#and reading the weird ass headlines and trying to put together the story from the titles alone

[fanaticalthings]

I've always wondered how Jason would be publicly integrated back into the family without it seeming suspicious as fuck (because let's be real, legally reviving your son who turns out to not actually be dead is gonna be real hard to explain to the public)

So instead of going through all the hassle of paperwork and a cover story, what if Jason just sorta...popped back into the family without any explanation whatsoever?

But instead of explaining his reappearance, Jason just doesn't fucking say anything and acts like the once dead Wayne kid suddenly being alive isn't the biggest fucking deal in Gotham right now

and when someone tries to approach him he just looks at them wide-eyed and says in his most startled voice "...you can SEE me?"

and then the second the person takes their eyes off him he just ✨disappears✨ (because bat powers obviously) and it freaks everyone the fuck out

and when the other batkids get interviewed they just put up their best act of pretending they have no idea what anyone's talking about

Reporter: Mr. Drake, what do you have to say about the impossible return of your late brother?"

Tim: Who?

Reporter: ...

their performances range from straight up ignorance to dramatically bursting into tears whenever someone brings up the topic

Reporter: Do you have anything to say about the recent events surrounding Jason Todd?"

[Cue Dick letting out the most obnoxious wail possible and crying all over the reporter]

Reporter: Oh-I didn't mean to upse-

Dick: I just wish I was there for him more when he was alive, yknow?

Reporter: Ah, well-

Dick: And sometimes I wonder what he would've been like now...All grown up and going to college...[more sobbing]

Reporter whispering under their breath: What the fuck is going on

everyone stopped asking Dick after that.

these shenanigans get so ridiculous to the point where Jason's even started standing RIGHT NEXT to his siblings whenever they're in public and they just pretend like he isn't even fucking there

it's come to the point where ghost!Jason (?) even has his own wiki page where people just talk about his weird ass appearances and the possibilities of him being a cryptid

and oh yeah this all happens during the span of one week while Bruce is (conveniently) off world

when he comes back he's just met with half of Gotham in hysterics over his dead son and theorizing if the Waynes are being haunted and he has absolutely zero clue about what the HELL is going on

he first finds out from an interviewer asking him how he feels about his ghost son and how any of this is even possible

but I imagine that Bruce's brain kinda short circuits and the only thing he's processing right now is that Jason is back in the family and he just starts tearing up like, "My son is back in the family? He loves me? 🥺"

and everyone in Gotham is like Mr. Wayne did you miss the fucking part where your DEAD son is just ALIVE again and just chilling around the city??

anyways you CANNOT tell me Jason wouldn't use this opportunity to pull the biggest prank in Gotham history like that boy LIVES for drama

[llendrinall]

So i got another fic idea in my head The dates are very important. 1 (May 1998) Percy was a Ministry spy and he worked closely with Albus. He saved a lot of lives no matter their blood or if they were creatures. And at the battle of Hogwarts he saves Freds life but hes in crit condition George is a total ass (He's angry and takes it out on Percy) going off at him saying nasty things along the lines of that Percy isn't welcome at the Weasley home anymore.

2 When he tries to go to the House to talk to them he's not treated very well ("Dont wanna hear excuses Percy"). He just give up, packs his things in his flat, & the next morning he goes, gives his mission reports that date from the start of his Ministry career along with his resignation letter on Shacklebot's desk. Then he's off to America to start over he snuck into Freds hospital room & used Snapes healing charms as a way to 'set things right' before leaving.

3. Percy is now in New York, gets a job, and then spends the next 6 months working diligently and whatnot. Then he meets Audrey Smith, they end up going on a few dates and she introduces Percy to her local gym and they become gym buddies and soon start dating. (Aug 2000) After 2 years together (They're married) Percy and Audrey find out they're expecting. And then the twins are born on the 2nd of May 2001. Percy laughs a bit as Audrey pats him the shoulder and says "They sure chose the date"

4. Sep 11 2001) Audrey dies in the 9/11 attack (she was a muggle) & Percy is left a widow with 2 daughters to look after. (June 2002) He bumps into Oliver who's on a quidditch training exchange. They catch up. (Oliver doesn't bring up the fact that Percy's fam has been looking for him for years and that he's saved so many lives) As December rolls around Oliver spends it at Percy's, meeting the kids and hearing Percy tell him everything (His wife, his family and the war)

(I think this is part 5? Idk its 2am here) (Jan - May) They spend a lot of time together after Xmas and slowly Percy begins to heal a bit more after Audrey's death. Oliver ends up going back to the UK and Percy misses him. (July) Oliver comes back with news that he's transferred to an NY team "They might not be big on Quidditch here but they're extremely good, Perce" (Its not because Oliver has been inlove with Percy since Hogwarts. Neither is it because he loves Molly & Lucy to death either)

6 (Feb 2004) The UK Papers get a picture of Oliver, Percy the twins out and it BLOWS UP. Charlie (The only one who even heard Percy out back after the war ended, He knows the others did wrong by him) floos in and then warns Percy about everyone knowing he's here and that they're gonna be coming in 2 days. So He ends up having Charlie take the girls. He ends up meeting with his fam and it takes a long long time for them to heal and fix things.

7. His Fam only get to meet Molly and Lucy when they're 6. When they're 7 he and Oliver gets married. Idk why but i seem to only send you these fic ideas when im hella tired and at 2am. T_T Why am i like this? So Audrey named Molly and Perce named Lucy (After each others moms)

 Honestly, What can I say at this point? You have the whole story thought out. Go for it and write it!

It’s not the kind of story I write, though. But since you dropped the materials here, I can share how I would assemble it.

I would avoid New York. Big cities have a character. They are characters and you have to treat them as such. In Life skills, London is a character, complex and big and hard and beautiful. In Secret language of plants, even though Draco and Harry end up in London, I had them stay in the house because London was too big of a character for that stage of the story.

So, no New York. If I had to use a well-known city I would go with Boston, I think. Otherwise, a small one with a nice name.

Audrey doesn’t die on 9/11. Well, she dies on that day, but not on the attack. It’s something as simple and dull as a traffic accident. Percy wasn’t with her, not that it would have mattered. Yes, wizards have potions to mend bones instantly and protective charms and spells to stop the momentum, but Audrey died instantly, and no one could have seen the car until it was on her.

The driver was an old man, fumbling with that new invention, a mobile phone, trying to call his daughter who worked in New York.

Magic Law on the States is a bit… over the place. It would be extremely simple to put a curse or a hex that man. If Percy was clever about it, it wouldn’t be too illegal. But he doesn’t. Percy realizes it wouldn’t make him feel better.

 Percy doesn’t particularly like the States. The tea is terrible, the coffee is weak, the spelling is painful and people are entirely too talkative. But it’s sunnier than England and the orange juice is good, so he stays.

He goes to Romania every summer to visit Charlie. The girls love it there and it was always easy to talk to Charlie. Charlie who had such a promising career in Quidditch and rejected the fame and fortune for a thankless career working with dragons. Not even training dragons for bank security, which is a cool and profitable career, but fighting that very same use.

Charlie only goes back home for a week during Christmas, so he gets it. They don’t have to talk about it, never mention that weird state of loving your family and not wanting to be with them, to fight, to have to explain and justify your very existence and your life decisions.

He meets Oliver in Romania. Supposedly Oliver is there to see the sights and rest his left shoulder, that was injured at the end of the league. But he is not the first Quidditch player who has a crisis of faith and comes to Charlie with questions. So far, none of them had taken up dragon-protection, but one became a broomstick racer and another is the head coach of an Italian team.

Charlie only thinks about dragons. Oliver only thinks about Quidditch and is in the middle of an existential crisis. So it’s perfectible understandable that the topic of Percy, his war heroics and his semi mythical status is never brought up. To be fair, Charlie doesn’t know much about it because he doesn’t read English newspapers and his family never talks about Percy when he is around. Oliver just thinks that Percy is the first Competent Adult he has ever met and is much more interested about this Figuring Life Out than any hero status.

So it’s fair to say that the headlines come as a surprise.

Someone snapped a picture of Oliver and Percy sitting very close together in a park, with twin stupid loving smiles. It was all perfectly innocent. Molly was doing something cute out of frame and they never kept any physical distance between themselves, not even in Hogwarts. But it doesn’t matter. The picture is sold as proof of the mysterious war hero and the dashing sport star carrying a secret love affair. It’s a beautiful story, powerful. Percy is the tragic handsome hero and Oliver the right person to bring love back in his life after years nursing the wounds of war. Or perhaps Oliver is the sweet and honest good boy, the boyfriend every mother wants for her daughter, seduced by the man living a life of exotic and daring adventures.

Whatever it is, the world wants to believe in it. So much so that bloody Draco Malfoy pops up to warn them that there is a dozen of rabid, ruthless, paparazzies coming their way. He knows because Malfoy owns the most read magazine in England and has put a bounty on a photo of the two of them kissing.

Paparazzies don’t have a concept of trespassing, but breaking and entering into a dragon reserve has certain difficulties that can’t be bypassed with an alohomora and a lack of morals. Percy and Oliver spend the rest of the month in the reserve, not daring to go out. Twenty-two days in each other’s company, hiking in the mountains and playing with the girls. Molly and Lucy have decided that Oliver is similar to Charlie in all the right ways, so they like him.

On day nineteen, they kiss. Someone gets a picture of it, but, in his excitement, the photographer wanders into a nest of young dragon carps. He is recued three hours later sans pants or shoes. The photo of their first kiss is lost.

Oliver says he is almost done with his existential crisis but now Percy has one of his own.

You see, there is something Oliver hasn’t said. Something he didn’t mention at all. And Percy doesn’t know if Oliver just hasn’t noticed (it took him two years to realize all the Weasleys were siblings) or if he noticed but… doesn’t care?

There is more than one reason why only Charlie has met the girls.

Even now that Percy has received letters from every family member (including Freaking Aunt Muriel) and even a surprise visit from them (he has a life debt with Charlie for the heads-up) and they have begun the unpleasant work of fixing their relationship; even now, they haven’t met Molly and Lucy.

It’s because of the Weasley cousin they never talk about. The accountant.

Percy knows that it’s perfectly normal. Many wizarding children don’t exhibit any magic until they are at least seven. But he also knows that every single person in his family was levitating toys (Bill, Ron and Ginny) or stopping spilled milk in mid-air (him) or shooting sparks (Charlie and the twins) by the time they were three.

Molly and Lucy had done nothing magical so far. Nothing at all. And Percy knows, in his heart of hearts, that if anyone makes them feel inferior, if anyone dares to say anything against them, he will go the Dark Lord route and kill every single person prejudiced against squibs. He might kill every single wizard and witch and eradicate all magic, so his girls won’t feel inferior to anyone. He found in himself the strength to forgive the man than took Audrey’s life, but he won’t do the same for the person who speaks against his children. He can’t.

 On Christmas Percy reluctantly agrees to go to England with the girls because Charlie promises he will be there too. It is not easy. It is, in fact, very, very difficult and tense. He is forever grateful at Lee Jordan, who is glued to Fred’s hip cracking jokes and defusing tension. Also, Angelina Johnson takes George and Ginny to the kitchen and informs them they are the biggest idiots she has ever had the misfortune of meeting and that helps to avoid anyone saying something unforgivable they will regret their whole life. On Christmas’ Eve Harry Potter takes everyone’s wands because he is Harry Potter “and I do what I want” which means no one hexes anyone and they can overindulge the punch.

Oh, why bother? The whole thing is terrible and awkward and it hurts. But it is a necessary painful step, either to fix things with time or to say that he tried, actually tried, and never look back at this moment with regret.  

Also, he gets to meet with Oliver. It turns out that Oliver hadn’t noticed the girls’ lack of magic, but he also doesn’t care. Why would he care? Are you- are you supposed to care? Is this another thing Oliver missed because he only thinks about Quidditch? What’s wrong with not having magic in any case? Oliver’s mother is muggle and it is agreed that she is wonderful.  

(Even Potter says so. Percy has no idea of when Harry Potter met Oliver’s mum, but he speaks of her in the highest terms).

 You can read about what happened next on issues of 32, 33 & 34 of Alakazam as well as special issues 17, 21, 22 and 25. Draco Malfoy earns 1.5 million galleons with issue 33, setting a record for most successful print in wizarding history. Then he obliterates that record with a single stolen picture of Percy and Oliver’s wedding. He committed around a dozen crimes to get that picture, got drunk on champagne and victory and asked Harry Potter to marry him.

(He also donated all the money to a newly created society for the support and trade education of squibs, but only two people in the world know that).

[ramblinganthropologist]

Writober 2020 - 18 (photograph)

Extra, extra, read all about it: someone’s about to fucking die. As they should, because who the hell honestly believes that Commander Shepard and Commander Shepard are straight anyway?

(ME1)

---

“Do you think either of them know they were seen yet?”

“Doubt it. Definitely explains the last name thing, though. How long do you think it's been?”

“Can't have been more than 5 years, they both did N7...”

Alistair was starting to get tired of people whispering. Didn't they know it was rude?

Ok, maybe his nerves were still a little frayed from the whole touch the Prothean beacon, figure out Saren is trying to kill everyone, become the first human Spectre thing. Nobody could blame him that he was a little cranky that morning as he left his office to get the Normandy where it needed to go. The fact it was actually his ship definitely didn't help either. After years of being enlisted or an officer, having free reign was... deeply uncomfortable.

He'd probably get over it, but... yeah it felt weird.

Still, even in his terrible mood it was impossible to miss the stares and the whispers from the crew whenever he walked by. Part of him had wondered if it was them gossiping about how he'd gotten the Normandy off Admiral Anderson, but... it didn't feel right. Professional whispering from the ranks was one thing, but this felt... oily. Salacious, maybe. Definitely something personal, which just amped up the gossip even more.

Now, had he been in a better mood, Alistair probably would have ignored it. The thing was, he wasn't. So he would have to be forgiven if he took a right when he should've gone straight and walked straight behind the two gossiping crew-mates. Neither of them noticed him, of course. He was quiet like that.

“What was that about N7?”

He shouldn't have enjoyed just how much air the two men cleared when they jumped out of their skins, but forgive him if he wasn't feeling just a little petty that morning. They were both 3 shades lighter as they turned to face him, and the sweat was really starting to pour down their faces. On his scale, he'd call that shit terrified.

Good.

“C-Commander Shepard, sir! W-we didn't see you there!”

He smiled, but there was nothing friendly about it. “Yes, that tends to happen when someone comes up from behind you. Now, to reiterate. What was that about N7? Have either of you been asked to join the training program? My congratulations if so, it's an honor even to be asked.”

He would know – he had it tattooed above his ass. And he definitely knew nobody on his ship was in active training at the moment. It was one of the perks that came with being the Normandy's CO. The other was getting to see moment like this transpire before him.

The larger of the two was sweating bullets as he tried to figure out what to say. “N-no... nothing like that, sir.”

“Just...” the words failed the smaller one. His face screwed up as he seemingly gave up whatever he was holding back. “How long have you been married to XO Shepard?”

…

Alistair blinked slowly. “What?”

If he hadn't known better... someone had just asked if he was married to his XO. His XO, Commander Bo Peep Shepard. His XO, Commander Bo Peep Shepard, his best friend and probably the closest thing he had left to family.

What the entire fuck?

Big one rubbed the back of his neck as his face began to take color again. “It... was on the extranet a few days ago. Pictures of you two together. It implied that you two were married. We thought it would explain the shared last name and all...”

Alistair let a sigh leak from between his teeth as he pinched the bridge of his nose. “A tabloid with nothing better to do, I assume.”

He let the pinch go, shaking his head. “Mind sending that site to me? I think I need to do some correction next time we dock at the Citadel.”

The two were already racing for their omni-tools, but he could tell the question still loomed in both their eyes. After all, he could just be trying to quash the story to keep his so-called marriage quiet. These crew, lovely as they were, didn't know he or his XO well enough yet.

Maybe that was why he rolled up his sleeve to expose his tattoo. “And by the way, I think this should clarify your questions.”

He tapped the wing colored in the gay pride flag for emphasis. The other, shaded in trans pride, went without saying. Years later, he was still glad he had gotten it during pride, even if it had been somewhat of a spur of the moment choice. Ironically enough, he had gotten it with Bo – she had the lesbian colors around her ankle.

You know, because she was a fucking lesbian and he was gay as hell.

“O-oh... yeah I guess it would.” Someone's face was turning red. “Sorry, Commander...”

“Just don't spread it around anymore.” Down went his sleeve. “Now, I'm going to go see where this website is hosted...”

With that he left them, the details blooming to life on his omni-tool screen. Once they got back to the Citadel, he and Bo were going to have to take a little trip...

---

“I'm going to murder them when I get my hands on them.”

“Don't worry, I won't stop you.”

The port hissed as Bo and Alistair left the Normandy's decontamination lock and entered the Citadel docking bay. It had been a few days since the discovery on ship, and now they were at the heart of the matter. Someone was about to get their clock cleaned, and it wasn't going to be mechanically.

'Don't forget ,you two, you don't have to testify against each other in court since you're married and all~!'

Al shot a glare back at the Normandy as he pressed the communicator in his ear. “Joker-”

'Just kidding, commanders. I know what teams you two play for. I guess we'll know you found them when we see the blood spurting.'

“You better fucking believe it.” Bo's eyes were practically glowing with hostility as she stomped down the walkway that connected their ship to the dock. Around them hummed the activity of the Citadel proper. Ships sailed above their heads, people went about their business... and somewhere, a tabloid was about to get the unholy shit kicked out of it.

Alistair checked the details on his omni-tool as they began to walk. “I traced the website's ISP to a building in the Wards. Chances are, they're there.”

“If not, they're going to tell us where the fuck they are.” Her knuckles were white as she slammed them together. “Damn straights and their height kink. How the hell could anyone think I was straight?”

Yeah, that was his question – she was built like a tank and had pink hair. How the hell could anyone read that as straight?

“I mean, they thought I was straight somehow, so they don't have a great judge of character.” Alistair tapped at his omni-tool. “It would be faster if we got a taxi, but walking is an option too. Up to you honestly.”

Bo didn't answer him. He realized why once he figured out he had lost his handy patch of shade. The other Spectre had left him in order to go storm over to a nearby newsstand where people were whispering. Given a few were running...

Well, he ran over to make sure nobody died.

“I can't fucking believe this!”

She pounded her fist on the counter, and Alistair felt like doing the same once he saw it. A new story had popped up, front cover with a picture that definitely wasn't photoshopped. Bo was front and center, chatting with a rather lovely lady. Anyone who could read body language could guess the two were probably flirting, which is probably why someone had been so quick to take it. Above the photo, a bold headline proclaimed “Commander Shepard: Newlywed in Bisexual Affair?”

Oh boy... whoever took that was a dead man.

Bo rounded on him, fire in her eyes. “Taxi. Now.”

Alistair didn't need to be told twice – they were soon in the back of a cab, headed towards the Wards. To say a burning silence fell over the back was putting it mildly. Bo was gearing up to kill someone, and he... well he didn't want to be next in the tabloid.

The cab driver unfortunately didn't have the sense God gave to rocks as he surveyed the two. “Trouble in paradise, huh? Well, there's always divorce court.”

Alistair grabbed for Bo before she could crash the cab. “We're actually going to clear up we're not married!”

“Ah, that's a shame. You two make a cute couple, being the first two Spectres and all. You could've made some wicked strong biotic kids.”

“Sir when I tell you I'm the only thing keeping you alive right now, please believe me and keep driving.”

By the time they were dropped off in the Wards, Alistair was pretty sure he had lost 10 pounds keeping the cab driver alive. His arms were killing him as they stepped out onto the sidewalk in front of a nondescript office building. It had a listing on the side, telling the different businesses inside. Their next stop was on the fourth floor... so if anyone got tossed out of a window, they would probably live.

“Alright, so let's figure out what we're-”

He didn't get to finish his statement. Bo was already walking in like a woman on a mission, leaving him in the dust. All he could do was chase after her, eventually catching up on the stairs to the second floor. All the while, a receptionist chased after them.

“Excuse me, you can't just-”

Bo turned back to face her dead on. “Spectre business.”

Their tail shook a little, but... Al was pretty sure it was because she was kind of into that. She was definitely blushing a little as she backed up. “R-right... fourth floor is what you're looking for, ma'am.”

Alistair sighed as he held up his hand in an apologetic gesture. “Sorry, we'll be done quickly. Thank you for your information.”

And then he was chasing after Bo again as she took the stairs two at a time. Before long, they were standing on the fourth floor's landing. There was only one door here, labeled with a sign that called themselves Citadel Daily. They were one of many tabloids that supplied the Presidium and Wards with the lack of news people loved, and no doubt they were one of the more popular ones. After all, they were creating quite the buzz about humanity's first two Spectres.

A buzz that was about to be repaid with a lot of violence if he didn't mediate.

He managed to grab her wrist before they went in. “Let's just... try talking first.”

“It's not you they're calling a cheat, Al.” She tugged her arm away. “I'm handling this my way.”

And then she pushed the door open, probably burying the knob in the wall. All motion stopped on the other side as she stormed into the room, coming to a stop at the heart of it. All Alistair could do was enter after her pulling the door out of the wall as he did. Yep... the handle went straight through. That was going to require a patch.

Bo glared at the room filled with desks and people. Someone was reaching for a camera, a device that abruptly died as her eyes glowed red. She might not have been good with technology, but she knew how to break it just fine. No more devices came out after that – they were smart.

“I'm only going to say this one, who the fuck is John Jacobs and when are they getting the fuck out?”

Nobody moved at first. Alistair could hardly blame them as he scanned the room. Mostly, he just saw shocked wanna-be journalists and gossip columnists who had never expected this kind of treatment. After all, they weren't printing anything particularly hard hitting. Of course, their mistake had been printing about the Shepards... which was a bad idea to say the least.

He spotted someone twitching in the corner of the room. Rather than alert Bo, he began to pick his way over. Nobody would look at him, but that was fine. He had his eye on the man trying to hide behind his desktop, looking at though he might piss himself.

And as he should – from the looks of things, he was working on his latest article.

“'Commander Shepard spotted coming out of a bar with-'” He shook his head, sighing. “Mr. Jacobs, if you were even half a journalist you would know I can't drink on my medication. That's just sloppy work right there.”

The man definitely pissed himself as he backed up in his seat. “C-Commander Shepard!”

“One of them, anyway.” He glanced over his shoulder. “Bo, found him.”

Maybe that was mean, but the photoshop job on that picture had been particularly atrocious. So maybe he didn't feel bad that hell on wheels was storming over, ready to put her fist straight through this guy's head. At least he'd stop it if it came to murder...

Maybe.

Bo came to a stop in front of the desk. His desktop fizzed and died as she loomed over him. Alistair definitely smelled piss and something else as the full weight of his crimes fell upon him. And of course, nobody was dumb enough to take pictures. After all, they were Spectres and about ready to prove what happened if you tried to smear them.

Though... was it actually a smear if they did make this guy's life a living hell?

“John Jacobs?”

His answer came out shaky. “Y-Yes, that's me. I didn't expect the story to get so big, b-but-”

Too late. He was already out of his seat by the collar of his garish shirt. Bo had him at eye level, and Al was there to avoid the pants region as he watched the carnage unfold. Someone nearby had a camera up  - a blue-eyed gaze quickly put a stop to that. Bo wasn't the only one who knew how to break technology.

“What the fuck was going through your demented little fucking head?” She brought him closer. “You got some kind of height kink, you nasty fuck?”

John was sweating bullets. “N-no! I just... a lot of people think you two are married! It's the same last names!”

Yeah, Alistair was doubting the lack of height kink, but at least he was trying to be honest. He was still probably going to get the shit beaten out of him, though. He kind of deserved it, what with insinuating they were not only married but... ugh...  straight.

Really, how the hell did anyone think that of them?

Bo's eyes said murder and her fists were willing to comply. “Let me put it to you this way, that receptionist down there is more my type than this manlet will ever be.”

“Hey, I'm a maligned party too, don't take out your frustration on me.” Alistair rubbed the back of his neck anyway – talking about his height was a sensitive subject. “Anyway, we're very clearly not married.”

“Or straight.”

He nodded. “Or straight, yes that's kind of important. So maybe you should print a retraction on those articles and apologize so you don't get thrown out a window. You'd probably survive, but it would sure hurt a lot regardless.”

Judging by the grip on his collar, he wasn't going to get out of this without some form of damage... but maybe they could keep him from getting tossed out a window. Besides, if he pissed himself anymore he was going to start leaking on the floor. Talk about gross.

John's eyes traveled from Shepard to Shepard. “T-this is cen-”

“Oh come the fuck on, she's ready to murder you do you really wanna complain about censorship? Read the room, man.”

