#and then I got nothing going on during the week until Friday the 14th (my birthday) and then Saturday I get a tattoo and Sunday new Barry

[milo-is-rambling]

Me when I just remembered I changed my main profile pic to my bounce castle (classic Milo can never get rid of bounce castle) and two human hearts and now I’m doing an art piece with a human heart as the center

[gra-sonas]

Hey! I hate to ask this, you already do so much for us! But would you mind just a tiny recap of Vlamis’ live from last night? You don’t have to go into a ton of detail or anything, I just saw that it was a half hour long. I have a weird anxiety thing that keeps me from watching lives and stories for the most. Still haven’t even been able to work myself up to watching the vlamburn one as much as I’d love to! 🙁

Either way, thank you for everything!

Okay, nonnie. I went and watched the whole thing again and wrote you a detailed account of what’s been said. I’ll link the live again, then you can watch here if you want to. Or not. Up to you. 🤗 Hope this helps. 💕

Brushing his teeth and flossing for 3 minutes while talking.

800 new follower lately “where have you been before?”

“Do you do anything to your hair at night?” He adds Moroccan hair oil in the morning, nothing at night.

“What’s your favorite of the drop?” He hasn’t seen everything from the drop (like the COSMIC tie-dye) bc he’s in Santa Fe. He loves the COSMIC and MALEX embroidered things (“so subtle”) bc they are in Vlamburn’s handwriting, he loves the Manesqueeze shirt bc you can make Alex and Michael kiss by putting your wrists together. He *loves* the candle (there’s one burning on his bedside table), the silky PJs are great, but he can’t decide on just one favorite thing.

“How’s Jesa’s sanity?” She needs like 3 weeks of sleep. He explains, that while we *are* the Vlambase, the Vlambase merch company’s just Jesa and Vlamis. Jesa has a team, but all the day-to-day things, ideas, emails/customer service (Jesa), the newsletter (Vlamis). They hadn’t collaborated with anyone before Tyler, so working with him was a new experience. 

One fan mentions how they wanted to buy stuff but couldn’t. Vlamis says that he’s been there, and when he wanted something in the past he couldn’t afford, he started putting away a Dollar a day. 

“Thought on One Direction?” Vlamis is a Harry Styles guy. “Harry Styles’ swagger is next level!”

“What do you think about Russia? Will Vlambase merch be available here?” Talks a bit about how annoying things are with shipping companies, says they wanted to protect themselves for the holidays, and now that the Christmas rush is over, some shipping options have become available again. 

“Who came up with  MANESQUEEZE” He ponders about it, and settles on Jesa. It was Vlamis’s ides to put tiny Alex and tiny Michael on the sleeves so that they can kiss tho. And Tyler came up with the idea to put a “toupee” on his head (in a previous drop, the NEVER LOOK AWAY design had tiny Alex and tiny Michael on the sleeves, but poor Alex was bald) for the design.

Someone got a MALEX pin and the candle. He knows the pin sold out fast, and he feels bad about that. They want everyone to get everything they want, but it’s difficult to make proper calculations how well an item will sell. The pandemic made things even harder. Like the PJ sets. Normally, they would wait until the sale ends and see how many sets were actually ordered, but during the pandemic, stock listings have been changing dramatically from day to day, so they had to pre-order the PJs and robes to make sure they had a certain number at their disposal. He said that they “overshot” on a couple of things, but ultimately sales have been great, and he appreciates that.

“I’m excited to make the MANESQUEEZE doodles kiss bc I do that with the NEVER LOOK AWAY shirt” Vlamis jumps up and shows his closet that’s full of Vlambase merch items.

“Why am I here, it’s almost 3am” He mentions that he’s been staying up until 4 in the past couple of days, but he has to be on set in 7 or 8 hours. 

“Hello, just wanted to let you know that I got a tattoo for you” Vlamis asks for a photo and to be tagged.

“Kyle the packer [Vlamis’s roomie KA, who works in the warehouse when a new drop is ready for shipping]” Vlamis says they’re working him to death.

“Please save this live” He doesn’t know whether he’ll save it. Thinks the one with Tyler was important, but since it’s just him, he doesn’t think it’s important.

“I followed Jesa, Jesa is the real MVP” Vlamis says that Jesa is “a beast, and best in the game”. Quickly explains who Jesa is, and that she’s his partner in the Vlambase merch company. He mentions that she recently called him with an idea for Valentine’s Day, and he was like “Jesa, we need to relax!” But she loved the idea. She’s a big fan of RNM and the characters (and Tyler). “Jesa’s amazing.”

“What about new Soli art [Soli’s the artist who created the Boys Will Be Boys art for a previous drop]?” Vlamis smiles. “What about new Soli art. I like that idea. 😏“

“Your house [in New Mexico] is so cute.” Vlamis says thank you and shows the ceiling of the house (which he likes best). “Santa Fe is dope!”

“I adore your teeth” *shows his teeth* Says he had to wear braces (some even adjustable)

“I could’ve used my birthday money to buy something but I forgot” 🤨 << Vlamis’s face. “How you you forget, man?”

“Back to Twitter after this live” He mentions that he’d just been on Twitter before the live.

He got retweeted by Mountain Dew and loves it.

“I’m from Australia and hope my merch arrives before winter” Vlamis says he hopes shipping will be fast. 

“Love the Valentines” They’re not actually Valentines, hence they’re “Love Notes”.  Vlamis considers doing them not just around Valentine’s Day. 

“You catch any of the CW shows returning this month?” “Might have to” But he knows what he’ll be catching on the 12th. “Prodigal Son, baby!”

“Where did you get the Game Boys?” Those are his Game Boys. He has a Game Boy Advanced and a Game Boy Color. 

“How do you feel about Forlex?” *scoffs* 😒 “Yeah” 

“So excited for the robe!” Vlamis gets excited. “The robes and the PJs are so comfy!” Talks about how it’s a bit weird, bc they don’t make them themselves.

Several people mention that their closet looks like his closet bc of all the merch and he loves that. 

“How do you feel about Forlex” *gets agitated* “Why are you asking me this? Don’t do that to me, alright?” *softer* “Don’t do that.”

“How are you doing?” He’s doing very well. Very relieved that eh sale went well. This drop was like 3-4 months of work, the night before the sale felt like an entire month, too. Jesa and Vlamis Facetimed for more than 5hrs. They set up the website, and that’s how the glitch with the GIVE ME MALEX OR GIVE ME DEATH shirts and poster happened. They made a mistake and only noticed after the website went live. 

“Do you know when S3 will air?” No, he thought it might’ve been sooner, but apparently not.

“I love your poetry from the last drop so why no poems this time?” He writes poems when he’s inspired, he hasn’t written a poem in a while. He’s currently preparing to direct his first movie in June 2021, and he’s been very focused on that. 

“The Meet & Greet day changed.”  Filming schedule changed bc they had snow, the schedule’s changing constantly. He’ll be set all day tomorrow (well, today, Jan 11) from 8am until 8 or 9pm. Sometimes they might even wake up in the morning and learn that the schedule’s been changed. 

 “You could talk about nothing and we’d still watch.” He doesn’t want to talk about nothing, wonders if anyone has any questions about the sale.

“I’m so excited about the robe. I was going to buy more but I’m broke.” He says we should be responsible.

Someone’s still waiting about their Black Friday stuff, but he says it’s the shipping company, not them. 

“Vlamentines" He *loves* that, thinks it’s a good pun. 

“Gotta support Aurora.” Always. 🥰

“Jealous Guerin in S3?” You’ll see, you’ll see.

“I placed 3 orders, last one last night. Give me Malex or give me death.” He loves it. He also mentions, that they’re working hard on figuring out how to combine orders in the future so people don’t have to pay for shipping several times. They just can’t do that logistically at the moment. 

“Real talk, how often do you check your DMs?” He says, that some people might’ve noticed that he occasionally likes random photos on people’s IG pages. When that happens, it’s a sign that he read someone’s DM. He feels bad when he checks his mentions with a delay, and people’s stories have already vanished after 24hours. He sometimes doesn’t get to checking DMs for a week.

“Will we ever get the original pic of the kiss recreation?” *smiles* *waggles his eyebrows* “Maybe in the morning”

“So happy the Trevor Project was chosen for this merch drop!” He’s very happy, too. According to him, it was a no-brainer. Tyler’s worked with them in the past, so it made even more sense. They wanted to make sure that Tyler felt very strongly about wherever they’d be donating. 

People urge him to go to sleep. “You want me to go to bed?” 

“Why is your merch not available in India?” *deep breath* “It should be, it’s ridiculous. Unbelievable.”

“Your poetry was awesome.” He appreciates the praise and promises to write some more poetry. 

Someone asks whether the movie he’ll be directing in June will be a comedy, but he says it’s the opposite. He’s mentioned in the past that Aurora and him will both act in the movie, but apparently he forgot about that. He doesn’t want to jinx the movie and doesn’t know how much he should reveal just yet. Talks a bit about 5 Years Apart. 

Someone mentions that it’s Jeanine’s birthday on January 14th. 

“Do (or don?) a face mask, Vlamis.” He refuses. Mentions his friend and roommate Spencer Waldner, who makes face masks.

“If there’s leftover merch, will you do another sale?” He says that most things are actually sold out bc they use Blank Clo’s blanks and will only make what’s been ordered.  They might try to restock some pins tho, bc they went so quickly. 

“USPS are a joke” He defends them. “They’re a public service, they’re trying hard, guys.”

“You should do a Vlambase drop with the Real Vlamis [a.k.a. Jeanie]” He’s excited and thinks it’s a good idea and asks if anyone’d be interested. 

Someone congratulates him on directing his first movie. He points out that he’s directed before (Making It, a 3-part web series, it’s on YouTube).

 “Would you ever come to Australia Comic Con?” He’d love to. Mentions that he’s supposed to be in Paris in May for a convention, but he’s not sure whether that’s gonna happen considering how things are currently going with the pandemic. 

Some more talk about 5 Years Apart.

Circles back to doing a merch drop with Jeanine. People like the idea. 

“Please save this live.” After an IG update, things have changed and he doesn’t know how to do it. In the past he had the option to save it [for 24hrs], now he can only upload it to IGTV. 

“$30 shipping to Australia hurts my soul but I did it anyway.” He appreciates that and mentions, that he lived in Australia for 6 months in the past.

“Sing some Bright Eyes” He thinks his singing would hurt people’s ears. 

Jesa Joy pops up in the chat and urges him to go to bed. 

“Jesa is yelling at you.” Vlamis says that Jesa’s a “yeller”, and that she has a tattoo that says “Don’t yell tho”. He admits that Jesa often yells for a good reason. “I need to be yelled at sometimes.”

Someone asks him to accept a request to join his live. He says he’s pretty tired. 

He says hello to someone from Germany (not me btw :P) “What’s up, Germany ✌️” 

More people ask him to sing, but he says he cannot sing. He says it’s not like a joke  or him being modest, he straight up can’t sing and is a horrible singer. 

“Will there be a sequel to 5 Years Apart?” Maybe a sequel called “10 Years Apart” (he’s joking and visibly tired)

“Should I buy anything before the sale ends?” Yes.

Jesa Joy’s from Michigan, and Vlamis’s grandma’s from Middlesborough, Kentucky.

“Is Tyler singing again?” He doesn’t know. “I hope so. Love that kid’s voice” (Tyler’s 3.5 years older than Vlamis :P)

He’s getting sleepy and will read a little bit before bed. Considers drinking some Mountain Dew. 

“Do you take design ideas.” Sure. Sometimes he sees design ideas from people they’ve been working on for months, but he’s gonna “steal” an idea from someone, he’ll tell them. He’ll steal it, though. 

“Are you still reading SAGA?” He read the first one and is half-way through the second. He’s currently reading a book called “My First Movie” by Stephen Lowenstein. “How cliché.” Aurora got it for him.

Purple Skittles are his favorite. Purple everything.

“Your girlfriend’s the best girlfriend.” She is, she really is.

Asks Jesa Joy whether he should go to bed now.Even though it’s late, he’s hungry. Considers eating something. People tell him to go to bed.

He asks “Should I get naked and put on the PJs?” *waggles eyebrows* “I’M KIDDING, YOU’RE SICK. YOU’RE ALL DISGUSTING.” xD

“Don’t eat!” He laughs.

Says goodbye and says that Jesa’s posted a surprise picture. 

“Any advice for aspiring actors?” Tells them to make their own stuff bc no one’s gonna hire them. (He’s being sarcastic). “It’s dark, but it’s what you need to hear.”

“Okay, love you guys. Thank you again! It was our best sale yet. Means a lot to me. Means a lot to Tyler. Us doing so well might mean that Tyler will work with us again. So I really appreciate it. Okay, I love you all.”

Jesa promises to post the pic in 4 minutes. He’s excited. “See, I got her to do it! The picture is kind of ridiculous.”

*pretends to take off his shirt, stops halfway through* “Noooooo, noooooo, noooooo!”

*throws kiss* “Love you guys, good night.”

[unbelievableholland]

Hey, can i request a harry x reader, where the reader is tom personal assistant, meaning she was with tom in America, while the twins were in London celebrating their birthday. And her and harry have been together for a long time so she's really sad she cant make it and so is tom. And it doesn't help that leading up to the interview the bday was the only thing talked about in the family gc. So they both just decide to still fly to the UK and surprise them all. Thank youu😊

Surprise!

Pairing: Harry Holland x Reader

Warnings: nothing. Just flufffff.

Words: 2,610

Summary: You’re Tom’s PA, but also Harry’s girlfriend. What happens when Tom’s interview is rescheduled to the day of the twins’ birthday, and you’re thousands of miles away from London?

A/N: Again, sorry this took so long! And this also might be the fluffiest fic I’ve ever written. I hope you like it!

——————————————————————

“Tom! Your interview with GQ got rescheduled to Friday!”

It’s a Monday afternoon, and Tom surprisingly had nothing to do today. Being his P.A meant knowing his schedule, and also managing your own life. Part of that is clearing his schedule for Friday so you could go back to London in time for the 21st birthday of your 5-year boyfriend, Harry. Tom’s brother, of course.

Hearing frantic footsteps running down the stairs is not what Tom expected to hear today. He thought this is a chill day for the both of you.

Tom stands up from the couch, eyes wide and panicking. Quickly swallowing the tea he has in his mouth, he speaks.

“What?! I thought Friday was all clear???”

“Yeah I thought so as well! But I just got an email from GQ that it’s going to be moved!”

Tom has his hand running through his hair and he’s pacing around the room.

“Can’t you cancel it?”

You look at him with sad eyes. “You know it’s not that easy”

Tom just ends up sitting down in defeat. You and Tom had been looking forward to going home and attending the twins’ party. You have plane tickets and everything, and all you’ve talked about in the Holland group chat is the party.

Since it’s already their 21st birthday, they have a big party planned.

“Fine. I’m just going to tell them we can’t go.”

Tom doesn’t want to, obviously, but it’s not like he has a choice.

You don’t answer. You only go back to your room upstairs. Although it does seem hopeless, you’re determined to make this work.

You sit on your bed, right as you get a call from Harry.

“So, you’re really not going to attend?”

Your heart sinks a little. You don’t like hearing his voice so sad. You promised you’d go home in time for the party, and all of you were looking forward to it.

You sigh. “I’ll make it work. I’ll find a way around it and we’ll make it there in time. I just have to—”

“Y/N, it’s ok. Don’t stress yourself out too much. After the interview, you can go back here and we’ll do another celebration. We’ll invite a few friends and it’ll be fine.”

His voice sounds enthusiastic now, because he just accepted that it comes with your job. He offered it to you in the first place when Harrison had to quit due to his own career.

“I know you’re pouting right now, Y/N. Stop pouting. If you try to reschedule Tom’s interview, you’ll only stress yourself out more.”

“Ok, fine. Promise we’ll celebrate after?”

“Promise. I have to go, we have some party planning to do. Love youuu”

“Love you too, babe.”

With another sigh, you hang up. Yes, you told him you wouldn’t reschedule, but you’re already determined to make it work.

And so far, Tom’s interview is canceled because the studio they were originally going to shoot in is closed because of technical problems. At least, that’s what they told you.

The party on the other hand, starts at 7:00 pm on Friday, February 14th. Your flight is scheduled on 5:00 pm on Thursday.

Now, you have to figure out a compromise for GQ. You could have the interview moved to Wednesday, because it gives them time to figure out the technical problems they have and you can make the party on time.

You pull up your laptop and you start writing them an email. For hours that night you’re just sending emails back and forth with GQ.

Technically, you could just tell them you aren’t going to attend. The interview being cancelled isn’t Tom’s fault. The only reason any of you don’t want to cancel the interview is because it was already announced to the fans and all of them are excited.

But at the end of the day, after a lot of convincing and reasoning, they rescheduled the interview to two weeks from now.

You stand up, quietly jumping and celebrating since now, you’re actually going to make it to Harry’s birthday. You’re too excited that you can’t even sleep.

You keep weighing your options though. You can tell them, or you can surprise them. As you pace around your room, trying to be as quiet as possible so you don’t bother Tom, you ultimately decide to not tell anyone.

Not even Tom.

In the morning, you tell him that you had already cancelled the flight, which, obviously you haven’t. You just need to make sure he doesn’t actually cancel it for real himself.

Ever since Monday, Tom has been a little gloomy. You feel bad, but at the same time, you wanted to keep the surprise. So as much as you could, you tried to cheer him up until Thursday.

You know he’s tired, so you cleared his schedule for the week, except for the GQ interview. At least, that’s what Tom thinks. Clearing the rest of his schedule is something you didn’t think was possible, but you still did it. His mood lifted a bit, but it didn’t help that the Holland GC is filled with details about the party.

You were looking forward to it, but not as much as Tom. He gets homesick and he just wants to go home. For once he just wants to let loose.

But, tomorrow is already Thursday. So, you just have to wait a few more hours and you could finally tell him in the morning. Later in the night, you face time the Hollands to wish the twins an advanced happy birthday.

God, you really did miss them so much.

Once the call ends both you and Tom go to your designated bedrooms, you set your alarm and you go to bed.

Usually, waking up at 6 in the morning when you have nothing to do isn’t the best start to your day. No though, you practically jump out of bed and run to the kitchen to prepare some breakfast.

Tom would be waking up in about an hour or so, and once he does, he immediately smells eggs and bacon. Which is rare, because you usually just order something for breakfast because both of you aren’t really the best at cooking.

“Uhm, are you cooking? I thought you didn’t know how to cook?”

You shrug. “I’ve been taking lessons from Sam.”

You present him two plates. Both have bacon, eggs, and garnished with toast and parsley. It looks good, and Tom’s surprised. He’d never seen you cook something that looks this appetizing.

When he takes a bite, he absolutely loves it. For once, you didn’t burn the bacon…or the eggs…or the toast.

“What’s got you in a good mood today?”

“Well, maybe because of these.”

You get the plane tickets from your pocket and you show it to him.

“I didn’t cancel the flight. I told them to reschedule, and they did. The interview is two weeks from now and I cleared your schedule for next week, so we can spend the next week in London.”

His whole face beams, his eyes wide and fills with happy tears as he engulfs you in a hug and spins you twice than puts you down.

“You, Y/N L/N are the best PA ever. Don’t tell Harrison that though.”

“Hmm, I’ll think about it.” you teased. You laugh for a bit, both of you happy that you’ll be able to get home in time for the party.

“I’ll go pack my bags then.”

“Tom, I already packed it for you earlier when you were sleeping. Just take a shower and all that then we’ll go to the airport.”

“You…really are the best you know.”

“I try.” you shrug.

“Don’t tell anyone though. I was thinking of surprising them.”

With a nod of his head, he goes to his room and prepares himself for the long flight you have ahead.

You on the other hand, is already prepared. So, all you have to do is wait.

Hours later, during the flight, Tom’s asleep beside you. You’re always the type to get bored on plane rides, so you preferred the window seat. Unfortunately, even after continuously trying to convince Tom to switch seats with you, he didn’t budge.

So, you ended up doing nothing on the plane. You couldn’t find any good movies to watch, and you’re way too excited to fall asleep anytime soon.

You look at your phone, and with an exasperated sigh, you tilt your head back to stare at the ceiling for a few minutes.

You still have 7 more hours to go.

“Tom. Tom, wake up. We’re here.”

“Hmph. 5 more minutes”

You roll your eyes. You slowly grab the pillow from under his head and yank it out from under him. Since he’s leaning towards the wall, he hits his head.

“Ow!”

“I said, we’re here. You already stole the window seat, the least you can do is get up.”

“Fine, fine.”

As he got up, he grabbed his bags from the overhead compartment then grabbed yours and handed them to you. Once you had your bags, you immediately ran out. Since everyone already got out before you, the plane is relatively spacious and you have more than enough space to run out.

