#anyways verses and maybe testing muses to come

[wovetales]

me rubbing my dirty little hands together knowing i can run ff7 remake on my lappy >:)

[sesamestreep]

30 Day Writing Challenge - Day 6

Write about a blackout (from this list) ➸ totally cheating once again and using this as a one-word prompt instead of probably how it was intended??? oh well. have some canon-verse angst and I’m sorry…

“Do you want to know the stupidest part?”

Foggy looks over at Matt, who’s hunched over his drink like someone might steal it from him. Then again, the fake IDs that got them into this bar were honestly not the highest quality, so it’s not an entirely baseless fear.

“Granted you’ve told me like three details total about what happened between you and Elektra, I will take any additional information you want to divulge, stupid or otherwise.”

Matt blinks at him with hollow eyes. “You just said a lot of words to me.”

Foggy sighs. “What’s the stupidest part, Matt?”

“I thought—it’s just—you’re going to think I’m a moron.”

“I won’t,” Foggy says, grabbing his shoulder and giving it a firm squeeze. “I think you’re extremely smart, buddy. You might be the smartest person I know, okay? Just tell me. I promise I won’t judge.”

Matt looks so utterly fragile and lost in that moment that Foggy honestly doesn’t want to hear what’s going to come out of his mouth next, because he just knows it will break his heart. It’s been hard seeing Matt in such bad shape and to know almost nothing about what happened between him and his girlfriend after he’d disappeared with her for two weeks. Foggy had been a wreck about it, beside himself with worry and yet without a legitimate reason to excuse himself from classes and responsibilities, so he’d walked around for those two weeks like a shell, keeping up appearances, until Matt came back. His relief at his reappearance was quickly replaced by a new kind of worry, when he saw how miserable and unstable Matt was in the wake of…whatever happened. Matt still couldn’t be induced by any means to give Foggy a straight answer on that count.

“I thought I was going to marry her,” Matt says, quietly. If Foggy hadn’t been actively trying to hear him, that statement would have been lost to the noise of the bar.

“That’s not stupid at all,” Foggy says, allowing the hand on Matt’s shoulder to slip over to rub his back between his shoulder blades.

“I thought she was my soulmate,” Matt adds, with some vitriol, in the direction of his drink, like he wants to spit the words in there to drown them.

“She wasn’t,” Foggy replies, firmly, because it seems like the right thing to say up until Matt’s face crumples.

“I think she was,” he says, miserably, as he buries his face in his hands. “I think she was and she left anyway and that’s it for me.”

“I don’t—hey, listen, Matt,” Foggy says, shifting his chair over so he can wrap his arms around Matt’s shoulders completely. “I’m sorry, okay? I’m sorry I said she—I didn’t know her that well. Maybe she was your soulmate. I don’t know! I’m not convinced that’s anything but a nice story we like to tell ourselves to make life more bearable or to impose meaning on random events.”

“This pep talk sucks,” Matt says, in the vicinity of Foggy’s collar. Foggy can feel his breath on his neck and it’s weird but not enough to get him to move away.

“Sorry. What I mean to say is, if soulmates are real, and Elektra was yours, then it’s not over yet. Maybe you’ll meet again someday.”

“I hope not,” Matt says, darkly.

Foggy resists the urge to roll his eyes at yet another vague but still concerning allusion to this terrible breakup. He’s trying to be sympathetic but Matt’s whole Catholic guilt lone wolf shit does test him sometimes, if he’s being honest. Still, one look at Matt’s pale, sorrowful face in the neon lights of this dive bar is enough to remind Foggy what they’re doing here.

“I think it’s much more likely that, if we have soulmates at all, we probably get more than one,” Foggy continues, hoping that if he just muses vaguely enough, he’ll stumble on something that makes Matt feel better. “So, you’ll get another chance to—”

“You mean like you and me?” Matt asks, and Foggy’s brain does a full factory reset as he tries to parse that question. He can’t possibly mean…

“Oh, like—yeah, you and me and, well, everybody could have more than one soulmate. Exactly.”

“No, that’s not—” Matt shakes his head, which, given his current position, is functionally just nuzzling his face into Foggy’s neck. “I mean, how you and me are soulmates. Kind of.”

“You and me?” Foggy asks, casually despite not feeling casual at all. “You think so?”

“You’re—yeah. I mean, you’re basically—you’re family to me but…also more than that. If that makes sense.”

It doesn’t and Foggy’s been holding himself back from drinking too much tonight because he wants to be able to get Matt home safely, but he does feel like he might throw up on this table right now. He tucked away the part of him that found Matt attractive somewhere deep and secret and well-fortified in his soul a long time ago, in the interest of not fucking things up with his best friend in the entire world, and he certainly can’t trust anything Matt says now when he’s drunk and lonely and heartbroken. But he’s never loved anyone as completely as he loves Matt and it’s such a pathetic, hopeless situation that he doesn’t let himself think about it except on really special occasions when he wants to feel bad.

“I’m not sure anybody has ever loved me as much as you do,” Matt says, like it’s not a crazy thing to say, here in a shitty bar near campus, after a breakup with his girlfriend, to someone he’s never even kissed.

“I doubt that,” Foggy says, even as he, selfishly, wants to claim it, even as he knows it to be true. “You’re very lovable.”

“We should get married.”

Foggy laughs, because what else can he do, under the circumstances. “Now? It’s pretty late. The courthouse won’t even be open.”

“No, I mean, we should get married someday,” Matt says, petulant like Foggy’s the one being ridiculous here for not following his thought process. “When we’re older. If we haven’t met anybody else.”

That last condition is enough to break Foggy’s heart all over again, but he does an admirable job hiding it, he thinks. Matt’s drunk and very distracted, and more importantly doesn’t know anything about how Foggy feels, really, despite his proclamations on the subject a moment ago, so it feels safe to assume he won’t notice any signs of disappointment or hurt in this split second before Foggy swallows those feelings and pretends to be his usual upbeat self. That’s who Matt really needs right now, and so that’s who he’ll be.

“How much older?” Foggy asks.

“Old,” Matt says. “Like, thirty.”

“Okay,” Foggy nods, already able to find this funny. Matt won’t still be single by the time they’re both thirty. He’ll be married by the time they graduate law school, most likely, so it won’t be an issue. Foggy doesn’t like to think about it, but he knows it’s true.

“You’ll do it?”

“Maybe,” Foggy says. “Ask me again when you’re not blackout drunk.”

“I’m fine,” Matt objects. “I’m not blackout. Not even close.”

“Then we can pick this conversation up in the morning, no problem!”

Matt nods, drunkenly. “Absolutely.”

Matt doesn’t bring it up in the morning, of course. Foggy never really expected he would, either, and doesn’t permit himself to be disappointed about it, no matter how much he would like to.

[arcxnumvitae]

Breeding, mirrors, bath sex for Mhoirbheinn

@thewolfisawake || Send in Kinks and My muse will rate them || Not Accepting

*Note: Even if Mhoirbheinn is eh towards a kink, if Bal is into that kink then Mhoirbheinn's interest in it skyrockets. Not because he's forcing himself to be into something he's not for the sake of his partner, but because Bal's interest in it instantly makes it seem much hotter to Mhoirbheinn. Because it's something Bal likes. Don't ask me how this guy's brain works. As you already know his hard no's he doesn't try to force (not that Bal would ever try to force them himself anyways)

Breeding kink

Definitely not | No | Not Really | Its Okay | Kinda (main verse) | Yes | Fuck yes | There goes my pants (royal verse) |

Bonus: Giving (royal verse) | Receiving (main verse) | Both

Mirrors

Definitely not | No | Not Really | Its Okay | Kinda | Yes | Fuck yes | There goes my pants |

Bonus: Giving | Receiving | Both

Bath sex

Definitely not | No | Not Really | Its Okay | Kinda | Yes | Fuck yes | There goes my pants |

Bonus: Giving | Receiving | Both

I know we already established that Mhoirbheinn is into the breeding kink in the royal verse because of...all the stuff going on with those two there, but I had to sit down and think about it in the main verse and...not as much actually. Mhoirbheinn has more hangups with the thought of procreating at all in the main verse than he does the royal verse with the Consort, ironically, which kinda lessens his enjoyment of it versus his royal verse self. Maybe it's something that clears itself up in later years once he's worked through his issues with the kids. I will point to the note above though, that always stands, so if Bal did it, Mhoirbheinn is suddenly way more into it. I mean, the possessiveness is a plus anyways. Funnily, he prefers to be on the giving end more in the main verse, and would be a little more susceptible to being caught up in it in the main verse if he were receiving, which is why I had to differentiate instead of just bolding both. Claiming Bal vs being claimed by Bal, which is an interesting way to distinguish the two Mhoirbheinns anyways.

As for mirrors-- Kirei. Come on now. How the hell would Mhoirbheinn not love getting to prop Bal in front of a mirror and sigh dreamily. They don't even have to be having sex. We already know Mhoirbheinn's weirdness with himself re: attractiveness so there's not much interest for him personally in watching himself. But hey, I'm sure Bal would enjoy it because if he held his lover up to a mirror, Mhoirbheinn would get a little embarrassed seeing himself in the throes of passion. Might even get a little whiny and bury his face against Bal, which I know is only more bonuses for Bal.

Bath sex, oh yeah he's already testing the temperature of the water. Already adding the oils. He's about to make an experience so sensual and relaxing for Bal. They work long, hard hours so Mhoirbheinn adores the intimacy of a warm and comforting steamy session of bath sex. He's also completely okay if Bal wants to rail him until he passes out. It's whatever Bal wants.

Please also imagine Mhoirbheinn, planning some fun times, gets so comfortable in a bath with Bal that he falls asleep before he can initiate anything. He's aghast when he wakes up and realizes that A. not only did he not deliver the planned fun times to Bal, but B. Bal had to dry him off and carry him to bed and look after him when Mhoirbheinn planned on doing the reverse...!

[umbrellamedic]

Plots please - HUNK or Jill

… and I’ll respond with  3  (or more)  interesting  plots / relationships / connections  I can think of for our muses! 

-HUNK-

Some kind of AU where Bertha was on HUNK's team instead of Lupo's could be interesting to explore, and possibly some kind of mission pre-Raccoon that goes south where they're the only survivors trying to get out (maybe they get sent to take out some scientist who defected from Umbrella to go to another company and run into a previously unknown type of virus or parasite or something)

AU where one of them is a BOW and the other is their handler (i have a love of this concept idk). There was that thing at the end of RE8 where Redfield finds out the BSAA is using bioweapons as soldiers or whatever- could be something like that where Bertha is made into a bioweapon instead of imprisoned (for all the things she did while working for Umbrella) except HUNK is literally the only one she'll listen to because even in this state she recognizes him as a superior officer.

HUNK and Bertha ending up sent out to retrieve something form a former Umbrella scientist who has gone to work for a competing company, but in the process they are infected with the mold stuff from RE7/8 and end up functionally immortal. This could be anything from they end up being treated mostly as test subjects, sometimes as bioweapon soldiers for Umbrella, it could go into post-Raccoon and they're used either by the military or some other group; it could be several hundred years in the future and they still can't stay dead- dealing with the psychic toll that takes on watching everyone they care about age and die, but they can't get the mold to work for anyone else for some reason. Or testing their limits killing each other in new and exciting ways. There's several threads that can come from this.

-JILL-

Pre-RE series, Bertha is implanted in the RCPD (either instead of or alongside Wesker) as the medic for the STARS team. This could also have RE1 & 3 threads. Maybe they end up becoming friends, or maybe something like Jill being suspicious of Bertha, but unable to prove anything (not that it would matter, Irons is in Umbrella's pocket anyways) and Bertha trying to keep her cover because Umbrella won't allow her to just murder her fellow cop

Between RE1 and the Raccoon City incident Jill is basically kidnapped by Umbrella because she's asking too many questions. Either something like she's being kept at Rockfort Island and used to get combat data on BOWs- Bertha gets to patch Jill up and keep her functioning for these tests. Or something similar to what Wesker does to Jill- Umbrella forces her under their control (idk, control parasite, whatever) and Bertha is her handler.

Post Raccoon City; either for BSAA or whatever organization Jill works for- or Jill following the trail of former Umbrella personnel to make sure they face justice solo (whatever floats your fancy)- she discovers Four Eyes's involvement in Shadowlaw. By extension: either Bertha is sent to kill Jill, or Jill discovers Bertha; point is: Jill, having gone through Wesker's control, is the only one who really understands what Bertha's gone through with Shadowlaw and that brings them into contact with each other somehow. (aka: i don't get to use my Street Fighter verse enough, but it's got so much potential, even if you don't know shit about Street Fighter)

[mystiika]

@ensuists asked: [ REMIND ]  for our muses to have passionate sex meant to remind one party who they belong to. MAYBE in the future verse tho 👀

so many feelings while writing this my god... anyway here u go <3

he must be dreaming, surely this is some euphoric hallucination & he's going to wake up any second. like he's wake up to a world where he won't let himself touch ryouta even in the most innocent ways because once he starts, the floodgates will open & he won't want to stop. one moment they're walking into ryouta's home, the next they're pressed up against each other on his couch with a half drunk & very much so forgotten bottle of wine sat on the coffee table. but isaac didn't want to think too hard about it. he'd rather just let himself make the most of this moment before reality sets in with all the reasons this is a bad idea. 

its been years of pining over a man he thought he'd lost only to have him in front of him for the past 2 weeks & fighting himself to keep things how they were. so the second his lips touched ryouta's he knew he couldn't deny his appetite, subconsciously ramping up the slow testing kisses into ones needy & desperate beyond all reason. & he knew from the way ryouta seemed to match him that the younger had no intention of stopping either. their lips only part long enough to tear away each other's clothing, as if wanting to spend as little time apart in order to make up for lost time.

they end sitting up, isaac half grinding against ryouta's weight where he's straddling him, hands holding tightly onto ryouta wherever they land — as if he'd disappear if isaac didn't hold him close enough. at some point isaac finds it in him to stop, but only barely. ❝ bedroom? ❞ the question is quiet, rushed between kisses. & some form of a mumble & nod comes from ry in hurried agreement. so isaac moves to stand, supporting ryouta with ease & holds him just low enough to feel his erection rubbing against him with every step it takes to reach the bed, kissing him all the while.

once at the edge, he carefully drops ryouta to his feet, using his newly free hands to pull the rest of his clothes from his body & pleased to see the other doing the same. isaac pushes him down onto the bed, quick to pin ryouta's body against the mattress with his own. letting out a sigh against the other's lips as their dicks are pressed against each other's with a slight grind. 

as good as it felt to touch each other, skin to skin without a single thing between them, there was a strange feeling too. it was as if their bodies fit together better than he remembered, but at the same time ry's touch & taste felt as foreign as it did familiar. despite this, with every passing press of his tongue against ry's or his lips where they drag across skin, ryouta started to feel less & less foreign — as if isaac's body started remembering how to touch him in all the right ways.

isaac feels like he should be embrassed about how hard he already was, despite how little ryouta had touched & kissed him, but he can't be bothered to care. he finally has ry in his grasp, he wasn't going to think about anything else. 

& its as if all thoughts stopped entirely the second as ry rolls them over & has isaac's cock in his hand. the other's grip tightening pulls a small moan out of him & he can feel himself twitch slightly into ry's palm. then pleasure more still when they two adjust so ryouta's lips & tongue can take over where a hand had been not a moment before. he also makes no effort to hide the pleased growl that stirs in his throat. the heat of ry's mouth was almost overwhelming from how long it had been since isaac had gotten laid, & he can feel himself swell a touch bigger from the feeling alone. ry starts slow, kissing & licking up & down his shaft, tongue circling delicately around & beneath his crown. & isaac makes no effort to quiet himself, letting out breathy moans & a curse or two while his hand had a tight grip on ryouta's hair. aside from how good it feel, if there was one thing that was absolutely the same it would be that the sight of ryouta sucking his dick was still so fucking hot — the type of thing some part of him wants to record because seeing it once just isn't enough.

so he watches ryouta as takes him all the way in, nose sinking to touch skin at the base of his cock. then, ❝ come on, ryouta... i know you can do better than that. ❞ & when ry deepthroats him a second later, his hand shifts to the back of ryouta's head to force the younger to hold in place, moaning out a quiet ❝ fuck. ❞ as he feels ry make a swallowing motion in his throat, tightinging around the head of his cock for a moment & almost doesn't want to let ryouta pull off ( key word being almost ). & after another second or two, he pulls ryouta back to see him gasp & take a breath. before isaac guides his head back down to his cock again but doesn't force him down. instead he waits until ryouta goes down on him again on his own before repeating the action to hold ryouta still against the base of his cock, holding him down a little longer now that its less of a surprise. ❝ that's right, take that fucking cock... ❞ then lets him pull back again. ❝ you know, why don't i make things a little easier on you... get off the bed & get on your knees so i can fuck your face the way you deserve. ❞ isaac gets a smirk in response along with a sweet ❛ with pleasure. ❜, satisfied to see how well ryouta listens when he's quick to follow instruction. so he gets up after him, lazily pumping his cock as he faces ryouta & reaches forward with his other hand to affectionally brush his thumb across his cheek a few times before moving to hold the back of his head. ❝ alright open your mouth, baby. i mean, this is what you want isn't it? ❞ he says, the petname flows out more easily than he'd have liked but ryouta either doesn't care or doesn't care to comment on it. he's making small motions just to start, but slowly ramps it up while isaac holds ry's head still with both hands. ❝ this is what you need, right? for me to fuck your face as much as i want. ❞ his hips are rather fast now, while a bit of spit starts to drip down ryouta's chin as it gets a little messier. not that this was a bad thing, rather isaac quite liked the look of ryouta on his knees, letting isaac do as he pleases.

& he pulls out for a moment to let ry take a few uninterupted breaths as he heavily admires the sight of him. face flush, & mouth & chin slicked with spit. he had actually intended to give his ex-lover, turned lover again, another second or two but was instead met with ry searching for & taking isaac's cock into his mouth again with an eagerness that made him smile. but he pulls himself out again, his hand reaching to force ryouta's chin upward to look him in the eye properly. ❝ you look so pretty when you look at me with those eyes, so hungry & desperate for me to ram my cock down your throat ❞ but instead he circles his tip around ryouta's lips, delaying a few more seconds simply because he can. ❝ so... since you want it so bad, here.❞ & he pushes his cock past ry's lips again, roughly fucking his mouth with each thrust forcing him to take isaac all the way down. he does it again & again & again, his pace almost merciless as a part of him gets distracted by just how fucking good it feels every time his dick hits the back of ry's throat. but he's not a monster, soon enough letting ry take a breather again. ❝ suck my balls too. ❞ his voice is firm, it wasn't a request. but whether the younger was wanting to follow commands or simply knew it was a chance to catch his breath again, ryouta was quick to comply. & isaac moans a bit, shutting his eyes & letting his head fall back as he focuses on his hand on his dick & the feeling of ryouta's hot tongue as he takes one of his balls in his mouth, then the other. ❝ oh fuck... yeah just like that. but i know you want me to keep going. such a slut for me, aren’t you? because right now, you belong to me. ❞ & isaac directs ryouta's face upward again to meet his eye in time to see a bratty glint in ryouta's eye & to hear a slightly mocking, ❛ oh, you think i belong to you? then prove it, right now. ❜ isaac grins, running his thumb along ry's lower lip, hooking into his mouth for a moment for the younger to suck. ❝ fine, then don't complain about what happens next. ❞

he moves his hips forward & ryouta wasted no time sucking on his cock again, tongue pressing expertly in all the right ways. isaac moves ry's head more roughly again, though he only pulls out a couple inches before immediately thrusting in again. he can feel ryouta's hands where they tightly rip his thighs, careful to watch for any tapping to request to breath, though when it finally happens, isaac only gives him a few short seconds before shoving his cock back in his mouth. ❝ fuck, baby, you look so good on your knees like this; acting like my personal cock sleeve. ❞ soon he can feel himself getting close so he pulls ryouta off for another breather while he settles on what to do. so, a few seconds later, he shoves his cock into the other's mouth again, pace picking up a touch. then, ❝ oh... fuck, i'm gonna cum... ❞ a few stuttered thrusts before he holds ry still with his cock burried in his mouth to the hilt & cums straight down his throat. isaac's briefly quickened breaths slowly calmed as releases some tention, eventually pulling his dick out. ryouta lets out a couple coughs & isaac takes the opportunity to make a quick jog to ryouta's washroom to grab the closest towel he could find & wet it under the tap. once retrieved he crouches in front of the other, gently wiping the mess of spit from his face as well as any cum that had been coughed out. he did sort of feel bad when it was so bad isaac felt the need to clean up but glancing down he sees ryouta's hand on his dick clearly hard as a rock.

while he was well aware of how much ryouta enjoyed himself, the visual reminder of this fact was reassuring to isaac all the same. ❛ you better not be done. ❜ ryouta starts once isaac's done with the towel. the line makes isaac smlie & look at the othter with a michevious smile. ❝ don't worry, you're not getting off that easy, i'm not planning on stopping any time soon. ❞ ❛ good. & next time, ❜ ry leans in for a languid kiss isaac was happy to meet. ❛ let me taste you. ❜ ❝ i think that can be arranged... ❞ isaac's heart leaps in his chest, desperately stiffling the excitment at know there would be a next time. he may appear full of confidence & courage but truthfully he was a little worried ryouta might not enjoy all the same things isaac remembered from before. its been so many years since then & people are bound to change. but ( if nothing else ) he knew ryouta wasn't the type to allow anything he didn't want to do which was a fact he could trust.

❝ as good as that was, i really fucking want to kiss you now. ❞ which he plans to, standing himself up & pulling the younger man with him. &, once up, figuratively pouncing & diving into slow, deliberate kisses, tongue moving to meet ryouta's. much to isaac's chagrin, ryouta interupts their kiss & turns his back to isaac for a moment ( to grab what isaac soon finds out is lube & condoms ) while isaac took the opportunity to get back on the bed & sits himself up against some pillows just in time for ryouta to climb into his lap, instantly going in for a kiss with both their movements as zealous as ever. he reaches down between them taking ryouta's cock in hand & enjoys the sudden breath against his lips at the touch. ❝ your dick is so wet... its so... sexy. ❞ he teases, grip tight as he presses into ryouta's slit with his thumb & presses kisses up the side of ryouta's neck to stop just shy of his earlobe. his voice is low, tone sultry as he speaks & his breath on ryouta's skin as bound to cause goosebumps. ❝ i guess you liked me using your mouth like a toy that fucking much huh. ❞ he wants to suck a mark onto ryouta's neck but ignores the urge & instead refocuses on kissing ryouta's lips. ❝ maybe i should let you keep going? after all i can't fuck you if i'm only half hard. ❞ half but ever increasing whether ryouta touches him or not.

❛ so demanding. ❜ but ryouta listens all the same, moving himself down to do as he was asked but isaac interupts. ❝ hey ry, baby, shift your hips this way for me... yeah like that, ❞ hands guide ryouta to so he was blowing him from the side, isaac's hand sliding down his spine. ❝ now, i can do this. ❞ after a successful guess of a nightstand, he was quick to warm some lube on his hand. he circles ryouta's rim for a moment, soon slipping in one finger, then two. his fingers find some sort of rhythm, but isaac keeps his gaze on ry's face, both to catch any reaction from isaac's handiwork as well as just watch. & before he really even realises what's coming out of his mouth. ❝ i forgot how pretty you look with my cock in your mouth. ❞ it's quiet, but ry obviously caught it the way he leaves slow deliberate kisses along his length, eventually putting forward a ❛ maybe i should never let u forget it again then, ❜ with a smirk.

however unmatching the genre their actions, the words gave isaac's heart a small flutter. he didn't want to read into it all & end up disappointed. but it was hard not to get his hopes up on the implication. though his voice is as even as ever, matching ryouta's tone with a playful, ❝ promise? ❞ & there's no verbal response to that, instead the younger seemed to want to prove good on his word — something isaac was MORE than happy about. ❝ you really love my cock in your mouth huh... & all i'm using is my fingers but you're so turned on your dick is practically leaking pre cum. you're such a talented slut i almost don't know what to do. & your body is so honest about how much you like this i almost feel bad i didn't sleep with you the day we met again. ❞ all feelings of regret aside, just as ryouta seemed to be, isaac too felt like everything was heightened — like he was so much more turned on than he'd always been. & he wonders if ryouta could tell when his cock twitched at his own words said as much for his benefit as for ryouta's. ❝ it's like your body was made for mine. & if you do a good job, i'll make sure you come so many times you lose count. ❞ & there's a shift of his index & middle fingers, moving to seach for ryouta's sweet spot & finding it in a second just from muscle memory alone. & he knows he's found it from the way ryouta has to pause, lightly vibrating around isaac's crown from the almost involuntary moan he lets out. & he smirks to himself, loving how undone ryouta had started becoming. this isn't to say he's alone though — the way ryouta kissed, sucked, & licked all around his cock was proving ever more difficult to resist giving in completely. but, in all honesty, he was at the other's mercy & would do absolutely anything ryouta might ask of him. ❝ maybe i should eat your ass too, i know how much you loved me fucking you with my tongue. ❞ he feels ry twitch around his fingers & smiles a bit at the reaction, a smile that grows fuller with ryouta's voice. ❛ are you gonna do it, darling, or just get me all excited for nothing? ❜ ❝ oh, you know me... i'm a man of my word. ❞

so he pulls his hand out & moves it to catch ry's hip & turn him closer. ryouta always had a nice ass, the kind isaac wants to take a bite of. so he leans forward, & bites ry's cheek ( satisfied by the small flinch the younger had made as a result ), soon pressing a few kisses to the now spot reddened in half apology. but he doesn't want to delay too long so he uses his hands to pull ryouta's cheeks open a bit more with his thumbs for easier access & licks a firm line from as far down as his tongue could reach straight upwards. he starts circling his tongue around ryouta's rim, slow licks all around it to tease the younger a bit. soon pushing his tongue in, carefully going as far forward as possible, with his tongue circling all the while. & he can tell just how much ryouta was feeling from how sloppy he was starting to blow him again or how the younger couldn't seem to help himself from moving his hips to meet isaac's mouth; half fucking himself on isaac's tongue from the way he was moving. so isaac carries on moving in the way he knows ryouta likes. thought he's careful not to get too distracted, making sure to loosen ryouta up properly, after all, some things you just can't rush.

after a point ryouta seemed to have given up on sucking his dick, too distracted by isaac eating & fingering him a little too well. not that isaac minded, knowing it felt so good ryouta lost focus felt pretty good for him & it wasn't like ryouta had slacked off before then. ❛ isaac, ❜ ryouta half whines, getting a little impatient with how good isaac's mouth & hands felt when it just wasn't enough. ❝ tell me how badly you want me to fuck you, ❞ isaac says, devillishly rubbing directly against ry's sweet spot to see how well ryouta can speak while he does it. ❛ nngh… i want you to fuck me so badly, isaac. i need to feel you right now... ❜ there's a desperation in his voice that isaac finds hard to resist ( besides he wouldn't mind moving on either ). ❝ are you craving my cock that much? ❞ its difficult to resist teasing him & isaac doesn't try very hard not to. isaac reaches forward, giving ryouta's dick some attention once again & smiles at how strongly it throbbed against his palm. ❝ it's almost like you're in heat. ❞ & he tongues ryouta's rim again, drawing out another low moan. & isaac decides enough is enough. ❝ well, you did ask nicely... ❞ isaac releases his lover, making quick work of the condom & lube while ryouta climbs over him. & isaac forces himself to keep his hips still while the younger sinks himself onto isaac's cock with a shudder & moan. 

❝ fuck... ❞ it comes out in a low growl. ryouta's still tight around him but isaac sees nothing but pleasure on the younger's face. isaac leans forward, pressing lips to ryouta's chest in a kiss, soon twirling a nipple with his tongue while brushing the opposite with his thumb. then looks up with expectant eyes. like a puppy asking for a treat. ❝ can i leave marks? ❞ ❛ just nowhere visible. ❜ ❝ i can work with that. ❞ isaac smirks, biting to leave a ring around the nipple he'd licked so far. but in his defense, ryouta knew isaac would do more than leave a hickey or two. isaac switches sides, index running along the light indent of his teeth, feeling satisfied while teeth & tongue give their attention to ryouta's other nipple. once he's satisfied with his work, he leans himself back against the pillows so he can really admire the sight of ryouta riding him, chest & collarbone pink & blossoming red still where isaac marked a little the skin harsher. nothing that wouldn't be hidden by a shirt but isaac has to make do after all. not only did he enjoy marking him up but he rather likes the idea of ryouta seeing his work after the fact & remember just how fucking good isaac made him feel while it was happening. first he let himself admire the moment, but as clear as ryouta's pleasure was, isaac knew he needed a little something different. ❝ how about i do some of the work now... ❞ he reaches up to pull ryouta in for a kiss before turning the younger around, & firmly but gently pushing him down on all fours. he lines himself up & pushes in easily, the warmth & pressure of ryouta twitching around him again pulls another growl from his throat.

❝ god, you feel so fucking good... & your ass... ❞ he pauses, stretching out ryouta's rim with one thumb & admires the view while he keeps thrusting into him. ❝... seemed to really miss me the way you're practically sucking me back in. maybe i should make you call off work tomorrow so i can keep fucking you until your hole remembers the shape of my cock. ❞ he slows his hips, reaching to pull ryouta back, flush to his chest. he presses a couple kisses to the side of ryouta's neck before brushing against his ear while he speaks. ❝ i bet you like that idea too... for me fuck you so well no one else can do the job. i bet its been a long time too... since you were able to find someone who could make you feel as good as i can. ❞ while his lips ghost along ryouta's skin, isaac's hands far more deliberate in the way they touch & hold him close. he has more on the tip of his tongue, but he's so terribly afraid that ryouta will take it all back the second he goes too far. ❝ & we both know how much you're going to enjoy this. ❞ so he grinds his hips & thrusts up into ryouta, leaving another clear bite mark on the younger's shoulder & watching his reactions to tell how to move his hips in every way ryouta wants him. he wasn't sure if he was imagining it, but he felt like ryouta was more sensitive than he'd been in the past, more reactive to his every brush with his hand or kiss of his lips, but more than anything —of each thrust. ❝ you it like this, don’t you? so needy... i mean look at you, you can't keep your hips still because i'm fucking you too well. & your cock, ❞ isaac reaches around him, jerking him off in time with every thrust of his hips, ❝ hasn't stopped leaking pre cum since we started. i want you to come for me. ❞ he picks up the pace, angling himself to hit the other's sweet spot head on each time, hand still jerking ryouta off. it was like he'd made it his mission to overwhelm ryouta's senses whereever possible. skin hot where their bodies meet, tongue & teeth along ryouta's neck as he feels ryouta react around him with every well timed thrust. ❝ oh come on baby... ❞ he says softly. he presses a few more kisses to the side of ryouta's neck when ryouta responds in a sultry tone of his own. ❛ if you want me to cum, then fuck me harder. ❜

& ever the attentive listener, isaac immediately gives up on kissing. hands move to grip ryouta's hips so tightly he might leave marks behind, but the way isaac snaps his hips so strongly, he needed to be able to hold on. he thrusts harder, making an adjustment to hit just that little bit deeper when ❛ ah.. ! right there... mmmm ❜ & once isaac knew this was how to push him over the edge, another minute was all it took before ryouta's shooting a load into his hand. isaac ends up letting out a moan of his own along with ryouta's from the way the younger's ass tightened & pulsed around him. it was hard not to react. when he could feel ryouta tense up & release from every avenue. he reaches for the towel again, quick to wipe his hand. but the second isaac's done, he pins ry on the bed, chest to chest as he thursts back in without warning. ryouta opened his mouth to speak but isaac cut him off. ❝ just because you came, doesn’t mean i’ll stop. ❞ as if ryouta had any desire to argue, any possible protest was silenced by isaac's lips, hips moving & causing a little wriggling from the subtle sensitivity following his high. even a tiny whimper when he rubbed against that spot a little to hard a little too soon. isaac replicates the stroke in the hopes of hearing it again & smiles against ryouta's lips when he's rewarded for his efforts. ❝ fuck that's hot. ❞ & isaac can feel his dick throb in response, stilling his hips for a moment. ❛ isaac... ❜ ry whines but isaac can't tell if its because he wants isaac to stop or if he's complaining that isaac paused his hips. ❛ more... i want more, now. ❜ as you wish, isaac implies with a kiss that has a need unbecoming of him ( but FAR passed the point of stiffling ). he keeps his pace slower, not wanting to overdo it just yet. 

now, true jealousy was always a foreign idea to him, but the fact of the matter was that he was jealous. jealous of every person ryouta has let touch him since they parted in paris all those years ago. jealous of every minute he'd missed out on because he had been too afraid to ask him to stay. despite how engrossed in the moment he was, he couldn't help the thoughts that swirled his mind. call me selfish but i don't think anyone should be able to see you like this but me, especially not when i fuck you so much better. every breath & moan makes him jealous knowing that even just one other person had been able to hear ryouta making those sounds. he doesn't know if ryouta knows how he's feeling. if ryouta can feel his intensity through his touch, but more than that, he wonders hopes that ryouta is feeling jealous of everyone he's been with too. of anyone isaac has bitten & marked, of anyone who had heard growling & moaning when he's enjoying himself, of anyone that shuddered when he's whispering filthy thoughts in their ear. he hopes so. ❝ tu me rends fou, ❞ comes another quiet line before he presses himself against the other, hands holding him close as he slides his cock into ryouta with ease again & again. he moves slow, wanting to make sure ryouta could focus on his words, just for a moment. & in this moment of courage, he finds it in himself to be half-honest with both himself & ryouta since they'd run into each other that fateful two weeks prior. ❝ god i missed this. ❞ missed you. he can't tell how his voice sounds to ryouta, all he knows is his heart feels so incredibly desperate & his eyes search ryouta's for something, anything.  ❝ even if its just for tonight, you're mine & i am yours. ❞ he's afraid to leave ryouta's mouth unattended for a moment. unsure of what he might say if isaac didn't stop him from speaking. so he kisses him again, passionate & deep, tongue slipping where it meets ryouta's. as his hips find a new rythm, knowing just the right pace so he can stick to it until all ryouta can do is moan & maybe whimper against isaac's lips, where the only word he knows is isaac's name. he'd always been good at that too, at reducing someone's vocabulary to consist of nothing but isaac's name & to beg him for more. ❝ let me hear it, baby, tell me who you belong to. ❞ but isaac  wasn't prepared for the answer he was give. ❛ yours, darling… all yours from the moment i met you. ❜ ❝ ryouta, ❞ he forces himself to slow, look the other in the eye & look a mix of desperation & worry. ❝ please don't say shit like that if you don't mean it. i'm going to hold you to that because i dont think i can handle it otherwise. ❞ so he holds ryouta close, kissing him with wantonness beyond all measure as he pushes ryouta over the edge again, this time cumming along with him unable to resist the overwhelming pleasure from feeling ryouta pulsing around his cock all the while.

