#at forever 21 and say things like ‘normal people scare me’. we will start sounding like jughead.

[foursaints]

"i'm normal 😭"

[horansqueen]

Stuck With You - Epilogue 2

Epilogue 2 : Anyone But You

���chapter 1  🡪chapter 2  🡪chapter 3  🡪chapter 4  🡪chapter 5  🡪chapter 6  🡪chapter 7  🡪chapter 8  🡪chapter 9  🡪chapter 10  🡪chapter 11 🡪chapter 12 🡪chapter 13 🡪chapter 14 🡪chapter 15 🡪chapter 16 🡪chapter 17 🡪chapter 18 🡪chapter 19 🡪chapter 20 🡪chapter 21 🡪chapter 22 🡪chapter 23 🡪chapter 24 🡪chapter 25 🡪chapter 26 🡪chapter 27 🡪chapter 28 🡪chapter 29 🡪chapter 30 🡪chapter 31 🡪chapter 32  🡪chapter 33 🡪chapter 34 🡪chapter 35 🡪chapter 36 🡪chapter 37 🡪chapter 38 🡪epilogue 1

College Enemies To Lovers AU

characters // masterlist // instagrams // mood board

I don't change my mind for anybody I won't waste my time on just anybody I won't share my life (with anyone but you)

It's such a long road (with anyone but you) That I couldn't follow (with anyone but you) Never anyone but Never anyone but (anyone but you)

THANK YOU! thank you for reading this story, for commenting this story, for reblogging and liking this story. Thank you to everyone on the update list, everyone who sent me requests and ideas, everyone who followed this story and everyone who was excited for every chapter. Thank you to everyone who messaged me, complimented me, thank you for all the emotions you shared with me through the characters. THANK YOU SO MUCH! i love you all. i can’t explain how much!

This is the final chapter. i hope you enjoy it and that this story reached your expectations. and i hope it makes you want to read my next story!

I LOVE YOU ALL SO MUCH THANK YOU TIMES INFINITY!

NIALL

I stared at the painting on the wall as people walked slowly around me. I was proud of my girlfriend for her first exhibition but it was the very first time I was seeing this specific painting and although I knew no one had seen the picture it was based on, I recognized it immediately. She had asked me if she could expose the pictures but I couldn't see them anywhere. Instead, she had painted one of them and I was staring at it. The feelings invading me were the same than when I looked at the actual picture and I realized it was probably the moment that made me feel like that.

I felt her soft touch on my upper arm and detached my eyes from her art, blinking a few times to look at her. She raised her eyebrows slightly and bit her bottom lip nervously.

"You hate it."

"No!" I quickly replied, shaking my head and frowning a bit. "No it's just, so different than what you normally paint."

"I know, I think painting the human body is so complex and it really depends on how you see the person. It gets so much more emotional when you paint someone you love."

Her eyes found the painting and she breathed in before sighing. "Maybe I shouldn't have painted it, maybe I shouldn't have exposed it... I just thought it was a way to expose the pictures without really showing them to anyone."

"It's amazing, Devie." I whispered, making her turn around to look at me again.

Our eyes met and she sent me a shy smile. I turned to her and cupped her face, running my thumbs on her cheeks gently before bending down to kiss her lips.

"Dev!"

My girlfriend broke our kiss when she heard her name and I looked up to see Lewis, Daxia, Louis and Eleanor getting closer. We had been hanging out a lot recently and it was nice to be around people like them. Louis and I were also getting closer, probably because of Devon, and I liked that. I had missed him.

"This painting is beautiful." Daxia let out, making her glass turn in her hands as she stared at it. "I mean they all are, this one is just different."

"I was just telling her that." I smiled, glancing at my girlfriend.

"A lot of emotions thrown on that canvas." Louis pointed out, raising his eyebrows, and I immediately knew that he had guessed.

I thought about the real pictures that we had left at my apartment. Devon had created a mobile with them and we had placed it in a corner of my bedroom. Sometimes, I stared at it, just watching it move to see the lyrics written behind one of the pictures,. It brought so many memories to my mind and I knew It always would, no matter how many years passed.

"Hey, where are we celebrating tonight?" Lewis asked as Louis sent a smirk to Devon.

"Nope, not tonight guys, but we'll plan something soon." I quickly replied, shaking my head. "Tonight I'm just spending the night alone with my main girl."

"Seriously, why do you guys call each other like that?" Louis asked with a grimace. "Does that imply you have side girls and guys?"

Devon chuckled but I shook my head. "It's a secret between us, Tommo." I just replied, hitting his arm gently and making my girlfriend laugh.

I didn't answer his question because I knew he was joking, but it made me wonder if Devon really knew why I called her like that. It took an hour and a half before we finally arrived at my apartment and as soon as we walked in, I pressed her against the wall, pushing the door with one of my feet.

"It's my turn to be proud of you." I whispered, feeling her hands slip under my hoodie. "Your art moves me, Devie. You move me."

She grabbed my bottom lip between hers and sucked on it, making me groan.

"You know why I call you my main girl, right?" I wondered in a whisper, my lips brushing against hers.

"Mmhm, because of that conversation we had, when I said I wanted to be the protagonist." she moved closer to kiss me again and I let her before licking my lips.

"Not only that." I admitted just as low. "Devie, my real story didn't start before I met you. It was just a long prologue before the main thing."

Her lips parted and her eyes watered as I kept staring at her in the darkness of the room. I didn't know how to explain to her what she meant to me but seeing the way she was looking at me at that exact moment made me think she may know anyway.

She brought one of her hands in my hair as she stared at me. I loved feeling her fingers in my hair and I kissed her lips gently again. I thought I knew what love felt before but I really didn't. I knew it sounded cliché but it was true. I was ready to bet on anything that Devon was the love of my life and that what we had would last forever.

"I love you," she whispered, shaking her head slightly. "And we're going to your room right now."

I chuckled at her words and shook my head too. "No, we can't. I have a surprise for you." I admitted, making her frown. "Close your eyes." She stared at me and i smiled. "Do you trust me?"

Instead to answer, she closed her eyes and breathed in before I turned the light on. I put myself behind her, placing my hands on her eyes and leading her slowly to the living room, making her stop next to the couch.

"Okay, keep your eyes closed alright?"

She nodded and slowly, I took my hands off her eyes, making sure she was not cheating, and I took a few steps back. I stared at her for a while, feeling my heart thump against my chest, a bit scared of what she'd say, and when I softly told her to open her eyes. I watched confusion appear on her traits until she saw the little puppy, laying on the floor, asleep. I had tried to put a bow on his head but it was falling down and Devon chuckled, her lips parted.

"Niall!" she let out without sending me a glance before getting on her knees and moving closer to the small dog.

Slowly, she took him in her arms and he woke up, making my lips curl. "It's a miracle he didn't bark before, would have ruined the surprise."

"Niall I... I can't." she shook her head, looking at the puppy with loving but sad eyes. "My parents will never let me bring a dog home, you know it."

"He can stay here." I just shrugged, pushing my hands in my pockets.

She chuckled and rolled her eyes, turning to me with an amused smile. "Ah, you bought yourself a puppy, then."

"No, it's your puppy." I explained after swallowing the lump in my throat. "And he's gonna need you 24/7. And... and I need you 24/7, too."

She frowned and slowly got up, walking to her, the dog still in her arms. "Niall, what are you saying?"

I breathed in and swallowed again, taking a few steps closer to her very slowly. I had no idea why it stressed me so much. Perhaps I was scared that she'd think it's too soon, or that it was a stupid idea, but deep down, I really wanted her to accept.

"Devie, I'm ready to spend forever with you." I confessed in a gentle tone, taking my hands out of my pocket to grab one of hers. I opened her palm and placed a key inside before sighing. "It would be an honor for me if you moved in here, with me. What's mine is yours, and all that."

"That... That would mean we'd go to bed together all the time, and wake up together all the time. And I could watch you get ready for work in the morning, and we'd take showers together, and cuddle in front of the tv, and make food together... Every single day?"

"No." I shook my head with a chuckle. "Sometimes I'd bring take out or we'd order."

She chuckled and rolled her eyes, putting the dog down before he just ran away, making her laugh. She brought her attention back to me and I raised my eyebrows. "So? Is that a yes?"

She got on her tiptoes as her lips curled and slid her arms around my neck, pulling me gently closer. "Yes. It's a yes." she whispered, making me sigh of relief. "Did you doubt it?"

I chuckled nervously and kissed her lips. "Was just nervous." I admitted, raising my nose up. "How are you gonna name your puppy? Something original!"

"No idea yet, but you're right, we need an original name for our main dog."

I laughed and wrapped my arms around her waist, pulling her closer. "Thank you, Niall." she whispered, licking her lips. The way she looked at me all lovingly made my heart jump in my chest. There was something about the way her body fitted perfectly with mine that I couldn't stop thinking about.

"What for?"

"For being you. For seeing me. For loving me."

"Easiest thing I ever did, petal." I admitted in a murmur. "I love you."

"I love you more."

[luci-in-trenchcoats]

A Nightmare In A Dream (Part 1)

Summary: Six months after reuniting with the Winchesters and her brother, things are going good for the reader. She and Dean are happily together and occasionally stay with her brother, Matty, and Sam, who has been getting him used to normal life. Life appears to be heading in a good direction when the past has a way of creeping up again and dropping a bombshell on them all...

Pairing: Serial Killer!Dean x reader

Masterlist

Square: AU!Dean

Word Count: 4,500ish

Warnings: mature (language, angst, death/murder, drugging/kidnapping, family drama)

A/N #1: This is a spin off of A Dream In A Nightmare and takes place ~6 months later. It’s recommended that fic is read prior to this one...

A/N #2: Written for @spndeanbingo​

_____

“Good morning,” said Matty as you came downstairs with Dean. You’d taken to staying over the vacation house Matty and Sam were permanently staying at over the weekends and a couple times during the week, even if Dean had to make the drive back home for work. “I made breakfast.”

“Thanks, Matty,” you said, heading for the fridge to get out some orange juice for the three of you.

“Smells good. Sammy’s really been doing a good job teaching you how to cook,” said Dean.

“He’s really good at it. He’s super smart at like, everything,” said Matty, dishing the food onto plates. Dean sat down at the kitchen table, Matty quiet before he brought the food over and took a seat himself. He glanced at the front door and you saw the worried look on his face.

“He’s just out on his run. He’ll be home soon I’m sure,” said Dean. Matty nodded and you brought over the drinks, starting to eat your meal. Dean picked out a piece of eggshell and pushed it to the side, Matty staying tense for the rest of breakfast.

“I’ll cleanup,” he said when you finished, your plate gone before you could blink.

“Matt,” said Dean. He swallowed from where he stood at the sink, glancing over at the table. “You can stick ‘em in the dishwasher. It’s why we have it,” he said.

“Oh. right,” he said.

“Breakfast was great,” said Dean. “Thanks for cooking.”

“Of course,” he said. Dean sighed and leaned over to you.

“I don’t think we should do this today,” he whispered.

“He needs the push,” you said quietly.

“He’s already upset about the eggs,” mumbled Dean.

“He needs to learn that part of life is being uncomfortable,” you said, smiling when Matty came back to get the glasses. 

“He was kidnapped for a good portion of his life. I don’t want to scare him,” said Dean.

“Neither do I. Sam’s gonna be a little late and that’s that. He needs to be his own person,” you whispered.

“Guys,” said Matty as he shut the dishwasher. “You realize I can hear everything you’re saying.”

You and Dean shared a look, Matty walking back over with crossed arms.

“My hearing is pretty good. I can’t exactly unlearn that skill,” he said. “I know I still get scared about stuff I shouldn’t, like accidentally leaving egg shell on a plate, but please don’t play games with me. I can function without Sam or you guys here. I know I’m not exactly normal like you guys but I’m doing my best.”

“Okay. We uh, we were going to have Sam come home an hour later than he normally would to see how you’d react,” you said, your brother pouting. “You’re doing so amazing with everything, Matty. But people are late sometimes and we wanted to see how you’d react.”

“We can’t use the kid gloves forever. It’s not fair to you,” said Dean, giving him a nod. “But we can be upfront about trying those things in the future.”

“I appreciate the honesty,” he said. “I’m not a kid. I might be a little behind for my age and I don’t understand some things but I’m 21 years old. Please treat me like an adult.”

“Alright,” you said. “You can’t blame us for wanting to give you some of your childhood back though.”

“Yeah but who in this house had a childhood? We all had shitty versions of it. Sometimes I feel like I was the lucky one out of us four if I’m being honest,” he said. “If you want to get me out of my comfort zone, alright. I’m willing to try too. Just don’t lie to me about it.”

“I think we can agree to that,” said Dean. You hummed and forced a smile.

“You guys cool if I go take a hike in the woods this morning?” he asked.

“Yeah. We have to run back into town, do a few things around the house,” said Dean. “We’ll be back for dinner?”

“Sounds good,” he said. Twenty minutes later you were dressed and in the car, Matty walking into his usual spot in the woods around the house.

“You think he has a point? That we’re all fucked up?” you asked, Dean pulling out of the driveway.

“Probably. I’m a serial killer after all,” he said. 

“Maybe he’s right. Maybe we’re the ones that need to be watched and not him.”

“He didn’t say that and while none of us has had great lives, we had freedom. Matty didn’t but he’s never killed anyone either. We all got shit to deal with. He needs more help right now is all,” said Dean. He reached over and held your hand, getting a small smile out of you. “We don’t have to do this today.”

“I haven’t killed anyone since Lewis. I’m nervous,” you said. “Even if this guy deserves it.”

“He’s a bad guy. He’s a monster. We kill the bad guys. James Smith deserves to go. He needs to go,” said Dean.

“I know.”

“If you don’t want to do this, it’s okay. I can handle it on my own,” said Dean. “I’m the one that likes it. You’ve always been forced. It’s different.”

“You don’t enjoy killing. You enjoy protecting people. That’s the part you like,” you said. He didn’t say anything as he continued to drive. “You were forced too.”

“I pushed a guy in high school and accidentally killed him. That girl? She thanked me for stopping him. No one forced me to go out and find other bastards to get rid of. That was all me. That’s not normal.”

“I disagree,” you said. He laughed and you rolled your eyes. “I’m serious.”

“Who on earth forced me to kill any one of those people? Who?”

“Lewis.”

“Lewis forced you. You had no choice. You had no choice because of me. I-”

“A psycho became obsessed with you when you were a kid. Was that your fault? Was it?” you asked. He was quiet and pulled over on the side of the road. “Was it?”

“No. But the choices I made, that my family was forced to make, that got your parents killed and your brother killed and your other brother lived in a hole in the ground for a decade because I didn’t let him have me. If I had, Sam and my dad could have come out of hiding. Those things? Those are on me. Killing? That’s on me. I killed the people I could find, the ones I could go after because Lewis? He scared the shit out of me. He still fucking does. The only thing I was forced into was ruining your life,” he said. “You’re not going after James Smith today. You’re not killing anymore if you don’t want it. I’m fucked up. Not you.”

“I don’t think either one of us should be doing anything today besides going home to the house and taking a quiet day for ourselves,” you said.

“You’re right. I’m not focused. We’ll hold off on it,” he said with a sigh.

“Can we talk about what you just said at least?” you asked.

“What’s to talk about?”

“Us and Sam and even your dad when he drops by, we have all been focused on getting Matty healthy and okay. I know he’s far from perfect but he’s getting there. My brother probably isn’t going to have a normal life. He knows it and we know it. It’ll be quiet and probably a little lonely but he’ll be safe. We need to take a day to talk about you.”

“Talk about what?” he said. You stared at him and he gave it right back, throwing up his hands. “No really, what? I want to know.”

“Maybe...maybe we shouldn’t kill people at all anymore. It seems like it’s stressing you out,” you said.

“Did you literally hear the words that just came out of your mouth? Seriously?”

“All I want is for you to be happy and lately you’re on edge. I don’t think you ever sat down and dealt with what Lewis did to you and you need to.”

“Are you my fucking shrink now?” he said, scoffing before he was back on the road. “If you have shit you’re going through, that’s fine. Don’t project it onto me or some crap.”

“What is your problem?” you said. “I want you to be okay. That’s it.”

“I am okay. Problem solved.”

“Don’t fucking go back to treating me like I’m some kind of prodigy or something.”

“Oh, you mean the time you were working for Lewis to fuck me over?” he said. 

“Fuck you. Stop the fucking car,” you said. He quickly pulled over again and you got out, the other door opening behind you. “I’m walking back so you can go on and fuck off.”

“Y/N,” said Dean. You didn’t look back, a hand on your arm quickly, Dean stopping you in your tracks. “I’m sorry. I’m fucked up. I’m more fucked up than Matty ever could be. I don’t...I don’t want you to love me. It’s why I’ve been pushing your buttons lately. You can have the house with Matty and Sam. Or the one back home. I don’t care. Just keep it. Just stay away from me. You’re better off without me.”

“What are you still scared of?” you asked. You spun around, Dean looking past you with a quick glance down. “What?”

“I think Lewis is back,” he said, biting his bottom lip.

“Dean, I killed him. I saw him bleed out.”

“You thought you killed him before you passed out,” said Dean.

“The police have the body. He died. They buried a body,” you said.

“I know they did. I dug it up a week ago with my dad,” he said with a sad smile.

“Dean. Who was buried?” you asked. He shut his eyes and you put your hands on your head. “No, no, no. No, he’s dead. No, please no.”

“It was a different guy. I wasn’t sure how to bring it up and then yesterday at work I got a strange phone call, just a little humming before it hung up. I got one from a different number a week ago too which is what prompted us to check the body. I think they know that we know. James Smith...I think Lewis had another backup plan and this guy was it. He’s around our age from the profile we did so it makes sense. I think there were always two plans and I think James Smith helped Lewis survive and recover. Or if Lewis didn’t make it, James is intent on coming back for me revenge. It’s why I want to get rid of him and yesterday.”

“This is going to sound like a horrible thing to even say,” you said, running your hand over your face. You glanced over to Dean and saw him shake his head. “I know it must have crossed your mind too.”

“Matty is not James Smith,” said Dean. “I triple checked the timelines. Matty was with Sam the whole time they were stuck in the cellar and once they got out. He never left his side. There’s no way it was him who helped Lewis.”

“What if he still fucked with my little brother’s head?” you asked. “He was there for ten years. Ten fucking years and we all always thought it was a little weird he wasn’t a shriveling mess.”

“You’re about to get really mad at me,” said Dean.

“For what?”

He pulled his phone out of his pocket and you saw it was on speakerphone.

“Hey, Y/N,” said Matty from the other end.

“What is going on?” you asked.

“Dean told me about his suspicions with Lewis. He and Sam questioned me about it earlier this week. Every so often, I thought maybe there was another person there. I never saw them. I always thought it was you which is why I never said anything. But I learned more about where you were at certain times and it couldn’t have been you. The guys wanted to make sure I wasn’t pretending. I don’t blame them for that. It got kind of intense which is the real reason I was timid this morning. They freaked me out some but I’m okay. I know they’re on my side.”

“Why the Hell didn’t you guys tell me about this?”

“It was my decision,” said Dean. He leaned back against the car and closed his eyes. “You’ve always been the protector. I wanted to take care of you for once. I wanted you to not know he was back.”

“We are going back to the vacation house. Now,” you said. “Matty, I want you back from your hike and tell Sam to get there wherever the hell he is.”

“I’ll see you guys in a few,” said Matty before he hung up. You threw up your hands, Dean not bothering to look at you.

“Never keep me in the dark again,” you said. He nodded and headed back into the car. “Dean.”

“I understand. I’m sorry.”

“I know why you did it but this is too big. Let’s get back and pronto.”

Half an hour later you were sitting on the couch, Sam coming downstairs after his shower. There was a knock at the door and it opened, Dean standing up and giving a nod down the hall. John stepped inside and headed straight for the kitchen, cracking open a beer from the fridge.

“It’s ten in the morning,” you said. He chugged it down and gave you a bitchface. “Oh I am not in the mood today, John. Don’t even start your shit.”

“Start my shit? Kid, I don’t care what my boys think about you. I still don’t trust you and I never will.”

“I saved their lives.”

“After handing them over to that scumbag. You’re no saint. I know where your priorities lie. Dean’s judgement is too clouded to see it but I-”

“Enough,” said Dean, shooting his father a dirty look. “You two don’t get along and that is fine. But we’re all on the same side. We need to figure out what our next move is. Together.”

“I told you to keep her in the dark,” said John.

“You got some trust issues there, John?” you shot back. He walked over to you and leaned down into your face.

“You threw my boys to the wolves for your brother. I know where your loyalty is and it’s not with them. It’s with him,” said John. Behind him you saw Matty gripping the pillow in his lap, his eyes squeezed shut. 

“You’re upsetting, Matty. I won’t apologize for protecting my brother. I’ve already talked about what I did with Dean and Sam and it’s their forgiveness to give, not yours,” you said.

“You will do anything for your brother. If you betrayed us once for him, who’s to say what you wouldn’t do for him now?” said John.

“Dad. That’s enough,” said Dean. 

“She and that fucked up brother of hers are working for Lewis or this James Smith guy. Even if they aren’t, they will. She’ll pick him over us in heartbeat. I’m not throwing away everything, all of the sacrifices we’ve made as a family, for people that are going to betray us,” said John. He walked around the coffee table and grabbed Matty’s arm, pulling a zip tie out of his coat pocket.

“What the fuck is your problem?” said Sam, pushing John away. You were out of your seat, Dean pushing Matty back towards you.

“Keep them secured until we deal with Smith and potentially Lewis. When they’re dealt with, those two can be on their merry way,” said John. 

“No one is doing that,” said Dean, turning to face your brother. He was behind you, clinging to your shirt like his life depended on it. “Matty. Look at me. No one’s doing anything to you.”

“I don’t know what to do,” he said. You grabbed his hand and he squeezed it far too tight. “I don’t…”

“Come on, Matty,” said Sam, giving him a soft friendly smile. “Let’s go take a hike. You didn’t get to take it this morning really.”

“I don’t…” he said, Sam smiling before Matty nodded. 

“Sammy, you need to-”

“Fuck off,” said Sam back at his father. Sam took Matty’s hand and quickly went out the back deck with him, the pair crossing the yard and into the woods.

“How the Hell can your brother think that-” said John before Dean grabbed him and shoved him against the closest wall.

“Do you have any idea what you just did to that poor fucking kid? He’s been getting better. It’s been three months since he’s been that scared. Even when Sammy and me questioned him he was still okay. This place is supposed to be safe for him and you had to go and fuck that up. That could have been Sam. It could have been me. His life got fucked up because of the Winchesters. You threaten him or Y/N ever again and I’ll add you to my fucking hit list,” said Dean.

“The only reason that kid made it this far is because he fell in line with Lewis.”

“The only reason he made it this far was because of her,” said Dean, pointing over to you. “You think we had a fucked up life? Try listening to hers. In case you forgot, she saved Sam and me. She risked her brother’s life for us. She tells me that Lewis made me this way, that none of it was my fault. That what I turned into isn’t my fault. That I should take the day off so we can focus on me, help me deal with the jacked up shit in my head. She’s a fucking saint I don’t deserve. None of us do. If you can’t respect her or Matthew, if you can’t protect them the way they protect us, then you can get out and never come back. Sammy and me don’t need any more angry men trying to control our lives anymore.”

“You need to grow up!” shouted John. Dean took a step back and John shook him off. “All I have ever done is protect you and Sam. All I-”

“I told you that Lewis was watching me. I was a kid and he scared me. He hurt me. He hurt you and Sam and mom. My mother is dead because you couldn’t stop him. Sam had his life destroyed because you couldn’t stop him. I don’t know how to be normal because of you. You couldn’t even protect me after the fact. I lost friends, people I cared about, because you couldn’t stop that monster. I’ve spent my life alone. I can’t be alone again. I won’t,” said Dean. 

“Fine. I’ll handle it myself,” said John. He started to head down the hall when he paused. “I’ve never been perfect but I kept you both alive. If you want me gone from your life, fine. I’m gone.”

“Dad,” said Dean, John getting out of there quickly. “Dad.”

John walked straight over to his truck and got inside, Dean barely getting to the driveway before he was out on the road.

“Dad!” yelled Dean but John was already driving off. You waited on the front porch, Dean standing there for beat before you went over to him. “Why doesn’t he want me?”

“He’s scared for you and Sam. It was a fight. It’ll be ok-”

“He always leaves me alone,” said Dean quietly. “I don’t think he even likes me. I think he pretends for Sam.”

“Dean-”

“It doesn’t matter. I’m too old for this anyways. I’m going to make up a sandwich for Matty for later. He likes those on bad days,” said Dean as he headed for inside.

“I don’t get along with your dad, Dean. But if I was in his shoes, I’d probably be wary of us too.”

“Half hour ago you were pissed at me for keeping the truth from you and now you’re trying to make me feel better? Why?”

“Because I know you did that so I wouldn’t be scared and your dad, despite how he goes about it, was trying to do the same thing for you and Sam.”

“I’m sorry about earlier and Matty. I think it might be better if I go back home and try finding out more there,” he said. You took a deep breath as he went inside and threw your head back.

“Somebody up there please keep an eye on him for me today.”

Four Hours Later

“Hey, Matty,” you said, knocking on the door to his room. You peeked your head inside the master and saw him on bed watching TV, Sam looking at something on his computer. “I brought up some cookies I made.”

“Thanks,” he said. You put the plate down on the nightstand as Matty tucked his legs up under himself. You sat on the edge of the bed, Sam looking over the top of his screen at you. “I’m okay. I don’t need two babysitters.”

“I’m sorry about John,” you said.

“Matty was okay once we got outside,” said Sam. 

“I’m better now. I just really don’t want to ever wear a pair of those zip things ever again,” he said. You nodded and he took a cookie off the plate, his sleeve riding up to show a few scars on his skin. “Y/N?”

“Sam? Can I ask you and Matty to do me a favor?”

“What’s up?” asked Sam.

“Dean owns this house. It’s in his name. There’s a possibility Lewis knows about it. Or Smith does. Can you take my brother somewhere safe while we deal with this?”

“Y/N. You-”

“Matthew,” you said, watching him swallow. “You are never being hurt like that again. Sam will keep you safe. I know you trust him to do that for you.”

