#and its about ranch fucking dressing

[simplydnp]

the only way dan can explain how ranch tastes and why it works is by sharing how he feels about he and phil's life together: meant to be

[imaginedanvrs]

atonement

masterlist

camp counselor!wanda x reader

word count: 6k

warnings: homophobia and homophobic slurs, conversion therapy, manipulation, gaslighting, references to drug use, unhealthy power dynamics (so rape), noncon to dubcon, cunnilingus, degrading, fingering, nipple play, size kink, general mean Wanda

a/n: me? posting blasphemous content on Easter Sunday? I would never

It looked harmless enough. You weren’t sure what you had been anticipating, mostly because you had been trying to keep your mind off of the unavoidable destination, but it certainly wasn’t the depressing place you had expected. No, they were smart enough to keep that reality away from the parents that dropped their ‘troubled’ children off. If anything, it looked like the kind of summer camp that a lot of your friends would be enjoying about that time. 

  There wasn’t a church for one thing. In its place was what appeared to be a ranch style house that had kept its traditional family features such as the pair of rocking chairs on the porch and the maintained flowerbed around the borders. On either side of the building, closing in the driveway, were several other intimate buildings that created the impression of a community style living. They were all decorated with various posters about god’s love and acceptance that you guessed you were going to be hearing a lot about during your stay. 

  Your mother got out of the car first as a man who looked like he was still being dressed by his own mum jogged over from the main house to greet you both. You clenched your grip on your bag strap before deciding to face the music and follow her lead, still examining the area sceptically as your mother and the man introduced themselves. Your mother failed to deliver the same excitement the blonde did, but she attempted to force it nonetheless while your hosts laughed easily at something she had said.

  You weren’t listening to either of them as you retrieved your other bag from the boot of the car, not expecting the man to walk around the other side to greet you. “Y/n!” He said like you were an old friend. “I’m Reverend Vision but you can call me Rev Vis.” You most certainly weren’t going to be doing that. “We’re so happy to have you here, let me give you the grand tour of our home,” he beckoned. You trailed behind them.

  “Do you live on site?” Your mother asked.

  “Oh yes, me and the Mrs. We love our work,” he drowned on and began guiding you through the various rooms of the two buildings either side of his house. The more you learnt about the place, the more you began to dread your stay. There were ‘entertainment’ rooms that were filled with musical instruments and religious books and music. A canteen area fueled by the kitchen in which all of the students were to prepare every meal. A prayer room that was deserted at that time. Finally, the dorms. 

  Vision wasted no time in searching through your bags for anything that could “interfere with your journey” and came up empty handed, much to his well hidden disappointment. Your mother didn’t seem to notice it, too focused on the contents that came out of your bag, but you saw the flicker of his brow when he declared you were all good and began explaining the long lists of rules that you had no intention of memorising. 

  “And we do not allow any kind of sexual acts, with yourself or others,” he said lightly. Your mother shifted uncomfortably and you nodded. You had no intention of being caught by him with your hands down your pants when he did his checks during the night. You didn’t anticipate being there long because you were fully prepared to fake your conversion to heterosexuality. How hard could it be? Besides, you dreaded to think how much your parents were paying the capm under the illusion that they could somehow change you. You had to find it humorous, otherwise it would really fucking hurt. 

  It still did when you watched your family car disappear past the camp gates and into the dense tree line. You sighed, resting your head gently against the cool glass of your window and took in the camp in its entirety. It was a waste of beautiful land, you concluded as you examined where the large field met the changing trees. There were a couple guys in the camp uniform playing football on the grass while a cluster of girls sat to the side cheering them on. Apparently you had caught the end of the game, because Vision appeared on the edge of the grass and called them back inside, most likely to prepare for dinner. 

  “Y/n,” a voice behind you called. You spun around at the unexpected caller just as she opened her arms and enveloped you in a tight hug that took you wholly by surprise. 

 “Hi?” You greeted as a question, making the older woman chuckle as she held you before pulling away and keeping her soft hands on your arms as she took you in and allowed you to do the same. Holy fuck she was beautiful. Her striking emerald eyes bore straight through your own and somehow had the ability to make you feel entirely exposed, as though it would be futile to ever conceal anything from her, including your undeniable attraction to her. In contrast, her smile was soft and polite as she gazed at you in a friendly fondness you would with someone you haven't seen in a long time. There was something noticeably comforting in it and the way she carried an entirely put together personar that you wanted a peek beneath. Metaphorically of course… but also literally. 

  “I’m Wanda, Vision’s wife.” Rev Vis was punching way above his weight. This woman’s voice was even hot. Maybe pretending to be straight would be harder than you thought. 

  “Nice to meet you,” you smiled and glanced away awkwardly, finding her impossible to maintain eye contact with. She didn’t seem to care as she hooked her finger under your chin and turned your head to keep your attention on her. 

  “I have every faith you’re going to do so well here, sweetheart,” she told you fondly then dropped her hand and took a respectful step back. Right, gotta leave room for jesus. “Your roommate will be back soon then you too should head down for supper,” she instructed as she headed for the door.

  “Okay,” you nodded and pretended to unpack your bags. 

  “See you later, honey,” she said before disappearing. You exhaled a breath you didn’t realise you had been holding and collapsed onto your bed. 

*

Your first day dragged by painstakingly slowly. Between meals, you attended bible study taught by Vision who gave you his extra attention as it was your first time there. He asked you to compare your own relationship with god to that which he was teaching, expecting an answer in front of all the other students who had been through the same ordeal and spotted your lies as well as Vision did. Apparently everyone did the same when they started at the camp. 

  You had kitchen duty in the morning and garden duty in the afternoon (which was probably the least crap one) before you had to sit down for what felt like hours to listen to Vision sing about god on a guitar he didn’t know how to tune properly. During every interaction you had with him, all you could think about was how he had ended up with a woman like Wanda. Had they been high school sweethearts? Had their parents pushed them together? Did he have some kind of twisted blackmail over her? They were the only three explanations that made any sense to you but you weren’t about to ask any of the other students for their input. 

  As it turned out, your daily routine was also going to include a one on one session with the older woman which should have been something to act as a silver lining in your stay, but it was the most challenging aspect of all. 

  “When did your desire for women begin?” She asked after some small talk.

  “I’m not sure,” you lied in an effort to buy yourself some time to think of a good response. She smiled at you softly.

  “You can lie to me, but you can’t lie to god,” she informed lightly. 

  “A couple years ago,” you replied honestly. This seemed to please her. 

  “And how did it manifest?” She sounded genuinely curious to know, lulling you into being unexpectedly open with her. It wasn’t as though you had anyone else to talk about that stuff with. 

  “There was a girl in my class that I thought was pretty,” you told her as you recalled your first real crush. “I felt more when she smiled at me than I did when I kissed a boy.” Wanda smiled as though she could see the purity of your memory as well as you could. Except to her, it wasn’t so innocent. 

  “The devil likes to work his way into places we could never expect,” she told you and your smile dropped. “Especially when we’re naive,” she added. It sounded as though she didn’t hold anything against you and she wholly believed you had been seduced by the devil himself and that it was impossible for there to be any other explanation. 

  “I was seventeen,” you reasoned. “I wasn’t naive.” Wanda liked the challenge you gave her. That whisper of a promised defiance gave her a thrill she knew to keep a cap unless she was required to use it. She would do anything for her beloved students to guide them back on the right path, especially one that wore the face of morality so well. 

  “And what do you mean by that?” Wanda enquired. 

  “I knew- I know what desire and attraction feel like,” you told her without looking her in those expectant eyes that unknowingly glimmered at your revelation. 

  “Lust,” Wanda said simply. “One of the hardest sins to resist when it affects one so physically.” 

  “Surely it can’t be bad if it’s natural,” you pointed out. That was not the response the brunette wanted to hear.

  “It is not natural,” Wanda said so quickly that she had to take a moment to recollect herself as you looked at her with shock as you took in that momentary crack in her exterior. It was interesting to watch and you wondered why it had hit a nerve. Surely you weren’t the only one to come into her office and state the fact. 

  “Y/n,” she called slowly. “If lust comes to you while you are here, you must come and tell me,” she told you seriously. Yeah, you definitely wouldn’t be doing that. You agreed obediently anyway. 

  “Good,” she smiled again. “Now, is there anyone you currently feel ungodly towards?” 

  “The same girl,” you admitted sheepishly. Yes, you had had a variety of other minor crushes in the past couple years, but she always managed to fill you with that teasing anxiety that never fully manifested when she said hi to you. 

  Wanda raised her brows indiscreetly. “I hope you will soon be able to give that same loyalty to god,” she said. You didn’t give her a response, unsure of what to say when you had no intention of doing such a thing. “In time,” she added when she saw your hesitation. 

  “Maybe,” you muttered, meeting her half way. “Won’t he love me regardless?” You painted the question with an air of innocence that anyone else would have fallen for. But Wanda saw beyond that and knew you used the faux front purely to challenge her again. She was impressed. 

  “Of course,” she told you gently. “Always.”

*

You thought you were being subtle with the way you kept glancing over at the couple. It was breakfast time so there was a general murmur of conversation that you didn’t feel particularly pressed to join in with. All it did was teach you to avoid sitting with the group you had found yourself with again because they seemed to be the only students there who were actively participating in the conversion with the belief it would ‘fix them’. You pitied them in a way, but not enough to interfere with their ramblings about their opposite sex celebrity crushes. 

  Wanda caught your eye on one of the many times you had peered over. Vision was talking to her but apparently she was as distracted from her company as you were, more fixed on returning your gaze. The corner of her lip twitched when you realised you’d been caught and you swiftly looked away to stare down at your cereal, actively keeping your wandering gaze on the other side of the room for the rest of the meal. 

*

“So what did you do to end up here?” A curly haired boy asked as he strolled into the kitchen you occupied alone. He was swinging a tea towel in his hands as he joined you and started on drying the washing up you had started. 

  “Got caught making out with the pastor’s daughter,” you said stoically.

  “You’re fucking with me,” he grinned and your composure cracked. 

  “Yeah, but it’s much cooler than the truth,” you told him honestly as he jumped up onto the counter. 

  “I’m sure it’s not that bad. My grandma walked in on me with my dick down my best friend’s ass,” he told you and you couldn’t stop the laugh that rose promptly. You grinned at the boy next to you in disbelief, thankful that your own luck wasn’t that bad. “Your turn,” he prompted. 

  “I told my best friend that I like girls. She told my parents,” you said humorously, as though it didn’t hurt like a bitch just to remember. 

  “I think I have better mates than you,” he concluded. You didn’t argue with that. “I’m James.”

  “Y/n,” you replied. “How long have you been here?”

  “Four months.”

  “What?” You splashed some water over the floor when your hand slipped in shock and James yelped when some drops hit him then started chuckling at the look you were giving him. 

  “What? Did you think it was only going to last a couple weeks?”

  “Kinda, yeah,” you muttered as you returned your attention to your chore. “Do you think you’ll be out soon?”

  “Nah, they know I’m bullshitting them. We all are, of course, but some of them can trick themselves into believing it, which is good enough for Vision.” 

  “Yeah, I know Wanda sees right through me,” you told him. “Which by the way, that makes no sense right?”

  “I reckon he’s holding her family captive,” James stated simply. You laughed with him easily, glad you had found someone like minded to you. “Hey, do you wanna get high?”

*

The nimble threads at the bottom of your uniformed cardigan were multiplying as your stay at the camp went by. Your fingers frequently found their way to them when you were uncomfortable, which was more often than not, and pulled at the finer threads until you unintentionally collected a small bundle in the palm of your hands that you had to hide. Vision never commented on it, but Wanda did, telling you that it represented your impulse to repress your femininity or some bullshit like that. 

  You left the threads alone and laced your hands together in your lap when she gave you a pointed look from her office chair and you muttered an apology. 

  “I’ve noticed you and James have become quite close,” she commented. “I must admit I was hoping you would find better company in some of the other students here. James doesn’t provide the best example to follow,” she told you. 

  “We’re just friends,” you shrugged, slightly irked that the older woman had a problem with the one refuge you had been able to find in the camp. 

  “Are you friends with anyone else here?” She questioned, not yet providing you the warm smile she offered every time you stepped into her office or saw her in general. She didn’t look happy that day. She looked troubled but you didn’t believe that was solely down to your decision to spend time with James. 

  “Not yet,” you told her even though you weren’t planning on expanding your social circle. Though if it was only two people it must be more of a line. Still, adding that unfulfilled optimism was meant to appease Wanda. You should have expected her to see it for what it really was. 

  “What do you and James talk about?” She wasn’t going to let it go.

  “Our lives, I guess,” you shrugged. 

  “Your experiences,” Wanda said for you. You knew there was no point in denying that when your glance towards her told her all she needed to know. 

  “Sometimes.” 

  “You should only discuss those topics with myself or Vision, otherwise you may end up having those experiences affirmed and encouraged,” she explained pointedly. You nodded uncomfortably as your fingers found their ways to your threads again only to snap back in place when you felt Wanda’s eyes momentarily burn into you. Something was very different with her. “So tell me what you discussed,” she pushed. 

  “I told him how much I dislike kissing boys,” you told her matter of factly as you tried to suppress your rising irritation. Maybe it was her job, but you hated her need to know everything you and James did. 

  “And you want to kiss girls instead?”

  “I want to do a lot of things with them,” you laid on the innocence thick, playing your role as the good christian who was simply admitting to how she had been led astray and just wanted to atone for her sins. As always, Wanda saw through your facade though that time it made her tick. You knew exactly what you were doing, you just had no idea the effect it was having on the older woman. You had no idea that your insistence on pretending to be good while knowing you were bad stirred something in her that she wasn’t supposed to feel. You were pushing those sinful desires that had infiltrated your mind right into her own and she wouldn’t allow it. 

  “That’s all for today,” she declared without giving a response to your statement. It hadn’t even been your full session time, maybe more like half of it. 

  “Okay,” you said slowly as you stood up. 

  “I suggest you spend the rest of your evening with your roommate today,” she told you as you lingered in the doorway. 

  “Right, bye,” you bid awkwardly, frowning to yourself as you walked away.

  The moment the door closed Wanda sighed heavily and leant back in her chair, catching sight of the framed photo of herself and Vision when they went on a hiking holiday in Colorado. The both beamed at the camera as they held each other close, though Wanda’s love for her husband had been as dim as it was in the present. But it was what god wanted. What god certainly didn’t want was for Wanda to allow her mind to wander to you in the way it had during that session when you had been taunting her with that faux naivety that everyone else seemed to fall for. 

  She had such hope for you when she first met you. But the images you had put in her head of her hand disappearing beneath your skirt as her lips clashed with yours, pinning you down to that very couch you perched on, that was something that could not be allowed to flourish, no matter how it made her throb between her legs. Wanda forced herself to stare at her husband’s image and remember when he used to make her feel that way, but those memories of his breathless features beneath her were replaced with your own and suddenly she couldn’t help but ponder what your sweet moans would sound like next to her ear as her fingers dipped inside-

  “Lord help me,” Wanda called, but he never came. 

*

You and Wanda both faced your own new challenges as the weeks went by. For you, your only refuge was gone. James had been sent back home randomly one night after an incident that no one would discuss with you. You had written your numbers on pieces of paper before that night, but it had disappeared as mysteriously as James had and gave you an equally chilling feeling. You had no idea what was going to happen to him when he arrived home without the results he had been sent away to achieve. Would they send him somewhere else? Somewhere worse? The only thing you could do was try not to end up like him. 

  Unfortunately, Wanda knew that nothing had changed within you. You continued to try and fool her with your illusion of innocence, reciting what Vision had taught you, socialising with the committed students and answering her questions in the way she wanted to hear rather than the truth. Little did you know that your efforts to quicken your release from the camp were futile, because Wanda simply didn’t want you gone yet. You were fighting a losing battle, just as she was. 

  As much as she despised to acknowledge it, the brunette fought her own desires as much as you did. It made her hate how much she was drawn to you. It made her ashamed of the acts she envisaged herself performing with you and how she just knew in her heart that you would so willingly part your legs for her. She wasn’t blind to your attraction to her, she had encountered it enough in her career to see it a mile away, no matter how discreet you thought you were being. 

  “I think I’m getting better,” you lied as you peered at Wanda cautiously. 

  “And what makes you say that?” The older woman inquired, humouring your plain fib. 

  “I don’t think about girls,” you said as you willed yourself not to look at Wanda’s long legs that were crossed eloquently. 

  “What do you think about?” You hadn’t been prepared for that. 

  “God?” Wrong. Obviously wrong. Wanda hummed and you knew that meant she didn’t buy it. 

  “Y/n, I want you to start being more honest with me.” You froze and didn’t dare look her in the eye. “I’m aware that you’re not progressing, so I think we should try something new. Just you and me.” You frowned and risked looking up to the confident woman, not having a clue of the excitement that manifested so secretly. “Are you familiar with penance?” You were, yet you had no idea where Wanda was going with it. 

  “There are many different forms. Some fast, some pray, some confess, but as we practise most of that here anyway, I want to try something else,” Wanda explained as she stood up from her chair and sauntered over to the desk in the corner of her office. You heard her rummaging around in the draws as a feeling of unease began to emerge in your chest. Rightfully so, because when Wanda turned back around, she held a riding crop firmly in her grasp. 

  “Stand up,” she instructed and you quickly did so as you eyed the tool in her hands. “Usually you would do this yourself, but I don’t believe you’re capable,” she explained lightly. “Hold out your hand.”

  “Wanda,” you said as you kept your hand glued to your side. “I don’t want to.” Her features were deceivingly gentle as she listened to you. 

  “I don’t want to do this to you either, sweetheart. It’s just the only solution. So hold out your hand,” she repeated, gripping the crop so tight you could hear the leather stretch in her grasp. It unsettled you greatly. 

  “But it will hurt,” you objected, eyes wide. Wanda could have laughed at how oblivious you were to her intentions.

  “It’s meant to,” she said simply and grabbed your wrist with a force that completely paralleled the softness of her tone. 

  “Wanda-” you tried to yank your hand back but you weren’t as strong as the brunette who only had to hold you with one hand while the other brought the crop down hard. 

  You cried out but Wanda used her grip on you to pull you flush against her chest, her features having turned ice cold. Her lips formed a straight line and her eyes pierced through your own with a sharpness that was usually dulled. The next words she uttered were void of that nurturing faith she used with everyone else and were replaced with something much darker. “If you keep struggling I’ll bend you over that desk and whip your ass instead.” You trembled against her, trying to decipher what your best bet was. When you took too long to decide, Wanda reached around and groped your ass, digging the crop in as she did so as though to make sure you knew she was serious. Your breath hitched as you found yourself completely trapped against the woman that squeezed you through your skirt. You whimpered, riling her up more until you nodded. 

  “Good,” Wanda exhaled, calming the heat she was struck with at the sight of your fearful eyes. “With every strike, you’re going to confess something you’ve lied about to me.” There were so many lies to choose from that when the first strike came, you struggled to pick one out. “Confess,” Wanda demanded, all of her patience suddenly absent. 

  “I don’t like boys, I like girls,” you admitted in a rush, refusing to look at Wanda or your burning hand that she struck again. “I’m not doing the work,” you continued. Wanda remained dissatisfied, striking your raw palm again and again as you admitted to your lies, none of which being what Wanda wanted to hear. 

  “I touch myself!” That was what she was looking for. 

  “Look at me,” Wanda instructed, examining the tear streaks down your cheeks as you whimpered. It was clear you were trying to appear strong and indifferent, but it was quickly becoming too much. The older woman cooed at you as dropped the crop to the couch behind you and took a hold of your inflamed hand, rubbing the abused hand with a tenderness that only made it burn more. 

  “Now that wasn’t so hard, was it?” Her smile had grown sinister and you realised you were nowhere near done. “What thoughts do you touch yourself to?” Wanda questioned further, rubbing the most tender areas of your palm. 

  “Lying with a woman,” you hiccuped, hoping the harmless phrasing could somehow ease your next punishment. 

  “Who?” She pushed, gripping your chin roughly and forcing you to look straight ahead at her as you confessed what she already knew. 

  “You,” you whispered. Arousal rushed to the forefront of Wanda’s mind, and with it came anger. You weren't allowed to make her feel the way you did. She had a husband and she was a faithful Christian wife until you showed up and infected her mind with your own illness. You had to be put in your place. 

  In a blur, you were laying flat on the sofa you had lied continuously to Wanda on. You were barely given the chance to react before Wanda hiked her leg over your chest and straddled you with a purely feral look upon her face. You felt a strike of fear hit you, however you also weren’t blind to how attractive Wanda looked in her state of desperation. It may have been a desperation to reclaim control and to punish you for her own feelings, but it was hot nonetheless. 

  “You’ve been tempting me ever since you got here,” she hissed, feeling under her conservative skirt for a moment before she lifted it up around her waist. “This is your fault,” Wanda told you as you soaked in the view of her exposed pussy just inches from your face. You could smell her arousal and when she moved to lower herself onto your awaiting mouth, you eagerly grabbed at the back of her thighs until she slapped you away. “You don’t get to touch me with those filthy fingers, just let me use you.” Although you knew it was terribly wrong, you felt your own cunt heat up at her instructions. You knew that it was fucked up that the married woman wanted to get off on riding your mouth, but you wanted it so bad. 

  “Just like that,” Wanda sighed as you ran your tongue through her wet folds and sucked on them lightly, aiming to savour every drop and inch of her. “Put your tongue out,” she continued to demand. As soon as you did, Wanda began to vigorously grind her clit against your muscle, allowing your tastebuds to become ablaze with her as she cursed above you. You had never heard her swear before and knew she would scold anyone who muttered anything close, so knowing you could elicit such a reaction from her made your insides twist with pride. 

  She didn’t argue when you switched to sucking on her pulsing clit and felt it throb in your mouth. You moaned against her as her movements continued and her thighs locked around her head. It felt as though she really was using you for her own pleasure, not caring about your own or any comfort. You were the shameful bliss she was forbidden to engage with, but it felt incredible to ignore her god and use you as she wished. But she was really disobeying him, she was just teaching you a lesson. It wasn’t really sinning. 

  “Fuck, don’t stop. Don’t you dare stop, you slut!” Wanda cried out as she became engulfed with the sensations you gave her. You had no intention of stopping as you shifted to pushing your tongue inside her. You were met by the tight squeeze of her walls and felt your own clench at the discovery she hadn’t had sex in a while. That explained why she was so sensitive too. Besides yourself, you smirked into the older woman and doubled your efforts. 

  It didn’t take long for Wanda to get close to the bliss she had become stranger to and you weren’t about to let her lose that. She knew her body, even after some time of depriving herself, and told you exactly what to do to get her there. “That’s it, that’s it,” she panted, head swimming as she erratically thrust herself onto her mouth and came with a sharp cry. You moaned against her, adamant on tasting your reward as Wanda trembled on top of you and eventually forced herself off when you didn’t stop. She wasn’t about to let greed overcome her. 

  You looked up at her with a hesitant smile that was apparently the last thing Wanda wanted to see. She glared at you and immediately lifted you up and spun you around so that you were leaning over the armrest on the sofa, not allowing you a second to object. “What-” you tried but she didn’t want to hear it. 

  “We’re not done,” she said without care as she lifted your own skirt over your back and yanked down your soaked underwear. She bit her lip at the sight of the wetness that stained them and threw them over to her desk for safe keeping, definitely not to sniff and use to get off later. 

  “Desperate whore,” she muttered to herself as she ran two fingers through your drenched lips. “You want to get fucked so bad? I’ll show you what it’s like to get fucked.” She let the threat loom over you as dipped her digits into you lightly, barely enough to stimulate you but enough for her to decipher how tight you were. Wanda groaned when she felt you clench in anticipation, desperate for any touch you would give her. At that, she let the remains of her self control slip away and thrust her fingers in at once. “So tight,” she commented as you clung onto the sofa, moaning at the feeling of her filling you up in the way you had dreamed ever since you first met the older woman. 

  “Wanda,” you whined when she spread her fingers out within you to push your walls. 

  “Shut up,” she hissed, refusing to listen to your pathetic pleas on the tip of your tongue. “Take it.” And you did. You bit into the couch to mute yourself as Wanda curled and thrust her fingers inside your wet cunt, mapping out every inch of you and pushing your body’s limits. She added a third finger without any consideration to your stifled whines. 

  Wanda, as she told herself, was only doing it to hurt you and punish you. You deserved it for sinning so openly in her home and for attempting to corrupt her. It wouldn’t work, she convinced herself, she wouldn’t succumb to your lust but she had to show you the right path. She had to make you ache. With that in mind, she added a fourth finger and pumped her fingers in wildly. 

  You cried out into the material you sunk your teeth into, feeling your pussy sting at the stretch Wanda was causing. Still, you continued to soak down to her palm. It just hurt so good. Too good for Wanda to allow, so she snuck her hand under your shirt and bra to take your nipples between her fingers and twist them cruelly. You whimpered at the unnecessary act, making Wanda grin triumphantly. 

