#and our drummer went for a walk and someone pulled a gun on + almost shot him totally randomly

[didnt-hear-idsb-live-again]

.

[storiesforallfandoms]

talent that runs in the family ~ machine gun kelly

word count: 2128

request?: yes!

“Being rooks sister and substitute him while he recovers and slowly start to fall in love with colson”

description: she steps in to replace her brother when he is seriously injured and ends up gaining feelings for his friend

pairing: machine gun kelly x female!reader

warnings: swearing

masterlist (one, two)

“Thanks so much for doing this (Y/N),” Rook said over the phone. “I appreciate it.”

“Yeah, no problem,” I said. “But does Colson know that I’m...y’know...not a seasoned vet?”

“You’ll do fine.”

I refrained from reminding him that he didn’t actually answer my question.

After Rook’s accident left him out of commission for some time, he came to me to ask if I’d fill in for him. I jumped at the opportunity. Rook had taught me how to drum when I was young and, much like my big brother, it became a passion of mine. How could I turn down working with one of the biggest artists of the year, even if it were just for a short while?

Well, my nerves were definitely telling me I should’ve said no as I walked into soundcheck that day.

“Whatever,” I said. “I’ll call you after the soundcheck.”

“Hey, don’t be nervous. You’re gonna do great.”

I said my goodbyes and hung up. I tried not to focus on how big the venue we were playing in was as I made my way to the otherwise empty stage. I thought I was the first person to arrive until I heard someone calling my name.

“(Y/N), up here!”

I looked up to see the guys sat in a booth in the balcony. Colson was all but leaning over the railing, waving for me to join them. I had no idea how to get up there on my own, but luckily a security guard showed me the way.

The guys were eating pizza and drinking from plastic cups as if they were the ones attending the concert and not performing in it.

“Pre-show ritual,” Colson told me. “Especially when we have someone new joining the band. Sit! Have a slice!”

“Shouldn’t we be practicing?” I asked, but still sat with them. I didn’t want to completely mess up my first day.

“We have hours to practice,” one of the other guys I remembered as Slim said. “And we don’t really need to. We do this every night. A soundcheck is basically just to make sure everything is working tech wise.”

I just nodded, not wanting to point out that I hadn’t been doing this every night. I hoped that I’d have some time to figure out the songs before the shows.

Colson nudged me, bringing my attention to him. “Don’t stress. You’ll do great.”

I smiled at him, wishing I’d believe him.

After our small feast of pizza and beer in plastic glasses, we finally got to our soundcheck. I was so nervous that I kept messing up during the first song. My hands were shaking and I kept hitting the wrong drum by accident. My face was burning with embarrassment as I buried it in my hands and groaned.

Colson walked up to me, a sympathetic smile on his face.

“I’m sorry,” I sighed. “I can get this, I know I can.”

“I know you can, too,” he said. “Just take a breath, relax. We’ll try again when you’re ready. And remember, it’s just drumming. Rook says you’re great at it.”

I smiled at him and nodded. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I pictured myself back in my bedroom from my childhood, playing my drums super loud until my parents had to call out for me to keep it down.

When we started practicing again, it went off without a hitch. We did most of the setlist all the way through and did quick takes on the last few songs before our time was up.

I was proud of myself as the soundcheck came to an end. I was still nervous about performing during the actual show, but I felt confident enough in myself not to make too many noticeable mistakes when we actually had an audience that night.

I was walking to my car when I heard someone calling for me. I turned to see Colson running to catch up with me. Or rather he was taking long strides to catch up with me considering he was so tall.

“I told you you would do great!” he said, putting an arm around my shoulder and giving it a light squeeze. “It’s like drumming runs in your blood or something.”

I chuckled. “That’s what mom and dad always said too, but neither one of them can keep a beat to save their lives and no one else in our immediate family plays either.”

“You and Rook are the start of a long line of drummers then I guess.”

I shrugged in response. We both stood awkwardly for a moment. I wasn’t sure what else to say. His arm was still around my shoulder and I didn’t want to pull away and make it seem like I didn’t enjoy the contact because I definitely was not complaining about it.

I guess Colson also realized that he was still touching me, though, because he pulled his arm away and awkwardly rubbed the back of his neck.

“Do you need a run to the hotel or anything?” he asked. “We have the tour bus.”

I shook my head. “I’m good, thanks. I have my car, and besides I haven’t even checked into the hotel yet so I should probably go do that.”

“Oh, yeah you definitely should. Get some rest before the show, too. It’s a lot more physically demanding when it’s an actual show, even if you’re just sitting at a drum set the entire time. I’ll see you tonight then I guess.” He turned to walk away, but paused and turned back to add, “What were you planning on wearing tonight?”

I looked at him, confused. “Uh...this I guess.”

I was wearing a hoodie and a pair baggy jeans and my most comfortable pair of sneakers.

Colson raised an eyebrow at my outfit before looking back up at me. “I mean, it’s definitely comfy, but I would recommend something a little less...well, just less. It’s going to be hot as fuck on that stage, especially with all the lights on you and shit.”

I nodded, taking note of this as I got into my car and internally panicked a little because I didn’t know if I even had anything to wear.

~~~~~~

A few hours later, after checking into my hotel room and promptly wrecking it by throwing my clothes everywhere, I was heading back down to the lobby to meet up with the guys. We were going to the show together, which would’ve been my first tour bus ride. I couldn’t lie, I was super stoked for it.

I was the last one to the lobby. All the guys were stood around, loudly talking to one another. You’d think they were just a normal group of guys and not a group about to play a sold out show in a massive arena.

Colson spotted me first. I smiled at waved at him. His eyes widened and his jaw basically dropped, which prompted all the guys to turn. Their reactions immediately matched his as they looked me up and down.

“Rook would kill you guys if he could see you right now,” I teased.

“Damn (Y/N),” Colson dared to say first. “You look...you look hot as fuck.”

I had decided on a loose muscle shirt with a bralette underneath since the shirt showed a little more than what I was used to, a pair of ripped skinny jeans, and kept on the comfortable sneakers I had been wearing earlier that day.

I giggled. “Thanks, but again, Rook would kill you for saying that. Also, it’s not anything super attractive.”

“You got a nice body,” Baze pointed out. “Anything showing it off even a little is hot.”

I could feel my face burning as I waved their comments away. “Okay, enough with this. We have a show to get to.”

We boarded the tour bus and started towards the arena. The guys were distracted amongst one another again, completely forgetting about me and my “hot outfit”. Besides Colson, who had come to sit next to me on the couch while the rest of the guys were already drinking whatever was in the mini fridge.

“Do you guys always get drunk before your shows?” I asked.

“Not always. Usually we get high,” Colson responded.

“Now that I can get behind. I’ll probably be less afraid if I’m high.”

Colson held out the joint in his hand to me. I took it and took a quick puff, the smoke immediately burning my throat and lungs as I tried to inhale it. Colson laughed as I started to cough.

“I still say you have nothing to worry about,” he told me. “You’re gonna do great tonight. You can’t even really see or hear the audience with all the lights and the inner ear pieces.”

“That’s even worse cause then I’ll just imagine how big the audience is.”

He put a hand on my leg, something I assume was just instinct for him to do to comfort someone, but the minute he made the contact I felt a jolt of electricity run through me. Colson quickly pulled his hand away and I wondered if he had felt that too.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have done that without asking,” he said.

“You can if you want,” I assured him. “I wasn’t mad about it or anything.”

Colson looked at me and I realized how blue his eyes were. Rook had always made jokes about how Colson could seduce any woman with just his eyes because they were such baby blues, but I didn’t really believe him until the moment I was looking in them myself. Now I was lost, completely forgetting everyone around me as I felt myself moving closer towards him.

The bus jerked to a stop, causing Colson and I to nearly be thrown from our seats. The guys started off the bus first, running towards the entrance to the arena as I could hear the waiting fans screaming outside.

Colson stood and offered a hand to me. “It’s showtime.”

~~~~~~

After the first song went perfectly, I stopped feeling nervous. Colson was right, I couldn’t see the audience in front of me, but I could faintly hear their screams of excitement over my inner ear piece. It was weird to have it in and not only hear all of us playing, but also the crew talking backstage. It was almost distracting, but it became easy to tune them out.

During one of Colson’s talking points in the show, I reached for my water bottle to take a sip. Colson was hyping the audience up, which made me smile a little.

“Before we continue the show,” he said into his mic, “you guys may have noticed that we do not have our regular drummer tonight.”

I immediately knew what he was about to do and I wanted to hurtle my drumstick at him before he went there.

“As you’ve probably heard, Rook was in a bit of an accident and is off recovering for the time being,” he continued. “So, we decided to get some family to fill in for him for the time being. Everyone, I want to hear y’all make some noise for Rook’s little sister, (Y/N)!”

The crowd cheered loudly. Colson turned to me and waved for me to stand. I glared at him, which I hoped he could see, before standing and awkwardly smiling and waving at the audience.

“All the cool drum shit you guys have been hearing all night has been (Y/N),” Colson said as he started to approach me. “She’s a bad ass fucking drummer, and she’s a pretty fucking cool chick, too.”

I was confused where he was going with this as he came to stand next to me, slinging an arm around my shoulder the way he had earlier that day after soundcheck.

“Which is why, (Y/N), I gotta ask: will you go on a date with me sometime?”

Slight embarrassment was swelling somewhere inside of me at being asked out in such a public way, but that embarrassment was overshadowed by the fuzzy feeling of excitement inside of me. I looked up at Colson, my eyes wide and a smile on my lips.

 He lowered the mic so he could privately add, “I’m being serious. I wanna take you out on a real date. Just the two of us.”

My words were stuck in my throat, but I was able to nod in response. The smile on Colson’s face stretched so wide that I could’ve been convinced he was the one lighting the show.

“Okay,” he said, then lifted the mic to say to his audience, “Let’s get back to the show guys!”

[nicknellie]

Anonymous requested: It would be really cool if you could do a library AU! Maybe one of them works at a library and they keep running into each other or something.

I have been unbelievably excited to write this one, I’m so happy I’ve finally got around to it! This is where my mind went as soon as I read the prompt, I really hope you enjoy it! (If anyone wants to suggest a prompt for a part 2 I’d be more than happy to do that once I reopen requests.)

Featuring he/they Willie because I really need to include that headcanon in my writing more often. Willie’s pronouns alternate throughout.

Books on Boards

Usually it was Reggie whose excuses began with “In my defence…”

“In my defence, I couldn’t see where I was going… In my defence, I forgot water and electricity don’t mix… In my defence, if Luke didn’t want to be shot with a Nerf gun then he shouldn’t have been standing in my way…”

Sometimes it was Luke.

“In my defence, no one told me not to… In my defence, I didn’t realise it could go this horribly wrong… In my defence, I did try to do it properly and I don’t know how it blew up…”

On rare occasion, it was Julie.

“In my defence, I was a little lost in my own head… In my defence, I’m terrible at comebacks… In my defence, I have an extremely annoying boyfriend and he was trying to talk to me about our new setlist the whole time which was very distracting…”

But it was never Alex.

Until now.

“In my defence,” Alex began, raising a hand and talking over Julie, Luke, and Reggie’s shouts, “I have to go to the library a lot. I’m an English major and it’s where all the books are!”

“But you don’t need to be at the library for five hours a day,” Luke countered.

Alex sighed. He had a point, and Alex had no excuse this time. Well, that wasn’t strictly true – his excuse was an adorable library assistant who just so happened to be very friendly to Alex and, by some miracle, worked whenever Alex needed to study. But he couldn’t just admit that to his friends, each of whom was staring at him with flat disbelief.

The assistant’s name was Willie and he was simply wonderful. The first time Alex had met him had been right at the start of his first semester – he had never been to the university’s library before and it was bigger than the one at Alexandria, so he was unbelievably lost. Alex had half-convinced himself that he would be stuck there forever, doomed to wander between the shelves looking for the section he needed, eventually becoming a ghost and haunting the place, still trying to locate his books.

Enter Willie. They had scared Alex half to death – in Alex’s defence, he hadn’t expected to be knocked off his feet by someone on a skateboard in the middle of a library the size of Buckingham Palace. And yet, he had landed on the floor, flat on his face and winded, understandably startled. As he scrambled to his feet, he heard his assailant exclaim, “Aw… you dinged my board!”

Alex had started to berate him but stopped in his tracks when he looked at the guy and realised that he had been knocked to the floor by a literal angel. His long dark hair was majestically swept to one side and tucked behind his ear, his soft eyes were sparkling, and he had a lopsided smile on his face despite the fact that Alex had been shouting at him just a second earlier (well, whisper-shouting at him – they were in a library, after all).

“Sorry,” they had said, picking up their board. “I didn’t see you there. Books were in the way.” He had pointed to a heap of books now strewn across the floor, some splayed open, some with ripped pages. Alex realised that he had been carrying the books stacked up in front of him, skating along with them.

“Oh!” Alex exclaimed, bending down to help pick the books up. “No, sorry, it’s fine. I was just stood there. I’m a little lost, no problem, my fault.”

Together they had stacked the books back up, and Willie heaved the stack onto a nearby table before introducing himself. Alex did the same, shaking Willie’s hand and trying to ignore the butterflies in his stomach – he couldn’t let himself get distracted by a cute guy with a skateboard, not while he still had all his books to find in the labyrinthine library.

“So,” Willie had said conversationally, leaning back against the table. “You said you were lost? Anything specific you need to find?”

Alex dug around in his fanny pack before pulling out the list he’d scribbled down. “Yeah, all of these. Do you know where they are?”

“I’d be a pretty terrible librarian if I didn’t,” Willie chuckled. At Alex’s bewildered look, he had raised an eyebrow and said, “I’m not a terrible librarian. I’m actually really good at it. I mean, I don’t usually knock over customers, but these things happen.”

“Oh,” Alex said, clocking on too late. It made sense – of course that was why Willie had been carrying so many books, he was a librarian. Alex didn’t know how he hadn’t guessed before. “Right, I get it, because of the books and the… Right, okay. What about the, uh… the skateboard?”

Willie had picked up their board, smiled at it fondly. “It helps me get around faster. This place is huge, man, you don’t seriously expect me to walk around it all day? Anyway, come with me, I’ll take you to those books.”

That had been five weeks ago.

It wasn’t Alex’s fault that Willie was incredibly cute. It wasn’t Alex’s fault that Willie’s shifts happened to perfectly align with his studying time. But he couldn’t deny that it was his fault that he had stayed there for hours on end every day since, talking to Willie about everything and nothing. And it was also his fault that he had done that very same thing today, checked his watch and seen that he was an hour late for band practise, and kept talking to Willie anyway.

Usually, Alex thought about consequences, but he had been having so much fun talking to Willie that day that he hadn’t considered them. Now those consequences had caught up with him in the form of one very angry rock band.

“Alex,” Luke said imploringly, “you’ve got to get your head in the game! We have a load of gigs coming up, really important ones–”

“We do?” Reggie interrupted, looking baffled. “I thought we’ve got that one at the old folks’ home and then that’s it for, like, a month?”

Luke waved him away. “That’s not the point. These gigs are just as important as any big ones. Dude, we’ve got to build up our repertoire so that we can start playing bigger venues, but that’s not going to happen if our drummer is too caught up in his studies!”

Alex inwardly sighed with relief. At least Luke thought the reason he was staying at the library so often was because he was working hard, not because he was talking to Willie. He would have preferred his tiny little crush on Willie stayed secret for a little longer; whenever Luke found out that Alex or Reggie liked someone, he became unbearable.

Unfortunately, it seemed as if Julie had other ideas.

She huffed an incredulous laugh, saying, “You seriously think he’s staying late because he’s studying?”

Luke nodded, confused, as Reggie gestured to Alex and said, “Of course he is, what other reason could there be?”

“Yeah,” Alex agreed, nodding. He knew that the hitch in his voice was unconvincing – in his defence, he’d never been a good liar. “What other reason could there be?”

Julie raised a challenging eyebrow, but the smirk on her face told Alex that she knew she had already won. “Alex, can I just ask, who was working at the library today?”

Alex cleared his throat and tried for nonchalance when he said, “Willie.”

“You mean the good-looking skater-boy history major, right?” Julie said slyly.

Alex shrugged. “Yeah. I guess he is those things.”

Julie nodded slowly. Luke and Reggie were watching the interaction carefully, though it didn’t seem like the realisation had dawned on either of them yet.

“And who was working last Friday when you didn’t arrive back here until almost ten p.m.?” Julie asked.

“Willie,” Alex said under his breath, avoiding eye contact.

“Right,” Julie replied. “And what about Tuesday when you missed three lectures and were smiling too much to even care about how much that’ll drop your grade?”

Alex scowled and didn’t say anything. It wasn’t as if she didn’t know the answer, and judging by the ‘O’ shape Reggie’s mouth was making and the wide grin that had made itself at home on Luke’s face, they had figured it out too.

“Bro,” Luke said excitedly, “you’ve got a crush on Willie!”

“No,” Alex spluttered, “no, I do not. We just happen to get on really well and he’s always working when I need to study.”

“But he is the reason you’re always there, isn’t he?” Reggie prompted.

Alex shrugged. “I guess,” he mumbled.

Luke leapt up, clamped his hands onto Alex’s shoulders and jumped up and down like an over-excited puppy. The ecstatic smile on Luke’s face didn’t quite make up for how annoying it was.

“Dude,” he said emphatically, “you’ve gotta ask him out!”

“Don’t be silly,” Alex said, shaking his head, “it’s not like that.”

“It’s like that,” Julie, Luke and Reggie chorused. Alex just rolled his eyes.

“Look, Alex,” Julie said. He looked past Luke to her, but only because in situations like this she tended to be the voice of reason. “I actually agree with Luke.”

Apparently, that day she was taking a break from being the voice of reason.

Alex opened his mouth to protest, but Julie interrupted him. “Hear me out. No matter what you say, you’re clearly head over heels for this guy. And it is distracting you – we’re two hours into rehearsal and you haven’t even set up your kit. If you ask him out and he says yes then you can hang out with him at other times as boyfriends, not when you’re meant to be spending time with us. If he says no, you can get him out of your mind and move on, getting your mind back on the band. What’s the worst that can happen?”

Again, Alex tried to respond, but this time Reggie and Luke both yelled over him.

“No!” Reggie shouted. “We agreed never to ask him that question again!”

“Have you forgotten last time?” Luke questioned furiously. “That was the longest three hours of my life!”

Julie held her hands up. “Sorry, sorry, it slipped my mind.”

“Okay,” Alex said, ignoring them and deciding to get the conversation back on track. “Even if I did do that, there’s so many things that could go wrong. I don’t know if he’s into guys, and if he says no for any reason at all then I can never go back to the library.”

Luke shook his head. “Dude, Willie’s the head of the university’s LGBTQ+ Society and he introduces himself as ‘Willie, he/they, gay’ at the start of each session.”

“How do you know?”

“I’ve been a couple of times. Hey, wait, we should all go, it’s actually super chill and–”

“It sounds great, Luke, but we’ll talk about it later,” Julie said, easily calming him as he started getting over-excited again. “Right now we have other things to focus on. Alex, if Luke’s right then Willie is definitely into guys. And from the way you’ve gushed about him and your conversations without realising it, I’d say he definitely has a thing for you. And he seems cool – I’m sure even if he said no then he’d act completely normally around you.”

“Yeah,” Reggie agreed, “the guy doesn’t find anything awkward. Last week I was looking through a book for my psychology class and just as I flicked to a… questionable page, he came up behind me. He just laughed it off and then offered to sign it out for me once I was done looking through it.”

Alex thought about it for a moment. It sounded too good to be true. Luke said that Willie was into guys, Julie said they might like Alex, Reggie said that they’d be cool with it no matter what… Good things like this didn’t happen to Alex too often.

“I’ll think about it,” he said. The others sighed, Reggie throwing up his hands with exasperation. “I will! I’ll think. But we should get to rehearsing.”

Almost two and a half hours later than they should have, the band finally set up their instruments and Alex counted them in.

*

He was at the library. Again. He was always at the library these days, just this time he really did need to be working. He had a big assessment coming up and needed to cram some last-minute studying in.

It would have been a lot easier if he hadn’t been trying to avoid Willie the entire time.

In Alex’s defence, it felt like the most reasonable option. Sure, he could see Willie and ask him out, but if Willie rejected him then he wasn’t sure he’d ever live it down despite his friends’ reassurances. He could have seen Willie and not asked him out, but then he’d be living in constant wonder of what could happen. So he had elected to do the sensible thing and just not see them at all.

It had been going well for the most part. His legs were beginning to ache from springing himself behind bookcases whenever he caught a glimpse of Willie, but it was worth it. Besides – he needed to focus, and an angelic librarian wasn’t about to help him do that.

He made his fatal error when trying to exit the library.

He had been so caught up in scanning the surrounding area for Willie that he hadn’t been looking ahead, or down at the floor. He heard the shout of, “Watch out!” too late.

Alex stepped forward, his foot landed on a skateboard, and he was sent flying down to the ground, landing hard on his coccyx. Pain shot up his back and he let out an agonised groan which earned him a “Shhhh!” from a tired-looking student sat at the nearest table.

“Alex,” came the same voice who had shouted the warning, the voice Alex now recognised as Willie’s. So much for avoiding him. Willie came and crouched down beside Alex where he was still laying on the floor, leaning over him, looking concerned. “Hey, Alex, you alright? I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have left my board lying there, I was only restocking that shelf.”

Groaning, Alex eased himself into a sitting position. Willie sat back, still looking worried.

“Yeah, I’m okay,” Alex lied. His coccyx was killing him. “It’s fine. I won’t sue or demand you get fired or anything.”

Willie chuckled lightly and then held out his hand. Alex took it automatically and was a little startled when Willie began pulling him to his feet – maybe it was the shock, but he had thought the hand holding was them simply having a moment. But no, of course it was too good to be true. Willie let go of his hand the moment they were both stood and then bent to pick up his board.

“I hadn’t seen you,” Willie said. “Where’ve you been hiding?”

Alex shrugged. “Oh, nowhere. Just… doing my English work. In the quiet area.”