Normally, Alistair didn't swear. However, this man clearly didn't have sense in his head, so maybe shock methods were needed. At least he shut his mouth that time as he thought the offer over. Maybe he should think a little faster.

Bo started to move to the window. “Well, he had his chance.”

“No, wait, stop!” Both his fists couldn't fit around her wrist. “I'll print the retraction!”

She stopped a few feet from the open window. “And you'll stop writing about us. No more Shepard stories, understood?”

He started to look like he wanted to argue, but... that window was pretty damn close. Sweat dripped down his forehead as he considered his options. Then he got inched a little closer, and the decision was clearly made.

“U-Understood... I won't print anymore.”

And then he was dropped to the floor in a sad, soggy heap. Bo wheeled around and glared at the entire room. Alistair stepped forward as well, feeling much more pleasant as he surveyed the terrified reporters sitting before him.

“I hope you all understand, that goes for anyone here. Nobody gets a free pass out of defenestration, understood?”

And then his eyes glowed as another camera died. “No story about this either, by the way. I've added you guys to my omni-tool news feed, so don't think just because we're off saving people that we won't hear about it.”

Given everyone else looked like they might need a change of underwear once they left, that was another pact sealed. With any luck, they wouldn't get too stupid about their stories. Of course, if they did... it wasn't like they were going to move buildings.

“Good talk.” Bo was already throwing the door open. “Let's get the fuck out of here, it smells like piss.”

Alistair was already following her out, sighing in relief as the door shut behind them. At least nobody had died, or even been really bodily harmed in the process. As far as missions went, this was one of their more successful ones.

Then again, Bo hadn't gotten to work her frustration out, so...

“Want to hit up the Alliance training course to work out that energy before we go see Anderson?”

“Fuck yes.” Bo was already heading in that direction. “I still should've thrown him out the window. Damn your sensibilities.”

Eh he could take her being mad at him if it meant nobody died. Dissatisfaction was part of being a commanding officer.

---

Retraction on previous stories concerning Commander Bo Peep Shepard and Commander Alistair Shepard

The Citadel Daily would like to publish a retraction towards two stories it printed. Along with this, we extend a heartfelt apology to-

“Well, I guess they got the message.”

Joker was chuckling as the message read over Alistair's omni-tool. All three were gathered in the cockpit a few days later, after a successful mission on a nearby planet. The news had come in as they were on the shuttle, and he had been waiting to listen.

Bo nodded as the message finished. “They fucking better... still don't know who took those damn pictures. They're lucky I didn't find them...”

Alistair nodded as he killed the feed. “Oh, speaking of. Turns out they're a freelancer. I think I have a beat on them-”

No doubt he was starting another hunt for some poor sap, but... well, again, he didn't feel bad. After all, they had thought he was straight. Someone had to pay for that grievous misstep. And with any luck, maybe this one wouldn't wind up out a window either.

You know, maybe being the CO wasn't so bad after all. He got to schedule time for defenestration duties. Talk about a perk of running the show...

[catlover7722]

Moral of the Story: Pro-Hero! Katsuki Bakugo x Ex wife! OC

(Doing another OC of mine. I honestly wanted to do this as an Rp with my favorite rper friend because it’s been in the back of my mind for a while. This is gonna a be a really angesty. If you guys want to see my oc more or a just a short description let me know. Both characters are older, Sakura is 40 and Bakugo’s 41. They have Aiko, who’s their daughter and is 15, and Kouichi, who Sakura son from another relationship (it’s revealed in this story) and is 20)

Trigger warning!: Past suicide attempt, angst, suicide attempt, swearing, past toxic relationship, and over all sad themes (this isn’t getting a good end)

Sakura POV

I sat there alone. I watched the TV, headlines about Ground Zero and Red Riot defeat a villain. I watch the News too much. I shut it off and looked out the window. I got up from the bed and went to window. I sat in the windowsill and stare at the trees. I could barely look at Cherry Blossoms without think about how we would sit under them talking about are future together.

A knock at the door and my nurse came in. I didn’t look at her “Miss, have you taken you medication?” She asked kindly. I nodded and keep staring out the window. I’ve been in here for 10 years and it was the same everyday. Wake up, take my meds with breakfast, go to group and just listen to them, go back to my room to watch the news, stare out the window for an hour, have lunch, do some light reading, Wait for Aiko to come and visit, have dinner and say goodbye to Aiko, watch some more news, and go to bed early.

I had gotten a letter from Dabi today, it was sweet of him. He was arrest 9 years ago and our son was in custody of Bakugo. Kouichi told me they both were at each other throats and was excited to go out of there. I felt bad but Kouichi needs someone like Katsuki in his life to be role model or at least a father figure. My nurse tapped my shoulder.

I looked at her and she looked at me “You remember what today is?” She asked. I looked the calendar and widen my eyes. Today was UA’s Sport Festival. Aiko was in it with her class. I promised her I’d watch it or see it. I looked at my nurse and she smiled a little at me “How about you get dressed into real clothes and go watch it in person?” She said smiling. I nodded and grab the clothes she had bought for me. I went in my bathroom and changed into a foral dress shirt with a black skirt. I put on the black heels she had for me too and walked out. I looked at her and smiled.

She looked at me “It’s been a while since I’ve seen you smile” she said. I nodded and looked at her happily “Let’s go” I said excitedly.

~~~~~~~

We got to the Festival. I see all the pro heroes that I knew. I had a black surgical mask on so no one knew it was me. I haven’t seen friends in years, the last person that saw me was Midoryia. He’s was a sweet guy but then he just cut off the contact with me. I couldn’t blame him though, I was definitely a lost cause. We got out and I looked around at everyone.

We walked to go find our seat. I looked around seeing unfamiliar faces and familiar ones. I avoid familiar faces which my nurse would watch almost ashamed of what I was doing “Sakura, maybe talking to them will help you clear up the air. They don’t know the truth on that night” she said. I let out pity chuckled, I’ve told everyone the truth yet no one listens to me. I was gonna respond but ran into someone. I turned to the person “Sorry, I wasn’t paying attention” I said and looked up at the person. It was Kirishma with Denkei beside him. He was standing there shocked with Denki confused “Sakura?” Kirishma said. I widen my eyes and lowered my mask so they could hear me clearly “Look please don’t say anything to Bakugo. I’m just here to watch and see my daughter. That’s all” I said

Kirishma looked at me with either sympathy or pity in his eyes. Denki looked at me and nodded “Yeah, we won’t say anything. Where’s your seat?” Denki spoke up before Kirishma. I pulled up my mask again and showed him. Denki nodded “Okay. We’ll make sure he stays away from there” he said. I smiled under my mask “Thank you” I said. My nurse grabbed my arm gently and we walked to are seats. I sit there nervously and saw Aiko class. I saw Aiko talking to a girl with green hair and white hair. The girl was Midoryia’s kid no doubt about that. Aiko was happy talking to the girl, maybe this was the girl that Aiko spoke about highly. I smiled at her.

The announcement started and I watched the student gather in a big group. I saw that Uraraka was the one nominated to watch the kids to make sure they don’t hurt anyone. Aiko was chosen to be the student to represent her class to say a few work. If she was anything like her father, this wouldn’t be good. I watched her come up to the stage. She looked at everyone “Look I want everyone to do their best here and I have to say I’m not doing this for my dad, I’m doing it for my mother. She’s watching me now and I’m gonna make her proud” she said in the mic

Okay this was worse then I expected. I was flattered that she said that but now Bakugou knew I was I here. She walked off the stage with her class. I felt the air get tense and waited for a explosion or yelling but nothing happened. My nurse grabbed my hand gently and I tried to calm down.

~~~~~~~

It went into The Battle Tournament and I decided to go see Aiko before she went to her battle. I went alone, if I were to see Bakugo then I’d be able to try and defuse the situation without her help. I got to her room she told Kouichi to text me. I got there and opened the door carefully. I saw her sitting there with Kouichi. She looked at me quickly and got up. I smiled at her and closed the door behind me “Mom!” She said and hugged me tightly. I hugged back and I didn’t really realize she was taller than me until now which was weird to me.

We pulled away and Kouichi came over then hugged me too while I hugged back. I knew Kouichi was gonna he tall just like his father. We pulled away and I smiled at them “I’m proud of you, Aiko. I didn’t get this far when I did the Sports Festival when I was your age. You take after your father a lot” I said. Aiko looked at me and smiled a lot “Thanks, mama. I just want to make you proud” she said. I looked at her and puts my hand on her arm “You’d never, ever disappoint me” I said.

Aiko tears up and wipes her tears “Thank you” she said smiling. Kouichi chuckled “Don’t cry. You’ll be too busy crying to focus on your fight” he said. Aiko glared at him angrily “Oh hush! I can kick your ass!” She yelled. I watched them pick on each other smiling at them. I missed this definitely, I never saw them together when they were younger pick and fight with each other. I felt bad but I was stuck in the hospital for most of their lives.

I hummed to get their attention which worked “I should get going, I need to leave before your father come” I said. Aiko and Kouichi hugged me together. I hugged them both smiling. I pulled away smiling and walked out the room. I closed the door behind me after leaving and looked up seeing the devil himself. Bakugo was standing there against the wall in his pro hero costume. His arm crossed and his eyes closed, a clear sign of him being pissed off. I stood there “Kats-” I started “Bakugo, you don’t call me Katsuki” he interrupted. I closed my mouth and recoil a little. He opened his eye, his vermilion eyes burning into my orchid colored eyes. He sighed “You can stay until it’s over then I want you to go back to the hospital again. We’ll talk there about the court order” he said “I promise you that you’ll never see my daughter again” he added putting a lot of anger on my. I stood there and nodded then started to walking away not wanting to start an argument. I started to tear up and then started to run down the hallway not wanting to look back at him.

I didn’t realize that he was staring at me with so much guilt. The built up guilt over the years made him angry at me and himself. I keep running crying and just kept running leaving the arena. I took off my mask harshly and threw it on the ground not caring. I was prepared to see him and I kept running.

~~~~~~

I was on a rooftop, I don’t know how I got on here. But I was here standing on the edge reflecting on my life. I had a quirk with a lethal side effect, I almost died from it, my birth father was a villain, my birth mother was abusive to me when I was born, I fucked up a good relationship with the only guy that I actually felt was a good one, and I didn’t get to see my daughter grow up. I stand there staring at the ground below.

I knew that people were trying to find me. An alert was sent out a few hours ago but I didn’t care. I heard the roof top door slam open and I turn around to look it. I saw Bakugo, Iida, and Aizawa. Aizawa was a dad figure just like my adoptive dad was too. Bakugo stares at me and moves towards me slowly. His mouth was moving but I didn’t hear anything. I smiled at him “I love you and our kids” I said to him and I backed off the roof. I closed my eyes and smiling. I felt myself fall and see glimpses of my life....

~~~~~~~~~~

10 years ago

The day that ruined my life, Aiko and I were playing in her room. Katsuki was getting groceries for dinner. It was his night to cook so we both knew it would be good. Aiko and I were smiling. I heard a knock on the door. I got up telling Aiko to say put. I went to the door and opened it. I saw Dabi there with Kouichi. I stood there “You can’t be here, Bakugo doesn’t like you coming over here without telling him” I said. Dabi looked down at me “You need to come back” he said to me. I sighed in annoyance.

“I’m not coming back. We made a deal, I sent money for you and Kouichi while you give us information on the League. I’m keeping you out of jail” I said angrily. Dabi sent Kouichi to Aiko room and he came in. He shut the door and I back up “Dabi!” I said. He grabbed me by my arms “I can’t do this without you. You don’t know how hard this is” he said. I looked at him and sighed “I gave you a choice back then. You and I can’t be together. I can keep Kouichi here few days while you sort things out” I explained.

Dabi stood there. He got mad and let’s go of me “I love you more than him. You know that” he said. I shook my head no “Katsuki loves me a lot too. I love him a lot too. You can’t change my mind” I said pushing him away. I went upstairs to go check on the kids. That was my first mistake, Dabi followed me upstairs and grabbed my back of my throat. I widen my eyes and reach back digging my nails in his scars which made him let go quickly. I ran to the bathroom and shut the door locking it.

Dabi bangs on the door yelling at me. I stood there crying and cover my ears telling him to leave. I opened the cabinet and grabbed the my medicine. I knew the dosage could kill me but I knew it would make me go in and out of consciousness only killing me if I . I grabbed the syringe and got the dosage. I put it in the my arm and sat down on the ground. I closed my eyes and get flashed of Aiko knocking the door, then the door getting blown up, the Bakugo hold me closely crying, and lastly I woke up in the hospital

I look around and sat up a little. My head pounding and I saw Katsuki in a chair. He was sleeping, I looked at him and grabbed his hand gently. I rub his knuckles trying to see if he’d wake up. He did stir awake and looked at me. He squeezed my hand and got up. He sat down on the bed and looked at me. He looked drained “I can’t do that again” he said. I looked at him confusedly “Bakugo I wasn’t trying-” I stared but he gripped my hand stopping me. I saw he was crying and I let go of his hand “Alright, I understand” I said. He got up and walked out quietly. I sat there and started to cry. I covered my face and keep crying. I’m an fucking idiot.

••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

I might do a part two to this but only if people want it

[vernonfielding]

Life Writes Its Own Stories

Chapter 16! The end! (Sort of!) (And on AO3!)

AN: This is the official end of this fic, but I’ll be posting an epilogue in a few days, so. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ 

Thank you again to my amazing beta @fezzle, who gave me such excellent guidance on this fic and who has become such a dear friend along the way. Love you, Z.

And THANK YOU so much to everyone who read this story and liked it and reblogged it (and commented on AO3). It’s been so much fun sharing it.

Jake’s butt was getting numb. He wasn’t sure how long he’d been sitting on the damp plastic steps of the Fort Greene play structure, but it was long enough that he’d mostly stopped shivering and he couldn’t feel his toes and his fingers were stiff and achy. He’d forgotten to grab a scarf so his chin and lips and cheeks were frozen with cold too and even if Amy showed up after all, he wasn’t sure he’d be able to form words to tell her – well, he didn’t know what, just yet.

She’d been the first thought on his mind when he’d woken up in the hospital that morning, clear-headed from a solid 12 hours of sleep but cranky with pain and desperate to go home and shower, put on clothes that weren’t blood-stained, and talk to Amy – definitely not in that order. But when he tried to call Amy her cell phone went straight to voicemail, and he realized he didn’t even know if she had a landline.

He’d spent the morning talking to doctors and cops. The doctors told him he had mostly soft-tissue damage from the stabbing and he’d be just fine as long as he took it easy for a few weeks. Still, the wound had been deep, and he’d apparently lost about 20% of his blood supply, which was horrifying and not something Jake ever wanted to think about again. So it took longer than he expected to talk his way into being discharged. And even after the doctors had gotten on board, he’d had to clear his release with the commissioner’s office too, because apparently the brass thought he might need a security detail at home.

He finally got back to his place mid-morning, and by then he’d been told that Amy was at the Eight-Two for her interview. He figured if he skipped the shower – it was going to be a pain in the ass anyway with his arm bandaged up – he could get an Uber there and meet Amy when she was done, maybe get lunch together.

But instead he’d been called down to the commissioner’s office for a meeting, and he hadn’t made it to the Eight-Two until long after lunch time. He’d been fighting a vicious caffeine-withdrawal headache by then and he’d actually snarled at Rosa when she’d reminded him that he should call Amy sometime.

His interview, of course, had taken hours. They told him that Pembroke was going to make a full recovery, along with Mr. Tall, and Jake was relieved mostly for Amy’s sake, because shooting someone was a lot to deal with. The third man, who’d helped kidnap Jake and Amy and who really had been out hunting for Rosa when all hell broke loose, had been arrested around noon. The detectives on the case thought they were the only three involved but were still investigating. Pembroke’s frat buddy looked to be an unwitting accomplice.

Jake had called the Bulletin during breaks in his interview, but somehow never managed to get Amy at her desk. By the time he’d been cut loose, and it had been dark outside and Rosa had given him a deeply sympathetic look and asked if he wanted to get dinner, he was frantic to find Amy. So he told Rosa he had plans, and he left a message for Amy with the first person who answered the phone in the Bulletin newsroom.

After everything they’d been through over the past 24 hours – hell, the previous two or three days – not being able to check in with her felt like a physical pain. He knew that Amy was okay, but he needed to see her and hear her voice. Even if she was only going to tell him that she couldn’t trust him after all, and maybe it wasn’t going to work out.

And now he was probably going to die of hypothermia at this park, waiting for her to never arrive. He thought about whether some little kids would find his body frozen to their plastic play castle first thing in the morning. That’d be either crazy traumatic or super dope. For them – for Jake it would just be pathetic. The Bulletin would probably run a really tacky headline over his obituary.

Jake squeezed his fingers into a fist to try to warm them and stomped his feet. He supposed it was possible she just hadn’t gotten the message. The kid who’d answered the phone had sounded about 12 and maybe didn’t even know how to read and write, though that seemed unlikely for someone who worked at a newspaper. Jake wondered, if Amy didn’t show up, what his next move would be. Maybe she needed space. Maybe she was scarred by all that had happened and avoiding him because he was part of it. Maybe she was just ghosting him. That didn’t seem like something Amy would do, but he wouldn’t exactly blame her, not after everything he’d put her through.

And with that morose thought, he propped his forehead in his hand and settled in to stare at his feet and contemplate a life of brutal loneliness and self-recrimination, until he either froze solid or gave up and went home to watch Nailed It! and eat cheese out of a tube.

“Jake!”

He snapped to attention so fast that he wrenched his shoulder, but he ignored the pain and stood on legs that felt creaky with cold and peered out into the dark playground. He couldn’t see anything at first, and was just starting to think he’d imagined her calling his name, when he caught a flash of movement at the edge of the trees, and then she was sprinting toward him, hair flying loose behind her. She stumbled when she hit the sand, tripped forward several steps, and grabbed for the rail at the bottom of Jake’s stairs.

She stopped there, face turned up to his. Even in the dark he could see that her cheeks were flushed pink, and her eyes were black and fathomless.

“You’re here,” she said, panting. “I was afraid you would have given up by now.”

“I would have stayed all night.”

Amy smiled, shy and beguiling, and tucked her hair behind her ears. She climbed up a step and he climbed down, and they paused there, a step apart, eyes locked on one another but neither making the next move. Jake reached out with his left hand to take one flyaway strand of her hair between his fingers, tugging lightly on it before letting go.

“I tried reaching you all day,” Amy said. “I couldn’t find you, and I was afraid-” She stopped, glanced away.

“Of what?”

“I don’t know. I was just afraid.” Amy narrowed her eyes at him suddenly. “Just to be clear: You didn’t call me out here to dump me because your job is too dangerous and you’re afraid of me getting hurt again. Right? Because that would be so cliche and wrong.”

Jake couldn’t help the bark of incredulous laughter. “Uh, no – if anything I might try to talk you into becoming a cop because you’re so badass.”

Amy laughed too, and for a moment everything felt good. Then Amy’s face slowly went serious and he recognized the troubled furrow of her brow.

“Are you okay?” she said, and her eyes wandered over his body, making his skin tingle even in the cold. “I mean, you’re out of the hospital, so I guess you must be.”

“I’m fine.” He nodded toward his right arm, which was tucked in a sling under his coat, the sleeve hanging empty at his side. “The doctors said your first aid bandaging probably saved the arm.”

“What? Really?”

Jake chuckled and scratched at his chin. “Not really. But they did say that you probably saved me a transfusion, so that’s something.” It was his turn now, and he searched her face before saying, “What about you? Are you all right?”

“Yeah. It’s a little weird, actually – I’m totally fine,” Amy said. “You’d think that almost dying would have a few more side effects.”

Jake felt his heart stutter at the mention of her near-death and swallowed thickly, his throat suddenly dry. “You’d think.”

Amy must have heard the catch in his voice, because she lifted her head to meet his eyes and said, “Jake, I really am okay.”

He nodded, unable for a moment to find his voice. He sat on the stairs and blinked away the image of her too-pale face, of her eyes fluttering closed, and tried not think about the could-have-beens. Amy sat beside him and pressed her shoulder to his, clasping her hands between her thighs. He reveled in that for a moment, just having her here with him, and safe.

Jake took a deep breath. “So, I know that after our big, dumb, terrible fight, which was totally my fault by the way, and then the kidnapping and all the shooting and the mortal terror and you actually dying for a minute…I probably owe you some big romantic gesture. But I’ve kind of been in meetings all day and there was so much paperwork and not to be a baby or anything but my arm hurts, like, a lot. And I just kind of never got around to the whole gesture thing. I got as far as we should meet at the park and then-”

He trailed off and raised his arms as best he could in defeat.

He could feel her eyes on the side of his face, and when he turned to look at her she was biting her lip, and her eyes were shining.

“Jake, I don’t need a big romantic gesture,” she said. “Although for the record? This is pretty romantic.”

Jake smiled at her, feeling vulnerable and a little embarrassed but also ridiculously happy. He reached for her hands, and they were warm as they wrapped around his fingers. He leaned into her and kissed her, gentle and hesitant. Her lips were cold and a little chapped, and she tasted faintly of cherry chaptstick. He could feel her mouth curl into a smile and he started to back away, happy for just this, when she grabbed at the lapel of his jacket and pulled him back into her. She crushed her mouth to his, lips parting, tongue darting out to taste, and now she wasn’t cold at all, she was warm and soft and inviting. Her hand moved to cup the back of his neck, and his hand slid under her jacket to the small of her back, and he tilted his head just slightly and opened his mouth to hers, and they kissed until his whole body felt flushed.

He could have made out with her on the playground stairs for hours, but eventually he broke off to kiss the corner of her mouth and her nose and her chin, and her skin was freezing and he realized she was shaking all over, and that he was too. He chuckled and wrapped his arm around her shoulders to fold her into his chest, rubbing his hand up and down her back to warm her.

“Why is it always so cold in this park?” Amy muttered into his shirt.

He laughed again and said, “Let’s get out of here,” and they got up together, both fumbling a little on freezing legs.

They walked toward his place without talking about it, his arm still tucked around her shoulders. His stomach grumbled loud enough that she could hear it, and they agreed to grab takeout from a Thai place on the way.

“So,” Amy said, as they shivered waiting for the light to turn green on Myrtle, “I sort of lost my job today.”

“What?” Jake said, loud and outraged enough to startle a woman walking behind them with a cat on a leash. The woman glared and the cat hissed.

“Oh no, sorry, it’s not that bad – Holt just took me off the police beat,” Amy said. She smiled shyly at him. “Actually, it’s not bad at all. Terry said they want me to be their main investigative reporter now. It’s kind of a promotion.”

Jake beamed at her and kissed her. “That’s amazing.”

“It is,” she agreed, and they went to cross the street. “You know, I feel a little bad that I’m getting all the attention for this whole thing with the Vulture. My google alert is going crazy.”

“You have a google alert on your own name?”

“Everyone should,” Amy said. “It’s like knowing your credit score.”

“Um-”

“I don’t want to hear it,” Amy said, “Anyway, the point is, I’m getting all the credit, and it’s like no one even knows your name.”

“Good,” Jake said. At Amy’s frown he added, “You know I never liked that kind of attention. And I like undercover work. If my name and face get out there too much I can’t really do my job, you know? Anyway, I’m actually getting plenty of credit. In fact, the commissioner says she’s giving me a Medal of Valor.”

“Wow, Jake. That’s huge,” Amy said, and he grinned.

“Yeah, and there’ll be a whole ceremony for it, with a party and everything.” He gave her a side glance, then quickly looked ahead again. “I mean, nothing fancy, but, you know, hors d'oeuvres, maybe some music.”

He could feel Amy studying him. “Passed or buffet hors d'oeuvres?”

“Which is fancier?”

“Passed.”

“Then definitely buffet.”

“Live band or DJ?”

“For sure DJ.”

“Yeah, that sounds not fancy at all,” Amy said with a heavy sigh.

“So like, if I wanted to bring a date to this thing, you probably wouldn’t want to go.”

“I mean, will it be held somewhere really special? Like the New York Public Library?”

“Nope.” Jake bit his lip to keep from smiling.

They arrived at the Thai restaurant and stopped in the middle of the sidewalk. A man walking behind them cursed under his breath and veered around them, and a jogger side-stepped into the gutter and gave them the finger, and they held their ground and faced each other, and Jake was sure his dopey grin matched hers perfectly. He took her hand and pressed her palm to his chest.

“Amy Santiago, will you go to a super not-fancy, low-rent commendation ceremony with me?”

Amy glanced up into the night sky, as though deep in thought. “Will you be in uniform?”

He nodded, and she smiled slyly at him.

“Jake Peralta, I will go to your commendation ceremony,” she said, and went up on her toes to kiss him.