  Despite the pain, it did little to distract you from the heat between your legs that was quickly growing out of control. Having stretched you out as much as she pleased, Wanda was able to thrust her fingers inside you without mercy, attacking every sensitive nerve until you became a mess on the sofa she was meant to therapise you on. “You going to cum for me, whore?” Wanda asked when she felt you twitch around her. You mumbled a yes you were lucky she heard. “You’re so pathetic like this, so weak to temptation,” she scolded you with a wicked smile you couldn’t see. “Cum for me.” That was all it took for your muscles to clench tightly around her and let go. You moaned like the whore she saw you as as you came, gripping onto the sofa for dear life as Wanda continued to ruthlessly pump her digits into your cunt. 

  “Too much,” you whined when she failed to stop. She didn’t listen. You came down from one orgasm and soon went tumbling into another when Wadna kept up her actions, making sure to drive her point home. You squirmed under her as your body became overstimulated but there was no room or strength for you to move away. “Please!” You begged as you bucked into her palm, unable to stop the contradicting action that served to amuse Wanda. 

  “So sensitive,” Wanda mused, coaxing you through another orgasm until she deemed that the message had gone through enough. You collapsed in a defeated heap as she stood up from the sofa and corrected her uniform as though you weren’t even there. You missed her taking her tainted digits into her mouth to appease her curiosity. Lord, she thought as she tasted your sweetness. She swiftly pushed away the impulse to keep you down and taste your sweetness directly from the source. She had to keep things professional after all. 

  “See me first thing in the morning,” she instructed, features still flushed with lingering lust. She had given into temptation and whether she liked it or not, she would indulge in you again. You weren’t going home anytime soon.

[httpsserene]

I LOVED daniel ricciardo x max verstappen x reader!! could you write a part 2?

𝖍𝖙𝖙𝖕𝖘𝖘𝖊𝖗𝖊𝖓𝖊'𝖘 2𝕶 𝕾𝖕𝖊𝖈𝖎𝖆𝖑 | 𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕯𝖆𝖓𝖎𝖊𝖑 𝕽𝖎𝖈𝖈𝖎𝖆𝖗𝖉𝖔 𝕰𝖉𝖎𝖙𝖎𝖔𝖓

𝐅𝐢𝐧𝐚𝐥𝐞: 𝐊.𝐎. !

summary: Okay, Daniel may have won the first round. He cleared her dry spell with no problem and used Max to do it, too. That’s completely fine, she will never complain about experiencing some of the best orgasms of her life. But, Max (the man unable to not have the last word) coerces her into giving Daniel a taste of his own medicine.  As soon as they can manage to walk on two feet, without a wobble. Mark their fucking words.  pairing: daniel ricciardo x max verstappen x fem!black!reader content warning: 18+ only. mdni. explicit sexual content. author recommends reading part one before this. polyamory. threesome. massages. overstimulation. multiple orgasms. safe, sane, and consensual. bondage. safeword mention. unprotected sex. ruined orgasm. handjob. oral sex (male receiving). edging. crying during sex. praise kink. nipple play. dom/sub ig? joking during sex. dom!max verstappen. switch!daniel ricciardo. sub!reader. vaginal sex. anal sex (male). sex toys (butt plug). frottage. don’t like don’t read. no beta we die like men. edited by the author, though. this is a fictional depiction of real-life people, and this is not an accurate representation of them. word count: 4.3k words

author’s notes: to all the lovely readers who begged for a part two of my f1 kinktober special | overstimulation kink w danny & max. these tags may look crazy...okay, they are but the fic is reasonably crazy i would say. this was humbling to write, you have been warned. my 2k followers special comes to its end with this final installment and there will be no part three of this fic < 3. i may repost this on ao3 in a week or so, for ease of reading as i know long fics on tumblr are kind of annoying :)

(i'm going to take a little pause from writing daniel ricciardo fics but those of you that have requested things for him i will get to them in due time xxx)

prev part 1 2k special join taglist feedback & requests table of contents↻

Your body feels like it’s been wrung out: legs wobbly, thighs bruised, hips aching, back broken, and numb with heat between your legs. You refuse to wear pants as the friction is too paralyzing to take more than a few steps. Loose dresses are your best friend–for the first couple of days, you even went commando around the ranch—thank god neither one of your boyfriends clued into that. 

However, it’s not like you disliked the oversensitivity and aching muscles that came after sex. You loved the feeling even more as it was the first time you’d been properly fucked in a few months. Having that unending thirst for Max and Daniel quenched; it’s heightened how you experience life. You swear that your vision feels sharper, your melanated skin softer, anything you eat tastes better than delicious, the homemade lemonade is sweeter, and most importantly, your desperation has calmed. While you love life on the farm, where living has become succulent under your senses—Max’s attitude has done a complete 180°.

His energy is completely subdued. It’s like Daniel drained the cum and brat out of him. Max is all stuttered words when he makes eye contact with either of you, blushing fully at the lightest tease or brush of skin, voice soft when he speaks, usual bluntness replaced with shyness, and he’s even clingier than normal. If he hasn’t glued himself underneath Daniel’s arm, he’ll be plastered against your back.

You wonder if he’s embarrassed that Daniel changed their “plan” on him at the last minute, or if it’s because Daniel used him as a tool to get you off—but, asking Max would only scare him away or cause the brat to resurface…so you don’t verbalize your theories. You find Max in this state more adorable than usual, and you won’t complain if it means a surplus of Max-cuddles.

Yet, the figurative rug is pulled from beneath your feet when the three of you go Christmas shopping. Daniel had separated from the two of you to go pick up a gift for his nephew, leaving you and Max alone to browse through knickknacks that decorate the shelves. Your eyes were caught by cat ornaments that looked exactly like Jimmy and Sassy but before you could reach out to grab, them Max grabbed you by the hand and pulled you to hide in the next aisle over.

“I want to break Daniel with so many orgasms that he won’t be able to speak by the time we’re done with him,” Max states bluntly. The brat is back.

“Regulate your volume,” you whisper-yell at him, hand moving to cover his mouth as you look around to see if anybody heard your Dutch boyfriend, “We are in public and you decided now is the time to bring this up?!”

He pulls your hand off his face, looking at you with wide eyes, “But, liefje–c’mon! Daniel’s been way too smug recently. Whenever I’m around him he doesn’t miss the chance to mention how he made me cry—made you cry, too!”

“Inside voice, Max,” you bite out, continuing to look at the Christmas decorations in this aisle.

“Fine,” Max whispers, rolling his eyes, “Technically, it’s another Christmas present for him if you think about it.”

“I’m trying not to think about it if you haven’t noticed.”

“Don’t you want to even the board? Imagine it: Daniel underneath the two of us, and we’re overwhelming him with pleasure. Doesn’t that sound like a good time?”

You stop walking abruptly and Max runs into your back. You spin around and stare at him with narrowed eyes and a flared nose.

“You seriously thought the best time to discuss this is in the middle of a family-friendly store, where our boyfriend is picking up a gift for his nephew?”

“Yes.”

“If you stop talking about it for the entire time we’re shopping today, I’ll consider it. We can discuss this when the phantom feeling of his cum on my skin goes away.”

That evening, you and the Dutchman watch Daniel fix a motorbike out in the driveway from the garage. He’s shirtless, sweat dripping down his face and back, you can see every muscle engage and relax as he moves. He’s silhouetted by the Australian sunset and you hear Max choke on his breath when Daniel’s loose jeans slip down his hips, exposing the waistband of his briefs—twin sighs of disappointment leave you both when he catches and drags them back up. With shaky hands, you grab the pitcher of lemonade you prepared to pour a glass for each of you. Ignoring how you missed the glass on your first few attempts, you two bring the drinks to your lips and dry the cups embarrassingly quickly to satiate your desperation—the lemonade doesn’t help. 

Daniel finishes with the bike and wipes his hands on a towel he had tucked into his back pocket, looking your guys’ way. He smiles brightly—shamefully, you wave in response and Max tucks a nonexistent strand of hair behind his ear; the two of you are acting like school girls with a crush. 

The Australian stands and in a few relaxed strides, he comes to a stop in front of you two. 

“Can you pour me a glass, sweetheart?” his request rumbles out velvety.

Stuttering, you scramble to do as he asked and find that Max has reached for the pitcher as well when your hands bump into each other. The two of you freeze and stare at each other with wide eyes; Max’s blush blooms red across his face and yours warms the brown skin of your cheeks. Daniel’s chuckle of amusement snaps you out of it; Max pours the drink, and you hand it off to the Australian, avoiding eye contact. He brings the glass to his lips and drains it dry. You and the Dutchman stare with gaped mouths, watching the bob of his Adam’s apple as he swallows, whimpering and pressing your thighs together at his ah in satisfaction when finished. 

He leans down to place the glass back on the tray and smirks at you and Max, “Absolutely delicious. It almost tastes as sweet as either of you is acting right now.”

Both of you stay silent, squirming in your lawn chairs. Daniel takes a second to slowly press both of your mouths closed with a nudge of his fingers before straightening up and clearing his throat.

“Thank you for the drink, sweetheart,” Daniel cocks his head to the side in question, before winking, his smug aura radiating off of him, “Or should I say, ‘sweethearts?’ As both of you seemed so eager to help me quench my thirst.”

Your mouth pops open again and Max audibly whimpers next to you. Daniel laughs and walks to enter the house, “Don’t feel afraid to join me in the shower.”

The plan is set before Daniel’s out of the shower. You’ve changed into a black mini slip dress, curls loosely cascading down your back as you’ve draped yourself on top of the bed sideways, face-down on your tummy, not caring how the back of your dress has ridden up a couple of inches. Max laid himself on his side next to you, dressed in a navy Enchanté shirt and a pair of Daniel’s briefs that hug at his thighs a little too tightly, and plays with the bottom hem of your dress, letting his fingers drift underneath to press at bruises that haven’t healed from that night. 

At the sound of the shower shutting off, the two of you glance at each other; Max checking in with you one last time before you guys follow through with the plan. At your nod, Max presses a soft kiss to your lips and goes back to fiddling with your dress. You rest your head on your folded arms and as your eyes flutter shut, the bathroom door opens.

You hear Daniel humming some country song and he gets about three steps into the room before he stops abruptly.

“Well, if I had known this would be waiting for me out here, I wouldn’t have spent a lifetime in the shower waiting for you guys to take me up on my offer.”

Max makes a noise of confusion, his hand pausing at your hemline, “What are you talking about? We just thought it would be nice to give you a massage—you know, prevent any muscle tightness from when you were hunched over the bike.”

“Is that so, pretty girl?” Daniel questions you, looking past Max. He’s dried off from his shower already, skin gleaming thanks to your cocoa butter lotion he probably stole, hair still damp but not dripping, and a towel wrapped around his waist. You’re sure he’s trying to sniff out any weakness; to see if he can bend you into revealing Max’s agenda for tonight. Little does he know that you’re not an accomplice, you’ve put a good amount of work into this plan too.

In response, you offer a small smile and hold up a bottle of massage oil that was previously tucked into your side. Daniel’s narrowed eyes flit between the two of you, and then he relaxes, shrugging loftily as he motions for the two of you to move so he can lie down. 

“Okay, sure,” Daniel laughs, falling into the bed as soon as the space is available, lying flat on his stomach, face planting into the pillows and his next words are muffled but loud enough to understand, “You don’t have to use ‘giving me a massage’ as an excuse to feel me up, but I’m not going to turn it down if you’re so willing to do so.”

You and Max are kneeling on opposite sides of Daniel’s body on the bed, resting on the heels of your feet, and you muffle a giggle at Max rolling his eyes at your boyfriend’s words. The younger man slaps his hand on Daniel’s back, grinning at the stifled yelp that sounds from near the headboard, and coos sarcastically, “Do you think you can handle that level of pain? Considering this is a deep-tissue massage?”

You drizzle a nice amount of oil on the middle of his back, letting your laughter escape as Daniel pleads, “Woah—hear me out, what about a regular massage? I would like to end this massage without crying from soreness, please.”

Slowly the two of you turn to look at each other, smiles spreading across your lips, and Max murmurs, “Oh. You’ll be crying by the end of this.”

You ignore Daniel begging for mercy underneath you and beginning massaging. For all of the Dutchman’s ribbing, the two of you are gentle. Your hands soothingly rub any tension out of his back; the two of you are only doing this to melt Daniel into the bed. He protests and grumbles through the both of you digging into his shoulders, but quiets as you make your way down his back, practically moaning when you push a knot out from behind his shoulder blade. Max manages to wrangle out a whimper when he presses his thumb into the dimple of his lower back. Neither of you gets close to the towel resting low on his hips; you want to keep him as calm and unaware as possible, but getting close to that towel would do the opposite. When Daniel’s breathing slows and his sounds of relief start to lessen, Max gently coaxes Daniel into rolling on his back with ease.

The brunette’s eyes flutter open, but you tut disapprovingly when his gaze meets yours. With a kiss on his forehead, Daniel closes his eyes at your word, not fighting you for a second. And from that point, you and Max begin conditioning the older man to get used to only having one pair of hands on him at a time. Max massages his chest, you take a break, you massage his chest, Max takes a break; and as Daniel starts to relax at the rhythm, you guys slowly increase the length of your breaks. 

Until the breaks get long enough to slip the ties that you guys fastened to the headboard out.

Daniel was so entranced at the sight of you and Max sprawled on his bed that he forgot to examine his surroundings. They’re silk ties, with pre-made straps for you to tighten as soon as his hands are inside them. The two of you take it to the next step; you each begin to massage his arms (still employing your regular breaks), raising them upwards to “get a better angle.” Daniel doesn’t even shift at the change, he just hums under his breath when either of you soothes across a good spot. And with little effort, you and Max raise both of his arms and smoothly slip his tattooed hands into the ties, tightening the straps in the blink of an eye.

The older man startles, eyes flying open as he tries to yank his wrists free of the binds, “Uhhhh, what the fuck?”

Both of you watch as Daniel tries to free himself without any luck, enjoying the show as the silk ties prove they won’t give out. Chills shudder down your spine as your older boyfriend tries to order the two of you to release him, but he must see the feral glint shine in your eyes because he switches to asking when neither of you moves.

“You know what to say if you really want us to let you go, Daniel,” Max states bluntly, pulling off his Enchanté shirt easily. 

You hum in agreement, straddling the Australian’s hips and simultaneously tugging your slip dress over your head and tossing it to the side, exposing your bare body before seating yourself on the bulge showing through the towel. Daniel chokes out a curse, his eyes dancing between yours and Max’s bodies being dangled in front of his face without being able to touch.

He tests the binds for any give half-heartedly before sniffing dismissively, jaw tightening as he challenges Max, “Do your worst, baby.”

Max scoffs out a laugh, “That is the plan.”

From there you and Max turn into savages. Both of you bypass kissing Daniel, pressing lips and biting bruises along his neck and torso instead. The man can only cry out as Max terrorizes his nipples with teeth and pinching fingers while you paint marks on his hipbones and navel. The older man isn’t convinced that the night will end without the two of you seriously attempting cannibalism but the thought is pushed away when the towel is tugged off his hips.

Max laughs mockingly and flicks Daniel’s already-hardened length, “Well, this will be even easier than we thought, liefje.”

“I was half-hard from the minute you guys put your hands on me,” Daniel snipes, “Don’t let this go to your head.”

You raise an eyebrow in question, tilting your head to the side innocently which contrasts the strong grasp of your hand around the head of Daniel’s cock, “Isn’t that a compliment, though? Anyways, it clearly went to your head.”

Daniel groans in pleasure as you start to rapidly stroke along his quickly reddening length, “That was a terrible pun–fuck–but, I’m only letting it slide because your hand is on my cock.”

He bucks up into your fist and you release him immediately, smiling as you see him choke down a whimper of disappointment. The older man isn’t left alone for long, as Max drags the tip of his index finger along the slit of Daniel’s cock before flattening his palm across the head and roughly circling it to overwhelm him with an alarming amount of pleasure-coated friction. 

The brunette can’t stifle his cries this time nor can he buck his hips, thanks to the Dutchman pinning him down with his free forearm. Max pulls both of his hands away quickly, delighting in Daniel’s sounds of displeasure, the two of you watching as he attempts to chase a hand that isn’t there anymore. His length is throbbing, pulsing angrily, redder than the blush that stains his tanned chest. You swallow wantingly. Both of you thought that you would be able to get a few more rounds out of a handjob, but that doesn’t seem to be the case.

Max gets his hand around the base and yours circles the tip. Simultaneously, the two of you start rubbing him off in time, keeping your fists just tight enough and your motions just quick enough to hurtle Daniel to the edge. He throws his head back into the pillows, hips freely bucking as neither one of you attempts to stop him, his hands pulling against the ties all the while,

“You can cum whenever you want, Daniel,” Max states.

The older man lets out several pants of desperation, calling both of your names as he nears his climax. And when you both see the telltale sign of Daniel’s chest rising and falling heavily, you release his cock.

“No! Wait–shit,” he tries to gasp, but it’s too late. His cock starts leaking, jerking pathetically as cum drips down his length in ribbons—his orgasm ruined. Dry sobs escape his lungs as he humps the air, looking for friction that isn’t there, continuing to beg for a hand even as he struggles to breathe as a result of the unsatisfying release.

You let him come down hard, offering support in a quick squeeze of the meat of his thigh over his tattoo. When he catches his breath, his eyes flutter open. Max sees the wetness gathered in the waterlines and moves in the blink of an eye, enveloping Daniel’s still-hard cock in his mouth. 

The Australian’s back arches off the bed, hips racing forward then backward as he cries out, unsure if the feeling of Max’s mouth is good. Both pairs of your hands fly forward to still Daniel, forcing him to feel every crevice of Max’s tongue and throat, trying to bring him to another orgasm as quickly as possible. It works, Daniel stops fighting and starts obeying, rolling upward into Max’s mouth, whimpering out depravedly as he struggles against his binds again. You see his abs start to undulate in waves, a second orgasm trying to form and you slip your hand underneath Max’s chin, lightly squeezing at Daniel’s balls—and the tears fall as his release slams into him like a semi-truck.

The younger man swallows around Daniel, humming as he does it, yet the bobbing motion of his head doesn’t stop—Max is going to try his hardness to prevent Daniel from going soft, even as the older man tries to fight and twist away from the wet grasp of his throat. The Australian’s tears paint his cheek as he sobs messily, and you’re quick to check in with him as Max’s mouth is occupied.

“Daniel, color?” you manage to make your voice sound steady, but your thighs are trembling, your cunt pulsing with wetness and need. 

The man whimpers, eyes unseeingly looking down at you and Max as he cries messily, “Green.”

You moan breathily, finally giving in to your urges and rushing forward to messily kiss Daniel. You let him cry into your mouth, nipping at his lips and tasting his tears before pulling away. Max pulls off Daniel’s cock with a reedy gasp and moves backward quickly so you can slip in between them, seating your cunt atop the half-hard length and beginning to grind along him. The brunette makes a sound as if he’s been punched in the gut, arms pausing in their fight against the ties before they resume with renewed strength. Daniel scrambles to get his feet underneath him, trying to buck off the hot, wet drag of your cunt against his cock. It’s pulsing so violently that he swears he can feel it in his throat. 

Max knocks his feet down, and tugs Daniel’s chin to look at him with a hardened grasp, with his voice rough and croaky he commands, “Can you give us one more, Daniel?”

Daniel's glossy, brown eyes stare at Max without answer, mouth parted as drool slips from the corners of his lips. The Dutchman’s brow tightens with worry and he releases his chin to pull you off. But, before he can stop you, Daniel gasps out desperately.

“M’ green—please, please, Max,” Daniel nods viciously, “Green, green—one more.”

The younger man soothes Daniel with sweet words, praising and comforting him as he leans forward to pepper his lips and neck with kisses and kitten licks, pausing to motion you to continue. 

You line up Daniel’s cock easily and murmur out a ‘thank you’, before sinking down and not stopping until your ass meets his pelvis, uncaring of how he attempts to shake you off. His body is reacting in too much, but Max and you both see and hear how his brain interprets it as too good. 

You keen in pleasure but your noises are deafened by Daniel’s cries and begs for relief. Well aware that you have to get yourself off so Max can have a turn, you find that toe-curling angle with the help of Max directing your hips, holding yourself steady with one hand behind you on the bed and the other drawing rapid circles on your clit. Max moves to let you rest your back along his chest, your frizzed curls a mess as they bounce with your movements. 

The visual stimulation of Daniel in front of you moaning and heaving for more, the frantic twitching of his length inside of you, the sound of your skin slapping against his, and Max’s voice ghosting right by your ear, the ‘good girl’ that left his lips taking a second to process; all of it pushes you into the abyss. You don’t know if it’s you or Daniel that screams, your blood rushing in your ears and your vision flashing white clouds your mind as the explosion of pleasure burns your nerve endings. 

With a choked ‘fuck,’ you slump over, slipping off his twitching cock and slinking down next to Daniel as you shiver and shake through the last dregs of pleasure. Max flutters over both of you, unsure if he should keep pushing the limit, but both you and Daniel yell confirmations of “Green!” that have Max ripping off his briefs, reaching between his legs and whimpering as he carefully tugs out the plug he’s had in for the entire time.

Daniel’s eyes roll in disbelief, his brain exhausted to the point where he can’t string together any words to communicate his confusion.

Max huffs out a hysterical giggle, one hand stroking along his cock as he tosses the plug off the side of the bed. “Fuck–you were in the shower forever, Daniel. I’ve had that in for too long.”

The younger man shakes as he lowers himself on Daniel’s cock, bottoming out with a whimper as he mouths down at Daniel, “Just one more, baby, okay? Make me come, yeah?”

The older man’s moan is curdled with overstimulation, but he finds the will to get his feet underneath him and shakily thrust upwards into Max, hoping somehow that that’s enough. Max lets his head fall back in pleasure, thankful for the moving pressure of Daniel’s cock inside of him rather than the consistent annoyance of the plug holding him open. Coupled with the stretch of his rim and his hand furiously twisting along his length, Max reaches his peak quickly.

Before taking the plunge, he chokes out words of praise at Daniel and you rush to do the same, understanding that Max is attempting to push Daniel over the edge as well. You see tears of frustration build in Daniel’s eyes as he struggles to fully give in, and you fall forward to tug at his nipples with your teeth, reinvigorating Daniel’s attempts at slipping from the silk ties. At the sight, Max shouts, body tightening and then relaxing as he strokes out ribbons of cum. Daniel’s hips stutter when the first drop of cum lands on his skin and you feel his lungs halt as the strongest orgasm—most likely dry, at that—wreaks havoc upon his body.

His body goes limp underneath the two of you, and his hands droop in their binds. You speedily untie Daniel’s arms as Max slowly slips off the man’s rapidly softening length, trying to lessen any unwanted stimulation for the unaware Australian. You catch his arms before they fall against the bed, rubbing your hands against them to coax proper blood flow in them. Spent, Max stumbles to Daniel’s side, taking one arm out of your hands and matching your movements.

“Good job, liefje,” Max breathes out, smiling up at you with an exhausted smile, his hair drenched with sweat and falling in front of his eyes. You blush and kiss him sweetly, “It was your idea!”

Max shakes his head, pausing his hands to reach down and brush Daniel’s curls off his forehead, “No; you made half of the plan. So, it was our idea.”

The Australian groans, eyes fluttering open but they’re still clouded enough that you both know he’s going to need more than enough TLC tonight, “ —idea made me think i w‘sgonna die.”

Max laughs, rubbing circles around the man’s temple, “I guess we forgot to factor in your old age as a variable, didn’t we, liefje?”

Daniel’s face flutters in displeasure at being referred to as “old,” even when he’s not quite come down, “Mean, Maxy.”

You giggle, “That’s what he calls mean out of this entire experience?”

The Dutchman presses kisses to both of your foreheads before he stumbles out of bed, “I’m going to grab some fruit and cream for Daniel’s wrists. Should I grab anything else?” He directs the question to you.

Of course, the Australian jumps in before you have the chance to respond, “Lemonade, please.”

© httpsserene2024

[jolalibrary]

anytime

javier peña x f!reader

summary: “Thank you for coming with me,” you whisper. Nodding, he feels you follow his path—dropping, scorching his face, tracing the place where the hair sits atop his lip. “Anytime, cariño.” “Anytime, really?”

wordcount: 3.1k. warnings: fluff. bestfriends to lovers. banter. reader wears a dress and has a gloss on lips. no physical description. javi calls reader solecito as a nickname only. likely warnings for spelling as i wrote this on my phone. an: huge thanks to @wildemaven for creating this moodboard (pls go show it some love), letting me make a banner from it, and then letting me write this for Javi instead of Frankie. bby, i hope you like this.

Javi had never been good at avoiding challenging situations.

For the longest time, he’s been finding himself in the centre of a whirlwind—whether in Bogotá, Cali or apparently even back home.

You, his friend, best friend—a well-kept secret, tucked away in his chest, not shared with a soul when he was away. You were a thing that he’d clutched close to his chest from the moment the two of you had first gotten close, through his failed engagement and even more so when he left for Colombia. You, in all your understanding, hugging him, telling him he’d be great, amazing, the very best.

Both of you were younger then, less worn down by life, its many obstacles and all the other things.

You best not become best friends with anyone over there, Peña. As if anyone could annoy me as much as you, solecito.

