed full of expensive crap. I'd feel claustrophobic living there, seriously.

Please correct my points, cos I'm really interested!

1. Lol-jackles (who is a bit of an arsehole IMHO) said JP would be getting the same for Walker as for SPN and extra (cut of profits as exec), so that's around $200,000 dollars per episode. The ensemble cast of Walker looks really expensive so that surprised me. Do you think that's true?

2. He shoves his overpriced vitamins #Mantrafamily down his fans throat and they are EXPENSIVE. He's an investor, though he's changed his story on his position several times. How much do you get from them?

3. He apparently owns a lot of property, including student housing in Austin.

4. He is owner or part owner of San Jac and Stereophonic in Austin.

5. His wife shills products daily on her blog

FYI, I HATE the "family" tag. The family is the fans not the stars. My test, I know my family's phone number and they wouldn't get an injunction if I went to anyone of their houses. Apply that test to J2?

Fans are PRODUCT to actors and definitely to Jarpad "I care so much I want you to feel better so buy my yellow vitamin wee"

I mean I never said Jared would end up homeless in a box. You can be blackballed and have money in the bank, these two statements have nothing to do with each other.

I haven't checked the Walker payrole. That statement could be true, but I'd say to take it with a grain of salt until you see a receipt about his paygrade. For example, on SPN last I knew he was making about 125K per episode (Jensen was 175K, Misha was just over 100K).

Jensen's value was higher due to a mix of... well, quality, quality of his representation, and the fact he had a few other skills in his pocket on access like directing.

Jared being a producer on Walker likely is worth a paygrade boost, and he headlines the show, truly. It's a matter of how his agent negotiated his worth.

On the other hand, it would be INCREDIBLY stupid for CBS/CW to accept a pitch that high on Jared on a show that hadn't been tested for its success. If Walker was still running its 0.3X in appropriate follow-up to SPN on the same TV season, sure. I guess. But with its fairly stable 0.15 for the last bazillion episodes that is rounding it up or down to 0.1 or 0.2 depending on its thousandths, that is baaaad. The first season should have been more conservative on its paygrades, but CW isn't known for the wisest business decisions and may have highly overestimated its potential appeal, in which case--LOL.

There is some wiggle room on potential budget because at a base, Walker is not a very expensive show to shoot, as it can just drop a camera in real world locations and roll from there. Very little CGI and the like. Again, I'd have to review what the show budget is to see what's going on.

Now to clear up some other things:

Jared does not actually own Stereotype. His friend owns Stereotype. He supported them early on with a small investment but his respective share is not enough to be a decision maker or an "owner" any more than anybody else that owns some stock in a company does. San Jac he is one of the owners of. One of. He holds far larger investment in it with several friends, so he is one of a few co-owners.

Things Jared owns:

Several empty lots

His fancy ass house everybody knows about worth about 5 million (Gen's been given power of attorney)

The "student housing" is:

a 4 bed, 2.5 bath home also for families, that can be arranged like a multifamily unit if needed. If you saw it from the street, you'd go "awww, that's a cute house." (some dude nobody knows has power of attorney--he owns a building company, not gonna be more specific)

a 3 bed, 2 bath home (power of attorney guy has this too)

A funky little duplex with 4 bedrooms per unit, best I can tell. (power of attorney guy has this too)

A singlefamily 3 bed home (different power of attorney guy)

One random suite in a business building with like 200 suites granted to him by a family member

The three with matching "power of attorney" is basically the three rentable ones so Jared himself doesn't have to be your landlord. In total there's 15 bedrooms between three properties (one truly multifamily, one arrangeable-as). These properties aren't located anywhere near each other. There's another 3 bedroom home in there that may be rentable. And some office space that got passed to him and basic cross searching in the past brought up a billion bankruptcy filings so I'm pretty sure it was "quick, Jared, take this".

jared doesn't own some giant mega campus complex. Jared owns a few homes that in theory could be rented out to students. This isn't unusual nor is this something the Ackles don't have too. Jared is the equivalent of that dude you find that owns a couple of houses and rents them out, but he goes through a property management agency by proxy of a building company that does the renovations that puts it in there for him, on 3/4 homes. He's not a landlord titan. He's a guy with a fraction of side income by the time it gets to him on a few properties.

So let's get that set straight before anybody makes it sound like Jared floats the student housing business in some lucrative scooby doo real estate scheme.

AND THEN THERE'S MANTRA:

Yes, Jared is a co-founder of Mantra. Which is honestly... god, don't get me started on why Jared Padalecki should not be simultaneously broadcasting for mental health and then packing nootropics down people's throats. (x for general nootropics) (x for phenibut in particular, which might explain his outburst on SM)

(That's just the one that jumps out as most problematic but the cocktails involved could really just not go over well with the wrong person, some of these things are like mixing OTC ritalin and SSRIs)

At the end of the day, regardless of the ethicality of mantra, I mean, sure, it's a business decision. It makes money. At the end of the day, though, this is not a career move.

Again, nobody ever said Jared's gonna end up living homeless in a box eating beans out of a can. The discussion is whether or not he has arranged himself a viable career forward in media.

Renting out a couple homes by proxy isn't gonna land him roles.

Selling miracle water that turns people into paranoid messes (but with great memory!!) isn't gonna land him roles.

Owning a bar isn't going to land him roles.

None of this actually adds any content to the discussion of Jared Padalecki's professional media career, which his stans keep trying to enter to the conversation to offset discussion of Ackles' business acumen in the acting field.

These are nonstarters in the conversation, at the end of the day. I just wanted to set straight some general details about them.

Jared has a future with an INCOME, but that doesn't mean he's arranged a future in MEDIA. And leave it from Jarpad stans to try to fuck up that conversation.

News flash: Rich White Man Bought Stuff To Make Money. More at 11.

The inability to see how this isn't the same as like. Owning a production company. And owning a record label. And owning a publisher (mostly for vinyls but other potential). And having establishment across multiple distributors and production hubs (WB, Amazon) as a path forward in media is B A F F L I N G.

[jazy3]

Thoughts on Grey’s Anatomy: 17X10

SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

I loved this episode! It was so so good! I loved seeing Mark and Lexie on the beach encouraging Meredith to return. I knew Lexie was going to be back based on last week’s promo, but I literally screamed out loud twice when Mark appeared on screen! I was shocked! I like what Mark and Lexie said to Meredith about the sand not being real and that the beach was in Meredith’s head and was her happy place and that it wasn’t real. She was in control even if she didn’t feel like it. Seeing her lost loved ones comforts her in her time of need. When living people she loves come to talk to her she sees them because it’s comforting.

I have a theory about who we see and why. Since this episode establishes that the beach is in Meredith’s head and she can go back if she wants to I think DeLuca appearing on the beach and them getting closer and her watching him reunite with his mother was her brain’s interpretation of people coming into her room and telling her that DeLuca had been injured and needed surgery and that he was stable and then telling her that he wasn't and had died from his injuries.

She needed closure on a tumultuous relationship so her COVID wrecked brain gave it to her in the form of a peaceful COVID fever dream during a difficult team. She sees and hears Hayes because she’s falling for him the same way that he’s falling for her and because he’s talking about her kids who she loves. She wants to go back but she’s doesn’t know how. She sees Richard and Bailey and hears their concerns and how worried they are about her because Richard is like a father to her and Bailey is a maternal figure in her life.

She wants to go back and as George says to her if she doesn’t it will break Richard. She sees Derek because he’s the love of her life and he represents death and passing over which is a real possibility and option. His presence comforts her in a way that no one else’s can. She sees George because what he did and how he died changed her life and they never got to have that closure in life. She never got to tell him that, but in her fever dream she does. She gets that closure and gets to re-examine why she did what she did. Why she goes all out for everyone like he did.

Seeing Mark and Lexie gives her closure too. Lexie provides that joy and that sunny optimism Meredith used to hate but eventually grew to love and missed so much when she died. Mark provides laughter and gives her the matter of fact tough love that she needs to hear in her time of need. Everyone plays a part and brings us joy and closure in the process. I loved Mark’s lines about how sometimes he yells in everyone’s ears to try and get them to listen and see reason. How sometimes people listen to him and think it’s their own idea and sometimes they don’t. How Callie and Arizona’s divorce made him shout.

It made me think of all the times when Lexie and Mark and other characters probably shouted at the living characters for their stupidity. Meredith deciding to waste her time dating DeLuca? Lexie and Derek definitely yelled in her ears for that. Every stupid fight, divorce, break up, date, and bad decision the characters have made since Derek, Mark, Lexie, and George died? They’ve definitely screamed their ears off at them. We now know that George tries to shake the grief out of his mother and Mark and Lexie make a habit of yelling in the ears of their loved ones making horrible decisions. I love it!

There’s something so hilarious and reassuring about the dead who have left us yelling and shaking us from beyond the grave and us taking that as a sign or our own idea and moving forward and making better decisions. I loved seeing Meredith talk about Bailey’s birthday party with Lexie and how what he really wanted for his birthday was for all of them to laugh. That establishes that Bailey’s birthday is in March or April. Which again makes that gelato DeLuca comment from Episode 8 literally impossible because he couldn’t have brought Bailey gelato for his actual or half birthday when he and Meredith only dated for a few months and he only met her kids officially a few weeks before they broke up.

Hayes’ storyline with his sister-in-law Irene was everything! We learned more about her, got to see what her relationship with Hayes is like, and learned more about how his boys are handling everything. He got his own storyline and development. I love it! His tour of the hospital on the way to the OR was hilarious! “And that is a supply closet!” LOL! I loved how supportive Irene was of him moving on. She really wanted to meet Meredith this great General Surgeon he keeps talking about all the time to his boys to the point that she knows all about her and knows that Hayes is definitely smitten. I loved her line when Hayes told her she couldn’t meet Meredith because she was on a ventilator and she looked at him and said, “Again?”

The fact that she knows he likes her because of the way he smiles every time he talks about her to the point that the boys have picked up on it and told her? My heart! Irene really came through for us in this episode! Bless her! Hayes was so distraught this episode. I like that they really showed his process and how upset he was that Meredith was still on a vent and that Irene was sick. His pain when he talked to Jo about how he couldn’t bear to tell his boys that they had lost another person that they love whose been taking care of them was heart wrenching.

Irene is a total badass. The information we’ve gotten about her shows what a fiercely loyal and supportive person she is. Cormac and Abigail meet at the Surgical Innovation Conference in LA when Abigail is a starving artist and Cormac is early on in his medical career. His conversations with Meredith show that he’s unfamiliar with American medical terms and colloquialisms and he talks about growing up in Ireland and how every day is Pro Bono Surgery Day there. We know that after his wife died he took his boys and moved to Zurich, Switzerland where he worked for two years before moving to the U.S.A. to take the job in Seattle.

We also know that Irene was Abigail’s POA when she was sick and that prior to the pandemic she was back living in LA. All of which implies that sometime after Abigail and Cormac met she decided to move to Ireland to be with him and they got married and she gave birth to Liam and Austin while Hayes was a practising surgeon in Ireland. But that when Abigail got sick Irene gave up her life in LA to move to Ireland for several years to be her sister’s POA and support her nephews and brother-in-law.

Abigail ultimately died and following that Cormac took Liam and Austin and moved to Zurich at which point Irene moved back to LA where she was living during Season 16 when they went to visit her during the Conference Episode. When the COVID-19 Pandemic hit the U.S. Irene then insisted on moving to Seattle to care for Liam and Austin while Cormac worked at Grey Sloan. Cormac and Irene drive each other crazy and agree on nothing and her own sister called her crazy before she died and yet she picked up and moved her whole life across the Atlantic and then to a different state for them. That’s love. That’s badass. You keep doing you Irene!

The scenes with Jo and Catherine in the OR cracked me up! "Child, who throws away a kidney? Lord." Haha! I loved Jo’s reaction when Catherine brought up switching careers. At first, I was confused as to why Jo lied, but then my friend Amy who I watch with pointed out that maybe Jo doesn’t want her boss to know she’s considering switching specialties just yet. I’d honestly like to see Jo switch from General to Urology. As Catherine says there are few women in the field and there are a lot of general surgeons on this show.

Jo switching from one surgical specialty to another to find joy and challenge herself makes sense to me. Her switching from general surgery to OBGYN does not. I thought she was going to adopt that baby Luna but then she told Jackson and Link that she doesn’t want to have children now or maybe ever and their scene this episode was pretty short. I thought when she was considering switching to OBGYN that either Carina or Hayes would train her.

But they’ve moved Carina over to Station 19 so completely that her brother died on Grey’s Anatomy and we only saw her briefly at the end of Episode 8 when she attended her brother’s memorial. Prior to this episode I would have described Jo and Hayes as friends, but they were pretty adversarial this episode and at this point they seem to be two people that like each other well enough and who respect each other’s surgical skills and that’s it. So, based on this week’s episode Hayes definitely isn’t going to step up and train Jo in his specialty. They’re not close enough and he’s got enough on the go.