“Y/N! Wait for me!

“You already took too long, you div! I want to see my boyfriend!” You shout from across the plane and Tom chuckles at your childishness.

“You don’t think I do too?”

“You’re telling me Tommy has a boyfriend?” You tease, but you laugh at the face Tom makes. He tilts his head back and groans.

“You know what I mean!”

“Hmm, do I?”

He rolls his eyes and chases after you when he sees that you start running.

When the cab arrives in front of the Holland household, you excitedly get out, but you immediately stop.

“Wait, Tom, should we surprise them at the actual party?”

“We can, but where do we stay?”

“We can stay at my place.”

“Aren’t your parents home?”

“I meant my house.”

“You have a house?!”

“Well technically, I share it with someone else.” you wink and run to the direction of your house, while Tom is busy thinking about what you had implied.

“You and who’s house?” You continue to run though, and he starts to shout.

“Y/N— you and who’s house!?”

He only groans when you don’t even look back and runs after you. He catches up quick since you’re carrying bags. So is he, but he’s more active than you.

Once you got to your house, only a few blocks away from the Hollands, you get the keys in your back pack and open it.

Tom’s eyes go wide when he sees pictures of you and Harry together. Some of Harry’s things that Tom could recognize is also there.

The house looks clean. It’s very organized and it’s very artsy. When he explored more of the house, he even saw a studio and a room with gym equipment. Your voice from the kitchen snaps him out of his shock.

“Harry told me earlier that he’ll be staying at your place today. He said he already left food and water for Holly, so he won’t be back here until tomorrow.”

“Wait, wait, wait, wait. Who’s Holly?” and as if on cue, you hear the pitter patter of paws going down the stairs. A little mocha colored pug greeting you.

“What?! You’re telling me, you and Harry have a house a few blocks away from ours, and you have a dog?!”

“Yup!”

“How did we not know??”

“Well, about one or two years ago, we wanted our own private place, and the previous owners of this house just moved out. We got a little lonely sometimes, so we got a dog. Oh, and whenever Harry randomly disappeared or whenever he says some dumb excuse to leave the house, this is usually where he goes. We didn’t usually stay here though, this is kind of just our…safe space, you know?”

Yes, Tom does get it, and seeing you there, sitting on the couch playing with the pug you and Harry have, he knows that Harry’s in good hands. That he’s happy. Tom has always been protective over his brothers, and that included being skeptical of you at times. Even though he knows you’re a good person.

It just kind of hit him now that, you’re it for Harry. Even if you and Harry have been together for years.

“You can stay in the guest bedroom for now, since it’s 3 am and the party isn’t until hours later.”

“Uh yeah, sure. Where is it?”

“Upstairs, first room to your right. Bathroom’s the last door in the hallway to your left.”

“Oh, ok. Thanks.”

“Uh, Tom? I’m sorry if this is all so sudden. Harry and I really just wanted our own place and—”

“It’s fine. I’m not mad. Shocked, yes, but I’m happy if the both of you are happy.”

“Thanks.” you say with a very grateful smile. You know how much Tom loves his brothers, so him saying those words means a lot to you. You’ve always been like his little sister, but this just feels like you’re officially a part of their family. To some degree, at least. You still need to tell Dom and Nikki.

Just before he disappeared from your line of vision, you yell.

“Oh, and Sam knows!”

“WHAT?!”

When Tom wakes up, he sees that you’re buzzing with excitement. You look really excited to be home, and so is he. Of course, he waits a few more hours since the party’s at 7. He takes a nap, and once he wakes up, you’re already dressed.

“Tom, come on! Get readyyyy!”

You’re running around the house, trying to find your boots and getting your gift for Harry.

When Tom came out of his room, prepared and well dressed, he sees the box your holding.

“Took you long enough, ya div.”

As you both walked along the sidewalk, he points to the box.

“So, what’s in the box?”

“Remember the Nikon camera he’s always wanted?”

“No. No way.”

“Yes. Yes way. I’ve been saving up for it.” You say with a proud smile on your face.

“That’s like, 2,000 dollars!”

“yeah, I know.”

“I don’t think I’ve told you before, but you’re good for him. Thank you.”

He says this as you arrive at the front door of the Holland household, and just before you open the door, you hug him.

“Thanks Tom, I appreciate it. Really.”

You pull away gently, and he beams at you.

“Don’t let it get to your head, L/N.”

“Hmm, I’ll try. You ready?”

“Go ahead.”

You open the door. The party hasn’t started yet, and no one has arrived yet.

When Sam hears the door open, his head turns towards you. The moment he realizes what’s happening, he slaps Harry’s shoulder excitedly and points towards you.

You look at both of them with a large smile and set the gift down on the shelf near the door.

“Happy birthday boys!”

Harry runs to you immediately. Passed Tom and hugs you. You jump up so your legs are around his waist as he spins you.

“God— I missed you, darling!”

He puts you down and kisses you. It’s the giggly kind and you both smile into the kiss and he pulls back to look at you.

“Best birthday ever.” He kisses your head and pulls you to his chest, your arms wrapped around him.

“Hey! What about me?” Tom says as he fakes a pout.

“Stop ruining the moment, dickhead.” You and Harry say in unison.

——————————————————————

Permanent Tag List:

@spideylovin @used-avocado @why-am-i-so-obsessed-help @annoylinglyaries @autobotgirl15-blog @shootingstarsaretearsofheaven @tiffy119 @eridanuswave @cherrysruin @spideygirl2003

[milkybonya]

apple pie

🍎Warnings: food mentions, some angst

🍎Pairing: college!Wooseok x college!(gender neutral)reader

🍎Summary: where i twist my (irl) first year university experience and give it the happy ending i wanted :D 

🍎Word count: 5k

🍎first year of university is annoying. some tall guy keeps stealing your seat, making your mornings a little more frustrating. when you find the guts to take your seat back, your feelings of anger develop into something else. but like a poisoned apple, though seemingly sweet, some things, or some people, are just forbidden. yet when an apple is baked with love into a pie, a pie that needs much care and time to bake properly, won’t the outcome be a good one? 🍎

You always sit in the front. It helps you to stay focused and it’s very important that you sit in the same spot everyday.

It always took a few weeks of getting to class early before everyone would stay away from your seat, since in university, there aren’t any seating plans. Consequently, it didn’t normally bother you if someone took your seat.

But this time, it did.

Getting to your chem class from calc involved rushing from one side of campus to the other, so by the time you arrived, someone was sitting in ‘your seat’. You sighed and sat somewhere a few rows back, glaring at the figure of this intruder. He had his black bag on the seat next to him, and you wondered who he was saving his seat for.

It was hard to focus in class, especially when you realized that this boy had not been saving the seat next to him, but was just putting his bag there. I could have sat there... you thought.

During class, there would often be multiple choice questions that you would have to answer on your phone called ‘iclickers’. It was a method of keeping track of attendance and who was paying attention. Your eyes were glued to your intruder’s back for the first twenty minutes of class, so you got the first iclicker wrong. They were supposed to be easy marks, but you got it wrong.

It’s all his fault, you thought. If only he hadn’t sat there!

From that day on, he’d always beat you to your seat. If he only sat there once, you would’ve been able to forgive him, but the fact that he was there everyday made you angry. Even worse, his bag took up the spot next to him. A perfectly good spot taken by a bag...

One day, you stomped up to him and without saying ‘excuse me’ or asking if the seat next to him was taken, you slid into the spot where his bag was, forcing him to remove it.

I did it! You thought. Front row spot secured.

Everyday, you would sit next to him, and the two of you never exchanged a word. You didn’t want to start the conversation because he was the intruder and you wouldn’t do that for him. 

Yes, at first, you hated him just a bit. He’d taken your seat! Why wouldn’t you? 

You started to notice how he would clear his throat every few seconds right before sniffling. How he’d push up his wire-rimmed glasses after looking down at his notes. How he removed his cap so he could fix his overgrown, dark locks underneath. The sound of his black jacket crinkling as he shifted his arms so he could rest his chin in his palm... Cute, you thought. No! Cute? Intruder man? No no no...

Your crush was in full swing before you knew it. You were excited to come to class everyday just to see him. That was it. See him. Not talk to him, but see him. You were too scared to suddenly start a conversation after sitting next to him in silence for a week, but you knew you would regret it if you didn’t try.

After frantically texting your friends for courage and advice, you walked to class early on Monday so you could be there before him. When he came to sit next you, your heart was racing. Okay, I’ll just ask him about the lecture notes so I don’t seem weird, then I’ll ask for his name, then...

You took a deep breath. Your heart beat was like an earthquake, shaking your entire body. Were your ribs crumbling inside? Why did it feel like your body was collapsing?

“Hey um...” he didn’t hear you, so you gently poked his shoulder and he turned to look at you. You were too scared to meet his eyes, so you stared somewhere to his left.

“Um, do you know where we left off in the lecture notes last week?” You asked. I did it, I’m doing it !

“Yeah,” he said, shuffling a few pages around and pulling out a paper, pointing to something. “Here.” His voice was deep.

“Ah, thank you,” you said, pretending to go through your own notes. “I know I always sit next to you, but I’ve never spoken to you before, what’s your name?”

“Me?” he asked, pointing to himself with wide eyes. “Wooseok.” 

“Wooseok... My name is [y/n],” You said. He nodded, looking back at his notes.

Realizing that he wasn’t going to continue the conversation, you decided to try asking him a question while mentally kicking yourself for doing all the hard work in the conversation.

He answered, telling you that he was studying Humanities. Unsure of which specific program he wanted to pursue, he was taking a variety of courses, including chemistry for some reason. 

“Just keeping my options open,” he said with a chuckle.

It felt a bit awkward, like you were interviewing him, but you were glad to have started the conversation, proud that you were brave for once despite being so scared of initiating conversations.

The professor strolled in and class begun, so you decided not to bother Wooseok anymore for the time being.

The next day, you tried again, asking him more questions. He told you how he was an international student from Korea, living here without his parents and family. You felt a little upset, knowing that his family was far away. It made you want to be kinder to the intruder who stole your seat. And your heart.

Each day, you tried to talk to him more and eventually, he seemed to feel more comfortable around you.

“How’s your day going?” he asked you for the first time as you sat beside him. You responded while smiling, earning you a grin in return from the tall boy.

At some point, he also started saving your seat for you. He had stopped placing his bag beside him when you forcefully sat next to him the first time, but he started placing his bag there again now, removing it as soon as he saw you rushing through the double doors to the front row.

He didn’t want anyone to sit beside him except for you.

Those brief moments before class were something that you treasured. The two of you talking and getting to know one another, Wooseok’s eye smile as he spoke... it was so lovely. Even during class, you’d share answers for the iclickers, explaining your thoughts to one another and debating the answers. You’d both groan when you got them wrong and grinned when you got them right.

The front row experience meant an up-close view of the demos, so the two of you would share your amazement with every explosion, trying to predict what would happen next.

During your bleak and often stressful first year of university, your crush on Wooseok and his presence had become your solace. That was, until February 14th. The day before reading week. A Friday. Valentine’s day.

Frankly, you were worried that Wooseok was seeing someone from the very start. He was so pretty, and pretty international students were known for having s/os. You used Valentine’s day as an excuse to see if you could find an answer to your question.

“Woah Wooseok, it’s Valentine’s day. The days are passing so quickly, I didn’t even notice!” you said, trying to play it cool.

“Oh yeah!” Wooseok said, scratching the back of his neck. “I should buy something for my s/o...”

s/o. There it was. The answer that you expected but dreaded.

You felt your heart drop but tried to keep it together. Wooseok returned to his notes, unaware of the fact that you were falling apart right beside him.

Even when the professor began to lecture, you were unable to pay attention, drifting in and out of sadness. You didn’t realize how big your crush on Wooseok was until now.

That’s okay! you told yourself. I can still just be his friend. I should ask for his socials later to see if he’ll want to meet during the break.

Wooseok was in a rush to leave as soon as the professor dismissed the class. A big smile on his face, he quickly packed up.

“Finally, the break is here!” he exclaimed.

You tried to keep up with the tall boy’s pace, scurrying behind him and quietly asking him if he would want to meet during your week off school. He seemed to be in a daze, grinning while he took your phone to search for his sns account. 

He left you standing there. 

You were happy that you could contact him but sad that he would be nothing but a friend.

🍎

During the break, you decided to ask him what he was up to while you were sitting in the boba store at your local mall. He told you that he was in a nearby city, staying at his friend’s house. Damn, he probably won’t want to meet me since he’s so far away.

You were glad that he wasn’t alone though, and after quite a dry text conversation with him, you slipped your phone into your pocket and walked off.

By the time the break was over and you were back in your chemistry class, Wooseok seemed sad again. When you asked him what was up, he told you he was sad because the break ended so fast and he hadn’t gotten much done. A lot of deadlines were waiting for him. It wasn’t even your problem, but you felt upset seeing him stressed. 

You had gotten used to recognizing his moods by the way he acted. He was a little more quiet when he was tired, sad or stressed, but when he wanted to talk to you, you could tell he was feeling happier, which also made you happy.

🍎

A few days later, there was a day when the professor didn’t come to class. Half an hour had passed and he still wasn’t there, so you decided to leave. Wooseok wanted to stay to do some work, so you left alone. 

You passed a boba shop in the student centre on your way to your next class and quickly messaged Wooseok asking him if he wanted you to buy anything. It was another stressful day for him it seemed, and you wanted to cheer him up.

He thanked you but said he didn’t want anything, so you trudged away to your next class, feeling defeated. You wished you had just asked him to come along with you.

It was your biggest goal and dream to see Wooseok outside of your chemistry class. It seemed like he only existed there, and you wished that you could randomly run into him on campus or have a study date with him... It felt like he wasn’t even real, since you only saw him in chemistry.

One day, it actually happened. Your next class was cancelled so you had an extra two hours, and Wooseok was also free for the next two hours. When you asked him where he was going to spend his time, he said, “the library. Wanna come with me?”

The fact that he wanted you to come along, that he asked the question with his eyes widened and a small smile on his face, eager for an answer, all of this was enough to make your heart flutter. 

As you left the lecture hall while walking right next to him, the cold winter air hit your face and both of you almost tripped on a pile of snow right outside the door. You laughed along with him, thankful that you see him outside of the lecture hall.

I guess he is real and not just some figment of my imagination...

The library was packed, buzzing with the sound of students studying for their midterms. The two of you managed to find an empty table though, sitting side by side and opening your books. 

Wooseok complained about his crazy final exam schedule, and as you showed him your own schedule on your laptop, he shuffled over to lean in closer, trying to get a better view. It made your heart race; he was so close.

Even as the two of you studied, he would lean in to see what part of the mock test your were on.

When it was time to head to class, the two of you walked side by side for as far as you could until you had to part ways. Wooseok’s tall frame towered over you from your right, and the fact that you had to look up at him every time he spoke made you feel small and cute. He was the only person who could make you feel this way.

Waving goodbye, you checked the time and began to ran as you realized you were late. Quickly shuffling into a seat, your friend elbowed you from beside you, asking you where you had been.

“In the library with Wooseok,” you whispered.

“A library date?!” your friend exclaimed. You slapped their shoulder shyly and tried to pay attention in class, but your head was still spinning. Finally you had gotten to hang out with Wooseok outside of class... Could this mean that your friendship was growing?

🍎

You and Wooseok would leave class together more often, sometimes meeting when you were both free to study. Even though you were both only close enough to talk about school and not your personal interests, you still tried to learn more about him and his love for anime, music, and his weird sleeping schedule.

Sometimes the two of you would only talk instead of studying, which you didn’t mind in the slightest bit.

Things were going well. You even got to hang out with Wooseok on a weekend, walking around town and exploring some shops. 

You stole glances at him as his long fingers thumbed through jackets, his eyes focused, trying to find something he wanted. When he pulled out a funny T-shirt that he wanted to show you, you quickly looked away and blushed, not wanted him to know that you were staring.

“[y/n], look! Isn’t this funny?” he asked you, grinning cutely. You nodded and walked over to look at the shirt, which has quite a weird design on it.

“I kind of want to buy it...” he admitted.

“You should do it!” you told him, lightly nudging him.

When you got hungry and found a place to eat, Wooseok shared his food with you.

“Hey, I shared mine with you so you better give me some of yours!” he demanded jokingly. He only ended up taking the smallest amount of your food, not wanting to take a lot from the dish that he noticed you were enjoying.

At the last store that you decided to check out before leaving, you found a keychain that you really liked. You rubbed your thumb over its edges, turning it over and over in your hand. Eventually, you left it there. It was too expensive and you didn’t want to spend your money on something you didn’t really need.

When you and Wooseok were about to part ways, he handed you a small plastic bag, eyeing you eagerly. When you opened it and looked inside, you found the keychain you had looked at earlier.

“I noticed you liked it... it would look pretty cool on your bag,” he said nervously, scratching his neck. 

As soon as Wooseok was out of sight, you attached it to your bag right away.

🍎

The two of you had become closer as friends. Things were going so well, and even though you still had a crush on Wooseok, you controlled yourself and reminded yourself that you were only his friend. He was in a happy, long term relationship and you didn’t want to ruin anything.

You didn’t ruin anything, but someone else did.

Strangely enough, even though you never saw Wooseok on campus, you saw him on this day, walking towards you while scrolling through his phone. His cream coloured winter jacket bounced up and down with every one of his long strides.

You nudged your friend beside you.

“You know how you’ve never seen Wooseok before? There he is, that’s him,” you told them.

Your friend followed your gaze and laid eyes on Wooseok.

“Yo! Wooseok!” they yelled. Wooseok looked up, confused, but smiled when he saw you next to your friend.

The three of you stepped off the sidewalk and onto the grass, since there were a lot of people walking around, trying to get to places and you didn’t want to cause what you and your friends called a ‘hallway traffic blockage’.

“Hi Wooseok, this is my friend,” you told him. He greeted your friend and your friend seemed quite excited. They were very outgoing, and finally having met your crush of a few months made them even more ecstatic.

“Nice to meet you, Wooseok! I’ve heard so much about you and now I finally met you... I’m like ‘ohhh, so this is the guy who [y/n] has a phat crush on’, they’re always talking about you I swear-” your friend rambled.

What? Crush? Did they just...

Your friend slapped their own mouth, turning to you with wide eyes.

You started laughing out of nervousness, making Wooseok, who was quite speechless, chuckle along.

“You’re so funny!” you said to your friend. “They’re just joking, Wooseok. Anyway, we’re so busy, gotta go I’ll see you soon!”

You grabbed your friend and pushed them forward, both of you speed-walking away from Wooseok.

“What are you doing?!” you asked your friend.

They looked down, completely guilty.

“I don’t know why that just slipped out; I have no idea...”

How am I going to face him again?

You couldn’t. Even though you thought you shook it off as a ‘joke’ quite smoothly, you still couldn’t face him knowing that he heard what he heard.

You started to skip lectures. So full of embarrassment, you followed along with the podcasts and recorded lectures instead, doing the iclickers from the library and teaching everything to yourself. It was difficult, but for the sake of hiding your shame, you would work hard.

Wooseok messaged you after a few days.

Hey... Have u been ok? why aren’t u in class anymore?

You responded by telling him that you were extremely sick, but after a few weeks passed and the end of the term approached, Wooseok continued to message you.

Is it really bad? It’s been a couple of weeks now... Do u need any help? Will u be able to write the exam?

I can write the exam... it’s just hard to come to lecture, I’m sorry

After the final exam, you spent the rest of the summer ignoring Wooseok’s messages out of pure embarrassment. He didn’t message you often, but tried to check up on you every few days.

hello? r u still sick?

are you feeling any better yet? is everything ok?

it’s not bad... right?

pls if you need any help, pls tell me

He stopped messaging you after a month, but your friend told you that they got a message from him asking about you.

“Tell him I’m fine, I’m just busy,” you told them.

“That’s not a good enough excuse, [y/n]... you can’t keep hiding just because he found out you like him. He probably thought it was a joke anyway, just message him back, okay?” your friend told you.

You never got the courage to message Wooseok, but your friend was pulling tricks behind your own back. 

A month later, your doorbell rang, and you cautiously approached the door. Not expecting anyone, you peeked through a window beside your door and saw Wooseok, who waved at you with a worried look on his face.

My friend did this, didn’t they... I’ll get them back for this..

Wooseok had seen your face, so you couldn’t ignore him anyway. You slowly opened the door, ducking your head down.

“[y/n], are you okay? Are you still sick? What’s going on?” he asked.

“Do you want to come in?” you asked him. You let him into your house and he politely removed his shoes, shuffling into your living room.

“Do you want anything to drink?” you asked him, hovering in the kitchen.

