#because even though it’s apparently not nearly as good a place to work for as it used to be

[cowboyjimkirk]

💀 looking for a new job and realizing that between my totally useless liberal arts degree, my chronic pain, and my deep reluctance to have another public facing job, i am absolutely screwed

[sunderwight]

AU where there's no system (or a decidedly less restrictive one) and Shen Yuan transmigrates into an OC rogue cultivator before the start of the novel, and decides he's gonna steal the protagonist before Luo Binghe even gets to Cang Qiong.

The logic is sound -- he'll keep Luo Binghe from experiencing neglect and abuse at Shen Qingqiu's hands, raise him away from the pressure of the sects and the likelihood that anyone else might find out about his heritage and try to harm him over it, keep him fully away from the Immortal Alliance Conference, and then Luo Binghe's course will change trajectory because he'll have no reason to want revenge against the world and no access to Xin Mo. Shen Yuan will be able to spare Luo Binghe some suffering and possibly survive in a world less subject to the harrowing whims of a half-mad tyrannical overlord. Win-win!

However, the tricky bit is that he's not sure exactly how far ahead of the novel he is, and also Airplane didn't specify where Luo Binghe grew up. This means that Luo Binghe could be any age younger than twelve and in any number of places along or near to the Luo river.

Shen Yuan decides he's going to approach this by pretending he is looking for the long-lost son of his sister, traveling through the likeliest areas, asking after abandoned children who might fit the protagonist's description. It's a long shot, he knows, and he's mostly relying on the existence of Narrative Destiny. But eventually he is directed by several people towards a particular city, which is not as close to the river as he'd have expected Luo Binghe to grow up, but then again he only knows that was where baby Binghe was found, not where the washerwoman who took him in ultimately lived.

It becomes clear to him, though, that he's been sent to the wrong target. But also why he's been sent astray is apparent in nearly the same breath, because among the slave children living in this area is a little boy who could be his much younger clone.

Seriously, this kid looks just like him! Or, well, close enough. He looks a lot like Shen Yuan's actual nieces and nephews from his past life. It's uncanny.

Also, because of his search, the slave kids get wind of what he's looking for (his long-lost nephew) pretty quick. The boy with the obvious resemblance to him greets Shen Yuan's own assessment with wary cynicism, but he's just a little boy. So it's not difficult to notice the way he's also practically vibrating with hopefulness, half-hiding behind a protective older kid and looking at Shen Yuan with big dark eyes like he expects to be rescued or destroyed with whatever he has to say next.

Shen Yuan has a big problem now. He just knows that if he says something like "actually no this boy is too old to be my nephew" or whatever other excuse, no one will believe him, and also this poor kid is going to be permanently scarred by it. He's going to think Shen Yuan is lying just so that he can reject him. On top of that, he's not in a good situation here. None of these children are even remotely well cared-for.

Shen Yuan's rogue cultivator self isn't rich on the level of being like a wealthy sect leader or anything, but he's made some money since transmigrating by doing random cultivator jobs and quests along the way here. He uses it all to purchase two little slave boys (Do Not Separate), then takes another job and uses that coin to acquire a somewhat rundown manor which used to belong to the local gentry. The Qiu family (rings some bells but that's not exactly an uncommon name) kept it up for a while in case a branch family sprung up in need of a residence, but they've been in decline and the place is downright decrepit, so they had been looking to sell it instead. It's too big for a wandering bachelor like SY to ever need on his own account, but that's sort of the idea. He makes more money taking on cultivator work, at first taking his boys along with him for lack of any alternative. Nerve-wrackingly dangerous! Eventually he hires workers to start restoring the manor, particularly setting up a yard to be a school area, and then starts taking on any freelance jobs he can get in order to steadily buy out the contracts on all the other kids. He gets it nice enough to house and care for as many orphans as he can acquire.

Not because he's a big old softie though!

His story of looking for his nephew is a bust now, since he's apparently "found" the kid. So he's got to change tactics! If he can't find baby Binghe and the washerwoman, the next best approach is to create an opportunity for them to come to him. So once he's got his new household established, he starts offering free lessons to all the local kids. Not just the ones he's taken in, but also any who come by and want to learn some things. It's a tempting setup for anyone who wants their child to get education but can't afford a tutor, and Luo Binghe's mother had been entirely the sort of person who would have packed up and left her situation if there had been an opportunity for it.

On that note, SY also starts hiring single mothers to help look after his new gaggle of children and do the work he doesn't know how to do in these times, like keeping house, laundry, cooking, actually raising kids, etc.

His "little school" is not universally popular. A few groups try and ruin him, because the poverty in the region provides a basis of business for them. The ringleaders of the human traffickers in the area don't want their trade to dry up, even if it means selling all of their merchandise for this round, so when they find out that their underlings let Shen Yuan buy off all the kids they try and intimidate him into returning them (it doesn't go well for them). The Qiu family also isn't thrilled after it becomes clear what he's doing, and get him investigated by the local authorities (read: use their bribed officials and local goons to try and interfere.)

When that doesn't work either the sects get involved, because the Qiu go crying to Huan Hua Palace that Shen Yuan is sketchy and is trying to establish his own sect. So Shen Yuan talks his way around the matter, and frankly the Qiu are small fish even if they're the biggest ones in the local pond, so HHP doesn't care to pursue things much further. (Read: SY could mop the floor with the disciples they sent to investigate him, and it's not worth it to piss off someone this mysterious and powerful just to bully some impoverished children.)

Shen Yuan is appalled by all this bullshit though. Trust the world of PIDW to make it so hard just for a guy to teach some poor kids how to read and do math!

It makes him dig in his heels about it, because he is at heart a stubborn bastard. The fires that once fueled a thousand angry screeds on zhongdian literature site is now aimed at the local magistrate. One of the women he's hired on has some dirt on the Qiu family, which leads SY to dig up some more until he eventually has enough to turn the tables on them. Local officials won't investigate because they've all been bought, but that in and of itself is of some interest to their superiors closer to the palace, and so SY arranges an investigation of his own that goes way further than he thought? Turns out there are some ugly skeletons in the Qiu closets, and the imperial investigator comes down on them hard.

Well, he can't say they didn't have it coming? Though he does feel bad for the children in the family, especially the oldest son, who gets hauled off to jail along with his father. At least the girl is sent to live with relatives. Maybe he should have done more to shield the minors in the situation...?

His kids tell him not to worry about it, though, that apparently young master Qiu was known to run people down in the streets and beat his servants and do other cartoonishly awful things. SY's not sure how much of it is true and how much of it is his little flock of fluffy sheep trying to ease his conscience, though they do all seem to take a lot of vindictive delight in the whole affair. Especially Nephew, who clings to his sleeves and loudly declares that the investigator should have publicly flogged the discredited nobles so that everyone could go watch, and then begs him for sweets as if that wasn't a creepy thing to hear come out of an eight-year-old's mouth. SY just sighs and tells him he can have something good when he finishes his calligraphy practice.

