#and then the shit with lucy which was just really confusing?

[seddair]

9-1-1 is great and all (would argue definitely less “great” and more just “good” over the last couple seasons but w/e), but Buck’s storylines ever since the shooting at the end of season 4 have been all over the place and shoddy tbh.

[pitchsidestories]

stay strong like a lioness II Ingrid Engen x Mapi León x Lioness!Reader

masterlist I word count: 1854

a/n: Hi, it's based off this request here, we hope it lives up to your expectations !

It suddenly felt hard to breathe, you fell to your knees on the pitch side, the whole England team was devasted, while the Spain team was celebrating the world cup win in front of your eyes.  The tears of disappointment and sadness you were holding back made your vision turn blurry.

In addition to that a lot of your Barcelona teammates were ecstatic by their glorious achievement which made it even harder for you to accept the loss.

An inner voice was screaming at you, you lost, you looser, you were bad, simply not good enough, not worthy to represent your country on the world’s stage !  The hateful monologue was interrupted by a familiar voice and a hand which was encouragingly placed on your shoulder.

“Good game, y/n.”, Mariona who was under the winners of the night congratulated you.

“No, it wasn’t, Mario.”, you shook your head frantically.

“Hey, you fought hard. It was a close game.”, she countered softly.

“If you excuse me now.”, you announced, shaking of her hand who was padding your back seconds earlier, as you prepared yourself to leave.

“Where are you going? I’m sure the others want to talk to you too.”, the midfielder questioned confused.

 “I’m sorry, but I don’t feel like talking to anyone, really.”, you apologized in an honest tone.

“But-“, Alexia joined your conversation, looking alarmed at you. Her worry made your inner demons even louder in your head, you almost screamed at her, why do you care about me now? You just won the biggest title in football and I’m just a looser who will be just a footnote in the history books.

Instead, you chose some words which wouldn’t hurt your club’s captain feelings:” No, please, I just need some time alone.”

“Come on, y/n.”, Keira who lost just like you, opened her arms empathetically, but you refused to let her touch you.

“I’ll go to the dressing room.”, you declared sternly.

“We win and loose together, y/n.”, Lucy added, her eyes were red from crying too, the sadness she felt was written all over her face, she was an open book to anyone who would catch sight of the defender.

But you did notice that a hand steadied her posture. It belonged to Ona who smiled at the older woman. Much to your surprise she returned the smile, an unhappy one, but it counted, nonetheless.

“I don’t want to talk.”, you stated stubbornly. The loving words of your teammates who were also your friends didn’t reach over the wall you built around yourself since the final whistle.

“But when you want to, we’re here for you.”, Keira offered.

“Sure.”, you nodded absent minded.

“Girls, I think we should let her alone now.”, Ona muttered biting her lip disheartened by your reaction.

“She’ll get over it soon.“, Lucy agreed calmly while she watched you leave.

What you did not know while you locked yourself into your hotel room as soon as the team was back at their base camp, was that your girlfriends where sitting at home in Barcelona worrying about you.

“Mapi, she’s not answering our messages or calls!“, Ingrid complained and slammed her phone on the kitchen table in frustration. Her team was already sent home after the Round of 16, so she and Mapi had supported your journey to the world cup final from home.

Mapi frowned: “Still not?“

“No…“

There was silence at the kitchen table for a moment until the Spanish defender cursed: “Shit!“

“Maybe I could call Lucy.“, Ingrid suggested, nervously tapping her fingers on the table.

Mapi shrugged: “It’s worth a try.“

While she waited for Lucy to take the call, Ingrid put her phone on speaker. The English defender sounded tired when she finally answered.

“Lucy, could you please look after y/n? She doesn’t respond to us since the loss…“, the Norwegian got straight to the point, trying to keep the urgency out of her voice.

“She’s pulled away from everyone. She doesn’t want to talk.“, Lucy explained.

Mapi joined the conversation. Nervously she asked: “Not even to you or Keira?“

“No, she’s locking everybody out.“

Your two girlfriends shared a concerned look.

With all the hopefulness she could manage, Ingrid suggested: “Maybe after a good night’s sleep, it will be better…?“

“Maybe.“, Lucys voice agreed but sounded less than convinced.

“Fingers crossed. Thanks, Lucy. See you soon, champ.“ Mapi ended the phone call, still not much calmer than before.

But your girlfriends had no other chance than to wait until you arrived home from Australia just a day later. They really tried their best to make you feel better about returning home without the trophy. There was even a cake on the table but all you wanted to do was lay in bed until you felt less empty.

“She’s home. Hello, my love!“, Ingrid smiled brightly.

Before she and Mapi could come over to embrace you, you had already shrugged off your jacket and kicked off your shoes. You silently waved at them before disappearing into your room.

Mapi looked at the suitcase that you left standing in the middle of the floor: “Still?“

“Mapi, that’s not normal.“, Ingrid voiced her concern.

“What should we do?“

“I don’t know…“

The two of them stared at the locked door for a moment before Mapi suggested: “We should make some dinner. She must be hungry after that long flight.“

Ingrid gave a short nod: “That’s a good idea, we’ll cook her favourite meal.“

“Yes, come on.”, the Spaniard got up from the stylish sofa they have been sitting on, while offering the Norwegian her hand, as she followed her to the kitchen to start cooking.

It didn’t take them long to cook the dinner you loved most, the delicious scent of it quickly filled the whole appartement, but smelling this only caused your stomach to turn.   

“Y/n, we made dinner for you.”, Ingrid told you in an uplifting tone, knocking softly at the closed door.

“Not hungry.”, you shot back. Immediately you regretted the harshness in your voice. After all it wasn’t your girlfriend’s fault that you’ve lost the final. It was yours alone.

“You need to eat something though!”, Mapi protested, she sounded almost mad at you for not accepting your favourite food.

“Later maybe.”, you replied quietly. It was so soft that your girlfriends were almost unable to understand what you’ve been saying.

“Okay.”, the defender sighed, clearly frustrated that they couldn’t get through to you.

The mist of sadness surrounded you and didn’t pass, even when the training with the Barcelona girls started it clung on to you like a second skin.

While you were pushing yourself extra hard in the gym Lucy’s green eyes noticed it with growing concern until she had enough and yelled at you:” Y/n, stop it!”

“What?”, you blurted out, still heavily breathing from the exercise you’ve just done.

“Don’t be so hard on yourself.”, Mapi added, the defender has been doing her training along side the English player.

“You all don’t get it!”, you countered angrily. The mist has been lifted in your mind, instead there was a thunderstorm of emotions rolling through your whole body.

“Yes, we get it! We’re all players just like you. We all want to be our best.”, Lucy disagreed furiously. The pain of the loss was fresh for her too, but she knew that new challenges were laying ahead of her, with potential wins as a reward to lessen the hurt.

“Exactly, and you can’t shut everyone out, because you lost one game.”, Ingrid tuned in, her facial expression saddened as she glanced at you. The Norwegian felt helpless against the state you were in. Nothing seemed to lift your mood and made you return to your usual cheerful self; the one, she fell in love with.

“It wasn’t just any game.”, you replied through gritted teeth.

“You were in a World Cup Final. Other players don’t even make it that far.”, Mapi reminded you.

“Right, this was a big achievement.”, Ingrid continued, beaming proudly.

You looked from one of your girlfriends to the other. Everything they said felt like pure pity, it made your blood boil.

“No, it was a failure… My dad said I had to be strong and I wasn’t strong enough!“, you exploded.

There was silence in the gym, your teammates stared at you.

Mapi took a step towards you.

“You’ve been very strong.“, she assured you.

You sniffed once, fighting the upcoming tears: “But not like a lioness should be… I let everyone down.“

“We all lost the stupid game.“, Lucy replied.

Keira nodded confidently, gesticulating to herself and your other teammates: “Yes, and we’ll win a lot this season together.“

“Oh yes.“, Mapi agreed.

“Now heads up, little one. There will be another World Cup final coming for you.“, Lucy winked at you.

“And you’ll be in it, no doubt.“, Ingrid added, her gaze soft.

You could feel your breathing slow down as you stood there and listened.

Keira quietly continued: “Plus, it might sound weird coming from me but it does help to talk to someone professional about it because…“

“Because you don’t need to be strong all the time, mi amor.“, Mapi finished for the midfielder, bridging the distance between the two of you and taking your hands into hers.

“Kei’s got a point.“, Lucy said before quickly following up with: “That excludes me though.“

This caused Ona to raise her eyebrows at her girlfriend: “Lies. You cried about it on the first night of our vacation.“

“Shut up, Ona!“, the English defender shot back quickly but with a laugh.

You paused, looking at her. Lucy was without doubt the toughest person you had ever met. “Wait, you cried?“

Instead of her Ona answered, shooting Lucy teasing look: “Oh yes, like a little baby.“

“I didn’t cry. Especially not like a baby!“, she protested.

For the first time since the World Cup, you could feel a smile appear on your face: “I believe Ona.“

Returning your smile, Lucy shook her head: “Of course such blatant lies cheer you up.“

“They do.“

The sadness still weighed heavy on your chest but you felt like a dark veil had been lifted. The conversation with your teammates earlier had helped and you were ready to finally let people in again.

Exhausted from your gym session, you laid in bed with your girlfriends, one on either side of you.

“Can you two just hold me until it doesn’t hurt as much anymore?“, you asked quietly, your gaze directed towards the ceiling.

Your sweet girlfriends immediately wrapped you up into their arms, keeping you safe in their middle.

“Sure, as long as you need us to.“, Ingrid whispered while Mapi pressed gentle kisses onto your temple.

You were so grateful for your teammates and your two girlfriends. Right there, between them, the voices in your head seemed to quiet down and you fell asleep almost feeling at peace.

Maybe you failed at winning the most important game of your life so far but you would always be more than just good enough for Mapi and Ingrid.

[wosoragebaiter69]

forgotten about you

barça femeni x teen!reader

request: here

A/N: i just know alexia turned off the tv during the game 😭

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

You wake up, today is what could be described as a neutral day but it’s still your birthday nonetheless. You didn’t want to leave your bed, but you had to. Your family never really celebrated your birthday, only really caring about your brother and his dreams.

Even if it wasn’t the best day for you, a small part of your mind hoped that someone would wish you a happy birthday, at least Alexia anyways. It’s not like you told them though, the Barça instagram page would probably announce it.

You go through your regular movements of the day, traffic is light and you make it just in time.

Walking through, the admin wishes you a happy birthday, you smile lightly saying thanks and continuing to walk into the change room. However when you’re there it’s the same as any old day, it breaks your heart a little but you wouldn’t tell anyone that.

You’re quieter than usual walking to your cubby, it isn’t much of a change considering you’ve been one of the quieter ones since you joined barca, preferring to only be loud late at night when blasting music in your car.