I loved the scene where Jo and Jackson were in bed together and Jo started talking about how scary his Mom was and he was like why are you talking about my Mom when we’re naked together? It reminded me of how April thought his Mom was the coolest and walked on water and would talk about it when they were together. Made me laugh! I love seeing Maggie innovate and find a way to help those poor patients and double the hospital’s ventilator capacity!

Seeing Richard dance it out at the news and then again when him and Owen successfully took Meredith off the vent and she began breathing on her own was glorious! Such joy! Winston’s proposal and Maggie’s acceptance of it surprised me! I like them together and want them to get their happy ending, but this feels a bit sudden likely brought on by all the stress they are experiencing.

I mean Amelia and Link have a child together and are also co-parenting Leo and Allison with Teddy and Owen and are raising a boatload of children during the pandemic and they’re not married or engaged.  It was nice that Teddy and Owen finally stopped fighting after half a season of nonsense! That was nice. I loved how Amelia stepped up and supported Teddy and told her what she needed to hear. Yeah therapy sucks sometimes. It can be uncomfortable. So are mammograms.

We still get them! You have to put in the work to get better otherwise it doesn’t happen. I like that they are showing us the process of Teddy getting better while making sure that the kids are looked after. Teddy is doing a bit better, but she’s still not well enough to be looking after Leo and Allison by herself without supervision and since Amelia is at home anyways she might as well help.

Plus, it’s probably good for Leo and Allison to play with Zola, Bailey, and Ellis. They’ve only seen Owen and his Mom for two months. I liked the moment where Teddy said that Ellis looked like Amelia and that they really are sisters. She’s Meredith’s daughter, but she’s clearly picked up some of Amelia’s mannerisms because Amelia’s helping to raise her. Which does happen. Also, she’s Derek’s daughter too and since Amelia and Derek are siblings and share a resemblance it makes sense that she might also share traits with Ellis. I like that we are learning more about Bailey and Ellis this season.

Seeing the joy on everyone’s faces, including Zola’s, when Owen came in and told everyone that they took Meredith off the vent and that she was breathing on her was palpable. Such a great moment! I loved the moment where Tom was holding a rosary praying for Meredith and Owen finally stopped being a jerk for five seconds to comfort him and tell him about his own experience with survivor’s guilt after coming back from Iraq after his entire platoon was killed.

I’d like to see them explore Tom’s relationship with faith more. Something else I loved? The texts from Cristina! Loved it! Owen was like I can read her charts myself and Cristina was like I don’t care take a picture! I love that we’ve seen Cristina through text messages the last two seasons. I really miss her. Also is anyone updating Alex? I feel like they are, but I would love to see them mention or show it on screen. Same with Callie and Arizona. I felt like Hayes was the obvious choice for keeping Cristina up to date but seeing as he has a lot going on this episode my guess is that she texted him and he didn’t respond because he was too busy worrying about Irene so she texted Owen and asked for an update.

Did anyone else feel like it was hypocritical for Owen to be so mad at Teddy for still being in love with Allison and not telling him about their relationship when he’s apparently been texting Cristina about Meredith’s condition and talking to Amelia regularly this whole time? He clearly still has feelings for both of them and they are still very much alive and in communication with him and he’s mad that Teddy didn’t tell him about a dead lover? Jerk.

I loved seeing Levi step up and step into his own as a doctor. He’s no longer the bumbling fool of seasons past. He’s got his crap together and he’s going to do what needs to be done to keep his patient alive and healthy. His song about hump day cracked me up! Link was so happy to be operating this episode LOL! His comment about the poop diaper explosion was something else. Seeing Richard’s anger and frustration and seeing him explain how he was feeling to Link felt raw and really expressed how we’re all feeling like now. The fact that being low on ventilators is a real problem that hospitals have been facing ever since the pandemic started is enraging! I hate that this is real.

I hate that real hospitals with real patients have to make these kinds of calls. Health care providers are real superheroes. I could never make a decision like that. How do you decide who lives and who dies? How do you decide who needs a ventilator most and live with the consequences for you and the patient? I couldn’t do it. I love that Meredith appears to be waking up in next week’s promo. My bet is that she’s going to reunite with Derek one last time and then wake up. I’m interested to see Richard fill her in on what’s being going on and to see Amelia and Link talk about the possibility of getting married at some point. Also, can we take a moment to appreciate shirtless Link? Hot!

Until next time!

[inmyarmswrappedin]

How does SKAM build a LI?

I’ve been thinking about this for a while, and even gave speeches to my long suffering friends about the topic. Now that we know what happened to Josh to make him the way he is, I feel like I can finally post about the way SKAM built love interest characters. 

When it’s good, SKAM is a very tightly written show because every clip, and every storyline, advances the themes that make the main character vulnerable. I would call this their “shame” but DRUCK fans don’t like that term because the show is called “pressure” and not “shame”. In the end, whether a character’s issues are internal (”shame”) or external (”pressure”) is irrelevant to what I want to talk about, so let’s just call those themes a character’s vulnerability, shall we? 

How does SKAM make every storyline relate to the themes of the season and what makes a character vulnerable? Well, one way it does that is to make the love interest the personification of a character’s fears and issues.

To wit: In season 1, Eva is called out on having no opinions of their own. If you read @skamenglishsubs‘ culture and context posts, they have listed every instance in which this theme is portrayed by having Eva follow someone else’s opinion (I recommend you do this, because there are way more instances than I picked up on!). So, who is Jonas? Jonas is an extremely opinionated person who feels he’s not a follower at all. 

In season 2, Noora is afraid of opening herself to a boyfriend, both emotionally and sexually, because when she was 13 she had sex with a guy she thought she was in love with, who then dumped her as that was all he was interested in. Who is William? William is the school’s fuckboy who dumps girls after having sex with them, and doesn’t seem to care about the girls’ feelings, but rather is just interested in them advertising his sexual prowess via hoodies. 

In season 3, Isak’s strained relationship with his mom makes him believe that it’s impossible to have a functional relationship with a person who has a mental illness, because they’re not in touch with reality. Even has bipolar disorder.

And then, in possibly one of the most simplistic ways to perceive one’s own character, in season 4, Sana is a hijabi out to prove she can do everything a ~normal Norwegian party girl~ can do. Yousef is... not a Muslim, lol. (Note that the Yousef storyline was not originally planned by Julie Andem, and in fact came about because of feedback she received from Muslim fans that they wanted Sana to have a LI. Sana’s main storyline isn’t so much about her religion, but rather her furious desire to prove the haters wrong.)

In general, most of the SKAM remakes have not tried to reinvent the wheel, and have more or less stuck to these character profiles in order to build their own seasons. Most of the changes remake stans will point to when they talk about a remake season don’t really qualify as changes (under this definition) because they don’t change the conflict between the main and the LI. 

I was pretty interested in whether the remakes had picked up on this way to build a LI, and most particularly, how the remakes that have done original seasons built their LIs. Thoughts on these after the read more.

Out of all the seasons that remade SKAM’s four seasons, I would say there are only four that didn’t stick to the character profiles as outlined above. In my opinion, it’s these seasons:

Eva’s season in SKAM España changes this because Jorge is never set up as an opinionated person. He’s a good guy, for sure, a good friend to his friends like most Jonases, but you will never catch Jorge acting like his opinions are better than Eva’s. He never calls Eva out on not having opinions of her own. Their break up scene doesn’t deal with this, and most importantly, Eva could never get the upper hand in that last conversation like the other Evas have, because Jorge is the only Jonas to kiss Eva first.

Matteo’s season in DRUCK changes this because while Matteo is afraid that his mom won’t react well if he comes out to her, we have no idea what he thinks about having relationships with people with a mental illness, as a general rule. We don’t know because David doesn’t have a MI (that we know of). He is trans, and DRUCK wisely avoided making David’s gender identity the personification of Matteo’s issues (gvgvvh imagine how shit that would’ve been!!). Matteo and David’s major conflict is that Matteo has abandonment issues and David a tendency to peace out when things get hot.

Cris’ season in SKAM España changes this because Cris’ mom doesn’t have a mental illness. In fact, Cris doesn’t know much about MI in general. While Cris does have some internalized ableism, it comes from ignorance and buying into societal prejudices against MI, rather than personal experience. Cris’ vulnerability isn’t her ideas about MI. Her issue is that she has bought into the idea that she’s an unintelligent party girl who can’t ever be responsible or dependable.

Nora’s season in SKAM España both keeps and changes the conflicts as presented in SKAM. Nora fails to trust Alejandro because he’s a fuckboy who would have sex with girls and then mock them for getting their hopes up. But, unlike Noora, Nora’s issue is that her lack of trust in Alejandro throws her into the arms of the seemingly ideal boyfriend despite the red flags, whereas Noora’s lack of trust in William made her withhold sex. 

As you can see, all Sana seasons so far (Amira N.’s included) have kept the original conflict by having a non Muslim Yousef. Under this definition, Martino’s season in SKAM Italia isn’t a subversion, because while he does live with his mom, he doesn’t think he can have a functional relationship with her. Aside from Eva Vázquez, all of the Evas kissed their Jonas first. However, I should note that while SKAM Austin kept the Eva/Jonas conflict, they’re the only other SKAM that doesn’t open with Jonas’ essay. (Which I chalk up to facebook not wanting their show to open with a blatantly anti-capitalist speech lmao.) 

Now, how did the remakes with original seasons build their LIs?

Arthur’s season in SKAM France is an interesting example, because Baguettes picked up on the LI personifying the main’s vulnerability. If Arthur is vulnerable about his (lack of) hearing, Noée embraces it, takes pride on it and bases her identify around it. So far, this is exactly how SKAM/Julie Andem built her LIs. However, Arthur rejects Noée and mocks her language. Noée disappears after s5. Alexia has no hearing issues, or any disability.

Lola’s season in SKAM France similarly picks up on the concept. Since Lola is an addict, Maya’s father was one as well. However, this conflict isn’t really explored amidst the thousand other ideas that were thrown at the wall during this season. It’s fair to say Lola and Maya’s clips don’t develop the theme of addiction throughout the season. Unless you want to count Maya telling Lola that Lola is Maya’s addiction, I suppose. 

Kato’s season in wtFOCK (oh yes I’m going there) could be said to have picked up on the concept, although not in any real elegant way. Because of fan feedback for Moyo to get a season (which they declined to do for super valid reasons I’m sure), the team decided to have Moyo be the LI and worked backwards to build the main. It is similar to how SKAM approached Sana’s LI.  Moyo is a black guy, so Kato would be a racist! Genius!

Given these precedents, I was really curious what Nora’s season in DRUCK would do with their first 100% original love interest (so, not counting David). If they decided to go with SKAM’s standard way of building a LI, there were several possibilities. Nora’s mom has addiction issues, and this is a vulnerability of Nora’s. Would that mean that Josh would have substance issues? Or maybe his dad? His mom? Nora has a mental illness. Would that mean Josh would have issues around mental illness or therapy? Would he maybe have a mental illness himself? Nora was set up from the start as a liar. Would Josh be honest to a fault? And so on. 

In the end, it seems like DRUCK has taken the same approach they did with David. That is, Nora doesn’t have to accept something about Josh that she has preconceived ideas about (Noora, Isak, Sana), neither are Josh and Nora extremes in one character trait (Eva and Jonas). With this clip, it appears that their conflict is that Nora has a problem sharing her vulnerabilities (reminder: she didn’t come clean in English class out of a desire to be vulnerable, but to prove a point) and Josh has abandonment issues that make him prefer to try to change a person or even be hurt, rather than be left behind. 

DRUCK’s approach to building a LI in s5 (and probably beyond) might end up making the season less cohesive than SKAM seasons were. On the other hand, you can argue that the way SKAM built LIs could end up being too predictable (Isak is afraid of MI so Even has a MI, Sana is a Muslim so Yousef isn’t, Noora is afraid of being used for sex so William uses girls for sex, etc) and perhaps lowkey reductionist. And that’s without getting into the issues of making a character’s mental illness, religion, gender identity, sexuality, ethnicity or race, etc... the source of another character’s vulnerability (or “shame” or “pressure” if you will). This is particularly clear in the hands of lesser writers, as seen on wtFOCK and SKAM France. 

I will also get yelled at by @dusuessekartoffel if I fail to acknowledge that DRUCK is now doing original seasons and, though based on SKAM, should therefore become its own thing, develop LIs how they will, without taking SKAM as a model for anything. Iiiiii... think that DRUCK still owes a lot to SKAM even in this generation, and I kind of feel like the way SKAM built LIs is like the real time aspect of SKAM, something that is embedded into the very concept of the show and not something you can just discard when you buy the adaptation rights, but this is certainly up for debate.  

[alj4890]

12 Days of Ficmas

Day 2

(Thomas Hunt x OC*Amanda) in a Choices Red Carpet Diaries Christmas one shot.

A/N I always love these two and their awkward ways of admitting they want more than friendship. What better way to do so than at a holiday party that is nothing but chaotic? This fic grew longer and longer as I worked on it. I blame my daydreaming and my lack of self-control. Woooo 2020! LOL!

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Song Inspiration: Underneath the Mistletoe by Kelly Clarkson and Brett Eldridge

Masterlist

Mistletoe Madness

November 28th...