Of course, it's not exactly easy running what is basically an orphanage-slash-school (and maybe a budding sect...?), especially when pretty much all of the kids have been traumatized and faced stuff like rampant dehumanization, food insecurity, abuse, and neglect. Hiring single mothers soon becomes not only a plan to try and lure in Luo Binghe's mom, but an absolute godsend of an idea because SY has no clue WHAT he would do on his own about the discipline issues or emotional breakdowns or acting out that some of the kids get up to once it registers that they're in a safe enough place to unpack their baggage.

Apart from Nephew, SY's favorite kid is the one who came with him, the oldest of the flock of former slave children. He's the big brother of the group, the one who tries his best to look after the others and to not make any trouble himself. But even poor Little Yue is still just a kid who has been through too much, and he also eventually starts having some meltdowns and struggles with processing everything that has happened to him as a vulnerable child in an unkind world.

SY really didn't mean to start a trauma center for mistreated children!

Though, that's still not necessarily a bad thing for Luo Binghe to one day come across, provided he ever actually shows up...

Eventually, Shen Yuan does figure out that he must be ahead even of Luo Binghe's birth, though he still doesn't put together that he's interfered in the scum villain's backstory. Probably something even more amusingly obscure, like the creation year of some random artifact Luo Binghe used in some wife plot or other, tips him off and he mentally throws his hands up in the air. He's got to wait DECADES? Maybe he ought to try and find Luo Binghe's biological parents and just follow them around at this point!

Not that he can, now, though, because he has to make sure no negative IQ villains (who will probably just be cannon fodder for a subplot one day) decide to send goons to literally burn down his orphanage. Also if he's gone for too long his kids get upset. Probably because no one else is as weak to their puppy dog eyes and pleas for treats and toys as he is.

At least it gives him time to shore up his position, and train Nephew and Little Yue more extensively in cultivation. Despite his initial assurances to HHP that he was but a humble orphan wrangler who was only incidentally a cultivator, Shen Yuan does also teach the other kids some basic cultivation exercises. There are a few reasons for that.

One is just the principle of the thing. No, these kids don't all have the potential to become great immortals or anything, but they can still learn some of it and it's good for their health if they do. The only trouble is if they try and push too hard or attempt things beyond their range, and that's a risk with everyone who cultivates. Or even just exercises!

Another reason is that it helps stave off the jealousy that some of the kids have towards those with more cultivation potential. Teaching a lot of the basics all around makes it into just another topic at school. Some kids might not be as good at it as others, but those kids might also be better at math, or memorization, or board games, and while cultivation can open more doors to people as adults, for the children this is generally enough to satisfy their sense of fairness. Or at least reduce outbursts and fights.

Finally, the impression that any of SY's kids might be a cultivator also makes wicked people more reluctant to try and abduct or interfere with them. Cultivators are revered and nearly mythological figures in the public consciousness. It isn't difficult to see why, if even a rogue cultivator NPC like SY* can mop the floor with most random muggers (*Shen Yuan is not a normal rogue cultivator). Not many people want to risk bringing SY's ire down on them, but of those who might chance it if he wasn't around to immediately react, even fewer want to risk that the kids themselves could kick their asses.

Not knowing that only two of the orphans probably could in fact mop the floor with them helps keep all the rest safer, and is more believable when all of them can conduct themselves enough like disciples to fool anyone who doesn't know what to really look for.

Developments that surprise Shen Yuan but wouldn't surprise anyone else who is paying attention:

People start leaving unwanted babies and younger children on his doorstep. Not all the time, but more than once has he had to frantically find wet nurses and worry that he's changed things enough that some fishermen might just randomly drop the protagonist outside his gate, and he wouldn't even know because Binghe would be a literal infant??

Nephew (SJ) and Little Yue (Yue Qi -- only Shen Yuan calls him "Little", especially when he gets taller than SY by the time he's sixteen) are prodigies who get really good at cultivation, really fast, and between that and Shen Yuan's OP skills they completely warp Shen Yuan's ideas for what normal cultivation potential looks like. This would probably cause more problems if he wasn't teaching all the kids how to cultivate anyway, but means his students actually do kinda run the usual range of skills for a small sect.

SJ and YQ swiftly reach the point where they need more advanced equipment than just SY's teaching can provide, if they're going to keep building their skills. Gaining access to certain tools, aids, and materials (like spiritual swords) is a real hurdle though, and usually is for rogue cultivators (one of the major disadvantages of no sect affiliation.) Shen Yuan is hesitant to use stuff from the plot, since it's For Binghe, but he eventually caves and starts going after some things that he doesn't think the future protagonist will miss much. He also ends up buying stuff from HHP, since they're willing to sell things like spiritual tools and weapons if the price is right, whereas most other sects like Cang Qiong reserve them for members only.

They get an invitation to the Immortal Alliance Conference. Not the one where the Abyss opens up, obviously, the one where (originally) Shen Jiu reunited with Yue Qi and killed Wu Yanzi. Shen Yuan debates on going but the boys really want to, and things have calmed down enough that no one's trying to burn down the school whenever he leaves these days, so eventually he figures it'll be interesting to see some of the Cang Qiong characters and should be safe enough if he keeps his disciples close.

They don't run into young Yue Qingyuan or Shen Qingqiu on the trip, but Wu Yanzi does show up and get killed, and SY only hears about it and assumes they just missed all that action. (WYZ just got caught by some senior cultivators who recognized him and killed him to avenge some disciples he murdered.) Nephew and Little Yue do meet young Liu Qingge, Shang Qinghua, Mu Qingfang, and Su Xiyan though! Which gives Shen Yuan the opportunity to tell them all (mostly Su Xiyan) that if they're ever in trouble near his school, they can come to him for help. Hint hint.

This open invitation ends up being accepted broadly by a lot of traveling cultivators after the conference, who from then on treat Shen Yuan's school like a free motel whenever they're passing through. Plenty aren't even people SY met, but it seems his statement was taken as a general one to fellow righteous cultivators all around! Luckily, this has some advantages. Shen Yuan has no qualms running off anyone who tries to take unfair advantage of him or especially his kids or staff, and no shame in conscripting anyone who is decent enough to help teach his students, even if it's nothing to do with cultivating, and somehow word gets around and people start bringing school supplies, medicine, food, or other useful things along with them as gifts to help repay the hospitality. Young Liu Qingge comes by a lot on his way to and from various quests, or even seems to just turn up randomly sometimes (he comes to challenge YQ and SJ to fights), and SY's just like "I guess this is happening now" and teaches him to recognize the early signs of qi deviation and advises strongly against meditating in caves.

At one point a young Shang Qinghua turns up in one of the spare rooms, very obviously hiding an ice demon. Shen Yuan again is just like "I guess this is happening now" and shelters them until Mobei Jun has recovered, and sends a message to Cang Qiong that one of their An Ding caravans was attacked and their disciple is recovering under his roof but isn't well enough to travel yet. Much less stressful situation for Airplane (who is desperately trying to figure out what he did to manifest SJ's benevolent uncle from somewhere???)

Su Xiyan seems like the only person they met at the Immortal Alliance Conference who doesn't turn up at their door in a state of emergency at some point.