It’s when even Alexia comes in and doesn’t say Happy Birthday that you feel even more hurt than before, out of everyone who would know, you’d just hoped she would. It’s not her fault though, you didn’t tell anyone. Why would she?

Training seems to be a blur, you miss the looks your older teammates give you at certain points. You’ve essentially become someone with no emotions which has somehow made you have a great session. Which in all honesty did not mend your shattering heart, no matter the praises the coaches had given you.

You make an effort to miss everyone after training and head straight home, you didn’t shower and just got up and left ignoring your confused teammates. No matter how much of an introvert you were, you’d always make time to say goodbye. It was a sign to everyone else that something had happened.

You make way to your car and drive off straight away, inevitably you end up sobbing halfway through. Unable to keep your emotions inside.

- - - - -

In the locker room, when you were gone there was silence. A pondering in the air of sorts. Mapi breaks it.

“Is she ok? She’s usually quiet but this… she’d at least say something.” Her statement lingers in the air, no one knowing what to say.

“Oh shit.” The unmistakable voice of Lucy Bronze cuts through the tension.

“Qué?” Many voices say at once. Lucy turns her phone around and shows the birthday announcement from the Barcelona Instagram page.

“How did we not know? Why didn’t she say anything?” Alexia sounds heartbroken, she cares for you deeply and to miss something so important is heartbreaking.

“I’m not sure.” Ingrid’s voice cracks and it looks like she’s about to cry.

Alexia is quick to regain her composure.

“Ok, we messed up. But, we can make this right. In the time I go to her house, talk and get her to come out, you all should do something. Plan a party and we’ll be there in like 1-2 hours. Got it?” The girls nod, seemingly ready to organise something not too big but enough to make up for what they didn’t know.

“Ingrid do you want to come with me?” The captain asks the Norwegian who nods, saying farewell to her girlfriend and teammates. You were very close with her, she took you under her wing a lot and you looked up to her.

- - - - -

You’re crying on your couch when there’s a knock on the door, thinking it’s preachers you ignore it, hoping they’ll leave. Only, the noise gets louder so you wipe your tears and trudge slowly toward the door.

Upon opening, Alexia and Ingrid immediately wrap you in a bone-crushing hug.

“What’s this for?” You say, you thought they’d forgotten about you.

“Don’t act like you don’t know, we’re sorry we didn’t know it was your birthday. We’ll make it up to you.” At Alexia’s words you start crying again.

“No Ale, it’s fine. I shouldn’t have expected anything. I didn’t tell you guys.” You say, feeling slightly bad.

“Elskling, no matter what we should’ve known, were your teammates and we didn’t even do any digging to find it. We made no effort before when we should have. Don’t ever feel like you should dismiss it. It obviously means something.” At her rant, you seem to understand her words as they compute in your mind.

“We did bring you something though nena. One from me and one from Mapi and Ingrid. Then we are going for a drive, ok?” You nod gratefully and get ready for what the two are giving you.

“Here you go.” Ingrid is first, she gives you two small boxes. You open the first one and it’s the Miss Dior perfume you’ve wanted for ages but haven’t ended up getting because you were too busy.

“I- thanks Ingrid.” You beam, she smiles softly back and points to the other one, you open it up carefully revealing a Dior charms bracelet. Your mouth opens wide.

“This is… thank you so much!” You place it down wrapping Ingrid in a hug.

“I’m glad you like it, I heard you said Dior was your favourite designer so I just figured.” It seems your broken heart from before was sealing up because she remembered something you’d told her weeks ago.

Alexia watches the interaction, smiling and happy to see you happy. Not the shell of a person you were at training because they forgot.

Luckily for her and Ingrid, there was a mall on the way to your house with many shops which would definitely satisfy what they needed to get you.

After speaking to Ingrid, you turn to Alexia who is also grinning and hands you a box.

“Aquí.”

You unwrap it, it’s quite big and heavy. When seeing the contents your eyes widen.

“Is this…” She nods her head, smirking. It’s a PS5, Alexia had been pretty strict on no video game consoles considering she wanted you to have a healthy sleep schedule.

“I didn’t think you’d ever allow it- Thank you Ale.” You bring her into a hug before unwrapping it fully and staring at the three things you had received in awe.

“Come on, get dressed we have places to be.” Alexia pulls you from your staring, you get dressed pretty quickly and you’re out of the house in 15 minutes.

- - - - -

You arrived at Patri’s house a little later and walked inside. The rest of the team were there, balloons everywhere and most importantly a cake with 19 on it being brought over by Frido.

Everyone’s singing and your face heats up at all the attention, feeling warm because of the love you’re receiving at the current moment.

When the singing dies down the Swede whispers to you softly.

“Make a good wish kid, it’ll be great.” You nod blowing out the candles and get given a knife to cut down the middle. It’s a pretty plain cake, but if you’re going to be honest you always loved when cakes weren’t so detailed.

The rest of the evening went by in bliss, people apologising and overall having a great time. Yes, they might’ve forgotten. But, they knew their mistake and made this the best birthday you’d ever had.

—————————————————————————

Finally wrote this.. I took too long to write it i’m sorry anon

can you tell what designer i like? (miss dior smells so good i feel rich when wearing it)

anyways i literally need to stop eating original kebab, like it’s so good and taking too much of my money PLEASE

[noemilivv]

hey! i love your stuff and think its pretty cool

just wondering if i could get a lucifer fic where the reader is like, adams sister? (lets ignore the lore for a sec) and shes like him but toned down a tad and less straight up bad. and they kinda date in heaven a bit before he falls and then shes sad and ends up falling aswell eventually and he gets all blushy flustered when he sees her again in charlies hotel and charlies just really confused

also maybe a quick flash to him mocking adam abt how he not only stole both his wives but also his sister

sorry if this is written badly i never send requests :>

this is actually rlly cute wtf

anyway, yes ofc i can write it for you, here you go!!

Warnings: Fem!Reader, Sexual References (No Smut)

“Mr. Took-Yo-Sis!”

Lucifer x Adam’s Sister!Reader

Lucifer had his fair share of significant others in his life, but there was only one that he truly loved, Y/N.

They had a relationship during his time in Heaven, which was eventually cut short as he fell not long after.

Y/N’s brother, Adam, didn’t like Lucifer, in the slightest. Lucifer had been with two of Adam’s wives, and he was not happy about that.

Unbeknownst to Lucifer, his beloved, had fallen not long after he did. But that was about to change.

Charlie, your first friend in Hell, was getting her rehabilitation hotel set up for her fathers arrival, various decor was hung, and (burnt) cookies were baked.

Charlie stood next to the door before taking a deep breath, “Okay everyone.” She said, getting ready to open the door, “It’s showtime!”

“Charlie!” A man’s voice says, you couldn’t see him, but his voice rings a bell.

“Hey da-” The blonde man runs up to his daughter, and squeezes her tightly, you finally got a good look at his face and… holy shit, it’s Lucifer.

“Oh, it’s so good to see you!” He exclaimed in a babyish tone, yep, Lucifer. “It’s uh, good to see you too, dad!”

Luci let’s go of his daughter after a moment, Charlie steps to the side, presenting to her father “Welcome to the Hazbin Hotel!” She says, as confetti pops out of two of Pentious’ non working canons.

“Wait…” Lucifer murmurs, before his eyes widen.

“Y/N?!”

You grin, ‘Fuck yes, he remembers me!’ You think to yourself.

“Hi again, Luci.” You say, a wide smile present on your face, as you approach him.

You both smile at eachother, before some incoherent, awkward mumbles are exchanged, ‘Shit, I did not think this through.’ You thought. Then both just settle on giving eachother an awkward but friendly hug.

“Uh… Dad?” Charlie said, focusing both of your attentions to her, “You know eachother?”

“Oh, me and dear Y/N here go way back, we used to fling around if ya know what I mean!” Luci said, pointing finger guns at his daughter awkwardly, as she gave an awkward yet also disturbed smile, as your face flushes a bright red.

Vaggie steps forward. “Wait. Y/N? Like the Adam’s sister Y/N?” She asks, eyeing you in shock, “Heh. Yeah. A lot has happened since I fell.” You say bashfully.

Everyone kinda stares for a moment, sort of in shock, they had no idea you had a relationship, let alone you fell from Heaven, let alone you were Adam’s sister.

“So uh…” Lucifer starts awkwardly. “Who’s up for pancakes?”

Bonus Scene -

“So this is what you’ve been up to since Eden? Gotta say, you’ve let yourself go.” Lucifer jokes, as Adam attempted to toss him around. “You judging me? You’re the most hated being in all of creation!” Adam says, flying after him.

“Well you’re first wife didn’t seem to hate what I had to offer her.” He said, putting a ‘V’ to his lips with his fingers. “Or the second.” He spoke, continuing to fly. “Or Hell, even your sister!” He said laughing, thrusting his hips back and forth, referring to what they’ve done in bed. “Bicka-chow-cho!”

“I will fucking end you!” You heard your brother scream to your (ex)boyfriend.

[haveihitanerve]

Oliver Queen was quite certain he was going to die. He had been holding in a laugh for the past ten minutes, which was dangerous under any circumstances, and downright fatal if it was an explosive, loud and hearty laugh, which this one was. Especially considering that no one else seemed to be as tickled as he was, and if he did laugh, he would be laughing at the Batman. The thing was, that Batman had brought his own coffee mug and thermos to the Watchtower (because apparently their coffee wasn't good enough, or something, as batman hadn't exactly offered an explanation) and both had phrases on them that would be amusing belonging to anyone, and were downright hilarious due to the fact that they belonged to Batman. The thermos said “I’m not saying I’m Batman, I’m just saying you’ll never see me and Batman in the same room together” which, sadly, no one else seemed to have even looked twice at, and his mug, which had a large black bat on it, which said “We’re a Batty little family”. Both items were very much not helping Oliver to win his fight with his mirth, when Batman caught his eye. “Oh shit.” he muttered when the Bat began to move towards him. Well, he was bound to die anyway. “Nice mug.” Oliver greeted the second Batman got close. To his surprise, Batmans lips twitched upward. “Thank you. My children got it for me. I’m surprised you're the first to mention it.” Oliver looked at him in surprise. “Oh my freaking gods.” Batman, the Batman, wanted people to comment on his mug. He was proud of it. Oliver finally released his cackle, and Batmans smile grew marginally in delight. “Oh man that is priceless.” Oliver chuckled when he had finally gotten himself under control. “But hey, kids are like that. I mean, mine got me a shirt with two arrows pointing up, with a bow that was sideways beneath it to make a simile face.” Oliver sketched on his own shirt with his finger to display the image. Batman chuckled lightly. “Thats… quite funny.” “Yeah.” Oliver agreed, thinking back with a smile how often he wore it, and Roy’s delight every time. “My kids,” Batman added, drawing Oliver out of his thoughts. “Got me a tie that says, uh, “Worlds Best Dad In Gotham. Which… o-k i guess..” Oliver stared at him agape before absolutely losing it at the tone with which Batman had quoted his tie. “That is… brilliant.” Oliver wheezed, wiping a tear from his eye. “Wow. Wow wow wow wow wow.” Oliver smiled with relish. “I love that.” Batman smiled back. “I do too.” “Uh, green arrow? Whats so funny?” Green Lantern called over. “Oh nothing, nothing.” Oliver called back. “Just some uh.. Dad jokes.” Hal made a noise of confusion, but Batman chuckled lightly. “Dad jokes?” Green Lantern asked, utterly befuddled. Batman and Green Arrow grinned at each other.  

