#and make it a school subject where it’s boring and leaves no room for creativity

[silverisafukintrainwreck]

my exams start today wish me luckkkk

[kkusuka]

(i had to repost lol- it wasn’t showing up on my page)

this the request: part 3 of thiccy gf hcs ??? with kuroo, terushima, sakusa, and daichi and/or atsumu 🥺👉🏽👈🏽 i must be fed

i understand your need for them

and as a member of the thunder-thigh committee, i am happy to write about my fellow sexy women! (another 4:56 am ramble i refuse to delete)

part one

part 2 <3

i mixed this with this ask ;  Pt. 3 of the thicc af gf with Aone, Osamu, Kyotani, Daichi, Kuguri, and Terushima plz? 🥺

this got wayyyyyyyyy long

4, 685 words. my finger slipped?

Kuroo tetsuro

this guy has been trying to get you since first year

he’s that dedicated

and you didn’t even notice, he was just a flirty friend who helped you with science

(even when he would practically put you in his lap while he went over things)

lo and behold, he finally got his chance during the third year culture festival

yeah as in he waited a whole three years for this

Eh, once again, had a whole pan to make you see him as your great future husband, aka the haunted house (a good excuse to have you hold onto him)

He has to give it to class 2-4, the did a damn good job, it was scary

Long story short you fell on top of him, boobs in face hands-on ass

~heaven~

Mans actually asked you to be his girlfriend right there, groping you and murmuring between your boobs. (he wouldn't have gotten up if the next group wasn’t approaching.)

From then on he’d literally do anything for the ass

He’s a big simp and we all know it.

Like When you wear shorts he has to ‘pull them down’ aka feel you up while pulling the hem of your shorts down ever so slightly.

Or when he gets on a knee right behind you to ‘tie his shoe’, but the school shoes have no laces.

He could be a bit more creative and he wanted to look under your skirt.

When he wants to cut the bull shit he’ll just lift the back of your skirt and rub around for a but, to hell with all the other kids in the hallway.

(did I mention that he puts things on the highest shelves so he can walk up behind you and practically dry hump you.)

Speaking of simp nation

You can't really wear anything without setting him off

Shorts drive him absolutely nuts, it's insane. But it isn't his fault that most of your shorts are spandex that cut off right at the beginning of your thighs, it's like a homemade booty lifter. He just can’t help but wanting to cop a feel.

Or the color red in general. It is ridiculous, the guy rips everything when he tries to take it off too. So that stunning red cocktail dress with the lace-up sides was not unwearable, and you only had it on for like 2 hours. And that was only because it was a friend's 18th birthday party you were both invited to.

(thanks to kuroo not letting you out of his arms you both were late and left early.)

((in his defense you looked like a full course meal and it was giving him severe blue balls, and he’s only seen you for a few minutes))

Halloween, you know. the one night you could dress up as anything. any you decide to go as a cat-girl in a maid costume. And you expected him to just take that sitting down? Hell no. the red thigh highs AND the corset middle? You're lucky it lasted as long as it did.

That my dear was bravery. His color. A cat. And a short skirt. With thigh highs!

And so, he did what he did all those other times, dragged you to sit on his lap, and opening your thighs, and like a good girl you’ll let him

If you could already tell, he gives no shits to whos watching, let ‘em see (they really never do but you get the point)

He’s also a prime thigh groper, especially when he wants to keep your legs open, he also loves thigh hic

Terushima Yuji

Another shower-offer

You were already he's so why can't he let everyone know?

Speaking of you being his, he doesn't tell people how you guys don’t together, with good reason considering you practically beat him up

Not really but that’s what he calls it, basically he tried to get with one of your friends at a party.

She just happens to not be interested in men and has a wonderful girlfriend, so she was uncomfortable but couldn't tell him to leave her alone

So you took fate into your own hands, literally, you stole Fate from class 3-2’s drink and poured it on him before slapping him and telling him about how he was a pig.

And he fell in love, you looked like an angel, a really hot angel, it didn't help you were in a white dress either

And from then on he literally once or twice, got on his knees for you, asking to give him a chance.

Honestly, it got annoying, so you just agreed to make it go away. It did, but you also gained a perv of a boyfriend who has an insatiable love for your lower half

He’s a simple creature, do take caution of his fragile being

So that means all those times you bend over in front of him he was slowly cracking and trying to figure out where the nearest storage closet is.

He thought he was having heart palpitations when he saw you in the damn dress again, apparently, he didn't see all of it. Specifically the v-neck top, and the fact it only went to the end of your ass. Needless to say, he made sure to walk behind you on every staircase that you went on

Another set off is yoga legging, like the lululemon ones, that people wear all the time. They fit you great, really really great. They were supposed to work out in them???? Why were they so skin-tight????? And he also figured out that you wore things because of them. Instant nut.

How you ask, simple.

One time he saw your underwear line through the pants and he pointed them out, they did make it seem like your ass was super soft so he saw his chance and took it.

So the next time you wore them and he didn't see the lines he was like ??????

And thus began the “Yuji hunt for lineless underwear” and he found the thongs

And you received the fucking of your life soon after.

Oh! And there’s any time you go to the beach. Literally every time.

No cap.

The first time was when you wore a red one-piece and he practically went feral. It wasn't really a one-piece if it was see-through and had the lowest neckline on the planet.

Everyone was looking at you.

He practically fucked you on the beach but held off until you got back to the hotel room.

He’s way more forward when he wants to fuck, if you could imagine. He’ll just walk up to you and tell you he wants to get some, like right now.

If you can even ignore him, he’ll throw an arm around your waist and grope around your legs, all the way to the apex.

It is also not below him to try and get you off while still wearing underwear that he will be taking after.

(i didn't say anything about his stash off orgasm ruined underwear? My bad.)

Sakusa Kiyoomi

Going beyond the fact he even has a girlfriend, y’know considering, but the fact that no one knew who you were until you showed up at nationals to cheer him on

(atsumu was even starting to think that you didn't exist and that poor kiyoomi just imagined you up, so can imagine his shock when you ran up to said boy after they won)

The whole dating thing wasn't the shocking part; it was the fact that you looked like you walked off of the Milan runway.

And you were wearing leggings and sakusa's jacket, all of a sudden everyone was interested in how that happened

It was a kind of a boring story, someone had spilled coffee in a shop that you both happen to be in

And he watched you offer the man the same disinfectant wipes that he uses!

And in the most sakusa way possible he followed you out of the shop and tried to talk to you.

An exchange of numbers and many awkward conversations (and boners) later, you were a couple.

Back to that hug, like the many others, he's let you have, it’s all just to feel how soft you were

But poor touch -starved sakusa doesn't know what to do with any of these pent up feelings.

And he has a loooooooot of them.

Multiple occasions have shaped the poor germ-boy into the horny-tornado he has become

so he’s not really into what you’re wearing, it’s more about what you’re doing

like when you wore the mask he bought you to one of his games, and you wore one of his alternate uniforms, but the kicker was how you stayed away from everyone and didn’t let a single person near you (or his shirt)

or when you helped him clean his dorm when he was doing his weekly deep clean

or when the two of you washed the dishes while trying to do one of those “try not to sing” challenges

(is it normal to get a boner when your girlfriend helps you clean? no?)

but, as much as he tries to remain emotionless on the subject, there are multiple exceptions to the “it’s not what she wears” whole thing

Like that violet puffy skirt, you wore to a study fate, the one with the white sweater? That one, the same one that he could see your panties, from anywhere he sat. and Every time you got up you would have to smooth it down to make the creases go down, but it was only ever really giving him a good idea about the shape of your ass.

(if he sees you in that skirt again he’s just going to fuck you in it)

The lesser-known horny-inducer, since he made you take it off within the first five minutes, was a dress! What kind of dress? A neon yellow see-through mesh dress. The bottom wasn’t what got him though, it was the fact that your white bra was clearly seen under the mesh top. Or maybe it was the way the skirt made your waist look super small, and how your hips looked so round and squeezable.

Yeah, no one else could experience you in that.

Not to sound like this, but sakusa is still averse to touch

BUT BUT BUT

That goes out the window when he wants to dance the devil's tango with you.

Mr. His way or no way shows up,  he does it every so slightly different

If it’s just the two of you, he’ll put a hand on your shoulder and he’ll push you to your knees. And he’ll pet your head and tell you what’s about to happen and advise you to listen like a good girl.

But in the instance you are in the presence of others, he’ll stand behind you and bring you super close to him, ass to dick. (maybe he’ll grind into you a bit, just to convince you to follow him) and he’ll throw a few words in about how much of a bitch in heat you are for getting turned on in front of all of these people.

It’s best to just do what he wants before he makes you cum in your underwear.

Daichi Sawamura

oh my

you guys are the power thigh couple

powerful and defined mixed with soft and pillowy

In Fact, that’s literally how the two of you met, thanks to Tanaka and Nishinoya of course.

(let’s just pretend karasuno has a cheer squad, and you just happened to be the captain of said team)

So basically you were doing a favor for the student council, and you were supposed to ask how many third years, managers included, were on each team and each club in the school

Easy! Turns out not so much. You were still in your cheer practice uniform, which was the shortest spandex ever made, and a Karasuno school t-shirt that was ever so slightly too tight.

Anyway, you make it to the gym and open the door, and the little one, Yachi, saw you and literally screamed. (she was right by the door), and that alerted everyone else in the gym, which led to the bald boy and his short companion pushing you further into the gym.

But in the better sense, it did gain the attention of the captain! Just the exact moment he was in front of you someone pushed; your back and within a second, in some miracle like way, you both ended up on the floor and he ended up planked on top of you with a leg between your spread thighs.

Almost kissing nonetheless.

Then, like the gentleman he was, he got off and asked you if you alright and kneeled down and let you use his shoulder to try and stand back up.

You did get up, for a split second, Daichi still kneeling letting you use him as a step stool when a certain red-head was flung right into you and you went toppling forward.

Onto Daichi.

Onto Daichi's face.

Your thighs around his head.

His hands-on your ass.

Hand in his hair.  

He could sit there forever, you were frozen, everyone else was frozen.

You eventually climbed off and asked how many third years there were. But he just sat there, his hands hadn’t moved either, luckily Suga answered and you were on your way.

And Daichi still didn’t move, after that incident, you had begun to see him everywhere, and eventually, he just cut the shit and asked you out.

Daddy Daichi likes seeing you in literally anything from sweatshirts to lingerie.

His favorite was the brown buttoned pencil skirt and the white blouse, that you wore to a date. You were kind of overdressed for the ramen shop and after a walk, but he didn't even care. He was so thrown off by how turned on he was he couldn't speak in full sentences.

An example:

“Yeah, the food here is- boob, I-I mean great, not boob, great, yes, great.”

The second.

.

.

.

.

.

Was a bathrobe.

Can you see where I'm going with that? Simply you look hot.

His favorite part of the night was ripping it off of you.

And like the first time you met, he had his head in your thighs <3

Atsumu Miya

You met poor atsumu at a party.

He tried to shoot his shot, y’know he sees a cute lady he’s just gotta try and show you what you could be getting

he had it all planned, he was going to walk up behind you and run his hands over your delicious curves and ask you if you were in need of any help

he doesn’t take into account that a having a random guy just start groping you and pressing himself behind a girl was panic-inducing

so when he dropped your waist, you freaked out and may or may not have punched him in the dick

while he was in a. world of pain you age to figure out what the hell had just happened to you

then you noticed him on the floor, and when he noticed you looking at him he put this forced cocky smirk on and gave you a “how you doing”

You took pity on the poor creature and helped him up and got him some ice, then conversed with him for the majority of the rest of the night.

And he just hasn't left you alone since

(and, you learned this far later, that he went so far to tell Sakusa and Kageyama all about you and how amazing you are, and has even sent them- more than one- picture

But in other news, he’s very horny

So really all that means is he always has his hands on you

Like during practice breaks when you're allowed to come down and talk to him for a bit, give him some things, but it normally just consists of him sitting on the bench and you standing in front of him.

While his hands rest on your hips and his face is shoved into the valley between your breasts, and he just sits and listens to you as you brush a hand through his hair.

Or sometimes, if he had been having a rough time, he’ll just have his hands under your skirt and he’ll feel around for a bit while grumbling about how people cant hit his sets

But for being the possessive bastard he is, he sure likes letting you wear all those outfits

Like the booty shorts and tank top, you wore to bring them food during the summer training camp. That same camp that the two of you disappeared at and he came back looking like he had won the lottery.

Or the cute little red dress you wore to your anniversary date? The one that made him have a hard-on the entire time you were at dinner. He knows the waiter remembers, he also bets the waiter remembers seeing him fucking you in the car when his shift was over.

And that time you wore his jersey to bed and sent him a picture of it. It was such a good picture that he made it his lock screen for everyone to see.

He just likes looking at you tbh.

Aone Takanobu

you guys didn’t meet in some weird perverted way, it was actually really cute!

Not to sound creepy but he knew that you were in the garden club because you sat right in front of him in class

And since he didn't talk to anyone else in that class he was just content with listening, and so there he was

Standing outside of the garden club door holding his withering basil plant. Lost.

Lucky for him you were walking down the hallway and greeted him, looking all pretty and cute

You did help him realize that he was overwatering the basil and within a few weeks, it was back to life!

From that first time on, he came to the club room with you twice a week and walked home with you, just listening to all the random plant facts that you had harbored in your mind.

Eventually, with the help of the team, he asked you out, and you hugged him and said yes, and that was the beginning of the “oh god, y/n is way softer than I thought”

So he really just tries to be near you or be touching you at all times  

(i am also a firm believer that he likes to slow dance to classical music in your living room)

Like during lunch periods when you sit next to him and the second you finish eating hell push you to lean against him

And he’ll rub small circles on your hips and give you small innocent gropes

Or how he hugs your waist when you're doing literally anything, and he puts his head on top of your head while swaying

I can also tell you that Aone is a good singer

So he hums to you (I'm uwuing over my own headcanon lol)

He also really likes just running his hands along your body, so he likes when you wear the one-piece dresses so he has smooth sailing down your body

As a man of little words, he clearly has a more physical approach to getting you on the horny train

What I am trying to get at is that more often than not he literally just picks you up and carries you away.

Of course, that leaves you to come back to whatever you were doing.

That is after the cuddles and after sex ‘conversations’ about the dumbest things

Basically, he likes to hear you talk and he really likes being near.

Osamu Miya

He knew who you were

With a brother like atsumu, who never shuts up about you, it's hard not to

(Osamu is pretty sure atsumu had a picture of you next to his pillow. ew)

Anyway, the two of you just happened to share the same lunch block, and it also just happens to be the only period block that he was alone

No teammates and no especially close that he could hang out with

That meant he could either study or eat

Had he chose to eat, only to be met with the fact that atsumu had drained both of their lunch accounts for his flavor of the week

Poor baby stood there for a while just processing what was the worst news of his life

When you, a true angel among the evil, said that you would graciously pay for his food so that he didn't outlook so sad anymore

If he wasn’t holding an armful of onigiri he would have fallen on his knees and begged to whatever god was out there to let him keep you

But he settled for thanking you and spending the entire period with you, he even offered to share (for the first time in his life)

You complimented him on his flavor choice and he decided to keep you

He made sure to share his recipes with you and you tried to do the same

And somehow that evolved into you guys going on dates, much to atsumu’s distaste, and you guys were totally hitting it off

Osamu was your official biggest fan, he loved everything you do

But that means he wants to stay your biggest fan, and he knows that you’re pretty well known for boys thinking not so innocent things about you

Again being brothers with atsumu gave him this little sadistic streak

He lets you wear all of the revealing outfits and the bikinis, all for everyone to see

Everyone to see what belongs to him

Like at suna’s party he let you wear a black mini-skirt and a white off the shoulder long sleeved flowy shirt.

You looked good, and all the guys staring at you proved that point tenfold. Three guys had come up to you and tried to get you to go upstairs with them. And it was almost immediately shut down when they noticed the act you were sitting on your boyfriend.

Speaking of, he almost always has you in his lap.

Aww, cute! Not, he like grinding you down on him, that's also why he likes having you wear skirts, easy access to your ass, also a nice way to ensure that he could get more than a few gropes in when he wants

No, it's definitely the way he made you wear thigh highs to school one day and the shortest skirt you owned (like a school skirt) and walked behind you the entire day.

And he just reached behind you and lifted your skirt for the whole hallway to see, but mostly for him

He waists no time when he wants to fuck, he’ll just walk up to and open your legs while making out with either you or your neck.

And yes he has done that in front of atsumu

Who was warned to stay out of their room for a while.

Not to mention all those times he convince you to go to school with no underwear on just for the fun of it

(I didn't tell you this but those off the shoulder mini dresses drive him wild. On graduation day he pulled into a closet and had his way with you. I mean he did say that if you wore that dress he was going to do it, buuuuuut y’know….. yolo)

Kyotani Kentaro

We all know he’s a fighter, which means he gets hurt a lot, which in turn makes him a frequent face in the nurse's office

And who happens to be the nurse's niece? You of course!

And right after school, when your aunt takes her break and leaves you to take care of the office alone

Right after school is also when Kyotani always comes in.

(it’s not like he knew that you would be there alone, and that meant that you had to deal with him and heal him up. And it also is not like he started the fight so he could come here and see you. No not that)

Who am I kidding it was like that.

It was totally like that.

Your hands were just so soft when they put the bandages on and you have to bend down to get the wrapping.

He had a crush, that's what iwaizumi said, and after googling what the symptoms of a crush were he was sure

So with the help of the third years, aka Oikawa just having Iwaizumi repeat what he wanted to say, they had a plan

And the next time he was in the office he asked if you wanted to see a movie with him, it was so cute and he looked so shy

It would have been perfect if after five seconds he tried to take it back, you still went on the date with him though

He was happy.

Angry boy likes hugs

And yes he does, no objections

So when he’s upset he’ll make these grabby hands at you and have you come over and stand with him

He shoves his chin on your shoulder and his hands squeezing your waist and you’ll rock back and forth until he calms down.

He’s also very aware of what you wear

Like how your skirt perfectly frames your legs. How the socks you wear make your legs look 10x longer, and make you look like you’re walking like a model.

Or the dark blue leggings you wore with his alternate jersey and you were cheering for him!

But nothing and I mean NOTHING gets him better than when you wear spandex shorts and one of his shirts. He goes feral every time.

This man is the CEO of picking you up and placing you on his lap, straddle style, and just going ham on you

Not to mention that sometimes when he’s really tired he’ll have you just sitting on his lap while he plays with your thighs

(he also likes playing with your waist and stomach, but he doesn't realize that he’s talking out loud so you can hear all of the “so soft”’s he lets out.

Kuguri

You were one of Mika's close friends so you were always just kind of around

It was a little get together that Daishou threw that really made you two close

It was a weird drinking game of sorts, and it had these teams, and you were out as a pair!

Somehow throughout the game, you guys got side-tracked and just ended up talking to each other the rest of the night

Eventually, you were convinced to go on a double date and the rest was history

He didn't even pay attention to what you wore that much until he heard a few rando kids in the locker room talking about it.

And that’s when he started thinking about just who he was dating

He first realized how round your ass was. Is it normal to look that good in leggings? No one else has ever looked that good to him. With that came his obsession with just touching your butt. He just grabs it or he’ll stop you from walking and palm it. Or he’ll rub circles into it.

(it's cute how intrigued he is by your butt)

Then came his obsession with your thighs. Mostly the way that they spread out when you sit. He didn't even understand why they were just so mesmerizing. They were so squishy too. He likes how they look in his hands-

Lastly was the waist thing. You aren't even sure what it is. He just likes putting his hands on your waist. Like a prom picture. Sometimes he’ll squeeze or run his hands along your sides. But he’s mostly stationary.

He also has this habit of just opening your legs and laying on your stomach.

He is just so into how soft you are.

[amaranthinewilliamsauthor]

Fanfic WIP 2 - Labyrinth - Sarah Williams x Jareth (Goblin King)

PLOT: Sarah, after grading the writing of her students (from rather good to criminally terrible), makes an ill-advised wish (essentially “I wish I had someone to help deal with this shit”). Jareth pops up, as you do when you’re bored to tears by your moronic subjects, and helps Sarah go through her work. They get take-out, have a few drinks, and Jareth decides to make it a regular thing. He audits the class, though he didn’t figure on having to actually DO the work, and just is a chaos magnet.

Sarah: English Professor (Associate) at (insert school) who teaches Creative Writing (deals with super shit writing) and helps with student theater performances. In her mid 30’s , divorced with no kids and two cats, and happily single at the moment. She keeps in touch with the Labyrinth crew, tries to be there for Toby but feels exasperated at times due to the age difference, and even keeps in touch with Jareth.

Jareth: Goblin King, eternally ageless, and has a fondness for moronic writers. (They will give up a lot to get their dreams, especially when they know that they don’t have the ability to earn their dreams.) He decides to audit Sarah’s class, with her knowledge and permission, and gives other students all the wrong ideas.

=============================================

CHAPTER ONE:

It’s the weekend, thought Sarah for the tenth time that night, I should be doing something other than grading papers.

The first creative writing project of the semester was always an unmitigated disaster. Either the work was perfectly adequate or it was criminally terrible. It made sense, she supposed, because most students hadn’t read a lot of literature to inspire them to write better quality stories. By the end of the semester the writing would get a lot better, or at least that’s what she hoped and planned on. At 28 Sarah was mostly happy where her life was, though she regretted some of her decisions, but at this particular point in time she was considering a career change. She didn’t hate her job, she was an adjunct English professor who taught creative writing, but sometimes she fantasized about leaving it all behind to pursue something else. Anything else. “I wish that I had someone to help grade this bullshit,” She felt perfectly safe to say those words, especially since she lived alone, but a cold thread of doubt wove its way through her. She knew better than most that you should be careful what you wished for. When nothing happened she let out a breath that she had been holding.

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

“Hello Precious,” Jareth purred as he stood in her living room, “Now what would make you call upon me, especially 13 years after you beat my Labyrinth?” Sarah’s mouth had gone dry, panic would do that, and she was in full blown panic mode, “I-I didn’t mean to “call upon you” as you say, but I just made a stupid wish.” “You wished for assistance in grading,” A wide grin slowly grew, revealing curiously (and frighteningly) sharp teeth, “subpar assignments from your students. A wish made in frustration, though one still meant, is a wish. I should know,” He conjured a crystal with a flick of his wrist, “I specialize in wishes.” Jesus, Sarah thought, he’s still such a drama queen….king. “I know what kind of price you charge for wishes, but you won’t lay a finger on Toby.” Though, now that she actually thought about it, Jareth might not want her brother even if he could take him. Toby was a full-blown teenager, with the requisite mood swings, and had a curious standard of cleanliness. Karen had, after much fighting with Toby over keeping his room clean, admitted defeat. Sarah, when she came to visit, refused to step foot in her brother’s room as the numerous clothes and dirty dishes were frightening enough.

“You won him back, and I must regretfully abide by the rules. Unless another wishes him away I have no claim upon your baby brother.” Jareth spoke, still grinning, but his words calmed Sarah.

[rostovs-lover]

dalí on tuesday

charlie dalton x reader | cursing, smoking, brief mentions of sexual things, charlie (probably) has daddy issues, cameron | she/her pronouns | fluff | wc.2562

i am in love with charlie, this is now a charlie dalton centric blog, also ignore how terrible the title is please

anon : Hi!! I love your blog! can I request a charlie Dalton x reader fluff where reader is an artist and he visits them while they're painting? (maybe they end up wiping paint on his face?) I don't know, something really sweet at cute <33333

Charlie Dalton had been resigned to relish in small pleasures to keep himself sane at school, never did he think the library would be one of those. More specifically, the painter tucked into the basement of the library. 