Nodding, Willie replied with something that made Alex’s blood run cold.

“That’s cool. It’s just that I was just talking to Luke a minute ago and he said there was something you wanted to ask me?”

Eyes wide, jaw open in shock, Alex looked behind Willie to where they had pointed. Sure enough, standing by the end of a nearby bookcase with his nose in a book (which he was clearly not reading because it was upside down) was Luke. He gave Alex a nervous wave when he saw him looking.

Trying not to sound murderous, Alex said, “Yeah. There was something.”

He realised too late that hadn’t been what he was planning to say.

“Yeah? What is it?” Willie asked with a smile.

Alex’s eyes darted from Willie to Luke and back again, then up to the ceiling and around the library for inspiration, and then they landed on his own wrist and the rainbow bracelet wrapped around it.

“I – well, we, me and my friends – we were wondering if there would be any space for us to join the LGBTQ+ Society. Luke mentioned you’re the head so I figured there’s no one better to ask than you. Right?”

Willie blinked, face faltering for just a moment. Alex tried not to panic – had he said the wrong thing, had he somehow offended Willie? But the look was gone quick enough for Alex to convince himself he’d imagined it, replaced by his radiant smile.

“Yeah, the more the merrier,” he said. But then he cleared his throat and added, “You’re sure that’s it?”

Swallowing nervously, Alex cast another glance to Luke who had given up the pretence of reading and was now urgently gesturing at Willie, making kissy faces, and mouthing words Alex couldn’t understand – but he got the message.

“Okay, no, there was one more thing,” he said quietly.

Willie tucked his hair behind his ear and Alex’s eyes caught momentarily on his earring.

“I was wondering,” he began, slow but steady, “if you would… by any chance… And you can say no, I won’t be offended! It’s just, I would really like to go on a date with you. And if you would like to go on a date with me then I think we should. Do that. Go on a date. Together. If you want?”

As awkward as it felt, Alex maintained eye contact – he was glad he did, because a moment later Willie’s face split in a beautiful grin that didn’t look mocking or apologetic, it looked genuinely happy.

“Yes,” Willie said, laughing quietly. “Yes, I do want that.”

Alex sighed with relief. “Thank god. I’m going to kill Luke.”

“Don’t,” Willie said, shaking his head. “I can’t have you getting arrested before I get to go on a date with you.”

“What about after the date?” Alex joked.

“Yeah, man, that’s fine.” Willie laughed but after a moment their expression softened. “I’m really glad you asked. I was going to, but I wasn’t sure if you’d say yes.”

Alex scratched at the back of his head. “Yeah. That’s the same reason it took me so long to do the actual asking.”

“Well,” said Willie, “that doesn’t matter now. Does Friday work for you?”

Alex’s only form of a social life was hanging out with the band, and his plans for Friday consisted largely of sitting in his and Reggie’s shared dorm room, eating cold pizza and watching reruns of Friends.

“Yeah,” he said coolly, “I can probably make it work. Might have to reschedule some stuff, but it’ll be worth it.”

Clearly not believing him but polite enough not to call him out, Willie laughed and clapped him on the shoulder. “Great. My shift finishes at five that day, I’ll let you be a gentleman and pick me up. I’ve got to get back to work, but I’ll catch you then, Alex.”

“See you,” Alex said.

Willie walked away and was seamlessly replaced by Luke, who gripped Alex’s arms and shook him up and down. “Bro! You got a date with Willie! You can thank me later.”

Alex left the library, Luke trailing behind him. “I’m not thanking you,” he said, fighting a smile.

“Why not? I got him to come talk to you!”

“You didn’t ask him out, I did that. There’s nothing to thank you for.”

“That is where you’re very much wrong because…”

As Luke went on for a solid ten minutes about why Alex and Willie finally agreeing to go on a date was actually all down to him, Alex zoned out and let himself be happy. He had a date with Willie, the angelic librarian, the good-looking skater-boy history major. He couldn’t believe his luck.

When they arrived back at the studio, Julie smirked and said, “You’re grinning like an idiot, Alex.”

“In my defence,” he returned, “I'm going on a date with Willie.”

[ladieswttda]

One in a Million

Chap. 2

Description: After arriving in San Francisco, in North America leg tour, Y/N spends more time with the drummer from Motlëy Crüe and the boys from Guns. ( Guess i’m terrible with descriptions lol)

Warnings: Smut, drugs and alcohol mentions, cursing and fluff.

Words: 3188

“Iz please...” Y/N moaned on Izzy’s neck “Good girl.” He kissed her while touching her by the fabric of the underwear, making her moan again during the kiss.

After cuddling with Slash during the whole bus ride, they arrived in San Francisco. The three bands were in the stadium they were going to play the next night, but needed to do the soundcheck today, for everybody unhappiness. Y/N’s band had already finished the soundcheck and everything went so smooth, making the girls receive a lot of compliments from the boys.

As soon her band went out of the stage, Izzy dragged Y/N to the bathroom of the dressing room. And the next thing they knew, the pair was making out like horny teenagers, with Y/N now only with her shirt and panties, and Iz with his button shirt open all the way.

When she was about to open his fly someone started to bang the door with all force “STRADLIN, it’s your turn to do the soundcheck, get your ass out here!!” Izzy put his head between Y/N’s neck and shoulder, panting “You can fuck a groupie after, we have the whole week!” Y/N was so worked out that she didn’t recognized the voice, that wasn’t from anyone from Guns, because they knew their little something with Y/n/N “I’m comin-ng” When he started to answer Y/N palmed his bulge and giggled at his reaction.

They put their articles of clothes they had taken off, and Izzy turned to her “This is not finished” He hold her chin making she look directly at him ��Yes, Izzy. Have a good time on stage.” Y/N kissed his mouth then gave a little peck on his nose, making him smile.

When he opened the door, they came face to face to with Tommy “Oh, Y/n/N?” He asked amused “Hi, Tommy!” She gave Izzy another peck and waved him.

In the dressing room was only the girls, and half of the mötley boys, Nikki and Tommy. Y/N sat in the couch between him and Sofia ,closing her eyes, but opening them as soon as Tommy called her again “So you two... you two are something?” She laughed at his statement making him confused “Us?” He nodded “Tommy sweetheart, I sleep with all of them.” She laughed even harder when his eyes popped out.

From the corner of her eye, she could see Blake and Nikki interacting with each other, they looked kinda cute, but she knew it wasn’t something to drag about, because like Y/N, Blake loved to be single and enjoyed every single moment sleeping with anyone she wanted.

“What you girls want to do tonight?” Ayla asked from the ground where she was tuning her guitar “I think me and drummer girl will ask some pizzas, and drink the three litters of diet coke she bought.” Blake answered with a giggle “I totally agree.” Y/N winked at Blake.

“And you Sofs?” She asked the blonde “Hmm, i’m invited to the pizza party?” Both Y/N and Blake said ‘yes’ with a smile “I’m going to the pizza party.” Sofia winked at Ayla.

“Boys?” Tommy looked at Y/N then to Blake “You can came too.” Y/N assured him putting a hand on his arm “So I guess I’m coming too.” He smiled “Nikki? You can came too if you want...” Blake said with a smirk “Okie.” He winked at the bassist making her smirk bigger.

“Oh, I think i’m going too.” Ayla said shrugging “Of course you are, babes. There’s no party without you!” Y/N said sending a imaginary kiss to the guitarist, who accepted with a wink.

Y/N started to talk with Tommy after without success trying to sleep, because not after five minutes the girls decided what they wanted to do in the night, Vince came with two groupies and they were fucking in the bathroom like animals.

Sofia and Ayla, had already gone to the hotel and Blake was jamming with Nikki in the hallway.

“Hey, Y/n/N?” Tommy asked “Yes,Tommy?” She looked up from her nails “Do you want to go for a walk? I guess Vince is going to take some time with them...” Y/N laughed and nodded “Of course, do you think he wants to come later?” He got up and banged the door.

“VINCE!! Do you want to come later to the girls room for booze and pizza?” And as if nothing was happening inside the tiny bathroom, Vince answered with the most normal voice “Yeah, course!” Tommy nodded as if he could see him and turned to Y/N “I think the lady has the answer” She laughed and took his extended hand, and walking to the door.

Walking for some minutes in a comfortable silence, Y/N said “Please don’t do any drugs at our room? We are not much into that, just some weed sometimes...” She said the last part a little bit lower making him laugh “This rule I think we can respect, hot stuff.” Tommy winked “Hot stuff.” Y/N giggled and shook her head.

“What?! Just the truth!” He said in her ear, laughing “Thanks for the complement, I’m just used to the guys using other kinds of pet names.” He stopped and looked directly into her eyes kinda worried “Do you feel uncomfortable? I can stop,...” Y/N put a hand on his shoulder and shook her head “It’s alright, I think it’s cute” She shrugged and he smiled relieved.

They walked a little more, than stopped besides the stage where the guys were finishing their set.

“How you met them?” Tommy asked Y/N who had her eyes locked with Axl offering him a smile which he returned with another.

“Well,” She returned her eyes to Tommy, who was already staring at her small form “Me and the girls studied the whole life together, and Ayla is Slash’s twin.”

“Yeah man, they are almost the same, it’s like she is him in the female version!” Y/N laughed loudly “I always say this!” He laughed with her, making some crew mates look at them.

“So then, we studied with Stevie too. So when they got together as Guns, it was just natural for us to become a big gang.” Y/N smiled at the old memories, she loved every single moment spent beside her friends.

“That’s really nice, man! It’s good to meet you girls too, you four killed when you’re playing!” She blushed “Especially you, the way you drum it’s fucking awesome, and how hot you look? Gezz almost died right here!” She smirked and got on the tips of her feet, and whispered on his ear “Thanks,you’re not so bad for yourself.” Y/N winked at him and turned to the boys that were coming out the stage.

“Y/N! Tommy! I thought you would be already gone by now!” Steven gave the pair a hug and turned to Y/N “The pizza thing is still up?” She nodded and kissed his cheek “Of course blondie, after you take a shower you are more then welcomed at mine’s and Blake’s room.”

“I heard pizza party?” Duff hugged Y/N from behind and she nodded “Sweet.” He kissed her head and walked to the dressing room.

Axl said hi for you and Tommy, and following Duff right after. Then lastly Izzy and Slash come together, both giving you a kiss on the cheek, making your smile grow.

“Y/n/N are you free now or later is better?” Izzy asked with hopeful eyes “I think later Iz, I need to take a shower and get the room sorted, okay?” He nodded and gave her another kiss on the cheek “Okay, sweets.” With that he walked off.

“God man? Why don’t we have a fucking friend like you?” Tommy said shaking his head “We are friends now, Tommy.” She giggled at his face “Yeah, but not like this!” V/N shook her head laughing “I’m going to the hotel, are going after with your boys or do you want to come with me?” He looked at ceiling thinking “I think it’s better for me to wait Vince, and look for Mick, but thanks Y/n/N.”

“No problem, Toms. See you later!” She got on her top toes and gave him a kiss on the cheek, making him smirk, and with that she went back to the hotel.

-

After some good two hours the girls were already together in Blake’s and Y/N’s room gossiping as always.

“I’m telling you, Y/N!” Ayla exclaimed “Call him!” The other girls nodded.

“I don’t know... maybe-“ Suddenly someone knocked até the door interrupting her “Coming!” Y/N got to the door and opened to review all the boys from mötley.

“Hi, Y/N.” Nikki said with a smirk and she waved “Hi boys! Come in, come in!” Y/N let the four of them enter and closed the door.

“Your room is very neat.” Tommy said after all of them say hi to the girls “We just got here, Tommy.” Blake answered the tall drummer.

“You say that because you didn’t see his room, it’s the shitiest thing.” Mick said rolling his eyes and murmuring a curse while rubbing his back “Are you okay?” Sofia asked.

“Yeah, I’m just very fucking old.” Y/N got up from the bed and sorted the pillows “Sit here, it’s gonna be better for you.” He shook his head “There’s no need, kid” She rolled her eyes at his stubbornness “Yes there is, sit there.” She said firmly and he sat on the stop “Thank you.” Y/N smiled “No problem.”

Right after someone knocked on the door and not even waiting, they entered the room, but Y/N already knew who was it “Hi boys!” Sofia said hugging one by one “Hi Sofs.” They said in unison.

Slash went directly to Ayla, bothering her as always “Hi sis.” She just smiled, knowing really well he was about to start annoying her.

Duff sat on the ground with Blake and Nikki, more like a bassist reunion.

Y/N never realized how close Tommy and Steven were, it was kinda cute how excited they looked when they were having a conversation.

Axl was asking the pizzas with Sofia on the phone and Vince was talking with Mick.

And finally Izzy, that as soon he entered the room, sat besides Y/N on the small couch. They were talking when Izzy pulled her to his lap “And that was for?” She did a questioning face at him, who cheaply smirked “And now I can’t kiss you?” She rolled her eyes but closed the gap between them, making Slash whistle in the back, receiving a middle finger from Y/N.

“Guys, the vodka and whiskey, and whatever alcohol you want are in mini fridge, some are in closet.” Sofia explained gesturing with her hands “VODKA!” Duff screamed making Y/N and Izzy laugh breaking the kiss “He is so weird...” He nuzzled on her neck “Let him be, he is happy with not so much.” Y/N shrugged and gave him peck, turning into a heated kiss.

“Get a fucking room!” Blake screamed “Well statistic speaking, I’m already in my room.” Y/N turned to Blake, who was already sticking her tongue.

“Let’s play a game?” Stevie asked “How old are you? Ten?” Axl said making Steven’s smile fall “Don’t be so fucking rude to him, Axl. If you don’t want to play just don’t fucking play.” Y/N rolled her eyes at the grumpy redhead.

Izzy giggled at how mad Y/N always got when someone mistreated Steven “So hot when you are mad...” He pinched Y/N’s ass making her poke his cheek “You are really horny, aren’t you?” Izzy smirked “Not my fault you walk around with this shorts, that look more like underwear...” Y/N giggled and shook her head “Ayla said the same, but I liked.” She shrugged.

Izzy kissed one more time her jaw and pushed her up “Oh, I liked it too. Let’s play your baby boy friend game.” They got up and walked where they made a circle on the floor.

“So we are playing truth or dare, Stevie?” Slash asked “Yeah, but if you don’t do it the dare or don’t answer, you need to drink a shot.” Vince smirked “Now we are talking” Everybody laughed and the game started.

-

“It was terrible! I think I spend some good months without sex, because I thought it was going to be that shit again” Y/N laughed tipsy at how she lost her virginity, question directly from Nikki “ I guarantee that not all bassist are bad in sex” He offered a smirk “Oh, I know.” She winked at Duff’s direction making him smirk and wink back.

She was about to spin the bottle when the bell buzzed “PIZZA!” She and Sofia screamed and ran to the door “Hi!” They exclaimed at the boy “Hello, ten pizzas, for... Y/N Y/l/N?” Y/N nodded her head with a smile “It will be 80 dollars.” She put the money on his hand“Keep the change” He smiled muttering a ‘thank you’ and walked away.

When the both girls settled the pizzas on the table was like a click, the food didn’t last more than one hour.

“Gosh, you guys eat like fucking animals.” Y/N said burping “It’s not every day we have free pizza, hon.” She laughed at Vince statement “Let’s go back to the game, It was getting interesting...” Nikki smirked.

“Okay, okay. It was my turn to spin.” Y/N span the bottle that stopped at Blake “Truth or dare, Blakie Blakie?” She thought for some seconds “Dare.” Everybody cheered “Ok... I dare you to make out with Nikki!” He looked at her with a smirk, so she got on her knees and stop in front of him. They stared at each other and Blake leaned in kissing him, making everyone scream.

After some good seconds, they broke apart and she winked at him, getting back to her place “My turn...” Blake did the same and for her luck stopped at Y/N again “Truth or dare, drummer girl?”

“Dare.” She said like it was nothing and Blake gave her the kinkiest smirk “I dare YOU make out with any boy from mötley, you choose.” All of them looked at Y/N and she looked directly at her pray.

Crawling in her knees, she stopped in front of Tommy “Take your hands out of your lap.” It was like he was hypnotized, but did what the girl told him. Putting a thigh each side of his lap, she sat and whispered on his ear “Good boy.” Tommy tensed and Y/N smiled at his body reaction. The rest of the guys were whistling at them making Y/N even more confident.

She leaned and connected their lips, one hand on his neck and another on his hair. For a tiny second he didn’t move, but suddenly he got his senses back and kissed her back. Tommy put his hands on her back, but it didn’t stoped there, one grabbing the ruts of her hair and the other went lower, grabbing her ass with such force that made her moan into his mouth.

At this moment all the attention in the room was in the drummers intoxicating kiss. The only noise was the soft music in the radio and their soft moans. But what made Tommy do a even louder sound, was when Y/N rolled her hips against his formed bulge and he broke the kiss moaning like they were alone in the room.

“God, you must be a hell of chick. Look how Tommy is almost done?” Vince laughed with Nikki, and then everyone started to laugh with them.

Y/N was still staring him and waiting him to open his eyes. When he opened them, she smiled “Hi” Tommy laughed “You are going to be death of me...” And kissed her one more time, making Y/N gasp because of the suddenness.

After some more minutes, Y/N got back to her old place. The gang played for another hour when mostly part of them needed to sleep because of tomorrow’s gig.

“Blake? I’m going to sleep at Izzy’s room okay?” Blake gave her thumps up and shoot her a wink.

Nikki and the boys decided to go to a bar down the road, and the other two girls were sleeping in with Blake, because in their word, they haven’t finished the gossiping.

Going hand in hand with Izzy, and with the boys in the elevator, she put her head on his shoulder “Today was fun.” Slash snickered “Of course, you almost had sex with Tommy Lee in front of us....” Y/N smacked him in the arm “Fuck off.” Izzy laughed and hugged her waist “Let the girl live.” She kissed his cheek.

The elevator got into their floor, Slash and Axl gave Y/N a hug and goodnight, going to the left. Duff hugged her and kissed her cheek as always muttering the same, and lastly Steven “Goodnight, Y/n/N. Love you.” She smiled and kissed his cheek “Night, Stevie. I love you too.” Both blondes walked to right.

The pair walked to Izzy’s room, him closing the door while she took her shoes off and laying down on the bed, making grab hands to him. Izzy laughed, but crawled on top of her, staying between her legs and with one hand on her hip and another on her beautiful face “Thought you wanted to finished what you started with him...” Izzy touched her jaw delicately with his finger “I would never to this to you, Iz. My friendship with you and the boys, the girls too, are beyond anything else.” He smiled and kissed her gently.

“You know that we love you, right? Even if we are not committed and everything, me and the guys love you.” Izzy was never the one to open about his feelings, but with Y/N he felt the need to be true and always say what he was feeling “Of course Iz, I love the five of you! My five punk bastards!” He laughed so much that made his tummy hurt “You crazy drummer, one moment making everything soft, then making me crack like a crazy.” He kissed her again, squeezing her hips “And let’s not forget when I make you all so hard that hurts.” Y/N winked and he hissed, already feeling his pants tight “Unfortunately I can’t deny, you are too hot too handle. Every time gets better.” She grabbed his face and connected their lips again “You are so cute!” She said when they break the kiss “Shut up” He rolled his eyes blushing a little “Make me.” Izzy smirked and shook his head “I have some other ideas.” He winked and the night began.

taglist: @harley-m-rose​ @roger-taylors-car​ @judeknight​ ( if want to be added, just send me a message or reblog REQUESTING )

[machinegunkellyimagines]

Title: My Brother’s Bandmate

Summary: Mötley Crüe meets Micks little sister.

Pairing: Tommy x Reader

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

You couldn’t believe this.

It was your brother’s first gig with his new band and you missed it. It was as if the universe was determined to make you miss the show.

First you had to stay late at the diner because your release was stuck in traffic, then when you finally got in the taxi (that you ended up changing your clothes in) you were in traffic.

By the time you reached the Whiskey the crowd had already mostly died out, only leaving a few drunks at the bar and some girls who were either waiting for taxis or trying to find guys to go home with.

You headed to the back to look for your big brother to apologize since you knew he must have been bummed that you missed his show.

The only issue was you’d never been to this bar and had no clue where the back room was.

So you checked each door that wasn’t locked, then you opened a door and it was obviously a restroom with a single toilet and sink.

And it wasn’t empty.

There was a tall man with dark hair at the sink and he appeared to be washing his face, but he paused when he noticed her.

‘Seriously? Another one?’ he scoffed as he turned to face you.

‘Oh sorry.’ you said.

‘It’s fine I got one more good go left in me I think.’

‘Excuse me?’ You asked in confusion as the strange man approached you.

Before you knew what was going on the man lifted you up and placed you on the sink.

‘H-hey! What the hell?!’ you gasped in shock.

The man didn’t reply he just pulled a condom out of his pocket and ripped it open with his teeth.

Oh hell no!

You brought up your knee as hard as you could, making full contact with his gut.

He grunted and doubled over and you took the opportunity to push him back enough for you jump off the sink and run out the restroom.

‘Mick! Mick!’ you yelled as you ran down the long hallway, desperately looking for your brother.

Finally the last door at the end opened up and your brother stuck his head out.

‘(Y/N)?’ Mick asked as he saw you running toward him with a frantic look of panic in your eyes.

You ran up to him and clutched onto his leather jacket.

‘Th-this guy in the restroom h-he tried to-‘

Mick cut you off by smashing a bottle of vodka you hadn’t noticed him holding against the wall.

‘Where is he?’ your brother asked.

‘I left him in the restroom.’ you answered.

Without a word he pushed past you and headed to the restroom you had just ran from, you followed behind if only to make sure he didn’t hurt himself trying to kill that pervert.

When Mick walked in he paused at the door for a second when he saw the attacker on the ground holding his stomach in pain.

‘You bastard!’ Mick snarled before he grabbed the guy by his shirt and held the broken bottle against his neck.

‘I’m gonna fucking kill you!’

‘Mick! What the hell!?’

You turn and see two guys had apparently ran up behind you. One was a blond and the other was really tall with black hair.

The tall one pushed past you and pulled Mick back.