+++

Amy took the plastic bags of Thai takeout from Jake and looped them over her left arm, so they could walk the rest of the way holding hands. Jake raised an eyebrow and smirked a little but he didn’t say anything or go all macho and try to take the bags back, and that was just one of so many reasons he was a good man, she decided.

They didn’t talk much, because it was cold and they were both tired. And even if a day or two ago Amy had thought there was a lot for them to work through, now?

Now, she thought, ‘I trust this man.’ And she thought, ‘I might love this man.’

That thought – it should have surprised her, and she turned it around in her head and looked at it from a few different angles and found that it didn’t. Jake had trusted her for months now, she realized. From the day they met. He’d trusted her before she’d even trusted herself, and he’d believed in her and had her back in more ways than she ever could have asked for or expected. She should tell him this, and maybe she would, later. But words were overrated, she thought. (The irony was not lost on her.)

Amy let it soak in a bit, this love thing. She could feel it settle warm in her belly and in her chest, and in the smile she knew was lighting up her face. She squeezed Jake’s hand and nestled into his side, and he pressed a sweet kiss to the top of her head. She felt it to the tips of her fingers and her toes and when she shivered, it wasn’t from the cold. It was from knowing that this man – this ridiculous, imperfect, improbable man – was taking her home.

EPILOGUE

[bastardsonofday]

It Starts with a Bike Lock

written to blow off steam

i felt bad theres no content im producing so have this *shrug emoji*

You accidently locked your bike to mine and i cant leave until you get off work au

ao3    chapter two

The first words Lucien Vanserra ever says to Rhysand Fitznox are “Hey Asshole!”

Rhysand knows Lucien Vanserra, the other man is a lackey of his worst enemy (though the two have never spoke before, only glared across the room at one another while Tamlin ranted), but he doesn’t know what in specific he’s done to incur Vanserra’s wrath. The man is sitting on the ground though his meeting with Rhysand’s Second ended quite a while ago (Rhysand is sure). He glares up at Rhys, his red hair braided professionally in dutch pigtails (Rhys almost giggles at the sight, he looks so… hot, but odd if he has to be honest). Lucien’s prosthetic eye doesn’t swivel up to meet his, instead staring blankly ahead. His legs are pulled up to his butt to let people pass on the sidewalk, and there is a small pile of coins next to him as if someone tossed him them because they thought he was homeless—which Rhys is pretty sure he’s not.

“Pardon?” Rhys says slowly.

“What have you never used a fucking lock before? Do you know how long I had to wait here, you ass? Tamlin’s already back at headquarters and I here I am waiting for you, you fucking moron-”

“I’m sorry, why are you insulting me?”

Lucien stares at him like he’s crazy. He points to the rack of bikes next to him. One of which is Rhysand’s. Normally Rhys doesn’t even own a bike but Elain made him start this ‘Go Green!’ initiative so to be a good leader he bought a bike and promised to bike to work every day for a month, which isn’t that hard since he lives in a penthouse about a mile from his company.

Today is the third day of Rhys’ promise. It is also the third day he’s ever used a bike lock.

“You locked my bike to yours, dumbass.” Lucien snarls. “I had to wait for you to get off for lunch because your secretary wouldn’t let me back up to make you unlock it yourself. And I can’t cut it open without a power tool because it’s metal.”

Fuck.

“Well? Aren’t you going to at least apologize?” Lucien asks. He stands and even stomps his foot on the ground, which almost breaks Rhysand.

Rhysand swallows his laughter at the absurd situation. To laugh at Lucien would only make him angrier, and while Lucien is certainly cute while he was angry and fun to play with, Rhys senses now was not the time.

“Jeez, dude.” Rhys says instead, unable to curb all of his laughter. “How long have you been sitting out here?”

“Open. Your. Lock.” Lucien snarls.

Rhys bends down to unlock the bike. “You know, I’m impressed that you biked here. I assumed you’d take Tamlin’s car.”

“I assumed you took a limo to work, we’re all wrong sometimes.” Lucien says without any cheer in his voice.

Rhys fiddles with the combination lock… what had he set it to, again? “‘Go Green!’ month. You?”

“I always bike if the meeting is under fifteen miles.”

Rhys’ eyes widened and whistled appreciatively. “Fifteen miles? And you always show up looking that good?”

“Well, we can’t all be as perfect as me. I’m sure if you tried to bike somewhere, you’d end up looking like a drowned rat.”

“Hey! I bike to and from my home!”

“And how far away is your home from here?”

Rhys turns around smirking. “Wouldn’t you like to know?”

Lucien rolls his eyes. “Are you done yet?”

“Ahh...” Rhys had been having so much fun sniping with Lucien he… may have… forgotten his seven digit code. “About that...”

Lucien’s eyes widen. “No. No no no no no! You have got to be fucking with me.”

Rhys laughs guiltily. “Believe me, that would be so much more fun than this.”

“Well? Who else knows the code, you utter dipshit?” Lucien snarls.

“Uhhh-” Rhysand’s mind was mysteriously blank.

“You jackass.”

“It’s not like I did this on purpose!”

“I don’t really care about anything you have to say right now unless it’s the code to that lock!”

Rhys sighs and looks at his watch. As much fun as it is to play with Lucien, he has a meeting with Thesan in five minutes in a place that can only be reached that quickly in a car at this moment.

“Look, I have to go to lunch. Why don’t you come with me and afterwards I’ll-?”

“You really think that now is the best time to ask me to lunch?” Lucien snapped.

“I have a meeting.” Rhys explains impatiently. “Come with me and if I remember the code, when it’s over and we come back I’ll give it to you.”

“No. You can go to your fun little meeting after we deal with this. I will go down with you right now, to the maintenance department and get a power-saw or something of some kind and we will come back and cut through that lock.”

“You can’t do that!”

Lucien crosses his arms, glaring. “Go ahead. Do it. Tell me why not.”

“It’s an expensive lock!”

“An. Expensive. Lock.”

“Yeah! It was like a whole, eighty seven dollars!”

“Eight seven dollars? If you paid eighty-seven dollars for that crap, then you’ve got bigger problems than me, Rhys.”

“It was for charity.” Rhys snaps.

“Besides, that’s petty change for you.”

“It’s the principle!”

“Rhys, we are going down to maintenance, together, right now. And you will ask for the power-tool yourself. Then you will cut off the lock, or I will go to every tabloid with a following and give them a special exclusive about the time that Rhysand Fitznox invited me to lunch after locking my bike with his.”

Rhys narrows his eyes. “So?”

“There will be many other details in this story, ones that may not have actually happened. Who’s to say?”

As much as Rhys wasn’t afraid of Lucien Vanserra… he was, well, a tiny bit afraid of Lucien Vanserra (the man had brought down entire companies with five well placed words to the press), he doesn’t want to make an enemy of him.

“You suck.” Rhys mumbles.

“Don’t you wish.” Lucien replies, and waves a hand for Rhys to lead the way.

Rhys grumbles, but does.

Lucien follows Rhys into his building. Rhys walks up to the front desk where Cerridwen and Nuala sit expertly answering phones. Nuala puts the person she’s talking to on hold and looks up expectantly at her boss. “Yes, Sir?”

“Um...” Now this is embarrassing, Rhysand thinks. He glances at Lucien whose stormy gaze tells him to turn around and start talking. “So… I may have accidentally chained my bike to Lucien’s here...”

Nuala’s face stays completely the same, though Rhysand knows she’s laughing on the inside. Cerridwen stops in her work to listen in, amused by the story already. “And… I forgot the passcode...”

“Do you want me to open it, sir?”

Rhys looks at her surprised. “You know my passcode?”

“You know his passcode and you didn’t tell me?” Lucien cries. “I’ve been sitting there for ages! You knew I was sitting there for ages!”

“I don’t know it, but Mr. Fitznox-Ah, your brother, sir, does.”

Rhys slams the heel of his palm into his forehead. “Az! Of course he does!”

Lucien is turning a delightful shade of purple, and Rhys wonders if this is the first time he’ll actually be able to see smoke come out of someone’s ears for real, just like they do in the cartoons.

Lucien is not very amused by the expression on Rhys’ face right now.

“Rhys, I’ll have your head on a platter. Then, I’m coming for you because you’ve been no help,” He says pointing a long delicate finger at Nuala, “and you’ll get your own for laughing at this,” he says as that finger finds it’s way to point at Cerridwen who is badly hiding her snickers into the telephone in her hand. “And finally, I’ll get Azriel Fitznox, just for the fun of it.”

Lucien snatches the phone and receiver from Nuala’s hand and speed-dials Azriel (whose speed-dial button has a label on it). He explains in clipped sentences the situation to Azriel and Rhys puts in his own two cents by graciously ‘ordering’ (he can’t really order his brothers to do anything for him if he’s being honest) Az to come down to the ground floor immediately and fix this.  

When Azriel Fitznox gets the very angry call from the secretary desk with Lucien Vanserra on the other side of the line he thinks he’s having some weird fever dream or nightmare. But no, Lucien Vanserra, the CFO of Spring Court & Co really is on his phone angrily yelling about… a bike lock? And Rhysand having the memory of an eighty year old Alzheimer's patient or something…? Azriel isn’t exactly sure.

But he is trying very hard not to laugh.

Lucien seems very serious though and when Rhys puts in “Yeah… you’d better get down here now with my code,” Azriel sighs and tells his brother that he’ll be right down.

He walks down to the ground floor and finds Lucien tapping his foot angrily and Rhys standing next to him very sheepishly. “What did you do?” Azriel asks Rhys mockingly. Rhys flashes him a smirk but Lucien is not amused.

“Do you have the password or not?” Lucien snaps.

Azriel nods and he walks past Lucien, glad the CFO can’t see how he can’t hold it together. Azriel walks out to the bike rack and bends down next to his brother’s bike. He moves the nine digit tumblers into place. “It’s the date and time you beat Spring Co out for the Summer contracts, don’t you remember that?” Az asks his brother.

Rhys face-palms. “Of course! How could I forget?”

This does not make Lucien any happier apparently. Azriel unravels the lock from around Lucien’s bike and he grabs it from the rack, shaking it roughly. “I hate you people and I am bringing all of you down with me.” He snarls at them. He swings one leg over the bike and speeds into the street and off to Spring Court & Co buildings.

“Nice doing business with you!” Rhys calls after his red-headed rival. Then, Azriel and Rhysand exchange glances at one another and promptly burst into the laughter that they’ve been holding in during this whole ordeal.

Rhysand walks into his meeting room to find his closest confidants hysterically rolling about. “Oh?” Rhys asks, an eyebrow raised. “What’s so funny?”

Cassian points to the tabloids fanned out on the table. Rhys pulled the magazines over to him, reading the headlines, beginning to laugh himself until he found himself crying.

CFO LUCIEN VANSERRA OPENS UP ON THE INNER WORKINGS OF NIGHT COURT INCORPORATED; “RHYSAND IS PETTY AND CAN’T REMEMBER FOR SHIT AND I’VE GOT THE STORY TO PROVE IT.”

[mintyvan]

Remember When

filling the request Bondy is the father of your curious little child, and they both tag along for a trip at the home improvement store. You’re reminded of how you first met Bondy. The flashback also satisfies the “you meet Bondy at a music festival and fall in love” request I got a few weeks ago. 

notes Major league fluff here, readers. Short & sweet. Enjoy.

word count 1.2k+

____________________

“Weeeeeeee!”

The happy sounds of your little girl Isabella playing in the home improvement store echoed around the large warehouse. You were a few aisles down from her, listening to her far off squealing and Bondy’s low chuckles as he guided her around the store, letting her play with odds and ends in the garden section. Earlier, he’d sat her on lawn mowers, making vroom vroom noises as she pretended to drive, or let her sit high on his shoulders as he walked around.

The reason for the trip was to purchase a certain kind of organic pesticide for the garden you’d started a few weeks ago in your home’s backyard. You’d planted tomatoes, peppers, and several kinds of herbs, but as soon as the shoots broke ground, the bugs swarmed in the humid summer heat. After you’d caught Isabella playing with beetles from the tomato plant, you figured her fearlessness might get her in trouble with other kinds of pests that might not be so welcoming.

Your eyebrows scrunched together as you searched the shelves for the kind of pesticide you were looking for; it seemed the general population still preferred toxic chemicals to keep pests from eating their vegetables.  

The abrupt sound of Isabella screaming bloody murder pulled you away from the shelves and into the larger main aisle, frantic with worry.

Isabella had already recovered the happy smirk she inherited from her father by the time you arrived at their location. She was sat in the largest terra cotta pot the store sold, and was grabbing at her dad’s jacket sleeve. Bondy’s attention was turned toward onlookers, though, with a sheepish expression on his face.

“Sorry,” Bondy said. “Peek-a-boo can get pretty intense.”

You rolled your eyes, laughing, and hoisted Isabella out of the pot. Her curls brushed your shoulders as you held her in your arms. Soon she’d be getting too big for cradling. You bounced her back over to the fertilizers and pesticides you were looking at, letting John peruse the rest of the store alone; he needed to find a set of cabinet knobs that matched the ones in the kitchen.

“It smells weird over here,” Isabella said in her toddler accent, squirming to get out of your arms. You put her down and patted her little head as you continued to scour the shelves. Her grabby hands touched nearly everything within reach in the aisle before becoming completely bored, and sighed. She plopped her tush down on the floor beside you, playing with the ashy brown curls she’d earned from her father. She’d pull them down slowly, watching them boing up and down a few times after release before disinterest took over again.

“Daddy!” she suddenly yelled, eager to play with him again since you weren’t giving her enough attention, and ran off to find him when he yelled, “Over here, Bells!”

In the peace and quiet, you were able to read labels and consider pricing. You stepped closer to a pesticide near a bag of fertilizer, and the grassy smell ignited a previous memory that made you smile.

You had been walking all day, your feet hurt, and you were grateful to the people who were selling waters for cheap. You plunked down onto the dry grass, and cracked open the water bottle. A cool stream descended down your throat, soothing the burn that had ached after singing along to your favorite artist perform their set. You surveyed the bodies down the hill from you - all equally hot, sweaty, and happy - packed together like canned sardines. You were happy to have secured the spot on the top of the hill, just high enough for a breeze to drift across your skin. You closed your eyes for a few moments, enjoying the sensation.

“Mind if I sit here? Think you’ve found the only empty spot of grass in the entire festival,” a manly presence laughed from above you after minutes had passed.

“It’s not empty if I’m sitting on it, is it?” You replied a little too snarkily, the heat making your words more fiery than you intended. You opened your eyes, and saw a beautiful curly-haired man standing above you, hat shading his deep blue eyes. You immediately regretted your decision to bark at him.

“Sorry, it’s really hot outside and I’m being a dick - of course you can sit. There’s enough room, I think.” You scooted over to let the man sit next to you, his hands wiping his sweat across his jeans before holding one out to shake your hand.

“Name’s Johnny.”

“Y/N.”

That day nearly five years ago, Bondy and you had become fast friends, and he spent the whole night trying to woo you with sarcastic commentary and shared beers. In the aisle of the warehouse, you were grinning like an idiot remembering the start of the rest of your life.

“Festivals think they can fuck you in the ass with high prices for a cheap beer, but I’m glad we’re here to fuck them right back by sharing a few,” Bondy had said to you, peering out over the setting sun. You’d chuckled, and kissed his cheek, but he’d accidentally turned his head, and his lips met yours full on. It was a movie moment, and despite how cliche it had been, your heart swelled and you both continued to make out anyways.

It wasn’t until he checked the time on his phone that he said he had to go. You, disappointed, thought he was going to leave the festival -- quite the opposite, actually. Once you found out he’d been waiting all day to join the headlining act as lead guitarist, you were eager to hear the beautiful man play, and were proud that he was so well-known. And so, he took you backstage, granted you a pass, and sat you sidestage for the gig. And afterward, he took you home.

At this point, you didn’t care that you hadn’t found the pesticide you needed. You wanted to go find Bondy and pull a “remember when” just to talk about that day again. He always smiled at the mention of the grassy spot, and said he’d stood behind for two minutes prior working up the courage to speak to your glistening form spread out across the grass.

When you found your dear John wrapped around your daughter in the gardening section once again, he was helping Isabella’s little fingers touch the sharp points of the venus fly trap, without actually hurting her.

“Pokey,” she said, focusing hard on the tips of the cactus, little brows knitting together with the force of concentration. Bondy kissed her soft cheek and looked up, noticing you watching them with endearment.

“Yes, darlin’, pokey. Go tell your mum how pokey it is,” he said, and he sent her running toward you with a little squeal and a “Mama can we keep it?” as you looked up at your husband, flashing him a stunning smile.

“Remember when……” you began, and as you told the story, his smile widened too, eyes crinkling at the corners from recollection.

“Can’t believe this little bugger came out four years later,” he laughed when you finished recounting, scooping Isabella up into his arms again, kissing the top of her head, and then yours.

You ended up buying three of the venus fly trap terrariums for Isabella and none of the stuff you were looking for. But you were happy.

[awed-frog]

This is going to be a mess - I had to erase the original post because the bots just wouldn’t stop coming, so here is how it all started -

And here are your kind requests -

So - thank you for your lovely asks and PMs - here we go. 

(Keep in mind that those moments were hugely embarrassing to me, so you shouldn’t find them funny or anything. They’re tragic stories I’m relating for your moral betterment - that is all.)

1) The ‘The Greeks Made Me Do It’ story

As a bit of background, I was eighteen and had just moved to another city to start my studies. I’d been there for a month, knew literally no one, had no idea where half my classes were and my ideals of switching to a Sophisticated Look and becoming A Lady had miserably failed, which means I was walking around wearing this insanely expensive, Managing Director of the IMF coat plus combat boots and frayed jeans plus a lopsided handmade scarf and 'Marilyn going on Morticia’ lipstick (I worried - a lot - about being the only weirdo and the only unfinished person in the entire town, because that was before I met Hamster Girl and Colour Matching Girl and I spend as much on weed as you do for rent but everything I own is see-through, threadbare or ripped Guy). Plus, I couldn’t speak or understand the local language all that well, and I’d taken to nodding and smiling whatever people said, which generally made me look like an idiot and meant I never knew what was going on. 

(And, yes, it’s tempting and it seems like the easier option, but seriously - don’t do that.) 

All of that means I was more or less living in the university library so I could pretend I had a purpose in life and, well, going from a high school library to a real academic library was like stepping into the Restricted Section - I mean, of course, I read what I was supposed to read, and I lost myself in serious books that had little to do with my actual subjects (that was my Minoan period - I’m sure every Classics student had one), but there were also the - uhm - other books, you know? All those studies about homosexuality in the Greek world, and how Mapplethorpe’s pictures were connected with frescoes of Saint Sebastian, and people having sex with statues and kings trying to trick their young wives into anal and truly lurid collections of Greek art which my high school teacher had once described as ‘Something you should probably have a look at, but if I let you borrow my copy your parents would not be happy with me’. And on that particular day, I had actually devoted my afternoon to a no-nonsense book about Eastern influences in Greek art, and well, the study of lovers and concubines on Greek amphorae was a sort of a plan B to relax a bit between chapters, because I was reading in a foreign language and it was hard work and when you don’t know anyone, it’s like you’re the only one working, right, and everyone else is off to wild parties and poetry lectures and screenings of a Guatemalan movie you never knew existed and that’s depressing af, so yay for weird art - but at around five I realized the day was done and I didn’t want to give the dirty book back because, come on, it wasn’t that dirty and I had a right to read it and it was complemented with passages by Theophrastus and Plato, plus it had come to me via the now defunct goblin-based system of tunnels underground the reading room -

~note - for younger readers, these things~

- so I didn’t want to give it back and go through the hassle of requesting it again, and I remember the fuck it moment that came over me - I was eighteen, I was studying the damn stuff, so I’d borrow the damn book and if the librarians disapproved, well, they could bite me.

(Obviously, they didn’t disapprove. The bored guy at the service desk didn’t even look at me, because nobody looks at you, ever, and your life is your own, so go live it.)

And next, I had to go shopping because there’s only so much time you can survive on cold cereal - and suddenly there I was, in a big and foreign supermarket, a dirty book burning a hole through my old Invicta, my Queen of England coat clashing with everything else I was wearing, and I was moving from aisle to aisle without making eye contact and trying to remember what spices were called in French, and I’d almost made it - I was collecting my mismatched groceries on the other side of the till when the bloody alarm started blaring, and two uniformed guards appeared out of thin air and it was like one of those slow-motion scenes in movies, right, when the dust in the air glimmers like gold and sound is no longer a thing and someone’s talking and everybody is staring and when God pushed the ‘resume normal speed’ button the two men were gesturing and smiling smugly and there was this old lady next to me and she was taking in my luxurious coat and my frayed jeans and putting two and two together - I physically felt her horrified, gleeful gaze on me like scalding water - and Jesus, I could see the headlines in my local paper already ‘Young Promise of Sci-Fi Literature Arrested’ (I was writing fantasy back then, but most normal people don’t seem to know the difference) and there were my parents, okay, my poor parents walking with their heads down as formerly friendly neighbours threw garbage at them and someone would interview my history teacher and he was bound to say, ‘She was something of a strange girl, but I never thought she’d end up in prison’ and next, of course, came the walk of shame in front of all twelve tills, with dozens of proper adults (people with families and eggs in their baskets, women with tasteful lipstick and women with kids and doggies instead of books about dead prostitutes) staring at me in disapproval, and What has the world come to and I heard that today, young women are as likely to commit crimes as young men and Do you think she’s on drugs? and then I was forced into the Small Room of Humiliation and asked to please empty my bag, so out came the frosting I was planning to eat raw and the crown of garlic I’d bought because it looked pretty and had no intention of ever using and a giant-ass bag of rice and as I looked on, horrified, I realized nothing made sense with anything and even those burly, middle-aged men could see that just fine - but, well, every single horrifying, meaningless item was on the receipt, so they had me empty my pockets (one condom, safety pins, a Swiss knife, an IKEA pencil and a very smooth and round rock, God have mercy on me) and next we all looked at one another like, What now? and that’s when I truly gave up on rational thinking, okay, because my first instinct is always to be of service, and so I said, in my heavily accented French, ‘The library book has a barcode, maybe that’s the problem?’ and of course, they hadn’t really looked at the book yet - it was face down on the formica table, looking all prim and innocent in its unassuming dark blue cover, but when the older man picked it up with his bear paw, I suddenly realized the front of it was quite different - I sat there and saw his eyebrows disappear into his hairline as he took in the big-ass picture (a painting of a woman fellating a much younger man) and the title (something along the lines of, THE JOYLESS SEX - TALES OF THE PLEASURE WOMEN, in all capitals, because books about Greek art don’t sell all that well, so anything to do with sex is pimped up to trick the unsuspecting general audience into giving it a shot) and of course he had to open it, because that’s how humans are wired, okay, and the thing right in the middle was a goat-like creature doing unspeakable things with two women and every single cell in my body wanted to explode and disappear and shout ‘IT’S MANDATORY READING FOR THIS CLASS I’M TAKING’, which was a lie, anyway, and I couldn’t get the words out and I couldn’t look up and I couldn’t look away - after a few excruciating minutes (seconds? hours?), the guy scanned the book on his barcode machine and yep, that’s when we all learned that library books respond to the same anti-theft thingies that pick up on stolen wine and cookies and fine cheeses, and Sorry, miss, and You have a good evening, now, and he was extremely uncreepy about it, but it was still hard to find my way out because of the WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOUNG PEOPLE UP THESE DAYS bewilderment that was shining like a beacon around his entire body, so, yeah - that was pretty embarrassing.

2) The ‘A Four-Part Seduction’ story

This actually happened almost one year before my adventure with the scanning machine - I was in my last year of high school, had kissed exactly 1 (one) boy, failed to seduce 3 (three) other boys despite my fox-like cunning and my sunny disposition, and I was now ready to sacrifice everything (well: my sanity and my dignity) for The Boy - a basketball player with a long, horse-like face and zero talent in anything whom for some reason I fancied the pants off.

(Looking back, I think I liked he was quiet and kind, and the age-old problem when you’re attracted to mysteriously self-effacing people is that you’re never quite sure - is there a colourful and occasionally wild ocean behind their silent lips and far-off gaze, or are they not saying anything because an evolutionary mishap converted half their brain into a second spleen, and therefore they were left with the mental capacity of a vivacious Mexican mole lizard? The joy is in finding out.)

Anyway, I have a feeling things haven’t changed all that much, but back then when you were intent on romantic hunting, you usually enlisted the help of your closest friends - people who inevitably were: 

your age 

unexperienced

not very familiar with The Boy and

generally speaking, completely unsuited to hatching a failproof seduction plan of any kind.

