#and oh my god the possibilities with this one!!

[mckinlily]

So I’m a woman in STEM, and in physics specifically that has some of the worse gender ratios out of all the sciences and right there with most engineering fields that I also worked closely with. All through my undergrad, I was told I was so lucky there were “maybe up to 10?” girls in my classes, instead of being the ONLY girl in the classroom like it was for my professors.

But you see, this wasn’t because men didn’t want women in physics. They did!! It was just women were socialized differently so they didn’t end succeeding as much (if they even tried at all—a pipeline problem that was not under the physicists’ control).

There were plenty of ways this showed up, but a big one was “Oh men don’t listen to women just because they don’t talk right.” See, women phrase their thoughts and contributions with “I think” or “I feel” or “Maybe it’s…” while men will just blast you with their opinions like it’s the word of god or some shit “ACTUALLY ITS THIS WAY”. See, it’s women’s soft way of speaking that actually disempowers themselves. Men would listen to them right away if they were just assertive. Just writing this out makes me want to puke, and very early on I was calling bullshit on it. Primarily on two accounts: 1) Why is it the woman’s communication style automatically Wrong and the man’s way is Right? Why don’t we accuse men of being failed communicators because they don’t communicate like women? Especially when both styles have advantages? Why do the men get to be assumed superior? And 2) we all know the term for an assertive woman: it’s BITCH.

But even while I could see all that bullshit, I was still pulled in by the underlying premise: if you’re just good enough—if you’re smart enough, experienced enough, competent enough, and confident enough—you will be let in and treated with respect.

So I tried to be as smart and competent and infallible as possible believing that if I did that, I would earn that respect.

Until one day, I actually managed it. I became a subject matter expert at my company. I had enough knowledge and experience to stand out among everyone else. And I did it fast. I learned more and faster than my other colleagues until I was the go-to person for multiple huge projects, even being relatively young. I was more competent, more efficient, more confident—finally able to go toe-to-toe with my male colleagues, even ones with more years of experience, on their level because I got that good.

And they treated me like SHIT.

It sucked being treated like an inferior, but it was 1000 times worse when they couldn’t believe I was inferior anymore and therefore treated me like a threat. Even the other women were less eager to back me up. The antagonism, the put downs, the way they kept me out of key conversations relevant to my job, the constant lying and gaslighting, the retaliation—

Turns out, they never meant to treat women like equals. But they held that promise out like a dangling carrot, convinced no woman could *actually* match that standard. And when one did, when I beat them at it, ALLLLL the nastiness came spewing out.

And this from guys who I had previously thought if it were decently ok!

Women act the way they do because that “female socialization” isn’t anything cute or passive or harmless. It is vicious backlash whenever they don’t—often violent backlash. Women are intelligent humans with brains very competent in opportunity v risk analysis. And if you’re a woman looking to survive or just minimize self harm—you learn very quickly which behaviors will protect you and which will get you attacked.

Don’t you dare criticize women for choosing the behaviors that are least likely to make them the targets of your cruelty and violence And girls, don’t internalize this idea that women’s ways are inferior or weak. Do what you need to do, whether that’s saving your energy for what you really care about, or throwing out patriarchy’s rules and taking the lumps that come with that. There’s no right answer when the system is built so that you’re always wrong.

Women do things that make sense. Women have always been just as logical as any human when presented with the facts of their lives which they know intimately.

Was it worth it to work hard, fight hard, and stand up for myself at my job? I don’t know. It wasn’t the “feminine” thing. It didn’t succeed in granting me the respect I wanted. It made life a lot harder for me, really. But I also found out that I’m a lot stronger and more skilled than I thought I was. I learned a lot of cool science.

And I left that job. Because I could see there was no path left for me to be respected that.

TLDR: Women aren’t “assertive” because men turn into raging lunatic de-aged monsters when they are. That’s some pretty strong negative reinforcement

a lot of behaviors that get attributed to "female socialization" can be so much more easily and accurately understood as a person recognizing the power differential surrounding them and behaving sensibly in response to that.

like. does a woman politely listen to a man monologue at her because of some experience she had when she was twelve that magically cursed her to behave that way forever, or does she do it because the man has the power to hurt her and she knows it?

does a woman do all the dishes in her household because she is less capable of breaking out of a long-ago conditioned response than, like, your average trained dog, or is she doing that because she knows that all the men in the house will blame her if she doesnt and will make life worse for her if she speaks up?

maybe a lot of sexist patterns of behavior that are widely observed in society arent caused by women like, lacking willpower or backbone? maybe it is super fucking weird for supposedly feminist movements to imply this is the case when they talk about female socialization as the end all, be all of predicting human behavior?

isnt it both more useful and more respectful toward women to consider that they are perceiving their present circumstances accurately, and recognize when power is already being wielded against them, and take logical measures to deescalate and protect themselves because it works? is it not fucking clear to everybody that trans women in particular have to do this all the fucking time?

[starkeysbabygirl]

𝜗𝜚 rafe cameron x dancer! reader✨

𝜗𝜚 just a little something that popped into my mind about getting face fucked by rafe after seeing this photo of drew — please keep in mind i literally wrote this while at work when i had the down time and i haven’t written ANYTHING in MONTHS!😭🤞🏼it’s rushed and all over the place, not edited☠️ butttttt it’s done now it’s time to hide🫣

𝜗𝜚 cw: throat fucking, nose pinching, slapping, some degradation, i think that’s it?

“rafe! we’re in the dance studio, we can’t…” you gasp in shock.

“shhh, it’ll be okay baby girl. trust me?” rafe presses his index finger to your lips as he whispers in your ear.

you blush and nod your head. that’s all it takes for rafe to take control as he shoves you down to your knees.

you look up at him with innocent eyes, completely lost in how damn good looking rafe was, especially in this moment. he was in jeans and a plaid button up with a few buttons loose showing off his chest. it was such a simple outfit but it drove you wild, wanting and needing rafe in all ways possible.

your eyes wander down, watching as rafe unbuckles his belt and shoves his jeans and boxers down just enough for his pierced cock to spring free, his tip already with precum. his dick was rock hard and throbbing, ready to ravage your throat.

“you’re going to look so god damn pretty with your spit and my cum dripping from that filthy little mouth of yours. don’t ya think?” rafe rasps, gripping your chin and making you look up into his eyes.

“please, rafe. i need you. now, please” you beg. you reach for rafe’s cock but he grips your hand and shoves it behind your back. you huff knowing he just wants full control.

“nuh uh. no hands princess. m’going to fuck your face so hard you’re going to be a blabbering mess when i’m done with you.” rafe smirks.

“oh fuck rafe, need your cock in my mouth, please?!” you practically scream.

“i love it when you beg, such a good little slut f’me. ready to feel my big cock on that sweet, sweet tongue hmm?”

“yes, rafe! yes! give it to me, can’t take it any longer!”

rafe wastes no time as he shoves his cock into your mouth, hitting the back of your throat. he thrusts in and out at a brutal pace making you choke on his dick. you try gasping for air but rafe was beyond feral and with one hand he grabs the back of your head forcing your throat deep onto his cock. the other hand lands a harsh slap to your cheek.

“atta girl. just a whore for my cock aren’t ya?” rafe pinches your nose, making it even harder for you to breathe and tilts your head so you can see yourself in the mirror, mouth full of cock. “shit, you’re such a good girl. look at you, you’re making such a mess. doing so fucking well f’me. m’so close already baby girl.” rafe’s groans fill the empty room.

“i just know your pussy is soaked, fuck i can’t wait to get a taste later” you look up, hopeful, and so desperate for rafe to touch you. he winks at you while his cock his slides out and back in.

rafe’s thrusts start to become frantic and sloppy and you know he’s about to cum.

“FUCK! here it comes princess, now swallow it. swallow every single drop like the good fucking slut you are.” rafe thrusts to the hilt and his cock pulses, ropes of cum hit the back of your throat. he slowly starts to pull his dick out but not before you suck on his tip and give it a pop as you back away and wipe your mouth with the back of your hand.

“mmm, wow. rafe, that was…” you begin to say as you get up while watching rafe pull his pants up and buckle his belt.

“fucking fantastic? yeah, it was” rafe says. he grabs you by the waist pulling you into his chest and gives your head a kiss.

“now fucking kiss me on the lips rafe” you demand, getting on your tippy toes.

“whatever my girl wants, she gets.” rafe smashes his lips onto yours. nevermind the fact that your mouth was full of his cock and cum just seconds ago.

tagging some moots: @cameronsprincess @rafesthroatbaby @rafesheaven @oceandriveab @bloodibambiidoll @cameronwillow 🫣

[wandixx]

Seriously chaotic fashion misadventures

I realized I posted a teaser and never really followed up on it, so here is some more of that

“Hey, Dami?”

Boy hadn’t looked up from the kittens he was bottle feeding but let out a hum indicating he listened.

“I'm thinking about trying out a more girlish style. Do you think it would suit me?”

Well, Damian had no idea but if Dani wished to give it a chance, then, well, the only proper reaction was to offer his aid.

*-*-*

“Father, I require access to your rouge gallery.”

Bruce almost choked on his breakfast when his youngest made this announcement.

Rouge gallery, as his children playfully called it, was vast collection of lipsticks, which he collected to uphold his Brucie persona. Famous playboy with head constantly in the clouds couldn’t not show up with discreet signs of scandal from time to time. And it couldn’t always be the same shade. Or scent when he choose more subtle approach and used one of his more feminine perfumes.

In all honesty, he enjoyed this.

But that’s not the point, point was that Damian wanted to use it and Bruce needed to know what disaster would fall upon him if he agreed.

“Mind telling me why, chum?”

Dick, who visited Manor for a weekend, barely stifled his laughter while Tim stared at his empty coffee mug like it personally betrayed him. Cass just wore her usual knowing and mischievous smile.

Damian shifted in his chair, hands clenching on butter knife. He was nervous and suddenly Bruce dreaded the answer he was about to hear.

“I don’t see how me sharing this information would change anything. It won’t be used to cause harm to anyone but it’s necessary in the extracurricular project I just started.”

“Dami, what project?” Dick asked, voice oozing with genuine curiosity and excitement. He was almost bouncing.

“I don’t want to disclose it.”

“Is this a hero or civilian type of deal?”

Damian didn’t look any of them in the eyes, both hands clenching on his seat as he kept shifting. Bruce narrowed his eyes. Was his youngest… flustered?

“Civilian”

“Alright, great” Dick swung back with single clap, almost tripping his chair over “I think B won’t have anything against you using his rouge gallery, will he?” Man knew his oldest son well enough to recognize his ‘don’t you dare to disagree’ tone. He was confused but there wasn’t any harm so he nodded with affirmative hum.

“Thank you, Father”

Boy practically inhaled rest of his food and rushed outside. Despite all his training and all his efforts, they clearly saw his excitement. Tim pinched himself and returned to staring at his mug.

“Cass, have you seen what I’ve seen or am I overreacting?” Dick asked, barely restraining his enthusiasm. Girl nodded eagerly, shoving more crumbs into her mouth. Young man cheered, throwing his hands up.

“What have I missed?” Tim mumbled, frowning a little.

“BABY BAT HAS A CRUSH!”

Cass nodded again with wide smile.

Oh.

Oh no.

Who were they? What did he know about them? Was Protocol 3r0s started? Did someone run a background check already? What could they do if they somehow hurt Damian? Was this person a risk to their identities? Oh gods, oh no.

He probably will have to do The Talk™.

He always dreaded having The Talk, with any of his kids. He felt The Talk with Damian would be even worse. Understandably so.

“Also sleep in at least three da-”

“Fuck off, dick.”

“Was this insult or-”

His children remained obvious to how much work it meant, cheering and sassing each other like they often did.

*-*-*

Damian did not know how it was possible but he lowered his guard enough to get caught.

"What are you doing?" Brown choked out after they stared at each other for a long moment.

"It does not concern you–"

"You're rummaging through my wardrobe, not many things concern me more and also, that's frickin creepy don't do it to anyone outside of the family"

She did have a point however he was not convinced it would be the correct approach if he shared his plan. Father's wards (even unofficial like Brown) tended to make assumptions and overreact based on these conjectures. Dani wasn't easy to scare off but he didn't want to check if his family would manage. They often did things thought to be impossible.

He tried to get away but the blonde stood fiercely in a door, leaving the window as the only way out. He wasn't this desperate. Yet.

Girl looked more and more angry at his silence. He had to give her some answers.

Now that he actually considered it, she could be a useful asset. She was far better versed in women's fashion and if he phrased it correctly, he wouldn't even need to bribe her. Question was, how should he phrase it?

"I have an acquaintance- I have a friend," he corrected himself "from the animal shelter I volunteer at. She mentioned wanting to try out more 'girlish style' and asked for my opinion. I wanted to see if you had any clothes that would fit her. She is smaller than me so I thought that whatever I take, it wouldn't be missed." 

Brown grinned with an unsettling gleam in her eyes. He suddenly regretted opening his mouth if not coming to this room in the first place. 

"Say no more, I have a plan Demon Child"

[marsmaximoff]

💔; crimson pain -a different kind of blood

content warning: gn!reader who plays as number 028. (dating) angst. mentions of death, financial struggles, vomit, blood and fainting.

word count: 1935. i got a bit too carried away 😬

author’s note: finally, here it is. i’ve had this idea for so long but the universe wasn’t on my side, it seems. i really wanted to post it sooner 🥲. as always, constructive criticism is welcomed, and i apologize for the mistakes (english is my third language). oh, and tysm for the support on the jun-ho headcanons post! what do you mean over 1000 likes? that is insane 🤧🤧. i hope you’ll enjoy this one too. 🩷🩷🩷🩷

the sugary umbrella lays on your shaky hand, under the excruciating yet unmasked gaze of the soldier. once the ‘pass’ is given, you stand up ready to get out of there. “you made it!” the voice of the one that has become the closest thing to a friend you could have in here relaxes you ever so slightly. “i almost didn’t. can’t believe i’m adding umbrellas to my traumas list.” having chosen the hardest doesn't surprise you much, not with unluckiness being a part of your life since you can remember. “well, im just happy you did. i thought the square was simple, but now i feel like we should have just chosen the triangle instead, you know? take a look at the survivors; most of them chose it and….” his words fade as an eerie feeling takes over your body, like something’s wrong. turning around, you’re met with one of them, staring right at you completely stiff, not even holding the weapon, merely some feet away.

“is he looking at us?” he can sense the uneasiness too, it seems. “let’s just go.” you can still feel his unfamiliar gaze on your neck, sending a shiver down your spine.

the doors opening break the silence and the rare calmness of the room. “player 028?” your body freezes completely. a stomach drop follows, and your heart rate skyrockets. no. nonono. you’ve done nothing wrong. is it the dalgona? the figure was perfectly carved out; you made sure of it. are they gonna kill you? two soldiers stand by the entrance, waiting. with a final glance at your friend, who is most definitely thinking the same, you reach the pink guards. you don’t even know what to say, should you beg for mercy? try to stay as cooperative as possible? “be quick.” what? the other one grabs your arm and begins to lead you somewhere. “i-i don’t-” your hands are shaking. “please, i didn’t do anything wrong...” begging it is. “keep. walking.” the words are almost a whisper, tho demanding. a hint of desperation can be heard as well. “okay, okay, ok-” wait. why did those words- no. you’re going crazy. it’s just the anxiety, the fear. 

the stranger takes you to the bathrooms and quickly closes the door. you step back. again. and once more. what now? he wouldn’t shoot you here, right? and why the hell does he look so tense? his hands move to his mask and make it disappear, and with it, the remaining bit of sanity you had.

the nausea from a few seconds ago comes back stronger, maybe you will die today. “jun-ho…” your voice is almost unrecognizable, tho a miracle, given the struggle breathing has become. “what are you doing here?” “i could ask you the same thing.” he’s angry, of course he is, but the hurt in his eyes pains you the most. “no….you need to get out of here.” god. you can feel yourself spiraling. nothing makes sense. “i will. and im taking you with me.” “h-how- when did- i-“ cold sweat has completely taken over your palms. “wait….wait. was it you?…. this morning?” he nods. “i found the damn card they gave you at yours and my brother’s house” what? “in-ho…?” why does everything keep getting worse? “have you seen him?” surely you would remember something like that, “n-no. maybe before the first game…..” you heed your legs’ warning to give up and sit down. “why are you doing this? i dont understand.” it’s not like he could. “they let you out. and you didn’t seek me. you hid yourself. again. i had to learn what was going on from a random man at the station. not you!!” silence between you had never felt this suffocating before, nor the atmosphere so uncanny. “don’t you realize how dangerous this is? they are killing innocent people! haven’t you realized?! 79 have died today. just because of a stupid cookie? what do you think you are doing?! you could have gotten yourself killed! you have no idea how worried i’ve been.” you don’t look at him. this shouldn’t be happening, he wasn’t supposed to find out.

“please, honey. this is insane and you know it. let’s get out of this madness.” the change in his tone of voice is evident, bordering the plea. it’s obvious he’s making an effort to remain calm, to use less confrontational comments. “i can’t.” “yes, you can. we’ll leave the same way i got here, don’t worry. no one will see us.” but you really can’t. you know that well. he sighs, “why didnt you tell me? how could you hide something like this from me? i thought we trusted each other.” 

distress seems to have replaced the blood running through your veins. “i would have helped you, always. i can still do it. if you need money, i’ll give it to you, it’s not a problem.” he keeps going after your negative. “i will. we can find another way-” “there isn't.” “of course there is. i have my savings, we’ll use them. i can ask for a raise. mr kim owes me after all this time. and i could do more hours-”

“its not FUCKING ENOUGH!” the sharpness of your words cuts all over his face. pain flows out, dripping a bloody red. more silence. you could drown in it. well, in for a penny, in for a pound.

“my parents’ house is gonna get seized.” a burning throat accompanies the confession. “i messed up like crazy.” the expected embarrassment doesn’t show up, instead, regret does. “it’s not your fault.” how can he say that? “it is. i got them into this, I'll get them out.” “and you think risking your life here is the only way to do it? thats not true. god, why didn’t you tell me?” you rub your temple. “that doesn’t matter now. you-you need to get out, all this is suspicious.” you are not only trying to avoid the question, the guards could notice at any moment. “i told them you were gonna throw up.” “vomit or not you’re still in the bathroom with a player.” for some seconds, the only noise that can be heard is the shatter of your heart. “honey, listen to me. your parents wouldn’t want this. they don’t even blame you, im sure. how could they ever wish for something at the expense of their daughter’s life?” but the guilt is too heavy, too imprinted on your mind. “it’s not about me. if it were my house, i wouldn’t care, but it’s theirs. i would never forgive myself for not doing anything.” “and there are so many things you could do that don’t need you participating in some psychopaths’ games! do you really not see how dangerous and demented this is? please leave with me.” “jun-ho. think about it. if i ended up here, even after they gave us a second chance, it’s because i want to. no one forced me, and i’m old enough to know what i’m doing.” your replies are getting colder, which you hate. but it’s the only way to make him understand. “besides, they’re all kids' games. they’re easy.” you can only hope he won’t sense your attempt at self-persuasion. “they are shooting people. you could be dead. and i would have never seen you again, or known what had happened.” the urge to cry gets stronger with every word, to dive into his arms and finally feel some sort of calmness, warmth, love.

“i’m sorry that i hurt you, that i made you worry and feel like i couldn’t trust you. but i won’t apologize for being here.” “i don’t want you to apologize. i only want you to get out of here and not die.” his desperation has increased so much it’s swallowed your own distress. “i’ve already won two, i can make it to the end.” you refute. but you read him easily, he is planning to get you out without your agreement, somehow.