‘What the fuck is going on?!’ the blond asked.

‘This asshole tried to rape my fucking sister!!’ Mick screamed as he fought against the guy that was holding him back.

‘What?! Nikki that is not cool!’ the tall man said as he struggled to keep his hold on your brother.

‘I didn’t! I thought she was another groupie looking to fuck one of us! I didn’t know she was your sister!’ The guy yelled as he got up, still holding his stomach.

‘Do you two know each other Mick?’ you asked.

‘Yeah I used to be in a band with this fuck, but that’s dead. Come on let’s go.’ Mick said before he snatched out of the tall man’s hold.

‘What?! Mick you can’t just quit!’ the tall guy said.

‘Watch me.’

Mick then took your arm and pulled you out the restroom and down the hall, the whole time he was mumbling something about being done with rug monkeys.

‘Mick you’re gonna break my arm.’ you whined as your shoulder began to ache from how hard he was pulling you.

Your complaint made him stop and take a deep breath before he turned and faced you.

‘Are you Ok? Did that asshole hurt you?’ he asked.

‘No, I’m fine...are you really quitting this band?’ you asked.

‘Of course I’m quitting! (Y/N) he almost-’

‘I know but it really seemed like a big misunderstanding, Mick come on you told me you actually like these guys.’

‘That was before that damn bassist tried to fuck my baby sister in a dirty bathroom.’

‘Mick!’

The siblings turn and see the two guys from the hall were dragging the man who had attacked you in the restroom. Nikki you recalled.

‘Just beat the shit outta Nikki and let’s move past this man, we aren’t gonna find another guitarist as good as you and you won’t find another band that works better for you than us.’ the blond said.

‘Or you could just not beat the shit out of me and accept my apology. Man I read the situation completely wrong and jumped the gun, but dude come on don’t let this one dumb thing mess up the future of this band.’

‘Yeah Mick, you said it yourself you think this could be the one that makes it. I’m fine, honestly I am, don’t quit because of me.’ you tried to reason.

For a moment Mick looked like he was contemplating leaving and ignoring everyone but then he looked down at you and you gave him your biggest puppy eyes, the ones that he ALWAYS fell for.

He let out a loud sigh, and rolled his eyes before he grabbed a handful of Nikki’s hair and violently dragged his head down so that he could knee the bassist in the face.

‘Don’t ever pull that shit again Sixx.’ he said before he turned and walked off.

There was a moment of silence as Nikki held onto his now bleeding nose.

‘Well...um its nice to meet you all. I’m (Y/N) Mars, Mick’s little sister.’ you awkwardly introduced yourself.

‘Cool, I’m Tommy, the drummer, this guy is our singer Vince and you’ve met our bassists Nikki.’ the tall one introduced.

‘Yeah...I’m sorry for th-’

‘No. I shouldn’t have assumed, or at least asked before I started.’

‘Yeah.’ you agreed.

You all turned and saw Mick coming back, still looking angry like always but not as violent.

‘Are you assholes coming or not? You invited the entire club to that shitty apartment.’

‘Oh yeah, are we riding with you or-’

‘No. Only got room for one and I don’t want my infant sister walking the streets with the likes of you guys.’

‘I’m not an infant!’ you stomped.

‘Still doesn’t change the fact that I don’t want you hanging with these guys.’

‘You hang out with these guys.’ you argued.

‘I’m not you (Y/N), I’m older, so get in the car so I can take you home.’ he said sternly.

‘I don’t want to go home yet, plus you said there was a party going on. I wanna go to at least that since I missed the show, I’m already dressed and tomorrow is my off day.’

‘Come on dude least we can do is show her a good time after the shit Sixx pulled.’ Tommy said.

Again your brother rolled his eyes before leaving, this time pulling you with him.

‘I’ll see you all at the party!’ you said as you were dragged away.

In the car Mick gave you his usual list of rules for parties; pour your own drinks, don’t sit your cup down, knock before you open any doors and don’t go off without telling him.

‘Sorry for missing the show.’ you said.

‘I’m sorry my bandmate is a fucking narcissistic idiot, I’ll talk to him.’

‘Actually talk Mick, not just beat him while you yell at him.’ you glared.

‘...fine.’ he agreed hesitantly.

Once you arrived your brother helped you up a flight of stairs and through a window. The party was already full swing, smoke clouding the air, the stench of booze, and the amount of people made it hot like a sauna.

‘I hate parties.’

‘I know Mick.’ you smiled.

‘I’ll be in the last room on the left.’ he said before walking off, leaving you to go and find a drink.

As he walked toward his hiding room he saw Nikki and the rest of his band sitting at the table snorting their lives away.

He sat down and the others all got quiet as they looked at him, Nikki moved his chair back a bit in case the old man was still feeling violent. The bassists had just got his nose to stop bleeding and was not in the mood to get it going again.

‘Listen up. I am only going to say this one time, my sister is off fucking limits. No one lays a hand on her, no one flirts with her...if I catch one of you so much as looking at her in a way I don’t like I will castrate you. Are we clear?’

‘Crystal.’ Tommy said, Nikki and Vince nodded in agreement.

Mick stood up and off he went, taking the tense atmosphere with him.

They all let out a sigh of relief as they went back to snorting up their drugs.

‘Dude, that dude is intense.’ Tommy said.

‘Yeah, but he is the best guitarist I’ve ever seen, we ain’t going nowhere without him’ Nikki sighed, moving his chair close to the table again.

‘I can’t believe that someone birthed Mick and then decided to risk it and do the shit again after that.’

‘I can’t believe his sister is actually kinda hot.’ Tommy smiled.

Nikki hit Tommy upside the head, making him whine.

‘Do you want Mick to kill you?’ he scolded.

‘Sorry, but she is. You were gonna fuck her.’ the drummer said.

‘I thought she was a groupie like the other three chicks that had ran up on me. Hell I almost didn’t want to but I figured I had one more good round left.’ Nikki said in his own defense.

‘Dumb ass, she looks nothing like a groupie, I mean she doesn’t look like she is even supposed to be here.’

They look over and see you talking with some girl, the girl was in shorts, a ripped up t-shirt, black hooker heels and some edgy jewelry. You however were in a white crop top and a pink high waist skirt on with white flats.

‘Looks like she just snuck out to go on a date with a boy she met at church.’ Vince joked.

‘Yeah, but don’t you think she has that like cute innocent look? Girl next door kind of thing?’ Tommy said.

‘More like the sister of an angry old man who plays guitar in your band kind of thing. Remember the rules T-bone, no shitting in your own yard.’ Nikki said.

‘Ok but while he isn’t here I’m gonna go talk to her.’ Tommy said as he stood up and left the table.

‘Tommy!’ Nikki hissed but it was too late, the drummer was already in front of the two girls and chatting them up.

‘What the hell is wrong with him?’ Vince asked.

‘He’s an idiot.’ was the bassist’s answer.

They watched as you looked at Tommy, your eyes darting around the room in worry. No doubt looking around to make sure your brother wasn’t around to see this.

Tommy was either ignorant or just stupidly bold because he simply waved his hand, dismissing your worries before he pulled you over to the table and pulled out a chair for.

You looked nervous and borderline uncomfortable as you sat down and let Tommy push the chair closer to the table.

‘Mick said he doesn’t want you guys talking to me, and I doubt even I can talk him down twice in one night.’ you said, voicing your concern.

‘Don’t worry about him, for now we want to know about you. Mick didn’t tell us he had any siblings at all. Other than his name and favorite booze we don’t know a thing about him.’ Tommy started.

At that you chuckled before taking a sip of your beer.

‘We have...seven siblings. Mick doesn’t really like the rest too much and he tries his best to keep me away from the guys he hangs out with so I’m not surprised he didn’t tell you guys about me.’

‘Are you like....adopted tho? Not to be rude or any shit like that but you two look nothing alike.’ Nikki asked.

‘Well Mick looked identical to his dad before he dyed his hair, Mom says I look like my father. Not that I’d ever know for sure.’ you sighed.

‘Oh different fathers. So which one one of you is legit, who is the love baby?’ Vince asked.

‘Well Mick’s dad was who mom stayed married to, so I guess I’m the “love baby” but...some shit happened before I was born and by the time mom brought me home Mick was already treated like an outsider. I latched onto him and held onto me and we’ve never been apart since...he was the father to me that his father couldn’t bare to be.’

They all listened closely, maybe it was their brains fighting against the drugs by focusing on something, or they were genuinely interested in learning about their closed off guitarist.

‘What was Mick like growing up?’ Tommy asked.

You let out a laugh as you remembered how your brother was.

‘He was...energetic believe it or not, especially when it came to music, and I thought he was the coolest person in the world. You know Mick never took a single guitar lesson, he’s almost completely self taught, he would mess with the strings until it made a noise he liked.’

‘Wow...the man is a genius.’ Nikki said in awe.

‘You already thought that Nikki.’ Vince said.

For a while the conversation went on like that, them pretty much interviewing you about your brother, squeezing you for info while you sipped on your drink.

‘So he’s just like super protective then since he raised you.’

‘Yup, I remember this time when I was in like second grade this boy pulled down my skirt in front of everyone in recess and I was...crushed.’ you laughed.

‘What type of jerk does that?’ Tommy scoffed.

Nikki and Vince looked away and sipped their drinks, because they stayed doing shit like that when they were little hell spawns.

‘So Mick snuck into our recess and without a word he wrestled the poor boy’s clothes off, leaving him butt ass naked and crying. Mick got in so much trouble and no boy looked at me funny ever again.’

‘Wow so you must be like a virgin.’ Vince said.

At that you blushed before you scoffed and walked away in an absolute huff, who the hell was he to make (true) assumptions about you. Your non-existent love life was always something you were self conscious about, you were in your twenties and hadn’t had so much as a first kiss.

Mick never let you have a moment where you could be alone with a boy, and your family thought it was hilarious and would egg him on and volunteer to keep an eye on you whenever he wasn’t around.

Of course you knew he had good intentions and you never had it in you to tell him to back off and let you get some damn play.

Right about now you were thinking you would just find Mick and tell him you were ready to go, but before you had even reached the hallway someone had grabbed your hand and stopped you.

‘Hey! Sorry about him, he gets high and starts to talk out of his ass. We were really having a good time talking to you (Y/N)’ Tommy said.

‘I’m sorry for storming off, but I really think I should call it a night before Mick comes out and sees me talking to you guys.’ you said politely.

‘Alright but we still totally want to see you some more y’know, we have another gig at the Whiskey on Friday. It would be cool if you showed and saw us perform then after we could get some drinks, Mick will be there and everything.’ the tall drummer said pleadingly.

You were really going to decline, but Tommy had obviously mastered the art of puppy eyes as well as you had, and you did miss their first show.

‘...fine.’ you mumbled.

Tommy’s face lit up like a Christmas tree and he jumped around and hugged you like an excited little kid.

‘Awesome! You are gonna freak when you see the show, this band is gonna own the strip in no time!’ he said, not letting go of you.

You didn’t know what to do in this situation, the only guy who ever really touched you for more than a second was Mick.

Tommy finally let go and smiled down at you.

You looked up at him and your heart jumped as you took in all his handsome features, his eyes, his sharp nose, and those lips. When you looked back up you noticed his eyes were on your lips as well.

‘(Y/N)!’

You nearly jumped out of your skin as your brother’s voice hit your ears.

As fast as you could you backed away from Tommy and out the corner of your eye in the midst of your own panic you saw the drummer hurrying back to his table with the others to play as if he had been there the whole time.

You look back and see your brother looking very annoyed as he came out of one of the rooms.

‘Hey! I was just gonna come and find you, I’m ready to go.’ you said as coolly as you could.

‘Good, some chick just tried to pull my damn dick out and I honestly just can not deal with shit...I’m too fucking old.’ he grumbled before pulling toward the window you had crawled through.

You looked over at Tommy one more time before you left, and he was looking at you.

Whatever that was just now could not ever happen again...but you wished it had gone on a little longer

[tu-writers-room]

December 24th

The Most Famous Reindeer of All

There were Dasher and Dancer and Prancer and Vixen, Comet and Cupid and Dunder and Blixem, they were all there, even some of the lesser-known reindeer she had never heard about before, but, most importantly, Rudolph wasn't. The most famous reindeer of all was very busy these days, it was practically impossible to get him for an interview, but that was fine with the journalist. She was more interested in the outside perspective, in the reindeer who were not the public spotlight, and what they would have to say about their superstar colleague.

She crossed her legs and pulled out the freshly sharpened pencil. She was *so* ready for this interview. It was going to be the story of the year; she could already see the headline in her mind: Rudolph -- Behind the Red Nose. This is how she knew it was going to be good. It always turned out to be good when she had a title this early.

"Sooo," she said, her gaze wandering over the reindeer surrounding her. She was pleased to notice that they anticipated this even more eagerly than she did. The journalist almost licked her lips in excitement. They were about to tell her everything. "We all know Rudolph as a public figure, a dazzling celebrity," she went on when she felt she had dragged this out long enough, "but tell me more about him as a person. What's he like when the cameras are turned off?"

Hooves were pawed on the ground nervously, eyes twitched, Dancer and Prancer exchanged a quick glance. "That's hard to say," one deer said in a diplomatic tone, maybe it was Cupid? "We don't get to see a lot of him these days." Cautious nods all around. They wanted to talk, but none of them was ready to start it. Not yet. But she was a professional, she was prepared for this. Uncrossing her legs and crossing them again, she cleared her throat. "But it hasn't always been like this. What was life on the north pole like before that one foggy Christmas Eve? From what I've heard, it seems Rudolph had trouble connecting with his peers growing up?"

Someone scoffed. Probably Dasher. "This is about the song, isn't it?"

"It's always about this cursed song", Dancer muttered under his breath. "If I get my hooves on whoever wrote that thing, I'm gonna give them a whole new sort of red nose!"

"It got my name wrong," said another, "it's Blixem, spelled B-L-I-X-E-M!" The journalist made a smart face and silently crossed out the name Blitzen on her clipboard.

"I'm not even in the song!", a small, antlerless reindeer called Piper complained loudly. "I wished I wasn't in the song!", yelled another.

"Let's answer the lady's question", an older, also antlerless reindeer said in a calm but firm voice, and the others immediately went quiet. "Yes, Drummer," Piper squeaked.

"It is true that Rudolph has always been an outsider to the group," he told the journalist, "but the song isn't giving quite the right picture here. In fact--" "It wasn't our fault!" Cupid interrupted, and chaos immediately broke loose again.

"He was the one who never wanted to join us!"

"He always felt so special with his stupid nose!"

"We never mocked him, he made that up to hurt us!"

"I would have loved for him to join us once in a while."

The journalist raised her hand to quiet them. As great as it was to get some emotions, she needed facts, too. When the others had calmed down, the older reindeer spoke again: "Rudolph had been Santa's favourite long before that one foggy Christmas Eve, basically ever since he was born, and he rarely let a chance to remind us of that pass by. He preferred to spend his time inside the house with the humanoid part of the staff and considered most of the things that happened outside beneath him. He would call them 'reindeer games', mockingly."

"It was so mean of him to put that term in the song," Cupid complained. "The whole song is a lie," said Blixem, "but with most of it, I at least understand why they did it. Putting the reindeer games in there, though, that was just to rub it in." Even Drummer agreed and nodded: "That was uncalled for, yes."

The journalist frantically took notes, determined to record every detail. "So, to get this straight," she asked without looking up, "Rudolph was never actually bullied for his deformation?" When she didn't get an answer, she raised her head and was met with blank stares. "For his nose!"

Everyone tried to look like they had understood her at the first try, and shook their heads. "No, never!"

"It wouldn't have worked even if we tried," Prancer muttered, obviously ashamed to admit this in front of his peers. "I wanted to mock him for it, just once, when the song was already out, to let him know what it's like when someone makes fun of you. But the only emotion he ever showed about it was pride."

"Don't feel bad about it," Dancer comforted him, gently nudging his shoulder with his nose. "We know you're a good person, you were just angry back then."

"I have another question though," the journalist interrupted the sweet moment, "why? Why make all of this up?"

This time Drummer was the only one who spoke. "People love a good story. The story of an underdog, someone who had to earn their place at the top. It's inspiring. Even more so as a Christmas story, it gives people hope. And more importantly," he sighed, "it's what keeps this place running."

"But...," came small voice from the far back, "that's going to change now, right? Now that you're here?" When she looked around, the journalist saw herself faced with a herd of huge, begging reindeer eyes. "Please?"

When she left the stable two hours later, she had more notes in her bag than she would have deemed possible, and she was determined to tell that story. She felt good about it, so good she started to hum the melody to 'Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer' as she walked back to the sleigh that had brought her here. Except the sleigh had disappeared, along with the driver and all the huskies. She turned around to start looking for an elf who could tell her where they went, and she found one quickly, several elves even, several elves with guns.

One of them approached her. "You can stop looking for your ride. You're not leaving here." Following an instinct, the journalist tightened the grip on her bag. They noticed. "This isn't leaving here either."

"This story is going to get told," she said, but, faced with several weapons aimed at her, handed over her notes regardless. "If not by me, then by someone else. Others will come looking for me."

The elf closest to her handed the notes to one of the others without taking his gun down. "They won't. Everyone already knows what happened to you. Misjudged the cold out here, the vastness of the eternal ice, tried to walk somewhere on her own, it didn't seem that far when taking a sleigh, did it? Happens to many. They freeze to death in the darkness of arctic winter, and when spring comes, their stiff bodies are found next to their clothes, taken off in the late stages of hypothermia." He shook his head, sighing as if he actually regretted it.

"You're not getting away with this," she started a desperate attempt. "Santa's going to hear about it!"

One of the elves laughed, but it wasn't a happy laugh. "Some investigative journalist you are. Santa's the one who sent us!"

Before she could think of an answer she heard hooves on snow, and a moment later the group of elves parted to let him through.

His nose really was exceptionally bright. She had assumed the pictures that reached the public were edited to make it look more glowing, but now that she saw him in person, it was so bright it blinded her in the winter night. She could hardly see anything else.

"Do it", he said to the elf next to him, and the journalist felt a sudden, sharp, but warm pain in her stomach. She hadn't heard a shot. As she sunk to her knees from the pain, still blinded by the red nose, one of the elves asked if they should destroy her notes. "Nooo," Rudolph said, dragging the word out really long to make sure everyone knew how bored he was by all of this. "Bring them to my room. Some of it might be useful for my biography."

She heard footsteps leaving. As far as she could tell, it was only her and the reindeer now.

"Who knows," she heard him say as the red light slowly grew dimmer, "maybe I'll even keep the title."

- Susanne

[the--blackdahlia]

It’s So Easy (And Other Lies) Chapter 11

Title: It’s So Easy (And Other Lies) Chapter 11

Summary: Stevie Adler likes Duff McKagan. She has for a while now, but she is convinced Duff doesn’t like her that way. Duff likes Stevie, but so does their new bandmate Axl Rose.

Chapter Warnings: Mainly some language

AN: Thank you for all the feedback!

Axl woke up a couple hours after they left New York. Izzy and Slash had slept the night before instead of going out, so they were up, watching something on TV. Axl headed out towards them, but stopped when he looked at Stevie’s bunk, which was empty.

“Hey guys?” Axl asked as he made his way into the main area of the bus. “You seen Stevie?”

“Not recently,” Izzy informed him as he flipped through a magazine that had been left behind. “Why?”

“Her bunk’s empty,” Axl went to the small bathroom, but no one was in there. “Shit, did we leave her behind?” Izzy looked over at Slash and nodded for him to play along.

“You know, I don’t think I saw her get on the bus,” Slash pushed her bag so it was out of Axl’s sight.

“Oh fuck,” Axl looked out the window. “How far away from New York are we?”

“About halfway between there and Charlotte,” Izzy tossed out. “Duff is going to be pissed.”

“What am I going to be pissed about?” Duff asked. Stevie was still asleep, but he had to pee and he was getting hungry. He was hoping they were going to be stopping soon. Axl paled more than he already was and gave Duff a small smile.

“Hey Duff,” He said, trying to divert Duff’s question. “I gotta go look for something in the bunks. I’ll be right back!” He quickly went around Duff, heading back to the bunks. Duff looked at Izzy and Slash.

“What’s up with him?” He asked.

“He thinks we left Stevie in New York,” Slash laughed. “We’re just letting him stew.”

“Oh my god, you guys are awful,” Duff laughed. “I wanna play along.” He headed back to the bunks where Axl was looking around, Slash and Izzy following him. “Watchya looking for?” Axl jumped and smacked his head on one of the bunks.

“Uh...bandanna?” Axl asked. That’s when Stevie ripped open the curtain from the bunk she was in.

“Okay, okay, I’m fucking awake!” She snapped. Duff started laughing.

“Stevie thank god!” Axl smiled but then frowned. “Why aren’t you in your bunk?”

“Why don’t you just mind your own business Red?” Stevie sighed. She always was grumpy when she got woke up, but she’d balance out after she got some food. She climbed out of the bunk and made her way to the bathroom.

“I think we’ll be stopping soon,” Izzy patted Axl’s shoulder. “And we’ll be getting our sweet Stevie back.” Axl just sighed and headed back to the common area.

****

“I hope we get big like the other boys someday,” Stevie told Duff when they got back on the bus after their rest stop. She was lounging in a chair, watching the world go by the window. Duff was sitting by her, playing on a guitar.

“Well, yeah,” Duff smiled. “But what’s your reasoning?”

“They have a jet,” She told them. “Tommy said that they’re gonna grab me sometime and have me fly with them.”

“Not without me,” Duff laughed. “We’re gonna get there sweetheart. We won’t be on this bus forever.”

“I’m calling bullshit on that one!” Axl called out. “We have been on here forever!”

“We just stopped like an hour ago,” Slash grumbled. “We’re almost there.”

“It could always be worse,” Izzy added. “It could be a broken van while we’re touring around the west coast in freezing temps.”

“I got so sick on that,” Stevie shivered a little bit. “But at least this has heat and air. And good company.” She smiled at Duff. He reached out and squeezed her hand before going back to strumming on his guitar.