"Well," Ryan began as soon as he entered Thomas's suite. "He did it again."

"Again? How delayed will we be this time?" Thomas demanded.

"We're looking at another six weeks." The former heartthrob movie star recently turned executive producer poured them both a drink. "Given the holidays approaching, I suspect it will be closer to nine weeks."

Thomas grumbled about never again agreeing to producing another person's film.

If he had not witnessed the young director's raw talent firsthand, he would have never joined this venture. With Ryan Summers urging him on to support the next generation, he had somehow ended up spending the last few months in New York City and basically babysitting a twenty-two year old recent film graduate.

"Austin swears this will be the last time." Ryan explained.

Thomas took a healthy gulp of scotch.  "Are we certain he isn't in over his head?"

"You've seen the dailies." Ryan rubbed a hand down his face. "What do you think?"

Thomas slumped in his chair. "It is going to be a critically acclaimed film that sweeps the Oscars."

Ryan finished off his drink and stood up. "Don't worry. There is nothing like Christmas in New York."

"Except in my home." Thomas grumbled.

"Have no fear." Ryan's charming smile flashed. "I intend on hosting my annual Christmas party."

Thomas didn't bother to repress his shudder. "You mean that garish monstrosity that you refer to as an intimate gathering?"

"Can I help it that everyone loves me?"

"I believe you could." Thomas grumbled.

"Look on the bright side." Ryan reminded him. "Most of the people who love me are nearly three thousand miles away in California. This might actually be my most intimate gathering yet."

"True." Thomas rubbed the back of his neck. "I suppose one night of revelry won't kill me."

"There's that Christmas fortitude." Ryan set his empty glass down. "I'll let you know when the plans are finalized."

On his way out the door, he sent an image with a couple of phrases to a few groups in his contact list.

Christmas Party: Where? 80 Fifth Avenue at 14th Street, 17th Floor PH, New York, NY When? 7p.m., December 17. Why? You already know the answer. RSVP? Only if you want to come inside.

Within seconds of sending it, his phone began to chime nonstop with friends and acquaintances saying they would fly in just for his party.

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

December 14th...

"Oof!" Amanda tried to keep from falling over. "I'm so sor--"

"My fau--Amanda!" Ryan grasped her arms. "What are you doing in New York?"

"Some of Cordonia's nobles were invited for a World Tourism forum." She explained. "What about you?" Her teasing smile formed. "Why are you not in sunny California?"

He chuckled and linked his arm with hers, guiding her toward a nearby coffee shop. "I'm currently here as a producer."

"I had heard that you were stepping behind the camera for a change."

"Producing seemed the easiest." He shook his head with a laugh. "I never knew I could be so wrong."

After placing their orders and finding a table in a secluded corner, he asked how long she would be in New York.

"I was supposed to leave with everyone yesterday." She picked at her chocolate croissant. "But I decided to stay a few more days and do some Christmas shopping."

"So it’s just you?" He asked.

"Just me." She smiled at him. "I don't have anyone complaining about the cold weather or my tendency to linger near Christmas decorations."

"Speaking of Christmas decorations," he held his phone up, "Did you receive my party invitation?"

"I did. I didn't RSVP because I wasn’t sure how long I would stay here."

"Then allow me to RSVP for you." He quickly added her to the list. "Can't have one of my favorite duchesses alone this weekend."

She chuckled. "Who else is coming?"

"The usual." He flashed a smile. "You know most of them. One in particular."

Her eyebrow lifted. "Now I am curious."

"Thomas has been here with me." He explained. "We are both producers--"

"I know." She said softly.

"You do?" His smile grew mischievous. "Just how close did you two become when he filmed in Cordonia last spring?"

She squirmed in her chair. "We became friends."

"Friends or friends?"

"Ryan..." She could feel a headache forming at his prodding.

"Sorry." He relaxed back in his chair. "I know it is none of my business. Just because I am friends with both parties doesn't mean that I have a right to know if they moved out of that friendship phase of--"

"Thomas was right." Amanda playfully threw her napkin at him. "You really don't stop talking."

"Well," he shrugged. "I mean there are ways I enjoy being forced to shut up." He winked at her. "But I don't think you want to go down that road, at least not with me."

"You are impossible." She shook her head in resignation.

"I know." Ryan straightened in his chair when he noticed the time. "I have a meeting with one of the caterers." He flashed a smile as he stood up. "Want to come along and keep me company?"

"I should try and finish my shopping." She glanced down at the different bags of Tiffany blue, Gucci white, and Cartier red. "Especially now that I have to find something to wear for your party."

"Come with me and then I will help you find whatever you want." He took her bags before she could give an answer. "I could use someone else's opinion on appetizers."

"I suppose I have to say yes, since you're holding my purchases hostage."

He chuckled at her teasing while offering his arm. "Come with me, duchess, if you ever want to see these again."

Slipping her arm through his, they set off down Fifth Avenue.

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

Later that night...

Thomas wrapped a towel around his waist as he stepped out of the shower. He rolled his shoulders in an attempt to work the many knots of stress that persisted after fourteen hours of filming.

I should have remained in the director's chair.

The need to take control was growing stronger than ever. It was a wonder that he had not broken the arms off of the chair he sat in as he attempted to keep his mouth shut. The ridiculously young director had made numerous decisions he wanted to change.

But it isn't my vision we are going for.

As he rubbed a towel through his hair, he heard the familiar ping of notifications on his phone.

He picked it up, smiling at seeing Amanda's name as part of an alert.

It disappeared when he saw the following images.

She was in New York. With Ryan.

And it looked like they were more than friends.

"Why didn't she tell me she was here?" He muttered to himself.

He swiped through the images of smiling Ryan sitting on a couch at Versace while Amanda twirled in a dress for him.

He then saw an image of the two walking out of a coffee shop, arm in arm.

Thomas tossed his phone on the bed as he hurried to dress. Frustration built within him at the thought that Ryan might feel something for her.

After months of debating how to broach the subject of dating, he couldn't believe that he might have missed his opportunity with her.

He was pulled from his thoughts by a knock at his door.

Eyes narrowed when he saw who it was through the peephole.

"Ready?" Ryan asked as he walked in. "I was able to get us a table at Cote for..." He trailed off when Thomas turned his back on him. "What's wrong? No to Korean barbecue or did Austin flounder again?"

"No."

"Still struggling with his directing decisions?" Ryan asked.

"No. In a way. But no." Thomas bit out.

He knew he was being unreasonable. Ryan couldn't possibly know how he felt about the duchess since he had not bothered to share that with anyone.

Still, it should have been him running around New York with her instead of his flirtatious, playboy friend.

Wondering just how serious Ryan was about Amanda, he decided to casually get some information out of him.

"How did the party planning go?"

"Better than I expected." Ryan's smile reappeared. "Everything is set. Music, food, drinks, and decorations will be on theme this year."

"Ah." Thomas mumbled. "And the theme is?"

"You'll see." Ryan winked. "You won't believe who I ran into today."

Finally. "Who?"

"Amanda Bridgerton. There was some type of forum she had to attend last week and she decided to remain here on her own for some extra days of fun and shopping." Ryan replied.

"Is she coming to your party?" Thomas asked.

"It took some of my powers of persuasion, but I got her to agree."

"She should have let me know she was here." Thomas cleared his throat. "It would have been nice to see her."

"I asked her about that when she said she knew you were in New York." Ryan cocked his head to the side as he studied his friend. "She said she didn't want to bother you while you worked."

"Amanda isn't a bother." Thomas felt a little better at hearing that.

It does sound like the thoughtful thing she would normally do.

"That's what I told her." Ryan replied, checking the time again. "If you don't hurry, we’ll be late in meeting her for dinner."

Thomas's head jerked up. "We're having dinner with Amanda?'

"Why wouldn't we?" Ryan slowly smiled. "Once I told her that you would welcome a distraction from producing, she readily agreed to dinner."

The pictures then were like any other from gossip magazines. Completely innocent.

Ryan noticed an expression of relief form on Thomas's face.

He leaned forward in his chair. "Just how close were you two in Cordonia?"

Thomas's flush told the actor all he needed to know.

"We became friends." He muttered on his way back into the bathroom.

"Friends, huh?" Ryan rubbed his hands together. "I guess that's why Amanda is still single."

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

Cote NYC, an hour later...

"There she is." Ryan pointed towards a table to the right of the restaurant.

Amanda was studying the menu and didn't notice them walking in.

Thomas felt that same jolt to his heart that he had each time he saw her. Knowing she would be here with him, with no distractions, made him decide to test the proverbial waters.

The moment she looked up, her eyes immediately went to Thomas.

Her smile was filled with warmth and a touch of shyness when she stood up to greet him.

His lips grazed her cheek as he took her hands.

Even in the dim light, he could see her blush.

Ryan glanced from one to the other and cleared his throat. After a second, louder clearing to get their attention failed, he spoke up.

"I'm here too."

Amanda pulled her hands out of Thomas's grasp.

"Haven't I seen you somewhere before?" She teased.

Ryan dramatically clutched his chest. "Did our day out together mean nothing to you?"

She shook her head at his foolishness. "I might have enjoyed it, if you hadn't made me try on so many dresses."

She sat back down and felt a thrill go through her body when Thomas slid in next to her.

He draped his arm along the back of their booth and turned more towards her as they talked.

Ryan observed the two closely, a slight smirk on his lips at discovering that there was a definite attraction between the two.

His party's mistletoe theme would go a long way in helping these two.

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

Towards the end of dinner, both men received a cryptic text from Austin.

Ryan lifted an eyebrow. "Do you understand what he is talking about?"

"Unfortunately, I do." Thomas slipped his phone back in his pocket. "We better go in case he decides to try and dangle a camera from the Empire State building.

Ryan motioned to the waiter for the check.

Amanda tried to not be too disappointed. She hadn't realized how much she had missed being around Thomas until she had him sit next to her. The dinner had been the best she had had in a long time.

And it had nothing to do with the food.

His attention had settled on her and remained. It was a wonder she had not become tongue tied under his steady, dark gaze. His fingers grazed her shoulder every so often each time he settled his arm along the back of their seat.

If only they could have been alone without anyone disturbing them.

"Where are you staying?" Thomas asked.

"The Ritz-Carlton." Amanda wrote her suite number down for him. "Twenty-first floor."

He slipped it into his pocket before giving her his hotel and room information.

"We aren't too far away from you." He smiled softly at her. "Perhaps after we calm Austin down, we can plan on meeting up."

"I would love that." She took his hand as he helped her out of the booth.

"If nothing else, you two can meet up at my annual Christmas party." Ryan added.

Thomas and Amanda both stared at him as if seeing him for the first time.

"That's true." She mumbled.

"It is a small gathering still. Isn't it?" Thomas asked.

Ryan shrugged as he led the way out.

"Do you know how big it will be?" Thomas whispered.

"No." Amanda's eyes narrowed. "But if I had to judge by the caterer's face when Ryan wrote down how many he was expecting, small is not going to be associated at all with his party."

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

Dec. 17, Manhattan Penthouse, Fifth Avenue...

"I can't believe that we have been trapped with Austin the past few days." Thomas grumbled.

"Neither can I." Ryan slung an arm around his friend's shoulders and gave a gentle shake. "Cheer up. We now have two weeks or so of freedom from the boy wonder."

"There is that." Thomas eyed the growing number of people coming in. "Aren't you supposed to greet your guests?"

"Nah. Everyone knows who I am." Ryan replied. "But I will go mingle."

Once he disappeared into the crowd, Thomas lifted his eyes to the ceiling. Every five feet or less, a sprig of mistletoe dangled with lights and tinsel. The plant was hung from the main bar to every inch of the ballroom. There were even a set over the bathroom doorways.

Between the open bar and whatever alcoholic concoction Ryan's Christmas punch was made of, this holiday party would soon turn into a different sort of gathering.

Thomas wanted no part of an almost drunken orgy.

The only reason he had come was so that he could see Amanda. The long hours working with Austin had offered nothing except a quick phone call to apologize that he couldn't meet up with her. The few texts they exchanged were filled with understanding and a hope to see each other soon.

He hoped to find her in this crowd that was quickly getting larger and entice her away. Go someplace quiet where he could talk to her about taking that next step that would change everything.

That shouldn't be too difficult, he thought as he began to walk around.

But Thomas had made one mistake.

He was walking a path covered in mistletoe.

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

An hour later...

"There you are!" Ryan greeted Amanda with a kiss on her cheek. "I was afraid you weren't coming."

"It was a long line for the elevator." She looked around at the crowded room. "Looks like you invited everyone."

"Not everyone." Ryan handed her a cup of punch. "I forgot to invite my financial advisor. One of the guys that serves coffee. Probably a couple of others."

Not paying attention, Amanda took a big gulp of the punch. She struggled to get a deep breath as she felt the alcohol burn a path down her throat to settle with the sensation of a small fire forming in her stomach.

"What," she wheezed, "is in this?"

"Old Summers family secret." He nudged her cup up to take another swallow. "The first is the hardest. The ones that follow make everything bright."