                            ───☮︎───

     Charlie Dalton was a connoisseur of many things. Pretty girls, expensive wine, shitty poetry, and hand rolled cigarettes - to name a few. His imprisonment at Wellington made only one of those things readily available. So he settled - boxes of cheap smokes bought through upperclassmen, bottles of grocery store wine someone would sneak in from a party, and the two girls that occasionally came with Knox. The shitty poetry was always on deck, he had that at least. It was a tragedy to be resigned to such a bland life, there was absolutely no carpe diem-ing happening in a school that held adolescent boys to uniforms.

      It was miserable, truly, but Charlie scrapped by on the thought that soon enough there would be no more stuffy Catholic school and he could finally have a taste of freedom. In the meantime, he would have what little fun he could. The meets in the cave were always the highlight of the week. A place where he could talk and people would listen, and not because they had to but because they enjoyed it. They enjoyed his words and thoughts and presence. No one else had ever really seemed to enjoy Charlie’s presence. They could tolerate it, handle it, but they always had more pressing matters. A business meeting to attend, a bill to pay, a dinner to go to. Always something just a little bit more important and never quite enough time for Charlie. But the other Dead Poets, they valued him. He wasn’t just a kid, a college tuition to pay and a life to layout. He was a person, with interests and hobbies.

      It had been there, in the safe haven of the cave, that the idea for the library first came up. Meeks had already talked Pitts into coming, Neil didn’t take much convincing at all, Todd was also easy to lure, Cameron groaned about leaving school grounds but refused to be left out, and Knox agreed to go but only if Nuwanda came too. Charlie had already started to cover what there was to do at a library, read?

      Meeks dove into the technical manuals and Pitts followed tentatively, cradling their science project in his arms. Todd had followed Neil to the S authors, Cameron was trying to chat up the woman at the register, and God only knew what Knox was doing. He had been stranded with few options. He could find the geniuses and be talked over for the next hour or third wheel Neil but that guaranteed intruding on something he probably shouldn’t. The polite thing to do would be to rescue Cameron from making a complete fool of himself, throwing bad pick up lines at a clearly uninterested college student, but it was amusing to watch.

      Charlie settled on trying to find Knox, at least then he could have some company. Said company was absolutely nowhere to be found. The rows of shelves wound in a confusing maze and Charlie was lost before he could even begin to look. Weaving around he did come face-to-face with a rather large picture of Charles Dickens that made him recoil. It was perched just at eye level above a short staircase and it seemed to judge his every movement. Charlie followed the carpeted stairs down to escape Mister Dickens’ strange little beard and beady black eyes.

      The further down the steps Charlie descended the brighter it appeared. The lower level was the children’s section. Considerably more fun than science books or Shakespeare. The big oak counter was abandoned but the lights were still on. He was alone, still.

      Charlie sighed, sitting down in one of the bright red wooden chairs. He was much too big for it but it held well under his weight. A sad stuffed bear stared dully into him from the green glossy table.

      “Well hello,” He mumbled, picking it up under the arms, “And you must be?” He cleared his throat to take on a gruff baritone, “Mister... Bearington,” Charlie sighed, that was bad. He dropped the bear into his lap, “This is so stupid,”

      “Bearington?”

      Charlie shot around in the chair, tipping himself off center and stumbling to his feet, bear still clutched in his arms, “Where the hell did you come from?”

      “A few blocks over, walked here actually.” You turned back to your work. A painting. Not just a painting, Charlie realized, a mural. It stretched the length of the wall, roughly sketched in pencil and waiting to be finished.

      He blinked, “That’s good. The wall I mean,”

      “Thank you,” Your face flustered and Charlie took notice, “It’s not much of anything yet, just an outline. It’ll look better painted.”

      He took a few steps closer, sidling up to you, “What’s it supposed to be?”

      “A forest,” You pointed to a rotund blob perched on a long line, “That’s an owl, and there’s going to be a fox somewhere down in the grass,”

      Charlie grinned, “That’s an owl?”

      “That-” you tapped the blob, “Is a shape, objectively. Subjectively, it’s an owl.”

      His brow creased, “Subjectively it’s an owl? That's like saying Mister Bearington is a rabbit, subjectively,”

      You stared at him, baffled. It was almost irritating that he could so casually come down to your domain and invade your creative bubble. And it was even worse that he talked to himself as a stuffed bear but now he was challenging your judgment on what was and was not subjectively an owl. But he had a wonderful smile and it lessened the intrusion. Plus, you had never seen a teenage boy develop an attachment to a stuffed bear as quickly as he had, “What’s your name?”

      “Nuwanda,” He grinned, setting his chin atop his bear’s plush head.

      “Nuwanda?” You blinked at him, “That’s… neat. I’ve never heard that before.”

      “What can I say? The only Nuwanda this side of Vermont. What’s your name?”

      As you opened your mouth to answer several sets of footsteps thundered down the stairs. Knox spun around the corner first, closely followed by Pitts and Meeks.

      “Charlie!” Knox called, “We gotta go before Cameron proposes to the clerk.”

      You looked at the boy in front of you, “Is Charlie short for Nuwanda, or just a nickname?”

      He shrugged, “I’m Nuwanda, subjectively. It was truly a pleasure meeting you. Can’t wait to see your thing DaVinci!” He set the stuffed bear back on the table as he made his way out of the room. With Charlie’s energy gone it became much quieter and you were plunged back into the impressionistic outline of your artwork.

      The next time a library trip was suggested Charlie didn’t completely dread it. Yes, it was still numbingly boring because it was a library and he didn’t have clerks to fall in love with, people to write love letters to, anyone to kiss in the aisles, or a spaceship to build, but he did have his own personal Van Gough to torment.

      The lower level was the first place he went, not even hanging his coat on the rack inside the big double doors. He made his way past Cameron’s preoccupied receptionist and under Dickens’ hard glower. Halfway down the steps, the smell hit Charlie. Wet paint.

      You had just picked out a brush when he pulled one of the wooden chairs next to your station. He sat in it backwards, holding Mister Bearington out in front of him, “Never got your name Monet,”

      “Well, it's not that. Or Da Vinci.” You stroked the brush up the grassy outline.

      “Do you want me to guess?”

      You had yet to look at him, “Nope,”

      “Are you gonna tell me?”

      “Should I?”

      “Obviously, I told you my name.”

      You set the brush down and turned to face him, “(Name).”

      “Pretty,”

      Charlie Dalton liked many things and the musty old library uptown had never been one of them. It had ancient red carpets and gaudy gold ceilings and it was trying too hard to look regal. So it was a sheer shock when he began to leap at the suggestion of going and even more so when he chose to go by himself one afternoon. Naturally, the other poets followed him, they had to.

      Charlie didn’t dally upstairs, waving hi to the clerk and rushing down to the children’s section. A sign was posted outside the entrance warning of wet paint but he stepped around it.

      “You’re making progress Picasso!” He set his hands on his hips and took in the wall.

      You turned back to look at him, “Did you not see the caution: wet paint, do not enter sign?”

      “Oh no I saw it,” He pushed his sunglasses up on top of his head, “It's bright orange, hard to miss, really,”

      “So you just chose to ignore it?”

      He nodded, making his way over to sit by you on the ground, “I choose to ignore lots of things, it really makes life easier,”

      You shook your head, “Are you just going to sit here and bother me?”

      “Yes, that's actually the whole reason I came today, believe it or not.”

      You blubbered in vague disbelief, “Please tell me you’re not serious,”

      “Dead serious,” Charlie grinned, leaning closer, “I had to see how your weird owl was going. And also make sure you hadn’t gone mad and cut your own ear off yet,”

      “You’ve already used the Van Gogh joke, Charles,”

      “Maybe I want your ear,”

      You paused, “You… what?”

      Charlie’s confidence cracked, “That was bad. Shit, that wasn’t supposed to sound that way. It was like, a bad pickup line? Because Van Gogh cut his ear off to send to his girlfriend,” He sighed, shaking his head, “Sorry,”

      “I mean if I had to pick someone to give my ear too I guess you would be my first choice?”

      Charlie looked at you, eyebrows pinched together, “Why?”

      You shrugged, “No one else has asked, first come first serve.” You dipped your brush back into the blue paint and went to work on a patch of flowers.

      “Huh, well I do appreciate it,” Charlie scooted closer, leaning over your shoulder. He was close, very close. When you took a breath you could smell his cologne and whatever it was he used in his hair and you could feel the edge of his sunglasses brush your ear. He brought an arm around to dip his finger into the soft sky colour on your palette. And then he wiped it on your nose.

      You gasped sharply at the foreign feeling, snapping your head to the side to glare at him, “Why?!”

      Charlie snickered, leaning back, “The opportunity presented itself, how could I just let that pass?”

      You reached back, squirting a touch of purple paint over the palm of your hand, “That was truly a horrible idea,”

      Charlie shot up just as you did, stumbling backwards, “I’m sorry-” He stuck his hands up in surrender, “I regret my actions and if I could take them back I would,”

      “Hmm, but you can’t” You took a step closer, “Surrender now and it doesn’t have to get any messier than this,”

      He pointed towards your paint coated hand, “Do not,”

      You grinned, “I might,”

      “I’m begging,”

      “Fine-” You offered him your other hand, “Truce?”

      Charlie mulled it over for a moment, “Fine, truce,” He grabbed your clean hand and you used it to pull him towards you.

          “Why on earth would you trust me?” You tugged him even closer as he shrieked and smeared your hand down his cheek, “There, now we’re even,”

      Getting distracted by your triumph gave Charlie the upper hand. He pulled you to him the same you had done to him and pressed his cheek flush to yours. The paint was cold against your skin and you jolted back, away from him.

      “Vile,” You hissed, “You are vile and evil. That's so cold. You will pay, I hope you know that.”

      Charlie snorted, “Oh please, what’re you gonna do?”

      “You underestimate me, you ass, I’ll figure something out,”

      “Will you?” Charlie grinned, “I will be waiting in anticipation,”

      “You better be,”

      Meeks elbowed back into Cameron’s ribs, “You’re going to knock me over,”

      Cameron craned his neck further to peek around the corner into the children’s section, “I just want to see, let me look,”

      “Nothing is happening-” Meeks snipped, “They’re just talking now and I might be able to hear if you could can it!”

      Cameron rolled his eyes, “Of course, whatever you say,”

      “Will you shut up?” Knox batted at Cameron’s shoulder, “They’ll see us, we’re not super well hidden,”

      “If you don’t stop talking they’ll realize we’re here,” Pitts mumbled, rolling his eyes. Cameron started to rebuttal, turning to look at Gerard but the motion knocked Meeks out of place and he gasped, stumbling forwards. This did indeed draw Charlie’s attention.

      “Meeks, what the hell?” Charlie snapped. He was in a state, sunglasses askew in his hair, paint smeared from his cheekbone down to the corner of his mouth, and his shirt was wrinkled away from his collarbone.

      Meeks stared, “Hi Charlie. Are there any textbooks down here, uh… the science ones?”

      Knox groaned, stepping out from behind the wall as well, “We wanted to see why you came here on a Tuesday afternoon by yourself,”

      Charlie blubbered, “Did you all come? Is Keating there too?”

      “He could be,” Meeks shrugged.

      Charlie rolled his eyes, “Will you leave, I’ll be upstairs in a second,” The other poets nodded, scampering up the steps to the first level.

      “Assholes, should have known they’d come,” Charlie sighed, adjusting the sunglasses atop his head, “I need to go before they decide to intrude again. I’ll see you soon though, anxiously anticipating payback,”

      He was almost out the door when you bucked up the courage to call out to him, “Charlie, wait.” You let him turn back to you before continuing, “Could I have your phone number?”

      He clicked his teeth, “Don’t have one, private school. But I’ll find the library number in the books and try to shoot you a call sometime,” He winked and started back up to his friends.

      Knox was waiting at the landing with a handful of tissues, which he shoved into Charlie’s hands, “So you’re gonna read your stupid poem about tits at a Dead Poets meet and then not tell us you’ve got a girlfriend?”

      Charlie grabbed the tissues, “Not my girlfriend, I meet her like two weeks ago,”

      “Didn’t stop Knox,” Neil elbowed him.

      Charlie wiped at his face, “Well I’m not Knox. I like her painting, she's good.”

      “It looks like she was painting you,” Cameron slapped at Charlie’s chest and he threw the tissues at him in retaliation.

      “Shut up, at least my library worker actually talks to me,”

      Cameron fumbled with the dirty material, batting it away from his chest, “You dick!”

      Charlie grinned, pulling his glasses down and starting towards the door. Something about it was thrilling, having this to himself. A little secret that he and you shared. His personal Salvador Dalí, something to look forwards to besides bad tobacco and Keating’s eccentric lectures. It was bright and exciting and he felt seen. He felt important. The blue paint he had stolen from your tray was still on the tip of his pointer finger and he wondered how long it would be until he could see you again.

 ( @interwebseriesfan24 )

[katsrnerstories]

BillDip SlowBurn FanFic Chap. 1

Bill had destroyed Dipper's mind.

It has been a few years since weirdmageddon. Since Dipper and Mabel defeated demons from hellish planes of existence and saved the world and their friends from soul and mind crushing madness.  

Dippers a freshman in college now. It was a moment that he had wished for for years. Highschool had been…

Well it wasn't the worst it could have been. Dipper hit a major glow up around the beginning of junior year (with Mabel's help of course) and life was a little easier. He was asked out on dates, went to a few parties here and there that people dragged him to, had some typical highschool fun in the city...

Until around that same time he started getting replies from colleges his senior year, he started to see Bill again. Every once in a while his mind would wander back to that summer, but it was always the good things or nightmares of the horrors they saw.

It started with just a little glimpse here and there. An eye in the back corner of his periphery, some yellow glimpse in a dark room. 

A ghostly hand on his shoulder.

But these things were nothing to the first time Dipper realized something was wrong.

Dipper saw Bill in his dreams. And those dreams were beyond nightmares.

He had had nightmares before. Nightmares of weirdmageddon were common for both dipper and Mabel. But these… these were real; as much as a dream could be.

Because of Gravity Falls, Dipper really wasn't afraid of a lot of things that would have scared him. The unknown was comforting to him. Maybe because it wasn't too unknown to him and Mabel.

But bill. During those nightmares, brought everything he feared to the frontlines. 

It had been a while since Mabel and him shared a room, so Mabel really didn't know about the fear Dipper experienced those nights. 

She was more focused on getting to LA.

She wants to be a criminal psychoanalyst. To look at the minds of people and figure how they tick. Criminals especially. 

Dipper could swear that Bill had done something to her to make her go down such a dark career path, but he couldn't say anything; he neither had a psychology degree nor was untouched by Bill himself.

Who really knows, it could have been anything else that happened to her in those hellish four years of highschool. 

She had moved away quickly after highschool ended to learn in LA. Of course they facetime and text all the time, but the separation was still felt by both of them.

Everyone missed her presence. Her positivity, her unique personality. 

That had transformed into something much darker come junior and senior year. She found out after a few failed boyfriends that she was not only Asexual, but that guys and even girls, can’t seem to give that part of a relationship up. Some even found it offensive that she felt that way.

Dipper went back to oregon. Of course he was in the city, but on weekends he would visit the Mystery Shack and Gravity Falls. 

Soos was happy to give him one of the rooms in the basement. Sometimes even Grunkle Stan or Grunkle Ford would visit. 

They decided shortly after Dipper and Mabel left that they would travel. Of course Ford's labs still sit under the mystery shack, but when Mabel and Dipper visited Soos the summer of their junior year Ford gave them full control of the labs (as long as Dipper kept everyone safe. Which he did too much annoyance of Mabel)

Soos and his wife at that time had just had a little baby boy, and now have a comfortable four kids, two boys and two girls (three of them were triplets) and run the shack not to much better than Stan did, with the same soul in the campy attractions and overpriced merchandise. 

Wendy is in her senior year at a community college in Oregon city, right around the same place Dipper decided to go to school. They hang out pretty regularly, just around weekly.

Robby left gravity falls as soon as he got his GED. Went for New York, looking for a punk career. He sends Wendy emails every once in a while about his music and where he's at. 

Shockingly, Pacifica stayed in Oregon, going to the same college Dipper goes to. They see each other, and after leaving her family, she found a lot out about herself and became a much better person. 

She found she loved a good smoke and art. Apparently, something she hid from the world was that she loved art. She was probably one of the best artists Dipper had seen. After she left the hell hole of her family, she became really chill. Calm. even nice. 

Her and Dipper have coffee pretty much every day. She was one of the only people who also knew what he had gone through.

And she was the only person who noticed as Dipper got worse and worse for wear. 

Bill had been particularly evil the past few weeks, taking much more joy in Dippers struggle. Long ago Dipper had just sort of given up on screaming for Bill to stop. But he always refused to make a deal with him to stop the fear. Not again. 

“Another nightmare again?” Pacifica asks, as Dipper requests 5 shots of caffeine in his already bitter caffeinated black coffee. 

“Yeah. it's getting harder and harder to say no every night. And honestly the empty dorm isn't helping.” 

“Why don't you just move in with me? I've got an extra room that's got your name written on the door if you want it.” 

Dipper almost accepted, but decided against it. It was kind of weird, no matter how good of friends they were, to live with the ex that made you realized you were gay.

It wasn't her fault, it was just…

He liked a different kind of ass, as Mabel had said when he came out.

No, the daily overpriced coffee meetup was enough. 

“Have you talked about it to Ford? Hes got to know something about it if he went through the same thing?” 

“I don't want to bother them with it. They thought they got rid of Bill that summer, we all did. Bills my problem now.”

Pacifica gives him a knowing look. She knew that he was breaking, but couldn't figure out how to help him. 

“Hows journalism?” Pacifica takes her coffee as she changes the subject.

“As boring as it ever is. Graphic design?”

“As confusing as ever.” Dipper takes a big sip from his steaming coffee. It's a briskly cold morning, enough he brought out his knit set Mabel had made for him on their 18th birthday. He had no shame in wearing it, and it in fact felt comforting today, to know that she was still with him in heart at least.

She never grew out of her sweater thing. She still makes sweaters, using it to get her to the next rent payment sometimes. Everyone can count on a big box with sweaters from her every Christmas here in Oregon. 

With their coffees in hand, Dipper and Mabel head off to campus. And once they made it there they said their goodbyes with a hug and went their separate ways to start the day. 

Dipper wanders into the lecture hall for his advanced maths class. People filter in as he types away on his computer. 

The students around him wanted to be scientists, economists, etc. everyone found it weird that a creative writing major was not only taking advanced maths, this early in the morning, but was killing it. His grades spoke for themselves. 

The class starts and Dipper still types away on his computer. He had been bored the night before as he was staving off sleeping and had read a chapter ahead in their textbook. He taught himself the three hour lesson that day in an hour. 

It was no doubt that Dipper took after his great uncle Stanford. Grunkle Ford told him at one point that Dipper reminded him of a young Dr. Fiddleford. Dipper didn't really like being compared to the scientist that started a whole cult under Gravity Falls before going batshit crazy himself for a very long time.

He only hoped that he wouldn't end up like him. He didn't want to be some crazy man who roams the town. 

Dipper had a story that he needed to finish for his next class. He had started to wear away the stories of Gravity Falls with his creative writing classes that he now had to actually think about what story to write. Mabel helped him out with the premise of the story last night. So he spent that class writing a simple flash fiction of one roaming the backrooms. (an urban legend Mabel had read about in an article somewhere.)

He found comfort in knowing that one thing did not exist to him. That one thing did not sit in the pits of Gravity Falls waiting for Dipper or one of them to unearth it.

The story reminded Dipper of falling through the endless pit just outside the Mystery Shack. A hole where they reminisced on days of the summer as they spent the day, or who knows how long, falling. they were all lucky that it was not, truly, endless. 

And quickly the story was finished and the class closed early. 

Dipper went for an early lunch. He scrolls through his phone, seeing Mabels three new instagram posts and all the other people she introduced him to. 

After Mabel found out Dipper was gay, she went on a mission to hook him up with some LA guy. Oregons not terrible with their acceptance, but it's not something to be very open about. Plus Dipper wasn't the kind to walk pride without someone like Mabel hyping the both of them up. Because god knows that she needs just as much hyping up with who she is as Dipper.

When he walks into his empty apartment, anxiety wells up in Dippers chest. Quickly he turns on the TV, letting it run as white noise as he makes his lunch. The apartment had been empty since his recent relationship ended. Dipper is glad it ended, as the abuse just got too much; yet it was bad for Dipper to be left alone with his thoughts. Especially in an apartment that seemed to hold so much sadness and bad memories.

Mabel, after helping Dippers style, had made him a whole cookbook for him. It had all different kinds of foods, but the main dishes all were healthy. She had gone on a fitness rampage her sophomore year and had never truly grown out of it. It was from a bad place, but she turned it to a positive. As she always does. 

She had told him that it was the first thing other than sleep to keep alive longer. She had made him promise that he would try to stay alive. 

At this point it was the only thing keeping Dipper alive. 

Bill had taxed his mind so much it was rare to find him not paranoid. Bill made Dippers anxiety beyond chronic, and the lack of sleep did not help his depression. 

That had developed after Pacifica. It wasn't because of the break up, more at the fact that she had helped him so much. 

She had accepted him being gay. She had helped him gain friends during their relationship, and she even helped him when money wasn't the best. 

All this caused his anxiety to get to his head. 

What if they think I’m evil for breaking it off with her? What if she'll never want to see me again? What if, what if, what if…

His depression had just gotten  worse after the breakup and dealing with being alone again. It was the reason Dipper stayed with someone like that for so long. 

All of the depression and anxiety ended up crashing down at the same time Bill Cypher ended up crashing into the picture. 

At that point Bill only came to terrorise Dipper a few nights a month. It was easier to deal with.  Now it's every night.

Dipper finishes making his food, sitting down in front of the TV to watch a show on Netflix. 

He had been getting through the true crime shows. He swore that eventually he'd eventually either run a show like it with Mabel or be one of the cold cases lost to the world. 

Yet within only a few minutes Dipper not only found himself asleep, but stuck in the mindscape. 

“Been trying to avoid me, Pine Tree?”

Dipper no longer was shocked by Bill's voice. In fact the more and more he heard his voice, the more and more it began to sound almost human.

[dancing-the-hellfire-rumba]

Seen ✓ - 2

Pairing: Sam x Fem!Reader Warnings: light anxiety Word Count: 2.2k Series Summary: On her way home, Y/n finds an abandoned, cracked phone on the sidewalk. Anxious about the well-being of its owner, she picks it up and texts the first contact she finds; Sam. A/N: Chapter 2! Our pals are kicking it off already. Can you smell the chemistry? The rOMANCE? LESSGO

Pictures used in this chapter were found on google images :)

Beta: no one.

Catch up! : Part 1 Masterlist

Chapter 2: overthinker.

From: y/n_andrews85 To: D_impala67 Subject: I have your phone. That sounds creepy. I don’t think there’s a non-creepy way of writing this. Whatever.

Dear Dean, is it?

I just wanted to let you know I found your phone at the bus stop the other night. I wasn’t planning on holding on to it, really, but I got worried that you may have been in trouble, and then you never really looked for it either so, I don’t know, I figured better than someone who’ll snatch it and leave, you know?

Anyways, that’s why I’m emailing. I snooped through it a little, sorry, hopefully you’ll understand it was kinda necessary? Maybe we can arrange something so I can get it back to you. This girl, Jamie, keeps sending me (well you technically) topless photos of her. It’s not really what lights my candle. I’m assuming you’d like it back too.