❝ you really do need to cancel your plans for tomorrow now. ❞ isaac's voice & kiss is almost sweet in contrast every touch up to now. even brushing  ❝ because if you think you can say something like that without me making good on your word then you really don't know me at all. we've got a long night ahead of us, after all, i did promise to make you cum over & over until you lose count & we're still only at 2. ❞

[ktheist]

1 | play me like a toy [m]

title inspired by blackpink’s sure thing cover.

⟶ read the last part, all yours to enjoy, here.

muses. mafia heiress!reader x ex-mafia!director!hoseok

genre. age gap factor. chaebol-mafia family au. arranged marriage au. office au. modern au.

words. 5.8k

warnings. contains smut. mentions of gun use. mentions of cheating.

verse. knj. ksj. myg. kth. pjm. jjk. jhs. 

synopsis. 

sit still, look pretty. 

such were the words your maid-turned-mistress of a mother has ever taught you. the mindless marionette mask worked for the most parts. but when you find yourself hanging by a thread - or is it the beeping line of your dying father’s heart rate monitor? - you decide it’s time to shed off that mask and seek han group’s infamous loyal dog that went off radar 17 years ago.

jung hoseok.

alternatively;

“marry me or be killed.”

“is there a third option?”

“we fucked but you were too drunk to remember so that option’s invalid.”

x

jung hoseok is in a dry spell.

there was no doubt as to whether he could score a date, get laid and maybe even have his nightstand to call him up again exactly the week after.

the issue was time.

with his boss and longtime friend getting married, he ends up coming to work with a different pile of papers on his desk every day. well, it was his idea to sign a promissory note that if kim namjoon ever found a woman he loved and married, hoseok would take half of the ceo-ly workload so his overbearing boss could enjoy his honeymoon and truly, as hoseok would put it, live.

the order went a little differently but namjoon found a hole in the way the sentences were worded that got him flying away to the caribbean and leaving hoseok to fend for himself in these trying times.

oh, and it’s almost hit the third month of the newly weds going mia.

in the first place, he didn’t think namjoon would hold the agreement over his head like he was flexing a few hundred thousand dollar’s worth of lawsuit.

but the man did just that and now hoseok is slaving over his nine-to-five which actually tend to drag on till ten or, if he’s lucky, even midnight. sure, he got promoted from head secretary to director but he’s wondering if this endless cycle of coming back home only pass out in the bed and wake up earlier than a parent with a toddler - is worth it.

hoseok groans, his hand grabbing around for his phone to put a stop on that obnoxious alarm even if it’s just for five minutes before he has to hear it again.

and grab something he did, but this so called phone feels too soft to be a phone and shapes like an cup but softer and - he puts more pressure to his grasp out of confusion -

“mhm, what the hell?”

- it complains in a groggy voice too.

almost as if pricked by a needle, hoseok leaps right out of bed, sending the duvet flying to the floor and revealing the naked woman - you - who’s stretching her limbs whilst her face scrunches in displeasure at the rude awakening.

“__-___?! wh-what the- what are you doing in my bed?”

x

“so you touched my boob,” you say, legs crossed and arms folded over said boob.

“i-i-” it’s the first time you’ve ever seen hoseok opened his eyes so wide - he has pretty eyes. especially when they’re brimming with fear and bashfulness, “i’m sorry, i have no excuse.”

he hangs his head low.

“why didn’t you touch the other one?”

it’s then, when hoseok’s eyes snap up to you, gaze searching for a sign - any sign, to confirm that he misheard that, does the man realize that you’re messing with him.

that, and you doubling over with laughter trickling out of your mouth should be affirmation enough.

“god, you should’ve seen your face, hobi!” you’re still holding your stomach when hoseok’s shoulders stiffen and his round eyes turn sharp.

“that’s not something you joke about, ___,” he says, it’s easy to mistake his sternness with anger if you didn’t know him your whole life, “are you gonna let it go every time someone disrespects you? mr. han would’ve snapped their neck in half-”

“hoseok, come on,” you cut him off with a dismissive hand, “none of those gory talks about snapping necks and pulling out nails. that’s the reason i end up here in the first place.”

it’s the way silence lulls into the room and hoseok looks at you with the hardest knitted brows and eyes that seem to have retracted his soul far back into his memories, as though searching for something - that makes your heart drop.

all sense of humor now gone.

“you don’t remember what happened last night... do you?” the last part is just an addition to ease your throbbing heart.

if you’d left it as a statement, it made it more real that he did forget.

just a man, sitting at a half empty bar, three shots of vodka in and hostility in his voice that could’ve killed but so very hoseok of him, “that seat’s taken.”

aloof. distant. and every word in the book that described a man who didn’t want to be bothered and he drowned himself in alcohol.

“i’ll leave once the owner comes back,” you’d slipped into the seat anyway, despite the heat of hoseok’s stare.

not paying any heed, you ordered yourself a margarita.

“it’s been awhile, hasn’t it, hobi?”

that’s when he turned to you. truly looked at you.

“do you perhaps have a little sister who,” his eyebrows began to knit as if the screws in his head started turning, “would be about your age by now... ____?”

you didn’t really catch up. all you could remember was hoseok’s calculative stare as he watched you down one drink after the other. the the chilliness of the margarita somewhat soothing the burning sensation as it went down your throat.

“that’s the fifth for you,” his large hand covered yours, stopping you from picking up the glass as he cautioned you.

“yeah? i’m only stopping if i have something else to occupy my mouth with.”

in his distracted state as he tried to make sense of what your words meant, you lifted the glass to your mouth and downed the last of your drink.

and then, you stood up, walked the tiniest distance between your seat and his, grabbed him by the collar and crashed your lips on his.

you remembered your confidence dissipating like air with every second passing without hoseok so much as responding to your kiss.

maybe it was the shock.

because one that passed, you found his arm around your waist and his lips kissing you harder than you kissed him.

you stumbled into your car, not caring if yeojun had a front row view from the rearview mirror of the things that transpired at the back seat. you barely remember the walk from the parking lot to his apartment.

those sweet whispered promises. the hands that burned your skin with every touch. those eyes that pierced right into your eyes, as if invisible hands reached into your soul and grasped it in his palm.

“mine,” hoseok husked, voice sending ripples of pleasure dripping down your legs. he’d thrust himself balls deep inside you, like a beast who hadn’t had a drop of water since the drought, “you’re mine from head to toe.”

if that wasn’t enough, he fucked you raw until you were at your limit and he’d just... stop.

“hoseok, why-” you’d been breathless, skin glistening with sweat and knees trembling to give in but he’d banded an arm under your torso and held you to him so your bodies remained connected even if none of you moved.

“you think i’d just let you cum so easily?” he placed a hand on your ass, as if warning you what would happen if you’d pull away, “after all these years... you grew up fine as fuck.”

he’d languidly pulled out of you, as if knowing how torturous it felt for you with his fingers on your clit that sent electricity through your veins.

“what is it, hm? is it the kang’s or is it the seong’s? i guess the rumor about boss being hospitalized was true,” his words barely registered in your mind as his index finger touched your back and traced down your spine whilst he started thrusting in and out of you agonizingly slow.

“please, just fuck me,” you’d hissed, pain and pleasure and frustrations mixed in your voice.

“hm, still as tight-lipped as ever, huh?” he’d sounded completely relaxed as if the smacking sound that echoed in the air as his body slammed against your deliciously - didn’t affect him in the slightest.

as if he took no pleasure in fucking you. as if this was only for your poor little soul that came running back to him because you had no one to depend on.

“y-you have to- ah! s-swear your l-loyalty to- oh my god,” it was last night, while the citylights poured through hoseok’s window, his room was directly across another apartment building.

“loyalty, huh?” he tested the words on his mouth, as if it was a foreign candy gifted to him as present.

his body feels hot against your back as he lowered himself flush against you, his breath fanning your sweat-glistened skin, his voice brushing the shell of your ear, “you should know i’m yours as much as you’re mine. nothing i wouldn’t do for you, kiddo.”

he’d used that nickname he’d used to call you as he fucked you into his bed, and sent you moaning his name like you wouldn’t know any other name.

anyone could’ve seen.

neither of you cared though.

well-

you throw your gaze out at the twenty storey building, noticing a man vacuuming the living room three units to the left from the unit directly across from hoseok’s. above him, two kids, a boy and a girl are jumping around while holding an airplane in their hands.

-until now, that is.

hoseok had become an entirely different person last night. no - rather, he’d returned to you as the man you’d always kept in that special spot in your heart and locked it up so no one would be able to see past your steel schooled expression and the devil may care nature.

“i...”

your gaze snaps back to hoseok once again. he parts his lips for the briefest moment, as if to say something but clamps them shut again. the way his eyes gleam with guilt is enough to tell you the unspoken words that hang in the air.

and yet, your heart hardens like the steel mask you often wear on your face.

“and... to think i gave you my virginity too...”

the silence that lapses between you is tangible.

“sike, i’m kidding,” you grin, brows rising to the ceiling but when hoseok doesn’t so much as laugh or frown - he simply looked at you like a parent disappointed of his child who still didn’t see why what she did was wrong - you tilt your head to the side slightly, “or am i?”

“ugh, you’re no fun,” you throw your head back after failing to gouge a reaction from the man who screamed bloody murder as if you’re some street rat that he was so close to calling infestation control.

“i need to meet mr. han,” he announces after a whole solid minute of sitting on the edge of the bed with feet planted on the floor.

“what for? what are you gonna tell daddy? ‘i’m sorry i took your daughter’s virginity, sir, it won’t happen again?’“ you watch him get up, tongue unconsciously slipping out and sweeping over your bottom lip as you watch the curve of his ass as he walks to the closet and disappears into it.

“were you really a virgin?” he comes out dressed in fresh crisp button down tucked in a pair of black pants, a contrast to his rolled up sleeves, creased shirt and disheveled hair from last night.

“i don’t know, did it feel like i was?” you shoot him a coquettish smile.

the gentle protrusion of his adam’s apple bobs up and down, his lingering gaze on your crossed, bare legs not going unnoticed by you. you’re donned in last night’s dinner dress that hugs your curves and stops mid thighs.

but his gaze is gone too soon.

“you’re not seriously going to daddy, are you?” you tug on his sleeve just before he steps out of the door, “hobi, i’m just kidding, i’ve been with multiple guys before you,” the way his brows threaten to knit into a frown doesn’t go pass you but it’s gone too soon, “and does daddy like the idea? he’s not fond of it, but he knows he can’t stop me from doing whatever i want with my own body.”

the beep of the door as he opens it rings in the air as he looks at you in the eye, “did any of those men work for mr han?” 

only silence follows his reply as you bite your lower lip, hesitant.

“we can’t hide this- mr han might already know. he has eyes and ears-” hoseok steps out of the door only to stop dead in track when he sees at least half a dozen men lined up in front of his apartment in black suits.

“good morning, miss ____.” they bow at exactly 90 degrees angle like robots.

“-everywhere...” hoseok trails off, eyes scanning the area on high alert.

“don’t worry, they’re not daddy’s men. they’re my men,” you raise one hand, index finger pointing to the ceiling as you shoot them an expression void of any smile.

they seem to understand that as they dip into a bow again, the leader, yeojun, stops in front of the elevator when he and his men would have joined you in any other circumstances.

“it’s not about saving my own ass, ___,” hoseok begins.

the way his arms cross over his chest makes his sleeves wrap deliciously around his biceps.

his deep brown eyes appear like a hazel storm under the sunlight that pours from every crevice of the parking lot where the elevator stopped at. “mr. han asked me to protect you from everything and i’m sure he hired someone else after i left to keep trash men away from you... and to think i did exactly what he wanted me to protected you from-” 

“hobi,” nimble hands hover over his chest before you gaze up at him through your lashes, making sure to give it a slow, innocent blink before speaking, “i didn’t regret what happened last night. and you trying to apologize for someone i’m not sorry kind of hurts.”

“i’m sorry i didn’t think of it that way...” he trails off, lips pressed in a straight line as though deep in thought.

“if it makes you that uncomfortable, i won’t talk about it but promise me this stays between us, please?” you hold up a pinky finger like you would when you were younger.

the smile that makes its way to hoseok lips causes your heart to palpitate just when it’s barely calmed down.

his pinky finger is much larger than yours as it hooks around yours in a promise, a ghost of a smile tugging on his lips. as if he’s still unsure if he should be making any promises. as if he’s unsure if he should be hooking his pinky with yours instead of pushing you as far away from him as he could. but before he can come to a conclusion, a voice reverberates into the air.

“miss ____.”

the sound of hoseok sucking in a sharp breath rings in your ear as a dozen men in black suits bow at the sight of you.

before another word comes out from anyone else, you speak, voice echoing against the walls.

“listen up you sons of bitches, if i find out any of you snitched to daddy, i’ll make sure your wife, your husband, your kids, your grandparents, hell even your neighbors pay for it. got it?”

a round of rigorous “yes, miss!” follows after the splitting silence that hovered after you finished.

turning around, almost getting lost in those pretty, star entrapped eyes of his, you smile, “see, they’re loyal to me.”

“uh, i can see why.” it’s the humorous tone that finally wraps around hoseok’s words that makes your heart clench painfully.

he’s still the same hoseok you know.

some things never change.

“well, i’ll lend you one of my cars,” you say all of a sudden.

almost as if hit by a foul ball, hoseok’s eyes widen, “shi- what time is it?”

you don’t expect much when you check your phone, the digits on the screen staring back with a 9-something am - you don’t care to check the details, “late.”

“fuck, i was so focused on gathering enough balls to meet mr. han - i need to get the papers i was supposed to look over for today’s meeting,” a string of curses follow hoseok’s scampering retreat. and you simply watch in your spot - he’s always been such a klutz, forgetting the important details and scrambling to get what he’d forgotten and just remembered - done.

before the doors of the elevator close and swallow him in its belly, hoseok’s nimble fingers slip between the shutting gap, making the doors split open again, “oh,” he says, as if remembering something, “you don’t have to do that - i can drive, i got a driver’s license like, eons ago.”

right.

when he left, he was only 18 and had nothing more but a duffle bag filled with all his belongings and an acceptance letter of the university he applied to.

hoseok had been driving you around everywhere before that. he got pulled over by a cop once but your father easily handled that.

jung hoseok’s been with you for as long as you remember.

you recall bawling your eyes out and clinging onto his leg, begging him not to leave because your nanny left and you found out a few months later that her body was found washed up along the river bank near her hometown.

mr. kim, the gardener quit and said he wanted to visit his kids but the whole family ended up dying in a fire.

everyone who left ends up dead.

pushing the somber feeling that’s threatening to pull the muscles in your face into a frown, you shake your head, an amused smirk tugging on your lips as you mask away every other feeling.

“you really don’t remember anything, do you?” somewhere in that innocently clueless gaze of his, you search for a lie - it would’ve been better if he lied about forgetting for whatever reason.

but when the genuinity over pours from those pretty eyes, you push away the gnawing feeling in your heart, “we were both shit faced drunk last night so we came to your place with my driver and you left your car at the bar’s parking lot.”

“oh shit,” he begins punching the button on the inside of the elevator, “i won’t take long, i pro-”

the metal doors gradually shut, cutting off what he was about to say.

x

“p-please, i’m sorry, i’ll do anything...” the man’s words got blurred out as you stare out the window of his medium sized flat with a master bedroom, a room and a bathroom connected to the common area.

it’s been a week since you met hoseok. you want to be mad that he doesn’t call, especially after not seeing each other for so long and finally reuniting only for him to forget everything about that night.

but you didn’t even give him your number and you may or may not be mad that he didn’t think to ask.

a bloodcurdling scream drums against your eardrums, making you physically flinch as your head snaps towards the man lying on the ground with his mouth wide open and no longer any sound coming out.

his head is titled at the new guy who’s standing over him with a baton gripped in one hand. the sight itself makes the pit of your stomach churn.

“god fucking damn it, yeojun,” you shoot a glare at the head bodyguard, “didn’t you teach him rule number 1? make no sound, catch no attention?”

at that, yeojun snaps his fingers and two of the bodyguards closest to the new guy - soon? soobin? was his name? - approach him. one of them places a firm hand on his shoulder whilst he kicks soobin behind his knee, sending him kneeling with a thud.

“i’m sorry, miss ___, it seems soobin,” ah so you did get his name right, “needs to join mr. yoo here in learning a thing or two about obeying orders.”

yeojun doesn’t even flinch when one of your donned-in-black bodyguard strikes one of their own at the back of his head with that baton they usually carry around their waist.

soobin’s face scrunches up painfully as he breathes out through his nose, teeth gritting together.

“you boys, break some things and you, get the car ready,” with that, the bodyguards hovering over the middle-aged borrower and soobin begin scampering around, toppling shelves over, pushing vases to the ground and breaking plates in the kitchen.

“you were too nice,” yeojun murmurs underneath his breath once you’re in the hallway, the sound of glass shattering and furniture breaking still echo off the walls.

“i shouldn’t even be doing this shit anyway. who does he think i am? sending me to take care of small fries...” agitated, you shoot yeojun a glare.

to which he only responds with raised eyebrows, as if asking if you’d go against your brother’s orders just because you’ve never liked to see violence yet violence follows you everywhere.

“let’s see.... richest bachelor, heir to han group, one of the biggest conglomerate family that runs the underground ring...” the black haired man starts counting off with his finger until you swing your purse to his side.

“which side are you on? me or my chanyeol’s?!”

laughter trickles down his lips as he follows you into the elevator. somewhere in the distance, the hallway faintly rings with the fading sound of mr. yoo’s helpless pleas.

x

when you arrive at kimcorp, the secretary shoots up from your seat, her smile is gorgeous and welcoming but the knitted set of brows above her eyes do a poor job of hiding her anxiousness.

odd.

you didn’t use the han name to get past the receptionist, only mentioning “hoseok is expecting me, tell him i have something of his he’d really like back.”

was it the lavish dinner dress? was it the couture handbag?

“ah, it’s the fox fur, isn’t it?” you twirl on your heels, lips curling prettily as you narrow your eyes at the startled secretary.

she’s standing there like a thief caught red-handed. as if her worst nightmares came true the moment you started saying something besides the “i’m here to see jung hoseok.”

“i-i’m sorry, ma’am?” her shoulders tense up and her smile doesn’t quite reach her eyes.

“nothing, it’s nothing,” you put on a billion dollar smile - one that she seems to be struggling to wear.

before the poor thing peed her pants, you turn around, your back on her and push on the double doors of the office with a white plate that spells out “head director jung.”

the syllables of your name roll off the mouth of the man behind the large desk that almost takes up half of the room, piles of documents stacked up on either sides while the middle section is cleared for a mac and a macbook perched directly in front of him.

“you sound surprised, didn’t the receptionist tell you i was coming?” you put on your best smile even as you watch him push a button on a smaller-than-a-palm-sized remote directed at the cctv and dash for the blinds and close them so that the secretaries facing his room won’t have any visual access to what goes on from now on.

“yeji didn’t specify who,” he says mindlessly, still peeking through the blinds - possibly to check if anyone noticed the sudden move.

somehow, hearing the name of another woman leaving hoseok’s lips doesn’t sit right with you.

“since you easily told her to send me right up, i assume you have an idea of who it was,” a devious smile tugs in the corners of your lips as the sound of hoseok sucking in a sharp breath brushes your ears.

as he was in the middle of turning around and facing you, you managed to catch him off guard and trap him between the window and yourself. the ridges of his toned abs brushing against your front torso with only layers of clothing separating you.

the warning tone he uses to say your name with is music to your ears.

he sounded like the old him. the old hoseok who’d drive his fist into anyone’s face without batting an eye. the old hoseok who would turn to your crying frame with the sweetest smile and hand you back your backpack that fell on the ground amidst the struggle of trying to bite and kick your kidnappers in the shin.

“i missed you, you know?” your voice is tinged with playfulness but your heart skips a beat like a schoolgirl with a crush.

“i-i... we...”

the words get stuck in his throat the moment your lips brush his. what surprises you is the softest sigh that leaves his mouth before a large hand buries itself in your hair, pulling you close until he’s tasting you. licking your bottom lip as if asking for something he didn’t need to ask for in the first place.

his free hand grasps your ass as if he’s been dying to feel your soft cheeks in his palm. you part your lips for him, tasting the faintest sense of cigarette in his breath.

hoseok tends to smoke when something bothers.

you hope it’s you. you hope he lays in bed at night, staring at the ceiling. you hope you’re all he thinks about.

by the time you pull apart, you’re both heaving for air. a soft thud drums in your ears as hoseok leans his head against the blinds-covered-window. you press your cheek against his chest, face hot.

one of his hands sits on top of your ass as if paying his overdue respect for your body but yet unwilling to let you go. the other rests on the back of your head, his thumb mindlessly caressing your scalp.

“hoseok?” you’re the first to break the silence.

he simply hums in response, “hm?”

“i can’t give it back,” you turn your cheek to bury your face in his chest, your voice coming out muffled, “i can’t give back your freedom.”

x

“so you’re saying you can’t let me go...” hoseok echoes the words you say to him.

but the way his lips curl into a pleased smirk and his white shirt creasing at the front from having your bodies pressed together a moment ago, gives those words a different meaning than you intend them to.

somehow, the distance between you seems smaller.

“thanks miyeon,” hoseok’s smile switches to that of a kind, considerate superior.

miyeon, the woman who guided you to hoseok’s office returns his smile. but you don’t miss the cautious gaze she throws your way before slipping out of the room after setting down the tea cups.

he’s back to himself. the kind that jumps at every little sound and tends to wear a frightened puppy look almost too often.

“no, rather...” you trail off, chanyeol’s face burning at the back of your mind - your brother, the heir to han group and the man that will marry you off to the kang’s in order to mend the strain in the family ties as soon as your father breathes out his last breath.

you shake your head, a smile on your face, “it’s been awhile, how bout catching up over lunch?”

and so it goes, you visit hoseok every few days in a week. at times you tell the secretary to keep your visit a secret so you could surprise him, you’d end up catching him neck deep in work yet he still manages to pull off the rolled up sleeves, two buttons undone and slicked back hair with a single strand falling over his forehead, its tip grazing those set of strong eyebrows.

when you knock, he looks up and the tension in his brows seem to fade away. he shoots you a dimpled smile as if he’s been waiting for you to whisk him away from work.

and you do just that. arm looped around his, you both walk out of his office like lovers.

hoseok talks about his past - the one you’re not part of - fondly. as if looking through a lense of something he never dreamed he could have.

at first, he attracted the wrong kind of crowd with his permanently set furrowed brows. but then he finds things he enjoys doing outside of classes that he couldn’t get to enjoy when he was with han group.

dancing, tracks, boxing and more. he likes that rush of adrenaline that courses through his veins. 

and you tell him about the meetings and gatherings and social events to maintain your relationships with the vassal families. they’re usually attended by the women of the han family which means you and han chohee would be smiling and laughing together in front of the wives and daughters of the vassal families before taking off that loving step-mother-and-step-daughter facade once you walk out of the vicinity.

your lunches and dinners are spent with trips down memory lane, filling the other in on the moments each of you miss in each other’s lives. and for a moment, the hoseok in front of you who flinches at the sight of bugs and little, random noises feel familiar.

that is, until you hit your one month reunion mark.

chanyeol’s been gathering support of the vassals by personally accepting their invitations.

his presence easily overshadowed yours and yeojun confirmed that your father’s condition isn’t getting any better.

“i need you to come back and work for me, half of the men would drop everything and follow you,” you stare at the girl staring back at you on the surface of the tea. she bites her lips and you feel the faintest taste of blood in your mouth.

eyes snapping to his calculative ones - as if he already knows what you’re going to say before the words even pass your lips, “i need you by my side so i can take over han group.”

the hoseok sitting in the single couch next to you with parted legs and feet planted on the dark carpeted ground fits the head director setting better than the inked skin, cigarette smoke and gun-in-waistline setting you’re about to drag him in.

“you’re willing to go against chanyeol to become the head of the family?” he asks, eyes clouded with a sort of emotion you can’t pinpoint.

hoseok’s always been an enigma. his mind, a maze you’ll never end up figuring out.

guess that part of him is still the same.

“it’s not a choice for me to make,” a clean click! resonates in the air as you place the gun you’d pulled from your garter, point facing him, index finger on the trigger, “you have two though.”

it’s the way his eyebrows rise whilst his eyes glint with amusement tells you that hoseok - your hoseok - is still somewhere in there.

throw a sane man into an asylum and he’ll start going insane. put a mad man  back in society and he’ll trick you into believing he’s sane with his warm, dimpled smile.

“marry me or be killed,” you say simply.

that amused glint is still there, granted, it shines faintly compared to the caution that overflows from those sun-hit brown eyes as they fix themselves on the gun perched on the see-through coffee table before they travel to your knuckles, to your arm and meet your steel gaze.

his the softest protrusion of his adam’s apple drops and rises again as he swallows, “is there a third option?”

“we fucked but you were too drunk to remember so that option’s invalid.”

the air is dense with tension. it fills up your lungs and almost causes your chest to cave. you’re not sure how long to stay there, stiff and still like a rock with your back straightened as if your etiquette teacher was hovering right behind you with a long, wooden ruler that’d be ready to strike your arm at a slump of your shoulders.

but liberation comes to you in the form of a phone call.

“___, we have to go, th-the boss- the doctor says he’s not gonna make it through the night.” it’s the first time you’ve heard yeojun stammer as if he hasn’t quite yet recovered from the shock of the news he’s relaying to you.

“are you sure?” you can almost hear the thump of the organ in your chest slowing down before it ceases to throb completely, “you know how bad chanyeol wanna fuck me up, he could’ve made the doctor tell you this because he knows you’ll tell me and if... if i rush there and daddy’s laughing that obnoxious laugh while trying to make pass on the nurse like he usually does...”

yeojun grunts, “yes, ___. i have men planted there as patients, nurses, janitors and they all say the same thing - that the doctors are rushing to the vip ward and they’re trying to make it look like your usual hourly check up but it’s not... look, this is the real thing. if we mess up, there won’t be another chance. now, did you convince hoseok to come back?”

almost as if reminded that you’re not the only person in the room, your eyes snap to hoseok whose eyes are already fixed on you with a concerned expression.

“he’ll come back.” with that, you hang up the call.

“i’d love for you to think it through for a few days, realize this isn’t really a life you want and come to me on your own to sign our prenups,” you say casually, placing down the teacup and slipping your phone back into your handbag as if you’re getting ready to leave the tea party, “but...”

but before you can lift the gun and fully point it at him, a large hand covers yours. his warmth seeps through your pores and makes your body feel warmer.

“the gun’s a bit excessive,” his breath fans your face as your eyes fix on the supple skin of his neck.

it’s as if invisible hands reached out and held your head in place, forbidding you from tilting it and gazing into his eyes. his fingers reach over the back of the gun, grazing your hands.

a click cuts through the silence.

“at the very least, unlock the safety,” his teasing tone doesn’t match his saddened eyes.

and just as you thought you’d closed the distance between you and him, the circumstance forces you to take five steps back.

[asterigos]

𝐏𝐇𝐈𝐒𝐇. 𝟐𝟗. 𝐒𝐇𝐄/𝐇𝐄𝐑. 𝐄𝐒𝐓.

Tired and I’m not super speedy with replies. Please be sure to read my rules before asking to write together, but if after that you’re still interested please message me as I’m typically open to plot and can usually make new characters if need be!

Has it been a while since I’ve responded to a DM/IM? Check my personal post tag to see if I’ve made any updates.

APRIL 2023: Currently on a HIATUS. Replies will be very sporadic; not accepting new plots.

ABOUT • RULES • CHARACTERS • NAVIGATION • PLOT BUNNIES • ASK MEMES

Characters lacking a bio doesn’t indicate being a “main” or “test” character, it just means I haven’t gotten to it yet. Since I can’t have two pinned posts, below the cut are specific plot ideas I’d like for some of my characters. They can be revised as necessary to fit other genres aside from modern day. Please review their general information on my character page!

These are just the main things to keep in mind, but please read my FULL RULES before asking to write together!

• I will not write with anyone or any character under the age of 21. No exceptions. Same goes for the FC of your character, they must be 21+. • I reply about 1-2 times per week. I can’t do frequent replies every day or every other day due to my busy schedule. • Please DO NOT reblog any of my graphics unless you were tagged in it or have otherwise received my explicit permission to do so. • Most of my characters are women as I primarily write F/F for romantic ships because that’s what I’m most comfortable with, but I am willing to write other gender romantic pairings. Anything goes for platonic relationships. If you’re interested in a M/F ship with one of my women characters, you can ask but I’m picky, sorry. Most prefer women anyway despite whatever sexuality they are.       • I’m open to platonic plots and encourage them too! • I’m open to just about any genre despite whatever genre I write my characters in as their main verse. They’re nearly all pretty flexible with being dropped into other settings and I enjoy branching out and doing different types of genres.

𝐖𝐀𝐍𝐓𝐄𝐃 𝐂𝐇𝐀𝐑𝐀𝐂𝐓𝐄𝐑-𝐒𝐏𝐄𝐂𝐈𝐅𝐈𝐂 𝐏𝐋𝐎𝐓𝐒

If romance isn’t specified then the plot doesn’t have to include it. The gender-pairings listed are only applicable when it comes to romantic connections, but irrelevant otherwise.

My muse for my guys is fickle which is why there are few to no plots listed for them. If you're interested in any of my guys let me know and we can create a plot together!

ALEXIS CAINE. 37. Medical examiner (mildly corrupt). F/F.

M.E./“Client”; changes the evidence to push a case into her favor for the sake of your character who is either being wrongly charged/suspected (e.g. being framed) or is on a track for receiving a harsh punishment for something that wasn’t their fault or an accident.

Coworkers-ish; she’s convinced to work with a private detective and help them with a case. Maybe the P.I. discovered what she does: tampering with evidence if she deems the case being unfair against the suspect, whom she will meet with first prior to agreeing to work together. They could’ve baited her into meeting.

Friends to lovers; your character could be the lawyer she works with on the cases which she’s altered the evidence or someone she works with (lab tech, detective, etc.). Basically sunshine/grump dynamics.

ALIZEH ROSHAN. 37. Personal assistant (aspiring chief of law). F/F.

Boss/P.A.; she’ll try to leave as soon as things heat up.

Exes/Past affair; in a chose of the relationship or her career Alizeh would pick her career. This could’ve been why things ended or not or one of many reasons.

Rivals to lovers; coworkers, working for rival companies, or your character could be CEO of a startup that’s rivaling Alizeh’s boss’ company, etc.

CAMILLA ZHU. 58. Spy / Hitman for a criminal organization. F/F.

Hitman, Spy/Target (can be a criminal, wealthy/prominent public figure, or regular civilian)

Mentor/Protégé

Rivals; whether they work with the same organization or they work on opposing sides.

Defective agent; someone who gets her to betray her organization and either work for a rivaling organization or partner up with your character and they work independently.

Betrayal (ex-friends, lovers, or something in between); current or former partners where one betrayed the other.

Enemies to friends/lovers; forced to work together for a mission, but start out hating one another.

Forced proximity; forced partnership for a mission leads to forced proximity (sharing a room/only one bed, hiding in lots of cramped spaces that puts them physically close, etc.); this can go with any of the above ideas.

ESPERANZA CORONA. 43. Councilperson. F/F, M/F.

Exes; from before she became a councilperson.

Target/Hitman; someone is targeting her for a shot at her seat.

Rivals; a rivaling politician or up and coming politician.

EVA HAWTHORNE. 47. Socialite / Artist (anonymous). F/F.

Crime; can be pulled into crime unwittingly as an art forger.

Boss’s wife/Personal Assistant; Eva is gay but very lowkey, almost secretive, about it due to being married to a prominent man for the sake of her family. This could be a legal age gap, but no one under 35.

INGRID SALINAS. 42. Head of herpetology at a museum. F/F, F/M.

Spouses; with a rocky relationship. She doesn’t know how to fix things so she focuses more on work yet at the same time fears the relationship’s ending in the same poor way her parents’ marriage did.