“I’m fine, [y/n], please just tell me what’s going on. I’ve been so worried, you never missed lectures and you always messaged me... What’s happening?” he asked you.

You sat next to him, leaving adequate space to avoid making either of you uncomfortable.

There were no more lies that you could make up now. Might as well come clean and end the friendship here.

“Wooseok... did you know I liked you?” you asked, quietly.

“You liked me?” his tone was high-pitched and sharp. “So what your friend said...”

“It wasn’t a joke. I know you didn’t believe it, but I couldn’t face you anymore after that, so I lied to avoid coming to lectures, I’m sorry. I swear I didn’t have any bad intentions, I know you have an s/o but I don’t want you to break up-”

“I don’t have an s/o,” Wooseok said.

“What?” you asked, finally turning to face him. Wooseok’s face was flushed, his long, soft hair perfectly sitting around his face as he looked down.

“We broke up... Some things just didn’t really work out,” he said.

“Wooseok, I’m so sorry...” You said, carefully placing a hand on his shoulder. 

It wasn’t because of me, right? What if they found out I liked Wooseok and they broke up with him because of that?

“You better not think it was your fault,” he said, looking into your eyes. “Cause it wasn’t...”

You bit your lip, trying to think of something to say.

“Do you wanna watch some movies... or something?” you asked him, carefully.

He smiled and sat up straight, suddenly towering over you.

“That sounds nice.”

You pulled out whatever snacks you could find and let Wooseok choose a movie. Despite feeling awkward at first, the two of you eventually sat comfortably on the couch. 

Hearing Wooseok’s laugh when a character cracked a joke, feeling his happiness and presence from beside you filled your heart with so much joy that you wondered how you had ignored him for all this time and went weeks without seeing him. You were glad that you could be friends again.

After the movie ended, Wooseok decided to leave, saying he ‘didn’t want to bother you’, but he made you promise to answer all his messages and hang out with him over the summer.

Following that, there were many late night messages from Wooseok ‘checking up on you’.

are u awake?

yes, Wooseok, i’m awake

but why, you should be sleeping

IT’S 9PM !

yeah.. bedtime cmon, don’t stay up late

says the one with the whack sleeping schedule

Wooseok was messaging you all day and was like a reminder to drink water, eat your meals and sleep on time. It got so out of hand that you had to meet up just to tell him that you were okay. He didn’t let you go though, and grabbed your hand to pull you towards the bus stop.

“Well you’ve come all the way here, wanna go to my favourite arcade?”

He didn’t even wait for your answer, but pulled you onto the bus and to the  seat at the very back. Seeing his long legs squished together and his knees hitting the back of the seat in front of him, you let out a giggle.

“What’s so funny?” he asked you.

“Your legs... you must be uncomfortable.”

You shuffled over so he could move his legs over to your side. The cute shorts that he wore and his pale, exposed skin made you want to poke his legs. They looked as soft as mochi.

While he was staring out the window, you quickly poked his leg and looked away. Wooseok poked you back in response, starting a poking war that caused the two of you to miss your stop.

It was okay though, because you got to walk back to the arcade and pass through a pretty park.

“[y/n]!” Wooseok said. “We should have a picnic in there someday.”

“That sounds nice,” you admitted, watching some kids running through the green grass, chasing each other.

The arcade was quite a small one with mostly claw machines.

“You like claw machines?” you asked the tall boy.

“Well...” he said, scratching the back of his neck. “I just really wanted to win you something.”

So he set off one a mission to win something from one of the claw machines, but it turned out to be harder than he’d thought. There were many frustrated groans that escaped his lips and he even hit one of the machines, earning the both of you a glare from the worker.

“Don’t worry [y/n], I’m going to get it this time,” Wooseok said, pouting as he carefully moved the claw around with the handle.

“It’s okay, Wooseok,” you told him. “You’ve already spent so many tokens!”

When he pressed the button and the stuffed animal was captured by the claw, lifted higher, dropping into the compartment, both of you high-fived one another in excitement.

“See, I got it!” Wooseok exclaimed, handing you the result of his hard work.

“It’s so cute... It even looks like you,” you said, holding it up to his face.

“Well I guess that means you’re stuck with me for life,” he said with a cheeky grin as he left the arcade. 

You ran to catch up with him, trying to shrug off his comment.

🍎

After spending your summer being in touch with a worried Wooseok every day and meeting up with him several times a week, the two of you were laying down in the sand at the beach. The sun had set and it was getting dark, but the calming sound of the deep blue waves and the soothing, chilly breeze was putting your mind at ease.

Another year of classes would be starting after the coming weekend, and you were trying to get as much rest up until that point.

Kicking at the darkened sand with your shoe, you looked up at Wooseok, who was staring at the sky. There was a glint in his eyes that you’d never seen before, and he seemed to be deep in thought.

Looking up the sky for yourself, you admired the navy colour and the dim stars that tried their best to shine through. Your gaze trailed back down to Wooseok and you stared at the straight outline of his nose.

Boop.

Wooseok’s nose gently squished under your finger as you touched it, and his eyes shifted to your face.

“What are you doing?” he asked in his deep voice.

“Booping your nose.”

He shifted in his position so that he could face you, and your heart felt like it was gasping in shock at how close the two of you were.

“[y/n],” Wooseok called out softly, even though he was right next to you.

“Yes?” you mumbled.

“Has it been lonely liking me all this time?”

Your eyes shifted down to the shore where the waves seemed to hesitate before falling on top of the sand.

“I’ve been controlling my heart, so don’t worry,” you reassured him, meeting his eyes again. His facial expression held pity, but also something you couldn’t quite describe. His small smile gave you a peek of his teeth, which you always told him you adored.

“I think I owe you an apology,” Wooseok said. Then he pressed his lips together in a smirk, turning his back to you as he quickly looked through his bag for something.

He turned back to you with an apple in his hand.

“Apple-ogy,” he said, wheezing at the corny mess of a joke that just escaped him.

You pressed your lips together, supressing a laugh.

“What’s the apple-ogy for?” you asked him, lightly punching his shoulder.

“I think, [y/n],” Wooseok said, choosing his words carefully. “I think I’ve actually liked you for some time too, but I made it seem like it was only you who liked me, I’m sorry.”

“You what?” you asked. “Since when?”

“When you ghosted me in that chemistry class and things fell apart with my s/o, I found myself worrying about you more than I worried about myself. And now I can’t even go a day without hearing from you. I really think I like you, [y/n].”

“Are you sure?” you asked him quietly. You didn’t want him to mistake his feelings as any sort of love if it was something else; you didn’t want him to feel bad that you liked him.

You wanted him to be sure of his feelings.

“Yes, [y/n]. This is kind of cringe and sappy to say, but even now Ireallywanttowrapmyarmsaroundyou and hold you,” he muttered quickly.

A smile made its way on your face before you even knew it, and you reached out to hug Wooseok first.

“If you’re sure, then I’m glad,” you hold Wooseok, who snaked his long legs in between yours, pulling you closer. You were laying on his chest now while he laid on his back, your ear against his ribs, listening to his heartbeat.

His arms were the only thing that held you in place.

🍎

When classes finally began again, you and Wooseok had purposely taken the same elective. You both enjoyed it, which was a bonus, but you would also be able to see each other in class everyday.

On the first day, you had to rush to your shared class from another class. You instinctively walked towards the front row, scanning for free seats. A tall boy was sitting with his black bag on the seat next to him, and you felt nostalgia deep in your gut.

Walking towards him, you realized that this was exactly who you thought it was. Wooseok looked up just before you reached where he sat, and with a big smile, moved his bag to the floor so you could sit beside him.

“Still saving seats for me?” you asked him as you settled in.

“It’s not my fault you’re always late,” he said, fake annoyance in his tone.

[queen-of-deans-booty]

Doing It With A Smile

Characters: Jensen Ackles x Reader

Word Count: 1,648

Warnings: just major fluff

Summary: Your new neighbor is finding new ways to annoy you, and the last straw breaks before you go marching over to his place to sort it out.

Beta: she wants to remain anonymous

Author’s Note: If you have any requests, please send them in!

This is the December 14th fic for my 25 days of RPF Christmas with the prompt: “Look, I get that you go all out with Christmas decorations, but I can see your flashing lights through the blinds on my bedroom window and they’ve kept me awake the past few days…”

Feedback the glue that holds my writing together

Tags at the bottom

This is the perfect afternoon for reading your favorite book. The clock has a nice ticking consistency, your house is pet and kid-free (not like you had them to begin with), you’re in front of the window to give you a perfect view of the snow lightly falling, and nothing could ruin this moment. Plus, you have a perfect view of your neighbor’s house across from yours.

Jensen Ackles moved in a few months ago, but you’ve never had the opportunity to go to him and introduce yourself to him. When he moved in, you were traveling for work in Europe. When you got back, he was filming in Vancouver for his television show. You’ve heard of the show, but you’ve never watched it before. You like more medical dramas and documentaries, not whatever he’s on. Only recently has he moved back in for the holidays, but you haven’t had time to go over yet. Yes, you could go over now, but you really want this time to be allocated for peace and quiet.

You just finished the fifteenth chapter when you heard loud, obnoxious music come from Jensen’s house. It sounds like a band is rehearsing, but you know he isn’t in one. You’ve never seen a van used for carrying instruments, no other bandmates, and the only person you’ve seen walk into his house is his mother. Well, she looked like his mother.

The only way you can read a book is by complete silence or with rain/thunder sounds. This is breaking your concentration. You look over at his house is disdain, but it’s not enough to make you go over to him and tell him off. First, the music he’s playing isn’t that bad, and he’s singing along to it as if he’s got a microphone or a karaoke machine. Either way, he has a beautiful voice.

You close your book and rest your head to the glass window. If he sounds this good from across the street, you wonder how he’ll sound from inside the living room. If he can sing this well, what’s he doing on a tv show? Maybe when his show is done for good, he’ll make a career out of singing. You’d definitely buy all his albums.

Jensen hasn’t done anything to annoy you for the rest of the week. Today’s Sunday, which means coffee and newsletters in the morning. If it wasn’t so cold outside, you would sit in your porch swing and read the morning newspaper. Instead, you’re by the fireplace with the unopened newspaper with a rubber band wrapped around the middle.

Taking your first sip of coffee, you take off the rubber band and open it to the coupon section. That’s the first place you love to look to see what the deals of the week are, and then mentally plan your shopping list based on the deals. Flipping through the pages until you get to the right one, you gasp at the sections that have been cut out. Someone stole your newspaper and cut out some of the coupons. To add to it, they left a note of the ones they took, ending with their initials.

Jensen did this. You know it based on the scrambled JA written at the bottom of it. You know it’s him because the day you came back, he left some flowers on your price with a thank you note for welcoming him to the neighborhood. Both notes have the exact same writing. Oh, that little menace…

You could match right over to his place and demand the coupons be given back, but they are the ones that you have no business buying. He took some clothes offers, some coupons for meat, dairy products, and other things you don’t eat. You’re a vegetarian that doesn’t like animal products. He must not know that about you since he took those coupons.

You didn’t mind that he did that, but you would love it if he came over and asked like a normal person. Maybe tomorrow, you’ll steal his coupons and leave him a note to see how he likes it. You just shake your head and begin cutting out the ones you really wanted, and soon, Jensen was out of your head.

Last night killed your ass. Your work demanded you stay in the office until two am to get works done that could have waited until morning. You’re in the running for a big promotion, so you stocked it up to get you on their good side. It was tough, but you made it home and fell asleep easily.

Jensen hasn’t stolen any more coupons when he realized his little “prank” didn’t work. He might just be looking for a rise from you, but you’re not going to give it to him. It’s going to take a lot more than missing coupons and loud music for you to get mad.

You have to be at work at eight, so you have your alarm set for six-thirty. It gives you enough time to eat breakfast, watch some news, get dressed, and head out with just enough time to set aside for the morning traffic. Your room is dark, and the silence is giving you everything you need for a peaceful slumber.

You’re in a deep sleep when you hear the rumble of a lawnmower. It’s coming from across the street, and it pulls you right out of your dream. Your eyes open tiredly, and you look at the clock to see it reads 5:00 am. Who the hell us up at five am to mow their lawn? You get out of bed and creep over to your window and power outside. The sun is still down since it’s wintertime, but you can clearly see Jensen morning his lawn as if it’s normal to do so.

The lawnmower he bought is noisy, tacky, and it keeps dying every few seconds. It’s as if he’s never used it before until this morning. Why is he always bothering you? Sure, the music and the coupons were harmless, but it’s still annoying to be disturbed. If he does anything to annoy you, even with the smallest thing, then you’re going to go over to his house and sort it out like he should have done in the beginning. You would go over now, but you’re too tired to put on something and deal with his mess. Instead, you pull the curtains shut and head downstairs for some coffee.

The next few days have been quiet over at Jensen’s place, but you know he’s brewing something. He got out his Christmas lights and put them up. They are flashy, bright, and you love to look at them after the sun has gone down. You don’t like it when they are flashing in your room when you’re trying to sleep. It’s been happening the mar free days, and you’re getting really sick of it. You love looking at lights, but this is Jensen. Why he’s acting this way, you’ll never know.

It’s the middle of the night, and you just got into bed and settled down for the night. It’s Friday, which means there is no work tomorrow, but you still have a lot of personal errands to run that you’d rather knock out in the morning. You pull the covers up to your chin and close your eyes. Seconds later, blue, red, green, and yellow lights flash into your room.

You let out an annoyed scream and get out of bed. Jensen has turned on his lights, and they are flashy as ever. This is it, you have had enough of his antics. You’re putting an end to this now whether it’s midnight or the am. You grab your fluffy purple robe and throw it on before storming out of your house. Crossing the street responsibly, you pound on his door when you reach it.

“Jensen!” you shout. It takes five seconds for him to get to the door and open it. It’s like he was waiting there for you.

“Can I help you?” he asks nonchalantly.

“Yes! First, you play loud music. I didn’t mind because you actually have a nice voice. Second, you take my coupons. They aren’t ones I want, but still. If you want them, ask! Third, you mow your fucking lawn at five am when you know I came home at two. Now, it’s these lights. Look, I get that you go all out with Christmas decorations, but I can see your flashing lights through the blinds on my bedroom window, and they’ve kept me awake the past few days. Please, turn them off.”

“Okay,” he shrugs.

“What? That’s it?”

“Yeah, it took you long enough to match your cute butt over here and tell me off. I did all those things to get you over here.”

“Why?”

“So I can ask you to dinner tomorrow night?”

“Why didn’t you come up to me like a normal person?” you sigh.

“I felt a bit intimidated. My character is a lot better at things like this than I am. I’m sorry for annoying you I just wanted an excuse to talk to you.”

“Well, I'm not going to bite. Next time, come over to me during the day.”

“Deal. Will you still have dinner with me?”

“You’re such a dork. Sure, but I’m a vegetarian. No animal products.”

“Yes, ma’am,” he grins.

“Turn off these lights, and we’ll have a dinner date.”

“Done,” he says and pulls out a remote from his pocket. He turns off the lights with a smile.

“Thank you. Goodnight.”

“Goodnight, Y/N,” he chuckles.

Your leave guys house and return to yours. Slipping off your robe, you put it on the hanger and slide back into bed. It’s easy to fall asleep this time, but you’re doing it with a smile. You got a date with Jensen Ackles.

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[oldguy56-world]

Electric Avenue

I was going to write about love this week but something happened over the weekend i will talk about instead while it is fresh in my mind. (Yes it is an age thing). Love will just have to wait. 

My wife and I were watching TV Friday night. Being peaceful people we were watching a show about terrorists. At 9:45 two explosions happened across the street accompanied by two flashes. Given what we were watching it startled us a bit. I have a very broad definition of the phrase ‘a bit’. Two pieces of good news:

1) It was a transformer blowing up. (Why twice? Who knows?)

2) Our couch is brown so all is good.

Now for the bad news: We ended up being without power until almost 9:00 am the next day.This is catastrophic in today’s society.  Immediately I did my civic duty and checked out our windows to see how many were affected. We live on the 14th floor so I have a very good view of the neighborhood. To my chagrin I discovered it was only our block (in reality our condo complex) that was blacked out. One of our daughters lives just across from us and they had full power. I was tempted to go over there and complain to them but I realized I wanted no part of walking down 14 flights of stairs, but more importantly walking back up those same stairs when we came (I should say I. My wife does not let these things bother her) home. 

Once I got over my jealousy, reality kicked in. This was going to be painful. I knew these things did not get fixed quickly, especially on the Friday night of a long weekend. Not to be obsessive (heavens forbid) here are the things that ran through my mind.

- No AC. Hottest time of the year. The condo hadn’t even started to get warm yet but I was sweating. If I were to roll over in bed and rub up against my wife, she would stick to my sweaty shoulder. She is not a big fan of that. The reason is once she is stuck, when I move she moves. She is small so this can be quite the wild sleep ride.

- Trying not to pee on the floor during one of my trips in the middle of the night. We have a flashlight, but you can only hold onto so many things at the same time. Upside is I amused myself with some shadow puppetry in the washroom. I was careful because no light doesn’t compare to the beating I might receive should I miss my target.

- Dreading when the power comes back on and having to reset the clocks on all of our appliances. (Thank God the computers reset themselves.) It is not that we have a lot of things to reset, but rather the coordination of the clocks. I get tired of having each room a different time zone, although it comes  in handy if I am late doing something. (’I’m not late. Check the clock on the coffee maker’)

- I was worried about the food in the fridge/freezer. We had just loaded up with groceries and it was a combination of the cost of replacing, the inconvenience of shopping on a long weekend, and trying to figure out just how much we can eat before it goes bad. We could have given some to our daughters that live in the area, but there is that 14 flights of stairs thing.

- Knowing we would wake up to little or no charge left on our phones. Not that we call anyone, but somehow we each manage to spend a lot of time using them every day. This could force a tense situation: my wife would have to listen to me talk all day. It would be mainly complaints. Some jokes (she has heard them all several times) or i could sing and dance. Always a crowd pleaser.

In case you are wondering, we survived all of this. Nothing bad happened. the clocks are almost all synchronized. (That damn coffee maker has a mind of its own)

I will be calmed down enough by next week to write about love. That is unless something else happens.

THOUGHT OF THE WEEK: “Don’t it always seem to go that you don’t know what you’ve got til it’s gone. Thank you Joni Mitchell

[maatryoshkaa]

Stray Kids as Roommates | Thread

some roommates-to-lovers fluff coming at you!

Bang Chan

You guys are the pair that n e v e r sleep

Turned his room into a home studio; probably would have thrown out his bed and turned his room into an office if you hadn’t stopped him

You often fall asleep to the sound of his humming and tracks muffled through your bedroom wall

You see the most of him during exam season, while pulling all nighters

He’s always in the kitchen making his 14th cup of coffee when you get up to go to the bathroom at 3 am

Lots of deep, meaningful conversations over late night snacks

You swear you’ve heard him talking to his Goku figurines during the unearthly hours of the morning

You’re the only one Chan lets ruffle his fluffy dandelion bedhead in the morning

Takes care of you more than he takes care of himself

Always asks you how your day went when you get home and insists on listening even when he’s been awake for over 48 hours

Always there to give you advice and comfort you when you’re feeling down! A living breathing mental health hotline

Walked into your room when you were studying for finals at 2am

You were in your pajamas, hair a mess and eyes barely open

And that was when Bang Chan decided he was in love with you

Ah, the couple with matching bags under their eyes.

☽ Read the rest of the boys under this cut! 

Woojin

Fried chicken takeout for dinner is a big Friday night thing

Kind of like a big moral support teddy bear, his hugs are the greatest

You steal half his closet in the winter because his hoodies are the comfiest

Literally the dad of your household

Checks up on your health and how you’re doing every now and then

Pushes you to finish your work and makes sure you’re not procrastinating

Honestly, your grades are soaring thanks to him

Helps you with homework

Your parents love him

Always saves and brings you good things to eat

Tucks you in at night when you can’t sleep nyahh i’m soft

And a couple times, when you wake up shaking from nightmares, homesickness or stress, he’s always there to comfort you, lying there until you fall asleep again.

“Woojin?”

“Yeah? Shh, don’t worry, I’m here.”

You always sit outside the bathroom and listen to him sing in the shower

Until he suddenly opened the door in nothing but a towel and you couldn’t face him for weeks

He thought your furiously blushing face was the cutest thing he’d ever seen and teased you about it, 

Until you finally kissed him to make him shut up

Hint: it worked wonders.

Minho

Saturday night dance battles are a t h i n g

Doesn’t do any chores unless he notices you’re feeling tired

Tried to cook once and probably accidentally gave the both of you food poisoning

Remember when he cooked rice cakes in the unwashed metal pan I’m--

Likes you a lot more than he lets on

Like, you’d mention craving a certain food or not having saved up enough money for something, and voila, the next day it’d be sitting on the kitchen table.