“Yeah. I do. But if someone is out there, if there’s two guys out there, you need all the help you can get. I know enough to know what I need to do if I start having a panic attack. I will go somewhere with Sam but then he’s gotta head back to help. I can cook for myself. I can be alone and not freak out. You need Sam more than I do,” he said.

“Matty, I’m not comfortable leaving you-”

“I spent most of the past ten years alone. I can survive on my own for a while,” he said.

“He has a point, Y/N, and Matty’s capable of handling himself. I’ve taught him a few things asides from schoolwork and cooking. He knows how to shoot and throw a few punches,” said Sam.

“Alright. But I want him someplace he can move if he needs to and get help, get around other people,” you said.

“I’m not supposed to go out in public yet,” he said.

“You may be forced to if something went wrong. Are you okay with that?” you asked. He nodded and you took a deep breath. “Sam, did you pick up the other thing yet?”

“I’m supposed to this afternoon,” said Sam.

“Get it on the way,” you said. “It’ll be good company for him.”

“Company?” asked Matty.

“We got you a dog. A german shepherd. She’s been away at training. Us three thought you might like her. She’s some responsibility for you and some comfort. She can protect you in a worst scenario too,” you said. “It was supposed to be a surprise for you.”

“Thanks,” he said. “I always wanted a German Shepard.”

“I know. You were supposed to get one that year for your birthday before everything…” you said. You shut your eyes and sighed. “Matty, I’m-“

“Don’t say sorry. You didn’t pick this,” he said. “I’ll be okay. I promise. You guys go get Dean and figure it out. Please.”

“Okay,” you said.

“If you see John...tell him I’m not mad. He got scared too. I know a thing or two about that,” he said. 

“We will,” said Sam. He looked over at you and gave you a smile. “I’ll go start packing the car. I have a safehouse up North a bit I think’ll be good. Nice little cabin, perfect yard for Maggie.”

“Do me a favor, Sam, and spend the night with him?” you asked.

“Of course. I’ll come and meet up once Matty’s all settled in,” he said.

“Thanks, Sam,” you said before he left the room. “Are you sure you’ll be okay by yourself?”

“I’m sure. Does my dog have a name?” he asked.

“Maggie. She’s sweet,” you said. “You’re gonna have to feed her and clean up after her and take care of her though.”

“I got it. Don’t worry about me. I’ll lay low. You be careful too. Don’t fall for any of his tricks.”

“I won’t. I’m gonna see you in a few days. Maybe we can take Maggie with us and go to the beach or something,” you said.

“I’d like that,” he said.

“Alright. Sounds like a plan then,” you said. You gave him a hug, Matty returning it with a tight one of his own. 

“Thanks for protecting me again,” he said quietly. 

“Always. I’m going to pack up the rest of the cookies for you to bring with you, okay?” you said.

“I know you’re scared too,” he said. “Promise you’re gonna come back.”

“I promise, Matty. A few days from now this’ll all be over.”

______

A/N: Read Part 2 here!

[mihidecet]

Tibi’s MCYT WritingTober: Masterpost

Created by @theonlygamergost​ , this was a daily writing challenge centered around MCYT themes. It was a heck of a lot of fun!

Day 1: MCC Minigame

Sbi is ready for a new round of battle box, and even more ready to destroy their enemies. We win these!

Day 2: MCC Teams

This might a Scott Smajor appreciation chapter, but every day is Scott Smajor appreciation day.

Day 3: Training

Techno needs to train in order to win his duel with Dream. Calvin is more than glad to help out.

Day 4: MCU

The Techno - Calvin - Nestorio team was impeccable. Good vibes, extremely OP, incredibly funny. Also, a lot of money raised for charity.

Day 5: Arrow A look throught Hbomb’s eyes as he wins yet another MCC - he’s just too good, we cannot deny it.

Day 6: MCM team

The Schlatt and Techno team will stay forever in my heart.

Day 7: MCM moment

Phil and Techno have a moment of rest while on the battlefield. Who knew they would have bonded so much.

Day 8: In the End

(Dream SMP AU) Schlatt loses his power. He loses what he believed were his friends, but that is just secondary (if he keeps telling himelf that, maybe it will become true)

Day 9: In the End, once more

(Dream SMP AU) Wilbur pushes the button during the festival. It’s safe to say he regrets it, but he might not realise how much yet.

Day 10: SMP Earth

It’s time for some Antartic Empire feels! You love to see it, even though Techno should be sleeping.

Day 11: SleepyBoisInc

All good sbi real life stories need a sleepover chapter. If anything, just to have them sleeping at least once.

Day 12: Fanmade AU

(SBI&CO d&d AU) Part 3 of the Tommy chapters: it’s time for family feels and bracelet building.

Day 13: Female Streamer

(Dream SMP AU) Niki’s thoughts as she leaves her hometown. While she may be scared, she is not going to bow down.

Day 14: Favourite Minecrafter

We’re Philza Minecraft stans first, humans second. AKA: a quick look into dad’s work in his hardcore world.

Day 15: Male Streamer

Fundy was supposed to be a spy. Supposed being the key word.

[strongly inspired by this]

Day 16: The Start of a series

Wilbur’s random item skyblock series fricked me up Part 1.

Day 17: The end of a series

Wilbur’s random item skyblock series fricked me up Part 2.

Day 18: Dream Team

The boys are on call, training, more or less, for MCC.

Day 19: Fanmade AU

(SBI&CO d&d AU) Hbomb has always been a survivor. Now, when one gets taken to a whole other plane of existance, one may be excused when they’re not ready to face the challenge.

Day 20: Fanmade AU

(SBI&CO d&d AU) Wilbur loses his guitar and nobody seems to be able to fix it. Meanwhile, Tommy reunites with an old friend.

Day 21: First Night

Techno has been working a lot, because that is what one has to do to survive. Skeppy is also there, but you can’t not love him.

Day 22: In the Mines

(Dream SMP AU) Fundy’s just trying to work, man, he never asked for his two paternal figure to fight over him. (this is way less dramatic than it looks)

Day 23: Fanmade AU

(SBI&CO d&d AU) Our favourite team of heroes has been sent to catch a scammer that has been plaguing the land. Little do they know, this sly fox has an angelic friend.

Day 24: Loss

(Dream SMP AU) The five stages of grief, with a twist at the end, as Schlatt realises that the people around him aren’t on his side - and maybe they never have been.

Day 25: Fanmade AU

(SBI&CO d&d AU) Calvin knows Techno, how he thinks and how he fights. After all, he taught him himself. When he meets him again, he knows what has to be done. (Spoiler Alert, it’s destroy his fame with embarassing stories)

Day 26: Creative

Because the world needs a bit of Grian appreciation. Him and his ever unfinished house <3

Day 27: Hardcore

(Dream SMP AU) Fundy knows how demons work, he’s just surprised it took him that long to realise what was going on with Schlatt.

[extended version on AO3: TW for a major character being dead, angst, demonic possession, memory loss, body horror]

Day 28: Muffin Duo

When the two of them manage to meet face-to-face, a cooking stream sounds like a perfect idea.

Day 29: A normal day

(SBI&CO d&d AU) George is a wizard, and he is not keen on being disturbed while he studies. Dream and Sapnap are very keen on disturbing.

Day 30: Stuck in a Room Together

(Dream SMP AU, sequel to Day 27) Once Fundy manages to get Schlatt back, he wants him to make things right. After all, Quackity deserves closure.

Day 31: Making a Halloween Costume Together

Tubbo & Tommy plan out their Halloween costumes, the results may surprise you.

[spnirwin]

Prompt Request: #21 - To Build a Home - The Cinematic Orchestra

Requested by: @fandomismymiddlename

Word Count: 1,089

Warnings: Implied death

A/N: Okay so before anyone hates me for this, listen to the song! At least to me, it’s a beautifully written story of love and loss and screams grief in all caps. I promise my next piece of work will be fluffy!

—

There is a house built out of stone

Wooden floors, walls and window sills

Tables and chairs worn by all of the dust

This is a place where I don't feel alone

This is a place where I feel at home

The first time you had laid eyes on Evan Buckley, you knew. He had walked slowly up the stairs in the firehouse, completely unsure of himself. Quickly introducing himself as the new recruit, his uncertainty made sense. He had sat down upon Bobby’s command, and you had offered him a supportive smile. You knew how scary it could be to walk into a well established firehouse, you had done it not even a year prior.

After a short conversation with Bobby you had taken it upon yourself to give Buck a tour of the 118. You had laughed and joked the entire time, trying to make him feel more comfortable. It was no surprise when he asked you out a month later.

—

‘Cause, I built a home

For you

For me

“I am not eating that,” you said, one eyebrow raised as you pointed to the omelette Buck was attempting to make on the stove.

“Oh come on!” he said, grinning at you. “It’s not that bad.” He poked it with the spatula, and absolutely nothing happened.

“I’m pretty sure it’s supposed to move, babe,” you laughed. “It’s not supposed to be a brick. I would break my teeth trying to eat it. Honestly, I’m not sure how you even managed that.”

“Yeah...you’re probably right,” he replied, looking sadly at his attempt at breakfast.

“Why don’t, instead,” you said, standing up from your seat at the counter, “we head over to the café down the street? Then we can get you those potatoes that you really like.”

“Yeah, okay. I just wanted to do something nice for you” he sighed, beginning to pout.

You walked over and wrapped your arms around his waist. “It’s the thought that counts,” you replied, standing up on your tiptoes and pressing a kiss to his lips.

—

Out in the garden where we planted the seeds

There is a tree as old as me

Branches were sewn by the color of green

Ground had arose and passed it's knees

Everyone was acting strange. They had been since the beginning of the shift. No one would look you in the eyes, and you had walked in on people whispering multiple times, stopping as soon as they saw you.

You had eventually given up trying to figure out what was going on and wound up secluding yourself in the bunk room instead. You had been in there for an hour and a half before Buck came looking for you.

“Hey,” he said giving you a soft smile.

“Oh, are people talking to me again?” you snapped, not even bothering to look up.

He sighed, sitting down beside you on the bed you were occupying. “I can explain that if you come with me,” he said, holding out his hand. “Please.”

You rolled your eyes before taking his hand. He pulled you up from the bed and, still holding your hand, walked you out onto the apparatus floor. What you saw in front of you took your breath away. There were thousands of pictures of the two of you covering the walls beside you. The photos spanned the entire course of your relationship, from five years ago at the beginning to present day.

You turned to look at Buck, mouth open in shock. Instead of finding his eyes slightly above you like normal, you found them below you, full of hope. He was down on one knee, a ring box open in his hands.

“Y/n, will you marry me?” he asked, slightly breathless.

Tears welled up in your eyes and you started slowly shaking your head at him. “Yes, Evan, of course I will,” you choked out, overcome with emotion.

He slipped the ring onto your finger and the room exploded with cheering. The rest of the team emerged from various points in the room, hugging and congratulating the two of you. You and Buck locked eyes from within the arms of your friends and, smiling, he mouthed “I love you.”

—

By the cracks of the skin I climbed to the top

I climbed the tree to see the world

When the gusts came around to blow me down

I held on as tightly as you held onto me

I held on as tightly as you held onto me

“Are you kidding me?” Buck shouted at you as you calmly hung up your gear. “Why in the world would you take a risk like that? You know you could’ve died, right?”

“And you’re telling me you wouldn’t have done the same thing?” you asked, cutting him off in the middle of his rant. “There was still a victim trapped in there, a kid no less. I was the only one that could fit through that window and there was still time. And look, here we are, everyone safe and sound.” You threw your hands up in frustration as he continued staring at you, a hard look in his eyes. “Look, you can’t get upset with me for doing something that you would’ve done in a heartbeat. Taking risks are a part of this job. I’ve accepted that for you, it’s time that you did the same for me.”

You turned abruptly and walked away from him. You had only made it a couple steps before he caught up to you, grabbing your arm to slow you down. He stood in front of you, an apologetic look on his face.

“I’m sorry, okay?” he said, his voice remorseful. “You just scared me. I know risks are a part of this job but that doesn’t necessarily mean I want to see you take them. I’ll try to be better in the future.”

You let him pull you forward into a hug, his apology accepted.

—

And, I built a home

For you

For me

You sighed contentedly, looking at the newly framed picture now hanging on the wall. It was from your wedding day, a candid, you and Buck surrounded by the rest of the 118. Everyone was laughing at something Chim had just said, every single face radiating joy.

Buck came up behind you, slipping his arms around your waist and resting his cheek against your temple. “We got lucky, didn’t we?” he asked, the smile evident in his voice.

“We certainly did,” you replied, leaning back into him slightly. You weren’t just talking about the family you had both found, and the little squeeze he gave you told you that he understood what you were trying to say perfectly.

—

Until it disappeared

From me

From you

And now, it's time to leave and turn to dust

The call had come at 1:03 AM. A fire at a storage unit. The place had been like a maze, you couldn’t find your way back out. You were with Buck when your oxygen tanks ran out of air. Eddie had pulled you out, but by the time he went back for Buck it was too late. The roof had collapsed.

The tears rolled quietly down your cheeks as you stood in your living room, staring at one picture on the wall. You reached out, gently brushing your finger across Buck’s smiling face. “I hope you know that I still feel so lucky,” you said. The words came out whispered and strangled, as though you were choking on them. “And I wouldn’t have changed a thing. I love you forever, Evan Buckley.”

—

[adhdeancas]

Sunset Sound: Made in Heaven

Read Chapter 5 on AO3 here.

“Alright, ladies and gents, let’s do this.” Pamela rubs her hands together. They’re all crowded around a table, having hauled Pamela’s magic crap in. She looks around at them like they’re all gathered around for a campfire ghost story. “So, rumor has it that you can crack into the Empty with an inter-realm spell. So… we need somebody from each of the ball fields: Heaven, Earth, Hell, Purgatory.” 

Charlie whistles. “Great. Well, we got the Heaven side covered. Earth is probably next easiest, right?” 

“Except we can’t run the risk of Chuck finding out what we’re up to. So, down low. Evasive measures.” 

Dean nods at Ash. “Sam’s got a handle on the Earth shit; he’s a little magic freak now. No offense.” he puts a hand on Pamela. She rolls her eyes. “But how do we get a message down to him without setting Chuck off? Not like we can send a halo-ed carrier pigeon.”

They all think on it for a second, till Pamela leans forward. “The veil. If we can contact a ghost, they can haunt Sam and get him the message.” 

Charlie raises an eyebrow. “Aren’t ghosts known for being kind of… crazy? Murderous?”

“Huge dicks?” Ash adds helpfully. 

Pamela shrugs. “We could find one that’s recently died; there’s the possibility they wouldn’t have turned yet. But we’d have to know who we’re contacting, we can’t just put out a classified.” 

Something pings in the back of Dean’s head and he slams his hand on the table. He apologizes quickly because damn near everyone jumps at the noise. “I got it. Kevin. Kevin Tran. He’s in the veil still, and he’s spent a fuckton of time down there, he’d know how to haunt somebody good.” 

“And is he going to want to help us?” 

Dean frowns at Pamela. “What does that mean?” 

“I mean, people don’t usually end well around you, Dean. Case in point,” she motions around the table at all of them. “It’s not your fault but… sometimes there are hard feelings.” 

Dean shakes his head. He deserves hard feelings from Kevin, that’s for sure, but the kid’s awesome. Hell, last time he’d seen them he’d been almost happy, even signing up to stay in the veil forever. “Nah, we can trust Kevin. He’s family.” 

“Alright. Fire her up then, Pam,” Ash is excited. Pamela shoots him a glare for impatience but she gets her shit together anyway. It’s already set up, all she has to do is ask Dean for a few personal details, chant a bit, and she gets through. “We’re asking for Kevin Tran. Kevin Tran, if you’re out there, Dean Winchester wants a word. Well, a few actually. Kevin, can you hear me?” 

The draft spigot turns on by itself, spewing beer onto the floor. “Hey Kev, want a beer?” Dean jumps up and grabs a glass, pumped at the prospect of seeing his friend again.” 

“That’s it, Kevin. You’re doing great. Keep trying, keep locking into that.” 

The candles on the table go out one by one: apparently, Kevin practicing. Dean holds his breath and shuts off the draft spigot, a glass of beer held out in front of him. “Can ghosts drink? Wait, are you even 21, Kevin?” 

“The kid’s dead and you’re gonna huff and puff over the legal age for a Pilsner?” Ash laughs. Dean hands it to him; he has a point. Maybe Jack’s made him a little overprotective of shit like that. 

Kevin appears in front of Dean then, hand outstretched to try and take the beer. His sudden appearance makes Dean spill half of it all over himself. “Son of a- hi Kevin!” he offers the beer out again, and this time Kevin takes it and pours it right through his ghostly figure. “Oh… shit.” 

Kevin deadpans at him. “Yeah, it sucks. Hi, Dean.” 

“How you doing, bud?” 

Kevin shrugs and sighs, looking down at himself. “Well, I’m dead. Still. Dean, you wanna explain what I’m doing here first?” 

Dean nods, grabbing the beer back from Kevin and setting it on the table. He motions for the kid to turn around toward the table set up with witchy shit. “Kevin, this is Ash, Charlie, and Pamela, the psychic who summoned you.” Pamela and Ash both give a flirty wink, which makes Dean turn about three shades of red in the face. 

“Heard a lot, kid.” Ash greets him.

“Yeah, I’ve never heard of any dead guy with such bad luck.” Pamela adds on. And she would know.

Kevin nods with a wry smile. “Yeah, well, that’s just me, I guess. Dead for years, in the veil most of it and hell for the rest.”

“Kev, I’m so sorry-” 

Kevin holds up a hand to stave off Dean’s apologies. “It’s not your fault, Dean. It’s Chuck’s. Tell me you got him.” 

“That’s what we’re here for, man.” 

“Yeah, apparently we’re the Kill God Team now.” Charlie grins and Kevin smiles back. 

“Hell fucking yeah. I can get on board with that. Whaddya need me to do?” 

They all sit down at the table and map it all out. “We need you to get the plan over to Sam, but we can’t have Chuck finding out about any of it.”

“Yeah, so you need to make sure he knows to keep a low profile.” Dean warns. The last fucking thing in the world they need is to lose the element of surprise. Plus, that would put Sam right in Chuck’s crosshairs, and Dean can’t be there to back him up. He curses himself again for dying. 

“What exactly do we mean by low profile?” Charlie asks. “Are we talking cabin in the middle of the woods off-grid kind of low profile or just a Meet the Robinson’s type deal?”

Dean sighs. “Sam needs to stay away from anything Chuck likes to watch.” God, it sounded grimy just saying it. “That means hunting, that means me, that means… Eileen too.” 

“Eileen?” 

“His girlfriend.” It hurts Dean to think about, but- “Chuck’s used them against each other before; he likes them together. So they gotta stay apart.”

“Shit.” Charlie exhales quietly, and Dean nods. It’s unfair. It sucks. It’s Chuck. 

“Tell him to live a normal life. Be as happy as he can. But don’t come looking for me and don’t get interesting. Or Chuck will just fuck with him some more, and if he does that… he’s gonna find out what we’re doing.” Kevin nods seriously. He never gets brought around for fun shit, does he? Dean feels a pang of regret at that. He immediately wants to change it. “But right now, whaddya say we have some fun, huh?” 

The table looks at him like he’s gone nutty. He shrugs and grins. “Come on guys, we’re dead. Don’t we all have a night to spare?” 

He sees Charlie come around first, slow grin spreading across her face. “Fuck yeah, let’s party, bitches!”

It doesn’t take the rest of them much convincing either. Dean has some good-ass friends. “Yo Kev, since you can’t get fucked up, you wanna play some pool?” Ash hitches his thumb at the table behind him. 

Dean laughs. “Ash, you are one cruel son of a bitch. Years of being a friggin’ ghost and you’re gonna whoop him in pool? That’s cold.” 

Ash shakes his head. “Nah man, I’ve spent way more time passed out on that table than playing on it. I’d say the kid’s got a fair shot.” Kevin smiles and shrugs at Dean.

“Hey, that’s more than I’ve ever gotten before; I’ll take my chances” 

They head off to play and Dean grabs a beer to watch, a good one this time. One with the label he and Sam used to buy, the kind that Cas said “didn’t taste as much like the vast expanse of space dust” as the others. Charlie and Pamela follow with their own. 

“So Dean,” Pamela says. “Ash tells me you gotta angel on your shoulder.” She sounds a little weary. Dean figures that’s fair, given her experience with the species. 

“Uh… yeah. Castiel.” He gestures to her eyes. “That one.” Pamela shrugs if off. 

“So make me like him. Charlie here says you’ve got quite the bond.” Dean blushes pink, but for once there isn’t any innuendo behind her voice. At least, none that is teasing. He looks to Charlie, who makes a ‘I didn’t say anything’ face at him and relaxes a bit. 

“Well, uh, he hasn’t burned anymore eyes out,” Dean starts, then reconsiders. “Well, none that didn’t deserve it.” Not really true either. “Well-” 

“He’s super cute.” Charlie cuts him off. Dean blushes deeper. “He gave a whole fuck-you to heaven to save Dean.” Dean blushes deeper still. Why does it sound so… intimate when she says it like that? Pamela just raises an eyebrow.

“Sounds like some ally.” 

“Cas?” Kevin sinks a ball. The kid’s not bad, actually. Ash was right; they are neck-and-neck. “Yeah, he’s awesome. I mean, weird, but cool.” Dean grins. Weird but cool was exactly Cas. 

“Someday, man, I gotta meet this guy.” Ash laments.

“Someday, dude, you will.” Dean vows. Somehow sitting around talking about him with all these guys, he felt confident it was true. “Once we bust him out, you better bet we’re throwing a party and meet-and-greeting everybody. 

“I’ll finally get to tease him for the eyes. You think it’d get him better without the fakes?” She pops her fake cloudy eyes out and waggles her eyebrows at Dean, empty eye sockets looking bizarre on such a cheerful face. Dean laughs. 

“You’re not gonna need to; he already feels shitty for that. He’ll probably offer to heal ‘em, matter of fact.” 

“Well, he won’t get far with that one,” Ash calls over. “Angels been trying to do it for years.” Pamela nods at Dean’s questioning glance.

“Wouldn’t be me without ‘em, now. Who needs sight anyway?” 

“Without eyes you won’t be able to see my pretty face!” Dean bullshits. 

“Yeah, or your brother’s tight ass. Second thought, remind me when Sam gets up here, won’t ya?” Dean makes a gagging noise and Pamela laughs. 

“So you said Chuck’s in your… kid?” Kevin asks skeptically. He misses a shot and Ash hollers. Dean cracks his neck and considers how to answer. 

“Kinda. I mean, yeah. Just not- he’s Lucifer and a human’s, technically.” He starts, realizing Kelly’s in heaven too. They’ve gotta let her in on this, but not now. Not now when Chuck!Jack is probably visiting her as her son; it’s too risky. With how sick he feels at the idea of Jack being Chuck’s meatsuit, well…

He sees Cas. Again. Just for a second, there he is standing outside the window, looking less wounded but more tired than before. He looks like he’s focused on something, like he’s scared, but he also looks transfixed, like he can’t look away. As Dean watches, Cas closes his eyes and mouths something. It looks like he’s counting. “One, two, three.” Dean blinks and he’s gone, and Dean’s left wondering if he imagined the whole thing.

“Dean?” 

“Yeah.” He smiles at Charlie to let her know he’s okay. Ish. “Sorry, uh, so he’s kind of devilspawn but he’s ours. Mine, Cas’s, Sam’s. Long story. But he’s a good kid.” He nods, knowing he oughta give more information, but not really knowing how.

“Who woulda thought, Dean Winchester, a dad.” Ash ribs with a grin. Dean laughs back and nods. His life hadn’t really screamed stability and mentorhood. His death still didn’t.

“Yeah, I… I haven’t exactly been a star father-figure…” Dean shakes his head. The conflict in his head that culminates in Jack is confusing as hell, but three things win him over. The first is Jack’s innocent, naive face looking up at him for any kind of approval or wisdom. A kid. Just a kid. The second is Cas’s face as he smiles at him that one night over a whiskey glass, the prideful joy as he tells Dean he always believed in Jack. The third is the pit in his gut of all the times he acted like his dad to Jack. And no matter what, Dean can’t leave those memories be. He can’t have Jack remember him like that, and he can’t look Cas in the eye knowing he didn’t do everything he could to make things right. “But that’s gonna change, if it fucking kills me. We gotta save him when we get Chuck, guys, we gotta.” 

“We will.” Kevin looks at him with an overly-confident smile. “We can’t lose. You’ve got me, now!”

The rest of them bust out laughing, and Kevin fakes offense. “You’re right, Kev. Don’t know what I’m so worried ‘bout.” 

Tag List (ask to be added or removed):

@dochunterwitch  @justonecitizenoftheearth @gnbrules @purpe @castiel-is-a-cat @alienapparatus @damian-janus-pendragon

[weekendwarriorblog]

THE WEEKEND WARRIOR 6/25/21: F9, WEREWOLVES WITHIN, THE ICE ROAD, FALSE POSITIVE, I CARRY YOU WITH ME and More!

Well, June is quickly coming to an end, but that means it’s officially summer. No, for real this time. Summer started June 21, and that means we have the latest attempt to revive the box office, and really, if this doesn’t do it, then we’re sunk. Doomed. It’s over, and Jeff Bock, the Streamer Relations guy, has won. We’re in the endgame now. Go to the movies this weekend, and don’t let Jeff Bock win!

Before we get to the theatrical releases, the 20th Tribeca [formerly Film] Festival ended over the weekend, and it certainly “looked different” as we were reminded every time some local celebrity introduced a movie on the festival’s virtual platform. As far as the movies I saw, a few are mentioned below but generally, the documentaries once again outplayed any of the narrative features, which was pretty much the same with other festivals this year. Besides the Rita Moreno doc that I reviewed last week, I quite enjoyed A-Ha the Movie, a documentary that covers the famous ‘80s “one hit wonders” travails since their first hit album and the ubiquitous “Take on Me.” It’s a great doc that really shows what can happen when you try to keep the band together even when you stop travelling or even talking to each other. Also Bitchin’: The Sound and Fury of Rick James was another great musical doc about a funk/soul singer who I really never knew very much about, so it was quite educational. I also liked 7 Days quite a bit, and that was one of the better narrative films at the fest.

