#anyways time to tag this with my entire music taste

[devilledeggz]

ok music thought when a song just Hits it either hits hard lyrically or hits hard musically it can also be both, but one's gotta outweigh the other

[neverendingford]

.

[steddieasitgoes]

@steddiemas Day 5 Prompt: Grinch vs Christmas Cheer

Tags: Modern AU, Eddie Munson & Jeff, Steve & Eddie Are Neighbors, Teacher Steve, Meet Cute

wc: 1863 | Rating: T

Read on ao3 | ao3 collection

“I thought you said you talked to them?” Eddie groans. He tips his head so far back he wobbles in the chair for a moment before he rights himself and buries his head in his hands. “I can’t work under these conditions!” 

“I don’t think planning a campaign counts as working,” Jeff teases. 

They’re in their apartment kitchen. Jeff cooking something that smells a hundred times better than the vending machine sandwich he had for lunch at the shop. Free from his day job, Eddie’s working on something he actually cares about now. The latest Dungeons & Dragons handbook is open to a random page while his trusty notebook sits open. There’s no use in hiding it from Jeff. It’s not like he could decipher Eddie’s chicken scratch penmanship anyway.

Besides, he hasn’t gotten much of anything done since he plopped down on the worn leather chair. It’s hard to work with the blaring sound of Mariah fucking Carey’s Christmas album playing on repeat for the third day straight coming from their neighbor's apartment. The obnoxious whirling of the fans keeping a dozen or so Christmas inflatables blown up on their shared stairwell and balcony also doesn’t help. 

If this continues any longer, Eddie swears he’s going to find them a new place to live. The peace and quiet would be worth losing out on their rent-controlled place. At least, Eddie thinks so. Christ, he misses the Richards who moved last year. He’d take their scowls and snide comments over this Christmas madness any day. 

“It absolutely counts as working,” Eddie scoffs, shooting a glare in Jeff’s direction. “And don’t change the subject, Jefferson. Did you even talk to Mr. and Mrs. Claus next door?”

Jeff snorts, shaking his head before returning to the pot of sauce he has simmering.  “No, I didn’t and I’m not going to.” 

“Jeff!” Eddie whines. “Your job as the approachable one of this house is to confront our neighbors when they’re annoying us.” 

“Okay, but they’re not annoying me.” 

“Well, that’s a lie. You hate Michael Buble as much as I do and I know you heard his stupid crooning voice at seven this morning like I did.”

“Okay, you’ve got me there,” Jeff sighs, turning away from the stove to face Eddie. “But I can’t tell them to lower their music! Not when they haven’t complained once about the shit you blare at all hours of the night or our Corroded practices when we have nowhere else to go.” 

If Eddie was less stubborn, maybe he’d see that Jeff has a point. But he is stubborn, so he doubles down instead. 

“That’s different.” 

“It’s really not.” 

“Fine,” Eddie shouts, throwing his hands up in defeat. The headache festering behind is eyes is too painful for him to keep arguing with Jeff. Besides, he’s never been able to push Jeff around. It’s why they make such good roommates. “Can you at least talk to them about their decorating habits then? I had to wade through a fucking forest of inflatables this afternoon. M’pretty sure Frosty the fucking Snowman almost punched my balls.” 

“Eds, need I remind you that a few days ago you had the entire place decked out for Halloween? How is a few inflatables different than all those skeletons and demon shit you had up?” 

“First of all, how dare you compare my artistry to whatever is going on outside,” Eddie scoffs. He’s going to give himself a sore throat if he keeps this up. “I have taste. My decorations told a story! Those inflatables aren’t even from the same properties. They’ve got Santa Mickey next to the fucking Grinch! Charlie Brown mingling with Yoda! There’s no plot!” 

Jeff’s shoulders slump, forearms coming to rest on the kitchen counter so he’s at eye level with Eddie. “Just look on the bright side. At least they haven’t done one of those obnoxious light shows like that stupid reality show.”

As if Jeff accidentally summoned a demon in the form of Christmas cheer, a burst of red and green floods their apartment. Their once dimly lit kitchen looks like the inside of a club, red and green lights flickering with the occasional white and blue mixed in. The flickers are timed with the beat of another Mariah Carey Christmas song. 

This is what hell must look like, Eddie thinks, as he glares at Jeff. 

“What did you do?” 

“I didn’t do anything,” Jeff defends, hands up in surrender. 

Eddie can seem him struggling not to laugh and it takes all the energy he can muster not to reach around the counter and playfully punch his shoulder. How can Jeff think this is funny? The flickering lights completely goes against their moody aesthetic! Not to mention it’s a health hazard! There’s no way Gareth is going to be able to come over here — not with the way he’s so sensitive to strobes. 

Jesus H. Christ and it’s only November 25th! He has to put up with this for weeks! 

“It’s not funny, Jefferson!” 

“I mean,” Jeff snorts, biting the inside of his cheek to keep his smile from growing. “It’s a little funny.” 

🎅🏼 🎄 🤬 🎅🏼 🎄 🤬 🎅🏼 🎄 🤬 🎅🏼 🎄 🤬 🎅🏼 🎄 🤬 🎅🏼 🎄 🤬 🎅🏼 🎄 🤬 🎅🏼 🎄 🤬

The lights have not fucking stopped. Not for one single day. Eddie had hoped his neighbors would have grown tired of the constant strobing and Christmas music by now. But nope. A week and a half and its still going strong. 

He’s going to lose his goddamn mind. 

“Jeff,” Eddie hisses, lifting the blanket of his makeshift fort enough that he can make eye contact with Jeff. Or at least, try to. Jeff’s perched in their recliner with the biggest pair of sunglasses Eddie’s ever seen. “Please. I can’t take much more of this!” 

“It’s not that bad.” 

“I might have believed you if you weren’t wearing those ridiculous things,” Eddie snorts. He waits for Jeff to retort but when he doesn’t, he groans and slowly emerges from the safety of his blanket fort. Christ he forgot how bright those damn things are. 

Stalking over to their small entryway, Eddie hastily tugs on a pair of boots and reaches for the doorknob. 

“What are you doing?” Jeff asks, voice laden with concern. 

“Someone has to confront the neighbors!” 

He doesn't give him time to respond, yanking the door open and slamming it shut behind him in one fluid movement. It should be a short trip to the neighbor's front door, just a few long strides, but Eddie forgets to account for the fuckton of inflatables cluttering the path. He ducks around Frosty, flipping him off when his stupid wood arms nearly deck his balls, again and forcibly shoves Mickey’s face away from him. 

It takes another bit of carefully navigating before he finally reaches the front door adorned with a festive wreath. These people really left no spot undecorated. Eddie doesn’t spare them the decency of a nice, neighborly knock or ring of the doorbell. They’re way past that. Instead, he makes a fist and slams his knuckles into the wood door, and keeps going. Knock. Knock. Knockknockknock. 

They probably can’t hear him over the damn music, Eddie thinks, as his knuckle turns redder and redder. Just when he’s about to retreat and face Jeff’s smug wrath, the door opens. 

The first thought that passes through Eddie’s mind is oh, he’s hot. The second, more vital thought, comes a moment later. He’s going to kill Jeff. How dare he not disclose how attractive this guy is the minute he met him months ago? 

The guy, who Eddie vaguely thinks is named Steve, looks just as surprised to see him as he is. Decked out in an obnoxious Santa-themed apron and green plaid flannel pants, his cheeks are spotted with flour and his hands are stained a faint red color. Judging from the delicious aroma of vanilla and peanut butter wafting into the hallway, Eddie interrupted some very serious baking. 

“Oh, you’re not the Instacart shopper,” maybe Steve frowns. “Can I help you?” 

“Oh, uh,” Eddie trails off. He’s here for a reason, he knows this, but his mind is blank. Distracted by the smells and the lights and the gorgeous fucking man standing in front of him with hazel eyes so sparkly Eddie’s pretty sure he belongs in a cartoon. “I’m Eddie, your neighbor.” 

I’m Eddie, your neighbor? 

This cannot be the same brain that creates intricate, plot twist-ridden campaigns that last months. Absolutely not.

“Ah, so you’re Jeff’s roommate! It’s nice to finally meet you. I’m Steve.” 

“Right, Steve” Eddie nods. He’s not sure why he nods, it’s not a normal thing to do when you meet someone, and yet, he can’t stop nodding. Stop fucking nodding! 

“So, uh, what brings you by?” Steve asks, casually leaning against the doorframe. 

“Oh, I uh…” The lights. You were coming here to complain about the lights! “I came to tell you, uh… I could smell you baking!” Oh my fucking god. “You know these walls are thin and we, uh, share AC vents or something I think? So the smell was filling our place and it smelled so good I just, uh, had to come over and see what you’re baking?” 

If Jeff was here, Eddie’s pretty sure he’d be two seconds away from collapsing in a fit of laughter. Thank god he’s not. As soon as he gets back to his room, he’s going to take a lukewarm shower and try to forget this entire interaction ever happened and then hide from Steve for the rest of his life. 

“Oh, I’m making peanut butter cookies.” Steve’s smile is almost as blinding as the twinkling lights and like a moth to a flame, Eddie can’t look away. “One of my students has been having a rough time and they’re their favorite.”

“Damn, maybe if I had a teacher who baked me cookies I would have done better in school.” 

Steve laughs, “Tell me about it. Actually, uh, do you want to help? I’m allergic to peanut butter and my best friend is tied up at work. I could really use a taste tester. Make sure they’re edible.” 

“Oh, uh…” Eddie glances over his shoulder and takes in the sight of the sea of inflatables staring at him with their beady painted on eyes, squints at the obnoxious flashing lights keeping time to a terrible cover of “Jingle Bell Rock.” Together it’s the reminder he needs as to why he trekked over here in the first place, but when he turns he’s hit with a punch of peanut butter and well… “Not to toot my own horn, but I am a pretty good taste tester.” 

“Perfect,” Steve smiles, pushing himself off the doorframe. “Kitchen’s this way.” 

🎅🏼 🎄 🤬 🎅🏼 🎄 🤬 🎅🏼 🎄 🤬 🎅🏼 🎄 🤬 🎅🏼 🎄 🤬 🎅🏼 🎄 🤬 🎅🏼 🎄 🤬 🎅🏼 🎄 🤬

Eddie returns an hour later. Belly full of joy just peanut butter cookies, but also chocolate chip, and gingerbread, and some cinnamon concoction that had him considering a marriage proposal on the spot and a tupperware overflowing with said cookies. 

Jeff is still in the living room, sunglasses shielding his eyes, but Eddie knows him well enough to know he’s judging him. 

“Don’t say a word,” Eddie sneers, heading straight for the kitchen. 

[bullet-prooflove]

All The Federales Say... : Alden Parker x Reader

Tagging: @crazy4chickennuggets@kmc1989@sarakafarrah @ @mandy426

Companion piece to The Secret

Trigger warning for loss of a child

Alden can’t stand country music. Whenever it comes on the radio it feels like someone is driving an ice pick right into his brain. He becomes reserved, short tempered, abrasive. You’ve never been able to decipher the reasoning behind it not until the night he tells you about Bonnie.

“We were coming back from swimming club when it happened.” He finds himself saying as the two of you sit on the chocolate brown Chesterfield in the greenhouse. Your fingertips stroke along the underside of his forearm, tracing over the Eagles lyrics tattooed there. “Bonnie was asleep in the back seat. She always used to drop off after those sessions...”

He smiles at the memory. Bonnie’s unruly dark curls falling across her dainty features, her cheek pressed into the side of the car seat. She’d been wearing a black and white striped dress that day, a silver barrette clipped into her hair.  He still carries the damn thing around in his wallet, despite the fact it’s rusted. It’s the only thing he has left of his daughter because Viv had purged the nursery in the aftermath, she couldn’t stand the sight of anything that reminded her of Bonnie.

“When you have kids, you have all these dreams for them.” He tells you, his voice getting a little rough as he watches your fingers trail over the ink. “I thought she was going to grow up, go to the Olympics, bring home a gold medal...It seems so stupid now.” 

He trails off then, swallowing hard against the build-up of emotion in his chest. It’s getting hard to breathe because he’s back there in that place fiddling with the dial on the radio as Viv focuses on the road ahead, her hands gripping the steering wheel.

“Things get hazy after that.” He sighs as his hand captures yours. He holds on tight squeezing your fingers because the road he’s about to go down, it’s not one he wants to walk alone. “They tell me I hit my head in the crash. I remember fragments. Viv was driving, there was a Willie Nelson song on the radio, it was Pancho and Lefty. We were singing that hook, you know the one? ‘All the Federales say…’”

He's there now, right back in that car with the taste of metal in his mouth and smoke filling his lungs. Viv’s slumped over the air bag, blood trickling out of her nose and he’s trying to wake her but Viv, her eyes, they just won’t open.

All the Federales say…

That song, that damn song is still playing and he realises that underneath the lyrics he can’t hear Bonnie, she should be awake now, she should be screaming but there’s just this silence, this horrible, empty nothingness and Alden knows, he just knows.

He forces himself to look anyway and what he sees...

Christ it still haunts his dreams.

“Car seats back then...” He hears himself telling you. “They weren’t as robust as they are these days. My daughter…”

He chokes because all of that anguish, all of that guilt, it’s like he’s feeling it for the very first time. He breaks then, his entire being shattering into a million pieces. The noise that comes out of his mouth, it’s raw, animalistic, a violent sob that wracks his entire body. He hasn’t grieved for Bonnie, not really. There was never any space for it. He was the strong one in the aftermath, holding Viv together and then that had fallen apart. By that point he’d shoved it all in a box because he didn’t want to face it, he’d convinced himself he’d moved on but in reality, it’s always been there, sitting just under the surface waiting.

Your lips chase over the tears that leak down his cheeks, your body pressing against his and Alden feels that rush of heat, that urge to feel anything but the agony that eats him up inside right now.

“Lisa?” He questions, his breath a little ragged and you know exactly what he’s asking you. “I need…”

You know exactly what he needs, you always do. You climb into his lap and his hand threads  through your hair, gripping it tightly in his fist. He pulls your head back, baring your throat and you make that noise, that sweet whimper as his lips ghost up the curve of your neck.

“It’s going to be rough.” He warns you, tugging a little harder, keeping you in place, flush against him. “I don’t have it in me to be soft with you tonight.”

“You don’t have to be.” You whisper as he thrusts up against you. “I mean it Alden, I won’t break.”

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Like My Work? - Why Not Buy Me A Coffee

[blackfangedreaper]

🍑!LUFFY HEADCANNONS

Summary: Headcannons of luffy and his darling giving him peaches every season

Pairings: Peach lover!luffy x Black reader

Warning: Fluff💞, suggestive content, grammatical errors. MDNI.

Note: Had this in my notes since forever. Anyways ive decided to write for both opla luffy and inaki cause manz is too cute.

Taglist: @closet-degenerate @sanjisblackasswife @luffyinlove @roronoaswifey @euphofic @itzgabz22

🍑 Noone really knew how his obsession for the butt-shaped fruit started but the most noticeable period was when a crate of them were delivered to sunny with a 'For luffy' tag on it after eating the fruit he suddenly ran into the kitchen demanding to grow a peach tree on sunny, urging nami to free up some space. "It's not like your tangerines taste all that nice anyways." He left the kitchen sulking and with a big red bump on his head but with burning determination.