****

Duff, Axl, Izzy, and Slash made their way off the stage. Stevie would do a little solo to give them a break, then Izzy and Slash had a dueling guitar piece they wanted to do before they all came back out. Duff had gotten a drink or two before slipping away from the others to watch Stevie.

She didn’t do as many crazy things as Tommy did, but she was still so amazing. Tommy and her had been planning crazy stunts though. Duff was just glad they hadn’t actually gone through with one yet. He was so proud of her as he watched her do different pieces. He didn’t realize that Tommy, Nikki, Mick, and Vince were standing there, watching her as well.

She was done soon and headed backstage while Izzy and Slash did their thing to give her a minute. She walked backstage with a big smile on her face. Duff walked up to her and kissed her deeply.

“Not that I’m complaining,” She laughed a little. “But what was that for?”

“I love you,” He told her. “And you’re so fucking amazing.” The Motley boys all looked at each other. Did he just say…

“I love you too,” She smiled at him. Duff kissed her again.

“That’s so sweet!” They heard Tommy’s voice over the guitar. Stevie blushed and looked over at the boys.

“Get you some!” Nikki called out. Stevie looked at Duff.

“We really need new friends,” She laughed.

“Hey, we’re your best friends,” Vince threw his arms around them. “And I mean, I can take credit for getting you two together.”

“Yeah, standing me up,” Stevie rolled her eyes. “Good thing you’re cute Neil.” She patted his cheek.

“Ha! She thinks I’m cute!” Vince laughed. Mick just rolled his eyes.

“We gotta get back out there guys!” Axl stepped out of the dressing rooms. “Let’s go!” He grabbed Stevie’s hand and pulled her back onstage, Duff following along behind them.

“I think we take those two and fly them to our next destination,” Mick suggested. The other three looked at him. “What? They deserve some alone time, right?”

“Yeah,” Tommy nodded. “And Stevie and I can talk about setting her up a big stage thing like mine!”

"Yeah so Duff can kill you when she breaks something?" Vince teased. Tommy just glared at the frontman, with Mick standing by, rolling his eyes. Nikki went to tell Doc that Stevie and Duff would be joining them on the jet and to let Guns n’ Roses management know.

****

Saying that Axl was annoyed that Duff and Stevie got to fly with Motley Crue a couple times was an understatement. They had been boarding the bus when Tommy picked Stevie up.

“Tommy! Put me down!” Stevie squealed.

“Nope,” He laughed. “Come on Duff. You can fly with us too.”

“You’re kidding,” Izzy shook his head.

“Bye guys!” Stevie laughed as she was carried off with Duff getting their bags and following them. Axl turned to look at Slash and Izzy.

“What the fuck just happened?” He asked. The two guitarists just shrugged before getting on the bus. Axl glared in the direction that they had headed in before he got on the bus himself.

Duff and Stevie got to ride with the Motley boys for a few stops before Doc had enough of Tommy and Nikki recruiting Stevie to the terror team, so he sent them back to their tour bus three stops later.

“Look who came back,” Axl scoffed when Stevie and Duff boarded the bus.

“Someone’s just pissy that we got to be on the fun jet,” Stevie laughed.

“You know the only reason they wanted you there was so you’d be on your knees,” Axl mumbled under his breath, but the next thing he knew, he had a fist to the face.

“Duff!” Stevie called out. Slash grabbed Duff’s arm to stop him from hitting Axl again, and Izzy kept Axl back to keep him from hitting the bassist.

“What the fuck McKagan?” Axl asked, rubbing his sore cheek.

“Don’t say shit like that,” Duff growled. Stevie grabbed ahold of Duff and pulled him back to the bunks while Izzy and Slash dealt with a fuming Axl. “Sweetheart…”

“You don’t have to do that,” She told him. “I’m not worth breaking up the band over because Axl says something stupid.”

“Babe, I’d break up this band a thousand times if it kept you safe and happy,” Duff looked into her beautiful blue eyes. “You are my whole world, have been long before we got together, and Axl can go fuck himself.”

“Duff…”

“I meant what I told you,” The bassist pulled her to him. “I love you. And I’m not taking it back because of anything.” He gently kissed her, resting his forehead against hers.

“Uh hum,” Slash cleared his throat. Duff and Stevie turned to look at him. “Got Axl calmed down. I’d just stay back here for a while though.” He laughed a little. “So, do you guys need anything? Food? Water? Condoms? Because we don’t need any half bassist half drummer children running around.”

“How…” Stevie started

“I’ve lived with you for how many years now Stevie? And you and Duff both for five years? I know you two better than you know yourselves.” He smirked at them. “And I think Izzy knows too. Axl is the only one who doesn’t know.”

“Oh god, he’s dumber than Vince,” Duff laughed. Slash shook his head.

“I mean, you know he has had a massive crush on Stevie since we got together as a band, right?” Slash told them. Stevie’s eyes widened.

“Red has a crush on me?” She asked. “Oh god…”

“Wait, you really didn’t know?” Slash asked. Stevie shook her head. “Well, this is awkward…” He stood there for a second. “I’ll come get you guys when we stop.” With that, he left, leaving Duff and Stevie there. Duff pulled Stevie to him, letting her rest her head on his chest. Duff had known about Axl’s feelings for Stevie, but Stevie had been oblivious.

“Hey,” He held her close to him. “Why don’t we take a nap, and when we stop, you and I will sneak away for a date?” Duff suggested. “Sound like a good plan?”

“Yeah,” Stevie nodded. Duff nodded and helped her into the bunk for a quiet nap.

Forever Tags: @anathewierdo​ @dekahg​ @marvel-af-imagines​ @feelmyroarrrr​ @nanie5​ @imboredsueme​ @gemini0410​ @aiaranradnay​ @babypink224221​ @mogarukes​ @xxwarhawk​ @sandlee44​ @shatteredabby​ @caswinchester2000​ @supernaturalwincestsblog​ @lauravic​ @mrsambroserollinsacklesmgk​ @teller258316​ @horrorpxnk​ @tommyleeownsme​ @marvelismylifffe​ @mrslogansixxpixx​

Guns n Roses Tags:@duffshairdye​ @slashscowboyboots​ @hauntedapricoteggsclam​ @bitter-13-suite​ @arianareirg​

It’s So Easy Tags: @str4nge-haze​ @viralwolf02​

[jaxl-road]

Scar Tissue, chapter 7

You know that part of fancy dances where everyone weaves around the room switching partners until you eventually find your way back to your person?

Slash is getting dizzy. And he gets the feeling he’s not missing something so much as being left out of something.

Pairings: Slash/Duff, side Axl/Izzy, side Nikki/Tommy, side Steven/Vince

Warnings: ((not in this chapter)) Implied/discussed past abuse (non-explicit)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The show went by in a blur.

Slash felt like he couldn’t stop smiling, running and jumping around the stage more than usual just to get some of his excess excitement out, almost rivaling Axl’s antics. The energy was infectious, and all five boys found themselves in a feedback loop that carried over to the audience. By the time the show ended, Slash could barely remember what had even happened, but that didn’t stop him from being certain that it was one of their best shows to date.

And the second they made it back to the dressing room, Slash pulled Duff down for another kiss.

Steven cheered, throwing his arms in the air, “Fucking FINALLY!” As the new couple broke apart, the drummer threw his arms around both of them, turning to Duff with a grin, “I’ve been watching this idiot pine for MONTHS.”

“Excuse you, we’ve all been watching him pine, “Axl chimed in.

“I kept expecting him to bring some sad, lovesick song to rehearsal,” Izzy contributed.

“I hate all of you,” Slash pouted, Duff chuckling and ducking his head to hide his red face.

They all settled around the dressing room, coming down from the adrenaline of the show, alternating between teasing Slash and excitedly discussing the show. Axl walked back and forth, waving his arms as he rattled off the potential for their upcoming gigs.

Eventually, the door opened and the terror twins burst in, grinning mischievously. “I can’t believe you guys ripped off our look!” Tommy laughed.

“We still win though cause you don’t have heels,” Nikki declared, kicking out one foot to show off the platform boots dramatically.

Tommy snickered, “Still though, that was awesome!”

“Brace yourselves,” Mick drawled as he slunk in behind them, “Incoming in three, two-”

“HEY, ADLER!”

Vince shoved past his bandmates, pointing accusingly at the Guns drummer, “Don’t think I’ve forgotten about that bullshit two weeks ago! I’ve got a fucking bone to pick with you!”

Steven froze, staring wide-eyed as all eyes locked on the two blondes.

Just as Vince was taking a step forward, Tommy leapt forward, standing between the two and facing his singer, “Okay, alright, as much as I love a good fight, I distinctly recall telling both of you to just talk this shit out.”

“Fine,” Vince grit out, crossing his arms, “I’ll start: What the fuck, man?”

“Uh…” Steven glanced around nervously, Slash giving him a ‘go on’ motion encouragingly, “Right. Well,” he gathered himself and narrowed his eyes, “fine. I was high and drunk and you were being a dumb bitch.”

“Excuse me?” Vince screeched incredulously.

Slash sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose, “Off to a great start there, Stevie.”

“Well, it’s true!” Steven snapped, “You tried to set me up with some random chick, of course I got pissed!”

“How is that a bad thing?” Vince exclaimed, “I was trying to help you get laid!”

“And I was trying to get laid by you!”

“Well I-... Wait, what?” Stuttering to a halt, Vince’s face was a mixture of confusion and surprise.

Steven threw his hands in the air in exasperation, “I’ve been flirting with you for months!”

“No you haven’t!”

“Yes I have!”

“Uh, Steven?” Slash raised a hand, cutting in, “Dude, I’m on your side, but you’re terrible at flirting. You literally don’t act any different than normal.”

There was a general murmur of agreement, Steven shooting a look of betrayal at his friends as Vince smirked in victory, “Hah! See!”

“Okay, well,” Steven glared, “even so, that night I was totally blatant! You said you needed someone to fuck and I told you I was available!”

“Ooooh, he’s got you there, Vinnie,” Nikki commented, he and Tommy snickering together in the corner as their singer glared.

“Well,” he was starting to look flustered, “I- you-... I thought you were straight!” he blurted out.

Steven’s jaw dropped, “Are you fucking kidding me?? Vince,” he gestured up and down at the singer and yelled, “no one is that straight!”

For a moment, the room is silent, Vince gaping as Steven’s hands curled into fists at his sides. Finally, the drummer sighed in frustration, “Fuck it, this is stupid. I’m sorry I punched you or whatever, let’s just-”

But before he could finish, Vince rushed forward and kissed him firmly.

There is only the briefest moment of surprised hesitation before Steven is wrapping his arms around the singer to pull him even closer.

Meanwhile, the other seven rockers in the room stared awkwardly. Eventually, Tommy started a dramatic slow clap. Unsure of what else to do, the rest of the group soon joined the applause.

“Fuck you guys,” Vince tried to look annoyed, but we was still grinning. He looked like he was going to say something else, but Steven pulled him back for another kiss.

“Wow. For a minute there I didn’t think this would end well,” Slash laughed.

“Apparently love is in the fucking air tonight,” Izzy mumbled, winking at Slash and Duff.

There was a soft thud, drawing their attention back as Vince pushed Steven up against the wall, and immediately the terror twins sprung into action, “Oh, oh boy, okay, time to go!” Nikki stated.

“Yup, trust us, Vince ain’t gonna slow down just cause he’s got an audience,” Tommy added, the two of them herding the group out of the room, managing to close the dressing room door just as the two blondes fell onto the couch together.

“I can’t decide if Vince is going to be more or less insufferable now,” Mick mused.

“Probably the same,” Nikki laughed, “But we are definitely late for the afterparty, so let’s get fucked up!”

The two bands (minus one singer and one drummer) once again made their way to Motley Crue’s apartment, and Slash found it funny how different this time was from the last time they partied together.

They were barely a block away when Nikki and Tommy honed in on Slash’s arm around Duff’s waist. Sharing quick look, the two quickly situated themselves on either side of the couple, Nikki next to Duff and Tommy next to Slash. It was a little absurd how tiny Slash felt next to the three of them.

“I can’t help but notice some PDA going on over here,” Nikki smirked.

“Don’t tell me today is couples day,” Tommy joked.

“Uh…” Duff stammered, glancing at Slash almost nervously.

Meanwhile, the guitarist puffed his chest out, grinning proudly as he tugged Duff closer, “You bet your ass it is. We beat Steven and Vince by a solid two hours,” he bragged.

“I didn’t realize it was a race,” Tommy said, “But in that case Nikki and I definitely win.”

“Damn straight,” Nikki high fived him behind Slash and Duff’s backs.

“I think the fuck not,” Axl snapped his head around, glaring, “Izzy and I left you slow burn fuckers in the fucking dust, thank you very much.”

“You tell ‘em, babe,” Izzy nodded.

“I hate being single,” Mick grumbled.

“I know Mick, I know,” Nikki patted his shoulder comfortingly, the guitarist swatting his hand away.

If Slash had been paying more attention, he might have noticed how Nikki and Tommy left him and Duff in favor of flanking Izzy and Axl, Nikki and Axl talking in hushed tones in a way that would have been suspicious. If Slash had been paying attention.

But he wasn’t. He was too busy walking on sunshine at getting to hold Duff so close, making the bassist blush as he complimented his playing at the show, kissing his cheek and the corner of his mouth every few minutes while Duff laughed and played with his curls as they walked. When he thought about it, part of him wanted to ditch the party- to just go home with Duff and have a few hours to themselves, to lay in bed and touch every inch of him, soft and slow.

As they approached the apartment, Slash opened his mouth to suggest to Duff that they split off. But before he got a chance, Tommy was sliding next to him, “Hey, Slash! I have a question,” he began cheerily, “You have a pet snake, right?”

“Um,” Slash blinked in surprise at the unexpected question, “I have a couple, yeah, but they’re back at my mom and grandma’s place.”

“Cool, cool,” Tommy nodded, throwing an arm around his shoulders, “I’m trying to convince the guys that we should get a pet, but Vince is allergic to cats, and Mick is allergic to dogs, so I was thinking a snake or something! What do you think?”

“Are you kidding me? No fucking way,” Slash laughed, “You guys can barely keep yourselves alive and you wanna add a pet? None of you should be responsible for any living thing ever. Just get a cactus or something.”

“But I can’t cuddle a cactus!” Tommy pouted.

“I mean, not with that attitude!”

“You’re unhelpful as fuck, dude.”

Slash’s laugh was cut off as Tommy guided him through the window into the apartment. He hadn’t even noticed them walking up the fire escape. Blinking, he suddenly became aware of the lack of bassist at his side.

Furrowing his brows, he glanced around, “Hey, where’d-”

“I am way too sober, all the adrenaline from the show burned through everything in my system,” Tommy interrupted, dragging Slash over to the coffee table as strangers started pouring into the apartment behind them. The drummer quickly kneeled down, pulling a bag of white power from his pocket and shaking it at Slash with a grin, “Care to join?”

Slash paused for a moment in consideration, but finally shrugged, “Sure,” he crouched down next to him. He’d just do a quick line or two and then he’d track down Duff and whisk him away.

It only took a few minutes for Tommy to cut a few lines and for each of them to snort them up, both laughing as they felt the initial rush to their system. Wiping at his nose, Slash stood and nodded at the drummer, “I’m gonna go find Duff.”

Tommy gave him a quick wave before turning to chat with some of the partiers. The apartment had filled quickly, people passing bottles and cigarettes and bags of coke, voices layering over each other and someone throwing on a record to add even more noise. Looking around the room, Slash saw no sign of the tall blonde. Glancing at the window he had come through, he was thrown back to the last time he had come to the Crue’s apartment- the last time he had lost track of Duff.

Walking over and glancing out the window, Slash blinked with deja vu as he spied Duff and Nikki standing at the bottom of the building, smoking and talking together. This time though, it looked almost like they were arguing. Not heatedly, but Nikki had his arms crossed, a serious look on his face while Duff gestured vaguely and seemed to ramble on about something with wide eyes.

Slash narrowed his eyes. He hated when Duff got that look of anxiety on his face, and he didn’t appreciate Nikki putting it there. He took the stairs two at a time, and by the time he hopped off the fire escape, the two bassists had become aware of his presence. Nikki sighed, and Duff shot him an almost guilty look.

“Hey guys!” Slash smiled tensely, “I was wondering where you ran off to,” he said to Duff, weaving their fingers together.

“Oh, yeah, sorry,” Duff gave a nervous laugh, “just got caught up in conversation.”

“Bassist bonding, y’know?” Nikki grinned, taking a long drag of his cigarette as he eyed Slash with a look the guitarist couldn’t identify.

“Yeah, I’m still trying to convince Mick to join me and Izzy for ‘guitarist get-togethers.”

“Oh, I definitely need to see that,” the strange look disappeared as Nikki laughed.

Leaning heavier against Duff, Slash turned to him, “I’m pretty beat from the show. I was thinking maybe we could get out of here…?” he suggested with a sly smile.

Duff looked away quickly, “Oh, yeah, sure, I-”

“Aw, don’t leave so soon!” Nikki cut in loudly, giving them exaggerated puppy eyes, “You only just got here,” sauntering around them, put his arms around them both, ducking his head between them, “At least stay for a few drinks.”

It wasn’t a question, the dark haired man already guiding both of them back to the apartment, his hands firm on their shoulders. Slash sighed, but figured it wasn’t the end of the world. After all, he wasn’t exactly going to complain about free booze. So the three of them made their way to the kitchen, where a variety of bottles had accumulated on the countertops.

“Pick your poison!” Nikki offered cheerfully.

Duff eagerly snatched a bottle of vodka, not even bothering with a glass, instead taking a swig straight from the bottle while Nikki cheered. Slash laughed and reached for the whiskey, while Nikki quickly mixed himself a jack and coke. They drank and chatted, practically yelling to be heard over the ruckus in the apartment.

Before long, Tommy bounded over, clearly having helped himself to more cocaine since Slash last saw him. Coming up behind Nikki and wrapping his arms around him, “Heya babe! Having fun with the lovebirds?” he giggled.

Slash barked out a laugh, “You’re calling us lovebirds?” he gestured at the other couple.

“Nikki, Slash said we shouldn’t get a snake,” Tommy pouted, ignoring Slash’s comment.

His boyfriend only raised an eyebrow, “Well duh, probably because we definitely shouldn’t get a snake.”

“But baaaaabe,” the drummer whined, “I want a pet!”

“I got a dog from a blacksmith once,” Duff blurted out, three sets of eyes snapping to him in confusion. He smirked slowly, “As soon as I got home he made a bolt for the door.”

While Slash and Tommy laughed in surprise, Nikki had unfortunately just taken a sip of his drink and proceeded to immediately snort it out his nose. Sputtering and coughing, his three friends howled with laughter as he glared and pulled himself together.

“God fucking dammit, Duff!”

“You get used to it,” Slash snickered, patting his back in faux sympathy as Nikki flipped him off.

Just then, two familiar blondes crawled into the apartment. Vince had love bites running from his neck down his chest, disappearing under the low neckline of his shirt, and Steven’s hair was even wilder than usual and as they got closer Slash could see his shirt was on backwards.

“What’s up, losers? Did you miss us?” Vince exclaimed, waltzing over to the group in the kitchen with Steven beside him.

“Not really,” Nikki responded sarcastically.

“You wound me,” Vince pouted, “Where’s the love? I was nothing but supportive when you fuckers finally banged.”

“You gave us shit for weeks!” Tommy cried.

“Don’t be ridiculous, Tommy,” Nikki rolled his eyes, “He still gives us shit.”

“We need new friends,” Sighing, Steven snaked his arm behind Vince’s back, too low for his hand to be anywhere but on the singer’s ass.

Slash fake gagged, “Oh God, I thought you both were bad individually, this is gonna be even worse.”

“At least get a room,” Duff mumbled into his vodka, looking away firmly.

Vince lit up, “That is an excellent idea,” he purred, Steven grinning as he was tugged further into the house.

As they disappeared into Vince’s room, Nikki shook his head fondly, “This is going to be interesting.”

“Yup,” Slash looked over at his own boyfriend, who was steadily draining the bottle in his hand, “Although, on the subject of getting a room-”

“There you fuckers are!”

Axl strutted into the room, Izzy close behind him, “Did you see Steven and Vince go by? I can’t believe this! I wanted to see Vince get punched and instead I have to watch them get all handsy with each other! It’s a fucking outrage!” he ranted.

“Unfortunately, love won this round,” Izzy deadpanned, smoking a cigarette lazily.

Huffing, the red-head crossed his arms petulantly. Nikki shook his head before changing the subject, “So, you guys have any more shows coming up?”

Perking up, Axl started talking about GnR’s upcoming gigs, Nikki and Tommy nodding along and commenting on the various venues. Meanwhile, Izzy turned to Slash.

“Speaking of, we should try to finish a couple of our new songs for the next show.”

“Oh yeah?” Slash nodded, “That’s not a bad idea. Any in particular you wanted to work on first?”

The two guitarists discussed which of their half-completed songs to work on first. Their conversation slowly shifted until they were discussing their favorite guitar riffs, from their own songs and from other bands.

“You guys should grab Mick,” Nikki suddenly chimed in, “I still want to see a ‘guitarist get-together’.”

“Oh my gosh, I’ll take pictures!” Tommy laughed.

“I wouldn’t mind,” Izzy shrugged, “Mick’s cool.”

“You’re only saying that because you don’t get scolded by him on a daily basis.”

“I mean… yeah.”

Looking around the circle, Slash frowned. He glanced over his shoulders, but the four of them were the only ones in the kitchen, “Where’d Duff and Axl go?”

The terror twins shrugged, “I dunno,” Tommy answered unhelpfully.

Sighing, Slash took another swig of whiskey, “I’m gonna go find ‘em.”

But before he could exit the kitchen, Izzy threw his arm around his shoulders, dragging him back to the circle, “Oh come on, they’ll be fine for a few minutes,” he argued nonchalantly, “let’s at least get back to figuring out which songs we want to work on next.”