"Don’t you mean right?" She took a tentative sip and realized he was right. The fire was gone, leaving her with an aftermath of warm giddiness. Finishing off her cup, she smiled while admiring his decorations. "It really does make everything bright."

He chuckled while pouring her another one. "Enjoy duchess. I have to go talk to the couple that just walked in." Ryan gestured toward the back of the ballroom. "I saw Thomas over there earlier."

Before she could say anything, he disappeared.

Smiling from not only the Christmas punch but also at the thought of spending time with the man she secretly loved, Amanda began to weave her way through, pausing only long enough to greet those she knew.

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

"For the love of--" Thomas suffered through another overly eager kiss.

This particular wannabe celebrity told him she was a popular YouTube personality.

It took all of his willpower to keep from telling her that he truly didn't care about her type of fame nor anything about her. He untangled himself from her arms and picked up his pace.

Being blocked in by Ryan's guests on one side and tables on the other, he had yet to escape the long line of mistletoe.

"Dammit!" He was grabbed once more.

"Is that any way to greet me, Thomas?" A sultry actress cooed.

"Good evening, Ava." He grasped her arms. "If you will excuse me--"

"You're under the mistletoe." She gripped the lapels of his blazer. "You know what that means?"

"Unfortunately, I do." He grumbled. Closing his eyes, he subjected himself to the kiss she pressed to his lips.

When Thomas was finally released, he first took pleasure in the disappointed expression on Ava's face from his lack of response.

Then his heart dropped at the person who stood a few feet away, staring at him.

Amanda turned away when Thomas locked eyes on her. Her mind jumped from one wild thought to another.

Thank God I didn't tell him how I felt! What if I had and then he had been forced to point out which woman he preferred? I need to leave. No! Then he'll suspect! I have to stay. Smile. Drink, dance, and be merry. Act like my heart didn't drop at the sight of Thomas being kissed by a woman I can't ever compete with.

She knew she couldn't run away so she remained in place. With a neutral expression on her face, she watched him out of the corner of her eye walk over to her.

"Amanda, I--that display you--I--" Thomas stuttered.

She turned toward him with a friendly smile firmly on her lips. "Thomas," she began with a slight, carefree laugh, "what can one do when caught under the mistletoe?"

Thomas blinked, taken aback when she casually shrugged the incident away.

Her heart was thudding as if she had sprinted. Pretending to not be affected by everything was too hard with his attention on her. She needed a temporary escape.

She called upon the things her friends in Cordonia depended on when upset.

Olivia would tell her to face the situation head on.

Not something I want to do.

Drake would go to the bar.

I've already had too much Christmas punch.

Hana would suggest desserts.

The table is too far away.

Maxwell would suggest to dance one’s troubles away.

Hmm. I could do that.

Her eyes scanned some of the men that stood nearby. Catching Ryan's eye, she nodded toward the dance floor with a silent plea.

He smiled at her. Coming over to do as she wanted, he noticed Thomas and glanced curiously back and forth at the two.

"Duchess?" He held his hand out. "Care to dance?"

"I would love to." She turned to a shocked Thomas. "Would you mind holding my drink?"

When his fingers grazed hers, she looked up at his face. Her carefully guarded expression flickered revealing her angry frustration.

"Feel free to use my cocktail napkin." She snapped.

"Your napkin?" Thomas repeated. "Why?"

"That shade of lipstick isn't really your color." She lowered her eyes and stubbornly ignored his attempt to explain.

She grabbed Ryan's hand and pulled him to the dance floor.

Ryan immediately twirled her as the upbeat tempo began. Taking both her hands to pull her toward him, he lifted an eyebrow in silent question.

She shook her head. "Don't ask. Please."

His gaze momentarily softened to pity. "Then hold on tight." He broke out some swing dance moves in the hopes of getting her to smile.

Her laughter at the numerous twirls he spun her in with dramatic dips made him smile.

"You know?" He said, once she was upright. "The only way I was able to get Thomas to agree to come tonight was telling him that you would be here."

"Ryan." She muttered.

"Amanda." He countered with a flirty grin on his face.

She couldn't help but smile back. "How do you make it impossible to ignore you?"

"Part of my charm." He admitted, twirling her into his embrace right as the song came to an end. "Now go forth and be kissed by someone you like."

She looked about at the number of couples kissing on the dance floor. She then lifted her eyes to the ceiling, sighing in relief that they had danced in a mistletoe free zone.

"I don't know if I should be thrilled for the one you prefer or insulted at how happy you are not to be under the mistletoe with me." Ryan narrowed his eyes playfully.

She laughed and rose up on her tiptoes to kiss his cheek. "Does that help?"

"Not really." He winked at her. "You just gave me a brotherly peck. I now have to find someone to bolster my flagging confidence."

She watched him dance away in search for a more kissable partner.

Amanda jumped when she felt someone grasp her hand.

Ignoring her surprise, Thomas pulled her off the dance floor.

"Thomas!" She tried to make him stop. "Where are we going?"

"Out." He stopped long enough to retrieve their coats.

"What about Ryan's party?" She couldn't stop her bitterness from spilling out. "Aren't there more people you hope to find under the mistletoe?"

"I never want to see that damn plant again." He snapped, gripping her hand as they stepped into the elevator.

They kept their eyes forward, trying to ignore the couples that joined them. Kisses were given as each seemed to still be in a haze from all the mistletoe..

They escaped and stepped out onto the sidewalk, each breathing a little easier.

Their eyes met.

"I should pro--"

"Walk with me--"

They closed their mouths and simply stared at one another.

"Will you go for a walk with me?" Thomas asked. "There is something I need to discuss with you."

Amanda hoped but honestly doubted that what he wanted to talk about was the subject she had intended to talk to him about.

Feelings are such a nuisance, she thought to herself.

With a brief nod, she began to walk towards Central Park. Once inside, she quickened her pace, hoping to burn up her frustration enough to calmly hear whatever it was he wished to say.

Without a word, Thomas kept up with her. When she started to slip on an icy patch on the walkway, he swept her into his arms.

Her breath hitched as her body slid directly against his.

Their noses bumped against one another’s.

Thomas tightened his arms around her refusing to lose this one chance to have her undivided attention. He had argued with himself about cutting in the entrie time she danced with Ryan. That ridiculous party would be the last time he allowed anything to keep him from finding out if she felt as strongly as he did.

"What," her voice cracked, "what did you want to talk about?"

His lips curved somewhat at seeing she was just as affected by being close to him as he was her. "Us."

Her eyes dropped down to his lips. "Us?"

His eyes drifted down her face, pausing at her mouth. "Yes."

"Oh." She breathed the word as his head slowly dropped toward hers.

He gently captured her lips in a tender kiss.

Thomas had felt nothing with those other kisses he had been given at the party. The spark from that touch of her lips warmed him to his toes. And yet, the mere brush of her gloved hand through his hair as he moved to kiss her again caused his skin to burn.

The kiss deepened, drawing an audible gasp from both at the sensation of the other's lips.

When they parted, their eyes met.

"Thomas, I--"

"I want to--"

Amanda bit her bottom lip. "You first."

Thomas smiled softly. "I'm in love with you."

"I love you too." She smiled against his lips when he kissed her again.

A thought popped into her mind, causing her to jerk away.

"Amanda, what--"

"I better never catch you in a room that has both beautiful actresses and mistletoe." She warned him.

He chuckled while cuddling her close. "You're the only one I will ever willingly stand under mistletoe for."

Amanda sweetly sighed at that as she pressed another kiss to his lips.

When his lips drifted down her cheek, she spoke up again.

"There was a corner at Ryan's party where one sprig of mistletoe wasn't being stepped under."

"Really?" He lifted his head. "That is a pity."

"Isn't it?" Her arms looped around his neck. "All alone. Without a purpose."

"I suppose we could go back and fulfill its one mission in life." He rested his forehead against hers. "Or..."

"Or?"

"We go somewhere private and pretend the entire room is covered in mistletoe."

"Private, hmm?" Amanda stepped out of Thomas's arms. "I think I would like to try this pretending."

He wrapped his arm around her as they walked out of the park. "If you follow my lead, I think you will enjoy yourself immensely."

[bcofl0ve]

I don’t care if my name isn’t anonymous on this lol. Just wanted to say, everyone always assumes if people broke up it’s always nasty and that one person did something bad to the other. My past relationships ended with still fond feelings towards each other, it just seemed like we weren’t meant for each other, or I moved away to college, or we just had different ideas for how we wanted our relationship to be. I always ended up unfollowing ex boyfriends because it didn’t seem right to still follow them, plus it just still hurt to see them if they popped up in my feed, because you miss that person still. (Probably not an issue for Olivia, Aus doesn’t post anything haha) Anyways all this to say, A simple unfollow doesn’t implicate Austin of anything. And Olivia is weird on IG anyways. I say that affectionately lol. (Also don’t know if Austin was her boyfriend.? It all seems like rumors. )

i do not want to start the boyfriend or not debate tonight lolol (we’ve also had that conversation 400 times it feels like) so i will leave it at saying i think we know *enough* to say they were. involved. in some capacity. everything else is guess work and theories, but like. something happened. even if it was coming from him being possessed and seeing her as his priscilla- which i don’t think makes him evil either fwiw

to your main point, thank you. i truly do not think olivia hates that boy- she wouldn’t have done those post oscars instagram stories if she did. she’s finicky about instagram like you said, we all saw it in her deleting and reposting and deleting and reposting without the text that one post-oscar story with the ‘so proud 🥀 @austinbutler’. her posting all that even finicky as she is imo was coming from a place of wanting to show she cared even if it made her antsy.

but like you said, an unfollow doesn’t mean she wants to run him down with her car or that she’s implying he did something horrible/was horrible to her. she’s allowed to want to move on with her life. i’m shocked she didn’t unfollow him sooner tbh- but as we all know, her and instagram have a complicated relationship!

[riordanversephantom]

So hi, since I’ve been crying for like... the past hour? (Lol future Phantom here, it’s taken me like an hour to compile this)  here’s a collection of moments from my Riordanverse fanfics that I really like or made me chuckle because I need some feel good.  These are all from my Ao3 and I’ll leave links.

--

“You know usually people show up at someone’s house when the person is home,” Nico said, starting to make himself a sandwich. Thalia laughed.

“You’re telling me that while you’re sitting here the same as me making a sandwich?” She leaned back on the stool, gripping the counter to keep her balance. Nico rolled his eyes.

“I don’t intend to show up while he’s not here.”

“You’re funny Nico.”

“Thanks, I get that a lot,” Nico raised one eyebrow, Thalia laughed again.

(Percy’s not home)

--

“Jason fractured his ankle...while on the rock wall…” Will looked up at Nico, “he can fly, how did he do that?”

“He’s silly like that.”

Will paused for so long that Nico thought he had finally fallen asleep.

“Cecil brought me some Zebra cakes today,” Will mumbled, “he wasn’t injured but they tasted good.  I appreciated it.  He probably stole them.”

(Just go to bed)

More under the cut

Nico couldn’t help but crack a small smile, “thanks Kayla.”  He gently took the sweatshirt from her.  This was one of Will’s favorites (and also Nico’s favorite to take).

“Since you’re practically a member of the family now, I wanted to look out for you,” she yawned and glanced behind her, “since things have been a bit quiet with Will visiting his mom.”

“Yeah,” Nico agreed.

She smiled, “I guess I’ll let you get back to bed.”

Nico nodded, “goodnight Kayla.”

“Goodnight Nico,” she yawned again and started to trudge back to her cabin.

(Miss him the most)

--

“Look at you, I think we still need to have that competition of who looks worse after crying,” Will smirked.

“I still think it’s you,” Kayla cracked a small smile.

“It’s probably still me,” Will sighed, “let’s get back before Austin gets worried and the harpies come kill us though.”

“Yeah…”

(I’m still here)

--

But Will, half asleep and frightened had somehow ended up on the front porch of the Hades cabin at four in the morning.  When Nico opened the door he had stumbled into Nico’s arms, enveloping Nico into a huge hug.

“Oh,” Nico whispered, running his fingers through Will’s hair.

“I…” Will swallowed hard, “nightmare I… didn’t know… what to do.”

He wasn’t crying but the panic was evident in his voice.  Nico nodded silently and led Will inside, shutting the door behind him.

(Understand that I love you, dear)

--

“It’s fine,” Leo wiped some grease on his shirt and shifted on the chair, “I know what I’m doing.”

Jason doubted that, but he crossed his arms in front of his chest and watched.  Leo’s chair that he was standing on looked old and worn, it looked very close to falling apart.  Jason got a bit closer just in case Leo fell.

“Are you sure you don’t want me to help you?” Jason asked again.

“Why? Are you worried?” Leo let out a sigh and turned to Jason, the chair wobbled and he threw his arm out to steady himself.  Jason hissed and quickly stepped forward, his arms outstretched.

“Yeah, a bit,” Jason responded, “I don’t want you to fall.  Let me help.”

(How tall are you)

--

“I’m thinking about hiding away in the woods for a while, maybe we could talk, maybe kiss,” Leo suggested with a shrug.