🍑 But this ain't about no fruit! This is about your big fat ass and luffy's weird fixation on it. Hates to see you leave but loves to watch you walk away, his eyes watching your ass jiggle and bounce when you pass by. And don't get him started on those short shorts you wore that one time. Got a beating when he suddenly had his hands shoved up your shorts. "I'm sworry, it jiwggled swo mwuch i thwought it'd fwall wout"

🍑 You once sent luffy a peach plushie because of his peach-phase oh ho big mistake, he took it round the sunny showing everyone and telling them how it reminded him of your butt. It was half his size and so soft he could sink inside, so when he was sad or missed your presence he would wrap his rubber arms around it a million times and cuddle into it. "Sigh.... Feels just like Y/n."

🍑 Luffy loves how you randomly grind on him, this usually happens when the your listening to songs on the radio and squabbling with ussop on who can rap faster, you just start rocking back and forth to the rhythm of the music and gosh he trys not to groan at your unconscious grinding but he can't help but hold your waist and grind back into you. This turns into another love making session. "You started it! So you don't get to run!"

🍑 As much as he adores taking you from the from the front just to see your lewd expressions during intercourse, he's more enamoured with watching your ass form ripples and bounce with the force of his thrusts, plus don't get him started on them stretch marks and cellulite, he thinks it's super sexy you have those. Loves to trace and suck on them leaving his marks and bites on every single one. "So pretty! Can i leave more- ouch! That hurt!!"

🍑 Loves it when you get an attitude, that way he can plow you from the back with no mercy. Your butt against his lower abdomen and your soft thighs pressing against his. His hard and firm grip on your waist keeping you steady from his relentless and brutal thrusts. The soft feeling of your watery behind against his strong hips will forever be one of the best feelings; apart from being inside you. "Yeah.. Just like that. So pretty!"

🍑 Loves to cup your cheeks, lift them up, release then watch it bounce back to place, is totally obessed with the way they dance around before settling down. You usually don't mind but he does this spontaneously leaving you to scold him relentlessly; that only stirs him up by the way, so you've given up letting him do as he pleases. "Haha! What is this?! it's just like water!"

🍑 Once tried the whipping cream stuff.... Yeah it went too well you had to ban it entirely cause, one; he wanted to eat it off your ass all the time, two; Swears your ass is jello, an apparent reason why he bites too hard sometimes, three; sanji's starting to get suspicious cause luffy manages to finish one can of whipping cream each session. Yeah never again. "Come on just one more time!" Ok maybe not, you can't say no to the adorable goof ball

🍑 Loves to lay on your back side. Indoors, outdoors, on the the deck or on your beach chair anywhere you can name on sunny he'll find you. Loves how his big head sinks in, your cheeks cradling his face in a loving embrace. Laughs when you try to shake him off cause he thinks it's a game. Has had naps on you and swears it's the best sleep he gets. Tends to smack you if you move too much. "Hey! Stay still i'm tryna sleep!"

[formosusiniquis]

have your cake

So way back in August 2023 the steddiemicrofic challenge was Cake and 311 words, my head empty brain came up with one thought and it was Steve Munson having a bakery called Mun's Buns and so many months later I finally got around to finishing my vision

Ships: Steve Harrington/Eddie Munson; Tommy Hagan/Carol Perkins; implied/past Tommy Hagan/Steve Harrington/Carol Perkins WC: 6408 | T | tags: Future Fic, the lightest of post homoerotic friendship breakup angst, fluff, Tommy POV AO3

The bakery has a stupid name, is the first thing Tommy thinks when Carol tells him where he's supposed to meet her on his lunch break. He’s still thinking that, when he sees the place for the first time through his rain speckled windshield. It's a modest storefront, small for what Carol says is a booming business, tucked in next to a used bookstore and a music shop. There's a baby yellow awning hanging from the front just underneath a sign lettered in soft blue that reads Mun's Buns.

He's late, is the second thing he thinks after pulling up. Caught up in some stupid bullshit for his dad he hadn't managed to slip away until 12:30. Even then it had only been because Tommy had told him he was going to be late for their cake tasting. He'd rolled his eyes when his father and Greg, a guy that Tommy only considers a co-worker in the sense that they are technically on the same payroll since Greg in every other aspect is incompetent and an idiot, had winced. Shooing him away like a kid who'd just admitted that he's already twenty minutes past curfew. But catching sight of the way Carol has her arms crossed, tapping her foot fast enough to kickstart a motor, while her hair hangs limp in a way that it hadn’t this morning a third thought crosses his mind: maybe he should have been a little more worried.

Waiting isn’t going to make things any better. So he steps out of the car, let’s the misty damp cling to him in a way that makes his dress pants and button down feel like a poorly tailored second skin, and takes his licks like a man. "Late, thirty minutes late. Christ, it's the only thing I've asked from you Tommy." Her right hook stings just as badly as it did sophomore year when she punched him for asking out Erin Murphy instead of her.

Shit like that is probably why no one expected them to make it this long or this far.

When they went away to college; different schools, hours apart. His parents had been gleeful as they'd warned him that high school relationships didn't always last. That he should keep his options open, he didn't want to miss out on the love of his life just because of comfort. He didn't get offered the family ring when he decided to propose right after graduation. Carol has always been particular. Wanted the house to come back to before the wedding could happen, wanted a long honeymoon. That meant saving, a lot of it. Tommy knew and Carol did too, they'd overheard his mother and aunt gossiping in too loud voices after too much wine that they hoped the long engagement meant they were both trying to figure out a good way to break it off with one another. 

Still, over the course of their now five year engagement no one's asked once if they wanted to trade for it.

Carol thought it was horrendous anyway. She’d had her ring picked out since ‘85, styled her class ring so it would look like the oval cut diamond she wanted. Had him slide it on her finger the second it came in.

Cause in the politest of terms, Carol could be a raging bitch. She was Tommy's favorite person in the entire world.

There’s going to be a bruise on his shoulder tomorrow, even if she’s guiltily smoothing a hand down his arm now. Thrust toward the door first in offering, Carol is sorry she hit him but she’s not apologetic. “I’m serious, Tom, if we lose this appointment and have to go with Sweet Treats for our cake I'll- I'll-"

Whatever threat she was preparing is drowned out and then cut off by the echoing TONG of the door chime. A light in the back shifts color for a second, out of place enough that he wonders if he even really saw it. Head tilting toward Carol, his question catches in his throat when he notices her pinched off appraising. Better not to add to the ammunition she might already be building.

And if Carol is looking he better do it too. She'll want to debrief when they're having dinner tonight, just like they did with the florist, the caterer, the three wedding planners they'd met with, and each of the venues that they'd visited. And it wasnt because she was demanding, fuck you Greg. It wasn't because she was being nitpick-y, alright it was a little bit because she was but he liked being particular with her. He liked being involved in his wedding.

So he looked around.

The way they utilized their space -- a building that big and there's barely enough room to stand, we want someone who knows how to work with limited space for the venues we're looking at -- was the reason their first wedding planner hadn't gotten hired. Small, but not cramped. There are a handful of tables scattered in the open space in front of the counter. It’s the kind of small town cozy that Hawkins had tried for and he doesn’t see very often anymore now that they’ve moved out to Indianapolis.

It’s lunchtime, still too early for people to be seeking out the rows of deserts in their neat glass counter and too late for the breakfast crowd. But one of the tables is occupied by a teenager with long, black braids scribbling in a notebook while a slice of ice cream cake melts on a plate by her elbow. 

Everything was neat, organized, and compliant with health code regulations -- they hadn’t even made it in the door of the first caterer’s when she noticed a trail of ants and roaches marching into the open kitchen door.

Carol had always been quick when she was making up her mind about something. Like those Sherlock Holmes stories they’d had to read in school, in a couple of seconds she could spot everything she needed to make a decision. After a decade Tommy still couldn’t keep up; but he was always best at following someone else’s lead.

The smile she’s got frosted across her face is as sugary and fake as the roses on the cupcakes he can see behind the low topped counters as she approaches the only visible staff member. A girl, young in the way that nebulous way anyone younger than him was now, with thick squared glasses that magnified two distressingly blue eyes. The counters looked like they were designed to sit low enough that she could easily see over the top while in her wheelchair.

“Welcome to,” her customer service tone borders on bored. Two words into a clear script and she sighs, as if saying the name physically pains her, “Mun’s Buns. We’ve got a special series of summer flavors: Strawberry Lemonade, Lavender Mint, Chocolate Fudgsicle, and,” she sighs again, “for the grownups a boozy Blue Moon with orange zest.”

“How about a wedding cake.” He’s impressed. Carol made it through the speech without interrupting.

“Do you have an appointment?” the girl raises her voice, enough to make them both flinch back. Customer service isn’t a requirement for this part of the job necessarily, but Carol had bailed on two venues because the staff hadn’t been polite enough.

Her smile doesn’t crack though, “Yes.”

Even though he’s pretty sure this girl has to be basically blind with the inch thick frames, she levels Carol with a lethal stare. “Not you.”

From the open entryway behind her Tommy had been able to make out what sounded like the highlights of yesterday’s game. He assumed that space had to be the kitchen where these rows of deserts were made. He’s still surprised when a guy’s voice is shouting back, “I don't know, Max, do I? Why don't you check?”

“How am I supposed to do that?” Max shouts back, glowering at then in stand in for her mystery boss.

“With your finger, asshole. It's in braille. When I gave you this job you said you were actually gonna work.”

“Douchebag." Her eyes never leave them, while her hands rummage around in a space beneath the counter where the cash register sits. Max offers no explanation or apology for her shouting or for her boss. A large red appointment book gets slammed down on the nearest counter, making Carol jump but the neat two by twos of chocolate frosted cupcakes don't budge. He watches, a little fascinated by the way her finger scans the page before slowing. "Did you write this or did Dustin?"

Carol has always valued gossip over professionalism, he thinks that’s why she’s done so well as a hairdresser even though she was always awful at chemistry. It’s also why he’s held off from pointing out that they could solve this a lot faster if this guy would come out from the back. "Why?" 

“Cause one of you can't spell and one of you is trying to invent braille shorthand. So I'm not really sure what to do with TomGan Wed.”

“It might be Thomas and Wedding.” Carol leans over the appointment book as she says it, using a tone of voice he has never once heard her use in the entire time he’s known her. He thinks it’s supposed to be helpful.

“Wedding sampler.” The girl calls toward the back, “It's getting late.”

“I’ve got it,” the voice from the back shouts back.There’s an effortless assurance Tommy can hear from where he’s standing. It hits him with a wave of nostalgia so strong he grabs Carol’s arm on instinct.

“Really,” she says, cutting her gaze over to him. He’s not sure what she sees. “If we could hurry this along, it's just we've only got an hour.”

“You're late.” The glare she gets shuts Carol down faster than he’s ever seen.

“Right.”

“Okay I've got it.” The voice from the back is now the voice in the doorway. Hidden for a second by a serving tray loaded with samples of rich looking cake, it’s the first time since arriving that Tommy has actually wanted to be here. Not just because he can make out strong shoulders and a body of a man that’s still very fit but clearly enjoys his work too; the hint of love handles above strong thighs. Only then that tray dips, and for the first time since 1985 Tommy finds himself looking at the shocked hazel eyes of Steve Harrington. “Oh.”

Carol reacts for him, taking in a breath sharp enough she might puncture a lung. They’ll both wind up suffocated on the floor of this stupid bakery with an awful name, because Tommy can’t manage to breathe at all looking at Steve. Still unfairly handsome, faintly pink at the shock of seeing them too he imagined.

His hair is long, is the first real thought his half fried brain manages to put together. Soft looking even where it’s damp at the temples where sweat has pooled. He has it pulled back with a couple of the same butterfly clips that Carol likes to use.

His second, somehow more hysterical thought: this wasn’t how Steve Harrington was supposed to be included in his wedding.

Tommy was six years old and knew he wanted to marry Steve. When he’d told his mom -- to ask for her ring, Steve thought it was romantic like princes and princesses that they had a special ring that they got married with -- she’d grabbed by his arm so hard it’d left finger shaped bruises. So he’d held that certainty quiet in his heart until he was ten, and suddenly it was okay to want to play with girls on the playground -- he thinks it’s because Steve got tired of there never being an even number when they tried to play kickball, he had a way of making everyone want to do the thing he was. Carol wasn’t afraid to tell Tommy C. that he was dumb or to tell Mark L. that he hadn’t actually made it to the base, Steve liked her fast. Too fast, and Tommy had to tell her that one day he was going to be able to keep Steve all to himself. But he knew that it wasn’t right to say that now, even if he wasn’t all the way sure why it wasn’t. He was ten, but he would be eleven soon, and he took this part of him that he’d kept secret for so long and he whispered it to Carol under the slide while Steve tried to convince Brad P. that he could too pick two people for his kickball team first.

He was ten and Carol said they could share. Boys can’t marry boys, but girls can. So they could both marry her and live together forever.

It became a joke when they finally shared it with Steve, thirteen and boys going out with girls wasn’t funny the way it used to be. Sarah Jane asked Carol if she had a chance at going steady with Steve. She told Tommy about it later and they both told Steve that he was too good to date any of the girls in their grade. “Well I’ve got you guys,” his voice cracked when he said it, throwing an arm around both of them. Carol didn’t care as much, but even she’d noticed the way Steve was changing from boyish to handsome.

They were sixteen and disaster was just around the corner, not that he knew that. Steve dated around but he always came back to them. The head, the heart, the body. They don’t feel complete without each other -- at least Tommy doesn’t. Mr. Kripke, who was hungover more often than he wasn't, passed out ten minutes into study hall. Carol didn’t even wait to see if he’d wake back up before she left her assigned table for theirs. She smoothed out a lined piece of notebook paper for them, and Tommy scoffed like he was supposed to. “Aren’t we a little old to be playing MASH?”

“It’s dirty MASH, and I thought you’d think it was funny.”

“I think it’s funny,” Steve had said, “that you’re getting eiffel towered on your wedding night. Who else is joining in, Carrie?”

“We couldn’t agree on who got you for their side of the aisle. So we’re taking you to bed instead.”

He was sixteen and the way that the two of them looked when they shared a joke was the hottest thing in the world. The way their smiles mirror when they turned to him, sharp and ready to flay open the softest parts of him.

Tommy’s two days older when Steve lets him kiss the taste of Carol out of his mouth.

It was three days after he turned seventeen and he had to pretend he didn't want to die when he saw how Steve looked at Nancy Wheeler. Like he didn’t want to rip his hair out because Steve was fucking infatuated with this mousy little teacher’s pet and wouldn’t even look at him anymore.

He still doesn’t like to think about the breakup. He pokes it like a fresh bruise. Less often now, but when he does he digs his fingers in. Baits Carol into fights he doesn’t mean just so he can pretend like he hasn’t lost something that hurts like a limb.

Steve Harrington turns twenty-eight next week, and he’s standing in front of them both holding pieces of what might turn into their wedding cake.

“Wow I can’t believe you’re in Indy!” False excitement grates, but at least Carol has gotten herself together enough to speak. He thought he’d have at least another few months to prepare for the thought of seeing Steve, by their ten year reunion he was going to be married and happy and over it.

“Yeah, this is- Married, wow! I kinda can’t believe you haven’t already.” He says it to Carol, his platitudes had always been for Carol, but his eyes find Tommy. 

While Carol chatters at them and for them both, nervous, he knows she’s nervous. The situation is sudden and strange and fraught. But Tommy just looks at Steve, who looks at him. He’s getting married in three months, one week, and two days from now and for the first time in eleven years Steve is looking at him.

"Takes a while to save up for when you want the best of everything. Dad's still the skinflint he always was, I think he'd pay me less than minimum wage if he could get away with it."

And those soft brown eyes look so sad, looking at him. Sometimes he thinks no one will ever understand him the way that Steve did.

"There's nothing wrong with wanting the best, or having a long engagement." Carol defends. It's the same line she's been giving everyone. Defensive of him and herself and the choices they've been making. He can't believe Steve is someone she thinks they have to defend against.