Frowning, Slash wanted to say no. He just wanted to hang out with his boyfriend- (and oh boy did that thought make him giddy every time he thought it- Duff was his boyfriend)- but he figured Izzy wasn’t being unreasonable, so he nodded along. The discussion went longer than Slash expected- every time he thought they came to an agreement, Izzy would suddenly change his mind, or Tommy or Nikki would interrupt with a note, or comment, or line of coke.

Eventually though, when the whiskey bottle was nearly empty and he’d done two more lines, Slash insisted on finding Duff. He weaved his way out of the kitchen, the alcohol making him a bit unsteady. Luckily, the tall blonde was easy to find. He was sitting on the couch, Vodka still in hand (it looked more full than it had been before- was that a new bottle?) and Axl sitting beside him, the singer facing him as he gestured wildly, clearly ranting about something or other.

Duff brows were slightly furrowed, like he was confused, and Slash couldn’t help but smile fondly. He was familiar with the way Axl could sometimes just talk and talk, and it was almost cute seeing Duff try to comprehend whatever passionate speech he was caught up in.

He wasted no time making his way over, sitting on the arm of the couch to lean over Duff and place a kiss on the crown of his head, giggling as the bassist jumped, “Hey babe,” he sang, “I missed you!”

Across from him, Axl huffed, narrowing his eyes at having been interrupted, “Um, rude? We were clearly talking.”

Slash glared right back, resting his chin on Duff’s head and letting his arms drape over his shoulders, “Hey, he’s my boyfriend, so I get to call dibs.”

Before the red-head could argue, they were both cut off as their blonde drummer reappeared, face flushed and smiling contently, “Hey guys!" he drawled, "I am having the best night. You would not believe the things Vince can do with his tongue-”

“No no no!” Slash cried frantically reeling back and slapping his hands over his ears, “lalalalala I can’t hear you!”

“Oh come on!” Steven laughed, “We’ve described good fucks to each other before!”

“Yeah, but this is Vince,” Slash insisted with a shudder, “This is someone I have to look in the eye on a regular basis! Please, as your best friend, I am begging you to spare me the details just this once.”

The drummer sighed dramatically, “Oh, fine. But only because I fucking love you.”

“Thank you.”

“What about you, Tommy? Can you handle the dirty details? Cause I seriously need to get this out before I’m ready for round three.”

“Wait, what?” Slash snapped his head to the side, nearly losing his balance as he blinked drunkenly. The blonde bassist had been replaced by the Motley Crue drummer. Axl sat beside him, pointedly avoiding the guitarist’s gaze, although he couldn’t quite hide a cocky smirk.

Tommy shrugged, “Honestly, I’ve walked in on Vince enough that nothing can scar me anymore. Spill.”

Growling in frustration, Slash lurched to his feet, Steven swiftly taking his seat as he began to wax poetic about Vince’s bedroom skills. Stumbling away, Slash didn’t understand what was happening. Because something was happening. There was no other explanation for how Duff kept being swept away from him every time he turned his head. He didn’t even care about going home anymore- he just wanted to spend time with his boyfriend. It would be enough to just stand next to him and hold his hand for more than two minutes, maybe press a few kisses into his skin. He’d waited so long to get to this point. He just wanted to savor it.

Pressing through the crowd of people, he found Duff in a corner, leaning heavily against the wall with an empty vodka bottle held loosely at his side. Nikki was next to him, smoking a cigarette while Izzy stood in front of them and spoke quietly.

“Duff!” Slash cried excitedly. The three boys turned to look at him, Duff attempting to stand up straighter but only managing to pitch forward. Luckily, Izzy and Nikki quickly steadied him, Slash hurrying over and slinging the bassist’s arm over his shoulder to hold him up.

“H-hey, Slash,” Duff smiled, his eyes slightly glassy from the alcohol. He pressed himself closer to him, burying his face in messy curls with a sigh.

Despite his previous frustration, Slash couldn’t help but smile, bringing his free hand up to play with the ribbon around his neck, “Hey,” he drawled, “I keep losing you. Or, you keep getting stolen,” he raised an eyebrow at the two rockers in front of him. They both stared back evenly.

But Duff shuddered in his arms, reaching to clench his fingers in the front of Slash’s shirt, “‘m sorry,” he whispered into his hair.

He almost missed the way Izzy and Nikki’s eyes seemed to darken, but he didn’t have the energy to think about it, instead focusing on pulling Duff closer, “It’s fine, you’re fine, ‘m just messing,” he soothed.

There was a nod against the top of his head, and the blonde seemed to sink a little further against him. Behind his back, Slash heard a soft thud, turning his head to see that the empty bottle had slipped from Duff’s fingers. Rubbing his back softly, Slash decided that this time, it really was time to go.

“I think you and I are gonna head home now,” he declared, “I’m half wasted and you’re half past wasted.”

Duff laughed lightly, nodding in agreement, “Yeah, kay.”

“Thanks for the booze and shit,” Slash nodded at Nikki, turning and giving Izzy a quick wave, “I’ll see you guys at home.”

He barely processed their responses, if there were any, too busy keeping himself and the tall blonde upright as they left the apartment. The fire escape was a challenge, but both of them were laughing by the time they finally reached the bottom. Normally the walk between their apartment and Motley Crue’s wasn’t too long, but with both of them weaving and tripping over their own feet, the journey took twice as long.

Slash didn’t mind though. He welcomed any time spent with Duff- always had, but even more so now. Whenever Duff stumbled against him, he couldn’t resist pressing his lips to the side of his neck, feeling the bassist sigh against him as he mouthed at his collar bone. When they finally reached the Hell House, Slash ignored his keys in favor of gently pushing Duff against the door to press their lips together, kissing lazily and stroking his hand against the small of his back while Duff tangled his fingers in his hair.

Eventually, the chill of the night motivated them to pull away and unlock the door, making their way inside. They giggled as they fumbled in the dark towards their room. Slash didn’t bother turning the lights on, and after the briefest flash of hesitation, guided both of them towards his own bed.

What a strange day, Slash thought to himself. It had gone so fast but felt so long, and even though the two of them had shared a bed the night before, tonight was different. Because, despite all of his doubts and shyness, Slash and Duff were together now. He wondered if the giddiness would ever die down.

As he maneuvered Duff onto the bed though, he couldn’t ignore the way the bassist fell back onto the mattress like dead weight, limbs sprawled out and eyes fluttering open and closed, and Slash still tasted vodka on his lips.

So, smiling softly, he crawled on the bed and gently laid his body on top of Duff’s, resting his head against his chest and sighing contently.

“Mmmm… Slash?” Duff muttered, turning his head to try to look at the guitarist, “I-... ‘re you…”

Slash hushed him, wrapping his arms around his waist and rolling them onto their sides, tucking his head beneath Duff’s chin, “Long day,” he slurred with a smile, “Let’s just sleep now. I’ll take you on a date tomorrow,” he promised.

“...Oh,” Duff let out a breath, “Okay,” he laughed a little, bringing a hand up to smooth back Slash’s wild curls.

Pressing one last kiss to the bassist’s shoulder, Slash held Duff tighter, smiling even as the whiskey pulled him towards sleep.

He drifted off with Duff’s steady heartbeat under his ear.

[justlightlysedated]

a little something to make me sweeter

for @roswellnewmexicoweek , written for the fic prompt, not just sugar and spice

a D.E.B.S. au

The alarm sounds loud and insistent, flashing bright red in all of the rooms as Valenti's voice sounds over the intercom yelling at them all to wake up.

Rosa looks up at the ceiling and wonders why she puts herself through this.

Liz snuggles up closer to Max, wrinkling her nose at the alarm, but not waking up.

Maria is already awake fielding calls from Chad while getting dressed.

"It's not you," she lies. "It's me. I don't love you, okay?"

"Who says that we have to be in love," Chad says, sounding incredulous. "We're the Golden Couple. You can't break up with me two weeks before Endgame. How am I supposed to find another date in time?"

Maria rolls her eyes and hangs up the phone.

She slips her handgun into her thigh holster and tugs against the hem of her plaid skirt a little making a face in the mirror before she walks out of the door and opens Rosa's bedroom door.

"Good," she says when she sees Rosa sitting on the edge of her bed, a sketchbook in her lap as. "You're up. Valenti wants us to meet her at the Crashdown in twenty."

Rosa throws herself back on the bed and covers her face with her pillow before she screams.

Maria rolls her eyes and goes to wake up Liz.

She opens Liz’s door and rolls her eyes at the Max shaped lump beneath the covers. 

“Liz!” she yells and Liz jumps, and falls out of the bed taking the sheets with her. “Crashdown! Twenty minutes!”

She closes the door, counts to five and then opens it again, “And no Maxes allowed after curfew, you know this.”

Liz throws a pillow at the door.

Maria walks downstairs and picks up the landline with the light flashing red that is connected to the alarm and puts the phone up to her ear as the alarm cuts out immediately.

"We're on our way, ma'am," she says and is answered by a dial tone.

Maria rolls her eyes and sets the phone down, only for her watch to start beeping.

She rolls her eyes even harder and presses the button.

“Babe,” Chad says. “Listen, let’s just stay together until after Endgame, and then we can go our separate ways.”

Maria hums, “Let me think about that. No, thanks.”

She lets the button go and looks up as Liz walks into the room placing her gun into her holster.

She looks up at Maria mouth open to speak when there is a knock on the door.

Liz answers the door since she's closest and rolls her eyes as Agent Guerin walks in through the door.

"Good morning," he says, and reaches for one of the fake apples in the centerpiece of the living room before frowning when he sees that it's fake. "I've been sent to retrieve you."

"We're working with the CIA on this?" Maria asks taking the apple from Guerin and setting it back down.

"It's a surprise," he says winking, before he yells. "Rosa, lets go!"

"You're not my dad, Guerin!" 

"Who here made a promise to Mr. Ortecho-?" he starts and Rosa just rolls her eyes and walks out the door.

Michael follows after her, hooking his arm through Liz and looking back at Maria.

"Come on, DeLuca, you don't want to be late for this meeting."

Maria scoffs but follows after them.

Michael gets them to the Crashdown with five minutes to spare, a slightly manic smile on his face as all the lights on their way turned green even at impossible times.

Maria leads the group into the diner, and to the booth where Valenti is already seated at with a cup of coffee in front of her.

Maria slides into the seat beside her and Guerin and Rosa and Liz pile up on the other side.

Valenti wastes no time in getting the meeting started, pressing a button against the wall right next to the salt and pepper shakers that creates a privacy bubble around their table before pulling her phone from her breast pocket and pulling up the monitor for them all to see.

“Let’s get his started shall we.”

The monitor stays black for a second before a picture flashes to life and Maria gasps.

“Jenna Cameron has been spotted in the country for the first time in over three years,” she says switching the picture on screen to a recent one showing Jenna in winter gear, getting off a plane, with her trusty sidekick who never leaves her side, Alex Manes.

“We don’t know why she’s back, but we do know that she’s been looking into several different candidates to replace the assassin turned traitor that almost decimated her entire crime syndicate before she went underground. This tells us that she’s planning something big. And we need to figure out a way to stop it.”

Maria licks her lips and turns to Valenti, opening her mouth to speak, but she’s cut off by Rosa.

“What’s so important about her anyway?” she asks looking unimpressed. “She doesn’t look like a big bad scary super villain to be honest, why is it so difficult to capture her?”

Michael accidentally knocks over the salt shaker, coughing a little, and Maria raises an eyebrow at Rosa.

“This was covered in class three weeks ago,” Liz says turning to her sister. “She’s ruthless and isn’t afraid to get her hands dirty. Not only is her right hand man, Alex Manes former airman turned traitor-”

Michael accidentally knocks over a glass of water, cutting off the rest of Liz’s sentence as she gasps in shock at the cold and throws him a glare over Rosa’s shoulder.

“Sorry,” Michael says, not sounding sorry at all.

“No one who has ever fought her has lived to tell about it,” Maria finishes for Liz and turns back to Valenti. “Do you think I’ll be able to interview her after we capture her? There are still some spots in my thesis where I could use some direct information.”

Valenti ignores her.

"What we need is a way to figure out where her headquarters are located," Valenti says looking at the monitor with narrowed eyes.

Michael's phone chimes and he tugs it out of his pocket and smiles before answering back.

When he looks up, Valenti is raising her eyebrow at him. "Is that important intel?"

Michael smiles winningly back at her. "Nope, it's just my boyfriend letting me know where he's staying. He just got back from a vacation in Antarctica."

His phone beeps again and he looks back down, "I mean Reykjavík."

“This is serious,” Valenti says, slamming her hand down on the table and making them all look at her. “This isn’t the time to be playing games, or worrying about who you’re dating or who you’re not dating. This woman is a menace to society and she won’t stop until she gets what she wants. And god only knows what that is.”

No one says anything.

“Good,” she says and straightens up. “Now. Our intel suggests that she’s going to make an appearance at Le Venue, a new restaurant in town that caters exclusively to people who want privacy. She’s meeting a former assassin by the name of Isobel Evans, and I want you there running point and figuring out exactly what she wants with her.”

Meanwhile in Jenna Cameron's Evil Lair Headquarters

"What's her name?" Jenna asks, sitting on the arm of Alex's computer chair.

"Isobel Evans and she's a former assassin, who is relocating to the States," Alex replies immediately, typing fast on his keyboard and minimizing a window of what looks like the traffic light database, pulling up her profile. "She even has her own custom made rifle."

Jenna makes a face. "Where did you find her?"

Alex doesn't look at her as he responds, "I asked around and-"

"Michael told you about her didn't he," she says scoffing.

Alex sputters. "It's not like it's a D.E.B. okay? She’s a bonafide assassin. You should see her record."

Jenna gives him a look. "Cancel it."

She pushes off the chair and walks out of the room.

Alex comes running after her. “Give me one good reason.”

“I don’t like blondes,” Jenna says, not turning to him.

She can feel his judgemental stare at her own blonde hair.

“I said, good reason,” he says following Jenna into the planning room.

Jenna doesn’t answer.

“Look,” Alex starts and Jenna groans throwing herself back into one of the chairs, as he looks at her seriously. “You were dumped.”

Jenna scoffs. “I was not-”

“You were dumped,” Alex repeats. “It was brutal. But you took some time off and go do whatever you were doing in Antar-”

He closes his eyes and inhales deeply before giving her a look, “Iceland or whatever, but now it’s time to get back on the saddle.”

Jenna sighs closing her eyes briefly before giving Alex a serious look. “And you think this Isobel is the answer?”

“No,” he answers, leaning against the table. “But it’s not like you have a lot of options when you refuse to date anyone who doesn’t have a record.”

“You try dating someone who doesn’t,” she says, and raises her hand when he opens his mouth. “Michael has a record.”

Alex rolls his eyes. 

“And anyway,” she continues. “I’ve been on dates since, you know. With that drummer from-”

Alex cuts her off. “First of all, we went on a group outing, you both just happened to sit next to each other, and you pretended to have food poisoning and left before the appetizers got there.”

Jenna makes a face at him, and Alex just rolls his eyes even harder.

“You’re going. I already made reservations. You’ll have fun. And if you don’t. Then at least you’ll have actually done something about it instead of letting a Chad win.”

Jenna gives Alex a look and shakes her head before she sighs. “Fine, but then you’ll stop bugging me about this. Just because you’re in love doesn’t mean-”

Alex pushes away from the table and heads out of the room.

Jenna just drops her head on the table once, before lifting her head and doing it again for good measure.

Time Skip to That Night

They’re all set up in the restaurant. Maria is the bartender in the middle of the room, and she has Isobel Evan's directly in sight. Liz is at the front of restaurant playing hostess, while Rosa is waiting the tables and has already taken Isobel’s order. Guerin is outside in the van monitoring the feeds.

“Incoming,” he says, at the same time that Maria’s phone rings.

She sighs. “Chad,” she answers. “Now is not the time-”

“I’m coming to you right now, we have to talk.”

“Don’t,” Maria hisses. “I’m in the middle of a mission-”

“Exactly,” he says. “Jenna Cameron is dangerous-”

“I have a team,” Maria snaps. “And most importantly, I can take care of myself.”

Maria hangs up the phone on Chad before he can say anything else and groans, "Please tell me you have a way to make sure he doesn't actually interrupt our mission."

"Relax," Guerin says through the earpiece. "I have eyes on every entrance. No one is getting in or out without me knowing."

There's the faint sound of someone knocking on the van, but Maria gets distracted by Jenna Cameron as she walks into the room and looks around.

"Wow," Maria says well aware she sounds awed. "Jenna Cameron, she's-"

"What?" Rosa demands when Maria trails.

"Real," Maria finishes swallowing hard. "I never thought I'd ever get to see her in person."

"Well, she's a real person," Liz says. "With a real ID, that I'm scanning into the system, right now-and it's fake."

Liz sighs, and Rosa snorts.

"Obviously," Maria says. "She's a professional."

There is complete silence over the line, broken only by a rustle of clothing and the squeak of the chair Guerin is probably sitting on.

"All I'm saying," Maria continues feeling flustered and like her team is judging her. "Is that she's smart. She'll be covering her tracks. So obviously, she won't be leaving anything as obvious as her own ID for anyone to grab."

"Okay," Rosa says long and mocking. "Now that we've heard the opinion from her biggest fan-"

"I'm not her biggest fan," Maria hisses as Jenna takes a seat across from Isobel. “I just think that she’s fascinating. With her skill set she’d make an excellent candidate to-fuck me.”

“I’m getting that,” Rosa responds, while Liz bursts into giggles, and then she’s heard apologizing to one of the customers.

“That’s not what I meant,” Maria says, and moves from behind the bar. “You go get their orders so we can get an idea of what they’re saying, there’s something I have to take care of.”

She stalks towards where Chad just entered through the kitchen with a group of very obvious agents all wearing their uniforms.

“What the hell, Guerin?” she says and hears a loud thump before Guerin is cursing in her ear. “You said no one could get in here without you knowing.”

“Oops?” Michael says sounding strangely breathless.

Maria ignores him and pushes until she has Chad pressed up against the wall. “What are you doing here?”

“I told you-” he starts looking earnest, and it sends a dozen red flags flying in Maria’s head.

“And I told you I don’t need your protection,” she snaps. “Stop bullshitting me. What are your orders?”

“Capture the fugitive,” he says, face going to it’s usual neutral expression. “And ensure that no civilians are harmed.”

“We are playing the long game here,” Maria hisses. “We can’t just capture her without actual proof that she’s up to something.”

“We don’t need proof,” he states. “Just the arrest.”

“Now,” he continues and pushes Maria back, until he’s able to slide out from where he was pinned to the wall. “If you’re not going to follow that up with a kiss, then I have a fugitive to catch.”

He moves towards his team, and Maria makes a low noise of frustration.

“Status,” she snaps.

“Clear outside,” Michael responds immediately.

“They were talking about Isobel’s greatest hits,” Rosa responds walking towards her. “Did you know that she was behind the assasination of the former presi-”

“I don’t want to know actually,” Liz says and Maria can just see the face that she’s making. “I’m pretty sure that Isobel is Max’s sister.”

There is complete silence for a beat, and then Isobel’s voice rings out. 

“Waitress,” she calls out, and both her and Jenna turn towards where Rosa is standing, right next to Maria, right in front of Chad’s group of soldiers.

“Well, shit,” Maria says.

Meanwhile at Table Number Twenty Two, Two Minutes Ago

“...it was the easiest shot of my life, if I’m being honest,” Isobel continues talking about herself, unprompted.

Jenna looks down at her watch to see that she’s only been here for less than ten minutes, and wonders if Alex will keep his end of the deal if she leaves right now.

“But that doesn’t mean that I want to keep killing people for the rest of my life,” Isobel says, taking a sip of her wine. “I’ve always wanted to be an actress-”

Jenna groans, and presses a hand to her stomach.

“What is it?” Isobel says, reaching towards her with one hand looking concerned.

Jenna moans a little pitifully, and says, “I don’t know. I think I might have food poisoning.”

“They say seltzer water is good for that,” Isobel says and then starts looking around for their waitress.

“Waitress,” she calls out and turns and then freezes, making Jenna turn towards where she’s looking.

Jenna counts the agents and the D.E.B.S. and curses underneath her breath.

“Target has spotted us,” she can hear some bonehead saying loudly. “Permission to open fire.”

Jenna is ducking down under the table and rolling towards the most secure spot she can find before the guns start going off, tugging her phone out of her pocket at the same time.

“Alex,” Jenna hisses into her phone as she ducks down behind the bar to avoid getting shot at. “How could you miss a whole group of CIA agents and a gaggle of D.E.B.S. staking out the place? What good is your little CIA boyfriend if you can’t get intel?”

“First of all,” Alex says sounding smug. “There’s nothing little about my boyfriend.”

Jenna gags and hears Michael asking Alex for a high five in the background.

“Second of all, the only reason our relationship works is that we don’t involve our jobs in it, meaning that I don’t ask him for intel and he doesn’t give the CIA information about us.”

Jenna makes a wordless sound of rage and hangs up the phone.

“Yeah,” Isobel says making Jenna jump as she turns to stare at her. “That’s the only acceptable reaction to whatever it is that Michael thinks he’s doing with your lackey.”

Jenna makes a face at that, and then pulls her guns from the small of her back and looks at Isobel who gives her a nod as she pulls her own gun out of her purse.

They both duck out from behind their cover and shoot over to where the spray of bullets aimed at them had been coming from while everyone seems to be reloading their weapons at the same time.

Isobel runs out of bullets first, and then Jenna and then they duck back behind the bar as the guns start going off again.

“Was it the accent?” Isobel asks sounding less Russian and more American. “Because that was totally fake.”

“What?” Jenna asks feeling confused. 

“You were making up excuses to go, I just want to know what I did wrong.”

Jenna shakes her head. “It’s not you. I’m just not looking for a relationship right now, and you seem like a-”

“I’m not looking for a relationship,” Isobel says scoffing. “It’s just hard meeting people when you do what we do, especially when you don’t have an interest in men.”

Jenna nods her head, but before she can answer, there is a shadow over them.

“Any last words?” the bonehead with the ridiculous haircut says pointing his rifle at Jenna.

Isobel says, “Bye,” and runs away, dodging the couple of bullets shot at her and slipping out through the door.