In the brief interim of his return, you hadn’t appeared all that different. You may have had a job, a house—drove a slightly better car than when the two of you were staying out at all hours—but you, at your core remained very much the fucking same.

Still just as understanding, as kind. A person who got him, without really needing to try.

For Javi, the best thing—outside of you being you and the monthly calls you made him promise to keep when he was drowning in murder, drugs and Escobar—is that you never ask him about it. Any of it.

You had always let him pretend, escape, listen to you fill him in on gossip—things such as disagreements over the size of rhubarb and whether someone was having an affair. A thing you did even when he came back. Even more grateful for it then, when he grew tired of the questions, the compliments, the everything.

Its why he didn’t tell you when he would land back in Laredo for good. Just waiting, standing outside your place, leaning against your car as you walk down the street—eyes brushing over him, pausing, before he gets to see that smile. That signature fucking smile.

When he’d left the first time, he remembers how you’d lingered near your car, unwilling to climb into your bright yellow death trap—the entire reason he called you solecito to begin with—wearing the beginnings of that smile even then.

The difference is now he knows that there was something under it. Hidden, held back, kept from him.

It’s why it meant so much to him when he saw it in all its glory, all alight, blooming and somehow healing.

He can’t explain it, but it repairs strands inside of him. Your presence alone continuing to do so when he meets you for lunches, coffees, and late-night drinks. In exchange, he makes you laugh, your head thrown back as he tells you about whatever he did on the ranch—all of it comical, apparently. Because the idea of him, Javier Peña doing ranch work brought tears to your eyes.

“You’re just jealous.”

“Jealous?” you splutter, taking a mouthful of your beer as you narrow your eyes.

Nodding, he leans back into the booth, arm stretched out, picking and picking—the label crumbling from the sweating bottle. “Yeah. Bet you’re upset you don’t get to see me herd cattle and mend fences.”

“Oh, yeah. One-hundred-percent.”

Shrugging, he grins—an easy task with you. A thing that has always been that way, even when he turned up at your door when he couldn’t get married; even when the two of you sat under the stars when he told you about possibly going to Colombia. You still made him grin—even when things weren’t fucking easy at all.

“I’ll add it to my to-do list—visit Peña on the ranch—it’s currently sat under finding a dress, a boyfriend and the will to fucking live.”

Snorting, he traces his bottom lip with his thumb.

Your face scrutinises him, before rolling your eyes. And he just waits—because you always spill eventually.

One. Two. Th—

Fine, you huff, before it unravels from you. How the wedding of your work colleague is close, closer than I thought and you’re tired of attending these things alone, circled like a fucking fish by single sharks.

And he’s listening, taking it in. Trying to not wince at how high-pitched you’ve got as you’ve ranted.

Mainly, Javi finds there’s more questions rising than answers provided.

One singular one rising to the top. A thing he’s wanted to ask for the last few weeks. Not in a rude way, or in the way it burns inside his chest when he talks to you on the phone and he has to bury it. But, it’s there, bubbling, wishing to escape and know. It's even louder when the two of you are like this, crammed in a space, laughing, smiling, sharing, wondering—

Why are you even single? How are you?

You’ve mentioned people—names, here and there when the two of you had been on the phone. Them fluttering out before you can pull them back, but then they’re forgotten. Javi, I get one call a month—let me tell you about the cattle war going off. And, in a way, he didn’t want to hear, didn’t want to know, so he never asked.

Now, it’s all he wants to ask.

Because you’re… you. You’re brilliant, beautiful—funny, clever, witty. And yet—

“—so, now it’s a week out, and I need to find a dress, a date and drive there to watch another person I know get married.”

He knows he should busy his mouth with the bottle—wrap his odd idea in beer. But, that part of him—the one which wants to help, solve issues, and be useful—rises up in him like a phoenix left from the ashes of Colombia.

“I’ll go with you.”

He expects the pause, even braces for the look of shock.

He doesn’t expect the smirk. Doesn’t expect the way it spreads out, to hit your eyes. How under the low-bar light over the table, it makes your eyes glimmer and fucking shimmer.

“You want to go to a wedding with me?”

Shrugging, he picks off the last part of the label—the mess of it all circling around where the glass meets the wood.

Mirroring him, you shrug. “Alright.”

“Alright.”

He should take his eyes off you, but he finds he can’t.

Javi hasn’t been able to since you stepped out of your place, a handful of your dress as you locked up—stepping down your steps to his car, letting it flutter down to your ankles.

You look like a fucking dream.

A thought he knows he shouldn’t have—but has all the same. His heart staggered, half-halting in its hammering as his hands paused in their drumming on the steering wheel; his glasses slid down his nose, his skin suddenly warm all over, even if his jacket was already splayed out across the backseat.

Close your mouth, Peña.

I’m chewing gum, solecito.

Yeah, that’s why your mouth is open.

It hadn’t passed his notice that you were good-looking before today. He’s known you were, had always known it—he had eyes, after all. But, he’d always felt there was a line. A line the two of you never delved too close to step over. The sign above both of your heads already illuminated in bright bulbs and flashing lights:

JUST FRIENDS.

Until this, anyway. This thing that can only be described as the longest one-hour drive he’s ever been on. And he used to do recon with Murphy.

Because you’re teasing, taunting him. All in that usual way that you do. And it’s so easy to flirt back, to let line after line roll, but he has begun to spot you squirming.

Doing so while matching his suit in a deep brown shade—chosen by him, ‘pick a colour suit, Javi’. Adding a tinge to some of your comments—things that if said by someone that wasn’t you, he’d ask them (flirtingly) if they were coming on to him.

But with you, it’s something he can never be sure. Never something that can be completely understood, known, cracked or figured out. In the same way, he can’t understand how your perfume keeps following him. How it embeds itself into the cabin of his truck when he picks you up, sews itself into his clothing when the two of you meet—and right now, is attempting to bury itself in his skin, muscles, and bones.

“You’ve been abnormally quiet.”

Smirking, he snorts. Fingers smoothing out his hair as he swings into a spot—the tyres crunching over the gravel. “Have I? Or have you just not shut up.”

“Rude.”

Laughing, he cuts the engine—hands resting on the top of his thighs, not missing the way your eyes follow his movements before clearing your throat. It shifts something in him, makes a little part of him surge, like the smallest of fireworks suddenly erupting in his chest.

Something he forces himself to shut down the moment you shove open your door, slipping out, as he grabs his jacket.

“Do I need to be worried about you crying today, solecito?”

Rearranging your dress, and slipping the strap of your bag over your shoulder, you squint as you stand tall, hand covering your brow as you meet his gaze.

And fuck, with this backdrop, even squinting, you look beautiful, radiant, stunning all over again. Somehow his brain having forgotten when you were next to him, when you were acting as if this was the most normal fucking thing they’ve ever done.

It isn’t.

Something he’s becoming more aware of as his throat goes dry, and his thoughts slow to nothing—

“No, you’re good. Your mouth is open again.”

You say it with a smirk, all teasing—making heat lick up his spine all over again. And, if you were anyone else, he’d have already pulled you close, tilted your chin up, and likely smothered your mouth with his.

But, you’re his friend—his best friend. The one solid thing he’s had in his life since he became a name, a poster, a hero.

“C’mon,” you say, turning on your heel as you head in the direction of the entrance, him following, jacket slipping on as he mutters mouth isn’t fucking open under his breath.

Even if he knows it was. Even if he’s desperately trying to stop his eyes from descending down to your hips, eyes fixated on the way you walk with ease to the wooden sign which greets all the guests.

He knows, due to his absence from home, there haven’t been many weddings he’s attended. Least of all like this. But even he thinks this is over the top, suddenly understanding why you hadn’t wanted to come alone. Because grand doesn’t quite cover it—not after the last one he’d attended.

This one has flickering candles lit in the day, waiters all set to hand glasses of bubbles and offer little mouthfuls of flavour on silver trays. Then, there’s the backdrop—the enormity of the building, only for you to tell him that it’s an outside wedding.

It’s more of a comfort as to why his hand drops to the small of your back than anything else. A need to be rooted, to feel calmer as he nods at passing people he doesn’t know (and hopes don’t know him), feeling you curl into him subconsciously, your bag swinging between the two of you both—affording a gap, forcing it, in fact.

The ceremony will start soon.

He overhears it, as he assumes you do, because your fingers wrap around his wrist—taking it from your back, before your palm meets his, and then you’re guiding, leading. Dragging him. All willingly to the back of the building where he sees it—the makeshift aisle. A wooden arch, and lots of deep orange-brown chairs all line up on either side of an orange aisle.

“Glad we chose brown now,” he murmurs.

“Does it make you think, y’know—being at a wedding?”

He swallows. Because it’s a loaded question.

One he assumes has been sitting all politely on the tip of your tongue since you sat beside him in his vehicle. It’s why his eyes watch you carefully as you grab the two of them a flute each from a passing waiter. Handing it to him, adding nothing—not rescuing him. Just waiting instead, doing that thing you do, where your eyes widen as you wait, trying to look all innocent even though it’s you who has just dropped a live grenade into the centre of the conversation.

Shaking his head, he snorts. “No. Not really. Knew… I knew deep down it wasn’t right. Her… and me.”

“You got any idea what’s right?”

You take a sip this time when the question lands, it again sparkling in glittered innocence, the softest of smiles pressed against the glass.

You he thinks. But he swallows that away and says ‘Not a fucking clue’ instead.

Throughout the day, he’s been desperate for a reason to stop looking at you.

So far, he’s found none.

Bits and pieces of things Murphy used to say, the words he’d drop into conversation when talking about his wife: how he knew, why she was the one, all coming back to him in drips and drops.

It dawns on him, the same as it had done since before he went to Cali, that you might mean a little more than a friend. A lot of what Murphy used to say, so easily applied to how Javi felt about you.

You make him feel calmer, create a space where he can relax, really unwind. It’s easy, uncomplicated, when he’s with you—from the conversation to the things he thinks. Complex balled thoughts stretch out until they’re in easy-to-decipher lines, able to process, able to understand.

He even told you about the boats.

A secret he’d have been prepared to take to the grave, if not for the fact you pointed out he wasn’t sleeping. Your eyes watching, pleading, don’t lie to me. And fuck, he couldn’t—not even if he wanted to.

That should have been the first sign.

He guesses he should be thankful today has been stuffed with more of them. One after the other. From the way you made sure to make him a plate of only his favourite things, to the way you knew when he needed a bit of space from the thousand questions as to how you both knew one another, and what he does.

Now, Javi is on the sidelines, admiring you in a way that makes his heart double in size.

Your dress skims around your calves as you dance—your arms rising above your head, glee stitched itself from cheek to cheek. On occasion, time halts when your eyes land on his—stealing whatever thought he had, only resuming normality when you close your eyes, belting out the lyrics to the song.

Mainly, the thought he finds which keeps returning is: I wanna do this with you again. any place. any time.

A hollowness scratches out in his chest as he lets himself acknowledge it. A thickness growing in his throat, a sorrowness weighs down on his shoulders as he nurses his glass—hand in his trouser pocket, telling himself he should be content he got to be on your arm, got to have you against him during a slow dance over an hour ago. That he gets to see you smile, hear your laugh—even know you.

“Hey, Peña.”

“Hey solecito.”

You grin—a little breathless, the music having changed, becoming slower, softer—wrenching the glass from his hand as you drain it.

“Fuck me. Y’thirsty?”

“Very. You’d know if you had any rhythm.”

He pinches you, lightly—teasingly. Your grin shifts into a laugh, tucking yourself in against him, arm around his back. And fuck, the way you’re looking up at him, he wants to warn you.

If you look at me like that, I’m going to kiss you.

Javi wonders what you’d do if you did. Whether you’d pull away, hissing the two of you are friends. Or whether you’d kiss him back.

“Want to get some fresh air?” you ask, your words against his ear—lips so close to ghosting his skin.

“Sure.”

It’s cooler when the two of you step out from under the marquee, the music getting quieter when your fingers loop in his, guiding, easing him around plant pots and tall trees, until the two of you are descending marble stairs and past iron fencing, to take him to the perimeter, to the view looking out over the city.

He watches as you step forward, fingers around the iron fencing, leaning, staring out as you let out a heavy sigh. One laced with things he wants to ask for, tug it from you, let you unload whatever is weighing on you—because that’s what you both do for one another.

You make it easy.

Make it all bearable.

But, whether you mean to, or not, you shiver. A light one, barely noticeable by most—but he isn’t most. His fingers are already at the button, undoing it, sliding his jacket down his arms before he places it over your shoulders, watching your head turn, meeting his gaze.

“You look really pretty.”

Flicking your eyes down, you smile. Sweetly. Unreadably. “Well, you’ve always been pretty.”

“Pretty?”

Laughing, your fingers tug his jacket closer, burying yourself in it. “The prettiest, Javier.”

Leaning beside you, he feels the metal from the railings, you’re both resting on, cut into his palms. He wonders if you feel the same, your dress billowing in the gentle breeze as the two of you stare off into the distance, spotting the flickering lights of a city, of homes tucking in for the night.

Then he turns his head, finding you already watching him, studying him in a similar way as you were before.

And, he lets his eyes drop to your mouth. A sign. A signal. It’s not the first time, usually, he does so when you’re not looking, letting himself trace the curve of your lips. Now, he stares at the way your gloss has long since gone, left behind on glasses and straws.

“Thank you for coming with me,” you whisper.

Nodding, he feels you follow his path—dropping, scorching his face, tracing where the hair sits atop his lip.

“Anytime, cariño.”

“Anytime, really?”

Nodding, he swallows. A thousand things he’s thought, and felt, all rushing to the surface—unwilling to bury itself, to descend under the usual guilt and feelings of inadequacies when it comes to you.

“I’d do anything for you.”

Smirking, you tilt your head. “Anything?”

Biting your lip, he feels it—something thrumming in him, being plucked.

“Will you kiss me?”

“I could…”

Your brows rise, a louder cheer coming from inside, but it doesn’t do anything to tear your eyes away from the other.

The whole world could slowly vanish from around the two of you, and all he’d want is just to stare at you.

“But?” you ask, delicately.

Almost so softly, it makes his chest ache.

Dipping his head, he lets his gaze wash over the place again—the rolling land, the trees, the houses in the distance.

“If I kiss you, I don’t think I’ll ever stop.”

You slide closer, shoulder to shoulder, eyes scorching his jaw, his neck, the side profile he can feel you tracing with your gaze.

“Then don’t,” you say.

His neck almost cracks with the quickness of his movement, his eyes scanning, reading, a part of him wanting to step back, and protect you. Because he’s not sure about the parts of him you’d find easy to love—

“You don’t know what you’re—“

“Don’t care,” you interrupt, fingers twitching on the lapel of his jacket. “I know you—Javi, not Agent Peña. I know the boy who cloud-watched with me when my parents wouldn’t stop fighting; I know the man who told me to stop sending him postcards from the town shop—but also whispered that he liked them.”

Snorting, he smiles.

“So, if you want to, no pressure—but, I think you should kiss me.”

“Yeah?”

Nodding, you bite your cheek. “Think you’ve wasted a lot of time not kissing me already, honestly.”

Of course you do, he thinks. And then he kisses you, palms on your cheeks, slanting his mouth over yours.

And fuck, it’s the best fucking thing he’s ever done.

an: honestly, this made me so fucking happy to write.

[emotoangel]

okay I’m going on a little ineffable phannie rant read at your own gut wrenching discretion bc I can’t lie this shit’s about to get parasocial

because it’s not just Dan and Phil dressed as Crowley and Aziraphale, is it?

it’s Dan and Phil, who have struggled with their sexualities for years. closeted, faced every speculation under the sun when it comes to their own sexualities, the other’s sexuality, their relationship, their legitimacy, if they’re queerbaiting or not, being OUT. OUT and dressed as two canonically gay men in love with each other, two men who would see the world burn to know the other was safe. two men who helped stop the end of the world so they could be together.

a man who is bitter and cold and a little bit bad (but not evil I would say, though he might try to make you believe he is) and a man who is love and light and exclusively good (or so he’d like you to believe). and am I talking about Dan and Phil there, or am I talking about Crowley and Aziraphale?

it’s about these two men who, even 5 years ago, feared the word ‘gay’. it’s about how Dan, Mr Commitmentphobe, Mr I Can’t Even Commit To A Pet, Mr Soulmates Are Not A Thing That Exist, bought a costume, and sprayed (or, fucking hell god help me DYED) his hair red, and posted a cute picture of him and his ranch partner/4000 year old tortoise/companion through life/actual soulmate and TAGGED IT INEFFABLE HUSBANDS.

it’s a couples costume!!! it’s impossible for it not to be, considering they are two of the most well known canonically in love gay men on the internet right now!! it’s a thank you to their little phannies online who make them feel safe and comfortable enough to do what they do every day. and it’s a shoutout to the progress they have made in 15 years. a ‘hey, we’re here, we’re happy and gay and (in love) together’. and that’s SOO SPECIAL. ITS SO SPECIAL. and it means everything!!!!

AND ITS NOT EVEN JUST THE ONE PHOTO.

it’s the selfie on the story of them cute and couply and drinking the aziracrow drinks and looking happy and in love 😭

AND DON’T EVEN GET ME STARTED ON CAT AND BEAR SAVE THE WORLD VS HOWLEY AND AZIRAPHIL ARE HERE TO SAVE THE WORLD

anyway basically I’m so insanely proud of them, feeling very parasocial about the progress they’ve made in 15 years to get to a point where they’re comfortable enough to make phwedding jokes and gay jokes and jokes about both being switches and furries and in love. feeling so proud of them being out and proud and gay and in love and also I have a good omens tattoo so I’m choosing to believe they did this for me personally thank you x

[javierpena-inatacvest]

Chapter 10, Pt. 2- Happy Birthday, Javi

Summary: Javi is convinced that after the perfect morning you've given him, his birthday can't get any better. Little does he know, his birthday still has a few more surprises left.

Word Count: 11.7K (Told you it'd be 20K if i put these two parts together)

Warnings: SMUT (18+), unprotected p in v sex (pls be safe), semi-public sex (and kind of getting caught?), vaginal fingering, creampie, praise kink, breeding kink (are we surprised, cause I'm sure not), mentions of death/loss (but it's really sweet), mentions of alcohol and drinking, mentions of food, Steve Murphy not letting Javi have a moment of peace, Javi holding a baby (please don't mind as I scream into the abyss), if you've made it this far, you already know the sickening amount of fluff there's gonna be (hehehehe)

A/N: Our favorite birthday boy is back!!! I'm excited for this one cause it's CUTE. But when are these two idiots not like, the most adorable couple alive. Enjoy the rest of our sweet Javi's birthday!! Also please someone understand my self indulgent Foo Fighters/Blink-182 references

Series Masterlist Next Chapter Previous Chapter

“So you’re telling me I don’t get to know anything about the rest of the day? Coming from the person who hates surprises more than anyone I know?” Javi chuckled to himself, wrapping his towel around his waist as he stepped out of the shower, handing you yours as you followed behind him. 

“Okay, just because I hate being on the receiving end of a surprise doesn’t mean I don’t like to be a part of planning a surprise. So no, you don’t get to know. Although, I will say what happened this morning and the way you just pressed me against the wall and fucked me in the shower are two surprises I’m not upset about at all.” You smirked at Javi as you watched him run a towel over the damp curls of his hair, seeing his satisfied grin from underneath the fabric. “Now go get ready, birthday boy, you’ve got a big day ahead of you.” Javi pressed a gentle kiss onto your bare shoulder as you organized your things on the bathroom counter, rolling your eyes as you watched him look you up and down in the mirror. 

“If we didn’t have places to be, I’d bend you over this counter and fuck you right here.” The kiss on your shoulder being replaced by a nip, making you giggle and swat at his broad body standing behind you. 

“Javier Peña, you are a goddamn menace to society, go change!” The two of you laughed as Javi gave you a wink and a quick smack on the ass as he left you in the bathroom to start getting ready. 

A menace to society in-fucking-deed. 

You made sure to get ready as quickly as you could, wanting to make sure that you stayed on time for the rest of Javi’s birthday festivities. You had plenty planned to keep him busy until 4:00, the time you told Chucho you’d arrive at the ranch, giving your guests an hour to show up beforehand without ruining the surprise. After changing into a new, cute peachy dress with little white flowers, you met Javi in the living room, sitting on the couch watching TV, looking handsome as ever in the dark wash jeans and cream colored short sleeved button down. 

“The watch looks good with your outfit.” You teased, noticing that Javi was already wearing one of his birthday gifts that he had insisted on giving you a hard time about after finding out about its cost. 

“I love it, Osita. I’ll wear it every fucking day. And it actually tells time, which is helpful.” He laughed before turning his head around over the top of the couch to see you in your dress, jaw going slack as he watched you move about the kitchen, gathering things for the next part of your day. “Fuck me. Is that new?” he asked, taking an extra moment to appreciate how well the peach colored fabric hugged your body in all the right places, particularly as you bent down to pick something up out of the fridge. 

“Mmmhhmmm.” You hummed, trying your best to hide the pozole de pollo you had made for Javi the day before in your travel sized cooler. “Same shopping trip as this morning’s outfit.” You looked up at Javi, giggling, as he ran a hand through his hair, knowing he was using every ounce of self control in his body to let you keep working on whatever you were doing. “Alright, I think everything is packed and should be good to go. You ready, roomie?” You smiled, grabbing the bag you had packed in preparation for the next part of your birthday plans. That one made Javi grin from ear to ear, still processing the fact that you had asked him to move in with you. He had practically already been living there, but something about knowing you wanted him to be the first thing you saw in the morning, and the last thing you saw before you fell asleep at night every damn day filled his heart in a way he didn’t know was possible. 

“Ready. Sure I don’t get to know where we’re going?” He chuckled to himself as he got up, putting on his shoes and grabbing his keys, including the newest one to your shared apartment that he had already slipped onto the key ring while you were getting ready. 

“You’re starting to sound like me. C’mon, let’s go.” 

Walking down the stairs of your apartment, you grabbed Javi’s hand, knowing that he was going to lead you to his truck. Before he could lead you any further across the parking lot, you tugged him in the opposite direction, leading you towards your car. “Nope, I’m driving today. How were you supposed to drive if you didn’t know where we were going?” 

“You could still drive my truck, if you wanted. You’re always complaining about how shitty your car is.” 

He wasn’t wrong. After getting stationed in Oregon after his deployment, your oldest brother, Charlie, had offered to let you have his 1985 Jeep Wrangler. In reality, the car was only a decade-ish old, but the way he had treated it before he gave it to you had it barely hanging on by a thread. After your drive to Texas, Woodstock (the name you had given the car, given its obnoxious bright yellow color) was in rough shape, but, like most things in life, you were too stubborn to give it up and get a new one until you ran it into the ground. 

“Every ounce of feminism in my body evaporates if I even think about driving that truck. It’s huge, and I’m terrified I’m gonna crash into something, and at least one of us needs a car that isn’t an absolute piece of shit.” You sighed, throwing your bag in the trunk before hopping into the driver’s seat, Javi taking his spot next to you as a passenger. “Please, please, please.” You mumbled to yourself, twisting the key back and forth in the ignition before turning the car over, praying it would start. “Yes! She lives to see another day.” You nodded your head in satisfaction as Woodstock’s engine rumbled. Javi shook his head, laughing to himself at your antics you had convinced him were the key to getting your car to start. “Alright,” You said, backing out of your spot and pulling on to the road, “you’re in charge of music today. Sorry I don’t have the Grease soundtrack in my car, but I do have some ABBA which I feel like could be a good replacement if that’s what you’re in the mood for.”

Javi rolled his eyes at you as he reached up to pull down the visor in front of him, lined with the CD’s in its sleeve. Since the two of you normally didn’t drive in your car, Javi wasn’t used to your music selection. Flipping through the discs, he found some overlaps, Fleetwood Mac’s “Rumors”, Queen’s Greatest Hits, AC/DC’s “High Voltage”, along with some CD mixes that your brothers had probably given you, but he was surprised to find a few CD’s of bands that he had never even heard of before. “Blink-182?” He asked, holding up the disc with a picture of a bull with the band’s logo branded into its ass. 

“David really likes them. They’re okay, there’s a few songs on there that I like, but some of them are really weird. I’m pretty sure there’s a song on there called “Dick Lips”.” You snickered, peeking over at the other CD’s Javi was shuffling through. “Oh, oh, that album is amazing.” You pointed at the dark blue disc Javi was now reaching up to grab. “David and Charlie both love these guys. You know the band Nirvana? The guy who was the drummer for them made his own band after Kurt Cobain died. I’ve been listening to this album every time I drive.” 

“I don’t think I’ve heard you play it around the apartment. The Foo Fighters? Literally never heard of ‘em.” He shrugged, pressing the disc into your car radio. 

“I think you’d probably would’ve remembered if I played them around the house.” You huffed under your breath sheepishly. “They’re a little more… intense than what I normally listen to at home, so no judgment, okay? Skip to the second song, it’s the best one.” 

“Now I’m intrigued.” Javi responded, placing his hand on your leg after skipping to track 2, his face scrunching in surprise at the intensity of the guitar and drums now blaring through your speakers. It didn’t take long for you to start drumming against your steering wheel, nodding your head to the beat, as you sang along to the words. 