It felt like there were two very different Tribecas. There was one for the elitist journalists who were allowed to attend all the in-person screenings and parties, and there was the one for the rest of us -- where we were just sitting at home watching stuff on our TV sets, just like we did with Sundance and SXSW. And make no mistake, as someone who has been covering Tribeca since Year Two (where I *bought* all my tickets), it definitely felt like I was being pushed aside by the current Tribeca regime who just wants to be seen as something exclusive just for certain people, including as a woke festival catering to the underrepresented (but not really… if that was the case, they would have given free tickets out to people who live in the areas of the city where they set-up their pop-up screenings). I only know a few locals who received the better in-person badge -- pretty much the entire staff at IndieWire, for instance -- but as someone who has covered the festival for years and received a Hudson Pass for the effort, it definitely felt like I don’t really need to cover Tribeca anymore. It’s just not the elite festival it thinks it is, and as far as I’m concerned, it will never be Cannes, it will never be Sundance, and it will never even be SXSW. It continues to be a festival with zero identity that caters to the rich, white New Yorkers that already get special treatment wherever they go. I’m not even sure how much of it even takes place in Tribeca anymore, since the premier location for movie premieres seemed to be at Hudson Yards, which is about four miles North of “Ground Zero,” the area affected by 9/11 that precipitated the need for something like the Tribeca Festival in the first place. I feel that this year’s festival was an even bigger disappointment than last year’s virtual only, but that’s because they’ve finally just given up on the press they don’t feel are worthy of covering them. So yeah, not for me.

It’s hard to believe that F9 (Universal Pictures), the ninth movie in the “Fast Saga.” is finally being released in North America, since I felt like I reviewed it five years ago. Actually, it was only a month ago, but it just seems like forever since I’ve been so busy this month.

In case you have no idea what to expect and wanna know: Vin Diesel is back as Dominic Torreto, and this time we meet another member of his real family, brother Jakob (John Cena), who is now working with the criminal spy organization Cypher. Most of the gang are back, except for Dwayne Johnson’s Agent Hobbs and Jason Statham’s Deckard Shaw, who you may remember went off to make Hobbs and Shaw a few years back. In fact, that last movie was the last movie in the franchise, which was supposed to act as a tie-over between 2017’s Fate of the Furious and F9, which was originally supposed to come out in 2020. Got all that?

Hobbs and Shaw opened with around $60 million in early August, which is generally one of the few weekends in the late summer where a movie could still open big. That was the lowest opening for the franchise in over ten years, because ever since 2009’s Fast & Furious, every single movie has opened over $70 million and closer to $100 million or more. 2013’s Fast and Furious 6 and 2017’s The Fate of the Furious didn’t quite hit a $100 million opening, but still, it’s a pretty good barometer of how big the franchise was in the before-times. James Wan’s Furious 7 still sports the biggest opening with $147 million in early April 2015, hampered by the year-long delay after one of the film’s stars, Paul Walker, died in a car crash a year earlier. Walker’s death may have helped drive audiences to the movie with the same morbid curiosity way as Christopher Nolan’s The Dark Knight back in 2008. (Furious 7 grossed $353 million domestically, which is also a high watermark for the franchise domestically.)

The Fate of the Furious grossed slightly less than the previous two installments and then Hobbs and Shaw ended up with $173 million, which is nothing to sneeze at… unless your movie ended up costing $200 million, which that one did. We’re talking about very expensive movies here, and one presumes F9 is up there in that $200 million range, but it bodes a couple questions. Was the success of the franchise since Fast 5 mainly due to “franchise Viagra” Dwayne Johnson and was that helped by the addition of Statham? With the two of them gone, does that take away from the movie’s potential or do people like Diesel, Tyrese Gibson’s Roman, Ludacris and the other long-timers like Michelle Rodriguez and Jordana Brewster enough to make this an opening weekend must-see?

There might some questions whether theaters in bigger cities like New York and L.A., where F9 would generally do big business, will be as full as normal -- even with full capacity finally being allowed. The other question is whether Universal may have released this movie overseas too far in advance of the States. Think about it. When you start to think about movie piracy and where a lot of that comes from, it goes right to China, and a movie like this at a time like this when people are cautious about running to theaters, well if you walk down the street and someone is selling a copy for 5 bucks, why wouldn’t you buy it? That’s the reason why studios release movies day and date across the globe, or at least they try to. Piracy used to be a big thing hurting the movie business, but that seems to have been forgotten.

Reviews for the movie have been mixed -- I already reviewed the movie over at Below the Line -- but about the same as the last two installments, so those won’t necessarily stop people from going to the movies, since this is a classic summer popcorn movie where it feels like everyone should go see it opening week. Like in the past, F9 will open Thursday night for previews, but it seems to getting more Thursday night previews than normal -- I’ve seen five to six screenings in many locations -- and that might because Universal realizes how important this release is and how many people will be looking to see if it can revive theatrical.

I think I’m going to say that F9 will make around $72 to 74 million this weekend, which takes it back to Fast & Furious days, but I do think audiences will like the movie more than critics, and because of that, the decision to make two more movies will probably be warranted.

I was very excited to see Josh Ruben directing another movie so soon after last year’s Scare Me -- a terrific horror-comedy you can watch on Shudder -- and his latest film, WEREWOLVES WITHIN (IFC Films), based on the Ubisoft game, is just as funny AND scary. It stars Sam Richardson as Finn Wheeler, the new park ranger arriving in the small and remote town of Beaversfield, which seems to have just as much politics and backbiting as the biggest of the cities. He quickly becomes friends with the bubbly postwoman, Cecily (Milana Vayntrub), as she introduces him to the quirky townsfolk… oh, yeah, and there is something brutally mauling them to death.

The premise for Werewolves Within seems fairly simple, and maybe that’s because it is based on a VR game where I assume you have to figure out who is the vampire, so that’s pretty much what’s going on as Finn, Cecily and seemingly the entire town wind up locking themselves up in the Beaversfield Inn trying to figure out who is killing the others. Thankfully, there are more layers built into the ongoing relationships between the townsfolk.

Ruben’s got a lot of things going for his second feature film, the first thing being a super-funny script by Mishna Wolff, but also the amazing cast he put together that not includes Richardson and Vayntrub with some brilliant chemistry but also the likes of Michaela Watkins and Michael Chernus, who can never do wrong in my book. Those two elements alone would make Werewolves Within worthwhile, but Ruben ably takes on the challenges of a much bigger cast than his previous movie and finds a way to keep the viewer constantly on edge and interested in what will happen next, especially to some of the characters who are not as jovial or friendly as Richardson’s Finn.

But what works best about the movie is that there are plenty of unexpected twists, maybe some more obvious than others, and the fact you never really know who might die next or house keeps the movie quite entertaining. It also shows off Ruben’s great skills at combining horror and humor, something that’s very difficult for even the best directors, but when you’ve got it -- as Ruben proved so perfectly with Scare Me -- then you might as well use it to its fullest.

It’s hard to describe how well the humor works without using jokes ala something like Shaun of the Dead, but it’s more of a light-hearted charm that one wouldn’t expect to go so well with the dire situation in which the characters find themselves. It doesn’t hurt that many of the characters are so unlikable that getting their comeuppance adds to that humor. If you’re expecting a lot of werewolf transformations or even werewolves plural, you might be slightly disappointed, but it’s nice that a movie can be its own thing without trying to copy other films in the horror subgenre.

Either way, Ruben is 2 for 2 with his second attempt at comedy-horror, which ventures just far enough away from Scare Me to make me think that he’ll continue to be a great voice in the much-maligned and hard-to-muster horror subgenre.

Werewolves Within just debuted at the Tribeca Festival, and it will be released in theaters this Friday and then be On Demand and Digital starting July 2. I’ll also have an interview with Josh Ruben over at Below the Line a little later today, too, so check that out!

Not getting a theatrical release in the United States unfortunately is Jonathan Hensleigh’s THE ICE ROAD (Netflix), starring Liam Neeson as a truck driver in Winnipeg, whose special skill is driving that truck across the frozen lake up north. When a diamond mine collapses in the very north side of Canada, it’s up to him and a crew of other ice truckers to drive their big rigs across the frozen lake to save the men trapped in the mine.

I quite liked this movie that definitely marks a return of Hensleigh to some of those great action movies he wrote in the ‘90s, like Die Hard with a Vengeance, but this is also a significantly better action movie than some of the ones he’s directed, like the 2004 The Punisher. The sad fact is that I’ve been pretty disappointed with Neeson’s recent film choices, particularly in the last year when disappointments like The Honest Thief and The Marksman managed to get theatrical releases even during the pandemic. The Ice Road is a much better movie, maybe because Hensleigh wrote and directed it himself, but also he had much better source material in the docuseries, Ice Road Truckers, and he clearly did his research into these 18-wheelers on these dangerous trips across iced-over lake that could crack at any time. Hensleigh uses this idea well to tell a story where much of the movie takes place on that dangerous ice.

There are elements to the story that might not work quite as well, such as the decision to have Neeson’s brother Gurty (Marcus Thomas) be suffering from such horrible PTSD that it makes him almost a bigger hindrance than a help on the trip. On the other hand, the movie does have the always great Laurence Fishburne in a smaller role and the real breakout has to be Amber Midthunder, the bad-ass Indigenous Tantoo who proves that she can drive as well as the guys. I also found that Hensleigh’s use of the corporation as the ultimate antagonist in sending these truckers to their potential deaths more for the money than to actually save lives works well to add to what would have been a simple rescue mission.

The Ice Road is a pretty solid (ugh, bad pun) action-thriller that has some elements of other similar movies but then really throws the viewer for a loop with the amazing on-ice truck driving stunt work, that keeps one invested while really putting it ahead of some of Neeson’s other recent action fare.

You can read my interview with Hensleigh over at Below the Line.

Next up are two very different movies that played at the 20th Tribeca Festival over the past week

Heidi Ewing’s I CARRY YOU WITH ME (Sony Pictures Classics) finally gets a theatrical release after getting its Oscar qualifying run way back in December and premiering at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2020! Based on the true story of Mexican immigrant lovers Ivan and Gerardo, who travel from Mexico to New York City and are reunited after decades apart and many struggles to rekindle their romance.

This is an interesting movie for Ewing, best known for her award-winning docs like Jesus Camp, because it’s not an easy story to tell or movie to make, covering a span of decades, and using flashbacks to tell the individual stories of how these two men discovered their homosexuality while surrounded by a toxic culture who hates them for loving each other. We meet Iván as he’s cooking in a Mexican restaurant in New York before we flashback to Pablo, Mexico in 1994 when he’s younger (and played by Armando Espitia), married with a young son, but when he meets Gerardo (Christian Vázquez) at a gay club and the two click, he’s put in a place where he has to keep his sexuality hidden if he doesn’t want to lose his son. As the romance blossoms, Ivan realizes that he needs to go to America if he really wants his culinary skills (he even went to school) to be used, because in Pablo, he’s relegated to being a dishwasher.

Ivan decides to make the dangerous trek across the border with his best friend Sandra (Michelle Rodríguez -- not the one in F9) with the promise to return to Gerardo. Things don’t necessarily go as planned but decades later they’re reunited, and struggle to make it in New York City as restaraunteurs. As you watch their story unfold, you can fully understand why Ewing might want to tell this story, co-writing the script with Alan Page Arriaga, but there are still elements of documentary in this narrative beautifully shot by Cinematographer Juan Pablo Ramírez AMC.

Unfortunately, those elements of documentary are what really confused me, because there are moments in the present day when the real Ivan and Gerardo are playing themselves, but then there are times when the two main actors are made up to look older, and I couldn’t really figure out what was happening at times, maybe due to some of the more dream-like nature of the storytelling.

Even so, Ewing has created a terrific character piece and quite a warm and wondrous love story, even if it’s plagued by violence and discrimination due to their roots and their homosexuality. I couldn’t help but think that I might have liked Moonlight more if it wasn’t told in such a linear fashion, separated into three chapters. By using the flashbacks to keep the viewer fully focused on what’s happening, Ewing creates something more on par with Cuaron’s Y Tu Mama Tambien that feels just as authentic as if Ewing were a gay Mexican herself.

Probably the weakest part is the second act where we watch Ivan trying to get to America, because that’s been done in so many other movies, including Cary Joji Fukunaga’s earlier film, Sin Nombre, and that feels a little less unique or special compared to the rest of the duo’s story.

It’s a shame that I Carry You With Me wasn’t able to build any awards traction, partially due to Covid and the long gap between festival appearances. Either way, it proves that Ewing is a lot more than a “mere” documentary filmmaker, able to mix those skills with that of a sharp narrative filmmaker with a keen eye for storytelling. This is a particularly strong character piece and a beautiful love story based on two real men, unlike anything I’ve seen in recent memory.

Honestly, I’ve given up on figuring what Sony Classics is doing in terms of their theatrical releases. I guess this could be opening in New York and Los Angeles or in more cities. I have no idea, because no one tells me anything. But I also wanted to share the review by my friend J. Don Birnam that he wrote out of the New York Film Festival last year. He has reasons to be able to connect with this material much more than I can, which is probably why his review is so damn good: http://splashreport.com/nyff-film-review-i-carry-you-with-me-an-inspiring-story-of-triumph-by-rarely-depicted-peoples/

Not quite as good is John Lee’s horror-thriller FALSE POSITIVE (Hulu/A24), starring Ilana Glazer from Broad City, who also cowrote the screenplay with Lee. It’s a very different non-comedic role for Glazer in which she plays Lucy, a pregnant woman, who finds her pregnancy turned into a nightmare, as she puts herself in the hands of the nefarious ob/gyn Dr. John Hindle, played by the great Pierce Brosnan, who happened to be her husband’s (Justin Theroux) medical teacher.

Man, did I want to like this psychological thriller, because I think Glazer is just the best in Broad Street, and the fact that she co-wrote this and is trying to do something unexpected out of the ordinary just thrills me to the end. That being said, her character Lucy seems to be a rather standard powerful NYC woman with a good job where she’s better than the rest, who ends up going through a torturous experience as an expectant mother who isn’t able to trust her own doctor. Part of the conflict comes when Julie is told that she is having more than one baby, but she has to choose between twin boys or a single girl, because she’s told that she won’t be able to take all three of them to term.

It’s an okay premise dealing with the many worries that women must have while pregnant, and things get crazier and crazier as Julia begins seeing everything, and while Glazer isn’t bad while playing a straight-up no-humor dramatic role, it’s hard not to see her more as a Debra Messing type when she has her hair straightened out to look different.

The horror elements are decent whether it’s the body horror idea of having a number of dead baby fetuses inside you, which is pretty creepy, and Lee doesn’t do a bad job with the trippier parts of the movie, though I feel like it overuses and leans on the use of blood to step up the horror, and it doesn’t work that well. There are also aspects to the story that feel somewhat predictable only because there are only a few way things can go the way things are set-up.

It’s obvious that Glazer and Lee wanted to make social commentary on the male-dominated field of childbirth with some of the weirder aspects of the movie, like the Stepford Nurses that constantly surround Brosnan’s Dr. Hindle. Having them there smiling eerily always boosts Lucy’s suspicion that her husband might be cheating with one or both of them. Still, there are too many aspects of False Positive (including the fact it was produced by A24) that makes one think that this is another attempt at the kind of “elevated humor” that’s been done so much better by the likes of Ari Aster and Robert Eggers.

Ultimately, False Positive is okay, it certainly tries hard, it’s maybe not quite as good as I hoped or expected of what might have been a perfectly fine vehicle for Glazer. I certainly had high hopes for what she might do with a pregnancy thriller, that this movie just never quite delivers.

False Positive debuts on Hulu this Friday.

From Sweden comes the horror film THE EVIL NEXT DOOR (Magnet) from filmmakers Oskar Mellender and Tord Danielsson, which follows a new stepmom Shirin (Dilan Gwyn), who has moved into a duplex with her partner Fredrik and his young son, Lucas (Eddie Eriksson Dominguez), but they soon learn that strange things start happening that seem to be coming from the abandoned house next door.

I’m always open to see what’s coming from the Scandinavian countries, because there’s been a lot of particularly good genre over the years -- Let the Right One In, for instance -- but I got the impression right away that originality was not going to be in the cards for this one, which immediately has the small boy having an imaginary friend, who you know is either an evil spirit or one of the spirit’s previous victims. Sadly, that’s the case here, and without the originality of some of the original horror films it's emulating, The Evil Next Door just seems like an international copycat.

If you’re even a modicum fan of modern horror, you’re likely to have seen many better versions of this movie, which is just kind of bland overall, but constantly resorts to scenes of a woman walking through the house acting scared and the cheap scares that inevitably come. This one even uses the eerie “next day” chapters that have been used in so many other horror movies, including the Paranormal Activity movies.

Mellender and Danielsson certainly come off as capable filmmakers, and they could do far worse than the incredibly dramatic and emotional performance by Gwyn -- the movie does get slightly better as it goes along -- but the feeling that you’ve seen it all before and know what to expect completely detracts from appreciating any of the finer aspects. For instance, there’s some decent creature design work but even that sometimes goes for the expected in terms of the spirit’s look. The filmmaker’s skills are also evident from the use of music and sound design, which is crucial to a movie like this working in any fashion, but it’s hard to fully appreciate it when you feel you know where things are going.

The Evil Next Door just feels like a movie made by fans of the far superior “Conjuring” movies who managed to cop some of the tricks to scare the viewer, but without fully understanding why those movies work due to original characters and storytelling ideas. These are decent filmmakers, but I’d really like to see them do something more unique or original.

If you live in NYC and feel like going up to Harlem, Questlove’s documentary, Summer of Soul, is opening a week early, this Friday at the AMC Magic Johnson in Harlem, New York, and it’s also opening at El Capitan in Los Angeles. It will open in theaters elsewhere and on Hulu NEXT Friday, July 2, so I’ll write more about it in next week’s column.

Debuting on Apple TV+ Friday is Drew Zanthopoulos’ documentary FATHOM (Apple TV+), which follows scientists Dr. Ellen Garland and Dr. Michelle Fournet as they study the whale songs of the humpback whale and try to figure out ways to communicate with them and understand whale culture. Oddly, this is one of quite a few whale documentaries coming out over the next few weeks.

Another movie that I just don’t have time to review just now is Eytan Rockaway’s gangster thriller, LANSKY (Vertical), which stars Harvey Keitel, Sam Worthington, John Magaro, AnnaSophia Robb and Minka Kelly. Worthington is down-and-out writer David Stone, who gets a call from the legendary gangster Meyer Lansky (played by Keitel), who has been of the grid for decades but worth a fortune. Stone meets with Lansky as the FBI closes in on the Godfather of organized crime, and he’s told about Lansky’s time with Murder Inc. and the National Crime Syndicate.

Other movies out this week, include:

SILENT NIGHT (Samuel Goldwyn)

SISTERS ON TRACK (Netflix)

TOO LATE (Gravitas Ventures)

Next week is the 4th of July (on Sunday), and we’re getting FOREVER PURGE (Universal) and THE BOSS BABY 2: FAMILY BUSINESS (also Universal!!?!?)... I guess someone really wants to dominate the box office again, huh?

[drunk-onsunlight]

Day #5 of Promptmas

Chapter 5: That took a lot of convincing!

Summary:

Some festive baking with MJ and maybe Peter is seeing MJ on a different light

Read on Ao3

Concept: Baking & Hot Chocolate

Dialogue: “The cookies! They’re burning!”

December 21st

He was dreaming, of that he was sure. Black Cat and MJ were mixed in one image, like they were the same person, and that was totally ridiculous. Yes, MJ did that complicated flip on the ice rink and then he saw Black Cat doing the same flip but on a wall, coincidence. With those two images mixed he went to sleep and woke up at a ringing phone, his phone.

“yeah?” not to formal but whatever, it was too early… probably

“Pete? You ok?” Morgan’s little voice shook him to awakening, she never called if it wasn’t important. She always texted him

“Yeah. I was sleeping. You ok? Are Tony and Pepper fine?”

“We good Pete, don’t worry” oh, so he was on speaker with the Starks

“Oh, ok… so, what’s going on?” He had totally forgot about calling Pepper to clarify that he didn’t have a girlfriend, maybe this was the perfect time

“Is MJ with you?” Morgan’s voice was low and calm, not like her, she was always excited when she asked about MJ. Was everything actually ok?

“Ammm… no? She is sleeping. Why?” He knew she wasn’t awake because he couldn’t hear her on the kitchen, but anyway, this conversation was getting weird

“Can you wake her up?” Definitely weird, Pepper sounded the same as when she made corporative calls.

“Ok. Is everything fine?”

“Yes Peter, trust me. It’s good” Tony’s voice calmed Peter down more. He got out of bed and crossed the hallway that separated him from MJ. He knocked the door twice and waited. His super hearing caught her moving around her bed, cursing softly and getting out of bed to open the door.

“What?” she sounded like she wanted to kill him but he knew better than that, she just needed coffee

“The Starks need us” Her face was pure confusion, he shrugged to tell her he didn’t know what that was about while putting on the speaker

“Ok, she is with me. You are all on speaker”

“Hi MJ!!!” Morgan shouted enthusiastically

“Hi little one” MJ’s soft voice caught him out of guard, she could be so soft with Morgan and so tough with everyone else

“It’s a pleasure to finally hear your voice Michelle” Tony spoke this time. Peter knew he had told him too much about MJ, mostly creepy and weird stories so he respected (and feared) MJ a lot.

“Mr. Stark, it’s my pleasure. I have heard a lot about you” she sounded so professional. Like when she was speaking to a client

“I think not as much as I have heard from you. Peter never shuts up about you” Oh God, no! Please no. Tony couldn’t be calling just to embarrass him. He closed his eyes for a second and when he opened them back, he found MJ looking at him with a mocking expression on her face

“They don’t shut about the each other dad, that’s for sure” Morgan’s voice ended the moment and made them look at the phone on Peter’s hand like it was speaking on its own

“Morgan, what are you doing?” Peter spoke a little rough to his phone

“Oh, Pete. It’s not a secret anymore. We know you guys are dating!” Pepper spoke enthusiastically

“What?” MJ wasn’t looking at Peter, she had her eyes glued to the phone

“Morgan told us you guys wanted to keep it down but it’s actually good news for everyone!” Morgan did what? He was going to kill her little sister

“Yes! Peter, you already told my dad about MJ a long time ago, he told my mom and I told them what I know about both of you”

“And it was kind of obvious Peter”

“What?” Peter was more confused by the second

“Your feelings for MJ” Pepper and Tony spoke at unison and Peter wanted to hide forever and never look at MJ in the eyes.

“And it’s obvious MJ had a thing for you too, Peter. It was bound to happen. You can both stop pretending” MJ looked dumbfounded

“Now that we all know what’s going on, you are both invited to our Christmas family reunion. It starts tomorrow and you can all go back home in time to go back to college” Pepper spoke like she had the last word and wasn’t hearing a no for an answer

“Yeah. Why not?” MJ’s voice sounded so sure that Peter turned his head so fast he felt the world move around him

“What are you doing?” Peter whispered to MJ so the Starks couldn’t hear him

“What? Scared you can’t resist my charm for a few days, loser?” MJ whispered to him and he had a flashback of gloved hands touching him and soft whispers in his ear from last night

“Ok! Perfect! No need to bring food or something like that, just the presents you already bought. We are inviting Ned and Betty too by the way. See you tomorrow” Tony ended the call without giving them the chance to say their goodbyes

“Now I want to bake some cookies for tomorrow. Do you think Morgan will like that? Maybe we can decorate them there with some frosting” MJ was moving around the apartment like nothing happened, just a normal reunion with friends or something like that, which wasn’t the case

“MJ?”

“Where are the cutters for the cookies?” She was still rambling about the cookies while he tried not to freak out to much about the whole situation

“Michelle!” She stopped looking for whatever she needed and looked at him

“Peter”

“What the hell just happened?”

“I was trying to find the cutters, the rolling pin and a bowl for the Christmas cookies. You wanna help?” She had an innocent face which he knew was nothing but innocent

“You know that we are going tomorrow to that reunion as?”

“Yes, Peter. I heard them”

“And you say yes” She narrowed her eyes at him, he could see the Michelle he knew from high school right in front of him. Observing him like he was a phenomenon

“So? You don’t want to go?” if he didn’t managed the conversation properly this could end in a massive disaster

“It’s not that, I would love to go but why you didn’t tell them we are not together, as a couple, I mean” Her face was expressionless now. That worried him, he always found a way to read her

“Peter, believe me, it’s the best way to show them we are actually not together. Stark has an idea we are together because you never shut up about me but I guess it’s because you never shut up about anything and we are friends that live together. And the other person you talk about nonstop is Ned. Now, probably Stark told something to Pepper and she also thinks we are dating or something. And then we have Morgan who knows we are not dating but she, anyway, gave them even more information of how we are "dating". It’s the perfect opportunity”

“I’m not putting two and two together here” MJ rolled her eyes and placed a hand over the counter

“I don’t want to go to my family reunion since there’s gonna be a lot of people I don’t want to see and pretending to be you girlfriend sound ten times better than getting comments all night of “why are you still single?” or "so, Michelle. Why you decided to stay in Queens when you can totally afford an apartment soemwhere else. Are you a lawyer?" that I really don’t like to hear. And I bet you get those same comments since you haven’t dated anyone in a few years, except the thing of the apartment but you know what I mean” Peter wasn’t so sure about them pretending to date but he wasn’t going to admit that he did get those comments from Tony, May and even Happy

“So we are going to pretend to date for this reunion to save the comments from everyone and then what. Or we are going like us and prove them we are not together?” were they supposed to have a terrible break up or something? He didn’t want to fight with MJ, pretended or not

“You can tell them we broke up because we saw that we get along better as friends so we can still live together. If that actually ends up happening we can always pretend we hate each other”

“Wow. You can lie with such ease”

“We are not lying. We still friends, right?” He just shook his head affirmatively and MJ went back to her preparations for the cookies.