“Rosa, wait!” someone calls out, but Jenna can see a D.E.B. following the same path Isobel took.

Jenna looks up again to see that the bonehead is distracted and so she grabs the rifle and tugs it right out of his lax grip, before using it to hit him in the face.

He falls back groaning hard and Jenna ducks out from behind the bar and takes the same path that Isobel took, dodging the bullets and running through the door. 

She takes a moment to use her lipstick laser gun to seal the door shut and then runs hoping there is a way out of what looks like the place where the restaurant keeps all their produce.

She runs down one of the aisles looking for a door, and bumps right into someone, who immediately rolls her to the floor, using the momentum to pin her down.

Jenna looks up into wide brown eyes, framed in bouncy curls, set on a face that looks like it’s been carved by an angel, and she feels her heart stutter in her chest.

Wow, she thinks as her breathing goes all funny, and then she notices the uniform, and curses, reversing the pin, and wrapping her hands around the D.E.B.’s wrists and pinning her to the ground.

She looks surprised, and Jenna just smirks down at her, “Didn’t they teach you not to let your guard down at your fancy academy?”

The D.E.B. gives her an unimpressed look, before she’s pushing Jenna off her and getting to her feet in one smooth movement.

Jenna is impressed in spite of herself, but she tugs the two smaller hand guns she has tucked into her boots and points them at her, because a D.E.B. is a D.E.B. and the only good D.E.B. is a dead D.E.B.

The D.E.B. is also pointing her gun at her, and it’s a beauty that Jenna wants to test out immediately.

“You’re under arrest-” she starts, and Jenna snorts.

“Are you being serious right now?”

The D.E.B. gives her a serious look. “You are wanted for-”

Jenna rolls her eyes. “You don’t have to list all of my crimes. I know what I’ve done. And while usually I would just shoot you for shooting at me for no reason, I really wanted to get out of that blind date.”

The D.E.B. gives Jenna a confused, slightly incredulous look. “Blind date? With Isobel? You were on a date?”

Jenna feels defensive immediately. “What about it? Do you have a problem with-?”

“No,” she says immediately and vehemently. “Not at all. I just, I didn’t know that you were-”

Jenna scoffs, “Why would you know?”

The D.E.B. inclines her head as though Jenna made a point, and then she’s quiet for a second, looking at Jenna with more curiosity than anything, before she licks her lips and relaxes a little.

“Here’s the thing,” she says, sounding less authoritative, and making Jenna narrow her eyes at her. “I’m kind of writing my thesis on you and-”

“What?” Jenna says furrowing her brow.

The D.E.B. gives her a look. “You are one of the most prominent female figures of organized crime, but there is hardly any information about you, and-”

“What?” Jenna asks again, letting her hands drop to her sides as she stares incredulously. “You want to interview me?”

The D.E.B. licks her lips. “Something like that.”

Jenna shakes her head. “I tend not to answer personal questions for people whose names I don’t even know.”

“Maria,” she says immediately, and then bites down on her cheek, and sighs. “Maria DeLuca.”

She holds out her hand, and Jenna tucks her guns into her pockets and takes her hand.

A shiver goes through her as they shake, and she finds herself opening her mouth. “Jenna Cameron.”

“I know,” Maria says slowly, looking down at their hands and then back up to Jenna with a furrowed brow before she seems to remember that Jenna is the bad guy.

“You’re still under arrest,” she says, and points her gun back at Jenna.

Jenna feels a smile tugging at the corners of her mouth, and thinks that this girl is absolutely adorable, for a D.E.B.

“Am I?” Jenna asks conspiratorially, raising an eyebrow.

Maria furrows her brow at her, but before either of them can say anything else. There is a shout as a door opens with a slam and several footsteps run into the warehouse.

“Maria!” someone yells.

Maria takes her eyes off Jenna to yell, “I’m over here.”

Jenna takes the moment to move and hide.

“Dammit,” she hears Maria say as she turns back to find that Jenna is gone. “Maybe next time,” she says in an even lower voice.

Jenna bites down on her lip, and feels her heart jump in her chest at the thought of a next time, and then she sneaks out of the warehouse as quiet as possible. The fact that everyone else seems more worried about Maria than finding her, helps her slip out unnoticed.

She runs out into the street and finds Alex immediately behind the wheel of the car.

She slides into the car, and he puts it in drive and peels out of there immediately, not even bothering to wait and see if someone is coming after them.

Alex starts ranting and raving, and Jenna looks at him, and eyes the fresh red hickey high up on his neck, and just rolls her eyes not feeling like teasing him about Michael when she can still feel the adrenaline running through her.

Alex stops speaking when Jenna doesn’t say anything in response and watches her out of the corner of his eye, not saying anything, and breaking through Jenna’s willpower easily.

"What?" Jenna asks not being able to help the smile that tugs at her lips. 

"I knew you were going to like her," Alex says smirking smugly.

Jenna rolls her eyes. "Isobel was a self absorbed trainwreck who isn't looking for a relationship."

Alex rolls his eyes back at her. "I said get back on the saddle, not walk down the aisle."

"Wait," he says stopping the next words out of Jenna's mouth. "If it's not Isobel, then who?"

Jenna bites down on her lip and looks out the window to avoid answering.

Alex has perfected the art of looking at you while driving without taking his eyes off the road, and Jenna cracks two seconds later.

"Okay, but don't freak out," she says turning to him.

"Just tell me already," he says.

"Maria," she says on an exhale.

"Maria?" He asks furrowing his brow, and he goes through the data banks in his brain to come to the right conclusion with just a name.

"Wait," he says, and stops the car looking at Jenna in disbelief. "Maria DeLuca? Curly hair, plaid skirt, carries a .357 magnum?"

Jenna gives him a winning smile and then gets out of the car.

Alex follows after her. "She's a D.E.B. and not just any D.E.B, she's The D.E.B. Their golden child, the perfect score."

"Well," Jenna says and holds her hand out. "Their golden child doesn't know it yet, but she's into me. Give me the keys."

“The perfect score means the perfect spy,” Alex continues ignoring her raised hand.

Jenna gives him a look. “Like you’re one to talk about dating a spy.”

Alex makes a face. “In my defense, I didn’t know Michael was a spy when I decided that we were going to spend the rest of our lives together.”

“And yet,” Jenna says giving Alex another look.

Alex just rolls his eyes, but still doesn’t hand her the keys.

“Look,” she says. “I’ll be careful. All I want is to talk to her. She seems, fascinating.”

“Fuck,” Alex says sighing roughly. “How do you even know she’ll be into you?”

Jenna gives him a look raising her eyebrows and then signals her entire self with her hand.

Alex gives her an unimpressed look back. “You do know I’m gay right?”

“You’re not blind, though,” she responds. “Anyway, I got that vibe, you know. She wants to know more about me, and that’s more than enough to start with.”

“Okay,” he says and goes to give her the keys, only to clutch them in his hand. “But I’m going with you. Who knows what trouble you’ll get in otherwise.”

Jenna rolls her eyes as she turns to head back to the car. “You just want to see if your boyfriend is going to be there.”

Alex scoffs. “How are you going to get through their state of the art security system without me to hack into it?”

Jenna doesn’t say anything, because he has a point.

“And yes, Michael should be on duty tonight,” he hums as he gets into the car. 

They both close their doors at the same time.

“Let’s go spy hunting,” he says grinning at her. Jenna smiles back and turns to look out of the window as he starts the car and feels her heartbeat tripping in her chest and for the first time in a long time she feels the rush that comes with infatuation.

She can’t wait to find out more about fascinating, refreshing, lovely, Maria DeLuca.

[spookyspaghettisundae]

Thirteen-One, part 2

Heavy clouds painted the horizon in a dull, bleak gray. Although still morning, the day was quickly fading.

Amy walked down the street. Her keys jingled in her leather jacket’s pocket, reminding her with each step that she needed to have someone check her car. She had not been able to start it this morning. Just another damned thing for her to deal with after the big move to this town.

From the corners of her eyes, she saw a shadow dart past. Her heart raced and she swiveled to spot her assailant. But nothing and nobody was there. Perhaps a mere trick her eyes were playing on her. Amy stood alone on this narrow road, amidst houses both old and new, some from the old colonial era and some just representing those artsy, newer architectural styles that she hated. Right now, she had no eyes for the environment itself, though. She was on the lookout for other people, specifically any creeping up on her.

Not a single soul here beside her.

Continuing on, a person took a left turn and joined her on the road, walking in the opposite direction and towards her. Some unknown man in his late twenties, dressed completely in black.

He just stared at her and a pit formed in Amy’s stomach. She tried to size him up but kept averting her eyes, both out of nervousness and just to see if eye contact could make him do the same. The real estate agent had sworn up and down that the area was all quiet and safe—"zero crime"—but Amy was new in town and the agent might have been full of shit.

The stranger’s course of walking was not in straight line towards her, after all. They moved along opposite sides of the small suburban road. He never stopped staring at her, however. He never turned his head. He creepily glared at her from the corners of his eyes until they had passed each other.

She could feel his gaze burning holes into the back of her head as she continued on. The pit in her stomach was still there, and she felt like all blood must have visibly drained from her face. Amy refused to turn around, refused to show any sign of fear—and listened intently to the sounds of his shuffling sneakers as they both walked on while the distance between them grew.

At the end of the road, Amy finally dared to look back. The creep was not staring back at her. Her gaze burned holes into the back of his head. Not looking where she was walking.

So she bumped into someone else.

Some man said, “Excuse you?” The voice tugged at some memory strings in Amy’s brain.

Under any other circumstances, Amy would have quipped with something snippy. But the day continued to be strange and unsettling all around, so she just looked up at the person she had crashed into. After a few seconds and incredulous blinking, she recognized a familiar face: her old high school friend and former band mate, Chris.

His furrowed brow made way to a face beaming with pleasant surprise. He asked, “Hey. Amy?”

Amy sighed and could not help but smile. With all the weirdness she had witnessed since getting up, followed by that weirdo gawking at her just before—seeing a friendly face turned out to be a true palate cleanser.

“Long time no see, fuck-face,” she said.

Chris chuckled.

“Uh, look. I’d actually like to catch up, but I need to be somewhere,” Amy said. She pulled her phone from her jacket, more demonstratively than anything, and added, “You still got the same number?”

Chris nodded and confirmed with a curt answer, then gestured to the sidewalk behind him.

“It’s cool, let’s walk together. I’m in no rush. I was just takin’ a walk to clear my head.”

Amy dug her hands into her jeans’ pockets and nodded. Chris plodded along by her side as she continued on with her way.

“I never thought you’d come back to this dumpy little town,” he said. “Especially not with the success you’ve been having in the big city. So—what brought you back?”

Amy shrugged. “Outside of the lame-ass answer you’d expect to hear about it never being quiet out there, I wouldn’t know where to start. Hey, so, uh—something else.”

“What’s on your mind?”

“You and the others still all in the same band?”

Chris’ face went blank and he stared at the sidewalk in front of them as they walked.

“Not all of us, no. Seth and Kevin left shortly before you skipped town. Don’t you remember?”

“Sorry. My memory’s kinda gone shoddy in recent years.” Amy took a deep breath, mentally crossing out the old haunt as a place she could find Seth to confront him about the disturbing video she had watched this morning. Then she asked, “So, is the band doing good?”

“I’d say so, yeah. Neil recently said he was gonna hook us up with some bigwig who could get us more serious gigs.”

“Without Kev, who’s doing the drums now?”

“Someone new—Beverly.”

“Hmm.”

“Wait, ‘hmm’, what? She’s really good!”

“No, I meant, ‘hmm’ in the sense that—well, I don’t know her. Like, neither as a person nor as a drummer.”

Neither Amy nor Chris looked at each other. The silence that persisted between them turned awkward.

“How’s Scott doing? He move back here with you?”

Amy stopped in her tracks.

“Scott?”

Chris followed suit and looked back at her.

“Well, yeah. Scott. Your boyfriend?” Burying his own hands in his pockets, he then asked, “Or your—your ex?”

“Y-yeah. He is—he has long moved to France. Neither of us thought the long distance would work. And here I thought I was the one who had memory issues. Do you?”

A short bellow escaped Chris’ throat. A bit too clipped, a bit too forced. Artificial.

They continued walking. Amy blurted out, “No, look, I’ve been seeing someone else. A real cutie, Steve. Steve Parker. You know him?”

“Nope.”

“Not surprised, he’s not from around here. Also staying in the city for now. Work.”

Chris grinned. There was almost something impish about it. Something devilish.

Where their road forked, he pointed up one way, leading uphill. Amy knew her path lied the other way. Chris nodded to her and said his goodbye. She called out after him, prompting him to turn around and proceed a few steps while walking backwards.

“Where are you actually headed to?”

“To this forest hut where we jam. You know—our band.”

Amy blanked out. And the memories of that morning returned to her in a flash, suffocating any positive feelings. The pit in her stomach returned, worse than when it had visited her before. She saw that single light bulb hanging from the ceiling.

She saw her darker self, talking into the camera. Talking about needing to dispose of a dead body.

And the she remembered the dark, clawed hand, reaching out from the darkness inside that pentagram. The nails digging into her flesh, drawing blood.

“You okay?”

Chris’ question grounded Amy again, ripped her right back out of the strange imagery bombarding her mind and inner eye.

“All good,” she said.

She had lied.

They went separate ways. She quickly forgot about the encounter with Chris even though something about their conversation felt utterly wrong, as if she had heard either of them say something she did not like to hear. But Amy did not dwell on that.

Instead, she pondered the strange video she had seen that morning. She did not want to, but the images kept invading her consciousness. And she could not shake that horrible feeling. She still wondered if she should call the cops.

But she did not.

The idea of being implicated in a murder and not remembering any of it—if it had even happened at all—was both deeply disturbing and crippling her from seeking out help from authorities.

She finally arrived in front of a big apartment building. The formerly bright white of its facade had turned into muddied colors with the paint chipping off, weathered away over the years. Loud, aggressive heavy metal music blared out from one of the open windows on the first floor.

Amy approached the entrance and tried pushing through the building’s front door. But the door would not budge—it was locked up tight. She scanned the doorbells and rang one of them. Seth’s doorbell.

Nobody responded. The door did not open. She pressed the button to ring the bell again and leaned over and looked to the window out of which loud music continued to thunder. As there still had yet to be anybody to react to her ringing of the doorbell, she wandered back out of the roofed entrance area, looked around the bushed and picked up a rock.

She thought on it for a second, and then tossed the rock up through the open window. Someone must have gotten hit by it, because that faceless someone shouted, “Ow!”

A topless, tattooed man wearing only jeans, with greasy long dark hair tied back into a ponytail, looked out of the window to see who had thrown the rock and hit him. He glared. Then his gaze softened upon seeing and recognizing Amy.

Another old, familiar face from back in the day: Adam. Good ol’ party boy. Bit of an idiot, but soft core.

And decidedly not Seth.

She had come here to find Seth. This was where he lived after all. She had not expected to meet Adam here, but Amy was somewhat happy to find Adam here instead of Seth.

The more she thought about it now, the more unsettling Seth had always been.

“Come the fuck on in,” Adam shouted down to her with a wide, toothy smile.

Amy shook her head and shouted back, “I’d love to. But fucking how?”

“What?”

“Your music is too fucking loud, jackass!”

“Calm your tits, I’ll be right there.”

Adam disappeared from the window. The music stopped in the middle of a stanza, making way for an uncomfortable silence. Soon after, the front door to the apartment block swung open, and the young man stood there, dressed still only in jeans and wearing unlaced black boots that were more scuff marks than leather.

“Since when did anybody start locking that door?”

Adam cocked his head back, causing the skin underneath his chin to bunch up, giving him the look of a turtle for a brief moment of contemplation.

“Folks are paranoid these days, I guess. Bunch o’ crackheads even in this small town, nowadays. You either keep some guns or you lock your doors, I guess.”

He thumbed behind him.

“You wanna come inside or talk right here? Got beer, got smokes, and I’m willing to share with an old stranger like yourself.”

They went inside. The place was a vision of pure chaos. The apartment looked like what you would expect from a tornado hitting the inside of a tour bus. Piles of empty pizza boxes, crumpled up beer cans, and an overturned ashtray with its contents spilled all over the carpet in a dark gray stain, on top of soiled newspapers on top of a cluttered coffee table harboring all manner of drugs and paraphernalia.

Adam plopped down onto the couch with a sigh and Amy thought twice about sitting down anywhere. The whole place reeked of stale cigarette smoke, cheap booze, and dried cum.

“Damn,” Amy said, the word slipping out more than anything.

She always hated it when fellow musicians were walking cliches. She hated it when they smashed guitars on stage, screwed around nonstop with roadies, or steeped themselves in substance abuse.

With narrowed eyes, Adam used a naked hand to shovel through the mess on the coffee table. He pulled a pack of cigarettes from the bottom of the junk and lit up a smoke with incredible speed and routine that only chain smokers possessed. Then tossed the pack back onto the table.

“Oh, you think this place looks bad?” Adam chuckled and choked a bit on the smoke as it came back up. “Yeah, it’s pretty bad. Shoulda been a quiet little evening, but somehow—somehow, way more people showed up, and it got out of hand.” He shrugged and took another long, greedy drag from his cancer stick.

Adam leaned back and started puffing out smoke rings.

“Can I bum one from you?”

“Dude. That’s a personal insult, coming from you. You think you need to ask me if you can have one of my smokes?” Scott guffawed. “Seriously. They’re not even mine. Pretty sure someone else forgot them here last night. So knock yourself out.”

He picked up the pack and held it open for her to take a smoke. When she reached out to grab one, he cringed when he saw that her hand was wrapped in bandages that had bled through so badly that a deep crimson spot had formed under the palm.

“You’ve got blood on your hands?”

Amy froze and stared at her own hand.

“Fuck off. Do you always need to frame things with such dramatic phrases?”

Through a faint smile and underneath a furrowed brow, Adam asked, “You got anything you wanna tell me?”

Amy took the cigarette and lit it up with a lighter from the table. Instantly regretting both the sticky texture upon what should have been a smooth plastic lighter, as well as the biting flavor of the cigarette, burning in her lungs like fire.

She flinched and shot him a glance that translated into a silent “Shut the fuck up.”

She asked, “What was that music just now?”

“It's—okay, Amy,” Adam paused and inhaled deeply from his cigarette, burning it down quickly and brightly. When he spoke again, his voice sounded tortured and the smoke billowed out of his mouth at the same time, “No small-talk, okay? What’s actually up?”

Amy let her own cigarette burn down between her fingers. She let her head hang before answering with a different question.

“Where’s Seth? This is his apartment, after all.”

“I don’t know. Woke up here all hungover after the party. I always thought he was more of a friend of yours than mine, y'know?”

Amy placed her cigarette onto the edge of an overflowing ashtray where it continued to smolder and gradually transform into a stick of hot ashes among the cemetery of fellow cancer sticks.

“Never really liked him, if I’m gonna be quite honest. Anything I can help you with, seeing he’s not home?”

Amy shook her head and asked, “Dunno. Does the number combination thirteen-one have any meaning to you?”

With a lopsided grin, Adam replied, “Well, since we’re speakin’ of Seth right here, I’d wager that’s the date when he sacrificed his neighbor’s cat.”

He burst out into laughter, holding his sides. He sputtered and his laughter ceased when he accidentally dropped his cigarette, causing a small explosion of tiny embers and provoking him to scramble and scoop it back up before putting the butt out in the ashtray.

“Big help,” Amy muttered. Though she knew he was right. Seth might as well have been a satanist.

“Sorry, but I really got no clue what I should do with that, but, uh, why—”

A smug grin overtook Adam’s face.

Amy whined, “You’re not taking me seriously, asshole.”

“No, not true. You know I take everything you say very seriously, but I sometimes just can’t help but fuck with you.”

Amy leaned back in the chair she had sat down on after assuring herself that it wasn’t as sticky as the rest of the dingy apartment’s furnishings. She stared out the window into the gloomy, overcast sky outside.

“I dunno. I dreamed something weird. Everything’s weird. Also, I saw Chris on the way over. Has any-fucking-body gotten out of this garbage town except for me?”

“If you’re back now, were you ever really gone, city-girl?”

“Fuck you.”

“Okay, so, you look a bit under the weather. I mean, I know what I did last night, and I’m still feeling kinda wasted—but what’s your excuse?”

Amy had no answer to that. Adam picked up a beer bottle from the table, sniffed it, and then took a swig of whatever lukewarm swill had been leftover in it.

“You know what I think? You should go see that new boy-toy of yours in the city—”

He shushed her with a hand gesture the moment she even opened her mouth to speak.

“Have a nice day, have a nice evening, get dinner, get stoned, stay out of town for the night.”

Amy leaned over, snatched the smoldering cigarette she had left on the ashtray, and stamped it out on the ashtray’s edge.

If Adam had taken part in any shenanigans involving a corpse, or a prank with the video she had anonymously received, then he deserved an Oscar for acting oblivious about it. More likely, he was badly hungover and had nothing to with any of this.

She gave him a feeble smile, said goodbye, gave him the middle finger after he made a rude joke, and left Seth’s apartment.

On the way out, she slung out her phone and tapped on Steve’s face from her contact list. The call rang, and rang, and rang. Steve did not pick up.

She paused outside the block. The loud heavy metal music started out of nowhere, continuing exactly where it had been paused and causing her to jump an inch of the ground in fright. Her heart pounded and she turned to yell some obscenities up at Adam.

Looking out the window was a figure clad all in black—not Adam. A deep unfathomable abyss yawned behind the darkness of the figure’s hood. Those living shadows stared back at her and Amy sensed a cold, seething rage. A malevolence so powerful that it felt like an invisible force wanted to rush at her and rip her heart out.

Frozen and unable to move, the honking of a car’s horn pulled her back into reality. Or at least, back into paying attention to her surroundings.

She stared into the angry face of a driver, waving at her to get out of the middle of the road. She had stood there for long enough to annoy some unknown man in a car. She got out of the way and when she looked back at Seth’s apartment, nobody stood in the window. Especially no shadow-person under a black hoodie’s hood.

The heavy metal music continued to blare.