I hope you’re safe. Looking forward to hearing back from you!

Y/n Andrews

-

Do you believe me now?

oh god

you didn’t

Sure did

wow. just wow.

you just handed his ass back to him holy shit!

last time he called, he said he dropped his phone while walking back to his motel, so

he’s okay.

That’s good, I’m glad he’s safe.

I was planning on including something along the lines of “This would’ve been easier if you were an active member of the 21st century and used social media”

But I figured the Jamie thing was motive enough?

yeah. topless Jamie? that’s something else.

Don’t be getting any ideas, dude, I don’t do nudes lmao.

oh god, no i didn’t think that

you did not just type lmao though. how old are you again?

oh god, you’re not 14 or something right? i don’t know what that would make me.

Don’t worry about it, I turned 16 last week.

…

are you serious?

Lmao, no, I’m kidding. I’m twenty-two.

But I think the word you’re looking for is a creep. Oh, and an ageist.

ouch.

Haha, I’m joking.

Lighten up, what are you, ninety?

hi pot meet kettle.

Shit I walked right into that one.

also i’d like to think i don’t text like a ninety-year-old man. could be wrong though

to answer your question i’m twenty-four.                                

Twenty-four huh? I assume you’re done with college, no?

Or- wait, I guess not everyone goes to college.

Yes, this is me fishing for information.

well… i kinda dropped out.

decided to go on a road trip with my brother.

things went a little south I ended up continuing the family business.

Damn, college drop-out ey? Where from?

Also, Family business? What do you do?

Is this too interview-y? I’m sorry, I don’t mean to snoop.

you’re good.

stanford. pre-law.

and my brother and i are private investigators. that’s why he’s not in Kansas with me. he’s working a case.

Daaaaamn. Stanford AND a lawyer? And now working as a PI? You’re pretty smart, then.

an ageist and a generalist? i didn’t take you for such y/n.

Fuck, okay, you sound like a lawyer too.

hahahah

so what about you?

What about me?

are you in college?

Oh yeah! Film school. My dream has always been to be a director. It’s rare to find someone who loves movies more than I do.

that’s really cool.

hey i’ve been meaning to ask.

Thinking of me, Sam?

…

Do tell.

how come you were walking home through a park in the middle of the night the other day?

Ooh, I was coming back from work.

I’m a bartender and I had a late shift on Friday.

oh I see. That makes sense yeah.

I’m sorry to cut this conversation short, but I’m legitimately three seconds away from falling asleep. I’m gonna hit the hay.

See you later, Sam :)

See you, y/n :)

A smile creeps on Y/n’s features at the thought of more conversations with Sam. He has given her something to look forward to, something to make her a little more excited during her boring every-day life. As she tucks herself in under her covers, eyelids heavy enough to droop involuntarily, the last thing she thinks of is him, the clever, sassy, twenty-four year old college dropout on the other side of the cracked phone screen. The overwhelming urge to get to know him overtakes her as she succumbs to sleep

--

So

Do you believe in ghosts?

that’s… random.

May be

why do you ask?

Idk, just wanna get to know you better.

that’s what you ask people you want to get to know better?

Yes?

Are you avoiding the question?

no

i do. believe in ghosts.

You?

So do i.

Well, sorta. I guess I believe in souls more than anything.

hm?

Well… I guess I hope (more than believe) that we are more than our corporeal selves.

In the sense that, it’s comforting to me that when we die, and our bodies stop working, we don’t evaporate.

I guess.

yeah I understand.

i don’t know. i guess i wanna believe in science more than anything but i know better.

How do you mean?

call it a hunch.

Oh c’mon, it’s gotta be more than that.

Sam…?

Y/n huffs out a breath, gnawing at her lip. She hopes her anxiety isn’t right, that Sam isn’t sick of her silly questions and existential dread, and is actually doing something. Perhaps his battery ran out.

...Sure.

She was doing something too, before she decided to text him. Eyes falling on all her books and notes, spread around her like ugly, depressing, anxiety-inducing flower petals. There’s a blanket over her legs, chilly fall weather seeping through her bones, and there’s a half empty pizza box in front of her. She’s full and the left overs are kept for her sister, Emily, who’s currently locked up in her room.

Damn it. Y/n is stressed and tired, and now her distraction is refusing to reply. This sucks. She hates the crawling, awful, gooey feeling of cold anxiety gripping every beat of her heart and stupidly convincing her he’s purposefully ghosting her, because he doesn’t like her.

Not knowing what to occupy herself with, she heads to take a shower. In the back of her head, she knows that she’ll probably not study any longer, so she takes it upon herself to sink under the hot water and wash thoroughly, trying to get her mind off Dean’s phone. When her feet step out of the shower and she has towel-dried herself as best as she can, she tosses her wet hair in a haphazard bun, and gets dressed.

Books stack under the rickety, stained coffee table, and she grabs her sketchbook, her favorite pencil, as well as her and Dean’s phone. She shoots Connor a text, arranging a hang out of some kind, and opens her little booklet, when a text vibrates Dean’s phone.

hey i’m sorry i got caught up in something.

It’s alright.

She doesn’t press the ghost subject, because he doesn’t seem into it and she really doesn’t wanna make him dislike her any more than he possibly already does.

The empty page of her sketchbook daunts her. With a tight grip on her mechanical pencil, she urges her creativity pumps to use some gasoline, but they seem limp and dead, and once more unwilling to help her. As her eyes fall on Dean’s phone, like a light bulb out of a cartoon, she gets an idea.

Hey, this might sound creepy, but what do you look like?

She stares at the phone. This feels like a risky question. God, if he wasn’t done with her before, he certainly must be now. But then, he surprises her.

why do you wanna know?

I’m in the mood to sketch some, and my creativity has officially left the building.

Care to help a girl out? Maybe your literary descriptions will spark something in me lmao.

i didn’t know you sketched.

Yeah, sometimes. Nothing great though, I promise. I’m certainly no Picasso.

i mean you don’t have to be picasso to sketch well. and you don’t have to sketch well to sketch at all.

Yeah, may be.

I don’t wanna pressure you into anything, you really don’t have to humor me.

If you do feel like it though, don’t send me a picture. Kinda wanna spark some life into my brain cells.

haha i will. only if you show me the finished product tho.

You’ve got yourself a deal :)

She simply cannot believe he has just agreed to this. Her breath is caught in her throat.

so.

what do you want me to start with?

Just whatever. Idk, tell me about your face.

well

i have brown curly-ish hair that reaches my ears. uh, my eyes are hazel.

Okay, that’s a start.

What’s your nose like?

it’s a bit pointy. thin i think?

Jawline?

sharp? i guess?

this is by far the weirdest thing i’ve done.

Lmao, yeah, this is pretty weird.

Exciting though.

She shouldn’t have said that. Fuck, that is definitely overeager.

yeah it is.

Her stomach feels floaty at his response.

Eyebrows?

uh

normal?

How do you classify “normal” eyebrows, exactly?

i don’t know? they’re simple i guess.

Are you implying complicated eyebrows exist out there?

…

Elaborate, Sam. Are you shy? Do you not have eyebrows? Are they bushy? Or too thin? Or pointy?

i’m telling you they’re average.

Sam

what

You officially suck at this.

oh fuck off how would you describe yours?

Y/n proceeds to write a cohesive sentence that includes adjectives apart from “normal” and “average”. Words like bushy, thin, arched and curvy.

well shit yeah i guess i do suck at this.

i think it’s not a skill i mind not having.

That… is a confusing sentence.

just… draw them however. what difference can eyebrows make?

Oh you have no idea.

Okay, last thing.

Do you have a fringe?

yeah but not for long. i’ll probably let it grow out.

Okay, I can do something with that. Thanks :)

no problem

Her creativity is finally servicing her according to her commands, and Y/n puts pen to paper and scribbles messily. Line after line, they curl and sit on the page, forming a smile with thin lips, a sharp jaw, a pointy nose. She has to guess the eyebrows a bit, and the eyes are more cartoonish and generic than she likes. In the end, she gets anxious at the prospect of having to show him, and gives him a hood, so she won’t fuck up the hair.

Okay, I’m done.

that was quick, actually.

Well I didn’t have much to go on.

Sam doesn’t reply. She worries he might have misinterpreted her teasing tone.

Gimme a sec, I’ll send it over.

Ugh, Dean’s camera is such shit. Do you mind if I send it from my phone?

no go ahead.

[Y/n has sent a picture]

As you said, it didn���t take long. It’s really not the best.

that…

is actually not too far from the truth

it kind of looks like me from two years ago

wow, really?

yeah.

and it’s honestly a pretty good sketch. good job.

Thank you :)

Sam doesn’t say anything after this, and she huffs. Her head falls back on the couch, and she stares at the ceiling. She should go to bed soon, it’s getting late.

isn’t this strange?

Oh shit. Oh shit, oh shit oh shit, she thinks. He’s regretting this. He doesn’t like her. He’ll stop talking to her and that’ll be it.

Why does she care so much? It’s a thought that passes through her mind. It hasn’t been long since they started talking and, after the near-kidnapping encounter, they’ve been having nearly daily conversations, but that still doesn’t mean much. She knows barely anything about him.

She guesses, she wants to get to know him better. He seems like the type of guy she’d enjoy hanging out with and she has so far. Stopping any kind of conversation would surely feel like a loss. She’d have to go back to her boring routine. This is the most exciting thing she has allowed herself to do in years.

A part of her feels rather lame for finding such a thrill at something so trivial. She’s talking to a stranger, and that’s all it is, but the prospect that he could be anyone at all, and she’s never even seen his face… well… It feels refreshing, new. Scary in an adrenaline-rush kind of way.

What is?

us. texting.

isn’t it a little odd?

I guess it is a bit.

I mean we’ve only known each other for, what, a week? And a half?

yeah.

should we stop?

I don’t know

Do you want to?

The extra moment his reply takes to arrive makes her want to vomit.

no

Then there’s your answer.

okay then

can I save you in my contacts?

Sure, go ahead.

I just did too.

alright.

Okay :)

I’m sorry, I have to go.

I guess I’ll text you later, Sam.

Go be whoever Sam Something is.

it’s winchester.

Like the shotgun?

yup.

That’s BADASS. Can you even get more badass than this? Pre-law, now a PI, and you’re named after a shotgun? Damn dude.

Well, it’s nice to meet you Sam. I’m Y/n Andrews.

Haha thanks.

nice to meet you, too

goodnight Y/n Andrews.

Night Sam Winchester :)

--- Part 3

A/N: Thoughts? How are you liking the newer version of this? right after I post it, I’m gonna delete the other one.

Taglist:

Old Can You See The Stars taglist: @shutupiminlooove @sammysgirl1997 @kymberlytorres @bambi95-blog @demonic-meatball @thekarliwinchester @littlekay15 @li-m-ii  @thinspo-isuppose @carryonmywaywarddemigodwitch @ellen-reincarnated1967 @moonlitskinwalker @marichromatic @illuminatus42 @lazy-author @mirandaaustin93 @hauntedsiriel @pilaxia @devilgirlsarah @nobodys-baby-now @captiveties @calamitychaos @midiocris @wordswillscream​

Sam taglist @kymberlytorres @theboykingsam @depressed-moose-78 @andi-mendes-barnes @captainmarvelcorps @nerd-in-a-galaxy-far-away @nellachain

[aneshkablack]

Divination

Divination

My second oneshot. I'll hope you like.

First Oneshot: https://isishiwatari.tumblr.com/post/648032827047378944/the-beginning

I published in: 

My first Blog: https://isishiwatari.tumblr.com/post/650480081602592768/divination

FF.net: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/13858840/1/Birds-of-a-feather

And in AO3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30581456/chapters/75436169

________________________________ Disclaimer: J. K. Rowling and Warner Bros. are owners of Harry Potter/Wizarding World. Jam City is owner of Hogwarts Mystery. I write this fic only for entertainment and leisure.

Divination

Finally she become an animagus: an eagle like her wish. She had decided don't register in Ministry of Magic after she heard the Talbott's reason. Isolde thought if the situation with R will continue after she'll graduate of Hogwarts; they could have spies like Voldemort in his Terror Era infiltrated there and could discover she can to transform into a bird. She didn't want give them an advantage over her. By other hand, he could use her gift against them… well, if someday need to spy or to take some of them; when she could know where they hidden.

Talking about Talbott, in their classes they had a little interaction between of both with some comments about the subjects, working together occasionally or had short talks of trivial topics. Divination was the class where they have a better interaction then other classes. And where Isolde discovered other facet of him.

Since she asked for him she only knew he was a good student, intelligent, quiet, liked the solicitude, stayed more time out of Ravenclaw's Common Room, and one time she found him in the owlery when she had to send a letter to her mother, feeding the owls. But with Trewlaney, Talbott was sarcastic, was probably he was regretted to take her subject when they studied here. It was funny he lost his calm when the professor said she was disappointed in him, told him he hadn't the Inner Eye. In some times she couldn't help herself but she smiled softly. Isolde understood his feeling. She didn't believe in the Divination, yet and she thought Trewlaney was a fraud.

Today, November 14th, they were studied the tea grounds, again. It was obvious Talbott was already fed up and she didn't feel well because today was the death anniversary of her dad. But didn't let her friends and others students saw her sadness, trying to give the best in every class.

"You can take your time, Isolde. I don't want to waste the time with the tea grounds". In this time, both was worked together. She was drinking her tea.

"Oh, Talbott, but you lecture could be easy. I mean" she lowered her voice. "Do you remember who am I? You can invent some bad in my searching or the Curse Vaults and Trewlaney will be fascinated with your 'prediction'. For example…" she saw her plate, trying to see a figure of something. "I thought it was a dog. You can tell her the Grim is follow me. Someone wants to kill me. You can add details how I would die" she smiled, but closed her eyes, too.

"Let me see" she gave him her plate. "Well, yes, you're right about the dog and… I'm not sure, a needle and an envelope…"

"About the second thing, news from abroad. Probably my mother. She returned to New York for a meeting of all MACUSA's ambassadors, but I guess she'll say the same thing 'Be a good girl and don't do anything that you'll expel of Hogwarts'. I wish, but the school is in danger, yet and I don't want my friends could hurt" she said in a gloomy tone. "I hope it would real she don't send me anything today".

He didn't say anything. It's probably she had a bad relationship with her mother and seemed she really was worried about the boggarts trouble... like she felt guilty for it. But he didn't ask for it because he didn't bother her. Isolde finally sighed and continued her reading.

"The book said it means an imminent danger. It's obvious, the boggarts and the vault. Well, I let you use your imagination and tell to Trewlaney a bizarre history of my future death".

"Fine, but I don't want to be who predicted your death and every person of Hogwarts could remember me for it or they'll say I killed you indirectly". It's probably he didn't say the best comment, but for any reason he was tried to animate her. Isolde saw him, with her eyebrow raised.

"I thought you don't care what the people says about you."

"It's true but it won't seem well in my curriculum when I want to get a job". He tried mocking. And it could've work, because Isolde was smiled.

"Are you afraid to be my 'messenger of destruction'?" She teased him. Talbott chuckled softly. Since she discovered the meaning of his name, she sometimes took the liberty making comments about it… in special in this class. Talbott didn't stop her, because she was the only who could handle his weird sense of humor. He observed her a few of seconds before to response this:

"Beware, Hiwatari. You shouldn't have so much confidence with people. Or someone could give you a love potion and have a tragic love story". He teased her, too. Talbott had been reading some British legends. One of them was 'The Tragic Romance of Tristan and Isolde'.

"Touché, Winger. I knew you like to read books…"

"Like many Ravenclaws and it's probably you are in that group, too".

"Yes, but I didn't knew you read this legend. My dad read me once this story, but they were in love before they drunk the potion. But finally both die unhappy and far each to other. My dad told me about the love potions, and even the Princess Isolde drunk it with the King Mark, she never fell in love with him and prevented me I never should use it to force someone to love me, because I could have a worst pain that them plus the person I would bewitch they could hate me for all my life". She shook her head. "Sorry. I'm afraid to bother you while I was yapping like a puppy".

"You talk so much, it's true. But I'm getting used to it. You do this class less boring when we work together".

"I'm not sure if I take that as a compliment or an insult".

"You should live with the doubt, Isolde".

"Hey!"

"Well, you'll die soon for a bad brewing love potion, after you received a package from your mother who stays in The United States, but really is of one of your enemies". He said, ignored her and wrote in his scroll.

"Did you see you can make a fake prediction?" she giggled.

"I never had told you I couldn't. Only I don't want to waste my time in this. But finally I did". He told her. "And you needed to get a conversation, even if it was a random topic". She was surprised. "I don't ask you, because it's probably you don't want to talk about the real reason with me".

'You aren't Rowan and I don't want bother you with my thoughts and feelings, even I feel comfortable with you. But we're in class and I don't want all to know how I'm'. She though, while smiled him.

Isolde thought was better to avoid tell him. After all, she wasn´t sure they're friends, even Talbott trusted her he was an animagus and the story about his family. He could called her 'a friend' in that time, but their relation it was more like classmates get along between them. More from him than hers.

"Well, it's a miracle you and me take a long talk". She teased him, again.

"You said it. Probably don't success again…" he gave his plate. "Now, it's your turn to use your creativity for your 'prediction', Isolde".

"Okay, do you want a tragedy in specific?"

"I said you could use your creativity". The girl tried to see any form in his plate.

"Well… I see an eagle…"

"Don't…"

"I know. Don't say anything of your gift. I try to invent some of it. A travel, maybe?" She saw the next form. "I think it's a hand" she read in her book. "It said 'a friend could have a trouble and need your help soon'. Has Penny brew a new potion?"

"No, even I know."

"It's better than my tea grounds. 'You'll have to help a friend in a terrible disgrace, you need to travel, where you could have an accident".

"If you say her it would be mortal, she'll like it".

"Okay". She wrote in her parchment. "Did you fly in a broom once time?"

"Well, I prefer to fly by myself, but better you put I used one. It could be more credible than I tried to do by myself".

When she finished it, Trewlaney went to their table. She took the Talbott's scroll, reading a loud in all classmates, crying and overreacting about the "Isolde's tragic destiny". The girl wasn't surprised, rolling her eyes. The Professor always used to her saying Hiwatari will die soon since they had their first class.

"Oh Mr. Winger, finally you're connect with the Inner Eye". Isolde controlled herself to laugh in front Trewlaney, but tried to be serious. "What did you write, Miss Hiwatari?" she asked her while she token her scroll. "Oh Mr. Winger, you'll have a terrible destiny, too. I've never had a two students in the same table could have a worst future in the only session".

"Didn't you have before? It's a surprise!" Talbott said ironically. The bell rang and the class had finished. When they were in the hall, Isolde started to laugh aloud and couldn't stop herself.

"Should I worry for you?" he said, raised his eyebrow.

"You shouldn't. I'm sorry but really can't stop me to laugh more time".

"You have a weird humor, Isolde. I mean, you laughed for your death predictions".

"It's like the pot calling the kettle black, Talbott. You have a same sense of humor like me. Do you remember once time you say Trewlaney you'll die by a pirate? And I don't worry about your prediction. Don't be offended, but you're the worst in the Divination class."

"Hey! Are you the pot or the kettle in this time, Hiwatari?" he raised his eyebrow. She only laughed again.

"I think I'm the pot, Winger. Like Liz, I have a seer in my family, but sadly I can't make any prediction. And I don't believe in this after all, but I tried to give an opportunity taking Trelawney's class. It didn't work. Probably I will leave the subject if I fail in my Divination OWL. By the way, can I ask you why did you take this class?"

"No, you can't".

"Ah…" she was a little disappointed, but she didn't say nothing. He saw her.

"Don't be offended, Isolde but we don't know each other well enough to we could talk about our private lives. It's very personal". He explained her, but seemed he messed it up more for her facial expression in this moment. "What did I say to hurt her? I only told her the truth." He thought.

"I understand". She smiled while at him while closing her eyes. She didn't wanted he noticed she was a little hurt. Talbott was confused with her change of humor, but there was something he didn't like in her grin. "By the way, I thank you. You tried to cheer me up today, or I hope that was your intention". She said, without looking at him when she opened her eyes.

"Yes, it was on purpose. I repeat you, I don't ask what happened with you before our classes. Not only in Divination, but you looked less like you today, even you tried to show all your friends everything was fine. I think only me and Khanna noticed it". She saw him face to face, without being able to hide her surprise. "I don't know if is because we share the same gift, but I don't dislike you".

"…" she didn't response, yet.

It was true Rowan knew what happened with her, because Isolde told her about her family when they were in first year. This day Rowan had been more close to her than usually do. But they separated the last hour because she took Arithmancy; and Isolde, Divination. Talbott, by other hand, how could he see her sadness? It was probably she trusted him more than she thought to let her guard down when they were together.

"Isolde!" Rowan interrupted them. She didn't waste time and reunited with them. "Are you fine?" she saw Isolde first, but Rowan noticed Talbott was here, too. "Hello, Winger".

"Khanna". He replied her. They walked to Great Hall.

"Don't worry Rowan. I'm fine. Talbott and I were talking about how horrible was the divination class, today. I feel better thanks to him".

"What was happened?"

"The usual, Trelawney said we will die soon, for our tea grounds and our 'predictions' when working together". Talbott responded.

"I'm so glad to take Arithmancy. I don't want every session someone told me I will die". She stopped, to see the boy. "We?"

"I mean, both of us received bad fatal predictions, but Isolde and I were guilty to invent them, after all". Talbott said. "I'm regretting to take this subject. It's boring to read every class the tea grounds and I don't interest in palmistry neither the crystal ball reading".

"Why do you leave it?" Rowan ask him.

"Well, I'll leave of Divination in June. I don't want to give up before the scholar year ends".

"I'll miss you, then". Isolde spoken. Rowan saw her, raised her eyebrow but she didn't said anything. "I mean, I like to share time with you in Divination, even we're the worst Trelawney's students".

The boy was surprised for those words, but didn't response to her. Talbott saw her a little before he stopped himself. Finally they'd arrived The Great Hall.

"Talbott, could you join us to dinner, please?" Isolde asked him.

"I'm sorry. Don't mean you bother me but I prefer to eat alone than in the Great Hall. I'll take something and I'll return to Ravenclaw's tower".

"Oh… I understand. Well, I'll see you later, I guess… And, thank you again. You made feel better today". She smiled.

The two girls entered to Great Hall, sitting down near to the Teacher's table. Isolde put in her plate some beef and mashed potatoes. When she put the gravy on her meal, Rowan spoken:

"Winger and you get along, eh Isolde? It's very strange Winger talk with someone isn't Penny… even she told me is difficult to make he say anything".

"I think he talked with me because I seemed sad in our class. It's probably I couldn't hidden more time and he saw it. It was a nice thing he did. Even he didn't ask me the reason I felt bad". She started to eat.

"I don't think so…" Rowan ate her meal and drunk her pumpkin juice. "Did you tell him anything?"

"No. Even I feel comfortable with him, I can't trust him like you, yet. And I know the My Dad's Dead Anniversary isn't a secret, but I don't want the people see me with shame… or someone use to bully me. And I don't want bother him with my problems eve he told me few weeks ago, we were friends… but I'm afraid we aren't close one each other".

"Do you want he would be your friend?" Rowan asked, curious. The blue-haired girl was in silence a few of minutes before responded her:

"Yes, I wish he would be my friend. But I don't want to force him if he refuses my friendship. But I think it's easier to break the curse of the boggarts and the vault than he permit someone be close with him". She continued to eat. Rowan only raised her eyebrow.