(How tall are you)

--

Will buried his face in his hands, tugging at his bangs.  He didn’t say anything, Nico was too afraid to do anything at the moment.

Finally, Will let out a shaky sigh, running his fingers through his hair, “you know what,” he laughed without humor, “nope, it’s been a long week.”  Will turned towards the desk and started to tidy up the papers he was working on.

“I’m going to bed, I can’t do this right now.  I haven’t slept all week and I’m exhausted,” Will turned back to Nico and put a hand on his shoulder, he smiled but it didn’t reach his eyes, “I’m glad you’re back Nico.  I’m too angry to actually welcome you home properly so instead I’m going to sleep for the rest of the day.  Then come back to this conversation as a well rested organized individual.”

(Cause it hurts)

--

(like go seek out any other of his friends to alert them of his return, or iris messaging his sister to let her know he was all right) he sulked back to his cabin.

He did eventually do the second thing and Hazel was more than thrilled and relieved.  Though when he first iris messaged her, she yelled at him so loudly Frank and a couple other kids actually came in to see what was going on.

(Cause it hurts)

--

“Did you come here for something?” Will finally asked, clicking his pen absently.  He looked back over at Nico.

“Oh right,” Nico walked over to where Will was sitting and plopped himself right on top of the desk, “I came for you.”

“For me?” Will raised one eyebrow, leaning his chin on his elbow.  

“It’s getting late, I was getting impatient for you to come back,” Nico said, crossing his arms in front of his chest stubbornly.

“Oh so you missed me?” Will smirked.  Nico thought he shouldn’t look so smug.

“Don’t act like you don’t miss me too when I leave for a bit,” Nico huffed.

“I’m not going to act, I’ve admitted it before and I’ll do it again.”

(I trust you as my eyes)

--

“There we go, that’s my Will,” Nico mumbled, “sometimes nightmares are just nightmares.  Nothing more.”

“No stupid prophecy or foreseeing of death,” Will squeezed Nico tighter.

“Just a normal old punch in the gut from your subconscious.”

“I hate my subconscious.”

“Me too.”

(My subconscious hates me)

--

“Oh, hello Sunshine.”

Kayla woke to her brother’s voice.  For a second she thought he was going insane and actually talking to the sun.  Then she remembered what happened at three am last night… or well, this morning.

(Not yet brother in law)

--

The two of them were quiet again.  A leaf fluttered onto Percy’s face.  Annabeth swiped it away without a thought.  He licked her hand.

“Gross, Percy!  Are you ten?” Annabeth cried out, wiping her hand on Percy’s shirt.

He laughed, “you asked for it, putting your hand too close to my mouth.”

“I was getting a lead off of you like a loving girlfriend.”

He stuck his tongue out at her.  Annabeth furrowed her eyebrows, gathering a ton of leaves that were settled around her and dropped them on his face.  He sat up spluttering, spitting leaves out of his mouth.

“That wasn’t nice!” He exclaimed, shaking the leaves from his hair.

(Content)

--

“You’re a whore,” Drew glared at Will.

Lacy gasped, she looked like she wanted to say anything, but she didn’t.

“ Wow ,” Will puffed out his cheeks before letting out a slow breath, “A whore ?  I’ve been called a lot of things, but a whore ?  That ones new.”

“Just like Apollo,” She crossed her arms in front of her chest.

“Oh yeah, that makes sense,” Will nodded in agreement, “but, well I hate to break it to you, but I’d like to think I’m pretty faithful to my boyfriend.  Unlike you so, I think that the term ‘ whore ’ would better apply to you.”  Will clicked his tongue and shrugged.

“Well,” Drew spluttered, obviously running out of insults, “at least I can get a date without even having to try.”

“Drew that is enough,” Piper spoke firmly, her voice cold, “you too Will.” She seemed a bit reluctant about that last part.

Will held up his hands in defense, “hey, I didn’t do anything.  Anyway, getting a date with no effort doesn’t really sound like love.”

“ Will, ” Piper shot him a pointed look, Will shrugged.

(Nail polish is gay)

I mean obviously there are a ton more since I have so many fics on my Ao3 but this was just a couple (a lot) from some of my more “recent” fics.  If you’ve made it this far, thanks and I hope you liked these small little bits.  Check out my Ao3 for more riordanverse fics and follow me on TikTok for cosplay (@phantomxlegend for both).

<3

[kickasskody]

                          DAKOTA ‘ kody ’ PIERCE, a character study.  “just because i cannot see it, doesn’t mean i cannot believe it.” -- jack skellington

Character’s full name: dakota pierce Reason for name and/or meaning of name: kody’s parents met and fell in love in north dakota, and decided to name their son after the great state 💖 Character’s nickname: kody Reason for nickname: in middle school, kody didn’t think the name dakota was cool. but the name kody, the most generic white boy name ever , was definitely cool Birth date: december 13th, 2002. baby sagittarius 

Physical appearance Faceclaim: austin abrams Gender: cis male Height: 5″8 #shortking Build: scrawny boy body. looks like he couldn’t lift more than 30 pounds... PSYCH!!! he’s a vampire so he can actually lift several hundred pounds 🤪🤪🤪 Eye color: blue with little dark green specks Glasses or contacts?: not with that snazzy 4k vampire sight !! Distinguishing marks/scars: funny little frecklescape on his back that looks like this emoji 😦 Hair color: dirty blonde Type of hair: type 1, aka straight hair Hairstyle: gets up out of bed, looks in mirror. maybe tussles it a little bit. thats it Physical disabilities: none Mental disabilities: adhd Clothing style: sweaters sweaters sweaters. striped sweaters ( because the best time to wear one is all the time ), disney sweaters, sweaters with dogs on them. white collared shirts to go underneath most of them. denim jackets, a couple of them tattering with holes in the elbows. black skinny jeans -- like he owns four pairs of the same black skinny jeans. someone tell him that skinny jeans aren’t in style anymore. uses the same jansport backpack he’s had since the eighth grade with a sewn in epcot center patch on the front pocket. dirty checkered vans. falling apart high-top converse. it’s not that he’s poor and can’t afford new things, he just prefers all his old stuff.  Make up: has never worn any but wouldn’t be opposed to trying some !!

Personality Good personality traits: good at secret keeping, friendly and uplifting, loyal, thoughtful, great memory, cautious, playful. chaotic good energy  🥰 Bad personality traits: gullible, slightly obnoxious, constantly confused, easily distracted Mood character is most often in: cheery, happy as f, practically bouncing off the walls Sense of humor: goddamn hilarious!!! at least he thinks so lol Articulation: loud and occasionally stuttery. repeating himself pretty often. the type to get lost in the middle of conversation and have to take a second to mentally loop back and remember what exactly they were talking about. uses the word ‘ like ‘ way too much. talks with his hands a whole lot. constantly talking like he’s a kooky disney character on a mission. Character’s greatest joy in life: riding a mf’in roller coaster Character’s greatest fear: disneyworld getting blown up / physically hurting someone  Character is most at ease when: he’s curled up with his friends watching a disney movie Most ill at ease when: he’s laying in bed at night, pretending he’s sleeping since he can’t Enraged when: thinking about how there are vampires in bridgemead -- that they could turn other people, kill other people, or worse... harm his friends.  Depressed or sad when: drinking from a blood bag. watching disney pixar’s coco. thinkin’ about a disneyworld churro and how he’ll never be able to enjoy the taste of one again. Priorities: at the moment? trying not to hurt anybody.  Life philosophy: “Keep Moving Forward!” -- walt disney said that Greatest strength: his optimism / ability to take something sad or bad and turn it around! Greatest vulnerability or weakness: giving just about anyone the benefit of the doubt. 

Goals Drives and motivations: getting enough money to be able to travel the world and visit every disney park on the planet.  Immediate goals: graduating high school / helping the scooby gang solve mysteries Long term goals: roller coaster designer / engineer. create a haunted house / rollercoaster hybrid ride

Childhood Hometown: orlando, florida Type of childhood: the kind where he’s an only child, where his middle class parents live to please and spoil him, take him to whatever amusement park he wanted to go to and buy him all the best merch. the smile on his face was worth more than anything they ever could’ve purchased for themselves. kody probably would’ve had siblings, but his parents had complications getting pregnant again, and thus they lived to make sure he had the best life possible.  Pets: a cat named toulouse ( shoutout aristocats ), but he passed when kody was fifteen Most important childhood memory: waiting in line for five hours to ride harry potter and the forbidden journey at universal studios orlando. blew his little kid mind. Dream job: imagineer!! Religion: non-practicing christians. church on easter and christmas ONLY!

Present Current location: bridgemead, massachusetts Currently living with: his parents 💖 Pets: none Religion: agnostic Sexuality: currently questioning his sexuality. growing up he always felt attracted to both boys and girls, but has never been able to articulate it. he’s only ever expressed interest in women, but he has a fat crush on chris evans as captin america Politics: would be socialist if he cared enough to think about politics Occupation/education: bridgemead high school super senior Mode of transportation: his parents dark blue prius!! but only thursday - sunday

Family Parent one: marcus pierce -- drug store manager Relationship with them: kody and his dad are best buds! if it weren’t for his fathers love for rollercoasters, kody doesn’t know what his life would be like today. they used to play rollercoaster tycoon growing up and kody still cherishes those memories today. Parent two: tina pierce -- bridgemead city manager Relationship with them: kody and his mother have a very loving relationship. however, kody’s adoration for his mother dwindled when it was her job that forced them to move to bridgemead. he thinks of it as her fault that he doesn’t get to go to disneyworld anymore, and there’s a bitter part of him that thinks that if she hadn’t made them leave, he never would’ve become a vampire. he knows its wrong to attribute her to his curse, but sometimes when he’s really sad he cant help it.  Siblings: none Other important family members: his widowed aunt shirley who lives twenty minutes from disneyworld and occasionally would join them on their weekend visits to the parks. he misses her greatly 😩😩

Favorites Color: that bright electric blue color on the cinderella castle at disneyworld  Music: electronic Food: a disneyworld churro.  Film: the incredibles / scooby doo 2002 Drink: pink lemonadde mixed with sprite Form of entertainment: disney+ subscription. if that’s all he had, he’d be content. Most prized possession: a magic kingdom two day passport ticket from the 1980′s

Habits Hobbies: playing rollercoaster tycoon / designing rollercoasters on his computer. obsessively watching ghost club paranormal on youtube. bothering aj with the latest thing on his mind that she definitely doesn’t need to know about Plays a musical instrument?: nope. wishes he could though!  Plays a sport?: nope, but would be great at track now that he’s a vampire! How he would spend a rainy day: playing kingdom hearts II in his pajamas. Spending habits: great at hoarding all of his allowance! since he’s not spending it on food, he’s an excellent saver. pre-vampirism kody was not as cautious with his spending.  Smoking/drinking/drugs?: no way 🙅🏼 has yet to even try alcohol Extremely skilled at: cheering up his friends! finding the good in others and convincing them to see it too 🤗 Extremely unskilled at: stopping himself from crying when he’s sad / when he’s in the middle of crying. putting together pieces of their investigations. sure, he can find things -- but what the hell is he supposed to do with them once he’s got it?!?! Nervous tics: anxious picking at his cuticles. messing with his hair. aggressive foot tapping. scrolling through his phone without actually looking at anything.  Usual body posture: that boy has been working on rollercoaster code on his computer for YEARS. his body posture is absolutely RUINED! Mannerisms: constantly talking with his hands. bouncin’ around like tigger when something exciting happens. abbreviating things that don’t need to be abbreviated. the loudest in the room at all times.

Traits Optimist or pessimist? Introvert or extrovert? Daredevil or cautious? Logical or emotional? Leader or follower? Disorderly and messy or methodical and neat? Prefers working or relaxing? Confident or unsure of himself/herself? Animal lover? HELL YEAH.

Self-perception How do they feels about themselves?: before the year 2020, kody actually quite liked himself! he realized that he was goofy and sometimes not everyones cup of tea, but for the most part, he knew he was a good guy who was a little obnoxious! now, he has mixed feelings about himself. vampirism has elevated a lot of his emotions and more often than not now, he dislikes himself for what he’s become, or what he could become if things turn bloody.  One word the character would use to describe themselves: spunky What does the character consider their best trait?: his compassion What does the character consider their worst trait?: his gullibility  What does the character consider their best physical characteristic?: his fluffy hair !! What does the character consider their worst physical characteristic?: that he’s a short king. stream short kings anthem by tiny meat gang How does the character think others perceive them?: he’s pretty sure most people think that he’s wildly annoying, but that doesn’t stop him from being fully himself most of the time!  What would the character most like to change about himself/herself: his vampirism!! get this shit out of him just make him a normal aging boy again!!