On this particular occasion, my advisors were: 

a girl who’d been the better half of a couple for time untold (three months, two weeks and five days) and was thus The Expert

another girl who’d done ‘not it, but almost’ with an unnamed boy she’d met over the summer

a third girl who still didn’t quite understand what ‘it’ meant and 

my only guy friend who was actually in love with me and I only found out about that twenty years later and that was one true what the fuck moment, because then I wondered what else I hadn’t seen when I was a teenager even if it was there in plain sight (like the fact my German teacher preyed on young boys, for instance,but that’s another story).

So, well - part A of The Plan - getting to know him better - had failed miserably, because what can you discuss with someone you only see once a week in French class and you have a monster crush on? I mostly pestered him about homework dates and then stared mutely at his hands as he turned the pages of his school diary and my God, he must have thought I was an anxious, forgetful idiot with absolutely zero life, ‘which means he already knows you better than most people,’ my best friend said consolingly, before trying out her married name signature (Alice DiCaprio) one more time. And as for part B - that had succeeded, but at what cost? Because through a string of sleights of hand and corruption, we’d managed to shift half our classmates around on the seating chart, so I was now sharing a desk with The Boy himself, but so far that had resulted in some awkward staring (mine), a couple of embarrassed smiles (his) and about 50 000 volt of electricity going through my entire body every time his elbow bumped into my arm by mistake (which happened a lot, because he was left-handed and I’m not and we were sitting the wrong way around). 

Now, this had been going on for weeks when the skies suddenly opened above me and the teacher, an I’m frankly disappointed in how everything turned out ‘68 hippy, assigned us a written essay on Victor Hugo and socialism, something that, as an anxious, forgetful idiot with absolutely zero life, I knew quite a lot about. Plus, I was good at French, and that’s how The Boy turned towards me and asked if I’d be willing to help him, his hazel eyes all clear and earnest, shining like stolen jewels on his horse-like face, and being a Cosmo reader, I heard myself laugh throatily and ask, ‘Sure - what will you give me in return?’ and fuck, how do these things happen and why are we not in control of our own bodies and also thank God, because he blinked at me and then said, in a slow voice I read as flirtatious, ‘I’ll buy you a drink’. And that’s how we all entered part C - there were weekly meetings with him in the library to write the essay together, and daily meetings with my girlfriends to analyse everything we’d ever said to each other and I think he was looking at you during break and I saw him blush twice now, he must be sensitive and My sister knows his cousin, I can tell her to ask him if he’s seeing anyone and also long walks by the river with my long-suffering guy friend during which I rambled on and on about how shiny The Boy’s hair was and he contributed to this mind-blowingly fascinating conversation mostly in uhms and grunts.

(Again, how could I have been so stupid? I mean, it was for the best in the end, but - ouch.)

And one windy evening of March, lo and behold, it was finally time for part D (no pun intended) - a bona fide D-A-T-E with The Boy, and possibly there’d be fireworks and he’d say, I’ve been wanting to kiss you for weeks and some tourist would snap a candid photo of us and then marvel at it, years and years later, because Do you ever wonder what happened to this couple, Mabel? Look at how happy and in love and beautiful they are and I’m not saying cover of the National Geographic, but cover of the National Geographic. Also, movies had taught me what was supposed to happen, you know?, 

which is why I borrowed make up and rollers from one of my friends and did a clothes pre-selection with her and then a second selection with my guy friend -

(I remember him sitting cross-legged on my bed and strumming my mom’s guitar as I hid behind the closet door to try on The Makeover Outfit and how his expression barely changed when he saw me in a skirt for the first time - how he said, ‘You look - good. He’s an idiot if he doesn’t go for it,’ and how the music turned into something slow and mournful as I disappeared again to put my jeans back on, and what the hell?)

- and at nine pm, I was ready - I had leveled up and transformed, or so it seemed - gone was the windbreaker, and the crappy Converse, and the overlarge plaid shirt - instead, my hair was curled in the right way and my skirt was short but not too short and I’d even bought a push-up bra which was uncomfortable as hell but Who cares, uh?, who cares? And let’s pretend my make-up was still perfect after biking twenty minutes in the half rain, because when I walked into the bar, some catchy song was on and my brand-new hoop earrings were catching the light just so and I was the Goddess of French and Sex and WITNESS ME and we saw each other at once - he was sitting with his friends, the Popular Good-at-Hockey Guys, and he turned as he heard the door open, as if he’d been expecting me, and he immediately smiled and came towards me and ‘So, what can I get you?’ and of course I ordered wine, because I was Sophisticated and also A Lady and as he pushed his way towards the counter I sat down at the only table for two and subtly (I hope) adjusted my cleavage and crossed my legs and wondered whether I should whip my copy of Rimbaud’s Les Illuminations out of my (well: my mom’s) purse just to make it extra clear I meant business, or if that would be considered impolite - a kind of, ‘You took forever to get me that drink’ reproach - and as I was still trying to decide, he came right back, all perfect and tall and horsey-looking in a grey shirt, and he was carrying my wine and a pint of dark beer and some idiotic voice in my head said, ‘Yes, we’d known each other for months, but I remember the night we truly fell in love - your father used to drink these strong beers, you know, and that evening-’ and before that thought could go anywhere, The Boy was there, at my table - he handed me the wine (our fingers touched) and he said ‘Thanks again, really - I would have been dead without you’ and then - and then he walked away and fucking sat down with his friends again because apparently he was a damn sophist underneath that equine disguise and he’d promised me a drink and now I had a drink and what the fuck? and for the second time that night I considered turning to Rimbaud, but you should never turn to Rimbaud because he was an addict and a killer, so I drained my wine in one gulp, looked around desperately, my vision already fogging over, for someone I could bother - there was no one I really knew, only older people and party people and cool people who were already looking at me weirdly - I shrugged my coat on and waved joyfully at The Boy on my way out and man, it’s been twenty years but sometimes I still wonder at it - I don’t think he wanted to be rude, I’m sure he was like me, awkward and empty-headed and inexperienced, and he now works with snakes in Canada so maybe there was something interesting about him, but after I never go to the movies guy and Do you go to this school? guy and Sorry, I’m looking for someone who’ll choke me during sex guy and - mostly - the ghost music / still not sure he existed for real guy, well - that was a crushing moment and the end of my grand plans and when I started to simply tell guys ‘I like you’ and also follow them home before they could realize what was going on and, whatever, if you’re looking for dating advice, that works much, much better. 

[Thanks again for your messages - if you like my writing, please visit my AO3 page!] 

[welllpthisishappening]

Tripping Over the Blue Line (35/45)

It’s a transition. That’s what Emma’s calling it. She’s transitioning from one team to another, from one coast to another and she’s definitely not worried. Nope. She’s fine. Really. She’s promised Mary Margaret ten times already. So she got fired. Whatever. She’s fine, ready to settle into life with the New York Rangers. She’s got a job to do. And she doesn’t care about Killian Jones, captain of the New York Rangers. At all.

He’s done. One more season and he’s a free agent and he’s out. It’s win or nothing for Killian. He’s going to win a Stanley Cup and then he’s going to stop being the face of the franchise and he’s going to go play for some other garbage team where his name won’t be used as puns in New York Post headlines. That’s the plan. And Emma Swan, director of New York Rangers community relations isn’t going to change that. At all.

They are both horrible liars.

Rating: Mature Content Warnings: Swearing, eventual hockey-type violence AN: Happy playoffs! Happy flirting in the hallway post-game! Happy it’s kind of obvious how much Laura hates the Pittsburgh Penguins! I am still just constantly stunned by you guys and how fantastic you are, but just know that I appreciate it a ridiculous amount. This story would be nothing without @laurnorder, @distant-rose & @beautiful-swan.  Also hanging out on Ao3, FF.net & tag’ed up on Tumblr. 

“Is there a reason you’re lurking in the corner?”

Killian’s head snapped up, smiling out of instinct as soon as he heard the question and the tone of her voice and Emma was staring at him incredulously, arms crossed over the front of yet another team-branded t-shirt.

“You’ve started quite a collection of my jerseys, Swan,” he pointed out, nodding towards the ‘C’ on her shoulder.

“This is a t-shirt.” “Semantics.”

Emma rolled her eyes and dropped onto the edge of the stool next to him, kicking her feet out slightly. “Come on, seriously. What’s the matter?” “Nothing’s the matter,” he said and it wasn’t a complete lie.

It wasn’t.

It was, just, as they say, all happening. And he was somewhere in the vicinity of excited and nervous and anxious and something that felt a bit like terrified – which was all kind of weird because Killian couldn’t remember the last time he’d been terrified of anything that had to do with hockey.

There’d never been quite so much riding on hockey either.

Emma’s lips twisted slightly and he could nearly hear the thought appearing in the back of her head, the flash of understanding in her eyes making him fall in love with her just a little bit more. Maybe terrified wasn’t the right word.

Maybe determined was better.

“Did you send out season-ticket blasts?” Killian asked, already certain of the answer. He was certain she’d sent out the e-mails and the announcements and the Facebook video celebrating the Rangers’ clinched Wild Card spot as soon as the buzzer went off.

“Are you kidding me?” Emma countered. She kicked at his leg again and he groaned dramatically when the toe of her heel connected with his ankle.

“Jeez, careful, Swan.” “Come on, you’re honestly asking me about work? We’re supposed to be celebrating. Easy playoff path and all that stuff.” “Who’s saying easy?” “Every newspaper in the greater New York City area and Yahoo Sports.” “You’re reading Yahoo Sports?” “Aren’t you?” Killian shrugged and Emma scoffed, tracing her finger across the bar. Of course he was. He didn’t normally – ever since Liam had gotten hurt, he’d avoided media reports like some sort of athletic-themed plague – but in the last few weeks, since they’d been just on the cusp of clinching, he’d found himself actually searching out stories and links and playoff projections. It was like he was actually trying to torture himself.

There was no easy path.

This was the playoffs and the Cup and everything from here on out was a very distinct type of challenge, but he was that mix of emotions and determination and he kept reading everything he could get his hands on.

The coffee table in his apartment was like a shrine to the National Hockey League at this point, a mess of sports sections and copies of Sports Illustrated he’d forced Ruby to get for him.

“You know,” Emma said pointedly, nodding in Eric’s direction when he left a plate of onion rings in front of her. “You left your Daily News sports section sitting next to the bed this morning.” Her bed. In her apartment. Several blocks away from his.

Not that it was a problem – it wasn’t. Really.

He wasn’t a complete ass. Killian really did understand why she’d gotten her own apartment and he hadn’t really been considering some sort of joint living arrangement until Emma had explained that there wouldn’t be one and Mary Margaret’s mom-disappointment probably extended to him as well.

The last month had been a back-and-forth schedule of nights in his apartment and her apartment and wrapping up the regular season and it was no wonder he’d left the sports section of a New York daily next to her bed because he could hardly remember where he had to be later that night, let alone putting a few sheets of newspaper back in his bag.

“If you were trying to make sure I didn’t find that story about what happens if you don’t win a Cup, you weren’t doing a very good job,” Emma continued, whispering the last few words so as not to draw the ire of an entire hockey team.

That got him to smile again.

“It was more just forgetting I’d left it there than any sort of overly dramatic attempt to get you to notice me,” Killian laughed.

His thumb traced over the bend of her knee and it wasn’t lost on him that they were back where they’d started – tucked into the corner of the restaurant with a very loud, very excited, team a few feet away and he didn’t care about any of them.

He kept staring at her.

It was the same spot as the set-up, but it couldn’t have been more different and he would have trekked back and forth between her apartment and his for the rest of the foreseeable future to ensure that Emma Swan kept looking at him like he was the best goddamn player in the league.

“That kind of seems like a problem,” Emma said. “Can’t score goals if you’re all distracted like that.” “Not distracted. Focused.” “On forgetting newspapers or what the newspapers are saying?” Killian’s thumb stopped moving and he gripped her knee a bit tighter. “I totally read the story,” Emma continued, tilting her head to the side as she ripped an onion ring apart.

He’d lost track of the number of times he’d read the story or the number of times Regina had told him about the story and, eventually, someone was going to just let him play hockey, right? He hoped so.

That might make this easier.

Emma leaned forward, balancing precariously on the edge of the stool and Killian’s hand moved to her waist out of instinct. “Jeez, Jones, relax,” she mumbled.

“I’m just making sure Eric doesn’t have to deal with cleaning up after you when you kill yourself from falling off this stool.”

She groaned, but she didn’t actually move his hand and the smile was still tugging on the edge of her lips when she sat up straight. The story was in her hand. “I think I’ve read it like a dozen times today,” Emma mumbled. “You’d look good on TV.” “Yeah, that’s what Regina keeps saying.” “Doesn’t surprise me at all.” It didn’t surprise him either – Regina’s promises that this was something to consider and, well, he’d already told the Av’s no and there was no guarantee any other team would sign him if the Rangers didn’t and they might have a playoff spot, but Wild Card wasn’t easy and...the list went on and on.

He could probably recite it verbatim at this point.

“The story seems to think you’d make several zeroes worth of money for your very attractive face,” Emma said and he didn’t think he imagined the way she leaned toward him, knee brushing against his and hand landing on the top of his pants.

Killian quirked one eyebrow and a slightly embarrassed Emma – the one who blushed just a bit when she’d been caught calling her boyfriend attractive – was something he was far more interested in than he realized.

“You telling me you think the TV people only want me for my face, Swan?” Killian asked, propping his elbow up on the bar and resting his chin on his hand.

She rolled her eyes. “I said no such thing.” “You did. You just said the story claimed I’d get several zeroes for my very attractive face.” “Slip of the tongue.” He widened his eyes and he was certain Emma’s face was nearly as red as the highlights in Ruby’s hair. “Oh my God,” she sighed. “Shut up.” “Your words, not mine.” She was quiet for a moment, lips pressed together tightly and Killian knew she was thinking exactly what he was – it was a good offer, it was a lot of zeroes, it kept him in New York no matter what happened this season.

His attractive face would, probably, look pretty damn good on TV.

“You don’t know that someone else wouldn’t offer after the run,” Emma whispered. “And this is the only time I’ve seen this story.” “It’s definitely true,” Killian said. “Gina thinks it’s some kind of fantastic back-up plan.” “Isn’t it?” He shrugged. It was. It made as much sense as Emma getting her own apartment.

Be prepared. Or something.

He didn’t want that. He wanted to win a fucking Stanley Cup. He wanted this to work. He wanted Emma to move into his apartment more than he’d been willing to admit to himself in the last month.

Emma narrowed her eyes and he’d never actually answered her question. He didn’t really get the chance – attacked, as per usual, by a seven-year-old whirlwind, decked out in head-to-toe blue and one of the fansite shirts that claimed the Rangers weren’t interested in easy victories.

“Hook,” Roland shouted, arms already thrust into the air so he could get pulled up onto the edge of the bar. “Oh, are those onion rings?” Emma laughed softly and for half a moment Killian forgot about the story and the playoff run and anything that wasn’t that sound and the look on her face when she tugged Roland towards her. “Come on, Rol,” she huffed and at least the kid tried to help her, pushing up on the balls of his feet before climbing up onto the bar himself. Eric only looked vaguely scandalized.

“Thanks,” Roland mumbled, mouth half stuffed with onion rings already.

“Slow down,” Killian said, tugging Roland’s hand away from the plate. He’d already eaten half the onion rings. “You’re going to choke and then Gina will kill me.” Roland shook his head and for a recently-turned-seven-year-old, he was deceptively strong, yanking his arm out of Killian’s grip. “Nah, she’s busy.” “Is she on the phone again?”

If Regina was talking to people without telling him again, Killian was going to break something. Or maybe throw something. Or maybe get two minutes on purpose in the season finale the next night. Probably not the last one.

Arthur would make him skate sprints if he did that.

“Not about TV,” Roland said seriously and Killian was momentarily stunned at that. Emma tried to turn her laughter into a cough.

“What about then?” “Henry.” “Henry?” Killian repeated and Emma’s eyes got impossibly wide. He glanced up, meeting her slightly stunned stare with one of his own.

Henry was, in fact, sitting a few feet away, legs stretched out at one of the tables in the corner of the restaurant with his arms crossed over his chest and he looked every inch like he belonged there, wearing his own playoff shirt and a smile that Killian was certain would never actually leave his face.

“What’s going on?” Killian asked, not sure if he was talking to Roland or Emma.

She bit her lip and he resisted the urge to mutter open book at her when Roland started babbling excitedly while trying to devour seven onion rings at once.

“He’s going to move in while you guys are in Montreal and Gina’s trying to make sure the house gives him all his stuff and he doesn’t have any stuff, not really, that’s what he told me, but Gina keeps calling and she’s using that serious voice she used when she talked about you going away, Hook and I asked Henry if that made him my brother and…”

Emma breath audibly caught and she was blinking quickly enough that Killian’s hand found hers almost immediately.

“Wait,” Killian interrupted and Roland froze with an onion ring halfway to his mouth. “Brother? What are you talking about?” Roland’s eyes got as large as Emma’s and his gaze darted between the two of them. He dropped the onion ring on his pants.

“Robin didn’t tell you,” Emma said. It wasn’t a question.

“He told you?” Killian asked.

“No, no, Henry did.” “When?” “A couple weeks ago.” Killian’s mouth hung open and Emma’s lips had all but disappeared behind her teeth, something in her expression that looked like an apology. “But it’s not final yet. They were still in paperwork then. It probably isn’t still. That stuff takes some time.” “Paperwork?” “I’d imagine there’s a lot of it if you’re going to adopt a kid.”

He’d been holding his breath. He hadn’t realized. And, somewhere in the back of his mind it made sense – everything about this whole night made sense – but it all hit a bit too close to home and no one had told him anything.

Old habits coming back to haunt or taunt or just be particularly annoying at the start of some kind of career-defining playoff run.

Killian ran his hand through his hair, desperate not to meet Emma’s worried gaze and this was what he’d been trying to avoid in New York in the first place. This was why he hadn’t wanted to come to that party all those months ago, the family that wasn’t quite his family and everything moving and changing and evolving around him.

And he just sat still.

“I thought Robin would have told you,” Emma muttered, squeezing his hand tightly. Oh, that was different.

Emma.

Emma was there now and she hadn’t let go of his hand and, well, Page Six wasn’t wrong. There was a reason he was staying in New York. And considering TV.

“Nah,” Killian shook his head. “You’re right though, probably didn’t want to jinx it or something.”

Roland looked distraught. “Dad didn’t tell you, Hook?” “It’s ok, Rol,” he promised, trying to take a deep breath. He smiled at the kid and tugged on the bottom of his t-shirt. “This is a good thing.” Roland beamed. “I’ve never had a brother before. And neither has dad and Gina doesn’t have any either and...” “And?” “And you and Uncle Liam are brothers.” Killian sat up a bit straighter, Emma’s hand gripping just a bit tighter than it had to. “That’s true.” “And you guys played hockey together and he taught you how to check somebody and, well, maybe Henry could teach me how to check somebody.” He hadn’t gotten enough sleep for this kind of conversation.

This was Robin territory. This was actual dad territory, not quasi-parental figure who let you eat more onion rings than you were supposed to as dictated by the Food and Drug Administration.

This wasn’t what Killian signed up for.

Roland, however, didn’t seem to care – eyes bright and expectations written on his face clear as day and Emma still hadn’t let go of Killian’s hand.

“You’d probably be the one doing most of the teaching in this case,” KIllian said, eyes flashing towards Emma. “Henry doesn’t really even know how to skate.” “What?” Roland shouted and he moved so quickly, he nearly flew off the edge of the bar. Emma only managed to save the plate of onion rings from crashing onto the floor. “We’ve got to fix that, Hook! How come he doesn’t know how to skate?” It was if the idea of not knowing how to skate was the most scandalous thing that had ever crossed Roland’s mind. It might have been.

“Not everyone grows up with an entire hockey team around them, Rol,” Emma explained. “Some of us just kind of fall into it.” Killian might have squeezed her hand at that point. God, the playoffs needed to start. He needed some kind of consistency.

“Can we do that, Hook?” Roland continued, undeterred by Killian’s soft exclamation when he tried to jump back towards the floor again.

“Stop, you’re going to kill yourself,” he muttered, pushing a grumbling Roland back into the center of the bar. “And you’ll have to ask your dad and Gina. Maybe after the playoffs are over.” “After you guys win a Cup?” Killian grimaced, but didn’t say anything, something about ancient superstitions sitting on the tip of his tongue. It didn’t matter – Will yelled it from the other side of the restaurant.

“You know the rules, Rol,” Will shouted, arm slung over Belle’s shoulders. She almost looked embarrassed. “We don’t talk about that.” “But you guys are going to win,” Roland argued. He tried to push himself up again and Emma laughed when she pulled the onion ring plate completely out of harm’s way, eating the last one for good measure.

“Well, of course we are,” Killian said evenly. Roland sat back down. “But we just don’t talk about it. Bad form.” “Is there form for that kind of stuff?” Emma asked. “Or just ancient athletic superstitions?” “Bit of column A, bit of column B?” “Yuh huh.” “And Henry said he’s going to wear your jersey during the run too, Hook,” Roland continued, seemingly undeterred by whatever Scarlet was still complaining about from the other side of the restaurant. “And once he gets his stuff in his room, Gina said we could get sticks and put them on the wall.” The whole restaurant froze – or at least the front line. Scarlet, at least, stopped yelling.

“Well, there went the secret,” Emma muttered. Killian shook his head.

Robin and Regina sprinted towards the corner of the bar, matching looks of dread on their faces when they skidded to a stop in front of Killian.

“It’s fine,” Killian promised. “Some would go so far as to say good.” Regina didn’t look convinced. She almost looked mad when she noticed the empty plate a few feet away from Roland. Robin looked a little nervous.

“You think?” he muttered, hands stuffed into his pockets as he rocked back on his heels.

Killian glanced at Emma again – and there was some kind of deeper meaning to that, that also might have been based in not-quite-reasonable superstitions, some kind of good luck charm or the force behind everything – and she barely moved her head when she nodded, smile tugging on the corners of her mouth.

“I know,” Killian said. “When did you guys decide to do this though?” “You really want to know?” “Why wouldn’t I?” Robin made some kind of noise in the back of his throat and Killian knew the answer to that question – because he’d been busy lying to everyone about going to Colorado and running away from every ounce of family that had ever existed in New York and turning down a considerable number of zeroes.

“Yeah, well,” Killian started, “that’s different now.” “Yeah?”

Emma was blushing again. It was lighter that time, just spots of red on her cheeks and eyes trained on Roland and Regina and Mary Margaret had showed up at some point, probably responding to some kind of Emma sense that just knew when there was something potentially emotional about to happen.

“I guess so,” Robin said, answering his own question as soon as he looked at Killian.

“If you’re going to get sentimental on me Locksley, I swear, I’m going to leave.” “Nah, that’s a waste of time when you’re there already.” Killian scoffed and there was a small crowd around them now – Scarlet and Belle and Henry had his own stool and even David had moved as well, hand landing protectively on Emma’s shoulder like it was a flashing neon sign regarding sentimentality.

“And since the break,” Regina said suddenly, not even turning to look at Killian when she spoke. “No one wanted to tell you because you were being stupid.”

“Always so good with words, Gina,” Killian mumbled.

“Stop feeding my kid an obscene amount of onion rings and I’ll be nicer to you.” “Ah, but now you’ve just set yourself up for even more disappointment, because you’ve got two kids and that’s just more onion rings to spread around.” She did turn around at that, eyes narrowed and glare plastered on her face and Killian smiled in response. “I wish you’d left when the Av’s offered,” she said, but the words didn’t quite ring true.

“That’s just rude.” “Control the onion rings then.”

“Big job.” Regina groaned, but there was almost a smile on her face and Killian felt something settle in the very center of him – or maybe resettle. Like he’d found something all over again.

Emma moved off the stool, squeezing Henry’s arm once, before she took a few steps towards him, fingers finding the back of his hair and Killian’s hand was around her waist before he could stop himself, pulling her closer to his side.

Maybe he’d consider TV. Maybe it was good to be prepared.

Maybe he was hedging his bets to keep Emma pulled up against his side.

“Will you two stop arguing,” Ariel hissed, cutting into the conversation with practiced ease. Eric sputtered when she moved behind the bar, grabbing the remote out of his hand and Killian was a mix of impressed and vaguely intimidated. “Some of us are trying to see how this all shapes up.” She changed the channel and the restaurant went silent again – a dozen pairs of eyes trained on the TV screen and the Penguins game and she’d timed it almost perfectly because there were only a few minutes left.

“That was impressive, Red,” Killian said and she just stuck her tongue out at him.

“Shut up and watch the game. And then show up on time for PT tomorrow.” “Are you not showing up on time for PT?” Emma asked sharply, pushing on his shoulder like that would get him to follow the final-day-of-the-regular-season-schedule he was all too aware she had.