"Why do you want befriend with him, Isolde?"

"Because I want to be myself with him like I'm with you, Rowan. It's a weird reason, isn't?"

"No. You and I are friends for this reason. We can be weirdos together". She chuckled.

They finished to eat and returned to the Ravenclaw's Tower. Rowan thought about Isolde's wish. She had heard about Talbott and she was a witness he preferred the solicitude before had friends. Even with Penny, who was the only friend he had, he didn't stayed with her. But with Isolde, she felt something different. Talbott was likely in a tug-of-war with Isolde: He debated whether to accept Isolde's friendship or not. Probably he had a reason, however Rowan could bet he was afraid someone could break his barriers. Like Isolde every time she met a new person.

Phoenix's nest

I wrote the second oneshot. In this time, after Isolde transformed into an animagus, in divination class. I know in the game we take divination until sixth year, but I was based more to HP canon. And I have the headcanon Rowan token Arithmancy. Talking about her, she observed how the relationship between Isolde and Talbott born and how grow in the next years. She knew there are only a friendship. By the way, thank you @whatwouldvalerydo for the favorite in FF.net.

[thephantomofthe-internet]

Read into Me Chapter 5: Romeo and Juliet

Steve Harrington x Reader

CATCH UP ON THE SERIES HERE

Words: 2,955

Warnings: Swearing, slut shaming, bullying mention

Tag List: @divinity-deos @thecaptainsgingersnap​ @wolfish-willow​ @scoopsohboi​ @herre-gud-nej​ @clockworkballerina​ @maddie1504​ @i-am-trash-so-much-its-scary​ @banjino-in-the-hole @buckysarge​ @wildcvltre​ @stanleyyelnatsiii​ @unusuallchildd @n3wtscaseofniffler5​ @peterparxour @alwaysstressedout @linkispink1995​ @asharpkniffe​ @a-big-ball-of-idk​ @used-avocado​ @mochminnie​ @sledgy14​ @the-creative-lie​ @yall-wildin-like-siriusly​ @ggclarissa​

After that afternoon, you spent practically every day after school with Steve, either in his bedroom or the library. It was weirdly nice. You didn’t always talk; mostly you worked in silence, Steve answering English questions or doing work for other classes and you doodling. You’d finished the sketch of Steve you’d started in his bedroom the same night you’d started it. You were actually quite proud of it; you’d managed to get the shadows on his face to make his face look hollow and strange, not beautiful like it usually appeared. And yes, you were comfortable with calling him beautiful. You found a lot of your subjects beautiful, they all fit into an easy collection of strong, attractive faces that could be found in Hawkins. Hawkins Most Beautiful: the collections of portraits labelled themselves.

Steve called you fairly often as well; usually on the days when you didn’t meet up he’d call so he’d have someone to keep him company as he worked. He seemed lonely to you. From your conversations, you learned little of his supposed friends, but you learned a fair bit about his family. Both his parents were rarely home. His father worked in the city and kept an apartment there, keeping him as far away from home as possible most of the time. His mother was home more often, but kept her hours in certain places, leaving him home alone most of the time. So it seemed, he was ignored past the age of twelve. You sympathized with that, your own parents weren’t exactly present, albeit for different reasons. He asked you a lot about Samantha, which didn’t bother you; you could talk about her far more than you could yourself.

“I can’t honestly say that I even really know her…” Steve laughed. You were sat in his bedroom one evening, the sun setting in creamy red swirls, ominous strawberry pieces in homemade ice cream. Sweet and yet worrying for reasons beyond you for the time being. You were sat at his desk, leaning back in his desk chair, turning left and right. Steve was sprawled out on his mattress, feet kicking beyond him casually, his papers spread out in front of him.

“Yeah, she doesn’t really associate with some of your friends. Tina isn’t really our biggest fan…” you replied, smiling softly. The memory of Samantha dumping a miniature carton of chocolate milk on her head in the seventh grade flashed through your mind, her shrill screech making you chuckle.

“Oh yeah? What’s up her ass?” Steve asked, turning onto his side to look at you fully. He looked incredibly posed and uncomfortable, his head placed in his palm and his ankles stacked neatly one on top of the other.

“They used to be best friends, before I showed up. Once I was on the scene, Tina decided that I was someone to bully and Samantha decided that she wanted to be my friend. They fell out because of it and Tina started bothering both of us. She stopped once we were in middle school.” You explained, pulling one of your knees to your chest.

“Tina’s a bitch…” Steve muttered, shaking his head solemnly.

“She’s got such a thing for you.” You chuckled, watching as his face coloured. You continued “Vicki too…they want you so bad.”

“How’d you know?” Steve scoffed, rolling his eyes dramatically. His face was still pink, it was almost adorable.

“Oh my god, they spend every class with their heads so far up your ass!” you linked your fingers together and pulled them under your chin. You batted your lashes at him with wide eyes, starting into an imitation of Tina “Oh…Stevie, tell me more about your basketball game…oh Stevie you’re soooo strong!”

Steve pulled the pillow from the head of his bed, throwing it at your head. “Oh shut up!” he groaned. You caught the pillow, chucking it back at him, smacking him square in the face.

Steve was great to hang out with. But that sort of friendship didn’t seem to transition outside the privacy of his bedroom. In school, the rules of social interaction began again. Steve returned to the arms of Tommy H and Carol, whose attentions flip between him and Billy Hargrove, and Samantha kept you busy with her questions, her arm wrapped tightly around your shoulders, squeezing you tightly into your side. And every time you passed Steve, she cracked a joke in your ear that turned you beet red.

In truth, it was clear that Samantha did not believe you when you told her that nothing was going on between the two of you. She had already decided that the pair of you were in some sort of torrid affair of Shakespearian depths. She seemed to earnestly believe that it was some secret, clandestine romance was happening behind closed doors. You didn’t really understand what she was imagining; it didn’t make sense to you. Steve was far too obviously interested in other people to be doing anything with you. You tried to point out all the girls who hung off his arm whenever she tried to embarrass you about it, but she didn’t see it.

“What you’re missing,” she said through a massive bite of cafeteria shepherd’s pie “Is that all those girls pay attention to him, but he doesn’t pay attention to them.”

“If we were having an affair, don’t you think that I would tell you about it? I tell you everything anyway.” You retorted, rolling your eyes at her.

“You didn’t tell me about Byers until I weaseled it out of you. That’s what I��m doing right now.” Samantha replied with a shrug, mushing her meal together with her plastic fork until it was a disgusting shade of brown, golden corn accenting the pile.

Talking about Jonathan Byers wasn’t fair and she knew it. In short, there was nothing to talk about. You’d had a small, teeny tiny practically nonexistent crush on the boy a year prior, but it was very clear that he didn’t like you back. Samantha had gone to Tina’s party in October, right as your crush was subsiding, and she’d told you that he was all over Nancy Wheeler. You’d had your suspicions about it, but hearing that he’d gone after someone else’s girlfriend and rejected you along the way hurt. Even though you weren’t interested, it still hurt. Samantha was still annoyed that you hadn’t told her about it until it was over, and since it was the only source of knowledge she had on your comatose love life, she brought it up all the time, much to your chagrin.

“All I do with him is sit in his room and help him study. And when I say help him study, I mean literally help him study, we do the chapter studies together and discuss the stupid book.” You said. That wasn’t the whole story; you talked a lot about life and listened to music. You were confident in saying that you were friends by now. You’d almost met his mother twice, both times in passing, and that seemed pretty important to friendships, when their family knew who you were. Still, it didn’t break into school. Steve stayed with his clique and while you tried to stray from yours, Carol or Tina would always scare you off before you spent too much time with Steve. It didn’t take much to scare you, a mere gaze could send you packing, and those two had been mastering the annoyed sneer since the fifth grade.

“Yeah, well you don’t see what I see…” Samantha muttered, turning her attention away from you and onto the loud clique at the centre of the room. Billy Hargrove was show boating, as usual, with Tina and Macy practically drooling onto their lunch trays. Vicki was trying to get Steve’s attention, her thin, spidery fingers gripping onto his wrists, speaking animatedly into his ear. Steve wasn’t facing her though; his whole body was turned away from her, and directly towards your table. Samantha noticed how he watched where you went, it’s why she thoroughly believed that something was going on beyond the surface, something even you might not realize. She knew what a person looked like when they were love struck. Often times, from the outside, it was easier to see when someone was in love with someone else before she could catch onto who actually liked her. She’d watched the women she yearned for fall in love with boring, lame men enough times to have mastered the signs of how men fall for girls. And Steve showed all the non-verbal signs. She couldn’t get a full read on you yet though.

Tommy had caught onto to Steve’s strange behaviour just as fast as Samantha had, although he wasn’t nearly as impressed. You were simply not worth the effort. Not by a long shot. You were fucking lame-never at the parties, never at dances, never at the lake on the weekends. And he knew you had money, you could afford to do all those things, you were just too much of a pussy to show your face. That was fucking pathetic! He knew his friend better than anyone else and a chick who couldn’t hang was not the girl for him. Steve liked fun girls, girls who could turn up for a last minute thing and not be weird about it. Nancy Wheeler was the farthest Steve needed to go on the preppy nerd scale, and that bitch ended up being a massive slut! Like nobody expected that shit. But Tommy knew that you didn’t have any surprises up your sleeves. Despite the fact that you never talked, he knew that you were plain about who you were. Everything was on the surface, and what he saw was not worth his friend’s time.

“Steve, buddy, I’m gonna go get another milk, walk with me.” Tommy motioned him over. Steve followed blindly, if only to get Vicki’s cold, clammy hand off him. Tommy had seen The Godfather one too many times and seemed to believe that he was some sort of small town mob boss, but Steve didn’t really mind following along with him flights of fancy. Usually they were pretty funny.

Tommy wrapped an arm around his taller friend’s shoulders, lowering his voice from the onlooker’s ears. “Listen, buddy, you gotta tell me what’s going up with that Y/N chick I mean you just keep staring at her it’s freaking weird, dude.”

“Y/N? She’s my writing partner for Lawrence’s class, she’s cool…” Steve replied, turning to catch your eye as they passed. He smiled at you, giving a short wave, which you returned with a small smile.

“She’s cool? That all?” Tommy pressed, stepping into the line and grabbing a carton of strawberry milk and the largest chocolate chip cookie in the basket. He unwrapped his arm from his shoulders, letting him go free for the first time in the conversation.

“Yeah, I mean she’s nice, what else do you want me to say?” Steve knew that was being a little defensive, but he didn’t like being questioned for his choices in friends or girls, he never questioned Tommy’s choices and he made the worst decisions most of the time. Carol was no prize and he didn’t say a word about her.

“You fucking her?” if Steve had had anything in his mouth, he would’ve spit it on the floor. Tommy didn’t even turn to look at him, paying the lunch lady in change.

“Jesus, dude, no.” Steve cried, recoiling from his friend. Tommy needed to get hit and while he didn’t have cause to do so yet, he firmly believed someone was going to do it soon.

“Hey, no need to freak out, it’s just a question.” Tommy pulled his friend back in, slapping his friend on the back. Instead of simply heading back to their lunch table, he pulled him to the side, standing next to the hot grab and go table, next to the cartons of fries.

“Now, the way I see it, you have something great going for you.” Tommy began, cracking open his milk and taking a long swig, leaving a milk film on his upper lip. “Vicki Clarke is a fucking babe and she’s begging for it! She’s all over your ass and she’s hot as hell! But you’re blowing it by spending all your time staring at some freak of nature instead. You could have a smoking hot babe at your beck and call, but you’re wasting your chances here, you see what I mean?”

“Not at all, dude.” Steve crossed his arms over his chest, looking over his friend doubtfully.

“Look man, I’m just trying to set you up for success here. Because that girl,” Tommy pointed at you slyly “Is not interested. If she was, she’d be over here, acting like Vicki is. But she’s keeping herself planted at that table with that goth freakazoid.”

Steve had no idea what to say. He opened his mouth to speak, to deny having any feelings for you, but that wouldn’t mean shit if he kept watching you. And Tommy was right, there was a girl there who wanted to listen to whatever he said, who chased him down. Vicki was there and you weren’t. So he swallowed his words and went back to his table.

“Hey, Steve…” Vicki drawled. There was red lipstick on her teeth. Steve didn’t say anything about it. It didn’t make her ugly. He wrapped an arm around her shoulder, letting her rest in the crook of his neck. Vicki seemed over the moon by it and it gave him something to focus on other than catching your attention.

Samantha frowned, turning her attention back to you. “What’s Steve’s opinion on Vicki Clarke?” she asked.

“He didn’t like when I told him that she had a thing for him, why?” you retorted, flipping through the college magazine in front of you. You still hadn’t chosen anywhere to apply and applications for the major schools were due in the winter and community colleges needed their applications in for the fall semester in by the end of June at the earliest.

“Well, he doesn’t seem embarrassed now.” Samantha hooked a thumb towards the couple. You looked once, narrowing your eye to scrutinize the pair.

“Eh, that seems about right…” you murmured. You wouldn’t deny that something about it hurt. But you ignored the pain until returning home from school. As always, you called before making any moves. It was the polite thing to do, even though Steve had made the plans to meet up with you after school the night before.

The phone was picked up after three rings. Steve’s car was in the driveway, not his mother’s, so you knew who would answer. “Hello?” his voice sounded anxious and breathy, maybe even annoyed.

“Steve-o, we still studying? You wanna go grab food at Hula Burger?” Steve had introduced you to the burger place in Carmel, a little mom and pop shop with the best Cajun fries in the county, at least in your opinion.

“Oh shit…” Steve muttered “Y/N I’m sorry I-I kind of made plans, can I take a rain check on the burgers?”

“Oh…yeah, sure I guess…some other time…” you said softly. You wouldn’t try to hide the disappointment in your voice. The pain you felt in the pit of your stomach returned with abundance, not exactly sore and angry pain, but more of a black hole opening up there.

“I gotta go, I’ll see you tomorrow, ‘kay?” Steve asked. He was already running late. He was supposed to pick up Vicki in twenty minutes and he still needed to shower. He had genuinely forgotten about his plans with you and he felt like an ass for doing so. He did want to hang out with you, but a date was a good step after being decimated by Nancy. He wasn’t super into Vicki, but it was still exciting to go out with someone new.

“Sure…” you hung up after that. You stood from your bed, dropping your book bag at your feet. You were used to spending afternoons alone, that wasn’t strange to you. Just because you’d spent a few days with a boy didn’t mean that he was yours to hold back from his life. You could’ve pulled a fit and tried to make him hold true to his word, the way your mother used to act towards your father. But those memories made you sick, you didn’t like that behaviour. But you also didn’t like being cancelled on. It wasn’t a feeling you were used to, not from friends at least. Samantha never really cancelled on you, she always made sure to tell you when she was busy and not agree to plans. She’d never cancelled on you for a date, even when she was dating Keith the creep she always put your friendship on a different level than him. Of course, she wasn’t really into Keith, she came out like a week after they started dating and broke up with him after kissing Jessica Klein at a house party, but that wasn’t the point. The point was that Steve had ditched you and it made your heart hurt.

You couldn’t help but watch him run out of his front door and into his car. You watched it pull out of his driveway and out onto the road. It was clear to you now, Steve was more interested in passing English than he was in being your friend. Vicki Clarke was the girl to pay attention, no matter how he acted around you.

So why pretend like he was your friend at all?

[jj-ktae]

Papers - Prologue -

Title : Papers Pairing : Park Jinyoung x Fem!Reader Genre : Victorian Era, Romance, Fluff, Angst, smut-ish,  Words : 1086 Summary : In the merciless 1850′s, Park Jinyoung finds solace in tiny pieces of paper and their owner.

Will be updated every Wednesday at 9 p.m CEST (Yes, I will!)

I, II, III, 

--

Prologue

Jinyoung considers himself a good student. He listens to the lectures, writes notes down, doesn’t fall asleep and most importantly, attends all his classes. He has good grades, is organised, his part of the house is clean and he has enough free time to do rest.

He can say so because his friends are the opposite.

A literature major seemed like the best option when he got out of what he calls death. He felt proud, like he had achieved something great and was about to become someone important after years of fighting against prejudice.

It made everything more stable. He was able to take revenge on his messy childhood and make people forget about his chaotic environment.

So why did it become so tasteless?

As the professor continues speaking with the same monotone voice, he feels like collapsing.

He is damn bored.

“I’m about to fall asleep,” He hears, his head suddenly too heavy for his usually perfectly fitting hand, “if he doesn’t stop talking, I will die.”

“You never come to the Philosophy class, Jackson.” Another voice answers, as bored as ever. “That’s also what you said when Sir Miller asked who you were even though it’s December.”

Jackson grunts, the memory still too painful for him. “Training got cancelled so I figured I’d do something productive and move my buttocks to this torture room. Sometime I wonder why I still listen to my own ideas. Next time please hit me, Jaebeom.”

“I can still do so right after this class.” Jaebeom answers, shrugging in the middle of his erratic writing. He looks concentrated, focused and totally immersed.

“You’re writing poems again. You’re not listening either.” Jackson snorts, crossing his arms over his desk to find a better position.

“This is how you act like you care, Jacks.”

“I’m not as sneaky as you. I can’t act like I’m interested if I just want to pull my hair one by one.” Jackson answers, before nodding toward Jinyoung. “Look at him, he is dead inside.”

“At least Jinyoung can be sneaky and have good grades.”

Jinyoung wonders how he does that. It’s probably not about being a genius – they don’t pick a major they don’t care about. Maybe it’s his memory. It prints everything and puts them in folders, neat into his brain and ready to flow right when needed.

“Jinyoung is….not like us.” Jackson yawns before falling asleep.

Jaebeom steals one last glance at his friends before going back to his messy sheet, muttering about boring classes and painful wood seats.

Jinyoung wants to disappear.

--

It’s like this every day. Jinyoung gets up after endless nagging from Jaebeom, fights with Jackson because the guy uses his cologne and rushes to class. He manages to listen to the first one, then his mind goes blank.

Nothing is important.

Jackson often tells him to tag along after his sword training. He explains they get to meet with young ladies but Jinyoung rejects the offer, explaining he isn’t interested.

And they fight again.

He only enjoys one subject and it is Creative Writing. During those classes, he can think for himself and leave that pattern he hates. Jinyoung finds himself coming up with stories and scenarios, all different and somehow related to a story he wishes to have.

It transforms his surroundings, makes him stop questioning life and erases that filth surrounding him against his will. During those classes he can stop being Park Jinyoung, one of the three dirty orphans who ran away from the orphanage to live a simple life in the merciless world of the 1850’s.

How he hates that world, where hard work and labour defines wealth, where wealth defines importance and where the rich hit the poor with the right hand while feeding medicine with the left.

Jinyoung knows he should be thankful. Him, Jaebeom and Jackson are here after one rich merchant paid for their education but he can’t. He isn’t like them, he has no purpose. Jaebeom wants to become a poet and he is very good at it while Jackson wields a sword like a warrior. He has nothing, nothing but a thirst for books and dreamy thoughts.

Everything is too unfair to be precious to him.

Today the teacher gives them the only rule for their literature project : Live your story. He has no idea what it means and the fact that he can pick whatever project he wants makes it even harder.

So while Jackson complains about why he can’t write an excessively explicit erotic scenario, Jinyoung thinks again. It sounds easy, reality is scary but not impossible to modify.

“He is writing about heartbreaks again, Jinyoung.” Jackson nudges him, his pen behind his ear. “What are you going to do?”

Jinyoung takes a tiny piece of paper and writes a simple Hi on it. “Jacks, give me your chewing gum.”

The latter makes a face, his brow rising in disgust. “You know I can give you a clean one if you’re craving-”

“Shut up, just put it here.” He hands him the piece of paper and waits. As soon as the gum is there he places it under the table, before going back to his scenario.

“Are you going to explain…?” Jaebeom cuts him, his eyes going from Jackson to Jinyoung because he was probably off for too long again.

“Next time let’s sit here. If I get an answer, I’ll write my scenario about this.” Jinyoung says, his smile now back because he can’t wait for the next chapter.

“About how you vandalize the school property?” Jackson wonders, eyes fixed on his own sheet.

Jinyoung sighs, shaking his head. “It’s an experiment. I wrote a simple greeting and if I get an answer, then I’ll write about it.

“And if you don’t?”

Jinyoung leans on his chair, tilting his head. “I won’t submit anything.”

--

Jinyoung waits. It takes a week before he ends up at the same seat. The teacher is busy giving instructions but Jinyoung is turning deaf.

He waits, looks around, hopes it worked.

Jackson and Jaebeom are looking at him as he carefully runs his fingers under the table. His fingers touch the thick wood like it’s a sculpture and when he feels a little piece of paper he try not to get too excited. It could definitely be the one he stuck last week.

He takes it out and turns it around.

“So…?”

His mouth curves upward as he turns the piece of paper toward his friends.

Hi ! 

He’s got an answer.

[roseskiesandbutterflies]

Le Démon Déchu - Chapter 2: Réponses Et Plus De Questions

Summary: The summary is kind of long so please check a previous part or my masterlist if you want to read it.

Warning(s): threat, swearing

Word Count: 6.8k+

Inspiration: Do You Know What Eternity Is? by Elderly_Worm on AO3, Great Omens (The Big One) by falsepremise on AO3, Pray For Us, Icarus series by Atalan on AO3, Demonology and the Tri-Phasic Model of Trauma: An Integrative Approach by Nnm on AO3, wasteland, baby by john1513 on AO3, Not of Us by ShesAKillerQueen98 on AO3, How to Win a Lifetime Achievement Award for Services to Television (and how not to) by GaryOldman on AO3, Doctor Who (don’t ask) and, of course, Good Omens itself

A/N: Okay I took a bit of a hiatus from writing literally anything for about five months so sorry about that but I’m back now!! That’s the main thing. Also, I’ve left high school now which is very exciting! That does mean I’ll have so much more time to write and I’m definitely going to try and use this summer to establish some kind of routine for writing so that when I start college, I won’t get too overwhelmed with both my studies and with updating my fics. That’s the plan anyway so don’t hold me to that lmao. With any luck, now I’ve actually said that it’ll have to happen. (I wrote that part of this note back in May when it was the start of the summer. It is currently September and I’m just about to finally publish this chapter and I assure you, I am cringing at my own optimism.) Sorry this took so long to post. This chapter has been in the works since May (yes, I know I’m terrible) but I actually got a lot more writing done in that time that what you just see in this chapter. All will be revealed soon. I just promise that I have been productive. Once you’ve read this chapter, you have my blessing to translate the title of this fic. Hopefully it will make sense.

I just wanted to point out something about the playlist I linked in the previous chapter. I am well aware that there are some rather problematic people in it, namely Sia. I want you all to know that I don’t support her in any way (I don’t like her at all I think she’s a complete ableist twat). Her songs are only on there because of how well they fit with the story (a lot of this will become clearer as the story goes on).

I also wanted to point out that I know that if angels do exist, then their true forms probably wouldn’t look anything like humans. I’m well aware of that, I’m not an idiot, I don’t know if any of you remember when people started googling ‘angel true form’ and some people got scared lmao. The point is, we’ve all seen the pictures. But for the purpose of this story, and honestly just to make it easier for me to describe what the characters are doing, we’re going to have to pretend that they did look like humans. Can I claim creative license with this one? Maybe it got lost in translation because there is probably no way someone could describe how an angel truly looks in any human language? I don’t know, just roll with it.I know that this chapter had so much exposition and explanation in it but I can promise you two things. One, there is still much to be revealed. Two, I promise this isn’t just bad writing on my part. Just trust that I needed to put this all in this early on.