Relationships with others Opinion of other people in general: kody is a big ole’ ball of love, and thus so, he tries to share that with everyone. strangers are treated with compassion, acquaintances are treated as old friends, and friends are treated like family. unless kody already knows someone to be a bad person, or is wary of them, he’s genuinely one of the nicest people one could ever meet. Opinion of the Scooby Gang: talented, brilliant, incredible, amazing, show stopping, spectacular, never the same, totally unique, completely not ever been done before, unafraid to reference or not reference, put it in a blender, shit on it, vomit on it, eat it, give birth to it. Does the character hide their true opinions and emotions from others?: it depends on the topic, but for the most part, yes. when it comes to most scooby gang related endeavors, kody will share his thoughts -- if it’s something related to movies or tv, he’ll be talking your ear off for hours. if it’s something that could result in it hurting someone else, he’ll be quiet, and if his vampirism was ever to come into question, he’d be absolutely be suppressing it.  Most important person in character’s life: oh god, not to pick scooby gang favorites, but probably aj. she’s the closest thing he has to a sister, and he doesn’t know what he would do without their banter, and her support. Best friend/s: aj darke, dylan frye, & arabella byrne Dating experience: absolutely none. kissed 2 girls in the span of 2 years over 3 years ago. Romancing: kody wouldn’t know the first thing about trying to get someone to date him. all he knows is the stuff he’s seen on tv, watched in movies, or experienced around him ( such as his parents successful marriage, or his friends dating people ), but if it were to come down to him, he’d be extremely awkward. picture tom holland’s spiderman trying to talk to zendaya’s mj in far from home -- because that’s extremely accurate. kody isn’t trying to date anyone right now for a couple of reasons: one being that he’s too nervous, and not exactly looking for love, but if it were to happen... he wouldn’t run from it necessarily. but two being that his vampirism creates a bit of a problem for him, and he’s not sure if he should subject anyone to the curse he’s stuck with.

Extra Physicality: if necessary, could probably lift a car and throw it down the street. as of right now, doesn’t know how strong he really is / is more concerned about hurting his friends with this supposed strength than he is finding out how many hundreds of pounds he could lift. kody in a fight? probably losing within the first five seconds, unless bloods drawn and the instinct to pounce takes over. Species: vampire How do they feel about it?: hates it. would do anything to reverse it. wishes he had just stayed a little longer at karma cafe that night. or had never gone at all. How do they look in their supernatural form?: pretty much the same, however when he’s hungry and near blood, his eyes go all dark and bloodshot, and the veins around his eyes start to pulse ( basically just like vampire diaries ), but kody is unaware of this since he’s never seen it happen to himself or another vampire

[obxlife]

To Me (Rafe x Reader)

A/N: I swear this is like the millionth Rafe request I’ve gotten lol. Tbh I love it, keep them Rafe requests coming. Btw the song recommended by anon was amazing! I totally recommend all of you listen to it. Also, I’m not really sure if I portrayed Rafe very well, but oh well. I still like this fic.

Pairing: Rafe x Reader

Word count: 4,076

Request: A Rafe fic where him and the reader dated for a while and broke up because his attitude got overbearing and they run into each other at a party or something? And like he can’t take his eyes off her. I’ve been listening to the song “To Me” by Alina Baraz and it put that kind of imagery in my head

Summary: After two months of hiding away from everybody (and kind of regretting the fact that you ended your last relationship), your best friend manages to pull you out of bed and take you to a party. However, you obviously run into your ex. And from there things only seemed to escalate. 

Warnings: Swearing, underage drinking, a bit of angst (if you squint your eyes), mentions of drug use.

TO ME

It’s been a while since you heard from me

I stay alone

Protect my energies

Found a little love

Lost my sanity

(Can we do it over?)

And then one day it just came to me

(Can we do it over?)

Camille walked into your room, scrunching up her nose. She saw you under your covers, scrunched up in a ball, unmoving. 

“It stinks in here,” she remarked. You stuck your head out from under your duvet and looked at her as she began to pick up the trash around your room (mostly chocolate wrappers, empty ice cream tubs, and tissues) and tidy up. “How long has it been since you last went out?”

You sighed. “Twenty minutes. I need to go to the kitchen for some food.”

Camille gave you a hard look as if you signal that your answer was not exactly what he was looking for. “I mean, how long has it been since you left your house?”

You tried to think if you had even left your house recently, but came up empty-handed. “I guess… since the breakup, yeah.”

Camille groaned. “Oh, God. Are you serious?”

You tried to glare at her, but ultimately knew she was right. You had no excuses for being cooped up in your room anymore. 

“Look,” she began, taking a seat next to you on the bed. “I know you loved him. And I know you miss him. But it’s been two months already. And, let’s be honest, towards the end he was being a bit overbearing.”

You gave her a soft smile, thankful she hadn’t even mentioned his name. 

She was right. Your best friend was always right. 

You sighed and told her so, smiling as she did the same. 

“Okay, so now that you have decided to be a normal human again,” you made an offended noise at this, “Will you please go to a party with me?”

Your eyes widened. “What about baby steps? This would be my first time going out again! I can’t just immediately jump into partying!”

Camille gave you her famous puppy eyes. “Please,” she begged, “Austin is going to be there and we were flirting earlier today. Just do this for me!”

You sighed. “Wouldn’t people find it weird if I just start partying around again, like old times? It’s almost as if I didn’t even grief over the end of my year-long relationship.”

You put an emphasis on the last words of your statement to make your point, but Camille quickly disregarded this. 

“Trust me,” she assured, “Nobody will think that because he began to party two days after you guys had called it off.”

“What?” you screeched. Hearing this information pained you. “Really?”

Camille nodded sadly. But then she beamed at you. “But, now you can show up looking super hot and be like ‘Him? Pfff.’ So, maybe this is better!”

You laughed at your friend’s antics to cheer you up. She had managed to convince you (once again) about something you weren’t sure about. This was exactly the dynamic that had always been part of your friendship. 

You pretended to groan, although you were actually excited to go out and see your friends again, and said, “Fine. I’ll go. But I’m only doing this because you begged me to.”

Camille shrieked in joy. “Yes, yes, yes! Okay, now hop in the shower because I wasn’t lying when I said that you stink.”

Standing up and moving towards your bathroom, you threw a snarky remark at her over your shoulder before asking her to pick out an outfit for you. With that, you jumped into the steaming water. 

I'm not asking for too much

I'm asking the wrong motherfucker

Just 'cause we're in love

Doesn't mean that we're right for each other

Can't keep makin' a home out of you

Just 'cause you're asking me to

I'm not asking for too much

(Can we do it over?)

Once you began to wash yourself off, you began to imagine possible scenarios of what might go done during the party. The one that scared you the most was running into him. 

To be honest, the relationship had been amazing. At first, you and him were so completely infatuated with each other. You guys were having sex (which was amazing), going on dates all the time, being honest with each other, everything. But then, he turned eighteen. And his dad began to bug him about joining his business.

He began to push you away. he was stressed and all you wanted to do was help him and love him and show him that he was doing fine and that it was okay. But he didn’t want that. He began to do drugs - not weed, but harder stuff. Stuff that scared you and made him act out of place all the time. Stuff that made you afraid of him. 

But then, every time he was sober he would make it better again, and promise that he would never do that again and that it had been the last time. However, next time always came around and the cycle repeated himself.

In an attempt to take his stress out on other things that weren’t drugs, he began to pick fights with the kids from the Cut. You had begged him to leave them alone. To stop going around and punching them. He just wouldn’t listen.

And then came the screaming. He would scream and scream and scream at you for hours on end. And you took it. You thought that the screaming was better than him taking all of those drugs and punching all of those kids. You thought that the screaming was better than him driving around on his motorcycle, pissed off at everything, and risking the chance of having an accident. 

In public, both of you put up a facade of the perfect couple. He was trying to make his dad proud by having a stable relationship. He was trying to prove that if he was mature enough for a stable relationship he was mature enough to help out with the business. And all you wanted to do was see him happy, so you kept the facade on in front of everyone. 

Your friends would all compliment you on the amazing boyfriend you had. But when you finally had the courage to tell them what was truly going on behind closed doors they urged you to escape. But they didn’t understand. Couldn’t they see you loved him? Couldn’t they see that he just needed your help?

However, they would turn these questions on you. 

“Can’t you see that loving him is hurting you? Helping him is hurting you, Y/N!”

You wouldn’t listen. All you wanted - no, all you needed - was him. And you had him. And since he wanted more than only you, you were helping him in every way possible to achieve that. 

Five months after he had turned eighteen, however, he did something that made you change your perspective on your relationship. This screaming match, in particular, had begun just like any other. 

He was drunk and high off his ass, and you were begging him that this was the last time he would do this. He began to scream out that this kept him grounded, getting high made him feel normal and better and amazing. He said that being high made him feel better than you had ever made him feel. As you began to cry, he kept throwing out words that felt like punches to your gut. And then he finally said it. The one thing that had scarred you in your past, and he was using it to get at you. 

“Maybe you were the reason your mother left you.”

After that, he walked out of your room, leaving you on the floor, chocking on your sobs.You had called Camille over, and as she rocked you back and forth you came up with a decision. This was the last time. This was the last time Rafe was going to use you as he had in the past three months.

The following day you went to the Cameron residence. Rafe met you at the door, and when he leaned down to give you a hug, you stepped back. 

Rafe frowned. Normally, you wouldn’t even expect an apology for what he had done and hugged him back.

“We need to talk,” you told him.

He nodded. “Okay. What about?”

You sighed through your nostrils, closing your eyes for a small second. “About last night.”

Rafe’s frown deepened. You had never wanted to talk about his episodes before. You had always ignored them and moved on. You had ever since he had shut you down the first time you had brought them up. 

Tears were prickling your eyes because you still loved him after everything he had done. But you had realized that you loved yourself more. 

“I can’t keep doing this, Rafe,” you spoke out, your voice breaky. “I can’t keep helping you and ignoring the pain that it brings me.”

Rafe shook his head, not believing that this was happening. “No, don’t say that.”

“How do you want me not to say that?” you belted out. “I’ve been exerting myself every day and every night to help you through all of your issues. And I’ve had to go through your screaming at me and taking drugs and making me worry. And I’m done.”

Rafe kept on shaking his head, tears falling down his cheeks. “No, baby, please. I love you. I’ll change, I promise.”

You scoffed. “That’s what you always say.”

“But I do. I love you. And I know I can change. Just give me a chance.”

You shook your head and sighed. The tears that had fallen down your cheek were now trailing down your neck. Rafe moved forward to wipe them, but you stepped back. “I know, Rafe. I love you too, but that doesn’t mean we’re made for each other.”

Rafe remained quiet, the hand that had attempted to reach out to you still extended in the air. 

“And even if I love you, Rafe, I need to protect myself. You’ve brought me a lot of pain.”

Rafe tried to make things better. “Y/N, baby, I swear I’ll make it better. I’ll get off the coke and I’ll talk things out with my dad.”

You just shook your head. “I’m sorry.”

You turned away, your back facing everything you had once wanted. 

“So that’s it?” he called out, desperately wanting you to look at him again. “Everything we went through down the drain.”

You continued to walk away. 

Here's to

Good people, good nights

Good highs, good health

Some tears, some stress

But I count my blessings

Here's to

Good music, great sex

Little time to feel alive

Little time to get it right

You hopped out of the shower and dried yourself off. 

Camille had picked an outfit that was perfect. It made you look great and it was really comfortable. 

You let your mind drift off as she did your hair and makeup. You didn’t really mind whatever she did. 

You both hopped into the car, Camille behind the wheel and you in the passenger’s seat. You placed your bag at your feet and stuffed a vodka bottle inside. Once you stopped at the house where the party was already in full swing, you gave Camille the bag and she passed you the keys. You were not about to get drunk when still grieving from a breakup. 

Walking in, you scanned the room. The couches were all covered in bedsheets and pushed into the walls. The porch was littered with drunk teenagers, some talking, some dancing, some throwing up and some grinding on each other. 

Camille grabbed onto your hand and pulled you through the house. You finally ended in the kitchen where your other friends stood. 

“Y/N,” Abigail screamed when she saw you. Ruby and Annabeth turned towards you, hugging you tightly. “We thought it would be another month before we saw you!”

You laughed and joked around with them. “No, Camille managed to pull me out of bed. But I’m glad I came. I’ve missed you, guys!”

With that, shots were poured from the vodka that was in your bag into four glasses, which they all drank quickly, begging you to join them. You simply denied their advances and stated that you were going to rive them home. This shut them up (you knew they always went to parties with no drives back to their places, so you knew this would keep them quiet).

After two more shot rounds your friends dragged you to the dance floor, where music was playing loudly and made your heart thump with its rhythm. 

You felt eyes upon you but tried to shake that feeling off. Not being able to do so, you looked around for who might be looking at you but didn't realize who it could be. 

Rafe had turned away from you when he had noticed your search. He hadn’t been able to take his eyes off of you. 

He thought you looked amazing, and his heart clenched at not being able to wrap his arm around your waist. 

The break up had been hard on him. But he was determined to keep the promise he had made you. He had stopped doing coke the day you walked away. He had talked to his father the day you had walked away. And he had headed out to parties he didn’t want to go to in hopes of bumping into you. 

He wanted to be better for you. He didn’t want to be the source of your pain as you had stated he had been. He didn’t want to be damaging you more than helping you. But that had been exactly what he had done. He had broken you down and hurt you more than he wanted to admit. 