“Don’t wanna be your monkey wrench. One more indecent accident. I’d rather leave than suffer this. I’ll never be your monkey wrench.”  

Javi watched as you lost yourself in the song, belting the lyrics as you banged against the steering wheel, practically out of breath as the CD moved on to the next track from singing. Javi always loved watching you sing along to whatever music you had playing, but something about watching you now was different, like there was intention behind every word that you sang along to, like you were letting something out that had been weighing on your chest with every thud of your palm against the steering wheel. 

“Sorry.” You sighed, lowering the volume of the next track as you caught your breath. “It’s a great song, but this is my angry screaming in the car song if I’ve had a shitty day.” You tried to play off your comment jokingly, Javi sensing that you had more you wanted to say, but you weren’t telling him. 

“What’s the song called?” Javi asked, trying to pry more out of you. 

“Monkey Wrench.” 

“Like the tool?” He laughed, making sure he understood you correctly. 

“Yes, like the tool.” You half smiled back. “The song’s not actually about the tool… Well, I guess it kind of is. It’s about someone who gets pushed around and used because they’ve always tried to be flexible and adjust to make someone else happy, but eventually they realize they can’t take it anymore, and are done putting up with that person’s shit before it breaks them. You finally come to terms with what a fucking waste of time it was being with someone who couldn’t have gave a shit about you.” 

You sat there in silence for a moment, embarrassed by your last sentence, realizing your comment had definitely become a lot more personal than you had intended it to be. “Sorry, I don’t- I don’t know why I’m talking to you about this, I shouldn’t have said anything about the CD, this is supposed to be fun, it’s your birthday, and now I’m ruining it and-” You stopped to look down as you felt Javi squeeze your leg, like he was trying to stop the apology that was flowing from your mouth with his grasp around your thigh. “Sorry.” You whispered, your voice shaky as you tried to hold back the tears welling in your eyes. “I know I always joke about Paul being an asshole and try to play it off like it’s not a big deal, but I think it fucked with me a lot more than I’d like to admit.” You took a long breath in before exhaling, shaking your head to clear your thoughts. “Okay, that’s all I have to say about that dickhead. He doesn’t even deserve the time of day to take up any space in my head. He’s a piece of shit, and I have you, and that’s all that matters. He can go… He can go… eat… rocks.” The both of you snorted at your terrible attempt at comeback, easing the tension in the car. 

“You’re not ruining anything, Osita. I promise. I can understand why the song makes you mad. Makes me fucking pissed for you. I swear, if I ever meet that motherfucker, I’ll kick him in the dick ‘till he can’t fucking walk.” Javi snarled, the idea of someone treating you like how your ex did practically making his blood boil. 

“I’d pay money to see that. Okay, no more Foo Fighters. Pick whatever you want and don’t listen to any of my suggestions because I am 0 for 1 today on birthday music.” 

Shuffling through the rest of the CD’s ejected the Foo Fighters album to replace it with one he knew would make you smile. As soon as the keyboard riff to “Rich Girl'' by Hall and Oats started, your mood instantly shifted, wondering how Javi always knew exactly how to make you feel better. “Listen, Javi, you don’t have to use the song, you can just tell me that you’re in this relationship for the enormous salary I’m raking in from teaching, it’s okay.” Javi reached down to grab your hand as you giggled, giving it a gentle squeeze as he watched you sing along, dancing in your seat, with a smile on your face. Truth be told, Javier Peña was a simple man, and knowing you were happy with him was the best birthday gift he could ask for. 

“Okay, we’re here!” You beamed, pulling up to the first stop of your surprise destinations for the day. Javi had lived in Laredo his entire life- he knew the city like the back of his own hand. That’s why when you pulled up to the small park entrance, Javi was perplexed as to where he was, or why you had taken him there. 

“Have I had it wrong this whole time, Osita? Are you the one that’s really the serial killer and you’re taking me out to some park I’ve never heard of to get rid of me?” Javi mocked as you playfully punched him before the two of you got out of the Jeep, grabbing the bag you had stored in the trunk. 

“Oh, shut up. Believe it or not, your dad is actually the one who told me about this place. C’mon, let’s go.” You hoisted the bag up onto your shoulder, making your way down the gravel path through the trees that lined the trail. Javi followed behind you, interlocking his hand with yours as you led him through the brush. The path opened up, revealing a small area overlooking Lake Casa Blanca, tucked away in its own corner, surrounded by trees and tall grass that swayed in the gentle summer breeze. It took Javi a moment to realize where you were, having been to the lake every summer since he could remember, but never once had he been here, shocked to find how quiet and peaceful the secluded patch by the water was. 

“Lake Casa Blanca?” He asked softly as you started pulling things out of your bag, laying down a big blanket, followed by a variety of containers and thermoses. 

“Mmmhmmm.” You nodded, fixing the edges of the blanket as you sat down, Javi joining you as you rustled around for the bowls and spoons at the bottom of the tote. “Your dad said you used to love coming here as a kid. So much that you would cry every time you had to leave. But he said there was a secret place hidden away on the opposite side of the lake where he always used to take your mom when they first started dating. They would be all cute and watch the sunset together before he had to take her home for the night. I know it’s not the sunset, and I know it’s definitely not your mom’s but um, I wanted to try and make you something for your birthday. I got her recipe from your dad. I know it’ll never be the same as hers, but your dad told me how much you loved it, and I-I hope that’s okay.” Carefully, you poured the pozole into one of the bowls, grateful that it still looked hot before you grabbed some of the garnishes out of the plastic containers and sprinkled them on top of the stew. 

“Is this… Is this her pozole?” He looked down at the bowl in shock, like he couldn’t even comprehend that the dish was really in front of him. He hadn’t seen the sight of his mom’s pozole de pollo in over a decade. He refused to eat anyone else’s, knowing it could never compare to his mamá’s. The memory of his mother lovingly feeding him bowls of the stew filled him with a comfort and heartache he wasn’t quite sure how to describe. He had never even bothered to ask his dad to make it, figuring like most of the things that brought him pain, it was easier just to avoid it all together. But then, there was you. How had you figured out this was his favorite? You must have gone out of your way to ask his dad? You made this just for him? You cared about him that much? He picked up the bowl and one of the spoons, realizing how nervous you looked as he scooped some up, bringing the spoonful of vegetables, chicken and broth to his mouth. 

You were practically holding your breath as he took a bite, praying to whatever higher power there was that he just didn’t hate it, or worse, that he was upset with you for even trying to attempt it in the first place. You watched hesitantly, over-analyzing every twitch of his face as he chewed and swallowed, looking up at you, tears welling behind his eyes. 

“Baby…” He paused for a moment, setting the pozole down. 

Fuck, was it so bad that you made him cry? Oh please, God, please not let it be terrible. 

He brought his hand to your cheek, caressing your jaw, his lips drawn in a soft sweet smile. His voice trembled, barley above a whisper. “It tastes just like hers. I-I never thought I’d get to taste that again. Thank you, Osita. You- You have no idea how much this means to me. It means everything. Thank you. Thank you so much.” A tear gently rolled down his cheek as he pulled you into his chest, cradling the back of your head as he brought you closer to him. He sat there for a moment, looking out at the lake then back down at you as he held you in his arms, the sweet scent of the pozole lingering in the peaceful silence. He wasn’t quite sure how you did it, but he swore he fell more and more in love with you by the second. 

“So, it’s okay? You’re not mad?”  

“Mad? Baby, how could I possibly be mad? I couldn’t be fucking happier. I love you so much.” He pressed a soft kiss on the top of your head, savoring the sweet scent of you as he buried his nose in your hair. 

“Well if it was really awful, it would be very fair if you were upset.” You let out a small huff of laughter, relief washing over your body, feeling like you could finally breathe again. “Like I said, I know it can never replace your mom’s, but it’s your birthday, and you deserve everything in the world- today and every other day. I love you too, Javi.” 

You were glad you had made as much pozole as you did, watching Javi practically inhale every last drop you had made. When you told him that there was still more in the fridge at home, his face lit up like a little boy on Christmas day. He was equally excited for the cupcakes you had made him, gobbling several of them down almost as quickly as the pozole. You sat at the edge of the water after finishing your food, listening to Javi tell you stories of his favorite memories at the lake, particularly enjoying the one where his older cousin had convinced him that you were allowed to take fish from the lake home as pets, and somehow managed to bring a full bucket back to the car with him before his parents found out. 

“Did you ever have any real pets as a kid?” You asked, finishing the last bite of your cupcake, still giggling from Javi’s story. 

“Besides all the cows and sheep and horses?” He laughed, face palming yourself for forgetting that Javi had literally grown up on a farm. “Yes in that sense, but never anything that lived in the house, besides that bucket of fish I almost got away with if my cousin wouldn’t have ratted me out.” 

“My house was a goddamn zoo growing up. I think by the time I was born, my parents already knew it was going to be chaos, so they figured, what were a few more animals going to do? I’m pretty sure at one point we had 3 dogs, a cat, Charlie had a rat and a snake which did not end well, and one day, Patrick and David came home from the pet store with an iguana, which only lived in the house for one day before escaping out the bedroom window at night, never to be seen again. Rumor is, that iguana is still roaming through the suburbs of Chicago to this day.” The both of you laughed, Javi raising an eyebrow, picturing you with all your brothers and animals running around the house. “After all of that, I am more than happy with just a dog, singular, not plural. I was close to adopting one when I moved down here, Paul hated animals- another red flag, despite how much I told him I wanted one, but it wouldn’t have been fair with me living in the apartment. I wanted to get a house when I moved down here so I could have a yard, but again, the giant teacher salary wasn’t doing me any favors, unless I wanted to live in a box by the side of the highway.” 

“I’ve always wanted a dog. I’d love to have one when we get a house.” 

We. When we get a house. That one put butterflies in your stomach. 

“When we get a house, huh?” You put a little emphasis on the word, the both of you blushing, quietly laughing to yourselves. 

“I mean, I love your apartment. I couldn’t be more fucking excited to live with you. But I mean- I don’t know, correct me if I’m wrong, I’m guessing you don’t wanna live there forever?” He traced his fingers along the small of you back as he sat propped up next to you. 

“I mean no, but again, not really rolling in cash over here in the money department, Jav.” You rolled your eyes, a part of you feeling guilty that your career choice always made you feel like a financial burden, despite how good you were with saving your money. 

“Listen…I don’t wanna sound like an asshole. I already know how much you hate the “I’m a man so I have to provide for you” stereotype, believe me. I’ve got a good amount of money saved up, and my job now pays better than the DEA even did. I just- I don’t want you to worry about it. I know how much you love teaching, and it’s un-fucking-fair how little teachers make, but I don’t ever want you to think you’re a burden because of it. I’d support you if you wanted to have 6 jobs, because if there’s anyone who could do it, it would fucking be you. But, I- I know you said that you wanted kids, and- and if you ever wanted to not work and stay at home with them, I’d support that too. I just want you to be happy, Osita. You deserve the world and I’d fucking give it to you if I could.” 

Those sweet chocolate eyes went straight to your heart. The way he looked at you made you feel like you were the only person on the face of this earth. He was right, you loathed the idea of a man telling how to live your life because he was the breadwinner, but you knew that’s not what Javi wanted. He cared about you. He cared about you so fucking much that almost hurt. He wanted to look after you because you were the only person in the world he ever wanted to treat this way. All he cared about was your happiness. And God, would more than gladly spend the rest of your life doing the same for him. 

“You trying to tell me you want me to stay at home and run the Peña household zoo while you’re at work?” You teased, giving him a little nudge as you smiled at him. 

“If that’s what you want, it’s what I want too. Although I may have to draw the line at having a fucking iguana in our house.” The two of you snorted, resting your head on Javi’s shoulder as he leaned down to kiss your head, placing a soft peck on your temple. 

“No iguanas is fine by me. Like I said, A dog is plenty. Maybe less kids than 4, but I could also be jaded from the 3 older brothers. But I mean- I guess, have you thought about how many kids you’d want?” You should have been embarrassed by how easily the question slipped out. There are lots of things you should have felt uncomfortable bringing up as you talked about your future together at this point in your relationship. You should of, but both of you seemed to agree that those should of’s flew out the window a long time ago. 

“Osita…” He paused, laughing to himself, shaking his head as he and those puppy dog eyes glanced over at you. “Baby, I’ll give you however many kids you want. I’ll give you a fucking football team if that’s what makes you happy.” Fuck, he’d give you a baby today if that’s what you wanted- but that’s one he still had enough willpower to keep as a should of, for now. Little did he know, you would have had as many babies as Javi wanted to give you right this very second. But that was a should of you could keep to yourself a little longer too. 

The two of you spent a little more time enjoying the warm Texas sun by the edge of the water, Javi bruising your competitive pride in your rock skipping competition, as you tried to persuade him that you only let him win because it was his birthday. Glad that Javi had decided to wear his new watch, you were able to keep a close eye on the time, gathering your things and ushering him to your last pit stop before the Peña ranch. 

“Alright, stop number two!” You smiled as you pulled up to Eva’s Dairy Barn. “Wouldn’t be a good birthday if I didn’t take you for ice cream.” 

“I was hoping this would be part of the surprise.” He grinned at you as the two of you exited your car, grabbing your hand as you stood in line. 

“Of course, Mr. Sweet Tooth. What’s today’s choice? They have a flavor that’s called birthday cake! Or does that not have enough sprinkles for you?” You stuck your tongue out at him as he wrapped you in a bear hug, shaking you as you both laughed. 

“Even on my birthday, you’re not gonna let me have a moment of peace, are you?” 

“Never. Where’s the fun in that?” 

You had never been more thankful for Javi’s incredibly fast eating skills, the impressive speed that he consumed his ice cream at keeping you on time for his last surprise. 

“You sure my dad really wants to see me that badly? I told him I was spending the day with you and that we could celebrate a different time.” Javi asked as the two of you got in your car to begin your journey to the Peña ranch. 

“Uh, yeah, he called the other day while you were at work, and said that he had something at the house he really wanted to give you today since it’s your actual birthday.” You replied, trying your best to make your lie as convincing as possible. It wasn’t until just now that you began to feel the nerves building in your belly. The day had already been so perfect, you hadn’t stopped to think about the surprise party until now. What if Javi hated it? What if he was mad at you for inviting all of these people? What if you had ruined what had already been such an amazing birthday for him? Javi could clearly sense that your mood had shifted, noticing how tightly you were now gripping the steering wheel of your car as you drove. 

“You okay, Hermosa?” He questioned, looking over at you with concern. 

C’mon, pull it together, you literally have like 20 more minutes, don’t ruin it now. 

“Me? Oh yeah, I’m fine, my head just kind of hurts. Probably didn’t drink enough water today.” You shrugged, turning up the radio volume, your answer seeming to satisfy Javi enough to keep him from pressing anymore. You tried your best to keep your cool for the rest of the trip, singing along to one of the Rolling Stones albums Javi had found tucked behind one of your other CD’s. By the time you were pulling down the driveway, you could feel how sweaty your palms were, relieved to see that Javi hadn’t noticed any of the guests’ cars peeking out from behind the other side of the barn as you approached the house. He reached over the center console to give you a quick kiss before the two of you exited, taking a few deep breaths and frantically wiping your clammy hands on your dress before Javi interlaced his fingers with yours to walk up to the house. 

“Hey Pops, we’re here!” Javi announced, opening the door for the both of you. He stepped a little further into the living room, a concerned look now growing across his face at the lack of response. “Dad?” He called out again to the sound of silence. Javi wandered a little deeper into the home, peeking his head into the kitchen and down the hallway as he looked back at you in confusion. “That’s weird, he’s normally done working by now.” He looked around, placing his hands on his hips before looking down at you, crossing your arms and biting your lip. 

“You promise you love me and you’re not gonna be mad at me?” You asked, scrunching your brow. 

“Baby, what is going on?” His face now even more puzzled. 

“You promise?” 

“Of course I promise, Osita, what is happening, why are you being so weird?” He now mirrored your stance, crossing his arms over his chest, trying his best not to panic. You grabbed his hand, leading him towards the door of the backyard patio, letting out one last little gulp before you spoke. 

“I love you more than anything in the world, Jav. I know you said you don’t think that anyone cares about you or your birthday, but there are so many people who love you, me included, who think that you deserve to have the most amazing day ever. I know you don’t believe it, but I do, and so does everyone else.” You pressed up on your toes to give him one last kiss before opening the sliding glass door, watching him walk out to the back porch. He looked around to see the balloons, streamers and string lights hanging from the deck as you stood behind him, giving a thumbs up to Chucho, who had all of the party guests hidden on the side of the house. He turned back around to face towards you, completely bewildered. 

“Osita, what’s going-” 

“SURPRISE!” 

Javi spun around to see not one, not ten, but a crowd of people now standing at the bottom of the deck, smiles stretched across their faces as they looked up at him. At first, he thought it was a joke. He looked back at you, nodding your head in reassurance, like you could read his mind. 

Yes, these people are all really here for you, pendejo. 

He looked back out into the sea of people standing in the backyard, now realizing just how many people had shown up just to celebrate him. His whole family- Aunts, uncles, cousins, and their children, his family friends, your 3rd grade co-workers, Carter and Miller, fucking Steve Murphy? And Connie? He turned around to face you one more time, tears welling in his eyes, truly in disbelief. “Baby… Did you… Did you do this all for me?” He cupped your face, cradling your cheek. 

“Yes, well me and your dad. Just about killed me to try and keep it a secret this long, I think I was gonna spontaneously combust if I had to tell you another lie.” Your gaze was soft and tender as you stared up at him, letting out a little laugh at the state of disbelief Javi was still in. “Happy Birthday, Javi. Te amo.” 

Taking his hands and grasping both sides of your face, Javi pulled you in closer, his mouth meeting yours with a passion that made your heart flutter, his kiss was deep and intense. It was almost enough to drown out the hooting and hollering of the crowd you forgot was watching you from the yard, Javi pulling away in laughter as he heard, who he assumed to be Steve’s loud “OW OWWWWW!” as the two of you found yourselves dangerously close to making out in front of Javi’s friends and family. Chucho joined you on the deck, his grunt from each step of the stairs giving away his presence as you ran over to give him a hug. 

“Lo hicimos, Chucho. Buen trabajo, Chiflado.” (We did it, Chucho. Nice work, crazy.) 

“Lo hicimos, Mija. Ven aquí, Javier. (We did it, mija. Come here, Javier).” Chucho held out his arm, motioning for Javi to join them in their group hug. 

“Feliz cumpleaños!” (Happy birthday!) you both beamed up at Javi, wrapping your arms around him. At that moment, Javi didn’t care how tough of a man he thought he was. He didn’t care that he was in front of almost everyone he knew. He didn’t care what anyone thought. The sight of the two of you wrapped around his waist, laughing and smiling together as you held him brought him to tears. You were the two people he cared about more than anything in this world, and the fact that you both cared about him just as much made him weak in the knees. For a very long time, Javi had convinced himself that he wasn’t worth caring for. Sure, people would say they cared, but words were really nothing but- They were just words. But then there was you. Your words, your actions, your kindness, your sweet heart. You. Everything about you. You cared about him. You loved him. For the first time in a very long time, Javier Peña could feel himself finally starting to believe that maybe, just maybe, he really was worth caring for. 

Chucho grabbed his son by the arm, giving him a firm grasp, as he too, wiped the tears rolling down his cheeks. “Te amo, hijo. Me enorgullece el hombre que eres. Yo se tu madre estaría tambien. Feliz cumpleaños, Javier.” (I love you, son. I am so proud of the man you've become. I know your mother would be, too. Happy birthday, Javier). You watched as the two of them embraced, Chucho patting Javi on the back, squeezing him tightly before pulling away and pointing at you. “She’s a good one. You better marry this girl, Javier. And not just because I want my nietos (grandkids).”  That one had both your faces turning an embarrassing shade of red as Chucho pulled you both back in for a hug before letting you go to address the crowd. 

“Vamos de fiesta!” (Let’s party!) 

As the upbeat music began to play in the background, Javi grabbed you by the hand, leading you down the deck into the crowd below. It was no surprise to either of you that the first voice that greeted you was one you hadn’t heard since the beginning of june. 

“MIJAAAAAAAAA!” Maria screeched as she wrapped her arms around the two of you, squeezing you in for a hug before pulling away with a staunch frown on her face. “Why have neither of you called?! Apparently you two are in love and I have to hear it from Chucho?! Dios Mio, I cannot believe it!” You and Javi laughed as she swatted at the both of you, the two of you grimacing between your giggles. 

“Sorry, Maria.” Javi replied, leaning back down to kiss her on the cheek, easing some of her theatrics.

“Fine, I will forgive you. Only because it is your birthday. As long as I am invited to the wedding, I won’t complain.” She pointed a finger at Javi as he pinched the bridge of his nose, taking a deep breath. 

“Maria… Please?” He looked down at her, giving your hand a little squeeze as you quickly caught him smirk in your direction. 

“Oh, pshhhhhh.” She waved her hand at him again, rolling her eyes. “I already know it will happen, so just keep me on the guest list. I really am glad to see you both so happy. Feliz cumpleaños, Javier.” This time, she ended her sentence with a genuine smile, bringing you back for one last hug before giving a wave and heading back into the crowd. 

“Well… This school year’s gonna be fun.” You raised an eyebrow at Javi, the both of you knowing Maria  was about to be a relentless investigator in your relationship once September rolled around. “I’m gonna go check on something inside really quick, are you gonna be okay if I leave you to fend for yourself?” You smiled at him, telling that as thankful as he was, Javi was still feeling a little overwhelmed by all the attention. He nodded, giving you a quick kiss on the head as you disappeared to make sure everything had made it to its proper place before the party kicked into full swing.  

Javi took a deep breath, relieved to find his dad approaching him, already holding out a beer in his hand for his son to take. “Figured you might need a little liquid courage.” Chucho chuckled, patting Javi on the back. Javi quickly took the can, cracking it open and holding it up to cheers with his dad, taking an extra long sip before holding it by his side. 

“She really planned all this?” Javi grinned at his dad in disbelief, looking out at the crowd around him. 

“Sure did, hijo. She’s been planning it for weeks, been over here more times than I can count while you’ve been at work. She wanted to make sure everything was perfect for you. That girl loves you so much, Javier. I hope you know how lucky you are.” 

Javi watched as you made your way back down from the deck, awestruck by every inch of you as you made your way back to him. Looking at you was like looking at a fucking dream. He was the luckiest man on the face of the earth. He knew that for damn sure. Before Javi could respond to his dad, he felt two hands grab him by the shoulders and shake him from behind, already knowing exactly who it was from the moment he heard his voice. 

“Happy birthday, you grumpy old bastard.” 

Never in his life did Javi think that he would be so excited to see Steve Murphy. 

“Hey, Murph.” Javi chuckled, grabbing Steve in a tight embrace, the two patting each other's backs before pulling away. 

“Fuck, you look old. What’d ya turn this year, 76?” 

“Fuck off, Murphy. Could say the same for you.” It had been years since the two had seen each other, but the way Javi and Steve picked right back up where they had left off made it feel like not even a day had passed between them. 

“Havin’ kids will do that to ya. Sure it won’t be long ‘till you find that out. Speakin’ of which, where’s the girlfriend?” Steve winked, taking a sip of his beer as Javi took an over exaggerated sigh, raising his own beer up to his mouth, relieved to find you walking up to the two of them. 

“Oh, you already got a drink? Okay, two for me then, I guess.” You shrugged, setting one of your beers down in the grass as Javi wrapped his hand around your hip, planting a kiss on your temple. “You must be Steve?” You asked, outstretching your hand toward his tall, lanky frame. 

“You must be the girlfriend?” He replied mischievously. 

“I wish. He’s just paying me to walk around with him all night to make him look good. Felt bad for the guy with it being his birthday and everything. What’d you say your name was again? Julio?” You snorted as you looked up at Javi, shaking his head as you nudged his side. 

“Fuck, she’s funny. I like her, Jav.” Steve grinned at Javi, raising an eyebrow. 

“You two are both the biggest pain in my ass I think I’ve ever met.” Javi retorted, smirking at you as he gave you a little nudge back. 

“Well, at least he’s got a type.” You held up your drink up to Steve’s, the both of you laughing as a petite blonde haired woman approached with 2 little girls behind her and one in her arms. 

“Hi Javi.” She smiled warmly, passing the baby off to Steve as she gave Javi a hug. “It’s so good to see you. Hope Steve isn’t already giving you too much of a hard time.” 

“Thanks, Connie. Good to see you too. Con, this is my girlfr-” 

“Girlfriend? I had a feeling. Steve told me all about you. It’s really nice to meet you.” Connie reached her arms out towards you, pulling you in for a hug. 

“It’s really nice to meet you too, thank you so much for coming.” You smiled at her, looking over at the two girls behind her. “Are these your daughters?” 

“Oh yes, this is Olivia and Abby, and the little one is Madison. Can you say hi, girls? Javi used to work with your dad a long time ago!” Connie cooed at the girls, playing with each other behind their mom. 

“Hi!” The girls waved shyly before darting behind Connie’s legs, giggling to one another. 

You and Javi both waved back as you crouched down on your knees to talk with them. “So Olivia and Abby, how old are you?” 