The call to Steve went to voicemail. Amy hung up and did not leave a message.

She walked back home, furiously typing out a text message to Steve, asking him to get back to her as soon as possible. She feared that he was busy and would not soon find time to respond.

And she would be right.

Once Amy stood at her own front door, cramming her fists into her pockets to find her keys and unlock the entrance, she felt watched. She saw something move within the darkness of her home, though the reflections of overcast skies in her windows and her tired mind could have been playing tricks on her.

Fear gripped her heart. Someone was inside her house.

Finally, Amy called the cops. She would not tell them the whole story—only suggesting that someone might have broken into her home—and they would find nothing. The police officers left come evening. To her chagrin, they also declined her request to leave someone there to keep an eye out.

But evil was lurking inside her home. It had been there all along.

Amy had not noticed it.

Yet.

—Submitted by Wratts

[rkxdowoon-a]

Royal Boys Acting Opportunity Yoon Dowoon as Yagami Light, aka Kira Light’s confession about Naomi and Shiori, Death Note [2006] (1:53:00 - 1:57:10) [00:00 - 03:44, cut clip]

{{ tw: suicide and murder }}

For almost the entire month, Dowoon had hummed and hawed about actually going through with the opportunity that had been give to the Royal Boys. On one hand, he was quite happy where he was at right now. He was still finding his feet and adjusting to life at Royal. On the other hand, however, the bug that he’d been bitten by at the SuperStar KT World commercial auditions and filming had bitten him once more. He’d never expected to enjoy acting so much, to enjoy ‘becoming’ another person and delving into them, analyzing their actions and then showing off his interpretation of them.

In the end, Dowoon decides to go through with the acting opportunity in the same way he’d gone through the SS KT World auditions and the Triple Threat Challenge. If he succeeds, it’s a wonderful surprise. If not, he was only having fun anyways.

The scene he’s chosen is one of the final scenes of the Death Note live action movie that had been released in 2006. Granted it was not a movie he’d seen until recently, given how old he’d been when it had come out. It was only because of the uproar over the Americanized version of the movie that had been released on Netflix that he’d decided to check it out and he’d found himself hooked. In all honestly, the final scenes had stunned him completely, Dowoon shocked at how callous the main character had become and the sacrifices he’d taken to further his own goals. The sheer audacity of it had made his transcribe the subtitles immediately, instantly deciding that this was the scene he was going to perform.

On the day of the performance, Dowoon is quietly confident in himself. He still isn’t expecting anything except being able to pull this off. Handing over the script to a coach, he explains what exactly he’s going to do and what he needs the coach to say in order to pull this off. It’s only a few lines, but it makes it far easier to get into Light’s character without having to switch to Ryuk’s bewildered responses midway. Having clarified everything, Dowoon goes to the clear space in front of the table and sits on the ground, resting his head on his knees, with his arms also folded around them.

In this scene, Light’s girlfriend, Shiori, has been murdered after a hostage situation that he himself organized had gone badly wrong. Or so Dowoon had assumed at the time. The coach’s voice speaking Ryuk’s reaction to it is Dowoon’s signal to change from the kind hearted drummer everyone knew to someone a lot darker.

“Didn’t expect Shiori to die, did you?”

There a moment of silence, as though Dowoon is absorbing the other’s words, then slowly he lifts his head up to look at the coach ‘playing’ Ryuk, but instead of the devastated expression one would expect the young man would be wearing after witnessing his girlfriend dying, there’s a smirk.

“I’m the one who killed Shiori. With the help of the Death Note.”

“But how? Naomi ended up killing Shiori, but you can’t make people kill. If you write their names, they’d die of a heart attack.”

The neutral delivery of the lines by the coach is slightly off putting, but Dowoon tries not to let it get to him. If he’d omitted Ryuk’s parts, the scene would simply be too confusing to work.

“I know. That’s why I wrote Shiori’s name on the page next to Naomi’s.”

He continues in a matter of fact tone, as though ‘he’ hadn’t deliberately orchestrated the killing of ‘his’ own girlfriend. If anything, he seems to mime writing the entry, a still satisfied look on his face.

“Shiori Akino, killed by a third person. Gets kidnapped at the Omei Art Gallery. On April 15th, 14:15, she is forced to phone her boyfriend. She gets away as the police break in. But at 14:55, a warning shot hits her and she dies trying to protect her boyfriend.”

While the words are delivered in a calm manner, as he speaks, Dowoon’s expression turns somewhat conflicted, as though ‘he’ is trying to justify ‘his’ actions, like Light did.

“It didn’t have to say anything about Naomi shooting Shiori or vice-versa.”

Dowoon had elected to cut Ryuk’s reaction to this, finding it somewhat redundant, particularly when Light explains the exact mechanism of his plot straight after.

“It was no coincidence. I planned everything. All I wrote was that Shiori would be killed by a gunshot. And that Naomi would carry a gun to shoot herself.”

Dowoon still can’t believe how twisted Light is, how someone could mastermind Naomi into killing his girlfriend and then killing herself seconds later. It made him glad that there was no such thing as a Death Note in real life. 

“No-one carries a gun around a gun in Japan, which means that the gun Naomi had would be shot at Shiori.”

His expression changes again to a conspiratorial one, as though this is all just a game. Which he supposes, to Light, it was.

“Hear this. Death Note changes our destinies in the most natural ways. So even though it wasn’t written, everything went according to my plan.”

“You’re a devil in disguise.”

At the reaction ‘Ryuk’ gives, Dowoon snorts in amusement, pulling himself to his feet and walking towards the coach with a swagger in his step and a smirk back in place.

“My girlfriend was killed before my eyes. If I tell them I want to join the [investigation] team and capture Kira, everyone would sympathize and believe me without a doubt.”

However his expression wavers as he ‘remembers’ his parting kiss with Shiori and the reality of what ‘happened’ begins to sink in. Did ‘he’ truly do the right thing?

“You’re far worse than a god of death. Shiori truly loved you. Didn’t you love her at all?”

At the question, Dowoon looks up at the ceiling, swallowing hard and letting his eyes fill with tears. He always figured that deep down, Light ended up regretting his actions. At least that was the interpretation ha’d decided to go for.

“....I don’t know.” he whispers, voice shaking and tearful, blinking hard before shutting his eyes tight. He keeps them shut for a moment before opening them again, and like a switch had been flicked, he’s back to being Dowoon, Royal’s drummer boy, rather than they mass-murderer Light Yagami.

“Thanks for your help! I hope you enjoyed it! ...Sorry if I creeped you out at any stage though.”

[Word count without script: 845. With script:  1,096)

[mercybees]

Expanse Fic: and I am coming to you

My prompt fill for @helpless-squeals for the Expanse Fandom Exchange (organized by @the-roci), who asked for Naomi/Drummer, hurt/comfort, related to Drummer's injury. 

This went in a different direction than I thought it would so I hope you still enjoy it. I wanted to try to capture the feeling of waiting and not knowing that comes when someone you love is in danger and you can't be there. I hope I did it justice.

Warnings for canon-typical violence, lots of Belter swearing, and a very brief and non-specific reference to past abuse. 

Spoilers for Season 3

Wordcount: 1243

Read it on AO3 or below the cut. 

Naomi knows. She knows the minute Diogo pulls a gun. Camina wouldn’t have gone with that, too blunt, too obvious. Camina would know, pulling a gun on Naomi’s boys won’t make her compliant, it’ll make her angry. So Camina isn’t in charge anymore. The only question is whether she’s locked up with Holden or if Naomi’s too late and her body’s floating somewhere in space.

‘Drop it Amos,’ she says. She’s loath to give up any advantage with Ashford apparently running this rustbucket but she needs to know what happened here, to find out the truth.

Amos drops his weapon too easily. On anyone one else, she’d say it was a bluff. She’s lost touch with him and she just prays that it isn’t too late to salvage their relationship.

She’s yanked out of her thoughts by Diogo. ‘You’re coming with us,’ he says.

Amos has a gun— not the some one— pointed at Diogo’s stupid head before he’s done speaking. ‘She’s not going anywhere.’

‘She’s a deserter sasa ke? She’s ours by rights.’

Amos might not trust her right now but he’ll still rip out Diogo’s throat and get them all killed.

‘She’s ours,’ snaps Alex, ‘As much as she is anybody’s.’

‘Stay out of our business, pomang,’ says one of the rowdier men by Diogo’s side.

Amos growls and swings the gun at the one who had spoken.

Naomi hovers between annoyance and blind terror. ‘That’s enough boys. No need to get excited. I’ll go.’

‘Like hell you will,’ says Amos.

‘Naomi!’ Alex exclaims at the same time.

She feels like screaming. She doesn’t. ‘Amos put the gun down. I’m going and that’s final.’ Amos looks at her like she can’t be trusted with herself and it makes her even angrier. She grits her teeth and walks slowly over to Diogo’s side of the little stand-off.

Alex looks back and forth between Naomi and Amos like he can’t tell who’s crazier.

‘Cuff her,’ Diogo says to the man who had spoken before.

Who needs to worry about the ring when these idiots are going to get them all killed right here. ‘Mi kom. To na wanya ando nakangepensa.’

Diogo puffs out his chest. ‘Keting sasa to, welwala? ’

Something inside of her snaps. She closes the distance between them in less than a breath. ‘Here is what’s going to happen, sabakawala. You are going to take me to Ashford and the grownups are going to talk or, you can start a bloodbath here and loose more beltalowda for nothing but your pride.’

Diogo’s face turns an interesting shade of red and he tenses as if he wants to hit her but he backs off at the last moment. ‘You answer to da bossmeng, deserter.’

Satisfied she’s out of immediate danger from that quarter, Naomi turns to her boys. ‘I’ll be back with information,’ she says.

Alex looks unhappy but resigned. Amos looks angry but that doesn’t mean much coming from him. They don’t like it but they aren’t going to get themselves killed over it. She turns back to Diogo. ‘Let’s go.’

‘Naomi Nagata,’ Ashford sounds slimy as ever.

‘What happened to Drummer?’ she demands. Did you lock her up? Hurt her? Space her?

‘She was injured during the deceleration,’ he says. It’s too casual, almost dismissive. There is something she’s missing here.

‘Injured how? I want to see her.’

Ashford waves his hand. ‘She is in a healing coma, recovering from surgery and we will not waste an engineer over sentimentality. You will work.’

‘I will work when I see her,’ says Naomi, ‘and Jim Holden.’

‘We have had trouble with our grid and it persists. Fix it and you are free to see whoever you wish.’

‘Is it true am under arrest then?’ she demands.

‘Nothing so crude,’ says Ashford. ‘But you will fix this ship.’

Naomi imagines Camina laying still and pale on a medic’s table. Her blood boils. She should be there. ‘Show me the grid,’ she snarls.

‘This way sesata,’ says a pale skinny man a tattoo that reached across the bridge of his nose.

In time, she thinks. The second they look away I’m coming Camina.

Naomi flings the third door open but it’s just another store room. Where are you Camina? I don’t have much time. She had shorted a circuit and slipped away in the resulting chaos, muttering something about tools as a slapdash cover. It won’t buy her much time. The second someone realizes she’s gone, Diogo and his posse will be looking for her. She tries to put it out of her mind and focus on the search.

Her hand is on the keypad of door number four when she hears a crash and muffled noise of pain from within. ‘Camina?’

The door slides open. ‘What are you doing here?’ The words are bitter and filling with barely controlled pain.

Naomi rushes forward. The other woman’s face is set in hard lines, from pain, or anger, or both. She lays on her back, legs stretched out in front of her, cot propped up a few inches, with a mess of metal and tools on her lap. ‘Camina! Ashford said you were in a coma!’

‘I don’t abandon those who need me.’ Camina won’t look up.

Naomi’s eyes sting but she pushes it aside. ‘What happened? What are you doing?’

Camina finally looks up and her eyes are full of angry tears. Naomi watches her blink them back in numb shock. She’s never seen Camina cry. ‘I crushed half my spine to dust. Ashford, da pashengwala, got me to the medics while you chased after your inyabaratna.’

‘Camina, you know I didn’t leave you,’ says Naomi. She’s crying for real now. She could have lost this woman and not known until too late. But if she had stayed, her boys would be dead. She feels sick.

‘You did,’ Camina is almost shouting now. ‘You left. You walked away for them, just as you promised me you wouldn’t.’

Anger sparks inside Naomi. ‘I had to know you would let me leave. I’m not a thing to be kept locked up Camina.’

‘Are you mine or aren’t you?’ demands Camina.

‘I love you, but you know I’m mine first,’ says Naomi. If anyone should understand this, it’s her.

‘And what am I then?’

‘Mi amolof,’ Naomi manages to say. ‘Tell me what you are doing to yourself?’

Camina’s face goes blank and she hands Naomi a power-cell. ‘Fix this.’

Power-cell . Suddenly it’s clear. ‘If you do this, they probably won't be able to repair the damage organically.’

‘This a war. Mi du keting mi mowteng.’

Naomi grabs a screwdriver and bites her lip. ‘Can I sit?’

‘I can’t stop you.’

‘That’s not what I asked.’

Camina gestures for her her sit on the end of the narrow cot. ‘You left.’

‘I came back,’ says Naomi. She takes a screwdriver from Camina’s pile and begins to unscrew the cap. ‘I didn’t leave you.’

After a beat of silence Camina’s hand slips over her own. ‘Kowltim kom bek Naomi.’

‘Always, I will always come back to you.’ She slips the power cell into place and the pile of metal makes a whirring sound.

‘Help me?’

‘Are you sure?’

‘Help me and we will walk to Jim Holden’s cell, set him loose, march to the bridge and take back our ship. You and me together.’

‘Kowltim,’ says Naomi. She lays her hand on top of Camina’s. ‘Together.’

[jungiyara]

Ever Since We Met [SF9 Dawon AU]

Man I’m a sucker for cheesy one shots. @fyeah-bubblekey this ones for you :3

Text Key:

[ sample ]: author notes

SAMPLE: Your thoughts

SAMPLE: Dawons Thoughts

SAMPLE: Same thought at same time

———————————

Ever Since We Met [Based off the song Nearly Witches by Panic! At the Disco]

Song for reference (Live ver. 2011) 

Song for reference (Org, with lyrics)

Dear lord I hate school. 5 tests, 3 essays, and a presentation in 3 weeks?

It was the beginning of the second semester of your 11th year in high school [secondary school?]. This was the most important year of your education. The year where all your grades and extracurricular actually mean something. Everything seemed to fall on top of you at once. If you had it your way, you would have dropped out and gone to performance school. But your parents would never allow that. So you dragged your ass out of bed into Hell. You didn’t care for much. But you only cared about one thing. Cheesy as it is, the school's music program is the only reason why you even try; your parents wouldn’t let you be in the music program if your grades were awful. You were the president of the program, you sang, danced and played both the clarinet and guitar.

The best part about this program was not just the fact it wasn’t a boring classical orchestral highschool band, but that it was a versatile program, where there were guitarists, drummers, bass players, singers, and dancers. It was to focus on different styles while promoting individuality and unity. Most students played more than one instrument and everyone was like a family.

You enjoyed adding new people to the program each year. But when your director said that there was a new singer who transferred in, you felt nervous yet excited. Since the seniors graduated last year, the program lacked any singers, and while you were amazing, it wasn’t your focus as was dance and guitar.

“Lee Sanghyuk is his real name but prefers to be called Dawon, I believe,” said your teacher. “He’s a singer and dancer, doesn’t play any instruments.” Wow, so I have a bit of competition now? “It’s your responsibility as president to introduce him to the program. I expect you to make an announcement to all three music class periods. And I believe he’s joining your class. Make sure you update on our set list for the concert in a month. I haven’t handed out the parts yet, but I heard the kid sing.” You relaxed at his expression. He seemed excited by it. “He’s one of the best I heard since our last male singer graduated.”

You took a look at the setlist. 2 general orchestral pieces and 1 instrumental alternative piece for the high school, 1 indie for the 8th graders, 2 combined 6th and 7th-grade pieces, few jazz ensemble pieces and a drum line piece. With a dance performance put in, the concert would run about an hour and a half.

“Nearly Witches? Isn’t that a Panic! At the Disco piece? For the high school” You asked. “Indeed it is. It’s the last song on the piece. It’s probably going to be a duo.”

Oh no. Your the only female singer right now and you haven’t even heard the new kid yet. “I know what you’re thinking y/n, and don’t worry, your voices match each other.” The bell rang, meaning you had to go to your last class. “Good luck kiddo, you can do it!” You loved your teacher. He was almost like a second parent.

Next Day:

You came to school early so you could run to the music room and meet the new kid. As you walked in your heart skipped a beat.

Oh god he’s hot. Almost tripping over the instrument cable damn 8th graders you walked into the office. You were trying hard to keep your composure. He had soft black hard and beautiful brown eyes, was a little taller than you were, though you were in heels. He had a smile that was so bright you thought you needed sunglasses. Your teacher read your mind and started giggling as he instructed you to sit.

Okay, professionalism. You gotta know the kid for the benefit of the program.

“Hi I’m Sanghyuk, but you could call me Dawon!” His voice was bright and I feel like he's comedic and outgoing. “Hi Dawon! I’m Y/N, the president. I heard you’re a vocalist? I know this is fast but we have a concert in about a month. Do you have a free period so we can discuss?” I’m talking so fast oh god. I hope he doesn’t notice I’m staring.

“Uh, I think 4th period?” You saw his schedule. I share 4 classes including free period. This should be fun.

“Do you dance Dawon? After school on Thursdays we have a dance class. We do stuff from hip hop to alternative and traditional. I can introduce you to the Dance team leader for you.” 

“I actually love dancing, I’ll take you up on that offer.” Does she know that I’m really fuckin nervous. 

“I think you’re gonna be a great addition to the program Dawon!” said your teacher, noticing the slight tension. 

The bell rang, and the first music class came in. The three music classes were the two highschool and the one middle school. The first was High school A. Your friends Taeyang, Zuho and Rowoon walk in. They greet you and Dawon; Taeyang walks by and whispers in your ear “he’s cute, I approve.” and you hit him playfully. “Dawon, I’d like you to meet the dance team leader and the most awful best friend in the world. Taeyang, we have a new member for Dance.”

He took one look at Dawon. “Like I said, I approve. Talk to me after school newbie.” 

“Well I wouldn’t bet on it, I have about 100 other things I gotta do, you gotta prove to be a priority!” I hope she found that comment funny or I’m gonna launch myself out the window. Oh my god and he’s comedic. Please don’t let me fall for this boy. You, Taeyang, Rowoon and Zuho are laughing. Thank god. 

As the class settles in, you walk in and introduce him to the group. Everyone muttered in delight; another singer. He shot finger guns at everyone when you described him, and everyone giggled. Oh boy a class clown. Everyones gonna love him. 

Throughout the day, you led him through the school. You two seemed to bond on your mutual hatred for the stupid amount of work you have as 11th graders. “5 test and 2 essays??” “And a presentation!” “How are you alive at this school?” How do i tell him that this music program is the reason why I even try. “I mean, I have music I guess, its my passion.” Oh my god she’s amazing. I can’t believe I met someone who loves music this much. He seems to love music as well. This might be fun.

During your free period, which you previously shared with only Zuho, you two helped Dawon catch up with music stuff. “Our teacher said he wants you and I to sing this song as a duet for the concert.” Nearly Witches by Panic! At the Disco? You both looked at the lyrics while Zuho sat at the table doing his homework. “Ever since we met, I only shoot up with your perfume, Its the only thing, that makes me feel as good as you do” oh god I hope the blushing isn’t noticeable.  

“Okay so the lyrics are a little... lovey... Its strictly professional though. Lets spend the next few minutes splitting up the parts and listening to the song.” My teacher is really trying to set me up with this kid isn’t he. You text Taeyang the song lyrics and he responds with the heart eyes and laughing emoji and you send back the middle finger one. 

“We’re having the whole group sing the first part in french. Seeing that you seem to have a funny bone in you, you can take the ‘Here I am, composing a burlesque part’“ She thinks I’m funny?? 

“You can sing the first verse, I’ll take the second verse following the burlesque line. You can sing the pre-chorus, we can sing the chorus together.” 

He knows what he’s doing oh wow. 

The lunch bell rang. Soon after was the music class. After everyones part was handed out, you two went into the practice room to sing vocals while the rest of the group practiced their part. 

The practice room was a bit on the smaller side; 1 speaker and a music stand. 

“Alright lets get this shit done Dawon.” 

“Don’t you mean... lets get this  shit Done...won...” That was the dumbest joke I’ve made oh lord- ShES LAUGHING?” 

You gave a disapproving laughter at his pun. God he’s cute. ok ok ok focus...

The next 30 minutes were spent singing the parts following the song as it was playing. 

As class ended, you realized he wrote his number on the back of your sheet music with a note. “You know, we might be partners, but that doesn’t mean we can’t be friends.” I hope that wasn’t too much. HIS NUMBER OH LORD. I hope this works out...

______________

You two spent the next two weeks bonding over whatever. You two got along really well. You had a mutual love for dancing. He’s such a good dancer. You found out that it’s been his dream to be a performer/singer. This only made you love him more.

He became everyone's favorite joker, the teachers loved him because he did his work, the students loved him because he made funny, snarky comments about people. Basically he opened up real quick to everyone and fit in right away. 

The best part was during rehearsals. There was a part in the song where the right way to sing the line is in a prissy valley girl accent and every time he does it, the entire class erupts in laughter and you feel yourself falling for him even more. At this point it became a full blown crush on this dude. And during dance practice, Taeyang made sure that you two were close together (he knows all).

He hung out with your general group of friends a lot. I hope she likes me back at some point. I’ve never felt this way about someone before. You noticed how whenever he’s around you he pulls out really bad puns and jokingly flirts with you. Rowoon keeps telling you that he thinks he likes you, but you deny it.

“The song is strictly professionalism.”

The day of the concert was getting closer and closer. You two were told that because it was the last song on the show that you two had to put on a performance. Performance? Its a love song and we’re making it a duet. This could be my chance to pull something. I can’t perform that well, I can show emotion but putting on an act?

The day before the concert you had a sound check/dress rehearsal. This was the time to practice with the amount of space.