A few years later, there is a big scandal involving her and the demon emperor. Su Xiyan disappears, Huan Hua Palace accuses Tianlang Jun of plotting against the righteous sects, and Shen Yuan is even invited to the meeting where they try and rally everyone to go kill Binghe's dad. Naturally, he declines to participate in the witch hunt, but the major sects agree to it. By luck (or narrative fortune) Shen Yuan comes across Zhuzhi Lang on his trip back home, and mentions the ambush and his distaste for it (not knowing who ZZL is). ZZL warns Tianlang Jun and the confrontation goes very differently, especially since there's no Yue Qingyuan wielding Xuan Su.

It doesn't go well for the sects involved. Huan Hua Palace gets decimated. The Old Palace Master gets killed. Shen Yuan is like uhhhh that's... whoops? Didn't Luo Binghe need that in the future?? Fuck.

But the sect isn't wiped out completely, they just take a massive beating. Some of their younger disciples end up leaving and turning up on Shen Yuan's doorstep, for some reason. The manor house is becoming too small to account for all of these foundlings! They have to expand. Though the expansions would be a stretch to term a "palace" they end up occupying a much larger chunk of territory, and even investing in farmland and some storehouses to help support the sect. That's still not really a sect, of course. Even if a lot of the business that would have normally gone to Huan Hua Palace starts coming to them instead. Once HHP is back on its feet the stream will probably dry out. Probably?

Zhuzhi Lang starts hanging around. He's actually looking for Su Xiyan or their baby, dead or alive and per Tianlang Jun's instructions, but he uses Shen Yuan's school as base camp for his kind of hopeless efforts to find any traces of them, while also looking for ways to try and repay Shen Yuan. All the kids are just like "oh great, another weird man has fallen in love with Shizun -- someone go run interference" about it.

Some years later, an older woman and her young son turn up. Shen Yuan's off on a quest at the time, so SJ receives them. As is standard procedure he gives the woman a job and places the boy in classes, after giving him the aptitude tests. The kid is cute and precocious, so SJ uses him to distract YQ while he himself sneaks out to go join LQG on a monster hunt (and claim the valuable parts of the beast's remains for himself), and neither SY nor ZZL notice anything until SY's going over the paperwork for stuff he missed while he was gone. Since he procrastinated, it takes him like a week to find out that Luo Binghe is finally under his roof. He's going over the admission form right when SJ arrives with The New Adorable Child to try and distract SY enough that SY will let him go on a solo hunt -- as far as being distracted goes, it is way more effective than even SJ anticipated.

Then he has to figure out how to let ZZL know, so that ZZL can let Tianlang Jun know, so that Luo Binghe will have more family than just his mom and more resources than just a shabby little not-sect! But even once he figures it out and sets up the dramatic reveal, TLJ is just like "great! so can he just stay with you? he's probably fine there" which... irritates SY.

SJ fully conscripts Luo Binghe as a minion in his many cons. He never lost his street kid conman tactics, although he now uses them less as a ruthless survival tool or weapon and more to just get things to go his own way. LBH has the face and disposition of a little angel, which SJ no longer can pull off as a full grown adult, so he fills a gap. LBH also knows full well what's going, especially since a lot of SJ's tactics involve throwing LBH at SY like a smoke bomb.

Luo Binghe inevitably still develops a big fat crush on SY, so this is fine by him. Especially when he gets older, he starts bringing SY tea and making him breakfast and running his errands until even SJ is like "wait a minute, this little brat's stealing my job!" and by then it's too late. Luo Binghe is SY's personal assistant, the disciple at conman puppydog eyes has surpassed the master! While SJ was busy being like "I'm going to trick this idiot into doing my chores" LBH was going "I'm going to trick this idiot into giving me his job".

SY takes too long to officially name his school so everyone calls it the Shen Sect, much to his embarrassment.

[tthoroughfare]

crush // abby anderson

*･゜ﾟ･* summary: abby is like can u read my mind? i've been watching u! couldn't fight to save ur life, but you look so cool!!! just me rambling about making abby realize she's not straight

*･゜ﾟ･* pairing: canon!abby x reader

*･゜ﾟ･* content: sfw! you two dancing around each other for now. abby being nervous and cute.

*･゜ﾟ･* length: 1.3k

this is part one and i've already written the majority of the rest. just thought this was a good way to break it up :)

recently i am thinking A Lot about the concept of being the girl that makes abby realize she’s not straight ,,, and the first girl she’s ever with

the idea of her being all fumbly and nervous and you having to take the lead. it’s just good

i also love the idea of being very different to her. you’re not a soldier like her, maybe you do something technical and sciencey. you get moved to the base and become friends, and people are just like… kinda surprised that you’re so close, so fast? on paper, you don’t seem to have that much in common but it just works. she likes that you’re different to her, it’s refreshing

you’d already heard a lot about her before you moved. you told her that not long into being friends with her, to which she’d scoffed a little, toying with her fingers. you were in the canteen, the two of you sitting opposite each other on the end of the table, leaving a gap between the rest of the group.

“good or bad?”

“good,” you’d chuckled, taking a bite of your lunch.

she paused, flitting her gaze away as you held eye contact, chewing slowly. “gonna elaborate?”

the corners of your mouth quirked as you swallowed. “just that you’re… pretty impressive. good at what you do. slightly intimidating.”

she scoffed again, eyebrows twitching. “i’m not… do you think i’m… you think that?”

“…impressive or intimidating?”

“either.”

you’d looked downwards, pausing before meeting her eyes with a teasing smile on your face. “you’re very tall.”

she didn’t tell you this at the time, but she’d heard things about you, too. she hadn’t paid it much mind at the time, but there had been a couple of mentions of a scientist girl moving in to help out with a new assignment full time, and that she was, ‘like, a genius’

also, manny had said something to her along the lines of ‘apparently she’s hot’, while raising his eyebrows with a cheeky smirk

she’d just rolled her eyes

but then she meets you for the first time, and okay. he wasn’t wrong

it’s only a chaste introduction as you cross paths one day, but she has to make a real effort to keep her cool. she doesn’t understand it, she’s just affected by you, just has to know you

and then she does know you, and she still wants to know you more. it’s this feeling, this drive, always wanting more more more

it sends her crazy. the fact it takes her so long to realize she has a crush on you makes her look back and laugh at her own naivety

she finds out you’re gay maybe a month into being friends with you, when you’re hanging out with her at the library. she never gave much thought to the fact you seemed to follow her around, spend nearly all your spare time with her. she figured it was just because you didn’t know anyone else that well yet.

she’s quietly reading on one side of the couch, while you try your best to get some work done on the other, papers strewn over the coffee table in front. it’s difficult to concentrate, though, even though you’re fully aware how inundated you are. one of her legs is slung up on the couch, bent at the knee, and you’re so conscious of the proximity.

after a good while of trying and failing to get anywhere, you look up at her and lean in a little. “hey, abby?”

she looks up from her book, acknowledging you.