“10!” Olivia responded, trying to pull her sister away from Connie to get a better look at you. “Abby’s 6 but she’s really shy.” 

“I am not!” Abby demanded, stomping her foot at her sister. “I’m almost 7, so I won’t be 6 for much longer.” 

“Well it looks like we have two birthdays to celebrate!” You smiled as Abby peeked a little further from out behind her mom. “So let me guess, you girls are going into 5th grade and 1st grade? I teach 3rd grade, so I’m right in between you two!” The girls' faces lit up instantly as you told them about your profession.   

“I wanna be a teacher when I’m a grown up!” Olivia beamed, tugging at Connie’s sleeve. “Mommy, do you think she’ll play unicorns with us?” Abby now bouncing up and down in excitement next to her. 

“Oh sweetie, I don’t-” 

“No it’s okay!” You interjected, cutting off Connie. “Of course I can play. Just for a little bit though. I’m sure playing with you is way more fun than talking with grownups, but I promised Javi I’d spend time with him tonight because it’s his birthday, okay?” You stood up, now facing Javi looking like he hadn’t heard a single word you had just said. “Jav?” 

“Uh yeah, sorry, what’d you say?” He shook his head, trying to clear the strangely comforting feeling he had growing in his chest with how sweetly you had talked to the girls. 

“You okay if I go hang with these two cuties for a little while? Unless you’re also dying to go play unicorns, in which case I'm sure the girls will let you join since it’s your birthday.” You gestured back over to Olivia and Abby, laughing as you watched them already pretending to gallop around the backyard.

“I’m good on the unicorns, thanks Osita.” He chuckled as you pressed up on your tiptoes to give him a kiss before heading off to join the girls. 

“THERE’S NO KISSING IN UNICORNS!” Olivia shouted from across the yard making you, Connie, Steve and Javi burst out into hysterics, holding up your arms like you had been caught, turning around to point at Javi and give him a playful stank face as you walked away. 

“Goddamn, Jav. When you puttin’ a ring on that girl’s finger?” Steve and Connie both smirked as he passed baby Madison back over to her, Connie carrying her over to watch where the girls were playing.

“Murph, c’mon-” Javi tried to stop him from getting any further before he knew how much shit Steve was about to throw his way, regardless of what his answer was. 

“I’m bein’ serious, Javi. She’s a fuckin’ catch. Happiest I’ve ever seen you, that’s for sure. What the hell you waitin’ for, man?” Javi could tell Steve was being genuinely serious, something that didn’t happen often. Javi took another sip of his near empty drink as he rested his hands on his hips, staring back at Steve’s impatient glare. 

“I don’t know, Steve. I- She’s perfect. Fuck, I don’t know, it’s only been 3 months, I don’t wanna rush things or scare her off, I- I didn’t know you could love someone this much, Murph. I’m scared I’m gonna fuck it up somehow.” Javi’s gaze shot down to the ground, running his hands through the dark curls of his hair before setting his can down in the grass. 

“Listen, I’ll say one more thing and then I’ll shut up about it, I promise.” Steve held his hands up in defense as Javi nodded, waiting for what Steve had to say. “I dated someone before Con for 3 fuckin’ years and it blew up in my face because it just wasn’t it. I met Connie two weeks later, and I knew from the moment I met her I wanted to spend the rest of my fuckin’ life with her. Got married 10 months later. When ya know, ya know, Jav. And if there’s one thing I can tell for certain is that you’re fuckin’ lovesick fool for her, and she sure as hell loves you too. You won’t mess anything up, Peña. Now c’mon, I got a lotta birthday whiskey I need to give you.” 

Looking over Steve’s shoulder, Javi watched as you ran around with Olivia and Abby, that bright beautiful smile stretched across your face, his heart bursting as he watched you laugh and giggle with the girls in the grass. He hated to admit that Steve was right about anything, but there wasn’t a doubt in Javi’s mind that he wasn’t. He’d marry you tomorrow. He would have married you yesterday. Fuck, he would have married you 2 months ago. God, the only thing stopping him at this point was not wanting to hear the 10 pounds of shit Steve was going to give him during the best man speech at his wedding. 

Despite getting roped into playing Unicorns for a little longer than you had intended, the party seemed to be going off without a hitch. People were having fun, the food Chucho had grilled was delicious, and more important than anything else, Javi was happy. Genuinely happy. You were worried that with the amount of people who had come, Javi would be overwhelmed by the attention, counting down the minutes until the night was over. It had shocked you how many times Javi had thanked you not only for everything you had done for him that day, but for inviting so many people that he had barely seen since his mom had passed. He was so excited to introduce you to the rest of his family that you hadn’t met yet, and found himself on the brink of tears as you tried to converse with them in Spanish, finding out that part of the reason you had spent so much time with Chucho was to learn more so you could talk to the people he cared about the most in their native language. It made him burst with pride how each friend and family member he introduced you to couldn't express enough how much they loved you, and how happy they were for him. Truth be told, the only thing that Javi had to even try to complain about was the fact that you still made everyone sing him Happy Birthday and blow out the candles on the cake you had made. Even when he told you that you were mad about it, Javi knew that you could see right through him, and that he couldn’t have been more thankful for every single thing you had done for him that day. 

Long after the sun had set below the horizon of the Peña ranch, the party was still in full swing, the string lights you and Chucho had hung along the deck now lighting up the boisterous dance floor the patio had become. Despite his genuine happiness, you were more than convinced that Steve’s birthday whiskey definitely had something to do with the fact that Javi asked you to go dance with him, but wasn’t quite enough liquid courage to keep him on the dance floor as you tried to drag him back out to do the Macarena with you and his tías. After a few of his cousins had dragged him inside for another beer, Javi found himself sitting at the kitchen table, still getting a good view of you on the porch as you sang and danced away. Javi took a sip of his drink, letting out a content sigh as he leaned back in the chair and watched Steve fumble his way into the kitchen, holding Madison with a desperate look in his eyes.

“Thank God, there you are. Can you watch her, please?” Steve outstretched the baby girl out to Javi, panting like he had sprinted to come find him. 

“Steve, what? Are you sure that-?” Javi looked back at Steve suspiciously, leaving Madison dangling between the two of them as Steve practically set her in Javi’s lap. 

“Listen, I got two little girls out in the backyard fightin’ over who the hell gets to be the purple mermaid, Con’s out at the car tryin’ to get the girl’s pajamas, so either you take the baby, or go help Olivia and Abby decide who the goddamn purple mermaid is cause I can’t do both.” Sensing the desperation in his tone, Javi took Madison in his arms as Steve went as quickly as he came through the kitchen. “Word of advice, Jav?” Steve yelled across the room as he moved towards the door. 

“Yeah, Murph?” 

“Don’t let the kids outnumber you.” 

Javi chuckled to himself as he looked down at the baby now sitting in his lap. “Guess it’s just you and me, huh?” Javi shrugged as Maidson as he bounced her in his lap. Javi had never really understood why people were so obsessed with babies, considering that they didn’t really do much. But as Javi listened to Madison babble and squeal as he rocked her up and down, he found himself with a grin stretched across his face that he was definitely not expecting. Now on a mission to get another cute reaction out of her, Javi held Madison in his arms, making goofy faces at her as her happy shrieks and coos continued. 

Realizing that Javi had been gone for a good amount of time, you looked around the yard, finding that Javi was nowhere in sight. Chucho mentioned something to you about seeing Javi head into the house with his primos (cousins) not too long ago, so you decided to make your way through the crowd to see if you could find him. 

“Oh hey, there you are, Hermosa!” you heard Javi’s voice greet you, your back still turned to him as you closed the door behind you. 

“Hi, birthday boy! I was looking for-” 

Oh. 

Oh, dear lord. 

The sight you had stumbled upon was nothing that you could have mentally prepared yourself for. It hadn’t helped that for some reason, Javi seemed to be a kid magnet- every child at the party wanting to come up and talk to him or wish him happy birthday. That in itself would have been fine. But what really sent you over the edge was the fact that he was so goddam sweet with every single one of them. Like when you had watched as he crouched down to talk with one of his youngest cousins, listening intently as he told Javi all about his soccer team, or hug one of Estelle’s granddaughters who had made him a birthday card, Javi thanking her in that same sweet voice you had heard him use with animals. It practically melted to the ground as you watched him wrap his arms around her, telling her “Que hermosa! Muchos gracias! (So pretty! Thank you so much!)  As she handed him the card. That alone was enough to turn you into a puddle. But now, here you were, looking at Javier Peña, making the sweetest silly faces to the baby he had sitting on his lap. You were ready to run home and toss your birth control out the fucking window. 

“You okay, Osita?” Javi asked, waiting for you to finish the rest of your sentence. 

“Yup. I am great. I am doing perfectly fine. I am feeling SUUUUPER normal about what’s happening right now.” You gestured to Javi, now propping Madison against his shoulder as he stood up. 

Oh my GOD, is he broad. That man could easily fit 3 more babies in his arms. I’m about to get him to put 3 more babies in- NO. STOP. STOP THIS RIGHT NOW. You aren’t even close to being engaged yet, let alone married, you idiot. You cannot have this man’s babies right now. Well, I meannnnn, I guess I- NO. Self control. Pull it together, you hormonal monster. Jesus Christ. 

Javi shook his head as he laughed to himself, almost as if he could hear the internal monologue going on in your head as you watched him carry Madison over to you. “What?” He smirked at you, bouncing the baby girl in his arms. 

“Don’t you what me, Javier Jesús Peña. You expect me to walk in on you holding a baby and just be normal about it? Here, let me hold her before I look at you any longer and my ovaries burst.” You reached up as Javi passed Madison over to you, holding her only for a brief moment before Steve came rushing back in, snatching her out of your arms. 

“If Connie asks, I had her the whole time and the girls didn’t have two extra pieces of cake to stop the mermaid argument.” 

Before either of you could say another word, Steve was back out of the kitchen, rushing through the patio door. His swift entrance and exit left you and Javi alone, standing dangerously close to one another, the sexual tension between the two of you so thick, a chainsaw wouldn’t have been able to cut through it. You were using any and all self control you had to not pounce on Javi after watching him hold that baby, but he clearly seemed to have even less restraint than you. 

“C’mere.” Javi rasped, his mouth moving faster than his brain as he grabbed your wrist to pull you down the hallway into his room, frantically closing and locking the door behind him. In seconds, your lips crashed into each other, moans escaping from your mouths in between each breath, as your hands grasped at tight fistfuls of the other’s clothing. Javi’s tongue swept into your mouth, kissing you like his life depended on it, the both of you becoming so needy and desperate in each other's arms. Javi’s hands hiked up the hem of your dress, sliding against your thighs before wrapping his arms under your legs, hoisting you up and carrying you into the ensuite attached to his room, using his back to push open the door. He set you down on the counter, quickly pressing the lock to the bathroom before he was back to nipping at your neck, the palms of his hands pressing against every inch of your body as he slid the straps of your dress off your shoulders. 

“Javiiii…” You whined in between his frantic kisses. “Javi, we can’t do this here, all your friends and family are outside, this is a bad idea.” Your words were less convincing than ever as you ran your hands through Javi’s hair, tugging at the ends of his thick, brown locks, wrapping your legs around the small of his back to pull him closer to you. 

“I don’t care. Fuck, I need you right now.” He planted hot, wet kisses along your neck and chest, pushing down the top of your dress, leaving your breasts exposed, your nipples pebbling against the cool air and Javi’s touch. He swiped his tongue against each, flicking and swirling them in his mouth as he dug his fingers into your hips, making it harder and harder to keep your moans quiet. 

“Javi, we can’t. What if someone finds us? I want your family to like me, and I’m pretty sure one of them walking in on us isn’t gonna help my case very much.” You couldn’t even bother trying to convince yourself at this point. You could already feel how wet the fabric of your underwear was, slick pooling along your thighs as you and Javi practically clawed at each other, feverishly desperate and worked up.  

Javi smirked, shaking his head as hooked his fingers around the waistband of your panties, letting them fall to the floor as they slid down your legs. “You don’t have to worry about that, baby. They fucking love you. You know what everyone keeps asking me, huh?” He took his hand, placing it under your chin, forcing your gaze to meet with the dark, lustful pools of his eyes, the other sliding up your bare thigh, his fingers sliding through your wet folds, collecting the arousal already dripping from them. “They keep asking me when I’m gonna marry you.” 

He pushed his thick fingers into your heat, making you shutter as your hands white knuckled the edge of the marbled countertop. “Couldn’t stop thinking about it all fucking day. How fucking perfect you are, what good wife you’d be.” The calloused pad of his thumb pressed against your clit, the motion of him rubbing back and forth and his fingers pulsing in and out of you making you scrunch your face, your jaw hinged open, trying everything you could to keep quiet. 

Javi would have loved to do nothing more than spend the rest of the night making you cum over and over again, but the both of you knew now wasn’t the time or place to keep things drawn out. He pulled his fingers out of you, making you bite down on your tongue to keep from whimpering as Javi worked at his belt, hearing the buckle clink as he pushed his pants and boxers down his thighs. His cock sprang free as it flung out from under the waistband of his underwear, already throbbing and leaking precum from its tip. Javi spitting on his hand to stroke himself before collecting the slick around your entrance and pushing deep inside your heat. Javi held his hand up over your mouth, trying to keep from screaming into his palm as the sweet stretch of his length felt like it was splitting you open. “Shhhhh, I know baby.” He mewled, reaching his free hand down to once again rub against your throbbing bundle of nerves. “Gotta be a good girl and keep quiet for me, okay?” You nodded frantically as he took his hand off your mouth, biting down on your lip as his thrusts became quicker, pounding into you with a desperate intensity. “Jesus you’re so fucking wet. Does it turn you on, Osita? Thinking about me being your husband?” The way Javi punched against your walls had you writhing, squeezing your legs tighter around his waist and burying your face in the crook of his neck, toes curling with each satisfying thrust. You were practically incoherent- the way his hips snapped ferociously against you, fingers circling against your clit, talking about being his fucking wife? You let your words babble from your brain straight to your mouth, unfiltered, as they fell from your lips. 

“Fuck- oh my god - Yes, fuck, it turns me on so much. I think about it all the time. Fuck, I wanna marry you so bad, have your kids, I want all of it Javi. I want- Oh shit- I want all of it.” You could feel the tingle creeping from the base of your spine into your belly, digging your fingertips into the shirt stretched across the muscles of Javi’s broad back, crying out silently into his shoulder. The sounds that filled the air between you were wanton, hearing how wet you were as Javi slid in and out of you, his grunts strained against his gritted teeth, thrusting deeper and harder as he felt your pussy begin to flutter around him. 

“Jesus- fuck me - Makes me so fucking hard thinking about it. Making you my fucking wife, putting a ring on your finger, fucking a baby into you. I’ll give it all to you, Osita.” You balled  your fists around the fabric of his shirt, nearly ripping it off his back as you sobbed into his neck feeling how close you were. His free hand reached back up against your face, cupping over your mouth to muffle your moans, feeling you clench tighter and tighter around his cock. “That’s it baby. Let go. Soak my dick before I fuck you full of me.” The coil in your belly snapped as you whimpered into his palm, your orgasm overtaking you, body erupting with pleasure. 

Hi Javi’s thrusts became sloppy and sporadic, frantically chasing his own high, desperate to fuck every last drop of himself into you. “Fuck, Hermosa, you’re so good to me, giving me the best fucking birthday- mierda - you’re fucking perfect. All fucking mine. Oh shit, fuck, baby, I’m- ahhhhhh.” With one last pulse, his seed spilled against the heat of your walls, his cock throbbing inside you, pushing every last drop of himself into your cunt. He slumped his forehead against your shoulder, feeling the sweaty curls of his hair stick to your skin as your chests rose and fell in sync. Javi hissed as he pulled out, feeling the mixture of the two of you drip down your legs. Running his two fingers along the inside of your still trembling thighs, he collected your spend, bringing it back to your entrance before pushing his thick digits back into your heat, making you gasp. “Gonna keep you full of me all fucking night, pretty girl.” He leaned down to kiss along the trail he had swiped up before traveling his lips up your body, stopping at your mouth. He reached down to grab your panties, pulling them back over your legs as he helped you down off of the counter, shuffling them over your ass as he gave it a quick smack before pulling your dress back down to its rightful position. You leaned against the counter as Javi brought his pants and boxers back around his waist, fastening his belt buckle, looking up to see you grinning at him. 

“Did you mean what you said? About- about all that stuff?” You asked, biting down on your lip, heat building in your face as your heart pounded in your chest. 

“Every fucking word, baby.” He cradled your cheek, running his thumb along your jaw, his face radiating with joy and content. “Osita, this has been the best fucking birthday I’ve ever had. Never in a million fucking years did I think someone would even care enough to remember my birthday, let alone do all this shit for me. I never wanna have another goddamn birthday without you. Today has been perfect. I’m ready to go and take you home to our apartment. Tú y yo, Osita. Para el restoro de mi vida (Me and you, Osita. For the rest of my life.) I love you so much.”

 Before Javi could lean down to kiss you again, your bodies both froze in fear as you heard the doorknob to the bedroom rattling. “Fuck…” Javi muttered to himself. “Wait right here, okay? I promise I’ll make sure no one finds out you’re in here. Fuck, I’m so sorry.” He gave you a quick kiss on the head before carefully closing the ensuite door, trying his best to fix his hair and shirt as he heard knocking on the other end. 

“Jav! It’s Steve. I know you’re in there, you sneaky son of a bitch.” 

Javi groaned as he opened the door, stepping out of his room to find Steve smirking as he crossed his arms against his chest. “Whatchya doin’ in there, buddy?” 

“Fuck off, Murphy, I just- I had to go get something really quick.” Javi’s eyes darted up and down the hallway to make sure no one else was around. 

“Whatever ya say man. Hey listen, all the girls are cashed out in the car so we’re gonna hit the road. I just wanted to say it was so good to see you, Peña. The two of you need to come by sometime now that we’re close. I know I’ve given you a lot of shit over the years, but I mean it when I say I’m really fucking happy for you. Happy birthday, ya grumpy old bastard.” Steve pulled in Javi for a hug, giving him one last pat on the back before pulling away. “And Jav?” 

“Yeah, Murph?” 

“Your fly’s undone.” 

“Oh, fuck…” Javi muttered, quickly reaching down to zip up his pants while Steve was trying to keep himself from cackling. 

You snuck out of the bathroom to press against the doorway, trying to figure out who had almost caught you and Javi. Not realizing that Javi hadn’t closed the door all the way, you leaned just a little too hard, forcing it open as you sheepishly peeked your head out behind Javi. 

“Bye, sweetheart.” Steve winked at you before heading down the hallway and disappearing around the corner, your face beet red knowing you had completely blown your cover. 

“Bye Steve.” You muffled through the hand now completely covering your face in embarrassment before looking back up at Javi. “Better him than your dad, I guess? Or God forbid, Maria?” You both grimaced, the idea of either of those two finding you in the state Steve had making you shutter. 

“Jesus, I can’t even think about that.” You both laughed as Javi snaked his hand around your waist, pulling you flush with his chest. “Whaddya say we head home, roomie?” The name making you grin as you hugged your arms around his hips, laying his head against the soft fabric of his shirt. 

“Sounds good to me, birthday boy.” 

The two of you made your way back out to the party, the number of guests dwindling from the late hours of the night the party had extended to. You said your goodbyes to the friends and family still lingering, making sure to give an extra long hug to Chucho, thanking him again for everything he had done to help make sure the party had gone perfectly. 

“I can come over tomorrow if you need help cleaning up okay? Don’t need you complaining about your knees anymore than you already are.” You smiled, Chucho pulling you in for one last squeeze. 

“Cabrón. Mis viejas rodillas están bien.  (Asshole. My old knees are just fine). But if you wanted to come over tomorrow morning to help, I wouldn’t complain. I’m sure this one wants to come get the rest of his things and get out his old man’s hair once and for all.” He chuckled as he grinned at Javi, shaking his head at the two of you. 

“Sounds good, we’ll see you tomorrow, Chucho. Thank you again. You’re the best. You ready, Jav?” You squeezed his hand, giving him a little nudge. 

“Yeah, I just gotta ask Pops something real quick, I’ll meet you out by the car, okay?” He replied, giving you a kiss on the head as you gave Chucho one last wave before making your way back to the driveway. 

“Qué necesitas, hijo?” (What do you need, son?). Chucho raised an eyebrow at Javi, watching his son fidget with his fingers, leg bouncing anxiously. Making sure you had disappeared from his sight, Javi looked around the crowd one more time before taking a shaky breath. 

“I uh- I don’t need it now, but, I mean I’m still gonna give it some time- I um, I just wanted to know if, fuck, if um, I could- I could have mom’s ring?” 

Chucho’s eye’s glistened, beaming at Javi as he wrapped his arm around his son. “Javier. That ring has been sitting on my nightstand since I got home from Maria’s party all those months ago. I’m just glad you finally asked and I didn’t have to put it in your pocket for you.” 

Taglist: @cool-iguana @rhoorl @whyjuliaaa @bbiophiliaa @pertinentpostmortem @angelofsmalldeath-codeine @pedrobaby @fatima-marisa @beboldbebravethings @poodlebae @kittenlittle24 @3sriracha @jungchloee @perennialdoll247 @prettyinpunk85 @partyofone3413 @harriedandharassed

[a66-1]

Because of you.

Regency!Simon x Regency!Fem!Reader

Chapter 1

TW: Cursing, Mentions of DV, (small use of y/n so you know who you are) and more to come in the next chapters!

Simon was on his porch, a drink in his hand as he gazed out into the wide landscape around him. He had a few animals, keep his mind and his hands busy during they day. The sun was setting beautifully. the sky an artists masterpiece, as Simon took a sip of his drink. It was wonderful being on the country side of London, a vast difference from being in the lime light all day and night because of a mere label you're born into. Simon was lucky, really. His mom could've dragged him by the ear to betrothe a girl, give the family an heir but.. He did have a ton of siblings, and the ton seemed more interested in them than him and his.. More quiet aura.

He noticed a note by his door. Odd. He must have missed it when we grabbed his morning mail. He put his drink down, and stood, straightening his shirt. He bent to grab the note, and his saw his sisters signature on the front, and his mothers.

Another oddity. It's the middle of the girls season, and Jasmine was already married...

He went inside to grab a letter opener, and slid it underneath the fold, swiping cleanly, as the paper made a small tearing noise. He pulled the note out and read over it. Blah blah blah, its a great season so far, Tommy found his match, Katy is doing well... But Jasmine wanted him over. Do the whole 'older brother' thing where he acts concerned and sits the boys down for a talk. Simon smiled softly, and turned the letter over, and his mothers handwriting filled the first half.

To be frank, he could barely read his mothers words, but something about Jasmine's husband's cousin?

He sighed, and folded the note back up. God, it's been.... Well, it's been years since he's truly had to be in the city.

He packed a small bit, really not wanting to be there too long, and he put his bag in the holder on his horse.

"Aye, Jackson. You ready for a long ride?" He patted his horse, before hopping on and starting his journey down to the city.

Once he arrived at his childhood home, he whistled lowly. Fuck, the house is huge. He lived here most of his life, but compared to his pretty modest ranch, but... Christ. He hooked his horse up in the stables, and he grabbed his back, keeping it on his shoulder, and he walked into the house. He spotted his mother first, and she squealed.

"Simon!" She ran, elegantly of course, holding her dress up. She hugged Simon tight, kissing his face as he laughed softly. He leaning down to her height, hugging her back.

"Hi, mother. It's been a long time since... I've been back." He mumbled the back end of his sentence. She shook her head, as her response.

"Nonsense, I get why. With 2 kids this season, it's getting harder to keep the reins in on these girls!" She had a smile, but it was tense on her forward. "And with your father being away on work, I need you to step up. Just for a couple weeks, but.. We need you, sweetheart."

Simon nodded. He wanted his mom to have a few things off her plate, knowing her tendencies to over work herself during the season.

He took his time to go through the home, finding his old study space, his old room, and then.. Jasmine. She was with her newly wed (by a couple of months) and then she spotted Simon.

"Si? Is that really you?" She stood up and sprinted to him, much differently than their mother, and jumped in his arms. He spun her around, kissing her head.

"Jaz, good god, you've grown." He laughed softly, and held her face. "It's good to see you."

She smiled up at him and gave him another big squeeze, "Oh! I need to introduce you!" She gestured her husband over, and took his hand when he was close enough.

"Alex, meet Simon, Simon meet Alex." She was all giddy, an arm hooked around his. Simon extended his hand.

"Alex. It's nice to see you have my little sister so... Lively." He teased Jasmine, and Alex took his hand.

"Sir. I've heard a lot of good things about you. Nice to put a name to the face." Alex smiled, and shook Simons hand tightly.

The rest of the day was just seeing his family again, getting reacquainted with all the gossip his sisters have. Only one thing was really bothering him. Jasmine and Alex kept... Talking. Alex seemed nervous, Jasmine was trying her best to comfort him. He had letters in his hand, and both of them were reading them, all worried.

Simon managed to slip away, and peered his ear over the door, which was now shut as Jasmine and Alex needed to talk.

"My love, you shouldn't worry so much, she's... She seems like she got out--" Jasmine started, but Alex worriedly interjected.