And how is everyone doing after the season 2 announcement? I mean, at the time of writing this specific part of my notes, it only got announced about an hour ago lmao. I’m very fucking excited, oh my god. It’s all I’ve been able to think about since I found out I can’t lie. Catch me trying to finish this before it comes out in case things occur which means I have to change things in this story. I can’t be arsed for that. Oh well. Hopefully it’ll read like those Sherlock fics that people wrote in between series 2 and series 3 if that doesn’t happen.

Taglist: @briarrose26​

Ask or comment to be on my taglist! Let me know if it’s for a specific fandom(s) or series. Full list is in my bio.

Hermit (upright) + Five of Wands (upright)

Conflict. Reflection. Resurfacing memories.

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

Let’s admit, without apology, what we do to each other.

We know who our enemies are. We know.

– Richard Siken (Detail of the Fire)

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

“Fuck.”

The angel and demon exchanged glances of what could only be described as thinly veiled panic, while the woman in front of them just looked annoyed at the most.

“They couldn’t wait five minutes, could they?” she muttered, pinching at the bridge of her nose in frustration before standing up again, “Look, just stay down here, I’m gonna go sort this out. With any luck they won’t have actually realised you’re here too.”

“Wait, how do you know they’re here for you?” Crowley asked, suddenly curious as to what business Eloise might have with Heaven.

“Just a gut feeling,” she said before making her way to the spiral staircase behind them, muttering to herself, “If they were here for you, I feel like they would have at least used the front door.”

The other two waited until she’d run upstairs before exchanging a quick glance, an unspoken word, and following her up.

Meanwhile, Eloise was hovering outside a room at the end of the corridor which she could only assume was the bedroom. She was strangely hesitant, not out of fear of them, simply out of fear of the unknown. She hadn’t spoken to anyone in that room for millennia, and something told her that this wasn’t going to be a friendly chat. She took a deep breath, even though she technically didn’t need it, letting a wave of faux confidence wash over her, and stepped inside. Don’t crumble now. You’ve come too far to crumble now.

“Ah, Mariel, long time no see,” Gabriel smiled coldly, brushing the dust off his white suit. Flanked by two other angels, he stood in the wreckage of the bedroom without even acknowledging the damage they must have caused when they crashed in. Beside him were Beelzebub and Hastur, who both looked as though they had been dragged kicking and screaming to come here. Beelzebub in particular kept shooting metaphorical daggers at Gabriel, who remained perfectly oblivious. The entire ceiling had caved in from the impact of their crash, the setting sun painting the doorway where Eloise stood in a pale gold and casting a dark shadow over the others.

She’d grimaced at the use of her old name; it was too unfamiliar, too ancient. Mariel was the name of a long-dead version of herself. Once upon a time, she’d embraced it, but that was once upon a time. Once upon a time long gone.

“Almost like I’ve been avoiding you on purpose,” she muttered, leaning against the doorway as she stared intrusively at each person in the room, observing, assessing. She silently revelled in the blatant discomfort in each of their faces.

“No need to be so rude,” Gabriel said, doing anything to avoid her eyes, his previous confident façade now shattered.

Eloise stared at him in disbelief, “What exactly were you expecting? A fucking welcome party? I haven’t seen any of you in over six thousand years and you just crash through the roof of my house, unannounced and uninvited, so yeah, forgive me for being a little irritated.” She couldn’t help but feel a little bit guilty. She’d barely been in Aziraphale’s bookshop for fifteen minutes and she was already pretending she owned it.

She watched smugly as he squirmed under her gaze, desperately looking to the others to say something in response. A moment or two passed before Beelzebub’s head suddenly snapped up in confusion, “Are you alone?”

Shit. She’d hoped that they wouldn’t have noticed the presence of the two who were definitely not downstairs like she’d asked. She swallowed, trying not to let any kind of emotion show on her face, trying not to give the game up that quickly, “Yeah, I live on my own.” She watched the whole group of them squint in concentration, trying to sense any other beings in the house. She sighed, changing the subject before they could comment on it any further, “Look, what do you want? I don’t have all day so if you could make it quick then that would be much appreciated.”

Gabriel looked back at her, his suave exterior unfortunately making a return, “Hey, we just wanted to check up on you, see how you’re doing-”

“That’s bullshit and you know it,” she snapped. She pushed herself off from the doorway, stalking towards the others, “You have had six thousand years to ‘check up on me’, don’t pretend you’ve only started to care now.”

She was met with only silence as Gabriel and Beelzebub glanced at each other awkwardly, looking very much like chastised children. Suddenly the latter groaned and cried, “You can’t just leave Hell!”

“Oh, here we go,” Eloise muttered, rolling her eyes, bored already.

“You can’t! You Fell from Heaven, so you go to Hell, there isn’t a third option!”

“Well, apparently there is,” she shrugged.

“No there isn’t!” they argued, face screwed up like a petulant child.

“Then what do you call this then?” she asked, unfolding her wings for the second time that day. She studied their reactions closely, scrutinising coal-black eyes piercing through their very souls. She was searching for any hint of shock, of recognition, of anything that could clue her in as to what was going on in their heads at that moment. All she could find, however, was pure, unadulterated confusion. Which was annoying when her wings were supposed to be an answer to their unasked questions.

Gabriel stumbled over his words, “Good Lord, how did you even-”

Eloise cut him off curtly, no longer having the patience to listen to his incoherent mumbles. She instead turned to Beelzebub who at least had the decency to look a little more composed, “That would be what you could sense then. I’ve got both Heaven and Hell in me, that’s a lot of energy to pick up on.” She stared right through them, daring them to say anything else.

“Must be,” they replied slowly, though they didn’t look at all convinced.

Gabriel held up a hand, his eyes darting about as he tried to comprehend what he was seeing, “No hold on, how did you even manage that?”

“I left Hell,” Eloise said simply, “Why should I have black wings? I’m not some demon who ran away from everything. I left. Permanently. I looked Hell in the eye and walked away. You know what? Fuck it, I looked Satan in the eyes and walked away.”

“You what?” he stuttered.

“Yeah, you heard me. You have a problem with me leaving Hell then go on! Take that up with the bloody devil,” she said, staring them down, daring them to retaliate. She smirked when she was met with pure, uncomfortable silence, “Except you won’t, will you? Because you don’t actually give two fucks about me. Just like I said, if you did then you would have chased me up a long time ago. Quite frankly, I think you must have been glad to have me out of your hair,” she sighed, half sad, half amused when they couldn’t even meet her eye. She paused for a moment, wondering how far she could push this, before asking, “You know what I think is really going on here? I think the pair of you are feeling a bit bruised after the absolute shitshow that was Armageddon last year, which, by the way, fucking hilarious. I think your egos are feeling a little sore after a literal child stopped you from ending the world, so you’re thinking ‘hmm, what would be an easy win so that we don’t feel like total shit? Oh yeah, what about that demon who ran away all that time ago? That should be easy to sort out.’. Well, love to disappoint, but you’re not getting me that easily, especially when not a single one of us actually wants me back, and Sandalphon, take one more step further I swear I will dropkick you back to Heaven,” she snapped, glaring at the angel who had been menacingly inching closer while she had been talking. He reluctantly stepped back alongside Gabriel, looking a little more than miffed that his plan hadn’t worked out. “You really want me back? Get your bosses to talk to me because I don’t actually see why it’s any of your business. No middle men. Just God, Satan and me. I’ll see what they have to say about all this. Questions?” she asked, tone snapping from one extreme to another, almost as if she had just been possessed.

Gabriel stared at her, mouth gaping like a fish, “You can’t just boss us around like that.”

“What? Like how you bossed us around all those years?” she replied without missing a beat, real rage, real danger seeping into her voice now, “I think we’re done here.”

“But-”

“I said, I think we’re done here,” she said, leaving no room for arguments. She gestured to the sorry excuse for a room around them, “Now, if you wouldn’t mind cleaning this up.”

“Why can’t you do it? You can miracle things too,” Gabriel said, desperate for any kind of leverage over Eloise.

“You’re right, I could, but I didn’t make this mess, and I personally believe that you should face the consequences of your actions, Gabriel,” she said pointedly, watching as he visibly gulped. In a matter of seconds, the room was restored to its original state and Eloise was left alone in the room, no indicators that she was ever with any other people remaining.

She sighed and all but collapsed into a chair that may or may not have existed a few moments ago, confident façade shattered completely. She breathed heavily in exhaustion, as if she’d just run a marathon; she supposed she had just run a mental one. Her emotions were bugging her to no end. It was strange. She wasn’t scared, per se. There was very little that Gabriel or Beelzebub could do to her that would frighten her anymore. She tried her best to compose herself, writing off the tsunami inside her mind as just plain old adrenaline, before calling out, “You can come in now. I know you guys are outside, it’s okay, you can come in.”

Crowley and Aziraphale walked into the room, one looking considerably more sheepish than the other. Aziraphale perched awkwardly on the freshly reconstructed bed, “We’re sorry–”

“No, you’re not.”

“No, we’re not.”

Eloise and Crowley exchanged a glance, amused looks on both of their faces while Aziraphale simply looked distressed. Eloise turned back to him and smiled sympathetically, “I told you, it’s fine. I would have done the same,” she admitted, looking away before collecting herself once again, “So, I’m guessing you have a lot of questions–”

“That’s the understatement of the century,” Crowley muttered as he took a seat beside Aziraphale, although it was a very loose definition of ‘taking a seat’.

Aziraphale glared at him while Eloise just sighed and reluctantly said, “I think it might be better if I just show you.”

Crowley cocked his head in confusion, “Show us what?”

She brought her chair closer to the edge of the bed and put out her hands, “Take my hands. Brace yourselves.”

Mariel was standing before a crowd of angels, dozens upon dozens of disgusted faces staring right at her. She couldn’t quite remember getting there. She had been in the pitch-dark holding cell and the next thing she knew, she was here. Blinding white light surrounded them, harshly illuminating her vulnerabilities before all of Heaven. She tried her best to keep her chin up even though she absolutely hated the fact that they could see the bruises from when she had been arrested that were now blooming on her face. She frowned as she noticed the lack of measures preventing her from escaping. All that was keeping her there was Gabriel’s presence at her side, cold violet eyes pointedly ignoring her. He really was an arrogant bastard for assuming that she wouldn’t even try to make a run for it. Just because he was right this one time, it didn’t mean that he shouldn’t have come prepared. Mariel sighed and looked up at the angels staring down at her. Michael was sat higher than everyone in the centre of the crowd, face void of all emotion as she said, “The Principality Mariel. You’re on trial today for betraying the will of the Almighty, rebelling against all that is good and light in the universe...”

Mariel blocked the rest of her pretentious speech out as she droned on about all the awful things she’d supposedly done to deserve this. It was all lies anyway. She knew the real reason she was here. There were a few things that stood out to her despite it all, things that nearly made her laugh. She’d known that they’d needed to conjure up some reasons for condemning her, but this was just ridiculous. Gabriel really had gone to extraordinary yet desperate lengths to slander her in her final moments in this Someone-forsaken place. She was surprised that the angels gathered to watch her downfall believed a word of this. She tried her best not to resent them, though. It wasn’t like they had anything better to believe in. Especially considering the amused smirk that had crept its way onto her face.

She returns to reality just in time to hear Michael ask, “What do you have to say to defend yourself?”

“I’ve done nothing I need to defend,” she said firmly, leaving no room for argument.

“Don’t make this worse for yourself than it already is,” Gabriel muttered dangerously from where he stood beside her.

Mariel turned to look at him in disbelief. “How the fuck could this get any worse, Gabriel?” she hissed, fury flaring up in her eyes.

He just looked back at her condescendingly, “Do you really need me to answer that?”

She pointedly refused to reply, turning back to face Michael, determined to ignore him.

The next part goes past in a blur for Mariel. Michael speaks again, though she doesn’t listen. Then suddenly there are shouts of anger, screams of rage, coming from the gathered crowd. They spit with venom as they hurl insults at her. She doesn’t hear a word. It’s as though her head is under water, completely submerged in the stone cold anger that seeps through her body, and suddenly Mariel is drowning in the realisation that this is really happening, oh God this is really happening.

Why? Why is this happening to me? You listening, God? Look me in the eye and tell me why this is happening.

She doesn’t get an answer, and though she wasn’t expecting one, it still hurts. Because she knows that she’ll never get an answer from Her again now.

Eventually she feels a tug on her arm from where Gabriel has been standing, dragging her away from the crowd and out her of current state of mind. She could feel her senses coming back to her as she stumbled backwards, but everything was crashing down on her too quickly, too harshly. She did her best to shove the rising panic as deep down insider her as she could. There was no way she would let anyone here see her in that state. She couldn’t let them think they’d won.

She didn’t even realise she had reached the edge of the ground she was standing on, the edge of Heaven itself, Gabriel no longer grabbing her arm. She nearly found herself peering over the edge, but stopped herself before she could lean too far. It may have helped her in the past but now was not the time to give in to her curiosity. And she didn’t trust Gabriel to not push her the moment he had the chance. She turned her head to glare fiercely at him, piercing holes in his very soul. She could slowly feel her anxiety being replaced by cool rage as she found herself saying, “Any institution that tries to silence anyone who opposes them is inherently corrupt.” She stared knowingly at his discomfort as he forced himself to face her. He knew what she meant by that. He knew.

He took a second to compose himself before practically scoffing in her face, “Don’t preach at me.”

Mariel cocked her head as she studied him. She watched as his eyes subconsciously flicked back to the crowd, to the other Archangels. He blatantly wanted nothing more than to re-join his fellow angels, the only beings who understood why he was doing what he was doing, or were at least supposed to understand anyway. Somehow she doubted they were all as cold-hearted and self-absorbed as the angel in front of her. She considered him for a moment before saying simply, “Your quest for power will kill you in the end.”

He furrowed his brows in somewhat amused confusion, “Is that a threat?”

“No. It’s the truth,” she blinked at him before leaning in and murmuring in his ear, “It will be your downfall.”

“The only one who’s going to Fall around here is you,” he said dangerously. Mariel leaned back and watched the lethal glimmer in his eye wither and die under the intensity of her gaze.

She just smiled. “We’ll see.” She let herself look at him for a moment longer before blinking away the tears and cautiously taking a small step backwards. She could feel where the ground ended beneath her feet and was sure not to step any further. She took one last look of the place she once called home, embracing how it felt for the last time though she knew she wouldn’t miss it.

She closed her eyes for a moment and fell back.

Mariel was Falling. That bit she knew, but much more than that? Everything was happening too fast for her to notice. And yet, it was as if she was existing in slow-motion. She worried for a moment that this was, in fact, her fate; doomed to remain in a perpetual state of limbo, of Falling, for all eternity. The only thing telling her otherwise was the view of Heaven above her, which she realised only too late was slowly shrinking into nothing. Mariel found herself reaching her own arms out, grasping for Heaven. They were opposite ends of a magnet being roughly pulled away from each other by an invisible force.

You hear that God? Why me? What did I ever do to deserve this? And don’t you dare tell me it’s all part of your plan because right now, the only thing I want is to be back where I should be and I can’t even have that.

She pulled herself out of her mind and back into reality; she’d have plenty of time in Hell to yell at a God who’d never listen, let alone answer. She only just started to register her surroundings, the fact that she was actually Falling, who knows how far and for how long, tumbling through the air at an unimaginable speed, plummeting towards a place that could be anything from seconds to hours away. The deafening wind that screamed in her ears, drowning out the screams which may have been coming from her mouth or her mind, who was she to say? Air whipped around her body, icier and more painful than any words that could ever be uttered by the angels above her. It wasn’t until she could no longer see any hint of Heaven on the horizon that she started to feel the tears finally fall, trickling down her face and floating slightly due to the force of the Fall.

Then suddenly it came. She felt it in the very tips of her wings first, a strange tingling sensation, as though hundreds and then thousands of pins were skirting the edges of her corporeal being. It spread over the rest of her wings, and then her body, at a faster pace than she could keep track of until her whole being felt as though it was burning. The pain grew, and it grew, and it grew, and she didn’t think she could physically take any more pain when she looked up in horror at her own freshly blackened wings. Her beautiful, holy wings which had once been the softest, purest white, were now stained with evil and ash. For the first time since she started Falling, however long ago that might have been, she let out a choked sob that racked through her whole body and through the ever-changing air around her. Nobody heard her cries. Nobody heard her screams as the searing pain in her chest grew stronger. She couldn’t even begin to work out whether it was physical or emotional but it was there and it burned a hole, a gaping wound, through her soul, leaving a scar fated to never heal and to forever haunt her-

Eloise was crying. She’d tried so hard to prevent the steady streams that were now running down her cheeks, but that was a memory that she’d never wanted to relive. She looked upwards for a moment, trying to regain control of her emotions and her breathing, before peeling her hands away from the two sat in front of her. She roughly wiped the tears from her face, and suddenly the only thing telling you she had been crying were the bloodshot eyes that Crowley tried to ignore as he said bluntly, “I’m still confused.”

“Crowley, give her a minute,” Aziraphale chastised him, furrowing his brows at the demon before he turned back to Eloise with kind eyes and a kinder heart, “Are you alright, my dear?”

She nodded without much hesitation, “I’m fine, it’s okay.” She certainly wasn’t fine, nor was it okay, but the last thing she wanted was to have to deal with her feelings in front of two people she was trying her best not to scare off. She looked back at Crowley, eyebrows raised in curiosity.

He looked at her in understanding, for if anyone knew her thought process in that moment, it was him. “Right, so you Fell and became a demon. Then what?”

“Well, you know what Hell’s like,” she started, looking pointedly at Crowley. She waited for him to nod before continuing, “Not my scene at all. I just point-blank refused to do anything they asked of me. Naturally they didn’t like that much. Eventually I was called in to see Satan about it. I remember thinking, ‘well, that’s that then. Terrible knowing you all.’, because I didn’t think I was going to survive that. Turns out he was just annoyed that I was being a bloody nuisance to everyone else, but he was too amused to really do anything about it, so he basically just told me to piss off. Leave Hell, don’t come back, and I won’t tell anyone where you’ve gone or that you’re even alive. Not exactly a deal I could refuse, so I left, came to Earth, been here ever since. I think everyone just assumed he’d killed me,” she shrugged as if she hadn’t just destroyed the whole idea of eternal damnation with just a few sentences. She smiled to herself as they gaped at her for a moment, though she doubted they realised they were doing it.

Crowley somehow managed to gather his senses quick enough to hold up a hand and say, “Wait, but when you were talking to Gabriel and Beelzebub and that lot, you said they had six thousand years to check up on you. Why would you say that if they thought you were dead?” He narrowed his eyes at her. He wasn’t altogether quite sure why he seemed to be so keen on finding any gaps in her story, but he needed to be able to trust that she was telling the truth. Or at least that’s what he told himself.

Aziraphale’s eyes lit up with understanding. “Yes, and they didn’t exactly seem surprised to see you alive.”

Eloise grinned. You two are gonna be fun, I can tell. “You’re both very observant, I have to give you credit for that.” She paused in thought for a second before starting carefully, “You see, the trouble with me is that I’m not really one for keeping a low profile. I’m too noisy, so to speak, and I don’t even realise it most of the time. This demon I hadn’t exactly been the nicest to back in Hell saw me in Babylon, gosh, it must have been eighteen thirty something BC? Anyways, he ratted me out to Beelzebub who must have told Gabriel all about it. I had about a decade of this bloody demon trying to discorporate me just to see if it would force me to go back to Hell, then one day he just stopped, and I never saw him again. Beelzebub probably told him to piss off.”

They were both quiet again for a little while. Eloise didn’t even think to say anything. It might be a rare occasion, but she did know when to keep her mouth shut when it mattered. She could see the cogs turning in their heads as if it was projected in the air above them. Eventually Crowley murmured, “I didn’t even know you could do that, you know, leave.”

She shook her head with a strange kind of sympathy that came from recognising an experience you had far too long ago, “Neither did I. It stills shocks me sometimes if I think about it too much.”

A few seconds passed before Crowley cleared his throat abruptly and said, “They called you Mariel. I thought you said your name was Eloise.”

She hesitated before answering. She knew exactly what he was doing, she’d been doing it for the whole of their conversation thus far, but just because she tended to bury her emotions, it didn’t mean that she liked it when others did it. She decided to ignore the hypocrisy of that thought, how ironic, she thought to herself, and instead explained, “It is. Mariel was my angel name. You know how it is,” she looked pointedly at Crowley again, hoping that Aziraphale would be able to put the pieces together. She didn’t actually know how much he knew about what it was like to Fall and become a demon.

“Oh, so is Eloise your demon name?” Aziraphale asked politely.

“No,” she said curtly, instantly feeling guilty when she saw the hurt that flashed over Aziraphale’s face. She grimaced and explained in a gentler tone, “I chose it for myself when I came to Earth. Hell tried to change my name after I Fell but I just refused.” She studied him for a second, watching his eyes dart about, before saying, “You want to ask something, I can tell. What is it?”

He looked a little startled at being caught out, momentarily glancing at Crowley for support, probably subconsciously, Eloise noted with a smile. “I, well, I couldn’t help but notice that you mentioned Armageddon. Back when you were speaking with, um, well, you know. H-how did you know about that?”

“I might have been there.” The words rushed out of her mouth in a much less casual manner than what she’d been aiming for, coming out in a sort of jumbled heap that took Crowley and Aziraphale a moment to decipher.

Crowley, the poor sod, could only think to lean forward and ask a simple, “You what?”

She jumped to defend herself, wanting to avoid the onslaught of questions if she could, “Not actually at the airbase, but I was in the area. I was living in Tadfield at the time.”

Aziraphale narrowed his eyes, although the hint of a smirk on his face told her it was more in amusement than suspicion, “How did you know it was at the airbase?”

Eloise couldn’t help but chuckle to herself because of course, they’d notice her choice of words, “I knew Adam and his mates. I ran an ice cream shop, would you believe it. He came and told me all about it the day after,” she smiled fondly before suddenly coming alive with excitement, “That’s actually how I found out about you two. That’s why I’m here. Because I thought I was the only one trying to stop the world ending, but apparently I wasn’t. I had to see for myself.”

A moment passed before Aziraphale asked quietly, “You were trying to stop it?”

Eloise, not noticing the newly subdued atmosphere, launched herself into a painfully over-enthusiastic explanation, “Yeah, it was quite clever really, if I do say so myself. I made sure Adam was swapped with the American baby in the hopes that he would have a human enough upbringing to perhaps change things. Seems to have worked,” she shrugged, before finally taking in the two shocked faces that were staring back at her. Her brows furrowed and her face fell as she asked, “Why are you looking at me like that?”

“You switched the babies?” Crowley asked blankly, although it came out as more of a statement than a question.

Her face screwed up as she tried to work out how best to explain herself. “Well, I say switched, it was more of a ‘made sure the demon dropping the antichrist off went to the wrong delivery room’ kind of thing. Feel sorry for the poor sod who had to deal with that but needs must.”

Crowley blinked at her and said bluntly, “I was the poor sod who had to deal with that.”

Eloise looked at him for a moment as about five different jigsaw pieces finally clicked in her head, before she threw her head back in realisation, “Oh shit, so you were. I knew your name sounded familiar.”

“You bastard, we spent six years raising the wrong child because of you!” he exclaimed, wagging his finger at her and jumping off of the bed at one point before Aziraphale tugged him back down. Eloise didn’t know whether to laugh or run for her life, for the menace in his words was betrayed by the disbelieving laugh in his voice.

