#and then i flipped through the season that came on in like 2014 i never saw and the ending honestly was lame af

[lordsardine]

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[soccerbites]

WHAT IT WAS | RAFE CAMERON

Masterlist on pinned!

A.N: Heeyy, if you find this familiar it could be because you read it on my wattpad account or on here before I deactivated! English is not my first language so please be kind!

WORDS COUNT: 4k

WARNINGS: a lot of them, swearing, blood, drugs, etc.

You hadn't thought about it in months when you finally were getting over it, suddenly came back, all the memories, good and bad, all the euphoria, when everything was angelic, when it was cruel, when suddenly it was radiant, then turned violent, and ended up being painful. When you gave up on it because you could not take it anymore.

-

Your family was the typical kook one, you grew up in a life full of luxury, you got everything you wanted due to your mum's richness.

Sarah and you were best friends since you were born and his brother was your boyfriend practically since both of you learned that word. The Cameron's and your family had everything arranged between you two, Rafe and you were supposed to be together for the rest of your lives, he was going to take care of his dad's company, the next step would be getting married, travel around the world, having lots of beautiful kids and live happily ever after.

2008

It was your 5th birthday party, all your friends were there and you felt extremely happy with the big amount of presents you had received from them all. You were not the typical little girl your parents desired you to be, you had begged for them to let "Pirates of the Caribbean" be the theme, you hadn't really seen the movies but you loved pirates! Rafe and you would always pretend you were them in his dad's yacht because Sarah did not like them at all, you couldn't understand how it was so fun! Your friend would lend you one of his plastic swords and play the whole afternoon. The best part was that you always won, but now, many years after, looking back at it Rafe was probably letting you win. However, your mum forced you to make your party about Cinderella, you hate princess but especially Cinderella, there wasn't a reason for it, you just did.

Weeks before you had told the little boy your birthday was going to be about pirates and he was so excited about it, you babble about it for days, so when Rafe arrived at your house with his family and saw all the princess decorations and the angry but yet sad face you had on, he instantly understood what was going on, you both were little but very smart for your age, plus he had sympathy for you due to his similar family conditions.

Everyone but you and him enjoyed the celebration, the young man and you stayed together in a corner of your backyard playing alone. Rafe picked up two small branches and played as you were pirates like you would usually do, he knew that was what you really wanted at that moment.

When it was time to blow the candles you looked at your sky blue and pink cake, wishing it had Jack Sparrow's face on it, Rafe smiled at you and you smiled back at him. Everyone sang the typical song, you blew the candles and buried three of your little fingers into the cake, thinking of three wishes.

being a pirate

playing as pirates with Rafe

Sarah wanting to play as pirates with you two

-

2010

It was almost summer and you were really excited about all the little adventures Rafe and you were going to have in the next months.

You felt so much older, your first year of primary school was over and it had been great! Even though Sarah was not hanging out with you as much as she was before; you had the hope of playing with her more now that you had nothing else to do.

Those weeks were great, you almost didn't see your girl best friend, but her brother and you were getting closer and closer as days went by. Rafe always protected you from everything and made you laugh a lot, he was funny.

Summer '10 was lovely, one of your favorites memories of you and the boy happened during that time, your first kiss. You didn't really count it as the very first kiss, but you had to admit that, at that time, for you was even more than what it actually was.

It was an extremely warm day and you invited Rafe over to play in the fort you both had made in your backyard, right where years before you were pretending to be pirates while your birthday party was going on inside the house. He was 'building' a table as you made mud cakes.

"Look at the cake i made for us!" you abruptly shouted, thing that scared Rafe, but he didn't let you notice because the last thing he wanted was for you to make fun of him.

"It looks delicious y/n, we should eat it!" he said, excitement on his face while sitting beside you.

"ARE YOU CRAZY RAFE?" you were shocked, the drama queen in you was starting to jump out, "IT'S MADE OF DIRT THAT'S DISGUSTING!" you looked at him, terrorized by what the little boy was saying.

"i- i- i wasn't serious, i- i just thought you'd like me to say that" he was so embarrassed.

"oh, i'm sorry" you apologized to him.

There was silence for a few seconds, it wasn't uncomfortable so you didn't mind about it.

"wanna know what Sarah made me do?"

"mmmm, maybe"

"she made me watch 'The Princess And The Frog', TWO TIMES" he sounded so mad, "and then she told me that Topper kissed her" he looked at you, you were not understanding why he was telling you this, but before you could talk; he continued, "and i was thinking that may- maybe we can d- do it too" you opened your eyes wide open, kissing him? like in the mouth?

"i- in- the mouth?"

"yeah, i mean, that's what she told me" you stared into his eyes, trying to figure out if he was just messing with you or was actually serious about it.

"uhm, i guess so?"

"you do?" he had a frown formed in his face.

"if that's what you want to" he nodded with a smirk on his lips.

You both turned and were now facing each other, without an idea of what to do you followed him, he started to lean forward and you did too, he closed his eyes and you did as well, and after what felt like an eternity but was actually almost four seconds, your lips touched his; ending up in a little pecked kiss.

After that day neither you nor Rafe talked about it again, it was like it never happened, which, at your really short age, was normal.

This year your family and you decided not to celebrate your birthday due to your grandma passing away two weeks before, it didn't feel right for them. At seven years old it was hard to fully understand what death was, you had heard about it but never experienced it before. Rafe felt really bad about it and on the day you finally turned seven he went to your house and spent it with you, so that way, you would not feel as lonely.

-

2012

Rafe was starting to change, he did not want to play with you anymore and that made you sad and upset. Your mom told you it was normal for boys to not hang out with girls once they grew up, but that wasn't him, it didn't felt like him. You never thought that the boy who was your best friend, the only kid you really enjoyed being around, especially after Sarah hang with more friends that were not you, would leave you alone.

You started to search for fun on other stuff and found that you loved to read stories about wonderful adventures, and when you finished every single book in your house about the topic, you started to flip through the pages of some old books regarding birds and insects, you were amazed by the stunning draws and colors of them and wanted to make your own.

For your ninth birthday you decided to do an exchange, it was difficult to convince your parents but they finally gave in, instead of a party you wanted them to give you a pretty journal with some color pencils. That way you would have your own investigation diary about those interesting creatures you were obsessed about.

Summer had ended and school season started, you and your little notebook were inseparable, you took it with you to class and spent all the recess doing little notes about birds you had seen during the day so when you arrived home you could search and learn about them.

One cold winter night, your dad told you that the Cameron's were coming home to have dinner, you couldn't wait for them to arrive, maybe that was the moment you had the opportunity to befriend Sarah again and show Rafe all the information you had collected during the months you didn't hang out. But they never appeared, their parents had gone but not them, Sarah was not feeling well and Rafe was sleeping over at a friend's house.

-

2014

Sarah was talking to you! you were friends again and there was no way you would not see each other every single day.

Spending every minute of the day over at her house was completely normal at that point. You two hanging out again made your families closer.

It was like your parents didn't care at all you were just a pair of ten years old, almost eleven, kids.

Rafe would always try to be with his sister and you whenever you were around at their house, but Sarah would just scream at him 'LEAVE US ALONE!' which ended in him giving up and walking away. It was sad, you missed spending time with the boy.

2014 was the year you turned eleven, and also had your first period. Everyone was so excited about that and you just hated it, with your whole heart, it made you want to cry every single time. Due to that, your body started to change, and boys started to notice it, including Rafe.

-

2016

The year it all started.

It was your thirteenth birthday and you did not felt like doing a big party, that night the Cameron's and your family went to a restaurant. Sarah, Rafe, and you were talking about what you were going to do the next week while Wheezie just listened. Finally, the boy and you were good friends again. When the food arrived you all shut up and started eating while paying attention to what your parents were talking about.

"oh yeah, of course, they are definitely getting married at some point," Ward said to what your father nodded.

"it's the best for them" this time your mom spoke.

"of course it is!" Rose laughed, "he will be taking care of the family business, they are going to have a splendid life together"

"Who are you talking about?" Rafe got into the conversation.

"we are talking about you silly!" you looked at your mom, not understanding what was going on.

"wha- what?" Rafe was just as surprised as Sarah and you were.

"yeah kid, we are talking about yours and y/n's future together" Ward stated as taking a piece of meat to his mouth.

"what exactly do you mean?" you stepped in this time.

"what you heard kid, your future life, your marriage, and all" your dad said as if it was the most normal thing to say to a thirteen-year-old.

"their marriage?!" Sarah was furious, you could notice it in her voice tone, Rafe and you stared at each other.

"you just are too young to realize yet" Rose brushed it off. None of you talked for the rest of the night.

Just a few months after that, your dad and Ward had already made a reservation for you two at the exact same restaurant. When you arrived you saw Rafe already there in a table positioned in a corner. Now looking back at it, everything was so fucked up, you were just kids. You approached him and sat, he smiled at you while you did.

"hi", he said, shyly, of course. It was really weird, you both had been alone before but never this way, this was completely different, your families were hoping that you turned this into something romantic. "Are we on a date right now?".

"i think so?" you laughed a little bit, "please, don't make this awkward, i don't get why they do this".

"i do" he said, you looked at him with a confused face, was he agreeing with all of this? "i mean, i can see why they want us to be together" after that he took a sip of his soda and started serving you some.

"Rafe, you should be allowed to 'date' whoever you wanted"

"And what happens if who i wanna date is you?" you were shocked at your friend's words.

"Rafe what are you talking about? i just turned thirteen and you are about to turn fourteen, you like it or not we are kids" you were a little bit mad due to what he was saying.

"well, Juliet was thirteen and Romeo was around that age"

"Rafe you did- you did not just compare us to Romeo and Juliet, have you read the book?"

"no, i did not"

"THEY DIE, THEY DIE AT THE END" you knew you were making this a lot bigger than it actually was but didn't care about it, "of course you didn't read the book" you whispered but he heard.

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN?" now that you're remembering everything you can't believe that a pair of thirteen years old could be so dramatic.

"I MEAN WHAT I SAID," you said while leaning over the table.

"you know what, why don't we shut up and finish with this as fast as we can, i don't want to be here" Rafe proposed.

"sounds perfect to me, i do not want to be here too"

Either of you spoke again until you had had dinner and Ward picked you two up.

-

2018 / 2019

In the past two years, Rafe and you had finally got together. Your parents were over the moon about it and you were also really happy. You both were discovering and experiencing together what being in a relationship was.

The first months were a little bit strange, you both knew that it was not a real relationship, for everyone else you were together, but in reality, you hadn't had that many kisses as you thought you were supposed to have and outside school didn't see each other that much.

Summer '18 the Cameron's took you with them on their holidays to the Bahamas, it was amazing, not just because Rafe and you spent a lot of time together but also because you got to hang more with Sarah who you were not seeing a lot since it all started, and the reason was that whenever you went to their house you were with her brother, and they definitely didn't get along that much.

Unfortunately, the 'real' part began in 2019, you and Rafe turned sixteen and started going to parties and being more around of what people called 'pogues'. During the school year, it was like a daydream, he picked you up and went together, you had lots of dates and spent beautiful moments together, those were the times when your relationship was at it's highest, where you realized that, after all, maybe your parents were right and your destiny was, indeed, be together.

Your favorite moment from that time in your life was with him. You both were laying in the grass of your house's backyard, it was really cold outside, and decided to take some blankets with you to be warm. You were laying in his chest while he hugged you, appreciating the stars. He pressed a kiss to your head and you smiled to yourself.

"wanna know something?" you looked up to him.

"pretty boy is thinking! someone please record this!" you said, just to annoy him.

"shut up" he laughed, knowing you were messing with him, "you want to know or no baby?" he asked, a more serious tone on his voice.

"of course i want to know" you took his hand into yours, the warmness made you shiver, to what he hugged you harder.

"i read on the internet that you can buy stars online, maybe one day i'll buy you one and name it Rafe so whenever you wanna get rid of me you would not be able to" the boy started swinging you side to side in a slow speed, you'd never felt that peaceful in your life before.

Once again you looked at him "that's a little bit wicked of you" he giggled, "however, i think that would be the most divine present someone could ever give to me" he backed down his head and kissed your cheek, "and also, i'm never getting rid of you" you could feel him smiling while pressing his chin against the side of your head.

That was the last happy time you genuinely can remember at perfection.

You still don't know what happened when summer '19 arrived, it was the breaking point of your relationship. Parties at the beach were being held by pogues most of the time, and you never went because partying was not your thing, all of them ended up in disaster, pure and authentic disaster. You are grateful the only one you went to was the first one. Rafe was extremely drunk and you were trying to take care of him but it was being hard, especially when Topper got into a really intense fight with JJ and John b, two of the few pogues you knew, it was tragic and it got worse when the blonde one pulled a gun at Sarah's boyfriend head, while all that happened you lost Rafe and found him after like five minutes beating up someone that was on the ground, barely moving. You ran towards him and with all your straighten you push him.

"YOU'RE KILLING HIM RAFE!" you yelled at your boyfriend, when you finally got to see him he was covered in blood, you took him by his hand and got out of there, arriving at your house where you helped him clean up himself.

"i think i'm in love with you" he tried to say but was too drunk to pronounce the words properly.

"don't start with that now when you almost killed a random guy tonight, for what? explain" you were furious.

"'cause he is a pogue, he deserves it y/n" you both walked to your bed and laid down to sleep.

"no he doesn't Rafe, that's not an excuse for what you did, they are people just like us" you scolded him.

"whatever" he ignored you.

Some time after that Sarah started to see John B behind Topper's back and she asked you to keep her secret safe, which you did.

At midsummers Rafe escorted you, it was a fantastic night, you two were together the whole time and drank lots of expensive champagne while you danced. The pride on your dad's face was priceless, in that moment you forgot about what had happened a few nights before and just enjoyed the moment, smiling at your boyfriend, always.

"you wanna know something?" Rafe whispered in your ear while you danced to a slow song, his hands on your waist and yours behind his neck.

"mmm, this brings back good memories" you smiled to the handsome man in front of you.

"i love you"

"i love you too Rafe"

"let me finish pretty girl" you laughed a little bit, "please stop smiling like that, i'm not sure what will happen if you keep doing that" this time your laugh was stronger, getting some looks from people around you.

"i'm just really happy right now, wouldn't want to be anywhere else" you hugged him without stop moving.

"i know, me too"

A few minutes after he disappeared, and you did not have an excuse to stay so you went home. The next day you found out he was trying to beat up the blonde pogue, JJ.

You don't really know why but for some reason it went away and everything was perfect again, but it only lasted a few days.

You were really bored at your house and after contemplating whether you should or shouldn't go to the Cameron's house, you got into your car and drove around the few blocks that separated your house from Rafe's. You knew his parents were out of town that day and Sarah was probably hanging out with John B and his friends so you didn't bother on knocking and just got in. You heard your boyfriend's voice from the downstairs bathroom. Once you got into it you saw his clothes on the floor and he was applying toothpaste to his arm.

"Rafe?" he looked at you scared.

"y/n- i- i" he was crying, you directed your eyes to his arm, a huge new burnt was there.

"Rafe what happened?" you got closer to him, "is that blood?" you pointed at the clothes on the floor.

"no", he denied it but it obviously was blood.

"Rafe, what's going on?"

"i- i got into a fight" ha answered.

"with who? baby who did this?" you helped him with his injury.

"Barry" but as soon as you heard that name you pulled away.

"Barry? as the drug dealer Barry?" he didn't even look at you, "Rafe are you doing drugs?" completely ignored you, and when he did that you figured out the answer, "how much do you owe him?" you asked, one hand on you waist and the other one on the bathroom door.

"some thousands" your jaw almost touched the floor, and your face was full of disappointment and anger. "don't look at me like that" he begged, and tried to grabbed you and pulled you closer to him but you just pulled him away.

"DON'T LOOK AT ME LIKE THAT? THAT'S ALL YOU HAVE TO SAY?" he didn't reply "FUCK RAFE, THOUSANDS? YOU OWED THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS TO A DRUG DEALER AND YOU EXPECT ME TO STAY CALM?"

"i can explain."

"NO YOU CAN'T, WHAT? TOPPER AND YOU GOT BORED OF THE STUPID WEED AND WANTED TO TRY SOMETHING STRONGER? WHAT DID YOU BUY? COKE? NOW YOUR HOBBY IS BUY THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS ON COKE? THAT'S WHAT YOU WANT TO EXPLAIN TO M-"

"GET OUT" he screamed to your face as he got closer to your body, while pointing to the door, "GET THE FUCK OUT OF MY DAMN HOUSE" you looked at him and turned away, walking towards the door and he didn't follow you.

"HOPE YOU HAVE AN AMAZING LIFE RAFE" you screamed without closing the door.

After that you didn't see him in a long time, you didn't go out of your house anymore.

You heard that Sarah and John B were missing, you missed her. You had no one to talk to, just your own thoughts.

A few weeks later, everything came out to the light, Ward went to jail for killing John B's dad and being kinda responsible for another poor man's death.

Rafe confessed that it had been him the one who shot the detective, but they found out about his drug addiction and blamed it on that, so he ended up going to rehabilitation and not directly to jail.

-

2021

It was your eighteenth birthday, Sarah was coming to your house to keep you company until your parents got out of work.

As you were walking towards the kitchen the doorbell rang.

"hi" you said as opening the door.

"hello, is this y/n?" the man in front of you asked while reading your name from a box.

"that would be me" you said, and after signing some papers he gave you the package.

You placed it on the table and started opening it. It seemed like a picture frame, when you paid attention to it, tears fell from your eyes, there was a little letter on it.

i did not name it after me, i realized that you were, are, and always will be the big star that keeps me going. I hope you know how much i miss you and regret everything i did, maybe one day you'll forgive me and love me again. I took that for granted and i'm so sorry of that. happy eighteen birthday y/n, i expect you still think this is the most divine present someone could ever give you.

- Rafe

It was a star, he had bought a star and named it after you, Rafe kept his promise, and even though you had said to yourself, just the night before, you will move on and forget about him, you couldn't help but smile; wishing you could re-do everything and go back to what it was that night from a few years before.

[starbuckie]

𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐭, 𝐫𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐰

challenge: 200 followers challenge by @angrybirdcr

prompt: “there may have been a slight misunderstanding, but nothing we can’t fix.” and locked in the trunk of a car

pairing: bucky barnes x reader

words: 5,504 words

warnings: post-endgame, bucky’s kinda a dick, enemies to friends(?), swearing, angst, mentions of violence, talk about sexual assault, guns, bickering, jealousy

summary: bucky had been adjusting to the new familiarity of having a stable routine, right until she walked in.

a/n: I DON’T NOT OWN ANY CHARACTERS ALL CHARACTERS BELONG TO MARVEL. okay, great, done that, but congratulations on 200 followers!! i had so much fun taking part in your writing challenge, so thank you so much. imma be honest, there’s not a lot of romance in this, it’s some enemies to friends type of shit and i genuinely did not think this fic would get so angsty and dark and actually long, but i had an idea and ran with it mid way through the old fic with this prompt. also i had an idea for an epilogue to this, so tell me if you want that part 2 because i am on the verge of writing it. this is not proofread by a beta, but i edited it myself and hope it is okay. anyways, now that we’re done with that, please enjoy this rollercoaster of a fanfic i’ve written.

main masterlist || sebastian stan characters masterlist

Life in the twenty-first century was strange, Bucky concluded. Though he’d been free of HYDRA for around nine years technically, being a fugitive and in another realm didn’t give him much time to learn about the modern world. As soon as he came back, Steve had left him and he had to move on without his childhood best friend. It was hard for him to adjust to this century, with the new rules and the whole scene in general, but he seemed to make it through just fine. He’d come to peace with the fact that there was no escaping the fighting at all, falling into a steady routine that became his holy grail. 

In the new Avengers compound in Upstate New York he felt content and more sure of himself than he’d felt in a very long time. Everyone in the tower was quiet and kept to themselves mostly, still dealing with the aftermath of losing so much in so little time. But in that silence Bucky felt like a free man, able to walk around without fear of being hunted down every second and time to really look about this new world.

There were still times when he woke up in a sweaty panic, disoriented and terrified until he realized he was in the safety of his room in the compound. He’d flinch at loud noises in the quiet and his heart would stop, something that went by unnoticed by everyone else, though he didn’t blame them for it. Bucky felt extreme guilt for the horrible things he had done as the Winter Soldier, memories of bloodied and dead bodies, bodies he had made fall to the ground motionless. It wasn’t him, he knew, but his hand still had pulled the trigger. When he found something new a smile would split across his face, ready to tell Steve what he had discovered, until he remembered that the rambunctious blond boy was gone, a wrinkled grey man with a new family in his place. It still hurt him to think that he had left him so easily, with barely a goodbye. Bucky still had days where he felt so incredibly tired, left still on his bed as horrible thoughts ran through his mind, anxious about the future.

But then he found new things everyday, things that seemed to outweigh the bad by a whole lot. He’d found cool ranch Doritos were the best chips and that he really liked the season of fall with the leaves falling around him as he took a serene walk. He found that he really loved Frozen, the songs and Sven the reindeer making him crack a smile every time he watched it. He found that he could sleep in on his days without missions and Wanda liked her pancakes with an unhealthy amount of syrup on the side to dunk them in. He found that Sam was actually really funny, always making the worst puns or the dirtiest jokes at the most inappropriate of times. He found a new sense of respect and warmth in the family they’d built together, learning how to go on without those that they loved. He found that he was really enjoying his new routine and his new sense of peace with himself.

All until she walked in.

Bucky could still remember the exact moment she flipped their world upside down. Sharon had fawned over her, talking about one of her old SHIELD buddies who was finally coming back to the states. After the organization fell in 2014, Y/N L/N fled to Hawaii, running away to the one place she knew no one would find her. She was done fighting, or that’s what she believed until Thanos showed up. 

It was shameful, really, that Y/N was aware of all the problems that went on, yet did nothing to help. They needed her help, she knew they did, but she couldn’t bring yourself to go help her friends. Originally she was trying for a settled down life, planning to retire from the constant fighting, but after a few failed relationships Y/N realized that she wasn't cut out for that white picket fence life. Those had just been the dreams of a fourteen year old Y/N L/N, left empty and hollow by the horrors she had seen during her time at SHIELD. There was nothing left waiting for her, no family, no friends, but she was too stubborn to get back into the fight, so she stayed in her humid Oahu apartment and waited for something interesting to happen.

Well, maybe Y/N shouldn’t have wished so hard, that “interesting thing” showing up in the form of being snapped out of existence by a large, purple grape.

When she came back she felt nearly indifferent, knowing that five years had passed by her, and though Y/N felt nothing but emptiness she knew that it was time to go back. It was her duty when she had joined SHIELD to always be there and protect, and she had failed that job. But Y/N was more than ready to make up for it. Nothing like Thanos could ever happen again, so she called Sharon, one of her closest friends and previous commanding supervisor at the organization. She was ecstatic to have Y/N back, probably a bit too much, and before she could have second thoughts the girl was on a plane overlooking JFK, ready to land in New York.

So when Y/N walked in, with a tight-lipped smile and butterflies anxiously fluttering in her stomach, Bucky couldn’t help but despise her. Maybe he had formed his opinion off of Sharon’s explanation of her past, but Y/N got the life of settling down that he didn’t and he was infuriatingly jealous. 

“Hey, Bucky, Sam, come meet Y/N!” Sharon said excitedly. Her hair was put back in a headband neatly, two suitcases in hand as she looked at the two tall, muscular men. Of course Y/N recognized both of them, she hadn’t been living under a rock. Keeping up with the news of the Avengers and remaining SHIELD officers had been one of the only things keeping her from coming back, hearing of the terrible fights and destruction done to whole cities. She recognized Sam Wilson, the infamous Falcon being marked down as a “war criminal” in 2016. She never believed that crap, if he and half of the other Avengers were locked up there had to be a good reason behind it.