Chloe; something inspired by the movie about a married woman hiring someone (but doesn’t have to be an escort in our plot, they could be a PI) to find out information on her spouse.

JAIMIE KING. 31. Black Market Dealer / Hunter (post-apocalyptic setting). F/F, F/M.

Ex-best friends; someone she abandoned or betrayed to save herself.

KALANI ENNIS. 38. Hitman / Criminal informant. F/F.

Lawful/Lawless; Kalani, seeking to try and turn her life around, starts working as an informant to help your character chase down other criminals.

Hitman/Target; The target she can’t bring herself to kill.

MARCELLA ESPADA-SHIRAZI. ~300 / 40. Vampire (can be written in a non-supernatural setting as a human). Hitman. F/F.

Almost lovers

Hitman/Target

Hitman/Hitman

Ex-friend, partner, etc.; Someone who knew her in the past as a lawyer before she became the wrathful, hollow version of herself that she is now.

Platonic or Romantic anything; Someone to teach her how to let go of her grief and channel her rage into something constructive.

REGAN SLOANE. 32. Bodyguard. F/F.

Hired for a heist; but she ends up getting close to your character who could either be a team member for the heist or the target.

Bodyguard/Client; your character could be a criminal, someone of importance, etc. that Regan has to protect.

RILEY THORTON. 35. Hitman. F/F, F/M.

Past gang member; someone who was apart of the gang she brought to ruin. They could be someone who had a high position (not the leader, as they’re deceased) and want revenge for some reason.

Investigator/Hitman; Someone who’s onto Riley, but doesn’t yet have solid enough evidence that she’s behind the gang’s collapse and this could be their big break if they can crack the story open. In this scenario Riley would work as a bartender as a cover job.

Clients; someone who’s hired her past or present and starts to be a repeat client for some reason and use this opportunity to get to know her.

Hitman vs. Hitman; someone who’s been hired to target Riley for something she did to the client that crossed them enough to want her gone.

SEVERIN VOLKE. Ancient; appears 38. Angel. Hitman / Various crime. F/F, *F/M (*for a casual relationship)

Guardian angel/Charge; Severin is a terrible angel and was exiled from Heaven for their violence and disobedience. In the process of turning into a fallen angel. They could protect your character for selfish reasons, but end up coming to their rescue (or to be a nuisance) on multiple occasions.

Guardian demon/Charge; similar to the above except Severin has nearly finished the transition from fallen angel to demon. Though they’ve embraced their chaotic nature there’s still a small part of them that’s good and that part is what leads them to protect your character.

VASCO RIVAS. 30. Thief. M/M, M/F. Original verse is historical, but can be switched into another with ease.

Thief/Target (royalty, noble, commoner)

Forbidden relationship; gap in social status

VALDIS ALMAZAN SOLVEIG. 41. Werewolf. Homicide detective / Bodyguard. F/F.

Bodyguard (maybe hitman)/Client; bonus if the client is a prominent criminal, preferably one who isn’t totally cold-hearted. Valdis could come to work as a hitman or bodyguard for your character if she comes to respect them enough.

Detective/Relative or friend of victim

Detective/Lawyer

VALERIA AGUILAR. 50. Hitman. F/F. Note: she’s immortal, but doesn’t think there’s anyone else out in the world who is as well.

Another immortal person

Scientist/Subject; someone trying to capture her in order to analyze her genetic makeup and biological structure to figure out how she’s immortal, how the accelerated healing processes work, the limits of her immortality/healing, and/or how to weaponize it, etc.

Liberation; she’s captured in a science lab, being used as a test subject but your character chooses to secretly try and help her escape despite this also putting your character in danger.

Hitman/Target, Hitman, or Client

Enemies or friends with benefits to lovers

YANMEI YIN. 53. Editor-in-chief at EXPOSÉ. F/F, F/M. Can also be written further back in her lifetime when she still worked as a police detective pre- or post-coverup scandal before quitting to pursue journalism.

Target/Hunter; someone related to a person who’s had their wrongdoings exposed by Yanmei and either are going after her themselves or your character is someone who’s been hired by someone to go after Yanmei. Doesn’t necessarily have to be a hitman!

Informant; the one Yanmei goes to for advice repeatedly. She knows they don’t work exclusively for her so she’s careful around them. The price asked of her could become more dangerous and not just about money.

Ex-spouses; Yanmei was married once, though it fell apart for a variety of reasons, but in part because of her unyielding personality although she’d have been gentler in a relationship. But still stubborn and blunt with her opinions. They’re always chasing stories too.

[lovelylogans]

debutante

previous chapter | chapter two | next chapter

part of the wyliwf verse.

warnings: mention of creepy adults/pedophilia, transphobia, memory loss problems, food mentions, kissing/making out, arguing, 

pairings: logince, moxiety

words: 21,995

notes: there are spoiler warnings for the first three seasons of downton abbey, and dee and logan have a discussion of journalistic ethics that includes a mention of a teacher that is creepy toward teenage girls; it’s an abstract idea for the sake of argument, there is no actual creepy teacher, but i wanted to put a warning in here anyway.

⁂

he really needs to get on patton about getting a new rug for his bedroom, virgil muses.

his bare feet are resting against the hardwood of patton’s floor. patton, who usually clings to inanimate objects with an intensity fueled almost entirely by reminiscing, even patton had admitted he probably should let go of the raggedy bedroom rug, and he’d been meaning to replace it, but. he hasn’t yet. so virgil’s sitting on patton’s bed, waiting for patton to finish brushing his teeth and washing his face, so that they can curl up in bed and go to sleep. 

that’s a new thing—it’s not entirely new, but new enough that virgil feels too awkward to just curl up in patton’s bed and wait for him to come back. so. virgil is sitting here, in his pajamas, thinking about patton’s bare bedroom floor and his need for a new rug.

and not thinking about the various strides he and patton have been making in their relationship, slow but sure. virgil knows that patton’s really excited, and eager to move forward in their relationship, and virgil is too, but, surprise surprise, virgil’s anxious about it, so patton’s been very understanding about moving at a much slower pace than he’s used to—“you’re worth it, honey,” patton had said, his chin hooked over virgil’s shoulder as they cuddled at night, “there’s no rush at all. it’s been this long, ya know? i want to do all of this right,” and really, virgil did not deserve patton, he really didn’t.

there’s the sound of bare feet padding down the hallway, though, and virgil looks up, smiling despite himself, as patton opens the door. 

“hey,” he says warmly, closing the door behind him and shutting off the light—the lamps on the bedside tables are still lit—and patton continues his path, only detouring to lean down to kiss virgil sweetly before he sits down on his side of the bed. 

“hey,” virgil echoes, and at last swings his legs up on the bed, settling back against the pillows. “how was your day?”

this part he likes a lot, too—this, sitting in the same bed, talking about their days. it’s cavity-inducingly domestic.

patton hums, already squirming to be under the covers, and virgil copies him; they’ll move to cuddle once they’re done talking, virgil knows, so he mostly just stays where he is.

“the usual,” patton says. “um—got news of a wedding incoming, so i’m sure i’ll be going nutty about that in… a year and half or so.”

virgil knows that the weddings held at the inns hold some of patton’s favorite and least favorite parts of the job—helping make people happy, seeing people fall in love all over again, making everything so beautiful and lovely, but also, bridezillas and flighty grooms—and he smiles, mentally calculating. “you don’t usually get fall weddings, right? that’s mostly a spring/summer thing.”

“i know!” patton says brightly. “i hope they timed it nice so that it’s a warm fall day, and they get all the pretty leaves falling, and the sun hits the ceremony just right…”

“that sounds nice,” virgil says honestly, because it does—a picturesque fall wedding, sookie making some fancy version of an apple fritter for appetizers, a pumpkin-flavored cake. “fall wedding, i mean. it’s so pretty here in fall, i know we get boosted tourism because of it, but. not many weddings.”

“not many weddings,” patton agrees, and squeezes his arm. “and it’s a lesbian wedding, too, so from the conversation we had, i really think they’re gonna lean into the whole witchy-alternative vibe. the word celestial was thrown around a lot.”

“oh, that’ll be really fun,” virgil says, refining his mental image—black dresses and a tux, maybe, star-studded hairpieces, lots of fairy lights. “you’ll have to remind me when it’s actually being set up, i want to see how they decide to decorate. you never get to do witchy lesbian alternative celestial-themed weddings.”

patton laughs, and leans in a little closer to virgil. “no, i can’t say i’ve ever gotten to help out with a witchy lesbian alternative celestial-themed wedding. so that’ll be fun!”

patton continues with other work things—he has a much sooner wedding in spring, and unfortunately it is not a lesbian wedding, but a double wedding of two sets of insufferably rich twins, so there’s a lot to deal with there—before he winds down and says, “well, that’s about it with me, really, how ‘bout you?”

“um, pretty calm, pretty typical,” virgil says, before he reaches over and squeezes patton’s thigh. “oh, before i forget, the middle davis kid—”

“yeah?”

“—going by brick for now, while they’re trying to figure out what fits better,” virgil says. he leaves his hand on patton’s thigh, because. well. he can.

“brick,” patton says, delighted. “oh, that’s a great nickname for them—every time i see them, they’re insistent that they’re gonna bulk up and hit a growth spurt any day now.”

virgil allows himself a grin—brick is a pretty ironic nickname for a skinny little korean-irish kid who’s been hankering for their growth spurt since they could have possibly hit puberty, and now at age fourteen it was definitely becoming a bit more plaintive, but they also said it’s because they have the subtlety of a brick, so it fits in at least one way.

“they are still using they/them pronouns, right?” patton checks.

“yeah, still they/them,” virgil says. “you’ll have to ask them if they’ve added any pronouns when they turn up for your get cultured day—which is why i brought it up, brick brought by their dress for me to try and alter so that sequins don’t constantly scrape, so that’ll be a fun little challenge.”

“ooh, i hated wearing sequins at their age,” patton says sympathetically, and pats virgil’s arm. “good luck with that one.”

“other than that, though, today was mostly boring, my interesting stuff all has to do with the debutante ball,” virgil admits, rubbing his thumb back and forth over patton’s thigh. “oh, except for the part where kirk’s trying to sell topical funny t-shirts now.”

“ah, kirk,” patton says fondly. “where would the town be, without kirk and his seemingly millions of part-time jobs?”

“yeah, well, the best he could come up with today was rudy ate oatmeal, so i’m not really holding out hope for the funny t-shirt business,” virgil says.

patton snorts, and then tries to pretend he hadn’t—but, really, kirk becomes way less aggravating when you take him as comic relief. virgil knows, it’s the way he’s managed to stand all of kirk’s eccentricities over the years.

“anyway, yeah, that’s about it,” virgil says. “how'd the dinner go—i mean, i know emily at least gave you the dress, so that went okay, right?”

patton shrugs a shoulder and says, “i guess. i mean, i have a feeling this isn’t over, but… gosh, you should have seen her and logan stare each other down.”

“intense, huh?” he prompts, when patton goes quiet. he squeezes his thigh again, because physical touch is one of patton’s top two love languages. he knows, they took the test together.

patton chews his lip, before he says, “he looked like me. back then, i mean. the look on his face. my mom must’ve seen it a million times when i was his age.”

virgil squeezes a little tighter.

he knows that patton’s teenage years were rough. again, patton doesn’t really like to talk about them—virgil doesn’t blame him—but virgil did see patton struggle through the later end of his teens, and he was there for him when he’d broken down in tears. now, with as old as he is, as removed as they are from it, having seen logan and roman grow up and realizing how truly young patton was when they first met, the thought of teenage patton—struggling so fiercely in a house full of people who hadn’t understood him just made him, how hard patton had had to work to get a better life for himself and his son, the years of therapy patton had gone through—just made him want to grab patton in a hug and never let go.

“so,” patton says, pauses, and lets out a sigh. “i don’t—i don’t know. it went okay. but seeing logan copy me like that, i just…”

virgil leans over to kiss patton on the cheek.

“the difference between you as a teenager and logan as a teenager is massive,” he says lowly. “because logan’s got you, and me, and roman, and ms. prince, and rudy. he’s got this whole bizarre town. you had you, and christopher, i guess, but he didn’t understand. you’ve learned coping mechanisms that you passed onto logan, so he knows other ways to redirect his feelings. if he’s being rebellious to help protest something he thinks is sexist or unjust, i think that’s a pretty good reason to rebel. you did a great job with him. he’s a great kid. yeah?”

“yeah,” patton says very quietly. “yeah, he is.”

“you’ve come really far,” he says, and leans to see patton better, and gently pokes at patton’s cheek, just to make him smile, and he adds, “plus, i’d think if teenage-rebel you came to the future to see that your son’s protesting the gender stuff you’d been struggling with, i think that would’ve made you pretty happy, huh?”

and, yes, patton does smile at that, and something in virgil relaxes at the sight.

“yeah,” patton says. “yeah, i think it really would’ve.”

“well, good,” virgil says, and kisses his cheek, before he decides to just kinda go for it and lean in to wrap his arms around patton, initiating the cuddling early. “so, other than that déjà vu—”

“it went okay,” patton says, wiggling into virgil’s arms. “i mean—still weird to look at the dress that my mom bought for me. but other than that, it was okay.”

virgil hums sympathetically, and presses a kiss to patton’s head.

“well,” he says. “i’m gonna adjust it so that it’s logan’s dress, and his dress only. does that help?”

he feels patton smile against his collarbone.

“you know,” he says musingly. “i think it really does.”

⁂

logan has never walked into a store afraid to touch something before.

granted, most stores he walks into are grocery stores or convenience stores; clothing stores, sometimes, mostly before the school year or whenever roman decides he simply must check out the latest collection of things that the outlet mall in woodbridge had to offer. most of the time, the stores logan knew were quiet, maybe with some inoffensive music piped in, with products he knew how to use, or how they looked.

this was not the case in a bridal boutique.

which is where logan and roman are; though logan had the dress once intended for his father, roman still needed to get his own, and had so enticed logan to come along with him to help him choose.

it’s a saturday afternoon, and they’re technically on a date. there’s a bookstore just across the street, and a frozen yogurt parlor near there, and a thrift store they could dive into so logan could see the second-hand books and roman could hunt for some kind of retro statement piece.

logan inspects his hands again. there’s a stray inky blue smear across his hand that must have gotten there when he was taking his notes earlier today. he eyes the pearly-white tulle suspiciously, and takes a step closer to the center of the room, away from any of the merchandise.

objectively, he knows that touching these delicate, temperamental fabrics and testing the sensation of them by running his hand along the skirts won’t harm them, but. logan has laid eyes upon the price tags in this room. he is not going to even slightly risk ruining these dresses, somehow. 

roman’s spinning some kind of tale for the bemused, yet seemingly enthusiastic dress attendant—something something debutante ball, something something drag family induction, something something the most experimental stuff you’ve got!—and logan considers a dress a shade of blush pink so light it’s practically white, with a delicate, lacy flower overlay, the whiteness of the flowers being the only thing to really give away the pinkness of the dress itself. he wants to reach out and rub the material between his fingers.

he also knows that, with the location in the store and the quality of the material, the dress likely costs upwards of five thousand dollars. possibly more. maybe even double.

“logan!” and logan looks away, to where roman’s waving him back toward the dressing room section. thank god, somewhere to sit and not worry about accidentally tripping over a dress and leave an irreversible mud print from his shoe, or something.

the attendant burbles something along the lines of “so supportive!” that logan doesn’t really listen to, and doesn’t really have to respond to, because she’s pointing roman in the direction of a dressing room and logan gets to sit down in a chair and finally not worry about catching a ragged edge of his fingernail in a veil and accidentally ripping it in two.

logan waits until the attendant leaves, and says, “you’re really getting a dress from here?”

“it’s not all high-end,” roman says. “they have some old samples that they’re desperate to get rid of—that’s the kind of thing i want.”

logan nods, absorbing this, and his shoulders start to relax. obviously, roman’s monetary discretions are not up to him, at all. considering it comes from either his mother or working at his mother’s studio, therefore it should primarily be roman’s concern or ms. prince’s concern, but it is reassuring to know that roman isn’t about to ransack his college fund to get a pretty dress he’ll wear once as a prank.

the attendant comes back with armfuls of tulle, which roman claps his hands at with excitement, and steps into the dressing room with her. the door closes behind them, and logan can just barely hear their muted conversation beyond the door.

logan digs around in his backpack and pulls out his history textbook, his history notebook, and a pen; he may as well study while roman’s getting primped.

he gets through about a third of the chapter on enlightenment ideals by the time the door opens again.

he puts down his pen and glances up in enough time to carefully fold his lip under his teeth in an attempt not to laugh.

roman makes sure the attendant is occupied with adjusting the train before he pulls a blech! face at logan, one he’s accustomed to seeing whenever someone attempts to serve roman anything with cauliflower.

blech, logan thinks, is right. the fabric looks like it’s made of aluminum foil. it’s all bunched up in the front, like the dress is made of paper that’s been crumpled up by a giant hand, but there’s a long train in the back, and the whole thing is bedecked with big, chunky gems, like plastic rhinestones.

of the pair of them, roman’s always been the more fashionably-minded one, but even logan can tell this dress is not good.

“what do you think?” the attendant asks.

“it’s…. unique,” roman says diplomatically, smoothing his hands along the fabric; the bodice is strange, and clearly not fitted to suit roman’s chest. “definitely on the right track toward campy. but, um—”

“you tend to favor golds over silvers,” logan offers, which is true; one of roman’s signature colors was gold for a reason. “the crumpled look isn’t the best, either. you could certainly pull off a, um—”

he makes a hand gesture, and roman offers, “high-low skirt.”

“—right, high-low skirt, but the bodice isn’t the best, either,” logan continues. “something more theatrical would suit your personality, certainly, but i think that’s more in terms of, you know. a very outdated dress, or maybe something ostentatious, but not—”

“not this kind of ostentatious, yeah,” roman finishes for him, and the attendant looks between them, seemingly starting to question why she took in two teenage boys to try on dresses. the look falters, though, and she pastes a smile onto her face—professionalism must prevail, logan supposes.

“back to the dressing room, then!”

she trots roman out in a few other options—an a-line dress with a lacy bodice and a tulle skirt, a trumpet dress with chantilly lace and a sheer back, a relatively simple a-line dress that roman keeps twisting around in to gleefully poke at the massive bow perched at the small of his back—and logan offers commentary when asked. as she sees roman adjust the bow again, the attendant smiles.

“you like the bow?”

“i like the bow,” roman agrees, grinning. “i look like a birthday present.”

“all right,” she says. “i’ll bring out something a bit more experimental again—”

at the looks on their faces, she adds, “not quite as avant-garde as the first dress. actually, it’s fairly old-fashioned, but i think it might have that theatrical aspect you’re looking for. i’ll go back and change you out of this one and bring it back for you so you can take a look, does that sound good?”

roman agrees, and accepts her hand down off the stand, with a wink at logan, before they go off into the dressing room together. logan turns again to his history textbook; he’s nearly done with the chapter, which means one less thing to stress about when he should be focusing on a date with roman.

he can hear roman laugh from inside the dressing room and, unbidden, the corners of his mouth lift, too. either this dress is hilariously terrible, or roman’s thrilled at the idea of wearing this dress which he thinks is perfect for him.

when roman hops up onto the stand, logan honestly can’t tell which it is.

it’s like some fashion designer decided to stick every terrible fashion trend from the eighties onto one dress. there are big, puffy balloon sleeves made of tulle, secured with rosettes, in addition to typical spaghetti straps with smaller rosettes all over them; there’s a panel of beading down the bodice; there’s an overlay of rows and rows of ruffly tulle over a skirt of satin.

and, of course, there is a big, fluffy bow, perched right at the small of roman’s back.

it is extra. it is absurd. it is dramatic.

“i love it,” roman says gleefully. “oh, my goodness, it’s so much!”

it is, of course, roman.

“you look beautiful,” logan offers, and roman flashes a radiant smile in his direction, before he turns to offer his exuberant thanks to the attendant, who seems relieved (”we’ve had that sample longer than i’ve worked here, i’m sure they’ll be thrilled we’re rid of it!”) and takes roman into the dressing room, to help him out of the dress and go ring him up.

logan packs up his history book with some satisfaction; he has succeeded in taking notes for this chapter, which meant that frees up some time tomorrow, which meant he could probably work to get ahead in his latin class.

or, more likely, his dad would insist he go out and do something fun, despite the fact that he’s clearly doing something fun now. and yes, fine, he’s brought his textbooks, but clearly there was time to study here, so logan will provide this chapter of notes as an example as to why studying in the midst of a date was necessary.

logan slings his backpack over his shoulder just as roman emerges from the dressing room, in the same outfit he’d been in before he’d enlisted on a dress-shopping extravaganza; despite the fact that he’s wearing a red linen button-down tucked into a pair of high-waisted, dark-washed jeans, along with a dark overcoat to fight any of the last of the spring chill, a look that still seems very put-together—it seems almost like he’s a little underdressed, after all of the wedding dresses.

he doesn’t voice this—underdressed or not, roman constantly looks lovely—and instead he offers his arm, saying, “shall we go pay?”

“we shall,” roman says in an officious british accent, probably making fun of logan, just a little, but he laces his arm through logan’s anyway, and tugs him out of the dressing room area, to the front, where he chitchats cheerfully with the attendant and takes the truly massive garment bag, hoisting it above his head to avoid letting it drag on the ground.

“virgil’s going to have a hell of a time with this dress,” roman says gleefully. “should we go and grab a cummerbund for him? you know, just to make things easier for him.”

“he’s going to complain the whole time he gets all dressed up,” logan points out.

“i know,” roman says brightly, and tugs logan again. “c’mon, let’s go drop this in the car so we can go get fro-yo. i hope they’ve got gummy worms, i wanna make the super-fruity bowl this time.”

“so it falls to me to make some chocolatey flavor, i suppose,” logan says; for the pair of them frozen yogurt, unlike lucy’s, is prone to sharing, and as to avoid unfortunate flavor combinations, such as pineapple tart and whoppers, each of them make a bowl for each flavor—one for fruity flavors, and one for chocolatey flavors. “do you think i should combine coffee and fudge brownie?”

roman kisses him on the cheek, even as he’s pushing the door of the dress store open. “you’re a genius, my darling love.”

logan realizes in the middle of a bowl of coffee-chocolate frozen yogurt that roman’s managed to get him to leave behind his textbooks in the car, along with the dress.

he can’t bring himself to mind all that much.

⁂

this plan straight out of the plot of an early 2000s movie, if early 2000s movies had meaningful and visible trans characters, is somehow working.

dee still can’t believe it, somehow, even after a weekend of getting texts from known-but-aren’t-supposed-to-be-known members of secret societies like the porcellians (the porks, to those in the know, and dee is most decisively in the know) and the clairs and the skull and dagger and the sphinx club and the order of the gorgon’s head—truly the secret society names at this school were something else. 

he’s consulting his list on his way to meet up with logan to give him a morning update (could use some more involvement from the knights of the lamp and the old crows, and if he’s truly dreaming big he’ll try to crack all twelve of the twelve peers) when he glances up to see logan at his locker, looking truly startled as he’s being accosted by a freshman, who is waving a piece of paper at him with a fierce look on her face, her voice loud, but dee can’t quite make it out over the chatter and clatter of the morning crowd getting their books for the morning, and catching up over the latest weekend gossip.

as he gets closer, he realizes who it is. poppy mcmaster, whose legal full name is so genuinely atrocious that he could only feel pity for her when he’d scanned all the freshman’s files early in the year. who in their right minds named a child coppelia parthenope mcmaster and expected them not to get brutally bullied? unless, of course, they somehow preternaturally knew that poppy would turn out with the kind of aggressive, single-minded ambition whose brashness made her preschool teacher cry.

he mostly knows her because their families move in similar social circles, as ten generations of mcmaster have attended harvard. she stands at all of 5’2”, quite a bit shorter than logan, and yet she seems to be threatening him.

dee sidles closer to get a better look at her—dirty blonde hair pulled half-up, intense dark brown eyes, chilton uniform in perfect regulation—and approaches right as she’s saying, “some discretion, for the love of god—”

“dee,” logan says, spotting him. “um, this is—” and he glances at her, eyebrows furrowing. “you didn’t say your name.”

“coppelia mcmaster,” dee says, partially to show off but also because, coppelia. “or are you going by parthenope again? or something short for parthenope, anyway.”

poppy scowls at him, fierce, and snarls out, “poppy.”

“of course, of course,” dee says placidly. “poppy. how long has it been? i don’t think we’ve spoken since your bat mitzvah. mazel tov, once again.”

“todah,” poppy says, with the kind of tone one usually reserves for saying thanks for a present they resoundingly dislike. “you’re involved in this whole debutante plot, aren’t you?”

“well, yes,” dee says. “logan’s brainchild, of course, but one could say we’re co-parenting.”

poppy then proceeds to shove a familiar piece of paper into his hands, and she says, “mr. gardiner nearly saw and grabbed this if i hadn’t pretended it was a participation sheet from the student council.”

dee sucks in a breath, turning over the sign-up sheet—oh, wonderful, they have gotten another member of the twelve peers—but his eyes also land on the Contact Logan Sanders for details.

“thank you,” dee says at last, and turns his eyes to logan. “how many of these are up around the school?”

“three,” logan says. “that one included.”

“well, we’ll have to take them down,” dee says decisively. 

“what?” logan says.

“you’ll get in trouble,” poppy says. “detention, suspension, maybe.”

“we are planning to disrupt a large social event for the daughters of the american revolution,” dee says, and glances at logan. “as you can likely imagine, social protest is not exactly the kind of press attention chilton would like to receive.”

logan scowls, and says, “tinker versus des moines—”

“—was a public school,” poppy says impatiently. “i know you came from the backends, sanders, but this is a private school. different rules apply to us.”

“plus, we’re recruiting for protest,” dee says. “i’m not sure how well the tinker test will hold up for us, and i’d rather not find out. the word’s been spread enough, we can further recruit over private text message and dms.”

logan concedes this point with a nod, and he says to dee, “i’ll defer to your judgement.” then, to poppy, “thank you for interfering. that would have complicated matters unnecessarily.”

poppy shrugs, and says matter-of-factly, “it’s common knowledge that either of you will likely be editor when i enter the franklin junior year, i may as well attempt to establish myself as one of your proteges this early on to improve my chances for being assigned the better pieces junior year, and to provide an even clearer path to editor senior year.”

logan looks startled at that, and dee turns admiring eyes to poppy—he’d known her ambitions, of course, but planning this far in advance was preparation that dee could appreciate.

she says to logan, “do you have an escort yet?”

“um,” logan says. “no. no, i don’t.”

“all right then,” poppy says, and fishes out a reporter’s notepad from the side pocket of her backpack, removing a pen from her breast pocket, scrawling, and then ripping out the paper and handing it to him. “consider the slot filled. i’ll do it.”

logan looks at the paper—her phone number—and then back at her. “you’re joining?”

“obviously,” poppy says. “the clairs are involved. my cousin was a clair, her mother was a clair. the connections you make with clairs last the rest of your life. if this helps me get closer to joining with them, i’ll do it, just so i won’t have to spend all year killing myself to get in. plus my mother has been insistent i attend a debutante ball for ages now, she’ll be crushed i’m doing it in a tux, and crushed that i’m not going for the puff route like her, but these are the sacrifices we must make.”

she doesn’t sound particularly sorry about crushing her own mother, but logan acknowledges this with a nod, digging around in his own backpack for a flyer before handing it to her.

“everyone is going to attend a sort of crash-course in debutante ball culture,” he says. “the dance, the bow, the curtsy, so on. here is the address and any supplies you should bring. do you already have a tux, or should i send you some information for rentals?”

“rentals,” poppy says, and exchanges a look with dee—dee knows logan wasn’t raised in all this, but seriously, a rental?

“i take that as a no,” logan says, undeterred, before he zips up his backpack again. 

“fantastic,” poppy says. “i was wondering about the strategy for establishing a working relationship with you, i’ve known him,” she flicks a dismissive gesture toward dee, “for years. it just so happens that this route will also help take care of my social life and allow me to enact some form of teenage rebellion, because it’s been scientifically proven that teenagers who rebel constructively form a robust sense of self and are more likely to a have a clear sense of direction, beliefs, or relational commitment, and those who don’t may find it hard to settle or focus on building a meaningful and satisfying life. this is excellent multi-tasking.”

poppy looks delighted. logan looks like he might be developing a headache. dee has found this a typical reaction to people within proximity of poppy.

⁂

virgil looks up as the bell rings and immediately steps out from behind the counter.

brick is struggling cheerfully with a stack of tupperware in their arms, and virgil takes the top few so that brick can see.

“i got it,” brick complains.

“i don’t want you tripping over chairs, i’m sure you can handle the weight,” virgil says. “i was thinking you could set up over at this table here—right by the door, but out-of-the-way enough so that you don’t have to deal with anyone bumping into you. that cool?”

“yeah, that’s cool,” brick says. “thanks, virgil!” and immediately sets down the tupperware on the table in question. virgil follows suit, setting down his own load, and arches his eyebrows, impressed.

“you guys could put fran and lucy out of business with all these baked goods,” he says.

because that’s what brick is here for—the first shift of kids manning a table for a bake sale, to raise funds to make sure the sideshire kids can afford their slots in the debutante ball. 

brick stares at him for a few seconds.

“sarcasm,” he elaborates, because brick doesn’t really pick up on that too well, most of the time.

“got it,” brick says. “um, i’m gonna go help ellie—they brought a few other things, so save up that comment for them, i’m sure they’d get it.”

“need any help?” he says, knowing full well that brick will say—

“nah, i got it!” brick says, and darts out of the diner again. virgil waits by the door, just in case they need someone to open it for them—which they do, brick with another load of tupperware, and elliott with a poster tucked under their arm, a register in hand, and a plastic jar under their other arm.

“hi, elliott,” virgil says.

“hi, virgil,” elliott says.

“right over here,” virgil says, gesturing to the table, “do you need any help?”

“um, do you have tape?” elliott asks, frowning. “i just realized i don’t have any.”

“tape, got it,” virgil says, and ducks into the back to see if he’s got any in his office.

by the time he’s come back out, brick and elliott are already seated behind the table, arranging the last of the opened tupperware, with the plastic jar having a sign taped over it saying DONATIONS FOR THE BALL, and virgil pauses to dig a ten out of his pocket, dropping it in the jar before he hands over the scotch tape.

“thanks, virgil!” brick cheers, as elliott quietly thanks virgil for the tape and goes about taping the poster to the front of the table. it’s definitely homemade—there’s glitter, and marker, and there’s a little flyer taped beside it that explains what exactly they’re trying to do at the debutante ball.

“you want drinks?” virgil asks, tucking his thumbs into his front pockets. “on the house.”

“ooh, cocoa, please!” brick says. “the—the minty one. do you still do the minty one?”

“i still do the minty one,” virgil says. “peppermint should be a year-round flavor. ellie, you want anything?”

“cocoa/coffee,” elliott says.

“that stunts your growth,” brick points out.

“i’m taller than you,” elliott tells brick, who bristles and immediately opens their mouth, and virgil ducks out to get their drinks.

by the time he brings back the two steaming mugs, brick is finishing off their tirade with “—i’ll end up built like korra, and then you will see.”

“drinks!” virgil says, and sets the mugs down in front of them. “uh, just so you know, we hit one of those weird lulls, so we’ve probably got half an hour or so before things start picking up for dinner rush.”

both of them make noises of acknowledgement.

“so,” virgil says, settling in a chair near them. “elliott, i know you were thinking about what you were gonna wear slash do, did you decide that?”

“i, um,” elliott says, fingers tracing the rim of the mug. “i thought i’d wear, like, a half-dress half-tux thing. i dunno if i’m gonna debut or escort yet, though, that kinda depends.”

“that sounds cool,” virgil says encouragingly. “do you have a picture?”

elliott does, but since it’s only partly designed—their sister liked messing around with fabrics like that—it turns out all the sideshire kids who are planning on going to the ball are in a groupchat, so after elliott’s phone pings with a message from there, there’s a brief tangent that ensues because elliott sends out virgil says hi to everyone and a picture of the bake sale, so virgil gets to hear about everyone’s plans which is also cool. and he also records a video with brick that brick pinky-promises to just send in the chat, so he ends up learning one of the latest memes that the kids are watching these days. god, he’s old.

“the debutante thing’s really awesome,” virgil says. “i kind of wish i’d gotten the chance to do it back in the day.”

elliott looks up at him, and says, “you do?”

“yeah,” virgil says. “i mean, i’m not roman or anything, but i still wear makeup a lot of the time, i’ve got a few makeup palettes, i wore some skirts back in the day—”

brick’s head snaps up at that, and they say, “you did?”

virgil blinks—he’s not sure why this is surprising, but.

“yeah, i did,” virgil says. “i bet i’ve probably still got them buried in my closet somewhere. my heels, too.”

this also gets elliott’s attention.

“you do?” elliott says.

“i mean, maybe,” virgil says. “i might have donated them, i dunno, but—”

“why don’t you wear skirts or heels anymore?” brick says.

“well, right now?” virgil says, and gestures to the outside. “it’s cold. but, uh—i don’t really know.” 

and it hits him—he doesn’t really know. he just kind of kept going for jeans.

“just a habit, i guess,” he continues to the kids, because i don’t know is a bit of a weak answer. “it’s easier to match things with jeans. plus, it looks kinda weird to wear a nice flowing skirt and then just, like, a hoodie and a pair of sneakers i wear all day because i stand all the time. and wearing heels while i stand all day is just asking for a sprained ankle.”