“I’m sorry, you did what now?” she asked, only just processing what he’d just said, and she couldn’t help the laugh that escaped her lips at his dramatic antics. She knew not to push it when Aziraphale just lifted a finger and pursed his lips with the look of someone who’d rather never bring up said event again.

“Oh bloody heaven, I can’t believe this,” Crowley shook his head, chuckling to himself. Although part of him resented it, he couldn’t help but look at Eloise differently now as they laughed like little kids together. Maybe it was the fact that she seemed so much more like them now, so much more human. Or maybe it was the fact that she had been trying to stop the apocalypse and all the implications that came with the fact. Suddenly he just wanted to know more about her, but he quickly silenced that thought. One thing at a time.

She raised her shoulders with a confused look on her face, giggling as she said, “Sorry? Well, I didn’t know, did I?”

They locked eyes for a moment before bursting into laughter again at the sheer absurdity of it all, leaving Aziraphale slightly bewildered and more than slightly exasperated at the pair. It took them a few moments to finally calm down but once they did, Crowley sobered his tone of voice as he asked, “Right, back to what happened before we came in. Anything we need to keep an eye out for?”

Though he didn’t say it, Eloise could see the unasked question in his eyes. Are we safe? She smiled softly, “Nah, you two’ll be fine. Basically I told them if they want to talk to me, then they need to get their bosses involved, and somehow I highly doubt God and Satan are gonna pop down for a friendly chat any time soon. Even then, you two should be fine. I don’t think any of that lot clocked on that you were here.”

Crowley nodded in understanding, and it didn’t escape Eloise’s attention how the remaining dregs of tension visibly dissipated from both of their bodies. Aziraphale and Crowley looked at each other for a moment, the relief palpable from the pair of them. Eloise averted her eyes, giving them the privacy that they didn’t necessarily need but probably did want. She allowed herself a moment to ponder their relationship. They were very in tune with each other, very in sync, that much was obvious. Are they in love? The question sounded ridiculous the moment she thought it. Of course they are, look at them. She’d seen that look time and time again over the millennia. Although when she thought about the way they looked at each other further, that lead to another question. Do they know? The hint of yearning in their eyes was subtle but it was there. No, absolutely not. They’re too comfortable with each other. They’re a unit, that much she could tell. A unit that might not want to be disturbed.

Oh dear.

She looked back up at them hesitantly, unsure of what to say for the first time that evening. Eventually she said, “I’d better go. I think I’ve outstayed my welcome.”

Crowley frowned. Hadn’t she said she’d been travelling for a while? “You got somewhere to stay?”

Eloise paused. She’d definitely not been expecting that response. “Not yet. There is a flat I was going to rent but the people haven’t moved out yet because of the lockdown and it seems rude to miracle them away. I’m sure I’ll think of something.”

“Stay here,” Crowley said almost instantly, then pulled a face of confusion at how quickly he replied, “I mean, only if you want to.”

Eloise blinked at that. Surely, they wouldn’t want her there? What reason could they possibly have to want her there? “Wait, are you sure? I wouldn’t want to intrude.”

Crowley just shrugged, “It’s not a problem. What are your options anyway? No hotels are open, and you can’t stay with anyone.”

“Only if you’re sure,” she murmured, still wary for a reason she couldn’t quite put her finger on. She glanced at Aziraphale for confirmation; it was his bookshop after all.

He nodded firmly, “Of course. I’ve been told the sofa is remarkably comfy,” he added with a twinkle in his eye, to which she grinned broadly.

A short while and a few miracles later, the sofa downstairs had become a makeshift bed that was significantly larger and softer than it had remembered it being. Eloise was currently settled on it; all it had taken was ten minutes for her to completely crash out. Aziraphale and Crowley had left her in peace with a chuckle, heading up to the bedroom they shared (that wasn’t out of choice, mind you. Simply because there was only one bedroom in the bookshop. No other reason.) One slightly confused item of furniture aside, all seemed to be well in the bookshop.

Upstairs in the bedroom, an angel and a demon were sitting in the same bed. Neither of them had thought to turn off the lights, so they were sat in thick silence in the bedroom. Aziraphale didn’t usually come up to bed, not as used to sleeping as Crowley was, instead opting to read the night away downstairs. However this seemed impolite considering their new guest, so he’d come up with Crowley. And while Crowley was mulling this over he finally stumbled upon why he felt so uneasy.

Aziraphale hadn’t brought a book up with him.

As bizarre a concern as that may seem, Crowley could always trust Aziraphale to bring a book up to bed with him on the rare occasion he came up at night. That was one of the things he lo- liked about him. Liked. He looked at Aziraphale curiously, noting the slight frown on his face as he stared into space. How deep in his head must he have been to forget a book? “You alright, angel?” he asked as softly as he could so as to not startle him.

He looked at Crowley with wide eyes that darted away almost instantly as he started to play with his hands in his lap, “Yes, my dear, I’m fine. I just realised something, is all.”

Crowley cocked his head in interest, “Oh really? What was it?”

He was silent for a little while before saying in a voice no louder than a whisper, “I think I was there when she Fell.”

Crowley felt his eyebrows raise in shock, looking away for a second to try and compose himself. “Right. Well, that’s a thing.”

“Quite.”

He furrowed his brows as he tried to make sense of what this meant now, “And was she telling the truth? Did all that actually happen?”

“Yes. I remember it perfectly well. Clear as day,” he managed to choke out with a forced smile before going back to his routine fidgeting.

Crowley laid a gentle hand on top of Aziraphale’s, stopping what he was doing and getting him to actually look him in the eye for longer than a second. “You sure you’re alright?”

“I am quite well. Don’t fret,” he said, and despite Crowley’s concern, he couldn’t pretend that the smile on Aziraphale’s face wasn’t genuine, however small it may have been.

He reluctantly let it go, changing the subject quickly, “You alright with her staying here? I know it just sort of happened.”

The smile on his face only grew, much to Crowley’s surprise, “It’s alright. After all, wasn’t it you who said we’re on our own side now? I think she’s the first person we’ve met who might understand what that means.”

Crowley tried not to think too much about the fact that Aziraphale had actually listened to him when he’d said that, let alone remembered it, instead opting for a casual, “Yeah, I suppose so. Right, I’m gonna get some sleep. I, um, yeah,” he stammered out awkwardly, cursing his brain for not thinking of literally any other decent response.

Aziraphale simply smiled fondly at him, “Indeed. Goodnight, my dear.”

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

Hello my love,

At the time of writing this, I do not know what the future holds. For me it’s an uncertain, unstoppable force, and it’s not one I think I can fend off for much longer. I’ve tried, please believe that I’ve tried. I’ve tried for your sake to prevent the inevitable. But it’s coming. I can feel it. It won’t be long now, I don’t think.

If you’re reading this, it means I was right, and I have Fallen. I know you’re probably confused and scared and that there is a biting anger bubbling inside you. I wish I could tell you why this is happening. I wish I could tell you that this is all a huge misunderstanding that will be resolved soon.

I wish I could tell you I love you one more time.

But I can’t. There are many things I can’t do now, and it’ll do me no good to dwell on this any longer than I have to. To survive we must focus on what we can do, and that’s exactly what I’m asking you to do.

If I know myself as well as I think I do, there are many things I would have liked to have said to you upon our final farewell, but didn’t because I wanted to make sure you were alright. Don’t feel guilty about this, my love. Think of it as my last debt to you being repaid.

I have a plan. Well, it’s more of an idea, and it might not work. And it’s because of this that I shan’t tell you exactly what it is. It seems cruel to allow you to hope for something that might never come into fruition. But please put your faith in me, and in our love, for we will prevail. One way or another.

I hope that you didn’t wait to read this letter because you were scared of its contents, though I’m sure this isn’t the case. You were always brave. It was always something I loved about you. Your quiet, beautiful, roaring courage in the face of such turmoil and anguish. You always had the courage to be kind and to love with all your being, even when everything was against you. No one would have blamed you if you had turned cold and bitter, and yet you chose not to. I admire you for it every day. My idea, should it work, will require us both to be incredibly brave. But more on that another day. It’s that bravery and that strength that you will need to rely on now. That, and the thought of me. Though I may not physically be with you, but I hope that my love’s own soul is enough.

I won’t sign off this letter, because this is not where our story ends. There is much left to be written. And I need you to remember that each day we are parted. Until the next time, my love.

[allthevmff]

Find Afrocurl’s work // AO3 // LJ  interview from vmfictitious // originally posted Mar. 20th, 2011

How did you get into Veronica Mars fandom?

Somewhere in the middle of S2, a friend of mine from high school started to talk about this show and how much I’d like it. At the general description of a high school detective, I borrowed her S1 DVDs and devoured the show in three days.  After that I started to discover fandom, mostly because I used Inigo’s transcripts to keep myself up with what the show was doing before I could watch live.

Shortly after starting the show, I had this job where I spent too much time in an office and was easily bored. I used a bunch of downtime to read fic and post in a message board (FanForum for anyone curious.)  When that job ended (thankfully) I had all of this spare time and just sort of fell into writing.

Were you an experienced writer when you started writing for VM?  If so, what kind of writing had you done, and/or what fandoms had you written for?   If not, was it really intimidating to post your first story?

I’m a little fuzzy on these details right now, but I wasn’t that experienced when I started writing in VM. I think I had a story or two written in The OC before I posted here, but I had some great support from a few friends (sarah_p //  Sarah's Crack ) for one was a big support) when I did post my first story.

What was it about Veronica Mars that interested you?  Why did you feel compelled to write for this particular show?

I really fell for the characters when I started to watch. Veronica was such a compelling character, and as I kept watching I fell more in love with Logan, too. I felt compelled in that post-S2 summer to see the relationship between Logan and Veronica explored (as so many other people did.)

Are you creative in other media for fandom (vidding, icons, etc.)?

I pick up making icons here and there, but I don’t think I have the same skill as many other people do. It’s a different creative medium, and one that I think stretches a different part of my brain.

What was the best moment for you, in fandom?  (Not necessarily a moment in the show, but fandom itself.)

I think it was the moment when I found myself in a position to go to all of these events around LA and San Diego. I found that people around LJ were interested as a result because there was something for people to enjoy that I had been able to capture.

If you had a magic wand, and could change VM fandom in any way, past or present, what would you do?

I wish S3 hadn’t been so divisive—it’s spoiled so many people on the show, and when you still love parts of it, but not all of it, it’s hard to stay positive around other people.

Of your accomplishments in fandom/cyberspace, which are you most proud of?

Weirdly, I think it’s little things I’ve done that bring a smile to my face. Sharing my time with the cast with others in any way. That’s not just the picspams when I went to an event, but these moments where I could get autographs or phone calls to other people. At different times, I’ve been able to make a friend’s birthday just a little brighter with a message from the cast (Sarah and another friend M.)

What’s your favorite VM episode and why?

I go back and forth on this answer all of the time, but I think it’s Ain’t No Magic Mountain High Enough. In part because it was the first episode I remember watching live, and also because I’m a sucker for banter between Logan and Veronica. That whole episode is filled with it, even if they aren’t together as a couple.

What’s your least favorite episode and why?

Blast from the Past—I just can’t get behind the mystery of the week, or what Jackie does to Veronica as a way to keep Wallace to herself.

How do you feel about season 3?

I’m a mixed bag on the subject. I think that the first arc has promise, though it didn’t do much to satisfy my need for Logan and Veronica in a healthy relationship. I’m not a fan of how Piz was introduced, or what his purpose was in the long run.

The Dean O’Dell arc lacks heart (and the Hearst rapist does too when I look at it), and the last five are just all over the place.

In total, I haven’t brought myself to rewatch the whole season since it aired, but I made a promise to myself at some point I would (I plan to live-blog all of the episodes, but I only managed to finish the first three.)

If you met Rob Thomas, what would you say to him?  (Assume that you have taken magical drugs that enable you to not be tongue-tied and you can completely speak your mind.)

I briefly met him and talked to him during season three, but if I could have a longer conversation, I’d really want to understand what his motives were for Logan and Veronica in that season. It seemed that the show always had Logan and Veronica together off screen so that the audience had no real reason to understand those later break-ups.

If you could talk to the writing staff, what question(s) would you have for them?

I’m always interested in some of the specifics of the room—are there any writers who cater to writing for certain characters? What characters do you like to write more than others? I think I’m just interested in their process more than anything else.

Writing

Which story of yours is your favorite, and why?

I’m really a fan of “The Black Hole” because I think it was a different sort of writing exercise for me. I also think I was really into the moment when I wrote it, and it shows. I can’t remember how long it took me to write, but I think it was a pretty quick write once I had the idea solidified in my head.

Are there any stories of yours that are (to your surprise) fan favorites?

Not really a surprise, but I love the reaction I had to Rational Thought. My Piz issues just got one big escape in that piece and everyone who read it had a similar reaction.

Do you (or did you at first) feel uncomfortable posting R or NC17 rated stories?

I think I was a bit apprehensive the first time (especially since it was my first fic in the fandom), but as I’ve written more and more of those fics, I’m more comfortable with the ways of writing it. I also love all of my betas who help me through the mechanics of writing it.

If you could start over and rewrite any of your stories (assume unlimited time and you would be paid for your efforts, because this is a fantasy), which story would you choose, and what changes would you make?

I’m not proud of Compulsion as it was written in the end, so I’d work there and really craft the narrative more than it is now. It’s not that it’s not beta-ed, but that it wasn’t really planned or structured beyond what is written. I think there was promise in the beginning and it floundered.

Do you write for any other fandoms?

I write here and there in a few other fandoms, but most of my work is in VM.  Some of the other shows are harder to get a feel for, so much that I don’t know if I have the character voices down.

Do you write any original works, and if so, can we see any of them?  Have you ever taken any writing classes?  Have you ever published anything? Won any competitions?

I wrote a few pieces of original fic, which are at my writing community. I haven’t been one to take a writing course, but in high school I had an award-winning poem at the local county fair.

That piece, I wrote was in my junior year of high school, spring semester (so let’s call is March 2000.) We had to write an emulation of Langston Hughes’s “I Am”, and I went all out—confused kid to the max. My teacher ate most of it up, and had me submit it to the Fair.  It went on to win the best poem for high schoolers, the best high school piece and Best in Show for all student work. I have three lovely ribbons, a paper weight to show for it.

What other VM author influenced you the most?  Do you have a favorite VM story (by another author)?

I spent most of my time reading things from Loveathons and Fic From Mars when I was reading, so I guess any of those authors. I really love dark_roast’s ( dark_roast) style. I think mutiousmuse and truemyth (TrueMyth) each have some amazing pieces, too. What’s great about being part of fandom is learning how much else you have in common with authors you love. I’m still friends with Musey and Truemyth after I met them at Comic Con in 2006.

Overall, I think my favorite story is Finite Erasure (TW), which puts me in the camp of loving angst. I worked with Trixx (Trixx) as she wrote it and I think I fell for the story she was telling and how much it hurt along the way.

What fanfic do you wish you’d had the idea for and written yourself?

If I had a mind for her particular brand of crazy, I’d have love to have written One True Pair, because the creativity and perspective amaze me.

Who are your favorite traditional authors?  Do you have a favorite book or series?

I love Oscar Wilde’s wit; I love Fitzgerald’s use of flawed characters. When I was in college I became a huge fan of Isaac Bashevis Singer. Sadly I’m not a huge book fan, though I do love words and compelling stories. Persuasion is one of my favorite stories, along with The Alchemist. I found myself more easily distracted by television as a kid and when I do get a book, I tend to read some fluffy chick-lit.

 Getting to Know You

To which character in VM do you feel you are the most similar, or what situation in VM reminds you of your own life?

Even though I don’t write her enough, I feel like I’m a slightly less tech-savvy version of Mac. I wasn’t one to have boyfriends in high school, and I think that just influences my outlook now.

Share a fun memory with us, something related to fandom.

This moment at an event in San Diego where my friends and I spent a good five minutes trying to remember the Eleanor Roosevelt quote from Logan’s voicemail.

Or the time I had Jason write a message to my journal without him really knowing where it was going.

Dog person, cat person, neither or both?

Cat person! My cat Auric loves everyone he meets, and wants to keep me from my computer when I leave it open in his presence. He really loves to sit on my keyboard when I’m not around.

What was the happiest day in your life (that you can share with us)?

December 12, 2000—the day I got into college. I’m pretty lame most of the time.

The apocalypse is on us.  You’ve got five minutes to gather your stuff before you flee (assume that your loved ones are already safe).  What do you take?

This is going to be pretty typical, but my laptop, and external hard drives, so I’m not without my pictures. Maybe a few of my autographs and old-school photos too.

What don’t we know about you, that we should know?

I’m not nearly as interesting as I sound on the internet. ;)

 The Nuts and Bolts of Writing

Do you consider yourself a stickler for grammar, or do you prefer a more casual approach?  Specifically, serial comma: for or against?

I’m weirdly a stickler for grammar when I’m not the one writing. I’m usually for the serial comma, which I blame on years of it being grilled into my head from school.

What grammar issue do you constantly have to struggle with?

 Spelling—I’m horrible at it most of the time.

 Do you have any writing reference books you can’t live without?

 I have a few copies of writing guides tucked away in my garage, but I don’t regularly look at them when I’m writing.

Are you a plotter or a “pantser”? (Do you outline your stories or do you write “by the seat of your pants”?)

It really depends on the story. I have some basic idea of a fic when I start to write it, but there are times when I only know that general outline and other times when I have a better plan.

There’s one story that’s been buried on my computer that’s plotted more than anything else I write. There are notes on how each chapter should work, but I only did that because it was a true multi-chapter fic.

My other fics that have turned into WIPs are not as plotted as they should be.

 What’s your favorite point-of-view to write?

 I love third-person more than anything else. It gives you the flexibility to talk about more than one person in the context of the story.

What type of writing is your favorite to write (dialogue, plot, action, interior monologue, description, sex scene, etc.)?  Your least favorite?

Dialogue—no questions. I love banter as much as anyone else.

My least favorite—probably sex scenes. They’re awkward to figure out, positions, how clinical but not too clinical.

Do you listen to music while you write?  Do you listen to different music depending on what you’re writing?

I do, unless I’m watching TV. My music doesn’t change depending on what I write, though maybe it should. My poor iTunes has been known to be demonic when I read fic, though it doesn’t do that as often when I’m writing.

What inspires you to write?

 I like motivational moments that can drive a point home—so I tend to write shorter pieces that are about emotions instead of plot driven.

What blocks you from writing?

Lack of time. The inability to express what I’m looking for.

 Specifically for Afrocurl!

What surprised you the most about Jason Dohring in person (that you can share with us)?

He’s a genuinely sweet person who adores his fans and what they do for him. I’d never had too many experiences with actors before I met him and he set the stage for being kind to fans.

How is he like Logan?  How is he not like Logan?  Did he do anything that freaked you out after watching him on TV so much?

I think he has Logan’s physical ticks—hair rakes and the like.

 He’s not as precise with language as Logan. In person he’s sort of like any other California guy I’ve met.

Which story of yours would it appall you the most to find out that Jason had read?

The Weevil and Logan story. I think he’d blush and be shocked at the subject more than anything.

Which of your celebrity encounters thrilled you to death, but the rest of world could care less?

The girl who loves politics was thrilled by meeting Justice Scalia at my college. Though I’m sure I’m the only one who can appreciate it now.

We know you do a lot for charities.  Do you have anything coming up that we should know about, that you’d like us to support?

Since Sweet Charity has ended, I haven’t done much work for charity recently. I’ve been a little too busy with the rest of life to help out with the Queensland floods and the like.

What’s your dream job?

Working at a high school teaching either Government or US History, maybe AP if that’s an option.

Your life seems to be going through a lot of changes right now.  How do you see yourself ten years from now?...family, job, hobbies, etc., anything you want to share with us.

I’d love to have a stable job, with friends and family nearby for support. I can’t hope for much else than that right now.

 Find Afrocurl’s work // AO3 // LJ

Source: X

reposted from vmfictitious // originally published on Mar. 20th, 2011

[skepticalcatfrog]

Every Week on Thursday (Aurora High School)

Introduction Part One Introduction Part Two Masterpost

Summary: When Finian realizes just how much he’s struggling in Social Studies, he turns to Scarlett for help.

Pairings: (Pre-romantic) Scarlett Jones x Finian de Seel

Word count: 4,090

Author’s Notes: Guess who’s back and better than ever with some brand new content! It’s ya girl! I’ve been in a real creative slump you guys, but I finally got something done and I’m feeling GOOD! (Requests for this au are still open, by the way! I can’t guarantee that I’ll do every one I get, but we’ll see.)

Important Author’s Notes: This story contains a character who is disabled. I did do some research, but since I don’t have a disability, it’s virtually impossible for me to be an expert on the topic. If you are more knowledgeable about this than I might be, and you notice an inaccuracy, please let me know what it is and I’ll try to fix it!

January 16th, Thursday

Finian hated Social Studies. It was as simple as that. He figured, why should he have to learn about a bunch of old people when most of them were assholes anyway? Not to mention the fact that he just couldn’t get the hang of it. He could never focus on studying, often found himself spacing out during class, and thusly struggled with tests and quizzes. He managed to keep his grades pretty high, and if anyone were to ask he’d say it was just luck, but in reality he found it insanely easy to get away with cheating.

For some reason, though, he’d decided that it was time to put in some effort. He knew he wouldn’t be able to do it on his own, so he’d concocted a plan. He would get himself a tutor. But it couldn’t be just anyone. No, it had to be someone he trusted. Fortunately for him, he knew exactly who that person would be.

The moment the final bell rang, he was off. Fin’s classmates rarely let him leave first, even though they almost definitely should’ve, so he was usually last. As he maneuvered his way through the hall, he looked around for the girl who would (hopefully) agree to be his tutor. Then he spotted her fiery red hair, and almost instinctively smiled. She was standing at her locker, packing her books into her backpack. He weaved around his classmates as he tried to get to her.

“Scarlett!” He called out, hoping she’d be close enough to hear him. Sure enough, she turned and waved.

“Good afternoon, Finian.” Scarlett said as he stopped beside her. She started walking down the hall, and he followed alongside her. “I’m going to the front door, is that out of your way?”

“Nope, not at all.” Fin lied, hoping she wouldn’t notice.

“Okay then, what’s up?”

“I’ve got a problem.” Fin got straight to the point. “I have a big test coming up in Social Studies, and I know nothing. My head is empty, there’s just clouds and stuff in there. Long story short, I need someone to tutor me.”

“Okay… and why are you asking me?” She raised an eyebrow.

“You’re, like, an expert at Social Studies. Why would I ask anyone but the expert?” Fin said as if it was obvious. Then, worried that he was coming on too strong, he added one more point. “Plus, you’re my friend, so I trust you to not fuck it up. For the most part.”

Scarlett laughed and shook her head. “You really have a way with words, don’t you?”

“It’s my specialty.” He ran a hand through his hair in an attempt to slick it back, but it immediately bounced back again. “So, what do you say?”

“Sure, I’ll do it. I’ve got nowhere better to be anyway.” Scarlett shrugged. “What were you thinking for times and locations?”

“Well, I would say my house, but that’s a no for a few reasons. For example, my siblings and cousins never shut up. Plus my parents would flip their shit if a girl visited who 1, isn’t related to us, and 2, isn’t with my cousin Dariel. I’ve got no clue how he gets girls in the first place, but somehow he does.” Fin said, already feeling like he’d given plenty of unnecessary information. “So do you have any ideas?”