"Y/n is being chased. Her... ex fiancé is after her, he found her at our mothers, at her best friends... She needs to get out of London." He seemed to be tapping his foot, by the soft tapping sound.

"I understand Alex, but honey, there's nothing we can really do, because if she comes here... I mean, isn't her ex... Using.. You know, substances?" Jasmine kissed his temple, and he deflated.

"I need her out of town. Is.. Isn't Simon living out of the city? Do you think-?" Alex was trying his hardest not to cry, by the sounds of it. Simon tensed. Hell no, he won't get involved with things like this, he's already managed to avoid the problems of the city--

"I could... I could ask him.. But he's not really-"

Simon walked away, shaking his head, what was Jasmine thinking? He isn't interested in homing someone, especially if there's a.. Drug abuser after her..

That's when he heard Jasmine come up behind her, grasping his arm.

Jasmine turns him around, Alex, avoidantly, in tow.

"Simon? Can we talk?"

aha cliffhanger (im still writing but you need to want to keep reading somehow)

small series im making because starving is killing me rn.

ilsym babes, happy pride!

-a661

[laura1633]

Thought I would give a sneak peek of the rough draft of my Cowboy Max x F1 Driver Charles au just because I am so far behind so am not going to be able to post the finished thing just yet. Please just keep in mind its just a draft:

The rain slowly eases off but leaves the view hazy, the sprinkling of lights far off in the distance are just about visible amongst the clouds. 

“Sorry, I didn’t know anybody was here.”

Charles whips his head around as he hears a voice, the accent is think but distinctly not American. 

“Oh fuck,” Charles blurts out to a rather shocked looking ranch hand, “Sorry I - , you just took me by surprise.” 

The Monegasque feels a sudden heat to his face as he lets his gaze linger on the sight in front of him. The guy is dressed in a pair of faded jeans and a grey t-shirt that clings across his chest and cuts across his biceps. His boots are beaten up but match the stetson that he is adorning. 

“I just need to grab some feed from the outhouse, that’s okay right?”

“Charles,” Charles says mindlessly, too distracted by the view to really pay much mind to what he has actually been asked. The guy looks like he’s just walked off the set of an editorial photoshoot - the blues of his eyes framed by long lashes and sparkling beneath the cowboy hat, his full lips a little dry but rosy red to match the flush along his cheekbones. He’s rough and beautiful, curved and muscled, like an image conjured up for the front cover of some sordid cowboy romance novel. 

“I’m Max,” Max chuckles, “So it’s okay if I go into the outhouse then?”

“Of course,” Charles voice goes all scratchy, his body flushed and damp beneath his clothes as he takes a swig from the can in his hand and hopes it will go someway to cooling him down. It doesn’t, he’s still burning up. 

“Come on then pretty,” Max hums making Charles’ heart stop almost entirely before thundering back into life. He’s half way off his seat and ready to follow when he sees the chocolate and white border collie that Max was actually calling over. 

The Monegasque’s gaze shoots over to Max, he’s almost certain that he sees the faintest hint of an amused smile before the ranch hand wanders off. 

Fuck, that was not Charles’ smoothest moves. 

[whatsnewalycat]

Burn It Down - One Shot

Javier Peña x Reader - Explicit (18+ only)

Summary: Before that moment, he was so careful not to tip his hand. Always trying to make you think he’s content to take the scraps of love you give him and feast upon them. Because wanting more with you means more than just having you. It means mess. It means burning your lives down to the ground. It’s the unspoken truth of your relationship.

Word Count: 4k+

Warnings: Javier's POV, Angst, Established Secret Relationship, Infidelity, Drunk Driving (DON'T DO THAT!), Leg Grinding, Dirty Talk, Orgasm, Possessive Javier, Angst With A Happy Ending

A/N: Story inspiration from "The Ideal Husband" by Father John Misty. This was originally a scene I had in mind when I started writing Just Dumb Enough to Try (can you tell I was listening to a lot of FJM??), but it didn't work with those characters or their relationship.

I revisited it and fleshed it out and changed some stuff, and, voilà!

[ Masterlist ] [ Taglist ] [ AO3 ]

He should leave. 

Just turn the car around and go back home. 

But the pragmatic part of his brain is riding in the backseat. Whiskey has the wheel now. 

The digital clock on the dash reads 7:00 AM. He shakes his head in disbelief when he realizes it's been just 24 hours since he woke up in your bed and everything was fine. 

What he wouldn't give to go back in time and be there again. Heat of your body clinging to him. Buried under your white bedsheet. Watching your fingertips dance across his torso. 

Sometimes he closes his eyes and tries to trace the path your touch takes. Other times he watches inquisitively. Always trying to decode the invisible messages you draw onto his skin in these quiet moments. When he asks you what you're writing, the answer is always the same. 

"It's a secret," you teased, amusement at his curiosity drawing your gaze to his. Humor crinkled the delicate skin at the corners of your eyes. 

You and your goddamn secrets. 

If he could go back in time to 7:00 AM yesterday, this could have all been avoided. He'd tell himself to get the fuck out as soon as you suggested breakfast. Before he could have a chance to wander around your kitchen and study the artifacts of your life with the man who lives there. He wouldn't have seen the calendar on the wall. 

"I have to go. Shit to do on the ranch," he could have lied. He could have gotten dressed and gone home. 

He wouldn’t have spent the whole day drinking himself into a stupor, trying to get rid of your voice in his head. Trying to make your bright smile, your infectious laugh, disappear from his memory. Trying to erase the penciled-in note on your calendar. 

This all could have all been avoided. 

Despite all the things that could have been, though, he's here. Turning down your street. Coming to a stop and shifting the gear into park. Watching the closed curtains for any sign of movement. 

He pries open the center console and pulls out a shiny aluminum flask, then slouches down in the driver's seat and starts to empty its contents into his belly, one pull at a time. Taking a drink every time the deep ache of yearning tightens around his heart. 

No, see, despite all the things that could have been, you're in this house and he's out here. You're in there, probably still tucked into the bed and sleeping soundly, and you can never unhear the things he said to you. 

Yesterday will never happen again. No do-overs in this life, unfortunately, regardless of how many times Javi has wished there would be. Yesterday will always be the day you were greasing a frying pan, and he snuck up behind you, circling his arms around your waist, pressing a kiss into the crook of your neck. You reached back and blindly ran your fingers through his hair as you melted against him. 

He mumbled against your skin, "Wish we could do this every day."

Now that he thinks about it, maybe those words were the catalyst, not the calendar. His admission of wanting anything more. Before that moment, he was so careful not to tip his hand. Always trying to make you think he’s content to take the scraps of love you give him and feast upon them. 

Because wanting more with you means more than just having you. It means mess. It means burning your lives down to the ground. It’s the unspoken truth of your relationship. 

The way your body reacted to his confession told him that you know this, too. 

It was subtle, the way you tensed ever-so-slightly, pulse jumping against his lips. It was so slight, he thought he might have imagined it. But now, looking back, he has decided it was another one of your secrets. Always trying to hide pieces of yourself away, as if you want it to be impossible for any single person to see all of you at one time. 

It's been occurring to him, more and more lately, that he desperately wants to be the person you'll hand all your broken pieces to. He wants to splay you out on his dining room table like a 1000-piece puzzle that's halfway completed. 

Fuck, more than anything on this Earth, he wants to hover above you, studying each intricate, jigsawed fraction of you until he's memorized them all. Then maybe, you can both figure out how it all fits together. Then maybe, he can see all of you at one time. 

Then maybe, he can trust you with his own broken pieces. 

"I do, too, Javi," you whispered. 

Your voice wasn't hopeful. Instead, it was thick with sorrow that settled heavy in his chest like pneumonia. His hands fell away from your sides and he stepped back, giving you space to cook. You started to crack eggs into a stainless steel bowl while he casually studied the kitchen. The metallic ting-crack of eggshells giving way to the lip of the bowl was background music to his exploration. 

When he closes his eyes and recounts these events, that ting-crack echoes loudly. 

He examined the shelf of cookbooks, wondering if any of them were hand-me-downs from your mom or grandma. As he continued to stroll, he saw trinkets and contemplated their significance, too. Filed them away as potential pieces of the puzzle. Always looking for clues. 

And then he found one. 

His eyes fell on a bird calendar hanging from the wall next to your corded home phone. November 1998 was represented by the kingfisher. Its teal and rust feathers contrast and compliment each other in a striking way that he found himself admiring. Then he noticed a penciled-in note for this coming Tuesday, handwriting unmistakably yours: Wedding Cake Testing 6:00. 

You were whisking the eggs together, head down, and didn't see his face when he shattered. It was obvious to him at that moment that the two of you were just playing house for the weekend. He was just filling in as Daddy while your fiancé was away on a business trip. The unspoken truth, glaring right in the eyes. 

And it ruined him. 

Of all the complicated emotions fighting over control of his brain, rage was the victor. The edges of his vision tinged red and hot. He clenched his teeth together and leaned back against the countertop, watching you with indignation as you cluelessly went about making breakfast. 

"Do you really or are you just saying that so I'll keep fucking you?" he heard the rage say. 

You were about to pour the eggs into the pan, but lowered the bowl and turned around to face him, chuckling with confusion, "Wh- what?"

He knows now that there was no way for you to see this coming. You couldn't have foreseen the blinding rage that overrode him. But your confusion fueled the flame anyway. 

All he could think is: It's all a goddamn act.   An illusion. You and your fucking secrets. This other life you lead when he’s not there. 

It burned hot in his veins. 

He didn’t take the evidence into account. The way you look at him like he's the only person who exists. The few broken pieces you allow him to see. Your claims to misery, a whispered confession the night before: "I feel trapped when I'm with him, and when I'm with you I'm free."

Because there you were, standing in a kitchen that your fiancé owns, scrambling eggs that your fiancé bought, drowning in your fiancé's t-shirt, wearing that fucking diamond ring on your left hand, and Javier was certain you had no intention of leaving. 

You opened your mouth, but just blinked frantically, rendered silent by this part of him you had never seen before. 

He pushed off the countertop and started pacing, pinching the bridge of his nose, “You agreed that you wish we could do this every day,” losing control of himself, he crowded you against the kitchen counter, pressing his nose into your cheek, craning your head to the side, “If that’s true, why haven’t you left him? Hmm? Why him and not me, cariño?” 

You gave no response. Just short, panicked puffs of air against his cheek. 

"What does he have that I don’t? Is it because you don’t want to be seen with someone like me?”  

“Someone like you? I- I don’t-” 

“Don't play dumb, you know what I mean," he sneered, palms pressing down on either side of your waist, cornering you there like his prey, "What is it, baby? What does he have that I don't? Hmm?" 

His lips brushed against your ear, his breath hot against your skin. A soft gasp expanded your lungs when he husked, “Does he pay attention to you like I do?"

"No," you whimpered and shook your head. 

He shifted his hips and wedged a knee between your legs, "Does he touch you like I do?"

When you shook your head this time, his teeth caught your earlobe and a little moan escaped your throat. The warmth of your sex found his thigh and you arched into the contact. He pulled back enough to meet your eyes, all confusion and blown-out pupils as you looked up at him through your eyelashes. 

"Does he fuck you like I do? Hmm, baby?" his heart was thudding loud in his chest, searching your eyes for the truth. 

You bit down on your bottom lip and held back a moan, shaking your head as you began rubbing yourself against his leg. 

“I didn’t fucking think so," he growled, grabbed your face and captured your lips in his. The kiss was possessive and heated. 

Simultaneously, he wanted to destroy you and make you whole. He wanted his touch to haunt your body long after you married this fucking prick. He wanted to spoil your appetite for other men so completely that the thought of anyone else touching you would bring on bouts of nausea. 

He wanted to fucking ruin you. 

Breaking the kiss, he placed his hands on your rolling hips and pressed you down harder. Your head fell back and you moaned wantonly at the friction. When your gaze snapped back to his, your face was flushed, soft moans falling from your lips as you humped his leg. 

You weren't wearing any underwear and he could feel the heat of your cunt through the thick denim of his jeans. When he looked down at the place your bodies met, the dampened fabric as proved that you fucking loved this. 

"I wish he'd walk in and see you just like this," he growled, digging his fingers into your hips, making you gasp. 

You grabbed onto the sides of his shirt and used him as leverage, gaining more momentum.

"See you rubbing that sweet pussy all over my leg," he purred, meeting your hot gaze with his own as he uttered the words, "See that you're mine." 

Your mouth gaped open and you started to whimper frantically. Grinding down against his thigh. He could tell you were close. Your eyelids started to flutter. 

"You sit here and placate me, tell me that you want this, and then what? You continue to plan your sham fucking wedding while you fuck me on the side?" he asked through gritted teeth. 

You whimpered and shook your head frantically in denial, "No, baby, that's not true."

"Such a fucking liar, cariño." 

His lips formed an O and he spurred your pace, rocking you back and forth so fast you started taking big, deep, swallows of air and released a choked sob. 

"That's ok, baby, you can use me. Use me to make yourself feel fucking good," he growled, pressing his forehead to yours, rocking you faster now, fueled by the moans slurring together from your throat, "Come on baby, I want you to cum all over my fucking leg. Show me how much you like being my little slut." 

"Oh my god-" you gasped, "Yes yes yes, I like it."

"Like being a little fucking slut, baby, hmm?"

You nodded, whimpering and gasping, rubbing your cunt all over his drenched, hot leg, reaching a fever pitch. And then your face twisted up with pleasure and you shuddered, "H-holy fuck-”   legs tightening around his as you twitched against him. 

His lips curled into a smile at your sexual satisfaction. He kissed your sweaty forehead, your cheek, your lips through panting breaths. You hummed and closed your eyes, releasing his shirt to link your hands behind his head. 

He wasn't done with you yet, though. 

The inflamed, red part of him was still throbbing. So fucking sure that he had you figured out. So convinced he didn't need to see all the broken pieces to know that you were just toying with him. 

“I can't keep playing boyfriend with you, hoping that one day you'll actually pull the trigger and leave him."

Your chest still heaving, you pulled back and narrowed your eyes in confusion. He stepped away and returned your stare with a piercing gaze. You averted your eyes and closed in on yourself, arms folding in front of your chest. He mistook it as a sign that he was on the right track. 

“Why, cariño? Why are you so fucking content to stay? So you can be miserable? But hey, at least it’s comfortable. Isn't that right? Hmm?"

When you turned to look up at him, meeting his gaze with disbelief and fury, he should have known that you were setting your phasers to kill. 

"Is that what you think, Javier?" you bit off, glaring as you searched his face, “That I want this? Do you think this is fucking fun for me?" 

It was his turn to be rendered silent and unmoving. He watched you carefully. 

"What the fuck am I supposed to do? I have fucking nothing ,” the last word was spoken through gritted teeth. The rage overrode you, too. 

The unspoken truth spoken. It was too much for either of you to handle. 

He cut you off with a lie, “That’s not true.”

“Well, what, are you gonna save me? Let me live with you? You won’t even let me come over when your dad is home,” you scoffed, then stared off into the distance and awaited a reply he couldn't give you. 

The weight of the truth started to settle on your shoulders. He could see them slump. Your face crumpled, folding under the pressure of sorrow that welled up in the corners of your eyes, “Can’t you see that I’m in love with you, Javi? Of course I want you.”

Desperately, you searched his face for a reaction. He couldn’t process this information. So sure that he had you pegged as something much more insidious, so committed to his rage, the question gave him emotional whiplash. 

You could see it then. The panic building in his chest, creeping into the features of his face, widening his eyes. He opened his mouth to form words but nothing came out. He just shook his head. Your confession met with complete and utter terror. 

Your nostrils flared. 

“Get out,” you spat, jabbing a finger against his chest, “Fucking hypocrite.” 

It’s been bubbling between the layers of his skin since. Your confession. Your anger. Your pain. 

Fucking hypocrite. 

You were right. He did as you asked. He left. 

Went home and hit the bottle. Thought long and hard about everything. The broken pieces he can see spread out before him. Waking up next to you. Your secret notes on his skin. How your body tensed up when he tipped his hand. The calendar. Your penciled in note. The rage it evoked. His accusations. Your confession of love. 

Can’t you see that I’m in love with you? 

Now he can. He put it all together. And now he can see it. Even clearer yet, he can see… that he’s in love with you, too. 

He drops the flask back in the center console and slams it shut. Gets out of the vehicle and lets his heavy feet carry him to your front door, where he rings the doorbell. Pounds his fist against the door. 

It swings open, and you’re wrapped up in a plush black robe, hair mussed from tossing and turning in your sleep, squinting puffy eyes at the intrusion. When you register that it’s Javier standing there, swaying unsteadily on your doorstep, you sigh and cross your arms, “What do you want?”

“I needta talk to you,” he slurs, leaning against the doorframe for support. 

Your eyes blink open wider and you study him, then ask, “Are you fucking drunk?” 

He neither confirms nor denies, just shrugs. Which is like a confirmation but at least he doesn’t have to say it out loud. 

“Jesus fucking Christ, Javier, get in here,” you groan and turn around into the house. He follows and closes the door behind him, then tries to bend over to take his shoes off, but stumbles forward. 

“Come on,” you pull him upright and wrap an arm around his back, guiding him towards the bedroom, “You need to sleep.” 

“Nnnno- Gotta tell you-” he mumbles, but lets you continue to guide him down the hallway, into your bedroom, where he plops down onto the bed that’s still warm from your body heat. 

You untie his shoes and yank them off. They thud on the hardwood floor, one at a time. He hums once they’re off and tries to sit up to look at you, but you press your fingers against his chest and guide him back against the bed, “He’s not gonna be back 'til tomorrow, you can sleep it off here.” 

His eyes close and he feels the room start to spin and fade as you take his pants off, then start unbuttoning his shirt. While you methodically strip him down into comfort so he can sleep, he tries time and time again to touch you, to pull you into an embrace, to make it like it was at this time yesterday. But you swat him away, muttering to yourself in annoyance. Or maybe you’re asking him questions. He’s not sure anymore. 

He hears you ask, “Why did you even come here, Javi? Can’t believe you drove in this condition.” 

This triggers his memory. He recalls the purpose of this trip. 

“I love you too,” he blurts out. You freeze. His eyes blink open and meet yours. 

Your eyebrows are pressed together, lips parted in shock. He lets it sink in. When you respond, your eyes are brimming with tears and your voice is quivering, “Don’t fuck with me right now, Javier.” 

“Mmmnot fucking with you, cariño,” he swears. His hand finds yours, and this time you let him take it, but it’s limp in response. He rubs his thumb against your skin and doesn’t part his gaze, tries his hardest not to slur his words, “I’m tired of running. Don’t wanna hide. I’m in love with you.”

Big, fat tears start to roll hot down your cheeks. You sniffle and wipe them away, avert your gaze, “You’re just saying that because you’re shitfaced.” 

“Nope,” a drunk smile stretches across his face, “Figured it out. I- I wanna marry you, have babies with you, all that. I wan' everything with you.” 

Your gaze meets his, and he can tell you’re trying to determine whether or not this is the booze talking. And, in a way, it is. He probably wouldn’t have said that last part if whiskey hadn’t destroyed his brain-to-mouth filter. He pulls your hand to his lips and plants a kiss on the back of it, then presses it to his cheek and tells you, “I mean it, cariño.” 

“Javi,” you whimper, lips forming a pout as more tears fall, “Can we talk about this when you wake up?” 

“Do you love me?” he asks, searching your face, nuzzling against the heat of your hand. 

“Yeah,” you smirk, “I do love you. Now please get some sleep, drunky pants.” 

“I don’t even have pants on,” he scoffs playfully. 

“I know, baby, I took them off,” you snort, then pull your hand away and tuck him into bed. As soon as the warmth of the blankets surrounds him, he passes out. 

When he wakes, the clock on your bedside table reads 1:35 PM. There’s music playing from a stereo in your kitchen. His head starts to pound as he sits up and puts his clothes back on, then gets out of bed. He vaguely recalls the things he said to you before passing out. 

The floor creaks under his feet when he enters the kitchen, alerting you to his presence. He peers around the room. The bird calendar is still open to November 1998, kingfisher still puffing out its impressive plumage, Wedding Cake Testing 6:00 still penciled in for this Tuesday. 

It’s funny how some things remain static although everything around it has changed. 

“Hey,” you greet him, flashing a hesitant smile as you lean back against the counter and cross your arms. 

Your body language confuses him. Hadn’t he told you? Hadn’t he confessed his love? 

Suddenly, anxiety vibrates his bones and leaves him feeling insecure. He approaches you cautiously, “Hey.” 

“How are you feeling?” 

Your voice is warm and filled with concern. He takes another step towards you and shrugs, “Grateful that you didn’t murder me in my sleep.” 

A grin plays on your lips. He comes closer to you, beckoned by the hopefulness brightening your face. You meet his gaze as he brings his hands to your hips. He slides them around you and your crossed arms that quickly respond, wrapping around his back, pulling him closer. 

The heat of your body in his embrace pulls a content sigh from his chest and he melts into it. He buries his nose in your hair and inhales the scent of you, and he knows. 

“I meant it,” he mumbles against you, closing his eyes and squeezing you tight, “I love you.” 

“I love you too,” you whisper.

Your fingers dig into his skin, like you’re trying to prevent him from escaping. Like if you hook your barbs into him he can’t leave you here to rot in a lie. But he’s not running. Neither are you. 

“What are we gonna do?” you ask him. 

He knows that this won’t be simple. It means mess. It means burning your lives down to the ground. 

“Are you ready to leave him?” he loosens his grasp on you to meet your eyes. Searching for clues. For secrets that might be lingering in the background. 

Your gaze is unflinching as you nod. You’re studying him, too. Both so timid as you tiptoe out from behind the curtains and reveal more of yourselves.

His heart is pounding in his chest, fingers tingling, vulnerability peeling away at his layers until he’s just raw, exposed nerves. 

“Do you wanna come home with me?”

The question leaves a thick residue in his throat, and he swallows hard. 

“Right now? To live?” 

He nods, ignoring the knot of insecurity twisting in his stomach that tries to make him doubt you. 

It’s like the further you both step into the bright light of truth, the more puzzle pieces you each give and receive, and it starts to fall into place. He sees more than those little jigsawed fragments of you now. He starts to see the bigger picture. 

“Yes, Javi,” you nod, eyebrows pressing together as your face crumples into tears of relief. He cups your cheeks with his palms and meets your gaze with a smile that takes up his whole face, folding his eyes into crescent moons. 

You pull him into a kiss that ignites his soul, then melt against him. 

Illuminated by the hot, glowing flames of your lives burning down, he sees you, and he knows that you see him. And he knows the two of you will dance on the ashes and welcome new growth.

[frozen-waters]

General Johnigail/Marston family hcs?? <3

ofc ofc yay yay yay!!!!!!! sorry for making John a little lover boy whenever I write johnigail and there are also a few angsty-ish hcs in here

More Johnigail and Marston Family hcs!!!

• John loves when Abigail plays the piano (canon but it makes me giggle)

• John also watches Abigail sew new clothes or mend old ones. I don’t mean this in a weird way but he likes watching her sew without her knowing. in like a sweet way. she looks peaceful to him

• I’m not sure how to explain this but the Marston family (or mostly Jack) is a few The Smiths songs to me

• speaking of The Smiths modern Jack would listen to them

• after Abigail died, Jack wished he had read to her more in his tween/teen years

• even as Jack gets older, he still laughs sometimes at the stories Uncle tells

• Jack also kept all of Abigail’s dresses that she had after she died. he didn’t really know what he was gonna do with them but he couldn’t stand getting rid of them. he did the same with John’s clothes but he kept them so he could wear them

• in modern when Abigail has to go to work in the morning or something John will wake up before her and turn on the car for her so it’ll be warm by the time she’s gotta go

• John and Abigail dancing together!!!!!!!!!!!!!! idk when but maybe if Uncle still plays the banjo or overhearing music is Blackwater!!!!!!!!!!