“yeah, that makes sense,” elliott says. “sneakers kinda clash too.”

“but you wear boots too,” brick says, and points. “you’re wearing boots today.”

virgil glances down at his combat boots, the ones that he’s also got the gel foot insoles in. “well, yeah. i guess i am.”

“and leggings or tights would probably help with cold,” elliott says.

virgil looks between them, and says, “you two want me to wear a skirt, don’t you?”

“yes,” they both chorus, unapologetic.

virgil pauses, considering this. well. he definitely has at least one skirt, maybe more, they’re probably just tucked away where he doesn’t see them everyday. and he is fully down for these kids running in there and shaking up the patriarchy. and he does support men, or anyone on the gender spectrum who doesn’t fit soundly in the box of “woman,” wearing more traditionally feminine clothing, as long as they’re comfortable with it. and the surprised looks on these kids faces when he’d mentioned he used to wear skirts more often, and then the studies he’s read of how much representation means to kids...

he turns and calls out, “jean?”

“yeah?” jean calls from the back.

“i’m gonna run upstairs for a second, would you mind keeping an eye on things out here?”

jean calls back an affirmative, and brick and elliott exchange a look, before turning back to virgil.

“are you—?”

“maybe,” virgil says, standing, feeling a strange sort of excitement just from their excitement, but also, it’s been a really long time since he’s worn a skirt, and he’d liked wearing skirts. “again, i can’t remember if i’ve donated ‘em, but—”

“awesome,” elliott says, while brick is nodding along with them, wide-eyed.

“all right,” virgil says, and then, “uh, cool” and makes his awkward exit, heading upstairs for his apartment.

it takes a bit of digging, but he does manage to find where he’s stashed his skirts over the years. he’d even managed to fold them neatly before he put them away, so they’re not even that wrinkled or anything. and then he remembers the various struggles of matching an outfit with a skirt, because in his mind, a skirt outfit has to be at least a little fancy, and so after he examines and discards nearly every shirt in his wardrobe he ends up pairing a plum, long-sleeved button-down with a black pleated skirt that falls down to his ankles, even after he tries to make the skirt a bit high-waisted.

and then he gets a little more carried away, and smokes out his dark eyeshadow and pops some purple glitter in the crease and the inner corner and does a little cat-eye for the eyeliner and puts on plum lipstick, before something in his brain says back away from the makeup products, you are in danger of re-enacting your teenage emo phase, and so he does, not without a bit of a longing look at the black eyeshadow, because this is fun. why hasn’t he done something like this in so long?

he has to pick up his skirt one hand as he walks his way down the stairs, before he tugs aside the curtain that covers up the stairs that lead up to his apartment, and steps out from behind the counter.

brick and elliott swivel to look at him in almost-hilarious unison. and then they just. stare.

oh, the staring. the whole staring thing is why he hasn’t done something like this in so long.

virgil clears his throat, running a hand through his hair to make sure it isn’t too messy. “is it that bad?” he tries to joke.

“i,” brick says, voice strangled, “am gay.”

“uh,” virgil says, unsure of what to really say to someone less than half his age declaring that, then, “i’m with patton, happily so, and also, i am way too old for you, you are a kid.”

elliott rolls their eyes, and says, “they mean you look, um. good. you look really good,” and then they elbow brick in the ribs. brick shakes themself.

“yeah!” brick says. “you look. good. you look good!”

the bell above the door jangles, then, which means brick and elliott are distracted by attempting to sell baked goods, and virgil escapes to behind the counter, ready to start up for the dinner rush.

(he does take a few seconds to remind brick and elliott that anyone over eighteen is too old for them, at the moment, and the dangers of grooming, and also he is here if they need to talk about being concerned for anyone or if they need someone to talk to, in general, before brick says, “ugh, fine, jeez, you sound like the guidance counselor” so that takes care of that particular situation, virgil guesses.)

virgil does get a few compliments on his appearance, throughout the dinner rush, and also a few questions about why he’s dressing up nice, which means he can direct their attention to the baked goods table (brick and elliott leave after a couple hours, and so a couple more sideshire high students start their shift) and the cause that they’re raising money for, so. things are going well.

he ducks back in the kitchen, for a minute, when the staring gets to be a bit Much and he needs to take a second to breathe. he’s not super anxious, necessarily, it’s just—well, he frequently has the thought people are looking at me, which tends to make him anxious, and that’s true tonight, so. he needs to take a bit of a breather. and so he cooks.

cooking’s been a good outlet for his anxiety, ever since he was a kid and didn’t really get what anxiety was, ever since he was an asshole teenager who had recently been wrangled into his first therapy session by his parents following a doctor’s diagnosis. it’s almost always the same—if you follow the same directions, you’ll get the same result, almost always. and, sure, it could be an outlet for creativity, too, if he so chose, but right now he’s grilling burgers and assembling salads and making pasta. it’s an adventure in multitasking he does almost every day. he knows what to do, and so he does it.

he feels calmer by the time they’re in the midst of the dinner rush, partially because of the time spent in here, but also because the increased business is something that’s also familiar and somewhat comforting. so he chances poking his head out of the kitchen door, evaluating if he’s ready to enter back into the fray and start helping out with the waiters. 

he pokes his head out just in time to see roman, logan, and patton sliding into a booth, and he breathes a soft sigh of relief—those are people he can definitely go over to and not start to feel nervous just because they’re looking at him.

he’s about to fully step out and make his way over unnoticed by everyone else, except—

roman looks up, and makes eye contact with him, and declares “virgil! i came as soon as i heard!” loud enough that virgil can hear it over the background music and the dull roar of the dinner rush conversations.

virgil winces a little, before he sheepishly walks over to the table. he probably should have expected this, given roman’s vocal and often repeated desires to give virgil a makeover.

all three of them come into view—roman, eager at last that virgil is stepping outside of his typical fashion comfort zone; logan, mostly neutral if a bit curious; and patton, who is staring at him, eyes wide behind his glasses, and visibly swallowing. a flare of heat burns to life in virgil’s stomach at that, and so he turns his attention to roman, so that he doesn’t start blushing and his thoughts don’t become immediately obvious.

roman looks him up and down, surveying him, before he says, “you look like a goth femboy version of a librarian fantasy.”

virgil runs a hand down the skirt, a little self-conscious. “oh.”

“but,” roman says, pulling a face at him, seemingly detecting virgil’s mood change, “at least you’re showing some sense of style. this is an improvement over your daily wear, believe me. one would even say substantial.”

“oh,” virgil says, more sarcastic this time, with an eye-roll to boot. 

“however,” roman says, “can i request that you at least extend your color palette to something that would not look at home as a poster for an emo pre-teen? and your foundation, virgil, you do not have warm undertones, you have neutral undertones, if you’re going to start wearing makeup more you need to have a summer and winter foundation—”

virgil reaches over to flick roman’s ear, and roman complains “heyyy” before logan glances up at him.

“why wear a skirt today in particular?” logan says.

“oh,” virgil says, and jabs a thumb in the direction of the bake sale table. “y’know, i figured i’d support you kids. people ask me why i’m all dressed up and so i get to point ‘em there, and then, you know, solidarity,” he says, taking his skirt in hand and swishing it a little. “win win.”

“all right,” logan says and looks across the table at roman, cocking his head.

“roman,” he says. “what is a ‘femboy.’”

roman folds his lip under his teeth.

“um,” roman says. “well, y’see—”

“i’ll get you some waters!” virgil says, before he has to bear witness to roman explaining that concept to his boyfriend and his boyfriend’s dad. he knows that a femboy is just people who are male or non-binary presenting themselves in a feminine way, the word kind of started around his teenage years, but he also knows that particular expression on roman’s face means that virgil has probably missed some segment of Youth Internet Culture that might provide the backstory behind the newfound popularity of the word a bit… complex.

by the time virgil comes back, logan is jotting something down on one of the notecards he carries around with him all the time, and roman looks normal, so the conversation must not have been too awkward, but patton—

well. patton looks at him, once again looks like he’s swallowing his own tongue, and turns his face back down to the table, but not before virgil can spot the pinkness in his cheeks.

oh. interesting.

virgil has to swallow himself, before he readies the notepad.

“what do you want for dinner?” he says, in a tone that is perhaps a bit gruffer than normal, and patton immediately and not-very-subtly puts a hand over the back of his neck to hide that that’s going pink too.

very interesting.

virgil doesn’t get much of a chance to observe this interesting phenomenon—it is dinner rush, after all, and he’s got other customers—but when he does observe it, it brightens that low flame in his stomach, like someone slowly turning the knob on a gas stove, and patton grows gradually more bold. 

looking at patton’s general personality, one would probably assume that he’s a generally shy boyfriend—hand-holding and kisses aplenty, to be sure, but fairly unassuming when it comes to public displays of attention.

looking at patton’s general personality, one would probably not assume that patton is a flirt.

but he is—he is absolutely a flirt, and a startlingly adept one at that, so when virgil swings by the table perhaps a bit more frequently than he usually would, patton stares at him with a little smirk on his face and with zero shame as his eyes roam over virgil’s face, his arms, his mouth. 

patton looks up at him from under his eyelashes, biting his lip just so, and virgil nearly drops patton’s plate—and notices, distractedly, that patton has managed to use virgil’s distraction to finesse his way into a helping of fries instead of the vegetables or salad that virgil would usually suggest.

and when virgil brings over the bill, handing it to patton, patton takes the bill and then takes virgil’s hand and kisses his knuckles with a cheerful “thanks, honey!” and virgil has certainly forgotten any anxiety that might stem from someone staring, because it’s patton who’s staring at him.

patton, who had gotten so flustered at the sight of virgil in a skirt that his eyes nearly popped out of his head; and now, patton, resting his lips against his knuckles for just a moment, lingering, and virgil feels like an elizabethan maiden about to make her way to the fainting couch because of it.

virgil excuses himself to settle the bill, and also maybe rest a cool hand against his own cheek. honestly. it was a kiss on his hand.

he’s about to go back the table and hand back patton’s card, but he glances up as the bell jangles, roman and logan already leaving, and patton stepping close to the register, his hands behind his back, rocking up onto his toes and back onto his heels.

“hey,” virgil says, and shakes himself, before he offers patton’s card. “um. here.”

“thanks,” patton says, tucking the card into his pocket, before he bites his lip. “um. could we go up to your apartment and get the book i asked to borrow?”

what book, virgil wonders, before patton hastily adds, “if you have time, i mean, i don’t wanna—take you away too long,” and oh, he wants to go—okay. okay.

“i have time,” virgil answers, maybe a little too quickly. “um—sarah,” he calls, “me ‘n patton are going upstairs for a little bit, so—”

“we’ve got things down here,” sarah says, “go, go” and so they go, patton reaching out to grab virgil’s hand and squeeze, running a thumb over his knuckles. and so they ascend the stairs.

virgil shuts the door behind them, and turns to face patton.

“i was, um,” patton clarifies. “i was asking to come up here to see if you wanted to kiss for a little bit.”

“i know,” virgil says, then adds, because consent is important, “i do.”

“oh thank god,” patton breathes out, and before virgil can get out a response, patton surges up against him, rocking up onto his tiptoes and pressing virgil back into the wall, and virgil barely has the time to wrap his arms around him before patton’s kissing him with searing heat.

patton is a remarkable kisser, genuinely the best that virgil thinks he’s ever been fortunate enough to kiss, and patton knows the precise angle to tilt his head and the precise way to possessively splay a hand at the back of virgil’s neck to make the kiss deep and heady and excellent, a kiss so downright lascivious that virgil’s thoughts about retiring to a damn fainting couch doesn’t seem near dramatic enough.

virgil is distantly aware that patton must be rocked up onto his tiptoes, and he splays his hand at patton’s waist, squeezing him gently, giving himself the excuse that it might help patton keep his balance a bit better, and also because his hand fits so beautifully at patton’s waist it could make virgil cry, the warmth of him even through his sweater and the way he can feel patton breathing in unsteady breaths, so maybe virgil isn’t the only one who is losing it here a little.

simultaneously, like they’ve choreographed it, they stumble back together until patton’s knees hit the arm of the couch and virgil practically falls on top of him, virgil barely breaking the kiss to make sure he hasn’t crushed him before patton’s twining his fingers into virgil’s hair and dragging him back into the kiss, wriggling a little so that his thigh is pushed between virgil’s, and virgil groans into his mouth, patton greedily swallowing the sound.

time goes a bit fuzzy, then, everything narrowed down to patton’s breathy gasps and the slick slide of his lips and the warmth and pressure of a thigh between his own and patton’s wandering, unabashed hands in his hair, on his back, wandering down to give him a cheeky squeeze, gripping at his thigh, like patton’s using the touches to punctuate a sentence that virgil has no hope of reading but it sure sounds nice anyway. 

and then there’s a loud sound—someone’s dropped dishes downstairs—and they break apart, the pair of them looking toward the apartment door, startled, and as soon as it sinks in what it is that’s happened, they look back at each other.

patton’s smiling up at him, plum lipstick smeared all around his mouth, coy and unashamed, but with a little quirk at the corners that tells him that make out time is probably over. it is an image that immediately sears itself into virgil’s brain that will probably pop up at incredibly inconvenient moments, but he cannot really feel bothered about that right now, because christ is that unexpectedly hot.

virgil clears his throat, because there’s never exactly a non-awkward way to end something like this, that is until patton’s brow creases and he reaches forward to touch virgil’s lips.

“oh, no,” patton says, a little distressed, “i messed it up!”

“i can redo it,” virgil promises immediately, barely even thinking of the words before they’re out of his mouth in attempt to make that coy little smile come back, and he clears his throat to try and make his voice go back up to its usual octave, not the gruff and low near-growl that came out of his mouth. “um—you kind of have—”

patton’s brow creases even more, before he wiggles a hand free from under virgil and smears a finger beneath his bottom lip, holding it up to see for himself, and he giggles.

“i guess i do,” he says, and beams up at virgil. “be a dear, would you? i don’t wanna walk out there and make it too obvious that we’ve been mackin’ on each other this whole time.”

virgil nods, and, regretfully, rolls off of patton to go to the bathroom, attempting to steady his breath the whole way. 

he bends to get the makeup remover from under the sink, and straightens, at last looking at himself in the mirror.

he looks thoroughly kissed.

his plum lipstick is smeared all around his mouth, down his chin, which shows off how his lips have reddened and gone a little swollen; his black hair is ruffled, especially sticking up in the back; and the generally gobsmacked, slightly stupid look on his face is a dead giveaway that he’s been spending time kissing patton.

there’s the soft padding of footsteps, arms wrapped around his waist, a face pressed between his shoulderblades, before patton pokes his head around him to see himself in the mirror, too.

he bursts into more giggles at the sight of them—matching messy lipstick, matching messy hair, matching slightly stunned look, except on patton it doesn’t look stupid at all, it looks like he’s thrilled with himself, a smirk playing around the corner of his mouths, like a particularly flirtatious cat who’s caught particularly prettily painted canary.

virgil can’t help but grin, too, and patton arches up to press a deliberate kiss to tendon of virgil’s neck, and virgil’s grin turns into a groan, more out of frustration than anything.

“what?” patton says, smiling playfully at him in the mirror. 

“if you keep doing that,” virgil says, and then he’s at a loss for words, but patton seems to get it, slipping out from behind virgil but still leaving an arm wrapped around his waist.

“i don’t particularly want to stop, either,” patton agrees, before he reaches up to turn virgil’s attention away from the mirror, and so that he’s looking directly into patton’s eyes instead. patton continues, voice lush and full of promise, “i’d keep you up here all night, if you wanted, but, well.” 

“we’re taking it slow,” virgil says ruefully.

“we’re taking it slow,” patton agrees. “plus, you’ve got a diner to close, and i’ve got a kid at home who’ll probably stay up too late reading if i don’t bug him about bedtime.”

“yeah,” virgil says, but he can’t help but sigh a little—they’ve both agreed that moving slowly is the responsible thing to do, they’ve talked about it a lot, first to agree to slow then later to refine their mutual definitions of slow, which turned out to be pretty damn different at first, but. well. 

“i know,” patton agrees fervently. and he really does—he’s literally the only other person right know who understands exactly how virgil’s feeling, and that sets him at ease more than anything.

“all right,” virgil says, and peels back the top of the makeup removal wipes package, removing one. “lemme see your face.”

patton obligingly tips up his chin at virgil, smiling.

virgil cups the underside of his jaw and works to clean off patton’s face, gently rubbing away the plum smears around patton’s mouth with a purposefully soft hand. 

it takes a few wipes for virgil’s lips to twitch up into a smile, too.

“stop it,” virgil scolds, without any heat.

“stop what?” patton says, still smiling.

“you’re smiling at me,” virgil says. 

“what, i can’t be a little happy that i spent some quality time with my fella?” patton asks. 

virgil ducks his head, because that’s one of his top two love languages, and patton knows it. instead, he says, “‘course you can, i am, too. but you’re gloating.”

patton’s grin widens, and virgil sighs, lowering his hand—he won’t be able to help patton at all with patton grinning up at him like that.

“i have,” patton says, “the prettiest fella. i’m allowed to feel at least a little smug that you’re the belle of the ball tonight, darling.”

“stop,” virgil grumbles, looking away.

“what?” patton says. “it’s true! you’re gorgeous, honey.”

virgil mutters under his breath and rubs at the back of his neck—he isn’t the best with accepting compliments, he never has been, especially when it comes to things like this.

but, well—

“so,” virgil says, staring at the makeup wipe in his hand. “you… liked it?”

“liked it?” patton says.

“y’know,” virgil mumbles, and gestures vaguely up and down his body—the skirt, the makeup. “it.”

patton grins up at him, and tugs him down a little so that they’re eye-to-eye.

“i,” patton purrs, “love the skirt.”

it takes a little bit longer to get polished back up after that. and if, perhaps, virgil walks around the diner a bit more at ease than before, with a bit of a stupid smile on his face even after patton blows him a kiss on his way out of the door, well. that’s virgil’s business.

⁂

christopher calls when logan’s studying at the diner. his dad’s already headed home, most of his dinner conversation having been rhapsodizing his deeply-held desire to put on his pajamas. virgil’s busy behind the counter settling everyone’s bills now that the bulk of dinner rush is over.

it’s still unusual enough to logan that christopher brings himself to call semi-regularly now—even stranger that it’s weekly, and on a set schedule. wednesday nights at seven. he even remembers to call precisely on schedule, most of the time. but still—every time his cellphone buzzes and lights up with a photo of him and christopher and dad at a sanders-hosted thanksgiving a few years back, he’s surprised.

it takes quite a bit of work to unlearn sixteen years that consisted mostly of irregular, unscheduled visits and not showing up when the visits are actually scheduled, logan supposes.

“hey, kiddo!” christopher says brightly.

“hi, dad,” logan says, digging around for a bookmark, before giving up and placing a clean knife in his science textbook to mark the page and closing it. 

a moment later, logan curses his mental preoccupation with studying and the upcoming phone conversation he’ll have to have—the napkins are right there.

“so, what’re you up to?”

“studying.”

“you’re always studying,” christopher says, and there’s something in the tone that sets logan’s teeth on edge; he knows that christopher isn’t exactly academically inclined, and in fact would likely be better described as an academic anarchist, seeming to disdain upon the opportunities and privileges he was given with no strings attached that logan would almost certainly kill to have, not to mention many other people who would put it to better use, but. it’s not the time to pick a fight, logan supposes.

“yes, well,” logan says. “i have science test this week.”

“you’ve always got tests.”

“chilton is an academically rigorous school,” logan says, in a tone that implies he’s explained this a hundred times, because he has. “and i would like to maintain my position as a competitor for the top of my class. how are… things?”

this allows him a brief reprieve—since the official collapse of christopher’s business, not too long after he’d visited last fall, he’s been picking up a variety of odd jobs and temporary work, whatever catches his interest—christopher spends about five minutes explaining that he’s found some temporary work at a bar, now, to make some spare cash as he looks for something more permanent during the day. 

“—but yeah, that’s about all that’s going on with me right now.” a pause. then, christopher prompts, “how about you?”

logan shrugs, even though christopher can’t see it. “not very much. the test. i think i did well on a pop quiz on monday—”

he explains his various schoolwork and extracurricular activities—christopher hums in all sorts of places—before he adds, “oh, and roman and i went on a date on saturday.”

“hey, finally, something fun!” christopher says. before logan can even say something like but the debate team’s mock trial was fun, he says, “what’d you do on your date?”

“we had frozen yogurt,” logan says, “and roman wanted to go to a thrift store to get some things, and we both got a couple books, and roman got something for the ball, so that’s good—”

“whoa,” christopher says, “hang on, rewind. the ball?! what ball?”

logan winces.

because, well. it’s complex to navigate building a relationship that he initially blackmailed his father into, rather than have him propose to his dad. it’s even more complex to figure out how to handle a dad who had, for sixteen years, mostly showed up in irregular, unscheduled visits and not showing up when the visits are actually scheduled. 

he has a dad. for the vast majority of his life, patton has been the only biologically-related adult on whom he could rely. if there was ever anything a parent needed to be involved in, whether it be a parent/teacher conference, or parent’s night, or a parent volunteer for his classroom—he’s always penned down patton sanders without a second thought. virgil, occasionally, if he’d known that his dad had a scheduling conflict, but—always, patton first. that’s just the way it is. christopher had never even stepped foot in sideshire before last fall.

but now, well. now, he has to navigate should i have asked him to come back for this? because the rules say he needs his dad to escort him. 

and for so long, he has been so used to only having one of those. (well. two, but one biological dad. the other one kind of adopted him on sight and now he fusses after logan getting proper vegetable and protein intake.)

having both parents be involved in your life is even more unnecessarily complicated than i could have anticipated, logan thinks, before he pinches the bridge of his nose.

“um, yes. a ball. the daughters of the american revolution debutante ball, to be more specific.”

“you’re kidding,” christopher breathes out. “jeez, what kind of dirt does emily have on you that you had to recruit your boyfriend to escort some girls, too?”

logan blinks. “i have no idea why a handful of soil would motivate me to do that?”

“no, like—” christopher begins, and, perhaps, logan was overemphasizing his usual ignorance for use of slang just to give himself a break.

“well, that isn’t the case, regardless,” logan says, before he decides to just get it over with. “he was getting a dress. we both have one. we’re going to be the debutantes, not the escorts.”

there’s a pause.

“is this a gay thing?”

logan cringes, ever so slightly—christopher sounds more bemused than anything, so logan doesn’t think it’s a necessarily passive-aggressive comment, rather a more genuinely ignorant one.

“no, it’s not—” logan says, and pinches the bridge of his nose a little harder. “it’s not, um. a gay thing. we’re recruiting a lot of chilton students and sideshire kids to join in, it’s more of a public statement than anything.”

“oh,” christopher says, still with that tone of bemusement. then, “a public statement of what?”

“we’re making a statement about how sexist it is that society still deems it appropriate to trot young women around like that,” logan says. “we—the boys, i mean—are wearing dresses as a gesture of support and solidarity with them.”

“oh,” christopher repeats.

there’s an even longer pause.

“how many people did you say you got to join in?”

“we’re almost at forty, the last time i checked,” logan says, and christopher whistles lowly.

“your grandma’s gonna throw a fit.”

“we told her, actually,” logan says. “i wanted to see if she still had the dress she was going to make dad wear.”

“and how’d she take that?”

“she’s making me wear heels,” logan grouses, and christopher laughs.

“well, can’t say i expected her to be especially nice about anything,” christopher says. “so, tell me all about this massive prank you’re cooking up, then, i knew that some of my teenage troublemaking had to rub off on you somehow.”

though logan wants to say it’s not a prank, he supposes that it doesn’t exactly harm the movement if christopher thinks that; it’s not like he’s about to tell christopher the real reason, after all.

but logan tells him, all about the chilton kids, and the sideshire kids, and the upcoming Culture Day that his dad and isadora were organizing, and the bake sale that the sideshire kids were doing to raise money to actually enter into the ball in the first place, and the way logan’s had to hide sign-up sheets from teachers, and it seems to go okay. 

that is, until christopher says, “hey, i guess if you’re going as a debutante, you need your dad to escort you, right?”

“oh,” logan says, and coughs. “um, actually, dad’s already doing that.”

there’s another long pause.

“oh.”

“i mean,” logan says, and shrugs, even though christopher can’t see it. “you’re saving up for other things, you hardly need to come out from california just to do this.” 

“i would’ve,” christopher says, defensively. “if you’d asked.”

“right,” logan says, and the sarcasm slips through before he can even really attempt to modulate it into something resembling politeness.

“i would’ve,” he repeats, more insistently. “i know i haven’t been the best—”

“look, i have to get back to studying,” logan says, cutting off whatever platitude about i know i wasn’t present for you throughout your childhood, when you most would have needed the stability of your other parent, but i am trying now after you had to blackmail me into not upsetting your life, “next week, we’ll talk?”

another pause. a defeated sigh.

“sure, kid,” he says. “yeah. i’ll talk to you next week. same time. love you.”

logan flounders, for a moment, before he says, “next week, then, bye,” and hangs up before christopher can return the farewell salutation.

logan takes a moment to lift his glasses so he can press the base of his palms into his eyes, before he resettles them on his nose and opens his science textbook again.

the conversations with christopher are… something. they tend to go cordially most of the time, even, it’s just—

well. like he’d thought earlier. he’s so used to having one parent, and christopher only ever making contact irregularly. no guarantee for birthdays, no guarantee for christmases, no guarantee for thanksgivings. no guarantee for if logan really wanted to lean on someone, if he’d be there, solid and steady, or if logan would be sent sprawling to the ground. metaphorically.

it’s a bit like that cartoon that logan recalls, as a child—lucy, holding the football, insisting that she wouldn’t yank it away at the last second, leaving charlie brown tumbling head-over-heels.

christopher has insisted that he wouldn’t yank the ball quite literally since logan was born. forgive logan if sixteen years of ending up flat on his back hadn’t exactly endeared him to exactly trust that christopher would hold the ball steady, even if christopher had ended up being much more punctual and consistent with phone calls than expected.

it’s just—difficult. to adjust. to really believe that christopher might stick around, this time.

he suddenly feels his (already immense) sense of respect for patton rise all the more, because he trusts people like this all the time, no matter how many times he’d ended up flat on his face; logan’s thought it naivete for so long, that now that he’s attempting to practice it, he finds himself… well, if he’s to continue the metaphor, he’s found himself unwilling to even attempt the run-up to the ball.

logan attempts to shake himself, as if the thought is something that he can dislodge, like water in his ears. he refocuses on his textbook and readies his pen for any notes that he needs to take. which he does, for a while, his pen scratching a familiar rhythm under the quiet rush of other people’s conversation, and the soft, inoffensive music the diner plays, that is, until the plastic of the pen cracks under the force of his grip. logan scowls, and tosses the pen aside.

“here.”

logan looks up, startled; virgil’s standing over him, holding a small plate. he’s wearing another skirt today—purple, and it falls just below his tights-clad knees.

“what’s that?”

virgil sets down the plate, careful to avoid any notebooks, pens, or textbooks. there’s a slice of loganberry pie on it, which is actually logan’s favorite, despite the downside of the many puns his dad has made about logan liking loganberry pie.

“you look like you need pie.”

“i do?” logan says cluelessly.

“pen tossing usually signals the need for pie,” he says.

“you,” logan says. “brought me pie.”

virgil arches his eyebrows. “i could take it back.”

“thank you,” logan says quickly, sliding the plate toward himself, as if virgil would snatch it away, and virgil snorts, reaching out to ruffle logan’s hair before he retreats back to the counter, and—

and it really is just the sugar that has logan’s shoulders relaxing as he stares at his science notes, he tells himself.

⁂

the science test is predictably grueling. logan sits at his lunch table, his brain still tracking over various formulas and small facts he’d memorized, as if in a half-stunned stupor.

there’s the sound of a tray clacking on the table. logan looks up, startled.

dee, in his usual cape and hat, looks over at him, and arches his eyebrows as if daring him to say something. after logan blinks at him owlishly, dee resumes settling himself, as if he has sat at logan’s lunch table a great many times and not at all as if this isn’t the first time he’s done this.

come to think of it, logan’s uncertain if he’s ever even seen dee during their lunch period before. he sets aside the question of then where does he eat??? and instead reaches into his lunchbox, grabbing something at random to start eating.

a clementine. okay.

logan starts peeling the clementine as dee gets his lunch tray in order, and dee says, very casually, “would you like to come over so we can discuss arrangements?”

logan’s fingernail catches; he resists the urge to curse as he punctures the fruit, and instead reaches for a napkin to wipe his hand dry of juice.

“arrangements…?”

dee looks at him. “for the project.”

logan’s test-addled brain then proceeds to panic and mentally trace over every single one of his shared classes with dee, attempting to pinpoint how on earth he possibly could have overlooked an upcoming project, before—

oh.

“i—yes,” logan says, and resumes peeling the clementine. “yes, that works out fine, i think. um—do you live near a bus stop?”

dee flaps a gloved hand at him dismissively. “i’ll have one of the drivers take you back home.”

one of the drivers??? then, he has even one driver???? what on earth necessitates plural drivers???

“i… sure,” logan says, rather than comment on that, “i’ll text my dad and tell him i’ll be home late.”

dee nods, and so logan eats his clementine in sections as dee’s lunch tray depletes with a rate of speed that would already be impressive if not compounded by the fact that logan doesn’t even really see him eat, before he pulls out his phone and texts his dad, I’m going over to Dee’s after school, I’ll let you know how long I’ll be there when I have a better idea of the time frame.

he’s walking to his next class when his phone buzzes, and he glances at his phone. 

Dad: okay!!! say hi to the adults and be on your best behavior! love you, have fun!!!

he is uncertain how much ‘fun’ will weigh into the activities for any event at dee slange’s house.

⁂

dee’s pretending to be on his phone almost the entire time a chauffeur drives them back (he could have driven, but he hadn’t felt like it this morning, so therefore he didn’t have his car in the afternoon) but really he’s looking out of the corner of his eyes at logan.

logan is sitting stiffly, and he has been since he’d gotten into the car; it’s as if he’s nervous he might scuff up the leather if he moves. he’s holding his backpack in his lap, and his eyes keep darting to the driver, suit-clad and silent, and out the window, before glancing at dee, and then back out the window. 

as they creep up to the gate, and the chauffeur inputs the code that’ll open the gate so they can drive up the maple-lined driveway, to the house, dee has abandoned the ruse entirely, because logan looks the most confused dee’s ever seen him look.

the look only grows more obvious once they break past the trees, and logan actually gets a good look at the house; dee knows the townhome was designed to be magnificent, especially on first glance, but he’s been so accustomed to it that seeing logan’s eyes dart from the fountain in the middle of the driveway to the sprawl of primroses and lavender and hydrangeas and all the rest of the landscaping, and the towering height of it all, the brick crowded with overgrown ivy and climbing roses. the historic townhome may not have multiple wings, and it might not really hold a candle to the ultra-modern mansion where his parents live, but it still, certainly, is impressive.

“you live here?” logan says, stunned.

“obviously?” dee says.

he’s tempted to say something like if you ever saw my parents’ house, maybe pull up that old e-edition of a magazine that had covered it once, just to see logan’s eyes pop out of his head, but the chauffeur puts the car in park and logan’s saying “thank you, sir,” and scrambling out of the car as quick as he can.

dee arches a brow, and the chauffeur moves to open the door for him, because he was raised with manners, jesus, wasn’t this emily and richard sanders’ grandson? one would think he’d know something about how to comport himself.

his brain provides several mental images, though: the little yellow clapboard house logan lived in, the absurdly picturesque tiny town full of brick buildings and repurposed barns and colonial charm, logan’s voice saying, my dad and i were effectively homeless until i turned six, and feels a strange clenching in his chest. 

dee shoves it down and arranges his face into his typical boredom by the time he’s walking up to the front door, logan quickly falling into step behind him.

he opens the door—the chauffeur’s going around to the servant’s entrance—and by the time he’s stepping through the door, nanny has materialized at his side, and looks only slightly surprised that there is another teenage boy with him.

logan is too busy looking around at the entry hall—the rugs, the paintings, the furniture, the post-its stuck up on the front door—to really notice any of that, for which dee can’t help but breathe a little sigh of relief.

“hello, we have a guest,” nanny says. 

“i told granmè,” dee says, and his stomach sinks as nanny gives him a sideways look, as if to say you know better than to let that serve as a notification system anymore, before she refocuses on logan.

“your name, young sir?”

“um, logan,” he says, looking boggled that he’s being called sir, and adds, “sanders. logan sanders.”

“emily and richard’s boy?”

“their grandson, yes,” logan says, looking to dee for some kind of help; dee would shrug at him, if he wasn’t kind of enjoying watching the usually unflappable logan flounder a little bit.

nanny nods, and says, “welcome to the lavandelands,” which is technically the townhome’s name, but they only ever use it to introduce the house to new visitors, so dee forgets the townhome has a name at all until it comes up again—it’s the same with the manor, which is technically the hearthfields. logan doesn’t seem to notice, nodding at her like he can’t think of anything else to do.

nanny turns to dee, instead, and asks, “would you care for any refreshments?”

“just the usual tea should suffice,” dee says. nanny looks at logan.

“um,” he says again—dee is a little delighted, because he has never heard logan get so knocked off-center before, and after all this attempted antagonizing about his grades all it took was bringing him to his house—“just—just water’s fine. thank you.”

nanny nods, says, “i’ll be with your grandmother in the greenhouse. mr. sanders, it was a pleasure to meet you, please have mr. slange ring for us if you require anything,” and sweeps off.