You looked better without him. He knew that for sure. There was a smile on your face as you jokingly threw it back on Camille - a smile that hadn’t been there with him for the last months of the relationship. A smile that he hadn’t witnessed in moths. A smile that lit up the room where you were standing, with a loght so blinding that it made his heart clench. 

How could he have let himself go as far as he did? As far as to push you away from him?

Rafe stood from the couch, his desire to be closer to you consuming him. However, he stepped further away from you towards a spot on the porch that was empty. A spot where he could think in peace and fall into his own self-pity. 

You, on the other hand, hadn´t even thought of Rafe. You were so busy dancing and having fun with your friends that there was nothing else in your mind at the moment. 

Camille had left you with Ruby, Annabeth, and Abigail as she had gone off into a room with Austin, but they were slowly branching off from you as they searched for their preys of the night. Deciding not to get involved with any boys (you did not want to have a rebound), you headed towards the kitchen to get a cup of water. Then, you turned towards the porch, where it would be less stuffy and easier to breathe.

Walking out, you tried to find a spot that was empty or kind of isolated. After two full circles around the porch you decided to stop next to a guy that seemed familiar to you, but you couldn’t recognize because his back was all you could see. However, looking down at his polo shirt you knew exactly who was in front of you. Rafe. 

You tried to silently walk by him, but just as you placed your foot down to walk away, he sighed and turned towards you. His eyes widened to almost twice their size, and you were sure your eyes looked the same. 

“Um, h-hey,” you spoke out, trying to be polite. You cleared your throat, as it suddenly felt even dryer than it was back inside while you were dancing. 

“Hey,” Rafe said softly, not believing that you were actually talking to him. He nervously put his hands in his pockets (a habit you knew all too well) before asking, “How are you?”

You stepped closer to the railing and brought your cup up to your lips. Then you placed your arms on top of the railing of the porch and looked out towards the water that surrounded the house. 

“I’m good,” you answered, lying. In all honesty, your heart was racing in your chest and your hands were so sweaty you could feel the cup you held slipping from your hands. “What about you?”

“Oh, I’m good, I guess,” he spoke out. He wasn’t expecting you to stand next to him at all. In fact, he was almost certain that you were going to try to escape from him as soon as he responded to your greeting. 

You both fell silent, not really knowing what to say. When had your relationship turned you into this? Into strangers?

Before, even when things were bad, there would always be some form of communication flowing between both of you. Wether it was a soft whisper, small talk, screams, or moans, you were never quiet around each other. So, feeling awkward and wanting you to know how much he had improved recently, Rafe said, “Um, I wanted you to know that I stopped dealing coke. And doing it, as well.”

You turned towards the blond you knew so well. A smile adorned your lips as you felt proud of him. “Really? When did that happen?”

Rafe felt weird talking about this around you. Wiping his hands on his pants, the only reason he could think as to why he had stopped was you.

“The day after we broke up.”

Silence fell over you once again before you said, “I’m proud of you. And happy for you.”

Rafe nodded, looking down at his hands. His thumbs were twidling around each other. Next to him, your fingers gripped onto your cup, as to avoid any fidgeting. 

“Thanks,” the green-eyed boy said truthfully. “I also spoke to my dad.”

You almost gasped in surprise. “When? How did it go?”

Rafe turned towards you and was surprised to find that you were already looking at him. He stared into your eyes, getting lost in their depths, and turned forward once again. 

“The same day I stopped doing coke. And it went well - or as well as it could go. But we dealt with everything that had to be dealt with.”

Now your smile was consuming your features. You were afraid to do so, but you softly took his hand in yours and gave it a light squeeze. Then you let him go. 

“I told you things would get better if you spoke to him.”

Rafe nodded. He always knew that you were right, but his fear had kept him from doing all of those things you used to beg him to do. But then, after his biggest fear came true (which was losing you), he pushed his temors aside. He would do anything to make you happy, even if you were not with him. 

Clearing his throat, Rafe said, “So, what’s going on with you? How’s life?”

You knew you had to lie. You were not about to admit that you had spent two months locked in your room because of the fear of seeing him. You tried to rake your brain as to think about what to say. 

“I haven’t been up to much, honestly,” you began. That wasn’t a lie. “I’ve mainly been hanging with the girls and just going to the beach and stuff.”

That was a lie. But he didn't need to know that. Instead, you asked him, “What about you? I’ve heard you’ve turned into a party boy.”

Rafe laughed, noticing the teasing tone of your voice. 

“Ugh, please don’t remind me. Most of them sucked.”

You furrowed your brows. You had thought he had been going to parties to have fun, but it seemed as if that hadn’t happened. 

“Why did you keep going to them if they sucked?”

Rafe breathed in and held the air inside his chest. This was the opportunity to steer yur conversation towards your relationship. 

“I was hoping I would run into you,” he admitted. Rafe was afraid to see your reaction so he turned away from you. Instead, you whipped around towards him, trying to see if there was sincerity behind his eyes. 

“Oh,” you replied bluntly and stupidly. You cleared your throat and stood a little straighter, akward again. 

Rafe sighed before deciding that this was probably going to be his only chance to truly speak to you. And he was sure if this conversation ended, he would never get a chance like this one again. 

“Look, Y/N,” he began. “I kept my promise. The one I made when you were walking away. And I’m actually trying to keep it.”

He paused, taking your hand in his. You turned to him again, staring straight into his eyes. “I know I fucked up big time. And that I hurt you. But I’m trying to be better for you. Like really trying.”

You weren’t pulling away from him, but you weren’t showing any emotions either. He tok your other hand in his, standing straighter above you. 

“And I know that maybe we aren’t meant to be like you said, but when we were together it felt right. It felt good. It was amazing. And I miss that. I want that back.”

You were slighty shaking your head as tears began to gather at the corners of your eyes. 

“So I don’t really care if we are or aren’t meant to be because I want to be with you. And maybe if we grow together we will eventually be meant to be. I want to try to be meant to be with you.”

You were shocked and weren’t responding. Rafe took this as a bad sign and let go of your hands. 

“I’m sorry,” he said, taking a step back from you. “I just wanted you to know that.”

As he began to walk away you realized that this was the kind of reassurance you needed from him. He loved you enough to let you go. He loved you enough to make himself better for you. He loved you enough to be the best version of himself as possible. But now he was walking away because he thought you didn’t want him anymore. But you did.

“Rafe!” you called out. “Rafe, wait!”

Walking towards him, you wrapped your arms around him. You hugged for what felt like an eternity. The music was thumping around you and kids were making out with each other but you and Rafe felt like it was only you right now. 

“Rafe,” you said. Your hands were on his face as you pushed a little away from him, staring into his eyes. “I love you. And I’m willing to be with you if you are willing to be the best version of yourself.”

He nodded vigorously. 

“No, Rafe, listen to me before you agree,” you laughed. “I know that the best version of yourself, the one you were before you turned eighteen, is the person that is meant to be with me.”

Rafe nodded vigorously again. 

“I need you to try and find him.”

“I’m him when I’m with you.”

You smiled at him. You could see a future with this Rafe. The Rafe that was clean and that had a good relationship with his father and that was collected and calm. You knew that this didn't mean that being back together with him wasn’t going to be easy, as he would always have this part of his past, but it was definitely going to be better. It was going to be better than if it was with anyone else. 

You leaned forward and kissed him, feeling his lips respond against yours. You pulled away and smiled at the man in front of you. He was everything you wanted and more. And he was trying his best for you. And that was all that mattered. 

[clumsyclifford]

bella I would love a directors cut on literally any of the rilex you’ve written, but specifically it’s always her, and you, and me, or for these days you’ve been stuck in my brain 💙

OHHHHHH those are some CHOICESSSSSS lucy. fuck yeah. let’s get into it. ill link them both here but we’ll take em one at a time

it’s always her, and me, you

these days you’ve been stuck in my brain

here’s a cut for convenience cos i KNOW i’m gonna go long here.

okay! let’s start with the rilisex fic.

it’s always her, and me, and you

so like it says in the ao3 notes, this fic came from realizing just how frequently rian and alex kiss each other like, all the time? just? casually? for funsies? this was another one of those situations like i mentioned where the hook aka first line (“Rian's no expert, but he doesn't think normal friends kiss this much.”) just appeared in my head and i was like heyyy that’s a GOOD first line. i have to build from that line. that’s the hook, that’s the summary, that’s the core. 

something i discovered upon searching through the editing history of the doc: i had originally sort of intended to go a direction with this where in some other circumstance, rian would see alex giving jack a super casual friendly kiss and he’d get all sad/jealous and be like sure why SHOULDNT alex kiss jack after all its just a thing he does with his FRIENDS. but the fic ended up going a different way and honestly? im glad. i like this way better.

the role of singin in the rain in this fic actually has a HILARIOUS backstory because the night i originally wrote that conversation in the tour bus kitchen, i went into the club and said the following

and then. the next day. rian streamed with ricky, and i asked if he’d ever seen singin in the rain, and he ANSWERED ME and said he hadn’t. so first of all i had already written the scene and i then had to rewrite it to make it so rian wouldn’t have seen it but also!!! i literally asked rian fucking dawson if he’d seen a movie for the sole reason of using that information for fanfiction!!!! and he provided me with the information i needed!!!! whole thing is just fucking hysterical to me. ANYWAY.

ANYWAY, the other reason why sitr has such a big role in the fic is because megs and i watched the movie together while i was in the middle of working on the fic, so it was extremely fresh in my mind. in fact i can probably show you this: i had this comment left for myself when i was kind of trying to figure out if i could make a real metaphor of sorts with the sitr ot3 and the Big Three of this fic. some of this ended up in rian’s wild musings in the hotel scene but i did conclude that it wouldn’t really have worked and that was definitely true but anyway. fuck it, director’s cut, here’s the kind of shit i leave for myself to refer to

so that’s part of the reason why it became such a puzzle piece of this fic, but real talk, it’s also just because i love singin in the rain it’s one of my favorite movies lmao

briefly gonna also touch on lisa and why she’s in this fic because i realize that rian/alex/lisa is an interesting approach to rilex! first of all, i love lisa. i love alex and lisa. and it occurred to me that there was really no reason to split lisex up just to make rilex happen. plus there’s this tweet that really just pushed me over the edge of being like yeah, rilisex is extremely plausible. so that’s that on that.

as for the scene in the hotel room while they’re watching sitr, there is a small piece of that scene - from when alex starts kissing rian’s shoulders etc to “it would defy the laws of nature not to” - that i actually wrote before anything else in that scene. that small piece got stretched out and edited quite a bit from how it started but it did function as a sort of foundation around which i built the rest of the scene, because that small section sort of ~came to me~ absolutely out of nowhere, and i really liked the Vibe it had and i wanted to include it. i THINK that was the only piece of this fic that i wrote Out Of Order - for the most part this was written chronologically.

ALSO!!! omg this is exciting, this fic actually has a deleted scene!!!!!! i hate cutting scenes but i also hate having scenes that are less than 1k and this one didn’t really contribute much to the fic. i can probably share it here right? sure why not ! hopefully you can read this. it originally took place after the scene where alex and rian call lisa for the first time. the question of “what gets left into interview videos and what gets cut” is also just interesting to me as a (fic) concept in general so...eyes emoji, but here’s my mini-exploration that i cut from the original fic. enjoy lol it’s silly <3

oh! also one more thing!! the very final scene was included for two reasons. the first reason being that when i write getting-together fics, i really prefer to add on a scene After they Get Together because i love to write domestic established relationship stuff and i think that’s a satisfying reward for a reader who’s just slogged through all the mutual pining and bullshit to get the characters together. but the OTHER reason is that i got an anon (here it is!) and i read that ask and was immediately like well shit. now i have to fucking include this. for the anon and for myself. so you can thank that anon for that last scene. (also i wanted to include merrikat especially since i had to cut their little moment in the interview scene above.)

so....................whew. i think i’ve bled that fic dry. holy shit that’s a lot of Stuff. OKAY! let’s move on.