“I really hope you're happy, man," he says, and the sincerity is a balm on the sting of this conversation. He pushes his hair back from his face, the way he always has when he's uncomfortable and trying not to make it obvious. And there's a fresh new hurt when Tommy catches sight of a plain gold band on Steve's finger, shining bright between the golden highlights of his hair.

“I’m happy about this,” he can say honestly. Carol is one of the only things he’s ever been sure about. She held him steady as she could when his other sure thing left him with a cracked foundation in a convenience store parking lot. “What about you? How long after meeting the future Mrs. Harrington did you wait to put a ring on her finger?”

“Tommy,” Carol chides as the teen in the corner snorts. To anyone else it would sound like a reprimand for being nosy, he, and he suspects Steve, knows she’s telling him to stop worrying a scab that has no hope of healing right.

Married and they didn’t know. Wouldn’t have found out until the reunion. It’s not like he expected an invitation, maybe an engagement announcement sent to their parents’ houses. They’d sent one to Loch Nora when the real ring had finally made it to Carrie’s finger. It was equal parts olive branch and offering. They’d gotten it back return to sender with no forwarding address.

The bell above the door tongs again, loud enough to make Carol jump. The platter of cakes doesn't shift at all in Steve’s hand. His arm shows no sign of fatigue. It’s almost distracting enough that he misses the obvious. The bell signals someone is coming into the store.

“Sorry, Sweetheart. I know I said I wasn't gonna be late but Mike…” There just inside the door is the Freak. Undeniable even with his head down as he digs through his shoulder bag. From the riot of poorly maintained tangles that still hang around his shoulders to the expanded mess of tacky ink on his arms. The only thing that’s changed is the age in his face and the band on his shirt.

“Munson?” Carol has the reflexes and the personal grace to address him first. Shock more than the disgust it might have been when they were still kids.

Tommy feels like a kid still. Looks to Steve in an instinct he’d thought he’d stamped out years ago, only to be met with wide eyes and teeth grit tight enough to draw out the square line of his jaw.

“Christ, I still get nightmares that start like this.” Munson says, eye darting between the three of them. “Max, am I naked?”

“Don't know, don't wanna know.”

“I thought you'd be able to tell by the energy in the room.” He wiggles his fingers, still bedecked in silver, like they can divine the vibrations or some witchy shit.

That’s enough to make Steve break just a little. A soft, exhaling scoff before he finally starts to move out from the counter. Tommy catches, and he doubts Carol misses it either, how Steve passes the closer tables to set his tray down between them and Munson.

“I can tell I don't want to be here for this.” Their redheaded audience member says, “I'm taking my 15.”

“Don't go harass Mike, he's finally working,” Munson says.

“Will and El are on shift on the other side,” Steve calls out, not looking at any of them as he moves cakes from his tray to the table. A deliberate selection he seems to be making.

“Whatever, I’m gonna call Lucas and break up with him so he can play better or whatever.”

“Don’t be too harsh,” Munson calls out, “I’ve only got him on a five point spread.”

If Carol’s nails break from how hard they’re digging into his arm, somehow it’ll be Tommy’s fault. Not the fact that they’ve advanced the worst part of their ten year reunion by months, and also Munson is here and knows shit about basketball.

“Sorry, think my hearing’s going, sounded like you said you want him to lose and he’s getting kicked from the next one shot. I’ll let him know.”

“She gets that from you,” Steve and Munson say in sync. Glaring playfully at one another the way Steve used to with Carol.

“I’ll tell Robin you were-”

“Do not sick Buckley on me, Max made the deaf joke not me.”

“Weird, that’s not what I heard.” Steve has always claimed his hair as his best feature. It isn’t -- Carrie liked his eyes, Tommy his hands -- but it’s hard to deny that it doesn’t look good, flipping over his shoulder. His smile is private, just for Munson, soft the way he got whenever he picked up a new girl. Carrie taps the back of his hand, two sharp smacks, their signal for years that he needed to pay attention and notice something she had. Wide, nervous eyes dart to Steve -- like he hadn’t already been looking at Steve -- so he does his best to assess the way Carol would.

Jealous, viciously, Steve had been theirs in every way that mattered since they were ten years old and Carol had never liked sharing her toys with anyone but them. She watched his face for any sign of unhappiness anytime a new girlfriend came along, and when she found one she passed it along to him. So he could pick and joke until Steve was all theirs again.

So he checked the face. Tried to ignore the way Steve was lit up from the inside out with a joy he could barely remember, and then he saw the hearing aid.

He tapped back, three times. O.M.G.

“The 1985 Homecoming court here to reveal that this has all been a long con, Stevie?”

“Yeah I faked the name change paperwork and picked up a fake ID, sorry I took my business somewhere else.” Steve says it with the sincerity he’s always made those kind of jokes with, his strange sense of humor never coming across when he always sounded so serious. 

Munson gets it though, snorts loud and ugly, before a smile pulls wide across half his face the otherside taught with a gnarly scar. “Now I know why my fake ID business went belly up when we got to the city, not like I only sold three in high school.”  He gestures to the three of them in a wide arc.

Sophomores, they had decided it was time to throw their first real party now that Steve’s parents had moved out of Hawkins in all but name. Steve was a latchkey kid of new proportions and took to self sufficiency in a way that had seemed adult to him then; and in hindsight looked more like a child fighting for his life. Steve bragged how he’d been saving up the weekly checks they’d sent to ‘sustain him’ while they worked in the city during the week. His contribution to Tommy and Carol’s vague plan to throw a kegger by the pool. When they’d floundered, immediately, with the hows, Steve had been the one to suggest going to Munson.

“Love this preview of the reunion,” Carol cuts in, there’s no bite but Munson bristles anyway like she’s being rude for reminding them that there are customers present. “Steve?”

It’s funny, Tommy thinks, the way Steve still straightens his back at Carol’s tone. All this time and he can’t fight the old ingrained instincts either.

“Dustin made the appointment,” Steve apologizes, even as he’s posture perfect and preparing his pastries. The unsaid, ‘I definitely wouldn’t have’ doesn’t go unheard and it doesn’t sting any less even this far from their last interaction.

“Munson could join us,” Tommy offers, a new olive branch since their last one was never seen. Even if it does raise three sets of brows and makes Carrie’s nervous smile tighten even more in the corner of her mouth.

“Well at least one of us has to,” Munson, Eddie, says. Just says, tone like it was meant to be something said under his breath.

He's grown up a lot since high school, they both have. Still, he's only got twenty minutes left on his lunch break and it's been a long day. "God, is that why it's called that?" Growth, he doesn't say that Steve Munson sounds a lot dumber than Steve Harrington.

"It's charming," Carol and Steve both say. Though Carrie is definitely lying and Steve barely gets it out from between his gritted teeth, a sore spot. He's always been good at finding Steve's bruises.

"It's charming," Tommy agrees, like he always did when he was out voted.

Eddie has a smirk spread across his face and a ‘too proud of himself’ look in his eyes. Mouth open to make some quip that Tommy is going to pretend is funny, for Steve’s sake. Now that they’re here, he’s going to do something to show that they could talk to one another again. Steve clicks his tongue, taps his index and middle finger down to his thumb two quick times before he can.

He turns to the girl in the corner, "Erica, scram, go help Robin and the kids with the new donation that just came in."

The teen continues to scribble in the notebook in front of her, bulky headphones over her ears, she makes no sign that Tommy can see that she's heard Steve speak. "Erica, go, or I'll tell your mother you moved out of the dorms. You're 20, it's not child labor, and you've got a timecard."

She sighs and wordlessly packs up her things, she gives Steve a scathing look that takes Tommy back to high school. The withering eyebrow and rolled eyes would have been just at home on Steve’s own face in 1985, but she marches behind the counter, the sound of her dish rattling in the sink before she disappears out the same door that the redhead had gone out.

Now that the room has been cleared, an awkward silence has found the space to squeeze in. Munson, the original, still standing in the doorway and Steve standing between his unlawfully wedded husband and the two people who had lost their chance at him years ago.

The wedding and the reunion both on the horizon had dredged up a nostalgia that Tommy and Carol had been dealing with in their own ways. Dredging up old yearbooks, Carol had found a shoebox of old notes that she’d kept. Conversations written in three different inks by three different hands, nonsensical after all this time. Tommy woke up from dreams that he hadn’t had in years. Always of Steve and Carol, a study in opposites, but similar where it mattered.

“Well,” Steve says, taking charge of the situation like he always would when the other two faltered, “you’re here for a reason. We might as well get started on it.”

Steve’s fingerprints are still on them, just like he’d noticed theirs on him, molded as they were together. They’ve always bowed to his expectations, and his whims. When he ushers them to the table with a spread hand, Tommy and Carol go where they’re beckoned.

And so does Munson.

They keep an empty chair between them, an artificial divide for Tommy’s sanity, but with the sprawl of Munson’s legs their knees still occasionally brush together. Carol had taken the spot closest to Steve, who has stayed standing. He is their gracious host, marking the head of the round table.

“I pulled out the full sampler before I realized it was you,” Steve says. Even with as off balance as the interaction has felt, Tommy doesn’t feel his hackles raising. While it’s possible he’s gotten more subtle with his digs, Steve’s vicious tongue was usually unmistakable. “I can tell you about as many of them as you want though if you want to pretend like we don’t already know what I’ll be making you. I’m sure neither of you have eaten lunch yet.”

“You are going to take us on?” Carol asks. Shock always gives her tone an extra edge, defensive and catty, even if she’s really just waiting to see if another shoe will drop.

“Obviously,” Steve says, placing a faintly orange square of cake in front of her. He slaps Eddie’s hand away from another piece without looking away from either of them. “That’s as far as I’ll be going in participation though.”

He doesn’t miss the way Steve’s mouth twitches up with the joke, a filthy smirk that leaves Tommy flushing hot. Too warm to not be a bright and obvious red at the acknowledgment of that old private in-joke.

It doesn’t get better when Carol moans, “Oh my god, Steve!” Even if it is about the cake.

He laughs, and Tommy suspects the two are actually trying to kill him. He chances a glance over at Munson who looks like he doesn’t care at all that his husband has made Tommy’s fiance moan. He is watching Tommy though, an inquisitive look like the one Carol gets when she happens to catch a nature documentary.

“Yeah,” Steve agrees with Carol, “I’ll do something small with that citrus cake for you and Tom so you’ve got something you’ll actually eat on your wedding, maybe a pineapple buttercream on top like that nasty Juicy Fruit gum you like so much.”

“I mean it’s really crazy how you’re so good at this when you’ve never had any taste,” Carol compliments, she never did learn how to be nice.

He could probably count Steve’s teeth in the answering smile. Tommy can feel it like an ache in his chest how much he missed this. He snatches another cube of cake off the tray just so has something else to focus on.

“That’s the fancy one for the people who hate their guests,” Munson says as the cake has settled on the flat of Tommy’s tongue.

“It’s lavender,” Steve corrects, and the floral flavor is lodged in the back of his throat at least gives him a reason now to feel so choked up. “And it is for a particular sort of bride.”

“Are you saying I’m not fancy and particular, Munson?” Carol asks. 

She’s obviously talking to Eddie Munson, who lifts his hands up in answer. But it’s Steve who says, “If you tried to feed that to Gail she would leave the reception bitching the whole time.”

“Well go on,” Tommy finds himself goading now that he’s swallowed, “finish calling your shot, Stevie. You said you knew what we were walking out of here with.”

Carol reaches across the table, locking eyes with Eddie as she snags the piece closest to him. The one his fingers had been inching toward like he thought Steve wouldn’t notice him trying to take it.

“I’ll make a small citrus cake for you, Carrie, we’ll hide it in the back of the larger cake so you can get the pictures of you cutting it and smashing into each other's faces-”

“We will not be doing that,” she interrupts, the warning for him and also unnecessary. He already knows how she feels about being embarrassed in public.

“Then the big cake for your guests will be a chocolate cake, I can cover it in a buttercream or a fondant icing also chocolate, because it’s the only kind of cake the Hagan family will eat. Even though I’m sure John hasn’t given you a dime for the wedding, he’ll complain until Hannah gets married if he doesn’t like the cake.”

“Really,” Steve continues, “the only thing up in the air is how many people you were able to get away with not inviting, Care.”

The two of them start talking actual wedding logistics, and as Tommy grabs another bite of cake -- this one looks like it might be a normal flavor -- he figures the real show of good faith would be talking to the only other person at the table while he eats what Steve correctly dubbed his lunch.

“Y’know he never actually answered me,” he says in an undertone.

Munson seems surprised at being spoken to, only widens his eyes in response to Tommy’s unasked question.

“I asked Steve how soon after the first date he proposed, he never actually answered.”

Eddie softens at the edges before he can even say anything. Steve had a way of doing that, bringing out the romantic in a person. He loved with a passion that demanded it be matched. “Technically I proposed to him, but he says it doesn’t count because we weren’t together and I was high on morphine after a major surgery and thought he was Apollo, come to whisk me away.” The smile on Munson’s face looks dopey and drugged up now, like the very memory of whatever hospital stay is so ingrained in his mind he can feel the high now.

“But,” he goes on, “he told me we were getting married whether it was legal or not about three months after he got legally married to another woman.”

“Stop,” Steve has always been able to sense when he’s about to be the butt of the joke. He has a finger pointed at Eddie like a teacher delivering a lecture. “You can’t tell people that. It was for tax reasons, I’m not cheating on my wife.”

“You say tomato, I say whichever one of us is your least favorite has to be the extramarital affair.”

“I say, you’re the most obnoxious person I’ve ever met.” Tommy can hear the warm affection behind the insult, the way their picking is a safer way to express their passion for one another.

He thought he would be jealous of whoever finally managed to reel in Steve Harrington for good, and he is. The emotion is there, present in the snarling tangle of emotions that this encounter has left in him. One that he and Carol will have to slowly tease and pick out tonight when they’re home in bed. Trying to make sense of what each thread is and what it means for them. But the one bright pulsing thread he can make sense of is happiness. He’s happy for Steve, happy that he gets to see an old friend so at ease and obviously cared for.

And he’s sad that his time is up, his lunch hour so close to an end he’ll be late getting back to the office. Something he can already hear his Dad and fucking Greg giving him shit for. Which means they have to end their time here.

Steve walks them to the door, flips the sign to mark them closed for lunch.

“Congratulations again, you two,” he says, “I really am happy I can get to be a part of this with you all. Even if it’s a little different than we used to imagine.”

Carol reaches out for the both of them, puts her hand on his arm. Tommy finds that he’s the one who actually says, “We’re glad you found someone who makes you this happy, dude. You deserve it.”

“Yeah, he’s alright most of the time.” It's said with such fondness it becomes a declaration. It’s hard to imagine how they thought they could ever be the something that could make Steve this happy. But maybe in a different life, under different circumstances it could have been.

There’s a minute where they all stand in the doorway. He wonders if they’re all afraid that this might be the last time they see each other, speak to one another, until Steve is delivering the cake on the day of the wedding. Maybe it’s just him, he was the one who pushed back the hardest after things ended.

Someone finally gives in and pushes the door open. It’s TONG a death toll for their current conversation. But it also sends a jolt through Steve, he straightens to his full height like a shock has gone through him. “Here,” he says, “here, um.” He digs around in his apron until he finds a pen and a receipt pad. Jots down something before tearing it off and putting it in Tommy’s hands, “It's our home number, in case you have any cake emergencies or something.”

They really can’t stay any longer.

Carol takes the note, better at keeping track of these things than Tommy is. It’s hard to know if they’ll actually use it, maybe after they talk about it, but if they do she’ll be the one to do it. She’s always been braver than him.