“What? It was on sale, just lying around. Don’t think too much of it.”

Clowns you for every little thing, but the moment he hears someone make fun of you, it’s on sight

Bicker like an old married couple, lots of back and forth catfights

Evenings falling asleep on the sofa, both tipsy and giggling while his two cats snuggle up around you

Arguing over who the cats love more

Endless crackhead antics; the neighbours probably hate you

Insists on walking his cats around the apartment complex, when in reality he just wants to spend more time with you

Everyone already knows you’re basically dating but you’re both too stubborn to admit it

Probably hooked up once or twice, or more than once or twice ;)

Changbin

Honestly when you first got him as your roommate, you were terrified

Because this 5’6 ball of dark is intimidating as frick

Realized how soft he really was when he whipped out his Munchlax plushie

Petty arguments with him are impossible because he speaks so fast

So you just let him win

Makes you kill the spider

Always manages to convince you to watch horror movies at 1 am

Probably as an excuse to have you in his arms if you get scared ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) he thinks he’s slick

Perfected the “stretch and put his arm around your shoulder” move

Made a special playlist for everything you do together: good vibes for breakfast, upbeat jams when doing the chores together, chill indie mixes for cozy evenings in doing work

Insists on helping you around the house

Bringing you fresh ice coffee, cookies, and convenience store hauls whenever he gets off work

“B-but the Peperos were on a buy one get one free sale 👉👈”

Suggests playing the pocky/pepero kiss game to which you smack him in response

But you end up giving him a quick peck anyways, and he freezes, stunned

You run off, face red, Changbin chasing after to you with a wicked grin

“What was that? Is that buy one get one, too, because I want another oneeee!”

Hyunjin

The chillest roommate, but when he gets hyper oh m y

I ain’t gettin no sleep cos of y’all, y’all not gettin sleep cos of me

You have to wake him on the weekends because this boy would sleep until the evening

You want to let him rest, though, since he’s always out and working so late ;(

Secretly takes so many candid, soft pictures of you and saves them as his wallpaper

Loves to take you shopping and dress the both of you in matching #OOTDs

Hypes you the heck up

“She’s sister snatched today! Skin glowing, outfit on point -- oh look at that SMILE! Do the thing again -- oh my gosh. You’re killing it, y/n!”

Gives you fashion advice and beauty tips, although you keep bugging him for his skincare routine cuz damn

Probably share skincare products

Always do face masks together but fail at keeping them on because the two of you keep laughing at the stupidest things

Sometimes he has to put you to bed when he comes home late, and you’ve fallen asleep on the couch waiting for him to get back

Can’t resist kissing your forehead sometimes when tucking you in

At moments like these, he finds himself wishing for a sliver of a chance that you might feel the same way he has

He’s honestly so damn obvious though, getting you matching “roommate” things when he goes out -- plushies that remind him of you, little snacks when you’re down, cute accessories, you name it

This boy also forgets that he talks in his sleep -- and is very hard to wake up

So one morning, you’re leaning over his bed, about to shake him awake, and hear him mumble

“y/n, y/n, y/n...i like you sooo much...what do i do?”

You nearly choke on your toast, effectively waking the boy up, and he stares at you, half-awake and mortified.

“What? Did I--did I say something in my sleep?”

The smug, blushing smile spreading over your face is enough to send him diving back under the covers as you begin to tease him

Jisung

So comfortable to be around, he’s basically your best friend from day 1

Except for the fact that he’s so. Damn. LOUD

Noise complaints filed from the neighbours, the landlord, the neighbour’s dog, you name it

Another soft bean whose bedhead you love to ruffle

I mean have you seen My Pace dance practice? That boys mane has a mind of its own--

Brings you lots of cakes and pastries from cute bakeries when you’re stressed

A responsible boi™ ! always helps you out around the house.

Grocery shopping together? What a concept

Except he piles the cart with chips and snacks when he thinks you’re not looking

Lots of late nights binging movies on Netflix

This boy loves moves

But he loves them even more when he watches them with you ;D

Afterwards, you’re both too lazy and comfortable to move, so you end up falling asleep cuddled up against each other

Always runs away and hides when you ask to see his songs

You find scraps of hastily scribbled lyrics and ideas strewn around the house all the time

Little phrases like “i think i love you” and “my heart beats impossibly fast when i’m with you”

So you manage to collect enough to bring them to him and tease him about it

Jisung gets all quiet, though, instead of whining like he usually does, and you quickly apologise, thinking you’ve gone too far

You reassure him his writing is amazing

“It’s not that.”

He finally looks you in the eye, the intensity of his stare making your heart stop for a moment.

“They’re about you.”

Oh, how the turn tables.

Felix

i hate him sm, blease

Why did you even agree to room with him

Rooming with Felix is a one way trip to insanity -- we going ✈️✈️ acid trip

You can hear him yelling yeets and yeehaws when he plays Fortnite while you do your homework, and you swear you’re t h i s close to putting his head straight through his screen

Video game marathons when you’re not busy though, you have to admit, are the bomb

Probably convinced you to make TikToks with him

Makes you do all the viral challenges, including the couple trends

Honestly the most fun guy to be around ever

Your daily dose of memes and sugar

Knows when to be down to earth and serious, though!

Gives the best massages when you’re overworked and runs you a bath, promptly ordering your favourite takeout and making sure to feed you

Building pillow forts together on rainy days and snow days, and having sleepovers!

Binging vine compilations together during said sleepovers

Sending each other memes at 1 am when you’re both simultaneously procrastinating on homework

You basically became a couple without really going through the confession stage; it just sort of happened

“Hey, ‘lix?”

“Yeah, what’s up?”

“I think I kinda like you.”

A sideways smirk. “Well, yeah, you’ve dealt with me for this long.”

The best-friends couple: soulmates, and, more importantly, partners in crime vine

Seungmin

Sweetest roommate!! Honestly you feel bad for even asking him to do chores

Has a bit of an evil side, though

One second he’s flashing you an angelic smile, the next he’s roasting you for your selfie skills on your recent Instagram post

You make one (1) complaint about the living room being messy, next thing you know you wake up and it’s spick and span

Cooks?? Really hecking well?

Sometimes you wonder if you signed up for a roommate or a housekeeper

Your apartment is so clean

Taking evening strolls together after dinner and taking pictures at the park

Walks you to and from work/school like a little puppy, and gets anxious if you’re late coming home

Doesn’t know how to show how much he cares about you and gets frustrated with himself

So he indulges in the little things, like packing you cute little lunches with sticky notes on the containers

Little notes around the house on days he stays out working late, like make sure you’re eating! And don’t sleep too late!

Honestly, you fell for him the moment he first smiled at you

Once, he was working overtime nonstop, and you didn’t get to see him for over two weeks

When he finally came home on time, you couldn’t help tackling him in a big bear hug

After he got over his initial heartbeat racing a thousand miles per hour, he dropped his head into the crook of your neck, hugging you back tightly

No words were needed, you missed each other’s presence so much, it seemed to say itself

I love you, and I missed you.

Jeongin

Is this boy even old enough to rent out a room? He is babie

So incredibly shy when he first meets you, but warms up quickly

Owns animal-printed pajamas and onesies

You both had a mini celebration when he got his braces off, complete with banana milk and animal crackers

You are both babie

An early bird, always wakes up before you

You wake up to him shaking you and laughing at your scrunched up face

“Wake uuppp, y/n, you’re going to be so late!”

“Ergghhhh.”

Can’t clean to save his life; always ends up breaking something or knocking things over

So he’s in charge of doing the laundry

Had a fat mental breakdown when he realised that meant your underwear

Your apartment is littered with figurines and plushies that both of you collect and don’t have the heart to clean out

“Jeongin, where are y----” you stop. “Why are you lying face down on the ground?”

“...we’re out of banana milk.”

Another hidden evil bean who clowns you for everything you do once he warms up to you

Baby boy!Jeongin switches to Savage!Jeongin in a matter of seconds

Also makes you kill the spider

Helps you cook, but only if you tell him how to do everything or he’ll freak out

Putting mukbang channels on the TV while eating together and watching in comfortable silence

Loves watching you eat and has a million derpy pictures of you saved on his phone

Poor boy has no idea how to tell you he’s falling head over heels with you

Accidentally blurts out “I like you” during a screaming contest

Lots, I mean LOTS of awkward laughing as Jeongin feels his face heat up, watching yours do the same

The longest moment passes, and Jeongin is getting ready to disassociate when you’re finally able to open your mouth and scream back,

“I like you, too!”

Baby boy found his soulmate.

[francoiserenaldt]

week two

last week | next week

warnings: cursing, references to homecoming,  references to alcoholism, implied arachnophobia

word count: 2139

Sunday, August 10th, 2023 - Day 8 of quarantine

“I don’t know why I keep looking at this TV like it’s not gonna piss me off every time I turn it on.” Desirée huffs before shutting off the TV. 

Andy is inclined to agree. He knows that the city is begging them to stay informed, but every day is just another announcement of a case popping up in another state. So far, it’s taken Oregon, California, and Nevada. CNN says it’s only a matter of time until it spreads to every state. The United States has officially closed its borders to limit the spread of what the media is calling the “Westchester Plague”.

“I wouldn’t bother looking at it anymore if I were you.” Andy zips up his jacket. 

Desirée raises an eyebrow. “Where are you going?”

“I’m going on a run.”

“Andy,” Desirée spoke slowly, “do you understand we’re in the epicenter of an epidemic?”

“I can’t stay in this house anymore, Desirée!” Andy snapped. “I’ve started talking to the fucking toothbrushes. I will lose my shit if I have to stay in here any longer.”

“Do you want to die?” 

Andy rolls his eyes and turns to go open the door when he feels her body against his, blocking the door. He sends her a warning glare and tries to step around her, but she follows his movements.

“Trust me, I get wanting out, but until they tell us how it spreads you need to stay here.”

“Desirée, you don’t understand-” He tries to go forward, but once again she impedes him by putting her hand on his chest.

“I do understand and that’s why I’m telling you to stay.” Desirée glares at him, forcing Andy to meet her gaze. “If it’s airborne and you’re inhaling it through your mouth and nose while you run, you’re as good as dead.”

Andy knows she’s right—she usually is—so he backs down. “I don’t know how much longer I can do this.” 

“We’ll get through this.” Desirée gazes up at him. He notices that her hand is still on his chest and he decides that he doesn’t mind the way it feels. “Together.”

Monday, August 11th, 2023 - Day 9 of quarantine

Andy gets sick of waking up in a bad mood and unplugs the TV. 

We’ll get any alerts we need from our phones, he decides. 

Desirée shakes her head when she sees the unplugged cord lying next to the TV. “You could’ve just changed the channel, you know.” 

“I could’ve,” he agrees, shrugging. “Didn’t feel like it.”

The TV is plugged in when he gets out of the shower that night.

Tuesday, August 12th, 2023 - Day 10 of quarantine

That night, Andy watches Desirée grab a dark-colored bottle and sit in the living room. He follows her and takes the bottle from her and reads the label.

“You drink cognac? What are you, 50?”

“I’m miserable being stuck in this house is what I am.” Desirée pours the contents of her glass down her throat, her head tilted until it was perpendicular to her back. Without so much as a grimace (how?), she turns to him and raises the bottle. “You in?” 

“What the hell.” Andy shrugs. Not like he had anything better to do. He pours his own glass and chokes down the searing sensation as it travels down the length of his trachea.

“Hey, where’d you learn to drink like that?” Andy asks a couple of glasses in. 

Desirée shrugs. “Life is frustrating. Hennessy is not.” 

The pleasant warmth in his body allows him to accept the nonanswer. He looks at her and she’s still nursing her second glass with a pensive look on her face.

“Hey, can I ask you a question without you biting my head off?”

“You just did.” Desirée shoots back monotonously as she swishes the dark liquid in her glass. “No promises for the next one.”

“What’s up?”

At this, she bites the inside of her lip. Then, she spills.

“I’m scared. About all of this plague shit going around.” Andy nods and she continues. “I don’t know when or if we’ll ever get to go back to our normal lives after this. I don’t know if there will be a life to go back to after all of this is over. And what if someone we care about gets sick? It’s just too much to think about right now and I feel guilty for not wanting to think about it.” She pauses again to empty the contents of her glass into her throat before making eye contact with Andy. “You?”

“Me what?”

“Come on, I spilled my guts.” Desirée nudges him in the side. “Time to show me yours.”

“It scares me, too. Scares the shit out of me.” Andy takes a deep breath. “But there’s not much we can do about it right now. No use in getting upset about things I can’t change. It’s easier to work with what you’ve got; right now, all I’ve got is the present. I’m in this apartment I haven’t been in since 2019 drinking alcohol that no one under the age of 40 should be able to stomach while we hide out from the world.” She chuckles and reaches to fill her glass once again when he stops and takes her hand in his, bringing her attention back to him. “And I’m with you. That means that we’ll get through this for sure.” 

“Yeah, there are worse people to get stuck with.” She chuckles. The moment passes and she’s squeezing his hand and giving him a small smile. “Thanks.”

“Anytime. Preferably when we’re sober.” Andy replies easily. “What are friends for?”

He immediately regrets the words as soon as they pass through his lips, but he knows that that’s all she’ll ever let them be. Friends.

“We should sleep. It’s late.” Desirée stands and gathers the half empty bottle and glasses in her hands. 

Her forlorn expression gives her away immediately and against his better judgement, he lets himself hope.

Wednesday, August 13th, 2023 - Day 11 of quarantine

“A vaccine for the Westchester Plague is in development at the University of Michigan. The national count for cases has risen to 90. Stay tuned for information on how to protect yourself during this troubling time. More on this at noon.”

“All this time and that’s the name they’re sticking with?” Desirée yawns, stretching her arms above her head as she enters the kitchen. “You’d think they’d find something better at this point.”

“You got any ideas?” Andy teases sleepily as he rubs at his eyes. 

“I dunno, the Erosion Virus? The Skin Feeding Illness? Shit, Westchester’s Disease?” Desirée fires off effortlessly. “I came up with three more off the top of my head but they just want to call it the fucking Westchester Plague. Embarrassing.”

“What’s in a name, anyway?” Andy shrugs as he takes milk from the refrigerator. 

“Only everything.” Desirée passes him the cereal as she speaks animatedly. “People judge everything based off of a name. That’s why it’s important that a name is meaningful and not something a three-year-old could come up with. Why do you think people buy ugly Gucci and Prada clothes?”

“Okay, I get it.” Andy stands behind her to grab a bowl. “What I don’t get is why you care so much.”

“If someone told me that I couldn’t go somewhere because of the Westchester Plague, I’d laugh in their face. They’d have to be bullshitting me. I mean, seriously...” 

He shakes his head softly, laughing softly to himself. This girl is going to be the death of me.

Thursday, August 14th, 2023 - Day 12 of quarantine

“No.”

Desirée sighs dramatically, waving her phone in her hands. “Come on! It’ll be fun!”

Andy sighs wearily at this. “You of all people should know how awful I am at dancing.”

“Andy, half the people on this godforsaken app can’t dance. It’s just something to do to pass the time. Besides, I can dance, so no one will even be looking at you.”

“Oh, thanks, Desirée.” 

“No one’s gonna see this. I have like 10 followers.” 

Tom calls him later that night. 

“Dude, you and Desirée are famous!”

“What?”

“That TikTok of you guys is on every repost page on Instagram!”

Andy shows her the post of them on his Explore page later that night. 

“2.7 million views. Wow.” Desirée sucks in a breath and offers an apologetic smile.

“Not exactly my idea of ‘no one’.”

“Well, no one’s talking about your dancing, right? There you go.”

He chucks a pillow at her face.

Friday, August 15th, 2023 - Day 13 of quarantine

For a little while, it’s a day like any other in her new normal until he hears her scream.

He’s in the kitchen before he fully realizes what’s happened and Desiree is there, staring at the ground with wide eyes and shaking hands. 

“Desiree, what happened?” 

But she’s already shaking her head, pushing him away. “It’s not that big a deal, Andy. I got it.”

“Bullshit. You wouldn’t have screamed if it was nothing.” Andy attempts to shove past her, but she’s there with her hand on his chest again.

“Andy, I promise you I overreacted. It’s fine.” The fear in her eyes gives her away.

He gently squeezes her shoulders and moves past her to investigate and he immediately, in a brief flash of cowardice, wishes he hadn’t.

Because there on the kitchen floor is a small family of daddy long legs on the kitchen floor. Not quite as huge as the ones that night, but large enough that he can feel their nimble little legs crawling up his throat and onto his face all over again.

He finds his once active body immobile as his breath comes quicker and quicker until he can’t breathe much at all. 

Then, he falls.

He finally comes to in the bedroom. The sun still shines brilliantly outside. Desiree is at his side, stroking his hair gently. 

“Are you okay?” Desiree asks. He can practically feel the guilt radiating from her eyes as she takes him in.

“I feel okay. How are you?”

“You nearly got a concussion and you’re asking how I am?” She raises an eyebrow. He only raises his own in response, which prompts a sigh. “I’m fine. I’m sorry for exposing you to that.”

“It wasn’t your fault.”

“It definitely was, but I won’t argue with you while you’re concussed.”

“I’m not concussed, I’m fine.” 

“Definitely what a concussed person would say.” Desiree replies with a singsong tone. He scarcely resists the urge to show her just how not concussed he is, but his thoughts are interrupted by another question. “Can I get you anything? Water, tea, food? I think they still have delivery despite the fact that we live in the apocalypse-”

“Desiree,” the seriousness of his tone stops her speech in its tracks, “breathe. I’m fine.” He moves aside to make room for her in the bed, but pauses as an idea brews in his mind. “If you really wanna help, I could really go for a head massage right about now.”

“Head massages are a girlfriend privilege, but I’ll make an exception just this once.” Desiree slides into her newly minted place next to him as her nails find their way to his scalp.

“How did you get so good at this?”

“I give myself one every wash day.” Desiree replies easily as she grazes her nails against his head. 

“You know what I just realized?”

“Hmm.”

“It’s Friday the 13th.”

“Of course it is.” Desiree huffs a laugh. “My hands are getting tired. Are you good?”

“I’m great. Thanks.”

As the day winds to a close, he hears Desiree mutter under her breath.

“Friday the thirteenth indeed.”

Saturday, August 16th, 2023 - Day 14 of quarantine

“You know, I think I can do this.” Desiree tells him one night.

Despite the late hour, he humors her. “Do what, Desiree?”

“This.” She gestures at the two of them. “This being alone with you thing.”

“Maybe I’m missing something,” he starts, tilting his head just so his lips hover over her forehead, “but I thought we were already doing this.”

He feels her breath hitch more than he hears it, but she continues anyway. “I thought it would be harder to be around you. It shouldn’t be this easy.”

“Why not?” He tilts her chin up. “We’ve never been awkward or uncomfortable around each other. That doesn’t have to change just because we…”

He suddenly finds his throat tightening at the thought of saying the words. Desiree allows the sentence to hang in the air.

“Hm. Guess not.” Desiree yawns, cuddling further into his chest. “Good night, Andy.”

“Night, Rée.”

[shineonyoucrazyyandere]

Your writing is so amazing and your Jojo writing is one of my favorites! Thank you so much for writing such wonderful stories and headcannons!😊💕 If it is alright with you, may I request a yandere Josuke with an s/o who is already in a relationship? Thank you again! ☺️

Thank you!!

Didn’t do much yesterday (14th) since I had very little energy. But hopefully writing for Josuke will cover for it! 

Yandere! Josuke Higashikata (Part 4) w/ s/o whose already in a relationship

    His heart thumped in quick palpitations as he saw you with that person again. One day, he had seen you giggling with them and at the time he wanted to believe they told a really good joke. But he couldn’t delude himself into ignorance when he found you both leaning on each other on a park bench. It really should be him making you smile and laugh like they do.

    He didn’t feel heartbroken that someone had taken you for themselves, he felt desperate. He should be there drowning you in kisses in anyway you liked. 

    Actually if he erased their presence he could imagine it vividly. The shape of your body melding into his as he held you close. But why imagine it when he could make it happen? It would take hell of a lot of work to do so, but he’d do it.

    Luckily, you were both mutual friends so he was close to you often aside from the times you went out on a “date” with that person. He walked off already concocting a little strategy to do away with you having them in your life. He didn’t think they really needed you after all. 

   Thus he couldn’t help but approach you at lunchtime. 

 “Oh hi, Josuke did you need something?” You asked 

“I wanted to sit up here and have lunch with you” He said nonchalantly while looking around for your partner. They seemed to be nowhere around you at the moment. 