Then, there was James Buchanan Barnes. Now, she knew him from her eighth grade American history books, reading about the brave Howling Commando who had given up his life for saving the country, but Y/N knew him better as the Winter Soldier from her time at SHIELD. The fight in 2014 had been brutal, hectic in all forms, but she’d caught a few glances at the metal-armed man. He hadn't been in his normal state, with being controlled and tortured by HYDRA at the time, but the kid inside of her freaked out, remembering memories of gossiping with her friends about how hot he was in the textbooks and how much of a hero he was. That man was still in there somewhere, hidden by decades of reprogramming and mind-wiping, and Y/N was finally seeing him in the flesh. She would be working with him daily, living in the same space as him. The thought made her giddy like a middle schooler with her first crush,though his presence was intimidating as well.

“Hi there, I’m Y/N L/N, it’s a pleasure to be working with you.” Sticking out her hand, she gave a bright smile, already growing out of her nervous state. 

Sam quickly shook Y/N’s hand, giving a warm greeting in response to her introduction. Then she turned to Bucky. “It’s nice to meet you, Bucky.”

His cold, dead glare locked onto Y/N, staring straight through her soul. It felt like he could see every insecurity and guilty action she had, and she didn’t like it one bit. “That’s Sergeant Barnes to you.” Without another word, he walked out of the room like a petulant child, leaving Sharon, Sam, and Y/N flabbergasted. 

“I’m sorry, Y/N, he’s usually more friendly than that, I’ll go check in on him,” Sharon furiously said with a painfully fake smile. Sam grabbed the new girl by the arm, linking it with his own and led her in another direction as he explained the usual training routine and schedule for the week. 

And while she was completely enraptured by Sam’s comforting words and the exciting compound, her heart still felt heavy from Sergeant Barnes’ cold greeting. 

-

She had tried to be nice. She really had. But after two months it was pretty clear Sergeant Barnes wasn’t getting any better, and Y/N was beyond pissed off. Childish, is what he was being, fucking childish. 

It started off with leaving every room she came into, blatantly ignoring her presence. When she would say hello every morning he’d grunt or even worse, he wouldn’t answer her at all. Y/N had begged Sharon if she knew why the sergeant was acting up, but she didn’t know either and just asked her to ignore him and his “crappy, old-man behaviour”. Sam wasn’t very helpful to Y/N’s cause either, but he was a great mentor and an even better teacher.

Sharon was really the only person Y/N had in her phone, her parents dead and no boyfriend accounted for. The rest of her family had wanted nothing to do with her when she joined SHIELD, but that was okay with her. She knew what she had gotten herself into, and it was an extreme risk to even be acquaintances with her. But now, living with several others in a compound that seemed so large after the great loss, Y/N became part of their family as well. 

It was nice to have friends again, as years of solitude on an island where she knew nobody had made her nearly desperate for more human interaction than with the teenagers who worked the cash registers at the grocery store. Y/N became an integral part of the Avengers (she could actually say that aloud now), going on missions and kicking ass just like she used to. Of course, Sergeant Barnes’ behaviour in and out of missions stayed the same, but she usually tried her best to not take it to heart and move on. After all, she couldn’t have everyone like her.

But one day they both snapped.

Y/N was sitting with Sharon and Wanda, eating lunch and talking over their most recent mission with them and Barnes in Cairo. It hadn’t been a necessarily bad mission, per se, but she had run back into the building to get Wanda out from under a fallen pillar, which apparently was “severely dangerous”. Looking back, she could see how it was, putting her entire team’s secrecy and mission in volatile danger, but Wanda was like her sister and in Y/N’s heart she knew that she had to. Bucky had had to grab them both, nearly dragging her back to the jet before the building had collapsed. He’d been beyond angry with Y/N for the stupid decision, but when they landed he just huffed and stomped away. The redhead was grateful for her and so was Sharon, but lunch was just for a simple stern talking about mission protocols. 

“Y/N, I know that you’re a fantastic agent and even better friend, but when we’re on missions we need that agent. You can’t let your feelings and outside life get in the way of our objective.” Sharon said in a firm voice. Y/N dropped her head in her hands and rubbed her face tiredly.

“I know, Sharon, I’m sorry, Wanda could’ve probably gotten herself out but I just let my instincts act too fast and ran back in without another thought.” She groaned. “Plus, I just caused more damage than anything else. It won’t happen again, I promise.” Wanda and Sharon nodded in understanding just as the Asshole Supreme walked into the kitchen.

“You talking ‘bout how Y/N fucked up the mission yesterday?” Sergeant Barnes grunted. While Sharon and Wanda gasped in shock, Y/N’s eyes were trained at the plate on the table in front of her, not daring to make a sound. She muttered out a sorry and got up to put her dish in the sink. As long as he was here, he was going to make her life a living hell, and as much as she wanted to lash out, it would be cause for her dismissal from the team. While her old, solitary life was what she had once dreamed of, Y/N now saw her future among these people, this family, somewhere she finally felt a part of despite Barnes’ horrid behaviour. “Sorry?” He scoffed, “Sorry doesn’t make up for the fact that I had to run back in for you. Sorry doesn’t make up for the extreme risks we all pull to save your ass out in the field.”

“Bucky, stop.” Sharon yelled.

But he ignored her words and sauntered over to Y/N with a knowing smirk, leaning down to meet her level. His warm breath hit her face and she could stare into his deep eyes, swirling like a raging storm of blues and greys. “You shouldn’t even be out there, L/N. I mean, you haven’t had training in years, it’s not like you were anything special either. Just another agent, hoping to get to work in the big leagues.”

“Shut up.” Y/N whispered meekly. Tears were just barely being held in, her chest feeling empty and hollow with anger and guilt. Is this what it felt like to want to kill someone with so much vengeance? 

“Where were you when Thanos came? Where were you, L/N? We needed all the help we could get, but there you are, in fucking Hawaii, with you little fucking margaritas on the fucking beach-”

“Shut the fuck up!” She screamed. The room went dead silent with her voice. None of the team had seen Y/N look so angry, so sad, so vulnerable, at one time. It was easy for her to hide her emotions and Wanda refrained from trying to toy with her mind, but shame was overwhelming the girl by the second and Sergeant Barnes was right, as much as she didn’t want to say it. She was a coward, thinking she could run away from the “hero life” so easily. They’d caught her, and Barnes was making her face that truth right now. “Don’t you think I know that? Don’t you think I know, that I was absolutely scared shitless of returning here, facing all of you after what you endured for so long?” 

Y/N took a deep breath, laughing mirthlessly as tears ran hot down her cheeks. “I’m sorry that I came back, I really am, but I’m trying my damn best to make up for what I did. Being scared is no excuse for why I ran away, I was fucking terrified of having one more thing to lose. My family is dead, SHIELD fell, and I had no one to lean on so I ran as far as I fucking could. But I’m back now, I’m ready to serve up to what I left behind, and you better fucking deal with it because this,” she jabbed a finger into his broad chest, “is not fucking it. I’m not going to live with your shitty behaviour anymore, Barnes.”

He, Wanda, and Sharon all watched as she slammed the plate into the sink, storming out of the room. They could hear her door slam shut, and the two women glared at Bucky.

“What the hell is your problem, Barnes” Wanda hissed in a scarily low voice. Fuck. He knew he’d messed up then, gone farther than he ever dared to with insulting Y/N, and both of the women were severely overprotective of the new Avenger. 

Sharon walked up to Bucky with large strides, delivering a slap to the side of his head. Yeah, he definitely deserved that. It was dead silent in the kitchen, the tension still high strung from the fight seconds before. “You better go apologize, Barnes, I swear to God this has gotten far too out of hand. You two have a mission tomorrow, estimated a month, and wheels are up at 2300 hours. I need you two to go get the intel quietly and undetected and we can’t have both of you arguing the whole damn time, so you better fix things by then.”

The blonde agent walked away, Wanda trailing behind her, but not without the middle finger from both of them. A mission? Tomorrow? With Y/N? This was going to be horrible. Bucky ran a hand over his face and trudged off to his room. 

It was going to be a long month.

-

Y/N stared out of the window as they flew over the clouds above the Mediteranean Sea. Eleven in the morning in Italy gave a clear view of the skies, light blue as far as she could see. They were ready to start their descent into Azzano and the woman glanced to the man beside her, his stormy blue eyes glaring in any direction but hers. The sergeant had avoided her all he could up until they boarded the jet, and even then he only spoke to her when necessary. “Hey, Barnes, we’re starting to descend, go get ready.”

The brunette looked over to Y/N and grunted in response. Oh well, it was better than him yelling at her. His little outburst in the kitchen had her pissed at him more than ever, but the words thrown around still rung true in her head. But now wasn’t the time to think about that.

She paid careful attention to where she was supposed to land, a shaded facility almost five miles south of where they had to get the intel from an old, but rebuilt HYDRA base. The same base where James Buchanan Barnes was once held captive, experimented on and tortured until Steve Rogers came to save him. Y/N didn’t care much for Barnes usually, but she also didn’t know how he’d react to being in a location with such horrible memories attached to it. They had both been at the mission briefing the day before of course, he knew what it entailed and he seemed unfazed, and he was always good at hiding his emotions. As the jet touched down finally, the agent thought back. Well, sometimes he was good at hiding his emotions.

Making sure her comm fit snugly in her ear, Y/N unbuckled herself from the seat, heading back towards the wall of weaponry they kept in the back of the jet. Barnes was already there dressed in hs black kevlar tactical suit, hugging his body nicely and vibranium arm on display. When he was around her he tried to hide it, and she saw him joking around and being comfortable in other’s presence with it out, wondering what made her so different. She personally found it fascinating, the beauty of the gold and black metal with the incredible Wakandan technology, but she respected his privacy and tried to not think too much about it. 

Y/N threw a vest on over her own navy blue tac suit, tightening her combat boots before she fully zipped up. Were they finally ready?

Three guns perched in holsters by her waist.

Two taps to her earpiece and Barnes’ breathing in her ear.

One mutual nod with the sergeant himself, and they were off, slowly making their way to grab the intel, not a trace to be left behind. 

-

Getting stuck in the trunk of a car was not in the plan. It definitely wasn’t. Bucky remembered every single inch and cranny of that meticulously planned out schedule, every move, every kill they had to make, but not once was it mentioned that Y/N was to get stuck in Baron Zemo’s car without any weapons on her.

“L/N, what the hell do you mean you’re in the back of Zemo’s car.” He seethed, already searching frantically around the large remains of the building for her. It had gone smoothly, she was just supposed to quickly check inside his car as he searched the base. It’ll be so much quicker if I do it, L/N, is what he had said, but now he regretted it. Like the incompetent fool she was, she was spotted and ended up shooting out half of Zemo’s goonies before dropping all her weapons to the ground and running when she ran out of ammunition.

“There may have been a slight misunderstanding,” Y/N whispered into her comm, “but nothing we can’t fix! Just come find me, Barnes, and all will be well.”

She could hear his angry curses and jostling, which she assumed he was running to come find her. It wasn’t entirely Y/N’s fault she had run out of ammo. Some of it must have fallen from her pockets during the shootout and when she saw the car she thought it’d be the perfect place to hide. Until she realized that no one else was at the partially burned down HYDRA base besides Baron Zemo, the person who Sharon had told her to avoid at all costs, and she was in his damn car. Practically her death note.

“If you had just listened to me you wouldn’t have been caught!” Bucky furiously whispered through the comms. 

Y/N rolled her eyes, though he couldn’t even see her, and groaned. “I did listen to you, Barnes, I checked the damn car, but we weren’t expecting his guards to find me so I killed them and hid. Is that actually so bad?” 

“Yes it is!’ He explained. “Give me your coordinates.” She checked the small watch on her wrist, pushing a button on the side that gave a small holographic image of the time and her coordinates on a world wide map. Reciting them for him, Bucky followed, continuing to berate her as he did so. “And you’re right, L/N, I asked you to check the car, not fucking jump inside it!”

This time Bucky could envision her rolling her eyes as she groaned even louder in very Y/N L/N fashion. “Would you rather I be dead?” She asked. It had been a few seconds, but she still received no response. “Barnes?” Crackling. “Sergeant?” Absolute nothingness. “Sarge?”

The trunk of the car opened as the woman let out a squeak, the broad frame of James Barnes hovering above her, some dirt smudged around the annoyed expression on his face. “Don’t call me that.” He grumbled.

He reached his hand towards her, grasping her own tightly before pulling her to a sitting position. “Why, you had all the ladies calling you that back in the day?” She mimicked a much higher tone, nearly resembling Snow White if the princess were high on drugs and had a Brooklyn accent. “Hey, Sarge, we goin’ dancing? Sarge, you goin’ to give me some sweet lovin’ tonight? Oh, how I’d just love for you to shove your fat, ugly head up your a-”

A loud beeping from his wristwatch cut her off. With a glare, the man let go of Y/N’s hand, checking to see what the problem was. A small red tracker on the map moved, and both of them knew they were in deep shit. “Crap, Zemo’s coming this way. That’s one of the trackers I set up on the ground and we gotta go quick.”

Faint whistling from Baron Zemo made both of them panic as Bucky tackled her back down and quickly shut the door behind him. Footsteps were approaching, the whistling getting louder and a door opening let the two Avengers know that they couldn’t get out anytime soon. Y/N could feel Bucky’s racing heart against her chest, hers beating just as fast. He turned to face her, a lot closer than both of them expected, lips dangerously close and noses nudging against each other. Ther breaths mixed together, the hot air of the car doing nothing to help her current close quarters with the man. 

“Can you bust us out of here?” She whispered hurriedly, rather uncomfortable with the present situation.

“We’ll die if we leave now. He’s much more prepared than we thought and with half his men down he knows something is up. Zemo wasn’t even supposed to know we were here so we’re far too unprepared and you lost your damn weapons. There’s no way we can go out so we’re going to stick in here until he gets out.”

Truth be told, Bucky was terrified and had no clue what to do next. Being stuck in a small confined space with Y/N had to be his worst nightmare, especially after he didn’t apologize for his shitty behavior last night. And the night before. 

And the several months before that.

From his view Y/N seemed to be uncomfortable and as the car started moving, she wiggled around, struggling to get as far away from Bucky as she could. He too was extremely uncomfortable, but as her wriggling continued, his already tight fitting pants seemed to get even impossible tighter as she practically grinded on him. 

“Would you stop squirming around?” Y/N shot him what would’ve been a questioning glance if not for the pitch blackness of the trunk, and heard his loud sigh, warm breath fanning across her face. “I’m sorry, I’m having a situation, uh, down there and your wiggling isn’t helping it too much.”

Her face heated up, not knowing what to feel after he said that. Was he… flustered? Y/N had never seen Bucky Barnes anything less than grumpy or professional before.

When she said nothing, he assumed the worst and thought she saw him as a disgusting and creepy person. Before that moment he’d never had any particular care about how Y/N felt, but he knew that there were still a lot of perverts, if not more perverts than back in his day. With his four little sisters always getting catcalled and the crude men who thought women were their property, Bucky knew it was definitely terrifying to be assaulted or any situation such as this. 

There wasn’t much he could do, but he shifted so they weren’t lying down hip bone to hip bone. “Sorry if I made you feel uncomfortable, I don’t want you to think I’m a pervert or anything, it’s just been a while since I, well, y’know…”

“I understand, Barnes, but thank you for apologizing.” Y/N said carefully. It was weird to hear the now shy and surprisingly considerate sergeant apologize to her, but she had to admit that her respect for him had gone up. 

He cleared his throat in return, trying to turn in any other direction besides hers as they listened to the tires of the car bumping along the road, heart wildly thumping. 

It was quiet. Far more quiet than it had ever been when either of them were in the same room. As Y/N stared down at Bucky’s head, almost resting on her stomach, she saw the man she’d read about in middle school. For a moment she was able to look past the last few months of fighting and hatred, and see the noble sergeant she’d admired for so long. 

“You can rest your head if you want to, I knew keeping it up like that must be hurting your neck. I promise I’m okay with it.” She reassured him. With a small hesitation, Barnes submitted to his screaming neck muscles and laid his head on her stomach, the vest providing cushion. A few more seconds of silence and gathering courage, and she finally asked him the question she had been wondering since her first day at the compound. “Why do you hate me?”

I’m jealous, he wanted to say, but he wasn’t brave enough to say it. With a small sigh, he managed to get out, “I don’t.”

“Then why are you so cold to me all the time?” Emotions that were borrowed so deep inside Y/N’s chest seemed to come barreling out, seeping into every question that she asked. “Am I really that horrible an agent? Do you not think I’m trying my best? I know I made a mistake, I wasn’t there when you all needed me, but I’m trying so, so damn hard to make up for it. I swear on my life, and every one that comes after it, that I’m-”

“It’s not you, it’s me, God damn it!” Bucky exclaimed angrily. Both of their blood ran cold in fear that Zemo might have heard them, but the radio continued to drone on in the background, nothing seeming to have changed. He took a deep sigh and tried how to best explain it to her. Even though he’d probably never have Y/N’s forgiveness for insulting her so plainly and hurting her so much, he felt as though she deserved as much as his reasoning as to why he “disliked” her so much. It was difficult for him to say, having to also put his pride away for once to just admit it. “I’m jealous of you, Y/N. You got the sweet life for a while, and that’s all I’ve ever wanted. When you look at us who remain, not a single one of us was planning to be an Avenger. You were getting the dream home, the kids, the family that I’ve wanted since I was a boy back in Brooklyn, and all you had to do to get it was run away. It was so simple.”

Y/N’s eyes widened, not at all expecting that. “It wasn’t all too much ‘sweet life’, you know? It was my dream when I was younger, I thought being an agent was temporary and then I’d move into a big, old house with a loving spouse and have millions of little carbon copies of myself to occupy my days. But the truth about what we do is that we can only stay away from it for so long, Barnes. With people like us,” she squeezed her eyes shut, letting the final tears roll down her cheeks, “there’s no running away from the hero's life. It's just who we are. We’ve already done too much to change that part of our lives.” 

Y/N felt him nod through the fabric on her skin, sniffles letting her know that he was crying too. They were connected. All the shouting, all the yelling, the pain, the battles, the fore, the blood, the years of torture, all led to this moment. This historic moment in Y/N and Bucky’s relationship where they both waved white flags, wet faces and hearts filled with sorrow for the life they never had. 

“I’m so sorry for the way I dealt with my anger and jealousy, Y/N.” Bucky croaked. 

“I used to idolize you when I was a kid.” Y/N recalled with a faint smile on her face. “In the eighth grade I wrote a history paper on you, Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes, American hero and inspiration to all. And you know, I always kinda had a crush on you. Wondered what it would be like if you were still alive, if you would’ve gone home after the war, if you would’ve had a family. No matter what wild thoughts ran through my head, though, you were always my hero.” Bucky took her confession in shock, pure amazement and surprise coursing through his body. Maybe a little bit of sadness, longing for that old life, maybe a bit of bashfulness of her having a crush on his as a schoolgirl. “And then I met you and you were this grumpy, irritable old man who seemed to despise me as soon as I walked in the door. Definitely not what I had expected.” He opened his mouth, ready to apologize again, when her next words cut him off. “I want to start over, don’t you?”

How was she so calming? Her words were exactly what he needed to hear and didn’t need to at the same time. Her voice brought back all the old memories of running around New York with Steve as a kid, reminding him of his wise ma in a way. “There’s nothing I’d like more than that, Y/N.”

Y/N smiled to herself, looking towards the top of the car. “Perfect.���

And with the twinkle in her eye and his head resting on her stomach with a small grin, it really was.

[techgoddessdeluxe18]

SidGeno Parent Trap AU!

Will someone please write this i stayed up till 1 aimlessly typing this, ive already fleshed it out for you pleaseee

So Sid and Geno played together as Rookies for the Penguins in the 2005-2009 seasons, lighting up the NHL world as they had done always, slowly finding love and happiness together (after the Me 3 years Super league convo, you saw how blushy Sid was), quietly getting married in an discreet court house somewhere in Pittsburgh, having blissfully unprotected sex before and after the 2009 Stanley Cup win, just happy and in love and their life and success was just beginning to blossom.

But Sid finds out that he’s been pregnant with twins for some time now, having been nearly 12 weeks pregnant already by the time the final round was played. Geno finds out that there are some legal issues from escaping the KHL in order to play for the Penguins, and so to settle some ruffled governmental feathers, it would be best if Geno went back to Russia to fulfill those duties. Sid is extremely worried about the awful timing of the pregnancy and the sheer amount of alcohol consumed during the Cup celebrations, and Geno is worried about Russia ever letting him out of the country, or worse; finding about his relationship with Sid.

They hole up in a remote corner of Canada for the off season, just trying to soak in the time they have together before Geno goes back to Russia. Days are spent going to doctors visits, holding hands as they walk around the lake, cuddling on the couch at night, Geno’s big hands rubbing Sid’s belly, little feet kicking as hard as they can, while Sid giggles and twists round to kiss Geno.

Sid safely delivers the babies, two identical adorable boys, who have thankfully have not had birth defects as Sid was fearing, and so the rest of the off season is spent trying to decide what to do, how they could go back to their respective corners of the world and try to raise their kids. They agree to split the kids, and keep silent on where they came from.

Geno returns to Russia with a little baby boy, who will mostly be taken care of by his mother and father. Sid does the same, heading back to Cole Harbor more often than he would during the season, always glued to his phone and even taking phone calls from his mother on game days.

So then the actual story goes, 16 year old Daniel Patrick Crosby and Dimitri Evgenevich Malkin meet at Worlds to play for their respective countries, and like a random dinner clash between Russia and Canada find Daniel and Dimitri really confused because they look exactly the same; dark curly hair, strong solid bodies, angular doe eyes. Their teammates chirp them, saying they wouldn’t know who was who if they switched sweaters before the tournament.

They meet up again after Russia wins, meeting in Daniel’s hotel room while his roommate is away. They’re like 

“oh when were you born? September 1st, 2009”.

 “Oh shit me too”. 

“ oh who’s your parents?” 

“Evgeni Malkin, big KHL superstar” 

“Sidney Crosby” because duh who doesn’t know the greatest player ever. 

Maybe they have a ripped picture like in the movie, like with Sid and Geno holding the Stanley Cup like they did in 2017. Daniel has Sid, and Dimitri has Geno, and they’re like “ yeah Dad never talked about who Papa was, but that he loved him, but they couldn’t be together”. So they whip out the picture halves, stashed in their wallets, and tada they fit. They’re twins!

Since the tournament for them is over, Russia with the gold and Canada with silver, they have a few days to themselves to watch the rest. On a midnight run to Tim Hortons, sharing a box of Timbits, they agree to swap places to meet each other’s dad, and then switch back during the Olympics, let say it’s somewhere in America, in a few months time. Daniel and Dimitri spend the next precious days coaching each other on how to be each other. Daniel is conveniently mostly conversational in Russian and can understand better than he speaks, but Dimitri is a quiet kid so it works out. Dimitri works hard to soften his Russian accent and worm eh into his normal syntax more. They get haircuts together, the barber laughing at these rambunctious twins and their beautiful curly hair, and they laugh at the ridiculous stripes they agree to shave onto the sides of their heads.

Before they separate at the airport, they exchange necklaces, a #45 from Daniel and a cross from Dimitri.

Dimitri flies back to Cole Harbor, and finds his dad waiting for him. He looks older than the picture he has, more lines on his face, Definetly shorter and grey-er hair, and sad eyes. If Sid notices his son hugging him tightly and for longer than he normally does, he doesn’t say anything. They chat through the drive home, to the lake house that Daniel told him about. Dimitri can only stare and try and absorb who this man was, the man who birthed him. Sid asks him if he’s ok as they eat dinner on the dock, bare feet dipping into the cold water. Dimitri can only mumble “you’re the best”, as he snuggles his head into his fathers chest. Sid can’t help but think that his son’s voice sounds different; the way he pronounced best sounded just like Geno.