Peter sat down on the couch and turned the TV on. He changed the channels not looking at what they had on, he just needed something to do while his anxiety was making him think about everything that was coming up. Was faking a relationship with MJ really that easy? Was everyone going to believe that they actually were dating or discover the lie? And what about Morgan? She knew they weren’t together and what if the plan was to show everyone they weren't together? How do you do that?

“Are you that actually paying attention to those infomercials?” MJ was sitting next to him and he haven’t noticed

“How are the cookies going?” of course he wasn’t paying attention to whatever was on TV. They could be saying that Peter Parker is Spider-Man and he wouldn’t even know.

“Pretty good, just put them in the oven”

“So you are actually taking the cookies with the Starks tomorrow? I know you have your opinion on Tony and what Stark Industries did so you don’t have to go or even make the cookies, we can eat them here” this is it. This was her way out of the fake relationship if she wanted

“I know but if you actually like the guy there’s got to be something good you see in him. You always do that”

“He found a way of doing good things for everyone. He may look like he is selfish but he’s actually very generous. He cares about others, too much” the infomercials on the TV were long forgotten

“Like you. You care too much about everything and everyone. May, Ned, Betty, the Starks, even The Bugle”

“And you. I care about you too” he looked at MJ, her curls where on a messy bun at the top of her head, she was wearing a white top, jeans and converse. When she turned her face to see him, he realized there was no need for make-up on her, she looked beautiful. All his observations were on a very friendly way, of course.

“The cookies! They’re burning!” She jumped from the couch to the kitchen and opened the oven. He moved next to her and saw the cookies on a perfect golden. He could see Christmas trees, something he assumed was Santa, some snowmen and snowflakes. Probably snowflakes, he didn’t have a clue

“Were they burning? I like that golden color” he was sure the cookies were perfectly fine, why MJ had ran to the kitchen like the oven was on fire?

“Yeah… Ammm… the timer… I didn’t set the timer… they can burn really fast” she was stumbling over her words. Didn’t sound like normal MJ, she was a little flushed even. Maybe because she had run to the kitchen, who knows

“I’m gonna place them somewhere when they can cool down for tomorrow”

Tomorrow, yeah. The Stark reunion, where they were going to pretend a relationship to save the comments of being single from their respective families or convicethem all they were just friends. All his worries were back just with those single words. And they were staying there for a few days so maybe he should pack some clothes or something

The phone on his pocket told him he got a new message on the group chat he had with Ned, Betty and MJ

Betty: OMG! We r going 2 Stark’s 2morrow!! Can’t wait to see u all!

MJ: Betty, we saw each other like two days ago

Betty: Ik. But we still have a lot to talk ‘bout apparently Michelle Jones

Ned: Yes. We need to have a serious talk too, you fake friend @Peter!

He was in a lot of trouble if Ned and Betty knew about the “relationship” he had with MJ, relationship that wasn't even a thing. Maybe they could get there as friends and everybody would believe them they are just friends

[kpop-zone]

Knight in shining armor | Momo

Warnings: consumption of alcohol

Genre: (slight) angst, fluff

Wordcount: 3,257

Request: hi! i love your writing ♡ could you do a momoxfem!reader scenario best friends to lovers? angst with fluffy ending in which the reader is the one to confess but momo says she only sees her as a friend but when the reader puts some distance momo realizes that she misses her

A/N: I’ve tried something new in the beginning, but I don’t think I even like it myself lol? So if you don’t like the style, just skip to the paragraph “today”, I think the story should still make sense starting from there :D

Monday, 09/13/2004

You just had moved across country with your parents. You had to leave all your friends that you had known since kindergarden behind and start all over again. It was your first school day and you were nervous beyond belief. Would the other kids like you? Would they be mean to the new kid? You tried to show yourself from your best side and after what felt like 15 hours, you had survived your first day.

Alone.

No one would even spare a glance at you. Your mother could immediately spot the sadness in your eyes and gave you a dollar to buy yourself a scoop of ice cream at the ice cream truck right in front of the school. But some kid shoved you and your scoop fell to the ground, only leaving you with the cone. You were about to start crying, fed up from all the frustration that you had bottled up since you knew you had to leave your home, when you suddenly saw someone transferring a scoop from their cone to yours. You turned your head to see a little girl with a crooked smile on her lips looking at you.

“Hi! I’m Momo!”

You later learned that she was your new neighbor and from this day on, you never had to sit alone at lunch again.

Friday, 07/21/2006

“Momo to Y/N. Are you there? Over.”

Your nightly routine started. The two of you would lay inside your beds, using your walkie-talkies to talk until late at night.

“Copy. Did you hear your parents talk to mine on the phone? Over.”

“Copy. Yes, we’re going camping together! This is going to be the best summer ever! Over.”

And it was. You would run around in the woods all day, imagining a magic world where Momo was the princess and you were her knight in shining armor, having to safe her from the dragon. At night you would lay in your shared tent together, watching the stars.

“Y/N! A shooting star. Quick! Make a wish!”

And you did. You wished to never be without Momo ever again.

Thursday, 05/05/2011

The both of you had grown up. You weren’t kids anymore. With the years, you had developed different interests, but you had managed to hold on to your friendship. Momo had started dancing in the school team and found new friends, but although you didn’t spend every living second together anymore, you still told each other everything. One day, Momo even told you when a boy in school had kissed her on the lips after dance practice. You remembered how happy you were for her, but how your heart grew heavy. You couldn’t explain it back then, but you were hurt.

Saturday, 11/09/2013

It was Momo’s birthday today. The last one you would celebrate as High school students. You knew by now why you couldn’t stand seeing Momo around other people drooling over her. You fell in love with your best friend. Could you tell her? Maybe you had to. After all, you told each other everything. So you decided that today was the day. You would tell her right after her toast, before the courage would leave you again.

“I want to thank you all for celebrating my birthday together with me. Especially, I want to thank my best friend, Y/N, who organized all of this and has been with me since forever and will hopefully always be my friend!”

Friend. It hurt to hear those words out of Momo’s mouth, but you didn’t let it show. You also didn’t let it show how your heart started to flutter when Momo pulled you into a hug, kissing you on your cheek. Maybe someday you could finally tell her, but not today.

Sunday, 08/17/2014

Today was the day you had dreaded for weeks now. Momo and you would both leave for college, only that between your two colleges would be a further distance than just your backyards. You were hugging in front of your car, not wanting to let go. This was your last chance. You had to tell her. Now. So you pulled away from her, but when you were about to speak, Momo cut you short.

“Don’t say anything now, or I won’t let you leave.”

A loud sob left her throat and she buried her face into your neck. Your unspoken words were the only thing that stayed unchanged that day. Everything else changed in a rapid pace. The next years, you would only be able to see Momo on holidays, because she often decided to spend even her vacation with her new friends. You missed her like crazy.

Wednesday, 05/23/2018

Today was finally the day! It was Momo’s graduation and you would start grad school together afterwards. You would finally overcome the distance between the two of you and even start living together. You had already rented an apartment and made a thousand plans. There was a lot of time that you had to make up for. It felt like you had just skipped the past four years. Now you were able to go back to normal again. You couldn’t wait to have your best friend back.

Today

“Momo, I swear to God, if you leave your dirty bowl standing around in the sink for two weeks ever again, I will kick you out of the apartment!”

You yelled from the kitchen, so your best friend could hear you in her room.

“It has been standing there for a maximum of five days... or a little more.”

Momo tried to convince you while shuffling tiredly into the kitchen. She gave you an apologetic smile, knowing that you couldn’t stay mad at her anyways.

“And you wouldn’t kick me out of the apartment, because you love me.”

She said while wrapping her arms around your waist from behind and laying her head on your shoulder, while you washed her dishes. When you took a glance to the side, you saw her giving you puppy dog eyes and a pout. Your heartrate immediately picked up and you decided that you couldn’t lie anymore.

Living together with Momo had been getting harder every day, especially considering that she was quite a touchy person. When you were lounging on the couch, watching a movie, she would just randomly lay on top of you, refusing to get up. Or most nights, she would sneak into your room, coming home late from going dancing with her friends. You always pretended to sleep, but secretly you tensed up under her touch, not wanting to take advantage of your friendship.

“Momo I have to tell you something.”

Momo was slightly startled at your serious tone but looked expectantly at you to continue.

“I think we should sit down for this.”

You dried your hands on a towel and guided Momo to the couch. You shortly considered whether you would regret this later, but then decided that you would regret not telling her even more.

“Ok. I need your full attention now, Momo, because this is not easy for me to say.”

Although your best friend was normally not one to be serious for too long, you could always count on her in moments like this. Her demeanor instantly changed, giving you her full attention. You took one last deep breath to calm your nerves before starting.

“I’ve been trying to tell you this for a really long time now.”

You stopped again, searching for words, chuckling to yourself.

“After knowing it for such a long time, you should think, I would have the right words by now. But I don’t”

You felt like passing out. What if she hated you after you told her?

“Hey, Y/N. You’re beginning to freak me out. Just tell me. We’re going to get through it together.”

Momo had a soft, but also worried look on her face. She was reaching out for your hand now, stroking it with her thumb and giving you an encouraging smile.

“I’m in love with you.”

You just blurted out, not knowing any better way to confess your feelings. Momo looked at you with wide eyes and absolutely no motion in her body at all. Scared, you took the word again.

“I’m sorry. I really didn’t mean to. It just happened.”

You were waiting for an answer. Or at least some kind of reaction, but there was none. You were about to speak again, suffocated by the silence, when Momo finally opened her mouth.

“Y/N...”

Her eyes were now nervously looking around in the room and you got the sign. She was uncomfortable. Because of you. Your heart shattered to a million pieces.

“It’s fine. I know that you don’t feel the same. Really, it’s fine. I’m fine.”

You rambled on, just wanting to get out of the apartment as quickly as possible, but Momo grabbed your hand tighter.

“No, stop it ,Y/N. Let me explain. I...I’m glad you told me. I really am. I want you to tell me everything important in your life, because you are my best friend. But... But that’s all I feel for you. I love you, as a friend...”

Momo dragged her words out, trying to convey her message as careful as possible. But there weren’t really any words she could have chosen that would have hurt less. Unless she would have confessed her feelings as well. But she didn’t. You felt tears welling up inside your eyes. But you didn’t want to cry. Not in front of her. So you forced a smile on your face, nodding your head in response.

“Ok.”

You almost whispered, loosening the grip of Momo’s hand with yours. Your ears began to ring, and you felt like you were drunk. Every sound around you felt like a million miles away and your surroundings flew past you like you were on tracks as your world shattered.

“Y/N!”

You could hear Momo’s voice somewhere in the distance. But you didn’t care. You just had to get out of there. So you grabbed your keys, running outside, hoping the cold air would give you a clear head again. You didn’t want to face Momo again today so you wandered around the city until you were sure that she would be sleeping. The next morning you left when it was still dark outside, because you knew that nothing could get your best friend out of bed before 10.

The hide and seek continued for weeks. You would spend more time in the library or take more shifts at your side job, only coming home when you knew that Momo was asleep or at practice. But you needed the time. The time to heal. And after a few weeks you truly did feel better. You actually felt relieved. You were finally able to breath again, after letting go of a breath, you hadn’t known you were holding.

You realized that there were other people in this world. And the sooner you would get over Momo, the sooner you could actually spend time with her again. So you went out with your friends more often. You started to work out and actually even started flirting when you went out at night. Three months had passed since you stormed out of your apartment and you felt ready to meet Momo again like normal friends would do.

“Good morning, sunshine!”

You exclaimed cheerily, when you saw your best friend leave her room with disheveled hair and her eyes half closed. Momo jumped at the sound of your voice, not used to you being home.

“Y/N?”

She asked surprised, not knowing why you were here. She wasn’t complaining though. The past three months had been pure torture for her. She had missed you so much that she actually cried herself to sleep most nights. Did she ruin things between the two of you? It hadn’t been her intention. But she couldn’t have lied to you. She simply didn’t feel the same way that you did. Right?

“I made breakfast.”

You smiled at her, putting down two plates on the table. Slowly Momo moved to the chair, looking at you like you were a ghost. While you were eating, she didn’t even touch her food, staring at you in disbelief.

“You know it’s going to get cold right?”

You laughed, pointing at the plate in front of her. How could you be so cheerful? You ignored her for three months straight and then you just came back like nothing happened?

“What are you doing, Y/N?”

Momo asked, combing her hand through her hair. Of course, you knew what she was talking about. But you still considered to act dumb. You didn’t want to talk with her about it. You knew how your last talk went. Not wanting to anger her though, you sighted in defeat,

“Look, Momo, I’m sorry that I ignored you the past three months, but I needed the time. To heal. To get on my feet again. But I’m good now. I’m ready to be friends again if you take me back. I think I’m finally over you.”

You smiled proudly at her, but Momo slightly flinched at your last words. Why did it hurt to hear you say those last words? Why was she secretly disappointed? She gave you the best smile that she could muster,

“Of course I’ll take you back. I’m glad that you’re feeling better”

She reached for your hand over the table, squeezing it lightly.

You were happy.

You finally had your best friend back. For real this time. Or so you thought. But the next few weeks taught you something different. They awfully looked a lot like the previous weeks, only that it wasn’t you who did the avoiding this time, but Momo. Whenever you would come home in the evening, she would hastily leave the apartment. When you wanted to go to the bar together, she wasn’t in the mood, although you could hear her stumble into the apartment early the next morning.

One night, it was especially bad. You were ripped out of your sleep by a loud bang. When you got up to see what was going on, you found Momo sitting on the floor, apparently after falling over while she was trying to get rid of her shoes.

“Momo?”

You carefully asked, coming over to her. She was giggling now, carelessly throwing her shoes to the side. At your sight, however, her look changed. She started to sniffle and when you tried to extend your hand to her, she swatted it away.

“Why did you give up on me? Why didn’t you fight for me? Where did my knight in shining armor go?”

Tears were streaming down her face now. But you didn’t understand. What did she mean?

“What are you talking about? I would never give up on you, Momo.”

You said silently, kneeling in front of her and stroking her hair out of her face. Her head rolled back slightly, and her eyes were almost closed now. Snaking your arm around her waist, you helped her up, supporting her on the way to her bedroom. You wear laying her down on her bed, changing her into her pajama and tugging her in. Her breathing was steady and she was already fast asleep.

“I’ll always be by your side.”

You whispered, giving her a kiss on the forehead.

It was already past noon, when Momo finally left her bedroom, looking as miserable as you expected her to look after the little incident last night.

“Good morning, sunshine.”

You greeted her with a teasing grin, but immediately pouring her a cup of coffee which she accepted gratefully. You sat in silence for a while until the color had retuned to her face again and you decided that it was time to talk about the words, she had said last night.

“So... About yesterday. You said something and I didn’t know what it meant.”

The color that had just returned to her face, immediately left again and she stared at you with wide eyes over the edge of her cup. But you decided to continue, nevertheless.

“You said something about giving up on you and where your knight in shining armor went. What did you mean by that?”

You furrowed your brow trying to remember the exact words and then waited for her answer. Momo looked torn. You could exactly see that her brain was working in full capacity, searching for the right words.

“Hey, you can tell me. We’ll work though it together.”

Oh this conversation was just too familiar, you thought to yourself. But this time it wasn’t you who fought back the tears. It was Momo, only with little success. The tears started to make their way down her cheek, making her burry her head into her hands in shame. Shocked by her reaction, you immediately made your way around the table, kneeling in front of her.

“Don’t cry, Momo. Whatever it is. It’s going to be fine.”

You wrapped your arms around her shaking body in attempt to calm her down.

“I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”

Momo let out between sobs.

“It’s ok. There’s no need to be sorry.”

You tried to take her guilt away, not exactly sure what she was referring to.

“It’s not okay!”

She suddenly yelled, pulling back from you.

“I broke your heart.”

She said much quieter now in a regretful tone.

“But I love you. I truly do.”

You felt awful. She just looked so broken right now.

“I know that you love me, Momo. I never doubted that for a second.”

You wiped away the remaining tears running down her cheek, but Momo suddenly jumped off the chair, looking frustrated.

“No you don’t understand! After you left me that day, I began thinking about all the time we spent together. And I was so blind, Y/N.”

Her tears were falling at a rapid pace again and you would’ve done everything to make her feel better, so you just let her pour her heart out.

“Every time I was not around you, I was feeling so, so empty. And I tried to fill that void. Making new friends, throwing myself into dance practice, going out every night. But nothing helped. You were all I wanted and that feeling scared me. So much.”

Slowly you began picking up on what she was saying, suddenly feeling dizzy.

“But I love you, Y/N. More than anything in this world. And more than a friend.”

You felt like crying. After all this time. Wasn’t it too late now? You had just gotten over her.

“Please, Y/N. My heart can’t take it anymore. I need to know. Can we work this out together or should we go our own ways?”

Own ways? No. You couldn’t lose her.

You had enough of this game the two of you were playing.

With big steps you made your way over to Momo, crashing your body and lips into hers. Your body was on fire. This was all you had wanted for years. You took Momo’s face in your hands, giving everything you wanted to say into the kiss. You were both not holding back anymore. Hands tugging desperately at each other’s clothes to get the other as close as possible and teeth clashing together while your tongues battled for dominance. When you had to pull back in need for air, both your hair was messy and lips swollen. But Momo couldn’t look more beautiful to you right now. Because she was a princess and you were her knight in shining armor after all.

“So I’m guessing we’ll be working it out together?”

She asked nervously, searching for your eyes, with her head still turned to the floor.

“We always did, princess. Didn’t we?”

[fuwafuwamedb]

A Cursed G Pt 23 (Hakuno, Gilgamesh, Enkidu)

Previous Part: 1 - HakuPOV / GilPOV, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22

_____

She had most definitely bombed that test.

The sheer fact that she had seen a couple test answers on other people’s papers as she had turned hers in was enough of an indication on her testing. Either her classmates who normally did quite well had failed or…

Crap.

At this rate, it would be a miracle if she passed that course. Math was no her forte. It wasn’t even kind of her forte.

Looking at the two climbing into her car and attempting to buckle the clay being in, she supposed that it really could have been worse. She could have been out of her space and time. She could have been trying to understand a world of technologies and systems that were vastly beyond her understanding. Poor Enkidu had taken the whole day in stride.

Gilgamesh had pointed at things and had been stubborn.

Enkidu merely leaned back and listened. They smiled and they nodded at things, simply accepting that they didn’t know the language and somehow knowing enough to just be seen as a strange foreign person.

It was nice of them to be that easy.

“Hakuno?”

“I know. I was waiting for you both to be ready,” she told Gilgamesh, listening to him and Enkidu talking in the back of the car. It seemed they were talking about the wedding a bit more, discussing places in the area that would be suitable.

“I think you should have it somewhere with lots of nature around,” Enkidu told the man.

Gilgamesh laughed at his friend’s suggestion. “I had a feeling that you would be wanting such a thing. I found a place that has a lot of greenery that you can enjoy and feel at home around. The fool from before, Rin, was pointing out the place when she was talking to me the other day.”

The lights on the street were coming and going as she drove through it all, listening a bit as she went. Things were quiet for once, the traffic still calm before the students and adults were released from their usual 8 to 4 jobs.

She turned onto the next road, feeling a trickle of something hit her senses.

“Hakuno…”

There was something wrong.

She wasn’t sure what was going on, but she pulled over to the side of the road, looking around as she noted that something was happening and her instincts were running haywire.

Gilgamesh moved from the backseat, slipping into the front of the car and glancing behind them.

“You sense her too?”

“Why is Ishtar here?” Enkidu asked.

“She followed me,” Gilgamesh told the being. The king glanced back, looking carefully as they all did. All of them were finding nothing.

“Do you think-“

“She’s making herself very hard to locate,” Gilgamesh told her. “She’s going to make this whole process difficult for us.”

That she was.

Again, all she could think of was how bad of an idea it was to get married to the king. He needed to be sent straight home with his friend and return to his ruling over Uruk. He could change the Epic of Gilgamesh and manage to be the great king that he had started out as being.

“Continue to steer us home,” the king commanded.

Yeah…

Yeah, they needed to be inside her home once again. For some reason, Ishtar played by supernatural laws: she didn’t enter unless invited.

Hakuno cranked the car into drive and pulled back out into the street, noting that the happy wedding chatter was now gone as both Gil and Enkidu were looking around them as they drove. The silence began to fill the space and the math exam didn’t feel important any longer.

Hard to care about one letter someone wanted to give when one’s life was on the line.

They made it home in record time, but Hakuno found herself grabbing her bag and slipping from the car faster than ever. She clicked the car into lock as the other two followed her up to her home and walked in before her.

Enkidu was moving around the house as Gilgamesh grabbed her wrist.

“I need something for my headache,” she told him.

There would be one coming. She could feel it. Her stomach was complaining as well, saying that she was thinking too hard about this. The stress of that test as she had remembered it in class and the stress of knowing that Ishtar was lingering around her school and her home was not comforting. She still needed to go to work in a bit as well.

“Hakuno,” Gilgamesh started.

“Gil, please-“

He yanked her close, pressing her to the back of the front door. His hands were delving into her hair, rubbing at her scalp as he tilted his head and eyed her a moment before…

Hakuno couldn’t help it. She sunk into that embrace eagerly. Her hands tangled into his hair and her weight was surrendered to the door and his hold of her. She found herself closing her eyes and letting his lips take the lead.

He tasted sweet and he knew how to massage for a headache.

“Ishtar is not your problem,” the man murmured.

She almost had to laugh at that.

Not her problem? The goddess had cornered her at her car. She was showing up in her lunch area where she sat with her friends. The goddess knew where she lived. What was truly stopping her from coming into this house? What was protecting her from being in turmoil?

Ishtar could turn her into things far worse than a cat.

She could be turned into a bug to be squished under a foot.

She could be turned into a fly to have to live off of the discomfort of others.

She could-

“Stop,” the king’s voice murmured to her softly. “Open your eyes and look at me.”

Looking at him wouldn’t protect her. It wouldn’t make her any safer.

Gods, now that she was thinking about this, it was actually starting to scare her. She loved Gil with every fiber of her being. That wasn’t something that she was concerned about. The man felt right when he was holding her and these fingers working through her hair, coaxing her headache to take a hike…

Wait.

I love Gilgamesh how much?

Hakuno opened her eyes, staring up at the man standing before her.

His lips pressed to her nose, her forehead; he pressed the smallest of affections to her face.

“She went back to Uruk for a bit,” Gilgamesh murmured. “That’s why she felt stronger. She can’t stay here and retain her power. That must be it. We’ll be fine, Hakuno.”

Hakuno stared at that face.

Her eyes were on the sharp features, the fair hair, and the intimidating expression. Her eyes trailed to his lips, pinkened a bit from pressing to her face and giving her affections. She could see his mouth moving, but…

A hand pressed to his chest without her thinking. She tightened her grip on his shirt and pulled him closer, keeping her gaze on his face.

I can’t go to work tonight.

The man glanced down between them, noting her hands holding him to her. The boyish surprise on his face, the blank and curious look…

When she had moved was a mystery, but there she was, moving a hand to his head and leaning up to kiss him. She was closing her eyes once again to enjoy the feeling of his kiss rather than the expression on his face.

“The house is empty,” Enkidu chirped nearby.

A pair of arms pulled her up from where she stood. The king held her close and carried her over to the couch.

“Enkidu,” he called.

They were on the other side of her almost immediately. Hakuno could feel their arms around her and pulling her close and Gilgamesh pulled wine from the gates and began to pour goblets for them all.

“We will enjoy the pleasure of one another and watch your plays for the evening.”

That sounded nice.

“I will call for your usual food,” he continued, “inform your people that you will not be attending to the library this evening. They must handle their archives on their own for the night.”

The phone was pulled from her pocket and set in her hand by the man before he was delving into her bag.

Gilgamesh knew how to turn her computer on.

He was humming a bit as he tried to remember the process for ordering food, impressing the being that leaned forward to watch him work on the machine.

Hakuno looked at her phone.

Why did it feel like calling in would only be the start to a direction she wouldn’t be able to back out of? Why did this feel like a moment of truth?

Flipping to contacts, she pressed the number for work and held the phone to her ear, closing her eyes and leaning into Enkidu.

She told them that her stomach was hurting and her head was aching. They had been hurting, although the feeling was going away. She listened to them wish her well and inform her that Rin had been by to tell them about her engagement and impending marriage.

“They said it was a blond,” Hans called from the other end of the line. “I hope you aren’t marrying that idiot who visited the library the other night!”

She bit her lip, quietly ending the call and setting her phone down to help Gil order their food.

They changed into comfortable clothes.

It was like one moment they were at the computer and the next she was returning to where the two were waiting. Gilgamesh was leaning back in all his jewelry and his loose lower robes. Enkidu was in a similar outfit, although they had let their hair hang loosely around their shoulders and were in the process of brushing through the green locks.

And she was walking to them in robes that Gilgamesh had given her.

They were more like a wrap dress than anything in her wardrobe. The belt at her waist barely held it shut. In fact, the moment she sat between the two, she could feel the front open up a bit.

Gilgamesh’s lips pressed to her neck and pulled her into his lap. Enkidu lay their upper body across her lap and sighed happily.

Was this the life that she would have in Uruk?

Pampered forever by the king and beloved by the king’s friend?

She pulled the brush from where it still remained in Enkidu’s hands and pulled the being closer, beginning to slowly run the thing through their hair. They turned that soft, flawless expression up to her; making her heart race.

She tilted her head a bit, feeling the king’s lips continue to trace along her skin.

When the door chimed, Enkidu moved, getting their food and turning on the television.

It turned into a strange caring for one another. Enkidu would offer bits of food to them. She would offer bits of food to the two Sumerians. Gilgamesh would insist that they drink what he had poured for them both. The room was warm and the nice, thin robes around her person was comfortable.

Her face was turned up at times, away from the direction of the television or of Enkidu. He would stroke her cheek and murmur for her to say again that she would stay at his side.

Was that his favorite thing to ask?

“Once more, Hakuno.”

“I am staying at your side, Gil.”

The being pulled her into their lap, delving their hands into her hair next and giving her time to breathe.

“Your world is fascinating,” they told her.

“I wish I was better with my classes,” she confessed, looking up at them. “I don’t think I did well on that test today.”

The being frowned.

“The math is confusing,” she informed the being.