There’s no way of guaranteeing anything but the fact that they’ll have a cake on the table on their wedding day. But he hopes that Steve might stay for the ceremony once he brings it, he can even bring Eddie if that’s what gets him there. 

Alone in his car, Tommy lets himself take a minute to think about Steve Harrington one last time. He isn’t going to get what he wanted as a kid. Doubts that he’ll ever be as close to Steve as he’d been in childhood, too much time has passed and too much has changed.

But there’s an opportunity to get to know Steve Munson, and he isn't going to pass it up. Even if he doesn’t know how to name a bakery.

[basicallyaturtle]

never been part of a tag game, sounds really fun! tagged by dear Lanvender, @khan-crete

Do you make your bed? A freshly decrumbed, stuffed animal arranged and dirty clothes removed bed feels great. How often do I do this? We mustn't ask (like once or twice a month) that's all making the bed entails for me, I just have a fitted then normal sheet and blankets

Favorite Number? 4 4 4 4 4! I've loved four my entire life she is like a goddess to me. 2+2 2*2 2^2, divides into halves twice. can only compete with sixteen, whose status and 2^4 and 4^2 is nice, but not as symmetric. 37 and 73 have a place in my heart as the 12th and 21st primes, but not a large place compared to 4

What's your job? What do I get paid for? undergrad lab TA, what do I do? grad research in low energy nuclear physics

If you could go back to school, would you? In school technically still. Would I rewind time to experience school again? highschool no college yes. would I go back for another college degree? I could be convinced if it would be cheap and unobtrusive to my current schooling. Was always torn between physics and linguistics. I made the right choice but I always wonder what if.

Can you Parallel Park? I have done it, on the driving test, like four or five years ago. I think I could do it again, but not too confident

Do you think Aliens are real? Eh, probably in a 'the observable universe 9.3e+9 ly across, it must have happened more than once' kinda way, but not in a 'they've been feeding us tech for thousands of years or are visiting us' kinda way.

Can you drive a manual car? Never tried, hubris tell me yes, anxiety with even normal cars tells me I'd probably fuck up the transmission while trying to leave the driveway. gonna say yeag

Guilty Pleasure? I think like cheesy childhood disney live action movies?, generally I'm pretty full chested about the things I enjoy

Favorite Type of Music? yeah, hard, a lot of vocaloid, which isn't reallly a genre, a lot of edm genres from like old school monstercat, a lot of jrock by way of anime OP's of show's I've never watched then finding other songs by those artists. some rock music though that genre is also extremely expansive and I'm not sure how I'd categorize a lot of it. Generally my music consumption consists of a group of maybe five songs completely unrelated on repeat for months at a time and genre is not a huge factor in that

Do you like puzzles? twisty puzzles like rubik's cube type puzzles are really fun working, towards doing a 3x3 blindfolded but challenging, I used to do jigsaw's with my mom but over the course of a very long time because we'd get frustrated. crosswords, but I'm no good at them

Favorite Childhood Sport? Soccerrrr. Wish I'd stayed with it, but there were only a couple more years before there wasn't a league for my age group anyway, been trying to get back into it recreationally

Do you talk to yourself? I do, but as if I'm talking to someone else. I prefer not to do it because I'm not content with my voice atm, but I find myself doing it a lot especially when getting stuck on research stuff trying to talk it out or I will say a comment to someone I disagree with outloud rather than typing it and posting it. A lot of this is to my reflection which is probably part of the reason it feels like someone else lol

Tea or Coffee? tea all the way. drank iced sweet black tea my entire childhood and started drinking it hot with milk in college. I was the kind of person that disliking coffee was a sort of pillar of my tastes, but then a few years ago made it with like half milk and a lot of sugar and like it, lotta people wouldn't call that coffee, but eh.

First thing you wanted to be when you grew up? The actual first thing was everything. I would amalgamate like all the stereotypes of things kids want to be into one so a firefighter-astronaut-whatever else. When I got a better sense of my interests, inventor, so I guess like product designer, but what that meant to me was I got to sit around and think of neat gadgets and items then figure out how to make them like freeze ray, time machine, clone gun, that kind of thing lol. the first practical idea of a job I wanted was theoretical physicist in like middle school, which I kinda am now so success I guess

What Movies do you Adore? not much of a movie person, but like to watch movies other people are interested in with them, love castle in the sky, LOTR, howl's moving castle, your name, probably others in those categories I don't know about yet or have forgotten and I have a strong soft spot for childhood halloween movies like twitches and halloweentown

I'm curious what @arc-archernar and @charyou-tree have got to say if they'd like to, and anyone else that wants to participate!

[hippiegoth97]

Into the Fire: An Eddie Munson x Reader Story Pt. 3

Collage by me :)

Masterlist

Pt. 2

Tag List: @rafescurtainbangz @voyeurmunson @xxbimbobunnyxx @taintedcigs @mediocredreams

@slowandsteddie @angel-munson @eldermayfield @munsonsbtch @babygorewhore

@rattkween86 @violetpixiedust @bimbobaggins69 @purplehazed-h @morning-rituals

@eddie-van-munson @msgexymunson @munsoneightysixx @impmunson @mysticalstar30

@jenniquinn @oneforthemunny @succubusmunson @ddeadly-succubus @prettyboyeddiemunson

@sanctumdemunson @stalactitekilla @s6raphic @hellfirenacht @birdysaturne

@ohmeg @h-ness1944 @pretendthisnameisclever @ahoyyharrington @micheledawn1975

@costellation-hunter @josephquinnsfreckles @leelei1980 @yourdailymemedelivery @spacedoutdaydreamer

Content Warning 18+ Only, Minors DNI: Swearing, smoking, light smut, drug use, angst, anxiety, mentions of vomit

Word Count: 4.8k

Divider by @strangergraphics

Part 3: Get Nervous

Sunday, March 12th, 1989

Sunday. Fucking Sunday. You've been dreading this all weekend. It’s the final day of the Hellfire Club campaign, and you also have a paper due for biology. You didn't mean to put it off, but a certain sexy metalhead has distracted you this entire time. You don't blame him, you didn't tell him you had homework. You're sure if you just said so that he would've let you focus. Given the length required for your paper, you decide to tell Eddie you can't sit in today. You don't want to spend all night rushing your work. You could easily write a passable essay over the course of the day.

"What do you mean you can't watch the end?" Eddie asks, surprised you'd deny him your company.

"It's nothing personal, baby. I promise. I just have a big essay due tomorrow. I should've mentioned it earlier, but I didn't want to ruin our fun. Though I think I've done that now anyway." You look down at your hands, leaning against the entry to the livingroom. Eddie's standing close to you, playing about with the hem of your shirt to tease you. He lifts your chin up with his finger.

"It's no problem, angel. I understand." He smiles kindly at you, but his eyes still read as hurt. He knows you'd sit in if you could, but he can't say he won't be missing you the whole time. Even though you're just going to be down the hall, all he'll want to do is run to you and never let go. "Who knows, maybe you'll finish early, hm? And then you can come see me." He says lowly, leaning down for a kiss. Your lips meet, and you wrap your arms around him. You pull him close, moving your mouth against his gently. He's so addictive, the taste of tobacco on his tongue makes you want to never stop kissing him. But it’s already 11am, you'd all slept in late so you have to get moving.

You break away from him, and he whines. "Eddie, relax. I just need time to write a decent paper so I don't fail, okay?" He nods, pouting playfully. "Believe me, I'd rather spend the day with you. But I can't let my grades slip. If I do, Mom will have a cow. And then she might not be so keen on me seeing you." You poke a finger into his chest.

"Are you saying I'm a bad influence, baby?" Eddie asks slyly. He enjoys being a rebel just a little too much sometimes. You roll your eyes.

"You just might be, Munson. Now come on, go tend to your club. And I'll be in my room. You can come check in on me when you're done if I haven't finished yet." You give him another quick kiss, and turn away to go work on your paper. You hear him let out an annoyed sigh, rolling your eyes again at him being so childish. You walk into your room, already regretting sticking to your guns about your assignment. You close the door, but leave it unlocked in case Eddie comes to you later on. You put your record player on, music helps you concentrate. You keep it low so as not to disturb the campaign, and you begrudgingly open your notebook to begin writing your paper.

Hours go by, and it's almost 6pm. You haven't bothered to look at the clock much, you just want to get this damn assignment done. You have about two pages left, but your hand is starting to cramp up. You flex your fingers to relax your sore muscles, when you hear a knock on the door. "Y/N?" Eddie calls to you. "The game's over, Erica claimed a victory for everyone. I'm gonna take the kids home, but I'll be back, 'kay?" You jump off your bed, running to open the door. You're greeted by Eddie's smiling face. "Hey there, beautiful. How's the essay coming along?" He leans against the doorframe, looking you up and down. Your hair is a mess from running your hands through it constantly. It’s one of your nervous tics. His expression drops slightly, worried about how your assignment has been treating you. "You doin’ alright?" He asks, reaching for your hand.

"Yeah, it's just kinda stressing me out. But I only have two pages left. It's not very good, I'll probably only get a B on it. I'm having a hard time concentrating." You downplay the situation, ignoring the alarms going off in your head. For some reason, this paper is kicking your ass. You can't help your anxiety overtaking you, your body begins to tremble uncontrollably. Eddie squeezes your hand to comfort you.

"Sweetheart, you don't have to be so wound up. I'm sure it's a good paper, it'll be okay." He puts his other hand on your shoulder to steady your tremors.

"I guess. I keep reading it over, but it all feels jumbled now. And my eyes hurt." Your breath shudders, and you pinch the bridge of your nose as your eyes squeeze shut. You feel one of your infamous migraines coming on. Perfect. Those last two pages will really be a challenge now.

"Hey, hey. C’mere, babydoll." Eddie pulls you into him, holding you close. Your arms wrap around his middle, and he strokes your head. You try to focus on him so you can steady your heart pounding in your chest. But you can't calm down, you're having a full-blown panic attack. You feel silly having one over a stupid essay, but you can't do poorly on this. You won't allow it. You cannot fail. Ever. Your breath comes out rapidly, chest rising and falling as you wheeze. Eddie loosens his grip, looking at your face. You've gone pale, like you might faint. "Shit. Are you alright? What can I do?" The worry in his eyes only exacerbates your anxiety. You're hyperventilating, and your head feels light. Eddie picks you up in his arms, carrying you to the bed. "I-I don't know what to do, Y/N. I'll get your mom. Just try to breathe. Fuck." His own voice is shaky now, you've scared him. He runs out of the room to the kitchen, frantically telling your mother what's happening.

You hear multiple sets of footsteps rushing down the hall to you. Eddie, Mom, Dustin, and all the kids file into your room. Mom and Eddie help you sit up, you feel like you're going to pass out. You can't steady your breathing, it’s as if you're suffocating. Mom holds out a paper bag to you. "Honey, we gotta get your breathing steady, okay? So just try to breathe in the bag for me. And then I have a Valium you can take to settle your nerves. It'll be okay, sugarpuff. We're here for you." You take the bag, inhaling and exhaling as best you can into it. It seems to be working, your breath slowly returning to you. You hate having everyone staring at you like this, you must look like such a freak. You wish they'd all go away, and leave you alone. You put the bag down, and Mom hands you the pill and a glass of water. You down it quickly, chugging the entire glass.

"Take it easy, angel." Eddie advises, stroking your arm. Mom takes the glass from you and walks out, quickly shooing the others away. Eddie stays with you, holding you close again. You're still trembling, but your heart slowly regains its normal pace. "Do you want to lay down, sweetheart?" He quietly asks. You just nod. He lays you down, caressing your cheek as you position yourself on your side. "Is there anything I can do?" You shake your head, feeling a tear escape one of your eyes. He tuts, wiping it away. "It'll be alright, baby. Just try to relax. I'm gonna take the kids home, but I'm coming right back, ‘kay? And I'm not leaving your side for the rest of the night." He plants a kiss to your forehead before standing up to leave. He walks out of the room, giving you a caring glance before shutting the door.

As soon as he leaves, you can't hold back the tears anymore. You begin to sob, drawing your legs up to your chest. You feel so stupid, losing control in front of Eddie like that. And to have your mom, and everyone else staring at you? It’s so humiliating. And over what? A stupid essay? You really are just a scared little girl that can't handle anything. You imagine Eddie won't actually come back, because he's too freaked out by your little episode. He only says he will in order to spare your feelings. And all the kids will tell everyone and their dog about how you crumble so easily under pressure. Dustin’s bound to have a field day rubbing it all in your face. And you’ll have Mom doting on you every second of the day over this, maybe she'll even throw you in the looney bin.

You lay stewing in your thoughts for what feels like hours, and the sun had set outside your window. You never want to move from this spot again, never look at anyone or talk to anyone. It’s all too much, and you just want to hide, or maybe even die. You hear the front door open, probably Eddie stopping by to tell you he can't see you anymore. He can't possibly go out with a nutcase like you. The door to your room opens again, and Eddie walks over to you. "Hey, angel. How are you feeling?" He asks with a smile, which disappears when he sees how red your face is from crying.

"Terrible. But I don't expect you to care." You blubber, wiping your eyes with your sleeve. He scoffs at your statement, confused at your change in mood.

"What do you mean? Of course I care. Where's this coming from?" He asks, moving closer to you. You turn your back to him, you can't take that concerned look on his face. He sighs. "Y/N. Please, look at me. Did I do something wrong?" You groan, rolling back over to face him.

"You didn't do anything. I just figure you don't want to hang around me since I'm a basketcase." You reply bitterly. You know he's given you no indication of what you're saying, but you can't believe anyone would possibly want to be around you now.

"What the fuck are you talking about?" He asks, shocked and slightly annoyed. "You're not a basketcase. And even if you were, I wouldn't care. I really like you, Y/N." He furrows his brow at you, trying to figure out where your head's at.

"You can't mean that." You shake your head, refusing to make eye contact with him.

"Why not?" He crosses his arms, searching your expression.

"Because you can't see me like this, all shaky and pale over a stupid paper, and still want to be around me. It's so embarrassing." You start to tear up again, and you curse your eyes for working against you. "And everyone was staring at me, I'm sure they'll tell everyone they know about it. And Dustin will tease me. And my mom will worry about me all the time. She might even have me committed." Eddie's eyes widen at your words, realizing what's happening. He lays down next to you, but lets you have some space.

"Y/N, I can tell you right now that you're wrong. About all of it, 'kay?" He reassures you, and you glare at him.

"How do you know?" You cross your own arms now.

"Well, for one. I'm still here, aren't I? What did you think I was gonna do? Just leave and never come back?" He's slightly angry with you doubting his true intentions.

"I guess I did. I didn't want you to, but I didn't think you'd still like me after everything." You answer, realizing how silly you sound.

"Well, I do. I'm right here, ‘kay? Look, it scared me. But I was worried about you. I wanted you to be okay. To be honest, it felt like I caused it, since I kept you from doing your work all weekend." He explains, sounding guilty.

"No, Eddie. It isn't your fault, I didn't tell you about it, and that's my own problem." You reassure him, reaching for his hands. He lets you take them in yours.

"Well, that's good to know, princess. And another thing? You're wrong about everyone else too. Again, they're concerned for you. But the whole time I was driving them home, all the kids talked about was coming up with a way to help you feel better. They care about you, Y/N. We all do. I don't know what negative voices you have in your head telling you otherwise, but you shouldn't listen to them." You nod, and he continues on. "And Dustin? He swore everyone to secrecy about your anxiety. He said he'll smother anyone who spills your private business in their sleep. And your Mom? She told me you've been dealing with a lot for a long time. She said she felt something like this coming on, because you work yourself to the bone constantly. You never take a break, and you refuse to ask for help when you need it. Obviously, I knew some of this already, given how Friday went. But she said she hopes having me in your life will help you. She still thinks it could, which is flattering, I guess." He chuckles, and you let a small smile form on your lips. "There's that smile I've been missing today!" Eddie coos, pulling you into his arms.