“please.” now it’s you that pleads. “if you love me, let me stay.”

his eyes widen, you see them watering. his heartbreak drowns out yours. you are aware you’ve never said anything as painful before. it hurts. more than anything they could do to you here. perhaps you are already dead. “how can you ask me something like this?” maybe you’re desperate, or too blinded by the blame that’s rotting on your insides. or perhaps it’s love. “get out of here. stay safe. and don’t tell the police, jun-ho. don’t even think about stopping the games. i need this, don’t ruin it.” god you don’t recognize yourself anymore. how nice it would be to go back when things were easy. when remorse didn’t control yourself, and you were happy with him. “what do you expect me to do if you die?” “i won’t” “you can’t know that! how can i let the love of my life risk it all when i know i could do something?” understanding such perspective is effortless. if it were the other way around, you too would act like he is.

you approach him for the first time, god how you craved it. your hands cup his pained yet beautiful face and a tear drops. “i missed you.” he says quietly, unable to stay angry at you for long. “i missed you too.” you answer back, wiping the tear. “i missed your face, your voice, your touch. i miss your kisses.” things already ache enough like this, so you give in. the kiss is soft, so fragile, like a bit more intensity would make it disappear. “i love you.” he whispers resting his forehead on yours. “i love you too.”

a knock on the door destroys the illusion. shit. “lay on the floor.” “what?” “lay on the floor”, he repeats, walking towards the door while putting his mask back on, “and play along.” the door opens and the same voice from earlier speaks. “what do you think you’re doing in there?” may that unluckiness give you a rest for some minutes. “she passed out. she was taking too long and not answering back so i entered and found her unconscious.” footsteps grow louder. “player 028…. i don’t remember any health issues on the file… fuck.” you stay as still as possible, it sounds plausible, given the stress. “take care of it, i’ll let the boss know. and don’t take longer.” with that, he exits the room, and you thank his unwillingness to deal with sensitive issues.

sitting back up, jun-ho kneels to your level. “you look good for a faint.” a hint of a smile appears on your face. “are you mad at me?” “i was. mostly worried. i don’t like this at all.” you grab his gloved hands. “i’ll be okay, believe me.” he doesn’t. he can’t. “please, be careful. and think about it. if you change your mind, i’ll be waiting.” you won’t. you wouldn’t let yourself. but you nod. “you’re the best thing that’s ever happened to me. i hope you’ll carry that with you. i love you so damn much.” his voice breaks, and you tell yourself it’s time to go back, this conversation can only get more and more devastating for you both. you offer the bleeding and broken pieces of your heart. not meaning to cut him this time. and he takes them. how could he not treasure them? you kiss again. it tastes different this time. like farewell. 

and when you get out of the room, you both know that was the last time you’ll see each other. 

[bilboyagathechickenfootedhobbit]

One of my friends daughters lost her foot to cancer when she was five. She gets steeply discounted prosthetics through the state, but the process is so long and harrowing that her parents have to start it almost as soon as she receives a new leg, to guarantee she’ll get her new new one by the time she outgrows the one she just got. And when the process takes too long? You have a constantly growing young girl with a too small prosthetic pinching her stump, limiting her movement, and causing her pain and discomfort (all of this on top of being a kid with a prosthetic and the bullying that entails). I tried to help them with it one time and got so frustrated after ten minutes I gave up. They persevered because duh she’s their daughter, but oh my god, it was almost a second job just dealing with getting her the NECESSARY prosthetics she needed to get around!! And they have to do this all the damn time until she stops growing and even then, they’ll need replacements. It seemed like it was deliberately set up to be as frustrating as possible to make people give up.

BOUNTIFUL, Utah (KUTV) — After weeks of fighting their health insurance's denial of coverage, the Bateman family from Utah has not only secured a prosthetic arm for their 9-year-old daughter Remi, but has also helped another child receive the same life-changing device.

Remi's mother, Jami Bateman, shared that after their insurance provider Select Health deemed the prosthetic "not medically necessary," the family launched a GoFundMe campaign. The response was overwhelming, with the fundraiser quickly exceeding its goal.

"The GoFundMe got reposted. We exceeded well over the goal," Jami said. "I was contacted by the CEO of CrowdHealth. They decided to pick up the bill and paid for Remi's arm in full. It's just been amazing."

Because the CEO offered to pay for Remi's arm, the Batemans used the funds raised to pay for a boy in Maryland's prosthetic arm.

The viral story didn't just help Remi — her family's campaign also caught the attention of another family with an 8-year-old boy named Taj from Maryland, who will now receive the same "Hero Arm" prosthetic.

"I wasn't able to do this for Taj for Christmas," Taj's mother said, "but thought 'maybe next summer, we'll be able to get [the arm]'."

Jami Bateman hopes their story brings joy to both families.

[lusanchromchinnn]

Viago De Riva your Undiagnosed But Extremely Obvious OCD is fascinating and so so revealing of your character and motivations ohh my gosh. Like of course your obsession is poisons and being poisoned! I refuse to believe that growing up adjacent to the royal court wasn’t the driving force behind this because literally where else would someone hear so many stories of people succumbing to assassination by poison. I bet nobles were dropping like flies to the crows every day. I bet he saw his father’s food taster (we know he visited during Viago’s youth) and realised how truly possible it was to die from a bite of food. Bonus points if he actually witnessed a food taster keel over in front of him. Paranoia through the fucking roof as he researches poisons for years on end before he’s ever presented with the option of joining the crows. Maybe he only drank out of clear glasses he could hold up to the light. Maybe he insisted on preparing all of his own meals rather than let servants near his food, much to the chagrin of his mother. AND OH GOD HIS MOTHER.

We know she was an alcoholic, and that Viago hated her drinking, it scared him as a small child. But what if his mind won’t let him watch her sip a glass of wine without the image of it being her last. She could be a target as a mistress of the king, just as he is as a royal bastard. Perhaps he becomes the one who uncorks her bottles and pours her glass after glass, because he’d rather her drunk over dead. Of course, there’s the very real possibility she succumbs to alcohol poisoning, which is so ironic and so fucking sad. He pours her final glass and becomes what he fears most.

It’s a no-brainer that he joined the crows later on. Not only does it give him access to the poisons and antidotes he’s craved for years, but it gives him a sense of control. He’s making himself less of a target than his half-siblings (and it’s more socially acceptable for a crow to wear gloves constantly lmao). He’s so skinny because he refuses to eat unless he’s 100% positive his food is safe, checking and double checking even if he prepares it himself. He knows, logically, that his fears are unfounded, that he (or someone he trusts completely like Teia) made this dish, or poured this drink. But he needs to be sure, or his brain won’t stop screaming that he’s going to die! Right now! God forbid he’s proven right too, like with the adder in the wardrobe that he survived because of his doses of antivenom. I just knowww his compulsions got so much worse for a while after that, it was so cathartic and miserable for him. I understand this freak and his freak ways. What a guy, thank you Courtney Woods.

[yomi-art]

i went through hell for that damned jacket. i need to kiss whoever made it

[bonbonly]

𝐓𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐡𝐞 𝐅𝐚𝐥𝐥𝐞𝐧

𝐬𝐮𝐦𝐦𝐚𝐫𝐲: heavily inspired by hannibal - after hearing tons of praise in regards to psychiatrist!max verstappen, you decide to test your luck and see what his true colors are 𝐰𝐚𝐫𝐧𝐢𝐧𝐠𝐬: this is a dark fic! you have been warned! do not read if you're not comfortable with dark fics or any of the following in this fic: dubcon, drugging/aphrodisiac, knife play, cunnilingus, p in v, character death, reader is not a good person, blood/gore, slapping 𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐮𝐧𝐭: 5k 𝐚𝐮𝐭𝐡𝐨𝐫'𝐬 𝐧𝐨𝐭𝐞: i want to give a special shoutout to @gokyrts because look at the abomination she's made me write, oh my god...

"mr. verstappen's skills knows no bounds, but the only ones being bound under his spell are the countless patients he must've paid to spread his work as if it were a gospel," you echoed the words that you wrote onto your laptop, the rough draft being filled with small notes on the side of the document to remind you of any criticism of the man that you might've missed the first time. your fingers drummed against the keys of your laptop, your brows furrowed as you tried to find another sentence to add. to spite him. to inform him that he had to be a greedy, money hungry hoax. your friends always told you that his appointments were so relaxing, they were very helpful but you saw through his lies. you knew that something had to be up. working as a forensic scientist for the BAU, and secretly organizing a crime blog under a pseudonym, you've racked up enough credentials to be under verstappen's radar. perhaps he was the only one that knew about the blog, and it irked you.

he mentioned once after you stopped by his office to request his presence in the lab. direct orders from your boss, you stated, making it very clear with your tone that you didn't ask for it. you'd rather die than have him near the corpse, stealing all the credit that should rightfully go to you. the depths you went to find the real perpetrator days later was overshadowed by the single fact that verstappen had walked in and saw a petal of a rose just underneath the right calf of the corpse. a careless mistake, he told your boss, but one that could be easily tweaked if you had just scheduled an appointment with him so he could discuss parts of your childhood that you locked away, buried underneath your heels so that every time you stomped around, you imagined it to be the throat of your parents. you were told to accompany the psychiatrist back to his office, and when you dropped him off he merely smiled at you, his dutch accent infiltrating your ears, "you always miss the details, which is surprising because you never seem to do it under your blog, caroli- i mean, ms. (l/n)."

your blood ran cold at his words, and you stumbled out of his office with a hardened glare. he was reading your blog, and had somehow directed it to you. how did he know? there was no possible way for him to know. you worked for the fbi, for peter's sake, you knew how to tidy up evidence, to be careful when lurking through unclear waters. how did the bastard know about this? so, when you typed up the new article criticizing his work and suggesting that he might be behind the disappearance of a few colleagues of yours, you knew he would read it. with full confidence, you wanted him to read it and storm into your office ready to snap your neck.

but he never did. in fact, he never even looked at you at all the next day. or the day after. or the week after. he smiled at your associates, then locked himself in his room, welcoming in patients and booking appointments for the ones too timid to ask him for one. during a lunch break, you walked past his hallway and pressed your ear against his door to listen in to an appointment he had with your friend. the shattering of glass, a muffled scream, the sound of a bullet, metal cracking against her skull, any sound would do for you. you just needed one piece of evidence, but you received none. your friend walked out unscathed, a happy smile on her face as she greeted you back in the lab. your eyes cast down to your hands, a feeling of momentary guilt rising in your gut. you wanted to forge your hands into the fire for writing that article and painting him in a bad light; no favorable colors, no accurate brush strokes, a half-assed attempt where the paint bled through the canvas, seeping through the lines that you carefully concocted. it didn't make sense, you were so sure of it! all the victims -charles, lewis, carlos, daniel - your good friends who were missing had one thing in common: they had booked appointments with verstappen before their disappearance. they also were in contention to get a promotion, daniel had also been a psychiatrist, eagerly waiting for his new life to become the head of the department one day. it was a risky move, but you figured that if you pushed his buttons enough, he'd slip up. he'd expose himself, he'd make a mistake and then you'd have him trapped. the entire BAU would understand that they had a criminal right under their noses this entire time.

for this entire plan to succeed, you had to do a few things. your first plan was to write more articles on your secret blog. while the BAU was scratching their heads about how their confidential cases were being exposed so easily, you were dropping bombshell after bombshell on your blog, your finger always pointing to the psychiatrist that would now look at you across the room with a deadly glint in his eyes. his lips were always in a thin line, and occasionally you caught him smirking whenever you'd miss a detail during analysis. you were predictable to him, and you needed to find a way to defeat him at his own game. there was a reason as to why he hadn't exposed you yet, perhaps the lack of evidence but you realized that there was something about you that made him keep quiet. you had power over him, the thought of it made you giggle uncontrollably at your desk one day, spinning around your chair like a little school girl. the second plan was to use his own tricks against him, which meant finally noticing the smaller details, being smarter than the rest of the team and most importantly, being incredibly fast. whether it be responding to your boss, showing up to a meeting, scavenging a crime scene to find clues or evidence, you had to be first. this entire time the team thought of him as reliable because he was the first one present at all times. you had to change that, had to show the team that the tide was turning to your favor. you noticed the way he'd bite the inside of his cheek, the light illuminating from the side would highlight his cheekbones, the dent a shadow amongst the very little light on his face.

and then finally, the third part of your plan. book the appointment with him. this one hurt your ego the most, but in order to catch him you had to stoop down to his level. making him think that you were willing to open up to him should give him the opportunity to do the same with you, and once vulnerable you could easily coax the truth out of him. you sat across from him on a velvet chair, legs crossed as your eyes traveled around the room, memorizing the layout of his office and the objects that were on display.

"lots of cars i see here," you pointed towards one large model of an RB19 on his shelf. he buried his hands in his pockets, teetering on his toes as he let out a small chuckle,

"i like things that are fast. things that fly, speed through... run," the last word sent shivers down your spine, but you swallowed the bile that threatened to rise and forced a smile at him.

"care for a drink? i got some wine if you'd like?" he walked over to the stand of champagne bottles on display. the glass sparkled under the light, its contents swishing around with each step that he took closer. it reminded you of your guts wanting to spill out and as he grabbed the bottle's neck, you gulped and felt the ghost of his hands tightening around yours. with a cough, you shook your head but he rolled his shoulders in a way of disbelief and stalked over to you with a wine glass in his hand, "please, i think you need it. it's ok, it'll help you relax."

the liquid pooled down your throat, but you kept your eyes open in fear that he might take advantage of you like this. you couldn't let your guard down, not like this. you watched as he settles down on the couch directly across from you, his legs spread out giving you an ample view of what you assumed to be his cock fighting to be restrained in his pants but with a firm snap of his fingers, your eyes flicker up to his face and then you saw the smallest hint of a smile on his face. you hadn't seen one in weeks.

"so why exactly did you book this appointment?" he asked, tilting his head. his hands clasped together, the forefingers coming up to touch his lips. you shrugged in response, before quickly shaking your head. shit, you needed to follow along with the plan you made!

"just... just been having some bad nightmares about my past," you responded. the topic of your parents was sensitive, one that you kept hidden for many years after you graduated high school. their death was their own doing, but somehow you felt that you had a part in it. had the murderer been you, it would've made no difference because the guilt remained. the bystander was far worse than the actual criminal. your mother's head rolling down the hill as your father watched with a twisted back. you winced at the memories, the glass slipping from your hands, "fuck!"

max watched your reactions carefully. his eyes were drawn to the way your fingers hovered over the glass, almost afraid that it would grab you. you paid no mind to the wine stain, but the countless apologies that spilled from your lips was music to his ears. he wanted to hear you say them, but in a very different circumstance. he read every article you wrote, he noticed your shift in behavior around him. he was a psychiatrist; if you wanted to play mind games with him, he was already ten steps ahead. while guiding you to stand near the shelf of cars, he went over to his closet to grab the broom and dustpan. he took off his coat, rolling the sleeves of his shirt before crouching down to gently grab the large pieces of glass. he dragged his finger onto the pool of wine on the floor and licked a long stripe, "such a shame. i always hate seeing my appetite go to waste."

the appointment was cut short much to your chagrin. your carelessness, you thought to yourself, you just didn't understand why you kept making small mistakes like this. you had to train your mind to be better. you sighed and gave one last glance to the RB19 model when you noticed the initials D.R. in italics on the edge of the car. before you could step closer, you felt strong arms grab onto your shoulders, guiding you out the door, "ms. (l/n), i am so sorry about what happened here. i would love to hear more about your past, but perhaps in a setting that might not scare you too much. dinner at my house, maybe? would that be an offer you're willing to take up?"

you frowned at his words, wriggling away from his touch, "you invite all your patients to your house for dinner?"

"only the ones i believe i have a strong connection with," he responded, licking his lips as he leant against the doorframe. you tapped your heels a couple times, thinking the offer over. if you declined, you'd have to come back to his stupid office. but... but if you accepted, you'd be able to catch him in his environment - and while he had the advantage of home ground - he definitely had to be hiding things there.

"you mind if i bring a friend over?" you asked, and he smiled,

"the more the merrier, but i don't think we can talk about your history then."

"it's ok. we can talk about my life later."

"6:30 at my place, i'll send the address down to you shortly."

"oh, mr. verstappen, dinner is very lovely! did you make this all by yourself?" your friend asked while taking a bite of the lasagna. her words are tuned out as you shifted through your food with a fork. the darkness of the dining room did little to ease any of your fears. you had walked in feeling confident, ready to tackle the monster down with your bare hands, but his kindness. his professionalism. his unwavering stare. they all made you feel as if you were being suffocated. you didn't have much energy in you to continue with the fake conversations. excusing yourself to use the bathroom to then explore his mansion would be too cliche, he'd be waiting for you to do it anyway. being too predictable would bore him, which would mean the chances of you being killed would be higher.

"not liking the food, ms. (l/n)?" max asked, his eyes flickering down to the food he cooked being tossed around like a bird amongst hyenas.

"no, i'm just... not very hungry, unfortunately," you responded, grabbing the wine to drink.

"a bite wouldn't hurt. just one bite, i spent hours cooking for tonight," he chuckled, and your friend kicked your leg under the table, her eyes narrowing at you to take a bite. you could already hear what she was saying in her mind. the poor man went out of his way for dinner and here you are, being a rude guest! with a very reluctant sigh, you grab hold of the fork and let your teeth sink onto the lasagna, the flavor melting into your tastebuds as you let out a slow hum of approval. it tasted nice, very nice actually. so you took another bite, and then another. her appetite's back, your friend laughed and max nodded his head, smiling at you.

but when dessert rolled in, you felt uneasy. your insides felt empty, as if craving for something that you couldn't quite place. your thighs clenched together as your gripped onto the arms of the chair. you couldn't make out whatever max was saying. he was asking you if you were alright, but his eyes asked a different question. you hadn't noticed how big his eyes were before, or the fact that his pupils were so dilated. how did you miss that detail before? was he always like this? you quickly excused yourself, running to the bathroom but each brush of your thigh under the thigh made you choke on air, your mind hazy. upon locking yourself inside, you immediately collapsed onto the ground, your head in your hands. you felt strong pair of hands around your waist, groping at your tits that spilled out of your dress - or was it be ripped off of you? your pussy bare against the cold dampness of the room, your mouth propped open with fingers as the sweet taste of an apple made its way. your jaw was sore at how your teeth delved into the fruit and stood rooted there as your arms were bound above your head. was that the woody scent of a candle, or the fireplace that was underneath you? where was that burning sensation? under you... or inside you? your legs were being spread apart, the itchy rope curling around your limbs to make sure you wouldn't move. you opened your eyes lazily to see a figure with dirty blonde hair at the end of the table, his shiny teeth visible amongst the evil grin you saw.

"my favorite meal... all to myself." he whispered, letting his tongue rake over your glistening folds. your strangled moans are swallowed by the apple in your mouth, your body aching for more as his nose nudges your clit. his teeth nip at your labia, tongue invading your womanhood as you can't do anything but scream out loud, drooling from the corners of your mouth. his tongue rolls your clit around, lapping at any juice that seeps from your cunt. he wants to ensure your taste is on his tongue forever. the sweetest dessert that one would ask for. his fingers spread your mound to get a good look at his masterpiece and he lets his saliva stalk down to your pussy before harshly rubbing your clit. when you finally look past your tits to see who this figure was: your heart stopped at the sight of max staring down at you with a predatory look.

you screamed as you woke up in your bed, cold sweat dripping down your forehead. you glanced down to your hands, your feet, your clothes that covered your body. you looked around your room, unsure as to how you were back in your bedroom. it felt real... was it real? you couldn't tell. you pulled the waistband of your panties down, check to see if you were still a wet mess. nothing. laying back down on your bed, you placed a hand on your heaving chest and ran your free hand down your face. what just happened? what was going on? you had to find out, you had to get to the bottom of this.

which meant having to go back to his house. on guard, and once again with someone. you decided to bring a colleague that you despised, but it would be better to sacrifice her than your friend.

you sat across the dining table, and despite how predictable it was, you excused yourself to the bathroom, keeping note as to how his eyes focused on your ass. never miss the details, you thought to yourself. you headed to the bathroom, opening the door to turn the lights on before shutting the door. with a few fake thuds just outside the bathroom door, you took your heels off and carefully took them with you around the staircase. with the layout of the house, the dining room wouldn't give clear access to the left side of the kitchen. which meant that the pantry could be entered carefully without him noticing. your colleague was busy entertaining him about her vacation in milan, her loud voice thunderous enough to rattle the house... and enough to mask the creaking of the pantry door as you slipped inside. it was cold, almost like entering the arctic as you pulled out a tiny flashlight to guide you through the foreign place. the meat hung forlornly from the hooks, the torse of a pig on display. you frowned at the ink patterns on the meat, and you hesitantly turned it around. you'd seen these marks before somewhere. a vacation trip with your friends that you planned one evening. someone had dragged you into the pool as a prank and when you floated to the surface, spluttering out the chlorine water, your hands found the shoulders of a man inked with tattoos on his back. it was lewis. your flashlight slipped out of your hands and clattered onto the metal railings.