“i’m bored.”

she chuckles as she sits up, closing the pages around her middle finger to keep her place. “c’mon, we need you to… save the world.”

you let out a small, fond scoff, putting your notebook and pen down on the coffee table. “that’s really… not what i do. appreciate the delusion of grandeur you’ve just given me, though.”

she watches you with a smile, not meeting your eyes as you sit back on the couch, shuffling around to face her. “so…” you begin.

“so…?” she parrots, raising her eyebrows slightly.

“what went on between you and owen?”

she’s a little shocked at your bluntness, laughing nervously and shifting in her seat. as far as she was aware, you didn’t even know anything about that. “what?”

you pull a face. “come on, i’m not stupid. i notice things.”

in truth, you’re using the question as a trojan horse to figure out if she likes women. you are genuinely curious, though, and right now the conversation sounds a hell of a lot better than doing what you’re actually supposed to be.

she pauses, eyes flitting around the room. “uh… we were together for a while. and now we’re not.”

you nod slowly, waiting for an elaboration that never comes. “that’s it?”

abby shrugs awkwardly, and you feel a little bad for pushing, holding your hands up. “sorry, sorry. i don’t mean to pry.”

“s’okay.” she messes with the novel, eyes trained on it as she runs the pad of her index over the closed pages. “what about you? you got a boyfriend?”

“i, uh… i was with someone. it didn’t work out.”

she hums in sympathy. “he a scientist, too?”

“she’s a medic.”

abby freezes, looking up at you, mouth falling open slightly. she feels stupid for assuming. “oh, shit, sorry. i didn’t realize you were — sorry. not that there’s anything wrong with that.” she mentally kicks herself for the last statement. of course there isn’t. she doesn’t even know why she said it.

you laugh, amused by her babbling and the way the tops of her cheeks turn pink. “you’re good, you’re good.”

she lets out a final, ‘sorry’, gaze darting from you, to her book, to the shelf on your right. then, she looks back at you, feeling the need to break the slightly uncomfortable silence that had fallen. “anyway… her loss.”

you chuckle. “owen’s loss. who needs ‘em?”

“who needs ‘em?” she repeats, breathing out a laugh.

after the revelation, something shifts for abby. she doesn’t know why, but finding out that you like women makes her feel… different (?) about you

not in a bad way. just different

she’d always looked at you and thought you were beautiful. possibly more beautiful than any girl she’d ever seen

and she knew she was nervous around you; she was normally pretty outgoing and didn’t really have an issue talking to anyone. but when it came to you she’d overthink every sentence, words getting caught in her throat. she just felt such a need to impress you, wanted to say and do everything right

she just thought that she really, really wanted to be friends with you. that she thought you were cool, and admirable, and funny, and smart, and liked being around you

but finding out that you’re gay just makes her… think. on a whole other level she’d never really looked into

knowing that you could, maybe, maybe, be a viable option sends her mind reeling with a whole host of confusing thoughts more than she’d like to admit

she’d never really put much thought into her sexuality. she’d always just assumed she was straight. sure, she’d looked at women before, gotten a little flustered around pretty girls, but just guessed everyone did

but when it was you… like. you… it was a whole other ballgame

and then, over a few months, she starts thinking about silly things like how it would feel to touch you — really touch you, not just the friendly brushes you already shared. how soft you’d feel, how it would be to have her fingers threaded through your hair

then she starts thinking about if she’d maybe want to kiss you

she decides she’s not against the idea

[frudoo]

A non Zombie apocalypse 141 poly

They find another survivor looking for supplies and decide to make her their wife.

I went a lil crazy on this one ngl

Warnings: Non-con/dub-con but nothing sexual. Fem!Reader.

It was that colossal motherfucker you saw first—the one you almost wasted an arrow on because of that creepy skull mask he wore. The big bastard was raiding your shelter, a little storage room in what used to be a department store. Believe it or not, the mannequins you placed outside of your hideout were enough to deter the zombies away, so you had a pretty good thing going. That was before this dumb brute decided to ruin all your hard work and steal your canned goods.

     Your plan was to shoo him away and tell him to piss off, but he wasn’t having it. No, instead, he made you carry your own supplies back to his shelter, where there were three other men to feed. Fuck, you had enough food to last yourself about three months, but now, with these giant men who no doubt have massive appetites? You’re lucky if it’ll last a week. 

     You’re sitting on a raggedy couch between the pretty man with the ball cap and another with a stupid overgrown mohawk now, arms crossed with a foul look on your face. Across from you sits the fucker with the skull mask, and beside him in an ancient recliner is a bearded man wearing a weird hat. Every now and then you let out an annoyed huff, earning yourself a pointed stare from each of them.

     “Are ye gonna eat summat, or jus’ pout like a wee baby?” Mohawk Man asks you through a mouthful of lukewarm spaghetti hoops. 

     You flip him off without even looking at him, earning a few snickers from the other men. If you weren’t so pissed off at all of them, you might have allowed yourself a little smirk. In fact, you feel the beginning of one curling at the corner of your mouth, until Ball Cap™ pulls you into his lap and traps you there with his strong arms. You yelp and try to shimmy out of his grasp to no avail. You go to bite him, but the second your mouth opens, a spoonful of beans gets plopped inside.

     “Swallow,” Skull Guy commands, covering your mouth with one wide palm in case you decide to try and spit it out.

     You glare at him the entire time, but still obey his explicit order because you truly are hungry. You give up on trying to escape the pretty man’s grasp, letting your body go limp. It’s probably wise to save your energy, anyway.

     “Good bird,” he praises mockingly. “Now, since you’re through bein’ a brat, I’ll introduce everyone. 

     “M’Simon. Tha’ there,” he points at the one with the mutton chops, “is John, or Cap’n, dependin’ on his mood. Beside you’s Johnny, but we call him Soap. The one you’re sittin’ on is Kyle. We call him Gaz when he’s bein’ a dick, though.” 

     You nod like you’re paying attention, using his distraction as an opportunity to steal the can of beans from his hand. It’s a weird group, for sure, but aside from the fact that they’re thieving bastards, it might be nice to have more humans to help protect you from the hoards of the undead. It’s a step up from mannequins, anyway. Perhaps it also helps that they’re all insanely attractive.

     “Wha’ aboot ye, hen? Go’ a name?” Mohawk Man—or, Johnny, apparently—asks with a cheeky grin. 

     Before you get the chance to tell him your name, the one with the mutton chops, John, interrupts you. 

     “No matter, is it? We’ll call her our wife soon enough.”

     You nearly drop the can of beans when you process the words that just came out of his mouth, choking on the bite you just took. Kyle pats your back until your little coughing fit ceases, and Simon wipes the sticky residue from your mouth with the sleeve of his hoodie. None of them, you observe, are as baffled by John’s statement as you are. It makes a weird feeling churn in your gut.

     “A-all… all of you?” You stammer nervously, then start again with a lilt of confusion in your voice. “Wife?!”

     “Yes, dove, all of us,” Kyle confirms, confiscating the can of beans from you and setting it on the ground. 

     “Aw, don’t look so scared, sweetheart,” John stands from his place in the old recliner, stepping in front of you and lifting your head up to look at him with his pointer finger hooked beneath your chin.