  “That’s fine with me, I don’t have anyone else to eat with right now” You shrugged 

  He hated to ask but it slipped through his lips anyway, “where’s (s/o name)?”

“Ah I think they’re helping some other students who failed a test in class this week to study during lunch and afterschool” Was your explaination.

 The pompadour bearing male nodded not really caring about their endeavors with helping other students. The fact it gave you and him extra time to be alone made Josuke internally burst with happiness. If that were the case maybe he could get you to come to his place. 

   He did chat you up a bit before asking about that however.

 A few of the things you described were just cute little things you and your friends did together. A little karaoke night that you kindly didn’t sing in since you weren’t all that comfortable, you all ended up ditching the session and went out for ice cream. 

  “What flavor?” He asked 

“(Fav flavor)” You answered “It tasted great from the place we got it from”

  You then moved on to things that he didn’t find himself trying not to smile at. The couple of dates with your s/o made him feel very off. He felt as if he couldn’t internally function with hearing what you and them did together. 

  “Sorry if I blabbered too much about that, I know not everyone likes to hear about another person’s relationship” You shrugged awkwardly

  “It’s fine…” Josuke replied stiffly “You just…really, like being with them huh?” He hesitated to put those words together. 

   “Yeah I guess so” You laughed a little 

 He held his breath softly at the sound of your cute laughter. It made him melt like butter right where he was sitting. Oh, he just needed to be alone with you so, so bad right now. 

  “Hey, uh if you got nothing going on after school with them or anything else would you mind coming over to my place to hang out?” 

  “Sure, It has been a while since we did hang out together…I think we need  to have better friend quality time with each other ” You said

 ““Of course I missed you, ya know” He curtly smiled getting extremely close to you, much so he purposely put his right hand over yours. Just to get a little feel for your hands touching. 

    Awkwardly you laughed trying to back away a bit, you did notice his eyes were just slightly half lidded. Like he was in some happy kind of dream state. Maybe you should change your mind and just head home? But then you hadn’t really been around him much for the past week and a half which made you feel bad. He deserved a little attention as a friend after all.

   You’d be nice and just let his puppy eyed stare slide. 

 That was a success in the teen’s eyes at that moment. 

  It was hard to not have a dumb smile on his face when the two of you met up that afternoon to walk to his house.  

   You both sat on his couch and watched whatever you wanted. He was mostly fixated on the scent of the shampoo you were using. Really he couldn’t keep his eyes off you. Neither could his hands as he sneakily put his arm over your shoulder. Eventually you just lied down on the other side of the couch to his disappointment.

   You were instinctually trying to avoid contact and he knew this well it was due to your relationship. But he wouldn’t give up, at least not in any indirect way,

   Said opportunity came when he heard ““ow” escape your lips

“Are you okay y/n?” He practically jumped at the sound of your small distress

“I think I might’ve pricked my finger on something by accident” You responded “I think I just need a small bandage and I’ll be okay”

““Mmm…how about you let me see it first?” The male inquired 

You held out your hand and pointed out your injured finger, while Josuke held it softly with his own. 

  Beyond your capable sight as a non stand user you didn’t see Crazy Diamond heal your small wound back to normalcy. 

  “I don’t think you have to worry about a bandage anymore” 

  While you were distracted by the fact it didn’t seem like you hurt yourself at all. Josuke used his stand to his advantage, wanting to try something out. Guiding Crazy Diamond carefully he made his stand just ever so slightly kiss the surface of your neck. An unexpected warmth came over his body as he could feel the sensation of your skin on his lips. 

     He got a little more experiemental and brushed the stand’s fingers over your arm lightly. A shiver went down your spine as you looked at him. Reflexively he dissipated Crazy Diamond after noticing your little jump as a reaction. 

  “Uh Josuke were you touching me just now?”

He put his hands up in the air “Nope my hands were over here the whole time” 

 “Weird…guess it was just my imagination then” You mumbled a bit rubbing your arm. 

   He was happy with what he got, but it still wasn’t nearly enough. 

“She was so cute and most of all, her skin was so soft” he muttered dreamily while laying in bed that night. He could do that and so much more if you were in his arms right now. 

 From that point forward he focused on doing something about your partner. He wasn’t even sure how he survived so long without doing anything before honestly. But this was a perfect time, he knew he needed you and they were very much getting in the way.

So, over a few days he got to know them and asked if they wanted to hang out on a Friday evening. Just himself and them of course without you anywhere near by. 

  “You wanted to go to the mall across town right” your s/o asked him 

“I’m cool with it, there’s window shopping after all” Josuke shrugged

““Right, right, and there’s the arcade too if we get bored” They added 

He nodded along lazily while walking with them. 

   About halfway there Josuke began asking questions about yours and their relationship. Some of it was insignificant such as how long you both had been going out. Even though he had already marked the first day on his calendar he had at home, the day he witnessed you both going out for the first time. 

  ““What’s your favorite food you ate with them?” Josuke threw the question out

““That’s a little weird to be asking don’t you think?” Your s/o asked 

“It is huh?” Josuke acted as if he didn’t know that 

 ““Alright, how about what’s your favorite arcade game to play?” 

 They went on about said game for a little while, the blue eyed male slightly drowning it out with his own thoughts. After that he stayed silent until they arrived at the mall together. 

   “Y/n and I got a high score on this game once…we’re down a few rankings now but I thought that was really neat” Your s/o casually mentions

 “Oh that’s pretty impressive that sounds like it was a lot of fun” Josuke answered as they both stood in front of the game.

 “It’s funny I usually come and play this game…you know sometimes when I don’t have much to do” The six foot tall teen continued casually. 

    “Though it was a little lonely without someone to play with” 

 Your s/o looked at him with slight concern forming on their features.

 ““How about we play, you know just for the hell of it?” Josuke asked.

He hummed as he went to one of the joysticks. As of late this game was malfunctioning but no one had gotten around to repairing it or shutting it down. Dangerous and neglectful really but he knew what he was doing.

   Watching them closely out of his peripheral vision he observed them  vigorously moving around the controls. He waited…and…then made something fly straight into their face. 

    They crumbled with blood slipping down their cheeks and body.

 While Josuke went in out of “concern” and propped them up with his arms. 

““I don’t understand what happened” they stumbled over their words shakily

  He slightly chuckled a little too cheery in his response.

““Well you know accidents happen it’s not like either of us knew this was going to happen” 

   The pompadour wearing teen then slowly began squeezing their wrist. 

“Just like that little accident you made in asking a certain person out huh?” 

 Your supposed s/o’s eyes were stunned. 

   “But I’m sure I can fix that no problem~” Josuke hummed.

…

       “I can’t seem to contact them no matter how hard I try” You groaned sitting on the edge of Josuke’s bed that afternoon.

    But it seemed like your friend in  behind you wasn’t really bothered by that at all. He simply slid closer to you and cuddled acting like it was completely normal.  

   “I’m sorry to hear that babe” Josuke softly whispered ““I can’t believe they won’t pick up the phone to hear a word you say”

 ““Wait. What?” You tensed ““Josuke, did you just call me-”

 His arms snaked around you before you could get up, he seemed awfully happy frighteningly enough. 

  ““I love you enough to say it…and I can call you so much more cutie since we can be together now”

   You stared at him like he was insane, ““but I’m with…”

““S/o name? No, no, they won’t ever come near you again” He mused

   ““I-I….I should really go” You tried to pull him off of you.

His hands only held tighter, “There’s no rush, come on…there’s nothing to be afraid of as long as you’re with me~” 

[justinsdaysinthedark]

Post #8 - So long, friend

Sunday August 4th: Today marks 3 weeks I've been in hospital and day 5 of my 16 day chemotherapy treatment. Before I left to head in here on the 14th of July, I joked with Courtney's dad, John that I'd beat his record for time in hospital (3 consecutive weeks) not thinking it would actually happen. Alas, when I wake up tomorrow morning, I'll own that title; one I'd definitely prefer not to have! Here I was thinking I'd be in here for a few days. I suppose in retrospect my breakdown in the middle of Coles 21 days ago was for good reason!

As mentioned earlier, I had my fifth day of chemotherapy today and everything has gone smoother than I thought. I had an incredibly difficult two days on Thursday and Friday (days two and three) with nausea, headaches, incredibly tired and just generally not feeling myself. A lot of this I put down to a couple of bad nights sleep and the chemo finally hitting my body and doing its thing. Saturday and today (days four and five) have fortunately been the total opposite, which is great for me! I've had more energy, less nauseas and just generally felt myself (as well as I can, I suppose!)

I know some of you are wondering what it's like to get chemotherapy...and that's a valid question. Let me preface my answer by reminding everybody that it affects different individuals in different ways. How I react to this chemotherapy plan won't be how anybody else does. I guarantee that! Essentially, it's just like having a fluid drip with a few warning labels on the packet. Some I've felt average during them or a few hours afterwards whereas others I haven't exactly noticed a difference. It's important to keep in mind that chemotherapy isn't the drug itself, it's a word used to cover a wide range of drugs which when used a certain way should assist with treatment of cancer. Much like the word 'car' doesn't distinguish what sort of car one owns - there's a big difference between a '92 Camry and a '19 Jag!

The next two days are 'rest days' for me, which I'm absolutely ecstatic about! Two days without chemo will be a great chance for my body to relax and recover from five days of being pumped with various chemicals.

Day 10 is when things pick up again volume wise and from them until the finish, I'll basically be on a drip 24/7 and constantly have to be monitored - totally different to these first five days.

How have I been going mentally? It's up and down like the hillsides in Tasmania! For the most part, I'm great and remaining as positive as one can be in such circumstances. My support network has been so incredible in coming into see me, calling and checking up on me. I may not have had to use them as much as I thought I would, but it's so reassuring to know so many people are there for me when I do need them. My eye has shown some seriously significant improvements since Friday, which is helping to confirm the fact that maybe this stuff is doing something. This morning I woke up and regained the ability overnight to look up and down with my left eye and I'm just waiting for the morning I wake up and my eyesight is back to normal with both eyes! I'm also just about back to normal with my ability to chew which has opened up the food options for me.

On the other side, I have the daily thought of 'why me? Why does this have to happen to me right now?' Unfortunately, this thought is only human nature and one I have to allow to enter and flow by. Nobody is 100% positive and by allowing this thought to come and go, it strangely makes the situation easier to accept. I'm at a stage where I'm really starting to miss the simple things in life. Little things like sleeping in a completely dark room with no noise, having a shower with a consistent temperature and being able to make up my own food decisions on a daily basis. There's so many other things however it's these three things I'm most looking forward to when I go home!

Last Friday morning was pretty tough for me as well. Adam, my roommate opposite me (not to be confused with Dr. Adam) got the all clear to go home. We'd spent roughly fifteen days together and had developed quite a bond and friendship. Adam had lymphoma, similar to me and was a couple of days ahead of me with his chemo treatment. To have somebody there to talk to, bounce ideas off and ask questions on what to expect is exactly what I needed over the most difficult times I had in here. It made early morning blood tests during breakfast and late nights after both of our families left that whole lot easier. Not having that somebody here anymore has made the past few days a little harder but nothing I won't get through. I know he'll read this to kill time at home so I hope you don't mind me writing this, Adam!

Adam actually sent me a photo a few days after he left with him and his son both smiling and that gave me strength and hope that I'd eventually get out of here and be in the same position! I honestly can't wait for that day! In all seriousness, a big thank you needs to go to this man for keeping me sane in the time we spent together. Whilst a brief fifteen days, we're in this journey together and we will both get through it.

I honestly don't have much planned for the week ahead so I can't guarantee when my next blog post will be. I'm expecting the results of a test that was sent off last Monday sometime this week. This should definitively tell me what type of lymphoma I have. My fingers and toes are crossed it's not Burkitt's as this will change my treatment program for the remaining cycles. I'm not holding my breath these will come through early in the week - I'm more banking on answers before Friday. I'm really looking forward to resting over the next two days before we get into the serious back-half of my 16 day treatment.

That's it from me tonight. I'm off to watch Day four of The Ashes and no doubt will be asleep before midnight! Enjoy your week and cherish moments spent with friends and family. You don't know when they'll be your last.

Much love,

Juzz xx

[reflections-in-tea-cups]

Shadow

tw: pet death

We lost our beautiful, lively, shy, affectionate, panther of a house cat on Monday, March 25, 2019. While I hope the details of the past month fade from my memory, I know some of you are shocked at the news and want to know what happened. This story is still too painful to retell, so I’m putting it here.

It’s a long story with a tragic end. It’s not my best writing, but editing it further is beyond me right now. 

Shadow came into our lives on Feb. 13th, 2015. We went to the animal shelter to look at a dog – instead, we came home with an eight-year-old black cat. We thought he was a gentle old man, but as soon as he stepped out of the crate we realized they had sent us home with a panther. He was thirteen pounds of pure muscle, and the first thing he did was jump up six feet to hide on the top shelf of my closet.

Despite his size and athleticism, he was incredibly gentle and shy. He hid under the bed the first two weeks that he spent with us, only coming out after lots of cajoling. Even then, he’d often stop just at the edge of the bed so we could reach in and pet him. Once he was comfortable with us, he’d throw himself at our feet for pets and scritches, rolling around so we could get at his belly. He was always deferential to our resident female cat, despite having at least three pounds on her. He was playful and sweet, jumping up walls to catch at laser lights and crawling under the covers for morning snuggles. You always knew what his favorite toy was, as he’d leave it next to (or, more commonly, in) his food dish.

I’m not sure when he stopped eating. He still cried for food every morning and night, and he still went to the bowl and began lapping it up. We noticed that there was more wet food being left over, but that happens sometimes and it usually isn’t a problem – maybe one or both cats don’t care for that flavor of wet food, or maybe they got tired of it, or maybe they’re eating less because everyone is less active in winter. They always had access to dry food, so I didn’t worry.

I was shocked when I picked him up in late February and realized I could feel his bones. He was always a healthy, muscular cat – but suddenly he felt frail and old. Concerned, I made an vet appointment; the soonest available was two weeks away. Luck was on our side, and I got a call a few days later saying they could see us March 8th.

At the vet, we found our healthy-at-thirteen-pounds boy was now under ten. Blood work showed signs of pancreatitis, dehydration, and anemia. X-rays didn’t find anything surprising, just an empty stomach. He got anti-nausea meds, pain meds, and fluids. They sent us back home with some prescription food, instructions to monitor his food and water intake, and a blood recheck appointment set up for a week later.

His appetite increased for a few days. He still wasn’t eating enough to gain any weight, but any progress was hopeful. But by Wednesday (the 13th) he was back to barely eating anything and I called and got him an appointment for the next day. The 14th was terrifying – his weight had continued to drop, and as had his red blood cell count. They recommended hospitalization for IV fluids and medication, and to monitor his eating. I cried signing the papers to leave him there for the day.

When I went to pick him up that night, they said he hadn’t really improved and they recommended overnight hospitalization. Our vet isn’t a 24 hour clinic, so that involved transferring him to a local emergency vet. The ER vet reassured us that pancreatitis is often treated by a few days of pushing fluids, so we should remain hopeful. She also offered to do an ultrasound on his abdomen, to further look for anything else that could be causing his symptoms. No one really knew why he was so anemic, but maybe the ultra sound would see if/where he was bleeding internally.

After a sleepless night, the ER vet called to tell us Shadow had done well – they’d gotten him to eat a little, and the ultra sound hadn’t found anything too alarming or conclusive. The only thing they noted was an enlarged lymph node. We were told another day of hospitalization would be ideal, but we might be able to take him home that night. It was with a much lighter heart that we brought him back to our regular vet, giving them the overnight report and excited to get our healthy boy back soon.

However, our rollercoaster took a sudden dive. The vet reported that he hadn’t eaten and had only gotten more lethargic as the day progressed. The next diagnostic step they recommended was exploratory surgery, during which they would also insert a feeding tube so we could ensure he was getting the calories he needed. At this point, they were very worried he was about to enter liver failure from starvation.

We decided to go ahead with the surgery, which was scheduled for the next morning. We took him home that night for lots of cuddles – lapped up our affection all night. He was so happy to be back in his familiar environment, and our other cat also made it clear she was thrilled he was home.

Taking him to the vet the next morning was a tense affair. After finally being home, he wanted nothing to do with his cat carrier and let us know it. Three hours later I got a call from the vet – he’d done very well in surgery and was waking up comfortably! They had a new diagnosis based on the state of his liver and gall-bladder: feline triaditis. While they did take a couple biopsies, they were pretty confident we were on the right track. They said the prognosis was good but the at-home care would be intensive; not only were we responsible for his calorie intake through the feeding tube until he began to eat again, but there were also five medications that needed to be given once or twice a day. They still hadn’t found a source for the anemia, but hoped it would recoup with everything else.

We were thrilled to bring him home and dedicated to getting him back up to health. His food was specially prepared each day and given to him 4-5 times daily. He had to be quarantined from our other cat and dog for a while, so he was confined to the spare bedroom. Within three days, he was starting to eat on his own and was feisty enough to try and escape to the rest of the apartment whenever I opened the door. His stitches were healing well, and we got a onesie for him to wear instead of the hated cone (not that he liked it much better). The vet checked in that Monday, and was almost as excited as I was to hear how well he was doing. We started letting him explore the rest of the apartment with Leira and Kenai when we were home to monitor him, so he got more stimulation and got to hang out in all his favorite spots. Everything was looking up.

Unfortunately, it didn’t last. On Friday (the 22nd) I noticed that his eating was declining. We had just gotten him up to full calories through the feeding tube, so I figured it would take a while for his appetite to surpass what we were giving him. However, his appetite didn’t pick back up, and he began showing increased signs of nausea when I fed him. He also felt unusually warm. On Monday I called the vet, and left a message asking if this was normal recovery behavior. I spent the afternoon at home with him, waiting for the vet to call. They didn’t, so I called and asked again that evening – this time someone went back to talk to the vet in person. We were advised to take him to ER.

We went back to the ER where he had been hospitalized just ten days before. After a quick physical exam (where we saw he had lost even more weight, and he was feverish), they took him back for more bloodwork. He was extraordinarily anemic – his red blood cell count had decreased by half from its previous low levels. We could take him to a clinic that could do a blood transfusion – the nearest one was an hour away by car, and he’d have to stay there for at least 24 hours to make sure his body didn’t reject the blood. And since we didn’t know what was causing the anemia, it was likely the transfusion would only buy us a little time.

The next diagnostic step would be to test a sample of his bone marrow, a process that would involve putting him under anesthesia. There were three main suspects for his anemia at this point: a virus attacking his red blood cells and/or bone marrow, an autoimmune disorder (his body attacking his red blood cells), or cancer. We were advised that was a toss of the dice whether or not it was something treatable; even if it was, it would be extremely intensive and difficult for him.

We took some time to hold him close and think about our options. His options. For the last few weeks (and the last four years) we had discussed always trying to do what was best for him. And as he fell asleep in my arms, that most difficult choice became clear.

The vet told us we could take him home overnight if we wanted, but it we weren’t going to do a transfusion we should bring him back within 24 hours to put him to sleep. I didn’t want him to go through two more car rides (his most hated activity) and what would clearly be a painful and stressful night – we decided it would be best to let him go peacefully that night. He’d had a good day cuddling on the couch with me, Leira, and Kenai (one of the rare times I actually got a picture of him and the dog together). Luis and I held him for at least an hour, telling him we loved him and soaking in his sweetness.  Finally we knew we couldn’t delay any longer. Luis held me and I held Shadow as the vet administered the anesthesia, lulling him into sleep for the last time.

Shadow was so much more than we ever could have expected. I’ll never be able to describe him adequately, or what he meant to us. We will miss him forever, and cherish the time we did get to spend with him.

[emmaruthrundlesh]

Interview with Emma Ruth Rundle // Astral Noize

An in depth interview with Emma Ruth Rundle about her new album "On Dark Horses" coming out on Friday, Sept 14th everywhere - Pre-order here. She will also be on tour starting Sept 15th. Interview by Paige Mathis via Astral Noize

“It’s hard not to feel like an asshole just talking about myself,” Emma Ruth Rundle reveals as she ponders the deeper themes of her latest work through an intermittently crackling Skype call. Intertwining a mild-mannered and introverted personality with deeply personal and revealing music may sound oxymoronic, but Rundle’s career is built upon these vacillating foundations. The American songwriter and visual artist’s atmospheric contributions to the music scene have grown increasingly intimate throughout her career, from the lush ambience of The Nocturnes, the cinematic soundscapes of Red Sparrowes and the sprawling haze of Marriages to the ethereal musings of her solo work. 2016’s Marked for Death felt much like the peak of this introspection, brimming as it was with brooding reflections on life, addiction, and self-destructive tendencies.