“We could go to the library.” Scarlett suggested. “It’s pretty quiet, plus all the books and things will be useful.”

“Which one, the old dusty one that looks like the set of a horror movie, or the big two-story one in the middle of town next to the movie theater?” Fin asked.

“The big one. It’s newer, so I assume it’ll have more up-to-date information.” Scarlett explained.

“I’ve never been in that one. And who knows, maybe after the boring stuff, we could catch a movie!” Fin winked. He was mostly joking, but not entirely. Apparently Scarlett had taken it as a joke, because she laughed a little, then brought the conversation back to the subject at hand.

“And as for times, I’m free on Tuesdays.” She told him.

Fin shook his head. “I’ve got practice for the play on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays. Friday, maybe?”

“Can’t, I’ve got debate club.” Scarlett thought for a moment. “What about Thursdays?”

“That works.” He nodded. “But today is Thursday, so does today count?”

“I’m going to say no, just because it’s too short notice. Next week, though, sure. What about 3:00, just to give us some time to freshen up after school?” Scarlett picked up her bag and started walking, Fin following alongside her even though his mom picked him up at the side of the school opposite the direction they were going.

“Is that your way of telling me you think I look bad?” Fin asked in false indignance.

“What? No.” Scarlett smiled.

“So you think I look good then?” He raised his eyebrows.

“Shut up, Finian.” Her smile widened and he couldn’t help but stare.

Okay, look. Finian definitely wasn’t much of a people person. He barely talked to anyone outside of the tightly knit friend group he’d made himself, unless of course he absolutely needed to. So what are the odds that he’d fallen for the exact opposite kind of person? Scarlett was extroverted, and was great at talking to people, had a smile that could light up a room, and was certainly more popular than Fin was. If it wasn’t for the fact that they were talking to each other at that very moment, he’d be convinced that she didn’t know he existed. He knew he’d never have a chance with her anyway. But still, there was something about her that drew him in, even though he figured it would end in disappointment anyway.

“I guess this is my stop.” Scarlett said as they approached the front door, pulling Fin out of his thoughts. “I’ll see you tomorrow.”

He waved to her as she left, waiting to move until the door had closed behind her. Once it had, he started on his way to the opposite end of the school, where his mom was most definitely already waiting for him.

January 23rd, Thursday #2

Scarlett had been sitting in the library and waiting for Fin for the past 30 minutes. She wondered if he’d decided to bail. He definitely had a habit of not admitting when he was struggling, so it was a possibility that he wouldn’t show. Maybe she should just leave and text him later, there was no use waiting if he wasn’t ever going to get there. 

She got up and slung her bag over her shoulder, but just as she was about to start walking, the entrance opened. And there was Finian. But he wasn’t in his wheelchair like he usually was, instead using a pair of crutches to get around. She tried not to look too perplexed, figuring it was probably something personal. But he saw right through her.

“What, something on your mind?” He asked as he approached, taking a seat at the table and setting the crutches down beside him.

“No, it’s nothing.” Scarlett shook her head, sitting back down.

“It’s the crutches, isn’t it?” Fin asked, gesturing to the aforementioned objects. “I would’ve gone with the chair, but it’s just that this library isn’t wheelchair accessible. And I didn’t know that since I’ve never been here before, so my dad had to bring me back home to switch them out, which is also why I was so late.”

“But there’s a ramp outside, isn’t there?” Scarlett asked.

“Yeah, but that leads down to the kid’s section. To get up here from there, you have to go up the stairs. And there’s no elevator.” Fin explained. “I don’t usually go with my crutches, if I’m going to be out and about for a long time I’ll use the chair. At school, for example. I really only use these at home, and even there I rarely do.”

“That makes sense, yeah.” Scarlett nodded. “We could go somewhere else if you want, my house is usually pretty quiet.”

“No, no, it’s okay.” Fin held up his hand. “I’m already here, there’s no point in leaving now. Maybe we could figure something else out next time.”

“Okay, if you insist.” Scarlett twirled a lock of hair around her finger. “Anyway, back to the task at hand. What’s your grade in Social Studies?”

“I’ve got an 95, I think.” Fin told her. “Haven’t checked in a while.”

“How have you managed to keep your grades that high if you’re struggling as much as you say you are?” She asked, leaning forward and resting her arms on the table. “You probably don’t even need tutoring if you don’t want it. I’m starting to think this was all a trick just to spend a little extra time with me.”

“Would it be so bad if it was?” Fin smirked. “It’s not, though. I’ve actually been finding other, slightly more against-the-rules ways to keep my grades up.”

“Finian de Seel, do you cheat on your tests?” Scarlett didn’t know whether to be shocked or impressed. She’d only cheated a few times, and every time she’d gotten caught, so if he’d managed to exceed a passing grade just by cheating, that was crazy.

“You got me. For some reason, I never get caught, so I just keep doing it.” Fin shrugged. “But I do want to stop, which is why I asked you to teach me about all of this history shit.”

Scarlett blinked slowly. “How long have you been doing it?”

“Since freshman year, when my grades started falling flat.”

“And you retained at least some of that, right?”

“Absolutely none of it.” Fin said sarcastically. “I guess we’ll have to be here all night.”

“Oh, be quiet.” Scarlett laughed. She had to admit, as annoying as he tried to be, she really did enjoy spending time with Fin. “Anyway… should we go find some textbooks?”

February 2nd, Thursday #3

The next week, after a bit of discussion over the previous days, Fin and Scarlett came to an agreement that they should just try going to the de Karran-de Seel house for their tutoring session. They’d already checked out all of the books they needed from their previous trip to the library, and they could use online resources if they ended up needing anything else. Plus, as opposed to the idea as Fin was before, he knew he’d be the most comfortable at home.

That being said, he felt like the short 45 minutes between the moment he got home and when Scarlett was supposed to get there were the most stressful minutes of his entire life. He spent the majority of his time rallying his family into cleaning up the house a little bit. He didn’t give them much information, which might’ve been a mistake in hindsight, but at the time he didn’t really care.

When Scarlett did finally arrive, the first thing she noticed was how loud it was. She could hear all of the family’s conversation from outside. It was never that loud at home. She walked up to the door and knocked three times. A kid answered the door, maybe around 11 or 12 years old.

“Are you Fin’s friend?” The girl asked. She took Scarlett’s hand and pulled her inside before she had a chance to answer. “Fin! Your friend is here!”

As soon as she was inside, the next thing Scarlett noticed was that Fin’s house was seriously populated. She knew that he had a lot of family, but damn. They all turned to look at her when she walked in, but only for a moment before going back to their conversations. None of them seemed to be too eager to talk to her. And every one of them looked exactly like him, with his same white blond hair and big brown deer eyes. Some of them had freckles like he did, others didn’t. The only one who really stood out was the guy who she immediately identified as Dariel. The best way to describe him, in her mind, would be that he looked like a young Severus Snape. And that wasn’t a compliment. He looked up to shoot her a wink, then went back to whatever he was doing on his laptop.

“Oh, you must be Scarlett! Finian has told me so much about you.” A woman who she remembered to be Fin’s mom approached her, leading her further into the house. “He’s in his room, if he hasn’t come out by now then he probably has his headphones on so he can’t hear us.”

As they dodged around family members, Scarlett couldn’t help but wonder if it was like this every day. She had to assume it was, Fin had made it very clear how many family members lived in the same house. She probably wouldn’t be able to survive a whole day in this house, and she didn’t know how he did it. Eventually, they got to a door at the end of a hallway next to the kitchen. Fin’s mom knocked on the door a few times, but when there was still no response after a few moments, she cracked open the door.

The inside of the room looked like an entirely different world. For starters, it was nearly pitch dark. It took Scarlett’s eyes a second to adjust. Not even natural light was coming in, because the curtains were drawn over the only window. There was a light in the ceiling, too, but it wasn’t on. The fact that the walls were painted black didn’t help much with the darkness. Speaking of the walls, they were adorned with a variety of things. 

There were posters for multiple musicals, only a few of which she recognized as ones that had been put on by the school. A bulletin board was hung on the wall, but she could barely tell what it was beneath all of the sketches and blueprints for what she assumed were set designs. A short bookshelf stood along one side of the room. It was stocked with books, but also a bunch of other stuff. Some notable examples were a seemingly homemade robot, a stack of CDs that may or may not have been burned already, a pile of tangled up earbuds, and a small plastic bag full of zippers and loose buttons, among other things. 

The floor wasn’t carpeted, it was hardwood like the rest of the house. The bed was in the corner of the room, and it didn’t look like it had been made in at least a few days. It had two pillows on it, but only one was at the head of the bed and the other was at the foot of the bed. Two beaten up notebooks had been thrown onto it carelessly, one purple and the other yellow. Otherwise, though, the room was pretty clean.

Fin himself was sitting at a desk that was opposite the bed. He had a pair of bulky wireless headphones on, and his face was illuminated by the bright light of the computer he was using. He was typing something up, maybe a screenplay. The music playing through his headphones was way too loud, and she could tell because he was singing along pretty loudly too. She had to stifle a laugh, but not because he sounded bad or anything. He actually had quite an impressive voice. It was just that he must not have known exactly how loud he was being.

Fin’s mother entered the room and gently put her hand on his arm. Despite how careful she was being, he still flinched and the room dropped to silence immediately. He looked up at his mom, slid his headphones off and hung them around his neck. “Uh, hey. What’s up?”

“Sorry I startled you, I thought I should let you know that your friend is here.” She stepped aside to reveal Scarlett, who was still standing in the doorway. She offered a small wave.

Fin’s eyebrows shot up. “Oh. Okay.” He hoped that she couldn’t see the redness rising in his face. She could.

“Alright then, I’ll leave you to it! Just let me know if you need anything.” His mom made her way towards the door, flicking the light switch on her way out. “You have to turn a light on in here sometimes, Finian. Someone’s going to trip on something one day.”

“So… not a fan of lights, huh?” Scarlett moved the notebooks aside and sat down on the bed. With the ceiling light on, she could see everything much better. “What song was that? You sounded really good.”

“You- you think so?” Fin stammered, turning his chair around to face her. His eyes were wide, his mouth hanging slightly open. For a second, he forgot he’d even been asked a question. “Oh, right, the song! It was What I Know Now. From the Beetlejuice musical. It takes some pretty powerful female vocals, but I can usually manage.”

“Well I think you killed it. I know you said that you’re on the tech crew, but have you ever considered actually auditioning for the play?”

“Nah, I’d probably just pass out immediately if I went to an audition. Let’s just say I haven’t taken to performing in front of people yet.” Fin was quick to change the topic. Because the truth was, as much as he did want to perform for an audience, he knew that he would be way too nervous to actually go through with it. He’d rather just go at his own pace. He gestured to the bookshelf, which was holding the textbooks they’d picked up the previous week. “I’ve been skimming through one of those books. It hasn’t been the most fun in the world, but y'know. Anything for the pursuit of knowledge.”

“Which one was it?” Scarlett asked, shifting to look at the books he was pointing at.

Fin left his spot at the desk and went over to the bookshelf. He couldn’t remember the name of the book, so he just picked up the one he was talking about and handed it to her. “This one. I read chapters 22 and 23, like you said to. And I did the questions. They’re in the purple notebook, right there.”

Apparently the notebooks weren’t as thoroughly used as she’d first suspected, because when she opened the purple one, only one page had been used. Both the front and back of it had been used to answer the 16 questions, 8 for each chapter. Aside from that, there were about a thousand doodles in the margins and along the top of the page, including little stick figure drawings of their entire friend group. She couldn’t help but smile at that. She took a second to read his answers.

“These are all right!” Scarlett closed the notebook and placed it back down next to her. “Great job.”

“And get this: I didn’t look up any of the answers.” Fin smiled wider than Scarlett had ever seen. Like, straight-up grinned. Not the usual cocky, teasing smirk. Not any sarcasm. Seeing him so happy, it made Scarlett feel… well, she didn’t quite know what the feeling was. But it was definitely a good one.

“That’s great, Fin!” She reached out and put her hand on his arm. “You’re doing a really good job with this, even just over one week.”

“Thanks. I’ve been feeling a lot better about my grades, like I can actually earn them.” Fin leaned forward to pick up the textbook, then turned around, went back to his desk and put it down there. “My future is bright, Scar!”

“Speaking of grades, what about your test? Are you feeling better about that?”

“Oh, yeah, for sure.” He turned back towards her. “I only read chapters 22 and 23, so we’ve still got the next two to go. Which is perfect! Because the test is on Monday two weeks from now, so we’ll have one more Thursday to go, which gives me time to finish both chapters.”

“Then I’m assuming you want today to be a review day?” She asked, clapping her hands once.

“Ugh, please and thank you. You’re the best teacher ever.” Fin laughed.

Scarlett stood up and grabbed another book from the bookshelf. “We’d better get started then.”

February 9th, Thursday #4

Fin quickly came to the conclusion that having a tutoring session at his house wasn’t bad the first time, but he’d rather not do it again. After Scarlett had left, his family asked him endless questions about her. Including Dariel, who asked if she was single, to which Fin had to begrudgingly reply that she was. In conclusion, he didn’t want to do that again.

In the end, they settled on the last location being Scarlett’s house. It was poetic, in a way, that they were studying to avoid cheating in the house where the principal lived. Which made Fin nervous, for good reason. Despite not wanting to continue cheating, he’d already done it many times, so he could still get in trouble for it.

Extremely luckily, the day was uneventful. Productive, definitely, but nothing particularly interesting happened. That day felt much more structured than the two previous weeks. When Fin had arrived, Scarlett had already set up a study station in the living room. Because everything they needed was already laid out, they got to work right away, and the hour that they had flew by.

February 21st, Tuesday

Fin caught up with Scarlett between third and fourth periods. He’d just gotten his test back, graded. And he had to tell her immediately. He pulled her aside, hoping that people would know not to bump into them.

“Scarlett. You aren’t going to believe this.” He grabbed his backpack, took a folder out of it, and flipped through the papers inside to find the test packet. He held it out for her to see. “83 percent! That’s, like, a B! It’s not much considering what I used to get when I cheated, but-”

“Fin, this is awesome! Even better than all that other stuff.” Scarlett assured him. “And you want to know why? Because this time, you did it yourself.”

Fin’s eyebrows drew together in thought, then a small smile tugged at the corners of his lips. “You’re right. This one’s going on my wall, I think.” He decided, turning the paper around to take a look at it himself.

“It should. I’m really proud of you, Fin.” Scarlett leaned down and kissed him on the cheek.

His face reddened and he did that oh-so-endearing broken engine sputter. “I- uh, yeah. Well, y'know, the real reason I asked you to help me with this is because you’re one of the smartest people I know.” He wasn’t even worried about keeping his cool anymore. He’d completely lost whatever train of thought he might’ve had. 

Now it was Scarlett’s turn to be surprised. “Really?” She tried her best to not let him know how big of a deal it was that he’d said that to her. She’d been called a lot of things. Some of them good, others not so much. But no one had ever thought to call her smart. It felt great. Because truth be told, as much as she struggled in some classes, she considered herself really good at some others. It was truly something else to finally have someone appreciate that.

“I mean, yeah.” Fin was starting to come to his senses, but he couldn’t take back what he said. And he wouldn’t want to anyway. “You’re really good at a bunch of crap that I suck at, which is awesome.”

“Thank you, Fin. I really, really appreciate it.” She reached out and ruffled his hair. Then the warning bell rang. “We should probably get to class, shouldn’t we.”

“Definitely. Wouldn’t want to end up in Adams’s office after we put in all this work to not do that.” Fin agreed.

They, somewhat reluctantly, went their separate ways. They couldn’t just skip their next classes, as much as they might want to. They’d get to talk again later. The best part was, though, that they left down the hallway both feeling just a little bit more confident in themselves. And neither of them would be willing to confirm that they thought about each other for the rest of the day. But they wouldn’t deny it either.

Taglist: @taco-taco-belle @ceceism @confusionnoises @bubblegumstardust @incorrectauroracyclequotes (Ask to be on the taglist!)

[keyenuta]

PSU First Dorm Leader

Name: Anansi Khari

Name Meaning: Kingly Spider

Voiced By: Hikaru Midorikawa

Gender: Male

Age: 16

Birthday: November 24th

Starsign: Sagittarius

Height: 5'5"

Eye Color: Scarlet Red

Hair Color: Black and Red

Homeland: Afterglow Savanna

Professional Status:

Dorm: Itan-ori

School Year: First

Class: 1-A

Occupation: Student, Dorm leader, prefect/therapist(unofficial)

Club: Trickster(this club is not officially recognized by PSU but everyone knows it exists)

Best Subject: Magical Analysis: Anansi's always been good at peering at the strings and gears of magic. And loves to mess with and edit how they work, especially if the result is chaotic as heck. But then again as a person he's analytical at everything. Both for tricks and basic survival.

Fun Facts:

Dominant hand: Ambidextrous with leaning to right

Favorite Food: really spicy ramen

Least Favorite Food: anything rotten

Dislikes: being looked down on, treated like he's worthless

Hobby: Writing, he loves writing stories, music, poems, and anything that connects to weaving words.

Talents: making traps, whether with words or physical objects

Anansi Khari is the first year dorm leader of Itan-ori. He takes on the MC's role in PSU, he's a crafty, mischievous and greedy person due to growing up with very little. But despite these harsher parts of himself, he was given the role of an unofficial therapist for the students. He was inspired from the spider deity known as Anansi, known to be a god of wisdom, stories, spiders and tricksters.

Appearance:

Anansi is a short boy with dark brown skin and 8 playful scarlet red eyes which peer through his messy mop of dreadlocks. Speaking of which, sitting atop his head and hanging down his face, Anansi wears a pair of messy black dreadlocks which fade to red near its tips.

The spindly boy always seems to wear a cocky, fang bearing grin as if he always has a trick of plot of mischief in his mind at every moment. (Which honestly isn't that far off)

And marked across his cheeks is a piece of white face paint. For as long as anyone's seen him in school he's always worn this paint. Reapplying it without fail day after day.

And finally for clothes, he's usually seen wearing his uniform in a very casual way. Around his neck are two multi-colored beaded necklaces. Beneath this he wears a grey turtle neck with rolled up sleeves, revealing a pair of black armbands with his magic ring on his right hand.

And around his waist is the sash that shows off his dorm. Colored black and orange, it later gives way to a silver web across the flap which rests atop his tied up blazer that's beneath the cloth. And finally on his legs are a pair of black slacks and sandals on his feet.

Oh and tied around his waist is a tanned gourd, being what his stave turned into when he became dorm leader. It's a reference to the gourd Anansi(myth) had which stored all the wisdom and stories in the world.

Personality:

Anansi to be blunt, is a little shit. He's a very playful and mischievous boy who often manipulates and weaves things to best suit what he needs to be done. This is mostly seem with how he handles getting the other dorms and students to both stop stepping on each other's toes and in giving each student who needs it therapy.

Instead of being honest and cooperative, using his analytical mind and a few other ways of finding information. Anansi often tricks and fools others into improving who they are. Even in his own dorm, it's never wise to fully trust the spider, because he always has some joke or trick to play. No matter if you're friend or foe.

Anansi is a very greedy person, often stealing, tricking, betting and playing for something he doesn't have. Even being the school therapist to assist Chiron was something anansi did was for a deal. He didn't do it out of kindness, but rather so he could receive a reward.

He's a person with a silver tongue amd a poisonous bite. Always weaving a web around those in front of him. And honestly despite his intelligence and skills in trickery, he often gets in his own way, getting too greedy for his own good, leaving him either beat up or in the same position he started in.

But while he is such a little shit, while he doesn't show it often, he can be caring and helpful to those who he views as being on equal or if possible beneath him in standing. He's always had a soft spot for people down on their luck. And often helps them as best he can. And especially for the slums he and Ruggie live in, you'll see the best side of anansi, he cares greatly for those there and really is an activist to get them better support. Even making many songs based on it. Though if he were to meet or see anyone from the Royal family, you are instantly marked for mischief.

This is a less noticeable part of Anansi but the boy is a giant creative nerd. He loves imagining stories sings and all sorts of other things in his mind while also making art. Despite his harsher parts he's a geek to be honest.

In summary: playful, intelligent, mischievous and at times protective and caring.

Unique Magic:

Hasn't awakened it yet

Trivia:

In Anansi's room, swaddled in a giant web in the corner of his room is a giant pile of all the "earned" items he's acquired over the school year. Often times you can see him swimming through it when he's bored

Anansi can produce natural spider silk and often uses it to get around, play tricks, and if he feels like it, weave actual stuff. He's probably made a subtle business about weaving clothes for people. Like need a bootleg expensive thing? Call Nancy

His fangs aren't just for show, they actually have venom in them. Though it's more just to numb and relax muscles.

Anansi is a giant nerd, if you can show him a story or piece of knowledge he hasn't read or heard of before, you can do that as an alternative to madool.

Anansi is actually really good friends with Ruggie, he loves collaborating with the hyena for pranks whenever possible. They grew up together and learned how to steal and trick people together

Continuing with this, Anansi has a deal with Ruggie where during holidays both bring back stuff for the slums. Ruggie brings back food, Anansi brings back the loot he's gained

Anansi loves playing drums, and is actually a really good performer and dancer, often times during winter holiday him and his family performed for the slums. Giving everyone some good entertainment and a rest from their worries. Anansi also often times drags ruggie to sing with them though he knows how well ruggie can sing and will tease him about it

He's like Spider-Man, often times you will see Anansi climbing on walls, ceilings etc.

Yes, he can see through each of his eyes, all 8 of them.

The spiders around campus are his little informants. Often giving him new information about students or activities coming up. To keep their support, he gives them flies bugs or whatever they feel like having for their service.

He often sneaks into NRC, both to mess with Leona and to study Yuu on any pointers on how to be a better prefect/therapist for all these students

A nickname for him is Nancy

If you want to see him blush, compliment him on his stories, it'll break his mask quicker than anything else. It always shocks him when someone actually likes them

If you dare him to move like a spider, don't. Just don't, you'll regret it. No one should be that flexible

[shelikesloki]

Getting To Know You | Prequel - (Loki x Fem!Reader)

Pairing: Loki x Fem!Reader

Warnings: none

Summary: Maybe you're too curious for your own good, too gullible. Maybe you should have listened to your dad when he told you not to talk to Thor's brother. But maybe he really wasn't the monster everyone thought he was.

Notes: This is the prequel to my first series. In this part you’ll get to know everything a little. I really hope you like it!

Series Masterlist

You frantically massaged your temple while sighing loudly. "Friday? can you help me look up ways to cheat without telling my dad?" You smugly asked the AI system. Economics wasn't your strongest subject, but you had a test coming up, and studying alone didn't seem to cut it this time around. "I'm afraid I would have to report this to your parents. But I am sure that you were only joking." Friday sardonically answered. Even though the lady only consisted of a voice, you could almost hear her smirk.

After soundlessly sighing, you pinched the bridge of your nose. "I swear this is torture. This is totally meaningless knowledge. This stuff will knock the creativity right out of you. Why would you need to know business strategies by heart? Would be better to make up your own, to stand out. Dad would agree, he knows." You frustratedly complained, knowing that your mom had popped in. She probably wanted to tell you that she was about to leave for her business trip.

"I know that you despise this class, honey. But you only have to make it through this year, after that you're done!" She came up to where you were sitting at your desk and compassionately patted your shoulder. You graced her with a half-hearted smile before standing up. "Did you say goodbye to Morgan yet? Oh, and did you tell dad that he's not supposed to bother me while I cook?" Your mom knowingly grinned at your apprehension. Your dad had a habit of stressing you out while you were cooking. Even though he had no idea how to work a kitchen, he really liked telling you what to do.