Oliver Queen was quite certain he was going to die. He had a meeting in Gotham today, which was always long and boring, especially since he usually only dealt with the lower members of Wayne Enterprises. Not that he had anything against status, not really, it was only that they were always such a drag, and it was clear they wanted a higher lifestyle. But, to his surprise, when Oliver walked into the meeting room, the CEO of WE was actually present, sitting at the head of the table in deep discussion with a man Oliver vaguely remembered was named something Fox. Lucy? “Ah, Ollie, so good of you to meet with us!” Boomed a voice and Oliver turned in surprise to see Bruce Wayne. “Bruce? Hey man! I didn't know you’d be here!” Oliver grinned in surprised delight, offering the other man a quick hug. Bruce shrugged, sipping some coffee. “I’m just here as a chauffeur. I’m taking Timmy out after this, but I’ll be a part of the meeting if you want some decent conversation.” He winked and Oliver laughed. “Not that my son isn't a good conversationalist.” He added. Oliver waved a hand, moving to his seat and offering the kid a quick smile. Tim glanced over, offering a wave before returning to his heated debate. “Naw I know he is. Wasn't expecting you guys to be here. Glad you are though.” Oliver sighed in relief. Bruce hummed in acknowledgement, taking a seat next to him. “Well I’m glad to see you too Ollie, theres, actually something I want to tell you.” At that, his son finally looked over for more than a second, something gleaming in his eyes. “Oh?” Oliver asked intrigued, leaning forward. That was when he saw it. Tucked just barely beneath the lapel of Bruces suit jacket…. A tie. A tie that said “Worlds Best Dad in Gotham. Which… O-k I guess..” Oliver sat back like electrocuted. Bruce and Tim watched him carefully, and Fox gave a very good impression of looking out the window. “You- uh- you're.” Oliver cleared his throat and Bruce leaned in intently. “Yes?” “Your tie.” Oliver blurted. “Its… nice. My friend has one too.” Bruce raised an eyebrow. “Does he?” He lifted his mug, which had a large black bat on it, and sipped. Oliver swallowed. “W-why me? Why now?” Bruce shrugged, glancing over at his son who was now also doing a very good job of admiring the ceiling tiles. “Because I trust you. And because I need a good friend.” Oliver smiled weakly. “Well, you already had that in Brucie.” Bruce smiled softly. “I know. But friendship requires trust. And Batman needs all the friends he can get.” Oliver chuckle lightly. “So… Dad jokes was the way to go huh?” Bruce smiled, pleased, leaning back. “Yep. Dad jokes.” Bruce Wayne and Oliver Queen grinned at each other. 

[ghoulfuckersincorporated]

Thank you for your service to the ghoul fucker community 🫡🤠

You mentioned that you have more headcanons for the Ghoul, can you share them with us? NSFW or SFW it is up to you

SFW Cooper Howard/The Ghoul Headcanons 2

(Follow-up to the SFW Prewar!Coop headcanons I posted here.)

I've said this before, but I firmly believe that this man doesn't sleep. Based on what we've seen about ghouls over the course of the franchise, I think that food, water, and sleep are basically optional; something that helps them feel and run better, but not things they can't survive without. With sleep comes vulnerability, both physical vulnerability and the vulnerability of being subjected to dreams. Cooper doesn't want to dream. His unconscious brain isn't nearly as good at shoving all the unpleasant things he doesn't want to think about down as his conscious brain is. The only true "sleep" he gets is when he's been knocked unconscious, whether that be by some enemy of the Wasteland or by one too many substances. He still will typically pick a spot to stop for 5-6 hours a night, put his feet up, get a little extra intoxicated. Sometimes he rests his eyes and feigns sleep when things feel especially calm.

He is a YAPPER! I've seen so many people theorize that for season 2 Lucy is gonna talk The Ghoul's ear off on their walk to New Vegas...I respectfully disagree. Have you ever met an old man? They never shut the fuck up at the best of times and this one has been without real companionship for so long; now that he's got an audience, he's never without something to say. I mean, the man was fancy waterboarding Lucy and standing there monologuing about some shit he read in the newspaper 200 years ago because he's lonely.

This man will absolutley start falling in love with you if you get ANY of his jokes or weird little references he makes to shit that hasn't existed in forever. Even if that's the first time he has positive feelings towards you, he's officially on that path. It would be a moment of genuine human connection, the kind he hasn't felt in so long. Even if it's innocuous, the poor thing is immediately gonna be a little obsessed with you.

Have fun if he DOES start falling in love with you, because initially it'll make him even more unpleasant than he usually is. He's confused at first, then he's annoyed by it when he realizes what he's feeling. He's gone this long without having to deal with that on top of everything else. Both emotions come with a hearty side of frustration and anger, as well as a general defensiveness you won't be able to wrap your brain around until his (reciprocated) feelings eventually come to light.

Marriage doesn't really exist in the same form he knew before, but if he was serious about you, he'd still wanna marry you. Depending on where you come from, whether you're a vault dweller or not, you might not even fully understand what he's asking when he proposes (which he would definitely still scrounge up a ring for, by the way; it wouldn't feel right to him if he didn't give you one). He takes it just as seriously as he took it the first time, and he's determined to be the husband he knows he's capable of being to you.

Not a headcanon so much as a musing, I suppose, but hear me out: what if the duster he wears is from the first person he ever cannibalized (or something similar)? Much to wonder about.

[vampirevatican]

Looking at saved photos of him...

pairing: om! brothers x reader

summary: the bros find you reacting to something on your phone. a huge smile, blushing, covering your mouth, or muttering things to yourself. they would've never guessed you were looking at them

note: whenever i see my fave boys, especially mammon, i think about how they'd react so i made this

Lucifer

remember. he is pride personified.

sure it's not an arrogant pride, more so stubborness

but!! in this case? oh yeah he knows he's hot shit and he couldn't be happier

funniest part is that the mfer usually has a smug and calm look on his face so when he's thinking about how you were just grinning over photos of him it doesn't really show to others

Mammon

he's boasting...

instantly in the HoL group chat he's going on and on about how he's better

how you ramble on and on over just looking at photos of him

he WILL NOT stfu about it... unless one of his stronger brothers makes him (lucifer or satan specifically)

would start sending you pictures of him at modeling jobs

Leviathan

oh he's flustered and confused

how could you blush over a smelly, bastard, gross otaku like him

and then he hears how sweetly you talk about him and he just gets more flustered and embarrassed

going over some of the pictures with him? maybe you'll build his confidence a bit

although im certain he'd still be fumbling his words and in awe at how you see him and love him

he's going to cherish this for a long time

Satan

he is his father's daughter son.

by that i mean to say that he's prideful about it but he's not focused on him and it being a natural fact like luci

and it's not bc out of all his brothers you're reacting like this about him like mamo or levi

nah this is him being better than lucifer. this is about you seeing him for him. this is about loving him from cute cat pics, rage and handsome

Asmodeus

it's worse than lucifer... mainly because he lives and breathes the reality that he is the most gorgeous thing in all the three realms

would constantly tease you over it

anytime you simply glance at him? "take a picture, darling. it'll last longer." (affectionate)

and me? personally? i'd wanna wipe the smirk off of his face

but for the folks who are in love with him?? you take multiple pictures instantly which he poses for ofc

you now receive every selfie he takes before he posts it on devilgram

Beelzebub

doesn't think much of it but is very happy about it

seeing you happy makes him happy, he's simple like that

at the same time he is very emotional intuitive, so he knows that when you swoon over the pictures it's more too it than his looks

hell the photos and your muttered words say it too, and he actually holds onto how sweet it all is

really makes his day that he's more than just brawn or someone who eats a lot to you...

he feels warm inside when you say he's your baby

Belphgor

he can look like he doesn't care, he can sound like it

but know for sure he's teasing you

and that teasing is the only way he can actually tell you he wants you to look at him more

being the baby, the seventh, and the least active/present brother he demands and needs the attention

might be sweet and smile at you more when you lock eyes, or just when he sees you... maybe even smiles in his sleep when hearing your voice or sensing your presence

i feel like he'd tease you if he catches you staring at him one day by saying "take a picture it'll last longer" (derogatory)

but please take pictures of him, he appreciates the attention

[bella-rose29]

Deck the Halls (and not your partner) - Part 1

Anthony Lockwood x fem!reader, enemies to lovers, fake dating, set at Christmas (because I'm feeling festive)

Word count: 3.1k

Warnings: swearing, lockwood is an arse, so is the reader, it's enemies to lovers what were you expecting really, Norrie is alive for the plot, I am British so if you're confused about words then that's why, mentions of extended family members being meanies, I think that's it?

Tag list is at the bottom (it's getting too long to put up here now), and as always if you would like to be added to/removed from it, then ask here or send me a note! <3

series master list

"Shit! Shit, shit, shit, shit, shit!"

It was safe to say that Y/n L/n was not having a good morning.

George had been watching her over the top of his paper while she paced the living room on the phone, his eyebrows changing between furrowing and raising as he tried to figure out what was happening with only one half of the conversation.

"Are you... alright?" He wasn't the best at this sort of thing, but when it came to his friends he tried to put some sort of effort in to show that he cared about them. Y/n huffed, pinching the bridge of her nose and looking like she was about to break into tears. If that happened George would have to go and get Lucy, because he definitely had no idea how to deal with Y/n when she cried. Normally he went and made her tea and plated up some biscuits, and she always accepted with a grateful smile and a lot of sniffles and let him leave again when he stood awkwardly near her, shuffling his feet on the spot.

He got the feeling that wouldn't be happening now, and he'd be held hostage instead.

"It's my mum. You know I've got this family Christmas thing coming up, right?" She paused while George nodded, taking her hand away from her face to see his reaction, then continuing on as she gestured wildly. "She seems to think I have a boyfriend, which I absolutely do not-"

"What, really?" George exclaimed sarcastically, pressing his hands over his heart in mock surprise. Y/n glared at him, looking incredibly non-threatening in her very jolly Christmas jumper. He resisted the urge to snort, knowing full-well that his friend spent most of the time complaining whenever relationships were the topic of conversation, since she couldn't understand why she was still single.

"As I was saying," another glare was aimed his way, "Mum thinks I have a boyfriend, and my aunt overheard her on the phone just now talking about my non-existent boyfriend, and it was Aunt Linda-"

"The one who gossips to everybody?"