Its follow-up, On Dark Horses, is suitably a reflection of an artist who has survived inner struggles and emerged stronger, though it doesn’t shy away from the dark realities of life. One of which being that life is seldom as uncomplicated as placing personal demons aside – many will wrestle with them for decades. To find out more, we had an in-depth conversation with the musician about the open and personal nature of her songwriting, collaborating with her partner Evan Patterson (Young Widows, Jaye Jayle), how this album’s creation differs from her past LPs, and how her visual art entwines with her musical output.

On Dark Horses by Emma Ruth Rundle

The last album was written in a remote artist’s residence whereas this one was largely written during breaks in touring after a move to Louisville, Kentucky. Did that change your approach at all? Are you inspired by your surroundings when writing?

I think it made the album a lot less desperate and I reached a lot of breaking points writing Marked For Death from being alone in the desert, but I think it allowed for maybe some more emotionally potent songs. For some of the stuff on this record, I took a week off in Cornwall and for some of the music I was able to access that same headspace, but it wasn’t as extreme as the last record. I do think it’s important and that it’s an effective way of writing to be in that kind of extreme setting of solitude.

This record was definitely influenced by the other musicians I was around in that having them playing with the band, getting to flesh out some of the songs, particularly with Dylan [Nadon, Wovenhand] and Evan [Patterson], the instrumentation of it lent itself to a little bit of a different approach. Being able to write an instrumental bridge in a song knowing that other musicians are gonna be there to play with you, that part wouldn’t really be as effective as a solo guitarist. There are some different things you can pull of as a band and I think I wrote some parts of the songs knowing that I was going to have that both in the studio and the live setting.

You mentioned before that this is the first time you didn’t play all of the guitar parts yourself. Was handing that over to someone else strange given how personal your music sometimes is? Or was it beneficial in that it allowed you to focus on other parts of the arrangement?

It was very difficult for me to do that. I had a really hard time not playing all the guitars on the record and especially letting a man do it was very hard for me. I love Evan and his playing is incredible and he’s been one of my favourite guitar players. I’m a huge fan of Young Widowsand obviously tour a lot with Jaye Jayle… part of the reason we have a relationship in real life is based on us playing together. We were forced into the situation last year when going on tour together, I hadn’t played with them before and they became my backing band for the tour. As soon as he started playing guitar, I was like woah I’m in love with this person – his playing was like an extension of myself. We have the same inclinations and he brings his own unique style to it as well. I was in love with his guitar playing anyway and despite that it was very difficult for me to not track all of the guitar parts and then force him to play things. Evan is an incredible artist in his own right, an incredible songwriter and technically wonderful at the guitar.

So, while it was difficult, I think it benefits the music. Being able to have a second guitar does allow me to play different kinds of leads, riffs, and focus on vocals more in certain areas in the live setting, and I know that I wrote some of the album with that in mind. There was a little bit more planning with how I’m going to live through this album cycle as far as performance goes than the last album. With Marked For Death, I didn’t even know that I was going to tour or even make another record. This record there’s been a little bit more of a strategy in the writing, and part of that has been having the support of other musicians. It was really hard, even up until we were going to the studio. The parts that Evan did write bring so much to the songs and it’s fun. I think I vacillate between being a kind of controlling crazy person and then wanting support and help from my fellows.

How do you feel being a solo artist compares to being in a band where the output is a collaborative effort?

I think it’s a lot easier to write solo. Writing in a band is a democratic process and so you’ll have, like in Marriages, three separate people coming from different angles and obviously we have similar interests and similar backgrounds as far as what music made us wanna join a band together. But, the influences can be different enough that you can butt heads on where to take a song or how to start a song. Every band is so different, but the band experiences that I’ve had – which is mostly Red Sparrows and Marriages – it just takes a lot longer to write songs in some ways because you have to contend with other people’s opinions and styles and egos and all of the things that go into being a band.

When writing solo, that just isn’t a thing… all you have to rely on and deal with is your own work ethic, whatever it is that you’re drawing from and the time frame that you have. So it’s part of the reason that I started making solo records and leaning more and more in that direction. [It’s not] because I don’t love writing with a band or writing with my previous bandmates, it’s just natural things that happened and [people] kind of went their separate ways, and Marriages… maybe next year. Writing solo is just easier and something you can do sitting alone on a side porch or in your house or wherever you have a moment and space to yourself. Writing with a band you need a rehearsal space, everyone’s schedules have to meet. Writing alone is something you can do more easily for so many reasons. Interpersonal reasons, logistical reasons, all of that stuff.

Do you think that your music has become more open and personal over time?

The last record was really open and personal. I think that there are some songs on this album that are as well. It’s all personal. It kind of makes it hard to talk about in some ways. The personal nature of the music just feels natural. I think the last record seems more personal. This record is still personal but isn’t as desperate and fraught. The last song ‘You Don’t Have To Cry’ is a song I wrote for someone else and doesn’t have anything to do with my personal struggle and pain, which is a new step for me. Other songs on the album are very personal.

Do you think it’s important for artists to write about this kind of thing and to be so open and candid and truthful?

I can’t say what’s important for artists to do. I can’t say that my art is important in itself… it’s just what I do. I don’t even know that it’s important. I don’t think there are any rules for what artists should or shouldn’t do. Everyone brings something to the world… if everybody was writing this honest, open music about their struggle it would be kind of depressing, I think there’s got to be other kinds of expression that serve a purpose. Human beings are so multifaceted and complex. Everything has a value and at the same time nothing matters when it comes down to it, especially about art. Art is a luxury.

Is it important to you that people interpret your music in a particular way?

No. You can’t control how anyone is going to interpret your music. Once you record or say something and leave it, it’s open to interpretation and there’s just nothing you can do to control that. I’ve been getting asked a lot of political questions lately and I don’t want that. I don’t want people to interpret my music as a political statement. I don’t have any expectations about how it will or should be interpreted.

You’ve said before that folk music was integral to your musical beginnings. In what way did folk music inform your music? Is this perhaps where often sincere and honest lyrics derive from?

I don’t know where that inclination comes from. What really influenced me the most was hanging around a folk music store and hearing that music constantly in the background. This place called McCabe’s in Santa Monica. I took Celtic harp lessons there when I was eight and then just started hanging out in the store. It’s been a folk music store for 60 years in LA, they have concerts etc. I was exposed to lots of different types of music at home but working in the folk music store affected my guitar playing more than my lyrics.

Lots of people have said that your last album was all about performance and visuality and there are essences of that on this new album too. Do you think that derives from your being a visual artist? Is it your intention to combine the two mediums?

In the past, I would say no. I think that the visual element is something that is kind of just out of necessity, like I’d need to make an album cover or, like on this The Nocturnes record called Aokigahara, I kinda got into creating a visual world around the album. On Dark Horsesis the first time since then that I feel I’ve really done that in the more extreme way, with the paintings I’ve been doing now and the album art and all the visual art. My visual art brain is coming into creating the world around the record more than it has in the past but I don’t think that the visual art that I do informs my music or my performances or vice versa. I think they’re kind of separate muses for me and I turn to one when I’m not doing the other.

Many metal fans can be judgemental and elitist about what they consider ‘metal enough’ to listen to. You said once that the metal scene is your world. Do you think that people like yourself – who experiment with the established sound – being embraced by the metal community is a sign that the genre is becoming more open-minded?

I would hesitate to speak for the metal community or for the genre or any genres. I think that there’s a listenership… the spectrum is so huge. I can only speak from my own experiences, which [are that] for some reason I have been invited to play metal festivals and seem to be embraced by that community. There are so many subgenres within metal – doom metal, classic metal, stoner metal, etc. – and maybe not all those people come from the same place. There’s this cross-section of bands and music that’s happening right now that has a very broad and open-minded listenership. I think people (not just metal listeners) in general’s tastes are broadening based on how accessible music is, not the content of music but the avenues through which people consume music is more accessible. Maybe listenership in general is broadening. At the same time, you have these festivals like Roadburn in the Netherlands that has a lot of different kinds of bands playing there. I would still say that it’s a heavy or extreme music festival, but there’s just something open-minded about it. I think it’s a progressive listenership.

What’s next for you. Any plans?

There’s lots of touring plans. I have a visual art show in Chicago on September 8th, and then I’m doing a full US tour that’s broken up in the middle by a European/UK tour which starts September 15th here in the states, breaks on September 25th, then I’m heading over to Europe and starting in France on October 6th. I’ll be in the UK November 3rd through to the 8th, and then I come back to the states and do the west coast November 20th to December 17th, so once September hits I’ll pretty much be on tour for the rest of the year, and then I’m hoping to finish writing this acoustic guitar album that I’ve been working on. It never ends.

[euroman1945-blog]

The Daily Thistle

The Daily Thistle – News From Scotland

Saturday 14th July 2018

"Madainn Mhath” …Fellow Scot, I hope the day brings joy to you…. Are you all set for the weekend, shopping, visit to family and or friends, maybe packing to catch a plane or take a trip, or what about a trip to the movies, my good friends, whatever it is carry on doing it … don't let the terrible thing that happened in Nice, London, Berlin, Paris or Manchester affect what you do, if it does the terrorist has won and we will never get our lives back again, I still walk my friend and companion Bella at 4am in a town full of people from Arabic countries and I will until it's my turn to get off this little blue planet, NO, I am not trying to be a hero, I'm a realist, the chance of that happening to me are slim and none, and you Gentle Reader, no matter where you are, the UK, Europe, United States of America or any other country in the world have the same odds, what the terrorist wants is YOU and ME to think we are next, and we are not, you have much more chance of being hit by a bus than being a statistic in a terror attack, so don't sit in the house worried, enjoy life, smell the Tulip's go down the Pub/Bar have fun and enjoy your selves, on this little blue planet we call Earth as we spin through space and time together.....

INSTALLATION OF SPEED CAMERA SCHEME ON A90 THAT ‘WILL SAVE LIVES’ GETS UNDER WAY…. The installation of average speed cameras along a notorious stretch of road has begun. Thirty average speed cameras will be installed on the A90 between Dundee and Stonehaven this year. Yesterday, a camera, signs and apparatus to hold more average speed cameras were installed – the first of the cameras which will be placed between three and four miles apart. There will be 15 on each side of the carriageway, similar to the system already in place between Perth and Dunblane. Sandra Burke, chairwoman of Tealing Community Council, said the initiative was going to “save lives”. She said: “We really welcome the installation of the average speed cameras. “The thing about Tealing is that it bridges the A90 so we have cars, tractors and other vehicles in the community crossing the road. “The cameras can potentially save lives.” Sandra said the community council believes a reduction in the speed limit on the road — from 70mph to 50mph — would be the next step in ensuring the safety of the public. She added: “We are pushing for a reduction in the speed limit but we believe that the average speed camera installation is a step forward for us.” Luke Macauley, head of the Scottish Safety Camera Programme, is one of the key people behind the scheme. Previously, he spoke to The Daily Thistle when the introduction of the cameras was announced and insisted the move would see fatal crash statistics drop. He said: “We install these cameras to save lives and improve road safety. “Unfortunately, the A90 features as one of the trunk roads with the highest collision statistics. “One death is one too many and you’ll get no apologies from us for doing what we can to reduce that.” The A90 cameras will be the third such scheme in Scotland, following the introduction of average speed stretches on the A77 in Ayrshire in 2005 and the A9 between Dunblane and Inverness in 2014. The cameras work by detecting vehicles’ number plates and using the time they take to travel from one camera to the next to calculate an average speed. Figures from Transport Scotland show more than 13,000 speeding offences were logged on the A90 by speed cameras in 2015 — accounting for 20% of the total number recorded in Scotland.

SCOT MURDERED AT HOME IN MAURITIUS…. A Scottish woman has been murdered in a robbery at her home in Mauritius while her young son was in the house. It is thought Janice Farman, 47, may have been smothered by the thieves, who stole jewellery and money then drove away in her car. Police were called to the property at Albion on the Indian Ocean island at about 1am on Friday and found Ms Farman’s body in her bed. Officers also found her 10-year-old autistic son in the property and have passed him into the care of the child development unit. Police have launched an investigation and are hunting three suspects. The car has been found and will be examined by specialists. Ms Farman, thought to be originally from Clydebank, was the managing director of PECS Data Services in Mauritius.

BOOZED-UP PARTY-GOER BREAKS PELVIS JUMPING THROUGH WINDOW AFTER POLICE ARRIVED….  A booze-fuelled man, 20, threw a TV from a second-floor window before jumping through it himself when police arrived – breaking his pelvis. The “dangerous” act left Stefan Shelton hospitalised. He carried out the offence after drinking at a party – and said he had no memory of the incident. Shelton appeared at Aberdeen Sheriff Court and admitted a charge of behaving in a culpable and reckless manner by throwing the TV from the window at a flat on the city’s Justice Street, on to a footpath below. The offence took place on September 8 last year. According to the Evening Express, defence agent Les Green said: “This would appear to be a party he was invited to. “He drank far too much.” The court was told that there was mobile phone video footage recorded of the incident. Mr Green said: “He has no recollection of doing this at all. “From what I’ve heard from the footage people are chanting and urging him to throw the TV out the window. “He responded to the pressure, it was a stupid thing to do.” The defence agent also told the court: “When police arrived he jumped out the same window and broke his pelvis.” Mr Green added that Shelton was aware of the “danger” his actions had posed to those below on the street. He said: “He has not drank since. “He got a shock when I suggested this is something the court could impose a custodial sentence for. “He tells me now he has had something of a shock to his system.” Shelton, whose address was given in court papers as Whitehill Place, Peterhead, was fined £250 by Sheriff Christine McCrossan. Sentencing Shelton, Sheriff McCrossan said she wanted the 20-year-old to realise how “dangerous” his actions were, citing the case of a person who threw a traffic cone from a bridge in Edinburgh, leaving the person it struck paralysed.

FORGOTTEN SECOND WORLD WAR AIR SHELTER DISCOVERED BY WORKERS…. Workers installing one of Scotland’s largest solar panel projects have unearthed a lost piece of military history. Contractors were cutting back shrubbery during the work at a waste treatment plant in Montrose when they discovered a preserved air raid shelter from the Second World War. The shelter was part of the former RAF Montrose site, just off the Angus coast. The old base is said to be haunted by the ghost of a pilot who crashed at the site back in 1913. Mari Davies, the project manager for Scottish Water Horizons who is carrying out the solar panel work, said the discovery was “interesting”. She said: “The site was overgrown and we had to do a bit of work first to remove the dense shrubbery. “Having liaised with the local council, we knew that in the past the area could have been home to munitions and radioactive material, all remnants of the Second World War. “Thankfully nothing hazardous was uncovered which meant we were able to carry on with the work. “However once we’d cleared the land, we made the unexpected discovery of the air raid shelter. Although an interesting find, it did mean we have to alter our plans slightly to fit round it.” “The treatment works also sits on part of what was RAF Montrose which is said to be haunted by the ghost of Lieutenant Desmond Arthur, a pilot who crashed there in 1913. There have been many sightings of him over the years, but luckily none of our contractors had any paranormal experiences.

DUNDEE WOMAN SLAMS ‘LAUGHABLE’ MOMENT SHOP IN ENGLAND TURNS DOWN HER SCOTTISH BANK NOTE…. A Dundee woman has spoken of her “frustration” after being turned away after attempting to hand over Scottish notes in a shop in England. Diane Drysdale had been enjoying an anniversary break with husband Clive in the Lake District, Cumbria, at the start of the week. After travelling down on Monday, the couple prepared to head back up the road to Kirkton after an enjoyable trip. However, their break turned sour after they and nipped into the Spar shop in Appleby-in-Westmorland on Tuesday night. Diane described the episode as “laughable”. The 42-year-old explained: “We went into the shop for a couple of bits and pieces for travelling. “We went to hand over a Scottish note and the woman immediately said: ‘No, we can’t take that’.” Diane added that the shop worker pointed them in the direction of a cash machine outside. Thankfully for Diane, the store was quiet at the time and her embarrassment was kept to a minimum. She added: “Yes, we could have just used our card, but that’s not the point. It was only a couple of pounds-worth of stuff. It was also pouring of rain and we were told we’d have to go out to get cash. “We were in Turkey recently, a country outwith the EU, and they accepted our Sterling but a few miles down the road in England we can’t use it?” Diane posted her complaint on the Spar Facebook page, to which they responded that the shopkeeper should have accepted the cash, but said they’d look into it. Since then, the Dundonian hasn’t heard back from the national retailer and has described the situation as “frustrating”. A spokeswoman for Spar said: “We try very hard to make sure that our customers have a positive shopping experience with us and in this instance we are very sorry for any inconvenience caused to Ms Drysdale.” By law, Scottish bank notes are legal currency and have no reason not to be accepted – other than at the discretion of the shop. The Association of Commercial Banknote Issuers states: “The acceptability of any means of payment, including banknotes, is essentially a matter for agreement between the parties involved.”

On that note I will say that I hope you have enjoyed the news from Scotland today,

Our look at Scotland today is of the eerie light through the trees near the Falls of Clyde, captured by John McElwee....

A Sincere Thank You for your company and Thank You for your likes and comments I love them and always try to reply, so please keep them coming, it's always good fun, As is my custom, I will go and get myself another mug of "Colombian" Coffee and wish you a safe Saturday 14th July 2018 from my home on the southern coast of Spain, where the blue waters of the Alboran Sea washes the coast of Africa and Europe and the smell of the night blooming Jasmine and Honeysuckle fills the air…and a crazy old guy and his dog Bella go out for a walk at 4:00 am…on the streets of Estepona…

All good stuff....But remember it’s a dangerous world we live in

Be safe out there…

Robert McAngus #Scotland #Spain #Travel #Coffee #News #Blog #Dundee

[junker-town]

The rise and collapse of a scalper’s sports card empire

Bribes, parking lot deals, and the cards you never had a chance to buy.

Warning: The following story contains strong language.

Tyrone sits in the middle of his three monitor setup like the cockpit of a fighter jet, one hand grasping a cup of coffee, the other his vape, alternating between stimulants and watching a scramble over spots in his newest break. “This shit’s been up 40 minutes and we only got two slots left,” he yells to his two business partners, pulling cards for their latest singles orders.

“Tyrone,” who asked not to go by his real name to keep his anonymity, elevated his hobby for collecting cards into a business three years ago, and turned it into an empire. Now he’s coming face-to-face with it all collapsing. “I knew we didn’t have forever on this,” he says, “I just figured it’d be the feds shutting it down, not some dumbasses at Target.”

May 14th was the end of an era for Tyrone. Target made the announcement they would no longer sell NBA, NFL, MLB or Pokemon cards following an incident outside a Wisconsin store in which a customer pulled a gun on another who’d just purchased cards. Signs, now posted all over stores in the country, read “To ensure the safety of our guests and team members, effective May 14th, MLB, NFL, NBA and Pokemon cards will no longer be sold in stores until further notice.” Walmart has not made an official announcement at this time, though there’s increasing speculation that they too will pull cards from shelves.

“That shit had me f***** up,” Tyrone says, shaking his head. “I dunno how it’s been working up north, but ain’t nobody in my area getting good shit from Target anyway.”

Tyrone began turning his hobby into a business like anyone else trying to get cards. He arrived at stores early on Friday morning, learning that cards weren’t stocked by Target and Walmart employees, but rather independent merchandisers who would enter the store on distributors’ behalf, and place items on the shelves. Tyrone would wait until the merchandisers arrived to put out the new cards, then pounce on them, buying out the store and immediately flipping them on eBay. It was a weekly ritual. Hit a store, move to the next, do the same.

“I’d spend HOURS in the car each week,” he laughed, remembering his beginnings. Tyrone quickly realized there was too much inconsistency. Sometimes he’d miss the merchandiser, or they’d go to another store first and throw off his route. Random shoppers would buy a fat pack (a wrapped package of multiple packs) as their nostalgia kicked in, having no idea what they were buying. This made his stock unreliable.

“It got exhausting, and frustrating as shit got bigger. That’s when I got smart about it.”

I know Luka and Ja, not Squirtle and shit.

After months of shadowing deliveries and driving around, Tyrone approached one of the merchandisers in a Walmart parking lot, and befriended them. He needed as much product as he could get his hands on, they needed to do their job. “I made it work for both of us.”

At the time the only thing really popping was basketball cards, particularly the highly sought after Panini Prizm series. If you went to Target or Walmart hoping to find Prizm basketball only to find it out of stock, there’s a good chance Tyrone had it, and you never had a chance of buying it.