"fuck, fuck, fuck!" you hissed, scrambling to grab the small material. you were delighted that your suspicions were correct, that this entire time you were right about verstappen. but you needed to get out. you could see the shadow of footsteps underneath the pantry door. there was a back entrance to the pantry, and you stumbled towards it. from the corner of your eye you noticed a bottle of liquid and you uncapped it with your teeth, chugging the liquid down. you really needed some wine to calm your nerves down at the moment. letting the bottle roll back onto the metal table, you ran out the door into the open woods. you'd have to go around the path to get back to your car in the front of the house. the more minutes you stood to think about a plan, the more time was being wasted. from the distance, you could hear the back entrance of his house being opened and you whined out loud, pushing your feet to continue running. you didn't want to die, not like this... no, not now, not ever!

and yet with each step that you took, you felt a strong pain inside you. that pain you felt when you had dinner for the first time at his house. you were craving for something, you didn't know. was it his tongue again? no, what? why were you thinking about that awful nightmare? you remembered the outline of his cock during your first appointment, oh it looked delectable. you could've gotten on your knees then and sucked him as payment for the appointment! as your mind was reeling with uncontrolled desire, your knees buckled and your leg caught onto a root from a tree. crashing forward with a loud groan, you struggled to get back up on your feet when you felt the underside of a boot press gently against your neck, pushing your face onto the ground.

"i told you before i liked things that run. at this point, you're just teasing me," a familiar dutch voice rang from above you. the boot nudged you over onto your back, causing you to hold back a whimper at the sensation. you were sensitive to everything, your skin on fire as he trailed his foot down your body and right below your heat. right below where your desire was burning.

"y-you killed them. i was right, you killed them all," you weakly laughed, "i was right this entire fucking time."

"round of applause for you, ms. (l/n), oh wait..." he paused, looking around the empty woods before he glanced down to you, "no one's here." he rubbed the toe-box of his boot against your clothed cunt, enjoying the way your back arched, squealing at the way your clit was being dragged along your damp panties.

"tsk tsk tsk," he circled to stand right in front of you between your legs, "you always missed the details. you could've made it, you know? you could've gotten to your car and made it back to your house, schatje. but it's your carelessness... what did you drink before you came out here?"

"w-w-wine?" you responded, tilting your head. you let out another moan as the boot dug deeper onto your mound.

"wine mixed into the aphrodisiac. which would've been my last resort if you had properly rescheduled the appointment that we never finished. details, ms. (l/n), always look at the details," he knelt down, letting his hand replace his boot. the warmth of his fingers made you whine, begging him to end your suffering. your mind was purely empty - save the thought of having him satisfy your primal needs. he bunched up your panties, tugging them up to see your pussy coat the fabric with more of your juices, "fuck... you're so wet. it must hurt doesn't it? you wish you had someone to help you, schat?"

"yes, yes, yes please... please!" you cried, bucking your hips up. max laughed, seeing the way your pussy was grinding against your panties. he ripped them off of you, throwing them over his shoulder as he picked you up into his arms, carrying you as if you were his bride.

"i think a change of environment will put you in your place." he mumbled, and while you didn't catch onto it at first, when he tossed you onto the metal table in his pantry, you felt fear course through your body. "such a nice suit i had on today, and now you made me ruin it."

he slips off his coat and vest, rolling the sleeves of his shirt that hugged his biceps. he searched around the pantry for a while before grabbing an apron, tying it around his slim waist. he gazed up at you as his chin tucked into his neck and he let out a dry laugh, "you know... if you had just stuck to your job, this wouldn't have been a problem. always wanting to be the hero, when you're the villain yourself."

he grabbed the butcher knife, tossing it in the air a couple times, "i used to keep him with a bunch of other knives, all neatly organized just like i love. had to use him so often these days that he gets his own special spot. what do you think? he's beautiful isn't he?" he holds the knife up to your hooded eyes, and when you don't respond, he uses the butt of the utensil to slap your face, beckoning you to respond.

"i-it's nice," you mumbled, and he nods his appreciatively, letting the sharp edge of the object gently kiss your skin before he cut away at your dress and bra, exposing all of you to him. he saw the lump in your throat when you swallowed, and he brought the edge of the knife to your neck, watching you crane around to avoid the sharp edge. he tossed the knife in the air once again, which caused you to shriek out loud in fear that it'll slice you but he caught it and tapped the butt of the knife on your lips.

"suck," he commanded, and still clouded by the aphrodisiac, you do what he asked and twirled your tongue around the tip before opening your mouth wider and letting it fully devour your throat. you caught your reflection in the metal, and you can't even believe how blinded you must be. the details, the details, the details. the body of daniel hanging above you, staring at you with closed eyes and parted lips should have you screaming as you rolled your eyes back, but instead you're feeling yourself growing wetter, eager to please max. the weapon hits your teeth as max trailed your saliva down the valley of your tits, over your navel and to your cunt that's been so desperate this entire time. he pursed his lips as if he was deep in thought and then brought his free hand to spread your legs wider, shoving the butt of the knife into you. the feeling of being stretched out, of finally being filled - even if only a little - had your back escape the confines of the metal table, your tits out in the air as you're sobbing in joy. max saw the way you're mewling, body contorting in pleasure and he left your cunt empty once again before slamming the butcher knife right beside your head. your breath hitched in your throat, the fear once again settling but it made your heart race in excitement. there was a small thrill present, maybe he was right earlier. you were the villain all along. you were worse than him. he took off the apron, unbuckling his belt and he snickered,

"you could've grabbed the knife and stabbed me by now, but you didn't... too desperate to get fucked, isn't that right, liefje?"

he let his cock spring free from the confines that tormented him since the day he saw you at the BAU. head held high, a haughty gleam in your eyes. the arrogance as you talked down to him, acted as if you were superior. he was waiting all along for this moment. his cock slid against your folds and when he pushed in, the tears that flowed from your eyes combined with the guttural moan made him smile. something was missing though, something that could make this so much more better for him. and as he began to thrust, he glanced up to see another corpse from a previous victim hanging to the side. a cruel idea formed in his mind and he grinned down at you,

"schatje, i don't think i could bring myself to hurt you... not when you're being such a good slut for me," he cooed, "but... but a man can't help but imagine..."

he grabbed hold of the butcher knife, slicing the corpse and letting the blood splatter onto the top half of your body. it trickled onto the table beneath you, the tiled floor now the canvas of a new twisted desire. he laughed out loud at the sight of half of your face covered in blood, and he brought the coated knife to your neck, continuing to thrust his aching cock into you as you screamed out loud in a horrid mix of fear and desire. you could feel your cunt clamp onto his cock, so close to cumming as his thrusts became more erratic.

"i knew you'd like this... you came all this way here to see if you could understand me. schat, but do you even know who you are?" he questioned, letting the edge of the knife kiss your neck. and as you came undone with a scream, your vision blurring at the intensity, you realized he was right all along. the details, you missed all the details. your parents death wasn't because of some man that had swerved the car late at night. it was you. you swung the sledgehammer at the car while they were driving down the highway, drunk out of your mind out of anguish from all the abuse you faced as a child. the man stopped to see the commotion and you sent his body flying down the hill. you'd done it, you were a murderer. you were twisted, you were... you were as bad as him. you glanced up to see max still bullying your cunt, pushing you to another orgasm before you could process the toll your body was taking in the process.

"your scent always drove me wild," he whispered, leaning down to bite your nipple, "fuck, schatje... i'll give you a deal." he lifted his head slightly to meet your gaze, "we can work together, you know? with your skill and this cunt of yours, i could keep you around. no harm to you at all, unless of course you'd like it."

"t-the blog... no, no, i can't... i'm better than you. i'm not you, i'm not fucked up like - oh fuck, don't stop!" your argument melts away with each snap of his hips,

"you have no other choice here. there's two ways this can go. you keep coming to my office, be my personal slut, trained completely to take my cock and i'll let you live... with the added benefit of working and helping me. and if you don't," the butcher knife digs a bit deeper into your neck, "i think you understand what i mean, right schatje?"

you nod your head, throwing your head back as you let out another visceral scream as your second orgasm rips through your body. he captures your lips in a bruising kiss, murmuring praises at how perfect you'd be, how you were always destined for this, no matter how much your ego told you differently.

and yet as you laid beside him on his bed that night, well-cleaned and taken care of as his new trophy, you secretly uploaded the photos of his pantry to your blog and slipped out of his house, past your dead colleague in the living room. he'd come after you, that was for sure. but he liked to hunt, and you've learned to run.

[ihavenohotcocoa]

hi i just finished book one and now am going to have to wait god knows how long until i can get book two derin what the FUCK

hi derin. i read the first 200 pages of TTO:U last night

i am irreparably changed as a person and will now relentlessly advertise this book to everyone in my social sphere

Lol, I changed your brain and there's nothing you can do about it

[moeswriting]

daylight | 1. black and white

pairing: no-outbreak!sheriff!joel miller x f!pregnant!reader

chapter summary: It was supposed to be a normal day. What happened to his normal damn day?

warnings: implied abuse (reader), implied parental neglect (reader), implied character death, descriptions of injuries on a pregnant woman (reader), descriptions of grief, age gap (joel is 48 and reader is 28), a little bit of a slow burn, reader is pregnant, eventual POV swapping but this time it’s all joel, small town gossip, this small town does not apply HIPAA because they’re borderline feral

word count: 7.8k

a/n: welcome to the very first chapter of daylight!!! this chapter is very joel-heavy, but i promise that next chapter we’ll get more of a glance into reader’s brain and what the hell is going on with her. next chapter should be up sometime in the next couple weeks (but obviously with my track record, who knows).

series masterlist | next chapter ->

read on ao3

“Ellie! What’re you doin’? You’re gonna be late for school!”

It’s 7:58. She should already be at school, but she’s not. He can’t even remember the last time that she was on time for school.

He takes a sip of coffee from his green mug with a picture of a little mug in front of a striped wall holding a placard that reads “MUGSHOT”– a gift from Ellie for his last birthday. He loves coffee. October is perfect weather for it. The revitalizing liquid warms up his frozen fingers through the ceramic and slides down his throat like heaven. He loves coffee.

Footsteps pound down the hallway and all he sees of his teenager is a blur of green plaid as she rushes past the entryway to the kitchen and to the front door.

“Hi Joel! Bye Joel,” she yells, hand popping into his view with a wave and quickly disappearing.

“Hey! Get back in here right now,” he shouts.

“What,” she pants, coming back to the entryway with one shoe on and the other dangling by the laces from her mouth, her tawny hair in a floppy, loose ponytail. Good god, he has no idea how this child has no manners at all. He knows she was not raised like this. Sixteen-year-olds should know not to put shoelaces in their mouths.

But all he does is grumble like he always does because it’s too damn early in the morning and he doesn’t want to argue with her when he’s this damn tired. He can’t think when it’s this early. “Take a poptart please. I don’t want people thinkin’ I starve you.”

She throws her hands up in the air and snatches the silver package off the table. “Okay, Jesus!”

Ellie already has her other shoe on before Joel can even blink. He hears the telltale squeak of the front door opening.

“Have a good day at school!”

“Whatever, Joel!”

And then the door slams shut, the cold October wind rushing its way in behind her.

He takes another sip of his coffee. If he gets another call from the principal lecturing him about Ellie’s tardiness, he might lose his mind. He cannot stand the sound of that man’s voice in his ear– it’s like nails on a chalkboard or the sound of a fork scraping on someone’s teeth. He just wants a normal day with no emergencies or stupid antics from his teenager.

He finishes his coffee off, rinses his cup out, and places it in the sink. 

A normal fucking day.

When he walks into the sheriff’s office, he is greeted by Mary– the nice old lady who works the front desk. Her graying hair is pinned up into curls like she came right out of the 50s and she’s wearing a simple blue dress that compliments her maternal curves with a flair.

“Morning, Sheriff!”

He gives her a polite smile like he does every morning. “Mornin’, Mary. How’s the family?”

“Good! Earl is getting a promotion tomorrow! He’s gonna be the manager over at the hardware store.”

“Oh, that’s great! Tell Earl I said congrats.”

“I will, Sheriff.”

He makes his way to his office, which is all the way at the back of the department to avoid talking to people as much as possible. He passes multiple people along his way back, the woman who keeps track of their files, one of the three beat cops in town, who he greets mildly. He passes his brother’s desk, which is empty save for the steaming mug of tea sitting on his “World’s Best Dad” coaster. He’s somewhere around here.

And, of course, as Tommy often does, he has invaded Joel’s space.

Joel leans against the entryway to his office and clears his throat.

Tommy’s sitting at Joel’s desk with his feet propped up and a hand over his eyes. For a second, he’s almost convinced that he’s asleep, but after a second of impatiently waiting, Tommy speaks up.

“Bill called.”

Jackson, Wyoming is too small for its own good. You can walk from one end of town to the other in thirty minutes or less, and everyone knows everyone and every bit of each other’s business whether they like it or not. Being the sheriff in a small town is easy in most respects– nobody’s getting murdered and there’s hardly ever any robberies– but when it came to Bill Brown, there were times he wished he hadn’t rallied for this job so hard.

Joel sighs and walks into the room, “Why?” He picks his stetson up off his head and smacks it onto his desk beside Tommy’s feet which makes him jump and place a hand over his heart dramatically.

Tommy shrugs after he gives himself a moment to recover, wide eyes pointed at his brother, “Says a ‘dangerous’ woman broke into his property.”

That could mean any number of things with Bill: it could mean that there really is a dangerous woman on his property, it could mean that a woman was walking their dog too closely to his yard, it could mean that a saleswoman knocked on his door to sell him solar panels. Bill is beyond paranoid, but Tommy sitting on his ass, not responding to his call probably means it’s nothing. He’ll check anyway, because if he doesn’t, Bill will come to the station later to get on his ass about it.

“Which property?”

“Old Betty’s place.”

What would anyone want to do with Betty’s house? She didn’t leave anything important laying in that house. It was just a glorified grandmother-themed Ikea after her lawyer had distributed all the things she had left in her will.

“Okay. I guess I’ll go see what’s up.”

The drive over to Betty’s is familiar. The gravel road that knocks his truck around winds him through the dense forest that surrounds the land that Betty Loving called home her entire life. The trees are a mesmerizing mix of reds, oranges, yellows, and greens that come together to highlight the tiny, white cottage that sits on top of the wooded hill.

Without thinking, he knocks the secret rhythm that only a few know onto the tall, white door. He’s stood here on this porch more times than he can count, but in the last few years, he’s avoided even thinking about it. It’s just not the same.

He’s pulled into the house by the collar of his brown button-up with a quick force.

“Bill, what the hell is wrong with–”

“Shhh!” Bill puts a finger up to his lips, scraggly mustache parted by his pudgy finger. 

Said finger points towards Betty’s bedroom at the end of the hall, the one with the pink floral wreath on it that reads, “Elizabeth” in curly script.

Oh god, maybe something really is wrong. He didn’t notice the front door being jammed in any way, nor does he see any damage in his peripheral, but maybe the damage was contained to her room. He really hopes that she didn’t break any of Betty’s trinkets.

“She in there?”

Bill nods his head adamantly, eyes wide.

Joel sighs out his nerves and puts on a brave face. He has to be ready for whatever he’s about to see in there. All he knows is that there is a trespasser that could be dangerous, he’s not sure. He can’t hear anything, in fact it’s eerily quiet.

He pulls out his gun from its holster on his hip. He rarely does it– it’s mostly just a prop to scare drunks from acting too crazy at the bar or one of his fellow officers from being too violent with their own weapons. The metal of the gun lays familiar in his shaking hands.

He pads down the carpeted hall with a practiced patience, boots softly scraping the tops of the fibers. Even as he approaches the door, he still can’t hear anything. Maybe his knock scared them off?

Placing his hand on the cold doorknob, he can feel wind blowing through the bottom crack of the door. Weird, considering it was 50 degrees this morning. She must have gotten through the window. He opens the door.

Laying on Betty’s frilly bedding is a young woman, probably late twenties or early thirties. Your eye is swollen and a dark shade of purple, but it’s fading into yellow around the edges. You’re wearing a long tan coat and a gray sweater dress that shows off the obvious curve of your stomach, hair splayed out underneath you in a halo. What he can see of your fingers and legs are covered in bruises and small cuts of their own. You look like a renaissance painting, splayed out over the bed like a star with your high-heeled boots dangling off the side– it’s almost Biblical paired with how tormented you look, eyebrows pulled together and mouth downturned into a frown even in your sleep.

He holsters his gun and pinches his brow with a heavy sigh.

“Jesus Christ, Bill– that’s an injured, pregnant woman. She’s not a danger to anyone.”

Bill grumbles an unintelligible response.

Another sigh tumbles out of Joel’s mouth, “Did you try to talk to her?”

“No.” Bill crosses his arms and huffs like a child being told off for hitting their sibling.

The wind blows into the room and causes Joel to shiver, fingers weaving together in front of him in an effort to gain some warmth.

“So, you just assumed that she was a danger based on… what?”

“She broke into my house!” He punctuates his stage-whisper by throwing his hands up in the air in exasperation.

“Bill, you are ridiculous.”

All he does is huff, the bristles of his mustache fly up with the breeze his breath makes.

Joel mutters a curse under his breath and stalks his way to the end of the bed.

“Ma’am? Ma’am?”

Your eyes flash open and he watches your pupils dilate as the bright light offends them. He hates to think it or even put it out into the universe, but your eyes are beautiful. They compliment your features in a way that makes his heart stop in his chest. 

Before Joel even has a chance to react, you’re up and as far from him as you can be, huddled against the metal headboard. Your boots leave behind a muddy stain on the white sheets as you clamber away from him.

He can see you wince in pain with the effort. It’s then that he notices the circle of blood you’ve left on the bedding where you were laying. It’s soaked into the white, turning it a dark maroon that slowly fades to pink around the edges. He can tell it’s fresh from the way the stain expands itself.

Jesus Christ.

“Woah, woah now, darlin’. Ain’t nobody here to hurt ya.”

Eyebrows crease together, you raise a hand up to signal him to stop.

Your voice comes out in a husky whisper, upper lip snarled, “Get away from me.”

He takes a step back and puts his hands up in mock surrender. He can tell you’re not going to hurt him, nor would you be capable of it, probably, but he wants to keep you calm and if backing up is gonna keep you calm, he’s willing to do it.

“You’re hurt,” he points out with a finger pointed down to the blood.

You chance a quick glance down to where he points, like you’re afraid that if you don’t look at him for two seconds that he’ll get the jump on you. He supposes he could. 

As if you can read his mind, you look back up at him with a piercing scowl.

“I’m fine,” you reply, voice a little clearer now.

He scoffs with an eye roll to accompany the sarcastic action, “Clearly you’re not, don’t have to act all tough. I’m Jackson’s sheriff; I can get you to the town doctor in less than ten minutes.”

Joel watches you evaluate him. Your eyes dart from one of his to the other, run down his body, and then back up to his face. He’s never felt so vulnerable just from being looked at. You soften a little.

“Really?”

He nods patiently, “Yes, ma’am. Dr. Teddy’d get you fixed up in no time.”

Your chest expands with one breath, two breaths, and then you let out a pitiful sigh.

He takes a chance by putting a hand out for you to take– a sign of good faith– and you hesitate. Your fingers twitch by your side. Suddenly, your soft palm grips his calloused one with a quiet ferocity. 