“you have a greenhouse?” logan says blankly.

“we have a greenhouse,” dee confirms. “you can see it later, if you’d like. shall we go study?”

logan nods, and falls into step behind dee; dee considers going to the dining room, the way logan did when they were making posters at his house, but he wants nanny, bertie, ingrid, and martha to have plausible deniability in case his parents demand to know if they’d heard anything about this, and so he leads logan up the staircase and into his room.

it’s been cleaned today recently, he can tell; it smells like the lemon candles he likes, the ones martha lights whenever she airs out his room, so the room is in its tidiest iteration; vacuumed rugs, swept and mopped hardwoods, dust-free surfaces, with a made bed and no mess anywhere anywhere.

it practically seems like a hotel room, if not for the legal pad on his desk with his handwriting on it.

and of course, logan crosses almost immediately to the desk; dee only catches on a minute later, when he bends slightly to get a better look inside the vivarium.

“luke, leia, and han, right?” logan says, glancing at dee for confirmation before scanning the plants and rocks; dee crosses over, too, and gestures toward the rock in the back corner—mostly hidden by plants, but the sun lamp shines directly upon it.

“they like to nap here,” dee says, and he’s right—luke and han are curled up, sunning themselves, and logan makes an ahh noise when he spots them too.

“they’re larger than i expected,” logan says, staring at them, eyes lit up with curiosity.

“mm,” dee says vaguely. “females tend to be longer and bulkier than males. leia’s biggest, she’s a little over two feet.”

“where is she?” logan says. “you said she was the checkered one.”

dee tries his hardest not to seem surprised, but—logan remembers his snake’s markings. from a a throwaway comment he made nearly a month ago. 

“probably hiding,” dee says. “she likes to stick near the water, so she’s probably curled up under the lip—”

logan kneels down, all the better to see, and he says, “i see her!”

“asleep?”

“i think so,” logan says, and frowns. “i’m not as familiar with snakes as i am with other reptiles, though.”

dee blinks. “which reptiles are you familiar with?”

“frogs, mostly,” logan admits. “lots of frogs and toads would be around the pool, when we lived at the inn, and they’re very common in the pond there. salamanders and lizards, sometimes, during summers. i had a brief phase of hunting for reptiles and bugs, i thought i would be a reptile research journalist, or something—i kept bringing them home and dad had to pretend he wasn’t scared of any creepy-crawly bugs or scaly things, he’d call over virgil so that there was someone i could show all the bugs to who wouldn’t get freaked out.”

dee has a mental image, then, of logan—shorter, and baby-faced, holding up a salamander and babbling to this mysterious virgil about its various properties, who would nod and ask questions and generally care what a child thought, his dad shoving down his fear long enough to listen to logan, because it’s something that interested him, something that logan cared about.

and then a memory of himself, hip-deep in snake research books, trying to tell his new adopted parents all about why snakes were so interesting and cool, and receiving three snakes for his first birthday state-side and overhearing maybe she’ll shut up about the stupid snakes now, his mother saying at least we won’t have to see them, they’ll be in her room, maybe she’ll stay there more and children should be seen and not heard as nanny and martha tidied up the wrapping paper from his birthday party—

he squashes the not-jealousy with extreme prejudice. 

“oh, and the occasional turtle,” logan adds, breaking dee’s train of thought. “not many snakes, though; not many of the inn’s employees were keen on letting the five-year-old try to find out if one was venomous or not, so i’d be stuck watching if they ever found one.”

“...right,” dee says, unsure of what to really say to that. also, he’s a bit busy listening to the purposefully-heavy footsteps coming down the hall.

“so i’ve never seen snakes up close like this,” logan finishes, and dee just. nods.

fortunately, a knock on the door breaks any lingering awkwardness; dee calls out “come in!” and nanny comes in with a tray of a typical afternoon tea.

“just leave that on the storage bench, thank you, nanny,” dee says briskly, and so nanny sets the tray of snacks on the bench at the base of dee’s bed, before she presents a water bottle to logan, and says, “there’s a chilled glass for you on the tray.”

“oh,” logan says, and takes it. “um. thank you.”

almost as if he’s unable to help it, his fingernails tap-tap-tap against the water bottle as he looks at the design, whatever sense of culture shock that might have faded after looking at the snakes rearing right back.

“thank you, nanny, that will do,” dee says, and nanny nods to him, before she departs and closes the door on the way out.

“this water bottle is made of glass,” logan says, as if it’s a question.

dee arches an eyebrow at him. “do you not like water served in glass? do you only like plastic containers for your water? shall i call for nanny to get you a plastic cup?”

“no,” logan says, “no, it’s just—” and he squints at the label, before he looks up at dee and says, “this bottle of water is from a glacier.”

“you can keep the bottle, if you like,” dee says, “we have plenty more.”

“the source is only accessible from the ocean.”

“yes, i heard you,” dee says. “it’s not like i would already know this, since i have lived in this house and had that water for years, but do go on.”

“our goal was to create the world’s first luxury premium glacier water product with unmatched quality—purity—elegance. created from an award-winning source, from the hat mountain glacier in beautiful british columbia, canada, we have captured the hearts of water connoisseurs worldwide,” logan reads from the label, and looks up at him. “dee.”

“i don’t understand what your issue is with the water,” dee says, even though he’s very aware that logan’s issue is primarily you even have fancy WATER?! but it’s fun to see how absolutely bemused he is over it. “if it’s good enough for water connoisseurs worldwide, it should certainly be good enough for you.”

logan hesitates, before he sits on the bench at the end of dee’s bed, and picks up the chilled glass. oh, nanny set out to impress, that’s one of the nice crystal glasses that granmè only ever really brings out for parties.

it also has the added benefit of logan’s eyes becoming even rounder behind his glasses, and looking between the water bottle and the glass, as if weighing if he’s blue-blooded enough to consume it, or if he’s so much of a commoner that taking a sip of it will cause him death, like the false grail in indiana jones.

evidently, the combined hayden-sanders genes must win out, because he carefully pours himself a glass, and then looks even more hopelessly confused when he turns his attention to the tea tray.

really, dee at the start of the school year would be clapping his hands in absolute glee at how much he’s managed to catch logan off-guard.

“are these cucumber sandwiches?” logan asks faintly.

“ooh, yes,” dee says, plucking one for himself and promptly shoving it into his mouth, fast, so that sanders won’t notice while his attention is captured by their snack. “plus pear and stilton, here, and ham-brie-apple, and pesto chicken, and those ones are prosciutto-fig, i think. of course there’s scones and clotted cream, battenburg, crumpets...”

“you,” logan says, looking hopelessly lost, “you just asked for tea?”

dee looks at him, amused, even as he’s pouring himself a cup of tea. “my grandfather was english, sanders. it’s afternoon tea.”

logan blinks, before he says, “i didn’t know that. that your grandfather’s english, i mean.”

“and my grandmother’s french,” dee says. “my particular branch of slanges relocated to the americas much later than your branch of sanders did.”

“you know that?” logan says, startled.

“of course,” dee says. “sanders’ came over on the mayflower, daughters of the american revolution, et cetera et cetera. our grandmothers have been friends for years, did you really think i wouldn’t know?”

he waits a beat, before he adds, “and, well. know your enemy.”

“i suppose you took that much more seriously than i did,” logan says at last, before he reaches for a safe option—a blueberry scone—and cracks it open, spreading it with jam.

“yes,” dee says pridefully, “yes, i did.”

logan rolls his eyes, even as he plops a generous helping of clotted cream on top—

“oh, cornish method, interesting,” dee says, just to see that confused look come rearing back, and is immediately satisfied—

before logan shakes himself, and says, “why did your grandparents relocate here, anyway?”

dee tries his very best not to brighten too obviously, it’s just—it’s been so long since someone so blatantly handed him an excuse to spin stories on a platter.

“well, that’s a very interesting story,” dee says, leaning back, “and really, it all starts with my great-grandfather. or, rather, my great-grandfather’s very distant cousins. you see, my family had a lordship—”

logan looks at him, surprised.

“—a very minor lordship,” dee says, “technically barons, not dukes or anything. you probably wouldn’t have heard of them, it’s not like they were major members of the house of lords or anything. anyway, my great-grandfather didn’t know that, because again, he was a very distant cousin, and the main line of the family had three daughters. no women could inherit.”

logan frowns. “sexist.”

“mm, quite,” dee says. “anyways, they were counting on a closer cousin to inherit—a second cousin, i believe—but he tragically died in a boating accident, and so the family came calling to my cousin—who was a solicitor at the time—and brought him to the estate, which was called,” dee quickly casts about for an alike-enough name, “...upton priory.”

and so dee goes on cribbing details from the first three seasons of downton abbey, changing names and having a merry old time. logan gets close to realizing—he says “that sounds rather familiar, actually,” when dee reiterates the whole plotline of his supposed great-grandfather’s valet getting arrested for supposedly murdering his wife, to which dee says, “it was quite a scandal, perhaps you’re remembering the details from your grandmother, goodness knows she’d find it fascinating,” which buys him even more time until he kills off his great-grandfather, the matthew stand-in, after the birth of their second child.

logan frowns, and says, “well, that’s rather sad, but—i thought you said your grandfather was eldest? why would he give up a lordship?”

“why else, sanders?” dee says, and gestures expansively. “love.”

logan arches his eyebrows, and takes another sandwich—he seems quite partial to the pesto chicken and ham-apple-brie—and says, “go on, then.”

and so dee goes on stealing details and weaving a story, this time from the king’s speech, explaining how his grandmother was a divorcée (she is not) and his grandfather wanted to marry her anyway, as they’d met and she’d become his mistress during an outing to new york (possibly true, but in the same way that the moon landing being faked is possibly true) but as she was a divorcée (again, untrue) and he was a prominent member of the church of england (as far as he knows his grandfather was a catholic) to have a lord marry a divorcée had caused quite the drama between the family, and then dee cribs even more details from downton abbey to describe the fight, mounting and dramatic and full of high passions, going on for another fifteen minutes, until his grandfather finally decided—

“to abdicate the throne?” logan finishes dryly; they’ve picked the tea tray mostly clean of snacks, by now, and logan’s long since finished his water and has stolen a cup of tea. “i didn’t realize you were a descendant of edward the eighth. should i have been calling you your majesty this whole time?”

dee tries his very hardest not to pout, but he does cross his arms. “how long have you suspected?”

“around the time you said he gave a lordship ‘for love,’” logan says, “but i knew for sure when you started talking about how your grandmother became a mistress in new york. she’s french.”

“damn!” dee says, not really angry at all, but still, he had to keep up appearances. “i managed to fool brad with that whole backstory until he saw the king’s speech five years later.”

and then dee waits; he waits for logan to get mad, or to snap at him for wasting time, something that dee will attempt to brush off and maybe even laugh at. he waits for logan—journalism-obsessed, fact-checking, scientifically-minded logan—to react to what was dee, essentially, lying straight to his face for about half an hour.

but then:

“well, that’s brad,” logan says, “it doesn’t take much to fool him, i’d imagine.”

dee smiles, pleased. “no, it doesn’t.”

“so where was the other stuff from?” logan says. “upton priory, i mean. i’m assuming that doesn’t exist. i know the story from somewhere.”

he’s… curious.

he’s curious??? dee repeats to himself—this is logan, who is, as stated, journalism-obsessed, fact-checking, scientifically-minded—he doesn’t seem mad. he just seems… intrigued.

this bears much more investigation that dee would have thought prior to inviting him over.

“downton abbey,” dee allows. “i can’t believe you caught onto the historical significance of edward the eighth meeting his mistress in new york, and yet i throw three season’s worth of downton abbey at you and not even a little bit of recognition.”

logan shrugs. “i’m not very good with pop culture. that’s more—” and very suddenly he looks like he wants to slap a hand to his forehead, if logan was at all prone to dramatic, cliché gestures like that. “roman. he was going on for days about matthew dying in the same season they killed off sybil, that’s where i heard all of it before, it’s from roman.”

“the boyfriend,” dee says. 

“yes, the boyfriend,” logan says, “who is very excited for the excuse to wear a pretty ballgown, by the way.”

dee accepts this for the subject change it is, and digs out his notebook and a pen.

“right, then,” he says. “as previously discussed, i’m handling chilton participants, and i’m pleased to announce that with the addition of ana salazar, the entirety of the clairosophic society are involved.”

“oh, excellent,” logan says, and so dee goes on listing chilton students they’ve enlisted—he’d been right, recruiting the puffs and the skull and dagger had caused a wave of wannabes to join in too—and they discuss setting up a form for people to ensure that they’ve paid their way in, dee eventually digging out his laptop and making a couple drafts of one. 

as he does that, logan talks about the sideshire students (behind on payments, but they’re doing an ongoing bake sale at virgil’s, which, dee doesn’t know how small town things work, but he supposes he should trust that logan knows what he’s talking about) and logan taps his own notebook with his pen, going over all of the entrants and discussing anything that needs finer-tuning—not very much on their end, it turns out, but they’ll definitely need to have another meeting after what logan’s dad is apparently calling get cultured day, where he and logan’s boyfriend’s mother will teach everyone the dance they’ll need to know and the proper way to curtsy and so on.

logan scans over his notes, nodding in satisfaction, before he says, “we were a bit oversaturated on debutantes, the clairosophic society should help balance things out with escorts.”

“ana wants to go with janey,” dee corrects. “so she and janey are already taken, but otherwise—”

he blinks. “ana and janey are dating?”

dee looks at him, amused. “you know nothing about the social stratosphere at chilton, do you?”

“i don’t have much tolerance for gossip,” logan says. 

“really?” dee says. “i’d think that as a journalist you’d keep an eye out for these kinds of things.”

“i don’t report on gossip,” logan says. “what do i look like, francie jarvis? anyone else who lives and breathes that rag?”

“what, the jefferson?” dee says. “are you kidding? that’s the most useful thing that chilton’s ever provided me, and i’m including the education, here.”

“useful?” logan repeats, looking as offended as dee had expected him to look when logan would catch on to dee lying his ass off for half an hour straight. interesting. 

“well, admittedly, they can be rather behind when it comes to certain things,” dee says thoughtfully, “but the chaos that happens on the day it comes out? masterful.”

logan frowns. “i thought you wanted to work on the franklin.” 

“oh, i do,” dee says. “like i said, they’re not exactly cutting edge, i can do better with a well-coordinated social media check than they can do with an entire staff full of rumormongers. the whole,” and he flaps a hand, “truth and investigation thing, for the franklin, that’s interesting. besides, the franklin has more effect when it targets adults; with the jefferson, they just want to confirm that the algebra and the calculus teachers are having an affair, which they are—”

logan looks perplexed. “how do you—”

“—don’t ask,” dee says. “believe me, i wish i didn’t know.”

his eyes narrow, as if to say why should i believe you? which, good. he’s learning.

“but in the franklin, one can publish a deep-dive anonymous investigation and get shady male teachers tossed out of the schools on their ear for their too-frequent uniform checks and saying that uniform skirts are distracting. the franklin has more real-world power.”

“not that an investigation of an adult potentially preying upon teenage girls isn’t important,” logan says, “because it certainly is, but journalism isn’t about acquiring power. it’s about holding those in power accountable.”

“isn’t that the same thing?” dee points out. 

“no,” logan says. 

“but it is,” dee says. “because the concept of holding power is so multi-faceted. everyone’s idea of power is different. the upper class has power, the president has power, the people protesting have power. people like francie jarvis and tristan have power, but then, so do you and i. but all of those kinds of power are different.”

“well, that i agree with,” logan says cautiously, and then he frowns. “how do i have power?”

dee looks at him. he looks at him harder.

“what?”

“you’re kidding,” dee says. “you’re a sanders and a hayden.”

“the haydens are not particularly pleased that i am a hayden,” logan says. “the haydens would adore nothing more than to tidily remove me from the family tree.”

interesting.

“but they can’t tidily remove you being a hayden from everyone’s memory,” dee points out. “and, well. power can be privilege.”

“well, i certainly have privilege,” logan says. “i’m white, i’m a cis male, i’m attached to an affluent family.” he frowns, and amends, “families, i suppose.”

“oh, good,” dee says. “you’re a sane person who recognizes white privilege, i won’t have to kick you out.” 

also—attached to an affluent family, not part of an affluent family. more intrigue.

“anyways. you have plenty of power—take chilton, for example. say you wrote that piece on a pedophilic teacher that i was talking about. it would be due to your actions, your hard work and diligence, that removed him from his post. that doesn’t seem like power, to you?”

logan shakes his head, and repeats, “that’s what journalism’s about. just because there are effect from the story i write, to hold said teacher accountable, that doesn’t mean that is personally driven from me. that would be a response—from parents, from students, from headmaster charleston, eventually. there are responsibilities that journalists have, important ones, and we serve a purpose for society. perhaps the story has a powerful impact, or the story is emotionally powerful. that doesn’t mean that i am powerful. i didn’t direct people to fire him, i didn’t influence anyone. i would have presented the facts and exposed his wrongdoings, that’s all.”

“well, i suppose it does depend on your definition of powerful, that’s accurate enough,” dee says thoughtfully. “but the more philosophical idea of what is power? isn’t what i’m trying to address, at the moment, i’m addressing you. another example, then—academically, you’re powerful. tristan dugray would pay a tidy sum for any one of your study guides.”

logan frowns. “i wouldn’t cheat.”

“yes, yes, you’re very moral and ethical, good for you, you’ve passed the after-school special test,” dee says dismissively, “but specifically, for this definition of power, it’s a certain level of strength. but that’s a different kind of power, than, say—”

“tristan dugray never getting in trouble for his foolish pranks because of who his father is,” logan says.

“right,” dee says, “although you’re wrong on that front, he’s a prank on a bad day away from being sent to military school, but—yes, you’re seeing my point. power varies, power changes.”

“well, i never disagreed with that,” he says. “but those aiming for power—their main idea is almost never let’s be a journalist! unless they’re decisively within the yellow journalism era, or if they are fictional character charles foster kane. and even then, he was a media magnate, his attempts at journalism were just to manipulate public opinion and make a lot of money.”

dee sighs longingly and says, “if i were white, that would be my ideal era to work in.”

“what,” logan says, and suddenly they’re talking about yellow journalism—logan is very boring and against it, because he likes things like accuracy and facts—and then logan looks like he’s about to blow steam out of his ears when dee tells him that his ultimate career goal is to write for and maybe run something like the national enquirer, which leads to even more discussions on journalism, things like what qualifies someone to be a journalist and who decides what journalism is, and they’re on a little side-tangent about journalism as portrayed in films when there’s a knock on his door.

“mister slange, mister sanders, dinner is ready,” nanny says, and dee tries his best not to startle, because—logan’s been here for three hours. and he has not once gotten annoyed at dee for reasons outside of journalistic, ethical, or moral debate, and even then, logan seems to set all of that aside relatively easily.

and dee, apart from making up his entire ancestral backstory, has barely even lied.

“coming!” dee says, and then to logan, “i hope you like snail caviar.”

an expression of panic pops up on logan’s face, and dee laughs at him.

“kidding,” he says reassuringly. “it’s french onion soup and croque monsieurs.”

logan looks relieved, and he even laughs, and then proceeds to bump into dee, the way that friends on tv shows jostle each other when one tells a particularly biting joke, and then logan pauses, looking at dee.

very suddenly, dee thinks, oh.

does he think he’s my friend?

they’ve been debating for the better part of two hours, and dee lied to him for half an hour, and dee has been purposefully throwing as many rich-people things into conversation as possible to get logan looking baffled, and logan thinks that they are friends.

is that what friends do?

dee clears his throat, before he grabs logan’s bicep in a way he hopes is normal and does not at all give away that he has not had a friend since he immigrated to the united states, and says, “come on, then, i’ll let you stick your head in the library on the way.”

“you have a library?!” logan asks eagerly, following along as dee tugs him down the hall, and dee tries his very best not to smile too openly.

⁂

dee’s house is…a lot. it’s a lot.

(dee had pulled up a picture of his parents’ house to show off how it could be his own personal xanadu, when they’d been talking about citizen kane, and logan has mentally tabulated the publication he was talking about to fact-check that, because that—that was just absurd, even more so than this one.)

but the smell of french onion soup and croque monsieurs—essentially french ham-and-cheese, either sandwiches or baked lasagna style—is a little more comforting. logan knows these smells, baking bread and ham and melting cheese and onions—granted, virgil’s diner does a french onion soup, but he’s sure it’s not as fancy as what he’s about to eat with dee.

and, as they cross into the dining room, his grandmother, seated at the head of the table.

logan’s technically had lunch with mrs. slange before; it had been at the country club, and he’d been more preoccupied with glowering at dee, but he has met her and spoken with her. she’d been nice; she’d spoken to his grandmother quite a lot about landscaping, and flowers. azaleas in particular, he’s fairly certain.

she’s a rather diminutive woman, her already short stature shrunk down even more from age; her hair is thin and pure white, fluffing up in a way that makes logan think of dandelion fuzz. her face is wrinkled, especially with smile lines around her eyes, her mouth. she’s wearing a cardigan over a button-down, much like his grandmother wears on particularly casual days, but whereas his grandmother prefers solid colors, mrs. slange’s cardigan is white with embroidered pink and purple flowers; it matches her pastel pink button-down. 

by all accounts, she should register in logan’s mind as a fragile old woman; a nice one, one that seems to have more concern about her flowers than anything else. but there’s something glinting in her eyes—flinty, icy blue—that reminds him very much of dee, despite the fact that they are not biologically related.

it’s cunning, logan thinks, or intelligence—she must have both in spades, to help raise someone like dee.

she smiles at dee, and says something in french—logan can manage a basic spanish conversation due to his proximity to the princes, and he’s taking latin classes, but he’s absolutely hopeless with french unless he lucks out and they say something with a latin root word—and dee responds in kind. logan notes that their accents are different. logan puts together, barely a second after he notices, that one of haiti’s two official languages is french.

logan spares a second to wonder if dee can speak the other, haitian creole, before his grandmother turns to him directly and says—something in french. he has no clue what.

“il ne peut pas parler français, granmè, utiliser l'anglais,” dee says, looking almost a little amused at logan’s expense—well, logan can put together he can’t speak french, use english, just based off of context clues.

she starts a sentence in french, pauses, furrows her brow, as if unpuzzling it, and then continues in lightly accented english, “welcome to our home.”

“thank you very much for having me,” logan says, his dad’s be on your best behavior! text at the forefront of his mind, with his dad saying evelyn, right? i always liked her shortly behind. “your home is beautiful; the landscaping’s lovely.”

her wrinkled face settles into its worn lines she smiles.

“mer—” she begins, shakes her head, takes a breath, and then continues, “thank you very much. the roses are finicky little things, this time of year, i’m quite pleased with how they’ve turned out. i think they’ve thrown their last primadonna fit until fall rolls around again.”

and from there, it’s easy to prod her into conversation as they eat the soup course—logan mentally apologizes to virgil, but if he’d taste it, he’d probably agree that this french onion soup is better than his, too—just by asking about the various plants she tends to favor, the particular conditions that each seems to like. the conversation seems perfectly fine, if not for dee staring at the pair of them out of the corners of his eyes, as if monitoring their conversation to make sure neither of them says anything unseemly. 

which is a little unsettling—logan doesn’t think he’s said anything horribly rude to an old person lately, unless one counted his paternal grandparents last fall—but the conversation seems to be fine. logan admits that most of his knowledge of plants is theoretical, scientific, which prods her into asking about their shared science course, and dee takes over that conversation.

it’s fine. the whole dinner is fine, and it seems to be going well, even, and he keeps on thinking so and thinking so as he digs into the main course of croque monsieurs, and she says—

“how do you find the meal, christopher?”

it takes logan a second to register what’s wrong with that statement, and, as soon as it does, unwittingly, his eyes flash to dee.

dee has frozen, fork halfway to his mouth. it’s like he has to buffer for a moment before he visibly stiffens, setting the fork down. logan is about to excuse it as a slip of the tongue—she had known both his parents, surely, perhaps it was just a misstatement. most people in his grandparents’ sphere exalted his resemblance to christopher, even though he was quite clearly a carbon copy of patton excepting his sharper bone structure, straighter hair, and thinner frame, until—

“logan, granmè,” dee says, in a very gentle tone that does not at all match his fists curling up on the table. “this is logan, christopher’s son. do you remember? we had lunch with him and emily.”

her brow furrows, and she says, “right. of course. logan.”

she quite sounds like she thinks that dee is pulling one over her head, and she’s going along with it, the way one did when a small child was pulling an incredibly obvious joke on them.

she maintains that tone and slips a couple more times—christopher, how are straub and francine? as logan’s halving his croque monsieur; christopher, didn’t you say you were going out to california? when the maid, as tight-faced as dee, is setting dessert on the table. 

and it dawns on him, slowly: why dee had to prompt her to use english, when she was born speaking french, and why it had taken her a few seconds to clearly switch over in her head when dee went from french to english at the drop of a hat; why there were so many post-its near the front door; why the household staff had seemed surprised at a visitor, despite the fact that dee had told his grandmother he was bringing home a guest; why his grandmother had said she’s coming out less and less lately, it’s been a while since we’ve had a good, long chat; dee keeping a keen eye out, as if he’s monitoring what they’ll say; not for him, logan realizes, for her. 

she has a disease. she’s aware enough that her gardens are in splendid shape, she’s aware enough that she clearly knows who dee is, but. but she can’t remember who logan is.

it is an exceedingly awkward dessert.

he can’t deny the chocolate-raspberry souffle is absolutely delicious, though.

⁂

the dinner is over. nanny is taking granmè to the library. logan and dee are left alone at the dinner table.

dee has been mentally preparing for this since his grandmother’s first slip—comebacks, things to say, particularly acerbic and witty things he could summon up if logan is rude about it. he’s ready. 

that is, until logan just says, “can i see the greenhouse?”

dee blinks at him. “what?”

“the greenhouse,” logan repeats. “you said i could see it after dinner. can i?”

okay, dee thinks. changing the setting of the argument. he isn’t sure what logan’s play is here, but—

“sure,” dee agrees, and stands, purposefully languid and unhurried. “follow me.”

and so he leads logan through the narrow hallways of the house, mostly ignoring logan as they go (“is that a velázquez?” he demands of a painting, which dee doesn’t really deign answer to—of course it’s a velázquez, does his family seem like the type to settle for a framed imitation) and at last comes to the door of the greenhouse, which he opens without ceremony.

logan walks in. dee expects him to maybe go to sit down, and ask dee why his elderly grandmother thought he was his estranged father, but no—logan beelines straight for the hostas.

well. okay. dee trails after him, meandering vaguely around the greenhouse. logan’s route seems to make sense to him, and only him, but he pokes his nose close to each plant, adjusting his glasses on his nose as he crouches to examine the soil, the roots; if dee was walking into this situation with no prior context, he’d think perhaps that logan was an enterprising botanist who had just gained entry to a highly regarded greenhouse.

but logan is just in the greenhouse of an old lady with memory problems, who he did not know was an old lady with memory problems until she repeatedly referred to him by his father’s name. 

and so dee follows as logan examines fauna, and flora, and the goddamn soil. everytime logan hums with interest, dee thinks it’s a precursor to the beginning of this conversation, but no, he’s just humming at the plants. the plants. they’re plants, his grandmother’s plants, so he’s used to his grandmother being very fond of them and rambling about them even if he’s mostly indifferent about them, most of his emotion toward plants being if it makes granmè happy. the key word in that sentence is granmè. he does not particularly care if these plants make logan happy. he cares what logan will say about his grandmother.

they’ve looped three-quarters of the way around the greenhouse by the time dee’s patience runs out.

“well?!” and it tears out of him in a kind of snarl. logan, from where he’s crouched beside the lilies, blinks at him, his fingers resting on the arm of his glasses, as if he’s about to adjust them again.

“what?”

“what,” dee repeats, then, “what?!” and before he can even think about it, he has his bowler hat in one hand, thwacking logan over the head with it.

“ow!” logan says, clearly more out of the surprise of being thwacked when he wasn’t expecting it. that, or logan is a big baby, dee didn’t even swing that hard.

“what,” dee repeats, jamming his hat over his head again before logan can see any semblance of hat hair, “what, are you kidding me, sanders, of all the times to go quiet when you clearly have questions, you choose now?! say something!”

logan blinks at him, before he says, very slowly, “about…”

“my grandmother,” dee snaps. 

“ah,” logan says, then, almost like he’s reciting something for his latin class, “i am… sorry that she is ill, and i respect your privacy during this time?”

dee actually leans forward because of the force of the Look he is giving logan.

“you know i’m bad at this kind of thing,” he says defensively. “what do you expect me to say?”

“i don’t—!” dee says, and nearly throws up his hands, but he is not allowing himself to get that carried away. “i expect you to say something! not just wander around the greenhouse and let me wait and see if you say something stupid!”

logan looks at him, and says, “was that insensitive of me?”

dee’s eyes must look close to popping out of his head, because logan’s hands are already rising to protect the crown of his head, like he expects dee to hit him with his hat again.

“do you,” he says, and gives dee a strange look, “do you want to talk about it?”

“not particularly!”

“that’s what i thought!” logan says. “i assumed the prior agreement of you wanting to speak to me about anything that particularly affects you would take precedence—”

agreement, dee mouths, and mentally backtracks, until—

“my parents wanting to out me and you coming up with this whole debutante plot and my grandmother having dementia are two different categories!”

“i didn’t think that a statement like ‘if you want to talk about it, i am here’ needed categorization!”

“the previously agreed upon ‘it’ was specifically about my parents’ plot to out me by way of american daughters of the revolution!” dee says, near-hysterical.

“okay!” logan says, “okay, fine, i put forward the terms of that particular definition of ‘it’ being broadened to anything particularly troublesome in your life and wait on your acceptance, or your proposal on how exactly to renegotiate ‘it’, does that help?”

dee stares at him, jaw hanging open, and says, “there is no way that you are an actual person, are you serious?!”

“i don’t know what you want from me,” logan says, near-mournful, and the absolute absurdity of the situation sinks in enough that dee starts laughing.

his parents want to very publicly out him without his consent, his grandmother has dementia that will only get worse and worse and it will only be a matter of time before his parents realize what is happening and send her into a nursing home and force him to move back in with them, the household staff who are the closest people he had previously considered friends have no choice but increase their focuses on spying on him for his parents in order to distract them from noticing anything wrong with granmè, or else risk unemployment, and logan is here talking about renegotiations like they’re on a legal team, and talking sure as shit isn’t an option, so dee can’t do anything but laugh.

“christ,” he says, and half-crumples, half-slides to the ground beside logan, who looks very bemused. “putain de merde, sanders.”

“i’m assuming that’s impolite,” logan says primly, and dee snorts.

“yeah,” dee says, in the same tone would say duh. “yeah, impolite, let’s go with that, shall we?” 

logan pauses, for a few seconds, as if allowing dee to get his bearings, before he says "dementia?" with a tone of curiosity that has dee swiveling his head to glower at him.

"sorry," logan says, not sounding particularly sorry.

"journalist habit," dee mutters, beating logan to the punch for his own excuse.

"yes."

they sit in silence for a little longer.

"i didn't know she knows that particular side of the family," logan says. "the haydens, i mean."

"oh, yes," dee says absently. "we probably lunch with them about twice a year, sometimes more—less now, though, now that they've moved away."

"huh," logan says, then, "what are they like?"

"what, you don't know?" dee says, glancing at him.

"not particularly," logan says. "i've only met them three times, and considering i was still in the hospital post-birth for one of them and was learning how to crawl for the other—"

"huh," dee echoes.

how weird it must be for logan, to hear that dee's had more regular interactions with his grandparents. both sets, probably; he would have remembered if logan had gotten dragged into various family gatherings the way he has.

"they," logan says, purses his lips, and says, "the haydens were particularly transphobic."

"yeah, well," dee says. "that doesn't surprise me."

"homophobic too," logan says, and he glances at his hands before he looks sideways at dee. "deviant was the exact word used in my presence. i'm assuming there was more, but dad kicked me out of the room before i could hear anything else."

dee rolls around various replies in his mouth. he could offer sympathy, or something equally socially accepted and something dee would have no problem letting roll off his tongue like a well-rehearsed monologue.

but.

he would tell all of those monologues to people who don't know that he's trans, that have never been to either of his houses, that have never listened to him spin a lie for half an hour and not be mad about it. he would tell all of these monologues to someone who didn't know that his grandmother has alzheimer's.

so dee doesn't offer a monologue. he offers something that he assumes logan might appreciate, something he'd recognize in a fellow colleague: curiosity.

"which dad?" dee asks. "patton or—"

"patton," logan says, cutting him off. "christopher walked me out, though, to make sure i actually stayed out."

another pause. it seems like curiosity hasn't been the outright wrong move, so dee strives for more questions.

"are you close?" dee says. "with christopher. i've only met him a couple times."

logan's mouth twists downward at the edges.

"i don't suppose you'd be willing to offer definitive parameters for close, would you?"

"no, not really," dee says. "closeness is subjective."

logan shrugs a shoulder. he looks almost uncomfortable.

"what?" dee says, interest now piqued—because if he didn't know any better, he'd say logan looked guilty.

"i," logan says carefully, "might have blackmailed him."

"you what," dee says, turning to face logan head-on, not even bothering to hide his shock. or his delight. he doesn't bother hiding that either.