“I’ll look at it when you both rest,” the being told her. “I think I could probably figure it out. I learned your language well enough! Although you speak our language so well.”

She did?

“You do,” the being insisted. She must have said what she had said aloud. She could feel her face flush a little as Gilgamesh lay atop her, wrapping his arms around her waist and watching more of what seemed to have become one of his favorite shows.

She was talking aloud what she was thinking. It was probably time to stop drinking.

“Hakuno?” Enkidu leaned over her, brushing her bangs from her face.

“What is it?”

“Doesn’t Gil remind you of a cat?”

Both she and Gil tensed up, with her staring up at the being.

“I wasn’t sure how to describe what Gil was like,” Enkidu continued. “I heard him purr this morning with you and I’ve noticed how he nuzzles and seeks to be in your space all the time. He’s acting just like one of his lions. It’s very cute.”

“Enkidu,” Gil growled.

She could feel the king’s hands balling into fists behind her back a little as the man continued to press against her chest with his person.

She had almost forgotten… but Enkidu had feigned being G. How would they do that if Gilgamesh hadn’t explained?

“Gil was turned into a cat for a time,” Hakuno told the being. “I found him when he was in his cat form and brought him home. He just recently was able to get his human form back.”

Enkidu blinked. “What’s this?”

“Gil was a cat until-“

“Hakuno is adept at a magic that is unwritten in our texts,” Gilgamesh informed the being, interrupting her and pressing his face against her chest a little more. “She was able to stop the malady that Ishtar had placed me under. We shall leave it at that.”

“So that is why the woman from yesterday had insisted on seeing a cat.” Enkidu snickered. “I bet Gilgamesh was as cuddly as he is now. Do you still talk to other cats despite being human, Gil? Does this mean you enjoy milk?”

Weren’t cats lactose intolerant?

Gilgamesh glared up at his friend, giving a low rumble.

He was looking up from under those bangs of his, forming a wrinkle on his brow as he glared at Enkidu in warning. She could see the way his eyes glinted a bit, the way he tried to make his expression as foreboding as possible.

“Gil,” she tugged at him to move up her person a bit more.

He turned that gaze to her, softening it a bit only for her to tug a couple more times.

“What is it?” He murmured.

“Gil,” she tugged once again.

The moment he moved to hover over her, she leaned up and kissed him.

The tension was gone. The great king was settling back in, delving that tongue of his into her mouth and doing that movement that left her breathless. He seemed to all but breathe in the air from her lungs, leaving her to pant and her heart to race. She could feel him laugh softly as he pulled back.

“I may have been the cat, but you are the smitten one, aren’t you?”

Those carmine eyes gleamed in pleasure.

“You are the one who looks at me like you’ve found more of those sweets you take such pleasure in. You look at me in a way that any man would falter on his feet at the sight of, Hakuno.”

She just felt his lips stop her from arguing, bringing out a soft moan from her. He laughed softly as he ran a hand along her chest, his jewelry tickling at her chest.

Enkidu laughed a little more, tightening their grip on her a little.

The warmth of the room and the company whom showed her such comforts and happiness probably had her settled in to the extent that she could say such things. She never would have considered saying such a thing otherwise. Gilgamesh was being so gentle. Enkidu was being so sweet.

“…I think I love you, Gilgamesh.”

The man loomed over her, his eyes widening at her words.

The being under her released her with a soft kiss to the top of the head. The soft, “ah” on their lips barely audible as she lay flushed underneath Gilgamesh.

The television may have been on full blast and she would have never noticed.

The man leaning over her had his lips curl up, his eyes gleamed in the low lights of the room to match the way his jewelry glinted.

“You think? Are you so unsure of yourself that you cannot confess properly, Hakuno?”

“I love when you purr against me,” she found herself saying. “I love when you join me in the shower and how you hold my hand in class. I love listening to you laugh and watching you argue and speak. Hearing you speak is better than a morning coffee and you make all my headaches go away the moment you work your hands through my hair.”

She did love him.

It felt good to say it.

The man had lived with her long enough for her to enjoy and want to keep him around. It was nice to have something other than the day to day routine to look forward to. Routines became dull and listless. The spontaneity of Gil’s presence in her life, even as a cat, had become something that gave her every day meaning.

He was being quiet right now though.

She pulled herself up against him and smiled at his surprised expression, leaning in close and pressing her lips to his again.

“I love you, Gil,” she purred. “I love everything you do.”

The man against her shivered. She could feel him pick her up, telling the being something as she pressed another kiss to his jawline, his neck; anywhere she could press her lips against.

They were back in her room, although he had made this space more to his own ends with more pillows and blankets. She found herself pressed back against the sheets, the man leaning over her.

“Say that again.”

“I love you,” she purred.

“Again.”

“I want to hear it back,” she argued.

The man turned beet red at her demand, his hands shaking as he held her to the bed and he trembled before her eyes.

She laughed softly at the foolish look on his face. “I even love when you are too shy to say it back, Gilgamesh.”

The warm room and the soft bed were enough.

Hakuno let herself go straight to sleep.

[let-it-raines]

Betting on the Bullseye (29/30)

Emma Swan loses a drunken bet that means she has to ask her celebrity crush - if you can call him that - to be her date to her office’s annual fundraising gala for Boston’s Children Shelter. Killian Jones is that celebrity. She expects all kinds of humiliation and for her dignity to be completely lost all because of the ridiculousness of the situation. What she doesn’t expect is for him to say yes.

What she truly doesn’t expect is to actually like the man.

Rating: Mature

A/N: So here we are! It’s the last official chapter, and while I would absolutely love to get to write this story forever, that’s simply not possible. But don’t fret! There’s still an epilogue and then a bonus chapter based off of a prompt that someone gave me. I can’t believe this little one shot turned into this big story that may very well be my own personal favorite. Thanks for being awesome and reading, you guys💛

Found on AO3: Beginning | Current

Tumblr: Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30

Tag List: @ultraluckycatnd @nikkiemms @resident-of-storybrooke @wellhellotragic @onceuponaprincessworld @jennjenn615 @mayquita @captainsjedi @teamhook @skyewardolicitycloisdelena91 @artistic-writer @branlovesouat @dreadpirateemma @kmomof4 @ekr032-blog-blog  @andiirivera  @hollyethecurious  @superchocovian @cs-forlife @qualitycoffeethings  @notoriouscs @mariakov81  @jonirobinson64 @bmbbcs4evr  @thejollyroger-writer @lifeinahole27 @ultimiflos @galaxyzxstark @idristardis

-/-

Killian: My family is all here and currently examining every square foot of the place.

Emma: I know you’re not complaining when this is all you’ve talked about all week.

Killian: I love them, but Anna is seriously asking me about the thread count on our sheets.

Emma: That’s important.

Killian: I’m going to leave you with them if you don’t start sympathizing with me.

Emma: Oh no! You’re going to leave me with two people who I talk to every day and your brother! However will I survive?

Killian: Kris and Aiden are also part of the package.

Emma: I like them too.

“Are you flirting with your boyfriend, Ems?”

“Holy shit,” she yelps, jumping in her chair while her heart takes off like a rocket. She’s got to start closing her office door or put a lock on it or something. Or Ruby needs to learn how to knock. Or stay in her office. This is becoming a perpetual issue. “Rubes, why do you insist on doing this to me?”

She shrugs, the picture of nonchalance, and then steps further inside, grabs some skittles out of the bowl on her desk, and then plops down in her extra chair.

“Because your face is so pretty when you’re scared.”

“You’re an idiot.”

“I’m your idiot, though.” She pops a handful of candy in her mouth, the red and green disappearing while she quickly chews. “Are you coming down to the warehouse to help put the care packages together this afternoon?”

“I’m coming down at four.” She hits send on her email and leans forward to take a few skittles of her own. Keeping candy in her office for the holidays was a terrible idea, but Mary Margaret and Anna both sent her bags of the stuff because they thought it might be nice. “This is always my craziest time of year with all of the donations and press, but, you know, I’ve been working through lunch so that I can leave at a normal time.”

“It’d probably help if you didn’t spend half of your time flirting with your boyfriend and the other half talking to me.”

“Well, you’re the one who comes to my office.”

Ruby waggles her brows. “For the candy. Is the Jones clan in town?”

“And apparently inspecting the thread count in our sheets.”

“What?”

“They’re particular,” she laughs, checking the email that just came in. She really needs the graphics department to send her the designs she’s supposed to put on Instagram. “I think Killian is letting them explore the apartment and setting them up, and then he’s going to show them around a bit.”

“That’s like the blind leading the blind.”

“I mean, it’s not us giving a tour of Boston, but it’ll work. I can’t wait for them to come back in the summer so it’ll be nicer weather.”

“You haven’t even seen them yet, and you’re already ready for them to come back?”

“Ask me again after Christmas. Speaking of that,” she hums, as she types another email when really she needs to go talk to Liz to get things going, “is Dorothy coming over on Christmas Eve?”

“Nah,” Ruby sighs, sticking her feet up on the corner of Emma’s desk, “she’s going home to Kansas for a few days.”

“Sorry.”

“It’s fine. I can’t wait to meet everyone, even if Killian’s infamous friends won’t be there.”

“Just his shoddy family.”

“I’m going to tell them you said that.”

“They love me. I think it’ll be fine.”

Her phone vibrates on her desk, and she looks down to check it.

Elsa: Does Killian actually know where he’s going? Or are we going to get lost and freeze to death?

Emma: I’d bring a warm coat and some food.

She does eventually have to get back to work, as does Ruby, and even if she spends most of her afternoon bugging the graphic designs department even while she’s putting blankets and toothbrushes in care packages, it’s a good day at work. She seriously needs a nap, but she knows that she’s not going to get one. The rest of her week is jampacked with work and with family stuff. They’ve got five extra people staying at their apartment until next Thursday, and about a million things to do with them and with her friends. It’s odd to her that these two sides of her life that are so important to her have never met, but she’s glad that it’s changing now.

Will and Robin get the short end of the stick though. They’ll have to meet everyone later, but she and Killian weren’t going to ask them to come to Boston when they have their families to spend time with. That would be ridiculous.

(She really wants to see Ruby and Will meet. It’d be fantastic.)

On her way home from work she stops to get a frankly excessive amount burgers and fries for everyone to eat for dinner. It’s definitely not the healthiest thing in the world and she and Killian did stock up on groceries yesterday, but sometimes she really wants a dang cheeseburger.

And onion rings.

She’s going to have to hide the onion rings from Killian.

That’s not going to work.

She’ll just get extra.

She can hear everybody before she unlocks the front door, twisting the key and then the knob, the conversation inside dying a little bit as she steps through the door to see everyone sitting in the living room with a show that must be for Aiden on the TV. She recognizes the little characters, but she can’t quite place whatever animated dog is running around.

“Hi,” she says, placing everything down on the counter that’s already full of baked goods that Anna must have found time to make sometime today. “I, uh, brought burgers for dinner, so I hope that Killian didn’t force feed you guys too much today.”

“He force fed us just the right amount,” Elsa sighs, getting up from the couch and scurrying over to her and wrapping her arms around her shoulders before Emma can even take her purse off of her. “Hi, hon. I’m so happy to see you.”

“Me too,” she echoes, pulling back and smiling. “It’s weird that you guys are here, but I like it.”

“Not as much as I like it,” Anna adds on, practically smothering her in a hug. “It’s amazing, even if it’s cold. I was not prepared for that, and Killian practically froze us to death. I cannot wait to come back in the summer. I bet we could go sailing. Though Killian would have to bring his boat here. Or buy another one. Or we could go to a baseball game, but I’m not wearing a Red Sox hat. Oh but I can visit you so much more now that I’m going to be in New York.”

“That all sounds like a wonderful plan,” she laughs, not even sure if Anna took a breath between all of her words. “Hi, Liam and Kris. Why don’t you guys come get something to eat before it gets cold? I got regular burgers and cheeseburgers and figured you guys could add your own toppings.”

Liam and Kris both nod their heads, moving from the living room to kiss her cheek and give her their own greetings all while paper bags are being rustled and food being spread out, the greasy smell taking over the cinnamon plug in that they have. She needs to change clothes and brush her hair out before she eats, but she should probably say hi to Killian if the expectant eyebrow he’s sporting is any indication.

“I could have cooked dinner,” he says first, opening his arms a bit so that she can gently loswer herself down onto his lap, adjusting herself before kissing his cheek in greeting. “You didn’t have to buy all of the burgers in Boston.”

“I really wanted a burger. I worked through lunch.”

“The graphic design people giving you trouble again?”

“Yep. I’m going to have to learn how to do photoshop myself or something.” She unwraps her arms from his neck and curls a stray section of his chest hair around her finger, wondering how the hell it escaped from the top of his sweater. “So you survived your hosting duties?”

“I did.”

“Do you guys have horse radish?”

“No because that’s disgusting,” she laughs, looking up to see the actual pout on Kris’s face.

“Top shelf,” Killian adds in. “I keep it where Emma can’t reach to throw it away.”

“Hey,” she scoffs, yanking at his hair, “rude.”

“I know you have candy hidden in the drawer with your bras, so you can’t even say anything.”

“Um, guys,” she starts, looking around the room, “where’s Aiden?”

“Sleeping,” Liam answers for her, coming to sit on the couch with his plate of food. If he gets grease on the furniture, Killian will lose his mind. “He was awake for the entire flight, and to him, it’s naptime now.”

“Oh, I didn’t think about the time change for him. Or for you guys. Are you sure you’re hungry?”

“Liam is always hungry,” Elsa tells her placing her plate on the coffee table while she feels Killian adjust his leg underneath her. “It’s really unfair how good men have it with their metabolism sometimes.”

“Darling, I’m nearly forty. I don’t have the metabolism I used to have.”

“That’s true for all of us,” Kris says as he and Anna both come back into the area. “And obviously Emma has determined to fatten us all up for the winter.”

She snickers under her breath. “You guys can all come running with me in the morning. The cheeseburgers are totally worth the pain.”

“Says the twenty-nine year old.”

“I can’t help that you’re all old.”

“Hey,” Anna scoffs, waving a fry in the air. “If Killian wouldn’t kill us, I’d definitely throw these fries at you.”

“That’d be a sad waste of fries.”

“It’d be worth it.”

“Debatable.”

“If you’re going to waste fries it has to be the ones from the end of the potato,” Elsa adds in.

“Those are the best ones,” Liam protests, popping a fry into his mouth.” “They taste too much like a potato.”

“Fries are potatoes,” Liam and Killian both protest at the same time.

“Not all potatoes are made equally,” she points out, pushing off of Killian’s lap. She’s hungry, but she wants out of this bra and out of these pants. “Just like all fries are not made equally.”

“Amen to that.”

“I’m going to go change clothes,” she tells everyone. “I’ll be right back. You guys can keep watching your kids’ show even though Aiden is asleep.” “Sounds like a plan, Stan,” Killian mumbles under his breath, and when she turns back to look at him, he shrugs his right shoulder and winks.

She doesn’t mean to take her time while changing clothes and washing her face, scrubbing the makeup off one side at a time, but it’s kind of soothing to be able to do that. As much as she loves every person in that room, she’s not exactly used to having families over for a long time. That’s never been a situation she’s had to be in before, and it’s going to take a little bit of adjusting. It’s a good thing, but she’s not made to have to talk consistently. She and Killian talk a hell of a lot, but a lot of nights they have are spent stretched out on the couch in near silence watching TV.

Not a show for a twenty-month old but TV.

She takes the time to brush her hair out before twisting it into a loose braid that falls over her shoulder, and then strips out of her clothes so she can pull on her leggings and a sweater. She’s just about to go outside to get her dinner and talk with everyone when she stops and opens Killian’s bedside drawer, pulling the small box out and opening it to look at the ring. It’s the oddest thing, knowing it’s there and not being able to wear it. Of course, she could wear it. They could tell their families and have it all out there, this secrecy thing stopping, but she’s still waiting on the boat ornament. It’s the dumbest thing. She doesn’t have to tell everyone that way, but she wants to because of all of those dumb texts Ruby sends her.

She thinks that it’s fitting for Ruby to be the first to know when Ruby has been here for this since the very beginning.

A bit of laughter passes through her lips at that. It hasn’t been a long time. She and Killian have only known each other for a year, but it’s right. There have been plenty of ups and downs and absolutely insane moments, both because of their personal demons, the distance, and Killian’s job. He doesn’t get stopped a lot here, but it does happen. It’s always so strange to her, even if that’s how she knew him first, but it’s even stranger that one or two times some girls have stopped her. That’s not something she’ll ever get used to, but Killian is worth it.

Her trust in him is absolutely insane, especially because of how she’s been treated in the past, but when you love someone, you know.

The whole white picket fence (or apartment with a view) future used to always freak her out, but it’s what she wants now. She’s got her job, her friends, Killian.

She’s done pretty well for a kid who had nothing.

So she’ll wait on the dumb boat ornament for Ruby and wait on getting to wear the ring, the physical representation of the future she’s so damn happy to get to be a part of.

And it’s not like the next few days don’t go by quickly. They actually go by pretty fast, even if she spends her weekend falling on her ass when everyone insists that they go ice skating. Somehow, despite coming from a notoriously cold country, Anna and Elsa have never gone, and when they pass by a public rink while wandering through downtown, they insist that they have to. Somehow she didn’t think about the fact that Liam and Elsa live somewhere where it doesn’t really snow, and that being here would be like a whole new world. At least Anna and Kris have been living in Seattle…of course, they’ll soon be based in New York and will have the ice rinks there.

Somehow despite the fact that they’ve never been, Anna and Elsa are fantastic at it, quickly able to get rid of the walker and move around the crowded rink while she has to hold onto Killian’s elbow so that she doesn’t keep busting her ass.

Seriously. It’s going to be black and blue.

She definitely would have offered to watch Aiden to get out of it. Liam beat her to the punch.

But it’s fun once she gets over the pain in her ass, and she can feel her cheeks actually hurting from laughing so much. It doesn’t help at all when Elsa and Anna figure out some kind of routine that gets them kicked out of the rink. It really doesn’t help when Killian gets recognized and he starts mumbling under his breath that Robin is going to kill him for making him have work to deal with when he’s supposed to be on holiday. She’s not sure if she feels worse for Killian or Robin.

Definitely Robin.

Killian can deal with a few articles about him getting kicked out of a public ice rink.

She may or may not see if she can have anything about it printed and framed to keep forever.

She’s a good girlfriend.

Fiancée.

Partner.

Lover.

Whatever. It doesn’t matter.

Guiding them around Boston kind of reminds her of when Killian first came to visit back in May. She gets to be a bit of a tourist again, except this time they’re all bundled up in thick jackets and hats as they trudge through a bit of snow instead of sweating from the sun shining down on them. There are some perks to the city in the winter anyways, especially when there’s a light dusting of snow. She doesn’t love January when it’s too cold to even go outside or too difficult to drive, but December is a good time. Yeah, there are thousands of more tourists, but so many trees downtown are wrapped in white lights that give the city this glow the makes it especially pleasant to be here. Her foster homes didn’t always decorate for the holidays, but the city made up for it enough.

Killian’s arm wraps around her shoulder, tugging her into his side, as they walk through Columbus Park Sunday evening, making their way through the crowd to look at the blue lights that have been wrapped in the archway. They’re meeting her friends at the Central Wharf for dinner so that everyone can meet each other, but Liam had insisted that they walk through the park on the way there since walking along the seaside was proving to be a bit too chilly.

“I love you,” Killian murmurs just below her ear, his scruff pricking her exposed skin.

“I love you too,” she echoes as she wraps an arm around his waist and sticks it in the back pocket of his jeans. “I think showing your family around this weekend is going to give me frostbite.”

“Aye, it’ll be so sad when you don’t have your toes anymore.”

“However will I walk?”

“Special shoes, obviously.”

“I don’t think that’s how that works.”

“I could carry you.” “That seems excessive.”

“You’re right. I’ll leave you alone to die in the snow.”

She taps his ass. “That’s all I ask.”

Killian barks out a laugh, his head thrown back, but then he’s leaning forward and quickly brushing his lips over hers.

“Stop making out and show me where this restaurant is,” Liam bellows, and when she opens her eyes, she can see several different strangers staring at all of them.

“Babe, it’s right there,” Elsa laughs, pointing to the glowing sign a few feet ahead of them.

“That was not there a second ago.”

“I promise that it was.”

“Your brother is kind of crazy,” she laughs, speeding her steps up because she can see David standing on the inside of the restaurant.

“I think the cold weather is getting to him.”

“Probably.”

Kris and Anna walk in first, the door held open for everyone but a constant stream of people, and before she can even bother to make introductions, Anna and Mary Margaret are wrapped up in a hug. They’ve seen each other on Instagram, but Emma was not expecting that.

She should have been expecting that.

And she should have been expecting the mess of hugs and shaking hands as everyone greets each other, blocking the entrance to the restaurant a bit with the crowd. She hears Killian chuckle when Liam and David size each other up, but honestly, it’s even funnier when Ruby stares Liam down and then hugs him so tightly while Liam is almost shocked still. She’s not sure what Ruby said, and it’s probably best not to know.

They’re all seated at their table, chairs replaced with booster seats, and soon their conversation mixes in with everyone else, constant chatter floating along with the steady flow of Christmas music playing over the speakers.

“So how do you guys like the city?” David asks after they’ve ordered drinks.

“It’s bloody freezing,” Liam grumbles, his body obviously still chilled. “This coat is not nearly thick enough.”

“I told you to buy a warmer one.”

“Little brother, you didn’t say this.”

“Oh shit,” Ruby laughs, and her eyes glance to the kids before she continues, “you’re right, Ems. Killian’s face does get all red and scrunched up when Liam calls him little brother.”

“Hey, way to call me out like that.”

“My face does not get scrunched up.”

She twists her head to look at Killian and the way his nose is very literally scrunched up, and she can do nothing but smile at that end the embarrassed red tip of his ears.

“It does,” Elsa agrees. “But that’s fine because Liam doesn’t realize how ridiculous it is to call a grown man little brother.”

“It is not ridiculous.”

“As someone who is a younger brother,” David starts, “I totally agree. No one talks that way.”

“That is not true.”

“It’s totally true.”

“You don’t see me calling Anna little sister,” Elsa points out, very lovingly caressing Liam’s shoulder while her free hand keeps Aiden from throwing his crayons on the ground.

She feels Killian’s scruff against her ear before she even sees him move. “They’re going to cause Liam to implode right in the middle of this restaurant.”

She snickers at that and pats Killian’s thigh before resting her hand over his knee. “That would be a very messy clean up.”

“Secrets don’t make friends, lovebirds,” Ruby teases, kicking her foot underneath the table.

“You’re already my friend, so I’m not trying to impress you,” Killian huffs.

“I’m your friend,” Leo says, nearly quieting the entire table when they were all still debating over the weirdness of Liam and Killian’s relationship.

“You are most definitely my friend,” Killian agrees, smiling over at Leo. “I think you, your brother, and Aiden are my very best friends at this table.”

“And Emmy.”

“Oh, most definitely Emmy,” he laughs, reaching down and twining his fingers together with hers, thumb gently moving over her hand in a way that sends a shiver down her spine.

“Emmy’s my friend too, but we can share.”

“That’s so good of you to say, Leo,” Mary Margaret sighs, reaching over and pushing his hair off of his head.

“So we’ll talk about how it’s weird for me to call Killian little brother but we’re not going to talk about how I didn’t make it on his best friends list just now?”

“Sucks to be you,” Anna and Ruby both say at the same time.

Emma looks at Killian then, looks at the lines around his eyes and the smile on his face as he talks back to Liam, and whatever kind of nerves she had about their families not liking each other completely disappear just then. They’re all going to get along just fine.

And they do get along just fine. Probably much better than fine. The conversation never stops, even when they get their food, and despite the fact that they have three small children there with them, they stay late into the night casually talking about whatever they want. It all feels so natural, even with the newness of all of these relationships, and she’s already thinking about just when they can do something like this again this summer.

Soon enough, though, the night ends, and they all go their separate ways promising to see each other on Christmas Eve. When they get back to the apartment, most everyone settles down into the living room for a little while before excusing themselves to go to bed, leaving just she and Killian.

“Come here, love,” Killian mumbles, his accent deep and thick in his tiredness. She likes when it’s like this. It reminds her of the way he sounds when he’s describing every filthy thought he has about her, and it’s most likely the reason why instead of folding into his side like he wants, she gets up and straddles his lap, pressing herself down on top of him while his hands immediately go to her hips, gently holding onto her as his thumbs reach up to touch her skin.

He doesn’t say anything, though. She figured he wanted to talk to her now that they have a bit of privacy with everyone else gone to bed. But he stays silent, his thumbs moving in lazy circles as he buries his nose into her neck, breath coming out warmly against her collarbone while his teeth gently bite down, heat slowly beginning to simmer under every inch of her skin.

“You’re going to leave a mark if you stay there for too long.”

“You’ve discovered my evil plan,” he mumbles, each of the words slurred.

She laughs, throwing her head back the slightest bit while her hands move from his shoulders up into the thick strands of his hair, fingers cardings through the softness while Killian continues to lavish her skin with his tongue. She bemoans it a bit, doesn’t want him to leave some kind of mark of possession or passion, but then right when she can feel heart curl between her thighs, he pulls back, the heavy weight of him no longer in her neck. Instead he stares at her, eyes a deep blue while they trace over face, finally landing at her lips.

And then he’s on her, lips pressing into hers and hands pulling her impossibly closer so that their bodies are flush against each other despite the layers of clothes in between them. She can still taste a bit of the rum he had with dinner, especially when his tongue slowly traces her bottom lip, prodding him for the entrance he must know she’s going to grant him. When their tongues do collide, it’s like sparks are moving across her skin, all of her hair standing on edge while the sparks trickle down all the way to her toes.

It’s that kind of a kiss. The toe curling ones are the best ones.

They get better when her hips shift the slightest bit against Killian and her hands tighten in his hair. He groans, something deep from the back of his throat, and she’s practically a puddle. It’s a weird phrase, but she is. She’s a puddle and a mess of damn good feelings that have her feeling like she’s practically on fire even if she’s only left on her camisole and her jeans, her sweater from dinner resting in the kitchen.