“It was so easy back then,” he says. “They’d come in, put the shit on the shelves, snap a photo with their phone to show they did their job — then immediately pull it back down and buy it.” To the distributors, Tyrone’s merchandisers were doing their jobs, to the public they just thought they were too late and missed out on the cards. No one was the wiser, except for the merchandisers and Tyrone.

“I’d meet them at the end out their route, give them a stack — normally double what they paid, and everyone was happy.” As far as he sees it, Tyrone thinks the merchandisers got the better end of the deal. They just needed to meet him and make some quick money, he had to do the leg work to move the cards on the back end, but with prices skyrocketing it was worth it.

It wasn’t long before demand outstripped Tyrone’s supply, even having most of an east coast state in his pocket. He needed to expand, and began hitting up friends and family members in other states, bringing them into the fold. Before long he had numerous states, stretching from the east coast as far Texas in his network. Everyone giving kickbacks to merchandisers, sending the product to him, and profiting as he became able to sell product online for four times their value, sometimes even more.

“I was making less, because everyone needed a cut — but who cares. I was clearing $10k a month easy.”

Flipping fat packs and sealed product was nice, but the real money came in when Tyrone started getting his hands on hobby boxes. Larger, 12 pack boxes which brought more money, and more opportunity. “I can make stupid money on a case break, you don’t even know.”

A box, or case break, is a multi-participant venture in which a large number of people essentially gamble by buying pseudo-shares in a mass opening. Let’s say someone has a case of Prizm, you might pay $500 to get randomly assigned a team, then get every card from that team opened in a case.

For the individuals participating, it was a potential gold mine. Lucking out and getting the Pelicans could mean landing a five figure Zion Williamson card, at the expense of someone who got assigned the Hawks, and coming away with nothing. Trae Young isn’t worth big money, so Atlanta is seen as a dud slot. For people like Tyrone, selling the slots represents no risk — and all upside.

“Let’s say I’m paying three grand a case. I’m turning around and making five times that it in a break.”

With everyone desperate to open product hoping of landing a chase card, Tyrone was just in it for economics. “I’ll leave the gambling to the gamblers,” he says, “sure I’ll open something now and then for fun, but nah, moving sealed is where it’s at.” Soon, not even his vast network was enough to keep him in the cards he needed.

The fever spread from basketball into everything else. First football, then baseball, and finally Pokemon. “Pokemon makes me too nervous man,” Tyrone says to a friend who suggests they start buying it up, “we don’t know shit about those. I mean, can we break it? I don’t know. I know Luka and Ja, not Squirtle and shit. I’ll stick to what I know.”

“You have no idea how dirty this all is.”

As far as Tyrone saw it, he was providing a service. It had become impossible for anyone to get sealed product without spending thousands on boxes, and he felt that private card shops were cracking everything they were getting and selling singles online. Even then, he felt a little bad about what he was doing. “It sucks man, like I remember collecting cards as a kid,” Tyrone tells me, “none of these kids have a chance at buying packs. It’s all being eaten up.” As far as he was concerned, if Tyrone wasn’t scalping cards, someone else would — so why not him?

A large impact on the card market came not from flippers like Tyrone, but from Wall Street. During the economic downturn caused by the Covid pandemic, an increasing number of investment bankers were looking to diversify their portfolios with collectibles, and basketball cards were at the top of the list. Grading services like PSA and Beckett, once tapped only by enthusiasts trying to secure their most valuable cards, were now being flooded with requests to grade from big-dollar firms, aiming to solidify their investments.

“You have no idea how dirty this all is,” a lanky man named “Tom” calls from the back room as he assembles as eBay order. “I know this goes all the way through the system. I know Wall Street is talking to Panini and they’re engineering all this. Shit, I think ESPN is in Panini’s pocket too, pushing these players they know are signing.”

“Man, you’re tripping,” Tyrone says, rolling his eyes, not buying Tom’s conspiracy theories. “Don’t listen to him, I mean shit IS dirty, he right about that — but nah, nothing like that.”

Whether you believe the wild theories floated by collectors or not, it’s unquestionable that there’s a massive card shortage and it’s pushing prices through the roof. If you want to find a rare Zion Williamson rookie card now it’ll take not a few hundred bucks, or even a few thousand — but a second mortgage on your house.

Card collectors were tracking the price spikes daily, but when word got out to the general public that there were five- and six-figure cards being pulled from packs, it started a frenzy. Go to any store that stocked cards and you’d find empty shelves, people who were never interested in cards before were lingering around the section, looking to quickly make four times their purchase in a matter of hours be reselling online.

Word of Friday stocking got out. It wasn’t long before there were lines down the sidewalk, in the middle of a pandemic, of people waiting for store doors to open to they could rush the card rack. “My people started getting scared,” Tyrone said, referring to his merchandisers. “Not like they were afraid of getting hurt or nothing. They just didn’t want the drama of pulling the shit off shelves, someone reporting them and losing their jobs.” Soon the merchandisers started to pull out of their deals, no longer interested in the risks the quick money brought. It became more and more difficult for Tyrone to secure large numbers of cards.

This is the harsh reality of the #Pokemon TCG right now. It’s a mess pic.twitter.com/3RnbeGz07A

— Pokémon News (@TrainerINTEL) May 22, 2021

Then the news came cards were being pulled from shelves. “Nobody was ready for that. Shit, I don’t think Panini or Bowman were ready for that,” Tyrone says. Overnight the network he’d cultivated for years collapsed, but this wasn’t a man who looked like his world was crumbling around him — rather, he seemed calm. “I knew it was coming, just not this way. I have plans, believe me I have plans. Just not ready to talk about that yet.”

While Tyrone pivots to whatever he’s doing next, on Friday May 21, one week after pulling cards from the shelves, Target opened them up again for online-only sales. This time with strict limits to how many packs and boxes people could buy, effectively killing the scalping market. A great day for general consumers, and perhaps the nail in the coffin for those who made a living off cards in the last few years.

When reached for comment Target corporate said they had nothing to add to the card situation beyond their initial statement posted in stores.

[thebarsondaily]

The 12 Days of Barson Christmas

for @cool-veggiesword

Title: The 12 Days of Barson Christmas Author: motherbearof03 Rating: Teen/Mature Summary: On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me: a partridge in a pear tree. That’s how the original song goes. But in the world of Olivia Benson and Rafael Barba, gifts are a little less traditional and not always tangible.

Our stories begin on December 14th and continue in order through Christmas. Some are short little scenes, others are longer. Most of it is fluff and fun, but not everything; because as we all know, holidays are not always candy canes and mistletoe. I hope you enjoy reading. Merry Christmas! A/N: If you read carefully, you’ll see I’ve not only used actual canon and my own headcanon but also borrowed one bit of headcanon created by @theoofoof because it was so wonderful when she wrote it and fits in perfectly.

December 14th On the first day of Christmas, my true love gave to me:  a new coffee pot for Liv’s place

Rafael was finishing the knot on his tie when Olivia came into the bedroom holding out his Harvard Law mug filled with steaming coffee. Noah was still asleep and they had a few more moments alone before he had to get up for school. Taking it from her hand, he traded it for a kiss.

“Thank you, mi amor.”

Lifting it to his lips, he anticipated the first rush of caffeine of the day. But as the sweetened liquid hit his tongue he turned away on the pretense of picking up his jacket and grimaced before swallowing. Ugh. While he’d never say so, he couldn’t stand the coffee at her apartment.

He wasn’t sure if it was the pot, the coffee or both, but something needed to be done. He decided he was buying Olivia a new coffee pot that day. Christmas was less than two weeks away, but he wasn’t waiting to give it to her. Rafael walked to the kitchen and poured his cup down the drain while she was in Noah’s room. He’d have coffee when he got to his office.

December 15th On the second day of Christmas, my true love gave to me: Lunch for two, no work talk

Olivia breezed into Rafael’s office Friday afternoon calling, “Hold his calls please, Carmen. We’re having lunch,” over her shoulder before she closed the door. She put the takeout bag down on the round conference table, then returned to his desk and closed his laptop.

“Hey!” he protested, “I was in the middle of a brief about —“ She silenced him with a kiss.

“Nope. No work talk during lunch. You made that rule awhile ago.”

Standing, he smiled at the woman he loved and put up his hands in surrender. “You’re right. So what are we talking about?”

He pulled out a chair for her and then sat beside her as she unpacked the bag of Chinese food.

“Christmas, Rafael. Christmas is in ten days and we’ve done no shopping. Have you bought anything yet?”

He smirked. “A few things for you. I already gave you the coffee maker. And something for Noah. But other than that, no.”

“Well, I haven’t gotten anything for Noah. Or you. Or your mother. We need to do some shopping this weekend. And we still don’t have a tree.”

“A tree?” His eyebrows rose as he took a bite, chewed and swallowed. “A real tree?”

“Yes, a real tree. You don’t have a real tree?”

“I’ve never had a tree at all. We did when I was a child and my mother has one, but I honestly don’t know if it’s real or not.”

“Then we’re definitely getting a real tree this weekend. And shopping,” she declared.

December 16th On the third day of Christmas, my true love gave to me (well actually Noah): 3 tickets to see Ferdinand

Saturday morning found the three of them eating breakfast, Noah and Olivia discussing where the Christmas tree should go that year, when Rafael got up from his chair. She looked at him quizzically.

“Be right back,” he told her, and disappeared down the hall to her bedroom, returning a moment later with a brightly wrapped, flat package that he put in front of Noah’s cereal bowl. “I know Christmas isn’t until next week, but this is a special present.”

The boy looked at his mother. “Can I open it?”

“May I.” she corrected, moving the bowl away to prevent spills. “And yes, you may.”

Noah pulled off the bow and tore away the paper to reveal a book. It had a worn red cover with a drawing of a bull on it smelling a flower. The title was “The Story of Ferdinand”. He looked at Rafael with a grin.

“We’ve read this story in school! Ferdinand likes to smell flowers.”

“This was my book when I was a little boy, hijo,” said the man. “It was one of my favorites and my mami saved it. I thought you might like to have it.” Olivia reached over to touch his arm and he met her gaze, his green eyes full of love. He cleared his throat. “But that’s not all. Open it.”

Noah opened the cover and to find an envelope inside. He opened the envelope and pulled out three tickets. Olivia leaned over to look at them. They were for a showing of the new movie based on the book that afternoon.

“I thought we could go see the movie today after we get the Christmas tree.” He looked at Liv and shrugged. “We can shop tomorrow.”

December 17th On the fourth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me: 4 new pillows for Rafael’s bed

Olivia pushed herself up on an elbow and tried to make the pillows under her head more comfortable. She looked at the man snoring softly beside her. How does he sleep on these things? It wasn’t the first time she had wondered this since the start of their relationship.

The pillows on his bed were horrible. She had fluffed and folded and scrunched them to no avail. She’d even swapped the two on her side for his, thinking they might be different. But no. She put her head back down gingerly and closed her eyes. Ah. She drifted back to sleep. In the morning, however, her neck reminded her how bad the pillows were.

That evening while Rafael read Noah’s bedtime story, she was busy with the new pillows she’d bought that afternoon while they were Christmas shopping. She stood back and admired them in place on the bed; tall and fluffy with the perfect amount of neck support. It had taken forever to choose the right ones. Memory foam, regular foam, feather, down, synthetic down…Olivia never realized the endless options when it came to pillows

She returned to Rafael’s home office that currently doubled as Noah’s bedroom to kiss her son goodnight. Closing the door behind them, she took the lawyer’s hand and said, “Come here. I have a present for you.”

“It’s not Christmas yet, Liv,” he replied, but grinned when he realized she was leading him toward the bedroom. “Oh.”

She smacked him lightly on the arm and rolled her eyes. “A real present! Close your eyes.” He did and she positioned him facing the bed. “Okay, now open them.”

Rafael opened his eyes to see four new pillows on the bed, each pair topped with a large red bow. He turned to Olivia.

“Pillows?”

“Rafael, I love you, but your pillows were horrible.” She watched as he walked to his side of the bed, removed the bow, sat, then lay back onto the new pillows. He closed his eyes with a smile. Opening them, he held out a hand to her.

“Why don’t you come over here and we’ll break them in?”

December 18th On the fifth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me: 5 gold pen refills

“Olivia Margaret Benson!”

At the sound of her full name, she looked up from the cookbook she was perusing for cookie recipes and glanced at him over the top of her glasses.

“Rafael Eduardo Barba!” she shot back. “What did I do to deserve my full name?” He was holding up his favorite gold pen, waggling it at her.

“Did you use my pen to do the Christmas cards?”

“Yes. It’s the best pen we have.”

“That’s why it’s my favorite. And now it’s out of ink!” He scribbled on the legal pad on the table in front of him and held it up. There was nothing on the page. Olivia sighed, putting down the cookbook and removing her glasses. She knew this would happen someday. Carmen usually took care of refilling the pen before he realized the ink was getting low. He probably never even noticed.

“Rafa, it’s okay. I was going to give this to you for Christmas, but I guess it will have to be now.” She picked up a small box wrapped in gold foil with a red ribbon from under the Christmas tree that dominated the living room.

“That’s mine? Are you hiding my presents in plain view, Liv?” He smirked, accepting the package.

“Just this one.”

She watched, curious to see how the man she loved unwrapped a present. The answer was damned seductively. Christmas morning was going to be interesting, she thought. His long fingers pulled the ribbon to loosen the knot and let it slide off the box onto the table. Then he turned it over to pull at the paper where it was taped together until it came free from the box. He removed the lid and a large grin formed on his face. Reaching in, his hand emerged with five refills for his beloved pen.

December 19th On the sixth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me: 6 dozen cookies for Noah’s school

“You agreed to what?”

“They need cookies for the school holiday party, so I said we’d make some,” replied Rafael into his phone to Olivia, who was still at work. He’d picked up Noah after school and was cornered by the moms organizing the event for a contribution to the refreshments. The boy had looked up at him with puppy dog eyes and said, ‘Can we? Please?’ and Rafael was lost.

“How many?” When he hesitated before replying, she knew it was more than she’d have agreed to contribute. “How many, Rafael?”

“Six dozen.” He spoke the words quietly and held the phone from his ear in anticipation of the explosion of sound while Noah giggled, watching. When he heard nothing, he cautiously put it closer to his head. No sound came from the device.

“Liv? Are you there?”

“Oh, I’m here. And here is where I will stay until you are done making those cookies, counselor.” He could hear the laughter in her voice. “You know your way around my kitchen. Have fun. I love you both.”

Olivia ended the call and gave in to the laughter that she’d been holding back. She laughed until tears ran down her face and her sides hurt. She should have warned him about those moms. They always zeroed in on the dads, especially the good looking ones. As she wiped her eyes she reflected on the fact that Rafael was acting as a dad to Noah. It warmed her heart that he had stepped into the role so willingly and it was easily accepted by the child who had taken to calling him Papi Rafa.

Back at her apartment, man and boy were in negotiations over what kind of cookie to make, several cookbooks open on the dining table. Rafael was leaning toward one with the least number of ingredients, which to him equalled lesser difficulty. But Noah’s eyes were drawn to the pictures of the colorfully decorated ones.

“How about chocolate chip?” Barba pressed. “That’s your favorite.” The boy nodded.

“Yes, but this is a holiday party. Chocolate chip cookies aren’t holiday cookies,” he argued. “These are.” He placed a small finger on picture of the festive cut out cookies covered in frosting and sprinkles.

Dios, a lawyer in the making, Rafael thought, his lips twitching with a smile. He read the recipe. It really wasn’t that complicated. Just the part about rolling the dough and cutting out the shapes. He paused and looked at the boy, thinking he had just won his case.

“Noah, we can’t make these. We don’t have any cookie cutters.”

“Yes we do!” Noah jumped down from the chair and ran to the kitchen.

Barba heard him open and close a cabinet. He returned with a large plastic container in his arms full of cookie cutters. Damn. If he didn’t know better, he’d think Olivia bought those deliberately, knowing he’d get suckered into doing this.

“Okay, hijo. Holiday cut out cookies it is,” he laughed.

Several hours later, Olivia unlocked her apartment door and was greeted by the smell of freshly baked cookies. A few steps in and she could see they covered most of the flat surfaces in the main area of the apartment. There were cookies in the shapes of stars, candy canes, Christmas trees, snowmen, reindeer and a few others she couldn’t identify. Each one was decorated with colorful frosting and sprinkles. She glanced into the kitchen, expecting it to be a disaster, but it didn’t look like any baking had taken place at all.

Hearing voices coming from Noah’s room, she made her way down the hall and pushed open the door. Rafael sat on the edge of the bed, finishing the tuck-in process.

“Mommy!” her son cried, happy she was home in time to kiss him goodnight.

“Hello, my sweet boy.” She sat beside Rafael and hugged Noah tightly, before kissing the man on the cheek.

“We made cookies for the party at school,” he told her.

“I saw them,” she said. “You and Rafa did a good job. Am I allowed to have one?”

He nodded. “There’s a plate for us to keep.”

“Then I’ll have one after I eat some dinner. Time for sleep now.” She kissed him on the forehead. “Good night, my love.”

“‘Night, Mommy. ‘Night, Papi Rafa.” The boy yawned widely.

“Good night, hijo.” Rafael kissed the top of his head, gently ruffling his curls.

The two left his room, closing the door behind them. They walked into her bedroom where he wrapped his arms around her and they shared a more intimate kiss. She rested her forehead against his when it ended.

“You smell like powdered sugar,” she said softly.

“I was covered in it,” he replied. “So was Noah. Do you know how much powdered sugar it takes to make frosting for six dozen cookies?”

December 20th On the seventh day of Christmas, my true love gave to me: a 7-day pass to a gym

“I got us something,” Olivia told her fiancé, putting her arm through his and tucking her hand into the pocket of his overcoat to keep it warm as they walked down the sidewalk.

“Liv, Christmas is Monday. If you keep giving me presents, there won’t be anything left under the tree,” he chuckled at her shifting his briefcase to his other hand, so he could put his in the pocket with hers and hold it. Since they’d gotten engaged and disclosed their relationship, they were a little more open with displays of affection in public.

“It’s not really a present. Just something I thought we could try. A new gym opened down the street from the precinct and they were offering seven-day free trial passes.”

“Are you saying I need to go to a gym?” He pretended to look offended. She elbowed him playfully.

“No. I’ve seen you naked, Rafa, and you are quite fine the way you are.” She winked at him, then continued. “But I know you used to run a little, and I used to do some yoga and use the weight machines at a place I belonged to when Noah was a baby. I’ve gotten away from it and thought this might be a good way to get back to it.”

He nodded. She was right. When he first transferred to the Manhattan DA’s office, he used to run two or three days a week. More if he was feeling stressed. Then it turned into a glass or two of scotch instead, as a stress reliever. Although lately, sex with the woman he was going to marry had become an excellent way to relieve stress.

“Sure. Let’s try it out. You know I like getting sweaty with you.”

December 21 On the eighth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me: An Argument

“Don’t tell me how to do my job, Barba!”

Olivia’s voice was louder than she intended as she slapped her palms flat on her desk and met his green eyes with her flashing brown ones. Her words carried out into the squad room and her detectives exchanged glances. It had been awhile since they heard her refer to her fiancé by his last name.

It was bad enough to catch a case four days before Christmas. But when it was the death of two siblings, one an infant, and the other the same age as Noah, tensions ran higher than usual. Both Olivia and Rafael wanted it wrapped up and justice served for the two children. Preferably before the holiday.

“Lieu must really be pissed,” muttered Carisi.

“This case has gotten to her a little since the boy was the same as Noah. If there was a victim the same age as Jessie,” Rollins voice trailed off, and Carisi nodded in agreement.

Back in Olivia’s office, Rafael was trying to reason with the woman he loved. She had been at the precinct since late the night before when they first got the call about the children. Thus far, not much about the case required action by the DA’s office, so he had gotten Noah up and off to school and picked him up after, explaining that his mom was working. The boy was accustomed to her being away for work, but that still didn’t preclude him from asking when she was coming home.

“Liv,” he said calmly, speaking the way he did when he had a hostile witness on the stand. “You don’t have to solve this case yourself. You have Fin, Rollins and Carisi – all three very capable detectives –  who can manage things just fine without you here. Come home with me. Noah is so excited about Christmas.” He paused when he saw her face soften at the mention of her son.

He thought his next statement would win the argument for him, but it did the exact opposite.

“He’s been asking when you’re coming home. He wants to make cookies to leave for Santa and string popcorn for on the tree and watch Rudolf with us tonight. He’s five, mi amor. This is when Christmas is extra magical.” He waved his hands in a small flourish to emphasize the word.

Her tired eyes narrowed as she looked at him where he was now perched on the edge of her desk.

“Sure, Rafael. No problem. We’ll go home to our five year old and do all those magical Christmas things, while there’s another five year old boy lying dead in the morgue, his little malnourished body covered in bruises and cigarette burns.”