“She’s making that up, Swan,” Killian answered. “I was no less than two minutes late for PT yesterday and I made a fist, at least, a dozen times. She’s just greedy.” “I am doing my job,” Ariel argued, still staring at the TV. The whole group groaned when some third-liner scored an empty-net goal for the Penguins. “Ah, there it is.” Emma slumped against his side and Killian, head resting on his shoulder and, Ariel was right. There it was.

The Pens won the President’s Trophy.

“God, I hate them all,” Will mumbled and Belle clicked her tongue in reproach as a line of gold and black skated to center ice and the obligatory post-game celebration.

“Why are we watching this, exactly?” Robin asked. “We knew they were going to clinch tonight.” “Well, to be fair, they could have done it tomorrow,” Killian said, trying not to actually sigh too loudly when they brought the trophy out onto the ice to the sounds of a crowd that had, just recently, won a Stanley Cup. “God, this is depressing.” “Which brings me back to my original question.” Ariel huffed loudly, rolling her eyes as if she couldn’t quite believe any of them were still talking. “Are you guys serious? This is motivation!”

“I don’t think we really need that,” Killian said.

“Wild. Card.” “Which seems like plenty of motivation to begin with.”

“Ugh.” “Did you just say the word ugh out loud? That’s your argument right now?” “Show up to PT on time, Killian!”

He laughed softly, hand still lingering on Emma’s waist and she’d started tugging on the front of his jacket like it was an old habit she couldn't quite shake. “You’re going to drive her insane, you know.” “Nah, she’s used to it by now.” Ariel stuck her tongue out at him again, but Killian barely registered it, eyes flashing up to the screen when the crowd started to cheer again and a collective ooooh moved across the restaurant.

“Oh, well, they’re totally fucked now,” Will said, immediately chastised by everyone over the age of twelve. “Right, right, sorry, we’re a family team.” “That’s bad luck,” Robin muttered and Killian was somewhere in the realm of almost hysterical at this point, head thrown back as soon as Soyer’s hands landed on the trophy.

“See, Red,” he said, nodding towards the TV as the entire Penguins roster passed the President’s Trophy down the line. Some of them kissed it. “We don’t need any motivation. Not when they’ve already broken the rules.”

She didn’t argue immediately – and that felt a bit like a step in the right direction. “I can’t believe they touched it.”

“Too confident.” “You think?” Killian shrugged. “Certainly looks that way, doesn’t it?” “What a bunch of idiots,” Emma mumbled. “Look at them. They’re all posing with it like they’ve already won the Cup.” “This anti-Pittsburgh side of you is fun, Swan. I like it. Keep going.” Emma yanked on his zipper again and he fell forward dramatically, huffing out the air in his lungs like he’d been punched. “They’re not going to win again,” she said and Killian nearly forgot there was an entire hockey team standing behind them.

“Of course not.”

“Plus,” Will added, nearly pushing his hand in between Killian and Emma. “We’ve got to win so Cap doesn’t get screwed over by the entire franchise.” “The soul of tact, Scarlet.”

Will hummed in the back of his throat, grunting slightly when Robin hit against the back of his head. “What? I mean that’s true, isn’t it?”

“Shut up, Scarlet,” Emma said and it sounded a bit like a threat. Her hand was flat on Killian’s chest, eyes tracing across his face like she was waiting for the blow-up in the middle of the restaurant. It wasn’t going to happen.

“We should toast,” David said suddenly and, it appeared, a bit out of his own control as Mary Margaret pushed him a step closer to Emma again. “Um, I mean, well you guys did it at the start of the regular season, right? We should do it again. For symmetry.” “Nice save,” she muttered.

“That’s a good idea,” Robin agreed, nodding towards an expectant Eric behind the bar. He handed out glasses and alcohol and soda and cleared his throat when David didn’t immediately start talking. “Your move, Detective.” “Oh, oh, right,” he sputtered. “Well, there’s no sense in talking about how long we’ve all waited for a run like this or a team like this. Everything is there and not just because that’s what the reports say. Because you guys, and well, all of us, are certain of it. No extra motivation needed. To the postseason.”

“To the postseason.”

The alcohol burned the back of his throat and landed in the pit of his stomach with an almost audible thump, but Emma hadn’t ever moved, head back on his shoulder and shot glass in her own hand and that very specific type of smile on her face.

That was more than enough motivation.

The first three games hadn’t been particularly easy.

He wouldn’t say that. This was the playoffs – nothing was easy. It was do or die and every sports cliché Mrs. Vankald could come up with was one-hundred percent true in situations like these.

There were no easy games, no easy shifts, every single hit hurt just a bit more and the bruises on his left hand were a testament to that.

It wasn’t easy. Hell, they’d nearly lost game three and Arthur’s whiteboard casualties were starting to get even more violent now, hitting them up against the boards and using them even after he’d cracked them, the lines tracing across them making it difficult to actually work out the plays he was trying to draw up.

The game’s hadn’t been perfect and Killian’s hand was black and blue and he hadn’t actually scored in the series, but he woke up with hair in his face and a smile on his lips and they could clinch that night.

He shifted slightly, breathing in slowly and maybe that had been a mistake because he breathed in more hair than he’d been entirely ready for and his whole body shook when he started coughing and Emma grumbled when she woke up.

“God, what are you doing?” she asked, voice scratchy from sleep and fingers splayed across his hip.

“Trying not to suffocate on your hair.” She scoffed and opened one eye, keeping the other squeezed shut and that might have made it even more difficult to breathe. Or it might have been the team-branded she was wearing, oversized t-shirt and not much else, legs twisted up with his and there’d been no conversation about coming back to her apartment after another home win, just an expectant smile on her face when he slung his arm around her shoulders in the back corner of the restaurant.

“Did you know that the reason they call the Canadiens the Habs is because of Madison Square Garden?” Emma asked.

“What?”

She nodded. “Yup. Tex Rickard, who owned the Garden in 1920-something, said the ‘H’ on the jerseys stood for Habitants. He was probably an idiot, but Habitants, Habs, it stuck.” “And why was he an idiot exactly?” “It stood for hockey.” “Ah, well, obviously.”

Emma grinned, pushing her hair back behind her ear and she did something with her eyebrows – or at least tried. Killian was paying more attention to whatever it was her fingers were doing, tracing out a circle with her thumb and she laughed when his breath actually caught, shoulders rolling back into the mattress.

“You know,” she said slowly, hand still moving and he wouldn’t have moved even if he wanted to. He didn’t want to. “You can clinch tonight.” “A fact I’m very much aware of, Swan.”

“Step forward and all that.”

“Also true.” “The tabs will have a field day if you sweep.”

“When,” Killian said instinctively and he wasn’t certain when he’d started being so positive, probably somewhere around the time the tips of Emma’s fingers found their way underneath the edge of his boxers.

He must have let out some kind of strangled Swan because she actually laughed, teeth tugging on her lower lip and that wasn’t even fair.

“Ah, that’s true,” she amended and he moved immediately as soon as she started pulling on fabric. “I just didn’t want to jinx it.” “You couldn’t do that, Swan.”

The words kind of felt like they were choking him, not quite as easy as the three games they’d won already and it was absolutely because of the look on her face and the feel of her next to him and if they did clinch that night, then Killian was half certain it was only because of how desperate he was to stay in this moment.

“I thought there were rules,” she challenged. “God, you’ve got to take these off.” “What are you trying to do exactly?” He knew exactly what she was trying to do – was halfway on his way to ensuring that she got to do it several times before either one of them had to get on the downtown one.

“Have I not made that clear?” “You’re not exactly talking, Swan. Except for some very early-morning facts.” “That was just my lead-in, get you interested with pertinent hockey facts and then keep you appropriately distracted with...not hockey facts.” Killian chuckled, but it might have turned into a groan when Emma’s foot found its way in between his legs, trying to push boxers into blankets and there was absolutely no need for a lead-in.

He should have said that.

He’d lost the ability to think. Or speak. Or do anything that wasn’t kissing his girlfriend a few hours before they could clinch a berth to the next round.

Emma gasped softly when they moved, her back on the mattress and Killian hovering just above her and his hand worked its way up underneath the fabric of the shirt she still had on. He’d probably think about that sound for the rest of the day.

That would probably make morning skate weird.

And if these last three games had been some kind of easy sweep, then this was even more simple. This – over-eager mornings and hockey facts and not-hockey facts and waking up with hair in his face – was as simple as breathing or stick-handling in between two defenders.

That wasn’t quite as romantic as Killian had been hoping for.

It hadn’t been some kind of straight line to this, had hardly been the stringent blue line he’d been certain had shaped his entire career and what he was allowed. It had been a criss-cross of emotions and feelings and finding and if he’d been looking for some kind of family and some sort of home somewhere, then he was positive he’d found it in Emma Swan and that sound she kept making whenever his lips found hers.

Emma’s hips hit his and then he was the one making that noise, sighing against her mouth and the hands that kept holding onto him like they were trying to make sure he didn’t go anywhere.

Not anymore.

Not ever again.

Not for a ridiculous number of zeroes or even after she’d gotten her own apartment or whatever happened in the playoffs.

He wasn’t a fool.

He knew it wouldn’t always be easy and they might sweep, but there were still three more rounds and his hand would probably be perpetually bruised by the time all of this was over.

Killian didn’t care. And for the first time in his entire career, he was ready for all of it, no matter what happened at the end.

“You didn’t have to have a lead-in, you know,” he mumbled, tracing down her jaw and there were goosebumps on her skin. He smiled at that.

“No?” “No,” Killian promised. “Although I am consistently impressed by how many facts you just have at your disposal.”

His fingers traced along her thigh and he could hear Emma’s breathing pick up, smile inching across his face at that and he was some kind of reaction hoarder now because he was documenting every single one of them.

“Good, that’s...good to know,” she said and it came out a bit like a sigh when he moved his hand again. “Are you teasing on purpose or just because you’re the only one who actually took their clothes off?” “Swan, are you suggesting you’d like me to take your clothes off?” “You’re infuriating, you know that?” “I choose to see it as endearing. I seem to remember someone once saying it was charming. Too charming, if we want to get technical.” “I must have been delusional.” “Ah, somehow, I doubt that.” “So confident.” Killian hummed and Emma’s hips were moving again, chasing after exactly what she’d had planned with the lead-in and there was something to be said for waking up early if this was how it ended up. It seemed to end up like this more often than not.

He moved again, fingers tracing out patterns on the inside of her leg and he was only vaguely concerned with the amount of damage she was doing to her bottom lip. The rest of him was very focused on the way her chest kept moving, like she was trying to catch her breath and couldn’t quite get there.

He loved her an absolutely ridiculous amount.

“Killian,” Emma sighed, her grip on his hips tightening.

“What, Swan?” She tried to glare when he started smirking at her, eyebrows moving quickly and hand slowing until he was barely moving. “I’m afraid I don’t know what it is you want. Exactly.”

He swiped his tongue over his lips when her eyes met his and something flashed across her face at his words. It looked like determination.

Emma Swan knew what she wanted – always.

And it might have been him.

That made it difficult for Killian to breathe.

She grabbed his hand, fingers wrapping around his wrist and yanking him forward until he was balancing on one forearm so he didn’t fall on top of her.

“Still not being very descriptive, Swan,” Killian muttered and if this was some kind of game, he was almost enjoying himself too much.

“Visual learner,” she challenged, shifting again and he didn’t care about anything outside of that apartment when his hand moved in between her legs.

Killian groaned, determined not to actually collapse and Emma squeezed her eyes shut and if he didn’t love her more than anything then it was the biggest lie he’d ever tried to tell himself.

He lost track of time at some point, far too focused on everything else and that database of sounds he was, apparently, collecting. And he might have mumbled a handful of promises in her ear, everything he’d been thinking for the last month, but had never been willing to give credence to.

She didn’t say anything back, just kept her hands on his back and fingers in his hair and when he, finally, moved again, she seemed to breathe him in and it was easy as that. It was as easy as breathing.

This made more sense than anything else ever had.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Emma asked later, head on his shoulder and arm flung over his stomach and he’d been tracing across the back of her hand without even realizing he was moving.

Killian lifted one eyebrow and she groaned, burying her face against his chest. “God, not that. Jeez.” “What do you want to talk about, Swan?” She tapped her fingers against his side for a few moments before answering and Killian couldn’t see her face, but he would have bet a fair amount of money he maybe didn’t have that she was biting her lip.

“TV,” Emma mumbled.

“No,” he said immediately and, perhaps, a bit sharper, than he’d intended. “I don’t.” “Oh.” He sighed and Emma propped her head up on her hand, staring at him expectantly and a bit more nervously than he would have wanted, all things considered. “It’s awfully greedy, don’t you think?” Killian asked and maybe this conversation would have been easier if they were in his apartment.

Home ice or whatever.

“What is?” Emma pressed.

“Wanting everything.” Her smile almost looked sad and for two people who were just a few hours away from moving on to the next round of the playoffs, this conversation had taken a decidedly negative turn. Maybe they should just start kissing some more.

That seemed like a distraction.

“That’s not true,” Emma said and there was a determination in her voice that caught Killian off guard. “No?” “No,” she repeated, shaking her head. Her hair almost hit him in the face again. “This team is...it doesn’t make any sense. You have a restaurant that you’ve claimed as your own and everyone knows everything about each other and, God, the Locksley's are going to adopt Henry. We should be featured on some sort of SportsCenter special.” “E60, definitely.” “A 30-for-30 at least. Multi-parter” Killian barked out a laugh and some of the tension that had taken up residence in his shoulders and his slightly bruised left hand dissipated at the look on her face. “You said we again,” he pointed out.

“Aren’t we? Like a mini team or something.” “As in you and me?” Killian asked, hand moving again and there were goosebumps on Emma’s arm.

“Yeah.”

“Absolutely.”

“Then no,” Emma said, smile wide and Killian would have sworn he could feel it settle into the very center of him in the middle of that bed. “That’s not greedy. You deserve this, Killian. A playoff run and a max deal and another picture on the side of the Garden. No one should have that more than you.” It wasn’t very often he didn’t know what to say – they’d been given media training after they got drafted and Killian could answer questions as easily as anything, even if he sometimes did his best to avoid him – but he wasn’t quite prepared for the certainty in Emma’s voice or the palm pressed flat against his chest like she was willing him to get her to believe him.

“Careful, Swan,” he mumbled, wrapping his hand around hers and dragging his lips over her knuckles. “That was bordering dangerously close to a compliment.” “Ah, well, maybe I’m just feeling generous. Make sure you’ve got some positive thoughts heading into a clincher.”

“I’m not going to take the TV deal.” “I know you’re not,” Emma said. “I wouldn’t expect you to.” “Why?” “Easy. You’re going to win a Stanley Cup.”

“I love you, you know that?” Emma nodded, smile still on her face and laughter ringing in his ears when he tugged her flush against him. “Weird, I wasn’t picking up on that at all.”

He kissed her and it wasn’t a distraction or even an attempt at a distraction, it was just that want he’d been talking about before and it would have been somewhere in the realm of perfect if the front door to her apartment didn’t swing open at the same time.

Emma yelped, eyes going wide and hand desperate for blankets and Mary Margaret looked like she was going to pass out.

“Oh my God,” she sputtered, face flushed and mouth hanging open. Killian laughed, but it turned into a groan when Emma smacked at his shoulder.

Mary Margaret appeared frozen.

“Jeez, Reese’s what are you doing?” Emma asked, blankets pulled up over her shoulders. “Didn’t we say noon?” “Yeah, yeah,” Mary Margaret said quickly. She was staring at the ceiling. “But it’s almost noon. I just figured…” “What?” “Shouldn’t you be at morning skate?” “I don’t have to be downtown until two,” Killian explained. “Morning skate is more mid-afternoon skate when you can clinch.” “Oh, yeah, that kind of makes sense.” “Kind of.” “Reese’s you’ve got to go back outside,” Emma implored and her face was red as well. Killian did his best not to laugh again.

“What? Why?” “Oh my God. C’mon Reese’s don’t make me actually spell it out for you.” Mary Margaret’s eyes, somehow, managed to get even wider and she nearly dropped whatever it was she was holding – what appeared to be several containers filled with food. She wavered for half a moment, eyes darting towards the refrigerator and Emma and back up to the ceiling and she nodded once before nearly sprinting out the door.

Killian laughed loudly as soon as she was gone, body shaking and Emma punched against his side. “You’re going to hurt me, Swan,” he said reasonably, grabbing her hand and grinning at her.

She huffed, falling back onto the mattress. “God,” Emma muttered. “She wasn’t supposed to be here until noon.” “Well, it is, apparently, almost noon.” “We had a schedule, though.” “Somehow I think we’ll survive. Is she just trying to feed you?”

Emma hummed, arm thrown over her face. “She thinks I’m starving. Something about having nothing in my fridge and I’ve got my own apartment, but no time to really make it mine. Just, you know, normal mom stuff.” “That’s not a bad thing, love.” “No, no, it’s not. And if she’d shown up at twelve it would have been totally fine.” “That embarrassed to have Mary Margaret see me?” Killian asked, pulling Emma’s arm away from her face. “I think she’s already aware we were doing this before.” She pressed her lips together and open book had never been more obvious. “What?”

“I wasn’t embarrassed by that.”

“What then?” “I’ve never brought anybody back,” she said quickly, refusing to meet his gaze. “I mean, you know, to my place or whatever. Reese’s did and David basically lived in our apartment in Boston and then, obviously, here. But when I was in Vancouver and LA, I didn’t do...this.” “This.” “Yeah. I had my space and they had their space and I was cool going to them, but not so much vice versa.” Words, it appeared, were becoming more and more difficult the longer Killian spent in that bed. Emma squeezed her eyes shut and made a noise in the back of her throat. “Anyway,” she said, trying to brush over his lack of response. “That’s why. She was probably just surprised you were here. We should probably get dressed though.”

She moved, half sitting up and Killian wrapped his fingers around her wrist, pulling her up short. “I’m glad I’m here,” he said and Emma’s eyes widened slightly.

“Yeah?” she whispered.

“Always.”

Emma nodded once. “Put some clothes on, Cap. We can’t afford to let Reese’s leave here totally scandalized.”

Mary Margaret hadn’t let him leave without, at least, taking ten minutes to eat and he’d have to tell El that someone else was giving her a run for her mom money. And morning skate was as easy as Killian had promised it would be, hardly anything more than taking a few shots at an empty net and Jefferson hadn’t even bothered putting on his pads.

They were going to win – Killian was certain and he was mostly just anxious for the game to be over so he could get back to his apartment or Emma’s apartment and wake up with hair in his face again.

He could hear the cheers already, the pregame noise and he shifted his weight between his skates, tapping the end of his stick on the floor.

“Relax,” Robin muttered a few feet behind him. “It’s going to be fine.” “I know,” Killian said easily, glancing over his shoulder. Robin looked the opposite of fine. “What’s the matter with you?” “Nothing.” “Locksley. You’re doing that thing with your eyes.” “That thing with my eyes?” “Yeah, like you’re trying to look in two different directions at once.” “That’s impossible.” “What’s the matter with you?” Will groaned loudly at the other end of the line and it sounded like he was hitting his stick up against the wall. “Are you two really going to do this now? Right now? They’re literally about to drop the puck.” “Well, to be fair,” Killian argued. “I have no idea what we’re doing because Locksley’s got that thing with his eyes.” “I hate that thing. It’s unnatural.” “See,” Killian said, staring at Robin and this couldn’t have been good for his neck.

Robin glared at him, but his shoulders sagged and they were, apparently, doing this right now. “You’re really ok with this?” “Clinching a first-round series? Yeah.” “That’s not what I meant.” “Be more specific then.” He took a deep breath and his gaze was heavy when it landed on Killian. “About Henry,” Robin sighed. “You’re really ok with that?” “Why wouldn’t I be?” “Cap. For real?” “Don’t blame him, Locksley,” Will shouted. “He’s been spending all that time at Emma’s apartment. His mind’s not totally focused on anything else.” “Shut up Scarlet,” Killian muttered, not looking away from Robin. “Seriously though. Why wouldn’t I be? This is a good thing.” Robin made a face. “No, no, it is. I just…” “You were running away before, Cap,” Will finished. “And you were all anti-this and all of us interfering and Locksley’s terrified his painfully adorable family is going to scare you off again.” Ah.

He really had almost fucked up everything.

Robin’s eyes were going to bore a hole in the Garden floor. “No,” Killian said. “It’s not.”

The music in the Garden was ridiculously loud and they’d already started Potvin sucks chants. It would have been impressive if Killian didn’t feel like he was waiting for something.

“We should probably buy Emma something,” Will said and it lacked his usual sarcasm. “Like a thank you or wait, what’s she always drinking? Hot chocolate, right?” “We could show up at her post-game thing,” Robin suggested and the lights at the end of the hallway were starting to flicker. They needed to get on the ice.

Killian wasn’t certain how anyone would expect him to skate after this.

“What do you think, Cap?” Will continued. “You think we’d start some sort of riot if we showed up at a fan event in midtown?” “I don’t think we’re that famous,” Killian said. He didn’t fall over when his skates hit the ice. That probably meant something. “And it’s during the game, anyway.” “Ah, well that’s dumb.” “I’ll be sure to mention that.” “Don’t be an ass.” “But you make it so easy.”

Will grumbled, skidding to a stop next to him on the blue line and Robin was still staring at him like he’d never quite seen him before – it probably had something to do with the smile practically plastered on Killian’s face at this point.

“You’re right, you know,” Robin muttered.

“About?” “This is good.” Killian didn’t answer – notes of the anthem filling the arena, but he didn’t stop smiling either.

They won.

A series sweep in the first-round and a 2-1 victory and Scarlet would probably never stop talking about his game-winner. There were cameras everywhere and reporters and phones pushed in faces, all of them a bit desperate to get thoughts on the win and who they’d face next and whether or not they heard the Penguins had won that night too.

They had. The reporters made sure they had.  

“It was just all instinct,” Will said, grinning into half a dozen cameras with that stupid hat on his head and it was all so different than it had been a year before.

Killian rolled his eyes when Will kept talking about reading a defense and how he knew his shot would come if he waited for it and Robin didn’t even try and mask his laughter. “Idiot,” Killian mumbled.

“He hasn’t had a game-winner all season,” Robin reasoned. “Leave him alone.” “Sure thing, Dad.” They were definitely breaking some kind of fire code, bodies packed into the locker room and there was barely enough room to move, let alone hear anything, but it would have been impossible to mistake the voice shouting for both Killian and Robin when she marched towards them.

“Ten-hut or whatever,” Ruby said, arms already crossed like she was ready for a fight. “Time for your post-game reaction.” “We did post already, Lucas,” Robin countered.

“Fan videos. Emma’s in the hallway where it’s at least, kind of, quieter. And you guys can talk about how psyched you are for the next series and how great Scarlet’s goal was.” “I’m not talking about Scarlet’s goal,” Killian said immediately, already halfway out the door.

“Too bad. Game-winner is a game-winner. Talk about it, Cap. And, speaking of talking, any reviews on Mary Margaret’s macaroni and cheese?”

“You know gossipping is a very unattractive habit.” “Luckily you don’t have to be attracted to me. Go help your girlfriend do her job.”

Killian saluted and Ruby made a face, heels echoing behind him as he made his way down the hallway.

The team-merch from that morning was now a dress and a blazer and Killian was only vaguely frustrated by Ruby’s gaze flitting between him and Emma, that expectant smile on her face like she was about to take credit for even the idea of them being happy. Emma’s head snapped up when she heard them, eyebrows pulled low and she tugged her hair over her shoulder.

“You’re not Scarlet,” she said.

“That’s true,” Killian agreed. “Should I be?” “Well he did score the game-winner. Fans were kind of clamoring for him. You guys’ll work though. Just, you know, talk about Scarlet’s goal. That’s all people care about.” “God, don’t tell him that, he’ll never shut up about it. How’d your in-game stuff go?” “Good,” Emma said, taking a step towards him and Ruby made some kind of gagging noise when her hands pulled on the front of his shirt. “Ridiculously good actually. I think Rol’s a bad influence on Henry now, by the way.” “What, why?” “They’ve fine-tuned some kind of round-robin cheer that incorporates both the goal song and Let’s go Rangers and it’s both the most adorable and annoying thing I’ve ever heard in my entire life.” “It’s definitely annoying,” Robin muttered, feet crossed at the ankles as he leaned back against the wall. “They were practicing the entire car ride home last night.” Emma laughed softly and something felt like it stuttered in Killian’s chest or maybe in his pulse. “They going to let you go to Boston?” he asked, fingers lacing through Emma’s.