• modern John had a gamecube when he was in highschool but the only games he played were like. sonic, eternal darkness, and resident evil. dug it out of Hoseas garage or attic when Jack became a teen and "gifted" it to him -> has it in the livingroom and John plays it and Jack will watch him sometimes -> John also thought Jack was insane when he didn't know what he was supposed to do w a gamecube. to him its The Gift

• in modern when Jack was like 7-10 he'd infodump for an entire dinner about a book or show he read or watched in excruciating detail

• Abigail loved dressing up Jack and his sister

• the Marston daughter used Johns shirts and basketball shorts as pajamas for like. five years straight in modern

• mosquito's were Jacks worst enemy in his tween years

• Abigail loves the horses they keep on Beechers Hope. she likes keeping them all pretty and clean

• John buys Abigail jewelry sometimes. it takes all his brainpower to find something that will look nice with an outfit of hers but its worth it when he sees her get giddy over a necklace he got her

• John bought Mary-Beth's books for Abigail since they were mostly romance and he would read them to her. after John died Jack would read the books to her on her and John's anniversary along with taking her to the movies. or he'd read them to her if she asked

• in modern I know deep in my bones John had some weirdass senior quote

• in modern the Marston daughter was afraid of the dark and had a horrible habit of going into John and Abigail's room and accidentally scaring them

• modern Jack wants to have a bunch of little nick-nacks and cool stuff in his room but everything he finds he feels like it doesn't fit the "vibe" he wants

• John does recognize Jack's empathy towards the animals on the ranch. not that he knows what to do or say about it. tried sugarcoating some sickness among the animals to Jack once but eventually had to tell him what was actually happening and Jack was very sad about it

• Abigail did teach Jack to sew a tiny bit

• John would give Jack "relationship advice" (as if he fucking knows anything) when they'd go into Blackwater to sell the ranches goods

• every year for John and Abigail's anniversary he'd take her into Blackwater and take her to see a movie

• Abigail always notices when John wears a gift she got for him no matter how long ago its from

• when Abigail's sick John tries to keep the house nice and tries to cook for her even though they're both fairly bad cooks

• Jack absentmindedly tells Uncle about the book he's reading when they sit on the porch together and Uncle comes up with some story he witnessed similar to the book

• John also takes Jack to see a movie for his birthday. the first time he did Jack does that thing where he gets excited and cant really talk straight and John was proud of himself

• Jack does occasionally like helping Abigail cook or gather things in the garden

• as Jacks hair gets longer he braids little pieces of it without thinking sometimes

this wasn't as long as the last one whoops

[pannman]

A Day Just For Them

Blitzø sat at the table in his tiny apartment. His thoughts from the argument with Stolas still refusing to leave his mind.

Fuck it. He thought as he rifled through the fridge for his Belzejuice but it didn't turn up. He must've already drank it. Or maybe Loona drank it

Oh well, he'll just have to wallow in self pity while sober. He sat down and poured himself some cereal

The silence while Loonie slept in was usually so peaceful but now it felt so lonely. More lonely than ever before

Stolas struggled to find the motivation to get out of bed. Via was visiting today. He needed to be up and ready to greet her (and to pretend like everything was fine)

Why was Via supposed to be over today? It was the weekend wasn't it? She was supposed to spend weekends with her mother. Not that he didn't want to see her but he wasn't sure how well he could put on a happy face for her

Although that's what he'd been doing for years

Why was she coming today? His brain was so foggy and tired he couldn't seem to remember what was so important about today

He really didn't want to forget something important to Via again after Esther thoughts tears when she ran off with his book

He felt terrible that it was he who compelled her to do that

So with all the strength he could gather he groaned and got out of bed

Blitzø sat there letting his cereal get soggy when he saw Loona exit her room. Oddly enough she was already dressed

That was unusual. He didn't think much of it though

"Alright espresso depresso, get dressed and let's get going" she said as she stretched

Blitzø blinked obliviously. "Going where?"

"To your father's day surprise"

Oh shit! That's right it was Father's day!

Stolas put on his usual wear and took his morning meds. He stepped outside to see the limo pulling up.

He took a deep breath and forced a smile and waved

Via jumped out of the car and joyfully bounced over to him. She seemed to be in a good mood

Anxiety spread over him at whatever it could possibly be that he had promised to with her today and how she would take the news that he forgot

She ran into his arms

"Hey dad! Happy Father's day!"

Stolas almost tripped over his words

"Th-thank you... Via. I'm glad you're here"

Of course! It was Father's day! That's why she was here. He didn't know what they would do together but maybe it would actually be quite nice

He could use a little love today

Blitzø ran into 3 different signs and a telephone pole with his blind fold on as Loona was not putting a lot of effort into leading him

But he was actually a little excited. He could use a distraction. And it had been a while since him and Loona did something fun together

"Alright, check it out" Loona said casually

Blitzø began to take his blindfold off but as he was doing so heard a noise. A noise that sounded like a certain animal

A noise he knew anywhere

"No way! That's not what fucking think it is. Is it?" He rushed to take off his blindfold. His eyes practically bulged out of his sockets when he seen it

A ranch filled with horses

Wait! Were they in the wrath ring?

"Ta da!" She said not so enthusiastic although she was smiling at him

"It's a whole day across the mountain on horseback" she explained

He began to tear up. "Loonie you did this for me!?!" Loona groaned in an annoyed tone "don't cry" she complained

Blitzø whiped his tears away "right yeah sorry. I'm just... I needed this. Oh my God Loona you have NO IDEA how much I needed this."

Loona smiled "I think you'd be surprised. I kinda had a feeling. Now pick out your horse for the day"

Stolas had managed to find something for them to do together. Put put. Then he had decided to get them a last minute reservation at a restaurant he knew she liked. Being royalty had its perks

Via just seemed happy to be with him. "Dad you didn't have to go through this trouble. This is my day to do something for you" she spoke appreciatively as they sat down at the restaurant

"I know, I know. But nothing makes me more happy than to see that smile. That's the best gift I could get today" he cupped her cheek with his hand as he said it

"Well dad. I did get you another gift if you would like it now" she began to pull something out of her bag

Stolas's eyes lit up in anticipation.

Via reached in and pulled out a present in a box and wrapped up with a bow on it

"Oh Via you really didn't have to do this" he said with excitement as he carefully opened the present

His glee on his face fell when he saw his gift

In the box, was a book entitled "memories with dad"

He carefully opened it to see it was filled to the brim with pictures of him and Via together. A lot were taken from her hellphone. There were funny and lighthearted captions on some of them

He was too stunned to speak

"Is it alright dad? I know it's not the most expensive gift but I-" she was cut off by him hugging her as tight as he could

"This is the greatest gift! Thank you so much! I think I have a new favorite book" he said as he began to flip through more of the pages

After Blitzø FINALLY decided on a horse they were off. Blitzø decided to call this beautiful baby "little lawnmower". Loona didn't have the heart to tell him it's name was "Sunny". She picked out a big white horse with a fiesty attitude named "Phantom"

They rode up and down a windy path to the top of a tall mountain. The view was gorgeous so of course Loona wanted to snap a pic with Blitzø for Father's day

They took a photo and Loona immediately tried to post it.

"Shit! No signal up here. I guess I'll have to post it on sinstagram later" she noted.

Blitzø looked on to see two eagles building a nest together

He begins to tear up

Loona looks over "hey Blitzø I said no crying"

Blitzø tries to calm down "sorry, it's just... did you know eagles mate for life?"

"I did not know that" she responded

"Even after they grow old and get fat or ugly! They stay together. They stay together cause they want to" he broke down crying

Loona pulled him in and comforted him as he cried in her arms

"Big. Beautiful. Dumb bird!" He sobbed.

"You should talk to him" she replied

"He doesn't wanna see me." He mumbled

"I think you should still try. I don't wanna become your tissue every time you see something that reminds you of him. Now go."

She was right. He was gonna make it right.

Blitzø hopped onto Little Lawnmower and took off. He was gonna make it right. He was gonna talk about his FEELINGS like a FUNCTIONAL PERSON! And it was gonna super romantic him riding in on a horse

He took out his phone to see Loona's post finally up...

On top of the world with my dad on Father's Day

He did feel like he was on top of the world

And he didn't want this feeling to go away

Ever

[ladamedusoif]

A Cup of Kindness, Yet

Part of the Pickled Peña Writing Challenge

(Challenge graphics and images by @musings-of-a-rose and @trulybetty - thank you!)

Pairing: Javier Peña x F!Reader

Word Count: 2191

Warnings: Alcohol; smoking; strong language (it’s Javi); post-S3 of Narcos; no physical descriptions of Reader; no use of Y/N. 

Rating: Teen

Summary: Another Auld Lang Syne in Laredo, two decades after you last saw in a new year with Javier.

A/N: My submission for the Pickled Peña Writing Challenge organised by @goodwithcheese and the rest of the @pickled-pena collective - thank you for organising this event, everyone! I can't wait to read all the different submissions for these really challenging prompts, and hope you enjoy my contribution.

(PS: if you enjoy this story please follow my writing blog @ladameecrit and turn on notifications - I'm also on AO3.)

“Well? What do you think?”

She twirls around in a black velvet dress, its long sleeves sprinkled with little rhinestones. You have to hand it to her - for a widow in her sixties, your mom still knows how to do glamour. 

It’s a pity the same can’t be said for her daughter. You’ve been schlubbing around the house all throughout the holidays in sweatpants, slouch socks, and your oversized college sweatshirt: the perfect “so your fiancé dumped you just before the holidays” cliche. 

“You look great, mom. You always do.”

She casts an eye over your attire, your messy hair, your bare face. “You could get dressed and come with me, you know. Might meet someone new? You never know on New Year’s Eve…”

You roll your eyes. “Mom, if you think I’m going to meet the love of my life on New Year’s Eve in Laredo - correction, in Laredo at the community dance - then have I got a bridge to sell you. You’re likely to be one of the hot young things there, going on the usual crowd it attracts.”

She swats at you with her black clutch. “I beg your pardon? I am one of the hot young things.” A final check in the mirror, a final pat to her perfectly-lacquered blow dry.

“All I’m saying is, you never know.”

“And all I’m saying is, this year I’m sticking to my New Year’s resolution: no more men.”

***

“Alright, pop. Have a good time - and no making out with girls down by the river!”

Chucho Peña shakes his head and smiles as he gets out of Javier’s truck, parked outside the community centre. “A pity you won’t join us, mijo,” the older man says, placing his stetson on his head. “You could do with the company.”

Javier shakes his head. “I’m fine, pop. You go and enjoy yourself. You know I don’t like New Year’s, anyway.”

He doesn’t. He never really did. As a kid he liked watching the countdown on TV with his parents and extended family, as a teen the last day of the year became a competition to find someone to make out with as the clock struck midnight. (Javi always excelled.)

But there was always something uncomfortable about the event, something that preyed on the melancholy aspects of his character. Maybe it was the forced celebrations, or the strangeness of marking the passing of time, or the pressure to be someone new - someone better - in the new year ahead. 

He’d been trying to be someone new for years, now. He never succeeded.

Back at the ranch, he flips idly through the TV channels and finds nothing to watch. A rumble in his tummy has him peering into the cold light of the refrigerator, confronted with a few cold cuts, cheese, and a half-eaten jar of pickles that’s been there forever. A solitary bottle of beer lurks on the refrigerator door. 

“Fuck this.”

He grabs his jacket and keys and heads for his truck.

***

The cashier rings up your two bottles of wine and places them in a plastic carrier bag. They’re young, probably not much older than sixteen, and their New Year’s Eve shift at the convenience store clearly isn’t setting their world alight. 

“Havin’ a party, huh,” they mumble as they hand you the bag. 

“Oh yeah,” you respond in a tone dripping with sarcasm, unable to keep your sass-mouth in check. “I’m having a huge party, with my two bottles of cheap Californian white.”

“Just makin’ conversation, lady. Y’all have a good night at your wine party, or whatever.”

You huff as you shove the plastic bag on the passenger seat and hop into your car, still rolling your eyes in misplaced frustration at the young cashier. You knew you were in the wrong, taking your heartbreak and loneliness out on a spotty kid working minimum wage. For a moment, you consider driving to a bar, seeking some sort of solace in the company of strangers.

But every bar in town would be celebrating, you remind yourself. The last thing you want is to ring in the new year being felt up by someone’s greasy uncle in an ill-fitting denim shirt and bolo tie, reeking of cheap whiskey. 

In that moment, the yellow glow emanating from the signage over the branch of Danny’s Restaurant, across the street, catches your eye like a beacon. 

Perfect.

***

Javier’s truck pulls into the parking lot of the convenience store, pausing to let a woman driving a beat-up compact pass on her way out. He’s got his heart set on a half-pounder and fries from Danny’s - extra pickles, extra mayo - but wants to pick up some beers and cigarettes first, to keep him going for the rest of the night.

The cashier rings up his six-pack and Marlboros, sighing as they place them in a bag. “Havin’ a party, huh,” the kid mutters, barely making eye contact with their customer.

“Pretty mean party, just a six-pack and a box of smokes,” Javier responds.

The kid stares up at him. “Whatever. Smokin’s bad for you, anyway.”

Javier wheels around as he exits the store. “I know. Don’t care. Quitting’s my New Year’s resolution so I gotta make the most of them tonight.”

***

“So that’s a Danny’s Special, hold the pickles, extra lettuce, and a Diet Coke?”

You nod up at the waitress and hand her the menu with a smile. You catch a glimpse of your reflection in the window of the restaurant, and for a moment you don’t recognise the woman you see.

When did you get so old, you wonder? Where did you - or at least, the you that used to be - go? 

Still, at least you’d put on some 501s, a fresh white scoop neck top, and a long-line cardigan for your first venture outside your family home in several days. Sure, it might just be for a trip to the convenience store and Danny’s, but even you had standards.

The waitress returns with your drink and the usual complimentary tray of chips and salsa. The restaurant is probably a little quieter than usual for this time of the evening: a couple of families in booths here and there, a few lone diners at the counter. As you nibble idly on the chips, you half-notice a dark-haired man coming through the door a little after you, placing his order quickly at the counter before he’s even been seated. 

It was just what you were after: no countdowns, no forced merriment, no crowds, but just enough hum and background noise to break up the silence that otherwise awaited you. 

“One Danny’s special.”

You thank the waitress and sigh with anticipation as you lift your burger, take your first bite, and find your mouth filled with the overpowering taste of pickles.

***

“Yes, ma’am?”

“Uh, I think my order got mixed up - I asked for no pickles, and this burger has…”

You become aware of the dark-haired man signalling to another staff member behind the counter, pointing at his burger in much the same way as you. 

There’s something familiar about him - about his body language, his profile, the way he carries himself. 

And then it hits you.

“Javi?”

***

How long has it been? Twenty years? Twenty-five?

No matter the number, when the shock of recognition has the power to jolt you back through time like this. Back to another New Year’s Eve, someone’s shitty house party, most of your senior year classmates wasted on cheap beer and tequila. Still an hour or two before midnight and already the party has split into two camps: the lovers, making out on every conceivable surface, and the fighters, yelling and screeching and walking off.

And then there were those who combined both roles, whose loving felt a lot like fighting and vice versa. 

Like Lorraine and Javi.

In your mind's eye, you're back in the upstairs hallway of that house, wearing your new flared jeans and ditsy print blouse and picking your way over classmates and half-drunk plastic cups of beer as you seek out the bathroom. 

A couple is rowing in one of the bedrooms, the door ajar enough for you to be able to peek in. 

You know you shouldn’t, but…

“You’re such a dick, Javi! You know what you did!”

Ah. Lorraine and Javi. Lovers and fighters.

“You stand there and accuse me, Lorraine, but where were you at the time?”

Lorraine tosses her perfect blonde hair indignantly.

“I’m not even going to dignify that with an answer. Fuck you, Javier.”

She doesn’t even notice you as she flounces out of the room. Same as it ever was. You’d always had a tendency to blend into the background. 

Javi notices you, though. “Did you enjoy the show?”

You step around the door and look in at him nervously. “I didn’t mean to overhear, but you guys were pretty loud…”

He’s got his back to you as he sits on the side of the bed, impossibly broad in his tight, striped shirt. 

You wander into the room and closer to him, emboldened by a couple of weak beers. “Are you okay?”

His dark eyes look into yours in surprise, as if he’s unused to being asked the question.

“I guess… it’s just - ah, fuck it. She seems to think I’m always cheating on her - and I’m not, I swear - but won’t explain why she’s gotta spend so much time ‘revising’ with other guys.”

“Maybe she’s just helping them prepare for the SATs?”

He looks at you, and you notice the sadness in his eyes. “Maybe. I dunno. She shouldn’t go off on me about this stuff, though.” He takes a swig from a bottle of beer and exhales. “Fuckin’ hate New Year’s.”

“Me too.” 

He huffs a laugh and smiles at you. “I’m in good company, then.”

You see in the new year sitting side by side on the back porch, sharing a small bottle of cheap bourbon and swapping stories about your plans for the future, your hopes and dreams.

Javier Peña tells you he’s going to change the world.

And then school starts again, and Lorraine and Javi make up, and that’s the last time you talk to him other than a mumbled “Hi” in the hallway now and again. 

Until tonight.

***

He slides into the seat opposite you and shakes his head with a smile. “All these years, and it took a mix-up about pickles to bring us back together again.”

You shrug, taking in the man he had become: handsome, charming, cool, even, but with the same lingering sadness haunting those beautiful eyes. 

“Of all the family restaurants in all of Texas,” you offer.

“You had to walk into mine,” he responds, taking the bait. “Or into this branch of Danny’s, at least.”

You tilt your head to look at him. “What’s a hero doing alone on New Year’s Eve, anyway?”

He rolls his eyes. “Not a hero. And don’t you remember? I don’t like New Year’s. Fuckin’ hate it, in fact. Told you that, all those years ago.”

“You did, didn’t you?” 

The waitress returns carrying your two freshly-prepared, correct orders and a large helping of apologies. “We’ll be sure to bring you over some more chips, too, and the drinks are on the house.”

Javier clinks his glass off yours. “Maybe this year is looking up already. What about you, anyway - what brings you back home?”

“My fiancé dumped me four days before Christmas,” you explain, dipping a French fry into a pot of chipotle mayo. “So what else is a girl to do but run home to mama, legal career or no legal career?”

“Fuck, that’s rough.” Javier seems genuinely sympathetic. He takes a bite of his burger and chews it thoughtfully. “So no New Year’s parties for you either, huh?”

You shake your head. “I would rather be dipped in boiling oil.”

He laughs, revealing the crinkles around his eyes that only serve to make him even more handsome as he enters middle age. Why do these little signs of ageing always look good on men, you wonder, but make a woman feel like she’s failed?

“Would you be opposed to a party for two?” he asks quietly. “Theme is: Fuck New Year’s.”

You grin. “Just like old times. Count me in.”

***

You hear the bells of San Agustín ringing in the new year from the back porch of your mother’s house. Javier clinks his whiskey tumbler off your glass of white wine. 

“A happy fuck new year’s to you.”

“And a happy fuck new year’s to you, too. You got any resolutions, Javi?”

He takes a long, satisfying drag on his cigarette before handing it to you. “Quit smoking. You?”

“No more men. Think you’ll stick to it?”

He raises an eyebrow at your resolution and smiles as he looks out into the night. “We’ll see. Hearing good things about those nicotine patches.” And then those penetrating, sad eyes are on you. “What about you? Think you’ll stick to your resolution?”

You meet his gaze and give him a knowing smile. “We’ll see. Might find someone worth breaking it for.”

[fuck-customers]

kitchen anon back with an ecstatic update!

J finally got fired :)

his hours had been severely cut and he was working more often at a different venue in our collection of businesses. after like a full pay period i finally worked a shift with him again. however, the two new folks in my section (EXCELLENT, by the way, i cannot sing their praises enough, both to the chef and to their faces) had both been scheduled that night. by the time J showed up that night we had already gotten almost everything done and really just needed to make ranch dressing.

so he starts roaming the kitchen, slouching, dragging his feet, hands in his pockets (all of which chef has told him not to do, for various reasons including he’s putting himself in everybody’s way and we don’t have that much space to move, and which chef later confessed to me he had already been considering writing him up/firing him for on its own) instead of like. finding some kind of busy work or something? wipe a counter, sweep a floor, stock something. idk. one way or another we had more hands on deck than were needed for the night and i had to be in early the next morning. however i did get very smug when the line lead told him to get back to “his section” and J got loud and bitchy about “it’s not MY section anymore, it’s [Anon]’s section,” because he’s fucking mad that i make him look bad for giving a fuck about the quality of the work i’m performing i guess lmfao

anyway given my official position as a floater, i asked chef if he wanted to put me anywhere else for dinner service, because we didn’t need four people in a section that two people can handle on a busy night when we’re well-prepared (like we have been since the two new folks showed up). he said no and sent me home, but little did i know he was planning to test J. i learn of this the next morning when one of the new folks greets me with “i need to tell you what happened last night”

the breakdown i got was that after i left, J wasn’t calling back orders, and chef was riding his ass for it all night. he’d call a dish on the fly, J wouldn’t call that he heard and just start working on it, and chef would lean through the expo window to snap at him. he continued to trudge around with his thumb up his ass between orders. later, towards the end of service but before they had stopped seating new customers, still actively preparing food and calling orders to each other, J’s got his earbuds in. line lead scolds him, snaps that “you know better than to have those in during service,” and chef happened to be rounding the corner at the time, and sent him home with like half an hour before service closed. chef made a comment about how he wanted to give him a chance because he’d initially hit it off and worked well with the new girl (who initially relayed these events), and J scoffed, with her standing right there and having to hold her tongue to stay uninvolved, but she revealed later how tempted she’d been to tell him off right there. after he left, chef pulled her aside and assured the section wouldn’t have to worry about him anymore.

chef confirmed these events with me later when he confessed that he’d been considering firing already; he usually only pursues it as a last resort because people tend to look for other jobs at the first sign of trimmed hours in our already inconsistent open schedule, and he doesn’t like filling holes in the staff lineup with temp workers—he’d rather replace them before they leave. J hadn’t quit at our venue, but had been working at the other site; chef confessed to me that he didn’t suspect J would be working there much longer, especially full-time, because the chefs and shift leads in that industrial-scale kitchen over there are going to crack down much harder on those behaviors.

between me, the line lead, and the new folks all coming to chef about J’s attitude and behavior and failure to communicate or cooperate, after so long without him on site chef had hoped he’d take the opportunity to try and show he was willing to turn around. instead J gave him the perfect straw to break the camel’s back on a silver fucking platter, and i remember the way the sun kissed the green hills of the shire.

Posted by admin Rodney.

[jolalibrary]

stockings and stars

javier peña x f!reader

summary: Still need the star putting on the top of the tree. ive got other plans for you Because I’m the star? yeah you're my star and youre not going anywhere but on your back

from the late night texts world - but can still be enjoyed on its own. chapter warnings: allusion to/mentions of smut. no actual smut. javi undresses you, though. flirting. fluff. reader wears red lingerie and a dressing gown. javi flirting. sexy talk, romcom vibes ofc ✨ wordcount: 3k

an: to @goodwithcheese merry christmas from me, to you. thank you for everything, for the tuesday fun we have - i wanted nothing more than to have this out sooner, but life, you know? but, i adore you. and I'm so glad we found one another. ahuge thanks to @thetriumphantpanda who cheerleaded for me throughout.

text key: bold is you/reader | italics is javi

Will I be seeing Santa Javi today? I want to decorate my tree.

one time I come to yours in a red shirt

You also had the tree under your arm and a bag of baubles, I’d class those as gifts.

keep talking baby and you can decorate your tree alone

Think I’m gonna wear that shirt you left here while I do it. Make sure I have to get up on my tip toes. Hope it doesn't rise up...

you don’t play fair

I think I’ll be in stockings too…

youre killing me

Maybe they’re white and red, and…

baby if i wasn’t putting this thing up for Pop, i’d be driving over right now

Hope you hurry up, I need someone tall to put the star on top of the tree.

how am I gonna eat you out when youre perched on the tree baby

The last thing on his to-do list from his Pop is to hang the front porch garland.

He had learnt there had been a huge difference in the front and the back porch garlands. A fifteen-minute-long difference when he'd timed the response given to his sarcastic answer.

Javi learnt there was not only one for the back porch and the front, but one which sat across the fireplace and one on the staircase.

He learnt that after he'd made a joke about mixing them up—earning himself a very pointed glare, and the task of the front porch.

Now, it’s a battle he’s losing.

Tremendously so.

While he’d never want his Pop to do the more challenging tasks, he did rather hate he hadn’t thought to trade this one in for the back porch at the very least—because that had looked fucking easy.

Holding the garland in hand, he’s suddenly hit with a second wave of nostalgia, the first having arrived when he'd pulled down the box and peered into it.

It did the same thing as it had done then, all but rushed over him, layering itself on his shoulders, sitting, nothing short of a comfortable weight on him. Letting his gaze fall out over it, he smiles at the tuffs of fabric, all the bows tied by hand, all in an array of sizes and shades.

Over time, he can see how they've become sun-dyed, remembering the first year they'd been sewn into the faux greenery by his mamá, memories of her all hunched over, humming carols.

Smiling, he rolls his lips, letting out a heavier sigh than he intended as he drags it to the post he’d begin at.

But, all he wonders is whether in the years he wasn’t here, whether it was occasionally hung—or if this year is just that special.

The mere hint that he was going to ask if you wished to spend Christmas at the ranch had sent his Pop into overdrive. Practically yanked him out of his chair like he’d been electrified, a bunch of orders being flung from under his white, wiry moustache that they needed to get ready.

He wasn't sure he'd get the image of his Pop suddenly scrambling around like a man half his age, to drag the decorations out from the cupboard, would ever be erased from his mind. Least of all the sound you'd made aww'ing down the phone when he'd given you a condensed version of the story.

Because he hasn't asked you yet, not properly.

Even though he's spent the last two days at the back of barns and spending a ridiculous amount of time at the hardware store—because we need to make sure the lights stay up, Jav.

He just hasn't found the right time to ask you. A promise each time he goes to see you left in the air. Not that his Pop remembers that, instead he's just busy thinking up ways to make it special: one of which includes decorating the trees at the entrance to the ranch.

An idea having sprouted with the newest ranch hand—one which, if Javi overheard correctly, involves rope acting like tinsel and a cowboy hat being the star on the top of the trees.