She rolls her hips again, and Killian grunts before he’s shifting his hands so that his arms are completely wrapped around her back. For a moment she wonders why, but then she’s being lifted and unceremoniously plopped down on her back, the couch cushions supporting her while a giggle passes through her lips. Killian shifts above her, his elbows propping him up on either side of her shoulder. His mouth is hovering over hers, less than an inch away, and she thinks that he’s going to kiss her again, but then his mouth is on her jaw, then her neck, her collarbone. Finally he makes his way down her sternum, tongue licking in the valley of her breasts, and she gasps as her hips arch up into him.

Even though she can’t see it, she can feel the wicked smile he’s sporting pressed into her skin.

“I’m rather learning to enjoy winter in Boston,” he breathes, breath hot as it travels over her. His mouth moves a bit to the side, and she watches him nudge her top with his nose so that she can see the top of her breasts. “But I do find that it means I get to see a little less of these.”

“Well, I could die of that frostbite we were talking about earlier if you really wanted to see my boobs that much.”

He glances up at her, one eyebrow raised, and she smirks herself as she reaches down to brush his hair off of his forehead. “I do love them, so I think it may be worth it.”

“You only love me for my body.”

“I’m going to tell you just how wrong you are about that after I get done showing you how much I love every damn inch of this body.”

She laughs, her head pressing back into the cushions, but then Killian has somehow worked his way past her bra and is biting down on her nipple. The laugh quickly turns into a gasp, and even her blood heats at the sound of Killian’s groan.

As good as he is with his words, sometimes when he wants her too damn much, it renders him speechless.

That’s always a bit of a proud moment for her.

He releases her with a pop, and instead of moving to her other breast, he moves back up her body, spending a very particular amount of time on her ear, before he’s back at her lips. It’s a slow kiss, lazy even, but these are the ones she prefers. Quick and fast and dirty are wonderful, and she’ll never complain about those. But she likes the lazy exploration of each other that only really comes when you already know all of the ins and outs.

“Bedroom.” She yanks at his hair, and presses her hips up again, and he nips at her bottom lip.

“In a moment.”

She’s practically jelly at this point, so she agrees, not thinking anything of it until there’s the a quiet creak of wood and the room is suddenly flooded in lights besides the ones of the city.

“Bloody fucking hell,” Killian groans, harshly shifting up on her, and she doesn’t realize why until she twists her head to the side and sees Liam standing at the end of the hallway, feet frozen and mouth wide open.

Oh.

Oh.

Oh.

Her fiancé’s brother, who is still staying with them for another few days, just walked in on them making out of the couch with her breasts decidedly exposed to the world. That would explain Killian’s sudden haste to cover her even more so with his body.

“Don’t just stand there, Liam,” Killian growls, his words lilting up into a bit of a laugh at the tail end of his sentence.

“Sorry, sorry,” Liam apologizes, holding his hands up and shuffling his feet. “I didn’t – you’re not – Elsa needed a glass for some water.”

“It’s fine,” she lies, every inch of her skin cooling down while she rubs her hands up and down Killian’s shoulder blades. She can feel the tenseness in them, the frustration practically vibrating off of him. “Help yourself to whatever is in the fridge. Killian and I were just about to go to bed.”

“Really? Because it kind of looked like you were about to fuck on the couch.”

“Get your fucking water, and get your arse out of here.”

“KJ,” she whispers, twisting her head to look back at him and caressing his face with her palm. He leans into it, his eyes fluttering closed so that his lashes land against his cheek, “it’s okay. He’ll be gone in a second, and then we can go to our room.”

“I’m not sure that I’m really in the mood anymore.”

She chuckles a bit under her breath before brushing her lips over his stubble. “That’s okay too, but I think you might change your mind when you can no longer see your brother.”

“He’s bloody fantastic at killing a mood.”

“That’s probably what Elsa says too.”

Killian has to bury his face in her neck to hide his laugh, but she can feel it though every inch of her body while she continues to move her hands up and down, his flannel moving with each touch. She should be mortified right now, but considering Liam saw her morning after look the first time she slept with Killian and then proceeded to accuse her of being some kind of stalker, this is nothing.

Maybe the embarrassment will hit when she doesn’t still want Killian so badly.

“Goodnight,” Liam hums. “Use protection.”

“Look at that. He spent two hours with Ruby, and they’re already just alike.”

Killian huffs and pushes off of her. “I think it’s time for you to move your arse into the bedroom so we can finish this.”

“See, I told you it’d be fine once Liam wasn’t in the room.”

“He’s never getting invited back here.”

“Don’t be dramatic.”

“What am I if not dramatic, my love?”

She finds that Killian most definitely doesn’t mind that his brother walked in on them when her lips are wrapped around his length in the privacy of their room.

-/-

Over the next two days, Liam never mentions the compromising situation he found them in, but she can tell that he feels more awkward about it than either of them do, especially when he avoids looking her in the eye for a few hours. But it helps that she’s constantly surrounded by other people. They go out to lunch on Monday, stopping to get seafood even though Aiden has an absolute fit in the restaurant, but the rest of their day is spent in the apartment, the curtains mostly closed as they play all of the Home Alone movies, Aiden giggling and babbling even though he can’t possibly understand what’s happening. It’s cute, though, watching him clap his chubby hands together and rock back and forth while he sits between Kris’s legs.

Anna and Elsa decide that they have to make Christmas cookies, and not the ones she can buy at the market that come precut, so for the entire afternoon the apartment smells like a mixture of cinnamon and sugar, the oven constantly being opened and closed as new batches in different shapes are made. Anna is freakishly good at baking. Like, far better than Killian, and she and Elsa are able to make intricate shapes and designs all the while she has this green glob of a Christmas tree. Killian tells her that he’s sure it’ll taste good, but that’s most likely because she didn’t actually bake them.

Christmas has basically exploded in their apartment, but she doesn’t mind at all. She enjoys it and enjoys all of the happiness of it. She’s got three days off of work, and she’s going to savor in it.

“This is delicious, love,” Killian mumbles as he takes a bite of a snowman that she did, the crumbs of it getting stuck in his beard.

“Are you going to make a point to only eat my ugly cookies?”

He winks. “Exactly.”

But, of course, since she wants to savor this time, it flies by quickly, Christmas Eve arriving in the blink of an eye. She’s excited for today, though. They’re having her friends over for lunch and presents, and after today, she doesn’t have to hide the fact that she’s got a very pretty ring hidden away and a man who wants to marry her.

Which is still just insane.

A good kind, though.

“G’morning,” Killian mumbles as he shifts in bed, sleepily grabbing her hand and pressing a kiss to each knuckle, lingering a little longer on her fourth finger before moving down to her wrist. He’s so romantic in all of these small ways, and it honestly kind of makes her heart giddy. It’s weird.

“Morning.”

“It’s cold in here.” “Says the human heater.”

“That sound rather odd when you say it like that, Swan. It’s like I’m burning humans.”

“Ew, stop,” she groans, falling back onto the mattress and putting space between them, pulling the comforter up over her shoulders and burrowing herself in. “You know what I meant. You didn’t have to get all creepy about it.”

“I saw my shot, and I took it.”

She rolls her eyes at him, and she sees his lips shift up into a smile while half of his face is pressed into the pillow, squishing his cheek and causing his eyes to crinkle. His hair is all over the place, the strands going in several directions, and she’s tempted to bury her hands in it to fix it. But she also kind of likes it when he’s disheveled.

“So are you ready for our families to start hounding us on wedding dates and details and wondering what kind of dress I’m going to wear?”

He chuckles, something deep and husky, and she knows that he’s going to lean forward to kiss her nose before he does it. And she knows that his hand is going to find a spot on her waist too, nails tracing nonsense patterns.

“I’m thinking after I film Life After and in a courthouse. We’ll both wear jeans and those ugly Christmas sweaters.” “I’m not wearing a Christmas sweater when I marry you.”

“Why not? It’d be very fitting.”

“This is true, but I do kind of want a nice dress. Not necessarily a gown. I might feel ridiculous in one of those. I don’t know. I kind of like this courthouse idea, though. Or maybe on the beach at your house in LA. Is that too cheesy?”

“All weddings are kind of cheesy.” “True. It’s not like we’re getting married in our swimsuits or anything.” “It’d make for easier access.”

“Shut up,” she laughs, reaching over to hit his shoulder, which only makes his face crinkle up more as he smiles. “I’m going to miss you when you’re living in Toronto this spring.”

It’s the first time she’s said those words. She hasn’t wanted to, not wanting to make him feel guilty about having to leave for filming when he should never have to feel guilty. But it felt right to tell him that now, especially as they make all of these hypothetical plans for their very real future.

“And I you, love,” he promises, and her heart pangs for a moment. “But I’ll fly home when I can. You’ll come to visit. We’ll get back to facetiming like we used to. That’s not something we have to worry about now, though. We’ve got a holiday to celebrate.”

And they do. She and Killian both hurry and get ready, going through their morning routines while they can hear all of the chatter and life going on outside, all of Killian’s family very obviously already awake. She thought the time difference would have them sleeping in, but she guesses that Elsa and Liam have a baby who most likely does not know what sleeping in is. So before she can even bother to have her coffee, she’s bombarded with “good mornings” and conversation from four different people, all of the talking about how excited they are for today and if there’s anything they can do to help before her friends come over. She knows that even if she said no, they’d help anyways.

They’re good people, and she loves them. She’s going to be a bit sad when they go home. But that’s not something that she thinks about as Kris and Killian start cooking the chicken while Liam and Elsa set up the table. Anna helps her wrap a few last minute presents, and by the time the Nolans and Ruby show up at one, absolutely everything is set up for them to celebrate Christmas. It’s most definitely the biggest celebration she’s ever been a part of, even if it’s not quite Christmas yet. Her life is so damn full that she’s getting a little emotional over having Mary Margaret be chatting with Liam about gardening.

It doesn’t get any better when they finish eating, her stomach hurting from laughter, and they all move to the living room, most of the presents under the tree dispersed to everyone.

Most everyone in this room is an adult with the exception of Leo, Aiden, and Brody, so she knows that tearing through gifts isn’t something that’s really going to happen. They’re going to go slowly, take their time, possibly even try to salvage the wrapping paper (Who does that? You would have to be entirely sure that you’re going to be wrapping something the exact same size or something smaller for it to even work, but whatever. Recycling is good.) and keep it for a later day, maybe even tomorrow. She’d fully expect Ruby to be doing some last minute gift wrapping for her grandmother. Or possibly even Dorothy even though she’s in Kansas. Hell, she wouldn’t be surprised if Ruby took the paper her gifts are in and wrapped a present that she’s going to get when she finally gets to her small pile of goods from her friends since they’ll all be off spending time with their other loved ones tomorrow.

She was a kid who used to spend Christmas wondering why Santa didn’t come to visit her and who had holidays pretty tainted for her. Now she has more family than she knows what to do with.

She’s good with that.

She’s great with that.

She’s also great with waiting for Ruby to get to the small box that’s sitting next to her on the floor. Killian had quirked his brow when she told him she knew just the way for them to tell all of their friends that they’re engaged. If anyone’d asked her five years ago if she’d ever be this excited to make a commitment to another person and then want to make a bit of a show about telling other people she was doing that, she’d have laughed in their face. That’s not her. And maybe it’s still not. She likes for things to be private, for her personal life to be personal, especially with learning to deal with Killian’s job and the complications that come with that, but some things she does like to share.

Why would she not?

There’s a lump in her throat that she has to swallow, a happy sob threatening to escape her and ruin all of her plans. She’s decidedly sentimental lately. She’s been sentimental for awhile now. It’s different, but being different, changing isn’t always a bad thing. Some changes are bad, are painful. They pull you back instead of propelling you forward. Others, well, others are good.

Changing in a good way is called growing.

Growing is a damn good thing.

Growing means that she doesn’t always have to have a tough exterior, that she doesn’t always have to be act like she’s okay. Growing means allowing herself to be vulnerable even when it hurts. Especially when it hurts.

Growing means knowing that instead of stopping at an obstacle, that she can climb over it.

Growing means that she can allow another set of hands to help her climb.

So she’s decidedly sentimental, and definitely a little bit cheesy, but she’s happy. And she’s not going to bemoan something that makes her happy.

“You’ve got a bit of a starry-eyed look there, love,” Killian whispers in her ear, nipping at the lobe and making her squirm a bit. Cheeky bastard. “Is there something on your mind?”

“Nah,” she sighs, walking her fingers up from his knee to his thigh, comfortably placing her hand there while she feels Killian tapping against her shoulder, a habit he’s taken up lately. She doesn’t think he even knows that he’s doing it. “I’m just…happy. It still surprises me sometimes.”

“Aye, me too.”

She twists her head and smiles at him, looking up into the blue of his eyes before she presses up and kisses the corner of his lips, waiting for him to meet her halfway.

He does.

He always does.

(Except when it comes to leaving shoes lying around or dishes unwashed, but that’s not the end of the world even when it feels like it.)

“Are you sure this little plan of yours is going to work?”

She nods her head, quickly kissing him again before pulling back and looking over to Ruby who is holding up a pair of earrings that Mary Margaret and David must have bought her.

“Yeah, I’m sure. Just wait. She’s going to figure it out.”

She squeezes his thigh for reassurance before she rests her head on his shoulder. She can feel Elsa’s eyes looking at her, the icy blue stare a familiar one even if it’s not from Elsa herself, but she doesn’t say anything. Elsa likely already knows. Not because of anything she’s done but because she knows that Killian told Liam he was planning to propose. And if she knows anything about Elsa, it’s that they’re kindred spirits in knowing when a Jones brother is holding something back.

Except she kind of failed at for the past few months.

She can’t always be batting a thousand.

Or homeruns.

Grand slams maybe.

What the hell? They all work. She knows her baseball terminology.

And there’s absolutely no way that she’s letting someone else break the news when she thinks that her idea for announcing it is absolutely brilliant.

She’s not an assistant public relations manager for nothing. She knows how to get people talking.

Finally, after what feels like ages, Ruby starts opening the small package they’ve given her. She feels Killian’s breath catch, the air stopping for the slightest moment, and she swears that her heart ticks up a few too many beats than should be humanly possible.

“Ems,” Ruby laughs, twisting to turn to look at her with a vibrant smile on her face, her lips practically reaching her eyes, “why in the world did you give me a photograph of you and Killian in these ugly sweaters? Did anyone else get these?”

“I didn’t.”

“No.”

“Nope.”

“I don’t know. Maybe we haven’t gotten to them yet.”

“Because,” Killian starts for her, his fingers pressing into her bicep with a little bit more force. She can feel the vibration with every word she speaks. Or maybe that’s an earthquake. It’s definitely not an earthquake. That’s how it feels right now though. If she were to look under the sleeves of her sweater, she knows her arms would be covered in gooseflesh. “Those are the awful sweaters Emma and I wore in those videos from last year, and one of your gifts is a way to thank you for helping us meet.”

“Even though I still think that it’s fundamentally unfair for you to have made me adhere to a bet made while drunk. That would have gotten any contract dismissed in court.”

“Are you really complaining right now? And using legalities? I feel like you should be eternally grateful for me. After all, I’m the reason you get to have se – the reason you get to do the horizontal tango so often. Plus, you know, have constant companion who loves you or whatever.”

“Open the damn present, Ruby.”

“Language,” Mary Margaret and Anna yell at the same time.

Ruby waves them all away before she’s digging into the box and pulling out a small ornament in the shape of a boat.

“What in the world is this? Why are you giving me a boat ornament? I don’t own a boat. I’m a freaking therapist. I can’t afford that. And why does it say ‘The Love Boat’ on it? That doesn’t even make any sense and – oh my God.”

She doesn’t even have time to prepare herself before Ruby is up off the ground, squealing so loudly that her eardrums might burst, and then tackling her into the couch, taking Killian down with her. Everyone is staring at them. She can’t see, but she knows, can hear the confusion, can hear Leo wanting to know what Aunt Ruby is doing to Aunt Emma. But right now she’s so goddamn happy that it’s out there, that someone knows, and that her best friend is excited.

“Are you for real?” Ruby asks when she pulls back, looking into her eyes before she glances over to Killian, cupping his cheeks and squishing them together. “Is she for real? You guys are engaged?”

“She’s for real.”

“Engaged?” Mary Margaret shrieks, the pitch rivaling Ruby’s.

Or maybe that was Anna’s shriek mixing in. Elsa’s too. Maybe it was Aiden or Leo joining in.

It definitely wasn’t David, Liam, or Kris, but they all let out some kind of noise too, the room suddenly roaring with conversation so loud that she can barely think. But it’s the good kind of roar and the good kind of deafness.

It might not be the good kind of having some sort of internal organ squished by Ruby, but she thinks whatever it is will be okay.

It takes a long time for everyone to calm down, for the squealing and smothering to stop so that she can explain to everyone that Ruby sent her a text the night after she and Killian met saying she wanted a boat named “The Love Boat” if she and Killian ever got married. Technically they’re not married yet, but it works. Everyone laughs at the story, especially when both Mary Margaret and Anna are reduced to blubbering messes, their emotions becoming a little too much. All of it is absolutely insane, but it only gets worse when she finally gets to put the ring back on her finger, right where it belongs.

She’s okay with this kind of hysteria, though. It’s part of that whole growth thing. And absolutely nothing is going to make this day any less wonderful or special or so goddamn festive that she can’t stomach it.

She’d bet on it.

Her bets seem to have pretty good end results.

[helenarlett-rex]

Goosebumps Review #7

Moving on with reading all the Goosebumps I never got the chance to read as a kid…

(Spoilers)

The Haunted Car

Goosebumps Series 2000 #21

The Haunted Car was originally published as a part of the Goosebumps Series 2000 but was later republished under the normal Goosebumps title when the movie came out. The movie is actually why I decided to read this book.

I had seen the Haunted Car in the movie, and knew what it was I was looking at, but I didn’t actually know anything about it. So I decided to read the book and see what she could do when she wasn’t just driving Slappy around. And I have to say… I am very disappointed…

The story is about Mitchell Moinian, a 12 year old boy who is obsessed with cars to an extent no one who isn’t old enough to drive should ever be. To the point of being completely ridiculous and unbelievable. It’s like R.L. Stine was sitting around one day looking at his old book, Go Eat Worms, and asked himself, “How can I make a main character more ridiculous than this one?” Then he said, “Oh I know! I’ll just make the same character over again but make his obsession something that doesn’t fit his age!”

Mitchell also has a younger brother named Todd who watches too much of The X-Files and thinks there are ghosts around every corner, a short tempered father who tries to repair everything himself even though he is the worst handy man alive, and a mom who has no defining characteristics at all. After being in a car crash in the first chapter and totaling the family car, they are in the market for a new car, which Mitchell takes it upon himself to find seeing as car related things make up the bulk of his vocabulary. And naturally to a 12 year old boy a news paper ad for a “luxury sports car” with no model or manufacturer name but says “mint condition”, “low mileage”, and “name your own price” sounds great. Why wouldn’t it sound like the perfect car to a 12 year old? 12 year olds don’t think about things like, oh I don’t know… this sounds like a stolen car? But apparently people don’t sell stolen cars in this universe because even when he drags his dad out to see this thing his dad doesn’t think there is anything fishy about it either. Even when the the owner practically begs them to take it, gives it to them for a price low enough to make your head spin, and tells them the only condition is they have to drive it off of his property today.

Naturally it’s not a stolen car. It’s a haunted car. That’s why he’s so desperate to get rid of it. But even if you didn’t believe in ghosts, no normal person would take this thing with how fishy the owner was being with it. So I guess he’s lucky the protagonists in Goosebumps books tend to be dumber than a wet log.

As I said, the car is haunted… Haunted by a girl who must have taken lessons on how to be evil from Roy Trenneman off of The IT Crowd.

I’m not joking either. It’s like this car really wants to be evil but it doesn’t know how so it just sits around all the time saying, “I’m evil… I’m so evil.” If I were to place myself in the position of this kid I wouldn’t be scared at all. Not because I’m some kind of tough badass or anything, but because the car wouldn’t have given me a reason to be scared.

Car: “I’m evil… I’m so evil.”

Me: “Yeah, you keep saying that… If you’re not going to kill me already would you turn the AC down? At best you are… mildly annoying…”

This car’s idea of being “so evil” is luring the kid inside, locking the doors so he can’t get out, and then… turning the AC on… Or taking him for a midnight joyride where she drives really fast but always chickens out before actually doing anything dangerous and then safely delivers him back home when she is done with him. It’s comical how bad this car is at being evil. For a while I was telling myself, this car doesn’t want to kill him… she wants to date him. I mean she’s taking him out and showing him a good time, and he is clearly more into cars than any normal human being. Maybe she thinks he’d be up for it.

Well I was half right. She was actually looking for a companion to keep her company. And she did pick him to be that companion. She just wanted to do it by killing him so his spirit would be trapped in the car with her forever. The reason she didn’t just kill him right away is because she is one really, really incompetent ghost. So incompetent that when she finally decided to off this kid she accidentally saves his life instead. Really…

She is out driving around with the kid trapped inside. He says he wants to go home so she says, fine, I’ll kill you by crashing into your house. And when she gets there and finds that the kid’s house is on fire (because his dad should not be allowed  to do electrical work) she skids to a stop just outside. Because killing him by crashing into a flaming house would just be too epic for anything this ghost can handle… Then Mitchell points out, hey, you just saved my life. If you hadn’t taken me I would have been in that house when it caught on fire and I would have died. This means the ghost did something good which means that she has to “die for real” now and can no longer possess the car, because… ghost rules? I don’t know…

Either way, everyone is safe, the ghost is gone, the car is just a normal car now, and we don’t even get a twist ending. Well we kind of get a twist, but it’s only a twist if you are Mitchell’s parents… who try to start the car the next morning and can’t, then upon inspection find that the car has no battery. It’s a twist for them because they didn’t believe Mitchell when he tried to tell them the car was haunted. But it’s not a twist for the reader because you already knew the car was haunted. It’s like after reading this entire book about a haunted car, R.L. Stine suddenly jumps out and shouts, “Here’s the twist! The car was haunted!”

Well no duh!

Despite how stupid and disappointing that is, it’s not even my biggest complaint about this book. My biggest complaint is that it takes forever before this haunted car book actually gets around to doing any car haunting. It’s like nothing happens until you reach the second half of of the book. The first half of the book, other than the crash of the first car, and the purchase of the haunted one, is just Mitchell going on about how much he loves cars and his dad trying to fix things but electrocuting himself instead. Even as pathetic as Becka (that’s the Haunted Car’s name by the way) was, she was at least entertaining, and strangely endearing, in just how bad she was at being bad. I would much rather have had more of that than half a book of nothing happening.

But at the very least I now know why Becka never got a chance to actually do anything in the Goosebumps movie. She’s just too incompetent to actually hurt anyone.

[purplesurveys]

626

HI BELATED HAPPY NEW YEAR

First things first, did you have a good year? I would say most of it was good. I did most of the stuff I said I was going to do so I’m giving myself pats on the back for that. Things just kinda took a turn for the worse by the end of the year what with an ambiguous end to my most recent semester (I don’t have two of my seven final grades yet because my prof likes seeing her students suffer, I guess) and losing Nacho, so it all balances out.

How old did you turn this year? I turned 21. Which means legality in the US, but I’ve been legal in the Philippines for three years now so it doesn’t warrant much of a celebration lol.

Do you feel your age? I guess. There are days where it’s very tempting to feel inadequate because there are many 21-year-olds in my social circle who have their own business, are grabbing opportunities here and there (they’re in a successful band, are junior radio jocks, hired as emcees, serve as UAAP courtside reporters, to name a few), already make their own money, etc., but I just have to remind myself that everybody is moving at their own pace and that in my case, at least I’m not behind and that I’m moving remarkably fairly for my age.

Did your appearance change in anyway? Nah I BARELY did anything to my look this year. I did not go for a haircut at all in 2019 and now my hair is crazy long. I’m keeping it untrimmed until my grad shoot, so the long hair will stay with me for a while.

Post your favorite selfie. I would but Tumblr doesn’t really work the same way as Twitter where I’d feel more free to share photos of myself haha.

If you traveled, where did you go? My family went to Pangasinan, Bicol, Tagaytay, and Cavite this year. I also took my friends on a day trip to Nasugbu shortly before school started in August as sort of a last hurrah for our summer vacation.

Which fashion trends did you love? Which fashion trends did you hate? I initially liked chunky sneakers until everyone bought their own pair solely so that they’d feel like they’re one of the cool kids – it quickly became uncool after that. I was a fan of mom jeans (still am), high-waisted jeans, culottes, and tops in muted colors and had cute little bows in the chest area. I hated bike shorts and scrunchies, and slowly got tired of off-shoulder tops by the end of the year. I never understood tracksuits and never bought one of my own, and was also never a fan of hype fashion like DBTK shirts.

What was your favorite article of clothing this year? Post a pic if possible? I looooooooved the floral romper and the two-piece ensemble I was both able to snag at Feliz.

What song sums up this year for you? Buwan by juan karlos, the two reasons being that the song exploded in 2019 and because it was Nacho’s favorite and he made a million jokes about it.

What album came out and has been on heavy rotation since then? This question is a little vague so I’ll answer it in two ways. In my case, I definitely played Beyonce’s Homecoming album TOO MUCH last year. But radio-wise, it looked like Ariana Grande and Camila Cabello had stellar years.

What was your favorite movie of the year? I had several favorite movies, but here they are put in order: Portrait of a Lady on Fire, Midsommar, and Toy Story 4.

Did an actor/actress catch your attention for the first time this year? Florence fucking Pugh. Also I just realized how attractive Timothee Chalamet is, although I’ve been aware of him way before 2019 and haven’t watched any of his material.

Favorite new TV show? I watched the first few episodes of Stranger Things but I found it too slow-paced so I let it go easily. Other than that I didn’t really get into any 2019 shows because I’m not a big TV person, but I did recently get into Descendants of the Sun so that’s new for me! Queer Eye will also always have a place in my heart.

Which new ship/fandom has taken over a lot of your time, attention, and tears? I’m a little too old for that now but I did heavily get into the Try Guys. I don’t ship any of them together but I just genuinely love each of them, them as a group, and all the content they put out.