You sniffle, wiping away all your tears. Your eyes feel irritated and red. "I'm sorry, Eddie. It's not fair of me to think the way I was about you. Or the others. I just...it's like I know those things aren't true, right? But, it also feels impossible that anyone would actually like and accept me as I am. You know? That probably makes no sense." You chuckle, slapping your forehead in embarrassment.

"No, it doesn't. But I understand what you mean. Listen, I'm here for you no matter what. I won't, however, let you wallow all day. You have a paper to finish young lady." He pokes your chest, making you giggle. "How about we go have a smoke outside, clear your head? Then you can finish your essay. And then, we can spend the rest of the night together. Sound good?"

"Sounds perfect, Eds." You both climb out of bed, making your way outside. You bypass Dustin and your Mom, they seem surprised to see you in a better mood. They look at each other in confusion, questioning one another if they know anything about what Eddie might've said to you. But they end up shrugging, chalking it up to Eddie being the right man for you.

It isn't until you light up that you feel the effects of the pill your mother gave you earlier. You begin to feel dizzy, almost falling over. "Shit, I've gotcha." He catches you, gently leading you to sit in the grass. He sits beside you, rubbing your back with his hand. "You feeling alright, Y/N?" He looks into your eyes with concern.

You try to get your head to stop spinning, but you can't. "I'm not feeling so hot, Eddie. I'm really dizzy, everything's spinning." You groan, clutching your stomach. You lean away from him, and vomit into the grass. He tries to help you, but you push him away. You manage to stand, bending over as you throw up again. You keep yourself steady, bracing your hands on your knees. The stomach acid stings your throat, making you cough. You stay in place, waiting for your stomach to calm down. You dry heave a few times before you're finally empty. You spit any remaining bile out, wiping your mouth. You stand upright, almost falling backwards. Eddie grabs your shoulders to steady you.

"I'm sorry, angel. Have you ever taken Valium before?" He asks, stroking the sweat-soaked hair out of your face. You feel slightly better now, but also very tired. You just shake your head, before burying it into his chest. "I'm guessing you had a bad reaction. You didn't eat much today, either. I know your mom was trying to help, but I wish I had known you hadn't had it before. That shit is not for the faint hearted."

"She takes it to help her sleep, she's always had bad insomnia." You state, muffled by Eddie's chest. You can barely keep your eyes open at this point, you just want to sleep. You know your paper needs doing, but a small nap could help. You could always get up early tomorrow to finish it. "I'm really tired, Eds. Can you take me to bed?" You ask, nuzzling your face against him.

"I will, but I don't think you should sleep right now. You might get sick again and choke. And you need water, and something to eat. I'll get you something, and I'll stay with you until the pill wears off some more." He sighs, lifting you into his arms. You groan, your stomach still hurts. "Sorry, baby. I'm trying to be careful with you." He brings you inside, and your mother immediately panics when she sees you in Eddie's arms.

"Oh, God! What happened? You look awful, sugarpuff!" She says, rushing over to you.

"She's fine, mostly. She had a bad reaction to the pill you gave her and painted the yard with her breakfast." Eddie snips. He continues walking, bringing you down the hall. He plops you on the bed, making sure you sit up against your pillow. "Stay put, baby. I'll be right back." You hear him say as your eyes have fallen shut. He leaves the room to get what you need. You overhear him talking to Mom, their words swirling around in your dizzy head. Eddie calmly explains to her that she shouldn't have given you the Valium. She doesn't sound offended, more so she's ashamed that she inadvertently made you sick. He reassures her, saying it was just a mistake and that he'll help you through it. But he makes a point to tell her to never do it again under any circumstances. You drift off near the end of their talk, hearing the fridge door open as Eddie finds you something to eat.

A while later, you feel Eddie shaking you awake. "Mooooooom, just five more minutes." You whine, your eyes fluttering open. You see him chuckling at you thinking he was your mother. "Oh, it's you. Sorry, silly me." You giggle, trying to keep your eyes open.

"Hey, sleepy head. I brought you some dinner, and a nice tall glass of water." He sets a tray down next to you.

"Not hungry." You shake your head, and Eddie frowns at you.

"You have to eat, Y/N. You'll feel better, I promise." He insists, getting in bed next to you. He sets the tray on his lap. You lazily scan your eyes over what he’s brought you. A PB&J sandwich cut in half, and some apple slices. "It's not too much, I don't want you to barf it all up later. But it's enough to help you."

"Ugh, don't say barf." You wince, feeling ill again.

"Shit, sorry." He hands you half of the sandwich, and you reluctantly take it in your hand. You bring it to your mouth, taking a small, apprehensive bite. You immediately want to spit it out, but you know you have to get something down. You gulp hard as you manage to swallow it. It hits your stomach, and you start to feel hunger overtake you. You take another bite, and another. "Take it slow, Y/N." He says to you quietly, gently stroking your leg as you chew. You swallow again, looking into Eddie's eyes.

"Thank you for taking care of me, Eddie. You're a good man, you know." You smile kindly at him, taking another bite of your sandwich. "Did you make this?" You ask him as you chew.

"How'd you know?" He quirks an eyebrow at you, impressed you can tell he made it.

"Easy, Mom uses grape jelly. But I think it's too sweet. And you...used raspberry jam. My favorite. I don't know how you guessed it, though." His eyes widen, a smirk spreading on his lips. "What?" You look at him suspiciously.

"Raspberry is my favorite, too." He replies, wiping a smudge of jam from the corner of your mouth with his thumb. He brings it to his lips, licking it clean. You stare at him in amazement, he really is something else. "What? Like you said, grape is too sweet. But raspberry? It makes the whole thing come together."

You don't know what to say, so you let slip the first thing that comes to mind. "I think I could be falling in love with you." You gasp at your own words, registering what you’ve just said to him.

"Over a sandwich?" He asks snarkily.

"Well, no. You're just so...." You search for the right words. "Good. To me." You gaze at him seriously, driving the point home that you care deeply for him. He gets the message, receiving it with enthusiasm.

"Well, I'm glad you feel so strongly for me, Y/N. And lucky for you, I just happen to feel the same." Eddie looks deep into your eyes, before glancing at your lips. He's breathing heavily, unsure if he should go further. He doesn't want to push you in your vulnerable state.

"Are you gonna kiss me already?" You say impatiently, his eyes snap to yours again. You can't help smiling like an idiot, closing the gap yourself. Your lips meet, both of you humming lowly into the kiss. You break away quickly, covering your mouth. "Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sure my breath is terrible right now." Your cheeks heat up, but he's unphased.

"It's fine, Y/N. You just taste like sandwich. I don't mind either way, not if it means I get to kiss the most beautiful girl in the world." He pokes your nose, making the both of you laugh. You finish the first half of the sandwich, drinking some of the water to wash it down. You reach over to take an apple slice from the tray in his lap. Eddie sits with you quietly while you chew, still stroking your leg. He watches as you manage to eat everything off your plate, kissing your forehead when you finish the last bite. "That's my girl." He says sweetly, taking the tray back to the kitchen. You sip on the water, feeling just full enough for your stomach to stop hurting. You can't stop smiling, seeing Eddie care for you makes your heart swell and gives you butterflies. He comes back shortly, plopping into bed beside you once more. "Better?" He asks, holding your hand.

"Better." You reply, planting a kiss on his plush lips. You cuddle up to him, laying your head on his shoulder. You still feel pretty tired, but you just might be able to finish your paper now. "I should probably finish my essay." You say reluctantly.

"You sure?" Eddie says, worried about you working yourself up again.

"Yeah, I have to get it done. But...stay here with me, okay?" You place a hand on his thigh, caressing it gently.

"Of course, Y/N. I'm not goin’ anywhere." He places his hand over yours. Your head leaves its resting place, and you reach over for your notebook and pencil. "C’mere, sit between my legs." Eddie says calmly, and you do as he asks. You put the notebook in your lap, reading the last page you were working on to remember where you’re going with it. You feel Eddie running his hands up and down your back, and your eyes can't help fluttering closed at his touch.

"Watcha doin' there, Eds?" You ask breathily.

"I'm keeping you relaxed, angel." He replies lowly. His hands go to your shoulders, massaging them firmly. You moan at his touch, your head falling to the side. "Does that feel good, baby?" He asks in your ear, his warm breath fanning over you.

"Mhm." Is all you can manage to say as his hands continue to work your flesh. His thumbs press into your back, working the knots of stress that have resided there for who knows how long. You wince as they hurt a little.

"I know, baby. Just let me help you, you'll feel better when I'm done." He presses a kiss to your neck, setting your skin aflame. You know he's not intentionally turning you on, but you can't help leaning further into his touch. He draws small moans from you as he loosens up your sore muscles.

"How are you so fucking good at this?" You ask lustfully, making Eddie's cock twitch. Under any other circumstances, he'd be going further than he is. But he doesn't want to push you when you're not feeling well, it wouldn't be right.

"Practice, sweetheart. I'll keep going, but you have to work on your essay." He kisses your neck again, before setting your head upright so you'll concentrate.

"Alright, alright. Just please keep going." You almost whine at him.

"I'll go as long as you want me too, babydoll." He chuckles quietly. You turn your attention back to the book in front of you. You reread the last paragraph to refresh your train of thought. Once you remember where you’re going, you begin scrawling more words on the page. The ideas come easy to you, and Eddie's hands travel up to your neck. He gently rubs out a large knot that you're sure has been there for months, but you remain focused on the task at hand.

About thirty minutes later, the infamous essay is finally finished. "Done!" You clap the book shut, tossing it away.

"I knew you could do it, baby." You blush at his praise as he kisses your cheek. Eddie had stopped massaging you ten minutes earlier, but he kept caressing you in a non-distracting way. He loves touching you, it seems he'll never get enough. You leave his grasp, turning to face him. He looks so tired, and you feel bad for stressing him out today. He peers at you, raising an eyebrow. "What's wrong?"

You straddle him, wrapping your arms around his neck. You look into his eyes, biting your lip. "Nothing's wrong, baby. I'm just sorry for making you so worried today. Let me make it up to you." You lean forward to kiss his neck, lightly biting down on his skin. He groans, his hands going to your waist instinctively. You look at him again, but his expression hasn't changed. "What?" You ask, scrunching your face.

He sighs, pressing into your hips with his fingers. He shakes his head. "It's nothing. It’s just...you don't owe me anything." You open your mouth to protest, but he stops you. "Don't get me wrong, you're sexy as all hell. But you should be taking it easy, sweetheart. It wouldn't be right for me to ask anything of you right now." Eddie cups your face, looking at you meaningfully. "But, what we can do is get cozy and cuddle in bed. I'm fuckin' exhausted, and you need rest before class tomorrow." He pulls you into him, pressing his lips to yours passionately. You return it, grabbing the sides of his face to deepen it further. Eddie quickly catches on to what you're doing, breaking away. "Easy, tiger. Man, even when you're sick, you're insatiable." He jokes, moving you off of his lap.

"What can I say? You really bring out my appetite." You smirk slyly at him, hopping off the bed to shut your bedroom door. You both quickly discard your clothes. Eddie's in his boxers, and you're in some panties and his Hellfire shirt. You flick off the light, and climb into bed with him. You scoot under the covers, and he snatches you into his arms to spoon you. You share a quiet laugh, the feeling of his arms around you gives you a warm sense of safety. You turn your head to look at him. "Goodnight, Eds. Thank you for being here with me." You whisper, giving him a peck on the lips. He smiles kindly at you, his eyes hooded from drowsiness.

"It's no trouble at all, ‘night, princess." He slowly shuts his eyes, holding you even closer to him. He nuzzles his face into you, sighing in contentment. You face forward again, closing your eyes too. You let your mind wander off to dreamland, feeling safe, warm, and secure in Eddie's arms.

To be continued...

[sipping-ambrosia-wine]

further lyrics and info below the cut. even if you havent seen the show i want opinions!

NYTW-> BROADWAY

1 2 3 4 5 6

EPIC III-

Where is the man with his hat in his hands/Who stands in the garden with nothing to lose -> Where is the man with arms outstretched?/ To the woman he loves with nothing to lose

DOUBT COMES IN-

Doubt comes in/ And strips the paint/ Doubt comes in/ And turns the wine/ Doubt comes in and leaves a trace/ Of vinegar and turpentine -> Doubt comes in/ The wind is changing/ Doubt comes in/ How cold it's blowing/Doubt comes in and meets a stranger/ Walking on a road alone

IF IT'S TRUE-

If it’s true what they say/If my love is gone for good/They can take this heart away/They can take this flesh and blood/Take my mouth that kissed her mouth/Take my tongue that sung her praise/Take my arms that used to reach out/ In the dark to where she lay -> If it's true what they say/if theres nothing to be done/If its true that its too late/And the girl I love is gone/If its true what they say/Is this how the world is?/To be beaten and betrayed and then be told that nothing changes

[...]

Take this voice, take these hands/I can’t use them anyway/Take this music and the memory/Of the muse from which it came -> (Absent, replaced with the workers' lyrics?)

WAY DOWN HADESTOWN-

Everybody dresses in clothes so fine/Everybody's pocket are weighted down/Everybody sippin the ambrosia wine/ It's a goldmine, in hadestown -> [Cut, replaced with she's gonna ride that train" build up after "that was not six months"]

CHANT II-

When I was a young girl like you/Sister, I was hungry too/Hungry for the underworld/When I was a young girl/Now you know how it tastes/The fruit of Mr. Hades’ ways/Sister, it’s a bitter wine-Spit it out while you still have time/Take it from a woman of my age/Love is not a gilded cage/All the wealth within these walls/Will never buy the thing called love/Love was when he came to me/Begging on his bended knees/To please have pity on his heart/And let him lay me in the dirt.../I felt his arms around me then/We didn’t need a wedding bed/Dark seeds scattered on the ground/The wild birds were flying around/That’s when I became his wife/But that was in another life/That was in another world/When I was a young girl!-> [Cut entirely]

ANY WAY THE WIND BLOWS

In the fever of a world in flame/in the season of the hurricane/flood'll get ya if the fire dont/any way the wind blows/Sister gone gone the [nomad*]'s route/brother gone gone for a job down south/gone the same way as the shanty town/and the traveling show/any way the wind blows

In the valley of the exodut/in the belly of a bowl of dust/crows and buzzards fly in a row/any way the wind blows-> [replaced by hermes's exposition on the fates]

*initial use of the word g*psy, which is a slur against the roma/romani people. mitchell was unaware of the hateful connotations and cut the lyric once made aware.

[damthosefandoms]

Umm will you please feed us (ME) more content about how Soda changed after the war because I’m obsessed with the shift in his personality and how drastic it would be for the rest of the gang and how not only is it soda having to cope with his new self but everyone else too….

Like the fics of him being in Vietnam are usually a little 🤨😬 but the character exploration of him post homecoming…. I eat that shit up (but I think mainly because I love angst and specifically Sodapop angst)

man I can’t even lie to you. 90% of it was I listened to (the Big Time Rush cover of) Revolution by the Beatles and went “post-Vietnam soda would’ve loved this song.” so do with that what you will.

actually i will! the Beatles are notorious for being a Soc Thing in the book, it’s stated that the Greasers like Elvis but the Socs like the Beatles, and I’ve mentioned this before probably in some tags somewhere but I think Soda’s guilty pleasure is that he doesn’t actually like Elvis, he likes the Beach Boys and the Beatles. Personally, my parents grew up in the 60s/70s so my music taste is whatever they played in the car for me growing up and this is entirely me projecting but it feels in-character to me for Soda to love all kinds of music, so anyway. One day when he’s home he’s driving around with some of the gang and Revolution comes on and they’re booing it telling him to change the station bc it’s a Beatles song but he just very passive-aggressively turns the radio volume up because that song is literally a fuck you to the world for the Vietnam War. Soda likes the Beatles now. Something is clearly wrong in the world. But they can’t tell him to turn it off now bc he’s belting the lyrics because it’s like cathartic for him. They cut his hair short when he joined the army. They cut his hair short and as a greaser that’s all he had, and now this song is all he has, too.

the rest is under a read more bc this may get long lol.