Joel helps you up and to his truck, not without a little mumble in his direction about how he better get her on trespassing, which he quickly replies to with a directed glare. Bill retreats into the kitchen to sulk.

Your wool coat is soaked with blood around the back, turning the nice tan into a dark brown. He tries his best to ignore it as he guides you up into the passenger seat. He’s going to have to clean the damn leather after he figures out what to do with you.

Hopping into his own seat, he turns the key in the ignition and turns the heat on. Out of the corner of his eye he can see you sink down into the warmth.

You’re silent the whole ride there, which he’s fine with. He’s never been good at small talk and he doesn’t think he wants to know what the hell is going on with you, your trespassing, or your excess of injuries. 

Or maybe he does. He shakes the thought out of his head. He’s going to get you examined at Teddy’s and send you on your way– he doesn’t have time for this shit. Not today. Today is supposed to be a normal day.

He parks in the one parking spot in front of the small, blue house that is the home to the practice of the one and only qualified doctor in town. 

Teddy is kind. You need someone kind, which is definitely not Joel.

He points to the building and motions with his chin to follow him. You stumble out of the car and do just that, putting most of your weight on your left leg as you walk. He offers an arm out to you, but you ignore him and push ahead.

He stomps up the porch steps behind you, kicking snow out of the tread of his boots before he steps inside.

The bell jingles loudly to signal your arrival, but he yells anyway, “Teddy!? You in here?”

A soft, raspy voice calls from the back, “One second!”

He turns to you with a, hopefully, calming smile. It feels more like a grimace than anything else on his stiff face.

“This is Doctor Theodora Taylor’s office. She’s gonna take a look at ya.”

Without warning, Teddy is next to him. Her voice makes him jump, but he tries to hide it behind a scoff. Her red-covered lips turn up into a smirk as she regards you.

“You can call me Teddy.” She holds out a hand to you. You hesitate before you grab her hand in yours for a weak handshake. He watches your muscles tense when you make contact with her, but the spasm goes away just as quickly as it came on.

Theodora Taylor is one of Joel’s only friends– her husband Jan is also included in that small number. She has thick, jet black, curly hair and skin so pale it’s a surprise to know that she goes outside at all. Her features are soft, lips always a vibrant red that makes her bright blue eyes pop. Voice raspy from a youth of defiant smoking, she is a calming force and a bright light.

“Follow me– exam room’s right over here.”

He follows behind you, because he has to. He has questions he’s supposed to ask and technically he needs to know if you need to go to court because of the trespassing, but there’s a part of him (the large majority, if he’s honest with himself) that just wants to send you to wherever you belong and leave you be. Bill can be convinced to drop the charges some way or another.

Teddy gives him no attention after her initial questioning of the situation and neither do you, surprisingly, as he plops down in one of the squeaky, teal, pleather chairs usually reserved for parents or significant others. It’s uncomfortably cold under his blue jeans. He’s sat in this chair a couple times before– one time when Ellie broke her leg a few years ago when she first started living with him, and a few times before and after that to evaluate drunks from the bar after they got into slurred fights resulting in, usually, minor injuries.

He watches Teddy go through the motions of listening to your lungs and taking your blood pressure. Joel isn’t a doctor, never claimed to be, so he doesn’t fully understand what’s going on, but she doesn’t look overly concerned as she peels the coat off your back and pulls your shirt up in the back to examine whatever injury is back there.

But when she puts a little too much pressure on your right leg, your whole body tightens and you gasp.

“Woah, what’s going on? I hurt you?”

You pause, evaluate (which he has quickly identified as a habit of yours), and pull your dress up higher on your thigh to reveal a nasty bruise that he hadn’t seen before. Black mixed with purple and dark hues of red over the entirety of your upper thigh. He has to stop himself from letting out the gasp that’s constricting the back of his throat.

Teddy’s dark eyebrows furrow for a split second before she cools her expression and looks up at you with gentle eyes.

“I’m sorry, hon, but I have to ask– where did those bruises come from?”

He watches your eyes flicker up to him and back down to your lap. Teddy takes the obvious hint, and so does he.

Something is very wrong.

“Joel, could you step out, please?”

He nods and pushes up out of the chair, “Yeah, ‘course.”

A grateful expression flashes over your face that he only catches for a second as he shuts the door behind him.

He knows he should be in there technically, to continue his evaluation, but it feels wrong to listen to you be vulnerable. He’s never really had a problem with it before– the child growing in you is probably the reason he feels the need to hide. Pregnant women make him think of her.

A few minutes pass as he sits in the quiet lobby– no one around to bother him or quiet his rampant thoughts. Just him, the open air with a distinct smell of hand sanitizer, and the muffled sounds of cars driving past.

He can see Teddy talking to you through the glass window on the top half of the door, that’s usually covered by a curtain, but it needs to be open in case you really are a danger to yourself or Teddy and she needs help restraining you. You look ashamed, embarrassed. Teddy just looks back at you while you talk, no emotions flashing over her face– just simply taking the information in. He wonders if it’s to keep you calm.

The front door slams open. The little bell attached to it slaps into the wood aggressively.

Maria almost sprints into the building; she looks disheveled, braids pulled back into a makeshift ponytail with a rubber band, eyes wide in a panic, still wearing her pink, flannel pyjama pants.

When she spots Joel sitting in one of the many chairs strewn in random places around the room, she lets out a puff of air and hunches over with her hands on her knees.

“Hey, we just heard–”

He nods and points to the windowed door, “Yeah, Teddy’s in there talking to her now.”

Tommy follows behind her. He looks just as out-of-breath as his wife from running after her.

“Why the fuck did we run here? Jesus Christ,” Tommy mutters to himself, pulling a hand through his hair while the other holds his tan stetson to his chest.

She clears her throat, ignoring Tommy as he walks in and keeping her attention on Joel, “How injured is she?”

“Not sure. She was walking fine, but her legs, Maria– they were covered in cuts and bruises.”

“Oh god,” she sighs and rubs a hand down her face, “Okay, I’ll go in there and talk to her. You two stay out here.”

They nod their heads to her like the loyal guard dogs they are.

Tommy flops his ass down in the chair next to Joel’s, slaps him on the thigh, and spreads his legs like a cowboy. Joel’s posture is ramrod straight, fingers intertwined in his lap. He can’t stop himself from bouncing his knee– the nervous energy in his brain spreading throughout his body. He is Tommy’s opposite as always. 

They watch the three of you through the small window cut out of the door. He can visibly see you calm down as Maria speaks to you in her usual confident and calming tone.

Tommy crosses his arms with a scowl on his face, “I recognize her.”

“How?”

“I– I’m not sure.”

Joel examines you for a second. You look upper class based on your outfit alone– expensive wool coat, gold jewelry. But those sad eyes– he could spot those sad eyes anywhere. He feels like a fool for not noticing it earlier.

“Betty’s funeral.”

Tommy points a finger at him, a grin spreading across his stubbled cheeks. “Yes! Yes, that’s it. She gave that speech.”

“She’s Betty’s granddaughter.”

A chill runs down his spine and all the way down to his toes.

Tommy slaps his knee in some show of triumph, “Oh man, that explains why she was at the cottage.”

Joel looks over at you again. He thinks he can see your eyes starting to water, so he shifts his gaze back over to his brother. He can’t bear to see your vulnerability; not like this, not again.

“Yeah… it does.”

Maria steps back out of the room and shuts the door behind her soft and slowly.

“Joel. I need to talk to you really quickly.”

She’s got that look, pinched eyebrows and lips downturned: the guilty look she gets when she asks him to watch their son, Benny.

“What? Is it a secret?”

She turns to Tommy with a glare, “Shut up, Thomas.”

Tommy throws his hands up in the air and widens his eyes in exaggeration.

Maria turns back to Joel, a disgruntled scowl covering her face. She and Tommy love each other– have for more years than he’s even lived here– but Tommy is the King of Maria’s annoyance. He knows just how to push her buttons, the ones that Joel wouldn’t dare to go near.

Joel nods, and follows her out to the porch. It’s cold, too cold to be outside.

“What,” he deadpans. Get it over with, he wants to spit out.

“I need you to take her in.”

No.

“Excuse me,” Joel blurts out, his mouth five steps ahead of his brain in shock.

Maria places her hands on her hips and rolls her deep brown eyes. Even in pyjama pants, she’s intimidating. 

“Joel, I highly doubt she will be any trouble to you. You’re barely home anyway.”

He can’t picture you in his space with your sullen expression and hollow eyes. The idea of anyone besides him or his family in his home makes him want to cringe.

“I’ve already got my hands full with Ellie. I don’t think taking on a huge responsibility like this is really in my job description.”

And, boy, does that ruffle Maria’s feathers. Her face drops even further than before.

“This ‘responsibility’ is a pregnant woman with no family, no home, and no job who needs immediate bedrest. She is extremely fragile right now and it’s best for her and her baby if she can keep her in to term. She just needs a place to relax, read a book, do some light chores– she’s not a teenage girl, she’s a grown woman who can take care of herself.

“And I don’t want to mention this, but I feel that I have to: she’s Betty’s granddaughter. You’re really not gonna give her and Betty’s great-granddaughter the best chance they have of living? After all she did for you?”

She gives him a pointed look; they both know she’s right. Her brutal honesty makes him uncomfortable, makes the hairs on the back of his neck stand to attention.

Joel sighs, “Maria…”

Suddenly, he watches guilt take over her features again. “I know; I’m sorry. I just need you to really think before you say no to that woman in there.”

“I’m not… ‘m not saying no, I just don’t think it’s a good idea.”

She shakes her head and puffs out a breath of frustration, “Why?”

He doesn’t really know why. Call it a gut feeling, call it intuition, call it whatever you want– he doesn’t know why it’s a bad idea. He just does.

“I don’t know.”

Maria’s shoulders sag. “Just do it. Please.”

He feels himself giving in before he can even say the words. He folds like a cheap suit.

Hands held in the air in surrender, he replies, “Fine. Fine, okay.”

“Thank you,” she sighs out exasperatedly.

“Couldn’t I just… couldn’t I go live in my grandma’s house? Then I wouldn’t have to be anybody’s problem.”

Teddy shakes her head, a strand of her curly hair falling into her face, “Betty’s place is way too far from here. You need to be as close as possible to the clinic with how high-risk your pregnancy is. Joel lives two houses down from here and he has an extra bedroom. You wouldn’t be any kind of problem for him anyway.”

He shakes his head, “You wouldn’t be.”

He can tell you’re conflicted. Your eyes flit from his face, to Tommy’s, to Teddy’s, Maria’s, and then back to his. There’s a hint of something there in your irises– something that makes his skin crawl with the memory of when his own eyes looked as dull as yours. Grief. For what exactly, he doesn’t know, but it’s there.

“Okay,” you mumble, eyes going to your lap where your fingers are picking at your cuticles.

What has he gotten himself into?

“Okay,” Maria exclaims, “Good. Let’s let Teddy finish her exam– Joel, you stay with her until she’s done?”

He nods.

“Alright, let’s go, deputy.”

She waves a hand for Tommy to follow her.

His brother turns to you with an overly-confident smile and chuckles, “She’s embarrassed that if she admits she likes me that people might find out she has emotions. We’re married, y’know? You’d think people would’ve found out she’s not a robot by now.”

A small smile takes over your lips, barely reaching your eyes. There’s Tommy doing what he’s always been naturally good at– talking to people, making them feel comfortable and relaxed.

“Tommy,” Maria shouts from the entryway.

“Coming, wife!”

Joel doesn’t even have to see her to know that she’s rolling her eyes into the back of her head. She loves him to death, and so does he, but he’s always been a bit of a handful.

Teddy shakes her head amusedly as she listens to the tell-tale sound of the front door closing behind them.

She turns back to the room, with you in tow.

It’s another 20 minutes before Teddy comes back, but she’s alone. You’ve been left in the exam room by yourself.

Teddy flops into the chair next to him and lets out a heaving breath.

“She’s got a pretty large cut on her back that’s going to need the bandage changed at least once every day. So, I’ll be there every day around noon to change it until it’s healed, but if she starts to bleed through it, I’m gonna need you to help her do it. I assume you can do that?”

“Yeah.”

“She can walk on her own, but she just needs to keep that leg elevated and iced as much as possible– give it a couple weeks to heal up. Just keep an eye on her for me.”

“Okay.”

There’s an awkward pause. She won’t look at him, just stares off towards the large bay window that overlooks the snow-covered trees in front of them.

“Did she tell you what happened?”

She nods. Her face is emotionless. “Yes.”

“Do I get to know?”

Teddy purses her lips and shakes her head, “Not unless she tells you.”

Licking his lips, he nods back, “Okay.”

He tastes blood when he bites down on his bottom lip to rip a piece of dead, dry skin off. His tongue runs over the wound left behind– smooth, raw. He relishes the taste of the aftermath of his pain.

She looks over at him. “And, Joel?”

“Yeah?”

Her cool expression is replaced by concern– heavy, devastated concern. 

She lets out a long breath and mutters back to him, “Please be patient with her.”

“Yup.”

Joel cannot handle this conversation anymore. He needs to get out of here before he explodes. In what? Anger? Remorse? Pity? He doesn’t care; getting out of here is what he needs and he needs it now.

Pushing himself up makes his knees crack with the effort. The oncoming winter always makes him feel his age more than anything. He masks his pain as he always does with a practiced cough and a slap to the side of his thigh.

“Whelp, gonna get outta your hair, Teddy. Tell Di I said ‘hey’.”

She looks equally relieved to be ending this conversation with him, even more so with the mention of her toddler.

“I will. She misses you; you should come visit soon.”

“I’ll try.”

He probably won’t.

WIth a quick side hug and a goodbye from Teddy, he walks out of the waiting area and to where you’re sitting in the exam room.

“Let’s go,” he states, pointing a finger towards the front door.

He doesn’t wait around for you to follow. You catch up.

Once you get to the porch, you begin talking to him quietly, “You know, you really don’t have to do this.”

You’re shivering aggressively, whether it’s the cold or the effort it takes you to talk to him, he doesn’t know. He’s just realized that you left your bloody coat behind in the exam room.

He shucks off his duck jacket and holds it out to you. You stare down at his hand like it’s going to bite you and shake your head reluctantly.

“Well, Mayor says I gotta, so seems like I don’t really have much of a choice, do I,” he replies with a huff, walking down to the bottom of the porch steps before your voice stops him.

“You could’ve said ‘no’.”

Your face is stoic, but he can see the apology in your eyes. They’re very expressive, like you can’t help that you wear your heart in them. He wonders if you even know.

He shakes his head, “She's my sister-in-law, I could not have said no.”

No response comes from you as you pick up your aching feet and creep your way down the steps. Joel offers to help, but you sigh and send a glare in his direction. He backs off.

When you’re at his side finally, he points at his house– two houses down and across the street. It’s a small thing– but it works for him and Ellie, who spends most of her time in the garage anyways. He’s always wanted to paint the light grey-blue siding something more neutral, but he just never has the time nor the energy and there’s no way in hell he’ll hire someone else to do it. Someday.

You fall into step beside him, heels of your boots clacking on the cracking concrete of the sidewalk.

The sweater dress you’re wearing looks comfortable, but the tights don’t look very warm and the large stain on the back of it must be freezing. His house is right there; he’ll let you borrow something of his while he goes to grab your bags from Betty’s.

You speak up again, arms crossed and hands shoved into your armpits.

“Tommy's your brother?”

“Yup.”

“Apple fell very far from the tree.”

He huffs, “Not really a talker.”

“No shit.”

You’re being brave. He can tell you’re nervous, but you’re trying your best to hold a conversation and that’s pretty fucking brave to him.

“Thank you,” you mutter through an exhale. Your breath is visible in the early morning air.

“Don’t gotta thank me. Just doin’ my job.”

“Thank you for doing your job, then.”

He doesn’t like being thanked. It makes him uncomfortable, rattles his bones. But he’s not going to ignore you when you’re being vulnerable– that would make him even more uncomfortable.

“No problem.”

A high-pitched voice screams across the road, “Joel!”

You both watch as Ellie runs down the street, her arms waving above her head like a lunatic, sneakers screeching because of the drag of her feet. The child has no decorum or manners. 

He drops his forehead into his hand.

When she gets to the two of you, she leans over with both hands on her bent knees, breathing heavily. She takes a moment to recover. Joel spares a glance in your direction, but you’re no longer beside him. He catches a sliver of your hair as it whips behind him.

Ellie’s gonna be the death of him, probably you too if you scare this easily.

“Can I go over to Dina’s?”

His hands settle on his hips in his most “I’m not fucking around” pose, “No, kid. I gotta talk to you about somethin’. Go home.”

“What? Dude!”

“Don’t ‘dude’ me. Go,” he points to the house and leaves it at that.

She turns and stomps her way to the house with her arms crossed and a sour look on her face, “Ugh! Whatever, asshole.”

He loves her and he would travel to the ends of the earth for her; but it’s moments like these where sometimes he wished he was a little harder on her. Maybe she wouldn’t scream swear words in the middle of the street. He doubts it.

“Who was that?”

Joel clears his throat, “Uh, that's my kid.”

Your eyebrows furrow, expressing the most you have the entire morning, “You have a kid?”

It’s accusatory– the emphasis on the ‘you’. He can feel himself bristle with something at the accusation that he wouldn’t be capable of caring for a child. What is it about him that makes you think he wouldn’t have a kid?

You’re right. She’s not his. But he had a child. A long time ago.

He huffs through a dry chuckle, “Well, she’s not technically mine— but she lives with me and I feed her, so she’s my problem.”

“Whose is she?” Your eyes flick across the street to Ellie and then back to him.

He can’t help the sigh that leaves his lips.

“A friend’s. She passed away a few years ago and she didn’t have any family, so…”

Your face shifts with pity, forehead wrinkled and eyes wide, “Oh, I'm so sorry.”

He’s used to the pity– the stares, the muttered sorrys. He doesn’t want it from anyone, but he especially doesn’t want it from complete strangers like you.

“It’s alright. She was my daughter’s friend more than mine, but when she got sick, I agreed to take care of her kid.”

“Oh, you have a daughter?”

He feels the grief rip through his chest like he always does when someone mentions her. But you don’t know what happened like everyone else in this town does, so he’s not going to get irritable with you like he would with other people. Besides, you don’t need Joel to be an asshole to you when you’re supposed to be on bed rest.

He hesitates, “Yeah.”

Your eyes search his face– for what, he doesn’t know. But whatever you’re looking for, he thinks you’ve found it as you move the conversation on from her and onto Ellie’s frame as she slams the front door shut so loudly that the entire street can probably hear it. He thanks his face for conveying how desperately he does not want to talk with you about Sarah.

“What’s her name?” You point in the direction that the teenager went.

“Ellie.” 

He shifts his stance, ready to restart your short walk to his house when you speak up.

“She seems like a good kid.”

He lets out a breath of amusement, “She's the best. Has a very colorful vocabulary though.”

You shrug, “Eh, she’s a teenager. I was a lot worse than her at that age.”

“Oh, really?” He’s not sure if this is surprising information or not. He’s having a hard time getting a read on you– and that’s a big part of his job, to read people. It feels wrong that he can’t figure you out.

“Yeah. I could’ve won some kind of award– ‘Worst Daughter In The World’. I would’ve deserved it too,” you huff.

He hums in acknowledgement. He doesn’t want you to feel like he’s ignoring you; he just doesn’t know what the hell to say to that. That you did deserve it? He wouldn’t know.

“It’s why my parents used to ship me off to my grandmother’s. ‘Grandma knows how to handle you’, they’d say. Really, I just liked her a lot more than them.”

He gets that. He really gets that.

“Well, I ain’t got nowhere to ship Ellie to. She’s stuck with me whether she likes it or not.”

You hum, “I think she likes it.”

He chuckles, “And you can tell that from a thirty-second argument?”

You look up at him with a burgeoning smile on your face, “She wouldn’t have listened to you if she didn’t like you– trust me.”

Trust me.