What food did you try for the first time? Ooh there’s a lot. Foie gras, aligue (crab fat) ramen, Bloody Mary, pistachios, a vanilla frappe from Starbucks, Tim Hortons food, ji pai (Taiwanese fried chicken) and pad thai, to name a few. I’m so so so pumped to try out even more new food in 2020.

Did you make any big permanent changes this year? I stopped talking to my brother.

What was one nice thing you did for someone else? Being one of the only two people in my org who can drive, I’ve always offered lifts to my friends. I don’t say anything even if where I’m taking them is entirely off my normal route, which frustrates Gabie, but honestly I just like helping my friends and making their commute easier for them. I also checked up on Nacho a day before he passed. I regret being too civil, but at least I checked up on him. Not a lot of people did that in his last few days.

What was one nice thing you did for yourself? Ok so one thing my org does is hold journalism workshops to schools across the country. The org is a bit small and not all the members are reliable, so what usually happens is that the same group of people attend the workshops and teach and facilitate – me being a part of that same group of people. Given that we have class during weekdays and these workshops happen on weekends, the schedule can be very demanding, especially if these schools request a shit-ton of topics for us to teach them. I sort of looked out for myself more this year by declining to go to a couple of the workshops, so that I can experience actually having a full weekend to myself.

Did you develop a new obsession? I discovered a YouTuber who is insanely good at Mario Kart 8 and I watched a ton of his playthroughs in 2019. Oh, and MUKBANG ASMRs. It’s an insanely unpopular opinion but I love chewing noises, dude.

Did you vote? It was the senatorial elections this year and yes, I did vote. None of my votes got in, of course, because unfortunately the rest of the Filipino electorate don’t know any better. I was part of a real-time fact-checking group that day for extra class credit, and I will never forget the collective groan and moan that came out of that room when the first batch of results came out on the news and we saw the same corrupt, power-hungry, money-hungry, anti-poor politicians top the polls.

Did you move? No. I’ve lived in the same house since 2008.

Did you get a job? I did not, BUT I did get an internship which I was pretty stoked about.

Did you get a pet? I did not. I don’t want anyone else but my dog, who I’ve had also since 2008.

Do you regret not doing anything? Sure. I have never taken Gab’s mom out on a girls’ night kind of date, and I always told myself that I was going to finally do that in 2019 – which I didn’t. I’m so going to make sure we do it this year. I’m also sad that I didn’t get to see Angela more times last year. And that I didn’t do more for Nacho, so now I have to live with the loss of him forever.

Do you regret doing something? Nothing is coming to mind so I guess nothing major. <-- Pretty much, thankfully.

Have you done anything that scared you? Tried vaping, did shisha for the first time, walk alone in Katipunan, be stuck at a restaurant table with Gab’s (very stoic) dad while she went to the washroom, to name a few lol. On a deeper note, I was a bad girlfriend several times over 2019 and it rocked the relationship quite a bit.

Did anyone/thing make you so mad it stayed with you for days? Yeah absolutely. I hated the people who went too far when it came to Nach, especially his ‘friends’ who didn’t hesitate to turn his back on him. And when things finally crashed and burned, I was too fucking pissed at everybody to even say something about it.

Did you lose anyone close to you? Yes.

Did you fall in love? For most of 2019 as with 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, and 2018, yes.

Did you fall out of love? Nope.

Did you start a new relationship? I did not.

Did you go through a break up? I almost had to, but we sat each other down several times in the year to fix what had to be fixed, and it’s been very smooth sailing since.

Did you have to cut ties to someone? They weren’t people I was close to in any extent, but I’ve blocked several people from a certain elite school because I hate that school.

Who was important to you this year but wasn’t important last year? No one strongly comes to mind since I basically just retained my circle, but I did meet Gab’s closest cousin this year for the first time, and anyone who’s family to her is automatically important to me, so I’d go with him.

Who wasn’t as important to you this year as they were last year? This is going to sound completely awful, but I guess my college blockmates. I was always sort of the ~black sheep in our small batch of 7 while all of them are incredibly close with one another. 2019 was the year that I stopped trying to hang out with them, because I realized that no matter how hard I try, we’re really just on different wavelengths and I can’t keep faking my expressions and mannerisms just so I feel accepted or so that I can survive a day with them.

If you could have a do over on one thing you did, would you take it? Yeah, I definitely wish I cut some of my classes much less.

What was the best moment of the year for you? What was the worst? There were a lot of high moments from 2019 if we’re being honest. I liked taking Gab and her dad out for a ONE Championship pay-per-view back in January, I liked being invited to her dad’s birthday dinner, my road trip to Nasugbu, every day that my dad was here, going to the beach, partying for Halloween with friends, seeing old friends again in our org Christmas party, that one night Gab and I went to BGC just to bar-hop, our fancypants date that was also in BGC, and I’m sure there’s a bunch more that I’ve forgotten to mention. The absolute worst moment came at the very minute I pieced it together and found out *surprise surprise* Nacho was gone forever. I don’t think I was able to speak for two hours. When I did, I ended up crying the rest of the night until I passed out.

Did anything happen that you were sure would change you as a person but it really didn’t? Not-so-serious answer, but I thought I was gonna live my entire life without needing injections to my mouth, but lo and behold I went to the dentist in December and got THREE. I thought I was going to pass out, I thought it was going to hurt, I thought I was going to thrash around my seat in terror... I ended up not even feeling anything. I dunno if it’s because I got a lower dose of whatever, or if my dentist is just better than others, but the whole experience went much better than I expected. This may sound shallow but I have the biggest needle-and-any-sharp-object phobia, so this is a lot coming from me hahaha.

Did anything happen to you that you were sure wouldn’t change you as a person but it did? Watching Portrait of a Lady on Fire. Gab just needed a companion to the cinema that night; I had no idea what the movie was going to be about and even read the entire plot while trailers were showing – in the end, it’s been me who’s been talking about the movie way way more than she.

What are you most proud of accomplishing? Not killing myself. The 2010s was just me internally betting on when I’d finally pull the plug, but I had what it took to get me to 2020, apparently.

What have you learned about yourself this year that you didn’t know in the years prior? That everything you do and say on the internet is permanent, and you’ll forever have to live with the the consequences that come from them.

Did your opinion of anyone change for the better? Andrew. Before 2019, I found him so horrifyingly clingy, so chatty, and he was always trying to be close to everyone (he still does). It drove the introvert side of my ambivert-ness absolutely NUTS. At one point I realized he wasn’t going to change, so I just gave him a chance and turns out, he’s a great friend and an even better co-worker hahaha.

Did your opinion of anyone change for worse? Everybody who claimed to be Nach’s friend but didn’t find it hard to say vile stuff about him.

If you make resolutions, did you complete them this year? I told myself I was going to make a one-photo-a-day private Instagram dump for 2019, but I stopped as early as January 27 LMAOOOOO. I’m doing it again this year and I’m much more determined to keep it going.

If you make resolutions, what will your resolutions be for the coming year? Keep my 2020 Instagram active, be able to travel... and be happier, basically.

If you could go on an adventure during the remaining days of the year, where would you go and what would you do?  Who would you go this? A little too late my dude. I’m typing this out in 2020.

What do you wish for others for the coming year? What do you wish for yourself? I just hope everybody on here feels a little bit more warmth and happiness, dude. We all deserve it.

[fandima-moved-read-pinned]

Would it be awesome to see you do all 100 asks? Yes. Will you do them? We shall see.

Wanna bet 

1: when you have cereal, do you have more milk than cereal or more cereal than milk? - More cereal than milk! 

2: do you like the feeling of cold air on your cheeks on a wintery day?- No, actually. I hate the cold ^^' And if there's cold air on my cheeks then it's on my nose and that's no good 

3: what random objects do you use to bookmark your books? - Usually a post it note! Not very random, but it's normally what I have on hand. 

4: how do you take your coffee/tea? - Depends on my mood! Sometimes I'll take my coffee black, other times ill add a fricc ton of creamer, whipped cream, and sugar. Also sometimes I mix coffee with hot chocolate and it's amazing. 

5: are you self-conscious of your smile? - Very. 

6: do you keep plants? - Always. I still have the carnations from Valentines Day (which surprisingly haven't died yet) 

7: do you name your plants? - Nope. 

8: what artistic medium do you use to express your feelings? - just a mechanical pencil or a graphite pencil. They usually end up being sketches. But if I like how it looks I'll go over them in pen. 

9: do you like singing/humming to yourself? - Yes and no? I'd do it more often but I don't want anyone to hear me. Especially my mom. 

10: do you sleep on your back, side, or stomach? - Side, always facing the wall. 

11: what’s an inner joke you have with your friends? - The only one I can think of off the top of my head is *slap slap slap* *jumps out window*. No I will not explain. 

12: what’s your favorite planet? - Pluto! Or Make Make. Make Make used to be my favorite because me and my brother would pronounce it wrong on purpose. But Pluto is ver pretty. 

13: what’s something that made you smile today? - seeing my brother's reaction to his birthday present from me! I made a little felt monkey with bushy eyebrows (I needle felted it) 

14: if you were to live with your best friend in an old flat in a big city, what would it look like? - Probably very messy. But also it would constantly smell like food! 

15: go google a weird space fact and tell us what it is! - Mars is shrinking. It is Smol. 

16: what’s your favorite pasta dish? - Fettuccine Alfredo with Shrimp! It's what I usually ordered at Olive Garden until I found out that it was expensive and was probably stressing out my parents. 

17: what color do you really want to dye your hair? - Don't laugh okay but pink! I want to dye the bottom half of my hair bright freaking pink. Like hot pink. 

18: tell us about something dumb/funny you did that has since gone down in history between you and your friends and is always brought up. - That time I slapped a guy twice for picking me up. That guy was my best friend. He picked me up from behind and I sorta whipped around and slapped him. The first time he didn't put me down, he just laughed. So I slapped him again. He got the hint. 

19: do you keep a journal? what do you write/draw/ in it?- I don't. I tried a while back, but I figured it would be easier just to talk to people about my issues instead of writing them down. 

20: what’s your favorite eye color? - Green. Or dark brown. 

21: talk about your favorite bag, the one that’s been to hell and back with you and that you love to pieces. - Not sure what this means, sorry. I've got this pencil pouch that has a tree print on it that I've used for a few years now even though it has a hole it it. Does that count? 

22: are you a morning person? - No. I wake up at 5:30 am on weekdays and usually don't get out of bed until I have ten minutes to get ready and leave. 

23: what’s your favorite thing to do on lazy days where you have 0 obligations? - Stay in my room and draw! Although I don't have lazy days. Every time my mom comes upstairs I immediately start cleaning because if I don't she'll yell at me for being lazy. 

24: is there someone out there you would trust with every single one of your secrets? - Yes. Take a look at who sent this ask. Also my other two online friends! One of them I spam with worms on a string and the other I just know I can trust and I don't know why. 

25: what’s the weirdest place you’ve ever broken into? - the only place I've broken into is my own house. I had to climb the backyard fence to go through the back door because me and my brother forgot our keys. 

26: what are the shoes you’ve had for forever and wear with every single outfit? - My plain black tennis shoes. I need to get new ones because these ones are old and barely fit but every time I mention it, it's like I never said a word. 

27: what’s your favorite bubblegum flavor? - Candy Cane! 

28: sunrise or sunset? - Sunset! I get to see the sun setting behind the Rocky Mountains and it's really pretty. 

29: what’s something really cute that one of your friends does and is totally endearing? - exist 

30: think of it: have you ever been truly scared? - Yes. I'd rather not talk about it. 

31: what is your opinion of socks? do you like wearing weird socks? do you sleep with socks? do you confine yourself to white sock hell? really, just talk about socks. - socks can burn in hell for all I care. I hate socks. I only wear them if I have to (like while wearing shoes) 

32: tell us a story of something that happened to you after 3AM when you were with friends. - I remember being at a sleepover a few days before I moved (this was in South Korea) and I woke up at 3:34 am (yes I remember the time don't ask why) because one of my friends was playing Megalovania on the keyboard. Then she turned around and asked who the hell took her pretzels. They were under her pillow. 

33: what’s your fave pastry? - c w a s o a n t (with jelly inside!) 

34: tell us about the stuffed animal you kept as a kid. what is it called? what does it look like? do you still keep it? - I still have this stuffed animal now (I have all of my stuffed animals. I haven't brought myself to get rid of them). It's a little pink blanket with a bunny head named Squeek. Not Squeak. I didn't know how to spell that. 

35: do you like stationary and pretty pens and so on? do you use them often? - No. I don't have any. 

36: which band’s sound would fit your mood right now? - https://youtu.be/7TqLXIBG-6g   not a band but still

37: do you like keeping your room messy or clean? - Messy! It may sound strange, but I can't find anything when it's clean. It also feels empty unless I've got stuff all over the floor. 

38: tell us about your pet peeves! - When I tell remind someone of the rules and they say "okay" and continue breaking them. Like we aren't supposed to put pans in the dishwasher because it ruins the pans. Yet my brother always puts them in there. I remind him and take it out, and he says "okay" and puts it back. I also hate it when I ask someone to stop doing something (usually when it's making me nervous or upset) and they ask "WhY?" in a really annoying tone and keep doing it. I ALSO hate it when I'm in charge and yet no one listens to me. 

I also don't like it when no one says thank you. It makes it seem like they don't appreciate me. 

39: what color do you wear the most? - Grey. I want to wear colorful clothes but the last time we went clothes shopping and I asked for pastel colors, I walked out of the store with grey, light grey, brown, and dark blue clothes. 

40: think of a piece of jewelry you own: what’s it’s story? does it have any meaning to you? - I have a locket that I made for my seventh birthday. It has little charms in it (a rose, my first initial, a heart key, and a birthday cake) and it's gold. I love it and I don't know why. 

41: what’s the last book you remember really, really loving? - There's a book series that I don't remember the name of but it's about a girl who is forcibly turned into a siren by three other sirens. She has to eat human hearts to live. It's kinda gorey, kinda romantic, lots of action. I love it. 

42: do you have a favorite coffee shop? describe it! - Unfortunately no, I usually get coffee at a gas station ^^' 

43: who was the last person you gazed at the stars with? - My dog Freyja! Whenever I take out trash, she comes with, and when the sky is clear I like to point out the starts with her before we go back inside. She's very sweet. But I can't stargaze for more than a minute. 

44: when was the last time you remember feeling completely serene and at peace with everything? - Last year I went on a trip to Florida to stay with my grandparents for a week. I remember waking up one morning with a beautiful view of the ocean and the sound of waves crashing onto the shore. My grandparents have an apartment of sorts that faces the Atlantic and you can literally go down the stairs and go swim in the ocean if you want to, it's like a two minute walk, not even. I love the ocean and the sound of waves and seagulls is always calming to me. But my house is very loud and there's no peace here. 

45: do you trust your instincts a lot? - Yes. When I have a bad feeling about something, I address it. It's not always true, but I don't want to risk anything. 

46: tell us the worst pun you can think of. - Sorry, I don't know many puns. I guess I'm just not a pun-ny person. 

47: what food do you think should be banned from the universe? - fucking macaroni with bread crumsb that shit is nasty af 

48: what was your biggest fear as a kid? is it the same today? - Storms, especially tornados. Now my biggest fear is death. Whether I'm the one dying or its someone I care about. 

49: do you like buying CDs and records? what was the last one you bought? - Not really, I don't have money to buy anything ^^' Even when I do have money, I spend it on art stuff. That reminds me that I need to fix my radio. 

50: what’s an odd thing you collect? - Fabric. I have so much and I don't even use it. But when I see a nice fabric, I get it (if I have money). 

51: think of a person. what song do you associate with them? - 'Old Timer Rock and Roll' (probably not the name of it) always reminds me of my dad. One day we were driving in his Jeep, just us two, and I mentioned that I wasn't a fan of the music on the radio. We ended up compromising and that song was the first one on the radio station that we switched to. 

52: what are your favorite memes of the year so far? - I am unfortunately not up to date with the memes. Although the ones where it's like "you've mc-ed your last Donald" or "you've ratted your last tatouille" always make me exhale aggressively. 

53: have you ever watched the rocky horror picture show? heathers? beetlejuice? pulp fiction? what do you think of them? - None of the above! I've been wanting to watch Heather's though. I just never get around to doing it. 

54: who’s the last person you saw with a true look of sadness on their face? - My brother. Not the same one from before. 

55: what’s the most dramatic thing you’ve ever done to prove a point? - nothing, sorry. I'm not very dramatic. 

56: what are some things you find endearing in people? - when they pour their heart out about a certain subject that they love. I know a lot of people tend to bottle up their opinions but when someone trusts me aniugh to tell me all about it, it's just sorta nice. 

57: go listen to bohemian rhapsody. how did it make you feel? did you dramatically reenact the lyrics? - I just sorta spaced out for the first have then did a little dance for the rest of it. I love the line "I see a little silhouetto of a man" and it's more upbeat and the music just makes me dance a little 

58: who’s the wine mom and who’s the vodka aunt in your group of friends? why? - bold of you to assume I have a group of friends 

59: what’s your favorite myth? - There's this one I heard as a kid that involves a faceless girl on the side of a highway who tries to steal faces. 

60: do you like poetry? what are some of your faves? - I can't think of any off the top of my head, but poetry is nice! 

61: what’s the stupidest gift you’ve ever given? the stupidest one you’ve ever received? - I don't really remember. I try to only give gifts that are meaningful. 

62: do you drink juice in the morning? which kind? - nope! I usually drink milk! 

63: are you fussy about your books and music? do you keep them meticulously organized or kinda leave them be? - I usually leave my music to its own devices, but all the books are organized by series and genre. 

64: what color is the sky where you are right now? - Blue! Just any other afternoon sky. 

65: is there anyone you haven’t seen in a long time who you’d love to hang out with? - My older brother. We don't get to talk much. 

66: what would your ideal flower crown look like? - Colorful, with a few white flowers! 

67: how do gloomy days where the sky is dark and the world is misty make you feel? - Those are usually the days that I don't feel anything. 

68: what’s winter like where you live? - The weather is all over the place. A little snow, then the next day, it's like 60°F. Not even joking. It snowed Friday and Saturday was warm. 

69: what are your favorite board games? - Monopoly and Battleship! 

70: have you ever used a ouija board? - No, but I really want to. But my dad won't let me. 

71: what’s your favorite kind of tea? - I don't really drink tea, sorry! 

72: are you a person who needs to note everything down or else you’ll forget it? - Nope. I'll forget it anyway. I usually set alarms for certain things but then I don't do it. 

73: what are some of your worst habits? - Biting the inside of my cheek and scratching/pinching my arm when I'm nervous. 

74: describe a good friend of yours without using their name or gendered pronouns. - kind, a good listener, talented, and understanding 

75: tell us about your pets! - We have four dogs. There's Emrys (the dog I've posted pictures of before), Cirilla (a husky German Shepard mix, very sweet), Cayde-6 (a Rottweiler mix I think, super energetic, loud, and steals food off the counter even when someone is watching), and Freyja (a German Shepard mix, puppy, also very sweet! She knows the phrase 'give hugs' and she always comes with me to take out the trash for whatever reason). I also have a Guinea Pig (who I want to get a friend for because she's lonely, but my parents keep saying no) names Neo. 

76: is there anything you should be doing right now but aren’t? - Working on my Someconsious series, cleaning, and probably checking in with some friends. 

77: pink or yellow lemonade? - Pink 

78: are you in the minion hateclub or Fan club? - Hate club. I don't like them. They're just annoying and bright and their language is stupid to me. 

79: what’s one of the cutest things someone has ever done for you? - One of my exes surprised me with a cars and roses out of nowhere. It wasn't Valentines Day, it wasn't my birthday, he just went out of his way to do something nice for me when I was having a rough week. 

80: what color are your bedroom walls? did you choose that color? if so, why? - They're a sort of off white. I want to paint them light lavender or pale blue but my parents have only painted the living room and refuse to paint anywhere else for whatever reason. I know we can afford paint, I know we have time. They just stopped caring. 

81: describe one of your friend’s eyes using the most abstract imagery you can think of. - Not sure what it means by abstract, but I'll try. Her eyes are similar to the bottom of a small river. The brown in the middle with green rings on the edges remind me of a river I used to go fishing in back in Oklahoma. 

82: are/were you good in school? - I'm okay. I have all A's and B's, but I have easy subjects that aren't very hard. 

83: what’s some of your favorite album art? - I don't really listen to albums, my music taste is mostly individual songs. Even then I don't really pay attention to the art. 

84: are you planning on getting tattoos? which ones? - I want to get a quote of sort on my ankle. Something in another language so I can tell them it means something mysterious and deep when in reality it's the description of a toaster oven that hasn't been cleaned since 1995.

85: do you read comics? what are your faves? - I read a few webcomics if that counts! I like Castle Swimmer a lot! Gay fish bapeys are best fish bapeys. 

86: do you like concept albums? which ones? - I don't know what those are, sorry 

87: what are some movies you think everyone should watch at least once in their lives? - The Princess Bride and the Last Unicorn. But I'm biased because they're both a part of my childhood. 

88: are there any artistic movements you particularly enjoy? - not in particular! 

89: are you close to your parents? - I'm only close with my dad. My stepmom can go fuck herself. She just told us that's she'll be making a schedule for the next two weeks because there won't be school. One of the weeks was spring break anyway! We aren't missing much! 

90: talk about your one of you favorite cities. - I like Palm Beach in Florida! It's fairly quiet, right next to the ocean, and filled with retired people who are all really nice. 

91: where do you plan on traveling this year? - Nowhere, we don't travel much. I really want to go to Florida again though. 

92: are you a person who drowns their pasta in cheese or a person who barely sprinkles a pinch? - I don't add cheese at all! It sort of ruins the texture for me. Especially the grated sprinkle cheese stuff l. I hate now it feels. 

93: what’s the hairstyle you wear the most? - I just keep my hair down. I don't like it in any other way. 

94: who was the last person you know to have a birthday? - My brother. His birthday is today! 

95: what are your plans for this weekend? - cry a lot cry some more lose feelings for a few hours draw watch YouTube art videos then try not to yell at my mom like I did last week

96: do you install your computer updates really quickly or do you procrastinate on them a lot? - I just get it over with so I can do whatever needs to be done. Or I schedule it for when I'm not going to be using it. 

97: myer briggs type, zodiac sign, and hogwarts house? - INFP-T/Mediator, Scorpio, and Hufflepuff 

98: when’s the last time you went hiking? did you enjoy it?- A few weeks ago. And no, I did not enjoy it considering I was supposed to be working on an important project that day. 

99: list some songs that resonate to your soul whenever you hear them. - Where We Started, If You're Going Through Hell, and We Like to Numb (a mix of We Like to Party and Numb) 

100: if you were presented with two buttons, one that allows you to go 5 years into the past, the other 5 years into the future, which one would you press? why? - Future. In five years I plan on being in college and I want to see what I should be prepared for and if my interests have changed. 

This took me at least an hour and a half. Thank you though! I 

[lazingonsunday]

Tag Game!!

I was tagged by @gretavanfic and @bigthighsandstupidguys , thank you, lovelies!! 💛

1. What is your middle name?

Starts with G lol

2. How old are you?

20

3. When is your birthday?

Dec 2

4. What is your zodiac sign?

Everyone is putting like moon and sun and rising and I have no idea what that mean lmao, sorry! I think I’m a Sagittarius though

5. What is your favourite colour?

Orange or Yellow 🧡💛

6. What’s your lucky number?

Don’t really have one, but I always tried to be #10 on my volleyball jersey

7. Do you have any pets?

An old border collie named Riley

8. Where are you from?

Canada! 🇨🇦

9. How tall are you?

Like 5’7 ish

10. What shoe size are you?

Usually 9.5 or 10. I got big ass feet :(

11. How many pairs of shoes do you own?

Way more than one human being needs

12. What was your last dream about?

I went to IT chapter 2 last night so safe to say I was having some freaky clown dreams all night lol

13. What talents do you have?

Um, I can say the alphabet backwards, which is super random lol. I can also kinda play guitar, bass, ukulele, and harmonica, but I’m not very good at any of them yet lol

14. Are you psychic in any way?

I used to think so when I was little, but not so much anymore

15. Favourite song?

Ooh, this is hard. Right now I really love When The Curtain Falls by GVF, but I would say an all time fave might be Forever in Blue Jeans by Neil Diamond because it reminds me of my mom

16. Favourite movie?

Oh, also a tough one! I think either Rocky IV or The Sandlot

17. Who would be your ideal partner?

Jake Kiszka, obviously. But in all seriousness, anyone who is genuinely kind that I feel comfortable and happy around.

18. Do you want children?

I never thought so, but now a bunch of my older cousins are having kids and they’re pretty cool, so maybe one day if I found the right person to raise them with

19. Do you want a church wedding?

No, even though my mom will kill me if I don’t lol

20. Are you religious?

I was raised Catholic, but I don’t consider myself religious anymore.

21. Have you ever been to the hospital?

Yes, I’m asthmatic af lol, and prone to breaking my fingers playing rugby

22. Have you ever got in trouble with the law?

No, I am a well-behaved child

23. Have you ever met any celebrities?

I met the magicians Penn & Teller if that counts haha

24. Baths or showers?

For practical purposes of actually getting clean, showers, but I l o v e baths

25. What colour socks are you wearing?

Black

26. Have you ever been famous?

No

27. Would you like to be a big celebrity?

While I daydream about it frequently, realistically I know I would hate it

28. What type of music do you like?

Literally the most random taste in music, it changes all the time. I don’t even have certain genres that I like, just certain artists or albums from a variety of genres

29. Have you ever been skinny dipping?

Yes. I was very drunk lmao

30. How many pillows do you sleep with?

Three normal ones and a body pillow

31. What position do you usually sleep in?

On my side cuddled up with the pillows

32. How big is your house?

Typical white suburban neighbourhood house

33. What do you typically have for breakfast?

I typically pout in the kitchen for 10 minutes before I give up and make something completely inappropriate for breakfast lmao. Usually grilled cheese. This morning alphagetti. I hate breakfast so much lol

34. Have you ever fired a gun?

Nope. No desire to.