"Yes!" Y/n jabbed a finger in George's direction, expression wild and fierce. "The one who gossips to everybody! So by now I think my entire fucking extended family and every single family friend knows that I have a boyfriend, who does not exist, and thinks that he's coming to our family Christmas in the middle of fucking nowhere!"

"I thought it was your childhood town?"

"Which is in the middle of nowhere! Genuinely nothing but fields and forests and the general countryside for miles and miles. Oh, and to top that all off, my cousin will be there-"

"The bitchy one who makes you feel like shit who you also thought wasn't coming this year?"

"Yes. Her. And Linda is her mum so Steph'll definitely know." Y/n finished, throwing herself into the sofa with a groan, turning over slightly, and screaming into a pillow.

George was about to stand up and head to the kitchen to put the kettle on (Y/n normally screamed not long before crying full-out) when Lockwood poked his head through the door, frowning at the sight before him.

"Everything alright?"

"Y/n's having a crisis. Fancy a cuppa, Lockwood?" George properly got up now, glad that another member of the household was here to deal with the situation. Lockwood nodded, then frowned again when he realised that George was escaping and shutting the two of them in a room together. Lockwood absolutely could have left anytime he wanted, but it was likely that Y/n thought he'd volunteered for the role of caretaker and couldn't leave without looking like an arse, or starting yet another argument between the two of them.

George breathed a sigh of relief, then made for the kitchen. He'd need a cup of tea in a minute when Y/n realised who was there to comfort her.

~~~

"The fuck do you want, Lockwood?"

"I- uh... what's... what's the problem?" His voice sounded pained, like he really didn't want to be in the room, and Y/n rolled her eyes.

"If you don't care, then leave," she said, attempting to hide the wobble in her voice at the thought of having to find someone to drag to her family gathering for three days, where she would be interrogated and prodded and poked and watched every second of every minute of every day, and criticised for every tiny thing she did. She was dreading it, really, but at least the third day would just be her immediate family and her non-existent boyfriend. The first two days would be filled with inquisitive relations that hadn't seen her since last year, wondering about her job and why she hadn't pursued something more stable, or asking about her love life (that was completely uneventful) and why she wasn't thinking about settling down.

Lockwood's frustrated sigh brought her out of her thoughts, and she pulled her face out of the pillow enough to see him clenching his jaw as he studied the wall with a lot more interest than it deserved. "Fine. Vent if you need to. Can I help at all, or are you going to get on my nerves until you leave?"

"Do you always have to be such a dick, Lockwood? Or are you like that because you're compensating?"

"Fuck off."

"Lovely comeback," she snapped, turning to lie on her back, staring up at the ceiling instead of at her boss' face. If she looked at him any longer she might bore holes through his head with the intensity of her glare. Neither of them said anything for a minute, the only sounds the clock ticking away in the corner, counting down to her imminent doom, and George in the kitchen making tea. "My family thing, this weekend. Everyone thinks I'm bringing my boyfriend."

"You don't have a boyfriend though."

"I know that, Lockwood. But my family think that I do have one, and now I have less than forty-eight hours to find one." She heard him snort, and squeezed her eyes shut in the hopes that it would block out his next words.

"Good luck with that. Maybe Kipps'll volunteer? He needs the free food."

"Can't you have just the tiniest bit of sympathy for me?" She pushed up, moving to sit and direct her frustration at Lockwood. "I am in a near-impossible situation here and you're being insufferable right now!"

"Maybe you should take Lockwood," George said, and Y/n jumped at the sound of his voice in the living room.

"Where the fuck did you come from?" she asked, already eyeing up the plate of biscuits on the tea tray. "Wait," Y/n paused as she properly registered George's words. "Take him?" Lockwood looked just as horrified by the idea of it, shaking his head frantically.

"Yeah. Oh, here's your tea, Y/n/n."

"What about you, George?! Surely you could come along and help me out instead?!"

"I thought I told you already, I'm going to my own family's house for Christmas. Lucy's going to stay with Norrie, and Holly's spending the holidays with her girlfriend. Lockwood's alone, in this big old house, and you've got limited time and also limited options." Y/n was annoyed at how right George was, but she wasn't giving in so easily. Not when giving in meant spending three days with the one person she despised more than anything in the world.

"Fine, if you have no other options by the time you need to leave, I'll go with you. But I will not enjoy a second of it if I do," Lockwood finally ground out, and Y/n had to fight back a look of surprise at his words.

"You- what?"

"It saves being in this house alone over Christmas. I've done that one too many times now, and at least your family will be a distraction. And," he added, "a great way to see all your baby photos." His smile was wolfish, and Y/n wondered how anybody ever found it charming.

"Alright. But I'm finding someone else, so it looks like you'll have to miss out on this one I'm afraid." Her smile was simpering, sugar sweet and sickly with how faked it was.

George looked between the two of them, then sank back into his armchair with his tea. "That's that sorted then."

~~~

It was absolutely not sorted.

Y/n was panicking. A lot. Apparently nobody fancied spending Christmas with some random agent for three days in the literal middle of fucking nowhere with her entire extended family, which was incredibly inconvenient for Y/n.

She now was supposed to be leaving in roughly two hours, and was frantically shoving the last few things in her suitcase while phoning anybody that she could attempt to pass off as her fake boyfriend.

Anybody that meant she didn't have to take Lockwood.

Perhaps if he wasn't such an asshole all the time, she'd be less reluctant, but since the first day they'd met he'd been rude to her.

It had been after a job, three years ago back when she was a solo agent taking any work that meant she could keep a roof over her head and food in her belly. Her night had been long, making her tired and weary with how much her bones ached, and she was hardly looking where she was going when she turned the corner onto her street, making her bump into a tall figure. Her first thought when the two of them stumbled away from each other was how gorgeous this boy was, and her second was how utterly awful his personality was. She had apologised before she could see his face, already muttering excuses and explaining her lack of coordination, but within seconds he was opening his mouth and talking, telling her that she should have been more alert and "could she not stand on his shoes, they're new" and she'd taken a proper look at him and decided that yes, he was pretty, but he was also not particularly nice.

Then a few months later she'd seen an ad in the paper for a small agency that had needed a new agent, preferably with strong Touch, and had chosen to go along for an interview. What she hadn't expected was the boy from that night to be the one interviewing her, and evidently he was just as shocked to see her, his expression quickly settling into a frown.

"No thank you. We don't want careless agents like you, thank you very much." His words had stung more than she cared to admit, making the backs of her eyes prick and her throat close up with emotion. She'd almost turned tail and walked out the door (something she very rarely did), but a girl dressed mostly in blue and with an excited smile on her face came in to the room, asking if this was their new recruit. Apparently the boy couldn't say no to her, or the other girl that appeared a few moments later with her clothes all neat and ironed, or indeed the other boy with glasses and curly hair who had ketchup stains on his t-shirt. Within minutes of the three of them arriving in the room, Y/n had a job at the company as an agent with a strong sense of Touch, and was being given a biscuit and a cup of tea.

She had quickly learned that the first girl was Lucy, the second was Holly, and the curly-haired boy was George, and then Lockwood had introduced himself as the head of the company.

"Don't you have... supervisors?" she had asked, confused as to just how this company worked exactly.

"No." His smile had been tight, and he had left the room right after, pushing past his colleagues and heading up the stairs. Lucy had been quick to fill in the rest, explaining all the answers to every question that Y/n had, with Holly and George chipping in when she forgot something.

Lockwood had continued his behaviour from that day ever since, despite Y/n's best efforts to get him to like her, and eventually after a few months of attempted friendship offers, she gave up and leaned into the whole hating each other schtick that was apparently happening.

So no, she did not want to have to bring Lockwood to her family gathering for three days and pretend to love him. She didn't want to do that at all.