     “I take good care o’my men. We’ll take good care o’you, too.”

[todayontumblr]

Thursday April 13th.

ffs neil will you stop banging out those damn tunes. it's the morning, for pete's sake

We won't ask you again, Neil—we have work first thing tomorrow and it is a big day at the office: we are presenting a keynote pointpower slideshow for the big cheese over at HQ to increase optimum brand synergy across all departments ahead of this upcoming 5th annual quarter in review, and we are getting pretty sick and tired you and that f*cking keyboard playing Clair de Lune (badly) on what you have apparently decided to be your very own live IRL ten-hour loop from early evening through the night until the break of day, because you are a rat, and rats are, of course, nocturnal!! 

*

It all began on April 13th, 2006. Neil's alarm went off at around 7:30pm, just as the human world was winding down for the day. He sat on the edge of his bed, yawned, stttrrreeeeeeeeeeeeeeeetcchhed, cracked his fingers, and got to work. He tucked his tail beneath him and took his place at his grand, multi-colored piano, and began to play. And my goodness did he play. As if possessed by the spirits of the maestros of old, Neil's claws flowed up and down the keys in a manner not dissimilar to the ebb and flow of the oceans themselves. No one could believe their ears on that day, almost 20 years ago: after so much early promise, so much self-destruction, torment, and pain, Neil finally accomplished what so many knew he could do if only he could find it in himself to achieve it: he began banging out the tunes.

Only this was something of a pandora's box. It is, as we saw, nearly 20 years later—and Neil continues to bang them out with a vengeance, regardless of whether we have to be up early for work in the morning.  

*

It is April 13th, 2009. Neil continues to play, enraptured by the majesty of the melody expressed by the delicate touch of claw on key in primary-colored plastic. As Neil reaches the end of the day's performance, a young man stands in his bedroom. It just so happens that this is the young man's birthday. Though it was thirteen years ago he was given life, it is, inexplicably, only today he will be given a name.

His name is John. As was previously mentioned it is his BIRTHDAY. A number of CAKES are scattered about his room. He has a variety of INTERESTS. He has a passion for REALLY TERRIBLE MOVIES. He likes to program computers but he is NOT VERY GOOD AT IT. He has a fondness for PARANORMAL LORE, and is an aspiring AMATEUR MAGICIAN. He also likes to play GAMES sometimes. 

As day dawns, Neil closes the fallboard upon the keys of his instrument for another year. John goes to retrieve his arms. And the rest, as they say, is history.

*

It's April 13th, folks. You know what that means: it's time for #homestuck and #neil banging out the tunes.  

Go bananas x

[sansaorgana]

— SOMEPLACE BETTER (III)

PART ONE || PART TWO

PAIRING — Sauron x fem!human(?)!Reader

SUMMARY — Lady Galadriel keeps convincing Halbrand and his wife to change their minds and go back to Middle-earth but Sauron is starting to realise that this new life might be his chance to start all over and redeem himself.

AUTHOR’S NOTE — As I warned, in this part Sauron is very ooc but I'm a sucker for happy endings... I couldn't picture it any other way with a mortal Reader tbh... 🤷🏻‍♀️ Although, whether she is really a human or not – I let you decide and interpret it whatever way you wish! 😉💝 The song The Reader sings in this part is called Lonesome Road and I know it from Joan Baez but I changed the lyrics a little so they could fit the fantasy world better.

WORD COUNT — 4,570

ENGLISH IS MY SECOND LANGUAGE.

SOMEPLACE BETTER (III)

Even though he thought Halbrand's wife had given up on him already, it seemed to be quite otherwise. The guards came to Sauron in the early morning to tell him that he was free to go under a condition to never start any fight on the streets of Númenor ever again. Next time, the Queen Regent would not be so merciful. And now, she would even give him a chance to prove his worth and earn the guild crest.

Apparently, (Y/N) had spent nearly the whole night begging and pleading after getting an audience.

Free to go anywhere he wanted to, he simply decided to walk back to his new home and wait there for Lady Galadriel to show up with the next idea or opportunity.

It was not going according to his plan – (Y/N) had made sure of it. But it was still going well enough and that was what mattered the most.

As he was approaching the house, he heard a familiar voice singing a song as the sound travelled through the open windows and out into the streets. The voice perhaps was not the most talented but it was not awful either and he found it oddly soothing to listen to.

Slowly and quietly, Sauron walked inside the house and leaned on the wall with crossed arms as he watched (Y/N) with a smirk. She had her back turned on him and had no idea he was there as she busied herself with brushing her hair in front of a small mirror and preparing to go to her new work.

And while doing so, she was singing. Sauron listened with curiosity because he had missed many new songs in the time when he had been regaining his strength to go back to the world of living.

And he had never been familiar with the songs of common people anyway.

“They say all good friends must part sometime. Why not you and I, my Lord? Why not you and I?” (Y/N) sang softly. “Oh, I wish to the gods that I'd never been born or died when I was a baby, my Lord… Or died when I was a baby,” she added and Sauron swallowed a lump in his throat.

He had no idea he would be able to see himself in a song written by commoners and yet, he sometimes wondered himself why the Valar had created him. And he often wished they had not. It would save him pain and suffering that he was not able to speak of.

“Oh, I wish to the gods that I'd never seen your face, heard your lyin' tongue, my Lord… Heard your lyin' tongue,” (Y/N) kept going with the song as she put some rouge upon her cheeks. “You better look up and down that long, lonesome road where all of your friends have gone, my Lord, and you and I must go…” she continued humming and then she jumped up at the sight of him standing behind her with crossed arms. “Oi, Hal, I haven't seen ye. Forgive me, I know ye don't like it when I sing,” she got nervous in an instant.

“I don't?” Sauron raised an eyebrow, surprised.

“Ye always say it's givin' ye headaches,” (Y/N) rolled her eyes with a sigh. “Anyhow, I'm off to work now,” she informed him with a sweet smile and approached him to place a kiss upon his cheek.

He let her but when she wanted to move away, he grabbed her wrists to keep her in place and she raised an eyebrow at him.

“What have you done to free me, love?” He asked in a whisper.

“I begged and pleaded for ye, Hal,” she answered. “Told the good Queen ye're naught but a man who wants to work, with a pride that's hurt. I promised ye wouldn't get in trouble again. An' ye better not.” (Y/N)'s eyes filled with pain as if she knew already he would break the promise.

Because Halbrand most likely had broken such promises many times before and Sauron had planned that, too. But now, looking deep into her eyes, he suddenly wanted to change his mind. He did not want to be like Halbrand – he wanted to be a better version of him.

“I don't deserve you,” he admitted and caressed her cheek gently.

“Start, then,” she challenged him with a cracked smile and patted his chest before going out of the house.

And even though Sauron was tempted to stay inside and wait for Lady Galadriel to show up, he walked out as well and went to the forge nearby where he was supposed to start his own training to be able to earn the guild crest.

Humiliating it was and very humbling for the disciple of Aulë to be reduced to the role of a common smith's errand boy.

When Sauron was coming back from work, it was getting dark already. He was walking slowly down the steps and whistling the very same song he had heard earlier that day – the one Halbrand's wife had been singing.