35. Have you ever tried archery?

Yes, we did it in school a few times

36. Favourite clean word?

Love

37. Favourite swear word?

Idk if it’s a swear word, but I say ‘goddammit’ a lot

38. What’s the longest you’ve ever gone without sleep?

Not long, I’m a sleepy bitch. Probably 24 hours

39. Do you have any scars?

Yes

40. Have you ever had a secret admirer?

In 9th grade I found out this guy had a crush on my and told literally everyone but me lol

41. Are you a good liar?

I don’t lie very often, but mostly because I am a terrible liar

42. Are you a good judge of character?

Yes. I frequently get such strong vibes off of people and I can tell right away if they’re the kind of person that’s gonna stress me out

43. Can you do any other accents other than your own?

Not well

44. Do you have a strong accent?

I guess I probably have a Canadian accent, but not super strong. The region I’m from has a pretty neutral North American accent

45. What is your favourite accent?

Certain regions of Irish accent are so beautiful. Like Hozier’s accent

46. What is your personality type?

Quite shy, but generally very kind

47. What is your most expensive piece of clothing?

I have a shirt that I got for work that was like a hundred bucks and I never wear it cause I sprayed foundation on it once and now I’m scared I’m gonna ruin it lol

48. Can you curl your tongue?

Yes

49. Are you an innie or outie?

Innie

50. Left or right handed?

Right

51. Are you scared or spiders?

Not really scared of them, but I don’t like them to be close to me if that makes sense

52. Favourite food?

Probably burritos

53. Favourite foreign food?

Mexican

54. Are you a clean or messy person?

Fairly clean

55. Most used phrase?

I really don’t think I have one?

56. Most used word?

Completely. I say it like to agree with someone or acknowledge what they’re saying

57. How long does it take for you to get ready?

Depends what I’m getting ready. For school or something I don’t really care about, maybe half an hour. For work or going out, probably over an hour.

58. Do you have much of an ego?

I don’t think so

59. Do you suck or bite lollipops?

Suck until I get bored and crunch it lol

60. Do you talk to yourself?

Yes, a concerning amount. Like full conversations with myself at full volume, constantly when I’m alone.

61. Do you sing to yourself?

Occasionally

62. Are you a good singer?

Not really

63. Biggest fear?

Never learning how to make meaningful connections , pushing all my friends away, and dying alone.

64. Are you a gossip?

No, I hate it! My friends try to tell me about people we went to high school with, and I just genuinely don’t care and don’t want to know lmao

65. Best dramatic movie you’ve seen?

Idk what classifies as a ‘dramatic’ movie, but I guess the Rocky movies again

66. Do you like long or short hair?

I love long hair, I’m so jealous of people with really long hair. Mine grows so slow :(

67. Can you name all 50 states of America?

Maybe, if I thought really hard about it? I can barely remember Canadian provinces lmao

68. Favourite school subject?

I always really loved some topics in science, but then hated others. I was probably best at English.

69. Introvert or extrovert?

Introvert af

70. Have you ever been scuba diving?

No, even snorkeling freaks me out. The ocean is some scary soup

71. What makes you nervous?

Pretty much everything lol. But mostly any social situation where there’s people I don’t know, or I don’t know exactly what to expect.

72. Are you scared of the dark?

Really depends where I am. Usually no, but if I’m outside then usually yes, and after watching It last night, yes lol

73. Do you correct people when they make mistakes?

Depends who it is and what the mistake is

74. Are you ticklish?

Honestly, not really

75. Have you ever started a rumour?

Not intentionally

76. Have you ever been in a position of authority?

Kind of? At work they have like hourly leaders who are in charge of the sales floor, and I did that a lot, but it’s not really a lot of power or responsibility. Also babysitting I guess

77. Have you ever drank underage?

Yes

78. Have you ever done drugs?

Honestly, this is gonna sound so stupid, but I’ve never done anything other than alcohol and cigarettes. I actually high key wanna try weed, but again the whole ‘not knowing what to expect makes me anxious thing.’ Not even so much that I’m nervous to try the drug but that I’m nervous to try to buy it or get it, even though it’s fully legal in Canada and there’s a dispensary on every corner lmao

79. Who was your first real crush?

The first one I remember was a boy named Evan in first grade

80. How many piercings do you have?

Just my ears, and I rarely wear earrings so I always have to stab through them again when I do

81. Can you roll your R’s?

No, and I can’t whistle either! Which is deeply infuriating!

82. How fast can you type?

Fast enough to not look foolish

83. How fast can you run?

Not fast at all. I’m asthmatic and out of shape lmao

84. What colour is your hair?

An ugly medium mousy brown. I always wanna dye it a little lighter, but I go to the hairdresser like once every two years so it would look stupid when it grew out lol

85. What colour are your eyes?

Hazel-y greenish

86. What are you allergic to?

All sorts of environmental allergies; dust, pollen, animal hair, etc. I’m always sneezing and watery eyes lol

87. Do you keep a journal?

I carry a notebook, but it’s more like an agenda than a diary

88. What do your parents do?

My dad owns a drywall company and my mom is a stay-at-home mom, but she volunteers a lot now that we’re older

89. Do you like your age?

No. I think that being in your late teens and twenties can be really stressful because you feel like there’s certain things that you should have accomplished or experienced and it can be very overwhelming, feeling like you’re competing with all your peers to get your life together

90. What makes you angry?

Rude and disrespectful people

91. Do you like your own name?

Not really

92. Have you thought of baby names, and if so what are they?

I’ve definitely thought about it but I don’t really have specific favourites

93. Do you want a boy or girl for a child?

I don’t have a preference. I’d probably like to have one of each

94. What are your strengths?

I think I’ve become a lot more kind and open-hearted in the last few years.

95. What are your weaknesses?

I feel like I have let fear dictate my entire life, and there’s so many things I haven’t done because I’ve been afraid. I need to step outside my comfort zone more often.

96. How did you get your name?

There was a character on a TV show called my name that my parents liked

97. Were your ancestors royalty?

Not that I am aware of

98. Do you have any tattoos?

I changed the question because scars was an earlier one. I have two tattoos on my right arm

99. Colour of your bedspread?

Because it’s summer, I have a lighter blanket that’s light blue. My winter duvet is navy

100. Colour of your room?

Light blue

That was LONG lmao but really fun! I’m too lazy to bold the questions so sorry if it’s hard to read!

Tagging: @frcmthefires @sweetkiszkadreams @okietrish @sammyscherub @gretavanbobatea @jake-thomas-kiszka @mr-stank-i-dont-feel-so-dank and anyone else who wants to do it!!

[hymn2000]

Chiquitita - MCU AU fanfic - C22

Story summary: Something strange is happening. Someone from space has made their way to Earth, armed with a strange weapon. Targeting teenagers, their ray gun, when fired, turns the victim into a toddler. The Avengers set out to stop this, and find a way to reverse the effects. However, they don’t all come out of the battle unscathed.

Previous chapters: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21

Part of my Frostiron and Spiderson series.

Warnings/themes: de-aging, family stuff, corporal punishment (early chapters only), mental health stuff, hurt/comfort, hospital/medical stuff

Chapter 22 - Old Friends

-

“The last few months feel like they’ve gone on for years” Tony said one quiet evening.

Loki looked up from his book, and sighed. “I know what you mean”

“Your brother hasn’t been in touch for ages”

“I know. He said he was giving us false hope by coming back so regularly”

“What’s taking them so long? Was Kindsprengen really from somewhere so complicated that they can’t figure out his gun?”

“Maybe. I haven’t really been thinking about it. Not to that extent. I just think they’re bound to find a reversal eventually. There’s nothing we can do to change things, or speed them along”

Tony sighed. “I know. Just it’s been three months, and I didn’t think it would even be as long as three weeks”

“I know darling, I know” 

“Wait, Loki? Where’s the kid?”

Loki looked over to where Peter had been a few minutes earlier.

“Oh” he said. “Peter!”

There was no response. They heard something, and looked at each other.

“Was that the front door?”

“It can’t be Peter; there’s a seal at the top of the stairs” Loki said, standing up. “I’m going to go and have a look”

“MUMMA!” 

Loki and Tony looked at each other and rushed out to the corridor, where they found Peter in Carol’s arms.

“Carol! Wh-what are you doing here?!”

Carol smiled at him. “I had a bit of free time, so I thought I’d stop by. I’ve gotta say, I didn’t expect him to still be tiny”

“I’m not tiny!” Peter said, pouting. “I’m big!”

Carol kissed him on the nose. “Alright baby, you’re big”

“How long are you gonna be around for?” Tony asked, coming over and taking Peter from her, tickling his tummy.

“Hey! Daddy!”

“I’ll be around for a bit” Carol said, touching Peter’s cheek gently. “So, how are you doing?”

“Why don’t we go and grab a drink?” Tony said quickly. “Then we’ll talk”

-

Carol sat at the breakfast bar, bouncing Peter on her knee. 

“Hey baby, I’ve got something for you” she said, handing him a marshmallow lollipop.

“Oh! Thank you!” Peter grinned, taking the lolly and pulling the wrapper off.

For once, Tony chose not to complain about it. He sat a mug down in front of Carol, and then sat down on the other side of the table with Loki. 

“So” Carol said, stroking Peter’s hair. “He’s still a toddler”

“Yeah” Tony said. “They haven’t managed to make the reversal yet”

“Must be something more complex than any of us expected” Carol said. “How are you finding it with this one, then?”

“I think he’s great” Loki said. “He’s so sweet and funny and happy. He’s fun to have around. We’ve settled into a routine now, and we know what we’re doing, so it feels quite natural now”

Carol looked at Tony. “How about you?”

Tony looked at Peter, who was happily gumming his marshmallow.

“Well, it’s much easier than it was” he said. “I love the little thing. Loki’s right; he’s a funny little thing. It’s been quite fun at times, but I’m still gonna be relieved when the reversal is ready”

Carol nodded, and looked down at Peter. “What about you, baby? How are you doing?”

“I fell in the pond at the park!”

“Did you? When was that?”

“Um. Last week, I think. Last week..? I scared the ducks!”

“You scared me too!” Tony said. “He went all the way under, you know. Poor thing”

“He thought it was hilarious” Loki said. “After he’d gotten over the initial shock, anyway. You should have seen him! Screaming with laughter, he was. It wasn’t the reaction I expected. He toppled in so heavily”

“I wasn’t allowed to go on the swings” Peter pouted. 

“You were soaked through, chick” Tony said. 

“It just had to happen on the one day that I didn’t bring a change of clothes” Loki sighed, shaking his head.

Carol laughed. “Sods law. Were you hurt, little guy?”

Peter shook his head. “I dropped my ice cream”

“Oh dear! That sounds like you had a bit of rubbish day”

“He laughed about it pretty quickly, especially when he realised his rocket hadn’t succumbed to the water” Loki said. “Still, we had to take him home and put him straight in the bath. All that filthy water... I think the other parents round the pond were more scared than he was”

“Bless him. How have the press been?”

“My press manager has been surprisingly good” Tony said. “So we haven’t had too much hassle. People do keep trying to get us to meet up with other people affected by Kindsprengen though”

“I’m guessing that’s not an idea you’re on board with?”

“Nah, I’d rather just get on with it as a family. We’re fine just being the three of us. Most of the time, anyway. Still get a bit of help from friends and stuff sometimes. We don’t need to meet the other de-aged kids”

“Some of them have met up with each other though” Loki said. “Some people at the hospital showed me a few articles in some tat-mags, and apparently there was a documentary the other week. I didn’t watch it though”

“Can’t say I blame you. I don’t think I would have watched it. I might have read the articles though”

“Tragically, Loki doesn’t allow tat-mags in the house, otherwise I’d probably have some to show you” Tony said. “You could always look online. I read a few of them”

Loki looked at him. “You did?”

“Yeah, it was interesting. It’s all the same kind of thing. Like, them not having memory memories, but remembering their likes and dislikes, and some people. There's this one kid who knows their mum, but not their step-dad. How weird is that?”

“How long had they been together?” Carol asked.

“About five years, apparently. That’s still a bit weird”

“Yeah, but Peter doesn’t remember May” Loki said. “Or Liz. Maybe it’s just a bit of a pick-and-choose oddity”

Peter looked up at Carol. “Daddy said I can have a garden”

“A garden? Really? That sounds... lovely”

“It’s just an idea” Tony said.

“It’s a stupid idea. How are we supposed to have a garden? If this house was made with a garden, fine, but it wasn’t” Loki said. “There’s no provision for it!”

“Wait, how did this come about?”

“Well, yesterday when we were out, he kept asking for one of those kids climbing frames they have displayed in toy shops” Tony said. “And I said no because we don’t have a garden, and he asked for a garden, and I was like, uhh, no. But then I started thinking about it, and I thought it’d be a cool project, making a garden”

“I admire your ambition, but you can’t really have grass inside, can you? Don’t you need specially adapted spaces for indoor gardens? And aren’t they basically just greenhouses?”

“I was thinking of using one of the balconies, actually”

“Not my balcony!” Loki said.

“No! No, one of the other ones, the ones we don’t really use” Tony said. “I started drawing up some plans last night. Peter gave me some input, didn’t you, chick?”

“Yep! We’re gonna get one of them big benches that swings! AND we’re gonna have a little pond!”

“No, sweetheart, I never said a pond” Tony said. “Especially after you fell into the one at the park! Maybe a water feature”

“So what are you gonna do? Make a huge soil bed to stick grass on?”

“Maybe. I’ll show you my plans if you like” Tony said, standing up. “I left them in the other room”

Carol shook her head fondly as Tony went off. “He’s having one of his creative spurts”

“Hm, maybe” Loki said. “Our balconies are big, but I think making a full garden is a bit too ambitious. I just don’t think it would work”

“Well, I don’t see how you could do it either” Carol said. “Maybe just something that looks like a garden, then?”

“I’ll humour him” Loki said. “I just don’t want him doing something stupid. You can’t really make a garden on a balcony, especially not one that would support a big play area thing with swings”

“Wouldn’t it be a bit of a waste?” Carol said gently. “I mean, he’s not gonna be like this forever. What are you gonna do with a kids play area dealie when he’s big again?”

Loki didn’t say anything. Luckily, Tony came back into the room at that moment, shuffling some papers.

“Here, look at these. I’ve drawn the grass in, but I’m not sure how it’d work yet” 

Carol looked at his carefully drawn plans. Peter put his lolly stick down and pointed to bits of the drawing.

“This bit is all big plants! And this bit goes against the glassy bit. Daddy said it’s safer that way” he said. “This is the swinging bench! Daddy said we can get a slide too, that’s what this is! It’s a, um... daddy, what is it?”

“It’s a novelty slide”

“Yes!” Peter grinned. “Oh, oh! Daddy, water!”

“Water?” Tony said. “Oh, are you thirsty?”

“Water! Water!” 

Peter scurried down from Carol’s lap, running over to the sink and pointing.

“Water, water, water!”

“Ooh, you wanna play, don’t you?” Tony smiled, getting up.

Carol watched while Tony filled the washing up bowl and set it on the floor. She watched him handing the toddler some plastic cups and little rubber bath toys. Tony knelt on the floor, rolling Peter’s sleeves up to stop them from getting too wet. 

“It looks like you’re doing well” she said to Loki. 

“Yes, well, it took some getting used to” Loki said. “Tony was rubbish the first week, but then he stepped up. He’s had a few rocky days, but ultimately, he’s been great”

“He’s such a dad. He looks so comfortable with him even now he’s a toddler”

“He’s cute” Loki said. “...Peter’s gotten really into water lately. I thought about getting him one of those big water troughs, but Tony said no”

“That makes sense. Have you considered what you’re gonna do with all this kids stuff after he’s been zapped back to normal?”

“Not really” Loki said vaguely, looking back at Peter and Tony. “He ends up spending ages in the bath now, since he’s got so many bath toys. He loves those little water mills”

“Have you taken him swimming? He might enjoy that”

“Oh yeah, he loves it! We’ve taken him a handful of times. He adores it, especially this little slide they have there in the shape of a whale”

“That’s cute. What about you, though? You never go swimming”

“Well, with the baby, we’re just in the baby pool and the shallow end, and I’m fine with that. Tony takes him into the deeper parts a little bit, but not much. Peter likes being able to splash around”

“Nice. So, you’re doing well?”

Loki nodded. “I’m enjoying it, if I’m honest. He’s a lot of fun, and it makes it a lot easier to deal with the whole situation”

“So you’ve not got any idea how long he’s gonna be like this?”

“No. Thor said he’ll let us know about any progress on the reversal as soon as he knows” 

“Something must have happened to slow their progress. How long has it been now? Three months?”

“To the day” Loki nodded. 

Carol sighed, looking at Peter. Tony was squirting water at him with a little toy frog, and Peter was laughing like it was the funniest thing ever.

“He looks happy” she said. “But he deserves to be given his life back”

Loki looked at her. “Isn’t happiness more important?”

Carol looked at him. “He won’t be like this forever. Regular Peter might have been through some horrible stuff, but he still has a good life. He has a family, and good friends. He’s a superhero. Secretly, yeah, but still. He deserves to have that life back. Even if he’s a toddler now who can’t remember anything from before he got zapped, he still has the same past. You’re never going to be able to change that”

“If it’s a past he’s forgotten, why would we need to?”

“You’re thinking dangerously, Loki” she said. “As soon as that reversal is done, Thor’s gonna come here first. He’ll zap Peter back to normal, and then he’ll go and zap all the other kids back to normal. This was always a temporary thing. As soon as that guy popped up, you all started talking of a way to reverse the effects, isn’t that what you said?”

“Well, yes, but-”

“But nothing. You knew how it had to go even before Peter got hit. Do you really think all those kids are better off now? I’ve heard bits about this, Loki. The first one to get zapped was like, four months ago, right? They're exactly the same as the day they got zapped. So there’s a chance they’ll be stuck as toddlers forever if they don’t get that reversal gun. Is that better than giving them their lives back?”

“I don’t care about the other kids: I care about Peter”

“Stop talking mad, then” Carol said. “You’re allowed to enjoy the toddler version, but you’re not allowed to contemplate keeping it this way forever. It’s not gonna happen”

“I know that” Loki nearly snapped. “I never outright said to you that we should keep him this way;- that was just your assumption. You’re putting words in my mouth”

“I’m taking them from your mind”

“Mumma, mumma!” Peter called. 

Carol stood up and went over to him. “What’cha doing over here, baby?”

“You can make the water bubble!” he said. “Make it bubble!”

“I’ll make it bubble, but only if you promise not to touch”

“Promise!”

Tony smiled at Peter’s fascination and amazement at the bubbling of the boiling water when Carol heated it. He was a little impressed himself. Carol’s glowing hands weren’t something he’d had the pleasure of seeing in action very often. 

“You know, if you’ve got some free time, maybe you could stay the night and come out with us tomorrow” he suggested.

“I’m up for staying the night. What are you doing tomorrow?”

“We haven’t really decided yet. If the weather is good, we were thinking about this outdoor splash pad thing. It’s like a big water-based play area. If the weathers not so good, well, I’m not sure. Maybe just something boring like going out for lunch and then going shopping”

“Getting stuff for your garden project?”

“Maybe. I kinda wanted to go to a garden centre anyway. We did up May’s grave recently, and I wanted to see if I could find another nice statue or one of those little coloured lanterns for her. Garden centres are gonna have ones that’ll last outside, more than normal shops”

“Was she into that kinda stuff? Like, gnomes?”

“God no; she hated gnomes. Peter once hid one in her bed so when she pulled back the covers she got the fright of her life. Peter said it’s the only time he can remember May properly hitting him” Tony smiled slightly. “I don’t know why gnomes freaked her out. She always hated that one Loki used to have by the front door”

“Oh yeah. What happened to that?”

“Peter smashed it in a fit of rage after May died” Loki said, draining his mug. “Somehow I never got round to getting another one”

“Huh” Carol lowered her hand, letting the water go still again.

“Oh!” Peter said. “It’s stopped bubbling!”

“Yeah, but it’ll still be hot, so you can’t touch” Carol said, picking him up and giving him a cuddle. “What time do you go to bed, baby?”

“Usually around midnight” Peter said, very matter-o’-fact. 

“He’s lying” Tony said unnecessarily. “He goes at eight. I guess he can stay up a bit later tonight, since you’re here”

“Aww, that’ll be fun” Carol said. “I’ll read you some stories if you like, baby”

“Ah, maybe don’t suggest that” Loki said. “He’s really into his reading right now, and he won’t let us read to him: he has to read to us”

“Ooh, you can read?”

“Yep! Daddy taught me!” Peter grinned. “I get stuck on the really big words though”

“I’ll help you along. Do you wanna read? Or do you wanna do something else?”

Peter thought for a moment. “I want hot chocolate!”

Carol laughed. “Better ask your dads”

Peter blinked at her, and then looked at Tony. “Hot chocolate?”

Tony smiled. “Sure thing kiddo. Just give me five minutes”

-

Peter decided he didn’t want to read after having his hot chocolate. Instead, he wanted to show Carol all of his toys. He had a lot, so this was quite a time consuming venture. Tony and Loki left him to it for a while, and Peter may have got through everything - if he didn’t feel the need to explain every single toy in detail to Carol. His enthusiasm may have been endearing, but it certainly ate into the evening too.

“Bambino” Tony said at quarter to nine. “I think it’s time to go to bed”

“No!” Peter protested. “I haven’t finished!”

“You can show mumma the rest of your things tomorrow. It’s already past your usual bed time” 

Peter looked at Loki for help. “I can stay up, can’t I?”

“You’ve already stayed up, chick” Loki said. “It’s time to put your toys away and let us take you to bed”

Peter looked at Carol. “I can stay up?”

“No, I think it’s definitely bedtime now” Carol said. “We’ll tidy up your toys, and then you’ll go to bed”

Peter pouted. “I don’t want to”

“You still gotta go”

“Can you take me?”

“Sure, I can take you” she said, looking at Tony for permission. “But first you need to tidy your toys”

Peter nodded and started throwing his toys back into their boxes.

“Careful!” Loki said. “You’ll break something if you throw them about like that”

Peter looked at him, and then started putting his toys away in a much more gentle fashion. Carol gave him a hand, and once everything was away, she gave him a little squeeze.

“Good boy. Are you gonna say goodnight?”

Peter nodded and ran over to Loki and Tony, who lifted him up and gave him a  big hug.

“Goodnight, darling” Loki said. “See you in the morning”

“Night, chick” Tony said. “Be good for mumma, ok?”

“I will!” Peter said. “Love you, daddies!”

“We love you too”

-

Peter happily trotted along to his room with Carol, thrilled to be seeing her again after so long. He decided he had to be good as gold, and he went straight to his en suite, climbed up onto his little stepping stool, and grabbed his toothbrush.

“You know exactly what you’re doing, don’t you, baby?”

Peter did his teeth and then let Carol wash his face and help him into his pyjamas. 

“You’re so good, you know” she said.

“I try” Peter grinned. 

“You ready to get into bed?”

“No! I need a wee!”

“Ok, ok. I’ll go and sort your bed out then” Carol said, taking his rocket and leaving him to it.

It felt a little odd, seeing Peter’s room filled with all this little-boy, toddler-sized stuff. Most of regular Peter’s stuff was still there, like his elephant and his shelf of trophies and his little collection of Steiff toys. But other stuff had obviously been put away for safekeeping, like his school things and his workshop things and his laptop. The photo of May and Peter that had been on the bedside table for so long had been moved. Carol understood why, but it was still weird seeing it was missing - it made the bedside table look bare. 

“Mumma?” Peter said, coming out of the en suite. “Are you gonna be here tomorrow?”

“Yeah, I’m staying over” Carol said.

“Are we going out?”

“I'm not sure yet. I think your dads were thinking of taking you out”

“Oh!” Peter said, climbing up onto his bed. “You too?”

“Yeah, me too” she smiled. “Do you wanna read a story before you go to sleep?”

Peter shook his head. “Tell me one of your stories!”

Carol laughed. “Sure, but you gotta lay down first”

Peter flopped down onto his back, hugging his rocket close. Carol sat on the bed with him. 

“Ok, I’ll tell you something that happened a few weeks ago. So, there I was, minding my own business, when suddenly, out of nowhere-”

-

Loki and Tony looked up when Carol rejoined them in the living room.

“Is he asleep?” Tony asked.

“Yep” Carol sat down beside Loki. “He’s a good kid. He’s excited about going out tomorrow, even though I told him I don’t know where we’re going”

“I think we should go swimming again” Loki said. “He enjoys it so much”

“Well, I’ve been looking at the weather forecast, and it’s supposed to be pretty hot tomorrow” Tony said. “We don’t wanna go to the main pool and waste the hot weather by being inside”

“Didn’t you say something about an outdoor splash pad thing?” Carol said.

“Yeah, but there’s also an outdoor paddling pool in this other park” Tony said. “There’s not really any pictures of it online, but it sounds like it could be a good thing. Just a basic pool, apparently with a kiosk nearby, so we could have an ice cream or something too”

“What if it’s busy?” Loki said. “It might be a bit much, having three of us with the toddler”

“It’s probably not gonna be too busy. People go to the coast and theme parks and stuff when it’s hot. Those are the places that are gonna be crowded” Tony said. “We could go earlier too. Then go for lunch afterwards? And the garden centre. Like I said; there’s some stuff I need”

Loki looked at Carol. “What do you think?”

“I don’t mind, but I don’t have a swim suit”

“We’ve got some here you could use” Tony said. “Peter’s friends have kinda got a drawer full of swim stuff here for some reason”

“Ok, but somehow I don’t think a fifteen year olds bikini will fit me”

“You’re not exactly huge, Cap” Tony said. “I’m sure Millie’s stuff will fit. She’s a bit fat”

“Millie isn’t fat!” Loki said. “She’s just a bit chunky”

“She’s bigger than the other two. She wears bigger sizes. You could always go and see”

“You’d wake Peter up, rifling around in his room for the swim stuff” Loki said. “Maybe we’d better think of something else to do tomorrow”

“I’ll have a brain storm over night” Tony said. “We’ll see what we can come up with. Any suggestions?”

“Hey, I’m easy” Carol smiled. “Now, do you mind if I raid your kitchen?”

Tony laughed and passed her his phone. “Order a takeaway. Loki and I were gonna get something in anyway. May as well feed you too”

*