Daniel manages to not say too much on the flight back to Russia, desperately trying to memorize more vocab and grammar before landing and being picked up by his grandparents. The cooing and lecturing is the same in either English or Russian, so he smiles and just lets it wash over him. He tentatively asks where his Papa is, and Grandmama Malkin says he’s probably wining and dining his latest girl. They go home and Daniel is stuffed full of food, everything Grandmama could have possibly made for his arrival. Geno comes home later that night, tired but eager to congratulate his son for winning Gold for Russia. He notices that his son perhaps looks a little different, ruffling the funny haircut that he had gotten, but more at the expression of awe on his face; a similar expression Sid had on his face when he told him he usually went out last before a game, many many years ago.

So yadada ya, they’re enjoying the time that they have with their respective dads, occasionally wringing out a small story or a sad look of their faces whenever they mention anything about each other. So the Olympics are rolling around, and they’re all going to be in one place (lets just say that Sid and Geno had never attempted to make contact whenever they played against each other, afraid that they might get caught) But Daniel has frantically been calling Dimitri over Geno’s new girl and how he might propose and would ruin their plan to get their parents back together.

Shenanigans during the Olympics, one groups disappearing before the other can see them, until Geno is in the elevator shmoozing his girl until he sees THE ASS tm across the room by the front desk. Sid turns around and just smiles sadly as the elevator door closes.

Then the scene where Sid is walking down the hall and Dimitri and Daniel open the doors at the same time and suddenly Sid is confronted with what he thinks is the son he hasn’t seen in 16 years. They pull him into a room, and explain the whole swicheroo, and Sid is mad because there’s nothing they can really do, he’s prepared to let Geno move on and do what’s he needs to, but resigns himself to being alone.

Then the pool scene, where Geno and his girl are lounging with his parents, and Sid walks his fine ass down the stairs and Geno falls in, scrapes up his nose a bit, Sid bandages him up a bit. Daniel and Dimitri reveal themselves to Geno.

Some time in between tournaments, with Russia and Canada on the rise to be competing for the Gold Final, Daniel and Dimitri bully their fathers into a family dinner at a nice restaurant. They cut a handsome swath at dinner, good looking men in good looking suits. Geno instinctually files in last, whether it being his remembered deal with Sid, or merely to ogle a bit as he pushes in Sid’s seat for dinner. For fun, after dinner, they find a nearly empty outdoor rink, equipped with rental skates. Daniel and Dimitri take off, chirping each other and racing and checking each other into the low boards enough for Dimitri to flip over and out of the rink, Daniel wheezing with laughter as Dimitri hefts himself back over. Sid and Geno skate around at a sedate pace, both having played a round that day and simply watching their sons fool around. They don’t say much. They can’t really. They can only quietly enjoy each others presence, wondering where had all the time gone, all the plans they had had.

The final round for Mens Ice Hockey has arrived, Russia vs Canada for Gold, and Daniel and Dimitri can only watch and wonder to see who will come out on top, and what will happen with their parents, watching as Geno checks Sid into the boards. Sid refuses to give up, and so Canada ends up winning the Gold. Like the 2014 picture where Geno and Sid hug after the game, what the camera doesn’t see but their sons see from behind the glass is the shaking hands of Geno and the single tear from Sid.

Like in the movie, before everyone hops onto their respective planes to their respective corners of the world, Sid and Geno make sure their sons aren’t faking this time, and that they go back to who they belong to. It’s how it has to be.

Cue the rain sequence, the sad music, the umbrellas.

Sid and Daniel return to Cole Harbor, still down pouring and quiet. They don’t say anything in the car ride back to the lake house. They finally arrive at home, and take some time to unpack and get comfortable. They silently look at each other, each longing for their other halves. Daniel had become so close to Dimitri, finding out who he was and planning the whole quest to meet their fathers. Sid just missed his husband, and playing against him after fighting so hard to play with him just made him wish for retirement sooner. They hug, and with Daniel under Sids arm, quietly wander down the bank of the hill towards the dock.

Although there seem to be two people already sitting there, with their feet in the water. Geno and Dimitri turn around, identical smug looks on their faces. Dimitri says, his accent hovering somewhere between the hard Russian accent and the rounded Canadian pronunciation, “hey Dad, did you know the Penguins still have those private jets?”

“Ye-yeah, they do bud”, Sid murmurs, still looking at the tall Russian slowly making his way towards him. Daniel duck out from under his arm to sit with his twin and watch the two goofballs that are their parents figure it out.

“I made mistake of not coming for you once, Sid. I’m not do that again, no matter how brave you are.” Geno says

“And I suppose you expect me to go weak at the knees and fall into your arms, and cry hysterically and say we’ll just figure this whole thing out, a bi-continental relationship with our sons being raised here and there, and you and I just picking up where we left off, and growing old together and… And, c’mon G, what do you expect? To live happily ever after?” Sid warbles, his tired eyes welling up with long withheld tears.

“Yes—to all, except you don’t have cry hysterically.” Geno murmurs, cupping Sid’s face and wiping a lone tear as it falls.

“Oh, yes I do—” Sid is cut off as he is kissed (AKA THE BEST KISS SCENE EVER, CUE THE MUSIC)

Daniel and Dimitri can only grin and fist bump as their parents finally kiss after 16 years apart. They put and end to it when Geno starts to dip Sid into a deeper, more lurid kiss and some major groping, and they push both of them into the water.

During the epilogue with This Will Be (An Everlasting Love) by Natalie Cole, scenes flash by of Geno and Sid holding hands in front of a press conference, their sons standing by their sides, as they announce their retirements from both the NHL and KHL after 20 years, and their relationship and their sons to the hockey community.

Another scene where Daniel and Dimitri attention Shattuck St. Mary’s to finish up high school before inevitable being drafted when they turn 18. It would be the first and only time they play together on the same team, Crosby-Malkin proudly spelled onto the back of their sweaters.

Another scene where they’re all playing shinny on a frozen pond somewhere, Geno getting distracted and just sweeping Sid into his arms after he scores a goal, kissing and swinging around until they both fall into a snowbank, their sons launching themselves at them at top speed.

Another scene where Daniel Crosby-Malkin from the Chicago Blackhawks and Dimitri Crosby-Malkin from the Dallas Stars face off for a Stanley Cup final

And finally, a small wedding held in Sid’s backyard in Nova Scotia, where Daniel and Dimitri stand with Flower and Tanger and Kuni and Duper and Talbo and most of Geno’s Russian buddies as their parents finally get married again, kissing happily under the sunset and the lake shining behind them.

Bonus scene: A few months after the wedding and a few days before the season starts up again, with everyone home, Sid comes down the stairs for breakfast with a strange look on his face and something in his hands. He’s a graceful 43 now, grey hairs really pushing now, so when he says “you boys up to being big brothers?” Geno spits out the tea he had been drinking and jumps up and envelops his husband.

[we-rate-tmnt]

Give us the Donatellos!

Donnie is my favorite so Imma be super biased on this one. Maybe I like smart guys or maybe purple is my favorite color, you’ll never know!

Up first, the og ‘hehe turgle’

Donatello (1987)

Yeah I’m sorry for making this 

First of all, not the biggest fan of his voice. It has a bit of a whiny quality to it, and I’m not about all that jazz. His gismo’s look pretty lame a lot of the times, either it’s a grey box with some buttons, dials and flashing lights or looks like it was pulled directly from Lost in Space. Still a cute design but he felt pretty bland and seemed to be used for plot convenience most of the time. To put it simply, he was cute and essential but kinda bland. I’m always really harsh on this version because it’s so painfully dated and cheesy, which ain’t my cup of tea, but what can I say be hehe turgle.

5/10

I had a crush on this Donnie so you know that this is not remotely close to a fair rating but eh, I love him and yall do too

Don (2003)

His voice, such a huge improvement. I’m really sound-oriented and I often like to play a game of ‘I’ve heard the VA before, but which role?’ when I watch cartoons and I don’t mean to brag, but I’m pretty good at it. So when I heard that soft, caring voice, ten year old me was head over heels. Which is one quality I love about him. His heart is so huge, like I can think back to a bunch of side characters and most of them were introduced through Don helping or knowing them. The Atlantians and the homeless in the show owe so much to Don, but he goes out of his way to make sure that they are alright. In the last season (which everyone hated but I actually really liked so fuck me I guess), Splinter is lost into tiny pieces across the web and Don blames himself and goes without sleep and food for days to bring him back. It broke my heart, and I’m pretty sure a lot of others, to see him like that.

On a lighter note, I vaguely remember this one scene where the triceration dude is like ‘you did this!’ and Don’s like ‘I did? Good for me then.’ and had a very pleased grin on his face right after. I don’t know why, but that killed me. Bless Don and his rare, but excellent, comebacks.

He really does so much and there were quite a few episodes focused on him. He also had quite a bit of character development, not as much as Leo, but whoever gets any more development whatsoever besides Leo?

I love him he’s amazing protect him/10

Next up is the Donnie that helped me love my old gap tooth.

Donnie (2012)

Voiced by the very talented Rob Paulson, this Donnie goes back and forth from really great character to eh. The whole April thing was just kinda strange to me and I don’t really think it added anything other than some interesting Casey and Donnie banter. His crush was really strong the first two seasons and came off as stalkerish almost. Although I’m guilty of having a picture of a crush as my lock screen once as well, so I can’t judge that much. I really liked that they actually addressed this when Bigfoot had a crush on Donnie and he realized how April felt. Yeah, that episode was weird and just didn’t make any sense, but it really helped Donnie gain a new perspective and made him go from super crush to (mostly) hidden pining. He has a nice design as well, especially with the gap tooth. I used to have one and was really embarrassed of it but whenever I saw that Donnie had one, I thought it looked neat and I started to see myself in a more positive light. It’s closed up now, but I can still spray water between the little bit that’s left as a parlor trick. But seriously, what the FUCK was up with Don visiososoos whatever tf his name I I don’t understnad my tiny brain don’t understand why my purple boy tried to kill this dude who looked like he should’ve been wearing a red jumpsuit in the background of a pixar robot love story. Anyway, my tall gap tooth son, ily.

7/10

Then, the barely changed but fantastic

Donnie (Heroes in a Half Shell: Blast to the Past)

Baby but Bastard at the same time purely because of the ‘Anyone who bothers me, ejector seat button’s right there’ line. 

10/10

Now this version has one of my favorite designs out of all the Donatello’s!

Donatello (2014/2016)

They put a lot of thought into his design psychically, the long body, the near-constant look of surprise and curiosity in his features, the gadgets made of common objects, the wraps on his arms, I would love to be able to think of and make those kinds of details! It was all really well thought out and he stood out since he wasn’t as bulky as the rest of the turtles. I really like the little lines and the actor did a fantastic job on the delivery and really made the character come to life. Some favorites: ‘Ohmygod, they have guns’, the little awed, snorty chuckle when he flips a car over with his bo staff, ‘doitdoitoitdoit im not gonna stop til you do it doditdoit’ and when he straight up yeets himself out of a plane. He has a genuine curiosity in everything he does and I think he might be my favorite version. It’s hard to choose when it comes to Donnie because he varies so wildly. But for detail, voice and writing alone, definitely the 2014 Donnie.

8.5/10

Next up is God himself

Donnie (2018)

Chaotic as all hell, like I can’t think of a more chaotic character from ANY of the versions other than this Donnie. I have a lot of thoughts about his character in general, from design, to psychology and complexes. First and foremost, Donnie is a softshell turtle, meaning he has a DOPE battle shell and overall looks pretty damn neat. Although, I think that just the fact he’s biologically weaker has caused him to put up a lot of boundaries between him and his family and friends. He can’t be incredibly strong like Raph, agile like Leo or fast like Mikey and even though he brags about being smart, he feels almost beneath his brothers and strives to outdo them in any way he can. He wants to show them that he’s just as, if not more so, talented and feels overlooked because his inventions become ‘too smart’ or ‘too over the top’ and even the ones that work out incredibly well are written off for flashier projects. 

He depends on technology and feels like that's all he has, and (ironically enough) he’s built up a shield around him. He acts confident and narcissistic and has an almost nihilistic outlook, but he’s frustrated and feels inferior and wants validation more than anything. I came up with this theory when I saw the episode Turtle Dega Nights. I know that the scene was meant for Donnie to express how he feels about Splinter lying about the event and believe that he didn’t genuinely want to hang out with his sons, but that kind of thing feels like it’s been built up over time, like he’s been lied to before about the true meaning behind something. Something like, oh idk, how great his inventions are? Or how helpful he really is? Or how talented he is? Just sayin. Also ngl I might be self projecting a bit, but mmm. Also he has so much purple on him and it’s wayyy more accurate compared to just a purple bandanna bc people who like purple GO ALL OUT. A friend told me this and I thought ‘nah thats not true I like purple’ but then I looked down to find my dyed purple jeans, purple vans and my favorite hoodie, also purple. A really chaotic version but he seriously needs a hug.

9/10

Storytime: One time my friend dressed up as Donnie the same year I was dressing as April O’ Neal and we didn’t even plan it. It was fantastic.

Thank you so much for sending this in! Sorry it’s taking me so long to get around to these! I’m so glad you guys are liking my blog and my opinions!

[harringtown]

maybe slide on in by my side

the song that ‘Steve’ wrote is Outlaws by David Lambert, and yes, it came out in like 2014 and yes, im using it anyway 

requested by anonymous

Pairing: Steve Harrington x reader

Summary: Steve plays the reader a song (aka guitar player!steve and fluff)

Word Count: 1.3k

Warnings: none

-

The old, beat up guitar has sat in the corner of Steve Harrington’s room for as long as you’ve known him, walnut-colored and faded with use, but not once has it been brought out; not in front of you, and not in front of anyone else, as far as you know.

“Can you actually play that thing?”

Steve lifts his head, setting aside the trashy magazine he refuses to admit he likes, and follows your line of sight to the guitar resting against the wall. One side of his mouth curls up, but the smile is shy, shyer than you’ve ever seen, and he shrugs a shoulder.

You cock a brow and climb off his bed, padding across the room to pick up the instrument and bring it back to the bed, sitting cross-legged in front of Steve with the guitar. You strum a few notes, a smile tugging on your lips, and look up at him.

“How long have you had this thing? It looks older than you,” you say. Steve’s brows twitch, and he smiles.

“It is,” he says, holding out a hand for the guitar, shifting to mirror your position, knees against yours. You hand it over, and he settles it comfortably in his lap. The image makes sense, despite your prior expectations. It’s like he’s always had an instrument in his hands. “My grandpa gave it to me. Started teaching me when I was six, and my fingers were way too small for the fret. He’d set me on his lap, guitar on top of me, and help me reach the chords I couldn’t.”

“You realize you have to play for me now, right?”

His ears go pink, and he ducks his chin, meeting your gaze through feathered lashes.

“Have to, have to?”

“Have to, have to.”

He crinkles his nose, and you laugh, leaning your arms on your forearms and waggling your brows.

“Have you written any songs?” You ask. His brows furrow and he presses his lips together, averting your gaze and shrugging noncommittally.

“A few,” he says.

“Ever written a song about me?”

He smiles, but it turns shy again, red creeping onto his cheeks. You’ve never seen him like this, never seen a completely vulnerable Steve Harrington. He’d squash the guitar playing immediately if you told him, but he’s quite adorable when he’s nervous.

“They’re all about you,” he says. Your lips part, heart skipping a beat. You lick your lips, inclining your head.

“The first one, then.”

“You sure?” He asks, cringing. “It’s…pretty bad. Like, really bad. Level-ten cheesy.”

“Oh, definitely that one,” you say. He laughs, rolling his eyes.

“You asked for it,” he says, fingers settling against the fretboard. He ducks his chin, a tiny crease forming between his brows as he rests his other hand against the strings to strum.

He glances up at you, one side of his mouth quirking up, and drops his gaze back to the guitar, reaching up to slide the capo down one and readjust his fingers before strumming once softly.

“Took you at your word, when you said you would steal my heart. Yeah this might sound absurd, but would you be my thief, take all of me, every part.”

The butterflies in your stomach go haywire, and heat flushes your own cheeks.

“Love love love is my crime.I think we might be outlaws, I think I might be in love, ‘Cause I'm all out of reasons, like seasons, Winter, summer, fall they're all washed up.”

Little pieces of Steve’s hair fall over his forehead as he plays and his fingers move deftly between chords, not a trace of that clumsy boy you know to be found. His voice is low and silvery, tipping higher on the longer notes. It’s warm and welcoming, like honey and sunlight on your skin and coming home.

“If you're still way over there, maybe slide on in by my side, ‘Cause I'm just an outlaw, wanted if you want me. I love you everyday and every night.”

His gaze flicks up to yours, his lopsided smile and bright eyes making your stomach flip, and he continues playing, keeping his eyes on yours.

“Oh whoa, Lock me up for good, right here in your arms. You vandalize my neighbourhood, with your piercing eyes and devilish charm. Love love love is my crime. So baby, come catch me and let's do the time.”

His smile widens, and he moves into the chorus again, eyes falling shut as he sings.

“I think we might be outlaws, I think I might be in love. 'Cause I'm all out of reasons, like seasons, Winter, summer, fall they're all washed up. If you're still way over there, maybe slide on in by my side, 'Cause I'm just an outlaw, wanted if you want me.” He opens his eyes, inclining his head and giving you that smile reserved just for you, half-singing and half-speaking the last line. “I love you everyday and every night.”

So much love for the boy with the guitar fills your chest you think you might choke on it, and a smile pulls on your lips of its own accord. Steve presses his lips together and flicks a look at you before setting the guitar aside, shrugging.

“Like I said, pretty cheesy-”

You lean forward, taking his face in your hands and pressing your mouth to his. He lets out a little surprised gasp, and then a laugh, and then he’s kissing you back, hands moving to your waist and lips parting against yours. He pulls you back and down with him, and you swing a leg over his waist, straddling his lap.

“That mean you liked it?” He asks, pulling away slightly, a smile playing on his lips. You tip your forehead against his, heart hammering in your chest, and laugh, nodding.

“I love it,” you say. “And you. So, so much.”

He lays his head back against the bed, smiling at you like you’re some kind of magical thing or miracle, like you’re not just somebody from a small town in Hawkins. When he looks at you, you feel like the biggest, greatest thing in the world. To be loved like that, to the point of creation, like you’re the source of the sun and the stars in the sky, is to live forever, even if it’s just in a moment.

“You know you’re playing me the others eventually, right?”

Steve groans, sitting up, hands slipping around your waist the steady you. He ducks his head, pressing his face into the fabric of your hoodie, and you laugh, tangling your fingers in his hair and pulling his head back, forcing him to meet your gaze.

He cocks a brow, one side of his mouth turning up.

“A song for a kiss?” He asks.

“That didn’t take long to come up with.”

He grins, and says, “I’m just that good.”

You snort, winding your arms around his neck and leaning forward again. Steve tilts his chin up to press a kiss to your temple before catching your mouth in his, smiling against your lips.

You sink into him for a moment before pulling back, making a face.

“Nah uh. A song for a kiss, right?”

He crinkles his nose, and tilts his head, arching a brow.

“First one isn’t over,” he says. At your expression, he grins. “Not my fault you didn’t make any rules.”

You roll your eyes, but lean back in, brushing his nose with your own.

“I guess that’s my bad,” you murmur.

“Careless thinking,” Steve breathes, smiling as he tilts his chin up and kisses you again.

There will be more time for music, later. More music and more kisses and just plain more.

-

Taglist: @allfandomxreader @kalie-bee @sourapplebaby @iiqtpiee @queenofthehairharrington @drcwse @whitecard62 @captainelsaeverdeen @hairrington @lemonypink @ludicstilinski @harrington-ofhawkins @dezzylou24 @mightstudysoon @ultrunning @xthe-dreamerx @bralessandflawless @pvnsie @anerroroccurrrrred @bookfrog242 @yayrainyday @snarky–starky @with-a-little-bit-of-light​ @mochminnie​ @redbullchick @izzylizzybizzy @sassisaluxuy @80strashbag​ @m-blasterrr​ @estrela-rogers @comedy-witch​ @sammyyyygp​ @alwaysthefangirl​

[kitkatwinchester]

On September 13th, 2005, a new show made its debut on the WB. It was about two brothers whose lives were flipped upside down the day their mother was murdered by a demon. It had a small budget, a small cast, and a small crew, but the people involved were dedicated. They wanted to do everything they could to make sure the story of Sam and Dean Winchester was told. They wanted to show us the true power of family in the darkest of times. Little did any of them know just how much of a legacy they would create, and just how much of a family their following would come to be.

I was four years old when Supernatural first came on the air. I had no concept of any show beyond Blue’s Clues, Lazy Town, and the Disney Channel. I was a smart kid, but a kid nonetheless, and Supernatural just wasn’t something I was ready for. As I grew up, Supernatural achieved milestone after milestone. It made it through the channel change to the CW. It survived a writer’s strike in its third season. And in April of 2010, it hit its 100th episode milestone. As it neared the end of its fifth season, Eric Kripke’s original storyline had been told, and it seemed as if the show would end, then and there. But it didn’t. Instead, it continued beyond its originally scheduled timeline, taking on a new showrunner in its sixth season and continuing for years after. And in 2011, in the middle of said sixth season, it finally made its way onto my radar.

Tenzin Tsekye and I have been best friends for fourteen years, so we’ve spent a lot of time together. We’ve had hundreds of sleepovers, shared a million memories, and watched thousands of shows and movies together. So when, at one of our many sleepovers, she suggested that we watch an episode of something called “Supernatural”, I trusted her. She knows what I watch, she knows how I am. I was bound to like it. Except there was one problem. She insisted on watching this one episode that she really liked (Family Remains) that was smack dab in the middle of season four, and I was not having it. I told her that we had to start from the beginning. I didn’t know anything about this show, so how could I possibly watch an episode in the middle of its fourth season? It wouldn’t make any sense to me. She kept assuring me that it didn’t have anything to do with the main plot (a concept I now know as “Monster of the Week”), and that I would love it. But I wasn’t convinced, and I was persistent. I told her that if we weren’t going to start from the beginning, I wouldn’t watch it at all.

We argued about it for at least an hour, and finally, I backed down. I said that we could watch the season four episode only if we went back and watched the first episode afterwards. She agreed. After we watched Family Remains, she stuck to our agreement and we watched the pilot. And then we watched the second episode. And the third. And the fourth. And my entire life was changed forever.

It still baffles me to this day how close I came to never starting Supernatural to begin with. I thank Tenzin all the time for being so stubborn on that night. Who knows what my life would be like today if she hadn’t been? Looking back, it’s hard for me to picture a time before I started watching Supernatural--so much so that pinpointing when, exactly, it became the obsession that it is today is near impossible. But what follows is a rough timeline of events based on the major things I do remember.

Tenzin and I never wound up watching the rest of the show together. Instead, I brought the show up to my dad. It took a while, since we were both pretty busy, but by the next year, Supernatural had become our new thing. I was a busy middle schooler, so it was often hard to fit in watching more than one episode on the days we spent together, which meant it was slow-going for a while, but we did our best. Luckily, the fact that we weren’t binging it all at once meant that we were able to avoid a lot of the cliffhangers, (which, looking back at it now, makes me feel very lucky), and it gradually became my favorite show of all time. By the time Season 9 was on the air, in 2014, we had caught up on all eight seasons on Netflix, and I was hooked and ready for more.

We didn’t have cable, so instead, we watched every episode a few days after they aired once they came on Hulu (I didn’t learn about cwtv.com until much later), and it was at this point that I really started to dive into the fandom. Now that I was caught up, I was able to look up fandom content as I pleased without worrying about spoilers. I guess you could say this is when the obsession truly kicked in.

As I came up on my teen years, Supernatural became my life. I started requesting even more Supernatural merchandise as birthday gifts, Christmas presents, and everything in between, and I would wear the gifts I got anywhere I could. Within a few months, I discovered the world of fan fiction, and within a year, I grew confident and excited enough to start writing my own. I started watching video compilations not just of the show, but of the cast--behind the scenes videos, bloopers, convention videos, and so much more. I joined Facebook groups about the show and finally started interacting with other fans, making all kinds of friendships along the way.