Soda would’ve turned eighteen a year after the plot (so 1966 in the book/movie timeline, 1968 in the musical timeline and the musical is the one I go by personally), and in my head it’s all pretty fast; he’s drafted and sent away as soon as he turns eighteen. His birthday’s in October and he’s gone before Christmas. He doesn’t come back until maybe the next Christmas, maybe right after—and I go back and forth on this depending how I wanna play it but I think for the sake of the rest of the gang still seeing the greaser/soc thing as something that matters, he’s just over nineteen when he gets back, and that matters bc they’re all still pretty young.

And Ponyboy’s probably still home and in high school and definitely is still in Darry’s care (he’s 16 now). and anyway at some point Pony & Soda are walking home and get jumped bc people are still mad about Bob’s death, and Pony steps in front of Soda bc Soda’s still injured from whatever causes his medical discharge from the army (I’ll get around to that) but when the socs pull a knife Soda just watches them tiredly, and he’s like “ain’t y’all realized there’s worse shit in the world than what side of town ya live on?” and that’s when they clock his knee brace and the bags under his eyes, the buzzcut hair that looks so silly on an east-sider walking around town in a too-big flannel and blue jeans, his hair’s shorter than Pony’s was after his trip to Johnny’s barber shop. Soda never ever let anyone cut his hair. He was so proud of it.

But now he’s there and they see the dogtags hanging around his neck, not the old rusty ones he wore in school but shiny new ones with his name and blood type and religion (yes, that used to be on dogtags, idk if it still is or was in Vietnam but I know it was during the Korean War so they’d know what kind of last rites or whatever it’s called to do for you if you died) (I also grew up on reruns of M*A*S*H can you tell. Soda would’ve loved that show btw) branded on there and they hesitate and Pony grips Soda’s arm tight and tells the socs to scram and they do, cause once upon a time soda was known around Tulsa for never having lost a fight and now he’s got military training and a shit ton of trauma and a bad knee.

and yes i think he went home after a year bc he got shot in the knee! I think he had a bad knee anyway (from the rodeo injury mentioned in the book) but now it’s kind of. he’s either on crutches for the rest of his life or once he recovers as best he can it depends on the day if he needs crutches or a cane or what. in an au where Johnny and Dally live, Soda post-war & Johnny bond over their legs not working like they used to anymore!!!!!!

they also bond over knowing what it’s like to be so scared you end somebody’s life, but like, that is something I haven’t thought too much about yet and don’t have the energy to put brainpower into tonight lol but I know Johnny feels bad about relating to him for a bit about it bc Soda was “protecting his country” and Johnny just stabbed Bob to save Ponyboy and thinks it’s not the same. But Soda’s trying to explain to Johnny that the “protecting his country” thing is a load of crap and they never should’ve been in Vietnam in the first place.

I don’t think any of the gang would be pro-war at all, but it’s the sixties so we’re talking blind patriotism bc they just simply Do Not Pay Attention To Politics Outside Tulsa Very Often (they’d all be liberal in today’s society tho) but I think Soda is so radicalized into the anti-war movement by the time he comes home bc of what he experienced they’re all like “ooooookay slow it down and explain one more time.”

[estrellami-1]

Soft Touch Baby

Pt 1 | Pt 2 | Pt 3 | Pt 4 | Pt 5 | Pt 6 | Pt 7 | Pt 8 | Pt 9 | Pt 10 | Pt 11 | Pt 12 | Pt 13 | Pt 14 | Pt 15 | Pt 16 | Eddie’s POV | Song | ao3

(If y’all want a tag list or something let me know, I’m already up to part 8 or 9 in drafts. I don’t know how many more parts there will be after that, but I’m willing!)

Eventually the god-awful hitching in his breath stops. The trembling stops. The tears stop. His breathing slows down, his mind comes back online, and he takes a deep breath.

“Hey,” Eddie murmurs. “That sounds better. You back with me?” He punctuates it with a slow hand down Steve’s back, and Steve never wants to leave.

He forces himself to lean back, sniffle and wipe his face and try to rein himself back in, laughing quietly when Eddie hands him the entire tissue box on his nightstand. “Back,” he mutters, sniffling again. “Sorry.”

There’s enough light coming from the hallway that Steve can see the brow Eddie raises at him. “Sorry for trauma? Cut the crap, Steve, and tell me what I can do.” He shifts so he’s sitting cross-legged on Steve’s bed. “Wanna talk about it?”

Steve huffs out a humorless laugh. “No.” He picks at the corner of the tissue box. “You died. We were back in the Upside Down, and Dustin was just standing there, and I was getting annoyed because it’s not like we haven’t been through this before, it’s not like he doesn’t know what to do, which fucking sucks, but. Anyways. He was standing there, so I walk over and I- I see you, and…” he shakes his head. “Guess you tried to be the hero or some shit. I don’t know. Fuckin’ broke me.”

“I’m here,” Eddie promises again, hand palm-up on the comforter between them. Steve stares at it for a second before taking it.

“Yeah,” he murmurs, taking another breath before he trusts himself to look up at Eddie’s face. “You are.”

Eddie cracks a joke, because he’s Eddie. “So I tried to be the hero and I couldn’t cut it, huh?”

Steve might still be figuring out his own emotions, and where his feet exactly are (he’d been sitting at an awkward angle and his legs fell asleep), but he knows that tone of voice. “You know why I said that?” He asks. “Why I told you not to be the hero?”

Eddie snorts. “Think your subconscious just told us exactly why. I woulda died.”

Steve shakes his head. “I told you not to because I couldn’t risk it. I know you would’ve, no hesitation. But I needed you safe. Alive.”

Eddie giggles. “Well, shit, man. Way to make me feel like a dick.”

Steve squeezes the hand he’s holding and somehow manages a teasing tone back. “You do that well enough on your own.”

Eddie groans and flops backwards, head narrowly missing the tissue box. “You wound me,” he says dramatically, and Steve starts laughing.

Eventually Steve gets his emotions under control and Eddie sits back up, tugging on their joined hands to get Steve’s attention. “You thinking you can fall back asleep?”

Steve shrugs. “I usually stay up and read or listen to music or whatever.”

Eddie grins. “How about breakfast instead?”

Steve laughs incredulously. “At three in the morning?”

Eddie shrugs. “You’re not gonna sleep. I’m not gonna sleep if you’re not. We might as well. Plus, pancakes just taste better in the middle of the night. It’s a well-proven fact of life.”

Steve giggles. “You’re so fuckin’ weird,” he says, uncaring that his voice sounds unbearably fond.

“Why thank you, my good sir,” Eddie says in an absolutely atrocious British accent, almost tripping over himself as he tries to get off the bed and bow at the same time.

Steve very carefully doesn’t think about the fact that they’re still holding hands.

He flicks on the light as they enter the kitchen, then immediately regrets it, hissing and shutting his eyes. “Fuck, I forgot.”

Eddie pauses. “Your eyes need to adjust?”

“No, man, fuckin’ headache, just… just gimme a second, I’ll be fine.”

Eddie reaches over and flips the switch back to off. “Y’know,” he starts, quieter than normal, “I’ve never made pancakes in the dark before.”

He squeezes Steve’s hand, pulls him forward a few feet. Steve, eyes still closed, lets him.

He startles at the feeling of something cold on his forehead, only after the fact registering the sound of the freezer door opening and shutting. “Thanks,” he murmurs, squeezing Eddie’s forearm before moving to grab the ice pack, adjusting it a bit and sighing. “Tylenol in the bathroom. D’you mind—”

“‘Course, sit down, I gotcha. Want a Coke? Does caffeine help or hurt?”

Steve hums. “Hurt. Water please.”

“I’m on it. Nurse Eddie, at your service.”

Steve smiles as he imagines the overdramatic bow Eddie probably took. “Nurse Ratched, maybe.”

Eddie gasps in mock offense. “I will have you know I’m an excellent nurse.”

“Mhm. You’re takin’ a while on those meds, excellent nurse.”

“I- you- be quiet,” Eddie lands on, at odds with the soft squeeze to Steve’s forearm as he brushes past on his way to the bathroom.

Yeah, Steve thinks, I’ve still got it.

Pt 7

[sopheadraws]

Thanks for the tag, @birdofmay!

Okay, so I don't actually have any playlists of my own; I entirely use playlists made by other people/generated by Spotify/actual albums, so I had to improvise. I stuck all six Spotify "Daily Mixes", my top 100 songs of 2021, 2022, and 202; my "On Repeat" playlist, and my "Repeat Rewind" playlist into a brand new playlist that contains 563 songs. I'm not good about favoriting songs, so I thought this was the fairest system. Some songs I don't actually know may come out of the Daily Mixes, so if that happens, I'll listen to it for the first time. Okay, cool.

1. Taylor Swift and Ed Sheeran do a cover of the "Thriller/Heads Will Roll" Glee mashup.

Well, Taylor and Ed are two people, and this is a duet, so that's a good start. However, that's as far as my enthusiasm goes. Taylor has a *good* voice, however, she's not really a belter, which is all the "Heads Will Roll" part is. And Ed Sheeran covering Michael Jackson is not something that needs to happen.

2. The Warblers from Glee cover "I Feel Pretty/Unpretty"...also from Glee.

This is a song a female insecurity (arguably with lesbian undertones). I do not want an all male a cappella group involving themselves. Terrible idea.

3. Johnny Cash covers "Girl on Fire". Specifically the Glee arrangement.

This is so stupid that I love it. Johnny "Ring-Of-Fire" Cash covering a 2010s pop song about a woman being metaphorically on fire is hilarious to me. And the Glee arrangement is the icing on the cake.

4. Johnny Cash covers "champagne problems" by Taylor Swift.

Interesting that I got Johnny Cash twice in a row. Anyways, I think this just might work. I can't explain why. But it would.

5. Brittany from Glee covers "Million Reasons" by Lady Gaga.

Brittany can only really pull off heavily produced dance pop, and this song is a belting-heavy ballad. Sorry, Britt, but it's a no for me.

6. Simon & Garfunkel cover "obsessed" by Olivia Rodrigo.

I can't * f a t h o m * how this would sound. I am intrigued to hear it, but I sense it would be terrible. But, then again, Paul Simon is a musical genius and I could listen to Art Garfunkel sing anything.

7. Natasha Bedingfeld covers "Last Kiss" by Taylor Swift.

Natasha Bedingfeld is one of the never-heard-of-this-person-before-in-my-life musicians I warned you might appear on this playlist. Having heard one song, she's a generic pop artist. Sort of a Beyoncé vibe. I'm sure she'd do just fine covering Taylor.

8. Avril Lavigne covers "Operator" by Jim Croce.

Avril is another person I don't actually listen to (I actually know who she is this time). Uhh.. this cover would be wack, but I'm not sure if it's wack in a good or bad way.

9. Darren Criss covers "Talkin' Bout a Revolution" by Tracy Chapman.

(Yes, this was a DC original song, not a Glee cover.) Okay, so, having been on Glee, Darren knows how to do a killer cover, and I'm sure this would be no different. Kind of a tone deaf song selection on his part, however.

10. Olivia Rodrigo covers "Heaven Is A Place on Earth" by Belinda Carlisle.

I do know this song, and it's not *out* of my taste range, but I don't think I've ever listened to it on Spotify before, so. Anyways, I think this is the best combination I've gotten! I really want to hear this now! Best for last!

Well, Sina, and these the crazy combinations you expected from me? Very Glee heavy and most of the combinations would be horrid, which seems in character.

I would like to see what @doctor-whu @porcelainvino @wheresurboytonighthelookslikeenj @katyobsesses @angelhummel and @hevanderson get if you want to try :))

[theprinceandagcd]

home is where the heart is (but God I love the English)

Summary: Alex's relationship with "London Boy" by Taylor Swift is an emotional journey.

Words: 4,026

ao3 link

Notes: via @KeptinOnZeBridg on Twitter: "alex continuously teasing henry with taylor swift's "london boy" and singing it over and over again when they shop, when they get to bed, when they cook, and when their friends are over"

So. Anyway. I'm not entirely sure what this is? Is it a crack fic? It might be a crack fic. I hope you like it anyway. I do :)

----

you know I love a London boy

I enjoy walking Soho, drinking in the afternoon

he likes my American smile

like a child, when our eyes meet

darling, I fancy you

----

Alex wouldn’t consider himself a Swiftie, necessarily.

June has been obsessed since they were little and still in Texas – Alex has distinct memories of her strumming a guitar and covering Our Song repeatedly because it was the only song she learned at the time. When Taylor Swift stopped in D.C. for the Reputation tour the year after his mom get elected, he’d tagged along with June and Nora, dressed in all black at the girls’ insistence to fit the vibes.

It’d been fine. He’d had a good time.

But he doesn’t know her entire discography and only pretends to keep up when someone starts diving into the Taylor Swift lore, like who her best exes are or why there were five holes in a fence in an Instagram photo years ago. Her music is good, and he doesn’t actively want to turn it off most of the time when he hears it – he doesn’t understand why that can’t be the end of the conversation.

Still, when Lover comes out in late August of 2019, only a week after he had to clean cake out of places he never wanted to clean cake out of, he finds himself lounging back on June’s unnecessarily fluffy pillows, Nora and June both curled up near the foot of the bed with June’s phone as midnight rolls around. Snacks are scattered around them, like they’re preparing for some kind of fucking apocalypse instead of listening to a pop album. He’s got his HRH Prince Henry fact sheet open on his lap as they start playing the first track for the first time, because he’s here for the snacks and to make June happy, and he’s supposed to be committing this stuff to memory at the same time.

The album isn’t bad. He nods his head along to some of the songs, taps his fingers in tune with a few, and he doesn’t really offer a lot of commentary.

“Okay, this next one is… London Boy.” He isn’t looking, but he feels June’s eyes on the side of his face. “Ooh, wonder if it’s about your new best friend.”

Alex frowns, glancing up at her. “What?”

“Henry, obviously,” June says, grinning around a mouthful of Pop-tart. She gestures vaguely toward the file in his hand. “Doesn't he qualify as a London boy?”

“There’s at least a ninety percent probability that it’s about her boyfriend,” Nora supplies, unhelpfully, as she rips open a bag of skittles.

“And the other ten percent?” June tilts her head and smirks, clearly enjoying this too much.

“I’d say like, eight percent that it’s Harry Styles.”

“And?”

“Probably at least one percent that it’s Henry." Nora shrugs. "He’s the more attractive option of the two royal English men within a decent age range.”

June turns back to Alex, eyebrows raised high on her forehead. “See, there’s a chance.”

“Just play the goddamn song, Bug.”

Nora throws a yellow skittle at his head. “Boo, party pooper.”

June plays the song, as requested, and it’s good.

Except.

Except it’s a little too... boppy for his taste.

Except now he’s stuck thinking about pristine blonde hair and stupid blue eyes and an upturned perfect nose because June has made the association in his brain before he’d even been able to give the song a chance. He breathes in deep through his nose and stares at the words in front of him and tries to push down the irritation rising in his chest. Random facts about Prince Henry are staring back up at him, mocking him and reminding him that he has to fix this stupid mess that wasn’t even his fault.