"after the visit last fall, he," and the corners of his mouth twist down even further. "well, that doesn't matter anymore. anyway, i dug up as much of his public financial and legal records that i possibly could and made him a deal that i'd extend equal efforts in getting to know him as he would getting to know me. we have a standing weekly phone call now."

"you blackmailed him?" dee says gleefully.

"with public information," logan says huffily. "it's not like i hired a private investigator or anything—"

"nuh-uh, nope, you used the word blackmail," dee says merrily. "you don't even have to justify it with saying where you got the information, you still used information you dug up on him to coerce him into a deal. that is the textbook definition of blackmail."

"i don't know if it's the textbook definition—"

"nope!" dee says. "nope, i'm not listening to your semantics. you blackmailed someone."

"you don't need to sound so thrilled about it," logan grumbles.

"are you kidding?" dee demands. "this is by far one of the most interesting things i've ever heard about you. please tell me there's more misbehavior like this in your past—no, no, wait! i'll figure it out myself!"

"good luck with that," logan says. and then, almost randomly, "everyone says i look like him."

dee stays quiet—give the interviewee time to consider their answer, if it's short, mel had lectured once. always leave a couple of seconds for them to think about if they want to add on to their answer before you move to an entirely different question.

"i mean," logan says, and runs a hand through his hair. "other than this, i don't particularly understand why. i pretty clearly favor my dad—ugh, patton, i favor patton, this is the problem with two dads—but everyone says i look like christopher. my grandparents—both sides—their friends, a couple teachers. it's usually rather frustrating, and though i can't prove it, i have a feeling it's somewhat rooted in transphobia, for most of those friends."

he pauses a beat, as if understanding where he's going with this particular line of conversation. dee suddenly feels a lot less excited about the potential for uncovering any more of logan's past misconduct.  

"but," logan says. "it, ah. it makes more sense, if your grandmother has more recently had contact with that particular side of my family—"

"don't," dee says, and the exhaustion in his voice almost stuns him.

"don't what?"

"don't," dee says, and flaps a hand. "don't make excuses for her. she has alzheimer's, she's not stupid. everyone's patronizing her now and i hate it, even though i find myself doing it sometimes, it's like everyone's scared that they'll somehow catch the alzheimer's if they don't talk to her like she's a toddler."

and now logan's the one who's quiet, just for a little bit, like he's strategizing how to carry out the rest of the interview. 

except, dee thinks, this isn't an interview. this is a conversation. this is that talking thing that logan offered so readily, back when dee had come out, back before logan came up with this whole absurd debutante plan. 

it's just—difficult. to consider turning this strategizing, conniving part of his brain off. he isn't sure if he ever has, ever since he was first notified it was there in the first place. why would he turn this piece of himself off when it protected him, when it kept him aloof and above it all and safe to conduct himself in the way that felt most true to him? if it took lying and manipulating along the way, so be it. he has no patience for attempts at moralizing the way he lives his life. immanuel kant was a fucking moron who would have gotten himself and his friend killed because he decided his perfect duty was to always tell the truth. what was the point of something like truth if it hurt you? if it put you in danger?

it's not even a choice. 

or, at least. it has never been a choice. because logan is no murderer at the door, or machiavelli-wannabe gossip, or high-society rich person who held so much more power than one could even think of through backdoor deals and secret donations, who had adopted a poor orphan from haiti because it might look good as an accessory, and people would think them charitable, and they would barely even thinking about that poor orphan from haiti growing into their own person with pesky, inconvenient things like wants and needs and opinions.

telling the truth would logan would be... telling the truth to logan. logan, who lived in a tiny, pleasantville knockoff town with things like dance marathons and punnily-named cat-themed stores. logan, who had once blackmailed his own father in order to obtain a standing weekly phone call. logan, who had a trans dad, and who had a boyfriend that he had brought to the school dance, and danced with him, and kissed him, and it didn't even occur to him to care who might see, who might disapprove.

logan, who was once homeless and penniless, and who had extended various sources of information that dee had in his hands, ready to drop into the public eye at any given moment.

logan, who had just sat and talked about citizen kane with him and didn't catch onto three seasons worth of downton abbey but immediately clocked a reference to wallis simpson. logan, who had looked helplessly confused at the sight of fancy water and finger sandwiches and afternoon tea. 

logan, who might think that they are friends.

it might become more of a choice then, dee thinks. 

so when logan asks, very quietly, "how long have you known that she's sick?" it only takes dee swallowing down the saliva rising in his throat to be able to answer.

"she was diagnosed about three and a half months ago," he says. "but i've known something's wrong for a lot longer than that."

logan swallows, too, and dips his head in a brief nod, as if to show he's absorbed the information.

"i'm sorry," he says.

dee could say any number of things: she could live as long as twenty years after her diagnosis, but it's more commonly four to eight years. or one day she's going to forget who i am and i am absolutely terrified. or when my parents catch on they're going to send her away to a nursing home, and i won't be able to live here anymore, and i'll go crazy if i have to stay in that house for too long, their screaming and shouting will drive me crazy. or you don't even know the half of it, the household staff that you probably think are so nice and who practically raised me have no choice but to spy on every little thing i do because otherwise they'll get fired.

but for as much as dee can briefly turn off that part of his mind, he cannot turn it off all at once. there is no way he's opening the floodgates of information like that. they might be friends, but dee isn't in hysterics. he can control himself. he can control this. 

"yeah," dee says, and tips back his head to look up at the ceiling; half of it is glass, leading up to where it joins the rest of the house. the sky is bleak and black tonight, with no moon or stars in sight. "yeah, me too."

⁂

the chauffeur closes the door behind logan, and logan has to fight the urge to jump, even though the chauffeur was also holding the door open for logan to get into the car in the first place.

he has to shake himself before he turns to look at the front door of the lavandelands; dee is standing outside, letting the light spill out of the house and backlight him enough that logan can see him leaning against one of the columns, one arm casually wrapped around his stomach. his bowler hat overcasts his eyes.

"your address, sir?" the chauffeur says, and logan has to fight the urge not to jump again. he tells the chauffeur the address to virgil's, anyways, and turns his head to look at dee again.

haltingly, he lifts his hand and waves, just a little bit awkward. dee's shadowed form doesn't move.

there's a brief moment where logan's left with his hand raised in the air, and he cringes to himself ever so slightly before he starts to lower it.

but then, dee lifts a gloved hand, and tosses logan a lazy, three-fingered salute off his bowling cap, and logan tries to smile a little bit. he can't quite manage it, but he's pretty sure the chauffeur isn't judging him for not looking pleasant enough, as the chauffeur’s a bit busy pulling the car into a neat, three-pointed turn, before beginning to drive away.

logan glances over his shoulder, just enough to see dee, shoulders slightly slumped, re-enter the house. logan lets out a breath he didn't know he was holding and redirects his attention to his phone, which he's mostly been neglecting this entire bizarre sojourn at dee's.

he takes enough time to text his dad and virgil that he'll be dropped off at virgil's, so he can pick up a study snack before he heads back to their house, and reassures his dad that he doesn't have to wait up for him or anything. 

he reads a text from roman—a brief complaint about a girl in his dance class, not one of the ones he teaches but the class he actually takes, and logan sends a response that he hopes sounds like the proper, thoughtful response to a mostly inconsequential venting message from his boyfriend.

and then he sits and stares at his homescreen, still that selfie of roman, his dad, and virgil that they took last fall, when he was staying at his grandparents, before everything with thanksgiving and patton's pneumonia had rather tidily messed that week up.

because he has his dad, and his other dad, and virgil, who consists as a dad figure, and he has ms. prince, in her way, and he has roman, a wonderful supportive boyfriend who he has always been able to talk to throughout most of his life. he has rudy, even if he has never particularly leaned on rudy as a means of support. he has maria, and meredith and mark, and his host of cousins from the danes side of the family. he has his grandparents in their own strange ways, even if their relationship prior to this school year would best be described as stilted. he has friends from sideshire high and his teachers and mentors that he left there.

dee has practically no one.

it seems so obvious, looking back at the start of the school year, how dee had seemed so desperate to cling to his academic superiority over everyone in the grade, because that's what he has. he has an ill grandmother, and exceptional grades, and three snakes. he has a former nanny and the rest of a household staff who seem more preoccupied with his grandmother's care. he has his secretive stance in the chilton social ladder, but he didn't have friends. 

logan worries his lip between his teeth. he is incredibly ill-equipped to handle this kind of situation. honestly, he's probably fortunate he only escaped with dee hitting him with his bowler hat; anyone who attempted to have an emotion-centric conversation with logan knew that he wasn't exactly the ideal person to talk to. that's never been his forte.

it has always been his dad's. his dad, who dee had seemed fascinated with, who certainly had a certain level of similarity in their life experiences. and though logan, of course, would never betray confidences...

he could, perhaps, offer some of his vast support system for dee to partake in. leave the choice to him, of course, but. but at least logan would have tried.

and so logan takes a breath, and sends out a text.

Logan Sanders: Dad, would it be all right if I asked Dee sleep over the night of the Culture Day you're planning with Ms. Prince?

[ko-chan-the-blueberry-donut]

Requiem 4

Hey everyone! I hope everyone is enjoying this story! Sorry it took me a little longer. I’ve been falling asleep more frequently. I wish I didn’t feel so tired all the time… the doctors think I have narcolepsy but I won’t be able to get tested until everything is open.

Disclaimer: I don’t own My Next Life as a Villainess.

----------

Gerald Stuart prided himself on being able to read his fiancée, Katarina Claes, very well. He had known her since she was eight, had known her the longest out of all her friends, and was engaged to her. He knew her likes and dislikes, what made her upset, what made her smile—Gerald was sure he could write a book simply on Katarina’s ‘katarisms’ within a day and have it published within the week.

So when Gerald had visited the Claes manor to see his fiancée, he immediately knew something was off when he saw her.

“Sister! Please put on something more proper!” Keith cried as Katarina raced up to greet Gerald in a strange outfit with… a surprisingly short length skirt. He felt his cheeks flush at the sight of her shapely legs.

“It’s fine, Keith! Mother says I can wear this around the mansion! What do you think, Prince Gerald? I think it’s great!” Katarina was expressive as usual, and if he wasn’t versed in how she was, he would’ve fell for it, but Gerald zeroed in on Katarina’s face. Her smile was there, but her eyes—they had a melancholy look in them. It was like she was about to cry, whether in joy or sadness, Gerald didn’t know, but the distant gleam in her eyes, as if she was here, but not, made Gerald pause.

Something was wrong, and this made Gerald very alarmed.

“Katarina…” Gerald murmured, concerned. He raised a hand to her cheek, and Katarina blinked, confused. “Are you okay?”

For a moment, a small second, Katarina appeared as if she was about to cry. She bit her lip, as if she was holding something inside, but soon she was smiling again, and the moment was gone.

“Of course I’m okay, Prince Gerald! You’re starting to sound like Keith—he’s been fretting over me too!” Katarina laughed. Keith and Gerald watched her, waiting for her to crack, for her to come clean about what was on her mind.

But it never came.

And that worried them more.

“Just because Mother gave you permission to wear those strange clothes doesn’t mean you should be wearing them everywhere, Sister.” Keith sighed. Katarina patted his arm.

“It’s fine, Keith! Maybe when I go to the Ministry of Magic with Mother, she’ll let me get more fabric for more clothes!” Katarina was excited, sparkles in her eyes at the thought of wearing more clothes like she wore in her past life.

“You’re going to the Ministry of Magic?” Gerald inquired, raising a brow. Katarina nodded.

“Yeah! Mother says she wants to take me! I don’t know why though! Maybe a job opportunity?” Katarina wondered.

“There’s no need for that, Katarina. After graduation we’d be getting married, remember?” Gerald pointed out, gently smiling.

“Oh! You’re right! Then I don’t know…” Katarina trailed off.

“You know, Sister would be much more suited for working than being Queen anyway.” Keith’s eyebrow twitched.

“Oh really? Actually as Queen she’ll be quite busy.” Gerald’s smile twitched. Katarina watched them both with a smile.

‘They get along so well! Maybe I should arrange for them to hang out more!’ Katarina grew excited at the prospect.

“Katarina?” Gerald’s voice called her out of her musing.

“Uh yes, Prince Gerald?” Katarina jolted. Gerald grasped one of her hands with his affectionately.

“I would like to join you on this outing, if that’s alright with you.” Gerald had a distinct suspicion this meeting with the Ministry was important—his gut telling him he should go to be there in case she needed protection.

“I-I’ll go too, Sister! This way Mother and you will have more support with whatever you’re doing!” Keith was quick to chime in. He eyed the third prince with a glare, but Gerald wasn’t phased. Katarina was what mattered the most.

“Oh! That’s a good idea, Keith!” Katarina praised him. She clapped her hands together. “What if we invite everyone? Maria said she was thinking of applying to the Ministry of Magic, and I’m sure Nicol would love to see all the ancient archives!”

“Whatever you want.” Gerald and Keith told her, just happy she was normal again. They listened as Katarina babbled excitedly about getting everyone together.

“Oh! I should go tell Mother we’ll have everyone coming with us! Excuse me!” Katarina bid them farewell and hurried into the Claes manor. Gerald and Keith watched her go with smiles. However, when she was out of sight, they sobered immediately.

“Something’s wrong.” Gerald said.

“I tried getting her to tell me, but she just said she was fine and waved me off.” Keith told him. “But that look in her eyes…”

“It looks like she’s about to fall apart at the seams.” Gerald finished for him. He turned to Keith, serious. “Did your mother say why they were going to the Ministry?”

“No. She just told Sister to be ready soon, but Mother appeared to be very conflicted, like a lot was on her mind.” Keith answered. Gerald’s expression turned pensive.

“Has she ever been like this before? Katarina I mean.” Gerald asked Keith. Keith furrowed his eyebrows, thinking.

“My sister’s always been a little strange… sometimes I’d catch her muttering in a strange language when she’s talking to herself. I’ve caught her writing in a notebook in also a strange language, but when I asked to see it, she freaked out and kept switching between language—like she was so flustered and scared her brain couldn’t focus. I never wanted to terrify her like that again, so I never asked about the notebook, but I know she hides it somewhere in her room. I just thought it was a diary…” Keith recalled a young Katarina rambling frantically, trying to get him to forget about the book. Keith appeared more troubled the more he remembered. “When I was getting adopted by Father, he mentioned something about Sister having night terrors like I did so he thought we’d bond. I tried asking her about those, but she just said they were gone now that I was there, so I didn’t need to worry. I thought I was special then—I made Sister’s night terrors go away, but I can’t help but wonder… sometimes I find she has dark circles under her eyes, like she’s been having bad dreams, and I wonder if that’s really true they’re gone.”

“Sometimes she’d say things—strange things like she needed to learn how to survive in case she ever gets exiled one day.” Gerald added his own two cents. “I’d ask her what she had meant, and she would startle, realizing who she was talking to, and immediately say it was nothing. I don’t think she’d ever meant to say that to me…” Gerald explained. “I thought it was just her being silly because how could Katarina ever think she was going to be exiled? She had to know I cared about her, that I would never let that happen. I’d sooner kill myself than causing her the pain of banishing her.”

“I’d kill you first.” Keith frowned. Gerald gave him a look before sighing.

“I wonder… does this have anything to do with her trying to break off our engagement all the time?” Gerald mused to himself. Keith raised an eyebrow.

“Sister tried breaking her engagement off?” Keith was confused.

“Unfortunately. She would say things like when I found someone else to love, she wouldn’t stand in the way. I just thought it was because she didn’t know how I felt about her, but I can’t shake the feeling there’s something bigger going on here. Something she’s not telling me…”

Keith observed his rival, and saw he was truly distressed by something bothering Katarina to the point it was affecting her mental state—just as distressed as him.

Before he could say anything, however, the object of their discussion was running towards them.

“Keith! Prince Gerald! Good news! Mother said we can invite everyone! Let’s let them know right away!” Katarina called.

“Of course, Katarina.” Gerald smiled.

“It will be fun, Sister.” Keith smiled as well. Katarina paused, watching them.

“Are… are you two okay?” Katarina asked. She placed her hands on both their foreheads. Keith and Gerald both felt their heartbeats speed up at her touch. “You don’t feel warm.” She noted.

Gerald gave a little laugh, grasping her hand as she was pulling them away from their foreheads. Keith watched in envy that he could touch Katarina so freely.

“You know me, I can be a bit protective.” Gerald told her, smiling tenderly. Katarina smiled in return.

“Don’t worry, Prince Gerald! I’ll protect you from any wayward snakes!” Katarina promised, probably not realizing what Gerald meant, but Gerald was fine with this, used to it, and laughed softly.

“I’ll hold you to it.” He grinned.

“Sister, let’s prepare the letters to invite everyone.” Keith interrupted them, eyeing Gerald sternly. He gave Katarina a gentle smile. “They’ll all be excited to hear from you.”

“You’re right, Keith! We have to hurry! We’ll be going to the Ministry soon after all!” Katarina replied.

“Yes… soon” Keith echoed.

He was sure they would have more answers after that.

He hoped more than anything.

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

There’s chapter 4! Sorry the chapters are so short! My sleep disorder makes it harder to write longer chapters, so I try to compensate with shorter chapters and quicker updates if my health allows it.

[fwoopersongs]

何必诗债换酒钱 - Notes

Clean version here and thoughts under the cut.

I saw the song translation notes made by @shelterfromrain​ a while back and thought, wow! what a fantastic idea it is to share the results of the rabbit holing (that you inevitably end up engaging in when doing this) and leave a record for your future self while at it too! Currently some of the song and poetry translations on fwoopersongs do have little notes, but those were casually written on the fly and after so long, the thought process behind certain choices often get forgotten, which is such a waste... Long story short - I’m doing it this way from now on!

This song was requested by @peerlesssqq on twitter - which may or may not have bumped it up by like a year on my list (yes, I’ve been sitting on it since 2018 and you’ll see why) - and I had WAY more fun than expected, so 谢啦 ~ It was a delight to receive your DM request. I was happy for days!

Some background: 《何必诗债换酒钱》 is the theme song of 【文定乾坤】- a collection of musical works that feature notable contributors to Chinese literature in ancient times, poets and the like. Oh, and I did notice that the MV on bilibili looks like it could be a promo for a webtoon or game. Who knows? I’ll be checking out the rest of the songs, that’s for sure!

The following part of this post will be my thoughts for first the title, then each section - the intro, verse 1 & 2 and the chorus, ending off with some final comments.

Disclaimer first though (otherwise later you read already then feel like beating me up): Everything in this post is only my interpretation of the song. I have quite limited familiarity with mainland literature and culture, so of course don’t expect much xD Here you’ll only find a story-loving banana who jiak-ed kantang too much in her youth and now regrets it a whole lot. 说好了哈 I’m pants at analysis, worse at Chinese, and am not at all good with words ok?

Title

So《何必诗债换酒钱》, let’s start off with the word here that’s unfamiliar to most of us:

诗债 | shī zhài or a debt of poems/poetry debt is a legit thing! - All you authors and artists out there might be familiar with it - It’s what you call the resulting debt when a poet promises to write something for another person but hasn’t done it yet. Procrastination has apparently always been the curse of content creators.

In fact, in the Bai Juyi’s poem that came up on the 诗债 baidu page《晚春欲携酒寻沉四著作先以六韵寄之》- possibly addressed to a friend he owes - he was complaining of illness, old age and writer’s block. But then oh, he goes on and then I passed by a party where they had drinks, and was quite up to my gills & totally out of it for some time, and THAT’S why I’ve done you dirty and owe you ever so many poems. I don’t really understand the last two lines but apparently he then offers to bring a drink for this person he’s talking to, mentions a wish to meet a winter goddess (????? pretty girl? or the snow? idk which), and starts reminiscing the times that were like a precious string of pearls they had singing at Yang Pass. Most likely farewells, but without context I just don’t get it. Anyway bribery and misdirection huh? I see what you did there bro, and I’m sure the person you attempted to distract saw it coming too...

何必 | hé bì, is a rhetorical question of Must you really? In the case of this word, 何 functions as roughly ‘is it that’ and 必 as ‘it must be so’.

换酒钱 | huàn jiǔ qián is of course, exchange for money to purchase wine.

‘Must you really promise poems in exchange for money to buy wine?’ then is the literal translation of 何必诗债换酒钱.

So here is the question: Is alcohol worth a poetry debt? Onwards to the answer!

Intro

生就诗骨 算来三百篇  Born and already a poet to the bones, (with) three hundred works counting up to now. 

浪掷秦淮长安 风流李杜王白  Spending lavishly in Qinhuai and Chang’an, free/unrestrained as Li and Du, Wang and Bai;

余下十分 便随意肩上担  whatever left is divided in ten parts, casually thrown over a shoulder

权作金玉铜板 相谢好人间  and taken for jade, gold and coin, a big thank you to this good world!

I interpreted the 生 in the first line as 天生 i.e. innate, natural born talent, so this first line describes someone born with a gift for poetry with ‘three hundred’ works to their name. Although... that three hundred should not be taken too literally, it’s more likely to be an allusion to collected works like the 16th century anthology of poems, Three Hundred Tang Poems. After all, Li Bai, Du Fu, Wang Wei and Bai Juyi are the most famous Tang Dynasty poets… and they were all name-dropped in the next line!

浪掷 | làng zhì was a new phrase for me, and means something like spending freely and lavishly or willfully wasted. Of course Chang’an was the capital during the Tang Dynasty and it was the world's most populous city at the time. One can only imagine how prosperous it must have been… and what fun things were there to spend your money on! The banks of Qinhuai river and that general area was once a gathering place for noble/wealthy families, scholars looking for a good time (and some say, the red light district xD). Though by Sui/Tang, that area was no longer doing as well due to political shifts. So the mental image I got from 浪掷秦淮长安 is of someone gallivanting through places of interest, from the bustling and prosperous to the dilapidated.

风流 | fēng liú is as always, hard to translate with no full equivalent in english. The feel it gives me ranges from, ‘cool, dashing bloke on a galloping horse with their cloak/robes/hair flowing elegantly in the wind’ to ‘pleasure seeking dandy who totally knows how to enjoy life, all the courtesans know him by courtesy name!’.

The third line started with 余下十分, which will not make any sense - why leftover? Divide what by ten? - until its put in context with the following:

Three hundred poems 算来三百篇 + 权作金玉铜板 pretend they are gold/jade/money (权作 | quán zuò just means to take one thing for another temporarily.)

The load thrown over the shoulder 肩上担

Spendthrift behaviour on tour 浪掷秦淮长安

The TITLE: bro so u wanna promise poetry in exchange for money to drink? why.

Let’s take those precious poems that can be exchanged for gold - a whole bagful of scrolls, and now I’m so rich I can scatter my money down the streets of entertainment districts and the capital! The very image of a 风流 poet, reckless and free spirited.

// Folks, please learn from this silly girl and do not read songs (or poems) line by line. They need to be appreciated at a distance, not one inch from your eyeballs.

Verse 1

两分与月 劳烦身前打点 Two parts to the moon, (may I) trouble you to take care of me while I’m alive.

哪处巍峨峰峦 当借我悬来观 Wherever there are majestic peaks and ranges, do lend me (your light) to hang and see by.

三分典��楼 好与长风赴宴 Three parts pawned for the tall building, good for attending the banquet alongside the wind,

遍寻可爱星子 唾手一把玩 searching for charming little stars, easily caught to play with.

Now we get to see how the poet is spending his ‘wealth’. This verse is a lot more literal as compared to the introduction, so there’s not much to say.

打点 used here is so interesting! Because it’s what you call bribing someone in a superior position to smoothen your path ahead (so to speak). Thanks to a childhood of tvb drama, I vaguely associate the type of people who would 打点 with rich merchant or minor noble fathers who want to give their sons an easier time at court. Either that or lower ranked officials with less moral scruples. Anyway, what’s being said in the song is something like: here is 20% dear moon, I’ll have to trouble you to bless me for the rest of this lifetime, and also please lend me your light to see by when I have need of it at scenic spots *for art*. The moon is a muse for many poets in all its forms after all… 明月, 圆月, 孤月, 残月, 冷月, 江月, 秋月 and so on.

Actually that whole sentence 劳烦身前打点 is so playful and fun that I put it in quotation marks to emphasize it. We’ve only just begun. Is the speaker already drunk?

And with the third line, 30% has been spent. Just noting here that 典 | diǎn can be read as pawn or mortgage. Another interesting thing to note would be that this imagery of ascending a tall building 高楼 and reaching out for stars 星子 in the last two lines of Verse 1 brings to mind one particular poem, famously attributed to Li Bai. Following translation by yours truly.

《夜宿山寺》- Overnight at the Mountain Temple 危楼高百尺 | dangerously towering a hundred feet high 手可摘星辰 | the stars are within reach 不敢高声语 | one dares not raise their voice 恐惊天上人 | for fear of disturbing the deities

Though the two probably have nothing to do with each other, doesn’t the reverence in the tone of this one bring out the playful irreverence of the other? So. Much. Fun. I adore the whole feel of 遍寻可爱星子 唾手一把玩 SO MUCH.

Verse 2

两分与桥 歇脚南北行船 Two parts to the bridge where travellers on foot and by boat from the north and south can rest,

欣然八方风物 闲话半日茶碗 delighted by the scenery all around, idly chatting half the day away over bowls of tea.

三分典流水 润色枯瘦石山 Three parts for the running water, moistening the gaunt stone mountains

又将天地一展 伸手 试浓淡 and again spreading heaven and earth wide, reaching out to test the viscosity (of the water).

It took a few listens, but in the end I really enjoyed the aesthetics here. And again, this verse is quite straight to the point albeit with two things I cannot understand.

The first point of confusion for me is why the lyricist chose to use 桥 | qiáo, a bridge as the place for people to rest on their journeys. I assumed here that this in reference to a pier or dock, assumed also that he is donating funds for this structure to be built or repaired. However, if that were the case 坞 | wù would have been enough - 船坞 was supposedly invented only in the Song Dynasty though, so maybe that’s why another word was chosen. But it’s not like there is any incidence of 桥 being used to mean ‘dock’ either!

The second thing that confuses me is the use of 典 for 流水. In verse one, that 典 was referring to the poetry works sold to reserve the venue for a banquet. That usage was apt. Here I suspect it might be for parallel structure, because there is no alternative reading for 典 that might allow one to use their 30% 三分 to do anything to flowing water 流水. That’s the literal reading, of course.

If we’re taking this a little less literally, it can be interpreted as borrowing the scenery (figuratively, since the place would not belong to anyone in the way you might own a property) to admire. It also expands on the second line’s mention of the surrounding view 欣然八方风物; there is running water which completes 润色 and brings the appearance of the gaunt and rocky mountains 枯瘦石山 closer to perfection.

润色 | rùn sè means to polish, to bring to greater heights. When you say something has been 润色 it is made more brilliant and closer to perfection by that addition. It can also mean moisten.

We always hear ‘rivers and mountains like a painting’ 江山如画 - originating from Su Dongpo’s《念奴娇·赤壁怀古》- used when the scenery is wonderful, because how often is real life as ideal as what we can imagine and depict? And that is exactly what is described here. The feeling out if the ‘water’ is concentrated or diluted 试浓淡 is used in answer to 一展 unfurling. 浓淡 of ink to 一展 of painting scroll. The land and sky seem like an ink wash painting, so beautiful that the viewer cannot help but reach out to run their hand through the water.

Chorus

Chorus Part 1

若趁游兴直到酣 If we take advantage of our wanderlust and go roaming till it is sated,

千字文章不值钱 classics and essays shan’t be worth a coin.

诗换花 词换雪 A poem for a flower! A song for snow!

再作檄文斗天官 Another denunciation for those heavenly officials!

Starting off with three new terms for me: 游兴 | yóu xìng means enthusiasm for travel. 酣 | hān can mean having a great time drinking, or being very satisfied and satiated. 檄文 | xí wén is a type of official document written for important announcements, declaration of war, or denunciation and condemnation of certain people or actions.

While I still feel this need to go out to see the world, I shall keep on the road until I am satisfied. Who cares about writing, who cares for study, it’s all worthless to me. I do what I want. And what I want is to write a little poem in exchange for a flower, some lyrics for a flake of snow. I’ll even write a denunciation against those officials in heaven (immortals). Fight me!!!!

I point again at Verse 1 with climbing the tower to play with stars. It’s no longer just playing nearby, now he wants a go at the gods.

Among the four parts of the chorus, this one is the simplest for sure. The lines mean exactly what is said. It also feels the most chaotic and mischievous. Is the speaker drunk? Is he high on something? One thing’s for sure. He’s out of money.

Chorus Part 2

何愁不得一样我 Why feel troubled that (I) cannot have another just like me?

知交尽向话中添 for one who understands you and is understood, look entirely towards stories to fill that place

唐解元 嵇中散 people like Tang Bohu (first in provincial examinations) and proud, upright and stubborn Ji Kang

且驰大梦任疯癫 Just chase that great dream, allow yourself to go mad.

I feel like the first two lines are quite straightforward, though they might not appear so on first reading: How could there be a need to feel sad or troubled that I have no like-minded equal. To find a true friend who understands you without need for words, and whom you understand in return, all you need to do is turn to those tales and stories 话中 for people to fill 添 that place.

唐解元 - People like Tang Yin, courtesy name: Bohu 唐寅, 字伯虎 (1470–1524 AD), noted painter, calligrapher and poet of the Ming Dynasty. Tang Yin led a life full of ups and downs that really cannot be covered in a paragraph’s worth of song translation notes. You can check out his wiki page if you’re curious though! There’s a little more on him where I cover the last line of this section. He is addressed as 解元 | jiè yuán here which is the term for the top scorer of the provincial examinations (second stage in the Imperial examination ladder). It is also an honorific for scholars. Tang Bohu is both.

嵇中散 - People like Ji Kang, courtesy name: Shuye 嵇康, 字叔夜, (223–262 AD), one of the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove - a group of friends who wisely kept themselves aloof from the dangerous politics of the Court, and devoted themselves to art, refinement and debate, of the Three Kingdoms period. He was a Daoist philosopher, musician, writer and poet.  

An accomplished musician, the qin composition 廣凌散 | guǎnglíng sàn is attributed to Ji Kang, though some versions of the story claim he learned it from a ghost while stopping at a pavillion on his way home. 嵇中散 was one of the names he was known by because of his appointment to the position of Attendant Counsellor, 中散大夫 | zhōng sàn dàfū, a civil official unspecified duties in the court of Cao Wei.

When Ji Kang was sentenced to death for his attempt to testify for a wrongly accused friend, three thousand scholars petitioned for his pardon to no avail. It’s said that at the execution ground, while they waited for the appointed hour, he had his favourite qin brought out and played a brilliant interpretation of Guanglin San that is now forever lost.

Do go read about them both if you have the time!

I would like to point out for the last line that 任 is to allow, to indulge, and it’s just such a heady sensation to say 任疯癫 - indulge in the madness! throw yourself in and don’t look back!

There is an easter egg here too. A nod to a poem by Tang Yin which can be read as his stance on his lifestyle choice after the alleged accusations of bribery in the final step of the Imperial examinations left him disgraced, and unable to pursue a civil career. Thematically the line does not call back to the poem at all, similarities end with the choice of words: chasing the dream 驰大梦 and indulging madness 任疯癫.  I leave an excerpt below. Translation again by me.

《桃花庵歌》- Song of a Plum Blossom Cottage // 若将花酒比车马 | if tawdriness and wine were compared against fine carriage and steed 他得驱驰我得闲 | he would have to drive and work hard for speed whilst I have my idle rest 别人笑我太疯癫 | others mock me for my madness 我笑他人看不穿 | i am amused for they do not perceive 不见五陵豪杰墓 | can’t you see that at the Emperors’ mausoleums and heroes’ graves 无花无酒锄做田 | there are no flowers, no wine, only land ploughed for farming

The second part of the chorus isn’t related to the first, but it has the same theme of showcasing the untamable (unhinged xD) spirit of the speaker. This time, the people he admires ‘intellectual equals’ and kindred spirits are featured, the 任性 feeling here has been pushed to greater heights.

Chorus Part 3

敢夸洒落何须酒 If one dares to boast of carefreeness, why, they hardly need wine.

不煮黄粱也称仙 Even without brewing millet they would still be called Immortal.

镜湖桌 白梅盏 The tables in the mirror-like lake, white plum blossoms in the cups,

等来春风恰开宴 await the spring breeze which arrives just in time for the feast to start!

Li Bai is regarded as both the god of poetry 诗仙 and god of drunkards wine 酒仙 because he wrote some of his greatest poems while drinking. The first two lines seem to be gently poking fun at that. Like hey, if you dare to claim to be all groovy, surely you have no need for alcohol? Just like how an immortal would still be an immortal without wine, your writing talent should not need any stimulants. This would be the time to mention that 黄粱 | huáng liáng is also known as millet, a type of grain that can be used to brew wine.

洒落 | sǎ luò has a few meanings, like shower down or blame, but the relevant one here would be 洒脱 generous, uninhibited and open. For me it feels similar to 风流 in that there is that ‘free, and exhilaratingly unrestrained’ element. 洒落 is in the most positive sense, being always open to having a good time, but without that dissolute or vaguely whirlwind-romance like connotation of 风流.

It feels like the intensity is letting up a little here - this is a light-hearted and frivolous song all the way through, but the words 洒落, 称仙 and imagery of a clear lake, white plum blossoms and the crisp spring breeze are grounding and sweet. Spirited in a different way from before.