Unfortunately, it was starting to look as though she wouldn't have a choice.

~~~

"Well? Please? Come on, I never beg for anything from you."

"I know, and I'm actually rather enjoying it."

"Prick," Y/n muttered, frowning at Lockwood. "You said that you'd do it if you had to. Well, you have to. So pack your bags and let's go; the train's in an hour."

"Fine. But I am not happy about this." He made his way back inside his bedroom, leaving Y/n stood outside the door (she refused to cross the threshold of this one particular room).

"Oh, because I am personally so ecstatic about this situation!" Her voice was thick with sarcasm, and Lockwood paused in his packing to glare at her.

"It's not my fault you couldn't find somebody to pretend to date you for three days."

"No, but I'll blame you anyway."

"Charming."

"Hmm. Hurry up."

"We've got ages, stop fretting like a mother."

"The train leaves in an hour, and it takes ten minutes to get there. Then you have to factor in maybe five to ten minutes of traffic, and difficulties getting through the gates at the station which is what, another five minutes? And then if there are any problems with the actual trains then we want to be early just in case so that a plan can be made to get a different one, and also if there aren't any problems then we at least want to be there early so that we can get on first and get a table. So no, we haven't got ages, we've got minutes before we need to go. Hurry up."

Lockwood had been staring at her in disbelief while she talked, his jaw slack and his eyes wide, but when Y/n glared at him again he went back to packing. "You really think that much about travelling?"

"There is so much that can go wrong with trains, so yes."

"Fine," Lockwood huffed, coming out of his room to cross into the bathroom, grabbing his wash bag out of the cupboard and shoving a toothbrush and flannel in. "Where's the toothpaste?"

"I've got some, so we can share. Trust me, you don't want to share with George. He's like a dragon with the way he hoards his toothpaste."

Lockwood gave her a weird look as he zipped up the bag, heading back into his room to finish stuffing items into the large bag he was taking with him as luggage. Y/n was sure he'd repurposed a kit bag for this, but if it meant she wasn't having to explain to everyone why she had failed at bringing a boyfriend that didn't even exist then she supposed she could forget about where the kit was currently being stored.

"Ok, I think that's everything," he said, running a hand through his hair as he stood up, yanking the bag up and over his shoulder. He was still in a suit, which Y/n thought was ridiculous since they didn't even have any meetings today other than the one with her family, and when they made it to the bottom of the stairs he grabbed his jacket and signature long coat. Y/n was already in her own winter coat, thick scarf wrapped around her neck and gloves poking out her pocket, her boots echoing throughout the building. They were the only two left now, since the other three had already left for their own Christmas celebrations, so Lockwood had to spend an extra minute finding the keys to lock up, and then another minute trying to put them back in his pocket. In the end, Y/n was so frustrated with how long he was taking that she snatched the keys from his hand and shoved them in the chest pocket on the inside of his coat, turning and dragging her small suitcase behind her into the pre-booked taxi.

"Sorry, he takes a while to do things every now and then. He's immensely stupid," she said, smiling at the driver as the man put her suitcase in the boot of his taxi. He looked concerned, frowning up at Lockwood where he was coming down the stairs, then nodded slightly, his expression morphing into confusion.

The drive itself was fast, and there were no problems at the station, but Y/n still couldn't help but feel that something would go wrong on their journey to her parents' house.

"The only thing that's wrong-"

"Don't say that, you bastard!"

"-is me being here."

"Oh. Well, that's true."

"Why couldn't you have just gone on your own?"

"You'll see when you meet everyone. Are you... will you be alright? I mean, it's literally everybody still alive in my family along with all of our close friends, which is near on fifty people, all in my parents' house."

"What are you trying to say?" Lockwood's expression was stony, and a coldness had come into his eyes that Y/n had only ever seen back when she was trying to be his friend and asked about his family. She had since learned that they had died when he was young, and had steered well clear of the subject afterwards.

"I just... it's a lot for me, and I do this every year. I can't imagine how awful this'll be for someone who's..." she trailed off, trying to find the right words.

"Who's family is dead?" Lockwood asked, more forcefully than he needed to.

"No, I didn't mean-" Y/n said.

"Sure," he cut her off, tone sharp and as bitter as the wind that was whipping around them. She tried to speak again, but he scoffed and turned away before she could explain what she had really meant by her words. Lockwood didn't seem to be relenting anytime soon, instead choosing to stare out at the tracks with a clenched jaw. The conversation died, and they didn't say a word until the train pulled up to the platform and they were attempting to find a good seat.

When they were finally sat down, bags secure and able to relax a little, Y/n sighed softly at Lockwood's still tense figure. He wasn't looking at her, which she supposed was a good thing because generally when he looked at her he was coming up with something rude to say. But if they wanted this to work, they needed to be talking.

And apparently, Y/n had pissed off her fake boyfriend.

Ugh, she thought. This is going to be a fucking shitshow.

part 2

Tag list (hopefully this is everyone): @anathemaloren, @augustisintheair, @avdiobliss, @briar-rose23, @curseofhecate, @dangelnleif, @el-de-phi, @ell0ra-br3kk3r, @informedimagining, @karensirkobabes, @locknco, @mischivana, @mitskiswift99, @mrsklockwood, @mrsyixingunicorn10, @no-morning-glories, @novelizt, @ran23sblog, @superpositvecloudshipper, @t2sh0, @taygrls, @tournesol77, @whenselenefallsinlove, @wordsarelife

[psychesetra]

luci and alastor with a filipino ! reader

VERY. SELF. INDULGENT. ALASTOR'S WAS A TEST AND SHORT ASF BTW !!!!! LUCI'S WAS POSTED IN THE I LOVE LUCI COMMUNITY SO YEAH!!!!!!!

they say the same thing in filipino but i do think the oneshots are different enough :3

❤ al

your downfall to hell had been rather early, considering your age. a child of the 1900s, you were, yet you died in 1929 to a simple poison. walking around in hell was surprisingly.. normal. like walking down the streets, although with the addition of sinners screaming and.. other, noises. it took years after your death before someone recognizable dropped down. you and alastor had been friends since childhood, though only briefly. you had moved from your home country to new orleans due to your father missing the city, but moved back home after a year after his death. you didn't expect alastor to remember you in hell, let alone the detail that your home country was the philippines. but now, as he shook your hand, he greeted you with a smile not different to the one he had in life. "greetings, and good morning, my dear! it has been a while, has it not?" opening your mouth to reply with a witty remark, you do nearly get to say it before he adds, "or should i say.. magandang umaga, aking mahal na reyna."

(good morning, my beloved queen.) you freeze in surprise for a few moments, processing the fact he had quite literally spoken in your native. you had never cared to teach him, though, so how..? he chuckles, noticing your surprise, and continues, "i decided to make it a point to learn your native after your death, dear! it was a little hard, but it was worth it to see the shock on your face, hm?"

💛 luci !!!!

your death and subsequent arrival in hell was.. unexpected. you were a confusing case, having fallen asleep at the wheel and getting into an accident. ironically, the person you hit did not die, and you.. well, considering you're down in hell, it's mighty obvious. you weren't exactly the most religious person, so maybe divine judgement had been a little harsh on that. but hell.. wasn't as bad as you thought it would be. sure, there was fire and a shit ton of red and screaming, but it was still civilized, at least. but one thing you REALLY didn't expect? to meet the goddamn king of hell. you could hear the christians screaming for mercy when you first saw him, you swear. he was surprisingly friendly, albeit a little awkward (though that was adorable). you honestly wondered how on earth god had put the poor man down in hell all those millennia ago, he was nicer than a lot of people you'd met. really, much nicer, considering he'd cared to learn your native language. you just mentioned your nationality once in a conversation, just a "oh, by the way," that you thought he'd forget. you were sure he didn't know many filipino people like you, so he might not even remember what country you were from. but no, actually. months later, he still remembered, especially after the two of you became somewhat of an item (cue charlie's confusion as to whether or not you are now her parent). but you didn't know all that. weeeeeellll.. at least until this morning. you had woken up a little late this time, and to the smell of pancakes, no less. already, there was a smile on your face. the thought of him tinkering away in the kitchen was one that you found adorable. you started to do a few tasks for the day, bustling around the room, fixing things up. if he could surprise you with pancakes you could at least return the favor by cleaning up a little. later, as you were tidying up a few ducks on the desk (which is to say there were dozens of them), the door creaked open, and the scent of pancakes became noticeably stronger. "gooood morning, duckie!" he greets, setting down the pancakes on his desk with a grin that you think is one of the cutest things you will ever see in your (after?) life. you smile at him, opening your mouth to reply, before he adds, "or, should i say.. magandang umaga, aking mahal na reyna." (good morning, my beloved queen.) his grin seems a lot more smug now, especially when seeing your face of surprise. did he just.. speak in your native? filipino? did he seriously learn how to speak that for you? after a few moments of silence, he seems to get a tad bit nervous. "did i say that right..? i made sure to check a few times before, was my pronounciation off?" he asks, worriedly, mumbling. your surprise disappears the moment he speaks, as your own smile widens. "no, no, you're right, luci. that was wonderful." his face shifts from worry back to happiness, and as he's about to speak, you add, in the same manner as he did, "or should i say, tama ka, aking hari?" (you're right, my king.)

[bibuckkinard]

In the Name-Epilogue

Ao3 appears to be down at the moment, so I'll add the link when it's up, but here's the whole epilogue. Thanks for the support! Eventually, there's gonna be more. Almost certainly a honeymoon fic, but I have another idea I want to work on first.

Here we go!

Epilogue: Eddie

Eddie’s sipping a whiskey at the open bar when he spots Buck and Tommy holding court at their table, standing with their arms around each other, so damned happy that Eddie can practically feel it from across the room. He’s been keeping an eye out for trouble all night because you never know. There’s been too much his family has gone through in the last few years and Eddie will get Buck and Tommy through their wedding day if it kills him.

He’s gratified to see that the Buckley parents really have turned a corner, which he wouldn’t have believed had someone told him it would happen a year ago. Tommy had even danced with Margaret Buckley and he only looked a tiny bit uncomfortable so Eddie supposes he’ll count that as a win.

“Gross, right?”

Eddie looks to the side to see that Lucy Donato has sidled up next to him. She orders a beer and turns to him, looking at Buck and Tommy (who have shifted position just slightly, but somehow still have their arms around each other) a little wistfully.

“They’re so in love,” Lucy continues and Eddie snorts.

“Try being around them more,” Eddie says affectionately. “They really are like that all the time. Being married now will probably make it worse.”

Lucy laughs as she takes the beer the bartender just handed her.

“I’ve been around them enough to know in the last two years.”

“Fair enough. Doesn’t take much.”

“So, Diaz,” she says, taking a sip. “Wanna dance?”

He’s about to say ‘sure’ when he spots Maddie motioning to him from the entrance to the reception hall, giving him the hand signal that can only mean one thing.

“Shit,” Eddie mutters.

“What?” Lucy asks and he turns to her.

“Tommy’s dad’s here.”

Lucy’s face clears of confusion and Eddie thinks she must know enough because now she looks pissed. “Seriously? He’d actually show up?”

“Yeah, Maddie and I worked out a way to tell each other without letting on to Buck and Tommy.” Eddie looks towards them to see that they’re now talking with Hen and Sal. They’re facing the entrance hall and he looks at Lucy again.

“Hey, can you just make sure they stay distracted? I’m going to go take care of this.”

“Yeah,” she says. “Of course.”

Then she turns to where they’re standing and hollers, “Hey, Kinard!”