In his hands he was carrying a few coins he had earned on that day and he was playing with them by tossing them in the air and catching them swiftly right after. As he approached the harbour, he spotted (Y/N) standing by one of the wooden tables and selling the goods to the people standing in the queue.

He wondered why she was left alone by the stand but assumed the woman working with her was having a break. And the closer to the market he was getting, the more he could see how stressed Halbrand's wife seemed to be.

“You useless woman, you can't even count properly, can you?!” Sauron heard some man's harsh words due to the fact his hearing was much better than if he was truly human.

“I-I'm sorry, I'm still learnin'. How much do I owe ye, then?” (Y/N) was trying to sound nice.

“You're good for nothing, stupid wench,” the man spat out. “Where is Bellona?”

“She had to leave earlier today. Please, it is no big deal. Let me just give you back the money and–”

“You should go back to Middle-earth where low women like you belong,” the man interrupted her.

Sauron didn't think much in that moment as the primal instincts took over him. He hid his coins away and hurried to (Y/N)'s stand as he grabbed the rude man by his tunic and turned him around.

“Are you bothering my wife?” He asked, raising his eyebrows.

“Hal!” (Y/N) squealed, looking nervously at the guards that were already coming their way after sensing trouble. “Let go of him, I beg ye! Ye promised me ye wouldn't–”

“Oh, but it's different, is it not? This man deserves it,” Sauron hissed out and when he was sure that (Y/N) kept glancing at the guards, he allowed his eyes to transform into two snake-like orbs that visibly terrified the rude man.

Sauron let go of his tunic the moment he heard the guards standing behind him and the man hurried away as quickly as possible.

“It's nothin', it's nothin'!” (Y/N) exclaimed at the guards. “I'm closin' for the day! Please, let us go.”

The men looked at each other but since the other man had run away and did not file any complaint, they just shrugged their arms and walked away alongside the rest of the people waiting in the queue.

“Ye promised!” (Y/N) gave Sauron a very scolding look as she busied herself with tidying up the stand and collecting the money.

“If you think I am going to let some bastard treat you this way, love, then you are mistaken. If I must rot in that cell for a lifetime, then I shall,” Sauron shrugged his arms and Halbrand's wife looked at him as if he had just said something crazy.

“Since when are ye so gifted with words, Hal?” She chuckled and shook her head. “Anyhow, in that cell, ye won't be 'round to protect me. Foolish, it'd be, but ye've never been the brightest, have ye?” she pointed out and Sauron gritted his teeth with an eye roll.

She kept blabbering to him about her day while they walked back to their house and even though it was a short road, it felt like forever due to her talking. However, Sauron was very surprised at the sight of Lady Galadriel sitting by the table when they entered the house.

He had been waiting for her to come and now he was shocked, nearly startled. As if he had forgotten already about his scheme.

“Oi!” (Y/N) put her hands on her hips. “Is it not illegal to sneak up on folk like that inside their own homes, Elf?!” She asked. “When'll ye leave us be, huh?”

“The Queen Regent agreed to gather the army. They will seek for the volunteers,” Galadriel announced. “People of Númenor might not need you, Halbrand, but when we arrive in The Southlands, a strong leader will be needed. Someone to unite and show the way.”

“Someone to lie, ye say,” (Y/N) rolled her eyes and finally closed the door behind her. “But go on, Elf, keep talkin'. I'm sure my husband'll agree sooner or later. Vain as he is, always has been,” she sighed as if she was defeated.

Sauron felt an odd tug inside his heart at those words. Even though going with Galadriel to Middle-earth and continuing his plan while leaving annoying (Y/N) behind would be an ideal outcome… He felt challenged now to refuse Galadriel just to show (Y/N) that he could do better than that.

“I have already told the Queen Regent who you most likely are,” Galadriel insisted, ignoring Halbrand's wife and looking deep into his eyes.

“You must be desperate,” he pointed out with a smirk and watched his angry wife unpacking the groceries from her wicker basket on the kitchen counter.

“Of course I am. And you should be, too. It is about your home. Why do you give up on it so easily?” Galadriel wondered out loud.

“It gave up on us long before we ever gave up on it,” (Y/N) turned around to answer her.

“This land was your place in Middle-earth. It was giving you vegetables to eat, grass to feed your animals with, clean water from the rivers…” Lady Galadriel pointed out.

“And what do ye know about it, grand Elf?” (Y/N) rolled her eyes at that. “It ain't easy work growin' yer vegetables an' keepin' yer animals alive. One bad winter's all it takes to take away yer loved ones, yer cows, horses, an' chickens. I've no love for that land,” she stated, harshly.

“You can change the fate of people who suffer like you have suffered…” Galadriel's voice softened. “As their Queen,” she tempted and Sauron raised an eyebrow, surprised to see how dirty she could play.

Nearly as dirty as him.

“Me? A Queen?” (Y/N) laughed at that. “I can't even read!” She only said and turned around again to deal with the groceries.

“Halbrand, please. They need you,” Galadriel stood up and put her hand on his shoulder before lowering her voice. “I need you,” she added and looked down before leaving the house quietly.

Long silence occurred between Sauron and Halbrand's wife.

“Go with her,” (Y/N) muttered.

“What?” Sauron looked at her, surprised. She turned around to lay her wet eyes on him.

“I know ye want to. Just go, claim the title that's not yours, go on. But don't be stupid enough to think she'd ever want ye the way ye want her. Please, husband, don't embarrass yerself by thinkin' she'd want a filthy, ragged commoner,” (Y/N) whispered but in her voice there was no malice – it was pure worry and concern. Love.

“I'm not that stupid,” Sauron approached her with hesitance and put his hands on her arms to comfort her. “I know you're the only woman who is crazy enough to love me.”

“But is that enough to make ye stay?” She asked and her lower lip trembled.

He did not answer but he pulled her close to his chest to wrap his arms around her and kiss the top of her head.

Sauron was laying awake all night long as usual, caressing the back of Halbrand's wife and staring at the ceiling. He knew they would gather the volunteers on the next day and he still was not sure what to do.

The path he had chosen for himself was not so certain anymore. He truly did not mind the life he had here in Númenor and even (Y/N)'s presence was becoming less and less annoying to him. In fact – even though she had no idea who he truly was – it felt oddly nice to be loved and taken care of. As simple as that.

He extended his hand to the nightstand and brushed the pendant laying there with his fingertips as he remembered the very first conversation he had had with the heraldry's original owner – Diarmid.

“A sure path may crumble, but there's always another. Often, it can lead us someplace better. Someplace good. They say there's a place across the sea, a man can escape himself. Find another path. Perhaps another life.”

What if it was a second chance for him? Not for Sauron, but for the real him – Mairon…? What if it was his chance to get redeemed? To be at peace finally as if all the suffering Morgoth had put him through had never taken place?

(Y/N) shifted slightly in his arms and he looked down at her face that was now lit up by the first rays of the rising sun getting through the window. At that moment, that common and simple woman looked like the most beautiful creature in the whole world to him. And she certainly felt like peace.