Chorus Part 4

四角天地也醺然 The four corners and heaven and earth are also tipsy,

醉极自有桃李搀 when I’ve overindulged, my students will be there to help.

快意只 笔下讨 Gratification can only be claimed from beneath the brush;

何必诗债换酒钱 is falling into poetry debt worth that money for drink?

New words: 醺然 | xūn rán just means drunk. A new word for me though! 桃李 | táo lǐ is literally peach 桃 and plum 李 (李花, also known as 玉梅) flowers, and is a metaphor for students. The term originates from a story in 《韩诗外传》which was set in the Wei Kingdom of the Spring and Autumn period (771 to 476 BCE). There was once a highly ranked official who was sacked from his post and left for the north. He met another gentleman and remarked that the people he helped before did not lift a finger when he was in need. This person replied that, if someone were to plant peach and plum trees in spring, he could relax under their shade in the Summer and taste their fruit in the Autumn. But if that person were to plant weeds, nothing can be done with their leaves in Spring and there would only be burrs to hurt himself on in Autumn. Clearly the people the unfortunate gentlemen had helped before were not worth his effort. Students ought to be carefully selected and carefully cultivated as one would a tree.

Reading the four corners and heaven and earth 四角天地 are also tipsy 也醺然, I imagine the world sort of spinning around the speaker because he is drunk. But that’s okay, because his students (or the trees xD) will be there to support him.

快意 | kuài yì is the feeling of sudden relaxation, and then lightheartedness and joy. In this line, I felt like the intention would be closer to 畅快，爽快 and so chose gratification, because really writing is like scratching an itch isn’t it? Pleasure from satisfaction of a desire. Phrasing it as 笔下讨 is so very fitting though, because 讨 can be interpreted - somewhat contradicting - as either to demand or to beg. What could be more gratifying than having squeezed out the perfect sentence or word under your figurative pen?

So so so after all that, 何必诗债换酒钱? What do you think, is alcohol worth the poetry debt? Is Mr. Poet actually drunk and about to dig himself a deeper hole of owed poems to get even MORE drunk, or has he just been thinking about it all along? :)

Thoughts

This has been such a fun adventure following our madcap big spender from the shining Chang’an to the inviting Qinhuai, shadow of great poets in tow and all. We’ve done everything from talking to the moon and seeing the sights by her light, to boating down a river, dragging fingers through the water. It was sort of like being on a backpacking tour, except with with someone contemplating opening (or perhaps regretting opening this can of worms?) poetry commissions instead of singing in the streets?

Dear reader, if you’ve reached this point of my post, thank you. I hope you enjoy the song as much as I do now!

[wxldchxld]

Just a friendly reminder that Beck basically doesn’t exist in a legal fashion and I do consider it to be godmodding if your character has information about her upon meeting her unless we’ve explicitly plotted out what your muse knows.

She spends almost all of her time in the wild, with the exception being when she has to go into a town for supplies (sometimes things like draught or other severe weather can keep her from harvesting/catching her own food) or for jobs. In both of these instances Beck is extremely careful around any human settlement to protect herself or the person she’s trying to help. You’re not going to find pictures of her in the background during strange happenings or secret cellphone footage of her shifting in a back alley. She’s too careful for that.

On the off chance anyone does have a photograph of her looking suspicious or doing magic in some way, you won’t have any way to connect it back to anyone else. She’s got no real drivers license, multiple enchantments on her van that keep it from being identified, and the last time she was associated with her legal name was when she was like 13. Even before that, she was homeschooled, never visited a hospital, never arrested. 

Granted you could even get her DNA I don’t think it’d get you far anyway. Maybe on like a vague ancestry test but her entire family is made up of witches every bit as paranoid about people as she is. There wouldn’t be any specific matches that came up.

And finally Beck lies about as much as she breathes. She lies so much that her first instinct is never to tell you her real name. And that’s not even her legal name. She lies about things she doesn’t need to or that don’t matter. It gets to the point in relationships where she has told so many lies that she doesn’t know how to come out with the truth, and that she catches herself in little lies because that’s how she communicates now. She’s just a little too good at fostering a sense of closeness with people based off complete fabrications.

I’m usually pretty happy to plot ways around this. There are very specific circumstances where Beck will tell the truth or will have government info logged on her. For instance in my verse with @justicescreaming where Beck has been arrested and sent to space prison to die, she doesn’t see the point in lying, because she knows she isn’t going to survive anyway. In my verse with @stcriestcld Beck’s employers gave SHIELD a file of information on Beck (though a lot of it is fabricated and there are strict restrictions on what SHIELD is allowed to dig into about it) so walking in people knew what name she went by and that she was a witch. So I’m very happy to work with you, but it can’t be random. It can’t be time skipped. This is a major part of interacting with Beck and if you don’t plot it out with me and make assumptions I will ask you to change them. 

[senorarelojes]

Fic: Precious (4/?)

Title: Precious (4/?) Pairing: Dave/Alan Rating: NC-17 Additional Tags: Mpreg, ABO verse

Summary: "What's wrong with me? Am I sick?" Dave asked.

"No, Mr Gahan," the doctor replied. "You're pregnant."

Part 1 is here. Part 2 is here. Part 3 is here.

.

(It’s something I’m just writing for fun for @pinksyndication so please don’t take it too seriously and don’t click if male pregnancy isn’t your thing, sorry!)

. Alan was very quiet over the next few days as they left Japan, and Dave overheard Martin and Fletch gossiping that Al's pensive mood was most likely due to his explosive break-up with Jeri. Dave was happy to leave them in their mistaken assumption, because he wasn’t ready for anyone else to know the truth yet. Thankfully the Japanese dates were the last of their tour, and they were able to fly back home to the UK for the summer before continuing the second European leg in July.

Dave hadn’t wanted to go home to Basildon, so he let Jo have the flat in Bas while he searched for a new place in London. Alan had suggested that they look for a flat together since he was now technically homeless too, although Dave suspected it was because Alan wanted to be near him and the baby. Ever since he’d learned the news, Alan had been extra attentive to Dave, and he’d insisted on accompanying Dave to all his doctor’s appointments. They’d found an omega specialist on Liverpool Street, and she had the same kind, maternal air as Dr Watanabe, which comforted Dave greatly. She also didn’t seem to recognise either of them, which was a major bonus point.

They finally settled on a flat in Earl’s Court, which was quiet and peaceful, but near enough central London for Alan’s liking. It had two bedrooms, but from the first night onwards they automatically gravitated towards the same bed. Sometimes Dave would wake up in the middle of the night and find Alan watching him pensively, a hand sprawled protectively over Dave’s exposed belly. It then became second nature for both of them to sleep naked, skin to skin. Dave supposed it was one of the biological aspects of mating and bonding.

They still didn’t know whether Alan was an alpha or a beta, since they were preoccupied with the baby. When Dave had suggested that Alan go for a test, he’d simply shrugged before changing the topic to something else. It didn’t seem to be something he was too concerned about.

Over the next two weeks, Dave spent most of his mornings throwing up, then swearing at Alan for knocking him up. Alan took the abuse with good humour and spent his free time studying furniture catalogs so he could babyproof the flat. He brought Dave out to the movies and to eat at restaurants they both liked. “We should make full use of this time,” Alan said, tucking heartily into a plate of cacio e pepe. “Y’know, before you start showing.”

God, Dave didn’t even want to think about that. The pasta now tasted like paper in his mouth, but he kept eating quietly as Alan talked about a fancy new stroller he’d seen in Mothercare.

***

When Dave was eight weeks along, they agreed it was time to tell the others so they could cancel the second leg of their tour. They met with Fletch and Martin at the Mute office in Hammersmith, the four of them chatting in the reception while waiting for Dan to come in. Both Mart and Fletch seemed to assume the meeting was for the purposes of discussing logistics for the upcoming second leg of their European tour. Fletch talked about how he and Grainne were now scouting for flats in London, while Martin mused about possibly moving to Berlin. Alan was somehow able to act normally and participate in the conversation, while Dave just sat on the sofa and wished very desperately for a cigarette. 

Finally Dan arrived, juggling his mail and a takeaway cup of tea as he unlocked his office. “Sorry about that, lads. Come in.”

Dan’s office was an exercise in organised chaos. He had stacks and stacks of unheard demos waiting on his desk, along with letters, faxes and advanced album master copies waiting for him to sign off on them.  Dave took the chair next to Alan’s as Fletch made himself comfortable on the little sofa Dan kept in his office for naps, Martin perching on the arm beside him.

“So.” Dan cocked his head at Dave and Alan. “What’s the agenda for today, then?”

“Wait.” Fletch pointed at the two of them with a frown. “You lot called this meeting? I thought it was Dan.”

“No, it was Dave and I,” Alan said, looking straight at Dan. “We need to talk about cancelling the second leg of the tour.”

Fletch scoffed. “You’re bloody joking.”

“What’s going on?” Martin asked, brows knitted in concern.

“I’m pregnant,” Dave said softly, staring down at Dan’s table. Ironically, it was Vince’s face staring up at him from an Erasure press release.

Fletch and Martin immediately burst into laughter, both of them clutching onto each other in mirth. However, Dan was frowning deeply, his gaze ping-ponging between Alan and Dave. Maybe it was Alan’s grave expression that convinced him, because he was leaning forward, every muscle in his body seemingly taut with tension. “Is this true?” he asked Alan very seriously.

Alan nodded, reaching over to place a hand on Dave’s thigh. Dan looked down at Alan’s hand, then studied Dave again.

Both Fletch’s and Martin’s laughter was dying down. “Oh come on,” Fletch was saying, still smiling. “This is a prank, right?”

“No it’s not a prank,” Alan said. He nodded at Dave, who turned and reached into his bag to pull out the latest report and sonogram from their doctor. Dan took them all, putting on his glasses and studying the reports earnestly as though they were sales figures.

“Get out.” Fletch got to his feet, stomping over to hover over Dan’s shoulder so he could see them for himself. It was only a few moments before Fletch’s face turned paler and paler, his eyes wide and disbelieving. “No fucking way…”

“Wait, it’s real?” Martin jumped up, squeezing himself into the gap between Fletch and Dan so he could see it for himself. After a short while, Martin laughed nervously. “C’mon, this is a forgery, right? Good one, lads.”

Dave stood up in a cold fury. “You can all fuck off,” he snapped before storming out of Dan’s office, slipping on his shades so Suzie the receptionist wouldn’t see him crying. He found himself in the alley downstairs behind Mute’s office, desperately fumbling with a stray packet of cigarettes he’d found hidden in his jacket. He knew Alan would scold him for smoking, but right now he absolutely didn’t give a fuck.

Anyway, it didn’t matter because his hands were trembling too much to light a cigarette. He felt someone gently taking away the cig and his lighter. “Don’t do that.” At least Alan’s quiet voice helped to soothe his nerves.

Dave gave a violent sniffle, grateful that Alan pretended to look away so that Dave could wipe his eyes. “They still up there, thinking it’s a fuckin’ joke?” He was unable to keep the bitterness out of his voice.

Alan shrugged. “Dan’s talking to the two of them. At least Dan believes us, right? It’s honestly a better outcome than I expected.”

Dave eyed him. “What did you expect?”

“To be laughed out of the office,” Alan said simply. He stepped forward, folding his arms around Dave who gratefully accepted his hug.

It wasn’t long before they heard two sets of footsteps. Fletch still seemed to be getting over his shock, while Martin’s face was ridden with guilt. “All right?” Fletch said awkwardly, scuffing at his feet.

“You two came down to laugh at me some more?” Dave said, although there wasn’t much heat in it. Alan was still holding him, which felt really nice and took most of the anger out of him. Dave felt cold when Alan finally let him go.

Fletch’s jaw dropped, while Martin frowned at him and elbowed him meaningfully. “Er no, not at all.” Fletch rubbed the back of his head, the way he always did whenever he felt bad about something. “I mean, it is a lot to take in--”

“Andy,” Martin interjected, raising an eyebrow at Fletch.

“We shouldn’t have laughed,” Fletch admitted. “It was just a big shock, is all.”

“We didn’t know you were an omega,” Martin told Dave gently.

“Neither did I, mate,” Dave said with a sigh. “Only found out in Japan.”

Martin’s eyes widened. “You mean, when you had that food poisoning thing? That was--” Here, he gestured awkwardly at Dave’s belly. Alan nodded for the both of them.

“So what are we gonna do, lads?” Fletch, who always spoke with an air of strident confidence, sounded as lost as Dave felt.

“I don’t know,” Alan said, before rubbing Dave’s back. “But we’ll figure it out, yeah? You two on board with us?”

Martin nodded immediately. Fletch shot him an unsure glance before he gave them a single sharp nod.

It was definitely the best outcome Dave could have hoped for, at least.

[ambidextrousarcher]

Sarcastic StarBharat Reviews- Episode 20: Sarcastic StarBharat Reviews-Episode 20: In which there is a fake war, and Ms. Melodrama becomes angsty.

The review is under the cut. 

Tagging @milesbianmorales @mayavanavihariniharini @medhasree @shaonharryandpannisim @ambitiousandcunning @jigyask @allegoriesinmediasres @hermioneaubreymiachase @avani008 @ratnas-musings @whydoyoucareaboutmyusername @bleedinknight @justahappyreindeer @iamnotthat @chaanv and @ruminationsofaraven

This episode begins with Glitterwash. (I can already tell I’ll rant, like, A LOT) He’s climbing something to the tune of badass yet really irritating music, his bow and arrow in his hands. He touches his bow and arrow to his forehead and then throws the both of them into the river. What is this unnecessary drama for…? There comes a peacock feather and Krishn is picking up the bow from water that’s also populated with lotuses. This lecture is about parents wanting their children to be happy. Scene switches to Ms. Melodrama, clearly the precap scene. Priyamvada’s voice echoes in her mind as she flashes back to her friend telling her that as long as the thread is tied around her wrist, she must not reveal the truth to her husband. Ms. Melodrama thinks that she must be wholly devoted to her husband, and hiding secrets lessens it. (Ah. They are turning even Kunti into a doormat, I see. I thought it was just for uwu Glitterwash’s sake they did that, but no, they are ruining her whole character) She resolves to tell him the truth. Honey Boy enters the chambers as she unties the thread. She twists the thread in her hands as the camera pans on Honey Boy as he walks to Ms. Melodrama. “Kunti,” he says, smiling and taking a brooch out, “This choodamani symbolizes her husband to a woman, by wearing it in her hair, she assigns her husband the highest position in her life,” He pauses, “but I do not approve of this. I’ll put it in your hair as a symbol of love and trust.” (Erm, experienced people, please tell me whether this choodamani thing existed in real life or not.) Also, uh, why is Honey Boy so soft? IDK. StarBharat universe, I guess. He struggles to put the brooch in her hair. “Handling a women’s hair seems to be harder than running a Kingdom,” Dude. You haven’t run the Kingdom yet. The one meeting I saw, your Drama Queen brother walked out on you, and your Tathshree did what else he could. That’s it. “You have the aid of your ministers to run your Kingdom, Maharaj,” she says. “But my hair is yours alone to decorate.” Ahhh. Help! Anyway, he manages to set the hairpin right. “May I say something?” he asks. “I really liked the question you asked in the Swayamvar.” Uh, what canon fail was the Swayamvar again? Let me check…ah, yeah. Canon fail #33. “I was lost. I wished that moment itself that my answer to your question should be the right one.” Okay, non-existent questions aside, let’s move on, or so I hope. Obviously, we can’t be that lucky. She says, “The moment I saw you, I too wished that you would answer my question from your heart.” “Did you want to test my intelligence or my heart?” Oh, my, Lord and Lady of Cheesy Lines! “A person tests only that he wishes to acquire,” she replies. “You’re amazing, you managed to test my heart and win it with merely one question!” “A king should not lose his heart so quickly. The worth of the person asking for the King’s heart must also be tested.” “Are you doubting my selection, or are you flaunting your talent?” Okay, I have a question. Just who wrote such cringe lines, dude? “I was just telling you something. Justice should be decided by you.” “My married friends say that a man testing his wife is himself tested.” Er…how do I make sense of this? “So I am give another test? Tell me. What is the matter?” “I wanted to say…” starts Ms. Melodrama, starting to drop the black thread on the floor. Just at that moment, drums start beating. Both of them turn. “What is this?” asks Honey Boy. “Whose message is it at this time?” “What is it?” asks Ms. Melodrama. “The beat of the drums conveys a message. I’m sure it’s a serious matter. I should go to the sabha.” Ms. Melodrama looks forlornly as he leaves. Scene switches to the sabha. “You cannot go for a battle immediately! You have just been married.” Satyavati clearly wants to protect her grandson. “My duty comes before personal pleasure.” Ladies and gentlemen, here’s an example of ‘it’s easy to say, hard to do,’ as this guy literally dies because he pursues his pleasure AFTER BEING TOLD EXPLICITY that nope, dude, you’ll die if you do. I’m sure this isn’t canon, either. But if it is…well, he actually does die pursuing his pleasure. The dialogue continues. “If there is an opportunity for war, then it is my duty to take it.” “I can deploy the soldiers for war. For a King, no battle is his last” This is Bhishm. Um, a question? What if a King dies in battle? Maybe that doesn’t happen in the StarBharat verse. Mr. Drama Queen intercedes here. “However, the first battle remains the first.” (Wait, this is Pandu’s first war? His sons were way younger, then…when they warred for the first time.) “The people would be doubtful about the caliber of the new King, Taathshree. Pandu has to exhibit his strength as soon as he can. Forgive me, Taathshree, but I believe so. For all that I might be blind, I know how to fight a battle.” You know, I think canon Dhritrashtra may be as whiny as this guy, but not so publicly. And that’s where they failed his character. “I’ll go myself.” He finishes. Honey Boy, not to be outdone, says, “Jyeshth Bhraata is right, Taathshree. To help the King of Madra is our duty. Whoever has warred on Madra has done thinking that I am a new King, and newly married. Hence, I would have neither the courage nor the inclination to help Madra. The enemy wants to test me, and I will definitely give that test.” This is said to the sweeping BGM of the title song. Hang on, this seems suspiciously like canon fail #44. I don’t recall Madra needing to be rescued, in fact, I actually recall something along the lines of Bhishm paying Shalya Madri’s bride price and bringing her home. (Correct me if I am wrong.) Also, here we come to canon fail #45. Er…aren’t Madra and Kururashtra separate? I don’t think they both fall under Pandu’s jurisdiction. Nor do they seem exactly allied yet. Kururashtra is hardly the samrat of a Rajasuya right now, that honor goes to Indraprastha very late in the future. “Have you thought about Kunti?” interjects Satyavati. “She will be heartbroken! What answer will you give her?” Everyone looks tense. Scene switches to Ms. Melodrama, pacing her room anxiously. She whirls when Honey Boy enters, striding to him. “What happened, husband? Is it grave news?” “The same news that delights one can be grave for the other.” Why is this guy pontificating right now, really? “A husband and wife are not two different people, they are one. What is good news for you is good news for me, too.” Oh, this I expected from Ms. Melodrama. “An allied Kingdom has been attacked. I have to leave for war, right now. Rajmata and Taathshree said that someone else can go with the army but I told them that this duty is the King’s. I will go on war myself. I should have asked you for advice before I took this decision, but…” “No, husband. You have taken a decision worthy of a King. If the King of Hastinapur took any other decision, I would have lost hope.” “I know that the Queen would be happy, but I want to know my wife’s heart. If you are angry at me, then you have the right, Kunti.” She turns away from him. “A lunar eclipse happens only to the full moon. Yet, after the eclipse, the same moon is brighter and more beautiful. I will wait for you. When will you leave?” Um, you’re not supposed to be that poetic! “Right now. This instant. If I so wish, I could spend the night with you, Kunti, but that would be myself succumbing to a weakness. And when one succumbs once, he is weak for the rest of his life.” High sounding words for a guy who literally dies of his weakness for Madri. But hey, perhaps he has no idea of that weakness.

“I want to be your strength, husband, I will not be your weakness. I too am a Queen. You will return victorious, I believe in you.” She does an aarti of him, but halts before she applies the tilak. “Do you want to say something, Kunti? Tell me if there is anything in your heart.” “No, husband. My heart only carries prayers for you. May you always be victorious. I will be waiting for you.”  Damn. This much sweetness…I can’t. He leaves, yet turns back once to look yearningly at Kunti, this is giving me Arjun/Draupadi vibes, but no, they are not like that, Pandu and Kunti, as far as I know. They nod at each other with smiles. This reminds me of the whole scene where the Pandavas are arrested in the future, and Arjun tries to convince Panchali to leave for Kampilya, but she shakes her head and he nods, both near tears. (Okay, this is Nila being Arjun-mad as usual, but it is kind of a foil scene.) He leaves. Outside, the army waits, crying out “Har har Mahadev!” Kunti and Pandu lock eyes for a moment as they exchange nods once more and he says “Depart!”, leaving with the army. Ms. Melodrama, of course, is crying. The scene flashes forward a few months. Ms. Melodrama is waiting for Honey Boy to return, of course in tears. Ms. Always Patnidharma touches her shoulder, giving her a lecture in Patnidharma. “Forgive me, sister, I did not want to hurt any of you by my behavior.” “Why have you stopped eating then?” What? This is canon fail #46. Kunti is a warrior maiden, a mother of warriors. She does not do shit like this, I’m sure. This is meant to be a Mahabharata retelling, not yet another abala nari thing. “What else can I do? Before, we got messages, now even that is not coming.” “If there is no news, it means that there is no news worth giving, that’s all. But it also means that there’s no bad news.” “I thirst to hear the sound of the drums.” Ah! So much sappiness, even I can’t deal with it. If you want to write angst, write believable angst, guys, please!  “Believe in the King,” says Ms. Always Patnidharma. Of course, at that exact moment, because this serial is the most clichest ever, the drums start beating. The episode ends to the tune of dramatic BGM. Precap: “Maharaj Pandu has triumphed over his enemies in the war.” Vidur announces, while Honey Boy himself is galloping towards Hastina in a chariot. “Rajmata,” continues Vidur, “The King of Madra has made Maharaj Pandu his son-in-law.” Canon fail, this, remember? Scene switches to Ms. Melodrama standing in the entrance of the palace to welcome Honey Boy, as Madri makes her entry from behind the King. Oh, and if anyone was wondering why the unexplained hiatus happened yet again, it was because I kept dropping off at how boring this episode was, really. Maybe things have the potential to look up soon, let’s hope.

[mobius-prime]

260. Sonic the Hedgehog #191

Metal and Mettle (Part 1)

Writer: Ian Flynn Pencils: Tracy Yardley! Colors: Josh Ray

A few days after Scourge and the Suppression Squad have taken control of Freedom HQ, Miles alerts Scourge to an interesting and unexpected visitor - namely, Metal Sonic, through whom Eggman is speaking and watching.

Yeah, don't underestimate a fellow evildoer, Scourge. Meanwhile in New Mobotropolis, Sonic and Knuckles stand before the Council of Acorn to try to get permission to take the base back. Unfortunately for them, the council votes four to two to leave it for the time being, as they don't see Scourge as that big of a threat, and want to focus on taking New Megaopolis from Eggman before going after smaller holdings. Sonic, of course, does not take this well, and tries to talk to Knuckles about it once they exit the building.

Oh, Knuckles. You have to stop angsting about this, my dude. Sonic leaves the city on his own, musing as he races back to Freedom HQ about how despite their recent successes in battle, and many gains against Eggman and his forces, he can't help a strange feeling that overall they're losing ground. He hopes that kicking Scourge out of the base will cheer him up, but is brought up short by the sight of Scourge and Metal Sonic battling it out on the grass outside. Miles stands nearby watching, and not-so-subtly tests Scourge's leadership by asking if he wants help against Metal, as surely the others helping him would only be an insult since he conquered his planet on his own. Sonic, uninterested in any of the politics, merely barrels in to help, offering Scourge a truce to take Metal out, but Scourge angrily refuses, and both he and Metal turn on Sonic to attack. Meanwhile, Julie-Su finds Knuckles brooding on a bench in the park, and when she presses to know what's bothering him he snaps, yelling that he can't trust himself or anyone else, as no matter what he does, someone always ends up hurt, and he can't bear to face the few remaining members of his family. Julie-Su reaches for him, looking at first like she's going to comfort him, but then…

I mean, all things considered, Julie-Su, you make a fantastic point. Your family's loss has been largely glossed over until now - I don't think she was even given a single panel before now to mourn the deaths of her foster parents, despite how delighted she was to rediscover them before - and as you point out, it's not like Knuckles is suffering alone. Back at Freedom HQ, the fight continues, with Eggman telling Metal to hang in there as he's putting the "finishing touches" on some backup. Sonic and Scourge briefly wind up fighting each other without Metal's interference, during which Sonic criticizes Scourge for taking his advice to better himself to a brutal, negative extreme. Scourge merely mocks Sonic's restraint, pointing out how much more powerful he is as a king than as a hero.

Ooh, dramatic parallels to their prior talk! I love it! Metal interrupts before Sonic can respond, and as the fight continues once more we move this time to Angel Island, where Knuckles is having a talk with Archimedes while Charmy sits nearby.

So something that needs to be pointed out is that inexplicably, this is Archimedes' last appearance in the comic, ever. Unlike all the other characters who have disappeared from the comic, there's no reason given - no genocide, no dimensional portal to swallow him up, no deaths or sudden decisions to leave and find himself on another continent, nothing. He just… never shows up again. It's disappointing, as y'all know how much I like Archimedes, but again I really do think this stems from Ian's weird, irritating habit of erasing a lot of Kenders' contributions to this world. I know that he's trying to make the comic's world more like the games, and that in the games, Knuckles is the last echidna and isn't embroiled in all these politics, but dammit, there's nothing wrong with comic Knuckles being so different from game Knuckles! Personality-wise, he's still similar, still recognizable, it's just his circumstances that are different. Then again, maybe I shouldn't be blaming Ian for all of this - for all I know, Sega themselves ordered him to get rid of all of this stuff. I dunno, man, I'm just some random fan with a blog. Speaking of controversial decisions by Ian, though, it's nice to see him doing his best to treat Charmy's brain damage with respect here. He certainly acts more childlike than he once did, but he's doing his best, and isn't a punchline, still actively participating in missions and helping Knuckles sort his own problems out.

Anyway, Knuckles, encouraged by his mentor's words, uses his warp ring to head back to the city, where he and Julie-Su give a curt apology to each other with an agreement to sort things out more fully later, when he's had more time to work through his emotional distress. They consider heading to Freedom HQ to help Sonic, but Knuckles believes that Sonic can most likely handle the situation on his own. Of course, we know better - Sonic might be able to take on Scourge or Metal individually, but both at once is a real challenge. He kicks Metal aside, only to be startled by the sight of another robot coming to join the fray - a robot that looks exactly like Scourge. Wow, Eggman, you really didn't waste any time on that one, huh? How many Metal Sonics do you think he has lying around in his base just ready for a paint job and a new assignment?

Though there's another story in this issue, we won't be covering it. Why? Well, it's the first real installment of "In Another Time, In Another Place"! I've mentioned it before, but it's basically what Ian decided to do when it was clear he couldn't keep putting in half-adaptions of random games anymore, but still needed to do tie-ins for newly-released games. With the pattern we've been taking with these tie-ins lately, you'd think this one would be for Sonic '06, but nope! For whatever reason, Sonic '06 goes completely unacknowledged within the comic verse (at least for now), with the sole exception of Shadow joining up with GUN. However, as I've mentioned before, Ian did state somewhere along the way that Sonic '06 did in fact happen somewhere during the course of the comic's plotline - it's just that due to the very nature of the game's story, the events of the plot are entirely reset and erased from the timeline at the end, meaning an adaption doesn't even have to take place, as technically, even though those events did happen, they also… didn't.

But all that aside, the tie-in in today's issue is actually for the little-remembered DS title, Sonic Chronicles: The Dark Brotherhood, which was an RPG developed by Bioware of all companies (and yes, they did include one of their trademark Bioware romance sidequests, though it's probably of little interest to anyone who doesn't ship Sonamy). While again, we're not covering it due to it being non-canon, it's an important thing to note regardless. For one, these In Another Time, In Another Place installments became pretty commonplace throughout the comic as new games were released, but perhaps more importantly, this was the game that apparently really got under Kenders' skin. The problem is that after all he'd done to develop the world of the echidnas and all the political and military factions thereof, this game's plot ended up heavily centering around a band of echidnas in dark armor emerging from a parallel dimension where time moves more slowly, with an intent to take the Master Emerald and use it to cement their place of power in the real world once more, though one female echidna realizes the error of her people's ways and abandons her army to side with Knuckles against her megalomaniacal and powerful male leader. Gee, sound familiar? While I don't believe that Bioware or Sega actually copied Kenders' ideas outright - the way I've described it makes it sound similar, but there's a ton of differences in the plot and presentation that definitely indicate they're two different ideas by different people - Kenders certainly seems to think it's a rip-off, and this was from what I understand at the core of all his problems with Sega that led to his eventual lawsuit that forced the reboot of the comic. It sucks, too, because even aside from losing all the years of history in the preboot, the plot of Sonic Chronicles was actually quite fascinating and it ended on a cliffhanger, which will never, ever be resolved because Sega doesn't even want to touch that can of worms after everything that happened. I think the game has actually been quietly stricken from canon, too, because the cliffhanger literally involved Eggman having taken over the world while everyone was away, and there's just no way to solve something like that offscreen. Just a bad time all around, folks. As they say in the fandom - thanks, Ken Penders. Still, though, we have quite a ways to go before we hit the preboot's end, so let's forget about the negative stuff and keep trucking on.

[bngtanah]

The Difference Between Boys & Girls | o6 (m)

summary: Sam & Erin are university students who share a cheap one bedroom apartment above a shitty takeaway restaurant. Due to the limited space, they’ve grown accustomed to sharing just about everything, including the occasional kiss.

pairing: Jung Hoseok (Samuel Park) feat. Park Jimin (Brian Yi)  x Named OC characters: meet the cast.

genre: angst, smut, fluff word count: 6.5k+ chapters: o1| o2| o3| o4| o5| o6| o7| o8| o9| 10| 11| 12| 13| 14 warning: smut, cunnilingus, fingering, boyfriend!hoseok, jealous!hoseok, painter!jimin, friends to lovers trope, college au, angst, sexual themes, slow burn

a/n: still a fool. still reuploading.

Erin's fingertips moved furiously over the keyboard of her laptop and her head bopped along in time to the loud music playing in her earphones. She had less than a week to prepare for her final two exams of the year and to say that she had been procrastinating doing so was a gross understatement. Between Brian and well.... really Brian was the only thing truly distracting her from completely focusing on her schoolwork. She was used to Sammy's intrusions and often studied around his periodic outbursts but Erin hadn't quite figured out how to balance out studying and showing her boyfriend his due attention.

Boyfriend.

The term still seemed weird to her, and it had only been one day since Brian acquired it. Erin assumed that was natural since they were still in the early stages of getting to know one another. His asking her to be his girlfriend was just a formal agreement that she wouldn't attempt to get to know someone else at the same time. At least that's how Erin looked at it, then again her views of dating were always a little strange compared to others.

"Noona!"

Erin heard her name being summoned for the fifth time that night, this time the '-ah' was drawn out so long Erin thought he might run out of breath and pass out. He didn't, of course, but the yelling and general noise making didn't stop when Erin ignored her roommate and continue with her work. Erin didn't know what he was calling her for but she was fairly certain that there was no way it was more important that what she was doing, he would tire himself out eventually and then Erin could look forward to a peaceful night of reading and essay writing. At least so she thought.

"I know, you're my saviour" Erin heard the words of the song she was playing echoed in her left ear and the heat of Samuel's body pressed against her side momentarily before he disappeared behind her. 

"I know some pleasure" The next verse was repeated in Erin's right ear and again she ignored him, her eyes remaining glued to the screen.

It wasn't until she felt a pair of strong arms wrap tightly around her shoulders and Sam's chin rest on her shoulder that Erin finally stopped typing and groan loudly in frustration. 

"Park Sang-Min! I swear to god I will punch you in the throat, what the hell do you want?" Erin asked in an exasperated tone as she spun around to glare at the face of a child who had just been scolded.

"Come out with me."

"Are you kidding me? I don't have time to joke around with you right now, Sammy."

"I am completely serious. You've been tearing over these books and printouts the whole day, you need a break." Samuel said softly and released Erin from his hold.

"I can't do that, if I don't pass both of these exams then I won't graduate and I am not going through another year of this."

"You know these textbooks better than the back of your hand and you're just going to burn yourself out if you don't take a little break sometime."

Erin exhaled harshly and pressed a hand against her forehead, she was feeling a little drained and the words she was reading were beginning to blur together indecipherably.

Maybe Sammy was right. 

"Just a tiny little break okay?" Erin clarified, making it apparent that she had no intentions of leaving their apartment.

"A small, minuscule break." Her roommate reassured.

This definitely was not a small, little break.

Erin wasn't even sure how it happened, one second she was fighting Sam on taking a few shots in their kitchen and the next thing she knew they were both three shots of tequila deep and on their way out the door in search of a place to dance and hopefully drink more.

And drink they did, Erin more so than Samuel which was the usual. Apparently she needed to blow off more steam than she originally thought.

As the night wore on Samuel began feeling less and less intoxicated, and one guy had the misfortune of getting too hands-y with his roommate, which made the amused smirk he was wearing while watching Erin float around the dance floor fall into an angry glare. 

Erin was clearly drunk and the sleazy vultures in the bar picked up on it, targeted her, and moved in to pick her apart, entice her to the nearest exit with the promise of a good time. Samuel figured they had already had their fun for the night and it was time to go.