Well, not really.

“It was cute,” Nora says once the song has stopped.

Alex just shrugs. “It’s not my favorite. Next.”

He pretends not to see the glare that June shoots at him. It’s easier than trying to figure out why his stomach is in knots just from thinking about Henry. 

It's probably just pure annoyance. 

----

Taylor Swift has bad timing.

On January 3rd, two days after Henry kissed him on New Years’, Alex is antsy and irritable and needs to distract himself because he's definitely being ghosted. So, he’s trying to get a head start on reading for his classes that don’t start for another fucking week because he has to do something when Idris Elba’s voice comes through the speaker playing a random pop playlist on Spotify. 

He hates that he recognizes it immediately, even though he’s pretty sure he’s only heard it twice since it came out. Even more, he hates the way it immediately makes him feel.

His stomach drops and twists, and the book he was holding slips from his hands because they’re suddenly damp and he can’t hold onto it. He fumbles in his hurry to slam his hand on the volume down button of the offending piece of technology, and the book crashes to the floor beside his desk, loud and jarring. The silence that follows offers little comfort, the tune still playing in his head, echoing between his ears.

Reflexively, he unlocks his phone and opens his message thread with Henry, reading back over the texts he’s sent – questions of if Henry is alive and if they can talk and—nothing. No new messages or missed calls or even a fucking like on his most recent Instagram post. That had been a stretch, he knows - a desperate attempt to get anything from Henry, but the radio silence has only continued. It feels like he’s lost something, something monumental, which is fucking stupid because they weren’t anything, not really. Acquaintances, at best. Fake friends, at worst.

It’s what Alex tells himself.

It doesn’t feel true.

He counts out four minutes in ten second intervals in his head and then turns the volume back up on his speaker. Another song has started playing, one that doesn’t remind him of cold air and warm hands on his cheeks and soft lips pressed to his underneath a tree in the White House garden.

It’s another story, he guesses, if that’s all he can think about anyway, regardless of what song plays. He’ll still blame Taylor Swift for the crack in his chest that he presses a hand to as he picks his book back up, opening it up and not comprehending a single goddamn word. 

Maybe he should have just let the stupid song play. He feels like shit already, anyway.

----

He plays it for Henry in Paris, just to annoy him.

They’re eating apricots and tarts and laughing curled up together on the bedspread in their robes and nothing else, and Alex gives Henry an airpod and they go back and forth picking songs. Alex pokes fun at Henry’s Bowie choices and Henry rolls his eyes when Alex plays the Beatles, but they’re giggling and it’s stupid, really, how this moment feels stuck in time. He knows minutes are passing and he knows Henry will have to leave soon, but their heads are tucked close together and Henry’s palm is warm on Alex’s leg, and he wishes they could just stay here forever.

Here feels like somewhere else, safe from prying eyes and people who wouldn’t understand. Here, they’re just two boys curled together in a Paris hotel room that are friends, that sort of understand each other, that know what the other tastes like when they come and where to kiss to make the other squirm. It’s a little terrifying, this feeling blooming in his chest and expanding. It feels beautiful and fragile, and Alex isn’t sure he’s capable of not fucking it up.

It would be on brand for him, if he’s being honest.

So, he types the song name into his search bar and clicks play. He cuts his eyes up at Henry with a grin, because this is supposed to be something casual, not something that makes him feel like he might die if he loses it. The song is just silly enough, and Henry rolls his eyes and shoves him away, complaining that he needs to take a shower before he heads out.

He hands Alex back his airpod and gets up, but he smiles at Alex before he disappears into the bathroom. Alex lets the song finish playing as he hears the shower turn on, and part of him kind of wants to take off his own robe and join him. Henry would probably let him, but Alex has already skirted the edge of what this is supposed to be this morning, when he watched Henry sleep and traced the ridges of his spine with his fingertips.

Taylor sings “you know I love a London boy” in his right ear, the other airpod tucked into his fist, and Alex, for just a moment, wonders if he could.

Or if he’d even be allowed.

----

The song haunts Alex on his worst day. 

When Henry leaves the lakehouse, the rest of them stay for one more day, like they had planned originally. Alex asks to leave and let them enjoy the last day without him, but everyone refuses to let him go anywhere by himself, and Alex doesn’t want to ruin their vacation, too.

He’s pretty sure he already has.

Nora and June hover around him, and he tries to humor them, but his heart feels torn open and shattered. No, his heart feels gone, ripped from his chest and halfway across the Atlantic by now, probably. He wonders if Henry has cried over him at all, too, or if leaving was easy for him. Has he thought about texting Alex back? Has he stared at their text message thread and considered responding and giving Alex any semblance of an answer? Of a reason?

Does he understand what Alex has lost?

If, he thinks bleakly, he ever had it to begin with.

Alex lets his sister and best friend pull him onto the porch, into the warm sun that does nothing for how cold he feels, and Nora turns on some music, and he tries very hard not to open his Instagram and scroll through Henry’s feed, and he tries very hard not to wonder what he did wrong, and he tries very hard not to cry.

“We could go driving in, on my scooter-“

A broken noise slips past Alex’s lips before Nora can grab her phone and change the song. The door slams forcefully when Alex runs inside, before he's even realized that he was moving, into the room that still fucking smells like Henry. Pain laces through his scalp and – oh – he was pulling his hair. He squeezes his hands into tight fists and presses them into his eyes as his tears start to fall and fall and fall. 

He was so fucking stupid. 

It’s like he can still hear the godforsaken lyrics even though he knows the song was turned off, taunting him, words about loving British mannerisms and “just wanna be with you”s, and he isn’t sure how he read it so wrong, how he misunderstood the way that Henry had looked at him, how he’d let himself fall in love with someone who never planned on being there to catch him.

He curls up in Henry’s bunk and cries into one of the last things that Henry touched that he still has with him, ignoring June when she knocks on the door, apologizing profusely.

It doesn’t matter.

None of it matters.

----

The song winds up being a comfort when he needs it. 

Curled into a seat on a private plane the night after dancing with Henry at the Victoria and Albert Museum, Alex slots his airpods into his ears and plays music to try to calm his racing thoughts. He brings his hand up to his sternum, feels the lump of the key and ring hiding under his shirt and clings to that feeling, that hope. 

“I want you to know, I'm sure. A thousand percent."

If Alex closes his eyes, he can still feel Henry’s soft jacket underneath his fingertips, the way his palms had slid into the dips in Henry’s waist as they’d shuffled back and forth around some of the most beautiful art in the world. Or, at least, Alex assumes it is. He didn’t see much of it, too focused on Henry, on making sure he took advantage of every second that he was allowed to hold him, to press kisses into his cheeks and jaw and neck, to love him the way he deserved to be loved.

The way that Alex is going to love him forever.

He isn’t really paying attention to what’s playing, until his brain registers a familiar cadence, and he realizes that London Boy is playing.

It makes him laugh, quick and surprised, the immediate visceral reaction almost making him skip it. But, the song plays, “but something happened, I heard him laughing, I saw the dimples first and then I heard the accent” and his finger stops over the button. It’s catchy, for one. It’s true, for another.

A lot of things will probably remind him of Henry breaking his heart in Texas, at least for a while - the lake house, bunk beds, this song. He can't change what happened, but he's certainly changed his perceptions before. He did, after all, spend the first twenty-one years of his life thinking that he was straight and now he has a boyfriend. 

Things can change. 

He leans back against his headrest and lets the song play, humming along. Cash shoots him a funny look from his seat, but Alex just looks out the window and breathes and creates a new memory for the song – a feeling of elation, of knowing that the future is uncertain except for one thing, the one thing that Alex is more sure of than he’s ever been of anything. Before the song ends, he takes a screenshot of the Spotify app as it plays and sends it to Henry, texting, miss you already xo

Henry’s response is quick: I’m never going to escape that bloody song, am I?

Alex grins. not if you’re with me, baby.

Guess I’ll just learn to love it, then. And then, immediately after: I miss you, too.

----

Henry doesn’t escape it.

June plays London Boy on purpose after the inauguration in January, her grin wide and wicked. Alex lolls his head onto Henry’s shoulder and sings along immediately, poking at his side until that beautiful fucking smile pulls up his boyfriend’s features.

“You’re a menace to society,” is what Henry says, but his cheeks are pink and his lips are warm when he presses them to Alex’s temple.

Alex just buries his face into Henry’s neck, pressing his own kiss to the soft skin there, before trailing up to Henry’s ear and, around a giggle, whisper-singing, “Dahling, I fancy you.”

Henry shakes his head, but his eyes are bright, and his grin is infectious, and Alex just wants to live in this moment forever. His mom and Leo are somewhere – grabbing champagne, he thinks. Nora is curled up on Alex’s other side, and June is sitting on the ottoman in front of them with her phone in her hand, and Henry’s arm is looped around Alex’s waist from where he sits next to him, and it’s everything.

He swallows past the sudden emotion in his throat and then laughs as June and Nora grab remotes and start using them as microphones, serenading Henry until his blush has spread all the way down his neck. They love him, too, Alex knows, and as he joins in with them, singing loudly and off-key, he thinks that this is what Henry deserves – to be loved this fully and wholly and unconditionally and, sometimes, a little comically. Nora leans over Alex’s lap to ruffle Henry’s hair during the bridge of the song, and Alex presses his “just wanna be with youuu” into the crinkle at the corner of Henry’s eye. June fakes a gagging motion, but then she gets up and smacks a kiss on Henry’s opposite cheek, which makes him splutter as he pushes her away.

During the last chorus, he glances over at Alex, as if in need of salvation, but Alex just smirks. Henry rolls his eyes, but the hand around Alex’s waist squeezes as the song ends, and Nora and June devolve into a giggling fit just as his mom and Leo appear with a bottle of champagne and 6 glasses. They toast their wins, all of them, including Henry, who flushes but clinks his glasses with everyone.

They’re all talking over each other and it’s chaotic and messy but there’s still something warm and tangible beating through his veins, comfortable and encompassing. Alex looks over at Henry, who smiles and laces their fingers together like it’s the easiest thing in the world before giving his attention back to Leo, and Alex knows – it’s home.

----

Alex adds London Boy to their move in playlist when they’re putting all of their things in the brownstone, credenzas and way too many shoes and everything in between coming together in a jumble that will probably take them weeks to work through.

But it’s their stuff and their mess, and unpacking boxes with Henry feels nearly therapeutic, like the culmination of everything that they had to go through to have this, a home that belongs to both of them, closets that they share, and decisions that they get to make together.

Henry lets him craft the playlist, which is a mistake on his part, but Alex takes advantage and then bides his time, waiting patiently as they unpack boxes and rearrange furniture and argue over which cabinet the ceramic bowls should go in, which is so fucking domestic that Alex actually kisses Henry mid-argument, fingers curling around the back of his neck as he licks into his mouth. Henry’s hands flutter for a moment around Alex’s shoulders before settling around his waist, and Alex’s grin breaks their lips apart.  

Henry swallows, eyes dark. “Um, I-“

“Put the bowls wherever you want, baby.”

The bowls go on the counter, for the time being, as Henry drops to his knees, and they christen their kitchen before they’ve even finished unpacking the first box.

Later, London Boy starts playing while Henry is setting up their coffee and tea bar and Alex is stacking glass cups in the cabinet beside the refrigerator. Immediately, Alex puts the dishes down and grabs Henry around the waist, effectively pulling him away from his work and into Alex’s arms.

“What are you – oh my – Christ, Alex, really?”

Alex laughs as recognition flashes in Henry’s eyes, keeping one hand in Henry’s as he twirls himself around once. Henry’s arm winds around his middle as he comes back, and then he’s rocking back and forth with Alex, silly and perfect and his. Alex is so deliriously happy as he obnoxiously sings the lyrics, feeling like he’s holding everything he's ever wanted in the palm of his hand.

And, well. He guesses he is.

----

It becomes a bit, something Alex always knows he can do to get a smile out of Henry. He’ll play their stupid song, and sing it off-key in Henry’s ear, and they’ll dance around their kitchen or their living room or their bedroom or whatever space they find themselves in. Henry eventually even stops complaining, unless he’s critiquing the accent that Alex sometimes tries to emanate as he belts the lyrics.

Alex adds London Boy to nearly every playlist they have on their shared Spotify account, including their chores playlist. So, it always seems to come on when they’re sweeping their dining room or dusting their ceiling fans or cleaning their kitchen countertops. They always stop, they always dance. Alex always feels like it’ll never get old, the way that Henry looks skyward for a moment and laughs and lets Alex keep doing it anyway. He’s lucky, so lucky, that this is the life he gets to live, with this man that he loves and that loves him, too, even when he’s ridiculous or overdoing it.

Henry never seems to think so.

Once, when Henry is washing the dishes, the song comes on and Alex puts down the broom that was in his hand to wrap his arms around Henry from behind. His fingers trail across Henry’s abs from over his sweater, squeezing lightly. He presses his lips to the shell of Henry’s ear and hums, “home is where the heart is, but God I love the English” in the most exaggerated bubble gum pop tone he can manage.

Henry pulls his lips between his teeth to try to hide his smile. “Your love for the English is singular, you cretin.”

Alex just kisses his jaw noisily and keeps singing, rocking back and forth, and moving both of their bodies in a way that makes Henry fucking giggle, and Alex might spend the rest of their lives trying to get that sound replicated as often as possible.

“You know I love a London boy

I enjoy walking Camden Market in the afternoon”

Henry sighs, finishing the last dish and drying off his hands before turning to rest his hip against the counter. He tilts his head in a way that Alex recognizes, slightly exasperated but endearingly fond. It still makes his heart skip a little in his chest.

He loves that – the way his entire soul still reacts to even the slightest bit of affection from Henry. It’s like he’ll never fully get used to it, even as much as he knows that Henry loves him, that Henry is staying forever. He hopes the thrill never goes away, either. 

Alex curls himself into Henry’s chest, still singing along with the song as he stretches up on his toes. Henry kisses him, cutting him off and effectively shutting him up, and Alex melts, reaching up to cup Henry’s cheeks in his palms. Their noses brush together when they pull away. “I love you.” Alex grins. “London boy.”

“Jesus Christ, you’re insufferable.” Henry scrunches up his nose, and Alex leans up to kiss it. Henry rolls his eyes. “But I love you, too.”

----

At the end of the year, when they get their shared Spotify account Wrapped, London Boy is their top played song, because Alex plays it while they’re cleaning, while they’re getting ready in the morning, when they have friends over for game nights, as often as he can. He does it for the sole purpose of teasing Henry, of getting to see the splotches of color that rise on his skin and know that it’s born out of love. Plus, as much as he didn’t like it when he first heard it, he thinks that opinion was based on his feelings about Henry getting in the way. In hindsight and objectively, he was too harsh on it. It’s a good song. 

When they go shopping at Target and the song plays over the store’s speakers, Alex’s eyes go wide and he sings it to Henry in the middle of the aisle, and Henry tries to run him over with their shopping cart.

When they get married, Alex adds it to their wedding reception playlist, delighted when it blares through the sound system and makes Henry blush, prompting Henry to pull Alex close and hide his face in Alex’s shoulder, his ring sparkling in the light when he covers his eyes with his hand.

A few years later, when they adopt their first daughter from an agency based out of London, Alex posts a photo to Instagram of Henry holding her, small and wrapped in a yellow blanket that has tiny water spots dotting the top of it from where they’ve both cried on her, captioning it, “you know we love a London (girl).”

June comments both a pink heart and an eye rolling emoji, then texts him asking for caption credit.

After all, she made him listen to the song in the first place.