“Is it time to wake up now, love?” She mumbled out, sleepily.

“No, love, not yet. I will tell you when,” he assured her.

“Good,” she smiled and nuzzled her face deeper into him.

“(Y/N)?” Sauron swallowed a lump in his throat as he fidgeted with the pendant between his fingers.

“Hm?”

“What if I told you I was not your husband?” He tried to make it sound light-hearted as if he was jesting. “That I'm a spirit that took over his body at that time when he was away while the village was being attacked?” He looked down at her, nervously.

“Ye're crazy, Hal,” she chuckled and opened her eyes lazily. Then, she tilted her head and reached her hand up to caress his hair. “But, mayhaps, I'd believe that, ye know? 'Cause ye've changed a lot since then,” she admitted and hesitated for a moment as she bit on her lower lip. “It doesn't matter, love. I love ye the way ye are now – more than I've ever loved ye, even though I didn't think it was possible,” she confessed and Sauron felt his heart swelling inside his chest as he leaned down to join their lips together in a loving kiss.

As he watched the ships sail away on that day, Sauron couldn't believe that he was simply letting them go. He saw Lady Galadriel standing in her shining armour, holding her sword. She was still glancing at him as if she expected him to jump into the waters and join them no matter what.

He wondered why she was so drawn to him, even after (Y/N)'s big mouth had made it clear that he was not any forgotten king. Could Galadriel feel who he was, deep inside?

But who was he? He was not sure anymore.

So, he looked away and went back on the road that would lead him to the forge where he worked these days. He was told he would get his guild crest very soon because they were in awe of his extraordinary talents.

Not only talent was his quality, though. It was also how much he was able to work at once and without breaks. At least it had been this way until recently.

It was the first time ever when he felt… tired. In the simplest and most common way, he felt exhausted and his stomach seemed to demand to have a meal. He nearly fainted at the end of his shift and when he dragged his feet back home, he was yawning. Surely, it would worry him under any other circumstances but now he was simply too tired to overthink what could have caused it. Was it some sort of a curse put on him by angry Lady Galadriel?

“Halbrand!” (Y/N)'s worried tone brought him back to reality when he entered the house.

She hurried to him and cupped his cheeks with widened eyes.

“Love, ye're so pale, an' the bags under yer eyes… What happened?!”

“Nothing happened,” Sauron shrugged his arms. “I'm just tired, that's it. I nearly fainted,” he admitted and sat down on the chair, sighing out of relief to finally be able to rest a little.

“Well, that's no wonder! Ye've been eatin' half meals for weeks now!” Halbrand's wife pointed out in a scolding manner. “We're not starvin' anymore, Hal, ye don't have to keep givin' me yer portions!” She exclaimed and approached the stove to pour him a bowl full of soup. “Here, eat,” she ordered as she placed it in front of him.

And, for some reason, Sauron ate all of it in a blink of an eye. He even asked for one more portion as Halbrand's wife gave it to him gladly but not without more of her whining about him being irresponsible. Then he asked for another and after three bowls of her soup, he finally felt better.

His stomach was no longer hurting at least, but he was still sleepy.

“Go, take some rest, love,” (Y/N) shook her head. “Ye don't sleep enough, don't eat enough. At least ye're not drinkin' and gamblin' anymore, but ye can't go on like this. Do ye want to die before forty, Hal? I ain't lettin' that happen!” She continued with her usual whining and he rolled his eyes.

“How can I rest when you keep your mouth open?!” Sauron asked and she huffed but she went silent and left him alone in the bedroom as she went back to the kitchen to clean the bowl after his soup.

It was the very first time when Sauron fell asleep not out of boredom or the need of dissociation but out of exhaustion.

And when he opened his eyes again, it was the next morning already and (Y/N) was shaking him to wake him up.

“Halbrand! Ye're gonna be late for work!” She exclaimed.

“But… I'm still tired…” He mumbled out, not understanding what was happening to him.

“Like all of us working folk each mornin'!” (Y/N) laughed. “Come on, I'm not lettin' ye out without breakfast, go to the kitchen,” she hurried him and he rubbed his eyes before nodding at her.

Sauron began to suspect that he was turning into a human for some time now but it took an unusual revelation to convince him that it was truly happening indeed.

(Y/N) was grinning widely on that day when he came back home and she welcomed him by throwing her arms around his neck and kissing him all over his face as he tried to give back some of the kisses. When she finally stopped, she fixed his brand new guild crest and batted her eyelashes while looking up to stare into his eyes.

“What is it?” He asked.

“I think I'm expectin', Hal,” she told him, excitedly. “I wasn't sure but my friends at work said those are the very symptoms!” She added happily and he froze as he blinked slowly a few times, trying to process the new information.

“That is… Impossible,” he furrowed his brows.

“I used to think so, too. Married for so long with no babe of our own but I was wishin' and hopin' and here we are!” She clapped her hands like an excited child. “Perhaps it was that damned Middle-earth not being good for us, Hal, but here we can!”

Sauron took a deep breath in. She didn't understand – it was not about being fertile or not. It was about the fact he was a Maia and there was no possibility of him putting a baby in her without doing it with his own free will.

Unless…

“You're not sleeping around, are you?” He asked before he could think about the rubbish leaving his mouth.

(Y/N) froze at his words and her smile turned into a frown. She approached him at this very moment and slapped his face. Hard. He could feel it like any mortal would now and he admitted it truly hurt.

“How dare ye, Halbrand?! Ye wretched bastard! Even if ye meant to jest, that was uncalled for!” She raised her voice as he rubbed his cheek and winced out of pain.

“I'm sorry, love, I haven't thought before speaking. I just can't believe it…” He tried to excuse himself. “Please, forgive me.”

Her face didn't look so angry anymore but she didn't say anything and turned around without a word to walk away.

In fact, she didn't say a word to him for the rest of the day and only at night when she was deep asleep, he dared to touch her abdomen slightly with his hand.

He wasn't able to feel any presence there but these days he couldn't feel anything, to be honest. He couldn't hear nor see as much either. He was losing his abilities as time was passing.

Sauron kept his hand there, on the belly of Halbrand's wife, and he sighed. It was happening, whether he liked it or not. And he was not even sure anymore if he wanted it or not.

As he got lost in the train of thought, he realised that he had been caressing (Y/N) abdomen all that time without thinking. Her eyes fluttered open and she smiled gently at him.

“Hal, ye son of a bitch,” she shook her head and giggled as she took his hand carefully and brought it to her lips to place a few small and sweet kisses upon his knuckles. “I swear, ye're gonna be the death of me.”

“And you are going to be the death of me,” he chuckled and leaned in to peck her lips.

She was going to be. Literally.

This body would start growing old normally now and, eventually, he would pass away like every mortal. But maybe he would do that laying in a bed, holding her hand and surrounded by their children.

When they broke the kiss, (Y/N) smiled widely and caressed her husband's cheeks lovingly. She looked ethereal at that moment and a crazy thought appeared inside of his head.