She crossed her arms over her chest and pressed her lips together for a moment before continuing.

“Him and his baby sister,” she said, bitingly “But that’s okay. I’ll just send everyone home and we won’t work on this case until after Christmas? How about that?”

“That’s not –”

“Then don’t tell me what I should or shouldn’t do,” she said putting her reading glasses on, and going back to the reports she had been reviewing before he’d come into her office, effectively dismissing him.

Biting back a sigh, he tried one more time, speaking softly, leaning toward her. “Liv –”

“Go home, Rafa. Tell Noah I love him.” She didn’t lift her head from the report.

December 22 On the ninth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me: An apology

It was very early the next day – still night really – when Olivia quietly opened the door to her apartment and stepped inside. They finally had gotten a break in the case on the siblings and were ready to make an arrest. All she needed was a warrant but that could wait until actual morning. It wasn’t necessary to wake Rafael and a judge.

The living room’s only illumination was the lights on the Christmas tree and the smell of the fresh pine tree lingered in the air. Her winter coat went on the rack by the door. Then she unzipped her boots and pulled them off, sighing as she did so. She needed a shower and some sleep.

She really hadn’t meant to speak to Rafael so harshly the day before. There were just some cases that she couldn’t leave until she was ready. This was one of them. Every time she looked at the crime scene photos of that little boy, all she saw was Noah and thought if Judge Linden hadn’t suggested she become his foster mother, that could be him in that refrigerated drawer. They’d discovered it was the foster family who had abused and eventually caused the boy and his sister’s deaths.

But it wasn’t him. He was here. Healthy, happy with two parents who loved him. No, they weren’t married yet, but Rafael had stepped into the role of father with little hesitation and Noah accepted it with equal enthusiasm. She loved seeing the two of them together. It made her heart happy. She sighed again. She owed the man who made her so happy an apology.

Olivia walked quietly down the hall toward the bedrooms. She stopped at Noah’s room first and opened the door. He was sprawled on his back, but his arm was curled around Eddie the Elephant, one of the first gifts Rafael ever bought him on a outing to the zoo. He had kicked off the covers so she pulled them up over his little pajama-clad body, thinking his limbs looked longer; that he’d grown taller in the short period since she’d last seen him. Brushing his curls back, she leaned over and pressed a kiss on his forehead.

“Sweet dreams,” she whispered. “Mama loves you.”

Leaving the room and pulling the door almost closed behind her, she moved on to the bedroom she shared with Rafael, thinking he was right (again) and it really was time they all moved into his place. It was bigger and had two and a half baths. Not to mention a functional fireplace; something she had always wanted. This door too, was not completely closed and the faintest of light glowed through the crack. She wondered if he was still awake. Pushing it open further, she stopped in the doorway. He was.

Rafael was sitting up in bed, reading not a law journal as one would expect, but the latest crime novel on the New York Times bestseller list. They were one of his few guilty pleasures, like Broadway musicals. She wondered when he’d bought that, thinking now she needed to return the copy that was wrapped and waiting under the tree from her. He lifted his head to look at her where she stood.

“Hi,” she said softly.

“Hi.” He slid a bookmark between the pages and closed the book, letting it lay on his lap. “You look tired.”

She smiled and ran a hand through her hair. “I am. But I need a shower first.”

“Go then.” He nodded toward the bathroom. “Are you hungry? I can heat up something for you.”

She shook her head. “No. Some tea, maybe?”

“Done.” He moved the book from his lap and threw back the covers to get out of bed.

Olivia went into the bathroom and turned on the shower, dropping her clothes in the hamper before climbing in and standing under the hot water, letting it soothe her tired muscles. She heard the door open, and could see Rafael through the steamed up glass shower door. He leaned against the vanity and folded his arms across his chest.

“Tea’s ready.”

“Okay. I’ll be out in a minute,” she replied. When he didn’t leave, she continued, because it was a little easier with the glass between them. “Rafa?”

“Yes?”

“I’m sorry about yesterday. In my office.”

“You don’t have to apologize to me, querida, for being passionate about your job. That’s one of the things that made me fall in love with you, and keeps me loving you.”

She turned off the water suddenly, opened the glass door and threw herself at him with a small sob, wrapping her arms around his shoulders not caring that she was dripping wet. And naked. He returned her embrace, smoothing her damp hair and murmuring soothing sounds. Then she remembered she was dripping wet. And naked. Pulling away from him, she reached for a towel and wrapped it around herself then looked sheepishly at the wet splotches on his t-shirt and sweatpants.

“Sorry about that.”

He waved her words away and pulled the shirt off, tossing it in the hamper. Tired as she was, desired flared in her at the sight of his bare, toned chest; something that was only going to get better if they decided to join the gym they’d been trying out. Seeing the look in her eyes, he smirked at her and said,

“See something you like, Lieutenant?”

“Oh, I do. But I’m too tired to do anything but admire tonight.”

“Then get dried and come to bed and you can admire some more.” He turned and left the bathroom.

Dry and in an oversized t-shirt, Olivia climbed into bed beside Rafael, her tea now cold and forgotten. He pulled her close against him, her back to his chest, legs bent and spooned with hers. She was asleep in minutes and they slept like that until the alarm went off.

December 23 On the tenth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me: 10 minutes of privacy

It was the day before Christmas Eve and SVU had caught an intense case earlier in the week, resulting in little time alone for ADA Rafael Barba and his fiancee Lieutenant Olivia Benson. Their conversations had been limited when they did see each other and anything beyond a brief kiss or hug hadn’t happened for several days. Barba looked at his watch. He was due at the courthouse in an hour for the arraignment of the foster parents accused of abusing and eventually causing the death of two children. That meant he could steal ten minutes with the woman he loved.

The elevator doors opened, and he walked into the squad room that was decorated festively. The only member of Olivia’s team there was Fin Tutuola. He looked up from his computer as Rafael approached.

“Counselor. Thought we’d be seeing you in about an hour. Something change?”

“No. I just need ten minutes with Olivia.” Finn nodded.

“I got you covered.”

“Thanks.” He clapped the other man on the shoulder as he walked by and into the open door of Olivia’s office, closing it behind him. She looked up from the documents she was reviewing.

“Rafa! What are you doing here? I thought I’d see you at the courthouse.”

“You will. But I just need ten minutes.” He locked the door. “With you.” He closed the blinds on the window that looked out to the squad room. “Alone.” Pulling his phone from his pocket, he pressed the home key, said, “Set a timer for 10 minutes.” and placed it on her desk.

She frowned slightly, removing her glasses. She was having a hard time reading him.

“Is something wrong?”

“Yes.” He took her hand and pulled her to her feet, then leaned against the edge of her desk and drew her close. “I needed to do this.”

He placed a hand on either side of her face and kissed her. “And this.” He kissed her again, running his tongue across her bottom lip, asking permission for access to her mouth.

“Oh.” She replied softly without removing her lips from his, and ran her hands under his jacket and around to the silky back of the vest he wore. Then she opened her mouth and they kissed slowly. Deeply. Lovingly. His hands moved so one cradled the back of her head, fingers tangling in her hair; the other went around her waist, pulling her closer to him. One of his leg moved between hers and she could feel his hardness pressed against her through his trousers. There had been no time for any of this the last few days and she missed it. Missed him.

Finally, they both needed to catch their breath and she rested her head on his shoulder, breathing in his scent, while their pulse rates returned to normal. As she was about to lift her head and step away, the timer went off on his phone. They looked at each other and smiled, and he reached for the device to silence the alarm.

He placed one last kiss on her lips and said, “I’ll see you at the courthouse.”

December 24th On the eleventh day of Christmas, my true love gave to me: 11 Things I Love About You

Olivia let Rafael sleep in on the morning of Christmas Eve, knowing that was a luxury he didn’t often allow himself. She got up with Noah and kept him quiet.

When he finally woke, Rafael rolled over and found the other side of the bed empty. He could hear the sounds of the television coming from beyond the bedroom. Stretching until his joints popped, he sat up, threw back the covers and padded into the bathroom. After showering for longer than he normally did, he dressed in jeans and a sweater, and barefoot, headed toward the smell of coffee. As he reached the dresser, he saw an envelope propped against the mirror. It had a candy cane taped to it and his name written in Liv’s scrawl.

Pulling the candy cane off, he unwrapped it and stuck the end into his mouth. Then he lifted the flap and pulled out a folded sheet of paper. Across the top was written, again in Liv’s untidy handwriting:

11 things I love about you

Then, “Rafa, today is the 11th Day of Christmas (according to the song) so I thought I would give you a list of 11 things I love about you. Not in order of importance, because they are all equally important.”

You challenge me. Professionally and personally.

You don’t give up. Not just in the courtroom. You wouldn’t be reading this if you did.

 Your green eyes.

 Your suspenders. And your ties. And your vests.

 The way you treat Noah as if he was your biological child.

 The way you sing.

 Your sexy hands.

 The way you treat your mother.

 The way you take care of me, even when I don’t want you to.

 Your sassy sense of humor

 That you chose me to love.

Not often was Rafael Barba rendered speechless, but by the time he got to the bottom of the page he was at a loss for words. It was rare that Olivia laid bare her heart like this, even to him. Carefully refolding the paper, he put it back in the envelope and returned it to the dresser. He left the bedroom in search of the woman he loved and found her, sitting on the couch, reading a Christmas book with Noah.

She looked up with a smile as he approached, “Good morning, sleepy head. You look rested.” Then she noticed the candy cane in his mouth. “I see you found my note.”

He took the book from her and handed it to Noah. “I need to borrow your mom for a minute, hijo.”

He grasped her hand and drew her to her feet, leading her into the kitchen and tossing the candy cane to the counter before pulling her into a tight embrace. Leaning back with his arms still around her, he looked into her chocolate brown eyes and said,

“Olivia Benson, if I hadn’t already proposed to you, I’d be on one knee right now.”

December 25th On the twelfth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me: 12 days of vacation

Christmas morning came early. Earlier than either Olivia and Rafael wanted, considering they’d stayed up late into the night on Christmas Eve after all the presents were under the tree and the cookies left for Santa eaten, talking about their wedding. No actual decisions had been made, save for the fact that they both wanted it to be small and private.

“Mommy! Papi Rafa! It’s Christmas! Santa came!” Noah came running into the room and threw himself between them on the bed.

“Oof.” Rafael exhaled sharply as a knee landed dangerously close to a sensitive region of his body and opened an eye. “Hijo, do you know what time it is?”

“Time to get up!” the boy declared.

“Noah, my sweet boy, why don’t you snuggle with us for a little while? Then we’ll get up.” Olivia tried to draw him down onto the pillows, but her son was not having it.

“No. It’s time to get up and open presents. Santa ate the cookies I left him! And the reindeer food is gone, too!” He bounced off the bed and ran back to the living room.

Realizing any hope for additional sleep was futile, Olivia pushed back the covers and rolled out of bed, reaching for her robe. Once it was on, she put a knee back on the mattress and leaned over to give Rafael a kiss on the cheek. “Merry Christmas. I know you’re awake.”

“Feliz Navidad, mi amor,” he mumbled. She poked him in the side where she knew he was ticklish. He jumped and opened sleepy green eyes at the woman above him.

“Why don’t you start the coffee? I haven’t figured out that fancy thing you bought me.” His reply was to reach out and grab her arm, pulling her off balance and down onto his warm bare chest, rolling over to pin her beneath him. “Hey!”

“How long do you think he’ll stay out there?” He nuzzled her neck. She wrapped her arms around his neck and gave him a brief kiss, mindful that she needed to brush her teeth.

“Not long enough. Unless you want him opening everyone’s presents.”

At that, he rolled off of her, and pulled on his sweatpants and a silly Christmas T-shirt of a llama wearing a Santa hat that Rollins and Carisi had given him. Liv was wearing a matching one. Holding out a hand to pull her up from the bed he said,

“Okay, Mrs. Claus, let’s do this.”

Noah was standing in the living room beside the Christmas tree, excitedly hopping from one foot to the other when the two adults walked in.

“I didn’t touch any of the presents,” he told them. “ I just looked to see which ones were for me.”

His mother laughed. “Rafa’s going to make coffee and then we’ll open them, okay? Do you want some juice?”

A little while later the floor was littered with torn wrapping paper and unraveled ribbon and a very happy little boy sitting in the middle of it all. Olivia and Rafael sat together on the couch, cups of coffee in their hands, watching as he moved back and forth between the toys he’d unwrapped. She rested her head on his shoulder.

“I think we did good.”

“Oh, it’s not over,” he murmured.

“What? Oh, the t-r-a-i-n t-a-b-l-e.” There was a table waiting at Rafael’s apartment for the train Noah opened from Santa.

“No, not for Noah. For you. Well, both of you.” He got up from the couch, reached under the Christmas tree for a small box that had been hidden from view and handed it to her.

“Rafael, what is this?” She had already opened what she considered to be too many presents from him.

“Open it,” he urged.

She removed the wrapping paper and lifted the lid on the box. There were two things inside: a brochure for a resort in upstate New York and a calendar with the days December 26 through January 8 marked out with x’s.

“What’s this?”

“I may have — I hope I didn’t overstep, Liv. But I knew you had plenty of unused vacation days. So I… that is… damn, why does my tongue get tied talking to you sometimes, querida?” He ran a hand through his hair and took a deep breath. Exhaling, he spoke quickly.

“We’re going on a vacation. You, me and Noah. For twelve days. It’s already been approved by Dodds.” He looked at her, hoping she wasn’t going be angry at him for going behind her back and getting the vacation time approved, as well as booking the resort.

For a moment she didn’t say anything. Then she laughed and leaned over to kiss him. “You’re so cute when you’re flustered. A vacation sounds like a wonderful idea, Rafa. While we’re away we can talk about moving into your place.”

THE END Not really, this is just the beginning for them…..

[morego]

2020 - The year the world turned upside down

There’s not a lot I can say about 2020 that hasn’t been said yet. It’s the year we never saw coming, the year that disrupted indiscriminately, the year nobody wanted. But also it was a year that refocused many of us, gave us a chance to slow down and introspect. Let’s get into how I faired.

Goals Living on hope I say living on hope because I didn’t take any solid plans or goals coming into the year. In fact these two are the only real goals I remember I had real intentions to go for 2020: A comfortable Comrades: This was an easy goal to run with (excuse the pun) and I could never forget it. I was intent on running a race (any race) without any uncertainty or unease - I wanted no ‘Bafana Bafana playing in cup competition calculation’. Ironically my Comrades qualifier was uncertain to the point of receiving the race results. But I quickly got focused and became the fittest I have ever been in my lifetime by end of March, just before the lockdown. Needless to say it’s been a struggle to get back to that point since we were allowed to run freely again. I comfort myself by reciting the script ‘The latter glory of this house will be greater than the former glory’. It’s getting there. Flow: For the first time I prayed for vision for my family and not just for myself to carry into the year. This year we focused on FLOW. We were to consider and acknowledge our blessing, but unlike the dead sea, we would be the vessel that allows blessing to flow through us. It was to be a year of generosity and kindness. I haven’t been kind to myself and expected that we could have done better, but objectively, we did pretty well. I’ve seen even The Boy intentionally exercise flow. With some of the idle cash from services being cancelled due to Covid, we were able to make charitable donations. However the most meaningful for me was being able to help and support family members. For the first time the phrase ‘charity begins at home’ made sense to me. Spiritually healthy: This was more of an implicit goal than anything, and I’m glad the family managed to stay plugged in to church week in week out. It would have been so easy to fall off this year (and perfectly reasonable), but we’re still as committed. We pray, we engage and still 100% team Jesus.

Under lockdown Theoretically, I’m team 5am, team crush the day, team goaldiggers. So it goes without saying that the moment we got ‘down time’ in the form of a lockdown, instead of taking care of my mental health I became obsessed with taking advantage of the extra time and doing EVERYTHING I previously thought I couldn’t because time. But that’s all in theory. In reality I failed almost across the board - but I now know it is as I said above: no solid plans or goals, nothing written down, nothing committed to. But at least: New garden: Ever since living on my property, we’ve had a constant struggle with the grass patch in our front yard. It wouldn’t grow evenly across the front yard. I resolved to fix it once and for all so that my children can play comfortable on the grass at the end of the year. Mission accomplished. On Christmas day we had the kids playing on the grass with a portable pool. Fantastic. Fit and healthy: I also resolved to keep my family fit, healthy and Covid free. I also hoped to get a six pack (or at least a flat tummy) but that didn’t happen. All in all everybody is now settled into a fitness regime, we take vitamins and get some sun time regularly and know how to keep healthy. But also part of health was the mental aspect. I think we’ve done well in that respect, everybody is still alive and we’re still a loving family.

After lockdown So I never went back to the office since the first lockdown and have been working from home ever since. This does create a little extra time for me and so I’ve been able to try get my running back on track and start swimming. Sub-25: In September I started a running programme to try run a sub-25 minute 5k. I really think I was progressing well, at least until a heart matter brought everything to a grinding halt (see below). But yeah, I consider this an achievement. Swimming: I now also go for swim lessons during lunch. This is something that’s been outstanding all my life and just starting is that big of a deal. But also unfortunately it was also disrupted at some point by an ear issue (see below, hahaha). I’m back at it though and progressing really well. I now just need a bike and we’re on our way to Iron Man.

Another day at the hospital Following from my first one last year, I really hope this doesn’t become a pattern. A heart matter: Anyway, this was a crazy story. My insurance asked for new medicals (routine), but the checkup picked up my heart was irregular again. This finding would trigger an absurd chain of events that landed me in a hospital bed for an Angiogram operation. And after all of that they found... wait for it... nothing. So I’ve been diagnosed with what they call ‘athletes heart’. I’ve spoken about this heart issue a few times here so, I hope never to speak about it again. (This is the matter that stopped my speed running ambitions). Specialists even: Though this was not an admission, I also ended up in the rooms of a specialist because of an ear infection. Yey, this one was painful and even more so when the specialist recommended a theatre procedure. Fortunately the meds cleared my ear. LOL. (This is the issue that disrupted my swimming).

Social adventures Because of the strict regulations, we were required to be socially distant this year. I want to say this suited me just fine but it’s something I’ve been trying to break out of for years, so much so that I’ve listed my social exploits as achievements on this platform. Throughout the year we’ve done the best we can to keep the WhatsApp, Zoom and Houseparty meetups going. But the moment we got the chance to socialise in person, we actually socialised, so much so I consider these outings ‘adventures’. Kuruman: By far the best thing I have done in a few years. Wife and I were on our way on a Friday night to a Sunday funeral in Bloemfontein, but at an uncharacteristically last minute we changed direction to go see my little brother in Kuruman who was having a birthday weekend bash. Man Kurara was lit and it was so great to spend time with family who came out to support him. We eventually went back to Bloem on Sunday morning and all was fine. Even after the funeral we klapped some drinks with the husbands of the Wife’s friends, was a cool hang out, at the funeral. Pati’s grad: In the spirit of intentionally badly calculated decisions, we went to Pati’s house for her graduation party and ended up staying overnight having the time of our lives. Yay! Wolfpack annual getaway: Once again this seemed like it would never happen, but fortunately me and the Wolfies managed to get out town (albeit to Haarties) for a weekend to go drink and once again attempt to play poker. I can’t say it was the best one yet, but it’s up there.

Work I really thought I was having a brilliant year at work. I really did. I put in the hours, I put in the sacrifices and gave everything I had towards it. But it was not to be seen. To say I’m disappointed would be an understatement. But because this has been the year of introspection, I see that much of the effort given was misdirected. But over and above that I think it has opened my eyes to what is important, and work is not important. My family is important. My spiritual, mental and physical health are important. Work is important, but not more than these.

The rest It’s really hard to account for this year, especially between April and September as that time, although felt like the longest time in the history of time, went by quickly in retrospect. I’m left here left with shoulda coulda woulda’s. But: Wife’s birthday: was awesome as we went bungee jumping in Soweto and for massages at some exclusive rich people boutique.  I grew a beard: As in I had a beard the whole year. Festive was great: with all my kids. I made every effort to make sure everybody feels included, loved and appreciated. Depression: is becoming a thing with me and my seasons are becoming longer and more frequent. Sure depression was inevitably a 2020 thing, I had hoped not to have it so hard. The issues in the Wolfpack are making things difficult to help figure and address issues. I suppose I need a new group of people to walk me through this.

Ok. So first of all I’m writing this on the 14th of January 2021 instead of the usual 31st of December. I’ve been struggling to commit to sit down and write my thoughts, goals and plans and because of that I’m totally convinced this is part of the reason why things didn’t go really well for me in 2020. If one thing I do in 2021, is get back to the habit of taking time to write, express, review and expect - the rest will follow.