"I'll go and say bye to Morgan in a minute, and yes, I told him not to step foot in the kitchen. But I do think that he'll take you guys out to dinner today." You grinned and hugged her. "We're gonna miss you!" "I'm gonna miss you guys too!" She gave you a brief kiss on the cheek and left your room with a feeble wave.

You were used to this. Your parents had to travel a lot for work. But it wasn't too terrible, after all, there was always someone home. Some of the Avengers were living with you in the tower, they all had separate spaces, but you would always find someone in the building's common areas. Natasha, Steve, Wanda, Bruce and Bucky are almost part of your family. But never being alone can be a significant disadvantage too. You were never able to host parties or bring anyone home without any snarky commentary. That's one of the reasons why you didn' have many friends, and it's why you never had a proper boyfriend. Being Tony Stark's daughter only made things worse, people seemed to judge you really hard on that matter. But you honestly didn't mind being single, guys your age were too immature for you anyways.

"Shouldn't you still be studying?" Your thoughts were suddenly interrupted. "Nat, what's up?" You asked while walking over to your closet to pick something out for you to wear. She let out a faint snort and stepped inside to look over your shoulder. "Pepper just left, so Tony wanted me to ask you if you were ready to go out to dinner. " Natasha stated and picked out a pastel green dress. You nodded, took the dress from her, and let her know that you'd need 15 minutes to get ready. "I'll tell him... Oh, and I also wanted to know if you were down for a workout tomorrow afternoon? Around three?" She asked while you were picking out shoes. "Yeah sure, sounds great, but ... go easy on me this time, okay? I'm still sore from yesterday's cardio workout." After some chit chat, Natasha left, and you got ready. When you were done, you went down the hall to help your little sister Morgan.

You really loved Morgan. She was an inquisitive, smart and funny little child. Of course, she was a bit annoying sometimes. You were 12 years older than her after all. But you really enjoyed spending time with her. You loved braiding her beautiful hair, playing with her barbie dolls and toy cars together. Your favorite thing was telling her great stories you made up and teaching her new things, that's when her eyes would light up.

"Hey, Morgan! What are you doing?" You went to sit on her bed and watched her play with some stuffed animals. "Are we finally going to go eat? I'm starving!" She dropped her toys and got up. "That's right! We just have to get you dressed. What would you like to wear? Maybe the new jumpsuit mom got for you?"

After a while, you finally sat at your table in the restaurant. "How's school?" Your dad asked you while looking at the menu. "Boring. How's Iron Man?" You replied, peeking over your own menu to look at him. "The new suit? It's coming along nicely... You're still not getting your own though." He glimpsed at you and shot you a smug smile. "Can I get one papa?" Morgan excitedly asked. "Nope, no one's getting a suit! You're both too young for all of this." He declared, trying to bring this topic to a close. "Well, Peter got his own suit and he's younger than me." You protested. Tony choose to ignore that and instead ordered his food. You just rolled your eyes and did the same. You've had this conversation a million times already. Your dad didn't want to involve you too much into his world.

"Are you home tomorrow afternoon?" Your dad asked you on your drive home. Morgan was already asleep in the backseat. "Yeah, why?" You asked him. He hesitated for a moment. "Thor's brother will arrive tomorrow... He's going to stay in the tower. To be honest, I'm not very happy with that arrangement. But it's the only place where I can keep an eye on him... He's supposed to redeem himself or whatever. So this Odin guy thought it would be a good idea to put him back on earth. Yeah, so you both have to stay in your rooms, I don't want you anywhere near this guy! Am I clear?" He took his eyes off the road for a second to give you a firm look. "Yes!" You answered. Your thoughts drifted off. Loki... The guy who destroyed New York. You only saw him on the news. Why would someone do this? Thor was always very defending of his brother. He had told you stories of his childhood and of Loki's magic. From what Thor told you, Loki seemed... almost, nice? So why would he do such horrible things? You couldn't stop thinking about it. So you made a decision, you would find out what he was really like.

[ Part 1 ]

[heresince93]

Gillian Anderson Sunday Times Interview Transcript

There is a moment in the second series of Netflix’s Sex Education when Gillian Anderson’s character, Jean, sighs a deep resigned sigh as she is lying in bed one morning and spots the messy pile of small change her latest lover, Jakob, has left on her bedside table.

It’s my favourite moment of this uplifting show about the tangled love lives of British secondary school teens that manages to appeal to both parents and adolescents alike. Anderson plays the outrageously inappropriate sex therapist Jean Milburn, a stylish, confident single mother.

The sight of those coins will resonate with any woman of Anderson’s age and stage of life (she is 51), whatever kind of relationship they are in.These pennies, a symbol of how untidy life gets and the constant imposing presence of someone else even when they aren’t in the room, represent for Jean the gradual realisation that the excitement of a new love soon becomes tempered by the boring bits.

For those of us who have been married a while, the coins are perhaps the equivalent of the dull domesticity of picking up the shirt always dropped on the floor or the wet towels you always end up refolding after your teens have left them near but not on the bathroom radiator. Anderson and I chat about this a lot when we meet to talk about the second series of Sex Education, given that we are both working mothers in our early fifties.

The actress, who is most recognised for her role as Scully in The X-Files, is twice divorced and has three children, Piper, 25, Oscar, 13, Felix, 11, all of whom live with her in London. Her partner of three years is the playwright, screenwriter and creator of The Crown, Peter Morgan, himself a father of five.

In person Anderson is chatty and witty, aloof and friendly at the same time, a peculiarly feline trait that I often encounter in driven, confident women who have reached midlife. Tell me about Jakob and the coins, I say, what is it like starting a new relationship in your forties, compared with your twenties?

“It’s very different,” she says. “I think you are more fully formed, especially if you have taken time out of previous relationships to find yourself.

“Early on after the break-up of my last relationship and before my current one, somebody encouraged me to write a list of needs and wants in a future partner. Needs are non-negotiable. If you go on a date with someone and realise they won’t meet, say, three of those needs, then they are not the person for you. It may last as a relationship, but it won’t make you happy. Wants are easier, not more frivolous per se, but easier to deliver. Doing this made it clear to me going forward who would be good for me in a relationship.

“And there is a new creativity nowadays to what a relationship should look like, too. For instance, my partner and I don’t live together. If we did, that would be the end of us. It works so well as it is, it feels so special when we do come together. And when I am with my kids, I can be completely there for them. It’s exciting. We choose when to be together. There is nothing locking us in, nothing that brings up that fear of ‘Oh gosh, I can’t leave because what will happen to the house, how will we separate?’. I start to miss the person I want to be with, which is a lovely feeling. And it is so huge for me to be able to see a pair of trousers left lying on the floor at my partner’s house and to step over them and not feel it is my job to do something about it!”

I’ve never interviewed a celebrity who, even though she is wearing heels (little pointy white boots) is still shorter than me (I’m barely 5ft 2in), but Anderson is tiny. This is only important to note, I think, because her roles since Dana Scully have been so big and so powerful: Blanche in A Street Car Named Desire and Margo Channing in All About Eve on stage; Lady Mountbatten in the film Viceroy’s House; Stella Gibson in The Fall; and now Jean Milburn.

I wonder if she is perhaps filed under “tricky, unpredictable, charismatic, spiky, intelligent and fearless woman” in the casting director’s directory of suitable roles. After all, her next part is going to be Margaret Thatcher (in The Crown). And when she arrives for our chat in the closed Chinese restaurant of a central London hotel, she apologises for the sticky mess in her hair caused by wearing the Iron Lady’s wig the previous day. Her nails are manicured pale pink like Thatcher’s too.

“She had a condition that meant two fingers of each hand would curl around — Reagan had it too — so it affected her gestures and she would wear lots of rings and bracelets to distract. But she kept her nails long, which is how I have to keep them now,” Anderson says. She is fascinated by Thatcher, concluding, after studying her childhood, that “nobody ever existed like her. She was unique.”

Anderson might be unique herself, and despite giving many interviews (three last year), I see that she has been smart and managed to remain a bit of an enigma. When I listen back to the tape, she is very good at general talk, but not so hot on specifics.

She spent her early years in north London with her American parents before going back to Michigan for high school. She was a teenage punk plagued by panic attacks that have continued to trouble her over the years, particularly during her intense work schedule on The X-Files. She went into therapy at 14, then became world famous at 25, and had her first child at 26 (the same age her parents had her, before going on to have her two siblings 12 years later). She split up with her first husband three years after that.

In 2011 she endured the death of her brother, Aaron, aged 30, from a brain tumour, which she rarely discusses. She is an impressive activist, campaigning for a variety of issues including women’s rights in Afghanistan, Burma, South Africa, Uganda and South America. There are 10 charities she has worked with listed on her website, and in 2017 she co-wrote We: A Manifesto for Women Everywhere, a well-received book of advice for women. She has also designed two small fashion collections for Winser London, which include some gorgeous silky blouses. I found I had three in my wardrobe without knowing they were hers.

She is a Bafta nominee and Golden Globe winner, and Neil Gaiman, who cast her in the TV series of his book American Gods, said: “She is in this strange place where everything exists in the shadow of Scully, yet she is bigger and better than that.”

When I listen to her 2003 Desert Island Discs, though, she tells a darker story. In between Radiohead and Jeff Buckley, she talks of troubled mental health that she has worked ferociously hard to improve. She has been in therapy for more than 30 years.

Anderson tells me she has been teetotal since her early twenties and despite some mild probing on my part is reluctant to elaborate on exactly why. I understand. She has soon-to-be teenage children who don’t need to know about any of the “dangerous things” she has done, as she described them to Sue Lawley.

I’m fascinated by Anderson and can see why she was the perfect person to cast as the quirky, funny therapist Jean in Sex Education, which really hits its stride in the second series. While still a comedy at heart, the subject matter tackled by its fantastic young cast is revelatory. Sex Education is one of the first productions to hire an intimacy director to make the young actors feel comfortable and process what they were doing, often naked in front of multiple cameras, to be happy and authentic about what they did and feel they had input.

Anal sex, drugs, masturbation, STDs and nudity feature graphically in this show, which I would advise all parents and teens to watch, though not at the same time — only Jean would do that. When I interview Anderson I have yet to see the finale, but Jean’s journey is that of many women in the middle of their lives after divorce with teenage children.

“There’s a grief, isn’t there?” Anderson says as we discuss the menopause. “I haven’t quite got to the place where I don’t have my eggs, but your body is going to mourn that, isn’t it? I remember the very last time I breastfed and it was heartbreaking. I wept and wept through it.

“And I know people who describe particularly difficult periods at home without realising they are describing their mothers going through the menopause.

“We’re all at the point where we’re kicking off just as our teenage children are kicking off. I was looking at some home videos of Piper when she was three and wondering where all my patience came from in my twenties. I have forgotten that version of me.”

She says she doesn’t feel quite ready for her two boys to become teenagers, but sometimes Jean slips into their conversations at home.

“I find myself saying something embarrassing at the dinner table and I don’t know if it is me or if Jean has given me the licence to say that. Maybe I have always been that way, though. Some of what she shares is too much information. I wouldn’t share it, even with my eldest in her twenties. But my son came home after having a sex education class and I completely clammed up. I couldn’t bring myself to continue the conversation. I just let it die. I really don’t know why.”

Over the years Anderson has tried to schedule her roles to fit in with her children, but like many of us who have devoted much of our time to careers, she still lives with nagging doubts about doing the right thing.

How did you deal with a small child while filming back-to-back episodes of The X-Files for 16 hours a day, I ask, especially when you decided to go it alone as a mum. “I missed her, really so much. Those moments when you see a small child in the street when you are apart from yours and the conversation just drops, it’s hard. She was on a plane a lot when she was six and we moved production to the West Coast. I justified that, I mean it was selfish on my part. I just could not imagine being away from her for long periods of time.

“I became obsessed with schedules, and I still am because of that time. I would plan and colour-code everything, make a series of propositions about schedules so I could see her, and the show would either reject or accept them.

“With the boys the longest I have been away from them was during the two X-Files movies, but again I would be travelling constantly to see them.”

I ask her if she regrets working so hard. “Not yet,” she says. “I have a feeling that will come. I definitely feel like on a level I do regret Piper flying back [to her dad, when she was six] as an unaccompanied minor.” We sit in silence for a bit, mulling over the thought.

“But there’s another version of my life where I could have worked less, had a smaller life and been more present as a parent. I could have chosen that, that could happen. But sometimes it feels like why would you, if you keep getting work as an actor, doing things you dreamt of doing and being offered incredible roles at this age, while paying the bills, and you still get to see them a huge percentage of the time and they witness a mother enjoying her work?”

She has talked to her daughter about it, but says Piper is not yet at the place where the lightbulb goes on and she realises Mum was still up at 6am the days she faced 16 hours of work to be with her, or those days we all have when we are still on the edge of the sports pitch, despite the demands of a job.

But Anderson is an all-or-nothing personality. She tells me she is either on a healthy eating plan, meditating and working out or hiding like a hermit at home eating chocolate. She has been plagued by frozen shoulders all her life, leading to months of pain-filled insomnia and cortisone injections.

“My default position is sedentary,” she tells me when I ask about her meditating and yoga right now. “I like being in bed in my PJs. When I’m working, like right now, I seem to exist mostly on chocolate. Then I go through a stage when I feel dreadful and I review it all and start a food plan, torture myself counting shots of milk and all that.

“In the cycle of all or nothing, I am in the nothing phase right now. It has gone on for quite some time, but I think I am better to be around. I was having lunch with my daughter and we were just, you know, eating, not asking for stuff without oils or sugar, and she said, ‘It’s so much better when you are not in that place.’ ”

I’ve enjoyed my hour with Anderson; she is likeable and thoughtful. I sort of hope we’ll meet again one day. It’s unlikely she’ll read the interview; she has said before that she rarely does. So what do I think as I walk away from her? I’m impressed by her curious nature and, obviously, her sense of style, a blueprint for us all at this stage of life, but mostly I’m inspired by her strong sense of self. It has obviously taken quite a bit of work for her to get there, but from what I can see, it has been worth it.

@GillianA

Sex Education series 2 is available on Netflix from Friday

Hair: James Rowe at Bryant Artists. Make-up: Mary Greenwell at Premier Hair and Make-up. Nails: Saffron Goddard at Saint Luke using Sisley Hand Care

[angryhausfrau-writes]

I Travel Troubled Oceans: Chapter 5 - In Which Jack Attempts to Become a Semi-Respectable Member of Polite Society and Charles Succeeds in Becoming a Completely Disreputable Trophy Boyfriend

Max and Mr. Scott – probably mostly Mr. Scott, who still has his finger on the pulse of London real estate in a way that's almost frighteningly omniscient - somehow land Jack and company a lovely house that's been subjected to a series of absolutely atrocious renovations and sat empty since the late nineties. So Charles and Anne spend the first few weeks of laying low pulling out all of the hideous carpeting and knocking down the terrible wood paneling – and in one case, an entire (non load-bearing) wall, which they attack with sledge hammers and far, far too much glee. And Mary, bless her, spends the week sweeping and scrubbing and peeling wall paper. Until the house sits an empty shell, stripped down to the stately bones that lay beneath the shag carpeting and twee plasterwork.

Jack spends his weeks learning to play tennis.

He hadn't had much chance to learn growing up, being an impoverished guttersnipe and all, so he's got a lot of ground to catch up. Because, see, the counselor – the one who'd sided with the Spanish over Lord Hamilton, allowing for his final downfall, the one who controls all of London's planning permission, the one Max needs an in with. He absolutely adores tennis.

He adores it with all the fervor of a middle class man who'd seen it as the gentleman's game growing up. And now that he's a gentleman – by wealth and importance, if not by birth, which still stings him, bitterly, and is the reason for his overcompensation – then by God, he's going to play tennis.

And since Jack's first job from Max is to get the counselor on side, he's got to learn to play tennis too. Well enough that whatever skill level the counselor actually has, Jack can play to it, keep the games close. Just barely beat the counselor or just barely lose, but keep it close enough that he keeps coming back for more. Which takes considerably more skill than simply learning the game and playing to the best of his ability.

So Jack practices and practices and practices, all with the help of a draconian ex-professional instructor Max found for him at a mid-level club nowhere near where the counselor plays for the entire month his house is torn down around his ears.

Meanwhile, in the real world, Eleanor and Woodes Rogers's world is coming down around their ears as well. Anne pays Max enough visits that she's always flush with the latest gossip – the sort of thing that goes beyond the polite, antiseptic description that has been in the papers. And the long and short of it is that Woodes Rogers is ruined. Fired from his job, disowned from his family, and, most importantly, the rich person version of penniless.

So he just doesn't have any resources to come after them, if he even suspected anything. And he'll be lucky if he doesn't end up in jail because apparently Eleanor's creative approach to accounting has been helping him evade taxes for a good long while as well. And now that he's too poor to be protected – and his reputation too tarnished – he's looking at the possibility of a five stretch.

Eleanor will probably avoid seeing the inside of a cell, mores the pity. She's too cunning to be taken down with her husband. But her social capital is destroyed, along with a good portion of her money, used to bail out Woodes Rogers with the various criminal elements he was indebted to. And with this new revelation of her less than legal exploits, it means that she's been let go from her position as well – not because she'd done anything they hadn't asked her to do for them, of course. But because they can't bear to have even a whiff of scandal or people might stop trusting in the sanctity of the British financial system. And we can't be having that.

At any rate, all of this means that Jack is able to move in the open again, which is good because he needs to start establishing himself as a quasi-legitimate member of polite society sooner rather than later. So that second month, in addition to playing tennis, Jack starts an Instagram account detailing the renovations on his house.

There's pictures of Jack choosing furniture and wallpaper and fabric swatches and rugs. There's pictures of the interior of the house, featuring Anne as Jack's PA, scowling and holding a clipboard menacingly. And Charles appears frequently as Jack's muse/boytoy, posed artfully shirtless and oiled up and muscular.

Mary, as his new social media manager, has had a lot of good ideas about how to sell Jack as a flirty and flighty and nearly terminally stupid fashion designer and she and Jack and Max have worked hard to make him appear harmless. Someone with money and influence but who was too wrapped up in pretty clothes and pretty boys to ever use it. Someone who could approach the counselor – and offer him valuable access into the upper echelons of society – without appearing threatening to him like Lord Hamilton had been.

And the bitch of it is is that it works.

Jack applies for and gets a membership to the councilor's exclusive health club – and the approval committee explicitly comments on the settee he'd had reupholstered in yellow silk for the upstairs sitting room in his induction hearing, so at least someone's looking at his Instagram. And he begins playing tennis there, familiarizing himself with the layout and the staff and the other patrons. So he can just ever so coincidentally grab the court opposite Councilor Featherstone during his weekly Saturday morning game.

They don't talk much during the game itself, but afterwards. Afterwards...

There's the usual handshakes and good games and shows of good sportsmanship from both sides. Jack had just narrowly, ever so narrowly, eked out a victory. But the councilor had more than made him work for it.

So Jack gets invited to a rematch next week – a rematch he'll make sure the councilor wins, just as narrowly. Because you've got to leave them wanting. You've got to leave them hungry for it. And they won't be if they win the first time. But they'll give up if they don't win the second and third. So you've got to walk that fine line of wins and losses until the whole thing's a habit and they couldn't walk away even if they wanted to.

That's what made Jack such a success as a pusher – not his product, but his approach. His way of knowing people. And the councilor is so very eager to be known.

Certainly he starts off with polite inquiries into how Jack's settling into London. Questions about the house and the neighborhood and the progress of the renovation.

But Jack is quick to talk about how difficult he's finding London to navigate, compared to the Bahamas, where they've decided he'll be from. How stand-offish people can be. How it feels like they snub him every time they hear him speak, or they find out that he doesn't know so-and-so from such-and-such school.

Oh, he doesn't come out and complain about it or anything. Just hints at it. Plants little seeds for Counselor Featherstone's own complaints to blossom forth.

And he has complaints aplenty. How it's such an Old School Chums crowd. How many incompetent idiots run various departments based on legacy rather than any actual ability. How put upon Featherstone is by all of them. How they all ask him for favors and expect to give nothing in return – because he should be overjoyed they're even deigning to talk to him and why wouldn't he want to do things for them, everyone wants to do things for them.

And Jack makes the appropriate noises of understanding and commiseration without actually volunteering very much about himself. Because that's the other half of the sell. Make the mark think that you're their friend. That they know you as well as they know themselves so they'll spill all the dark – or in Featherstone's case, mildly frustrated – parts of their soul. Make yourself their confidant, the one they can always turn to, because you think just alike on all the important points. So if you ever disagree, well, it must be my dear friend Jack in the right, he would never steer me wrong.

Of course, you can't do it all at once. It has to be done slowly and carefully, so that the mark never cottons on. But, as born out by Jack shaking Councilor Featherstone's sweaty hand and promising same time next week, he's certainly made a start on it. So that ought to make Max happy.

Jack wipes the sweat from his brow with an obscenely high threadcount towel provided by the club and goes off to assess Charles's progress on the other half of Max's request. Because while Jack has been honing his tennis game and scoping out the club, Charles has been there as well, spending mornings in the gym and afternoons sunbathing by the pool in the smallest bathing suit they'll allow him to wear. Which is quite small indeed. And it's therefore no surprise that Charles has accrued rather a crowd of rich bored socialites around his little flotilla of deck chairs, drawn like moths to a sexy, sexy flame.

Charles just dangerous enough to be interesting. But safe, because he's taken and (presumably) gay. Just a sexy backdrop to their boring, catty lives. Able to blend right into the scenery.

Meanwhile, Charles listens to - and dutifully recounts to Max – all the idle gossip he becomes privy to due to his position as living ornament. Because, to Max, information is worth its weight in gold. And you wouldn't believe what kind of things you can overhear simply by being ignorable.

Plus, Jack thinks as he sets his bag down next to Charles's deck chair and he looks up at Jack from behind his knock-off Coach sunglasses, Charles is having far, far too much fun playing Jack's boyfriend.

As evidenced by him sprawling his thighs even more obscenely open and practically purring, “Hello, darling.”

An obscene mockery of Jack's own favored greeting. And a slight that will not stand.

Jack kneels between Charles's spread legs. “Hello yourself, Chaz.” Jack tilts his chin up for a brief peck on the lips. “Have a good day, dear?”

Charles further escalates things by pulling Jack down onto his lap and nuzzling against his ear. “Better now that you're here, darling.”

And Jack's going to have to do something drastic if Charles keeps this shit up.

But before Jack can retaliate, escalate, they're interrupted by tittering laughter.

“Aren't they just the cutest?” one of the rich ladies coos.

There's general agreement amongst the ladies. “And so fashionable,” one of them says, giving Jack's tennis outfit a once-over.

“Perks of the job darling,” Jack says lightly.

And then one of them – the leader, if the obscene amount of designer and diamonds she's wearing – says, “You both simply must come to my bachelorette party.” She studies her nails faux casually. “It's going to be a real rager.”

This is exactly the kind of thing Charles has been waiting for since Max assigned him this stupid job. And getting on Max's good side is infinitely preferable to even her neutral regard. So Charles'll be damned if he lets it slip through his fingers  – even if he has to play some boring bitch's gay best friend for a whole night.

He tips his fruity umbrella drink in her direction and looks at her over the salted rim. “Sounds like my kind of party.”

Jack resigns himself to a night of drunken socialites vomiting in the back of a limo. “We'll be there, darling. Never fear.”

It'll be an opportunity to move some blow, if nothing else.