On top of that, as the tenth season came to a close with no signs of the show stopping, my mom finally caved in to my babbling and excitement and started watching the show with me. We started back at the Pilot (which, for me, was probably about my fifth re-watch at that point), and we made it all the way to about mid-season five just as the eleventh season was getting ready to air.

And then a truly amazing thing happened.

For my 16th birthday, that same amazing mother bought me tickets to the Supernatural Convention in Chicago.

To put it lightly, I was excited. Very excited.

On the weekend of September 9th, 2016, just a week before my birthday, I got to meet the Supernatural cast for the first time. And that convention experience was one of the best things that has ever happened to me.

When we were on our way to the convention, I was really just excited that I’d finally get to meet these celebrities--these HOT celebrities--that I’d seen on the big screen for the last few years. At this point, they were basically idols to me, and even having the chance to see them in person was the best thing I could’ve asked for. But when I got to that convention, I was hit with something even better than I could’ve hoped for.

I say all the time that the SPN Family is a different fandom than any other. There’s a special feeling throughout our fandom that, as someone who is in multiple fandoms, I have not been able to feel anywhere else. When I try to explain that to people, nobody gets it. Even my mom, when I first started talking about it, kind of shrugged it off like it was nothing. But when we got to that convention, she felt it too. The air is different. The second you walk into a room of fellow Supernatural fans, you feel comfortable. You feel welcome.

That first convention, my mom didn’t really come with me to the panels. She took some photo ops with me, but being as far behind as she was, she didn’t want to spoil things for herself too much, so I spent the majority of the convention by myself, at a mere fifteen years old. But I never felt scared or alone or apprehensive. I made friends immediately. The people I was sitting next to, the people I stood in line with, basically anyone I came in contact with struck up a conversation with me, and it would end with Facebook usernames, Twitter handles, or even phone numbers being exchanged to contact each other in the future. It was insane. I’d never been in an environment like that before, and I loved it. And the openness didn’t stop there.

When it came time to meet the actual members of the Supernatural cast, they were just as kind and wonderful to talk to. At every panel, the guests were so eager to interact with fans, and many of them even stepped off the stage to come say hi to fans who were in line to ask them questions. Even the three main stars, Jensen, Jared, and Misha--who had to stay on the stage for security reasons--did everything they could to bond with fans and make them smile or laugh, and it was beautiful. And that transcended beyond the panels.

That Sunday, my mom and I had a photo op with Jensen and Jared, and let me tell you, I was crazy nervous. I mean, these were huge celebrities and people that I really looked up to, and I was about to get a photo with them. Plus, Jensen was my very first celebrity crush and all-time favorite actor at the time (he still is, to be honest). The whole thing was crazy nerve-wracking.

After standing in line for a bit, it was finally our turn, and as my mom and I stepped up, and I turned to Jensen to tell him what we wanted for the photo, I completely froze up. My brain told me to say: “We want to do a squishy hug photo.” But what came out instead was something more along the lines of “hug please photo hug?” To say the least, I was blushing with embarrassment for several hours afterwards. But despite my nerves and fangirling, Jensen just smiled at me, and he gave me a little chuckle, and said: “sure thing, sweetheart”, which, of course, made me fall apart even more. Nonetheless, the photo happened, and at the end of it all, Jensen gave me one more reassuring little rub on the back, plus a second hug and a last smile before we headed off and away from the duo.

It took me hours to process the whole thing, but at the end of it all, I was so happy and relieved.

Jensen could’ve been cold. He could’ve given me a weird look for freaking out so much. He could’ve even just done the picture and gotten it over with. But he didn’t. He went the extra mile to make sure I knew that my nerves were okay, and they were understandable, but that he wasn’t judging, and he was okay with it. And that really says something.

After that, I went to a convention every year (excluding this year, for obvious reasons). I’ve been to four conventions in all, and every single year, the experience has only gotten better, because I’ve gotten more confident and comfortable around the actors--all because of that special energy.

In 2017, I was picked to sing karaoke with several of the actors from the show...on stage...in front of a huge crowd of Supernatural fans. For those of you who know me pretty well, you know that I have terrible stage fright when it comes to singing in front of people. I get super nervous, and the nerves just get higher with bigger crowds. But that night, to my surprise, I was great. Not only did I sing the classic “Wanted Dead or Alive” in front of hundreds of people, but I got to sing and dance with some of my favorite actors--and I was confident about it. When I was on that stage, dancing with the actors and singing with the fandom, I felt good.

It wasn’t until long after I was done that it hit me what had just happened, and I couldn’t believe it. All of my years of performing in theater productions and talent shows, and I had never been as confident as I had been on that karaoke night. I still have the video on my phone, and I smile at it in disbelief every time I watch it.

My confidence only grew from there. In 2018, I decided to submit to the convention’s fandom music video contest. I spent many hours and many days putting together an edit for Team Free Will 2.0. I was super particular about the timing--beats had to hit scene changes exactly right, lyrics had to line up with the scenes being shown, and I really wanted to tell a good story. When I finally finished the edit, I showed it to my dad--who’s been doing films his entire life--to get his opinion, and he was super impressed. Even though he had stopped watching the show around Season 11 (luckily, my mom was caught up at this point, so she and I were able to watch it together), he really loved what I had done with the edit. (He actually wound up loving it so much that he asked me to edit several projects for him later, including a music video, film production, and theater trailer, opening a door for me in life--one I never would’ve found without Supernatural.)

I submitted it to the Denver convention, and months later, when I was finally able to attend said convention in August of 2018, I was nervous, but excited. As my convention experience went on, I kind of forgot that I had submitted an edit, instead enjoying my time with my new Supernatural friends, the actors, and, now that she was caught up, my mom. But on the third day, they announced the winner, and to be perfectly honest, I didn’t hear what name they said, but we all kind of assumed that it hadn’t been me, which was a little disappointing, but I didn’t let it get me down. But then, while I was talking to my friend, I heard the tell-tale notes of the opening of “This is Me”--the song I had used for the edit--and my head whipped to the screen faster than it ever has for anything. Sure enough, in the #1 spot, was my music video edit.

Needless to say, I kind of lost my mind. I ran up to the front to claim my certificate--including the gift certificate for $100 of Supernatural merchandise--and couldn’t stop jumping up and down. And my friends that I’d made at the convention that year were jumping right along with me. It was a beautiful moment.

By the time the 2019 Chicago convention rolled around, I had grown really comfortable with the whole cast, crew, and fandom, and 2019 was one of my best experiences yet. I submitted another video edit and got second place. I sang the Ghostbusters theme (Hillywood style, of course) with a friend at karaoke night. I even managed to ask every actor a question at their panels without stuttering, even bantering back and forth with a few of them. At autograph tables, I managed to have full-fledged conversations with some of the actors, and at my photo op with Jensen and Jared, I actually told both of them exactly what we wanted to do for the picture without stuttering over my words.

In any other fandom, I don’t think I would’ve been able to do that. But the actors and the fans make that entire convention so comfortable and easy to get through, no matter how nervous you are, and that’s one of the many things I love about this show.

Sadly, though, there was also something else that happened in 2019.

On March 22nd, 2019, Jensen, Jared, and Misha made the announcement that all Supernatural fans were hoping would never come. On Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and everything in between, Jensen Ackles said the words we’d all been fearing: “Though we’re very very excited about moving into our fifteenth season, it will be our last.”

I was in Europe when I found out--Barcelona, to be specific--and to say that the news put a damper on my vacation would be an understatement. I was in tears, and I know many of my fellow Supernatural fans were too. This show had always struggled with ratings, but it had always pushed through, hitting milestone after milestone. So when the news finally came that it would be coming to a close, after a whopping 327 episodes, it shocked us all.

But even knowing it was ending, the cast, crew, and entire fandom were quick to note that it would never be far away. While the Winchester brothers would take their final ride in (what was supposed to be) May of 2020, it didn’t mean that the fandom would die. While news spread from actors to fans to, frankly, the entire world, we all rallied together, knowing that, as Jensen put it so well, “the show might end, but what it has built, this will never end”.

So we prepared for the end. I did my ten day countdown leading up to the premiere, and as the cast counted down each of their lasts on social media, we counted down each of our lasts watching the show.

And then 2020 happened, and everything changed. COVID-19 shut everything down, including production on Supernatural, and with only two episodes left for the cast to film (plus four that still needed post-production), it looked like Supernatural wasn’t gonna be able to end after all. They aired the completed first thirteen episodes of the season, and then it went on hiatus. I think, at the time, a lot of us were worried. What if something happened? What if they weren’t able to finish? What if, after fifteen years, the show had to be cancelled because of a pandemic?

But Supernatural’s never given up, and the pandemic was no exception. For the cast and crew, this was just another obstacle in the long line of obstacles that Supernatural has made it through over the years. And in August of 2020, Jared and Jensen went back to set--along with several other actors--and finished the Winchesters’ long legacy. And on October 8th, 2020, Season 15.5 began airing on the CW, and our long goodbye to a show we’ve all loved for years started all over again.

And now here we are.

I’m sure you’re asking me why all of this matters. I just gave you a complete rundown of the Supernatural timeline from the day I started it, and I haven’t even gotten to the point. So, here’s my point.

This is what my life has been for the last nine years. I was eleven years old when I finally discovered Supernatural, and now I’m twenty, and my life has changed so much.

Supernatural has taught me things that no other elements of my life possibly could. It’s brought out parts of my personality that I never would’ve discovered otherwise.

Supernatural has made me who I am today.

Supernatural has gotten me more involved on social media, even going so far as to create my own content to share.

Supernatural has influenced other things I watch. Now, I try to find shows, movies, and even books that have some of the same themes as this show because I love them so much.

Supernatural got me connected with GISH, which helped me feel more comfortable going out of my comfort zone and being a little (okay, a lot) weird.

Supernatural made me proud to be a fangirl, giving me the chance to express my interests publicly and feel free from judgement.

Supernatural gave me some amazing new friendships, and strengthened the relationships I already had with friends and family.

Supernatural brought out my creative side. From fan fiction writing, to photo collages, to video editing, this show has given me more ways to express myself than I ever could’ve hoped, and it’s opened so many doors for me in the process.

Supernatural has taught me so many lessons and mantras that I will cherish and keep with me forever. Between never giving up, spreading love and kindness, knowing that family always has your back, and not being afraid to be who you are, the show and its cast have given me confidence and strength that I will never forget.

For those of you out there who still think that Supernatural is “just a show”, this is what I present. When I first started Supernatural, I thought the same thing. But over the years, it has become so much more to me than that, and I know that the entire fandom agrees.

With Supernatural ending, a small piece of everyone in the fandom is ending with it, but deep down, we all know that this show will always be with us, and the legacy it’s leaving behind is something that will never be forgotten.

Supernatural has been through a lot, just like it’s two main characters; but, like Sam and Dean, it has never given up, and it has saved so many people’s lives in the process.

I feel so honored to have been even a small part of such an incredible journey.

Thank you, Supernatural.

Thank you, Supernatural cast and crew.

Thank you for making your fifteen years in this world matter.

Thank you for teaching all of us what it means to be human.

Thank you for showing us that we can continue to fight for ourselves and others no matter what the world throws at us.

Thank you for making every single one of us feel special and worth something.

You have changed my life, and the lives of so many others, more than you can possibly imagine by teaching us all that we truly can “carry on”.

On September 13th, 2005, an era began.

On November 19th, 2020, that era will end.

But its legacy will last forever.

“No doubt, endings are hard. But then again, nothing ever really ends, does it?”

[alexskarsgardnet]

New Alex Interview with the NY Times + a new portrait by Aaron Richter!

There Are Worse Roles Than the Seducer. Ask Alexander Skarsgård.

The actor talks about his latest turn as a compelling sociopath in “The Kill Team” and his Emmy-winning role in “Big Little Lies.”

By Kathryn Shattuck

Alexander Skarsgård found “The Kill Team,” Dan Krauss’s 2014 documentary about American soldiers accused of murdering Afghan civilians for sport, deeply disturbing.

But when Krauss decided to transform it into a feature film, and asked Skarsgård to play Sergeant Deeks, a role based on the ringleader — Staff Sgt. Calvin Gibbs, now serving a life sentence — Skarsgård imagined something other than the war atrocities and whistle-blowing central to the narrative.

“At end of the day I saw it as a love story,” he said, recalling his character as at once fatherly and sadistic, in many ways irresistible to the impressionable infantrymen. “It’s about jealousy and how my character is able to manipulate these young soldiers and how he plays them against each other. It’s a courtship.”

The sociopath in sheep’s clothing is a role Skarsgård has come to know well; it follows his Emmy- and Golden Globe-winning turn as Perry, the suave, wife-beating rapist whose death ignites “Big Little Lies.”

And now he’s shooting “The Stand,” the CBS All Access adaptation of the Stephen King novel by the same name. He’ll play Randall Flagg, a.k.a. the Dark Man (among other aliases), an evildoer who repeatedly shows up in King’s work.

On break from the show’s Vancouver set, Skarsgård , 43, settled his towering, post-“Tarzan” frame onto a sofa in a Manhattan film office while alternating sips of water and black coffee. The city is his base, though he intends to spend more time in Sweden with his family.

Has portraying the seducer become a recurring theme? “I hope not,” Skarsgård said, laughing uncomfortably and blushing a little. “Though I could have a worse fate than getting stuck doing that,” he added.

These are edited excerpts from the conversation.

NYT/Kathryn Shattuck:  Calvin Gibbs isn’t heard from in the documentary. So how did you begin to develop his character?

Alex: It was very important to me that he was enigmatic and magnetic in a way where he would draw them to him. It’s not that he’s just a tough badass who’s been to war, because that wouldn’t be very interesting for long. It’s that feeling of “I would do anything, whatever you ask me to,” which in this case turns into something really, really dark. So in these more intimate moments I wanted it to be more of a seduction. It’s not all big muscles and testosterone.

NYT:  Because you wanted Deeks to feel like an “other” when he appeared, you didn’t prep for the film alongside Nat Wolff and Adam Long. Were they aware of what was happening?

Alex: [Laughs] I think they felt that I was trying to seduce them.

NYT:  What disturbed you most about the documentary?

Alex:  It raised a lot of questions — and a lot of questions about myself. How would I react in a situation like that? Do I have the moral courage to say when enough is enough or when something is wrong? Whistle-blowers are vital to a democracy, and I’m very troubled by the way they’re being persecuted today. Having served in the military, I’m not naïve and understand that there are things that you don’t want to go public. But when there are wrongdoings, there’s got to be a channel to address that, and they’re referred to today almost as if they’re spies. We would not have had Watergate without Deep Throat. We would not have had the Pentagon Papers without [Daniel] Ellsberg. It’s important to have people in authority be held accountable. Because if they can act with impunity, then what kind of society are we creating?

NYT:  Drawing on your own military experience in Sweden, how do you explain the dynamic between commanding officers and enlisted men that makes soldiers do things they wouldn’t ordinarily consider?

Alex:  You’re fascinated by them. When I first joined, I remember a week or two when we’re on base and the guys that had been in for a year already were out on a mission. We were sitting there in our crisp, brand-new uniforms, nice polished shoes, and we hadn’t yet earned the hat and the symbol on your shoulder and the dagger that our unit had. And when they came back after two weeks in the woods with the smell and bloody knuckles and dirt and a uniform that’s been out in the field for a year and the hats, and the daggers on their shoulders, I remember looking at those guys like they were the coolest human beings on the planet. If they ever said hi or something, we’d just melt.

NYT:  Let’s talk about that other sociopath, Perry in “Big Little Lies.” Your character was already dead in Season 2, but you frequently showed up in flashbacks. Did you film new scenes?

Alex: Yeah, all those flashbacks were shot a year later.

NYT:  How tricky were those scenes in which you hit Nicole Kidman, who played your wife?

Alex: Nicole and I slowly walked through the movements, just to feel that we were comfortable with what was happening and that we were on the same page with what we’re trying to do. But then it was like flipping a switch when the camera rolled and diving in, which was very intense and very exhausting. But I think the importance in that relationship is that you flip those switches at the same time, on and off, and Nicole and I were very much in sync. We both know we feel it and then, boom, we’re in. And then we know exactly when to stop and pull the ripcord.

NYT:  You also had a scene with Meryl Streep, who played your very scary mother. Were you at all nervous or star-struck?

Alex:  I’d never met her, but Dad [Stellan Skarsgård] has worked with her on “Mamma Mia” twice, and he adores her. She couldn’t have been more magnanimous or lovely on set but you definitely feel that you’re in the presence of greatness.

NYT:  So like the military, there’s a hierarchy on set?

Alex: I wouldn’t say it’s a hierarchy because she’s so warm and lovely and easygoing. It’s not like you’re on set and a big movie star walks on and people tense up or get uncomfortable. But that said, it’s [expletive] Meryl Streep, so to work with her was extraordinary. You don’t have to act because she gives you so much that you could just sit and absorb and receive. I felt like a spectator sometimes in those scenes. I just wanted to lean back and eat popcorn and admire her.

NYT:  And now you’re cast as Randall Flagg, another terrifying guy.

Alex:  It’s early days, so I’m still trying to shape him and figure out who he is. But he is definitely one of the most enigmatic characters I’ve ever played. He’s a trickster and seducer as well. He has an anarchistic streak, and he’s intrigued by physical destruction but also moral destruction and finds most people very pitiful and very easy to manipulate.

NYT:  Is Stephen King involved in the production?

Alex:  They’re talking about going up to Maine to do a private screening once we’re done with the first episode, and it’s exciting that he’s very much involved. He wrote the final episode himself. It’s a coda to a novel written 40 years ago where you see what happened after the novel ends, and that episode is amazing.

NYT:  Next year we’ll also see you in “Godzilla vs. Kong.” What can you say about your character?

Alex:  He’s much more likable than Perry or Randall Flagg. He’s a geologist and works closely with Kong. And what I liked about my character was he’s terrified, he’s not brave, he’s not equipped to be a leader or a hero, and he enters this adventure very reluctantly. I’d done a series of quite intimate and dark films, which I loved — “Little Drummer Girl,” about the conflict in the Middle East, and “Hold the Dark,” about a man who loses his son. So after these very intense roles I was just ready to go and have fun.

NYT:  Back to the question of being a whistle-blower yourself: What did you ultimately conclude?

Alex:  It’s easy to sit here on the couch with a coffee and say, “Yeah, I would blow the whistle, of course. I’d do the righteous thing.” I hope that I would have the courage to do that — but I’m not sure.

Sources/Thanks:  Article:  Kathryn Shattuck for The New York Times (x, x), Portrait:  Aaron Richter for The New York Times  (x, x)

[wordstrings]

Inbox dump 

(brace yourselves, I’m including the timestamps because these have been sitting forever and you may literally forget ever having sent one of these because they’re from so long ago 😬)

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Anonymous said: March 11th 2014 *Clears throat* Non-canon verse, uni AU probably *strums guitar and takes a deep breath* DUEEEEE TO A COMPUTING errORRR, dean and gabe are stuck as roomatesssssssss, whilesamandcascanbestucktogethertoo that'snotaneccesitybutitwouldbegreaaaaaaaaattttttttt, and veeery soon it turns into something of a friendship BUT THEEEENNNN dean fights with saaAAAM and gabe is like "dude stop being so upset" aND FLUFF HAPPEeeeeeEEEEEEeens! *stands up and bows* tyvm for accepting debriel though like omg <3

I’ve been rewatching some of Supernatural seasons 5 and 6 this past weekend, and it reminded me how much I love and miss Gabriel. I still maintain that Debriel is a super-underrated ship. The manic-chaos potential is *muah*. (see: #Debriel)

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Anonymous said: August 7th 2018 psst... light back tickles while cuddling in bed are pure™ and wholesome™

Good shit good shit good shit

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Anonymous said: September 19th 2018 I love science and go to public seminars as often as I can. I walked in to the most recent one (which I had picked at random), and it was on the science of tickling. There were demonstrations. There were hand gestures and finger wiggling. There were in depth descriptions of the anatomy and physiology behind ticklish spots. It was legitimately your Amateur Production’s fic, and I was Kevin. Worst of all it was 2 hours long. I think I died during it and my soul was sucked into hell.

Uhhhhhh where can I get a copy of the slide deck?? Asking for a friend. (see: #series: Amateur Production)

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Anonymous said: September 23rd 2018 your art skills have me shook in the best possible way

aaaahh thank you! Fun fact: I went to art school and even took illustration as a concentration area but I’ve hardly drawn anything for like ten years. When I do draw, it’s usually because there are feelings that I don’t wanna do words about. (see: #strings does art)

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Halo!anon said: September 27th 2018 A small, sinful part of Castiel had the urge to gloat. It was somewhat dampened by the fact that Dean was still under the impression that being abducted is peak romance."I can't believe you went out of your way to set up our second date!" He'd squealed, as Castiel tightened his restraints. - little excerpt of a sequel to Date Nights with Demons i had planned for months but abandoned. halo!anon

Your demented version of Demon!Dean is so entertaining 😄 (see: Date Nights with Demons)

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Anonymous said: November 6th 2018 Aaaaah your Gabriel / Kali drabble was adorable, I can't help but love seeing our mighty archangel reduced to a mass of giggles, and you write Gabriel so so well <3. I love your writing your stories always brighten my day ^^

It’s so rare for him to let his guard down, isn’t it? But when he does, he has a grand old time of it. :) (see: this drabble)

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sarah-lou-who said: November 8th 2018 1/4 Boo! The ghost of my online presence in the community is peeking its head in because I need help. I don’t have a platform or following to sound an alarm, so I’m using my platonic tumblr wife’s platform and following for me, because that’s what platonic tumblr wives do. Right? Anyway, I’m very actively fixated on Attack on Titan atm. You know this very well. You also know my predicament. I seem to have exhausted the entire supply of tickly AoT content I’m interested in that exists currently. 2/4 So, if you’re willing to publish these for me, I’m crying out into the vast TFB lands hoping that there’s someone out there to answer the call. I am in desperate need of tickly AoT content. I don’t know if anyone around here writes for it much these days. I haven’t found anyone. And I know beggars can’t be choosers, but it can’t be helped; I really only care if Eren is involved. Even better would be Levi, but I haven’t found ANYTHING involving him, so I feel like asking for that is futile. 3/4 I digress. Even after all this time I can’t keep my asks less than 50 parts long. So my goal here is that someone, somewhere, will by chance come across these, and be able and willing to either write fic of the tickly variety for Eren and/or Levi from Attack on Titan, or direct me to someone who can, if they know a person who knows a person who knows a person. (Sidenote, hi anyone who still remembers me! It’s Sarah, the more ticklish half of Leerah. I’m doing good and I miss you!) 4/4 (I hope you’re all doing well!) Thank you for letting me take advantage of your devoted followers, Strings! Love yaaa!!!

Ah, my platonic tumblr wife Sarah returns! (Digitally, anyway. Reality-wise, we hang out all the time and it’s probably very rude of me to have not published this ask for so long!) I keep teasing her that she has a Type, and that is dark-haired sulky badass who’d probably make a wicked ‘ler – AoT Levi, SPN Cas, FMA Roy, etc. So anyway, if anyone knows of somewhere I can point her to find the content she’s (still) craving, lmk!

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Anonymous said: October 23rd 2019 I’m sorry if this is invasive in any way, but how is Sarah doing? I’ve been absent from Tumblr for a couple years and I see that her blog is now deactivated. I was just wondering if she’s doing alright and if she’s still around here on a different blog maybe?

See above! She doesn’t have a TFB community blog anymore, but she’s doing well. We’re quarantine buddies and helping each other out a lot. Very kind of you to ask! <3

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Anonymous said: December 2nd 2018 Hi, sorry to bother you but do you know what happened to prodigal-anon’s blog? It seems to have been deleted. Sorry again if you’ve been asked this before

No worries, friend! Here’s an answer for you!