Eddie has the presence of mind to snort a laugh as both Buck and Tommy turn to her.

That works.

He walks calmly over to Maddie before following her out the door and to the entrance of the venue.

“He showed up about ten minutes ago,” Maddie says. “Amanda thought she could warn him off with the Persona Non-Grata, but that didn’t work and she sent another employee to find us.”

“God, what an asshole,” Eddie says. “Tommy says he made it very clear he wasn’t welcome.”

“I know.”

They get to the entrance and Eddie hears the smarmy, too polite, voice that reminds him nothing of the warm way Tommy tends to speak. Even if he’s shooting out one of his deadpan remarks, he never sounds like this, like the person he’s speaking to is so far beneath him, they’re not even work listening to.

“...my son’s wedding, and…”

“You’re not welcome here,” Eddie snaps, stepping in front of Amanda, who had glided back when she saw Eddie and Maddie.

George Kinard looks at him disdainfully. “And you are?”

Eddie rolls his eyes, not bothering to introduce himself. “I was there when you accosted Tommy at his former workplace.”

George scoffs. “Accosted, please. I simply went there to have a discussion with him.”

“In which you made it perfectly clear how you feel about him and his husband,” Eddie snaps. “You were told not to come and I’m here to enforce their wishes. Leave. Now.”

“And who do you think you are to talk to me like th-”

“Mr. Kinard,” a familiar voice says from behind Eddie and he turns to see Bobby and Athena rushing up, Athena holding up her badge. “I’m Sargent Athena Grant of the LAFD. You were warned not to come. If you don’t leave now, I will arrest you for trespassing.”

He sneers at her. “You wouldn’t.”

“Oh please, try me,” Athena says, planting her hands on her hips, looking authoritative and a little scary in her dark blue gown.

“Tommy and Evan don’t want you here. Go. Now.”

He looks at them all. “Well,” he says with another scoff. “I know when I’m not wanted.”

“Do you, though?” Eddie wonders and Maddie stifles a laugh next to him.

George gives them all one last disdainful look before spinning on his heel and stalking off to the town car waiting some distance away.

“Thanks, Athena,” Eddie says. “How did you know?”

“I spotted your little exchange in the doorway,” Athena says.

“When you didn’t come back right away, I figured there was trouble.”

“Come on.” Bobby wraps an arm around her. “Let’s head back inside. I think they’re going to cut the cake soon.”

They all troop back inside and Eddie knows he’s going to have to tell Buck and Tommy about this but when he spots them at a back table, Buck sitting on Tommy’s lap, an arm around his neck and kissing him sweetly, Eddie sighs.

He’ll tell them in a couple of days. He wants them to enjoy tonight.

For now, he’ll go find Lucy for that dance.

Tag list: @desert--moonchild, @sazzynatural, @multishippinghussy, @mmso-notlikethat, @tommy-kinard-buckley,

@sunnywithachanceofbi, @sleepywinchesters, @buck-up-buckley, @manifestingchaoticvibes, @corvid-cryptidd

@lbltpsmspenguin

[oceanlifeenthusiast]

OOC:

Can you imaginr what would happen if Lovecraft became president.

Louisa: Sir there's... there's an issue

Francis: Hm? Is this 'issue' going bankrupt?

Louisa: ...No...

Francis: Then it can't be that bad.

Louisa: Howard has become President.

Francis: I take back my words. WHAT.

Louisa: I don't know, either! H-He was just- somehow elected? I think Twain got him to run for president as a joke but-

Francis: And people genuinely voted for him?

Louisa: Apparently so...

Francis: ...Good GOD.

~

Nathaniel: Did you hear the news?

Margaret: Hm? What about?

Nathaniel: Lovecraft has been... elected for president.

Margaret: ...I beg your pardon?

Nathaniel: I am just as confused as anyone else.

Margaret: I reckon we're all done for by now.

Nathaniel: Only the Lord knows...

~

Mark: HOLY SHIT.

Lucy: What? What happened?

Mark: You know that idea I had that you said was pure insanity and wouldn't work?

Lucy: ...Which one?

Mark: The one regarding Lovecraft...

Lucy: Yeah, that really narrows it down, Twain.

Mark: Hey! But anyway- er, you know how I jokingly made Lovecraft run for president...?

Lucy: ...Don't tell me.

Mark: Yeah.

Lucy: Sigh.

~

Atsushi: Dazai, why is the being you fought now president of Yokohama?

Kunikuda: He's WHAT

Dazai: Oh, man.

[calmlb]

have some silly skk wedding hcs bc. idk i just wanted to yell w someone abt them

chuuya cries in sporadic bursts the day of but taken altogether it's like 3 hrs of hysterical sobbing

dazai doesn't cry at all because he slips into like a shocked fugue state the second he sees chuuya but he DOES bawl like a baby the next morning

nobody who attended remembers past like hour 4 of the wedding and six months later they're still uncovering some of the wild shit they did during the afterparty. this is because the wedding staff accidentally became part of the celebration and the photographer, who was supposed to record the whole thing, ended up sleeping with one of the cast. it was kunikida.

just to be obnoxious ranpo proposes to poe and chuuya has to be held back by a crying w laughter dazai from Physically Attacking Him

dazai insists on having a bouquet to throw, which he purposefully angles for akutagawa to catch. atsushi faints, lucy's face progresses from angry -> considering in real time (they r a throuple real)

chuuya picks his best man/maid of honor fairly easily (hirotsu and kouyou duh) but dazai basically told the ada to figure it out amongst themselves and come back to him with their decisions (he's lazy/genuinely didn't know who to pick and wanted to outsource) and there was Actual Violence

lots of drama over whether or not to invite mori and verlaine. turns out to be a nonissue bc all verlaine does is cry in a corner about a) rimbaud and b) holy shit my little brother is getting married and after hour 6 mori and fukuzawa disappear from the event (neither they nor anyone else remembers this. very lucky)

ango receives an invitation with no context and has like 3 mental breakdowns about what this means for his and dazai's relationship

7 hours in (it was a long party) kenji's cow somehow shows up (he swears up and down it wasn't him, everyone's very confused the next morning)

it was a sunset wedding, dazai wore white and chuuya wore blue

adam and shirase and some other members of the sheep are there. adam makes fast friends with kyouka, meanwhile the former sheep are very narrowly spared dazai's wrath, mostly bc he keeps forgetting they're even there. it's a big wedding

tachihara tried to drunkenly breakdance, gin laughed so hard she thought she got heart palpitations and was afraid for her life. she went to look for mori and walked in on him and fukuzawa. none of them remember this but now gin feels a vague sense of horror every time she looks at her boss and she's not really sure why

yosano tries rizzing kouyou up and fails by any normal metric (yosano: please please please please please please please please please please) but kouyou is Tipsy and Charmed

dazai does indeed burn the marriage certificate (TRY RETURNING ME WITHOUT A RECEIPT, CHIBI!!). chuuya is so in love he starts crying again

higuchi and tanizaki had philosophical discussions about life on the rooftop and accidentally solved the secrets of the universe. they do not remember this

kunikida returns from his steamy rendezvous with the photographer and immediately sets his sights on ango. drunk kunikida knows what he wants (twinkish men) and when he wants them (now). there is a reason one of the most important ideals in his notebook is to Not Drink

the guild is there and are generally having a good time until fitzgerald sees tsujimura (only there as ango's plus-one, got abandoned bc of drunk kunikida's machinations) and calls her a blue-haired liberal, and hey, what's a party without a brawl in the middle of the dance floor

between the guild and the wedding staff half the people at the party weren't even invited. which is why the doa and hunting dogs are also there

kenji, kyouka, q, elise, and aya are having a Kids' Party in a separate room with adam as an extremely enthusiastic babysitter (well, more like occasional check-in-er, he's swinging back and forth between the parties). tecchou joins them after a while and has a great time, as all except aya are extremely fascinated by his unholy food combinations

bram and lovecraft kickstart their enemies-to-lovers arc the second they set eyes on each other

fyodor, dazai, kajii, and nikolai start up a game of Knife Monopoly, to everyone's surprise the extremely determined caterer sweeps them all. sigma is smitten at once and immediately starts to flirt with her (the caterer is a milf who is seduced by sigma's transgender rizz, sigma will eventually have an entire 'convincing the stepkids' family movie arc)

teruko FUCKS IT UP on the dance floor, haruno is so impressed she immediately falls into her first disastrous sapphic crush

hirotsu and natsume mutually agree to restart their homoerotic situationship without ever even actually saying two words to each other, someone has to take skk's place now that they've more or less gotten their shit together

katai wasn't there physically but was supervising through security cameras. he's the only one who will ever know everything that happened that night and deleted the footage due to trauma :( sorry katai

tsujimura and mushitarou bond over how desperately they Do Not Want To Be There

skk Try to have a romantic wedding night(/morning, given how long the afterparty stretched) but they are both too drunk, chuuya trips and falls flat on his face and dazai laughs so hard he throws up

omg i started yapping and then i just didn't stop. i didn't even know i had this many thoughts in my head. i am sending this before i can regret it feel free to delete if u want to

anon. THESE ARE SO GOOD OMG???? i could literally visualize a whole fic just by reading these hcs

adding my comments under the cut so it doesn’t get too long 🫣

ok first of all… the skk crying hcs??? CANON OMG im so obsessed

Ranpo turning skk’s wedding into his engagement party is so true of him. he absolutely would

Dazai totally would insist on a bouquet to toss, & him throwing it at to Akutagawa is so funny 😭

SOMEONE SAVE ANGO PLS-

KENJI’S COW IM SOBBING it reminds me of that wan episode where Atsushi asks Dazai what Yosano needed & he was like “… a cow!” boba eyes & everything

i had never thought of Adam & Kyouka being buddies but my life is changed now tysm for this revelation

NOT GIN BEING SCARRED BY ZENKU SKK 💀 someone get my girl outta there

ok but tipsy + charmed Kouyou is a vision

Chuuya tells Dazai that burning the marriage certificate means they’re not married anymore & that’s when Dazai finally breaks down into tears

ok Higuchi & Tanizaki is another duo i never considered and i LOVE IT???

KUNIANGO SO TRUE

TSUJIMURA A BLUE HAIRED LIBERAL I AM SCREAMING

omg i love the kids party & skk are both good with kids so they definitely would make sure the kids are taken care of 🥹 Adam would be such a good babysitter, and Tetchou too??? omg giving me fic ideas with this one

super invested in this caterer x Sigma arc tbh

ykw i was thinking abt bsd rarepairs the other day & couldn’t figure out who to ship Teruko or Haruno with… should’ve thought of this honestly

SOMEONE SAVE KATAI TOO OMG THAT POOR MAN-

now that you mention it… i actually love the idea of Tsujimura & Mushitaro but i think it’s mostly bc her hair matches his suit PFFT

skk’s ideal honeymoon = SLEEP 😫

i’m so glad you didn’t stop yapping non, this was so wonderful tysm i feel blessed 🥹🩷 please feel free to yell abt hcs or say hi anytime!! 🫶🏻💕💕

[reminiscingtonight]

Head Over Heels

Leah Williamson x Reader

Word Count: 1.6k

[WOSO Masterlist]

Leah doesn’t mean to stare. Really, she doesn’t. 

But when you lift the bottom of your shirt to wipe away the sweat on your forehead, Leah can’t help the way her eyes drift down to your abs. You’re all fit, most girls having well defined muscles themselves, but something about yours has Leah biting down on her lip, staring unabashedly as she helps collect loose balls around the field. 

One of the girls shout at you, telling you to stop showing off your assets. The shirt stays in your hands, but you stop wiping at your face, confusion etched all over your expression. It’s sometimes cute how oblivious you are to your good looks and even better physique. 

Leah’s still watching when it finally clicks for you, the embarrassed smile turning into a knowing smirk. When you start posing, playing to the hoots of your teammates, Leah stumbles over her feet. 

And straight into Katie. 

The Irish woman lets out an indignant cry when she drops the stack of cones she just spent the last couple minutes picking up. “Leah!”

Somehow it takes the two of them longer to pick up the spilled cones than Katie did by herself. The two of them keep pushing each other, their laughter and jokes making the process ten times longer. By the time Leah remembers what got her in this mess in the first place, she doesn’t know how much time has passed. 

Leah raises her head to see you already looking her way. The second your eyes make contact, your smirk instantly fades into a shyer, more genuine smile again. Your hand raises in a half-wave greeting.

Leah ducks her head, a blush instantly spreading across her face.

---