He gripped Erin's arm to make her look at him. "Let's go home."

The drunk man she was subtly trying to avoid dancing with didn't seem too happy about the interruption. He opened his mouth to complain, but Samuel cut him off.

"Fuck off."

"Who the fuck you think you're talking to?"

"No one," Sam dismissed him and tugged Erin upwards.

"Yah," The stranger exclaimed and reached for Erin's other arm.

Sam moved to step in between them, his jaw square. "Let. Her. Go." Sam wasn't exactly a threatening figure, but he knew he could handle himself in a fight if it came to that.

Luckily the guy had the foresight to see that this confrontation was not worth the possibility of him getting hurt. "Whatever," he huffed and smartly walked away.

Erin and Samuel shuffled to another part of the bar.

She was piss drunk and yet her watery, red streaked eyes still sparkled when Samuel looked at her. "You were going to fight that guy?"

"Maybe," Sam shrugged and silently checked their surroundings, making sure that the douchebag didn't round up any of his friends to attempt to jump them later.

"Aigoo, Sammy you love me," Erin slurred.

"More than you know," Sam grinned.

"Can we dance to one more song?"

"No."

"Please, Sammy. It was your idea to come out anyway."

Erin pouted but Samuel managed to fortify himself against her full bottom lip, refusing to crack.

"It's late and both of us have to work in the morning."

Erin was full on scowling at this point but didn't fight as Sam led her to the entrance and then both of them were outside, taking in the chilly air.

"You weren't having any fun?" she hiccuped.

"I stopped having fun about two shots ago. But hey, you were drinking enough for the both of us."

Erin giggled again and leaned her head fully against Samuel's side.

Three hard drinks were her limit and Erin knew that. Tonight she was definitely testing her liver and kidneys' ability to break down the components of tequila, rum, and god knows what else.

"My feet hurt," she whined.

Sam stopped in the middle of the sidewalk and leaned down "Get on."

It took three tries before Erin could climb on his back. She snickered uncontrollably the entire time.

"My ass is showing. I can feel it," Erin laughed.

Sam joined in too. He always found her adorable when she was sober, but drunk Erin was ten times worse.

"I need you to promise me we'll always be this close, Sammy."

"Of course we will."

"Even after I tell you that Brian asked me to be his girlfriend?"

Samuel paused for half a second but kept moving forward, pretending that her revelation hadn't bothered him at all. "Why would that make us not close?"

"I know you don't like him."

Samuel chuckled silently, and without humour, nothing got past his best friend. 

"That's not true, I just didn't want you to get hurt. If you like him and he treats you well, then that's good enough for me." He lied.

"I think I really do like him" Erin mused and pressed her cheek against Samuel's.

"Great."

After hitching her higher along his back several times because she kept slipping, Sam and Erin finally made it back to their apartment. Erin was singing about riding a surfboard and drinking watermelon and Samuel had no clue what she was talking about.

He dumped her momentarily on the couch and headed to the kitchen to get her a glass of water. Her cell phone was buzzing since she had forgotten it on the kitchen counter. Samuel looked at the name on the screen, looked at Erin, then back at the screen, and hit the ignore button. She was in no condition to talk to anyone at the moment.

Brian could leave her a message as far as Sammy was concerned. It wasn't too late, but late enough to be considered booty call hours by his standards.

With the glass of water in his hands Sam strolled back to the living room only for Erin's phone to start ringing once again.

"Is my phone ringing?"

"Ignore it."

"It could be important."

"It's not," Sam handed her the glass which she accepted but only drank a tiny sip. "Finish it."

Erin's brown eyes darkened, and she glared up at him, but chugged the water anyway and thrust the empty glass back against Sam's chest.

"Why aren't you drunk?" Erin curled up on the couch.

"I know my limits." he laughed "Why were you determined to get wasted?"

"I thought that's what we went out to do. Don't question me right now, my head hurts."

"Come on," Sam pulled her up. "You need to get to bed."

Erin stumbled into her room, mumbling incoherently, and tossed herself on the mattress then began fumbling around with hem of her top. She was having trouble realizing that it needed to be unbuttoned and not pulled over her head.

Without any more questions, Sam squatted downward and helped Erin unbutton her blouse, pushed the fabric off her shoulders, and dropped it on the floor. His eyes moved over her lacy camisole long enough to realize that she wasn't wearing a bra and his cheeks flushed a deep shade of pink when he felt the need to kiss her flare up within him once again.

Instinctively his tongue peeked out to moisten his bottom lip and when his gaze finally fell back on Erin's face, he saw a distinctive look in her eyes.

It was the same look she had given him all those years ago on his graduation night. The kind of look that led to clothes coming off and body parts being caressed and fondled. That look. 

Immediately Sam clamored to his feet and put a space between them. "You should get some rest, noona. I'll see you in the morning."

Sam was out the door and on the couch before Erin could say anything, even just suggesting that he sleep with her that night like they had many times before. If she had, Sam wasn't sure if he'd been able to turn her down, say no. It was different when she was relatively single and he had the option of stealing her attention away from a guy she'd been out with just a few times, but there were labels involved now and Samuel finally caught on to just how stupid he was for waiting so long to say anything.

Erin felt like crap. The second she woke up she was overcome with the feeling of monkeys playing bongos on her temples and every bone in her body that could ache did. A long drawn-out groan left her lips as she tried and failed to get out of bed, the sun was already high in the sky and she was positive that this was the latest she’d ever woken up since her first year of university. The palm of her hand rested as gently as it could on the side of her temple as she did her best to push herself upward and out of her sheets. 

The worst part of this was that she couldn’t even remember why she was in so much pain. Erin was positive that she spent the night in her apartment so what could have gotten her so unbelievably wasted? The last thing she remembered was sitting in the living room begging Sammy to leave her alone and let her study.

Ah, Sammy.

If anyone would know why her head was currently doing gymnastics, he would.

"Sammy," Erin said hoarsely as she shuffled out into the living room, but she was met with a silence which was unusual because Samuel was never silent. 

"Sam!" She called again but once she got to the couch, she realized that he wasn't answering her because he wasn't home. There were only two places he could be so early in the day and Erin knew he didn't have any classes that day, so he must have been at work. A few seconds after the word 'work' popped into her head Erin's eyes bulged open and she sprinted back towards her room to grab her cell phone.

How could she have forgotten that she was covering for someone today?

Erin scolded to herself as she tore around the room looking for her cell. Once it was in hand, she wasted no time in checking her voice mails, three were from her supervisor and none of them were pleasant. One was from Brian but she didn't have time to check that or the messages he'd sent her, her only priority for now was getting ready for work as quickly as possible while she still had a job.

Erin was showered and dressed in a flash, her hair slapped up into a messy bun and just a dab of BB cream slathered over her face before she dashed towards the door. As her hand grabbed the knob to twist it open something taped to the peephole caught her attention and made her stop for just a moment.

Erin-Ah ^-^~ You're going to be late today, I should have woken you up before I left but you looked so peaceful drooling into your pillow. I know you won't read your phone this morning so I'm leaving you this note. Try not to stress out too much I know how you think but you know they won't fire you over this, you've never been late before. Have a good day!!! Work hard!!!! I'm rooting for you!!

Love, Sammy. P.S. When you get home there's something I really need to talk to you about.

Erin smiled and folded the note up to place in her jacket pocket, she always loved receiving these hand-written notes from her roommate whenever they missed each other in the morning time. Her mind traveled as she made her was out of her building onto the sidewalk, wondering what he could need to talk about that couldn't be mentioned in the letter but Erin came up blank. Unless something happened last night that she didn't remember, maybe she did something embarrassing when they went out. Or something embarrassing when they got home? She didn't puke on him did she? And even if she had would that warrant a discussion?

Erin settled somewhat once she finally got into a cab and started on her way further into the city. She was about ten minutes away from her job when a muddled memory buzzed her conscious; she remembered being on her bed with Sammy kneeling in front of her unbuttoning her top and tossing it aside. She remembered wanting to feel his lips against hers among other things and then...

Nothing.

Erin tapped her hand against her head in an attempt to jog her memory but that proved to be an idiotic idea since it made her headache even worse. That couldn't have been the last thing she remembered if it was then all signs were pointing to the fact that she may have made a very stupid decision last night and she couldn't even remember it.

She wanted to call Sammy and put her mind at ease before she got to work but before she could unlock her phone, she was in the front of her office building and preparing to shuffle her way inside. Her supervisor seemed to be waiting for her once she reached her floor and it took nearly half an hour to explain why she was late and get her supervisor to leave her alone before she could start working. Every step sent shock waves of pain throughout Erin's body and it didn't help that everyone needed her to do some mindless task for them that day. The menial things took so much energy out of her that she actually had to stop and take a breather while she was making copies.

This was definitely going to be a rough day.

Erin had managed to make it all the way to her lunch break without barfing or cursing someone out for standing too close to her and she was rewarding herself by taking a breather on the rooftop garden her boss maintained. It was freezing outside but the cold and coffee she sipped were keeping her awake.

Her phone buzzed in her pocket and the corner of Erin's lips turned up into a smirk. She knew exactly who it was before she checked. She had managed to send Brian a quick text apologizing for ignoring his messages from last night and this morning. Erin choked on the small sip of coffee when she opened the message and rested the cup on the ground next to her. 

Brian had sent her a selfie, a shirtless one. At 12:30 in the afternoon. Erin returned the favor by sending him a selfie of with her jaw dropped open.  It only took a few seconds for him to call her back.

"I want to hear the noise you made."

Erin laughed, honestly happy to hear his voice even if he was being indecent in the middle of the day. 

"Who said I made a noise? Maybe that was me being disgusted."

"Don't lie to me, Erin."

She chuckled softly and threw her head back, a bad idea since she immediately began wincing.

"You left me speechless, Brian." Erin groaned and rubbed her temples

"Your face does that to me every time I see it."

Erin groaned louder smiled even wider, if that was possible, and pressed her hands against her cheeks to cool down the heat that was caused by Brian's words.

"Brian I am at work," Erin said in a warning tone even though she was beyond amused.

"I know, I know," He laughed "I just missed talking to you...Hey, are you busy tonight?"

"I shouldn't be,"

"Good, because I'm making you dinner."

"Aw, Bria-" Erin's words were cut off by the beeping of her phone to signify that her lunch break was over and she had to get back to work.

"Sorry I have to go, I'll see you tonight?"

"Ah, I won't keep you, work hard. See you tonight."

It only took a few minutes for Erin to get ready and leave her empty apartment, she didn't know where Sammy was but there was no time to figure it out.

Judging by the address he sent her Brian lived about half an hour away from Erin's apartment and she fretted the entire taxi ride there. She was feeling miles better than she did this morning but it was also the first time Brian had ever invited her to his place and Erin had so many questions.

When the cab rolled to a stop in front of a slightly run down building Erin almost didn't get out of the car. The neighborhood didn't look unsafe, but it definitely didn't seem like a place Erin wanted to wander around alone. It wasn't until she saw Brian standing outside waiting for her, looking cold but still so attractive with the long sleeves of his shirt pulled over his hands, that Erin released the breath she was holding in.

Erin tossed her fare in the driver's direction and quickly exited out onto the sidewalk.

"Sorry I’m late!" She said once she was close enough and Brian turned to look at her like she had just descended from heaven.

"Don't worry about it, you look beautiful."

His arms were around her waist, pulling Erin's body close to his own and lips pressed against Erin's in no time. She felt her frigid body melt against his despite the cold and Erin returned his kiss with vigor, her arms encircling his neck and fingertips playfully threading through his hair. One would think they hadn't seen each other in weeks, not two days.

"I hope you're hungry" Brian murmured against Erin's lips once he'd finally stopped ravishing her mouth.

"I hope you can cook."

Her reply garnered a sincere laugh from Brian as he led her inside his apartment.

As it turned out he actually owned the entire building and left the outside as is because he enjoyed the worn look of it. The majority of the space was occupied by a makeshift studio where Erin presumed that he spent most of his time painting, there was a small corner where a kitchen had been built and another where a loft bedroom was built with an office underneath it.

Tonight there was a single table set up in the middle of the floor with two place settings and a candle between them.

Erin gasped softly when she walked inside and sight came into full view, complete with fairy lights to gently illuminate them as they sat.

"Brian this is beautiful," She stated softly as he took her coat from her.

"Do you like it?"

"I love it,"

"I'm so relieved, I was worried you would think it's cheesy," He said shyly before motioning for her to take a seat.

Erin giggled "It is a little cheesy, but in a nice way."

Brian ignored her teasing and pressed his lips to her temple before moving to the kitchen to grab dinner.

"Can I ask what you made tonight?" 

"You could, but I might not tell you."

"Okay~ I just hope it's edible."

Brian guffawed.

"Why do you think I can't cook?" he asked as he walked back towards Erin with two plates of pasta in his hands.

"I don't know that many men that can really cook. I mean Sammy can make ramyun but that doesn't require much skill, I asked him to make me kimchi fried rice once, and we almost had to call the fire department."

Brian smiled, but mentally began his tally on how many times Erin was going to mention her roommate's name that night. It was a game he began torturing himself with on their first date and he was always the loser.

"Well, it's not ramyun but I hope you like fettuccine," he said with a playful wink as he set down a plate in front her Erin before taking a seat on the other side of the table.

Erin grinned and took a quick bite of the dish then looked at Brian in disbelief  "This is really good," she said as if she didn't believe her own words.

Brian responded with a prideful smile and a slight bow of his head.

"So, how was your day?" Erin asked while twirling more pasta on her fork.

"Nerve wrecking."

"Why?"

"I had four meetings lined up with potential buyers and every time I tried to explain the inspiration behind one of my pieces, it was like I forgot how to talk," he laughed. "My mind was too preoccupied on getting everything perfect for tonight."

Erin blushed, offering her boyfriend a shy smile "I hope I didn't cost you a sale."

"No, I managed to make up something eventually three of the buyers are coming to pick up paintings tomorrow."

"Good, because I had no intentions of paying you back."

They shared a good-natured laugh and returned to eating, a pleasant conversation soon flowing between them. Erin told Brian about her difficult day at work and the night out she'd shared with Sammy which caused her difficult day at work. She conveniently forgot to mention the possible ending of their night out, not because she wasn't riddled with guilt over the possibility that she may have cheated on Brian so soon into their relationship. But because she didn't know for a fact that she had cheated on him, she could still only remember bits and pieces from the night before and there was no definitive proof that anything happened between them other than Erin's overactive imagination and hopeful wish fulfillment. Sammy had helped her get dressed and undressed when she wasn't able to do it herself multiple times before, that memory of him removing her shirt could have been totally platonic. 

"Well, Erin?"

Brian's voice made Erin stop day dreaming Sammy and focus her gaze on him, he must have asked her a question but Erin obviously wasn't paying attention.

"I'm sorry, what did you say?"

"Do you want dessert? I bought a cake but I wasn't sure if you'd still be hungry,"

"Oh, yes I would love dessert! Let me help you with the dishes,"

Erin quickly stood up and began stacking their plates together even though Brian protested, she ignored him and followed as he moved to the kitchen to grab the cake out of the refrigerator. Erin dumped the dishes in the sink and glanced over at Brian as he started unboxing his store bought cake, brown eyes roamed over the profile of his face and down to the subtle veins that exposed themselves in his neck when one of the tags holding the box gave him some trouble. She smirked gently when he finally did get it open and his biceps flexed underneath his tight white shirt, had his shirt always been that tight? Before she stopped herself Erin's eyes were moving downward and shamelessly she ogled his tight ass when he turned to grab a knife and fork from a nearby drawer. 

She got caught staring when Brian looked back at her over his shoulder and when their eyes met he raised a brow and shot Erin a seductive smirk.

"Pervert," he said playfully and pulled Erin near to him by a hook on her jeans.

"You're an artist, you should be able to understand wanting to appreciate a masterpiece," She replied with a chuckle and leaned back against the counter.

Brian grinned and shook his head, moving to stand in front of her and placed both of his hands on either side of her body.

"Nice save, but you're still a pervert- open,"

"I can live with that" Erin answered as she held her mouth ajar and Brian fed her a small piece of cake before taking a bite himself. "Are you going to feed me the whole cake? Because I don't think I have the self-control to stop you" Erin joked as she prepared for another forkful.

“I could do that" Brian answered and pulled the prongs of the fork from between Erin's parted lips. “But I’d prefer to do this,"  His strong arm slipped around her waist and hugged her tightly to his chest, leaning in to softly press his lips against her throat.

Erin giggled softly as Brian hugged her tightly in his arms and nibbled on the skin of her neck. They hadn't been dating for an exceptionally long time but it seemed like Brian knew just how to touch Erin to make her senses go haywire. Though it didn't really take much. A soft kiss to her neck, a firm grip on her thigh, even his chest pushing against hers got her aroused. She grasped his side, tugging gently on his shirt, pulling him closer against her. 

“You sure you want to do that?” Erin teased, running her hand under his shirt and grazing her fingertips over his hard abs making Brian's lips curl up in a warm smile against her throat.

He answered her taunt by abandoning her neck and moving his head upward to capture her lips in a heated kiss. Without much effort, Brian lifted his girlfriend into his arms while he palmed her ass with one hand and the other gripped her waist and rested her against the surface of the counter. Erin yelped softly when he hoisted her up as if she weighed nothing and her legs wrapped tightly around his waist once she was sitting on the counter and Brian was standing between her legs. 

Erin was careful to be conscience of her movements, restraining the urge to roll her hips forward. She had a decent amount of self control but honestly it was tapering off by the second. Every time his tongue stroked against her own and she felt the silent vibrations of a groan hum beneath his chest Erin felt her desire for him grow more urgent. 

"It's getting late..." Erin said as she leaned back, her hands clutched tighter to the back of his neck as their lips separated and she took a much needed huff of air while Brian began moving his lips against her neck again and cutting off the moan that wanted for escape from her throat. "I should get going."

Brian smirked and tilted his head upward upward to look Erin in the eyes, the look on his face conveying just how much he didn't want her to leave yet. 

"Do you really want to go?"

He accompanied his question with a tender peck to Erin's lips, his hands pushing up the hem of her skirt and massaging the skin on her thighs. Erin shivered and bit down on her bottom lip, every inch her body was begging her to stay and continue their moment but as per her usual Erin was over thinking the outcome of this situation. Were they moving too fast? Or too slow? They had been seeing each other for just over a month so maybe this was long overdue. All these thoughts were buzzing through her mind but then Brian's lips were slowly trailing against her skin again, leaving wet open kisses wherever he could find a section of exposed skin. His hands were gripping her waist and roaming, moving up Erin’s torso to squeeze her breasts gently through her shirt. When that happened, Erin lost what little restraint she’d previously had and moaned heavily against his ear, her head leaned forward and her teeth tugged on his earlobe gently. 

"I'll take that as a no" He laughed gently, not doing anything to hide the grin on his face, he was glad to hear that she wanted him just like how he wanted her. Brian gathered Erin in his arms and lifted her off the counter gently her legs still wrapped tightly around his waist. She didn't feel the need to ask where he was taking her, the look in his eyes gave her all the answers she needed. In no time, they were up the stairs that led to his loft and Brian was placing Erin gently on the surface of his bed while he leaned down and attempted to kiss her again.

She ran her thumb over his soft bottom lip, then did the same thing with his top lip. Brian kept his eyes on her but didn't move other than putting his hands on her hips. She leaned forward until they were only a hair apart and looked into his deep brown eyes. He smiled, and she smiled back, and they continued to look at each other until she finally kissed him softly. Their eyes stayed connected as she kissed him over and over and alternated between sucking his bottom and top lip.

It was as if a light switch had been flipped because both their bodies came alive instantly. Brian whipped his t-shirt off and was on her in an instant. She sank her hands into his hair and met his tongue, stroke for stroke. Erin switched their positions so that he was beneath her and leaned her head to the side to get the maximum amount of pleasure from his mouth, her hips took on a life of their own as she ground against him, up and down and side to side. They moaned together, and Erin hadn't realized how much she wanted him until right then. She also hadn't realized that his hands were in the exact same position, holding her hips in a vice grip. She assumed that he was letting her control the ride and determine how far they did or didn't go. And that made her melt inside.

She pulled her lips away from his and slid down so that her mouth was on his neck. She switched between kissing and sucking his smooth pale skin and every time he tensed underneath her, Erin knew that he was fighting not to flip her over and ravage her right there. She kissed down his bare chest and teased his nipples with the tip of her tongue.

"Shit, Erin," he groaned.

A jolt of arousal shot straight down her legs at the way he said her name and she pushed herself down on him harder than before, forcing his erection right where she wanted it. She moaned and bit down on his lip, which he seemed to enjoy more than she thought he would. Erin pulled him up, so that she was straddling him, and watched his hooded eyes as she slowly pulled her shirt off. She felt a seconds worth of uncertainty but that vanished with the way Brian stared at her breasts like they were the best things he'd ever seen. He licked his lips but still didn't move his hands.

"Touch me," she whispered hotly.

Apparently that was the only nudge he needed. Brian secured her position in his lap with one arm around her waist while the other wrapped around her back. His mouth immediately took possession of her right breast and he devoured it like he was starving. Erin's head fell back and she whispered to him how amazing his mouth felt on her. He licked, sucked and bit her sensitive flesh with just the right amount of pressure, over and over until Erin was sure that might come just from this action alone. He stopped and switched to the other one, working her up more and more with each caress of his tongue.

Brian finally relented and dipped his head down as low as it would go to kiss all over her stomach. He switched their positions and laid her down on his comforter, continuing his quest down her body. She shivered with want and met eyes with him as he slowly pulled her skirt and panties down and revealed her nude form to him. He grunted in amazement and grabbed his constrained erection pressing against his bottoms. He used his free hand to spread Erin's legs and when it looked like he was going to bend down and go to work on her, she grabbed him by the shoulders and shook her head.

"Next time," she said, her voice raspy with lust. "I want you right now."

He made quick work of removing his jeans and boxers and she pulled him on top of her. Their mouths met in a messy, desperate kiss and she whimpered when he rubbed his tip against her warm center.

"You're so wet," he groaned.

"And it's all for you," she whispered, which only made him groan again, that coupled with the feeling her hand gently moving up and down his hard length.

“W-wait,” he murmured, sitting up and reaching for his bedside table, not wanting to leave her body. Brian just barely reached the familiar feeling of a foil wrapper and caught it between his fingers, quickly tearing the package open and using the latex to cover himself. He pulled her back to him, settling between her legs and kept his eyes on her face as he guided himself inside her and paused once she gasped and he felt her flinch beneath him. He brushed back the spirals of curls from clouding her face, wanting to make sure she was comfortable. “You alright, jagi?” he asked, his eyes searching for any sort of discomfort.

Erin nodded quickly and blushed at her reaction "It's just been a while, but I'm fine"  she replied with a soft chuckle "But hey..that's the first time you've called me that."

"Called you what?"

"Jagi, I like it"

Brian grinned and rested his forehead against Erin's shoulder, his hips swiveled slightly against Erin's even though he was truly trying not to move for Erin's sake. He didn't want to hurt her but there was only so much he could do to remain still while she was wrapped so tightly around him. 

"Are you ready for me, jagiya?" Brian whispered against her ear and pressed his pillow soft lips to the skin beneath her earlobe. 

Erin nodded and slowly he pulled back until the head of his member was lined up with her entrance, reaching between them to tease her with strokes up and down her slit. Then he finally slid his entire length into her, stopping only when he reached the hilt. Erin's eyes rolled into the back of her head and she groaned so loudly that she was sure his neighbors could hear her.  He began to move, slowly, pushing in and out of her at very slow pace, feeling every inch of her, and letting her do the same.

"Oh god...Brian" Erin managed to gasp as her hips moved in time with his, his name tumbling from her lips again and again as he picked up the pace so that he was now pounding into her. The sounds of his breathing and grunts, mixed with Erin's soft moans and whimpers and the sound of skin on skin was a symphony that filled Brian's studio space. 

“Baby… fuck,” lifting his head back up, Brian gazed down at her and took in her expressions of pleasure with pride before dipping down and capturing her lips in a sloppy, passionate kiss. A thin layer of sheer sweat formed over their bodies, and his grip on her waist tightened. With every moan and word to slip past her plump lips, Brian felt his length  twitch deep within her. It took everything in him to hold out until she had reached her own climax.

Bringing one of her legs up over his shoulder, Brian looked down to where their bodies met and groaned at the sight. Her soaking heat taking him in with every stroke, her essence covering his length while he plowed into her at an increased speed. Holding her leg up just a little bit higher, he could feel himself hitting her hilt while her core quivered around him. Chest heaving and sweat dripping down his body, his hair becoming damp, Brian felt his undoing approaching him.

Reaching down between them, he placed a slick thumb on her swollen clit and began rubbing furiously. “Come on, baby. You gonna come?” Grunting and matching with his thrusts, he was determined to get her finish before he did— and he didn’t know how much longer he could hold out. Erin felt her clit throb intensely and her walls twitch around his member. She couldn’t hold back the sharp, loud moans that left her mouth.  Erin released a sensuous moan into the air and she felt her entire body coil then suddenly stiffen as her orgasm rocked through her hot core. As soon as Erin hit her climax, Brian allowed himself to be overcome with pleasure. He gripped onto her skin tightly, sloppily and mercilessly pounding into her before he released himself and his face buried in her neck as he let out a string of profanities. He slowly lowered his entire weight on top of her, his head resting snugly against her breasts.

The room was silent except for the sounds of their heavy pants and stray whimpers. Brian slowly removed himself from her body and Erin worked up the strength to turn and look at him. Their eyes met and he smiled. Which made Erin smile and a flicker of warmth flare up within her. Lazily, she reached over to cradle his face as Brian pulled her into his arms and threaded his fingertips through her curly nest of hair.

Erin wanted to say something while she laid there with his rapid heartbeat returning to normal against her eardrum, but everything that came to mind just made it sound like she was complimenting a male escort. When she tilted her head upwards and Brian leaned down to kiss her again gently again Erin realized that maybe for once she really didn't need to say anything.

[pvtteralbvs]

❝ But before I go, remember one thing, promise me one thing: be brave when you’re afraid. ❞ ALBUS POTTER looks a lot like that muggle, CHANCE PERDOMO, right? Only 20 years old, that SLYTHERIN alumnus works as an EMPLOYEE IN THE DEPARTMENT OF INTERNATIONAL MAGICAL COOPERATION and is sided with the ORDER OF THE PHOENIX. HE identifies as CIS MAN and is a HALFBLOOD [ ADOPTED ]. [ PLOT ARC 30, PROPHECY 15, THE MEDIATOR. ]

DEATH TW. so albus was adopted by the potters when he was only one. his birth parents, a halfblood couple from london, were murdered in their home one night when al was just a baby; the result of a past affair gone wrong. whether he was left alive because he was merely a child or because the murderer didn’t realize he was asleep upstairs remains unclear, but he was the only one still alive when the team of aurors arrived, among them harry potter. unfortunately, albus had no other living relatives that could take him in, and his situation hitting close to home for harry, he and ginny made the decision to adopt him. END DEATH TW. 

so yeah, al grew up with the potters from a young age, and is just so, so grateful to have been adopted by them. while he has sometimes wondered what his birth parents were like and what his life would have looked like had they lived — really, who wouldn’t? — al loves the life he’s been given and wouldn’t change it for the world. he’s never once had to doubt the love of his family — it’s clear in their every action — and the same can be said for al. he loves them more than anything in the world, and really would do anything for them. 

when it came time for al to go to hogwarts, he was quite nervous about his sorting, but quickly found that slytherin really was the right fit for him. he’s ambitious, resourceful and holds a great deal of self-preservation, and his house helped him hone his skills and develop them. 

he was always a really hard-working student and often one of the top in his classes, so that plus his helpful and friendly nature made him a good fit for prefect in his fifth year, and he eventually became head student in his last year which he was rly proud of hjfsgdj

growing up, al was quite an observant child and quickly became interested in politics and the way the world worked. somewhat cynical, he couldn’t help but notice the flaws in the system more so than the things they got right, and felt that he had to do something to make the world a little bit better than it was when he entered it; just do whatever he could. his family have been subjected to countless powerpoint presentations about things he would improve and correct because he is a certified nerd™ hfjkdhkj (still thinks of himself as a Bad Boy™ but that’s just wrong)

would play the sims a lot as a kid to show how he would build a society fjhsdk 

his goal is to one day become minister for magic so he can work on improving life in wizarding uk for its citizens, and he’s currently working as an employee in the department of international magical cooperation. he landed an internship there after he graduated hogwarts, after which they hired him. he really wants to learn as much as he can before he fully pursues his dream, especially in terms of politics, which is why he started his ministry career here. so yeah minister is the longtime goal but i mean he’s gotta try to survive this war first! we’ll see if he succeeds. 

speaking of which�� al joined the order pretty much as soon as he was able to, partly because he fully believes in what they stand for, but also because he kind of felt like he had to, coming from the family he does? frankly, the war has terrified him from the start, and he wasn’t sure what he could really contribute to the order; he doesn’t consider himself brave and a big part of him would rather run away than join a battle, but he would never go through with it ( he wouldn’t be able to live with it tbh ). i think it comes down to a fundamental misunderstanding of what bravery means; it doesn’t mean that you feel no fear, just that you try to do what’s right despite it, so like — al is brave, as he fights for the order and what he considers to be right, he just struggles to identify it in himself. he can see it so easily in his friends and family, but when he looks at himself he just considers himself a coward which tbh… isn’t even true? we love insecurity in war verses! besides that he’s pretty confident tho but that’s like. his Big Insecurity you feel 

DEATH TW, PARENTAL DEATH TW. harry’s death just ruined al. he keeps replaying the last moments in his mind, wanting to go back and stay with him and fight, do something to help, not just run away. he blames himself, even though he knows deep down it’s not his fault. since the start of the war, al has been terrified of losing someone he loves, but he never really thought it would be his dad - he didn’t really think anyone could get him down. he was harry potter, and he’d already survived so much, so surely he would survive this war too. finding out that he didn’t almost made al lose hope - if his dad didn’t make it, what chance did the rest of them have?

that said, when al found out about the resurrection, he was horrified. he missed his dad more than anything, but in al’s mind, there are things you simply don’t mess with, and death is top of that list. it goes against every natural law and the fact that his sister and the other knights managed to do it made him nauseous. he’s angry at lily for her actions, but more than anything he’s mad at himself - he should have made more efforts to reach out to her and support her in her grief, even though they’re in different locations. if he had been a better brother, maybe he could have helped her through it and known about the plans in advance so he could stop it

not only is he horrified that they pulled harry back from death, when he was finally at peace, but the loss of his godfather in doing so was a punch to the stomach and more grief than he knows how to handle. losing neville was something none of them saw coming; losing the only other father figure he has, and knowing that the longbottoms are now suffering as much as he and his family is, is something he never imagined or wished would happen. all the grief he’s been feeling have returned tenfold and he doesn’t really know how to handle it

because of his belief of how wrong the resurrection was ( and as part of his plot arc ), al is trying to convince the order not to restore harry’s memories. he knows some might find it strange or even cold for him to take that stance when he can have his dad back, but the thought of them having snatched harry from peace wrecks him. he feels like the least they can do for him now is allow him to live the rest of his life out in peace, away from the horrors of the war. what he doesn’t admit is that part of the reason he’s so against bringing harry’s memories back is because if his dad returns to fighting in the war, there’s a chance they can lose him again, and al doesn’t think he can survive that loss a second time 

nr 1 ginny weasley defence squad over here. losing harry made al realize how much he’s taken his parents for granted? not in terms of like — ignoring them or not appreciating them enough throughout his life, because he always has, but he never imagined he would lose them? he always thought they would be there? but now harry is gone but also back but also not really and it’s a mess and neville is gone too and it’s just ginny left and al is absolutely terrified, he is so scared something will happen to her too, or to one of his siblings. he doesn’t share that with anyone, really, especially his mum, she has enough on her plate, but he wishes he could just take her, lily, and james away somewhere safe so he could look out for them  because he cannot stand the thought of losing them. he just can’t and he’s so afraid. END DEATH TW, PARENTAL DEATH TW.

okay in terms of prophecies al’s one says that he ‘is destined to achieve true greatness. however, it will come at the price of what they hold most dear. they will be tested in ways they cannot imagine, and if they do not persevere through it, everything will be doomed.’ so that definitely starts out good but then sounds terrible! al honestly wishes he didn’t hear it and he’s trying to forget it but it’s hard. achieving greatness sounds good and all, especially for someone who has been dreaming of helping make the world a better place as minister since he was a kid, but at the cost of losing what he holds most dear? no fucking thank you. he’s absolutely terrified it means he might lose more family members, because they’re the ones he cares about most in the world, and he just can’t go through that again. he can’t. he wishes it won’t come true but also the warning that if he doesn’t persevere through it they’re all fucked isn’t very reassuring so altogether he’s Not Pleased!

anyways when describing characters as different types of lights, jane said al was a guiding lighthouse, looking out for the people in the night, and that really is the best description of him i can imagine tbh 

but yeah, to sum him up, he’s got that Potter Sass™ and can be a hypocritical pain sometimes, but he’s quite friendly and charismatic and he’s got a good head on his shoulders and right now he is Suffering™ because of the war and what it’s doing to his family 

i think his patronus might be a thestral but i need to muse more on it and also what sort of codename that could give that isn’t like…. death related gfhjsdgfk idt they need that, so i hope it’s okay i add that later!!