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Anonymous said: December 13th 2018 I LOVE THE LOOPY SERIES! I love it so much, is there any chance you’ll be doing a part four? I’d give anything to see Cas and Dean tickle each other, it would be so cute 😍

Despite all evidence to the contrary, I haven’t entirely stopped writing... and Loopy 4 is one of those unfinished pieces that has seen a few additions lately. :) I’ve learned not to make promises about when something might get finished and posted, but I genuinely do believe this may be one of the first things that shows up once I’m ‘back in the game.’ Stay tuned... (see: #series: Loopy)

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Anonymous said: January 1st 2019 No no no you can't just stop there! I need more fluffy destiel with tickles and kissing! Pretty please?

I believe this is in response to Wonder whose arms will hold you good and tight. Don’t you worry, anon – Dean and Cas are not done being fluffy on this blog!

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1832wasalongtimeago said: January 25th 2019 Hi I just wanted to pop in and say the Maintenance series is amazing!! The second part was doing things to my poor heart I’ve read it like 5 times already. You’re such an amazing writer and thank you fo writing for us!

I’m very flattered, but I can’t take credit for the Of Maintenance series – that’s the lovely work of ask-flip-frost! It does things to my poor heart, too, so you’re in good company. :)

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Anonymous said: January 26th 2019 Sam Winchester can take a lot of things. The one thing he CAN'T take? Someone using baby talk on him when he's being tickled. He collapses into a puddle of helpless giggles faster than a house of cards in a stiff wind.

Precious Sammy just needs to laugh and be held, doesn’t he? <3

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Anonymous said: May 17th 2019 Thor needs tickles. So. Damn. Much.

Oh this was from right after Endgame came out. Thor did make me feel some sads there. :( Poor bab.

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Anonymous said: July 25th 2019 hi! i’ve read your wonderful fics forever but i’ve never really sent anything like this before so i don’t really know what to say.. but i had a destiel tickly thought and really wanted to share it with somebody, so here goes i guess- dean is taking too long in the shower so cas decides to use his mojo from the other room to speed things along. and listens to dean’s echoey laughs through the door. that’s all. sorry if this is weird! okay bye have a good one

This is not weird and I may have delayed in telling you any of my feelings about it but I definitely have a doc somewhere that has some vague notes about how I’d like to write this because I like it!

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Anonymous said: August 6th 2019 Anhhgff your Good Omens tword fics are so cute snvfddf i never knew I needed that of my favorite husbands till now😳😍

I know, right?! They’re just dying to be dropped into every fluffy situation. (see: #Good Omens)

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Anonymous said: July 25th 2019 Poking my head in to say hello, hope you’re doing well still! I just got into Good Omens and I absolutely loved your fic! (I watched the show first because my book was taking too long in the mail lol) Also, the other week I somehow talked myself into making a tfb blog, after all these years of almost doing so before chickening out (this ask isn’t from it because I just hopped in here briefly in a private phone browser to say hi, it’s literally just august-anon though) ~August!Anon

August!anon, I’m always so happy to see you stop by! Tagging your (not-so-new anymore) blog so everyone can check you out: @august-anon​

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hey-teenblog said: August 4th 2019 I love your fanfiction very much! They give me a lot of pleasant emotions. And most importantly, they, saturated with tenderness and love, gave me to accept myself as lee!! sorry for my english, i'm russian Love you 😘❤️

I will never tire of hearing things like this! Thank you for telling me. “Saturated with tenderness and love” is a such wonderful compliment about my writing – thank you very much! No need to apologize for language differences; I’m always impressed with anyone who manages to pick up English because it’s bonkers. 

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Anonymous said: August 23rd 2019 Hi! Just found this blog and wondering some basic info. ** What fandoms do toy write for? ** Do you accept prompts? ** Do you write reader insert fics? Thank you lovley ❤️

Anonymous said: August 29th 2019 Do you write tickle fics for bnha?? Asking for a friend 👀👀

The only fandoms I have reliably been able to write for are Supernatural and Good Omens – but even Good Omens is a rookie player here. Supernatural is my main jam, and Destiel is my favorite flavor. I don’t do reader inserts, but I’m always “accepting” prompts. I just haven’t written many of them for quite a long time now, so you’re welcome to drop them as long as you’re okay with them collecting dust. (see: this selfsame post)

My About/FAQ page is very dusty right now, too, but there might be some useful tidbits in there for you.

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Anonymous said: November 12th 2019 okayokayokay. Have you watched Lucifer? It's on netflix, it's great, so much emotions and pining. (Also, y'know, reg. Luci stuff. He runs a club. Bad jokes. It's great.)

I haven’t, but it’s on my Netflix watchlist, so I’ll get there eventually! I saw a gifset once where he actually did the thing I see in winged fanfic all the time, where there was gunfire and he sheltered someone he cared about with his manifested wings. And honestly, that was the deciding factor for me.

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Anonymous said: November 16th 2019 Oh Man U listen to Critrole as well! Nice! Campaign 1 was awesome but also heartfelt and really gut-punching at points. Who is your fav so far, anyone you aren’t fond of? (& Out of interest do you have any tickle related thoughts on the main crew or upcoming Fics we can look out for? As you said it’s tumbleweeds out here for this fandom’s tickles and I’ll take anything really 😂!) Hope u enjoy!!!!!

It’s STILL tumbleweeds out here and it’s making me crazy! My heart belongs to Vax primarily, Percy secondarily. I don’t really have cohesive thoughts or headcanons about anything, unfortunately. I do have this one mental picture that keeps coming up that I keep wanting to see art of (who knows, maybe I’ll commission somebody someday?) – of ridiculous brute Grog just lifting Vax straight up in his arms and gettin’ wiggly with his fingers while all Vax can do is laugh and pry and kick while absolutely nobody helps him.

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Regarding #series: Accessor:

Anonymous said: August 31st 2015 I would like to see accessor!verse cas using feathers on Dean!!! and NIBBLES and RASPBERRIES and TEETH and TONGUE and WOWWWWWW

ME TOO, FRIEND. It’s been aaaaages since I published anything new for the Accessor AU, but that doesn’t mean I haven’t been going back to my unfinished docs every once in a while to add a few lines here and there. ;) 

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Anonymous said: October 29th 2016 Prompt: Cas is put in charge of getting a treaty with a neighboring country that shares a lot of the same customs, including Accessories, with certain... twists (think Bracelets AU) and treats their personal slaves (like Accessories) like people (listening to opinions, giving proper care, etc.). The foreign diplomats keep bringing that up and talking to Dean. Cas isn't sure he can make it though the diplomatic proceedings. Also, he might be having improper thoughts about that custom and Dean...

I’m posting this here, but I’m definitely keeping this filed elsewhere because it’s FANTASTIC.

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Halo!anon submitted: June 4th 2018 I can’t help but imagine how tickling must play a part in other aspects of society in the accessor ‘verse, besides the sessions between master and accessory. So here’s some imagines and headcanons, with a touch of worldbuilding. (Warnings, besides the usual for this AU: death mention, reference to past trauma.)

- Among the high class, during parties and other celebrations, it’s seen as a common courtesy to string up one’s personal accessory in the center of the room and let the guests entertain themselves with them. Lord Castiel never does this with Dean, much to his fellow nobles’ disappointment; the mere suggestion had Dean quaking as things he’d rather forget came back to bite him.

- Every so often, a petty criminal(the poor man’s accessory, if you will) is placed in stocks in a small town’s square and left at the mercy of the very people they used to menace. What happens next usually involves honey, some sheep, and plenty of begging. A guard stands by to warn people, “No hurting, only tickling. Everyone please wait your turn, they’re not going anywhere any time soon.”

- Certain monastic healers perform tickle therapy as a treatment for anxiety, stress, and other “diseases of the soul”, as they call them. Balthazar himself proposed the idea, because of course he did. The rich usually indulge in this kind of therapy secretly, due to its undignified nature. Some contemplate the possibility of training accessories to tickle in the future, but it’s still a big taboo.

- Every town has a folktale about a tickle monster. Curiously, many of them involve controlling plants and attacking through dreams. The southern communities still have a giggle remembering that one time six years ago when Michael offered to hunt down one such monster and came back with Crowley, a sleazy drunkard with a fetish and a dream, sitting in a cage and wearing a mask.

- The Masters sisters, Lillith, Meg and Ruby, have a long history with law enforcement. Their favorite pastime is snatching unlucky merchants off the roads and tickling them into coughing up everything they have. Everyone is sure they had a hand in Fergus"Crowley" Macleod’s untimely demise by ferocious attack hounds, but they’re very good at covering their tracks. They’ll help you cover up your tracks too, if you’re a friend- ask Bela Talbot.

I might make a second part if I get any more ideas. I hope you enjoyed this! -Halo!anon.

I am very fond of you indeed, Halo!anon. These are so creative!

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hypahticklish submitted: July 24th 2018 Accessor!Ideas:

~ Gabriel leads a furious rant regarding Prince Lucifer/Sam to Castiel, relating back to perhaps dealings he has directly had with the Prince between their two unstable-yet-truced Kingdoms. Castiel relates with similar views shared by Gehenna’s councilor(s).

~ Dean and Sam BM where the audience learns more about their homevillage. Dean starts it after a rather morose remark from Sam and ends with Sammy smiling and stealing my heart.

~ Balthazar helps Sam in several ways: 1) Learns the Sam was originally a psuedo-Advocates apprentice, as well as herbalist nephew when Sam identifies the components to some salves/medicines he’s making (he had been explaining what he was doing in an attempt to spare himself being attacked like the first couple times) 2) Calls Sam out on being intelligent and making a recklessly stupid choice by selling himself to find Dean. 3) Removes Lucifers mark. And maybe perhaps: 4) Allows Sam to assist in his own healing/medicine making under his careful observation, feigned as needing two sets of hands to do correctly and his assistant was running an errand, to assess his skills. 5) Offer he work in the hospice under him, apprenticing, should Gabriel allow his intelligence not go to waste. It’s not what Sam really wants to do/learn, but it’s better than doing nothing.

~Dean officially thanks Castiel for saving Sam. I’m talking full feels, single man tear sorta thing. And Castiel says “there was never another option” and then its schmoopy sweet with the kisses and the tickles and the Cas saying he loves Dean back!!!!!!!! swoon.

~ Kali!Likes!Sam’s!Spirit! Give me a dinner scene with Gabriel, Kali and Sam where hes holding his own in a diplomatic conversation with them when he nearly crosses a line (maybe something classist? Making it clear that Cas and Gabe are the exception to his experiences) and she says “I like this ones fire. He reminds me of you, my love.” *grabby hands*

~ Prince Lucifer sends a message to Gabriel requesting (threatening) his Helpmate be returned to him for a handsome reward. Sam somehow sees letter and gets spooked because DRAMA. Gabriel responds to Lucifer with the Chief Advocate equivalent of “Fuck Off”

You, my friend. YOU. All these feelings about Sam? Top-notch, and I shall be borrowing them, yes I shall.

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Regarding #android!Cas:

hypahticklish said: January 23rd 2016 Android!Cas deciding today is the DAY. Dean has been teasing him lately that he likes these strange sensations that have him using all his back-up generated power to not accidentally break Dean's bones and challenging him with that cocky smirk and relaxed confidence. Android!Cas practicing during time while Dean rests with holding objects with similar density to the human wrists with enough gentle force that they neither fracture or slip from his grasp. Android!Cas surprising Dean by turning the tables and pinning his wrists over his head while settling himself on Dean's thighs. Android!Cas not necessarily tickling at first so much as just touching like he had been wanting to so as to catalog how his best friend feels with his new technology. Android!Cas feeling that bubble of FEELS in his chest as he listens to Dean swear at him with positive physical actions negating his harsh words, growing more amused as the bubbling giggles begin. I love Android!Cas 

Anonymous said: January 23rd 2016 Android!Cas figures out his own strength comes in handy for more than just retaining himself during tickle fights. When he surprises Dean, Dean tends to squirm and fight back a little (even though he told Cas to get him back as part of the experience), so Cas uses his strength to gently hold Dean down while ticking him. Dean's never been held immobile before so it's a new experience for him, but he ends up liking it. Cas notices how Dean relaxes into his hold after a minute or so. Cas doesn't fail to use this knowledge about Dean, coming up with teasing words and methods of ticking to make Dean all squirmy and giggly, taking special notice of how light tickles effect Dean even more than most other touches, using that specially designed soft brush meant to gently clean Cas' delicate computer chips.

Anonymous said: February 17th 2016 I'm joining in on the Android!Cas thing, if not too late. Perhaps Android!Cas has detachable parts, like a foot, and Dean is a jerk and runs off and hides with it all the while tickling it and making fun of Android!Cas's increasingly desperate attempts to get it back.

Y’all, careful deliberate curious determined ‘ler Cas is LIFE. And, reserved confused helpless adorable ‘lee Cas is also life. Detachable and extensible parts are probably key to both of these things.

---

Regarding current personal circumstances:

Anonymous said: January 14th 2020 I pray that you’re able to find peace during this difficult time. You are loved more than you will ever know. I know it’s hard to believe, but there will come a time that you are thankful for this experience, because it will have turned you into the person you are truly meant to be. Be strong and be hopeful. Keep your faith and keep knowing that you are going to be okay. Don’t let this dark time destroy the magnificent light inside of you. Sending you so much love

Anonymous said: January 17th 2020 I’m so sorry you’re struggling. Hang in there! We’re all here for you!

Anonymous said: February 11th 2020 all my love, thoughts and prayers are going towards you right now. also wanted to just drop a little thank you note in your inbox for all the light and joy i've found in your fics over the years. im sitting half way through my first year at uni currently but ive been a fan of yours since early highschool and i feel like ive almost grown up with your writing and fanfics in a strange way, so thank you so much for that. sending all my love to you once again- you are so strong x

I love you all so much.

[paceypeternathanslawyer]

Top 10 Favorite TV Shows (In A Row):

The Dick Van Dyke Show (The Dick Van Dyke Show has earned the number 1 spot in my heart through years of love and loyalty. Growing up you learn about shows through your family, it’s only natural. Especially with me because we didn’t have cable much of the time. So the only way I could really learn about TV shows was through them. TDVDS was the first show that I considered to be “my show,” it was sorta my identity for a lot of years. Yes, I learned about it through my family, but the first time I remember watching it was on my own. My sister Ingrid had it on VHS tape, and I just remember rummaging through her VHS’ and deciding to watch it one day. One thing’s for sure…. my love for that show outpaced everyone in my family. It was also one of the first shows that I came to consider myself an expert on. It’s a show that is everything to me, and if you get me started I could talk about it for about 24 hours straight. If you want a big list of why TDVDS is such an iconic show. I have a whole post about that)

Get Smart (Another show that has earned it’s spot and that will never change despite whatever hyperfixation I have at any given time. Don’t even talk to me about the 2008 movie adaptation of Get Smart. It’s not even worthy to lick the TV shows boots!!!! Get Smart is a show that I have memories of since I was like 8 years old. It’s such a happy show for me, though I would say that about all of my top 10 favorite shows. This show had such a genius concept. It came at a time when spy shows and movies were all the rage. It took that genre and just flipped it on it’s head. It was kinda like a parody of James Bond and stuff like that. Get Smart has shaped popular culture so much…. and so much more than people realize. So many popular words or terms that are in out lingo and dictionaries were created in Get Smart)

I Love Lucy (I Love Lucy is a show that has been a part of my life…. forever. I literally don’t think there was a time when I Love Lucy wasn’t in my life. It was probably playing in the hospital room while I was being birthed. My dad was obsessed with this show. He was so obsessed that when he was in California with my mom, on vacation. They went to Beverly Hills and my dad wanted to knock on Lucille Ball’s door and say “hi” (this was in the 80s), but my mom was too mortified at the thought. So he snuck into her backyard and took a picture of her garbage can. Yep… that’s my dad for you. I think that picture is still in a picture book of his!! He was a huge collector, he collected a shit ton of stuff before giving most of it away in the early 2000s, cause our family was moving to a much smaller house. One of my first memories of any show or movie was I Love Lucy. It was in 2003, when I was 6 nearly 7. We had recently moved to a condo, and the house was still in disarray and we as a family sat on the floor watching I Love Lucy. I remember the episode…. it was called “First Stop” and it was about the Ricardo’s and the Mertz’s trip to California and they stop at a shady diner off of a highway. The diner owner tricks them into staying in a cabin that he rents out (long story, you’ll have to watch the ep to see how that happens :) ) Either way, they are in this cabin that is feet away from a train track and every time a train goes past, Ricky and Lucy’s bed moves all the way to the other side of the room. It was so funny and I peed my pants… no joke…. i’m embarrased to admit it but it’s true. But hey I was 6 years old, I give myself a pass for that ;) )

I Dream Of Jeannie (I Dream Of Jeannie is a show that I learned about relatively late in life. I was 12 when my sisters and myself watched the first episode. It really became a show that was mine and my sister Ingrid’s show. We used to watch every episode together from start to finish and we were both huge fans of Tony and Jeannie’s relationship. Tony and Jeannie were one of my first ships)

Stranger Things (STRANGER THINGS!!!!! This show took me completely by surprise and it has now earned the 5th spot, that will never change! I have never been hyperfixated on a show for this long. It has been my hyperfixation for over 3 years now. Before I started watching Stranger Things, I thought I knew all I needed to know about it. I knew it was a sci-fi/horror show that revolved around kids. I had heard the cultural noise surrounding it and I respected that, but as someone who doesn’t consider herself a “nerd”, I had no real interest in it. It was one of those shows that I acceded I would eventually watch, maybe in 20 years, but it was so low on my priority list. In fact, my opinion of sci-fi or quote un quote nerd shows/movies really hasn’t changed despite my love of ST. I still have no interest in Star Wars, Star Trek, Doctor Who, Lord Of The Rings, Harry Potter, or any other show like that. I have no interest in action for action’s sake. I can’t watch a light saber dual and get excited about that. In order to care about an action scene I need to first care about the characters. It wasn’t until Jan 2017, that I decided to give in and watch and i’ve never looked back. It’s one of the best decision i’ve ever made. I’m telling you, if there is anyone out there who hasn’t watched ST yet and doesn’t think they would like the show. Please give it a try…. I thought the same thing as you before I watched it. It’s so much more than just sci fi and horror. It’s also a drama with big comedic elements, it’s a relationship show. It’s horror but it’s not overly scary (and this is coming from a scaredy cat), it’s sci fi but it doesn’t lean on that too much, it’s not overly gloomy and the cinematography is so beautiful, it’s fun and exciting, it’s got a really interesting conspiracy storyline running through it. Believe me, it’s worth a try!!)

Gilmore Girls (Gilmore Girls is a show that became mine and my sister Greta’s show. She’s on Tumblr (though not as active) so if you see this Greta… thankyou for my undying love with this show :) It’s all your fault ;). GG came at a time in my life where I was really kind of averse to watching any new shows. I had my favorite shows and that was fine with me. But Greta wanted to watch this show with me, and we hadn’t really bonded too much because I was in school and she was working and there was an 8 year age difference between us. So I really credit GG with bringing us closer. We really bonded with our love of this show. Though I think she only watched it with me cause she thought that Jared Padalecki being in it would help me get into Supernatural…. i’m onto you Greta, i’m onto your tricks ;) The year was 2011, the month was October and I was 15 years old (the same age as Rory when the show started) and my life has never been the same (I think i’m being overly dramatic at this point) :)

New Girl (New Girl is a show that my sister Millie got me into in 2016. She just kept showing me clips of it until I gave in and watched it. For anyone looking for a quality comedy to watch, ya’ll should watch this. It’s damn hilarious!!!)

Community (I watched Community for the first time around 2012. I watched episodes here or there when my siblings would have it on. But I didn’t start watching it from beginning to end until about 2015. I regret not watching it all sooner because Community is a genius show, and is grossly underrated. I think it’s the first show that had a big grass roots fan base that saved it from being cancelled year after year. It seemed like every year Community was in danger of being cancelled by NBC, but the fans would go ballistic and kick up a storm during every hiatus. It was really one of the first, if not the first time that fans would picket and riot online and their attempts to bring the show back did not go unnoticed by NBC. The show would go on to have 5 seasons on NBC, and then it had a 6th season on Yahoo. Now every time a show is cancelled people kick up a storm online and make their attempts go viral, but Community was really the first of that. Community fans are freakin tenacious)

Psych (There are 7 people in my family including my parents and everyone of us is fans of Psych. Psych came out in 2006 and was on until 2014. It’s a show that a family where the oldest was born in 1953 and the youngest was born in 1996, can all agree and love the show. My brother Johnny was the first, I remember he used to walk around and sing the theme song thus annoying me constantly. Then my brother made my sister Greta a fan, and then my sister Ingrid became a fan, around that time my sister Millie became a fan. Next Greta watched Psych with my mom and my mom became obsessed to the point where it’s one of her favorite shows ever and Shawn and Gus are two of her favorite TV characters ever. She has watched it all the way through about 7 times. Then my mom and myself watched it together from start to finish, and I became a huge fan. I can safely say that is the only time my mom has ever gotten me into a show. I love her so much, but she is not a big TV viewer, she’s more into books and such. Which makes her love for Psych even more unique and surprising. Then Greta and my mom watched it together again about 2 years ago and my dad joined in and found himself becoming a fan of it. That’s also not including my 2 brother in laws and my sister in law who are all huge fans of it. And my sister in law initially hated it…. until she found herself becoming a huge fan as well. This all speaks to Psych’s amazing power. It’s so funny and an all around amazingly done show.)

Remington Steele (Remington Steele is a show that my mom and dad watched together with a group of friends when it was first airing in the 80s, so I learned about it through them. It’s such a fun show!!!!!!! It has a really fun concept as well. If there is any Psych fans who are reading this post, you should all watch this show. A writer of Remington Steele was also a writer on Psych and RS is referenced on Psych multiple times. Totally worth everyone’s time, it’s my favorite 80s show)

[dccomicsnews]

Now that Arrow has concluded an incredible eight-season run, I couldn’t help reflecting on more than what happened on the show itself during that timespan. It wasn’t just enough to reminisce on what happened to the Emerald Archer on the small screen, but also to look back on what transpired in my own life over that period.

The more I got to thinking, this game-changing TV series was running parallel to my career as a writer. Although Arrow got things started by premiering in October 2012, I wasn’t lagging too far behind when I began as a volunteer contributor at Comic Book Movie in July 2013. As the show grew, I did likewise as a person and a writer – and there was more than a little overlap.

From this point on, I’ll sum up the finer points of my journey so that you can see the affect an inspiring work of fiction such as Arrow can have on a real person. I hope you all enjoy this piece, and you’re more than welcome to share your own stories in the comments section. Our own Damian Fasciani recently wrote a retrospective of his own, so click here if you would like to check out that as well.

My Name Is Oliver Queen, I Mean, Eric Joseph

Like I said, my time as a writer pretty much ran parallel to Arrow as it grew from a standalone superhero show/crime drama into something that birthed an entire universe of comic book adaptations on television. I didn’t stick around at the aforementioned CBM for too long, later making my way to Dark Knight News (2014-17) and We Got This Covered (2015-19).

Along the way, I had the chance to meet various cast members at different points during the series’ lifespan, thereby lending multiple perspectives on the tale as it grew. Some of them them I merely met at conventions, while others I actually got to interview.

Motor City Comic Con (you’re going to see that one referenced a lot) was often the means I had of making this all possible. In 2014 alone, I was able to shake hands with Katie Cassidy (Laurel Lance), John Barrowman (Malcolm Merlyn) and Robert Knepper (Clock King). Cool as that was, it prepared me for the interview opportunity I’d get with Michael Rowe (Deadshot) in 2015.

2016 was a mixed bag, as I met – but didn’t interview – Katrina Law (Nyssa al Ghul), though I did get to speak with Echo Kellum (Mister Terrific) over the phone. I won’t forget either of those experiences, but I’m holding out hope that Kellum will roll through Detroit as some point so that I may actually meet him face-to-face.