As much as Leah loves football, she always dreads weight training. Yes, it’s important to build muscle and keep up her strength, but damn is it tiring and damn does it allow her mind to drift to many places it definitely should not be drifting to. 

Especially when you’re in view. 

You’ve just switched positions with Lucy, the defender having just finished her own reps. Lucy helps you get the weight off the rack, keeping a careful hand on your back until she’s sure you’ve got your feet firmly planted.

And then you start squatting. 

Leah has to fight the urge to groan. See, she would be fine if you were not checking your posture in the mirror or maybe just not standing right in front of her. But the problem simply lies in the fact that you are standing in front of her. And you are facing the mirror. Which means Leah’s getting an eyeful of your ass every time you go to squat.

Leah’s not sure how she’s going to survive conditioning today. 

The music playing overhead on the speakers cycles through song after song. The entire time Leah just watches you go through the motions of your own exercises. It isn’t until there’s a strangled wheezing sounding off from next to her that Leah rips her eyes away from you and back to where they should have been all this time. 

“Shit!” she hisses, quickly grabbing hold and racking Keira’s bar.

The first thing her best friend does is rub at her chest and hack out her lungs. Keira’s next act is to repeatedly whack at Leah’s thigh. 

Leah squeaks in response, instantly recoiling from the hits. 

“I cannot believe you risked my life to ogle (Y/N). She’s hot, I get it, but c’mon Leah.” Keira looks more amused than annoyed, but she still looks a bit annoyed nonetheless. 

“Hey, be happy you don’t have to see this every week.” Beth chuckles from her spot next to the other two Lionesses. “Leah’s about ten times worse when exposed to (Y/N) lifting weights back with the Arsenal girls.” The blonde striker ignores the glare Leah throws her way. 

“Let’s be honest, nothing’s worse than going to the beach with the two of them,” Keira jokes back.

Leah’s seconds away from strangling the two girls next to her when she notices movement from the corner of her eye. 

She refocuses her attention back towards you… just as you make eye contact with her through the mirror. 

Your eyes go wide at the same time Leah’s does. Your face burns a little bit when you realize she’s been watching you while hers does so for being caught. 

Leah awkwardly scratches at the back of her neck, wondering how in the world she’s going to explain this away when your look of surprise quickly morphs into one of amusement.

And then you wink. 

Leah jolts so suddenly that she slams into the weight rack, sending the loose weights crashing to the floor. 

---

Leah’s not sure why she thought taking a bunch of rowdy football players to a bowling alley was a good idea. But she did. And now here you all are. 

Some of the younger girls are causing a ruckus near the bowling lanes, another half of the team scampered away into the arcade the second you walked in. You’re sitting quietly at one of the tables in the back with Lia, the two of you deep in conversation while Leah and another group of the girls grab some food for the rest of you. 

She must’ve been staring too often, for she’s only just paid for the food when Caitlin starts poking fun at her. 

“Earth to Leah, Lia and (Y/N) aren’t going anywhere,” the Australian snickers. 

Caitlin’s observation catches Steph’s attention, the second Australian quickly jumping in on the fun. “If you stare any harder, you might burn the two of them into crisps.”

“The two of you are literally the worst,” Leah complains, face turning red from their teasing.

It’s rare to ever find a day when the team goes out and not have at least one of them make fun of the way Leah’s so obviously smitten with you. It always makes it all the more fun when you’re always oblivious to the way she stares or clumsily runs into things whenever you’re in her presence.

Good for Leah, she’s actually perfected tuning out most of the teasing. After all, you can’t really get far in life if you don’t have thick skin. It isn’t until both of the Australian’s eyes go wide, fixated right over her shoulder that Leah tunes back into the conversation. However, neither of them have a chance to say anything before Leah hears a familiar voice. 

“What’cha guys laughing at?”

Startled, Leah turns around, accidentally knocking over one of the cans next to her in the process. She watches with horror as it drops towards the ground. She’s mentally imagining the amount of work she’ll have to do to clean it up when a hand darts in front of her.

You snatch the can out of the air before it can make contact with the ground. 

“Hi,” Leah breathes out. 

Your grin turns dopey. “Hi, babe. I think you dropped this.”

Leah blushes when you hand her the soda can. 

“I’d wait a little bit before opening it.” You look over your shoulder mischievously. “Or give it to Katie.” 

Caitlin lets out a bark of laughter at your suggestion. “I think she might kill you if you did that.”

Eventually the four of you move on to another topic of conversation, hoping to kill more time until the rest of the food arrives. You’re unusually silent, more than content to rest your chin on Leah’s shoulder, hands wrapped around her waist. 

“Any reason why you’ve decided to come join us?” Leah hums during a lull in the conversation, relaxing against your arms. 

“Just missed you.” You shrug as if it’s the most obvious thing ever. 

Caitlin fake gags. “You guys are disgustingly in love.”

“As if you don’t do the same with your own girlfriend,” Steph snorts. She gives you a fist bump when you hold your hand out for one. 

“You’re supposed to be on my side,” the forward grumbles. 

“Not so fun when you’re on the receiving side now, isn’t it.” Leah tsks under the breath. 

All she receives is a death glare, one she is quick to ignore. 

When your food finally arrives, the two Australians are quick to depart. You and Leah take your time, carefully stacking the trays. 

You probably could’ve grabbed some more, but you seem content with having one hand pressed against Leah’s back. There’s really no reason for such a touch, but Leah couldn’t find herself to complain. 

Except for the fact that the feel of your hand is a little too distracting. 

Leah doesn’t even make it past the first set of stairs without nearly face-planting. It’s only your arm dropping to hook Leah’s waist that stops her from meeting an untimely demise 

“Sorry.”

“Don’t apologize. I think it’s cute when you stumble over your feet.” Your words are accompanied with a cheeky grin and a wink. 

So okay, yes, Leah might be a klutz whenever you’re near her. And your friends might all tease her for never being able to stay on her two feet. But at the end of the day, Leah wouldn’t have it any other way. As long as you’re there to catch her, she wouldn’t mind falling for you every day. 

[mayonnaise2004]

Meeting and dating Micheal Emerson Headcannons

You and Micheal met at a ‘Saxophone man’ concert.

You were trying to appreciate the music, but some boozer blond wouldn’t leave you alone. Micheal noticed this and walked over.

With a furrow of his dark eyebrows and a very deep pitched, ‘I suggest you get lost before I kick your tailbone so hard you end up looking like a PEZ dispenser.’ The blond scoffed and walked away.

You stood there, face deep red with blush as the handsome stranger in front of you asked if you were alright, snickering softly when you stuttered a ‘thank you’.

After getting to know you (and buying you a slushie with whatever pocket change he had), Micheal said goodbye and walked off the boardwalk.

Over the next few weeks, Micheal silently prayed he would see you again. So when he saw you talking with Lucy at Max’s store, he was a bit confused.

Turns out you also worked at the store, and had gotten along pretty well with the single mother.

His mom thinks your the sweetest thing, and is constantly trying to get Michael to bring you over for dinner

After a few more meetings (and extremely sweaty palms) Micheal mustered up the courage to ask you out.

Your first date was dinner at his place. It went terribly wrong (nanook drooled all over you, Sam had a fever, Lucy burnt the spaghetti sauce so you had to get takeout, and Micheal was embarrassed as hell.)

DATING HEADCANNONS

Michael is deeply in love with you, he would go to the ends of the earth for you.

‘Protecting’ Sam.

^ “Michael, apologize.” “That little shit did it first!” *insert Sam giggling behind you.*

Boardwalk/beach dates (which usually include Sam being a third wheeler)

Michael is a bit odd when it comes to PDA, some days he just wants to hold your hand, others he wants to be close enough to be inside your skin.

Lucy absolutely adores you, she thinks your a great influence to help tame Michaels new ‘attitude’.

Wearing each other’s jewelry

Holding hands under the table at family dinners

Play fighting in the pool/ocean

Drawing on his arms

Riding on the back of his dirt bike

Spending a lot of holidays at Michaels

He is adamant you shouldn’t go anywhere near David and his group, he really doesn’t need to deal with more vampires then he already does.

[flumpermergen]

Very important very canonical list of what BSD characters would say “urm what the sigma” either ironically or unironically

Dazai and Ranpo both say it ironically often back and forth to each other or to confuse the rest of the agency. Dazai especially would say it after a ten minute lecture by Kunikida in which Kunikida would respond with another ten minutes of yelling at him for not taking anything seriously.

Yosano says it once or twice when the moment’s right mostly to tease Kunikida for taking it so literally but not nearly as often as the other two.

Kyouka and Kenji heard Ranpo and Dazai say it and started repeating it even though neither of them understand what it means but it sounds funny.

Lucy joins in with Dazai and Ranpo in saying it especially towards Atsushi who doesn’t get it but just awkwardly laughs it off cause he doesn’t know how else to respond.

Tachihara said it once with the black lizards and again with the hunting dogs and both times was met with confused silence. He was trying to get a laugh but ended up just feeling hella cringy and never said it again out of embarrassment.

Gin actually did giggle when Tachihara said it but no one heard it under her mask. Now she mumbles it under her breath occasionally and once said it in front of Akutagawa who was also very confused.

In another life I firmly believe that Q would be an IPad kid who laughs at skibidi toilet jokes. If he ever were to canonically gain internet access he would defo laugh at and use the phrase unironically.

Take one look at Kajii and try to tell me he doesn’t say the most cringy chronically online shit every time he opens his mouth.

Nikolai starts saying it all the time the minute he hears the phrase. Everyone else just assumes it’s something he made up to annoy Sigma so they don’t question it. Meanwhile Sigma himself is initially confused as to why Gogol keeps using his name in vain like someone would to god. He increasingly gets more and more annoyed at it because it’s very obvious Nikolai is only doing it to make him upset. Once Sigma is at peak annoyance, Gogol starts replacing the word sigma with other words that start with the letter S like scallop or something to subvert his expectations. This only makes Sigma more annoyed as it’s obviously just a replacement for his name and its meaning remains the same. Although Sigma acknowledges how silly getting all worked up over something stupid Nikolai did is, he still can’t help it. Gogol uses the excuse that he’s not saying his name anymore so he can’t get mad at him. Finally one day Nikolai airdrops Sigma multiple TikTok’s about “sigma males” causing Sigma to have an existential crisis over what his name means and the implications of being named after such a thing cause he would never treat women that way all while Nikolai laughs about it from afar.

Natsume because of the vibe and I think it would be really funny

Come back next week to learn which kids 2000’s/2010’s virtual world each bsd character played on obsessively and why.

[tokkias]

dancing in the marbled moonlight ship: natsu dragneel x lucy heartfilia summary: Natsu can name a million things he would rather do than dance at some stuffy party but somehow all it takes is Lucy (and seeing another man's hands on her hips) to make him change his mind. ao3

Nalu Week 2024 Day 7: Dance/Jealousy

The sound of the brass band bounces off the marble walls and ceiling of the grandiose ballroom. It’s been a while since Natsu has been to the royal palace, and it’s kind of a miracle that they’ve been allowed back given his history, but regardless of their recklessness, Fairy Tail and their members are still highly regarded by the royal family. That’s how they find themselves back here, as guests at an annual ball held in the heart of Crocus.

It's not really Natsu’s vibe, what with the stuffy clothing, the uptight rules, and the boring dances, but what is his vibe is the endless food and booze that is provided by the best chefs in all of Ishgar. The company is good too, as he gets to mingle with some of his friends that he hasn’t seen in far too long, but everyone who approaches him knows where his priorities lie tonight. He’s under strict no-destruction orders from Erza, which he is more than happy to follow as long as the food keeps coming.