“Yeah, actually. Since it’s so close. I won’t be able to go to the Garden, which kind of sucks, but we’ll do some Rangerstown stuff when you guys are there.” “She’s been e-mailing some hotel bar since the second intermission,” Ruby added and there was no mistaking the pride in her voice.

“Second intermission, Swan?” Killian asked. “We weren’t winning yet.” She clicked her tongue. “Film your post-game thing, Jones.” “You know, love, I think this is what some people would call evading the question.” “Was there a question?” “You started making phone calls to a hotel during intermission. Before Scarlet’s game winner.” “Just being prepared,” Emma muttered, nodding towards a Rangers backdrop he hadn’t noticed before.

“Good at your job.”

“Was that a compliment, Captain?”

Her eyes flashed up to him and the smile on her face was enough to warrant turning down all those zeroes – from TV and other teams and this was the year. It had to be. Killian took a step towards her and he could feel the turn of her lips when he kissed her, hand tight on her waist as she moved her arms around his neck.

They might have been there for days or weeks and maybe they’d won the Cup already. Ruby coughed loudly and Robin laughed under his breath when they finally moved apart.

“God, don’t come to Boston, Emma,” Ruby sighed. “This is gross.” “The worst,” Emma laughed, twisting when Killian kissed the top of her head. “Come on, film your stuff and then we can go eat, I’m starving.”

The video went out to fans just a few minutes after they filmed and there were more reporter questions and desperate cries about deadlines and Killian walked out of the arena with a smile still plastered on his face and Emma’s hand tied up in his.

And it was good and perfect and everything it hadn’t been at the same time last year – or it would have been if either one of them had noticed the cameras.

[brerediddy]

more than survive - chapter 13

“So, it just bit you and all of a sudden you have...superpowers?” Michael seemed hesitant. Not disbelieving by any means, just hesitant. “I’m not sure how the science checks out there.” His fingers drifted absentmindedly along Jeremy’s shoulder as the shorter boy rested against his collarbone, lanky legs draped over his lap.

“I’m telling you, dude, there’s nothing else it could have been. I got bit by a spider, went to bed, and then I woke up like this. With spider-powers.”

“Okay, okay,” the bigger boy accepted with a light smile. He reached out for Jeremy’s hand, weaving their fingers together. “So then what?”

“So naturally, I started fighting crime,” Jeremy shrugged. He grinned and poked at Michael with his elbow. “No, but really. It was kind of an accident.”

“How do you accidentally become a masked vigilante?”

Jeremy leaned back to straighten his spine a bit, leaning against the cushions instead of his best friend. He was still holding onto Michael’s hand firmly. “I was in town to pick up a new game-”

“Apocalypse of the Damned Second Edition?”

“Yeah, of course,” Jeremy nodded. “Anyway, I was in town. And when I left the store, I saw a guy shoving some poor kid up against a wall. And, like, normally I wouldn’t get involved. You know me. I’m a wimp.”

“Apparently not,” Michael countered softly.

“I’m a wimp,” Jeremy confirmed, nodding. “But this guy was towering over him, and the kid probably wasn’t more than twelve. So I told him to cut it out and before I knew it, he lunged for me. And I knocked him out.”

“Jesus, Jere, you’re such a badass.” Michael beamed at him for a moment before adding, “Although, maybe that would have been a good time to fill me in about your new powers. Y’know, a way to break the ice...like, hey, I kicked someone’s ass today.”

“I know, I know,” Jeremy conceded. “I get it. I messed up.”

Michael shrugged. He shifted to lean his head against the other boy’s shoulder. “Continue,” he hummed.

“So I figured, hey, I could do the superhero thing. I thought I’d at least give it a shot and if it didn’t work out, then it didn’t work out.”

“Naturally.”

“So I made the suit-”

“You made the suit?”

“Yeah, how else was I going to get it?” Jeremy asked, dumbfounded. Michael lifted his chin to look up at the other boy.

“Jeremy, that’s amazing. The suit is awesome . Where did you even learn how to do that?”

He shrugged. “YouTube.”

“Maybe if being a superhero doesn’t work out, you could go into costume design.”

“Yeah, maybe.”

The taller boy shifted once more, trying to get comfortable. He ended up laying in Jeremy’s lap, looking up at his best friend’s face. Long fingers worked through his hair gently, relaxing him. He knew that the more up-to-date parts of the boy’s story would probably stress him out, but he was enjoying the easy nature of the conversation for the time being. At least Jeremy was being honest with him.  

“So I fought petty criminals for a while, like, mainly just bullies. But then more and more villains came into the spotlight to challenge me.”

All of the headlines Michael had seen suddenly congregated in the forefront of his mind. He couldn’t believe that all of that was Jeremy. His dorky best friend. “I talked to you about Spider-Man,” he murmured, feeling heat rise to his cheeks. “Did I say anything wrong? Jesus, I probably sounded like an idiot.”

“No, no, you were fine,” Jeremy assured. “I mean, you were practically fawning over him.”

“You act like he’s not you.”

Jeremy cleared his throat, trying to figure out how to phrase his thoughts. “He’s not, really. I don’t feel like...like, me , when I’m Spider-Man.”

“Is that a good thing or a bad thing?” Michael inquired, eyes focused on the other boy intently.

“It’s a good thing,” he explained. He wasn’t sure what to say since he’d never really voiced this feeling before. “He’s like, the better version of me.”

“I don’t know about that. I think you’re the best version of you.”

He smiled down at his best friend, his heart skipping suddenly. “Thanks. It’s just...complicated. Sometimes I feel like he’s who I should be.”

Michael nodded. That made sense. Spider-Man was confident, brave, inspiring, and witty. The hero was what everyone wanted to be: that’s why he’d made that stupid fanpage in the first place.

Jeremy continued on, “Michael, can I tell you something?”

“That’s kind of the whole point of the conversation, isn’t it?”

“Touché,” the smaller boy laughed. “I know that I’ve lied to you a lot. And I know that I’ve fucked up a lot. But sitting here and telling you everything that I’ve wanted to since day one feels awesome. You’re awesome.”

Michael melted, tilting his head ever-so-slightly to gaze at the other boy. “I’m glad you feel that way. As much as I wish you’d told me sooner, I’m really thankful that you’re telling me now.”

“Me too,” Jeremy spoke softly. “I don’t even know what else to say. Just...thank you for hearing me out.”

“You’re my best friend. What was I supposed to do? Ignore you forever?” Michael teased, “We both know that I’d break in a few days.”

Fond blue eyes met brown and Jeremy added, “You’re taking this whole thing really well.”

“I didn’t have much of a choice. I mean, I could have left you in the lake while I had a personal crisis, but that would have been a bad plan.”

“Yeah, I’m glad you didn’t go with that.”

“Speaking of bad plans...do you care to explain how you ended up there in the first place?”

Jeremy sighed, his fingers stalling in Michael’s hair before continuing slowly. “So, the SQUIP is a dick. As we know. And, um, I’ve kind of been working with him for a bit-”

“The SQUIP? You’ve been working with a supervillain?” Michael shot up, staring at Jeremy eye-to-eye. “Seriously?”

“I know, I know,” he responded, folding his hands in his lap to occupy the space that his best friend had abandoned. “But I had to. It was the only way to placate him.”

“From what? Invading Poland?” Michael asked incredulously. He couldn’t think of one reason, not one, to work with such a monster.

“He threatened you.”

Oh. Oh. That changed a few things. The taller boy chewed his lower lip and cast his eyes towards the floor. “...Really? How’d he even know that I existed?”

“He can read minds, I guess, and he knew that I would do anything to keep him away from you.”

“Jeremy, I-“

“I know, I know. I’m stupid. I didn’t have a choice,” Jeremy mumbled.

“No,” Michael spoke softly. He leaned forward to press a chaste kiss against his best friend’s cheek. “Thank you. I mean, it sucks. But thank you for protecting me.”

The smaller boy gave a nervous smile and responded, “Anyway, that’s the college guy that I said I was working on a project with.”

“Oh my god,” Michael groaned, covering his face with his hands. “Oh my god, I was jealous. Of the SQUIP.”

“You were jealous?”

“Of course I was. I mean, I was offended that you didn’t tell me. But, mostly, I was just pissed off that I might have missed my chance with you.”

“Well, now you know,” Jeremy said, face tinged pink. Michael was jealous. He didn’t know why the idea put butterflies in his chest, but it did. “He did experiments and shit, mostly. That’s why we were meeting in an abandoned part of town.”

“E-Experiments?” Michael stammered. “Like, MKUltra?”

“No,” Jeremy hurried to amend. “He mostly just took down information about me, like my strength and my suit and everything.”

The taller boy blanched, his mouth opening slightly in shock. “You gave the supervillain information about how to beat you.”

“There’s more.” Jeremy shifted his eyes and picked at his nails as he said, “I, um, took some kind of pill. It was a weird microchip-looking thing.”

“You did what?” Michael breathed in for a long moment. He didn’t want to get mad at his best friend, since he was just trying to protect him and all, but really? What the fuck was that boy even thinking? Was he thinking?

“He said that it was either me or you,” he defended. “Besides, it didn’t even do anything.”

Brown eyes grew wide and Michael exclaimed, “That you know of!”

Jeremy crossed his arms protectively. He knew that the other boy was right, but he really couldn’t help it. He had to do it. “It didn’t work. Whatever the SQUIP was trying to do, it didn’t work. That’s why he threw me in the lake.”

Michael chewed on his lower lip. He couldn’t believe that all of this had been happening to his best friend and he had no clue. How could he have not known? Was he the world’s worst best friend? “And now we’re here,” the bigger boy said conclusively.

“Now we’re here,” Jeremy affirmed with a nod.

“What about all of the villains who aren’t the SQUIP?” Michael asked, leaning into Jeremy’s scrawny side. “You kicked all of their asses, right?”

“Right, yeah,” he said in response, raising an arm to rest in a curve around the other boy’s shoulders. “I guess so.”

“You did. I run a fan-page, remember? I know pretty much everything that’s been in the news.”

“True, true,” he allowed. Jeremy chewed on his lip, wondering if he should bring this into the conversation or not. On an impulse and with his heart beating into his throat, he said, “So, I killed that guy.”

Michael paused, his breath catching. He knew all about the man—some kind of dangerous killer with super-strength. He’d sunk that ship. Spider-Man had drowned him in response. It was odd, in a way, to think of it now. Before, it was just a story. Hero beats villain. Typical. But as he thought about the event in recent context, with Jeremy at the forefront, it didn’t just feel like a story anymore. It was real. A man had died and Jeremy had caused it. Not that his best friend was in the wrong, of course, Michael was sure that it was self-defense. But he knew Jeremy well enough and he knew that he must have brought it up for a reason. Finally, the bigger boy found the nerve to speak. “It wasn’t your fault. You were protecting everyone.”

Jeremy nodded half-heartedly. “I mean, kind of. Everyone was off the boat.”

“What happened?”

“I didn’t mean to. I was in the middle of everything, he had a gun. He was shooting and I was just trying to stop him.” Jeremy gripped at Michael’s shoulder a bit tighter, breathing in deeply. “I threw some debris at him and before I knew it, he was gone. I didn’t know he was dead until the next day. You told me about it at school.”

Michael remembered. He knew that something had been up with the boy that day but he was never able to put his finger on it. “Oh. I’m sorry. You shouldn’t have found out that way. I’m sure it’s not easy to think about...but you made it out safely. That’s all that matters.”

“Someone is dead. Because of me,” Jeremy mumbled. “Not very heroic.” He shook his head and spoke once more, “I wish I could take it back.”

Michael leaned up to kiss the side of his best friend’s face. “I’m sorry. I’ve never really thought about the emotional damage of being a superhero,” he admitted. “But I’m glad he didn’t shoot you. Whatever it took to prevent that, I’m thankful.”

“Me too,” Jeremy accepted in a small voice. Trying to lighten the mood, he added, “Getting shot isn’t fun. I can’t imagine if it were lethal.”

Michael froze. “Excuse me?”

“Well, I mean, I haven’t actually been shot. Just grazed.”

“Explain. Now.” His voice was steel.

“Well, um,” Jeremy murmured, trying to stall. He knew that he was being honest with Michael now and that was cool and everything, but he didn’t consider all of the details that came along with it. “Here.” He moved away from his best friend so that he could push the sleeve of his shirt over his shoulder, the one that wasn’t resting behind Michael’s head. This effectively showed off the bloody gauze that had started their fight from before; it seemed like a million years ago. “When you got mad at me for being in the city alone, I was actually trying to take down some petty crime. There was an ATM robbery and a hammer and a van and a gun,” he rambled, not keeping eye-contact.

Michael’s eyes narrowed, leaning forward across Jeremy’s chest to inspect the gauze. “Y-You were shot ?” His mind was recounting the events of the previous afternoon. “You brought me Buon Cibo. You were shot and you brought me Buon Cibo. What the fuck?”

“I was in the area,” Jeremy said. He neglected to mention that he’d slept in garbage in the area, but it wasn’t important. The blue-eyed boy swallowed and added, “Then, I mean, with the guy on the boat. He got my leg.”

“Jesus, Jere,” Michael huffed, pinching the bridge of his nose. He reclined back to rest against the arm of the futon. “There’s so much that I had no idea about. Like, not the slightest fucking clue. How does that happen?”

“I never told you,” he shrugged. “I didn’t want you to know.”

“But I’m your best friend, I should have known. I should have figured it out.”

Jeremy reached out a hand to press against the side of Michael’s face. “You knew that something was up. It’s not your fault that I didn’t tell you. How were you supposed to figure out that I’m Spider-Man?”

Michael didn’t seem to register the words that came out of his mouth. “You went to school the day after being shot in the leg,” he said calculatedly. His eyes scanned the other boy’s frantically and he asked, “D-Did you even get stitches? Did you go to the hospital?”

“No.”

“Jere-”

“I don’t have to,” he said in a soothing voice, trying to calm Michael down. “Everything heals on its own, okay? I’ll show you tomorrow. This,” he gestured to the injury on his arm, “will be gone by the afternoon.”

Michael seemed disbelieving but now wasn’t the time for skepticism. He picked at his nails and suddenly, a thought struck him. “You weren’t even mugged.”

Jeremy let out a long, defeated sigh. “No. No, I wasn’t. I know it was shitty, I know I shouldn’t have let you believe it. I’m sorry.”

It was weird to have everything that he thought he knew turn out to be a lie. He asked, trying his hardest to keep his voice even, “So what actually happened?”

“Did you hear about the bomb thing? In a warehouse?”

“That’s what happened?” Michael thought he was going to be sick. Jeremy. Bombs. Guns. Vans, SQUIPs, drowning. Bullet wounds, bruises, handcuffs. His mind flipped through every unexplained injury, every I’m just clumsy, every slight limp. Every headache, every night that his best friend was mysteriously absent.

What he concluded, by the end of it, was that Jeremy had been in a lot of shit.

[thekillerssluts]

Arcade Fire’s Win Butler Responds to Criticism of the Band’s Much-Maligned, ‘Misunderstood’ Everything Now Rollout

Ever since Arcade Fire roared out of Montreal in 2004 with the release of its instant-classic debut album, Funeral, the band has built a critically and popularly successful career as purveyors of emotionally earnest, musically galvanizing rock. So it struck some observers as a little discordant when, in advance of its recent Everything Now album, the band undertook a decidedly un-earnest prerelease campaign, flooding the internet for a brief time with, among other things, satirical music criticism, bogus marketing tie-ins, and fake-news stories.

The critical response to the campaign was not kind, and the album, too, was met with some of the toughest reviews of the band’s career. Front man Win Butler has suggested that skeptical critics — of both the promotional high jinks and the album itself — may be missing the point. For the first time in its career, a band with an undeniable gift for connection seems, both intentionally and not, to have crossed a lot of wires. Speaking from the tour bus on the way to a concert in Boston, Butler explained the thinking behind the Everything Now campaign, and his reaction to what he sees as the confusion surrounding the album.

I’ve seen you refer to the Everything Now campaign as an “experiment.” So what was the purpose of that experiment? And now from the vantage point of seeing the album out in the world for a few weeks, do you think the experiment was successful? A big question for us was “How do you release a record post–Donald Trump?” Since we were making a record called Everything Now, and it would be coming out after that election, it felt like a real moment to try and address subjects like fake news and how the media works. The other part of it is that when you make a record in this modern context, it instantly gets refracted in the media. There’s all this side content, this trail that follows everything. So we thought that maybe we’d just make all that content, as opposed to just making the art. That stuff was going to get made anyway, so why not make it ourselves?

Those are sort of more practical explanations. What ideas and theories were you testing? It’s a little bit like when you go to the doctor and they put dye in your bloodstream — we just wanted to see where fake-news articles about the band would go. The media is built for clicks now, and we were trying to see firsthand how it all works. I feel like I now understand on a much deeper level why Trump got elected. Negativity is what travels. So we learned more about how the internet functions, and how it’s an insane feedback loop. It’s like, we just played a show in London that was one of the best shows we’ve ever played there. It was honestly so fucking exciting. And at the show we sold a T-shirt where we put an ironic Everything Now logo on top of Kylie Jenner’s face. It was visually punk as hell. We knew doing that would get a lot of press pickup but every single news outlet in the world covered it. Somehow there’s a story in that, but there’s not really a story in Band Is Really Amazing at Music and Plays a Live Show and People Cry Because It’s So Beautiful. So it was really interesting to us to see what got picked up about Arcade Fire. That idea plays into what we were doing as well: We were providing the ammunition for people who wanted to write negative things about the band: Here you go! Here’s something to be outraged about!

Is it possible, just on a personal level, that you give too much emotional weight to negative coverage of the band? What you just said about providing ammunition makes it seem like Everything Now was being released with a preemptive feeling of defensiveness. But I think it’s fair to say that, on balance, Arcade Fire have been hugely successful with critics and audiences. I understand that criticism. The success we’ve had is one in a million. But there’s an overall level of meanness online — I think it was worth pointing out the disingenuousness of that stuff. I remember when Lana Del Rey played Saturday Night Live. Say what you will about her, but she’s a real fucking artist, and the media reaction to that performance was like people were trying to ruin her career. Did they really want to ruin this person? Or did that stance play better online? Like I said, so much of it seems very disingenuous. And I’m not just talking shit about music journalists now. I know how lucky the band has been. But publications are tightening their belts and people have to churn out more stuff, and the media landscape has changed — it’s turned into a fucking meat grinder. The Everything Now campaign was happening in the context of all that and coming out of an election where we essentially elected Mussolini as president of the United States. It would’ve been hard for us to just be like, “So this is our new record!” I wouldn’t know how to not try and address what’s going on in the world.

Did the marketing campaign negatively color how people heard the new music? I don’t know. I think some things were misunderstood. From my perspective, the album is musically one of the best things we’ve ever done. It’s also one of the most earnest. People have called it a cynical record, but I don’t think any honest attempt to listen to the music really supports that reading. So it’s hard for me to square that with the negative reception —which hasn’t been the case in Europe, where they took the campaign much differently. Obviously the French are not going to have as much of a problem understanding a meta news campaign; you don’t have to explain any of this to a French journalist. Everything we’ve done has been pretty obvious if you read past the headlines of the stories, which is something else we’ve learned people don’t really do. The other reality of it, for me, is that fans are enjoying the album and listening to it. So again, it’s hard to square what’s been written about Everything Now with my experience of Everything Now.

I can’t imagine there was a lot of backslapping and handshaking after you guys saw that fake-news stories you put out were picked up as real. Has it been at all emotionally satisfying to test your idea that the media is broken? It wasn’t triumphant, but these aren’t exactly triumphant times. We’re not in a particularly feel-good mood. It’s extremely dire and extremely dark right now. When things are this shitty, sometimes nihilism is a good response. It’s like the punk-rock movement in the U.K.— the Sex Pistols cursing on TV. It’s not overtly political, but in the context of the politics of those times, it’s just “fuck this fucking shit.” We weren’t excited about making people feel weird. That doesn’t mean it wasn’t a valid thing to do.

It seems like you have a clear sense of your intentions for the Everything Now campaign. Does other people’s being less clear suggest that maybe the band’s execution wasn’t as sharp as it could’ve been? Or that maybe the tone was coming off more snide than you’d hoped? Maybe there was a certain amount of naïveté on our behalf about how things would be received. I guess at the very core of it, we were hoping that, at least among our fans, we could contribute to a conversation about thinking about what you read, not taking things at face value, critical thinking. Maybe certain parts of that got away from us.

Like what? The thing that really got away from us in the most fascinating way was when we played a show in Brooklyn. There was this kind of big story about how we demanded there be a dress code, which was completely false and was something that could’ve been corroborated by a simple phone call or email to our publicist. But instead of that, there was this sea of outrage: “How dare they do this!” There was even an article written in Canada slagging the band about the dress code after it was clear that we had nothing to do with any dress code. A journalist writing about something after it was proven fake was not something we’d anticipated happening. But I can’t say I was surprised, because that’s where the culture’s at now. Fake news becomes something that real news has to respond to. It’s totally insane. From my perspective though, the Everything Now fake-news campaign lasted about a week and a half, and let a lot of people know that there was a new Arcade Fire album coming out. So I’m not really sweating a lot of this.

Does the response to the campaign — and what I imagine was the difficulty of putting it together — make you at all want to go the Radiohead route and basically just let the music do all the talking from now on? We only did something like five interviews for Reflektor. This is by far the longest interview I’ve given for this album.

Maybe you didn’t give a lot of interviews for Reflektor, but you promoted it with a special on network TV. The band wasn’t exactly shy about letting people know it had an album out. But the thing is, it’s bad to me when a record comes out and people are like, “Oh my god the new Radiohead record! Yes!” — then it’s gone the next day. It might as well not have existed. Remember when Radiohead played the MTV Beach House for Pablo Honey? You watch that video and you can tell the band was in hell. That was some stupid-ass shit, but you know what? That’s where I learned about Radiohead. They suffered through that, but they did it because they wanted people to hear their music. Before OK Computer, they toured the U.S. opening for Alanis Morrissette — most British bands weren’t doing stuff like that, but Radiohead wanted Americans to know about their music. Now, 20 years later, they’re still here. We want people to hear our music too. I don’t think we’d go out and open for Taylor Swift, but we want people to hear our music, too.

Would you have done anything differently with the rollout? Or put another way, has any of the critical feedback you’ve gotten rang true? Any criticism anybody else has had of the band — I’ve already had my own way, way harsher criticisms. Honestly, we’re talking about two weeks in the lifespan of this album. You listen to some of the albums Leonard Cohen made in the ’80s, and they have cheesiest-sounding keyboards, but those are such essential records. They’ve stood the test of time. If the songs are good enough and interesting enough, the music lasts. Time will tell if Everything Now holds up — everything else is ephemeral. And if ultimately the biggest regret of my career is that some people think maybe we made a misstep with an album rollout, I can certainly live with that.