“Okay so the beginning is us turned around facing the ensemble. As the song goes into the guitars, we turn around and start dancing. It’ll be mild impromptu.” you explain.

“How should I do my valley girl accent?” he asked everyone, but directed towards you. He starts reenacting that part several times with different poses and accents until the whole group including the teacher is laughing uncontrollably. Dear lord I love him. Your heart rushed with happiness and affection as you told him “Whatever you like. Every time I make her laugh, the happier I feel and the more love I feel for her. 

THE DAY OF THE CONCERT:

You were wearing a short blue dress, white necklace, light make up and your hair falling to your sides. Dawon was wearing a short sleeved blue collared shirt and black jeans, with faux glasses and he hair straightened. Wow. She/He’s hot.

The songs passed, one by one, each group walked off stage and you stood by the door praising everyone. The dance performance came. You couldn’t perform as you requested not to; it was a particularly difficult song and you wanted to watch your boys. Taeyang, Zuho, Rowoon, Dawon as well as Inseong, Jaeyoon, Hwiyoung, Chani and Youngbin all performed a self choreographed and produced song called K.O. At Dawons part you couldn’t stop staring at him. God he’s so good. Is she watching. I hope shes watching. She better be watching, I’m using all of my energy.

As the song ended, you greeted them with hugs as the audience and students cheered. The dance performances usually got the most response.

Soon it was time for the duet. Usually you were nervous, but this time, with Dawon, you felt at ease. 

The whole group walked onto the stage. Here we go. 

“My wing tips waltz across naive wood floors. They creak innocently down the stairs.” You start.

Dawons part came up. Oh boy. 

“HERE I AM, COMPOSING A BURLESQUE, OUT OF WHERE THEY REST THEIR NECKS” Dawon did a 360 degree turn, jumped off the stage, sassily stood with his arm up and hand facing down, his eyes closed and in the most high pitch voice sang with his heart. The audience loved it. You loved it. You loved him. 

You two sung through the whole song, but what confused you was that he walked by Taeyang and grabbed something and hid it behind him halfway through, but you didn’t pay much attention to it.

You two sang the last part together. Waltzing on stage, pretending to be lovers.

“And my one regret is you~~” which was repeated about 4 times.

The last time you two sang that line, he turned around, pulled out something which made the audience gasp and aww. Then turned to you. Here goes nothing.

“And my one regret is you.” A FLOWER! 

As he handed you the flower, you almost in tears, him with a goofy smile and on one knee, the song ends. This is a dream. She accepted it! The whole audience and ensemble is cheering.

You two walk out on stage, flower in one hand, your other hand holding his, and bow down.

After the concert, you two walk back to the music room. As you two pack up your things, as well as in the post concert commotion, he throws the question. At this point it’s just you two alone in the instrument closet.

“So, Y/N... do you, maybe wanna go out some time?” please say yes please say yes.

Truly a dream come true oh my god oh my god! 

You kiss his cheek. “Does that answer that for you?” 

To break the tension he replys in a sarcastic voice, “No actually it doesn’t!” 

“Yes of course I’ll go out with you you big goof.”

He kisses your cheek just as the rest of you friends look through the window. Rowoon walks in shouting.

“HEY LOVE BIRDS WE’RE GONNA GO CELEBRATE AT THAT ONE BOUGIE RESTAURANT DOWNTOWN, CARE TO JOIN OR ARE Y’ALL GONNA FUCK?” 

Dawon starts laughing and you hit Rowoon with a music stand, but agree to go.

The music program truly was the one thing that made you happy.

[ephemeralem0tions]

Hi! I've read your summary of Levihan fanfic recommendations and I've noticed that you are fond of the concept "pretend lovers". I'd love to read your version of pretend lovers, if you don't mind. (or post your Levihan art if a story is too much.) Thanks :D

*Casually inserts self in a cameo in my own fics* Can you spot me? XD

Anyways, college will start tomorrow and I’m so anxious! But for the mean time, your wish is my command ;)

P.S. I stan Coldplay 

Impress (LeviHan - Pretend Lovers)

Theme: Pretend Relationship

Rating: PG

Warning: Curse Words

send your requests/anons here x.

For the thirty-sixth time around, he turned around to face her and gave her a big fat “NO”. His face was already evidently annoyed, and a frown was already forming on her lips after so much persuasion, only to face rejection.

“Oh come on Levi! I know you also want to go to that concert! You can have the other ticket! I’m not even interested in that band!” she pleaded, but it only made him groan. He’s been hearing the same statement for the past four hours and she was still at it. Admittedly, yes, the offer is tempting, but its her purpose he questions.

“I’m not helping you get tickets for your boyfriend four eyes” he hissed. Yes, she wanted those tickets for someone else, not herself.

“He’s not even my boyfriend!” she countered “Well, yet. He promised me he’ll give me a chance if I manage to get him tickets. You know I’ve already spent my allowance money on my experiments, so this is the last resort I have”

His eyebrows furrowed. She’s worth more than a concert pass. Whoever the douche was, he sure didn’t know how brilliant and amazing the woman was, despite her frequent freaky behavior.

“No” he repeated again, firmly.

“Please! All you have to do is appear in the event. I’ll already study everything and you don’t even need to lift a single finger” she was already using her big doe eyes, but he wasn’t falling for that trick. At least not yet. He had managed to set his personal best at resisting them today. Two hours more than the past record.

She started pulling out the big guns. Making her eyes wider, glassier and more persistent than usual. Those pretty hazel irises she knew he cannot resist.

“Remind me why I have to be there again?” he sighed, and she perked up hearing those words. He definitely fell into her trap. Like always.

“Because its a couples event. You have to pretend to be my boyfriend for that time” his frown became deeper. “But you just at least appear so they see I’m with someone”

“Alright shitty glasses. I get it” he replied.

“Yes! Meet me tomorrow at the entrance of the Central Stadium!” she yelled at him from across the hallway. He didn’t even notice she was already away till her voice echoed from the distance. She gave him one final wave, and a heart melting smile before she disappeared.

Great. He was going to be her boyfriend for a day, to impress a guy who wouldn’t even let her be his girlfriend for a day without compensation.

“So what is this game about again?” he asked, as he trotted beside her who skipped excitedly. As promised, they met up in front of the stadium and now walking towards the event hall. He sighed upon seeing that she even wore the band’s shirt even though she had no fucking idea who ‘Coldplay’ was. She sure was really trying hard to impress the guy

“Its a guessing game. It will most likely be their songs and I have listened to every single album they have released last night” yeah, she reeked of coffee again.

“Welcome! May I get your names please, and your team name!” a perky brunette greeted when they reached the registration desk.

“Hanji Zoe and Levi Ackerman” she replied for the both of them.

“Your team name please?” she asked again.

“Team Titans?” it came off more like a question than an answer. He gave her a glare with her weird nerdish innuendos. This is why people avoided her, because they don’t get her.

“No silly” the receptionist chuckled. “Our team name requirement needs to be a combination of both your names. Like a ship!”

They looked at each other. He as always, had a stoic and cold expression, but she was rather embarrassed in his opinion. Her cheeks were flushed red and she was speechless, mouth hanging agape as if her brain suddenly hanged. And those moments are really rare for an intellectual girl like her. Damn she was cute.

“Well since you two can’t think of one. I’ll name it! You are officially dubbed LeviHan” she brunette declared, handing them both one sticker each with their team name to attach to their shirts. Her ponytail bounced from behind her, a sinister smile plastered on her face which give him creeps. What the fuck was wrong with this girl?

They slowly backed away from her and made their entrance to the event hall, where people were already looming and trying to find seats in the busy room.

He scanned the area. Pairs of seats are placed at least a meter away from each other, so no team could cheat and copy answers. A tablet and touch pen laid on the table, where they could write their answers after the host up front on the stage shoots the question.

The music started to die down, and everyone was requested to find their respective places. They opted for a more low key position, down at the back corner, where no one would mind them that much.

“The mechanics are simple! You just need to write your answer on the tab in front of you in the span of thirty seconds. If your answer is correct, your tab will glow green and automatically move on to the next question. If you are wrong, it will glow red and your screen will be stuck to your last answer” the host started up. “Now ladies and gentlemen, please write your team name on the tab”

Hanji immediately picked up the pen and wrote in the messiest way possible. He was almost anxious that it couldn’t be read by the android, but silently whispered his thanks when the sides of the gadget glowed green and automatically emptied the screen.

“Great! I see everyone is ready and registered. To win this game, you must be the last couple standing after answering all our questions. Only the top Coldplay fanatic can pass this test” the host spoke again. “Now for the first question. What is the full name of the lead vocalist?” he heard his partner cuss from the side.

“I memorized songs not facts and background” she murmured, panic evident in her features. He sighed and stared at her, she will definitely fail if he would not help out.

“Christopher Anthony Martin” he whispered, sight directed up front so it looked like he didn’t care at all.

“What?” she looked at him with wide eyes.

“I said Christopher Anthony Martin. Now write it on the board before we loose time” he repeated, and she did what she was told to do so. Soon enough, green light emitted from their own tab, making her smile wide at him. They were going to win this game.

“What song featured Beyonće?”

“Hymn for the Weekend”

“Who in the band is left handed?”

“The bassist. Guy Berryman”

“In 1997, the band’s name was?”

“Starfish”

She gave him a weird look.

“What?” he raised an eyebrow at her.

“Who names their band Starfish?” she questioned him.

“Says the girl who named her team Team Titan” he rolled his eyes. “Quit talking and start writing”

“Whose death wake did they perform for?”

“Steve Jobs” she continued with her disbelieving look but he did not mind her anymore.

“For which three companies did they turn down contracts?”

“Coke, Gatorade and GAP”

“Who married first in the band?”

“The drummer. Will Champion”

They continued doing so, for the rest of the day. Hanji did come up with her own answers once in a while, when the questions were about ‘what’s the title of the song’ or ‘complete the lyrics’. She most definitely did her research.

“Yes!” she giggled, staring at the two tickets in her hand for the fifth time around as the walk away from the stadium. The setting sun definitely made her prettier from his view. Her unique nose, glasses, eyes, smile illuminated by the warm glowing light. He considered it a mission success in helping her and making her happy.

“So you can go to your shitty boyfriend now shitty glasses” he stopped and folded his arms over his chest. He honestly felt annoyed by the fact that his hard work will go to someone else when he did it for her. But whatever makes her happy, supposedly could make him happy too. Right?

“Oh Levi!” he took a step back, as she took him in one of her bone crushing hugs. On any other day, he would have shoved her away or avoided it. But perhaps the afternoon nostalgia made him a bit softer? Or was it that he was mentally tired after remembering all the facts about his favorite band.

A piece of hard paper was suddenly placed in his hand. The other ticket, as she promised was right in his grasp. She gave him a wide smile but he returned to it with a frown.

“Take it shitty glasses” he put back the ticket inside her palms. “Just go and have a date with your boyfriend or whatever” he ‘tsked’.

“No silly” she gave it back to him, and this time, encased it with his fingers. Now she was holding his closed fist with her warm hands which sent shivers down his spine. Her touch is so comforting. “I got this ticket for you, not for anyone else. Because I know you wouldn’t shell out money even if your favorite band went to town. I couldn’t buy you tickets so I decided to get you one with your help”

His mouth hung agape. She did all of it for him? It didn’t quite process in his mind yet.

“You tricked me? This is for me? But what about the other ticket? I thought this was supposed to be for your boy friend?” his forehead scrunched up with his confusion. She chuckled after all his questions.

“Yes I tricked you. This is all for you. I’ll meet you at the concert hall tomorrow night, the other one is for me to accompany you. And yes, it is for my boy friend” she left him dazed and frozen on the side walk, while she ran away from him.

“O-Oi! Four eyes!” he tried to call for her, but she was already waving at him goodbye from the other side of the street. Damn that stubborn ass unpredictable woman.

[the--blackdahlia]

Pride: Alternate Take (Tommy x Nikki)

Title: Pride: Alternate Take

Summary: Requested by @sharon6713. Picks up where Tommy’s leaving the house.

Warnings:  Homophobia, depression, suicide attempt, language, but it does get sweet I promise.

Tommy took a deep breath and made his way out the door. The street was quiet. Their neighborhood was a lot better than the one that they started out in next to the Whiskey. There weren’t wild parties going on between the hours of 10 pm and 3 am every day. Things were so calm and peaceful. And sometimes Tommy ached for the old days.

He secured his bag onto his bike and took a deep breath. He knew his parents wouldn’t miss him. Nikki would at first, but he’d move on eventually. Vince and Mick would have a moment of silence before they went to find a new drummer. That was one thing Tommy always thought about himself. He was replaceable, no matter how much people said he wasn’t. They could find another drummer quickly. Nikki could move on and have a new family.

To Tommy, he was just a placeholder for the real thing.

He got on his bike and took off down the street, heading towards the High Desert Motel.

Two minutes after Tommy had left, Nikki pulled into the driveway. He had had a feeling in his gut that he was needed at home. But traffic and stop lights had delayed him. He made his way inside.

“Tommy?” Nikki called out as he made his way inside. The house was silent. That made Nikki feel sick to his stomach. Of course, Tommy might be at therapy, but something in the back of his mind told him that was not the case. He checked the music room, bathroom, kitchen (that one hurt a little to do) and every place else he could think of before he headed to their bedroom. He looked around. Nothing seemed off at first.

Until he looked at his nightstand where he kept his gun and saw the drawer was open. Rushing over to it, he dug around. The extra ammo was there (Nikki had never really learned proper gun etiquette), but no pistol. Nikki looked around the room, eyes wide, when it landed on a piece of paper on his pillow. Shakily, Nikki reached out and picked it up.

Nikki,

Let me start off by saying that I love you, and this isn’t your fault. I’ve tried for so long to make myself be the person everyone wants me to be, and I can’t do it anymore. By the time you read this, I’ll probably be gone. I checked into the Desert High Motel and I used your old name. I’m not sure which room I got. I took your gun with me, I hope you don’t mind. There’s plenty of better musicians out there who could take over the drums so Motley Crue doesn’t have to stop partying. I heard Randy Castillo is pretty good…

Anyway, I’ve got to go. I love you Nikki. I’m sorry that you wasted so much time on me.

T-Bone

“No!” Nikki tossed down the paper and ran back into the living area. He wasn’t sure where the Desert High Motel was, honestly. He grabbed the phonebook and scanned through it. Someday, he was going to break down and get internet installed in the house. Might make things quicker. But right now, he didn’t have time for that.

“Joshua Tree. That’s two hours from here!” Nikki’s hands were still shaking as he tossed the book down and headed back out to his Porsche. He was debating on calling the cops, but what if that just spooked Tommy even more. He could call Vince and have him head out there. He loved racing his car and probably knew all the shortcuts. But Nikki didn’t. Instead, he got on the I-10 and pointed his car towards Joshua Tree.

****

Vince might have been a racer, but Tommy was good at using his bike. What would’ve been a two hour trip, he cut down quite a bit by backroads and going ten or twenty over the speed limit. He didn’t care if he ended up wrapped around a pole in a non stripper way. He pulled up at the office, cash in hand, ready to pay for his room.

“Name?” The old lady at the desk asked.

“Uh F-Frank Feranna,” Tommy told her. She nodded and got the keys for him, took his cash, and pointed him in the right direction.

“You look familiar,” She told him before he left. “Are you someone famous?”

“For all the wrong reasons,” Was all he told her before he got back on his bike and drove down towards his room. He carried his bag in and tossed it on a chair. He closed his eyes for a second before looking around the room. It wasn’t as extravagant as the hotels they had stayed in before were. But it was going to do the trick. He went back to the bag and pulled out the gun, setting it on the bed while he paced and just stared at it.

“Do I want to do this?” Tommy asked. “Do I really want to leave Nikki all alone?”

‘Maybe he’ll get back with Brandi. Or that Donna chick the papers thought he was seeing back when the two of you got together,’ The voice taunted him. ‘I bet he likes her company better anyway.’

“Fuck!” Tommy cried out as he pulled at his hair. Why couldn’t he be stronger than this? Nikki had overcome addiction, which was a lot harder, in Tommy’s opinion. So why couldn’t he deal with his demons? Why did he still let his dad’s words cut him so deep? Why couldn’t he just force himself to be happy for once?

But, worst of all, why was he so willing to let Nikki, Vince, and Mick be unhappy with him? Why was he so willing to let them watch him like this? Why couldn’t he just let go so they could move on?

That’s when Tommy reached for the gun.

****

“Come on, come on,” Nikki was so close to Joshua Tree. He was sure that he had broken every driving rule California had to offer, but he really couldn’t care. His heart had steadily been beating faster since he left the house, and the minute things started to thin out and become more desert like, Nikki was sure you could see his heart beating out of his chest like those old Looney Tunes cartoons.

Joshua Tree was right there in front of him. And it didn’t take too long to find the motel. He pulled in, ready to go to the office to ask which room Frank Feranna, of all names he had to pick that one, was in. But that’s when he spied an all too familiar bike, parked in front of a room on the end. Nikki parked by it and took a deep breath, preparing himself for what he might find there. He finally got himself out of his car and walked towards the room he hoped was Tommy’s. His legs felt heavy as he approached the door.

Taking another deep breath, he raised his hand and knocked.

****

Tommy was staring at the gun in his hand. He had heard of people killing themselves with guns, but he wasn’t sure how he was supposed to position it. He was about to lift it to his head when there was a knock at the door. Tommy almost ignored it, thinking it was just the wrong person, because no one would be looking for him. But they knocked again. With a sigh, Tommy laid the gun down and went to the door.

As it opened, the last person he expected to see was Nikki standing there. But he was.

“N-Nikki,” Tommy’s eyes were wide.

“You’re surprised to see me,” Nikki pushed his way into the room. “Didn’t think I’d find your note until after you’d already been dead a few hours, didn’t you?”

“Nikki…” Was all Tommy could say. Nikki’s eyes fell on the gun laying on the bed before he turned to look at the drummer.

“What the hell are you thinking Tommy?” Nikki asked. “Is this because some asshole with a camera thought he could show off our lives? You want to take your own life because of that?”

“That’s not…” Tommy shook his head. “It’s not the only thing…”

“Then what is it huh? Do you hate me that much that you’d rather kill yourself than be with me? Are you that ashamed of us?”

“No!” Tommy yelled. Nikki had not expected that reaction. “I’m not ashamed of you or us. It’s me okay!”

“What are you talking about?” Nikki asked. “Tommy…”

“My dad has installed this idea in my head that I should be ashamed of who I am, okay?”  Tommy sighed and sat on the edge of the bed. It took Nikki a second before he put things together.

“That wasn’t your therapist on the phone, was it?” He asked. Tommy shook his head. “It was your dad?”

“Y-yeah…” Tommy whispered. “I didn’t think he’d call me. I’ve moved around so much since the last time I talked to him.”

“What did he say to you?” Nikki asked, moving to sit by Tommy.

“R-remember how I told you guys that my dad kicked me out because I wanted to quit school to join a band?” Tommy asked. Nikki nodded. “Well, that wasn’t entirely accurate.”

“What did he do to you?” Nikki asked, remembering the revolving door of step dads and boyfriends who liked to smack him around while his mother watched.

“I...when I was just a teenager, I kissed a boy from school,” Tommy told him. “I didn’t think anything of it. I thought he was cute, he thought I was cute, he just wanted to try it out. I had known for a little while that I liked boys. But, what I didn’t realize was my dad...he had seen us. He didn’t say anything until...until I told him and my mom that I wanted to quit school to spend more time working on the band with you, Vince, and Mick…”

“Tommy…” Nikki whispered, reaching out to cup his face and brush some tears away.

“His exact words to me were “is it because you’re a faggot?”.” Tommy told Nikki. “I was really confused until he told me he had seen me that night. I...we got into a fight and that’s when I showed up on your doorstep with a couple bags.”

“You could’ve told me baby,” Nikki told him, keeping contact because it seemed to calm Tommy some. “Back then though, I probably would’ve killed your dad. No one fucked with my favorite drummer.” He smirked a little.

“I just...I didn’t want you guys disgusted with me.” Tommy told him. Nikki frowned. “I heard the things that were said on the strip about guys like me. It was bad enough wearing the makeup and getting called names. Could you imagine what it would be like if people found out? Being gay, or bisexual, or whatever the fuck I am, it wasn’t exactly a cool and trendy thing. It was mainly stripped down to stereotypical, feminine men and butch women, waving rainbows and living in San Francisco. That’s not me...”

Nikki pulled Tommy to him. Tommy’s head rested in the curve of his neck and he just let himself melt into Nikki’s side. Nikki held him close. He had been so scared that he was going to walk into the room and find that he had really lost Tommy this time.

“Baby, you know I love you. I always love you. No matter what you do. You could braid your hair into cornrows and sing rap and I’d still love you.” Nikki rubbed his back.

“Then why can’t my parents?” Tommy asked softly into his neck. “Why can’t my dad love me for who I am?”

“I wish I had an answer for you sweetie,” Nikki held him close. “But I don’t exactly have a good relationship with either of my parents. And I know that you were really close to yours growing up. I wish I could tell you everything will be okay, that they’ll see their mistakes and realize that you’re happy, but I can tell you that I love you, and I’m here for you no matter what happens.”

“You deserve a better fiancé than me,” Tommy whispered. “You’re too good for me.”

“We both have been dealt shitty hands in life. I think this is the universe's way of saying sorry. It brought us together.” Nikki tilted Tommy’s head up and placed a gentle kiss on his lips. When they pulled apart, Nikki offered Tommy a comforting smile. “Do you want to go home?”

“Yeah,” Tommy nodded, not really wanting to move away from Nikki but he had rode his bike here, and he didn’t really want to leave it.

“We’ll go home and have that date I  talked about earlier,” Nikki told him. “Just you and me. No one else.”

“That sounds perfect,” Tommy nodded. “I have a lot of making up to do.”

“No,” Nikki took his hand and pulled Tommy to his feet. “I’m here to catch you when you fall. Don’t ever forget that.” He kissed  Tommy again before they got Tommy’s stuff and left the motel room behind.

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