“Whatever you say, ma’am.”

You nod resolutely.

It’s silent the thirty seconds it takes to walk the rest of the way to Joel’s. 

He shows you around the house and watches you as you map out his home in your head. You pay extra attention to the exits and the windows. Joel catches the way you stare longingly at the kitchen from the entryway.

When he walks up the stairs to show you the bedrooms, you lag behind. But he doesn’t notice until he’s already at the top of the stairs and he doesn’t hear your footsteps anymore. You’re staring at a picture on the wall. It’s of Sarah. 

You don’t say anything. Just stare. He can’t get himself to say anything either.

One breath, two breaths. And you look up at him with something in your eyes that he can’t quite identify; it’s soft, but not pity. Understanding, maybe.

You walk up the rest of the stairs, holding tight to the banister. There’s a slight twitch in your lip when you put weight on your bad leg. He offers to help you, but you just shake your head.

He points out the upstairs bathroom, his room, and then guides you to the guest bedroom that’s been gathering dust for a while now. It used to be Ellie’s, but ever since she’d moved into the garage, it’s been empty. He’d renovated it on the very off chance that one of his relatives came to visit, but it’s stood empty for almost two years, so he doesn’t find himself opening the door very often.

“This’ll be your room. It’s not much, but it’s enough to get you through until you get that baby out of you.”

It’s a small room, enough to comfortably hold a double-bed, a couple side tables, and a dresser. The closet door stands ajar in the corner, full of Christmas decorations. He’s going to have to take those out– find somewhere else for them. Maybe Tommy has room in his basement–

“Okay,” you mumble, “Thank you.”

Your heels click on the hardwood floor in even beats as you walk into the room. Your evaluating eye examines the bed when you approach it. You swipe at a spot on the blanket and the dust jumps and sails through the air, illuminated by the sunlight. Once you’ve decided it’s good enough, you sit down slowly, a hand planted on the mattress behind you as you lower yourself.

Maria had said you were six months pregnant. He remembers how miserable Sarah’s mom had been at this time in her pregnancy. The memory makes him want to puke.

“I know it’s none of my business—“

You glower at him, “Yup. I would say that too.”

“But, whatever brought you here— I hope we can help you. You just let me know if you need anything.”

You soften a little, but the glare remains. “Okay.”

“You ain’t a talker either?”

The both of you know he isn’t talking about “talking”. Emotional vulnerability isn’t a strong suit of his, and it is very clearly not one of yours either.

“Nope.”

He nods, turns, and walks out the door.

Ellie is strong. You don’t lose your mom at thirteen and not have massive amounts of strength afterwards. But she is an expert pouter.

When Joel creeks open the garage door, Ellie is face down on her bed, limbs spread out beneath her. A punk song plays over her speaker that makes Joel’s ear drums pop. Even with the hearing loss in his right ear, he can feel his teeth rattling.

He walks over to the blasting stereo and turns it off.

Her head whips up to pierce him with a death glare, “What the fuck?!”

“Can’t hear myself think with that shit on.”

She mumbles something in her pillow, probably some egregious swear word or some insult related to his age, but he lets her get away with it. Your words come back to him– she wouldn’t listen to him if she really didn’t like him. He’s not patient with most people, but he tries to be for her.

He lowers himself on her bed with a grunt.

“She’s gonna be living with us until her baby comes.”

She hums into her pillow and stuffs her face even further into it.

Joel sighs, “What are you thinking, kid? I’m sorry you didn’t get much of a choice.”

Her voice is muffled as she responds, “Well, what does it matter what I think? You would’ve done it anyway.”

His eyebrows furrow, “What makes you think that?”

“Dina heard she was Betty’s grandkid. Is that true?”

He has no doubt that Dina already knows; she loves to harass Maria when she thinks something is going on and he’s sure that Ellie has been texting Dina since she was forced to go home. 

He nods reluctantly. Joel is sure that as soon as he leaves the room, the stereo will be back on and her phone will be in her hands.

“Exactly. You would not have said ‘no’ to her.”

He sputters, “I’m very capable of sayin’ ‘no’.”

She shakes her head and flips over onto her back, “Not when Betty’s involved.”

He huffs, a small smile on his lips, “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

He doesn’t hear the knock on the front door, but Ellie does.

“There’s someone at the door, old man.”

Joel sends a glare in her direction and hoists himself up and off her bed.

He walks to her door, but she interrupts him, “Hey, Joel?”

“Yeah, kid,” he huffs.

Her joking smirk has fallen off her face and a rare seriousness replaces it.

“I’m okay with it, by the way… with her staying. Don’t worry about it.”

All he does is nod. She mocks him with an equally gruff nod.

“We’re not done talkin’ about this; there’s gonna be some new rules around here,” he states.

Ellie throws her limbs up into the air and waves them around erratically, “Whatever! Get out of here so I can sulk!”

The door closes softly behind him and his quiet chuckle.

Opening the front door reveals Mrs. Cassini, his neighbor and the town gossip. 

Her grey hair is in tight, pink curlers and she has a half-done knitting project in her hands, like she’d gotten up in a hurry. There’s little footsteps in the snow in a path from her porch, through his yard, and up to his own porch; her purple slippers are so soaked that they look like a completely different color.

She leaves no time for pleasantries.

“I hear you’ve got a pregnant, homeless woman living in your house.”

It’s gotten to a point where he doesn’t even question how she hears things anymore. He heard a rumor a long time ago from one of their other neighbors that somehow her landline picked up other people’s phone calls. He stopped using his landline after that.

He can’t help the breath of frustration that puffs out of his mouth, “Mrs. Cassini, go home, please. She doesn’t need you spreadin’ rumors about her. She’s already stressed enough as it is.”

Her eyes widen. 

She gasps, “So, it’s true?”

Well, it was going to be confirmed at some point. Guess that point is right now.

“Mrs. Cassini, please go home.”

She huffs like a child, turns on her heel, and walks back to her little cottage next door. He needs to get some sort of security system in his house, specifically for this woman and her unexpected visits.

He hears footsteps scurry up the stairs when he turns around to go back into the house. 

Well, shit.

Joel hadn’t heard the bedroom door open nor had he heard your footsteps as you came out. Mrs. Cassini always knew the worst times to show up, didn’t she?

He approaches the bottom of the stairwell and calls out to you as calmly as he can, “I assume you heard that?”

A tiny gasp comes from the top of the stairs and your feet come into view. You step down a couple stairs and sit yourself down carefully on the plush carpet.

You nod.

“I’m sorry. She’s just kinda like that. Town gossip and all.”

You shrug, stiff and dejected.

“I get it. Weird pregnant girl shows up and everyone’s gotta know what’s wrong with her.”

“Well, it’s none of their business. I’ll just keep turnin’ ‘em away.”

You grab your knees like a kid who’s in timeout. Why do you always look like you’re about to be reprimanded– like you have to protect yourself from some unseen force? He suspects he might look that way too sometimes.

“Thank you. For telling her to go away.”

He hums, hands awkwardly stuffed in his pockets.

“Well, uh, I gotta go back to work, but don’t worry about Bill– I’ll get him to drop the charges on you.”

“Oh, okay.” You nod with a faraway look in your eye, hands coming up to your stomach almost instinctively.And he leaves, hops into his ancient, blue pickup truck, and puts it into drive. What happened to his normal fucking day?

series masterlist | joel masterlist | masterlist of all masterlists

[heeambi]

⊹. ˙ Midnight Mischief ⌒⌒.

Pair ups 、ni-ki x reader Featuring 、jake

⥼﹒ You decided to sneak into the practice room late at night to leave a note for Ni-ki…. But you're caught in the act by Ni-ki, who teases you mercilessly, and Jake, who walks in at the worst possible moment ﹒ 、

εϊз﹒ Nat’s notes — I am so so sorry for not posting. I've just been so exhausted and didn't have the motivation at all :d ◞

It was about 11:30 pm, and the practice was supposed to be empty. You had checked the schedules three times to make sure no one would be there.

You had a folded note in your hand and it felt like it weighed a thousand pounds, but you were determined to leave it in ni-ki’s bag before leaving unnoticed.

You began crepting into the practice room, your sneakers squeaking slightly on the polished floor. Ni-ki’s bag was just right there and where it would always be, it was slouched against the wall by the mirror. You crouched down slowly and carefully made your way towards the bag as you tucked the note into your pocket.

“Gotcha brotha!”

You never screamed so loud in your life and you nearly fell backward as ni-ki popped out of no where, turns out he was hiding right behind the couch, a mischievous grin formed in his face.

“What are you even doing here ?” he asked, his arms crossed and his eyes sparkling with amusement. “l-listen! I thought no one was here!” you stammered, trying to look anywhere else but him.

“Well, I was about to leave, but then I saw you sneaking around like a ninja. So, What does the note say, hm?” he made a dramatic reach for the note in her hand.

“It's nothing!” You practically lunged to black him from the note, your face burning. “It isn't for you. I mean—it’s not even important!”

Ni-ki raised his brow, clearly not buying anything you're saying. “Oh, so you were just sneaking off into the practice room at midnight to leave a note for… the floor? Sounds mad legit.”

But before you could protest, the door had swung open, and Jake stepped in, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. “Why are you two yelling?? It's midnight—”

Jake froze in his tracks, his gaze bouncing between you and ni-ki, who was trying to grab something like a note with a sly grin.

“What the hell,” Jake said, suddenly completely wide awoke. “Did I walk in on something? Should I leave or??”

“Erm, no!” you yelped, literally mortified.

“Oh, definitely not,” ni-ki replied at the same time, clearly enjoying himself.

Jake then leaned against the doorframe, smirking. “I’ll stay, this looks interesting.”

Ni-ki finally managed to pulled the note out of her hand, holding it up like a trophy he just won. You tried to snatch if? But he was way too quick.

He then quickly unfolded the paper, his grin only widening as he reads the first words aloud. “Ni-ki, I think you're really funny and talented, and I—”

“Uh, that's enough!” you managed to grab the note from his hand, crumpling it in your fist.

Ni-ki looked at you, his teasing expression softening. “Aw, you think I'm funny and talented?”

Jake gasped dramatically. “Woah…. Is this a confession??”

You wanted to melt right into the floor. “No! Well… maybe? Can you both just please forget that this even happened?”

Ni-ki titled his head, a small smile tugging at his lips. “Mmm, I don't know…. I think I kinda of like this little midnight ninja thing you had going on.”

Jake snorted. “Oh my god, you’ll never live this down. I'm telling everyone!!”

“Jake!” you shouted, chasing after him out the practice room as ni-ki laugh echoed behind them.

And the very next morning, you had found a note in your bag saying “I think you're pretty cute and funny and talented too. — Ni-ki”

taglist 、@mydearyeseo @senazzzz @jeoism

[gretagerwigsmuse]

But tonight, you were on the clock instead of watching - this made me smile each time i read it

but not even the decent severance package they sent you out the door with could have cushioned that blow. You’d been laid off from your tech job just in time for your industry to be hit with hiring freezes - okay but now i can really pretend she’s me

like a groundhog’s day from hell - HAHA

You couldn’t remember who your first celebrity crush was, but you definitely remembered the boy with the curly brown hair who was responsible for giving you butterflies in your stomach for the very first time. - i mean matt damon, but if i had bradley bradshaw around growing up id forget all about him

You’d always hoped he remembered you just as fondly. - oh 🥺

Just like you knew that he was left-handed but preferred to throw a baseball with his right. - i love these little details! this and the stuff about the dole whip and mini golf are so sweet and from a time gone by

“I don’t know about ‘hotter’, but probably taller since that last time I saw you.” - AND BROADER 🤭 oh my god he’s so pretty and he had the perfect response to this

more below 💕

“I keep telling the squad to stop underestimating the old man, but they never learn. They’re still just as competitive as ever.” - HE WAS THE ONLY ONE IN THE MOVIE WHO CAUTIONED AGAINST THE PUSHUPS BECAUSE HE KNEW!!!

“I feel like there’s some kind of ‘the birds and the bees’ joke here. One I’m not qualified to make since you were always the funnier one of the two of us.” - ohmyfuckinggod he’s such a NERD ugh i love him

The way Penny said it always made it seem like you should know who she was talking about - girl thinks she’s SLICK

“I’d like to catch up, if you have time for an old friend.” Friend. The word shook you out of whatever Bradley Bradshaw induced haze you’d found yourself in. - oh sweet girl 🥺 my stomach dropped at that too

He helped you paint the kitchenette in the loft a soft blue- with your aunt’s permission, of course. - this is so?!? who will come into my kitchen and be hungry for me!?! like!? and the tight uva shirt?? bye (don’t even get me started on the family dinners)

He’d even taken you for a spin on his motorcycle. - not to derail, but can you imagine smart aleck doing this? oh my god bradley would go mental (affectionate)

It was nice to have a friend. - oh sweet girl 🥺 and i love the part about her not being too hard on herself because he really is the sweetest boy and it’s so easy to have a crush on him

“It’s the weekend, Bee,” Bradley said like it explained everything. “It’s a Wednesday.” - everything about this has me giggling

because then he was leaning in, in, in. - THE REPETITION!!! and then friend friend friend!!!

He ended up giving Penny and Mav the same treatment too. Although Pete shoved him away good-naturedly when he tried to plant a particularly sloppy one on him. - OBSESSED with this!!! i know he’s a head kisser!! especially since maverick is so goddamn short! and the bit with amelia!?? BEST FRIENDS SIBLINGS (edit: did he get her a christmas present? i love the visual of her just standing super still and everyone else in the house being a little chaotic)

Everything sparkled and shined, the light bouncing off everything gave the bar a wonderfully hazy glow, it was the perfect ambiance for the most hopeful night of the year. - i wanna go to a new year’s party like this with all my friends 🥰

Bradley was dressed up in a navy suit that fit him in all the right places, looking more handsome than you knew possible. All broad shoulders and thick thighs. The top button of his pristinely pressed white shirt undone, giving you a peek at the divot base of his throat. - STOP THIS! how dare you keep this from me!?? oh my god it’s a FANCY PARTY!?? god he’s so pretty and tall and broad AND HIS THICK THIGHS!?! she’s stronger than any naval aviator

Bradley chuckled and reached out taking an end of the little rhinestone bow that dangled from right beneath your neck where the straps met and twirled it between his fingers for a moment. “I think this might be my favorite part though,” he rasps lowly. There was an intensity in his eyes directed at you that you hadn’t seen before. - jesusfuckingchrist i got butterflies why can’t he be real like you know i love a bow moment

He hadn’t come up to you at all since before the party started…saw him talking with the girl in the shiny dress and her interested eyes as you put the freshly washed glasses away. - oh 🥺 he always comes up to talk though 🥺

The countdown had snuck up on you. Just like everything else had this year. - love this sentence and i also really like how you put a little blurb after each number in the countdown. i like that the countdown ends with her smiling to herself and being happy for herself! and all the work she did with the decorations and party planning work perfectly

You’ve come to accept that he had a piece of you that you weren’t sure you were ever going to get back. But that was something for you to deal with next year. - oh 🥺 and then there was bradley 🥺

As you got back into the groove of serving people, your brain snagged on the sound of Auld Lang Syne being played on the upright piano at the other end of the bar, and the only person it could be playing it. - this is so hot of him i’m being so serious, i love auld lang syne so much, it’s so gorgeous on the piano and slowed down

That even though the ball had dropped and the confetti had fallen you weren’t ready to have the night be over yet. Knowing that the moment you locked up for good and got in your car and headed home, that the bottle of champagne you’d bought for yourself and plans with Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal wouldn’t hit quite the way you’d hope it would. - oh 🥺 this made me sad. she doesn’t want the magic to end and be alone 🥺

He says it so conspiratorially, like he’s getting away with something and you’re an eyewitness to his delinquency, as if he wasn’t a decorated golden boy of the United States Navy. - NEPO BABY!!! but ugh i just know he’s got this cheeky smile on his face!!

You’ve spent all night catering to everyone else, it’s nice to have someone looking out for you now. - this is so sweet! oh i love this like he wants to take care of her! like he easily could’ve asked her for a drink, but he does all the work!

“It was nice enough, I guess,” he says, giving you a half smile, “I’m having a much better time now though.” - sweetest boy!!!! ugh

He takes the bottle and pours you a little more. “People kept hogging my favorite bartender.” - ENOUGH!!! this is so cute!!! and their little back and forth!? the fact that he pushes back on her response is so 🤭🤭

“You see, I’ve been saving these ones for just the right girl.” - my heart would stop, my jaw would drop, i’d be a mess 🤭 this is SO cute wowowowowow

This rendition was delicate and atmospheric. Intimate. Almost like the music was wearing its heart on its sleeve. - just like is bradley in this moment!! he’s so smooth with all of this, but it still feels so earnest and sweet?

“This doesn’t feel very friendly,” you whisper. - oh sweet girl!!!! she doesn’t want to believe it yet

“You didn’t get a New Years Eve kiss.” It’s a statement. Like he knows because he was paying attention. - oh bradley 🤭 isn’t it the same thing, love and attention?

Bradley brings both hands to cup your face. - TWO HANDS!!!! oh bradley!!!

That it’s the moment he’s been waiting the last four months for. - bestie you both have been waiting for years even if you didn’t know it

But only after Bradley finally stops kissing you long enough to grab that cork he’d shot across the bar earlier, pretending not to see the way he tucked it into the pocket of his suit jacket. - i knew one of them was going to keep it!!!!

And you can’t help but think that this really will be the best one yet. - 🤭🤭 i hope so

Save Your Midnights for Me

Summary: This year has thrown you through a loop. You lost your job, you moved to San Diego, and you reunited with your summer crush from all those years ago who still is just as handsome as ever. As the clock ticks down, you can’t help but wonder what the new year might have in store for you.

Pairing: Bradley ‘Rooster’ Bradshaw x Female Reader

Length: 9k

Warnings: fluff and two pining idiots in love

(Author’s note: this one is for the hopeful romantics! Happy New Year, friends!)

You’ve always loved New Year’s Eve. The excitement, the fun, the champagne, the confetti. Everyone riding the high of the hope and potential of the new year ahead.

But tonight, you were on the clock instead of watching as it inched closer and closer to midnight with every tick of the second hand.

The evening has been a whirlwind of cheerful faces as you pour pint after pint of frothy, cold beers. Your arms were definitely feeling the burn of all the margaritas and whiskey sours you’ve been serving up. You were putting all your well-earned practice from the last four months of working at the Hard Deck into good use for the steady stream of Naval patrons who had come to gather and celebrate.

But you liked the steady flow. It kept you focused; it kept you busy. With your head down and your thoughts occupied with tasks and orders and drink recipes and tabs, it spared you from having to see Bradley with the girl in the silver dress who was making it more than clear whose midnight kiss she was after.

Bradley Bradshaw had been the star in all your daydreams growing up. You just never could have anticipated that you still wouldn’t be able to kick that summer crush on him, even all these years later.

This year… hadn’t been the greatest.

The meeting you’d thought was going to be the start of a new chapter in your career with that promotion you’d been hoping and working so hard for had ended with you clearing out your desk and turning in your ID badge, but not even the decent severance package they sent you out the door with could have cushioned that blow.

You’d been laid off from your tech job just in time for your industry to be hit with hiring freezes so glacial it felt like there must have been a breakthrough in global warming, as if the ice caps weren’t melting.

You spent days then weeks then months applying and interviewing on repeat like a groundhog’s day from hell, only to encounter more closed doors than open ones. Had enough ever-so-casual networking coffee chats that you were pretty sure you’d need to switch to decaf if you still wanted to have some functioning adrenal glands by the time you were fifty.

Coming close- so, so close- so many times. Having the final decision come between you and another candidate only for your fingertips to slip off the edge at the very last moment.

Still freefalling the same way you’d been since you’d first been let go.

With your savings dwindling and spirits low, you’d decided that what you needed most was to decompress and reassess. And where better than the place where some of your favorite memories had been made.

All it had taken was one call to your Aunt Penny for the little strands of silver lining to peek out from behind the gray clouds that had filled your skies lately.