If you’re keeping track, these encounters went down near the conclusions of seasons 2, 3 and 4, respectively, with the Echo Kellum phoner happening right before the “Invasion!” crossover. Dedicated fans of Arrow shouldn’t have to strain themselves remembering what each of these characters were going through at those times, and what it must’ve been like to hear, say, Katie Cassidy tease the inevitable Black Canary reveal, or how Kellum’s Curtis Holt may deal with Dominators.

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Cosplay

It’s at this time I’ll discuss the cosplay element. This is a field to which I’m certainly no stranger, and I always wanted to own an awesome-looking superhero costume. Seeing as how Batman is my favorite character, he’d be a no-brainer, right?

Well, if you’ve looked around at gear online, then you know how Batman costumes that don’t look like crap are quite expensive. This was key in my motivation for instead laying down money on a replica of the Green Arrow suit worn by Stephen Amell in seasons 5-7. For an affordable price, I felt every bit as badass as my onscreen hero, and the compliments from fellow convention attendees never cease whenever I choose to suit up. Heck, I’ve even worn that thing to a cosplay beach party!

Although I wouldn’t mind taking a crack at the Dark Knight at some point, there’s something inherently altruistic I’ve noticed about guys cosplaying as Batman that I don’t think I share. But Oliver Queen (at least The CW’s version) is flawed. He’s made mistakes unlike those of Bruce Wayne’s. He’s done stuff he’s not particularly proud of – but he never stops trying to better himself. That, I found relatable, and it occurs to me when I flip up that hood.

All that said, you couldn’t believe how elated I was when Stephen Amell himself shared a DC group cosplay photo taken at Youmacon 2017 (above) on his Facebook page for one of his “Fan Art Fridays.” Yes, I was the one who submitted it, but to see the man himself deeming myself and the accompanying DC enthusiasts worthy of sharing with his fanbase at large was truly touching.

Which brings me to…

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The Main Event

If I have to single out my favorite event ever attended, that honor will probably go to Motor City Comic Con 2018. Should you have been there as well, then you’ll recall how that particular show was an embarrassment of riches when it came to booking actors from superhero shows – and where I finally met Stephen Amell himself.

Hey, he may have not been doing interviews for that weekend, but getting a photo with him and attending his panel meant the world to me. Despite him being only a few years older in age, that doesn’t mean I can’t look to him as a positive example.  I mean, the guy is known for having an incredible connection with his fans, doing charity work, and has even appeared on American Ninja Warrior.

Speaking of which, a lot of praise could be thrown Kirk Acevedo’s way as well. The man responsible for bringing the inhumane Ricardo Diaz to life is actually an awesome person himself. I actually did get to interview him during that weekend, as we discussed what was next for “The Dragon” in season 6.

Before I move on, I’d like to give an honorable mention to one Cress Williams. Black Lightning may have not been part of the Arrowverse at the time, but it sure is now. I likewise interviewed him on behalf of WGTC, as he was just cooling off after a spectacular debut season.

Fadeout

If there’s any impression I’d like this article to leave on you, the reader, it’s that you shouldn’t let anyone tell you it’s silly to say a TV show can impact you. Arrow, The Flash, Black Lightning and countless others can be a driving force in inspiring ourselves to become better people. To Stephen Amell, his co-stars and crew, I thank you all for eight years of phenomenal storytelling – and I hope to once again meet the people mentioned above.

You helped me become someone else…something else.

Reflecting On A Personal Journey Through Arrow's World Now that Arrow has concluded an incredible eight-season run, I couldn't help reflecting on more than what happened on the show itself during that timespan.

[lostinfic]

Summary: She writes for magazines about luxurious resorts in exotic places and five-star hotels in glamorous cities. He’s photographed devastated war zones, refugee camps and child soldiers. For both of them travel is an escape, but he’s had enough of this grim reality, and she’s had enough of this disconnected fantasy. Perhaps together they can find something in between, something real, and stop running from themselves. Each season, a new destination and a chance to grow closer.

Pairing: Alec Hardy x Hannah Baxter Rating: Teen (for now) Word count: 2.3k

Ao3    |    Gifset

Hardy woke up gasping for breath. The room spun above him. The pillow was damp under his cheek. He squeezed his eyes shut and held his breath until his heart rate slowed down.

The city shone through the curtain-less window. 3:16 blinked on his alarm clock.

He turned on every lamp in his tiny flat, filled the empty space with light. He scrubbed a hand down his face and prepared a cup of tea. As the computer whirred to life, a knot formed in his stomach.

Nightmares were nothing new for him, but they harassed him more frequently since he’d been tasked with selecting his favourite photos for a retrospective exhibition of his work. For twenty years he’d roamed the world with his camera, documenting the best and worst of humanity. Mostly the worst. From war zones to refugee camps, from barren deserts to overpopulated slums. Shining a light on those forgotten and left behind. Twenty years of anonymous faces. Twenty years of people he’d promised to help staring back at him on his computer screen.

Had his work really made a difference?

He clicked on a folder labelled “Syria 2014”. Thumbnail pictures popped up one by one. He’d never accustomed to this jarring feeling: looking at devastated places from the safety of his flat. His brain couldn’t reconcile the vivid memory of fear gripping his guts and chemicals burning his lungs with his quiet surroundings. Here, only the rattle of a too-close commuter train track and one nosey neighbour bothered him. But his brain sought hidden dangers, pushed warnings through his blood.

Tess would have helped him pick the photos, he thought. She’d once been his editor. She’d encouraged and admired his work until his commitment to it drove her into another man’s arms.

Just like this flat, the separation from Tess was meant to be a temporary situation. But three years had passed and now the divorce papers rested in their sealed envelope on the corner of his desk. He wasn’t sure which of the divorce papers or his old photos were the hardest to look at. The children and women he’d failed to help properly or the woman and child he’d failed to make happy.

He opened another folder of pictures, these ones from Tunisia in 2010, during the Arab Spring. An intense time, exhilarating. Still on his chair, he felt the protesters pushing against his body, carrying him like waves. He felt their thirst for freedom, the shift in the balance of power.

He selected a photo of a passionate young woman, shouting her heart out against the regime. Her eyes glistened with tears, her hands held high in peace signs. Red smoke surrounded her like a divine aura. In the next shot, a soldier punched her in the stomach. Hardy’s first instinct had been to take the photo. Thankfully, a young man came to her rescue. Hardy scrolled farther down the folder to another picture of the same young woman, a month later. In the crowd of protesters, she and the young man who helped her are exchanging wedding vows. He wondered what happened to them. He wondered what happened to their hopeful spirits.

Hardy slipped a hand under his grey t-shirt and touched the fresh scar on his chest.

Maybe this retrospective exhibition of his work was a second chance. An opportunity to atone for leaving these people behind.

The exhibition was still months away, in autumn, during a World Press Photo conference. Until then, he’d have to live with the nightmares.

His computer pinged with a new email notification. His eyebrows rose when he saw the sender: Ellie Miller.

I’m sorry to reach out to you like this, out of the blue. I know I haven’t been in touch, but we need your help.

Maybe you’ve heard, I’ve moved to Indonesia. There’s an island here, Pulau Kesuma, and there’s something really wrong going on. Foreign investors seized a huge part of the land to build a hotel, the Mahal Kita, and it’s been having a terrible effect on the local people and nature. I’m sure they must have done the same in other countries too.

I tried to reach out to my former colleagues at BBC World but it’s a small island and they’re all very busy. What we need is a photographer to show the destruction.

Give me a shout if you’re available and I’ll tell you more.

Hardy’s doctor had warned him against stressful work, but not helping people in need stressed him out more than throwing himself in the middle of a conflict. He replied to Ellie right away.

*

Hannah signed on the dotted line and returned the contract to her editor, Duncan. In exchange, he handed her a plane ticket to Pulau Kesuma and the necessary documents to complete her assignment for Elite Travelers magazine.

“The Mahal Kita Eco-resort & Spa,” Hannah read out loud. “Eco-resort? Didn’t you say ecotourism is a load of bullshit?”

“It is. That’s not the part I’m interested in: this island was closed to the tourism industry before now, at least not our kind of tourism. Smelly backpackers could go all they wanted and sleep in a goat pen.”

“How come it’s opened now?” she asked.

“There was no point in keeping it a nature reserve after the tsunami. So the Indonesian government lifted the restrictions. About two years ago. In exchange, the company helped restore the island.”

“That’s nice.”

“Anyway, just focus on the resort, the beaches, the night life… ”

“I’ve an angle to sell it, the ecotourism—” she spread her hands in a presenting gesture— “treat yourself to a guilt-free escapade.”

His reaction was something between a nod and a shrug. He didn’t believe it could interest their readers, but the comments on her blog told her otherwise.

“Stick to what you’re good at. Don’t fuck this up. If you get this right, you could become a senior writer.”

Hannah gasped and smiled. “Really?”

Senior writer meant less freelance work to make ends meet, business-class travel, press pass to fashion weeks, yachts and five-star restaurants. Not to mention she’d be the youngest and only female senior writer.

Duncan drummed his hands on his desk. “All right, fuck off, I’ve other writers to babysit.”

After the meeting, Hannah went straight to Stanford, an iconic travel bookshop in London. Even as a child she loved this place with its hundreds of globes and ceiling-high shelves of guidebooks. She’d pester her parents relentlessly until they agreed to take her here.

There was an enormous vinyl National Geographic map on the floor, and she trailed her feet from England to Indonesia. It elicited a lightness in her chest, and she nearly danced to the Asia section.

She would spend a week at the resort, then she intended to visit the rest of Indonesia for two weeks. She flipped through guidebooks, and compiled a mental list of ideas she could pitch to other magazines.

In the periodical section she checked out the trends and the competition. She scanned the racks and flipped through a few magazines. Three of them mentioned carbon-neutral travel, zero-emission hotels or sustainable tourism. She didn’t want to bore her readers with the science of climate change or to make them feel guilty about flying in a private jet, but being environmentally-conscious was trendy right now so she needed to get on that.

Hannah herself had become interested in the subject after a trip to St. Maarten in the Caribbeans. Not because of the trip itself but a documentary she saw after about a side of St. Maarten hidden to tourists: a vast and ever-growing landfill caused by the flow of cruise ships. Half the island’s population lived in that junkyard. Filled with good intentions, she had bought the filmmaker’s latest book. A year later, it was still on her nightstand, a bookmark halfway through chapter two. It had not been written for neophytes, that much was clear. She had returned to her usual travel ways, but a discomfort lingered.

Should she stick to what she was good at, as Duncan put it, or go all environmentally-friendly? She knew what her editor expected but, if done right, bypassing his instructions could work in her favour. Or ruin her chances at a promotion.

Back home, she dropped her magazines on the small kitchen table that doubled as a desk. For all intents and purposes, her two-room flat was a storage unit: a place to keep her things while she travelled the world. She had plans to make it cozy and pretty but had yet to do it. The few weeks a year she was here, she spent working, eating takeout and trying to catch up on whatever normal people did with their lives. Still, the flat held all her souvenirs and books. It was a place to rest her weary feet and head. A place to listen to the rain and traffic, and to dream of her next trip. When it came to travelling, having a home was just as important as having a passport, it was the difference between traveller and vagabond.

Ben was coming by later, meanwhile she fixed her make-up and curled her hair.

When he arrived, he entered without knocking first. He carried a plastic bag of thai takeout.

“Panang chicken for you,” he said as he placed the white oyster pails on the counter.

“Extra pineapple?”

“Extra pineapple.”

“Thanks, you’re the best,” Hannah kissed his cheek.

He blushed lightly and looked her up and down.

“You look beautiful.”

“Thanks, but don’t get any ideas, it’s for my followers,” she replied with a humorous tone.

She handed him her camera and stood in front of the one nice wall in her flat. She posed in a calculated casual way with various travel accessories and her new book on Indonesia.

“How much are you getting paid to have that bottle of sunscreen lotion in the frame with you?” Ben asked.

“Don’t ask, it will only make you mad.”

“Do you even like that stuff?”

“It’s alright.”

She actually couldn’t afford a regular supply of it beside the one sponsored bottle, but the product was very on brand for her.

After Condé Nast named her in their top ten travel blogs, her follower count surged. Sponsored posts became a significant source of income which translated as two more trips a year. She liked thinking of herself as an entrepreneur. She sold herself and her lifestyle— well the brighter side of her lifestyle— and it allowed her followers to indulge in a little fantasy.

She looked over Ben’s shoulder as he swiped through photos on the camera screen.

“Are we done? I’m peckish,” he said.

“Just a couple more, I’m not sure about that shirt.”

After some consideration, she switched her top for one that wouldn’t make her look so pale.

“Thankfully I’ll have a nice tan soon,” she said.

The change in Ben’s mood was subtle, he blinked too fast and his shoulders stiffened. And she felt herself becoming defensive, her cheeks warmed up.

“Oh. You’re leaving again.”

“You realize that’s like me saying: ‘oh you’re going to the office again’?”

“Yeah, the office, a cubicle with annoying coworkers and a boss, not a five-star hotel in L.A.”

“Christ, Ben, you know I didn’t become a writer for Elite Travelers by lounging around the pool all day.”

“I don’t need your resume.”

“I wouldn’t need to give it to you if you stopped implying mine’s not a real job.”

Ben tried for levity: “I’m just saying, why go halfway around the globe when you’ve got the best right here? You said so yourself.”

Hannah went along with the joke even if she knew part of him was serious. She tried not to create false hopes in him. She’d said she wasn’t interested in a relationship, that he shouldn’t wait for her. But when she travelled alone and felt lonely, she called him and, in-between trips, he was her only friend left in London.

She offered him a beer from the fridge and neither of them mentioned the trip again.

As they ate, she chose the best picture out of thirty and posted it on her Instagram account. She was the first to use #pulaukesuma, but not the last if she did her job well.

Scrolling through her feed, she noticed a picture posted by her sister: her son’s birthday, with their whole family gathered for the occasion. It was today and they hadn’t invited her. “I didn’t think you were in the country,” Jackie replied when Hannah confronted her in a text message. She didn’t insist. What was the point? She was leaving soon anyway.

After the meal, she watched a movie with Ben, but her mind kept drifting off to her next assignment. She repeatedly stood up to get a glass of water or add something to her packing list. At the thought of Indonesia, her limbs buzzed with a sort of restlessness and her stomach swooped.

She often thought of visiting new countries as a fling. The way they occupy all your thoughts and that anticipation of seeing them. You want to know everything about them. There’s always more to discover and experience. You can’t get enough, but you know it can’t last. And in a way, that’s the best thing about it because you only have time to see the best of them. You must enjoy it while it lasts. When it ends, you’re sad and miss them, but, in all honesty, you wouldn’t settle there permanently.

She was only ever faithful to London. Or perhaps she had yet to find the one.

***

→Chapter 1: CGK

[talatomaz]

fresh start | team flash x fem!reader | part i

a/n: i decided to binge watch the flash for like the 5th time and this story idea popped into my head. (i think I might make this into a series) this takes place around season 2 episode 1 but the fake ‘jay garrick’ hasn’t introduced himself to the team yet. this story is mostly canon with a few things changed

davis = your last name

warnings: mentions of past torture

word count: 2.7k

masterlist | request list | request rules

pt.i | pt.ii | pt.iii | pt.iv | pt.v | pt.vi | pt.vii | pt.viii | pt.ix

reader is british, from the year 2041, and has the powers of telekinesis which you gained after being experimented on by ARGUS. after you escaped, you met many different people, some like you, some not, but the one thing that you all had in common was that you knew you couldn’t survive on your own. so you started an underground scheme, under the pseudonym ‘renegade’, where you provided fake IDs and other necessities to those in need and you were able to maintain this business with the help of other metas. however, one evening, you were caught in a fight with a few ARGUS agents and in the commotion, you were accidentally sent to the year 2014 and now, you had no way of getting back to the future

i do not give you permission to repost or translate my fics on any platform - likes/reblogs are okay and are much appreciated

There comes a moment in every person’s life where you come to a startling realisation. For some, it happens in high school, for others, it can be years into their career before they realise. But the moment it happens, the moment that switch is flipped, you can never go back. It’s the moment where you realise that not everything will work out in the end.

There won’t always be a happy ending.

For the select few, the world will just never be right. And unfortunately, you were one of those few. You came to understand that the world was not what it seemed to be; your father was not the amazing person you thought him to be; and the people who serve to protect were the ones you needed protecting from.

                ✧── ･ ｡ﾟ★: *.✦ .* :★. ───✧

It’s been almost 2 years since you were accidentally sent back to the past and, to be honest, you were kind of grateful. Of course you were worried about how your underground business was going but you had made sure there were protocols set in place in the event that something happened to you.

You knew the people who needed to stand up and take your place would do so with minimal resistance from everyone else because, so long as people got their IDs, ration cards and money, there wasn’t really much of an issue.

You were doing relatively well for yourself and, luckily for you, you were carrying your bag when you were accidentally sent back by Micah. That bag contained your laptop which had everything in it: the mask you used to hide your identity, information like the programs you used to funnel money from the corrupt banks to give to those who needed it, and a list of buildings that you knew had been abandoned for almost 4 decades.

In the beginning, you stayed in one of those buildings, and managed to get yourself through the police academy and was able to get a job at CCPD.

You had heard about the effects of time travel and how one little change could ripple throughout time which is why you only worked as a desk cop, pushing papers, because, at least that way, you could keep an eye on everything that was going on without accidentally interfering.

You watched as the particle accelerator exploded, exposing everyone in Central City to dark matter; as the Flash became Central City’s hero and as the Arrow teamed up with the Flash.

You watched as reports of a ‘Burning Man’, better known as Firestorm, was exposed to the world, and most importantly, as Harrison Wells was revealed to be Eobard Thawne aka Reverse Flash, which somehow caused a black hole to tear the city apart before being stopped by the Flash.

Six months after that incident, however, was when you were revealed to Team Flash. For the 2 years you had been stranded here, you kept to yourself, working at CCPD, getting coffee at Jitters which was amazingly cheap, and watching the news.

But you often helped the Flash with meta humans and because you knew how to disappear without a trace, he was never able to catch you. But that was all about to change…

It had been a couple of weeks since the Flash was attacked at his own ceremony by a meta human who was later defeated, and for the most part, life had gotten back to normal.

Well, back to whatever passes for normal in Central City.

You were sitting at your desk, writing reports on crimes, when there was a commotion around the massive TV screen in the police department. You got up from your seat and huddled with the rest of the officers as you watched the news report.

“A man who appears to be able to control the ground is attacking the citizens of Central City.”

The voice of the reporter echoed through the now silent police department. As everyone watched the report and then began suiting up to fight the meta human, you noticed CSI Barry Allen conversing with Detective West, and after a nod from the latter, the former ran out of the building. Interesting. You were disturbed from your thoughts when everyone’s attention refocused on the screen.

“The Flash has now arrived. He is battling the man, dodging pieces of debris…”

You watched as the Flash fought the meta human and then glanced back to Detective West who looked slightly worried. Definitely interesting.

As everyone geared up, ready to aide the Flash, you decided to offer a little help of your own. You waited until after the group of detectives had left before donning your mask and making your own way to the scene.

By the time that you got there, the meta had managed to trap the Flash under some blocks of debris, and continued to wreak havoc by throwing blocks of debris at civilians, effectively injuring them.

As the Flash successfully worked to free himself, you began helping people escape by using your powers to remove the debris trapping them. The plan was going well as almost everyone had been evacuated, but then you saw a young girl, who looked around 6, trapped under several blocks of debris.

You looked from the crying girl, to the Flash, and finally to the meta who seemed to have noticed you. He began hurling blocks of debris at you which you were able to deflect back to him and after hitting him back, you ran over to the girl and used your powers to free her.

As you both began to run, the meta turned his attention back to you and began doing everything he could to hit you.

“Look out!”

You turned just in time to stop a load of blocks from hitting you both. Your hands stretched out, holding all the debris back, you shouted for the girl to run and you watched as she did before being knocked unconscious by a block of debris that flew from the other direction.

In the commotion, the meta got away and so, the Flash ran over to help you. He looked up at Detective West who simply nodded and then he picked you up and ran you back to S.T.A.R Labs.

                ✧── ･ ｡ﾟ★: *.✦ .* :★. ───✧

“How did we not know she was a meta?”

You groaned and began to stir.

“Uh, guys. She’s waking up.”

You fluttered your eyes open before shutting them as you groaned again at the bright lights.

Oh, no. You were back there. They had taken you again.

Your eyes shot open as you sat up and stared at the five people staring at you. There was Detective West, and his daughter Iris, a woman dressed in a lab coat, a man with relatively long hair, and the Flash. You looked around as you took in your surroundings, you were in a med bay of some sorts, laying on a bed.

“It’s okay, you’re in S.T.A.R Labs. The Flash brought you here after you were attacked by the meta human.” The woman in the lab coat reassured you.

“Yeah, Boulder.”

You turned to address the man dressed in a graphic t-shirt, “Bit on the nose, isn’t it?”

He shrugged in response. You moved so you could sit up properly before moaning slightly in pain. Your head hurt as did your shoulder which, when you looked at it, turned out to be dislocated.

“You have a mild concussion from the impact of the…boulder, and we decided it was better to relocate your shoulder when you were conscious. So, if you lay back, I can reset your shoulder, but unfortunately, it will hurt.”

“Dr?”

“Caitlin Snow.”

“Right, Dr Snow, there’s no need.”

“But your shoulder-“

“Yes, I know. Can you just grab my hand, please?”

You asked and when she held your hand in hers, you gritted your teeth and used your right hand to pop your shoulder back in with minimal resistance. You moved your shoulder to test its strength, “That’s better. Thank you.”

You looked at Caitlin then at everyone else and they all displayed the same look of confusion.

“But how?” The man with long hair started.

“Not the first time I’ve had to do that.”

You swung your legs off the bed and moved to stand up before being stopped by Detective West.

“You can’t leave, Detective Davis.”

“And why is that, Detective West?” You folded your arms and stared at the man.

“You have to answer some questions first.”

You turned to look at the Flash and your suspicions were confirmed.

“And I’m assuming if I refused and tried to leave, you’d stop me?” “Yes”

“You’ve been helping the Flash for the past 2 years without being found out.” Iris said. “And we need to know why, y/n”

“Alright, but I want one thing first.” “Which is?”

“For you to remove your mask.” Everyone scoffed at the idea and began spouting reasons why he couldn’t.

“You want me to answer your questions, those are my terms.”

“It protects my identity.”

You looked at the Flash who still seemed remiss to the idea so you decided to make it easier for him.

“Doesn’t do as well of a job as you think it does, Barry.”

At this, everyone’s faces dropped as they scrambled to dismiss the idea.

“Guys, I work with Barry on a daily basis and he always seems to disappear when the Flash appears, and now that I’ve seen him up close, there’s no doubt in my mind whose under that mask. Besides, why else would Detective West and Iris be so invested in the Flash if it wasn’t Barry?”

“She’s right, guys.” The Flash removed his mask and revealed himself to be Barry Allen.

“Time to answer some questions, y/n”

“Yeah, firstly, there’s no traces of dark matter in your DNA so how do you have your powers?” Caitlin asked.

“Yeah, and what are your powers, I love your accent and who made that sick mask?” “Cisco!” “What?”

“I got my powers as a result of human experimentation. I have telekinesis so I can move objects with my hands. Thank you, I moved here from England when I was 5. And I made the mask.”

“Wait, you experimented on yourself to get your powers?”

“It’s a long, and quite frankly, depressing story.”

“Start from the beginning then.” Barry suggested.

“Well then, the first thing you should probably know is that I’m not from here. And no, Cisco, I’m not talking about the fact that I’m British,” you added when Cisco opened his mouth.

You exhaled a deep breath, “I’m from the future.” Everyone gasped in shock.

“Like Marty McFly?” Cisco’s eyes lit up like a child who had just been given candy.