[tellywoodtrash]

ishqbaaz 12.07.17 lb

plain text version here. 

self confidence goals: ragini 😊😊😊

anika’s hiding and snooping game be hella weak. 🙄🙄🙄

god this baagad billa looks 🔥🔥🔥 in black. i can’t even. meri saansein ruk rahi hai yougaiz. 😧😧😧

LMAO SHIVAAY REFUSING TO TAKE THE HINT HAHAHAHA 😂😂😂

lololol the speed jis se anika prakat hui when ragini touched shivaay. 😆😆😆

“kaadha? what’s kaadha?” “this? this green green item is kaadha! drink this, and your health will be TAN TANA TAN TAN TAN TAARA!”

hahahahahaha shivaay’s faceeeeeeee. 😂😂😂

this family is super big on its weird kaadhas. i’m on team ragini. it looks weird and hell no to drinking it, no matter what you say, billu in black. 😒😒😒

pfffffffffft, these two be eye-fucking riiiiiiiiiight in front of her. kuch toh sharam karo. 😶😶😶

ragini makes valiant second attempt. 😌😌😌

success! 🙌🏽🙌🏽🙌🏽

lmaoooooooooo if looks could kill, there’d just be scorch marks on the floor where billu previously stood. 🙃🙃🙃

i’m not falling for this tej-jhanvi nonsense again. tej’s a dirty dog who will never sudharofy. he doesn’t deserve to even be on the same continent as jhanvi. 😑😑😑

“kitne dino baad hum normally baat kar rahe hai!”

yeah it’s so sad when someone trying to set you on fire and that puts a damper on civil conversation. 😕😕😕

ugh this simpering conversation is sooooo boringgggggg. im fwdinggggg. 😣😣😣

yup. fully called it. 🙄🙄🙄

WAZZZZZZZZAAAAAAAAAAAAA QUEEEEEEEEEEEEEN I MISSSED YOUUUUUUUUUUUUU LOOKING FIRE AS EVERRRRRRRR 😍😍😍

... someone tell me where REAL bechaaaari svetlana is though. 😐😐😐

time for regularly scheduled Faraq Fight of the hour. 😊😊😊

baaat ka batangad. kaadha diya, zeher nahi. untwist your boxer briefs, billu. 🙄🙄🙄

he’s getting angsty and mad at her for believing that ragini is his fiancee, when that’s exactly what he wanted in the first place. stupidddddd boy. 😑😑😑

he’s thissss close to blurting out the truth. he’s this close to growling “how could you believe i could be remotely interested in anyone else?” 😌😌😌

oh ho, kabab mein omki. 😒😒😒

...yeh dikhaana tha? iske liye achcha khaasa sexy shivika moment kharaab kiya tha? 😠😠😠

ok rudra is the unfittest gym bunny i have ever seen. 10 crunches take it out of him???? son, i haven’t exercised since 2003, and *i* can do 10 crunches. 😕😕😕

also @ acp anda (as @vishwaspur calls her): who the fuckkkkkkk exercises with hair alll khulaaa and flowing around? 😑😑😑

caaaaasual misogyny time. nice to see that bit of rudra’s personality is constant. 😒😒😒

RETURN OF OLD SENSIBLE, SNARKY OMKARA. *CRYING OF HAPPY* 😭😭😭😭😭😭

pfffft, shivaay and his tarafdaari of baby brother. 😆😆😆

i honestly love how much shivaay babies rudra. it’s fucking adorable. 😚😚😚

ugh svetlana, girlllllllllll, you can honestly do SO MUCH BETTER? it painssssss me to see you waste your hotness on terrible tej. 😫😫😫

i just realised that i want svetlana and jhanvi to get together. like, as a couple. two amazing, beautiful queens. haaaaye. imagine the flawless. 😍😍😍 #jhanLana #makeItHappen

oufffffff, can this scene enddddddddd already? 😑😑😑

oh boy. what plan? will they steal jhanvi’s face next and put her in the freezer dabba? 😟😟😟

sarcasm singh oberoi needs to shut it. 😒😒😒

omkara is me. i am omkara. 🙄🙄🙄🙄

oh god are they going to sabotage his gym equipment? IT COULD KILL HIM, YOU FUCKING IDIOTS! 😧😧😧

of course pedantic singh oberoi has to sit and read the user manual. 😑😑😑

i relate with omki’s frustration level sooooo much rn. 🤦🏽🤦🏽🤦🏽

why are pinky/shakti on the DBO set of OM? 🤔🤔🤔

TAMEEZ AND DISCIPLINE? WHAT IS THIS, GURUKUL OF MOHABBATEIN? 🙄🙄🙄

ooooooop, shaktiji calling pinky out on the reallll issue. 🙊🙊🙊

oh dang. shaant shaktiji is shaaant no more. 😬😬😬

pffffffft, bhains ke aage been kyun baja rahe ho shaktiji? go do some pooja-paath instead. 😕😕😕

but yeah, this is the slow start to the pinky ka redemption track, methinks. she’ll continue with her ragini wala plan for a while, but then she’ll do something that’ll be her “ek kadam” and the family will forgive her and accept her. whatever. i don’t even care anymore. i just need her to stop being so nasty so i can stop hating her. it’s exhausting. 😖😖😖

“ab toh aaj yeh machine rahegi, ya main rahoonga!”

famous last words. 🤐🤐🤐

📰📰📰 tomorrow’s headlines 📰📰📰: oberoi scion (no, not the hot and short rude one. or the one with the hair. the other one.) killed due to stupidity. absolutely no one surprised. we’re amazed he made it this far. 

eeeeeee callback to “haath chod” moment of yore! omkiiiiiii. alavoooooo. *pulls his cheeks* 😘😘😘

i need the mom of a hot guy to throw her son at me, the way pinky is throwing shivaay at ragini. 😌😌😌 #suchSexPositive #muchProgressive #Wow 

ragini’s amazing faces of the day: 

how the fuck is dadi expecting this whole fucking taj mahal sized mansion to be painted IN ONE DAY?????????? 🤔🤔🤔

awwwww bulbul and her adorable baby cheenkein. 😊😊😊

pft. what a contrived issue. and these idiots are sooooooo useless. 😒😒😒

literally just some pics of shivika being attractively annoyed/annoying: 

this is suchhhhhhhhhhhhh a stupidddddd “problem”, lord. literally just watching for shivika and om’s hella beautiful faces. 😒😒😒

wow. gale force winds blowing inside the room at romantic scene. amaze. 😐😐😐

so... gender reversed fairy lights scene from IPKKND/DBO then. but with... gym equipment. sure. 🤷🏽🤷🏽🤷🏽

it’s amazing how little fucks i give about these two as a couple. i’m literally more invested in prinkveer. 😕😕😕

OH MY GOD WHY WON’T THIS SCENE ENDDDDDDDDDD????????? FWD FWD FWD FWDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD. can’t believe i’m having to sacrifice on bulbul screentime/rikara romance for this BS. 😒😒😒

there. there’s the beginning to pinky’s redemption. she’s going to try and expose him for jhanvi’s sake. but it’s gonna backfire and he’ll expose the truth about shivaay to fuck her over. oyyyy vey. 😬😬😬

these threeeee fucking idiots. don’t they have their own love/sex lives which are in shambles to attend to? khade ho kar vicariously getting kicks from the most thanda “love story” in the history of the world. 😒😒😒

greattttttt. back to square one. 😑😑😑

shivaay: “tum log ladne ke bahaane ko dhoond kyun rahe ho? come on, be nice to her, she helped you out.”

oh my god. OH MY GOD. irony just died a thousand fucking deaths right now. *lays flowers at its grave* 😧😧😧

ragini: comes to talk to shivaay.  shivaay: literally ignores her to turn to anika and randomly ask her what SHE’S up to. 😂😂😂

ohhhhhhhhh shivaaaay. why you even started this whole stupid engagement drama when you don’t even have the mettle to act on it for 10 minutes is beyond me. 🙄🙄🙄

oh nooo, ragini ki choppppp. 😋😋😋

pinky’s gonna do it. she’s gonna blurt it out. 😗😗😗

yuppppppppp. she’s... 

oh no, shaktiji is putting addddchan. and misunderstanding her intentions. 😐😐😐

I FULLY NEED JHANVI TO GONE GIRL TEJ’S ASS. LIKE YESTERDAY. PLEASE GOD. HE DESERVES TO BE STABBED IN THE FACE, THIS LYING SNAKE. 😡😡😡

ok, when someone is going to SUCH lengths to prove their story, it’s shady af. 🙄🙄🙄

yes pinky, please use your tedhaaa dimaag for productive things like these. leave your son alone for like a day, so he can get laid already.  😑😑😑

LMAOOOOOOOO WHY IS ANIKA SO SMUGLYYYYY SWAYING WHILE SHIVAAY LOOKS UNCOMFORTABLE? 😂😂😂😂😂

GENDA CHAAP DANT MANJAN. lolololol. 😆😆😆

produced by same company as chamko detergent??? 😁😁😁

of course he doesn’t know what manjan is. #burgerBachcha 🙄🙄🙄

GOD SHE’S SO STINKING CUTE I CAN’T EVEN. HOW IS IT POSSIBLE FOR ONE PERSON TO BE THIS CUTE? IT SHOULD BE BIOLOGICALLY IMPOSSIBLE! THE LEVELS OF CUTE IN HER BLOOD ARE TOO HIGH!!!!!!!!!!! 😧😧😧😧😧😧😍😍😍😍😍😍😍 

“shivaay, aap na meri baat kabhi nahi samjhenge.” “main toh tumhe hi nahi samajh paaya, anika. tumhaari baaton ko kya samjhunga.”

ooooop. things suddenly serious. though, is he talking still labouring under the misunderstanding, or does he Know��� about what she did? 🤔🤔🤔

“story kahin se kahin bhi pohunch jaaye, lekin yeh dono har do minute kisi na kisi pillar ke peeche hi milenge.” “ya phir RK pose mein!” 

lmaoooooooooo 😂😂😂

anika be like bitch i don’t have time for this passive aggressive emotional garbage. ANIKA OUT!!!!!!!!!! 😒😒😒

lololol om’s shiftyyyyyyyyy look. GODDDDD MAN, WHAT EVEN IS YOUR FACEEEEEEEEE I LOVE YOUUUUUUUUUUU 😍😍😍😍😍😍

hahaha khanna be hardcore shivika shipper from literally day 1. shivaay have dinner with some other ho? NOT ON HIS WATCH! ❌❌❌

pft such contrivedddddddd excuses. and these idiots are falling for it too. 🙄🙄🙄

how nice and convenient that there’s such strategic mood lighting that makes their skin look perfect and glowy. 😌😌😌

THIS ISN’T THE FUCKING STOREROOM. THIS IS THAT... ok idk what to call it, but it’s that random performance hall type space in their house. 😐😐😐 

waaah lighting got even more romantic. and there’s dinner too! 😇😇😇

me: waaay more excited about the food >>> the man. 😊😊😊

ooooooooooh. things getting serious. and angstyyyyyyyyyy. 😌😌😌

lmao what the fuck even is this tent nonsense? WHY WOULD YOU SET UP A TENT IN WHAT LOOKS LIKE A FULL-ON FUCKING STORM? HOW LONG IS OM PLANNING TO STAND THERE HOLDING ON TO THE DAMN THING????????? 😕😕😕

JUST GET IN THERE AND CUDDLE WITH HER, BOO. 🙃🙃🙃😚😚😚😉😉😉

[yourtoradorasextendedwarranty]

The Problem with MSM

So I honestly don't have many followers. I'm also prone to going on tangents. And most of my posts are rooted in politics. Not by choice mind you. I was not the one that decided literally everything in existence is political. I'm also not the one that created the view points that want everything to be political. TL;DR At the bottom.

To start off however, I need you to understand the process of radicalization.

Find someone who feels discontent with how a situation is, or how their life is

Tell this person that what's happening to them is not their fault

Place the blame for this person's problems on a certain group (political group, racial group, religious group, etc.)

Talk to the person like you know how they feel, "drop your guard" and tell them "problems you've had that were not your fault" blaming that same group

Show them that they are either a victim or oppressed in some way, shape, or form.

Slowly start swaying their views further to the extreme, by showing them other instances of "others who are being attacked or are victims" of said group.

Promptly but softly oppose any "differing views" with warped information or flat out lies

Get them to start going to events and taking to others that have already been radicalized

Have you and another radicalized individual, keep track of this person and say you support them and their issues

Sit back and watch

Now this is a rough lost but more or less the bare bones basics of radicalizing other people. Though in some cases it takes more steps and in some others it takes less. So what does this have to do with MSM (Mainstream Media)? Quite a few things in modern day actually.

The job of MSM is to get you information, as fast as humanly possible. This however was not the first goal priority in the past. In the past, the first priority was to cover a story as factually as the could, and look for more information keeping people constantly updated. Here we get to our first real problem for Media today. Technology. The Advent of modern technology has been both a blessing and a curse in this regard. And of course I'm talking about the internet in its current form. The internet being the very center of information distribution in 2019. And it has been for almost 12 years now.

So what did this change? Basically everything we know today. "Old wives tales" are now a Google search away. Feeling sick? WebMD says you have Cancer. Looking for the next hour story? Check CNN's Twitter account. The Internet brought us a great, many things. But it has taken away just as many. MSM has had to slowly move operations into social media in order to try and stay relevant. This because many people have unplugged, and have gone full digital. The only real exceptions being places of business. And with the world at your finger tips at the clock of a button, being factual has lost its relevance. Not to mention that as far back as 2013-2014 activists started working for MSM companies. Most notably progressive activists. This causes many problems we currently see today. Below is an example of what a headline used to look like, and what most headlines look like now:

Normal headline: Shooting in Birmingham leaves 3 dead and several injured during city wide festival.

Headline now: White, Trump supporter, Nazi, KKK, skin head, punches 2 people in hate crime.

See the difference? The first headline shows the basic facts and dives into known details during the article. Often they'd avoid opinions all together. The second one one the other hand, blatantly discloses anything that could generate clicks. Why? Because true or not, outrage sells. So over the past several years, MSM has been slowly radicalizing us. But they do this on a bipartisan level.

Are you black? The cops will kill you, and the white man is evil. Can't find a job? Racism. Are you a woman? Then you're unhappy because "rape culture". Do you regret having sex with that guy? Well guess what? He actually raped you without you realizing. Are you white? You're evil. Are you strait? You're a monster and should give all your money to gay people. Are you a man? You are responsible for every rape ever committed. You're also a pedophile and violent. Are you a strait white man? Oh boy you won the jackpot because you're basically Hitler.

See my point here? MSM spends most of it's time trying to rage bait you into clicking their articles. And in doing so we've gotten so lazy as a country that half the time, we don't even read past the headlines. And MSM knows this. They don't care if you read what they write. They are just radicalizing you so they can keep feeding you outrage. Because the more often they do it, the more often you will click it, skim all of 3 lines and then hop on Twitter and talk about how outraged you are. Sure, we are just as to blame for letting it happen to us, but most of us used to have at least some trust in the media. But after SEVERAL severely awfully false hit pieces that were headline news for almost months, many of us have started staying away from MSM.

What incidents might I be talking about?

Covington Catholic controversy (Almost every media outlet took a 7 second clip and ran with it. Turns out, there was a full 2hr video out there, and the Native American man, whom CNN interviewed, lied his ass off. Most media also chose to ignore the VERY beginning of the video which showcased a group called The Black Hebrew Israelites. These individuals, called Trump a homosexual, called the Native Americans there "Uncle Tomahawk", and said Gay people should not have rights. THESE CATHOLIC STUDENTS, were appalled by this statement. But what did we see in the media? "Racist Maga hat kid threatens and blocks the path of a Poor innocent Native American man."

Duke Lacrosse. Years after these kids were crucified by the Media and many others, the girl actually came out saying it never happened. You know who reported on this? Next to no one.

Ferguson. Now as controversial as this one is, the media took and RAN with it. What followed after the skewed coverage was a cult like gathering that led to phrases like, "hands up don't shoot" and "oink oink, bang bang". But Obama had the issue federally investigated. Both witnesses and the coroner report said basically the same thing. That he was aggressively wrestling with the cop trying to take his gun. But, it's too late. Now all cops are evil, and Democrat politicians are quoting it like it happened yesterday, and claiming the cop guilty. Why? Because MSM already got what they needed. They radicalized the individuals they wanted, people who will come back to them for, "facts".

And what does all of this boil down to? A video that made me write this out.

2 things need to be said here. 1. The "manifesto" as it were, was actually debunked to have been uploaded by the shooter, by the site admin himself. As well as several other sources. 2. If, by some chance the manifesto was real, and he had someone upload it for him, he mentions several liberal talking points, like universal basic income, saving the environment, among other left policies.

But this brings me back to both the beginning and to this story. Assuming for a moment, the manifesto was his. How did this happen? Most of you might just jump and say, "RACIST NAZIS", or something slightly more colorful. But here is the thing. MSM is partly responsible for all of this. Assuming the conspiracy that the CIA or FBI is responsible is false, I agree with the YouTuber in the picture. I believe that if you belittle and berate someone enough over time, you can cause them to do extreme things. I mean look at this site. Look at Twitter. Look at MSM. "White people bad", "white people are evil" "K*LL all whites" "white privilege", "fuck men", "male tears", "man spreading", "mansplaining", "Yes all men". All of this. This is popular. This is a trend. And it's unacceptable. Because frankly, it's basically bullying someone into a corner. Personally? I've been told by a few companies that are scared of social justice warriors and the online hate mob, that their company is actively not hiring white individuals. And I wish, REALLY WISH, I was making that up.

Is it any wonder, that people who go to the internet as an escape end up in a low point in their lives and then decide to do something awful? And it's the same with school shootings too. The news puts out, the name, ethnicity, how tall they are, and their entire life story, for weeks at a time. And now for much longer, because they support the desire to ban guns. So they need these things to happen more often. So the glorify the shooter, and keep talking about him/them for months. But here is where the story gets fun.

Columbine's shooting, was actually supposed to be a bombing. The kids who did it? Not the "school losers" the media talked about. The trench coat club? They were not even apart of it. More info on that here. As well as other places on Google.

More or less This video covers what the media got wrong in their rush to cover everything. What they did not intend on, was making these two boys heros to those bullied in school. Mostly boys, who are torn down and told they aren't enough, that they don't matter, they are isolated, bullied, harassed. So they look for someone who stood up to their bullies. What they were given, was a sociopath who manipulated a suicidal boy into helping him commit mass murder. Almost all of MSM were quick to say they were bullied into it. What's worse however, is Parkland. The Parkland 5, (the students whom MSM propped up for months) one of them came out admitting, that she bullied the guy who shot up the school. Said he was weird and that she needed to do it. This is one of the teens the media has PROPPED UP, saying we should listen to their infinite wisdom. A girl who is probably half responsible for the shooting.

Start paying attention. Start doing research. And for the love of all that is holy, STOP BULLYING PEOPLE! I don't care what your narrative is, or what it means. IE:

White people are human

Black people are human

Hispanic people are human

Gay people are human

Strait people are human

Women are human

Men are human

Stop normalizing anything to the contrary. Because when you do, you become part of the problem.

TL;DR The media only cares about themselves and clicks. They don't care who they radicalize, so long as you keep giving them traffic. Which for them is money. Do your research, look into things, and don't bully people. I'm looking at you progressives.

[sinceileftyoublog]

Chuck Mead Interview: Hit It, Get It, and Quit It

BY JORDAN MAINZER

Context isn’t everything, but it can often shape the mood of a record. Such is the case with Close To Home, the new one from Nashville-based Americana artist Chuck Mead. Recorded in the legendary Sam Phillips Recording studio in Memphis and produced by Matt Ross-Spang, Close To Home is a record of true stories and legends, featuring with some Memphis stalwarts, exemplary of the loose expansiveness of the Home of the Blues as opposed to the concision of Music City, laden with Mead’s quintessential sense of humor and just enough sincerity to evade corniness. 

On Close To Home, there are songs of devotion that tackle both moods: For instance, “My Baby’s Holding It Down”, Mead’s sweet tribute to his wife who looks after his home when he’s on tour, is a non-traditional juxtaposition with a song like “Daddy Worked The Pole”. That one’s about a man who got a job hanging telephone wire so his wife wouldn’t have to work the kind of pole that normally comes to mind--until she started stripping so he didn’t have to work. “Billy Doesn’t Know He’s Bad” and “There’s Love Where I Come From” occupy two sides of the same coin, the former an exasperated look at a sociopathic outlaw and the latter an ode to inclusiveness, both songs in it for the good guys. The distorted country rock of “Big Bear in the Sky” references Native American lore; the title track tackles the eerie prescience of songs on the radio. But as serious as Mead gets, he’s also having loads of fun, with the bayou grooves of “Shake”, barroom piano of “Tap Into Your Misery”, and reggae blues of “I’m Not The Man For The Job”. Perhaps the most ramshackle is the old-school hillbilly burner “Better Than I Was (When I Wasn’t So Good)”, which ends with a snippet of the recording of the song itself. “Did that sound drunk enough?” asks bassist Mark Andrew Miller with an appropriate drawl.

I spoke to Mead over the phone last week about Close To Home, and my main takeaway was that his personality was reminiscent of the album itself. Friendly, engaged, unafraid to tell me when I was wrong about the record, and possessing of a penchant for quotes, quotables, and non-sequitir, Mead was a delight to talk to. He’s coming to City Winery on Thursday for The Cosmic Honky-Tonk Revue, a co-headlining tour with Jim Lauderdale and Jason Ringenberg, all backed by his band, the Grassy Knoll Boys. Read the interview below, edited for length and clarity.

Since I Left You: What about Close to Home is unique to you as compared to your previous records?

Chuck Mead: The lion’s share of what I record is in Nashville, so going to Memphis to do it is a departure. To put yourself in a different place--and there were a couple of songs we had been playing for a little while that took on a different dimension just because of where we were and the studio we were in, the Sam Phillips Recording studio he built in 1962 when he left Sun [Records]  and had enough money to do what he wanted to do. My buddy Matt Ross-Spang is a great producer and is the manager for the place now doing a lot of great work. Just tapping into the spirit of Sam Phillips, where anything can happen.

SILY: The title of the record is taken from the idea of songs that “hit close to home.” Were you playing with the idea that home is not as much a concrete place as it is a feeling?

CM: Yeah, I guess you could say that. You’re always close to home. Home is where the heart is...on the bus! Sorry, that’s a Frank Zappa quote. But it’s true, nonetheless. I think you hit on something. But that particular song [the title track] is about how some weird song on the radio explains exactly what you’re going through. How does that happen? Man. That thing you said last week that came true. It makes it seems like there’s some order in the universe when probably there’s not. It seems like it happens a lot. I don’t want to get too spacey or hippie-dippie about it.

SILY: You mentioned working with Matt. How did the record have a different instrumental vibe than your previous ones?

CM: We never had someone coming into play like during this one. Don Herron who used to be in BR549 played some fiddle. Critter Fuqua from Old Crow Medicine Show came in and played accordion. It was still very Nashville-centric, but because we were in Memphis, we got Rick Steff to play the keyboards. John Paul Keith came in and played guitar. It lent more of a local flavor to it. It led to a slightly different vibe, which is great. Doing the same thing every time would be pretty boring, don’t you think?

SILY: And the album within itself has a nice variation--speaking of which, how did you decide upon the sequencing?

CM: You know, I don’t know. I just went through different sequences the songs were in, and it just seemed to flow the best the way it came out. It’s not like we were trying to tell a long story or anything. The songs seem to go together even though there’s a lot of different kind of things on it, and I guess that’s just because it’s us.

SILY: I want to ask you about a few specific tracks. First up: Is “Big Bear in the Sky” literally about stargazing?

CM: Well, no, it’s about that particular constellation. Many different cultures have a legend that they put a bear up there in the constellation. This particular story is an Indian legend from up in Canada. Originally, the song was for the Bear Family label out of Germany. [Founder Richard Wieze] asked me to write a bear song for their 40th anniversary.

SILY: I like the juxtaposition in the track “My Baby’s Holding It Down” between “holding it down” and “holding me down.” What’s the difference to you?

CM: Well, she never holds me down. She’s holding it down because I’m not there. But she’s not holding me down at all--though she could probably kick my ass. People who travel a lot, the people at home have to take care of stuff. And when you’re home, you have to take over, because they’re holding it down the rest of the time. She’s also probably holding down her anger. [laughs] But not really. People suck it up and they get through life. That’s just kind of what that song’s about. She doesn’t need me around. I guess I’m kind of nice to have around sometimes.

SILY: It’s about your wife, presumably?

CM: Yeah. I wrote it with my friend Paul Cebar, who also travels a lot and has been married about as long as I have. But you can write only so intimate a song. It’s general. It’s a tribute to significant others who hold it down a lot.

SILY: In the song “Better Than I Was (When I Wasn’t So Good)”, at the end, when you say, “Did that sound drunk enough at the end?”--

CM: That was Mark Andrew Miller who said that. [laughs, then imitates] “Did that sound drunk enough?”

SILY: Was that the type of thing you simply left in because it was so funny?

CM: Well, yeah. When we got the rough mix of it back, and that was in there, we thought, “Well, that’s gotta stay.”

SILY: Let’s talk about “Billy Doesn’t Know He’s Bad”. In so much of traditional music, you have murder ballads where the murderer has a clear intention and a lot of agency, and here, it’s a song where you have a lot of empathy for this murderous outlaw who doesn’t know why he’s doing the things he’s doing.

CM: No, I don’t have a lot of empathy. It’s a comment on sociopathic people. They think everybody thinks exactly like them, but they don’t care. They don’t know they’re being bad. They don’t know they’re assholes. I’m not excusing anything. Billy was an asshole. He lit up his neighbor’s house for no reason! It was a comment on someone like Jesse James or Billy The Kid who were kind of glorified for the way they lived their lives. Jesse James robbed and killed people. He’s a sociopath. You try to be understanding of it. When I wrote that song--Logan Ledger and I wrote that song--it seemed like it needed something. Mark Miller said, “Hey man, I think I have a good bridge for that.” So he comes up with that middle part that takes it to a whole new level of people trying to understand the way they are, nature, and nurture. It really ties it all together. I was really happy to have that happen. It’s kind of different. Those songs aren’t usually about that. It’s usually about a guy who kills his girlfriend because she’s pregnant or something.

SILY: Do you think the instrumentation of that song was an intentional contrast to how you’re viewing the character and subject matter?