[ultrakatua]

Smut game: give me three hottest paragraphs you’ve ever written. Doesn’t need to be from the same work.

Thank you for the ask!

Won't be the best, and won't be three haha

I think objectively the smut I wrote for Chamber Music is my best by a long shot, if only because it's the most recent, I edited it so much and the entire thing was an exercise at smut. But we've been there. So, this had me do the unthinkable for the sake of variety: reread my old shit.

(I cringed)

Also since I can't shut up I'll say that I've noticed a few things:

-I'm seriously seeing patterns I wish I could unsee

-all my smut is some degree of sloppy and messy

-ALL THE FLUIDS. ALL THE SMELLS (see above)

-also I like to write what I can't find, which lands extremely niche tropes or pairings

From oldest to newest

Some handjob from this claudeleth one (context is: she has no heartbeat and gets off listening to his)

She reached inside his pants and she moved her hand awkwardly around him, studying his length with her fingers. Claude gasped at the sudden contact. “It goes ‘Du-dum. Du-dum. Du-dum��,” Byleth murmured, ear pressed against his chest. If she sounded almost curious like a child, there was nothing ingenuous in her gestures. Byleth’s small hand didn’t have the delicacy of a maiden’s. Her skin was not soft, and her movements not gentle. However, no matter how awkward she was, she was earnest, and Claude found that the size of her fist was the perfect fit around his girth. He bit his lip to muffle his groans when she started to jerk him off slowly but, ear pressed against his hot skin, all she seemed to hear anyway was how his heart had suddenly skipped a beat. “Claude,” she whispered, “Claude, you sound like you are going to explode.” It seemed more and more likely indeed with every new twist of her hand. Claude was sure Byleth could even feel his pulse through the skin of his cock. The sound of his blood pulsating strongly in his ears was covering his own groans and the obscene slaps of Byleth’s hand working on his shaft, now so hard and wet it felt like an exquisite burn. Adrenaline melt with pleasure, and Claude’s mind drifted away. For long seconds, there was no more war, no more pain, no more anguish. And no more doubt either, not when the object of his year-long desire was doing her best to please him with her little hand while her lips were kissing and bitting his chest almost obsessively, as if she was trying to eat his heart out. Claude grabbed her hair too forcibly and he moaned obscenely, bucking his hips to meet her hand.

Whatever the hell this is (hate sex?) from a Jinmalos fic I left on anon for a reason (but there's literally 12 fics in the tag so fuck it)

Malos grabs the tip of his cock and he squeezes there with enough strength it cannot feel anything but uncomfortable. As placid he can look, he struggles to hide a grimace. “Come on,” he barks, still holding Jin’s face in place with the other hand. Jin hisses at the defiance in Malos’ eyes and he digs his nails into the strong legs crushing his midsection. “Come on…” Malos orders again, bucking his hips to punctuate his words, but his voice is strangled this time around and the hand holding Jin’s face turns kinder, palming his cheek almost as a supplication. Jin grabs his ass and Malos smiles back at him; the look nothing short of demented. We are both sick, Jin thinks, since the look invigorates him, and he buries himself one last time into Malos, pulling him on his lap and coming within the same breath. He misses the part where Malos lets go of his cock to masturbate furiously again, only feeling the aftermaths of it when he’s spilling all over Jin’s abdomen and his chest in thick spurts, desecrating the precious last memento of Lora that’s sitting there.

I will put that blowjob scene from chap 4 of Chamber Music because I think it's my best? I really wanted the smut to be crass in this one.

With each rough slide of his cock, Tav tasted his arousal dripping down her throat. The more his cock fattened in her mouth, the more she could smell his infernal stench, almost blasphemous, hiding behind the layers of perfume and of sweat. Tav barely registered her tears nor her whines when Raphael’s movements grew more frantic. Drool and pre-cum escaped from the corners of her mouth to drip down her chin as she struggled not to gag. “Is this how you pictured me when you touched yourself?” Raphael hissed. His second hand joined the first behind her head. Tav’s breathing quickened in anticipation and in answer. She closed her eyes. Her throat contracted around him, rejecting his intrusion.

I like the evolution of paragraph length. They grew shorter, but not the prose uh

[aeide-thea]

tagged by @aldieb! thx for thinking of me, these little questionnaires are like. a cute little blast from tumblr's more interactive past :)

last song: i was going to have to give a sad little answer here about how i don't listen to music nearly enough anymore (never mind sing) and it's very definitely a reflection of my depression, but then i entirely out of nowhere and very urgently was like 'wait actually i have to listen to gordon lightfoot's "song for a winter's night" right now' so then i dashed off and did that and now that's the answer:

if i could know within my heart that you were lonely too i would be happy just to hold the hands i love on this winter night with you…

favorite color: oof so so many!! colors are so important. the signature one has gotta be a really highlighter-vivid chartreuse (🎾), but i do also really love me a good marigold orange? not to mention vermilion, or ochre, or moss green, or really saturated cobalt, or shades of rust or russet…

last movie/show: shetland bbc, which is a quiet well-acted murder mystery series set in a very beautiful very remote landscape. soothing if you like the british isles and can bear to entertain the fantasy of a decent policeman, at least for an hour or so at a time. also i admit to enjoying douglas henshall's face.

sweet/spicy/savory: all the best things are savory and also spicy! like. the jamaican curried chicken i grew up with. indian curries. malaysian laksa my beloved. can you tell i like curry. :D

relationship status: sidebar but this is such an amatonormative question lol. like why are we societally expected to look at 'relationship' and infer 'romantic.' also it seems like a weird outlier given that all the other qs are low-stakes little softballs abt yr tastes. however. extremely single! sometimes i'm sad about it because i miss sexual intimacy and i'm too shy to pursue that with strangers? but honestly most of the time i'm just as glad, because i don't actually know how to love people romantically without making a whole self-abnegating religion of it, so i'm not really convinced that dating was ever really all that good for me, on the whole…

last thing i googled: i use duckduckgo now, and you should too! :) having said that: 'yoal boat.' which is a very beautiful traditional style of shetland boat—apparently descended from a norwegian model?—that the islanders used to use for fishing, and then for storage draw up onto the land into these little prepared hollows called noosts (they have marinas now), which like. obviously i think is the most charming word imaginable. a cozy little noost for a lovely little boat! 🪺

current obsession(s): yoals aside, i guess the thing that best fits this category is that sometime in the last year or so i turned into Merino Guy??? like. even my boxer briefs are merino now (well, a merino-tencel blend) and like. it's so good, guys. comfy in a startlingly wide range of temps, helps me lessen my contribution to the microplastics problem, somehow even makes for reasonable athletic wear in the right weights and cuts: what's not to like. anyway brb, gotta go print out my 'NOT 🐑ISH ABOUT MERINO' bumper sticker. :D

tag 9 people: oof idk, do this if you'd enjoy it and ignore it if you wouldn't? gonna make like west and pull some names from my activity feed: @e-b-reads, @ghostofasecretary, @leatherbookmark, @nathanielthecurious, @obstinatecondolement, @papavera, @quailfang, @tisiphoness, @youcanthandelthetruth

[ratt-fried-this-pasta]

Comparing the intros to Eroica vs Wellingtons Sieg by Beethoven *fanboy screaming*

Inspired by @impetuous-impulse 's long-post essay on if Wellingtons Sieg was a certified banger or just liked because of its political ties. Very interesting, go read the post. Also literally don't worry about being socially awkward while interacting with me, my tumblr tag is literally diagnosed anxiety disorder, I understand if you get social anxiety in my notifs 😭

I'm going to put the post under a Keep reading so my mutuals don't get sieged with a wall of text on their dash ahaha

tldr: Wellingtons Sieg focuses more on imagery and takes a more cinematic/patriotic approach, sacrificing a bit of melodicism. While Eroica is very lyrical and musical, having a steady motif that it grows on, but I wouldn't know that it's about war if someone didn't tell me. Both pieces focus on different aspects of musicality and in their own domain, they perform quite well. I like Eroica more since it's more musical in my opinion, but Wellingtons Sieg is also really dramatic and cool. This is just my personal taste. I recommend listening to both and formulating your own opinion! Both pieces really do sound very Beethoven-esque though

ok coming at this from a musician's perspective and not a historical perspective (since there's plenty of you history buffs out there haha). I had to play a bit of Eroica for an orchestra audition and I just took the time to listening to a bit of Wellington's Victory and sight read the conductor's sheet music. I will now proceed to do a long post looking at the intros of Eroica and Wellingtons Sieg because I don't have the time to listen to both of them in their entirety right now

Just going to put it out there, Eroica and Wellingtons Sieg are both in Eb Major, which is practically known as the heroic key, but that's probably because of Beethoven. The only difference is that Wellingtons Sieg first starts in Eb, then goes to C major (bright and festive) then goes to B major (in this use it's similar in mood i think to C) and then it goes back to Eb.

First of all, I will tell you right now that I like Eroica more than Wellingtons Sieg. Not only am I biased but I've actually listened to Eroica in its entirety multiple times.

At the start of Wellingtons Sieg (after the dramatic snare drum and trumpet fanfare thingies) you have this nice cute little motif. The motif actually ends after the down beat in measure 8 but I wanted to include the crescendo poco a poco. Anyways, this is in Eb and it's backed up by a bunch of quarter note Eb's on the down beats as well. It's a simple melody and it kinda feels like a marching song honestly. During the whole crescendo part it kinda does a whole developmental twisty thingy with the motif and then lands on a forte and it ties it all together at the end with a small recapitulation of said motif. This whole intro just feels like the army marching into battle and whatnot.

Eb Major motif ^^^ I really like it! The staccatos and major key makes it feel very bouncy and lively

Then Beethoven decided that the army is not done marching actually and he's actually going to change the time signature entirely, giving the next upcoming C Major section an entirely different feel. In fact, an entirely different melodic motif, because it makes it ✨interesting✨. So after an even longer period of the snare drum going insane in a triplet-based time signature and then the trumpets follow up with their loud repeated notes since trumpets are good at doing that, then we have another motif!

C Major motif ^^^ (pretend like there's a quarter note C in the invisible measure 8, it was written on a different page so i had to cut off the resolution im sowwy) .

Similar to the first motif, it also has a light and bouncy feel with all the staccatos. The grace notes play a similar role as the 16th notes in the Eb motif as well. I mean, C is the 6th of the Eb major key, but I don't know enough music theory to know the significance of that :/ (im taking AP music theory next year though!!!). So this motif repeats itself a bunch of times in different modulations in 3rds (i think) while the violins either do nothing or echo the melody. Very big focus on the band, especially brass probably.

And then... we get into the part that is probably when the army actually reaches the battlefield. Now, we have our two soldiers right, the Eb motif and the C motif. These two soldiers were obviously on the front lines and got brutally one-shot killed by artillery or something because in the B major section there is literally no motif at all!!

Ok, these two screenshots are 11 pages apart. Beethoven wanted to torture the violinists for a bit. He's literally doing what Wagner did for Ride of the Valkyries where he turns the violins into little Christmas ornaments and gives the brass section a field day. Moments like these are the reason why most of the violinists I know wish they picked the cello instead because wow look at all those juicy quarter notes and long notes ties, very chill. Also the second page that I screenshotted is when the key shifts from B major to Eb major. It's not written in the key signature but the accidentals suggest that the key is different because Beethoven wanted to make sure that no violinist was sight reading on the day of the concert, which is totally something I've never done before (haha... sorry maestro 💀)

I don't think you really need to read sheet music to understand what's going on. The winds are just holding long dramatic notes while the strings are having a stroke. This part of the piece is very cinematic and it very much sounds like the background music for a 1800s based war movie. A lot of times when pieces are based on.. uh... "things" they tend to ditch melodic lines for foley impressionistic sounds. There was this one concert I went to for my city's philharmonic orchestra and they played a piece based on Nazi Germany and they literally used two metronomes that were going off asynchronously as apart of the piece. I mean, the piece was very 1900s modern so... but that's the only example that's at the top of my mind right now.

What I'm trying to say is that there's no melody. Or at least there's no clear lyricism or melodic line that you can pinpoint, or there's no sense of melodicism that I can find with my mediocre knowledge of music theory and composition.

Overall, the intro of Wellingtons Sieg is very cinematic, in its sense that the musical lines paint a picture of the army marching to battle and then roughhousing it on the front lines in the section I just talked about. I really liked the motifs at the beginning, I hope Beethoven recapitulates on them at the end of the piece :(

Alright onto Eroica– I love how it just jumps just straight into the theme after the grandiose entrance. I love the intro to this piece so much, the cellos have such a beautiful rich tone with the arpeggiated Eb 2nd inversion chord while the strings just have a bubbly metronomic portato touch, it's so satisfying. Then when the violin I's take over with the G to Ab dotted quarter notes and how it just leads into the next phrase. Then the end of the first motif is on the same beat as the repeat of said motif but the woodwinds play it instead, contrasting from the deep cello sound to a more free and gentle tone it's really beautiful.

Just listen to the Berlin Philharmoniker play it, they do such a good job with the phrasing and musicality. The Berlin Phil is one of if not the best orchestras out there in my opinion. Each section is so in time with each other it just sounds like a one person powerhouse from each instrument. I wish I can play in an orchestra even a fraction as well-refined as them one day. Nothing wrong with my school's orchestra, it's just aaaa Berlin Phil <333

I don't know where this happens in the sheet music, but after some developmental stuff building off of the Eb major chord motif that is juggled between the sections, the strings lead up to a tremolo-d Eb note and then the brass takes over and plays the Eb chord motif. It's so grandiose and probably sounds amazing live.

The melodic line moved from a soft but rich tone from the cellos to a calm interjection from the violins, sounding like a sigh that is carried on by the woodwinds. The woodwinds take their own artistic spin on the melody as the violins gradually crescendo in anticipation to the climax of the exposition. At the peak of the phrase, the brass section majestically explodes and sound goes everywhere and it's just... Beethoven. The piece feels like a really nice hug

With that being said, I kind of focused on two different things for the two pieces. Wellingtons Sieg tells a story through its music while Eroica is more melody based. Wellingtons Sieg does a great job on portraying a certain patriotic feel through its use of percussion and the brass section. It gets its point across that it is about a heroic war victory, listening to the piece is like watching the battle unfold in front of you. While Eroica, ah Eroica... it's majestic in itself. I don't know how else to describe it other than it really sounds like Beethoven. The way he stamps the epic Eb major motif all over the place and plays with the notes, always making it interesting, it's so nice to listen to.

These two symphonies are both musical in their own way. I believe these two symphonies were written roughly a decade apart, so a lot could've happened to Beethoven personally to influence how he sounds. Wellingtons Sieg definitely has its patriotic zeal thoroughly seasoned across the score while Beethoven's heart bled out on the pages of Eroica.

They're both beautiful in their own special Beethoven-esque way. I'm not historically educated enough to tell you what the audience of the time would prefer but what I think is the most important is to know your own opinion. Like how you don't read a book, the book reads you, music is interpreted differently for every pair of ears, or singular ear (not discriminating van Gogh). Music is for everyone, but at the same time, not for everyone. No matter the political introjections or emotional ties, art will always be art and will be seen differently by any audience. I think it's more important to just experience the music for yourself and figure out what you like.

Alright, this post is long enough. I'm not familiar with making long posts so I have no idea if I did this correctly ._. Thank you for reading this in its entirety if you did, I really appreciate it!

All this talk about Beethoven is making me want to relearn the Beethoven Sonatas I was working on on the piano and violin. Anyways, I gotta study for one of my final exams that is... uh... tomorrow.. and I totally studied for it hahaa.. ha... ... please wish me luck, I need it

ok, I'll shut up now, 再见

The End !