“Sort of, except I’m not here to meet my parents and accidentally become my Mum’s love interest, because ew.”

“So why are you here? And how?” Detective West asked.

“It’s a long story. Me and this other meta, whose power is to manipulate time, got into a fight with someone else and he accidentally sent me back in time. Huh, guess it’s not that long of a story.”

“Still doesn’t explain the origin of your powers.” Caitlin interjected.

“In lieu of revealing too much about the future, when I was a teenager, I was captured by a government agency who experimented on metas, and they either mistook me for one, or knew I wasn’t one, and experimented on me so I now have my powers.”

“But why would they experiment on metas?”

“Where, or rather, when I’m from, metas are essentially illegal so many of us have either been captured or are hiding underground.”

“Explains why you have no dark matter in your system.”

“Yeah. That and the fact that I made sure I was in Star City when the particle accelerator exploded. I persuaded Captain Singh to let me help SCPD with a case similar to ours and when the particle accelerator went off, I was working with ADA Lance.”

“Laurel?” Cisco asked. “Yeah, I think that was her name. You know her?” “Very well, actually.”

“Wait, so you knew the particle accelerator was going to explode? Why didn’t you say something?” Detective West asked.

“Of course I knew. Everyone in the future knows that was the explosion that led to the creation of meta humans and if I had said something, it could have rippled throughout time and if I stayed in town when it went off, who knows what effect it could have had on my powers?”

“Okay, I’ll give you that. So you said you can move things with your hands?” Detective West asked.

“In Layman’s terms, yes.”

“What’s your codename?” Cisco interrupted eagerly, as if hoping you wouldn’t have one so he could name you.

“Depends on what you’re asking about.” You answered vaguely.

“Wait, what does that mean?” Caitlin asked.

You walked into the cortex where everyone else followed after you.

“If you’re asking about my codename for my powers, it’s Meson.”

“Like the subatomic particle?” Caitlin said.

“Exactly. Because if one could manipulate those particles…”

“They could move things with their mind.” Cisco and Barry said in unison.

“Alright, that’s kind of cool, I’ll allow it.” Cisco conceded.

“So what’s the other codename?” Iris asked, interested.

“It’s kind of ironic considering my current job. It’s Renegade.” You added when the group looked at you in a state of confusion.

“As in a rebel?”

“Yes, Detective West. Because in the future, I ran an underground business to help metas which most certainly went against everything the Government believed in.”

“Call me Joe, and you ran it?” He seemed surprised.

“Well someone had to.” You shrugged.

“But you’re-”

“A woman?” You interrupted Cisco, light warning lacing your tone.

“What, no. I mean you are but I meant that you’re only 24.” He explained.

“Well, unfortunately, I had to grow up when I was 8.”

“Why?” Barry asked.

“That…is not relevant to this conversation. Now, did you catch this Boulder guy?” You deflected, changing the subject.

“No, he managed to get away but we’re running facial recognition software so if he steps out to get a Big Belly Burger or whatever an evil meta does, we’ll get him.” Cisco answered.

You walked from the centre of the cortex to behind the large desk which held three computers, “May I?’ You asked, gesturing to the screens.

After Cisco granted you permission, you sat down in the middle chair and began typing.

“Damn, this software is just as good, dare I say better, than the one I installed back in the future. Whoever created this is a genius.”

“That’d be Felicity Smoak, best hacker, of what seems to be, this century.” Caitlin replied, pride in her voice.

As you continued inspecting the software, you decided to research vacant buildings.

“What are you doing?” Cisco asked, sitting down beside you as Caitlin did the same.

“Well, I figured if this guy loves the earth so much, he‘d want a place where he could be alone and hone his powers. And where better to do it than-”

“An abandoned industrial factory.” Cisco finished, as he followed suit and began researching abandoned factories.

“Exactly. Like this one on Lex and 5th. It was shut down in the 90s and has been unoccupied ever since. And thermal imaging registers that only one person is in that building right now. And that person happens to be the same height and build as the meta Barry fought earlier.”

“Since when did we have an infrared sensor?” Barry asked, shocked.

“I may have hacked a satellite.”

The group were shocked once again at your revelation.

“Damn, girl, I could just kiss you right now.” Cisco exclaimed.

“Okay, let’s go.” You turned to look up at Barry who had put his mask on and was now holding out your mask in his extended hand.

“Wait, me?” Your eyes widened at his request.

“Well, you helped fight him earlier and you just helped us find him now, so yeah. And we talked about it whilst you were unconscious, and we think you’re a great fit for our team. So, are you up for it?” You contemplated Barry’s offer as you looked from Joe, to Iris, to Cisco and to Caitlin whose faces all seemed to gleam.

“Definitely.” You took the mask from the Flash’s hand and put it on.

“Let’s go.”

Barry lifted you into his arms and he sped off, running you both to the deserted factory to fight Boulder.

Huh, maybe this was the fresh start you needed.

Next Part ->

[spamzineglasgow]

Bon Iver’s hauntological i,i (William Fleming)

Image Copyright: Bon Iver / Jagjaguwar 

In this essay, William Fleming takes a detailed look at bon iver’s new album, i,i: through acid communist hauntology to oedipal melancholia and the future’s cybernetic fracture. 

> This week I’ve been reading Mark Fisher and listening to Bon Iver’s new album on repeat so I combined the two.

-

> Mark Fisher, in his Ghosts of My Life (2014), laments the dearth of creativity in popular music after the turn of the century, the loss of experimentation and of hearing something New and Radical, and the persistent replication of past methods, sounds and images. Fisher was no Adorno though (I don’t think anyway?). His essays are emotive and developed from a deep desire for a compassionate politics; Ghosts evokes the pathos of his seminal Capitalist Realism (2009). One of the key themes associated with his work on pop culture, is the use of the Derridean term ‘Hauntology’: the haunted ontology of futures that never came to be, the spectral disturbance of time and place as the possibility of political becoming dissipates. As he details in Ghosts, Fisher initially used hauntology as a genre-defining term for music. He identified artists which were 'suffused with an overwhelming melancholy; and they were preoccupied with the way in which technology materialised memory', this results in us being made 'conscious of the playback systems’ and of ‘the difference between analogue and digital’, 'hovering' out of reach behind the media’. Fisher uses this conceptual framework to analyse a raft of musicians and their work but there is a consistent emphasis on the political narratives of class and race which shape these cultural offshoots.

> Despite being one of the biggest records of this summer – and thus perhaps a bit bait for me to discuss? – Bon Iver’s i,i bares all the hallmarks of the hauntological genre: melancholia, the clash of digital and analogue, anachronism, the suggestion of political solidarity, artistic experimentation.

-

> First a confession: I first listened to Bon Iver because, in 2011, there was a girl on twitter I fancied who posted a video to Birdy’s Skinny Love. Birdy’s rendition is a wisp of a song, sad and grasping and completely lost on a shallow sixteen-year old and probably rightfully so. Failing to select the next song, I’m guessing Bon Iver’s original version played. For the first time I felt I’d discovered adult Sad Music. None of the ghd straightened, dip-died, angst-ridden emo tunes I’d gotten into a few years prior to impress my first girlfriend; or the one ballad acting as the penultimate track on one of the indie-rock albums from my older brother’s excessive collection. (- Does anyone know how to recycle these properly?). I would wallow in performative sadness playing immediately gratuitous and instantly gratifying XBOX games, quickly repeating the heartbeating guitar of Lump Sum on For Emma, Forever Ago or the wails of Holocene from Bon Iver, Bon Iver as I pined for my yet-to-be second girlfriend.

> I went off Bon Iver for a few years: these days, the quiet acoustic melancholia of these first two albums doesn’t fit with any aspirational sense of masculinity of mine. Being a man and being non-toxically emotional isn’t about listening to acoustic guitars and barely audible snares whilst you lie sulking in your room or on the drizzled walk to the library or job you hate. Instead it’s about communication, solidarity and empathy – ‘I’d be happy as hell, if you stayed for tea’. And so, when 22, A Million came out I was into it. Everyone thought it was a bit shit the first time few times they listened to it but this gave me cover to pretentiously purvey that they just didn’t get it and listen to it over and over. It was still the same anguished voice of Justin Vernon – but it was finally coming to life. Revived through stretched synthesizers, neologisms which made you question the contributors on A-Z Lyrics, and deconstructed bass. The piano riff on 33 “God” interrupted by alien helium-infused voices and the stammering, looping saxophone of 45 are still highlights. Listening now, 22, A Million initiated the hauntology of Bon Iver.

-

> At times, i,i feels like Bon Iver’s latest album is a playback of their first album, but one done through a signal sent by an analogue walkie-talkie found on the abandoned spaceship from Alien: Isolation – itself maybe the most harrowing video-game I’ve ever played, one which is played in constant anticipation of being found. Listen to the intermittent signal of Holyfields,: the bleeps and radio fuzz a beacon we sent out into space, only for it to sporadically and hauntingly talk back at us – a cultural SOS signal.  

> i,i is the same guitar riffs from albums one and two but cybernetically fractured through time. The same syncopated kick drum but ripped out from the mid noughties and dumped in a Iain M. Banks novel or an episode in Love, Death + Robots. Fisher, quoting Derrida, quoting Hamlet: ‘the time is out of joint’. In these time fractures, it’s not just the music’s original location which is torn into the future, but also objective fragments of past culture: the sax (Sh’Diah) and violin strings (Faith) torn from eras when politics and music were still intertwined.

> The first track on the album, Yi, is garbage. But it is orbital astro-garbage – a notable anthropocenic feedback loop! – sitting uncomfortably at the stratosphere of an album which explicitly reflects on ecological destruction. Yi’s inaudible conversation and the ‘Are you recording, Trevor?’ set it up as a soundcheck for the album too. Including a soundcheck evokes Vernon’s emphasis on the album as a performance piece in the accompanying mini-documentary Autumn. In the doc, Vernon mentions the problem of ‘How is it going to be played live?’. Immediately, we are forced to imagine i,i as more than just another album on Spotify.

> Yi bleeds into iMi, a psychedelic echo of a track built from interspersing a melancholic vocals/arpeggio combo and an encroaching synth/dub beat combo. We is similarly eclectic, digitalised vocals juxtaposing with endearing, major-key sax. Following is Holyfields,, perhaps the most alien but most beautiful song on the album.

-

> Hey, Ma is the headline single from the album. An ode to Vernon’s mother and a sense of the sunrise walk home after the summer party (I’ll try and avoid further seasonal references: the four albums are set up to represent the four seasons, i,i being autumn, but IMO this is pretty naff).

> There is a sense of time passing in Hey, Ma, a nostalgia for the yet to be – ‘Well you wanted it your whole life’ – but with this passing is a sense of desire – ‘I wanted all that mind, sugar / I want it all mine’ – and of becoming or evolving – ‘You’re back and forth with light’. Becoming is the famous Deleuzean postmodern motif; i.e. being is constantly flowing and reforming. Bon Iver’s becoming, however, is not a flow, but a hauntological wrench into the future state. The entire album feels as though you’re experiencing the tech-enhanced evolution of Bon Iver’s music. That skipping between soft indie and futuristic synth reminiscent of the OG Pokemon games when your Pokemon was evolving and it would flicker between its past and future states. But becoming is never complete. As Fisher highlights, ‘futuristic’ no longer refers to a time/space but is now merely an adjective. We’ll never hear the Bon Iver made entirely on digital tech.

> For Fisher, melancholia is a productive force of political resistance. He distances his ‘hauntological melancholia’ from that of Wendy Brown’s ‘left melancholia’ which ‘seems to exemplify the transition from desire (which in Lacanian terms is the desire to desire) to drive (an enjoyment of failure)’. Fisher’s melancholia, ‘by contrast, consists not in giving up on desire but in refusing to yield'. Under scrutiny, Bon Iver’s first two albums fail this melan-test – they are a spectacular, self-pitying self-indulgence. Self-pity as a common form of masochism. For Deleuze, thinking through Jung, thinking through Bergson (yeap, I know), masochism is always regressive, flipping the Oedipal on its head as a form of un-becoming.

> Is Vernon’s song to his mother a masochistic form of melancholia; a self-pitying reversal of the Oedipal? ‘I wanted a bath / “Tell the story or he goes”’; ‘Tall time to call your Ma / Hey Ma, hey Ma’. The type captured by Maggie Nelson in The Argonauts (2015) when reflecting on Ginsberg’s poem Kaddish, which is dripping in, in Nelson’s words, ‘misogynistic repulsion’. Or is Bon Iver’s a hauntological melancholia? One of stubborn resistance. The type of mother-son relationship photographed by Donald Weber in his response to Alison Sperling and Anna Volkmar’s conversation on the post-atomic (Kuntslicht, 39: 3/4). Weber’s photographs were taken over two years in Chernobyl. The, now fetishised, explosion in Chernobyl perhaps the example of the nuclear, a hauntological theme post-WWII, made material. The bursting of a political, biological and biopolitical reality which was never meant to be. Weber’s photo of a middle-aged man and his elderly mother is captioned: ‘Mothers sought to be photographed sitting close to their sons, in domestic scenes of proud companionability. Their eyes signal an unalterable communion. And more – elevation. A man’s mother transcends the material order, and rises easily above even the most squalid circumstances. It is the frank declaration of her biological supremacy: This is my child’. If it is this relationship captured in Hey, Ma, it may promise a spectre which can be made material. An artefact which can continue its evolution, its becoming. ‘Let me talk to em / Let me talk to ‘em all’.

> Finally, that Hey, Ma’s nostalgia is a culturally productive one is suggested by one of its more memorable lines: ‘I waited outside / I was tokin’ on dope / I hoped it all won’t go in a minute’. In Fisher’s posthumously published Unfinished Introduction to Acid Communism, he, when imagining the process of resistance and a new politics whilst citing Jefferson Cowie, writes 'these new kinds of workers – who “smoked dope, socialised interracially, and dreamed of a world in which work had some meaning” – wanted democratic control of both their workplace and their trade unions’. The curious, outdated use of ‘dope' in Vernon’s lyrics then mirrors Cowie’s use of 'dope', echoing Cowie’s nostalgia for a lost working-class culture of 1970s America. Fisher uses Cowie’s argument to piece together an acid communism, which I will return to, but this, surely consequential, similarity further constructs i,i as a contemporary hauntological album.  

-

> Following Hey, Ma comes the Sunday-school piano of U (Man Like). Raising an image of a crisply ironed, white America, like that depicted in Robert Putnam’s Bowling Alone (2000), which acts as a reminder that nostalgia isn’t always productive. However, the nostalgia is continued with Naeem ‘Oh, my mind, our kids got bigger/ … / You take me out to pasture now’. Fisher asks ‘is hauntology, as many of its critics have maintained, simply a name for nostalgia?’. However, he argues that it is not a ‘formal nostalgia’ but one of solidarity and of a longing for the process of social improvement. Naeem, despite its nostalgia, continues the flickering between hope and despair. The joyful ‘More love / More love / More love’ and ‘I can hear, I can hear’; the anguished ‘I can hear crying’ and ‘What’s there to pontificate on now? / There’s someone in my head’. The latent and angelic child-like choir on Naeem another hauntological theme. As Fisher declares, ‘no doubt there comes a point when every generation starts pining for the artefacts of its childhood’. However, Vernon’s evoking of childhood is one perhaps linked to the, at times damaging, trope of ‘future generations’ in environmentalism. It is still a political longing though – ‘I’d Occupy that’. Occupy: that great post-2008 political uprising which dissipated into a mere exemplar in an undergraduate geography textbook.

> Next, Faith brings back the aliens from 33 “God” but this time, for attention, they’ve brought their clean guitar and slowly morph into the catholic choir we began to hear on Naeem. God died and, despite the sexy, liquidity of our modernity, we miss him.

> Marion momentarily brings us back from the cybernetically fractured semi-future. Back to the £3-coffee coffee-shop where you’re telling your friend that you think you and that girl will probably get back together but you need the time to be right. The hope is sucked back out; we’re back in capitalist realism and Arctic Monkey’s fourth (fifth?) album. Luckily, Salem restarts the signal to bring us back from our self-pity, dragging us to the obfuscation we were enjoying. Salem’s witches are still here and they’re pretty good at Ableton.

> Next, Sh’Diah grows from an autotuned prayer – ‘Just calm down (calm down) / And she’ll find time for the Lord’ - into a yearning saxophone riff/rift. But, alas, RABi, the album’s final song, returns us to a blues guitar and Vernon’s vocals. If the oscillation between past and future throughout i,i was a dialectic, the depressing outcome is ‘consumer capitalism’s model of ordinariness' (Fisher) of the neoliberal present. As in Fisher’s hauntology, the technologically-infused creativity of i,i is a lost future. Watching Vernon being interviewed feels like this. He’s got the Pacific-North-West hipster look: vegan but drives a V6 truck. Goes to the craft brewer’s bar and talks about that latest public health campaign to encourage men to talk about mental health over a pint but refrains from actually talking about depression. (Maybe serving beer in 2/3rd schooners means you never end up getting to the important part of the conversation?)

-

> But why does it matter? Because it’s about political and cultural (and creative) imagination. Fisher’s last big, and tragically but appropriately unfinished, philosophy is that of Acid Communism. Maybe there is a future !

> Fisher mourned not only the flattening of pop music, but also the ‘culture constellated around music (fashion, discourse, cover art)’. In contrast to a digital album which you never perceive in any physical manner, Bon Iver have emphasised various forms of art in their work, ensuring a communal creativity. There are multiple iterations of the album cover art on public posters and on social media. More excitingly though, is the collaboration with WHITEvoid, a Berlin-based sculpture group/company, which is discussed on Autumn. Prepared for live performances, WHITEvoid have constructed an ensemble of floating mirrors and kinetic lighting made from ‘space-age metal’ and motion tracking sensors. An artistic contribution as ethereal and tech-enhanced as the accompanying music and one which aestheticises our material sciences. The lighting provided by WHITEvoid in collaboration with the experimentation in sound system, similarly shown on Autumn, constructs the performance of i,i as an ongoing innovation and experimentation. The effort put into the upcoming live performances of i,i ensure that it is a music to be experienced not merely consumed. In another discussion on Autumn, Michael Brown, Bon Iver’s Artistic Director, says ‘you have to be in the moment with other people, you have to be able to know that the person next to you is having the same communal experience’.

> In Krisis (2018:2), Matt Colquhoun sees acid communism as a “project beyond the pleasure principle” (2) and of an “experimental” politics. If the sounds of i,i are hauntological, then the spectre it suggests is one of acid communism. The acid is provided by its accompanying artistic experimentation and the communism is its emphasis on the political and the communal.

~

Text: William Fleming

Published 30/8/19

[coolkidstable]

guess who’s back!

it’s been like a week but i am BACK BABY! as you can guess i have mixed feelings about that entire series, which were amplified by the fact that i actually went to that game - yes, game 4 - as a (slightly early) birthday present from my brother. this is truly just 2.3k words of me being emo and getting personal, but it helped me process everything. and sorry for the lack of a read more but i’m on mobile lmao

i made it clear to both family and friends that i wanted this series to be a close one, for the home team to win each game, and for it to be a hard fought series that shows just how good both of these teams are. (maybe this wasn’t as clear on tumblr, but the decision to step away was made abruptly, though i’m very glad i did it.) that, well, didn’t happen. the canes are a great team, and their success wasn’t a fluke. don’t even try to suggest that. but this series didn’t work for them, for reasons that i really don’t know but may be revealed with time. who knows. regardless, it was a fantastic run and while i wish the ending wasn’t so bitter, i’m so proud of this team and all that they accomplished this season. the future is bright, and this time “next year will be better” isn’t just a hope - it’s a promise.

i really wanted them to score a goal, though. i love tuukka, and i want him to win those two trophies so badly, but i was really hoping he’d give up a goal. obviously, the canes’ chances of coming back to win the series were slim to none, but one last goal would’ve been a way to end the season on a somewhat promising note. and it’s weird and a bit sad that i went to 3 home games this season, and didn’t even get to hear raise up in person - two shutouts and a whalers night for which brass bonanza played instead.

that’s not the main reason, though. i was at this game with my brother, whose main team is the canes, who just got back into hockey late last season, opting to root for his local team over his childhood rangers and getting to see such an incredible run. he just wanted to see a goal to ease the blow, and i was right there with him. it was expected, though, and he’s not crushed or anything. he went to some pretty special games this season, including both the first storm surge and the first playoff win, and he knows that the rest of our family is happy. and really, that’s what it all comes back to - family.

the first bruins game that i have even the vaguest of memories of watching is the 2010 winter classic against the flyers. i’m not even 100% sure if i watched any of it; i just remember asking my dad why they were playing outside and catching glimpses of the game while he watched. he and my mom, once diehard bruins fans, had become fairweather fans upon moving to north carolina in 2003. the bruins, quite frankly, sucked, and games were rarely on tv. meanwhile, the patriots were quite the opposite. the bruins soon started to improve and began to creep back into our lives. i remember the 2011 cup finals, and not knowing a single player other than zdeno chara - the Tall One - and tim thomas - the Brick Wall. i don’t remember much else, but i was there in some capacity.

then came 2013. a series against the leafs. a historical game 7 comeback from a 4-1 deficit. i remember watching bits and pieces of this game on two different TVs - first the main one downstairs, where my dad was watching, only because it was the playoffs. he didn’t watch or care about regular season hockey - i didn’t even know there’d just been a lockout. when he gave up on this game, he went upstairs to go to bed and turned on the tv for background noise while i hung around to say goodnight. we were almost done when nathan horton scored the first goal, and from there, we watched history unfold. i was losing my mind - was this what i’d been missing out on?

from there, i watched the rest of the playoffs, and i haven’t looked back since. first i watched this young undersized rookie defenseman by the name of torey krug take the rangers by storm, then i watched the bruins hand the penguins‘ asses to them in a swift 4-game sweep that began with a shutout on my birthday, and then i watched the bruins lose a hard-fought series against the chicago racistlogos in the blink of an eye. it was a rollercoaster of a postseason, and i spent most of my free time learning about the game and my new favorite player, who i must regretfully admit was seguin. every game brought me closer to my dad, as before the game 7 comeback, i’d never join him to watch sports, or anything, really. in turn, it allowed him to reconnect with the sport he’d once loved most of all.

the next season was a good one as well: my first full season, the first game i ever attended in person, and the bruins winning the president’s trophy. that season ended in disappointment, but it was a good run, and i grew an appreciation for every single member of that bruins team. (nowadays, i guess that attitude is what the kids would call my brand.)

halfway through that season, i discovered hockey tumblr. i didn’t really make content or liveblog or even talk in the tags, and i never made any lasting connections, but still, it was a community that i greatly enjoyed. it also opened my eyes to other teams, and i started to experiment with the whole having more than one team thing - yeah, those were my stars fan days, among other questionable choices that aren’t important right now. this is also where the canes first came into my life, though not as a true second team until much more recently. things were changing, and not always for the better.

the 2014-15 season was fun, though i wasn’t able to watch as many games due to not knowing about r/NHLStreams or anything of that nature. regardless, the bruins just simply weren’t very good, and the season ended in disappointment. a few months later, hockey became very disappointing for reasons i won’t get into, and this coincided with my second emo phase (see: my current url). i ended up jumping ship for bandom tumblr and the life of a panic! at the disco stan.

still, i kept up with the 2015-16 season a little. it kinda sucked, but it was fine. i still loved the team - i just wasn’t really invested anymore. and maybe it was for the best given how busy school was that year. the next season went much the same, only this time, the bruins made the playoffs, i had just about given up on using tumblr at all, and there was this new kid on the team named sean kuraly.

the 2017 playoffs were odd. i hadn’t watched many games that season, and i hadn’t watched a bruins playoff game since the last time i was truly invested in hockey. still, it wasn’t like a switch flipped and i suddenly stanned the bruins again. i spent all the games in that series playing pokémon moon while occasionally glancing at the screen to see what was happening. i wasn’t even truly playing the game; i’d already beaten it and was merely trying my hand at shiny hunting a jangmo’o by hatching dozens and dozens and dozens and dozens and dozens of eggs, nicknaming them, and randomly trading them over the internet. it was mindless enough to pay attention, and pay attention i did.