Feeling his phone vibrate, he temporarily ignores it as he begins to weave the beginning of the garland around the wood—already knowing, before he tries to move it around the spindles, that it isn’t going to be easy.

Because nothing ever fucking is.

Least of all when you’re waiting for him.

His mind begins to concoct images of you in bows and sheer material, lips painted, sat waiting, smelling nothing short of heavenly as you call out for—

“Fuck,” he shouts, dropping the garland to the ground.

It had pricked him, stabbed him right in the skin—hand shaking the pain out, face likely all scrunched. And, if it didn't have sentimental value, he's sure he'd have kicked its protesting ass with everything he had. Instead, he just narrows his eyes more than he had done moments ago as he begins again.

He feels his nostrils flare when it begins to undo itself. The sound of faux bristles on wood grates him before it will even attempt to do what he needs it to.

And it makes him want to quit, to throw it back into the box and tell his Pop it isn’t worth it. But he knows it is. Knows that his mama didn’t spend hours bent over under flickering light for it not to be seen.

Javi also strongly suspects you’d love it. Likely run your fingers over several bows asking who made it. He can even imagine the look of joy on your face when he tells you.

It’s why, if he didn’t already suspect it anyway, he’s pretty sure his Pop loves you more than him. Because even the first Christmas he was back, there weren’t this many decorations; not nearly as much need to have them all out, either.

Not that Javi really minds—or blames him.

There’s a notable shift in energy when you stay over. Even more so in him. He can see there’s a cheer and a glow to the place—one Javi hates watching vanish when he takes you back to your place.

It's why, when—and where—he can, he fights for you to be here. Practically finds convincing ways to do so, including, crossword puzzles, dinner, and two-person showers. But, at some stage, your clothing dwindles, underwear runs low, and he has to make the painful drive into town to return you to your place.

Your fingers in his hair, practically clambered into his lap as you whisper that you’ll be back before he knows it. His fingers on your chin, thumb stroking out the words he says right back—that he’ll miss you all the same.

Javier Peña. Texan softie—what will the world think?

He only thinks one thing when he drives back—a response which had been there on his lips. Guess they’ll see just how much I love you. A thing you know, comment on, say back to him first thing in the morning and last thing at night. An array of promises there, sometimes spoken at a normal level and sometimes whispered.

You always keep them, just like the one that you are always back before he knows it.

He likes it when you are. Enjoys it when you’re nestled beside him, arm across his chest, hand close to his ribs—strumming them, tracing lines and words he tries to understand before sleep takes him.

He still always sleeps better when you’re beside him. When his breathing can mirror yours, when he can feel for you in the night when he’s awoken with nightmares and things he knows won’t ever come true.

Now, he’s fighting a different battle. One to get to you.

Halted in his path to freedom by the garland which refused to be hung, and could be labelled as giving him more grief than the horses which had banded together. A phrase he never thought he’d admit out loud, never mind think.

You still fighting with the garland?

baby its torturing me on purpose

Do you want me to come and help?

will you come in the stockings

No!! Your dad is there.

then stay there actually lie down, but do not begin without me

Still need the star putting on the top of the tree.

ive got other plans for you

Because I’m the star?

yeah you're my star and youre not going anywhere but on your back

Hurry then.

i’m hurrying

He does hurry—practically scratched up by the time he’s parking his truck outside your place.

As he takes the step up to your door, Javi realises how much he misses it here when he doesn’t visit. A place less frequent and often spent time in, even under your insistence of renting it.

It is always usually a stopping point, him parking up, letting you go in and grab what you need before you're back in his truck, heading back to his.

He does like your place though, likes how small it is, how cosy. Plus, it has all the things which make you, you. A thing his place is currently missing.

Although, as he steps through the door, and calls your name, he does have to admit it currently looks fucking ridiculous.

On a good day, he’d describe your place as crowded, but right now, it’s claustrophobic.

The tree you’d forced him to get is shoved into a corner, branches fluffed out, surrounded by the piles of unpacked boxes you’ve tried to discreetly hide. Your remaining floorspace is overtaken by a bit of rug, several piles of books (you have no room for, but continue to buy) and odd bits of furniture you find and attempt to restore.

For the most part, you’ve decorated. A thing you did inform him of.

You’ll be pleased to know when you get here your only job is the star. managed it all yourself, did you I’m a very competent woman, Javi. oh i know baby ive seen you with a crossword Does that do it for you? Me finishing a crossword. does something to me Get over here. im leaving now

There’s a warm, comforting glow spread out across the place from the fairy lights you’ve hung and the array of mismatched decorations—both bought and handmade—hanging from branches.

He breathes in the scent of orange which hangs in the air, his eyes finding the culprit on your fireplace, a garland—one not dissimilar to the one he’d been battled with—places there, mocking him due to the ease of which had been laid, with oranges and little beads all entwined within it.

Snorting, he glances back at your tree, spotting the things he's been with you when you've bought. And, as promised—and informed him through text—there’s nothing at the top of your tree.

“You finally made it!”

Spinning on his heel, he comes face to face with you, and fuck if the sight of you doesn’t make it all worth it.

Dressed in a red, silky dressing gown, all tied in the middle, you're a vision. Then, there's the fact your lips are painted a shade he’d now famously dub Christmas red, a colour he wants nothing more than to be stained with. A path of it from his mouth down to the space where his jeans meet his hips. A thought which seems to only make how tight his jeans are even more uncomfortable.

“Cariño, you’re…”

You sway a little, letting the fabric move—allowing his gaze to land on the stockings. The ones he’s been thinking about all afternoon. The ones he can’t wait to feel under his palm and know whether they’ll create friction when wrapped around his waist.

“Fuck me.”

“I’m kinda banking on it,” you say, biting your red-painted lip. “But first…”

His hand crawls around your waist, feeling the smooth, soft texture under his hand—swallowing, dragging his eyes up and down you, unsure how he could ever be so lucky—how something so good could ever be here for him to unwrap.

“I need you to hang the star,” you continue.

“Right now?”

Nodding, you ghost your lips over his. “I’ve been so good waiting for you.”

“You're never good. You, baby, are a menace.”

“I’m your menace.”

Snorting, he presses a kiss to your lips. “Damn right, you are.”

Moving from you, reluctantly, only to pick up the gold star he assumes you want to hang, getting a nod from you that he’s right.

“Need to ask you something too.”

And even though he’s only taken a mere short step from you, he’s floored all over again about what a picture you look like when he glances back. That you’re standing all for him, dressed in nothing but cheer and ribbons all for him.

“Go on.”

Turning to your tree, he flattens his hand to the wall for stability. “I wanted…”

His concentration slides in—suddenly aware he doesn’t want to knock anything from the branches. Doesn’t want to force things to be misplaced from where they were expertly hung.

He’s also sure he’s wanting to swallow the question. A part of him, all the way deep inside of him, having been bracing—and waiting—to hear you’d be apart for the holidays. A thing the two of you have rarely been since you moved here, not a day going by he hasn’t seen you for at least an hour.

“Wanted to know if you—shit—” the star almost sitting atop, before at the last minute protesting. “I wanted to know if you wanted to spend Christmas with me—with us, me and Pop. At the ranch.”

The star slides into place, sitting more comfortably with another shove, more branch supporting it.

But he doesn’t turn, not immediately. Not as the question hums around him, swirls in the silence of you not immediately saying yes. So much so, that it takes him a second to move on his heels, to face you—to read the answer before it’s delivered.

What he sees is something his heart couldn’t have ever prepared for.

You, grinning—a silly, almost goofy, smile spreading out as you bite down on your lip, forehead slightly crinkled.

“You… you want me to spend the holidays with you?”

“Of course—cariño, I want nothing more than for you to be with me.”

It all quick to leave his mouth, mirroring the movement to be back in front of you, fingers under your chin, lifting your eyes—those beautiful, fucking eyes—to his.

“Do… do you—wanna spend it with me?”

You pull a different face before you’re nodding. One more excited, one which begins to expel out over a smile and a bunch of escaping phrases such as I can’t believe you want me with you and of course.

“Why wouldn’t I want to be with you?”

Shrugging, you scrunch your nose—an act he finds just as cute as the first time he saw it. “Guess it’s a big deal. It’s… a thing people do with families.”

Pulling you close by your hips, your hand lands flat on his chest. “You are my family.”

“Javi,” you whisper, making each letter feel so individual the way you say it, that it makes his heart double.

“It’s true. You’re it for me, cariño. All I’ve wished for.”

Eyes widening, your eyes shimmer under the lights—more so than normal. Taking a deep breath, you lift your chin before pressing a kiss to his mouth. One which turns hungry, desperate—your mouth searing, a thing he’s craved since he woke up before the sun even rose.

“Baby,” you whisper.

And he hums.

It vibrates out, able to feel it from the way his fingers cup your cheek.

“Undo me.”

Releasing your lips with a pop, he opens his eyes, studying your eyes, moving from one to the other.

“Go on,” you urge in a whisper, more breathless, more tinged with something that makes his skin hot.

Sliding his fingers over the knot, he barely has to tug before it comes undone—unveiling you, like a curtain which wishes to part. If he’d thought you’d looked good before, he’s sure every bit of you is a sin now—a Christmas sin.

Red and lace. It’s all he sees. It sitting there, against you, hugging your breasts—sitting on your hips. His mouth is suddenly dry at the thought of running his tongue over the place it meets your skin before pulling it down.

Your fingers follow his eyes, sliding between the valley to land on the bow in the centre, twisting the edge of the tie around your index finger—palm skating over your stomach, allowing him more chance to take in how you’re stood before him in see-through fabric and promises.

“How’d I get so lucky?” he asks, more to no one, than to you.

His fingers teasing the fabric sat on your hip—marvelling, unsure how to think straight until you clear your throat, forcing his eyes to meet yours.

“Hey,” you whisper, tightening your hold on his hands, bringing his arms more around your waist, pressing your front to him, feeling the heat from your skin through your clothes. “You’re all I wished for too.”

Smiling, he looks at your tree, before landing back on you. “You look so good.”

“I know. Could look better though?” His brow arches as you slowly begin to smile, the tip of your tongue sliding over your upper lip. “Everything is held in place by bows.”

Groaning, he closes his eyes, letting his hand slide down your lower back, over sheer material before his fingers find the ribbon on your hip.

“All for you.”

“Mine,” he answers, slotting his mouth over yours—staining the four letters to your lips.

His fingers slide around, brushing over soft skin, until he finds the first bow. Undoing it with ease, licking into your mouth, only to grunt against you when you whimper as the fabric falls to your feet.

“Yours,” you say back, your own hands beginning to undo him.

an: merry christmas, love you

[lovergirllane]

Cowboy Lovin’ (J.M)

Warning(s); Smut!, Piv sex!, Daddy kink,age gap,Joel is in his 40’s reader’s in her early 20’s,make out session,mention of weed, use of drugs (weed),Oral (R Receiving), semi public sex,outdoor sex.

Pairing(s); Neighbor!Joel Miller x Afab!Fem!Reader.

Summary; you’re home for the summer.

A/n; this is the longest thing I’ve written in a hot minute, pls enjoy and if you like this pls check out some of my old works on @bellaramseysgf & @billyslittledolly <3

You had missed your smaller home town however you didn’t regret choosing a out of state college. The small town had no place for your career path,the small town had less than 1000 people inside its barrier.

Though you couldn’t truly admit it you missed your neighbor the most. He was everything a small town cowboy would be. Polite,kind, a honest sweetheart but stand off-ish at first. His daughter was friends with your younger sibling causing him to be there most days.

You smiled to yourself seeing his truck parked in your driveway as you pulled up to your house. You hadn’t brought much from school just the necessity’s.

You had walked inside and were bombarded by your younger sibling smiling as you hugged them tightly. “How you been looser?” You asked and they began rambling on about what they’d done while you were gone.

Your parents came to hug you next before you finally locked eyes with Joel. You felt your whole body heat up after catching his gaze.

You and Joel had a rather….complicated relationship. After his wife left when you were freshly 18 the man took over your life. You don’t even truly know what turned inside you but you jumped on him every chance you got. Joel was more than happy to oblige.

You hadn’t seen him since you left 5 months ago. He looked different but the same, he had scruff and part of a beard growing on his face. He looked to be stronger and more fit, he also had cut his hair.

You broke the stare before anyone could notice mumbling a quick hello to him and his daughter both.

It was later in the evening when you were finally getting a chance to unpack that there was a knock on your door. You turned to see Joel in your doorway leaning against the frame.

“Hey kiddo” he spoke and you sighed when his voice still made your hair stand up in the best possible way. “Your dad said you were looking for a job this summer” he added and you nodded as you sat your make up onto your vanity.

“I need some help around the Ranch if you’re interested”

He had another daughter now. Why did he need any help?

“Joel, Don’t you have Ellie now? Why do you need my help?” You asked as you continued to unpack your vanity. “It’s not a need…more of a want..” he said and you shrugged in response.

You tried to not let you excitement show as you turned to look at him “sure, easy money for me” you said like you didn’t have a care in the world. “Mmm, Perfect be there tomorrow at 9” he said and you nodded.

You already knew that you weren’t gonna be helping with anything around the ranch what so ever.

The next morning you were up,dressed, and out of the house before 8 knowing that if you got there early you’d get even more time with him and boy were you right.

“That’s it, good girl” he praised as you took his cock all the way into the back of your throat. You were on your knees in front of him his back pressed to his bedroom door. He had both hands settled on your head as he choked out moans.

“Fuck, yes- so good!” You knew by his constant babbling that he was close and sure enough with a couple more moves of your head he was releasing down your throat with a groan.

That’s how your days started, most days with you pleasuring him, he would always return the favor of course and fuck you brainless.

You and Ellie had unexpectedly become close mainly off the fact you both smoked, late at night when she thought her dad was asleep she’d come over and share a joint with you.

It was late one night and you and her were giggling about Joel falling off his horse earlier in the day. “I know! He just hit the ground like a sack of potatoes!” She laughed as she blew smoke out and handed you the smoking paper.

“Yes! That horse was like ‘that’s enough’” you replied urging another fit of laughter before you inhaled the smoke. The joint got passed a few more times before the pair of you heard your worst nightmare.

“Ellie Miller!” You both cringed when you heard Joel’s voice from behind the pair of you. “We’ve been caught! Run!” You exclaimed and the pair of you really had every intention to but neither of you did. Instead, you both just let out another round of giggling.

“Ellie! Home! Now!” He commanded and she let out a huff followed by “yeah yeah” as she walked past him and through your house. “Just what kind of influence are you having on my 17 year old daughter?” He asked and you shrugged snuffing the joint out in the tray.

“A fun one?” You offered but were met with a stern look and rolled your eyes “it’s just a little fun okay? She’s fine it’s not like it can hurt her” Joel let out a sigh “how can you be this reckless! This could ruin her life!” “Oh my god, grow up Joel. You’re fucking your neighbors daughter who’s half your age, that could ruin her life. Not some measly drug” you let out a huff once you were done and stood up.

“It’s a little weed, Chill” you shoved past him and he grabbed your arm before you were met with his lips on yours. It was quickly heated and turned into him slamming you against the side of your house as his tongue ran over yours.

His hands dropped to hike up the dress you were wearing,he spun you around with force making you use your hands to catch yourself. Your dress was pushed up feeling the soft material fall around your waist made you squeeze your thighs together.

It was even more exciting that your parents were right on the other side of this wall you heard the clanking of his belt and soon enough you were filled with his cock.

You let out a quiet gasp as he entered until he was settled at his base inside you, he let out a sigh in return before he began thrusting in and out at a steady pace.

The hot night air was soon filled with moans from the both of you as he worked you both closer to your release

Everything felt way more intense now that your high was finally in full blast your head felt floaty and you let out a sigh, leaning to set your head on his chest. “You feeling it?” He asked and you let out a weak moan in response.

“I know baby, I know.” He said as his hand stroked over your stomach “must feel so good” you let out a squeal when he thrusted harder and hit a sensitive spot you didn’t know you had. “Daddy!” You moaned. “Shh shhh, daddy’s here. Gotta stay quiet baby” he whispered.

He shifted and wrapped his arms tightly around your waist before he let out a few grunts and began to fuck into you faster. You let out as quite of moans as you could as he slammed into you each thrust knocking another “daddy!” From your throat.

You were nearing your end and he was too, a few more thrusts and you were both sent flying over the edge as he mumbled sweet praises into your ear over and over until you were both settled.

It took you awhile the waves still making your body tremble for a while as he gently rubbed your stomach mumbling about how good you were.

“Now, is that attitude of yours fixed?” He asked and you let out a sigh as you nodded sleepily. “Good girl, let’s get you cleaned up and tucked in bed.”

[nopeferatu]

okayyyy i guess ill just write abt some things that i wanna get out before i forget to??

- LOVE, love love how they made ennis the one who initiated all of the romantic affection between the two. literally insane over it. it feels so in-character, considering ennis has probably been affection starved since his mother died when he was a kid. of course he has alma, but do we really get the sense that ennis was ever very affectionate with her? could he have been, in rural, christian, wyoming, where conervative notions of courtship prevail? did he even want to be, knowing that the only person he shows real attraction towards is a man? who knows. we just know that he was craving love, and lucas did an amazing job at capturing that need.

- the "'lets ranch up together', 'no bc earl and rich'" conversation happens after ennis tells jack that he'd divorced alma...a year and a half earlier. what an interesting change! it seems like both adaptations, movie and play, mess around with that specific sequence of events. i really enjoyed what it brought to this specific show, though, because in the script it's described as a "gut-punch" to jack when ennis tells him he already left alma in response to jack telling ennis that he'd decided to leave lureen. it really hammers home the idea that jack thought it was just their wives getting in the way of their life together all that time. it was framed wayyy different than jack driving up 14 hrs after getting his hopes up thanks to a phonecall or a postcard from ennis abt the divorce, but it still hits the beat it's supposed to, where we as the audience can see that its the first time their relationship shifts—and not for the better.

- "little darlin'."I got to hear "LITTLE DARLIN'" not just once, but TWICE. still not over it.

- the show also brought more...i guess, explicit attention to the fact that ennis really only wants to do ranch work, and how much that affects his family. i know its present in all the texts, but the new conversations he and alma have regarding the various 'city jobs' she tries to rope him into and the dead-end ranch jobs that keep going belly up from underneath him are just really sad. he's someone who craves wide open spaces, and the beauty of film allowed heath to capture this hunched, clenched, uncomfortable look and feel of a man who seems too big for any room he's in. ennis is not happy in domesticity. he's a saddle bum through and through, and out with nature is where he belongs. but since theatre (esp theatre in-the-round) doesn't have the luxury of different set dressing, those conversations and arguments bw ennis and alma capture that same bit of characterization.

- i...dunno how i feel about mike's jack, if i'm honest? lucas was incredible. i think he brought just the right amount of taciturn and tender, rage and remorse to a role that needs all of that in an actor. i think mike's jack was a little...idk. too big, if you get me? like there were certain line deliveries that i felt could've been said differently, or had different emotions behind them than the ones i was picking up on. i know stage is different, so in both cases, the actors went VERY big (heath's quiet, simmering rage is a completely different beast against lucas' loud, screaming outburtsts, for example), but...idk. there was just something about mike's jack that threw me off? I told my friend that I was iffy about his performance, and without prompt she said, "I didn't like how much he laughed at everything" and I think I feel the same. For example, the "I didn't want none of either kind but fuck all has worked the way i wanted, nothing has ever come to my hand the right way" line was said really jolly, without much of a edge to it, and i think thats what's thrown me off-kilter so much. in mike's performance, i didn't feel the bitter edge to a lot of his lines that occur later on in the script that are apparent to me not only in jake gyllenhaal's performance, but in the SS text, itself.

He was technically very good and I love the silly things he'd do to get ennis to open up, but he was a little too jovial, not enough bitchy, not enough moody and sassy like jake's jack. i see a lot of jake's jack in mike's performance bc aside from a few lines about how much jack likes the rodeo, all we can really glean from either characters in the SS text is that ennis is quiet, and that jack talks a lot. im not trying to compare the two performances too much bc they are fundamentally different actors working in different mediums, but heath and jake brought a lot of dimsension into charas who could have turned out waaaay different had different actors played them and gotten in touch w different emotions within the script, so i can see how other actors could look to the film for a lot of inspo on how to go about portraying ennis and jack while trying to do their own things as well. my issue is that jack becomes very heartsick and bitter and just plain fed up with everything about his life by the time their last trip rolls around, but play!jack never let that bitterness start to show, so by the time that jack does his whole "i wish i knew how to quit you" monologue, it felt very abrupt to see him screaming and yelling and hollering at ennis like that.

i dunno, after seeing tons of ppl in the brokeback tag over the past few months saying that mike faist was their favorite jack, i was actually really expecting a lot more? but as it stands, jake gyllenhaal still reigns supreme. he captured every facet of jack twist that makes him so compelling to read and write and think about and analyze, and mike, while he was still very good, didn't do that nearly as well imho.

- the play firmly cemented to me that jack twist is just bottom coded, i guess

- some of the music hit at different scenes than i had initially thought they would?? i thought the play would end on "hale strew river" playing in the bg as *SPOILER* old!ennis holds the ghost/dream/memory version of young!jack in a mirror of the way he'd held jack by the campfire on brokeback in '63. but that was not the case. this is an instance of where my heightened expectations made the reality seem kind of disappointing in comparison. i'm also kind of sad that my other favorite song, "beneath the moon," was only featured as a diegetic recording heard on a clock radio (NOT live), and it was played during a scene between alma and ennis. Like, looking back at the lyrics it makes sense:

Why don't you take me for a stroll into the sunset

Another lonely summer's day is ending soon

Oh, let us walk another mile into the twilight

And let me be alone with you beneath the moon

But i thought that it was going to be played during a scene where another one of jack's frequent proposals of a life together gets rejected. when the soundtrack for the play was released it gave me the same vibes as "i dont want to say goodbye", one of the few original songs on the movie soundtrack, and i was POSITIVE that this was a jack-longing-for-ennis song. like, it's all about sunsets and twilight and the moon and all this outdoor imagery, and as we all know, jack and ennis are literally only together underneath the sunsets and twillight and moon! so im actually really sad it wasn't an ennis/jack moment :c

- the actor who played jack's dad played the role a lot more emotionally than i expected. movie!john is very, again, muted and quietly bitter, just like all these characters are. play!john seemed really...what i can only describe as choked up? like, he was shouting and got really riled up in his "jack used to say" monologue at ennis, and there was some disgust in there and a lot of anger, but what i actually read was more like him telling ennis "you're part of the reason why my son is gone." and then he gets up and walks away from the table, and exits the stage. it was really really heartbreaking. maybe i have a different read on the performance than what was intended, but it opens up a whole new side to john twist that i think would be interesting to explore.

- theres a few little added lines of dialogue on jack's part that are great. when they leave brokeback and are heading away in opposite directions, jack turns back around and goes "ennus-" as though he's going to make his proposal to start a life together then and there, but ennis knowingly cuts him off and says smth like "see you around, jack twist", and shakes his hand goodbye. there was another moment (the divorce admission, the rich and earl confession scene) where jack is talking about their sweet life together, and hes talking about them being in rocking chairs on their porch in front of a nice fire and ughhghf....it called to mind this line in one of my all-time fave fics, Recompense:

Couldn't set out on the porch, just set, quiet and together; there wasn't any porch, wasn't even any house, where they could be seen setting. Start hauling their canes, their bifocals, damn electric blankets, up in back of the pickup? They couldn't have that life. They couldn't have any life at all. The weight of Jack's misery, pressing all around, seemed enough to cave him in.

one i didnt like, though, was when jack and ennis are wrestling, jack gets pinned under ennis and says "sheep be damned!" before ennis kisses him in the first romantic display of affection we see bw the two. also when the sheep get mixed up, ennis has a meltdown and tells jack that aguirre will realize the counts off and put 2 & 2 together that they're fooling around, and he yells smth along the lines of their trist being "sick", and Jack says smth like, "you sure didn't seem to think it was sick this past month."

this is just a me thing honestly bc i'm kind of a SS purist in some instances, and one thing that always stuck with me is that jack and ennis never talk about the sex they're having when they're on brokeback. aside from the "im not no queer" convo, the sex wasn't even alluded to; they just "let it happen," and i think thats veryyy in-line for a character like ennis. i think jack would love to talk about it, but he doesn't wanna spook ennis away, so he keeps his mouth shut. i dont think either of them would speak, even in a roundabout way, abt their sex life when they're 19 on brokeback, and thats why the whole "redlined it all the way couldnt get here fast enough" line is so revelatory imo, bc its the first time either of them acknowledge the conscious choice theyre making to fuck. so idk. i didnt really care for the fact that they were (somewhat) openly referring to their tryst while still on brokeback

- less a note of the show and more a note of the audience, but i saw the show twice and the first night i saw it, the audience laughed at REALLY sad and serious moments that i in no way thought were laugb worthy, and i felt like maybe i was taking the work too srsly until i saw the final performance and THAT audience didnt laugh at any of those really sad moments. so i got rly irritated abt that the first night cause it wasnt even like the lines were delivered in a jokey way or anythibg....

anyways. i need to sleep. look out for some other posts cause im sure ill have more to say the longer i stew on it