CM: No, that was just kind of the way it came out. We went through it a bunch of times. I guess Rick added a Mellotron on that song to make it more dramatic, which helped out the bridge. In that sense, I guess you’re right. But it was one of those things that evolved in the studio. When we were originally working it out, it was just us four. That’s the thing that can happen in Memphis that doesn’t always happen here in Nashville, though that’s less true as time goes on. A lot of people own their own studios and cut their records so they can take as much time as they want. I don’t have that luxury. Usually, you just go into a studio and bang it out because everybody’s so damn good. In Memphis, you like to kick it around a little bit. That’s why we were able to chase that one around the room a little while.

SILY: What’s the inspiration behind the cover art of the record?

CM: I’ve been working with Jim Herrington for a long time. He’s my best friend. He’s done all of my solo records. He did the first couple of BR549 records, too. He’s photographed tons of great people over the years, and he and I have this consistency of getting something slightly noir that doesn’t look like your average album cover. Probably one of my favorite things someone said--there was a review of the record where the guy didn’t know anything about country or Americana but was drawn to the record because he thought it looked like Bryan Ferry. He liked the record, and he said, “It’s the most curious record you’ll hear all year.” For him, I guess. I don’t seem so curious. But it’s a tribute to the mysteriousness of Jim Herrington’s photo.

SILY: How are you adapting these new songs to the stage?

CM: Just goin’ out there and playin’ ‘em. [laughs] We’ve been playin’ ‘em over in Europe. Just bangin’ it out. We really did it pretty much live right there in the studio. More than a few songs, that was the vocal I was singing while we were cutting. Of course, we did overdubs where necessary, but there’s a certain liveness you want [in order] to capture the spirit of what’s going down. But when you start playing them after a while they do take on a certain dimension?

SILY: Extending a part or jamming.

CM: We don’t do too much of that. Sometimes, we’ll cut loose. We’re not a jam band to play a song for 30 minutes, although there’s nothing wrong with that. But I like to hit it, get it, and quit it.

SILY: Anything you’ve been listening to, watching, or reading lately that’s caught your attention?

CM: I’m reading a Lightning Hopkins biography right now. That guy recorded a lot of songs. [laughs] He’s one of my favorites though. I just finished this novel called Country Dark that was pretty damn good, about people up in Kentucky. Listening--I’ve mostly been listening to a lot of Jim Lauderdale and Jason Ringenberg. Gettin’ ready for the tour. We all have records out. Of course I like Margo Price’s record.

Album score: 7.1/10

[romanmacharoni]

The Best Songs of 2016

I know some critics say that 2016 was a bad year for music (and yes, it was, let’s be honest). We also lost quite a few great musicians too. The world won’t be the same without titans like Prince, Bowie, and George Michael. 

That doesn’t mean there wasn’t a lot of awesome music out there. Quite a few songs set fire to the charts in more ways than one and really showed us that there are diamonds in the rough. There were 15 in particular, similar to my film list for the year, so here we go. These were the best songs of 2016.

First, some honorable mentions...

“Dangerous Woman” by Ariana Grande https://open.spotify.com/track/7l94dyN2hX9c6wWcZQuOGJ

The only reason it’s not on the list itself is because of its poor sense of pace. The build is way too monotonous and slow. The chorus kills it, though, as Ariana feels right at home hitting this sweet spot on the album of the same name. 

“Chunky” by Bruno Mars https://open.spotify.com/track/0mBKv9DkYfQHjdMcw2jdyI

Bruno Mars’ newest album, 24K Magic (which title track is on the actual list, spoilers), has quite a few winners on there, but this sticks out as the second best of the album. Though it’s weird to refer to normal sized, curvy woman as ‘chunky’, it’s still a pleasant jam with a tight production as it plays to Mars’ strengths. The back-up vocals complement him well, and the keyboard adds some welcome spice to the composition.

“Adventure of a Lifetime” by Coldplay https://open.spotify.com/track/69uxyAqqPIsUyTO8txoP2M

I feel like this has become a commercial song (not that’s always a bad thing), but this is still a solid track. Delightful to listen to when you’re in a good mood. Coldplay isn’t what they used to be, but they are far from bad with this new direction. That guitar ‘drop’ if you will is trance-like and peppy. With all the slow stuff we got this year, it’s nice to have something like this on the radio. 

“The Good News” by Bloc Party https://open.spotify.com/track/3FI3nRETDMfK3z9SQwfVZr

While bright and loaded with the religion-inspired direction of Bloc Party, this song has some needed grit. Those guitar on the chorus give this track warmth and something to chew on while you’re listening. Kele’s soft vocals pair well with the strings to create something wonderful. 

“Play That Song” by Train https://open.spotify.com/track/3ZMFrvkNgwwMfPdX3aThYs

 This is what “Soul Sister” should have been. Happy, short and sweet. Not great, but still an enjoyable song. That’s probably because Pat Monahan isn’t inserting his odd lyrcial nuggets in there (See in previous songs: “I’m so gangster, I’m so thug”, “Hefty bag to hold my love”). 

“The Plain Moon” by The Besnard Lakes https://open.spotify.com/track/0p6DGv92OOuXu927xxlkmH

Call it bias (I did an article on them for coming to the Beachland Ballroom), or my apology for my editor messing up the headline for a story I did on the band (sorry again, if you’re reading this). Regardless, this song is the strongest track on “A Coliseum Complex Museum”, meshing a psychedelic flow with heavy guitars to create a haunting atmosphere. The vocals have the feel of ghosts, slowly moving in and out of the lush acoustics laid on thicker than honey. It’s a powerful jam in terms of sonics and a brilliant piece of music that honestly should have charted. Also, you can put “Towers Sent Her to Sheets of Sound”, reminiscent to a Beach Boys jam mixed with the usual psychedelic sound, on here as well. They’d be tied if this wasn’t an honorable mention.

You can read my piece on the Besnard Lakes here. 

“East Coast Girl” by Butch Walker https://open.spotify.com/track/2PMRCXna6KCB5D5EVU3hzD

 Consider this the unofficial #16 of this list. A modern fusion of personalities such as Bruce Springsteen and John Mellencamp collide in this cool little flashback track. Butch really projects himself in the chorus, opposed to his laid-back delivery in the verses. The storytelling feel to the verse as well places you into that throwback mood this song gives off. 

Now, onto the list...

#15 -  “Love Like That” by Mayer Hawthorne https://open.spotify.com/track/2pk8466VZtaO1QiiqaSJ8e

 I’ve been a fan of Hawthorne for a while. His use of old and new conventions to create fantastic pieces of music has been on my radar for equally as long. His appeal mimics how Chromeo came on the scene in 2014. Of his three singles released this year, “Love Like That” feels the most fitting for the radio and this list. Its crisp production is paired with a bombastic chorus and tight percussion. Mayer clearly knows what he’s doing here. A strong song to start off this list. 

#14 - “The Love Within” by Bloc Party https://open.spotify.com/track/35Qc5U57RCROGY3h2l0d51

 Bloc Party’s “Hymns”, another re-invention for the decade-and-counting post grunge Brit-punk band, begins with a looping, weaving synth. It’s met with a thudding bass drum and Kele’s voice welcoming you to their new musical direction. And then the drop hits, and you know that this will be a fun ride. Very few albums this year start out this strong. I still haven’t heard anything like this so far. It’s just fantastic, and at the same time fascinating. 

#13 - “Send My Love (To Your New Lover)” by Adele https://open.spotify.com/track/3LGxef3inmn5jMLGDz9lqw

While I did enjoy “When We Were Young” off her album “25″ a lot, “Send My Love” layers her voice beautifully and gives her a unique platform to provide her heavenly vocal work and deliver a great performance. The minimalist nature of her music is a little less evident here, but it’s not overpowering. It feels more free than her usual mega-smash hits, which is why I decided to place this track on here rather than the aforementioned “Young”. The lone guitar providing the majority of the back beat is solid and quite atmospheric. And as always, Adele knocks it out of the park.

#12 -  “Reaper” by Sia https://open.spotify.com/track/1usLCyaUZ2y0uoPmKj1uYo

So Kanye West helped out Sia for this song off her album “This Is Acting”. You can tell. The delivery is very close to West’s part in the previous year’s “FourFiveSeconds”, and Sia has the conviction to make it feel genuine. I guess her ‘acting’ is just fine for this. I enjoy the sing-a-long feel to this track and the flow of the lyrics in the chorus most of all. Sia can really let herself lay it all out on this one, and it’s probably why this was chosen to be a single off the record. 

You can read my review of “This Is Acting” as an album right here. 

#11 - “Same Old Blues” by Phantogram https://open.spotify.com/track/28iw1FqJf6Vnfl2Fcu9rBh

I made sure to not include non-charting songs (as in not on the Hot 100) out of my Top 10, as I try to focus on hits, but I had to include this one. Plus, their third album — appropriately entitled “Three” — placed 9th on the Billboard Hot 200 in late October, and this song feels like the star of the album, burning so bright that’s blinding. It’s an elegant orchestration with gorgeous vocal work, and a killer guitar break towards its conclusion. Phantogram have always been known to brilliantly deconstruct and build their tracks to create sweeping pieces of music, and this is no exception. A fantastic piece I can recommend to everyone.

#10 -  “Cheap Thrills” by Sia https://open.spotify.com/track/27SdWb2rFzO6GWiYDBTD9j

From those of you who may have read my review for “This Is Acting” (link above), you might have seen that I said that the album was only slightly above average, a mixture of hits and misses. However, when Sia hits... it’s masterful. This one isn’t the most well written or put together, but it captures a feeling better than anything else on the album. I guess she’s been writing for Rihanna for so long that I can’t tell if this is her attempt to sound like her or Sia’s elements that she adds to Rihanna’s repertoire, but it works. This pseudo-island feel suits Sia as perfectly the odd face-concealing wigs she wears. 

#9 - “Into You” by Ariana Grande https://open.spotify.com/track/2meEiZKWkiN28gITzFwQo5

The first four tracks of her third studio album “Dangerous Woman” are pretty stellar, a mixture of the elements that make Ariana shine among the other pop divas (Daya, you could learn a thing or two). This string of songs is capped off by this slice of polished and refined pop excellence. The structure and production screamed for this to be a hit, and the populous answered accordingly. Grande’s grand on this track (see what I did there?), belting it out and oozing with sensuality.

#8 - “Drive It Like You Stole It” by Sing Street ensemble https://open.spotify.com/track/2ZBiHAwdeCnrKvXap6Yzef  

I don’t mean the other version with Hudson Thames. His vocals alone are… not as good as the original released with the trailer for “Sing Street”. The added filters to his voice as well as the back-up performers fit the mood of the bouncy instrumental a lot better. Simply put, a welcome homage to 80′s pop ballads. The beat almost has a doo-wop feel to it, fitting for a film that somewhat resembles an alternative “Footloose”. The final chorus breakdown is also what I consider hair-standing-up-on-neck pop perfection.

#7 - “Starboy” by The Weeknd ft. Daft Punk https://open.spotify.com/track/7MXVkk9YMctZqd1Srtv4MB

The Weeknd made my top spot last year (in a tie, too!) but this year there was quite a few acts who really stepped up their game, so here he sits. That doesn’t mean that this song isn’t kick-ass, though. Daft Punk found a great partner in ol’ Saturday/Sunday here, as they meld a tight and methodical instrumental to pair with Weeknd’s always fine-tuned vocals. Elements of Daft Punk blend with Weeknd’s usual darker tones to create a melody that manages to be glittery and haunting simultaneously. It’s an ear worm in the best way. The stars are far from the limit for this pairing; I really hope they try another collaboration.

#6 - “This Girl” by Kungs and Cookin’ on 3 Burners https://open.spotify.com/track/5D1swG82nVVngZLHOLbe0V

I’m placing the extended version on here because I believe it builds the instrumental easier without just throwing it all out there first thing. However, either version is solid. The original by Cookin’ on 3 Burners is nostalgic kick-back to blues classics, but this sped-up and pumped-up remix by Kungs gives this song some needed pep. And those trumpets, my God. They’re loud, they’re large and in control; they make this song an instant summer classic in my opinion. Best drop of the year, bar none. I can’t say enough good things about this song.

#5 - “Let Me Love You” by DJ Snake, Justin Bieber https://open.spotify.com/track/0lYBSQXN6rCTvUZvg9S0lU

DJ Snake has really stepped up his game. This song feels minimal but is structured perfectly for a satisfying experience. Bieber’s vocals are great here, it feels like he’s really found his rhythm in this song. The drop is pure bliss and quintessential DJ Snake. It almost feels sad, as it complements the nearly pleading nature of the lyrics. The build works around the vocals to spotlight them and let them complement the composition.

#4 - “24K Magic” by Bruno Mars https://open.spotify.com/track/6b8Be6ljOzmkOmFslEb23P

Mars’ “Unorthodox Jukebox II: Electric Boogaloo” “24K Magic” opens with a bodacious nod to Zapp and Roger before breaking down into the grooviest track of the year. It’s also prove that lightning can be caught in a bottle, as it models itself and improves on “Uptown Funk” from the prior year. Normally I dislike the use of his ‘posse’ back-up vocalists, but they a lot to this track and make it feel like a true ‘playa’s’ anthem. Mars feels so loose on here, just shooting the breeze, juxtaposing the tight, restrained composition. A perfect party-starter with endless re-playability.

#3 - “Redbone” by Childish Gambino https://open.spotify.com/track/3kxfsdsCpFgN412fpnW85Y

This is one of the funkiest tracks to come out this year, a mix of a tribute to Bootsy Collins and R&B slow jams with a modern flair. Glover has a tremendous sense of pace here, taking its time to build. His voice throughout is strange yet inviting. I find myself always going back to this song by any mood, it’s just a beautiful piece of music.

#2 - “I Took A Pill in Ibiza— Seeb Remix” by Mike Posner https://open.spotify.com/track/1MtUq6Wp1eQ8PC6BbPCj8P

Depression and optimism mix to create such a solid song. Mike Posner’s meaningful lyrics are better highlighted here with this punchy bass rather than the original slow acoustic delivery. This personifies a state of lull with sparks of excitement. Even the small things like the tambourine in the bridge (you’ll never not notice it once you do) and the voice manipulation add so many layers to the track. It’s just so satisfying to listen to.  

#1 - “Lazarus” by David Bowie https://open.spotify.com/track/3Vn9oCZbdI1EMO7jxdz2Rc

This is the closest thing to a perfect song we got last year, and it came so early in the year as well. It stuck with me all this time. From the moment the drums kick in, it’s like a musical euphoria. This is where the dark scratches the surface of the light for me in terms of tone, a proverbial sweet spot if you will. The somber, beautiful saxophone pairs with a light funky bass and David’s brutally honest delivery. This is simply a masterpiece, a perfect final note for a career as varied and brilliant as Bowie’s. RIP Ziggy Stardust, even in death you showed us all what you’re capable of.  

[aion-rsa]

Immigration Nation Asks How Do We Fix The Unfixable?

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There’s a moment in the trailer for Netflix’s docuseries Immigration Nation that’s understandably garnered quite a bit of attention. In it, camera operators sit in the back of a van filming an Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agent on the job. The agent’s superior calls and says via speakerphone “I don’t care what you do but bring at least two people in.”

After the call ends, the agent says to the documentarians in the back, “He knew you guys were with me, right? Because that’s a pretty stupid thing to say.”

As developed by Christina Clusiau and Shaul Schwarz, Immigration Nation isn’t an exercise in “gotcha” storytelling by any means. Clusiau and Schwarz set out to capture a comprehensive picture of the United States’s broken immigration system and how it has changed in recent years. But due to the near totality of their access to ICE and its detention centers across the country, there are quite a few “gotchas” thrown in there all the same. 

Schwarz worked with ICE previously in 2011 while making his first documentary Narco Cultura about drug smuggling. Schwarz reached out to his ICE contact in 2017 with this concept and he and Clusiau were granted unprecedented access to the inner workings of the controversial division of DHS. If this seems like a bad decision for a governmental agency whose employees engage in people-snatching quotas, ICE eventually agreed, with the Department of Homeland Security trying to intimidate the couple into not releasing the series. 

But Immigration Nation is now out on Netflix all the same. And it’s about much more than merely ICE’s questionable PR tactics.

The six-episode series was shot over three years and seeks to understand the story of modern immigration in America through the daily workings of ICE agents, activists, attorneys, and undocumented immigrants. Contextualizing a nation of immigrants fear of immigrants is a tall task but it’s a task that Immigration Nation’s six installments are certainly up for. 

We spoke with Schwarz and Clusiau about the experience of bringing their project to life. 

DEN OF GEEK: When developing this concept, did you envision it as a feature or an episodic experience?

Christina Clusiau: From the beginning on this one we definitely wanted it to be an episodic series. We knew we had access to ICE and we really wanted to take an approach from an inside-out lens. Because when you’re inside the system, you get access to both the enforcement officers and to the individuals who are caught up in it. We were trying to create an arc of their lives from when they’re inside, to when they leave the system and the effects on their families that are left behind, those that have been separated, and the reunification of families in all of this.

Shaul Schwarz: The vision was episodic and was exactly what came out of it. From the moment we had access to ICE, we did not intend it to be a Cops kind of show only. We wanted to be a fly on the wall, inside the system, that tracks immigrants in quarantine and tells the stories of both the enforcers and the enforced. I think that just actually came pretty much exactly how we had hoped it is. 

What consideration went into deciding what topics would be introduced in each episode? It seems like there’s the overarching story of ICE and DHS throughout the series, but, in almost Wire-style, each episode introduces a new element to the system.

Shaul: To the Wire thing: our tagline opened up with, “In a Wire-like look at the immigration system…” Literally, that was the initial idea. What was hard about it was there was so much ground to cover because it’s such a complex issue. To that effect, there’s been so much change (within the system) as well that we have to balance that and figure out how to make a show out of it. We wanted to open with episode one “Installing Fear”, that shows how enforcement has radically changed, because I do think that was what set up the understanding of today’s immigration landscape. 

Usually you tell people “immigration” and they’re like, “So how was it on the Southern border?” But we were filming in New York in the beginning. ICE is actually the enforcement that is not protecting the border. It’s dealing with immigration inside the country. That was very important for us to, right off the bat, change that up and key you into the new reality and how that has pushed people into the shadows. Maybe an average New Yorker doesn’t understand that this cat-and-mouse atmosphere that’s been set is played in LA, Chicago, and many other places. 

Christina: Each area of the nation we profiled was different from one another, and we are approaching different issues within all those. New York was more about enforcement. El Paso, Texas is a detention center story of family separation, which is happening there. Charlotte was a worker’s story and delved more into local politics. I remember very early on we had a cut-out construction paper back on the wall of different places we were looking to go. 

You mentioned this is quite the sprawling endeavor. Practically, how did you go about filming? How many people did you have involved? How many cameras did you have? What was travel like?

Christina: Logistically, it was chaos. We had to be very nimble. We had to be able to jump at a moment’s notice. As for the team, overall, there’s around six of us shooting about 75%, 80% of the series.

Shaul: Christina and I both come from photography so with our prior films we shot almost everything. Here, it was not possible. So many things were just breaking in a moment. You never know when a detainee is moved. Now you can get access. Now, this operation is happening. In a weird way, we started to get more disciplined about what we run after, but you also have to stay extremely open minded.

For example, we met six parents who were separated from their families in El Paso Detention Center in the first few days that we spent there. Only three would make the show because of our ability to track their stories for a long time and not just make it about one strong moment. A lot of that was like that. It’s like working in this unknown because the drama is unfolding over a long time. We had great access to ICE, but we can’t go everywhere all the time. 

This is a question that you’ve undoubtedly gotten a lot already and will continue to get, but I feel compelled to ask it myself. Why on earth did ICE go along with this? Why did they think that this was a good idea?

Christina: That’s a really good question and I’m always conflicted by that. I think at the beginning, it was because of a previous connection that [Shaul] had with a spokesperson at ICE, and working on another story with him.

Shaul: Regardless of headlines or our fight at the end, we came in at a moment when the spokespeople knew they would come under fire. ICE is a law enforcement agency and that’s already a sensitive issue, as we can tell very clearly today, of police accountability. Under this administration, they understood that they’re going to come under a lot of heat. I think they wanted to let someone show what their real daily life looks like. We’re very grateful for that and we’re not cynical about it, and I think we did just that.

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Sure, there are moments that are uncomfortable, I hope the viewer doesn’t just come away and say, “Oh my God, that cop is such an ass.” It’s bigger than that. Sure, maybe there are some bad apples, but a lot of ICE officers we saw were actually put into this incredible, difficult position. I’ll give you an example. Judy is an officer in episode one who is going to a house to take the target of her investigation, and suddenly the man has a child. That is just inherently part of her job and it’s an extremely hard position to be in.A lot of people will ask that question, a lot of people maybe will be cynical, but if you think about it deeper, we can’t just throw those individuals under the bus, and I don’t think the show does. We have to think about our broken immigration system. And every person in ICE agreed that it’s broken, whether they were right wing or left wing. 

Christina: As filmmakers, too, we like complexity. We like taking issues that are challenging, polarizing, and divisive and have the viewer question what they thought they knew. I think that’s something we expressed very early on. From our previous work, we felt that we were able to take an issue that was very polarized and make people question it.

Shaul: Christina’s referring to Trophy, which was about trophy hunting. People expect that in Trophy we just shame these people. But, the truth about trophy hunting, and generally the idea that animals have some kind of value that equals money, and that could be part of conservation, is complicated. That is part of our journalistic and director style, to take that issue and flip it on its head and, quite frankly, often anger you as a viewer so you will be moved enough to dare to ask questions. I think that’s what we did with this law enforcement agency.

Obviously, the follow-up there is that ICE didn’t necessarily go along with it afterwards, What was it like to go through that experience – where DHS is trying to block your film as you cut it together.

Shaul: We can’t dive into the legal for obvious reasons, but I don’t wish it on my worst enemy. It’s haunting. We didn’t do a “got-you” piece and it didn’t change even after we were attacked. We didn’t fight to put more. If we wanted to do that, we could have done six hours of that. At the end of the day, we did get to tell our story, pretty much in full. It’s about the story and not about us, and I hope the show speaks to that. It’s a hard position to be in. I truly mean that from, unfortunately, our experience.

We are lucky enough to have a status, to have an amazing legal team. Most undocumented people don’t. I think we saw some parallels in systemic abuse of the system and I think they have a lot less tools to deal with. In their case, it literally destroys lives and families. 

While watching, I couldn’t help but wonder how hot, sticky, and uncomfortable it must be in a lot of these facilities by the border. Though the visuals from the series are striking, film is still limited to visuals and audio. Were there any lingering sensations, smells, or experiences that you recall from filming this and you don’t think the film could fully capture? 

Shaul: I don’t think anybody would understand what it really means to walk through the desert for days. That is definitely something that’s hard to capture. Also when you are taken into 26 Federal, the (ICE) headquarters in New York, you could go to anywhere – more than 200 holding facilities. You’re constantly moved and it is impossible to track you. It was impossible for us to keep up with that. For a family or for legal representation to actually be able to just stay in touch is so overwhelming. Those are the two that immediately come to my mind that were so hard to convey.

Christina: The desert. Just the vastness, the heat, and all what Shaul just said. But also the feeling of being detained. I think it’s something that is very hard to visualize and imagine – the actual emotion that goes into it for many people. To be in those facilities for such a long time, I think there’s a lot of feeling of hopelessness, a lot of feeling of loss, and a lot of feeling of trauma that was very hard for us to bring forward.

The tagline of the series asks “how do we fix a system that seems beyond repair?” As people who just spent years experiencing it and documenting it, do you have any insights on what are the first steps that we could take to fix that system?

Shaul: I think that this is an issue that’s been over-polarized. It’s complicated and we certainly don’t agree on some things, but I think we can all agree on more than you’d think. I’ll give you examples. Are there really many people that want to deport our veterans? I truly don’t believe that. I don’t believe that American people will think that’s right. I also don’t believe that the American people will think that we should abolish ICE and have no immigration police. I don’t believe that we should have a court system that’s backed up with a million cases of people who sit in private funded detention centers for upwards of a year. It’s just wrong. There’s a lot of examples like this. I think the first thing we have to do is educate the people that this is what’s happening. It’s gone bad under this administration but, in all honesty, it’s been bad for a while. Latinos called Obama “deporter-in-chief.” Bill Clinton created a lot of laws that mak\de people like these veterans deportable. 

This issue is that it’s become emotional for people and I just want to remind everyone of something very basic. Unless you’re Native American, somewhere down your line maybe recently, maybe further back, your people came here. People came here. Some of them were legal, some didn’t have “papers”, but ultimately it has made this country better. I truly believe that. We have to take some of this heated rhetoric out of and be able to say, “You know what? On this 50%, we don’t agree, but on this, we do.” We should fight to make it better because it makes us better, it’s the American way and we treat people with dignity. We need to bring that back. 

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