By the end of the conversation not only did you have a place to land- the furnished loft above the garage with an ocean view from the tiny kitchen- but also a just-for-now job too, getting to work with her at the bar. Something to help get you back on your feet while the dust of your imploded life settled around you as you figured out your next move.

You weren’t known for staying in any place too long as it was, so it had been easy to pack up and leave the city you’d been living in for the Southern California sun, feeling lighter than you had in ages.

Your mom’s longtime best friend was quite possibly one of your favorite people on Earth. And still is.

There was nothing you looked forward to more than those summers you got to spend in San Diego, when you got to trade your textbooks for days out on the boat. Your family would rent at home near the Benjamin beach house and for almost two months it was carefree days of endless blue water and sand between your toes.

But without a doubt, the highlight of your summer was always Bradley Bradshaw.

A few years older than you, he’d been the cute boy who was the object of all your daydreams. You couldn’t remember who you first celebrity crush was, but you definitely remembered the boy with the curly brown hair who was responsible for giving you butterflies in your stomach for the very first time.

While your brother was more than fine trying to ditch you at every turn, Bradley had always made you feel like you were right where you were supposed to be. He always made you feel included. He had been the one to teach you how to wakeboard, gave you his free dole whip when he made a hole-in-one at Tiki Town, and sat next to you the first time you ever rode the Giant Dipper Roller Coaster.

Even though Penny and Mav’s relationship had been on and off for years, Bradley had remained a steady presence in your life every July and August.

Until the one summer when he didn’t show up.

You’d sat on the stairs with your arms wrapped around your knees that first night and listened on as your mom and Penny talked, piecing together the explanation for Bradley’s absence and why your aunt was dating the uninteresting man you’d met earlier that night at dinner.

The sun, the sand, and the sights were all the same. And yet everything had changed after that.

That had been your last San Diego summer.

You moved on, you went to college, you grew up. But you had never forgotten the boy who had made you feel like sunshine.

You’d always hoped he remembered you just as fondly.

When you heard that Penny and Mav were back together, you thought there might be a chance to see him again, you were always curious about how things had turned out for you. You just never expected for him to quite literally crash back into your life.

Or for all of those sun-warmed feelings came rushing back.

It was your third day of working at the Hard Deck.

You were still getting use to the lay of the land- and announcing corner whenever you made your way out of the stockroom- when you’d come out of the back with your arms full of refill napkins packs only to collide with a wall of muscles with a less than dignified oof.

“Oh, shit!” The hand that reached out to grasp your hip was probably the only reason you hadn’t landed on your ass, even as the napkins went everywhere. “Sorry, that was my- wait, Bee?”

The nickname from your younger years was exclusively reserved for close family and friends. Shortened over time from busy bee, a name your mom still wrote in your birthday and Christmas cards, because of the way you were always pursuing new activities with the kind of intense tenacity only found in the most precocious of kids.

Although, no one who’d known you squarely post-braces had ever called you that before. And definitely not anyone so solidly built with such a masculine, raspy voice.

But you knew those rich brown eyes and sun-streaked curls.

Just like you knew that under the soft looking linen blend shirt there’d be freckles dotted along his shoulder. Just like you knew that he was left-handed but preferred to throw a baseball with his right. Just like you knew he rode the Beach Blaster four times in a row that one time, not because he liked it, but because he was trying to get over his fear of heights.

“Bradley?” The right side of his mouth pulled up in a smile, seemingly pleased you recognized him. “Bradley Bradshaw?” you repeat, because even though he was standing less than three feet away from you, your brain was having a hard time processing the boy you’d known was now the man in front of you.

You hadn’t seen him since you were fifteen.

Although, you did try to look him up once in college when you and your roommates were tipsy off cheap sparkling wine and talking about first crushes. Giggling over poor choices and high-fiving over the ones who still Had It. Only when it was your turn, you’d found out pretty quick that he wasn’t on any socials- at least none that the four of you could sleuth out drunk on sheer determination and peach Andre. They’d let you have the rest of the bottle as a consolation prize when you’d all come up emptyhanded.

Bradley Bradshaw had remained a mystery to you, until that moment.

Gone was any trace of baby fat from his familiar face, replaced with a defined jaw and crinkles around the corners of his eyes. There were scars on his cheek and neck that hadn’t been there before, but the smile underneath that mustache was the same one from those summers all those years ago.

“It’s been a long time, huh?” Bradley said.

The only difference was the cute boy you’d known growing up was now quite possibly the most handsome man you’d ever seen.

“How’d you get even hotter?” you blurted. It only took a split second for your brain to catch up with your mouth, wincing at the words that hung in the air unable to take them back.

Bradley’s eyes widened in surprise just for a moment before he laughed. Loud and unguarded and amused.

Mortified and flustered you drop down to your knees to pick up the scattered brown craft paper wrapped bundles of napkins that littered the narrow hallway. His presence- and bulk- filling up the already small space.

He kneeled down next to you, helping to collect the packs. “I don’t know about ‘hotter’, but probably taller since that last time I saw you.” You couldn’t help but notice how big his hands were as he reached for the furthest one that was sent flying as victim of your two-person Big Bang.

And broader, you think.

“We’ve been doing a lot of push-ups lately,” Bradley chuckled, “I keep telling the squad to stop underestimating the old man, but they never learn. They’re still just as competitive as ever.”

“Jesus,” you muttered under your breath, needing a rock to crawl under. You couldn’t remember the last time you felt that ruffled around a man before. So caught off guard that all semblance of casually cool had left the building. You looked at him from the corner of your eye, and attempted to diffuse the situation with some self-deprecating humor, “Well, I wish second puberty had been as kind to me as it was for you.”

“From what I can see, it looks like it was pretty damn kind to you too.”

You’d pressed your lips together and fought back grin as you shook your head, reaching for another bundle. The last thing you’d needed was for him to be charming too.

You felt his gaze on the side of your face, like he was trying to catch your eye, and when you couldn’t avoid it any further without making it weird you met those warmer than cinnamon brown eyes.

“It’s good to see you again.” There was an earnest smile still in place on his face as he passed you the napkins he’d collected from his side of the hall.

He looked at you- probably the same way you’d been looking at him only a couple moments ago- trying to reconcile the carefree girl with the stunned woman in front of him, seeing what changes could be picked out on a face that hadn’t been seen in over a decade. You didn’t dare call it interest that was flickering in his eyes, but you could safely say there was at least some curiosity reflected in them.

You knew he wasn’t flirting, just trying to make you feel better less awkward about your earlier slip. Playing along the same way he did when he’d sabotage your brother at the water gun war game at Belmont Park so that you could stand a chance at winning a stuffed animal prize.

“It’s good to see you again, too,” you replied, meaning it as you gave him a smile of your own for the first time and watching as his own grew a little wider.

“Bee? Did you find them? The napkins should be-” Penny came rounding the corner, taking in the scene in front of her and who you’d been delayed by. Your whole body jolted like she’d caught you playing 7 Minutes in Heaven instead of crouching on the floor. “Oh, I see you’ve found Rooster. And the napkins.”

“It was my bad, Penny, I plowed right into her,” Bradley- Rooster?- said standing back up, wrapping a hand under your elbow to help guide you up to your feet.

“Sorry, I’ll be right there,” you told her, gesturing with your napkin filled arms. He was quick to reach out and catch one of the slipping packs from the top of the pile before it could fall to the ground again, helping you to get them better situated and less like a Jenga stack waiting to collapse.

“There’s no rush. I just wanted to make sure you were finding everything alright.” Her eyes drifted back and forth between the two of you, before landing on him and flicking down to the hand still on your elbow. “Hey, since you’re here, would you mind grabbing a fresh keg of the Stone Brewing lager for me?”

He nodded, letting go of you and hooking his thumbs into his front pockets. “Sure thing, can do.”

“Thank you, Bradley. And Bee,” she continued, turning back to you, “You can just bring those up when you’re ready.” You didn’t know what to make of the smile she gave you before she’d set off back to the bar.

The two of you stood there in silence for a few moments, although it hadn’t been the uncomfortable kind.

Bradley cleared his throat, his mouth quirking to one side. “I feel like there’s some kind of ‘the birds and the bees’ joke here. One I’m not qualified to make since you were always the funnier one of the two of us.”

That time it was your turn to laugh. You were more than a little pleased when his deeper one mixed with yours.

You warred with yourself- still holding those damn napkins- whether or not to wrap things up and go take them to Penny, but you wanted to know more.

“Rooster?” you’d asked, tilting your head at him in question.

“Believe it or not, I finally got past that fear of heights,” he explained, “I’m a pilot now.” You felt your smile grow on its own, it was something he’d always talked about. You were happy to learn he’d made it happen for himself. “Rooster is my callsign.”

It was a name you’d heard a few times since moving into the loft above the garage. The way Penny said it always made it seem like you should know who she was talking about, you just hadn’t taken a moment to ask, figuring that you’d meet this mysterious ‘Rooster’ eventually. You just never would have guessed you already knew him.

You told him as much, adding on, “Maybe she thought we’d kept in touch.”

“I would have liked that.” You ignored the fluttering low in your stomach. There was something in his voice that made your mouth go a little dry. “What’re you doing later? Are you here for long? I’d like to catch up, if you have time for an old friend.”

Friend.

The word shook you out of whatever Bradley Bradshaw induced haze you’d found yourself in.

You didn’t know how long you were going to be here, but one thing was for sure, all the two of you were ever going to be was platonic. It was a necessary reminder before any coconut sunscreen scented daydreams tempted you off course.

A smile stayed plastered to your face, one that felt more forced than it had been a few heartbeats ago, “I’m behind the bar until midnight, but I’ll be your friendly neighborhood bartender for the foreseeable future.”

Bradley grinned. “Guess, I’ll be seeing you around then, Bee.”

“I guess you will, Rooster.”

And you did.

You went from not seeing Bradley Bradshaw for over a decade to seeing him multiple times a week.

He kept you company at the bartop, swiveling on his stool, on slow nights as you found little projects to keep yourself occupied, like polishing and reorganizing the Hard Deck’s glassware collection. Filling each other in on the important things and people that had helped shaped the two of you into the adults that you’d grown into.

Rooster introduced you to his friends and teammates, making you feel not only included but liked you belonged in that same way he had when you were kids. Seamlessly bringing up common interests you shared with the people closest to him, giving you something to connect with them on your own outside of him. Always taking the initiative to extend invites your way to hang out at the beach or to check out the best spot for breakfast or to experience a Padres game complete with an unofficial culinary food tour of Petco Park.

He helped you paint the kitchenette in the loft a soft blue- with your aunt’s permission, of course. Meticulously taping off the countertop edges and cabinets, yet somehow ending up wearing more paint on an old, tightfitting UVA shirt that had seen better days than he got on the wall.  

And on Sunday nights he was seated across from you at the oak dining table with Amelia, Penny, and Pete for the weekly dinner the five of you all had together. They’d been back together for over a year now, and it seemed like it was for good this time based on the way they looked at each other. Your aunt was noticeably happier than she’d been even just a few years ago, that spark back that had been dimmed from an unhappy marriage.

You were happy for her and Mav.

He’d even taken you for a spin on his motorcycle. It was a one and done event, reaffirming what you already knew, that you were more of a four-wheel girl than a two-wheel one.

When you weren’t at the bar or working on the few remote side gigs you’d taken on to keep your skills feeling fresh, you were helping Amelia learn to code. It wasn’t your forte, but you were having fun spending time with her and teaching her what you did know. And in return, she’d help you to revamp your wardrobe a bit. You thought California cool looked good on you.

There had been a brief moment when you’d been packing up your old apartment when you’d worried about being lonely in San Diego not knowing anyone outside of your family, but you were the furthest thing from lonely and you had Bradley to thank for that.

It was nice to have friend.

However, you were finding that crush on him harder to get over than you anticipated.

You still get annoyed at yourself when he smiles at you a certain way making your cheeks heat up and your stomach flip. Although, you try not to be too hard on yourself because he’s genuinely kind and good looking and you’re only human. God knows you’ve seen enough people notice him too from your perch behind the bar.

But there were worse problems to have.

You had spent that morning getting the Hard Deck decorated for the big New Year’s Eve party.

As the first to arrive, you’d gotten the coffee going on the ancient coffee maker that you were trying your hardest to get Penny to replace when a big hand skimmed the side of your waist, reaching past you to steal the cup you’d just poured for yourself.

You turned to see a sleepy looking Bradley standing behind you, his curled looked more like they were fresh off his pillow than the way you usually saw them styled.

“It’s too early for this.” You watched as he took a big swig from the cup, wincing as he registered just how hot Jimmy’s machine had brewed the coffee, just a couple degrees below scalding.

You gave him an unimpressed look, “Says the man who routinely wakes up at 5am for a sunrise run.”

“It’s the weekend, Bee,” Bradley said like it explained everything.

“It’s a Wednesday.”

“Schematics.” He took another deep sip of your coffee, but not before you caught the mischievous way his mouth was curved upwards. “Everyone knows the days between Christmas and New Years Day are the Wild West of the calendar year, every day is a weekend day from the 26th to the 1st.”

You actually hadn’t seen Rooster since Christmas.

You’d decided to spend the holiday in San Diego since your parents had decided this was the year they were finally going to check out the Christmas markets in Europe like they’ve always wanted too. And you didn’t want to crash your brother’s first Christmas as a dad, instead you’d sent the most obnoxious baby toy you could find online in addition to a silky soft stuffed rabbit with your niece’s name embroidered on the ear.

When you opened the front door with the pretty stained glass sailing boat picture window, you’d been surprised to see Bradley standing there with a white faux fur trimmed Santa hat and holding a bag with unexpectedly well wrapped presents in one hand and a creamy, cranberry-colored pie in the other.

Your hand stayed glued to the doorknob as his eyes trailed over you. The house had been warm but a shiver still worked its way through your body as he took in your festive pajamas.

Before he could say anything Amelia ever-so-helpfully pointed out the mistletoe you’d conveniently forgotten about that had been hung above the wood door. Frankly, she sounded a bit too enthusiastic about it.

He mumbled something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like little punk, although his tone was so affectionate that you thought you must have misheard him. But you didn’t get to think on it for too long because then he was leaning in, in, in.

Your heart shot straight into your throat at the first prickle of his mustache and then the slightly dry lips as they brushed against your cheek for the briefest of moments.

And then he pulled away all too soon.

Friend. Friend. Friend. You tried to remind yourself, but your heart was too aflutter to get the message.

He looked you straight in the eyes as he stepped back, “Can you do me a favor, Bee?”

You must have made a sound that was close enough to an mhm, because then he passed you the bag of presents and the pie waiting only long enough to make sure you had a good hold on them both before darting around you to chase after Amelia.

Amelia squealed when Bradley caught her, ducking his head down to drop a playfully chaotic kiss on her cheek.

He ended up giving Penny and Mav the same treatment too. Although Pete shoved him away good-naturedly when he tried to plant a particularly sloppy one on him.

All while your feet stayed glued to the same spot they were when he kissed you.

But that was six days ago. Probably the longest stint without seeing him since you collided with him that afternoon a few months ago.

The smell of strong coffee and cinnamon had coaxed you back into the moment, and you’d shook your head a bit like that would help you clear your mind with Bradley standing so close to you again.

“I don’t think it’ll take us too long,” you declared, trying to get focused back on the task at hand- that being the unofficial head of the NYE decorating committee, “I even made us a schedule.”

“Of course you did. Is it color-coded?” he asked over the rim of the chipped mug.

“And if it is?” you countered, unashamed of your planning. And then there was that damn smile of his.

“Then I’m really going to need this coffee,” he winked, and poured you a cup of your own.

You’d been right though. With everyone pitching in things came together rather quickly.

The morning moving steadily as the Christmas decorations were replaced with classic the gold and white and black color scheme you’d went with for the party. The silver tinsel tree covered in beach themed shaped ornaments with a few planes hung about by the front door might have stood out at odds with everything else, but metallic was a neutral in your book so you’d opted to keep the cheerful tree up just a little bit longer and tucked a few party blowers into the branches to tie it in with the rest of the space.

It was easy for you to get in the zone, delegating and divvying up the tasks on your color-coded schedule, putting all your project tracking skills to use. There were dozens of strands of string lights that had to gone up on the ceiling and along the walls. All of the windows with the snowflake cut outs you and Amelia had made for Christmas were framed in a metallic fringe. There was a station with hats and headbands and glasses in case anyone was feeling particularly festive. The tables and booths had been stocked with noise makers and confetti poppers in addition to the mirrorball centerpieces and confetti scatter.

Everything sparkled and shined, the light bouncing off everything gave the bar a wonderfully hazy glow, it was the perfect ambiance for the most hopeful night of the year.

At one point, you’d been working on hanging up some dangling golden stars from one of the ceramic mug rounders only to find Bradley standing there at the base of the ladder behind you with a well-defined arm stretched out just in case you lost balance.

And then just like that, your focus went out the window. Because then he was everywhere. He made it impossible for you to not notice him, especially since so many of your jobs and his overlapped, something you’d come to regret more and more as the hours went by.

You’d been working on tying off balloons and lamenting the fact you didn’t order another pump with the tying tool, when you’d decided to take a break to massage your numb fingertips. You looked up to check the progress made with fresh eyes, to see Rooster on a ladder helping Mav to get the netting set up for the balloon drop.

The athletic shorts he’d been wearing were hanging low on his hips. And as he reached up to hand Pete another nail it caused his t-shirt to ride up giving you a glimpse of toned stomach and tantalizing v-lines. It was just as tempting as it was taunting.

You’d switched to ice water after that.

The image was seared into your mind for the rest of the afternoon. Not even the freezing cold shower you’d hopped into the second you made it back to your loft to freshen up before the party had helped. Neither had the rushed orgasm to take the edge off, because it wasn’t your own fingers that you wanted.

He’d found you before the party well and truly started.

You’d been double checking all the prep, making sure you had the bar stocked up as was possible without losing any valuable space, when you felt a hand on your back. Bradley was dressed up in a navy suit that fit him in all the right places, looking more handsome than you knew possible. All broad shoulders and thick thighs. The top button of his pristinely pressed white shirt undone, giving you a peek at the divot base of his throat.

You weren’t sure what made you more flustered, that hint of his neck or the skin under his bellybutton that you’d seen only a couple hours ago.

A soft smile coasted over his face as he took in your New Years’ Eve finest. “You look-”

“I know, rhinestones for New Years’ Eve, how groundbreaking,” you joked, cutting him off and giving your best Miranda Priestly impression.

You were wearing a black velvet jumpsuit for the party. You loved the way it fit the curves of your body and the way the halter top made your collarbones and shoulders look. There was just a hint of skin with the keyhole near the bust. But it was also practical- right down to your plain black no-show panties you had on- so you could move easily without worrying about giving anyone an eyeful. It wasn’t the flashiest of outfits, there’d be more than enough sequins later on, but the way Bradley was looking at you made it feel like your off the rack might as well be haute couture.

“I was going to say, you look good. Really good.” Bradley takes his time letting his eyes drag down your body, his cheek kicking up when he lands on your shoes. “I especially like the birks, they tie the whole look together.”

The clogs you were wearing were decidedly unsexy, not many people could pull of the potato shoe, but you weren’t there as a party guest, you still had work to do and your night was just getting started. “I don’t think stilettos and stouts would mix together very well,” you said by way of explanation.

Bradley chuckled and reached out taking an end of the little rhinestone bow that dangled from right beneath your neck where the straps met and twirled it between his fingers for a moment. “I think this might be my favorite part though,” he rasps lowly. There was an intensity in his eyes directed at you that you hadn’t seen before.

For a moment it looked like he was about to say more, and then a glass shattered.

The sound of it caused you to crash back into your body.

“And so it begins,” you announced, taking a half step backwards and out of his touch, that rhinestone cord falling back against your sternum with a gentle thud that you felt reverberate in your chest.

You heard him say your name, but you were already setting off for a broom.

So you’d kept your head down and your hands busy.