“Are you just going to sit here stuffing your face for the rest of the night?” Comes Lucy’s voice--the only thing that can seemingly pull him out of his food-induced trance.

Wiping away some stray sauce with his sleeve, he looks up at her to find her standing over him, her hands on her hips, where flowing waterfalls of pink fabric fall to her feet.

“Yeah? What else would I be doing?”

“I don’t know. Mingling? Dancing?” She suggests.

“Nah, I’m good,” he dismisses.

Clearly, his response is not what she had been fishing for when she lets out an exasperated huff in response.

“Geez, are you really making me do this?” She asks, and he only replies with a quirked eyebrow in confusion. “I want to dance. I’m asking you to dance with me.”

He looks at her puzzled for a moment before he glances over to the dance floor. It’s not like the type of dancing they get down to back at the guild hall—this is that fancy ballroom shit. Everyone is sweeping across the floor in poised movements that feel incredibly rehearsed, unlike the laid-back, borderline chaotic dances of Fairy Tail that begin as dancing and end in moshing. He can imagine Lucy on that dance floor, with her everlasting elegance and grace, but it’s not really his thing, and he doesn’t know how to do it.

“No thanks,” he repeats.

He can’t imagine any of that being fun, and he can think of a million better ways to embarrass himself and Lucy in front of all these people, so he doesn’t entertain the thought for any longer than it takes to shoot her down. He does feel a little bad when she sees her expression falter for a second into something that looks like disappointment, but he can’t really imagine she was that eager to dance with him like that in the first place, so he doesn’t pay it much mind.

“Fine, I’ll find someone else then,” she says with a huff.

He doesn’t think it’s that big of a deal, but his brows still knit together in confusion as she walks away. He tries not to dwell on it for too long before he’s back to what he really came here for.

Palace food, he finds out, is not unlimited. Though the kitchen staff cooked enough to feed a small army, what they don’t realise is that the guilds may have the numbers of one, but their appetite exceeds it, which leaves Natsu waiting pathetically at the banquet table for the staff to bring out more food. He quickly learns there’s not much to do when he’s not stuffing his face because everyone else has already settled into their place. Groups have already formed, and conversations have been firmly established. For a moment, he considers taking Lucy up on her previous offer because there’s simply nothing for him to do right now, but she’s long gone into the midst of everything.

With Lucy lingering in his mind, he scans the ballroom for her. If she hasn’t found a partner yet, then maybe she’ll accept his late agreement, but those hopes are quickly dashed when he spots her curled blonde updo and silken pink dress twirling across the dancefloor.

She’s with some guy he doesn’t recognise—either a member of another guild or maybe a staff member of the palace—but whoever he is makes Natsu uneasy. He’s got his fingers intertwined with hers and his hand resting comfortably on her waist, and it makes his stomach bubble up with this weird feeling that he can’t name but certainly doesn’t enjoy. Lucy doesn’t like it when guys touch her waist—something she has made incredibly clear to him and any other guy who has tried—but for some reason she doesn’t look like she minds it when this guy does it.

He can see the smile on her face and hear her laughter as they twirl around the floor together.

He knows he should be glad she’s having a good time, but something about it makes him feel ill. It ruins his appetite, and by the time the food comes out, he doesn’t really feel like eating.

He tries to look away and drag his mind elsewhere, but it’s like a train wreck that he can’t take his eyes off, no matter how much it hurts him. His heart squeezes and twists painfully in his chest, but in this moment, he has become a glutton for punishment. He watches them step and sway as he tries to figure out why it hurts him so much because it’s just a stupid dance. It’s a stupid, boring dance that he couldn’t do anyway, even if he tried, but for some reason he suddenly wishes he hadn’t been so quick to brush Lucy off when she had asked, because now seeing her do it with someone else makes him want to be the one dancing with her.

He wonders how mad she would be if he marched up to her and told her that it was his turn now, but realistically, he knows that’s going to get him the opposite of what he wants, so he continues to sulk into his empty plate.

When rounds of seconds come out, he’s not as enthused about it as he thought he would be. It’s not as much of a distraction as he expected, his gaze continually flicking up to check on Lucy in a repeated moment of self-punishment. She looks like she’s having fun, and he wants to be happy for her, but he’s still kicking himself that he’s not the one out there having fun with her. He picks at his food half-heartedly in self-pity. Sure, the food is good, but he wonders if it was really good enough that he dismissed her so flippantly.

He's never been one to regret food, but if there’s one person who could make him feel bad for choosing food over them, it would be Lucy.

He doesn’t know how to dance all nice and fancy like that, but Lucy probably wouldn’t care because she’s nice like that. She wouldn’t laugh at him or care if people stared; she’d be patient and kind until he got the steps right, and then they’d twirl around the room and make total fools of themselves. It’s not something that seems fun to him, but he thinks it would be fun if he were doing it with Lucy.

He watches her as the night progresses and she moves from partner to partner with new faces who are more than willing to indulge her in her night of dancing. He probably looks a little creepy to onlookers, but there must be some horrible vibe radiating from him as he lurks because no one seems to bother him. He’s trying his best not to be weird about it, but he’s waiting for some sort of lull to approach her because he knows Lucy, and he knows that interrupting her nice dance with some other guy is only going to reward him with a swift Lucy Kick.

When a lull finally occurs and she’s left wandering the outskirts of the dancefloor, he takes this chance and makes his way over, drawing her attention when he brushes his hand against her own.

“Natsu?” She says, and he can see the surprise in her eyes and hear it in her voice. “What are you doing here? I thought you said you were going to eat all evening.”

“I want to dance,” he says, but his voice is little more than a mumble, and she doesn’t have quite the hearing that he does.

“What?”

“I want to dance with you,” he repeats, louder this time.

She meets him with a look of confusion and mild bewilderment at his request.

“You said you didn’t want to earlier,” she replies.

"Yeah, well, I changed my mind,” he tells her.

The way he says it with a pout forming on his lips, he probably sounds like a little kid, and he feels it too. It feels a little bit embarrassing going back on his word like this after she had already asked him to dance with her and he had dismissed her so flippantly, but he knows when to swallow his pride, and he feels right now is the right time.

She looks at him with confusion, a hint of scepticism behind her eyes. She doesn’t answer immediately, but when she does, it’s not exactly what he wants to hear.

“Why?”

He hesitates for a moment because it’s hard to admit that he was wrong to reject her in the first place, but he knows he has to swallow his pride to get what he wants.

“Because it looked like you were having fun, and I wanted to have fun with you,” he confesses.

“If you wanted to have fun with me, why did you say no the first time?”

It’s a little frustrating having her interrogate him like this when she could just say yes, but he supposes he brought this on himself by not saying yes in the first place.

“Because I thought it looked boring,” he answers candidly. “And I don’t even know how to dance like that anyway.”

His gaze flicks away in light embarrassment as he adds that last part, but with the quick glimpse he catches of Lucy’s face, he sees her expression soften.

“I can teach you,” she says, her voice sweet like honey and making his heart tighten in his chest.

Of course, she would. Kind, sweet, patient Lucy would teach him how to dance even after his prior flippancy about it. Not everyone was patient with him, but Lucy was, even when he was grumbly and difficult. She had been with him through thick and thin, and now here she was, teaching him how to dance, because her love was not conditional to the battlefield.

“Take my hand,” she begins. “And then put your other hand on my waist.”

His fingers interlock with his as her other hand guides his to her waist, where it sits comfortably in the little dip before her hip. She brings her hand to rest on his shoulder, and that’s the moment he realises just how close together their bodies are. He feels warmer than usual, and he can hear his heart thumping so loud in his ears that he almost wonders if she can hear it too. If she does, she makes no mention of it.

“I’ll lead,” she simply tells him.

His brows furrow together in concentration as he stares down at their feet, trying his best not to step on her toes. It takes a bit to get the movements down, but it’s not as hard as he thought it would be. He steps where she steps, following each movement she makes, leading them across the dance floor.

Even when the steps become muscle memory, it takes him a while to look up at her while they dance. He’s worried that he’ll step on her feet, for one, but his face feels awfully warm from being this close to Lucy, and it makes him feel a little self-conscious.

He’s never cared about what other people think about him, never cared about how people perceive his appearance or behaviour, but he cares what Lucy thinks of him. If there was anyone he would try to make himself look nice for, it would be her. He doesn’t know what it is about her because she’s seen him at his lowest, his worst, and his downright grossest, and has never done anything but adore him, but he still wants to be his best for her. He doesn’t want her to think he looks silly because dancing with her is making his cheeks flush, and he doesn’t know why.

He's had the steps down for a good while before he finally musters the courage to look up and meet her gaze, and any worries about himself dissipate when he sees her smile. She looks like she’s having the time of her life dancing with him, and gods, he feels he is too. Yeah, he still feels like this whole dancing thing is kind of dumb, but it doesn’t matter how he feels about it because Lucy’s having fun, and that means he’s having fun.

With a bit more confidence gained, eventually he is the one leading, with Lucy following his steps and letting him take them wherever he may. He does it with less grace than she does, but if that’s something she cares about, she doesn’t say anything. She giggles and squeals when they turn a little too fast, and with his newfound confidence, he uses the momentum to twirl her around, which seems to catch her off guard. He catches her before she can lose her balance too much, but she’s grinning ear to ear over it, so he doesn’t think she’s about to complain.

In that moment, everyone around them seems to disappear, and he pays no mind to the looks they might be getting. He has no time to regret not doing this earlier because he’s too busy enjoying himself in the moment. Dancing is fun, he discovers—or perhaps more accurately, being with Lucy is fun, but he already knew that. He supposes he wouldn’t mind doing it more often if it meant he could be chest-to-chest with her again.

She doesn’t split off from him the way she has her previous partners. They twirl around in their own little world until the crowd thins out and the moonlight streams in through the palace windows. Their movements become less refined as the evening grows into night, but given they’re the last left on the dancefloor, there’s no one but the musicians to watch them fumble. Even when he makes a misstep, Lucy only laughs, and they keep going. They dance only until she tires and complains her feet hurt, which leads her to leaning against him to keep herself up. Perhaps in another time he would have pretended to complain about it, but as his hand slips around her waist to hold her up, he thinks he doesn’t want to risk losing it, so he keeps his mouth shut and lets her lean her head on his shoulder.

They walk back to the inn like that, Lucy toddling along at his side with one hand on her waist as he carries her shoes in the other. He takes it as the good deal that it is, because if there had been more alcohol at the event, he fears she would be making him carry her back.

When they make it back to the inn, she flops down onto his bed, not bothering to walk the extra few steps to make it to hers. He doesn’t mind. When she finally rolls over, she flashes him a smile, and in that moment, he considers himself the luckiest guy in the world.

That, of course, doesn’t stop him from disrupting the moment.

“You didn’t tell me you were good at dancing,” he says, a shit-eating grin plastered across his face.

She smacks him on the arm, and it elicits a howl of laughter from him. After a night of elegant dancing, this is more the Lucy he knows, and he really wouldn’t have it any other way.