~

these days you’ve been stuck in my brain

so!!! THIS fic was the breakthrough after (what felt like) a long bout of writer’s block. long for me was maybe two weeks, but i am the kind of person who is always writing, and two weeks was a long time to go with little to no inspiration/motivation to write anything. i had also been in a weird narrative headspace because i’d been binge-watching disney shows (jessie > austin and ally > girl meets world) and i don’t know how well i can explain this but the way those shows are written is a lot snappier and cares way less for realistic and consistent character development or plots or relationships, and so i was stuck between caring a lot about including those things in my fics but also being unable to conceptualize them in writing because my brain was in Disney Writing Mode. does that make sense? this is rhetorical so let’s go with yes. so anyway. i was in a slump

actually what i ended up doing was basically googling something like “au prompts tumblr” or something and just scrolling through posts. i saw something about soulmate telepathy and i actually tried to write something totally different before i wrote this one, but the first attempt was a different concept and then the direction i took it was like......it wasn’t quite right and i realized that i was kind of writing dark disney style? there is really no way for me to explain what i mean by that because it seems really obvious to me but that’s just because i’m inside my own head so just take my word. 

anyway. attempt #1 of soulmate telepathy rilex went poorly, and this fic was attempt #2. i kinda took the soulmate telepathy thing and changed it as i saw fit and i also went back to skim helen’s telepathy fic because obviously she’s the pro and then i tried not to steal her ideas. and as i was writing it i kinda realized i was doing the whole quirky funny best friend character with jack and also doing the whole “somehow this not-very-dramatic situation with teenagers is treated as The Most Dramatic Thing Ever and that’s totally normal and nobody finds it strange” disney trope with rian and alex being soulmates and i was like (deep sigh) i have to accept that no matter how much i try to fight this, this fic is going to be tainted with disney. and that’s life

on top of that i will add that the real-life rilex were extremely inspiring during the two-day period during which i wrote this fic, because that was when the once in a lifetime video came out and in the brief pre-video livestream rilex were Beyond Married and that definitely helped in the writing of fic rilex!

hmmmm what can i tell you about this fic itself.................honestly, i don’t think there’s much to tell! rian is a band kid because in real life rian was a band kid and he’s staff manager at rita’s just like he was in real life. there is truthfully not a lot to unpack here that i can think of!

oh here’s something i guess: rian and alex go on a date in this fic! that is because watching So Much Disney made me realize that i often forget the fact that people just. go on dates. sometimes. look i clearly do not have an active romantic life but i also really liked the idea of alex and rian going on a date despite not knowing if they’d be soulmates or not and liking each other organically just by getting to know each other, rather than being victim to the whole soulmate thing. like i wanted them to build a connection so that they would want to be soulmates. and then the audience would want that for them too. stakes!! very important.

i can tell you i had a mild crisis over the title of the fic because i am not a fan of the word brain and i didnt wanna use that sticky lyric for the title when it had a word i hated but it was objectively a much better title option than the other one i had, which was “sticky just like the song in my head” but i obviously decided on the former and it has not upset me nearly as much as i expected it to so that was the right decision imo

so! i think that’s all on that! sorry (?) that it got so long although then again i don’t know what’s to be expected in a director’s cut for two long fics but thank you for asking me about these, i love them both so very much rilex is so supremely underrated but so very important

[cooloddball]

DESTIEL AND COCKLES RANT

THIS IS A RANT ON ALL THINGS DESTIEL AND COCKLES

PS. I do not know how to make gifs and or use photos yet so feel free to add yours

I have said this before and I will say it again. I have been in this fandom for a month and I ship Destiel and Cockles anyone who has a problem with this then move along and/or if you are an anti and read this, keep your hateful comments to yourself.

That being said, I have read about almost all ships in the fandom but mostly Destiel, Cockles, Wincest, and J2. Through all the reading and discovery, I still have to say I ship Cockles and Destiel more than ever before. However, I have seen some things from the antis that did not sit well with me.

This is going to be a long post so brace yourself and it is mostly about the hate the antis (anti-cockles, anti-wives , and anti-Destiel Shippers spread). Also this is a rant so don’t mind me,

ON DESTIEL

The hate on Destiel is massive. Mostly this is from Bronlies who hate Cas like he is the anti-Christ, and the Wincest shippers.

Now I am not trying to rain on anyone’s parade but come on. Cas is Dean’s best friend. Whether you ship them romantically or not, it is canon that Cas Dean’s best friend. We have seen time and again how miserable Dean is every time Cas dies. Dea has also expressly stated that Cas is his best friend and even said they are better together; all three of them including Sam. He has called him his family. So why the hate? Chuck himself has said that he has rebuilt Cas more times than anyone.

Now, people who believe that it is better to ship Sam and Dean who are literally blood brother but it is not okay to ship Dean and Cas what is wrong with you? Is it okay for someone to fuck their brother and/or be in love with them? I mean come on.

Before I was even a shipper, I always looked forward to episodes that Cas was in. He brought a different dynamic to the show in a positive way. Yes, I love the brothers but Cas is just deifferent and all the sass he brings makes the show, at least to me 10 times better. Sue me.

People saying that JA would never be comfortable with Destine because he is a Christian. I mean, he can call Chuck a dick, call angels dicks, make deals with demons and all other unchristian things but kissing another man is where he draws the line? If he was such a Christian, why does he let another man straddle him on stage or want to kill God?

Someone once said that JA supports wincest. I saw the video and I get what he said is that whatever floats your boat or something like that. So why is it so hard for him when it comes to Destiel? I don’t understand this man. He is a paradox.

 ON COCKLES

I have seen antis, mostly those who ship J2 throw shade at MC saying that JA doesn’t like him, he just tolerates him and everything they do is for PR. I have not once seen anyone say that JP doesn’t like MC. You know why? I believe they view MC as a threat to their J2 ship.

So I stumbledupon this antis blog who had a whole analysis (much like am doing here) on why JA cannot be a couple. Here are some that I remember from the top of my head:

1.     That JA said that he thinks Matt Bomer is attractive.

2.     That JA moved to Austin to be live next to JP.

3.     That JA and MC have nothing in common being that JA plays golf and sings etc and that MC does woodwork, writes poetry and bicycle touring.

4.     That JA is with JP hence no. 2.

5.     That JA does not curse on stage but MC does.

6.     That MC does not take acting seriously but JA does.

Now now now. This beats logic. All the above things I beg to differ with not because I am cockles shipper but it is just common sense.

Being with someone or rather being in love with someone does not mean any of the above things have to be true. Hear me out.

1.     On finding Matt Bomer attractive. I have many celebrity crushes, there are also ordinary people that I find attractive. But then again, I have a boyfriend, who I am in love with; I have been with for six years. But he looks nothing like my celebrity crushes or the ordinary people I find attractive. Does that mean I am not in love with him? No. It means I have eyes and I can appreciate beauty and have a few fantasies but I chose to be with him because I love him. He also has other people he finds attractive that look nothing like me, does that mean he does not love me? I mean come on.

 Oh the most hilarious thing is that the anti said you cannot compare Matt to MC since Matt is way attractive. I mean come on; they may not look alike but they both have dark hair, blue eyes. Seriously people! And MC is so handsome and adorable at the same time. Sometimes I feel like he looks better than JA and JP. Sue me.

 2.     On JA moving to Austin. Lol. This means that he went to live next to his best friend. I mean come on. I have moved to live next to my best friend (bff) who is married. Does that mean I am in love with her? Hell no! But I feel safer knowing that she is there for me.

Also people need to understand, MC and JA could be involved romantically or not (pick your poison) but you don’t need to be next to your lover to love them or be in a relationship with them. Lond distance relationships anyone? They have families and kids and other priorities. Just because you are in a relationship with someone does not necessarily mean you live together or evn in the same area. Distance makes the heart grow fonder and also they are where they are now because of other priorities in their lives. So, living together or in the same town doesn’t make you more or less in love.

3.     On the issue of common interests. This made me laugh so hard. I mean comeon, People who are together do not need to share any interests. The diversity of their interests is probably what attracted them to each other. Also how can you say a poet and a singer have nothing in common? They are artists. MC can write poems that JA can sing. Oh also remember that video MC’s friend DM posted on Twitter where they did the whole bicycle touring in Germany? Uh huh? JA seemed to be interested in that a lot. So..

4.     I could say a lot about JA being with Jp. This J2 being married and their wives being beards is the weirdest thing I have ever seen. Seriously, J2 tinhats have gone ahead to hate of D’s posts and call her names. Telling her to stop pretending that she is JA. It is laughable and not in a nice way, really. Can they just stop? Before I became a cockles shipper I watched J2 videos where they interact be it cons, red carpet moments or even gag reels. It is just different. All I see are two bros; one that is really playful like a little puppy and the other one trying to be the big brother. As for JA and MC, it is different, there are things that JA is comfortable when Mc does that he is not comfortable when JP does them. Neck kisses for a start.

Also most of the J2 tinhats evidence about J2 being real is rarely backed up by visual evidence and if there is any, it is usually from years ago. I am not hating on antis, just stating facts.

5.     I mean, cursing on stage really? I curse all the time my bf doesn’t. Does that mean he doesn’t like me or love me? Hell to the Fucking No! Suck it!

6.     On Mc not taking acting seriously. Yeah I can guess why he doesn’t. It is not his only priority unlike JA who has chosen it as a career path. From what I have seen, MC’s priorities include making the world a better place through charities, politics, and oh, he is also a writer. Oh so forgive him if he is not obsessed with acting. Besides JA says that he likes how he acts as Cas because it is not like anything he has seen from other guest stars that have come on the show. I mean not being serious about something does not mean that you are not good at it. Would he have lasted 11 seasons if he was not good at what he does?

There was also hate that JA is only around MC for PR and he actually hates him. There were some photos and gifs so the apparent hate. So, if he cannot stand him, why is there so much evidence of JA going to MC to give some love, Neck kisses, intimate IG posts, face caresses, ass smacks, calling him his baby dadfy, heart eyes, even when they don’t know that they are being filmed?

Also why is it during the Vegascon 2020 all JA did was bring up MC unnecessarily even when no one, absolutely nobody asked him to. Come on! stop the bs and admit that Cockles is the realest ship in the history of ships!!

ON THE WIVES

I swear bitches be crazy. How can you just hat someone for literally nothing? This is mostly from J2 tinhats at other J2 stans who do not ship J2 together romantically. I mean…comeon. You do not need to be a stan for the wives just because they are married to J2 but please stop with the madness.

I recently saw someone comment on various JA posts on IG asking why he is lying to the fans that he is with D when he is with JP. So many rude things have been said about the wives especially D that it breaks my heart.

Seiously? People have gone ahead even to say that she is with JA’s friend SC and that the twins are not JA’s they are SC’s since D and SC are ‘always’ hanging out together. My question is, so D is not supposed to hang out with their friends? And for Chuck’s sake, everyone can see that the twins especially the boy (idk their names, sorry) looks like JA’s twin. I mean come on people.

I believe that they hate D because she says how much she loves MC and that Cas is her favorite character and that they are also bitter that JA chose her and not them. Just my opinion, but what do I know. On JP and G. I don’t know much about them mostly because I do not follow either of them of IG or elsewhere but I have seen hate on G as well.

The antis have gone ahead to say that when JA said that he was hanging out with SC writing songs, that he was lying and that nothing was happening he was just trying to dampen the rumours. I wonder how they felt when the album by JA and Sc came out last year. Jokes on you haters. Bitches be crazy fr.

Oh, the antis also say that the same way JA looks at his wife is the same way he looks at MC. With contempt. I mean talk about hanging yourself with your own rope. What they are saying is, JA feels about his wife the same way he feels abouts MC. Aww! That is true love bitches.

If JA actually cannot stand MC, shouldn’t he have gotten him fired from the show or at least make sure he gets less screen time and that they don’t have any panels together being that JA is the star of the show and all. I mean Mark left and he was a major character to the plot so...

Also why would JA give and buy MC clothes if he hates him? Give him a ring, a bracelet? Huh? Explain it to me.

Oh, some anti also said that before every Cockles panel at JIBCON JA cries and has to be forced on stage by Daniella and JP has to give him a hug and that’s why he drinks a lot of apple juice. LOL. WTF? What do you say to such people. I cannot even..My question is, are we talking about the same Cockles panels that I have seen? Then JA deserves all the Oscars and Tony Awards for his impeccable acting skills when he is around MC. Must really hate him. *wink*

MY TWO CENTS ON COCKLES

I know JA gives off mixed actions about MC. But I think it is to confuse people like us, shippers.  He does’t want to too out there so he tries so hard to be mean with his words. But his actions tell a different story. I mean, who gets a boner when their friend straddles them on stage and then goes ahead to post that chest to chest selfie on IG. That is the gayest thing I have ever seen.

Sharing clothes? I mean friends do share clothes but if it is like a daily thing. More than 20 articles of clothing exchanged between each other on various occasions even when they are apart does not make sense to me. And to make matters worse, JA does not deny it. One even had a tag on it. Lol. We are not children, we can see what is going on.

The 2014 DallasCon – Rob’s Birthday Party. WTF? Was all that between JA and MC? Why did he he swallow and react like that when he saw MC’s bare abdomen? Who does that? Also the looks when MC was leaving the stage. Come on.

Also what was up with the” I love you from the bottom of my heart” at the MTV top 10 in 2010.

The wife is my rock but I am glad to have some pebbles in my life.

Truth is, JA could post a video of him balls deep in MC and the antis could say that somehow MC manipulated JA to post it for PR.

People need to leave MC alone, he ie a human being who has made mistakes, JA and JP have too and I don’t see the antis hating on them. The double Standard s FOH.

I could write about this forever but the truth is JA loves MC, and D and V know that they love each other. All their friends know including JP and other castmates. I believe they know it is more than just friends and the antis can’t stand it because they also know it to be true.

JA LOVES MC. JP LOVES MC. J2M LOVE EACH OTHER. J2 LOVE THEIR WIVES. STOP THE HATE!!

I am not done but I am done for now. I could be here forever writing about this if I do not stop.