it was kind of like the rangers series, on a smaller and less successful scale. much like torey krug before him, sean kuraly came out with a bang and made bruins fans love hockey again - or maybe i’m just projecting. regardless, you know he scored the 2OT winner, and you know about the kuraleap. i don’t remember how many jangmo’os named sean, kuraly, and sean kuraly i traded to the lucky people of pokémon sun and moon wondertrade, but the humber was definitely higher than 52. the bruins did lose the series, but i was interested again.

when the 2017 draft happened, i felt a special connection to it by virtue of these boys being the right age to be in the same high school graduating class as me. this draft piqued my interest in a way no other since 2014 truly had (unpopular opinion on 2015, i know, especially considering my favorite player was drafted fourteenth that year), and you know what? it had been a few months since i’d been active on tumblr, but i searched a few tags and started peaking back at hockey tumblr. i was almost convinced i should dive back in and redo my account for the second time, but i had college orientation to worry about, and by the time i returned, the motivation was lost.

until the 2017-18 home opener. you all know i love jake debrusk, and you probably know he scored his first nhl goal in that game (alongside charlie mac). you’ve seen the video and/or gifs of his dad crying. but beyond all that, it was just a damn good game. i had so much fun watching it - in boston, no less, because finally, after all those years trapped in my hometown, i was where i wanted to be - that i just had to get involved with hockey tumblr again. watching on my own wasn’t going to be enough, i knew.

and so, tumblr user @david-pastrnak returned. honestly, that season was fun, but the first half felt like a blur - likely just because it was my first semester of college. i even went to my first bruins home game in november, and though it wasn’t a good one, it was fun. they picked up the season with a win against tampa on the day i met my favorite band, and somehow, that seemed important. soon i saw my first live bruins win on td garden ice, and even went to a few more games, during which i watched as my grandma grew to love hockey and the bruins, bringing us closer together. it was around this time that i truly embraced the hurricanes, too, and having that second team that i truly care about and love has made being a hockey fan so much fun. it was also around this time that i rediscovered my love for writing. things were changing for the better, but they were only getting started. even when the bruins lost in disappointing fashion to the lightning, i knew things were going to be okay - better, even.

the off-season was mostly uneventful, but towards the end and into the beginning of the season, i ended up in a few group chats with others on here. some of these are still active while others are not, but regardless, i connected with a lot more people, got better at making conversation, and, most importantly, found some of the best friends i’ve ever had. you don’t really expect to meet a lifelong friend on the internet, never mind several, but i’ve gotten incredibly lucky!

this season has been special. i started going to games more often, grew to care about every member of this team more than i’ve probably ever cared about the entire team, and made some incredible friends who i’m blessed to know. and beyond me, this season has been incredible. you know that if you’re reading this, so i won’t get into it all. there were ups and downs, there were moments we thought we’d be golfing in april, and now we’re going to the stanley cup final. the last time this happened, i had just started watching hockey and was still learning. i was also a literal child who still thought i was straight. a lot has changed since then, and somehow, this stanley cup final feels like a culmination of everything i’ve been through with and because of this team. winning the cup isn’t just about how happy it would make jake, how much tuukka deserves it, or whether sean would hand it to danton or vice versa. it’s not about watching to see who helps wags lift it without damaging his injured hand further. it’s not even about watching the look of pure joy on pasta’s face and thinking back to his draft day and my bold, unwarranted, yet correct claim that he would be one of, if not the best player to come out of the 2014 draft. no matter how much they mean to me, winning the cup isn’t about the players.

winning the cup this season would be a celebration of all the friends i’ve made, the stories we’ve shared, and the connections we’ve made. winning the cup would be a celebration of how much closer hockey has brought me to my family. shit, winning the cup would be a celebration of kureinen and all our fun memes because why the hell not?

winning the cup isn’t about the players, or the team, or the parade, or the bragging rights for fans of boston sports. winning the cup is about the deeply meaningful and even just the fun ways in which hockey and the community on here have positively impacted our lives.

and even if we don’t, it’s okay. this season has been by far the best i’ve ever watched, and no matter what happens, it’s one i’ll always remember.

but hey, if we do, i’ll get my first tattoo to commemorate it. speaking of playoff promises, from now on, i’m going to have to talk like anders bjork on here so checkurohhhhhhhh

[violetemerald]

Crying Over A Fictional Kiss

This is my submission for the September 2019 Carnival of Aros, hosted by aceofarrows, on the theme of “Aromanticism and Fiction”. The Call for Submissions was here. This post has also been cross-posted to my WordPress blog. Please follow that blog of mine too, as I don’t cross-post everything.

Content Note: discussion of varied kissing experiences, including my kissing-aversion. Let me know if I should’ve warned for something else.

Also… I’m not sure how much of what I am focusing on is about my (gray-)aromanticism and how much is my asexuality… it’s hard to really categorize some of this into one or the other category. But I know this is meant to be aro-centric and if you stick with this post I’ll make sure it ties back to aromanticism.

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

Last month, I listened to the audiobook version of Alice Isn’t Dead by Joseph Fink.

Potential spoilers are in this blog post below by the way, so you have been forewarned. I’ll try to minimize the spoilers (and I’m not spoiling the ending or anything). I’ll also mention, later in the post, details from over halfway through the book All the Wrong Places by Ann Gallagher, and a few details from The Flash (2014 TV series) season 2 and the Veronica Mars 2014 film and 2019 revival for a season 4.

I loved the audiobook of Alice Isn’t Dead. I found it really compelling. I have heard the podcast was probably a better way to first be introduced to the story, but I instead only consumed this fictional tale in its book form, because my asexual meetup group had decided to read it for its book club. It’s a story with a lesbian married couple at its heart—a romance.

Keisha is the main character. Her wife, Alice, went missing and was presumed dead before the start of the story. When Keisha first sees Alice in this story, Keisha is so angry about the depth of grief she’s been in, grief which is all Alice’s fault due to the circumstance of Alice faking her own death and then… they passionately kiss. And I kinda felt like I was triggered by the way the kiss was used in this work of fiction. I don’t know how else to describe it. I had a visceral negative reaction to it.

This is the paragraph:

Keisha could have hit her. Could have killed her, honestly. Let Alice finally actually be dead if she wanted to be dead that badly. But what she did instead was pull her toward her, and their lips met, and it could have been the day they met, could have been the day they got married, could have been any weekday evening before she disappeared. Keisha felt love, right where she had left it, and kissed Alice so hard that it hurt both of them, because what she really wanted to do was to find her way into Alice’s chest and live there among the bones and blood. She wanted them to be one person, but also to be two people; she wanted so many things, most of them contradictory. She pushed Alice away.

I just said I loved this book. I swear, I really truly did. There was so much I loved about this book, the #ownvoices portrayal of anxiety with a ton of depth (and kinda turning it into a superpower without minimizing how hard it is to live that way), the way the horror played out, the characters, and even the way the romance was written. (I’m usually a pretty big fan of romance in fiction even though I’m not alloromantic. I enjoy romantic arcs, and I even feel shipper type feelings a fair amount of the time.)

But also, listening to this audiobook in my car on a drive home late on a Sunday night, hearing about kissing, and how through kissing a character (whom I could otherwise actually emotionally- and personality-wise relate to quite a bit) was feeling a strong positive sensation of love coming rushing into her… it made me cry. I shed real, actual tears. I got distracted by my own thoughts and angst and had to pause the book and switch to playing music on the radio for a little while. I had to rewind it later because I’d missed parts of what came next. I was just. Not in the right headspace for this romantic kissing situation. Not at all.

The timing was partially to blame. I heard this moment in the book while I was driving home from a day spent with the person I’m dating, Asher. (Asher is the pseudonym I use on this blog for my alterous partner.) We had, just that evening, explored if maybe my kissing-averse self might be able to handle closed-mouth chaste kissing on the mouth, but first I had gotten confused and thought I was agreeing to trying open-mouthed kissing for the first time in nearly 6 years. I had indeed agreed on a previous night that I’d try that too, but when we’d get to trying a number of things had still been unclear. But I knew making out would be a thing we tried at least once… eventually.

I knew that I was kissing-averse after my experiences trying kissing in 2012 and 2013, but I wondered what if my partner being a different gender this time around mattered? Or what if it mattered that I have a demi “sensual” attraction switch that has flipped for Asher, considering the fact that that switch hadn’t flipped for the only two people whom I tried kissing back before I knew my orientations? Or what if it wasn’t really that bad and I was exaggerating in my memory how averse I felt to it all? And what if I could be neutral to “making out” briefly?

Asher asked me, “Can I kiss you?” and I was finally ready to give open mouthed kissing a chance with them. I mean, I guess I thought I was. I braced for the experience. I said, “Yes,” then asked what kind of kissing. Oh. Not open-mouthed, after all. It ended up being Asher just… giving me a light peck on the lips. And then asking me if I was okay. And I said I was. But then I was crying anyway, as I do far too often with Asher. I feel hyper-vulnerable when I’m with them or messaging them or thinking about them and I seem to cry at the drop of a hat. And I’m not entirely sure why, in this instance, the tears were streaming but I kept insisting I really was fine with that kind of kissing. It was maybe a little awkward but I didn’t feel averse to that. And it would get less awkward with more time/practice, I was sure.

(I still think it’s often a little awkward, but in the over-a-month since we started those, I’ve never again cried after being given one of those little kisses.)

I think maybe, though, it seemed fine and neutral to me at first but over time it’s maybe felt more awkward to me, more like I have to be extra careful to keep my mouth closed because I’m scared of an aversion sensation I’d feel if my mouth was open, so I can’t just appreciate the little loving gesture. I overthink it each time.

And as I have been writing this blog post and sharing the unfinished draft with Asher, we discussed this more. Now, I’ve requested to instead try goodbye quick kisses on the cheek or maybe blowing a kiss instead of the goodbye peck on the lips. We tried one cheek kiss this morning. 💜💚 We’ll keep testing this out.

Dating Asher for five months now has been a rollercoaster of emotions for me. I’ve been so happy to be in an alterous partnership which in many ways resembles the established “perfect” romance I saw described in Alice Isn’t Dead—cooking together, cuddling while watching TV, having long conversations that the participants never want to end. Deciding to build a life together with another person. I feel so much love for Asher and know they have brought so much that’s positive to my life.

Nonetheless, it’s been very stressful. Lots of aspects of it have been. I’m not touching on all of it in this post. Waves of excitement or joy are interrupted or overlayed and mixed with other things. Some of my emotions are difficult for me to fully understand or process. But I’ve been thrown back into a situation of mismatched orientations, where my partner feels romantically for me, in certain ways I can’t reciprocate. For Asher, the desire to kiss me is connected to their demiromantic switch. When this switch is engaged and “on” (and it fairly consistently stays on for me), they feel this desire to kiss me. For Asher, kissing is very much non-sexual, but it is romantic.

Asher also feels sexually for me in ways I can’t reciprocate, but that is a topic for another time.

We did eventually, not particularly long after that night when I cried in the car listening to Alice Isn’t Dead, try open-mouthed kissing. Compared to maybe the “making out” that I was envisioning, Asher was… gentler and more hesitant; it was a subtler type of kiss. It wasn’t passionate in that way that I imagine is definitely sexual for characters in stories when making out is described. It wasn’t as full tongue deep into each other’s mouths as what I’d experienced with two guys in 2012 and 2013. We tried this kissing because Asher was so full of a desire to try expressing romantic love that way.

I probably already deep down knew, crying in the car, that while I feel deep alterous love for Asher, love that lets me relate enough to the love described in Keisha & Alice’s marriage, I would feel the opposite of all that amazing love in a moment where I would get even close to that kind of kissing. And indeed open-mouthed kissing I just am so viscerally averse to. It’s hard for me to explain, but I’m not neutral. It’s not just a lack of feeling anything like love. It’s the saliva interacting that is a very specific thing my body seems to react to. It feels uncomfortable in a way that’s almost like anti-chemistry, like people are supposed to notice a spark that’s good between them (and they call this “having chemistry”) and for me the spark isn’t exactly missing—there is still a spark, but it just feels bad. I’ve never felt anything like this feeling except for when I kissed two different guys, nearly a year apart from one another, back in 2012 and 2013. But here we are in 2019 and only once I found myself in the midst of an open-mouthed kiss again did I realize my body remembers exactly what this anti-spark feels like. All 3 people I’ve open-mouth-kissed trigger this exact same kissing-aversion feeling in me.

In the book All the Wrong Places by Ann Gallagher, which is an ace/ace romance, there is a part around the middle of the book, slightly over halfway through, where Zafir says he can’t stop thinking of how much he really wants to kiss Brennan. Brennan thinks it might be weird for asexuals to be kissing one another. (Brennan is new to asexuality and Zafir is more knowledgeable.) I’ll share two select passages from pages 139 and 140 of my paperback copy of the book, from a chapter that happens to be Brennan’s point of view:

”And who says it’s sexual? It’s just affection.” He ran his hand up my forearm. “People can touch without it having anything to do with sex.”

And

His hand slid around to the back of my neck, and with the faintest pressure from his fingertips, he drew me toward him.

Our lips met.

And everything… faded.

The ocean was suddenly a million miles away. The seagulls were distant background noise. There were people and cars, but my senses were too busy exploring the softness of his lips. His stubbled chin hissed across mine, driving home that I was kissing a man for the first time in my life. That I was kissing Zafir. And I liked it.

Slowly, I wrapped my arms around him. Nothing about this felt as weird as I thought it should. It was… God, it was perfect.

He broke the kiss and our eyes met.

“Wow,” I breathed.

“Yeah. Wow.” He searched my eyes. “Does that turn you on?”

I swept my tongue across my lips. “It, um ... not really, no.”

Zafir’s brow knitted, and he sounded more nervous than I’d ever heard him when he whispered, “But did you like it?”

“I—” My heart thumped against my ribs, and I caught myself missing the softness of his lips against mine. This didn’t make any sense, but … “Yeah. I did like it.”

So I pulled him back to me and kissed him again.

This scene was another scene in a book that made me feel a lot of emotions. I read this book after having been in a relationship (that had since ended) with a gray-asexual queerplatonic partner, and I related a lot to two aces dating each other throughout the book. I loved the portrayal that aces can also be parents, which thanks to Sara K. I knew ahead of time this book would have—possibly the only book out there like that—and I knew that this would be an appeal of the book for me as an ace who wants to be a parent. But I’m more averse to sex than both of these protagonists, and then when this happened on page 139 of the book, I suddenly felt very frustrated that kissing aversion seems to never ever be shown in ace romances. I’d been reading a handful of novels with ace characters, and kissing seems to almost always be utilized by authors as “proof” that a relationship without sex is still romantic.

This kind of thing made me feel more possibly aro, the more I realized I can’t feel what all the alloromantic ace characters seem to feel, but I also was skeptical. All The Wrong Places, as I researched and found out after finishing the book, was written by a bisexual woman. While the asexual representation was overall amazingly accurate and relatable (and the book at various points just made me cry because of its emotional resonance), maybe this kissing thing isn’t actually accurate to how all alloromantic aces feel. Perhaps that scene I just quoted was more exaggerated, hyperbole for the sweet romance of it than actually how first kisses tend to feel for people in their shoes.

Maybe it would be more a sex-averse ace thing than necessarily an aro thing to not feel so positively toward the softness of lips, for everything to not just “fade away”. I really don’t know. I haven’t heard enough from sex-repulsed aces who feel alloromantic. I don’t feel like I know their narratives. What I see instead around are aces who are more sex-indifferent or sex-neutral or even sex-favorable when they explain being alloromantic, so when they maybe say they do like kissing (depending on the person) I still don’t know if the reason they like something I don’t is because I’m averse more than them to sexual things and that kind of kissing is sexual, or if it’s because I’m much more aro than them. I don’t know how to parse out my feelings, my romantic orientation, or any of it. It’s so messy and complicated and I wish I had easy answers…

…but when a lot of what I have influencing my thoughts on all this is fiction, the theme of this carnival, it gets even murkier. Fiction doesn’t necessarily reflect reality. And when I read about what kissing feels like it’s almost always in fictional accounts. Whether it’s fanfiction or published novels, allo characters or aspec ones, none of this is really what I should be basing an understanding of reality on. None of this is necessarily quite accurate. I need more nonfiction accounts to fully make me understand my own orientations.

I recently edited a new, very romantic, fanvideo set to a recently released Taylor Swift song using 23 romantic couples featured on 20 different scripted (fictional) television series.

While I identify as gray-aromantic and classify my relationship with and my feelings for Asher as alterous, I basically feel like I could pretty easily sing 99% of this song to my partner and it be entirely accurate to my happy, excited feelings toward the thought of us one day getting married as nesting partners and everything else. I don’t feel like the song is too romantic for any of my current feelings. (The inaccurate parts are that Asher is not my “baby boy” as we don’t use the pet name baby, and Asher isn’t a boy… and I don’t want Asher in “dirty dreams” because I’m sex-averse and don’t have such dreams… seriously that’s pretty much the only parts that don’t really fit, I think? Well, I suppose we also don’t use the pet name “darling” and the idea that Asher and I were ever “friends” before becoming partners isn’t quite true, since we met via online dating, and other little tiny things don’t quite fit. But overall… I can still be aro-spec while relating a lot to this song. I can. It’s my reality.)

For a long while now, I’ve second-guess any of my choices when it comes to vidding kissing scenes.

As I’ve written about before, for my birthday this year I had friends participate in four collaboration fanvideos where I:

made a rule of no sexual scenes and no kissing on the mouth at all. These collabs were also, by the way, a mix of romantic pairs and platonic bonds. They could vid right before or after a kiss with the characters’ faces close but just not vid the kissing itself.

I told my dad about having made the rule and he turned to me and asked with a surprisingly high level of confusion and interest, “Do you really mind kissing scenes?”—or something like that. I don’t even know what I said but I don’t think I fully tried to explain how complicated it all was for me as someone vidding such kissing scenes for over 12 years. Whose attitude in reaction to seeing characters act sexually changed drastically once I realized 5.5 years ago I was sex-averse, how frustrating it was in my birthday collab in January 2016 when one of my friends vidded one of my OTPs (Jane/Rafael on Jane the Virgin) and she happened to choose, out of SO many scene choices, one of the absolute most sexual Jane/Rafael scenes with them making out while skinny dipping (naked in a swimming pool). How sex averse I felt in that moment and how much I wanted for my birthday collab to not have that happen again.

I think what I said to my dad was that it’s nice sometimes to feel more able to relate to the characters and kissing scenes I can’t relate to. I don’t know.

Now it’s closer to 6 years since I first figured out for sure I was sex-averse, and when editing my “Paper Rings” video, which is embedded above, I couldn’t stop thinking about when to include kissing and when not to. And also what kinds of kissing I feel comfortable with. 

I hadn’t met Asher yet when my birthday happened, so when I was making up the “no kisses on the mouth” rule for it I didn’t have much personal life experience with other types of kisses. Like the guy from 2012 kissed my cheek once but… basically zero experience, give or take. Yet, I still knew on some level that kisses on the top of the head, the forehead, the cheek, the shoulder, the arm… none of these would bother me and feel sexual and trigger my kissing-aversion, and I didn’t know if they’d necessarily feel romantic, in fact I still don’t know if anything feels exactly “romantic” for me which is part of why I’ve gravitated so strongly to the term “alterous”… But it feels sweet and affectionate and wonderful when Asher kisses my upper arm while I wear sleeveless shirts, or my shoulder, or my head.

When I was editing this fanvideo and I chose to include mouth-kisses during lyrics that weren’t specifically “kiss me” or “kiss you” lines of the song (lyrics without the word “kiss” at all), it was because of the surrounding details of the scene being really perfect for a particular lyric, combined with the fact that the kiss itself probably wasn’t that zoomed in on nor super open-mouth style “passionate”. For the lyrics specifically about kissing, as much as I easily could, I included kisses that were on the nose or head, or I vidded just enough of a scene that my fanvideo didn’t even show the actual kiss part of the scene once their lips touched, like in the case of the Barry/Iris during the lyric “’cause you waited your whole life”.

I had a number of my vidder friends and acquaintances on Twitter giving me feedback on my video as I was creating it, suggesting ways to improve it. One of my oldest vidder friends, with whom I’ve been friends for 12 years, suggested that when Logan kisses Veronica’s nose in my video, I should’ve instead used when they first kiss (very passionately and sexually) in the film as it fits that same “cause you’ve waited your whole life” lyric better than the cute nose kiss from later in the movie.

However, I told that friend of mine I checked that sexy Veronica/Logan scene from the film and if either character had kissed the other “Three times” in quick succession to really match that lyric amazingly perfectly i would’ve used it. But because that didn’t happen, so…

I’m kinda partial to using less sexual scenes now, more than maybe I typically would be, if I can avoid them. I just. Dating Asher and not wanting to open mouth kiss at all is proving really hard and I’m really insecure about my orientation(s) and how they manifest and makes me incompatible with almost everyone in the world. The nose kiss is much more a kind of kiss I feel happy seeing right now. Less fraught emotions for me in my super cutesy lovey dovey vid if I keep it this way lol. Also my two “dirty dreams” lyric matches are super tame and cute/sweet rather than actually dirty because of that. But no, I couldn’t think of a 3 kisses moment to use either time the lyric comes up.

It just. It’s all so complicated, my relationship to the way romance is portrayed in fiction. And in popular songs. I mean have you all heard the song “Kiss Somebody” by Morgan Evans? It’s on my local country radio station a lot.

It’s frustratingly catchy and enjoyable as a song for a person like me (see how I just vidded Taylor Swift, above – lol). The only reason it’s frustrating though is that it’s so anatonormative, and that it’s one of just so so many songs that imply if you really like a person you “gotta” kiss them, that such a desire to kiss is essentially inevitable. And that everyone feels these things. It is invalidating. It hurts. Even now. Even over 6 years into knowing I was probably asexual, and 6 years after the possibility of being aromantic first crossed my mind. It’s been such a long time, but it’s still not easy for me.

I’m not nonamorous. I’m not romance-repulsed. I don’t seem aromantic when you consider a lot of my interests and actions, when you quickly glance at my successful dating life. In less than a week I’m moving in to a brand new apartment with the person I’ve been dating and I’m happy and excited by the direction my life is going. I’m so very happy.

But I’m kissing-averse. Not averse to all kissing. I actually deeply enjoy certain kinds of kissing, but I’m very averse to open-mouthed kissing, so much so that I would rather not even engage in closed-mouth kissing, despite not even being personally averse to the closed-mouth type!

I’m not sure I like the phrase kissing-aversion as much anymore now that I realize just how nuanced my feelings on the subject are, but I’m not sure I know of a better alternative phrasing. I don’t want to imply ruling out sweet little kisses on my arm and shoulder and head and cheek. I love those so much. So maybe I should just say I’m mouth-kissing-averse, but that sounds so clunky and just… I don’t see myself really starting to say that. Lol. Maybe a whole descriptive sentence about it would be better in the future. I don’t know. I’ll keep thinking on it.

One of my alloromantic & allosexual (straight) friends actually recently let me know she’s not a big fan of making out, because I was sharing my own… struggles.

She said:

It’s funny, I am not super into kissing. I like it more on the top of my head or the cheek… That is more romantic to me than mouth kissing…that is kind of slobbery, lol.

So I guess to conclude, if you made it these 4,300+ words into this monster of a post, I’ll ask you all to please let me know your relationship to kissing, whether you love it, hate it, or are anywhere in the middle! I’m very curious to know how people feel and how they feel it does or doesn’t relate to their orientations. And I’m curious to know if you have any other thoughts for me after reading my post. Please comment. It means the world to me when people do. (Also I’m happy to answer personal questions; you can ask me more stuff if you’re curious!)

💜💚💜💚