It felt like for every drink you made, two more were ordered. Barely noticing as the final minutes of this year flew by while you garnished drinks with bright cherries and slices of lemon with a flourish before handing them off.

Offering smiles and well wishes to those here to celebrate. True to your namesake as you swiped cards and counted bills and mixed and poured and served the drinks to the ever-rotating people in front of you.

You made eye contact with Rooster a couple times throughout the night, the same way you usually did when you were behind the bar and he was there. Eyes drawn to him like a magnet against your will.

He hadn’t come up to you at all since before the party started. You’d seen him with the Daggers when you went to refill the water tank, heard the keys of the upright piano when you grabbed more ice from the back room, saw him talking with the girl in the shiny dress and her interested eyes as you put the freshly washed glasses away.

Just like he’d been the best parts of your San Diego summers, he’d become the best part of your year.

You’d spent the last four months trying to convince yourself that it was a silly crush, that you could will it away or get over it. But now just a couple moments shy of a new year barreling towards you, it was time to face the fact that Bradley Bradshaw wasn’t someone you were ever going to get over.

Although if you were honest with yourself, you weren’t sure you wanted to get over him.

You’re giving the counter a quick wipe down, taking advantage of the brief lull when the music cuts off, startling you out of your thoughts.

Twelve!

The countdown had snuck up on you. Just like everything else had this year.

Eleven!

You’d had your fill of unexpected surprises, some for the worse and some for the better. While it felt like you’d had more downs than ups, you were ending the year feeling the most content you have since you were laid off. And that was more than good enough for you.

Ten!

At the beginning of this year, you never would have guessed that you’d end it in San Diego. This year had taken from you, but it had also given you a lot. New friends, new places to explore, new memories, new hopes.

Nine!

You were still figuring things out and that was ok. Even though you still weren’t sure what was next for you, you knew everything would work out. One way or another you’d find yourself on the other side of this and able to look back with pride for making it through all the challenges that had been thrown your way.

Eight!

And while things didn’t shape out the way you anticipated them to, with goals still yet to be achieved and a vision board of ideas that you’d carry into the new year, you had so much to be grateful for.

Seven!

You liked San Diego- and not in the just-for-now way. You liked the life you were building here. You liked the beach and the sand and the sun. You liked you Sunday dinners with Penny and Amelia and Pete. You liked the people you were surrounded by. You liked the stories you’ve collected from your side of the bar. You liked the diner down the road with their perfectly shaped coffee cups. You liked your new normal while you got your feet back under you. You liked the potential you felt was here.

Six!

And then there was Bradley.

Five!

You were avoiding looking in his direction, too worried about what you might see, not wanting to end this year with another disappointment. You’ve come to accept that he had a piece of you that you weren’t sure you were ever going to get back. But that was something for you to deal with next year.

Four!

For now, you are right where you are supposed to be.

Three!

Because what is meant for you will never pass you by. Not in life and not in love. And that was something you could count on, something you could hold onto.

Two!

You smile to yourself and close your eyes.

The crowd chants One!

You breathe out and let go.

And when the cheers of Happy New Year! ring out, you breathe in and open your heart up to all the possibilities.

Enjoying the moment for what it was- exactly as it was- as the party noise makers started going off all around you.

As New Years’ kisses were traded.

As people greeted a fresh, bright New Year with wide-open and welcoming arms.

Where anything could happen.

Where anything was possible because the year was waiting to written.

You tip your head back and open your eyes, watching as the balloons you’d spent the afternoon tying knots in started to fall, slowly at first and then more until your view was a cocoon of black and gold and white and clear blocking out the rest of the world from view.

Time seemed to slow a bit as the confetti poppers joined the mix adding to the echo of fireworks going off nearby. The glints of gold and little shiny dots of sparkles and streamers seemed to hang in the air. There was a cacophony of cheerful noises, from the poppers to the people to the familiar sound of Whitney Houston being piped over the static-y speakers.

A moment of magic for you and you alone, as you pocketed the hope and optimism you felt rippling around you.

Over the next couple of hours pass just as swiftly as before. As you got back into the groove of serving people, your brain snagged on the sound of Aud Land Syne being played on the upright piano at the other end of the bar, and the only person it could be playing it.

It wasn’t long before people steadily started to trickle out the front door.

You’d made sure to shoo Penny out to the dance floor with Pete as the lineup of people slowed down enough for her to have some New Years Eve fun.

No one had gone too crazy, but even so, you helped arranged people rides to get home safe between closing out tabs and announcing the last call for the few people who wanted to stick it out until the very end. Waving to your new friends as they all slowly but surely made their exits.

You’d lost track of Rooster along the way, it would have been nice to wish him a Happy New Year, but it was probably for the best. It was easier on your heart to not know whether he left with some of the Daggers or with the girl with the silver sequins.

You just locked the door after the last couple stragglers had left for the night. You’d sent Penny away a little over a half an hour ago- along with Mav- since there’d been only a handful of people to look after.

She’d made you promise not to stay behind after locking up, but you didn’t see the harm in tidying things up a bit more. You were collecting the empty glasses that had been scattered about and abandoned on window ledges and tables when you caught a figure out of the corner of your eye, nearly causing you to drop the bus tub you were holding on to.

“Bradley! Jesus.” You set the plastic tub down on a table with more force than necessary, the glasses rattling against each other, and press a hand to your chest where your heart is rapidly knocking about. “What are you still doing here?”

You figured he left already, so you’re more than a little surprised he’s still here. And not just because he startled you half to death.

“Sorry, sorry,” he apologizes, putting his hands up. “I didn’t mean to sneak up on you, I was taking out some trash and then got held up talking to Jake for a few minutes. I didn’t realize everyone else had left.”

“I just locked the front doors,” you say, waving towards the now closed front door.

Bradley takes a cautious step closer. “So, it’s just us then?” He doesn’t even have the decency to look like he’s been partying for the better part of five hours, he looks just as handsome as he did at the start of the evening, whereas you’re sure you probably look as ruffled as you felt.

“We’re the last two standing,” you confirm, putting your hands on your lower back to stretch out the tightness that had settled along your spine over the course of the night, “But just barely, on my end.”

“You’ve been busy tonight.” You hum in agreement and reach for a foam-covered glass that was left between the coaster holder and napkin dispensers. His big hand closing around it first and he pins you with a look, leaning a hip against the table, “So tell me, why are you still cleaning when you and I both know for a fact Penny hired a crew to take care of this in the morning?”

You don’t have an answer for him, at least, not one you were willing to share. That even though the ball had dropped and the confetti had fallen you weren’t ready to have the night be over yet. Knowing that the moment you locked up for good and got in your car and headed home, that the bottle of champagne you’d bought for yourself and plans with Meg Ryan and Billy Crystal wouldn’t hit quite the way you’d hope it would.

Instead, you offer him a shrug.

Bradley’s eyes search yours for a moment before he gives you a gentle smile. “C’mon, busy bee, I think you’ve more than earned yourself a glass of champagne.”

He doesn’t give you a chance to argue, already making his way towards the bar, not that you put up much of a fight. The ‘Greatest Hits’ playlist that Penny had queued up for the night is still playing in the background, you recognize opening notes of The Cure’s “Just Like Heaven” as you trail after him.

You lift an eyebrow as he pulls out a stool for you, but he just mirrors you by lifting one of his own and gestures to the seat. You think you feel his thumb sweep over your hip as he helps you into the stool before stepping into the front bar. A little sigh of relief slips out of you, finally off your feet for the first time all night.

You’re tired, but it’s a happy kind of tired. You’d had a nice time all things considering. Seeing the bright faces of everyone tonight had made all the work you’d put in feel worth it, all the planning and prep and decorating made it worth it if tonight ended up being a fond memory for someone.

Bradley grins at you from over his shoulder mischievously, “You know, Penny’s never let me behind the bar before.” He says it so conspiratorially, like he’s getting away with something and you’re an eyewitness to his delinquency, as if he wasn’t a decorated golden boy of the United States Navy.  

You laugh, endeared by the boyish smile on his face. “Probably because you’re never wearing the right shoes,” you tease, wiggling a clog towards him.

And he chuckles, warm and affectionate.

Rooster finds the freshly washed glasses easily- Pete had done a great job as the designated dishwasher of the evening, loading and unloading glasses as quickly as they came with speedy efficiency. You see as his hand hesitates for a moment eyeing the already open bottle of champagne on the counter warily, and you point a glossy cranberry coated fingernail to the fridge under the counter, where you knew a few uncorked ones were still stocked knowing that Penny won’t mind if you pilfer a celebratory bottle to share between yourselves.

With your help he finds the chilled bottle and shoots the cork across the room with a cheerful pop! You make a mental note to pick it up later marking the spot in your mind, which he must notice because he says, knowingly, “Don’t worry, I’ll grab it later. You’re officially off the clock.”

He pours you a glass and then one for himself with a flourish, clearly showing off as the bubbles fizz to the top of the rim without spilling over. You’ve spent all night catering to everyone else, it’s nice to have someone looking out for you now.

Rooster holds out a glass for you, “Cheers, Bee.”

You smile and clink yours against his.

The bubbles burst across your tongue, refreshing and crisp. The two of you sip on your glasses of champagne in companionable silence for a few moments, enjoying the calm after a busy day and busier night.

“Did you have a nice time tonight, Bradley?”

“It was nice enough, I guess,” he says, giving you a half smile, “I’m having a much better time now though.”

You take another little sip, attributing the fluttering in your chest to the bubbles.

“It feels weird to be sitting on this side of the bar,” you muse, changing the subject, “You know, I don’t think I made you a drink at all tonight.”

He takes the bottle and pours you a little more. “People kept hogging my favorite bartender.”

You grin into your glass.

“I would have made time for you,” you say.

He leans down and fold his arms in front of him, so that your faces are level. “You would have?”

The answer comes easily. “Of course.”

Bradley gives you a look you don’t know how to interpret, like reading your face isn’t enough that he wants to know what’s going on inside of your head. You always kind of thought your cards had been on the table the whole time, but maybe you’d been keeping them closer to your chest than you’d realized.

“It was nice of you to make sure Penny and Mav got out on the dancefloor earlier.”

“You saw that?” It hadn’t been an easy feat, but it had been worth it to see them looking at each other in a way you hoped you’d find someday.

His gaze is steady when he replies, “I did.”

Flustered now, you feel your cheeks heat up. “Amelia and I had a bet about if he was going to propose tonight, and I thought I’d do my part to try and help her win twenty dollars. I didn’t think he would, at least not here in front of a crowd of people, but I hope he’ll do it soon.”

He nods, taking a sip of his own, the tips of his ears getting red.

You lean forward on your elbows, “Tell me what you know, Bradshaw.”

“I’m a vault,” he says, shaking his head.

“Does he have a ring?” you ask, elatedly.

Bradley takes another deep sip of champagne, giving you nothing, at least not with his words. But you don’t need him to confirm, not with the way his lips are turned up, clearly happy for his uncle and your aunt.

Good, you smile to yourself, that’s good.

“I also happened to notice that you didn’t get to dance at all tonight.”

“No, I didn’t.” You could have. Penny had tried to get you to take a few minutes to enjoy yourself, but you kept finding excuses to stay planted where you were. “There’s always next year,” you add, circling your finger around the base of your champagne glass.

Bradley steps out from behind the bar and takes the half full glass from your hand, setting it on top of a coaster in a move that you find entirely too appealing.  And holds out a hand out for you, “We should fix that.”

His large fingers wrap around your hand- strong and sure- as he guides you towards the old jukebox, the two of you walking over the confetti covered floor and though the sea of balloons that bobbed in your wake.

He lets go when the two of you have reached the middle of the makeshift dancefloor that had been cleared of the tables that were normally there for the night. Your feet stay put as he makes his way to the sticker covered jukebox and starts flipping through the options.

“I keep trying to get Penny to get a new one that takes a card,” you say nervously, filling the quiet, the air now charged with something new between the two of you. “Or one with an app, where people could pay and pick things from their phone.”

“Now where’s the fun in that?” he teases playfully, still scanning through the CDs, clearly on a mission to find a particular song.

“She keeps a couple spare quarters on the ledge behind it- but uhm- I’m not sure if they’re still there or not, or if people have already used them. I could grab some from the register-”

You take a half step back, but Rooster stops you.

“Don’t go flying away, Bee.” He pulls out his wallet from the inside of his suit jacket and fishes out a couple coins, holding them out on his flattened palm for you to see. “You see, I’ve been saving these ones for just the right girl.”

You didn’t know your heart could beat so fast.

Bradley slips them into the machine with a metallic plink, once and then twice. The corner of his mouth pulls up as his eyes drift over you. “Yeah, you’re definitely an N24 kind of girl.”

He punches in the code and walks purposefully back to you.

The gentle sound of an acoustic guitar crackles to life over the old speaker system of the Hard Deck, the song much slower than you were anticipating. The opening notes are familiar ones to you, but different than what you were used to hearing. This rendition was delicate and atmospheric. Intimate. Almost like the music was wearing its heart on its sleeve.

Bradley wraps an arm around you and pulls you in. His eyes are heavy on yours, you feel the weight of them everywhere. He coaxes your hand onto his broad shoulder and takes the other one in his, drawing it to his chest.

He holds you close as he leads you in a dance.

No one has ever looked at you the way he is looking at you.

“Ask me about my night again,” he murmurs, invitingly.

You swallow. “Did you have a nice time earlier tonight?”

“No.” Your breath stutters in your chest and you miss a step, but he easily guides you through it. “No,” he repeats, “I didn’t because I couldn’t spend it with the only person I want to.”

Your voice has escaped you, not that you’d trust it not to completely give you away.

“This is the part where you ask me how it’s going now.” He runs his thumb over the back of your hand, encouragingly.

“This doesn’t feel very friendly,” you whisper.

Bradley presses you even closer to him. Every part of you is touching him, and you’re warm everywhere. “That’s good,” he rasps, “Because I’m not really going for just ‘friendly’ here, honey.”

You see everything there plain as day, written all over his face.

All you can say is his name.

“Bradley.”

And he says yours in return, so gently like it’s precious to him.

“I kept hoping you’d look my way during the countdown. But then you looked so thoughtful and all I wanted was to see that moment through your eyes. I couldn’t look away, you’re so beautiful.”

Feeling brave, you slide your hands up his chest and around his neck, combing your fingers through the short hair at the base of his head. He hums, pleased and content.

“You didn’t get a New Years Eve kiss.” It’s a statement. Like he knows because he was paying attention.

Your stomach swoops, and it’s like you’re fifteen and riding the Giant Dipper again.

“Neither did you, it seems.” His eyes drop down to your mouth.

“No, I didn’t,” he confirms, raising a hand up and skimming his thumb along your lower lip. “But now I’ve got a whole year to practice.

Bradley brings both hands to cup your face. His eyes traveling from your eyes to your nose to your mouth, a soft smile on his face as he leans in to kiss you.

When his lips meet yours it’s like time stops. You can’t hear the music over the rushing in your ears or the beating of your heart. In that moment, all there is only Bradley.

There’s no hesitation in the way his mouth moves against yours. Or in the way his teeth grazes your lower lip, right before he follows it with his tongue. It’s as if he has played this moment in his head so many times before.

Like there was never a question in his mind about if it was ever going to happen, but when.

There’s a surety in his touch, in the way he cradles your face in his big hands, in the way he angles your head just right.

The way Bradley kisses you makes you feel like this is the moment he’s been waiting for the whole night.

That it’s the moment he’s been waiting the last four months for.

His kiss is sweet like cinnamon and you know you’ll never be the same now that you’ve had a taste of it.

Your first one of the year. And it belongs to Bradley Bradshaw. Just as you always hoped it would be.

He pulls away just enough to skim his lips teasingly against yours. “Happy New Year, Bee.”

“Happy New Year, Bradley.”

You grin and he dips back down to kiss you again.

Time ticks on, but this time there isn’t a countdown. Only his mouth against yours and your arms wrapped around his neck.

After a while, he pulls away again, looking entirely and thoroughly kissed. It’s a good look for him.

He smiles at you. “My mom used to believe in ‘beginning as you mean to go on’. Taking time on the first of a new year and doing something that you want to make a part of your year going forward,” he says, stroking your cheek with his thumb, “So if you’re up for it, honey, I’d like to take you out to breakfast at that 24-hour diner. Because I mean to go on with you this year and the next one after that if I’m lucky.”

“I’d like that,” you say, taking a snapshot of this moment and the way those warm, brown eyes are gazing at you. “Just as long as we leave some time for mine. I have an idea of how I’d like to ‘begin as I mean to go on’.”

“Yeah? What did you have in mind?”

You don’t answer, instead you just lean in close until you feel his smile pressed against your.

The two of you eventually lock up for the night, for good this time. But only after Bradley finally stops kissing you long enough to grab that cork he’d shot across the bar earlier, pretending not to see the way he tucked it into the pocket of his suit jacket.

He takes your hand in his warm one, his fingers slipping easily between yours like he’s done it hundreds of times before.

The sunrise is still a couple of hours away, but you can see the promise of dawn and all the possibilities it’ll bring.

Bradley turns his head back to look at you and grins, it’s wide enough that the corners of his eyes crinkle.

A new day, a new year.

And you can’t help but think that this really will be the best one yet.

Happy 2025, tgm friends! I hope this is your year! Thank you for reading!

And a big thank you to Jordan ( @gretagerwigsmuse) for all the support and encouragement and general woogirling over Bradley Bradshaw!

If you want to know what song Bradley played for Bee 🥰

You can read my other stories here!

Taglist:

@gretagerwigsmuse @sehnsuchts-trunken  @callsignspark @notroosterbradshaw @tongue-like-a-razor @laracrofted @ofstoriesandstardust @bradshawsbitch @starryeyedstories @top-hhun-main @startrekfangirl2233 @callsign-viper @teacupsandtopgun @angelbabyange @oneelleandaneye @mizzzpink @cornishkat @alana4610 @20th-centu-fairy-girl @pono-pura-vida @donttouchmycarrots @eg-dr3amer3 @whaledots-blog @a-beaverhausen @hangmanscoming @mandolin22 @theweekndhistorybook @lilpeekabooze @high-bi-imgonnacry @ahintofkiwistrawberry @ruewrote @spiderman-stilinski @jayniebop @my-soulmate-is-mycroft @imaginecrushes @keyrani @chicomonks @artemissunn @mayempress @eddiemunsonreader

[cherryswisherz]

GLORIA [verse one]

♱ CONTAINS: kissing and cursing das it

♱ NIYAHSPEAKS: PAZZI MINI SERIES ONNA HOE okay so like the vision is pazzi reminiscing on memories of their relationship. shoutout anon for the request

♱ ♱ ♱ ♱

❝i met her when i was off the porch as a teenager, she said one day i would right my wrongs and see paper❞

“BUECKERS!” Micah yells my name as I approach the benches near the basketball court. 

I’m 15 minutes late but everyone should be used to that by now. By now, being late is my trademark so none of my friends look bothered. In fact, almost everyone is smiling as they dap me up and say hello. 

Everyone except the only person in the group that I hadn’t seen before. Some girl with bug eyes. 

Okay, so they aren’t big eyes. But they are big, brown eyes that look at me like she wants nothing more than my head on the chopping block. 

“Yo, who’s this?” I nod my head towards the girl who’s shooting me the literal death glare. 

“This is Azzi.” Micah slings an arm around Azzi's shoulder and she shrugs him off with a huff. “She’s my cousin. She just moved here.”

“Can she hoop?” I ask. 

“She’s standing right here and she would appreciate it if you didn’t speak about her like she wasn’t.” Azzi snatches the ball from my hands and begins walking to the court. “And I thought the movie was White Men Can’t Jump?”

I have no choice but to laugh at her insinuation. Meeting her on the court, I snatch my ball back. “It’s a good thing I’m a woman then, huh?” I say.

“Oh? You got game white girl?”

“Like you’ve never seen before.” 

“Show me then.”

“Check.” 

And the game began.

❝we started out young, lookin' for some identity, made a thousand mistakes, but never did we lack chemistry❞

“PAIGE!” Azzi’s chasing after me. “Will you just wait for a a fucking second?”

Every fiber of my being is telling me to keep walking and never stop, but we’re in a hotel for state and she’s screaming my name. If someone complains, coach is gonna kill me. 

I stop walking and shut my eyes, taking a deep breath. 

Relax, Bueckers.

I pivot on my foot and stare at the girl in front of me.

If I wasn’t such a pussy, I’d tell her how beautiful she is. With her frizzy french braids and her tie-dye t-shirt and her St. Patricks Day socks. But complimenting her would only make this whole situation even more awkward, and if it gets any more awkward I might off myself. 

So, instead of telling Azzi everything I’ve wanted to tell her since I’d met her, I speed walk back to our room grabbing her arm in the process. 

I’ve never been one for serious conversations and Azzi and I’s friendship isn’t necessarily one where we have too many of them. But tonight, I thought I saw something. 

Something in her eyes said, ‘it isn’t just you.’ 

God, I couldn’t have been any more wrong.

Shutting the door, I turn to her and make it a point to never take my eyes off the lamp behind her. 

“I’m sorry.”

She furrows her eyebrows and cocks her head a little to the side. “You’re sorry?” she sounds confused, which is confusing me. 

If she doesn’t want an apology then what the fuck does she want?

“Yes?”

“For what?”

For kissing you. For reading this whole thing wrong. For ruining our friendship and possibly losing us State because there’s no fucking way I’m gonna be able to focus tomorrow.

“For everything.”

All of a sudden, she’s not across the room for me anymore. She’s right in front of me, smacking me hard on the back of my head.

“OW!” I duck my head and slid under her raised arm. “What the fuck, Azzi?”

“You’re so stupid!” She shouts.

“How the fuck am I stupid for apologizing to you?”

We’re both yelling at each other, which to anyone else, may seem like a bad thing. But Azzi and I get our best communication done during our screaming matches. 

Don’t ask me why… It just is what it is.

“Because I don’t want a fucking apology, Paige!”

“Well, the fuck do you want then?”

“YOU!”

Record. Scratch.

“What?” I’m not yelling anymore. I’m actually speaking so low that I almost don’t hear myself. “What did you say?”

“I was trying to tell you, but you kep-”

I cut her off, “Say it again, Azzi.”

She grins like the Cheshire cat, “I want you.”

“What does that mean, though?”

“Holy fuck, you’re actually dumb.” She rolls her eyes, “I like you too, Paige.”

I’ve waited to hear that for almost a year. 

A year of staring when she isn’t looking. A year of moments that I wondered if she held as close to her as I did. A year of wanting her- no, needing her in ways that seem too mature for a 17 year old girl.

A part of me thinks she’s joking. Or she’s just trying to make me feel better…

I think about the kiss we shared 2 minutes ago. Her soft lips on mine, her in my lap on the bed next to me, grinding on my lap, driving me insane. 

I think of her scrambling off me and saying stop and the guilt that has sat on my chest since.

“But-” The sentence dies in my mouth and tears well in my eyes, “But when we kissed-” I point at her “You said stop.”

Azzi’s arms fly up before plopping back to her side, “Because I don’t wanna fuck you the night before the state championship!”

“Oh.”

“Yeah, oh.” Azzi mocks me, “If you would have just waited 30 seconds, I would have told you that.”

Azzi Fudd likes me back. The girl I’ve been feining for, likes me back.

Suddenly, I’m aware of the chance to be a jackass, and of course, I have to take it.

I walk over to her and nudge her shoulder, “You liikkkee meeee.” I sing

She laughs and shoves me away, “Get away from me.”

“You liiikkke meeee and you liked when I kissed yooouuuu”

She crawls back in bed and uses the comforter to hide her smile, “Go to bed, Paige.”

I crawl in bed, on top of her and kiss all over her face, relishing in the fact that Azzi fucking Fudd likes me back.

❝i was in love with you, didn't know what it was with you, kiss you in back of the class just to get a buzz with you❞

“Ms. Bueckers.” Ms. Jackson says. “Put your phone up, before it becomes my phone.”

“I’m sorry, Ms. Jackson.” I flash her a grin and slide my phone into my pocket. I don’t even need to me on my phone anymore anyway. 

Azzi and I’s plan is already set. 

My eyes never leave the clock. Counting the seconds until they become a minute, until eventually a minute begins five. 

My hand shoots in the air. “Can I go see my counselor?”

Ms. Jackson never turns from the board, her back still to the class as she groans before saying, “Get out, Paige.” 

“Love you too, Ms. Jackson.” I smile and dip out of the classroom, making my way across campus to the gym.

“Finally.” Azzi groans, ball already in hand. “How do you make the plans and still come late?”

“Shut up,” I throw my bag down and walk over to her. ‘Gimme kiss.” 

She ducks away from me, laughing, “I thought we were gonna play one-on-one?”

“We were.” I nod my head, “But you look so good,” I smile and grab her hips, pulling her closer. 

She gives me a peck and tries to pull away, but a peck is never enough, so I chase her lips and she drops the ball, wrapping her arms around my neck. 

In a few months I’m gonna graduate and go to UCONN and she’s still gonna be here. We’re gonna be almost 2,000 miles apart, and I don’t know how I’m gonna survive without her but I’m not gonna think about it right now. 

Right now, I’m gonna do everything but fuck my girlfriend in the middle of my high school's gym.

♱TAGLIST @patscorner @riyahtheballer @mattslolita @thaatdigitaldiary @janaelalfysblunt @kmoneymartini @sageworld

@darkskinchristiandiorpostergirl @justliketoreadsowhat @pb524830 @pb524830 @dnftpn @sierrale8ne @numberonepartyanth3m

@pppaaiiiggggeeeeee @uwupaige @paigeluvvr @colorthecosmos444 @authentic-girl03 @makethemhoesmad @lovegalor333 @mrsarnold

@sellasstories @heart4caitlin @avvwritesstufff @st4rrzynight @bueckersp @paxaz535 @thelightknight21 @paxaz535

@darlindayss @his-loss @dreatopia

[wandixx]

Relationship reveal with side of mind-control (or, really, the other way around)

to that one anon who asked for relationship reveal M'gann/Danny one-shot, here is another take I mentioned

Trigger warnings: mind control ofc

M’gann just needed to get closer. It’ll be alright if she just got a little closer.

“Are you trying to kill us dude?”

Answer was apparently yes as Robin barely jumped out of the way of an ectoblast. M’gann knew true answer was no, she knew Phantom well enough, after long calm nights under starry sky and comfort after breakdowns in the closets and heart-to-heart over battlefields and kisses stolen in the quiet moments of in-between. But for some reason, now he was acting against everything he was and stood for. Red eyes were probably point towards an explanation.

“What even is your beef with us?!” Artemis yelled, shooting one of her special arrows at him.

Right, Team didn’t know Danny. She was going to introduce him soon, when the time was right, gods, she even convinced him to join the Team and was just waiting for Batman’s approval. And now Phantom got worst possible introduction.

M’gann just needed to get close enough to snap him out of it. She could of course just use her psychic powers from where she was but it was a nuclear option. It was better if she handled it the ‘normal way’.

For all he was great fighter, Phantom stood no chance against the whole Team, even when he was in his right mind. As it was, however had in their clutches didn’t know full extent of his abilities and were absolutely pathetic at using what they did know about. Though intangibility made it a bit tricky-

Oh, wait, Kaldur’s water attacks countered it, Danny plain and simple hadn’t had a shadow of the chance.

“Don’t knock him out” she demanded over the Mindlink, right when Kaldur scooped Danny out of the sky, pinning his hands so he couldn’t fight anymore and Conner jumped at the ghost, fuming with anger.

“Don’t lapidate this one M’gann, they are not a robot”

“Excuse me, what?!”

“It was one time Robin, one time. And I know he is not a robot, I can read his thoughts”

“I sooo need to hear this story”

“As you wish Artemis, as you wish”

“Could you all just shut up and focus?!”

“Thank you Superboy”

“So, what’s the plan?” Wally asked while pacing, trying to work off excess energy after battle finished too soon.

“Oh, I’m going to talk to him”

“They tried to burn our heads off, I kinda doubt you can talk them out of anything”

“He is mind-controlled. And he is my friend, I taught him how to fight it. He just needs a little help, it seems”

“Get to it then Miss Martian, he is trying to slip”

She nodded and kicked off to fly, stopping at Danny’s eye level, just slightly breaching his personal space.

“Hey Phantom,” she started softly “I need you so use what I taught you o-?”

“Shut up” Danny’s mouth spat in distinctly not-Danny way.

“I’m not talking to you. I’m talking to Phantom and if you don’t leave I’ll make sure he kicks you out or do it myself” she didn’t bother with niceties, she didn’t bother with putting an inflection in her voice.

Danny’s body snorted.

“I won with psychics stronger than you. I just also know Phantom well enough, he’d prefer to do it himself and he can do it. If you don’t leave now, you’ll learn how much worse is it to be kicked out instead of leaving peacefully”

Slowly, so painfully slowly she reached out to put hand on Danny’s cheek. Touch always helped ground him and there was a chance it would distract whoever controlled him at the moment. Red in his eyes dimmed for a second or five. She smiled gently “Yes, just like that Phantom, you’ve got it. Just how we trained, alright?”

She got a little closer but not enough to lose view of his eyes. She could tell whether he was back in control just by using his powers, even without breaching the boundaries Danny was comfortable with. But she simply wanted to see his whole face and for him to see her whole face, like he did during hours upon hours of their practice.

She could feel his muscles twitching between expressions, as his eyes changed colors like police lights if they were red-green instead of red-blue. M’gann kept steady stream of assurances, slowly brushing thumbs against his cheeks. If situation wasn’t so dire it would probably feel pretty nice. She’d need to bookmark this idea for later.

At last, the whole spectacle ended, with Danny’s eyes turning back to their soft green his face pressing into her hands like it was his only salvation. M’gann grinned enthusiastically barely containing relieved laugh.

“You did it Da- Phantom! You did it!” she yelled before giving him a quick kiss and engulfing him in the hug, despite the water still holding him in place, few feet above the ground “I knew you could do it” she whispered to his ear. Kaldur asked if it was safe to approach so she waved them forward. As soon as Atlantean freed Danny (also getting water out of her cloths, which was nice) she lowered them both to the ground.

Danny’s hands hesitantly reached to hug her back, squeezed like his life depended on it and then he started shaking apart in her arms. She slowly lead him to sit on the ground when it was clear he could hold his own weight at the moment.

“I’m sorry” he whispered, as if he struggled to even make a sound “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry”

M’gann ignored growing wet patch on her shoulder, clinging to him just as strongly as he did.

“You did so well. There is nothing to be sorry for, you did so well”

“I’m sorry I- You- I should’ve- I’m”

“She is right,” Kaldur stated calmly “You are not to blame for being mind-controlled, especially since you broke it at first give chance”

“But I- I attacked you”

“Comes with the job, really” Robin said with almost imperceptible strain in his voice characteristic to the hand stand.

“I could’ve hurt you”

“Ha! You wish,”Artemis snorted.

“I really don’t”

Everyone snickered lightheartedly and Danny relaxed at clear lack of hostility.

“What about a collateral damage?”

“We’re in the middle of nowhere there is no collateral to be damaged”

“This is not what collateral means on it’s own-”

“This is not the point. Phantom, are you looking for things we should hate you for?”

“I have hard time believing you don’t”

“Danny, I love you but you’re an idiot right now. I told you they won’t hate you”

“Superboy still looks like he considers which of my bones he should break first”

“Not yours but whoever’s mind-controlled you. He has a bit of a history with that”

“Exactly”

“Huh. And you could probably do it too if it’s a guy I think it is” Danny whispered with some sort of amazement in his voice “That’s relieving. I’d hat if you hated me. Miss Martian told me a lot about y’all”

“Can’t say the same about you, sorry”

“That’s fine, I asked for it. I’m Phantom, I’m from Amity Park and usually I fight other menaces who try to stir some shit and worry about collateral damage and not the other way around. Pleased to meet you, sorry it happened like this”

“So like… you’re a small town hero, right?”

“Now, that might be a bit over-”

“Definitely a hero,” M’gann interrupted “With personal arch nemesis, regular rogue gallery and all that”

“Miss Martian also called you her friend,” Kaldur said, clearly trying to learn how that happened without outright asking the question, but he would get anything but, judging by Danny’s sudden grin, that could be called sly if he still wasn’t clearly shaken by the whole mind-control ordeal.

“Oh c’mon M. That’s not what you called me last week when we made up in the broom closet”

She loved that boy but she should’ve let Conner knock him out when she still had a chance.

[seraphicloves]

𝒋𝒋𝒌 𝒉𝒆𝒂𝒅𝒄𝒂𝒏𝒐𝒏𝒔 𝒘 𝒂 𝒔𝒏𝒐𝒓𝒕𝒊𝒏𝒈 𝒓𝒆𝒂𝒅𝒆𝒓!

⊱✿⊰ summary: requested by anon; jjk boys reacting to a reader who snort (laughing not drugs) and is insecure abt it

⊱✿⊰ warnings: insecurities, overall very cute!!, romantic undertone possibly(?), should be gender neutral, one suggestive comment in toji's and in choso's

⊱✿⊰ notes: ty to who requested this! i included only the canonically adult characters bc you said "men" but feel free to ask for a pt.2 with other characters you want to see (politely ofc i am sensitive)

Satoru Gojo:

❀ he thinks you are the cutest thing, ever. seeing the way you tilt your head back with laughter, eyes shining with unshed tears. and oh god, that snort? you were so adorable he was sure he was going to explode

❀ gojo definitely teased you about your reaction, although not maliciously of course. he'll give you that signature smirk and say in that cooing voice, "aw, baby! that was so cute, do it again!" and absolutely adore watching you fluster

❀ he would not allow you to be insecure. you are like a literal god, how could you be insecure? especially over something seemingly miniscule. he'll tease you of course, but he makes sure you know he doesn't think its weird. hell, he'd probably make sure to snort around you later, so you feel less alone.

Suguru Geto

❀ laughter is a rare thing for the cult leader, even rarer with such a genuine one. but he doesn't seem to mind seeing your eyes twinkle with amusement and a snort escaping you.

❀ "hm? i didn't think i was that funny." he mused, unable to suppress his slight smirk. he reveled in the way your eyes widened and your face warmed, your embarrassment prevalent.

❀ he could tell you were insecure about the noise you made, which surprised him a bit. what surprised him even more was the fact he cared how you were feeling.

❀ "it's nice to know somebody appreciates my humor." geto said, trying to alleviate your insecurities. he wasn't sure why he cared about you, but he did and he wasn't planning on stopping.

Ryomen Sukuna

❀ he probably wasn't purposely making a joke, so he definitely thinks you're making fun of me. all huffing and puffing, asking, "why are you mocking your king in such insolent ways? answer me, human."

❀ then he figures out you're not mocking him, and feels a slight sense of pride. you thought he was funny? he would be sure to try and say funnier things mors often (though his lame attempts at knock knock jokes are more dorky than anything)

❀ when you apolgize for snorting, he was a bit confused. what were you apolgizing for? so he simply said that, "don't be ridiculous, peasant. it was an adequate reaction." which was his way of saying it was cute.

❀ he refuses to let you be insecure, as long as he's aware of it. for some reason he wants to worship you like a queen, he has the strange urge to make you happy always. so he makes sure you know you weren't weird for snorting. hell he might force his servants to snort around you so you feel more comfortable.

Kento Nanami

❀ he was probably confused by something you said jokingly, taking the statement literally. it was so absurd you couldn't help but laugh a little which turned into a full snort.

❀ nanami will give you a mildly amused look, mixed with a hint of confusion. "did i say something funny?" and you would look away with a guilty smile

❀ he might not admit it, but he loves your laugh and your snort. it felt so pure and untouched by the grim realities of life. he liked how happy it sounded.

❀ he'll secretly overexaggerate his lack of understanding a joke, taking things in a literal sense even if he knows what you mean. he also tries out some dad jokes on you, of which are so bad you can't help but snort

Toji Fushiguro

❀ he was probably insulting someone or saying something so awful you can't help but snort. he'd look over at you with surprise before he gave you a shit eating grin

❀ "hm? what a pretty noise, i wonder what others you could make..." yeah he's a shameless flirt, literally not caring if you know how much he wants you. toji is confident in himself.

❀ he adores your snort, wishing he could always and only be the one to make you feel happy. maybe he'll make more comments that you would find funny, just in hopes to be the one to put that pretty smile on your face

Choso Kamo

❀ he has zero clue what he did to make you snort, he had just been trying to ask a question about some balls? what was so funny about the toy?

❀ he very bluntly asks you, "what did i say that was funny? I wanna hear you make that noise again." He gave you a smile, brown eyes twinkling.

❀ that would practically just erase any insecurities, with how genuine his enjoyment in your little snort was. and anyway now you were more focused in having to explain to choso the misfortune of having a dirty mind.

lori © 2024. please don't copy, modify, or do anything weird with my writing! i like reblogs and comments but please be kind as this was my writing.

[utilitycaster]

Following on the last answer you gave about Laura/Ashley.

What I'm stuck on is that this fear of making a mistake is not a new thing? They've been like this for all of this campaign, note Ashley not wanting to take the shard, Laura's constant fear of letting Imogen's mom stay on the moon, etc. And to a degree, I get it! Exandria is a pretty expensive and important source material - there's an Amazon series!!! - and it's scary to make any huge decisions in it. Additionally, I understand the feeling that there's something specific that the DM wants and you're just not getting it. But I keep wondering, how hard is it for Matt to sit them down and be like. Fuck around man, it's fine! (Or even the opposite! Give them some railroads, they're all over the place!) You know? It just feels to me that Matt can solve so many of these problems outside the stream with a quick convo and I'm so confused why that's not happening.

(I didn't watch this episode completely because the discussion at the end was giving me a very bad case of secondhand embarrassment due to how stupid it was. So if this happened and I missed it, feel free to ignore this.)

Yeah that is where I am at, and this is the MOST speculative I will get to the point that I'm making it nonrebloggable but my personal guess is that like. I watched a LOT of interviews at the start of C2, as a new viewer who was looking for more stuff (which...ultimately just resulted in a C1 binge) and the cast was at the time very cognizant of wanting to prove C1 wasn't a fluke and that they could tell another great story in the world with new characters. But they also prepped EXTENSIVELY for it; and also, in this case, I think a lot of the world was in a somewhat more nebulous state (ie, I think Matt probably had the concept of an ancient archmage plotting to release a god-eater possibly that far back...but I think Liam's concept for Caleb very much influenced the nature of the Assembly and gave Matt a place to put proto-Ludinus).

I think that with two campaigns under their belt, I don't want to say they rested on their laurels, because as I've said repeatedly the caliber of the vast majority of other things they've put out has remained high. But I think that because Campaigns 1 and 2 came together so well Matt might not have realized that Campaign 3, and his fairly specific intended plot, required more work and different work. Like, it required the level of planning and railroading you see for dimension 20 seasons. Campaign 2 could meander and focus on characters because the main goal it needed to achieve in a presumably 3 campaign story was worldbuilding, and I wonder if the fact that it diverged almost entirely from Matt's vision and still came out great obfuscated the fact that this wouldn't work for C3. Campaign 3 really needed to have realized and invested characters right out the gate with knowledge of the world. Like, I think it could have been solved with a conversation but I also think that there's been some sufficient "wtf" choices (bringing in Abu as the Arch Heart without any specific guidelines is one that comes to mind) that I wonder if the cast has entirely internalized how much this doesn't cohere narratively. And also, to be fair, I've played in D&D campaigns that didn't have a great plot or really any at all but I was having enough fun hanging out with my friends that I didn't really care, and since we weren't being filmed it didn't matter. It's a lot easier to see this stuff from the outside, is my thought. I don't think it's hard in terms of time and effort, but also, I know I kept thinking "oh HERE'S the course correction, finally!" pretty much up until the last ten or so episodes. I wouldn't be surprised if he kept thinking "surely this will pull together."