“Tell me, love,” he started and she raised an eyebrow at him, “are you a spirit sent to me from Valinor to lead me back on the right path? Have I passed the test?” He dared to ask and he could swear, there was a small sparkle lighting up her eyes for a short while. But then, she only laughed.

“Go back to sleep, ye madman,” she patted his chest lightly and turned around while laughing softly.

He kept staring at her for some time more, then he went back to looking at the ceiling. And, eventually, he turned around as well to wrap his arm around the waist of Halbrand's wife.

His wife.

Halbrand was coming back from work slowly while playing with the little horse forged out of iron in his hand as he hummed a song. The sun was setting slowly on the horizon when he approached the harbour where (Y/N) was slowly tidying up her stand on the market.

Her own one, that she had earned finally and was so proud of it as she was working for herself now and was able to bring more money home.

He watched her tidy up with a loving smile and their son was helping her while talking to her excitedly about something – his mouth would never close just like his mother's.

“Daddy!” He spotted him finally and ran up to him as (Y/N) chuckled.

“Hey, little man,” Halbrand crouched down to give his son a hug. “How was your day?”

“It was good!” The boy nodded. “I helped mummy a bit. And yours, daddy?”

“I made this for you,” Halbrand handed him the little horse and the boys' eyes sparkled at the sight.

“So pretty! Thank you, daddy!” He wrapped his little arms around Halbrand's neck to give him another hug and Halbrand patted his back.

“And for me?! For me?!” He felt something tugging at his tunic and he laughed at the sight of his excited daughter. He gave her a hug, too and caressed her ruffled hair as she gave him a toothless smile.

“I have something for you, too, Princess,” Halbrand assured her and took another item out of his pocket – a seashell made out of iron.

He had made sure it was crafted with the best precision and with all the tiny details, therefore it looked nearly like a real seashell. Only it was silver, which made it even better in his little girl's eyes.

“Thank you, daddy!” She giggled as she squinted her eyes at the shell and kept examining it under every possible angle.

“You spoil 'em way too much!” (Y/N) stood above him and he stood up to greet her with a short peck on the cheek.

“Somebody has to,” Halbrand answered playfully and his wife shot him a glance, which made his son giggle.

“Stop sayin' nonsense and let's go back home,” she shook her head and walked away slowly.

He watched his children follow her happily and he did, too, but much slower as he stared at the sun setting on the horizon. The sky looked like a canva full of pink and orange hues and he took a deep breath in at the beauty of it.

It was nearly as peaceful and beautiful as back in the day in Valinor. Mortals perhaps were not welcome there but, apparently, they could also experience wonders as marvellous.

And perhaps this whole life was built on a lie because he couldn't imagine telling (Y/N) the truth about who he truly was and that her real husband had been dead for years. That he had died because of gambling and drinking after leaving her alone when she was being attacked by the Orcs. There was no point in telling her even if she would somehow believe him. It would only bring her useless pain and he knew very well that her actual husband would most likely never do all these things he had done to make her happy. He would not love her right like he could.

“Ye comin', Hal?” His wife's voice brought him back to reality.

Halbrand nodded at her and joined her side to take his daughter by her little hand.

After all, it was not the sunset but her and her brother that were the real wonders. And it was not Númenor that he called home but it was them – they were his better place.

MASTERLIST

[violetrainbow412-blog]

Day 10: porch swing

Masterlist flufftober 🎃

Reblog if you liked it!

You visited your mother frequently at the sanatorium, as it had been a tough blow to accept that you had to make a life without her. Senile dementia, they said, likely caused by a combination of other illnesses, but that was what it was in the end.

You tried to spend as much time as possible during those visits because, even though you knew she was better cared for there, you didn’t want her to think you had abandoned her. Fortunately (in some way), your mother had found an old friend there, none other than Mrs. Diana Reid. It had been years since you’d seen her, and you felt guilty thinking about how poorly you and her son had communicated, to the point that you never knew her schizophrenia had escalated to the extent that she had to be placed there.

The two elderly women had their good and bad days, but overall, your mother enjoyed the literature workshops Diana taught, and Diana, in turn, loved watching your mother knit. She had even learned to make a few things, including a purple scarf meant for her son, whom you hadn’t seen there even once since your mother began living there.

Diana often talked to you about him, telling you things he mentioned in his letters, and all you could do was feel touched. Once upon a time, when the world was simpler and you were younger, you had a bit of a soft spot for the boy, without realizing that what you felt was called love. It was a childish thing, even silly, you could say, but you often found yourself smiling when you thought of him, and you never wanted to spend the day with anyone else, making him stay at your house until late at night, ending in a sleepover.

You had always been more daring and carefree, so you often showed up with new cuts and bruises. He, so calm and proper, always tried to dissuade you from your impulsive plans, but in the end, he joined in, claiming he only did it to look after you. Climbing trees, hunting for bugs, and looking for trouble were the things your childhood was filled with. And for a sickly, fearful boy like Spencer, those adventures were incredible experiences.

One of those weekends when you could visit your mother, you noticed that you couldn’t see Diana anywhere. You assumed she was in a consultation or busy with other activities, but after a couple of hours without any sign of her, you started to worry.

“Excuse me, is Mrs. Reid okay?” you hoped she hadn’t had any health complications or suffered any incident. “I just… I haven’t seen her today.”

“Diana? Apparently, her son requested permission to transfer her to stay with him a few days ago. But as far as I know, she’s fine, miss.”

“Oh, I’m so glad,” you replied with relief. “I was afraid she had gotten worse. My mother and she are friends, so I was worried. About both of them, of course.”

“Don’t worry, she’s in good hands,” the nurse reassured you, slightly moved by your concern. “Has your mother been improving?”

Following that question, the two of you started chatting, and the matter of your mother’s friend was forgotten, at least for that day. Work and other activities kept your mind busy until your next visit to the sanatorium, nearly a week later. You decided to buy flowers for your mother so she could decorate the nightstand next to her bed, along with some pastries to share.

However, it was a huge surprise when you arrived at the courtyard area (where the nurse had told you she was) and saw her sitting at one of the tables, accompanied by Diana Reid and another person you could only see from behind—a head of messy, golden hair.

A strange feeling grew as you approached, one you couldn’t identify until you heard the voice of the stranger. It had become deeper, of course, but it was still the same voice.

“Spencer?”

The man nearly fell out of his chair when he saw you, looking as pale as if he had seen a ghost and equally shocked by your appearance. You thought it was probably silly of him to think he wouldn’t run into you there, but you still found it endearing. His features had definitely changed, making him more of a man and less of the shy boy you had known.

“My dear!” your mother murmured, visibly excited. “Look who came to visit.”

He wasted no time, standing up fully and wrapping you in a happy hug. At first, he feared you might pull away from the contact, but that fear disappeared when you enthusiastically returned the greeting.

“I’m so happy to see you!”

“Me too! My mom and your mom have been keeping me up to date,” he laughed playfully. His body felt so soft against yours, giving you an inexplicable sense of security.

When you pulled away, you couldn’t help but notice that your mother and Mrs. Reid were looking at each other with complicity, as if they were hiding a secret.

“I brought, uh… something to eat. We can share it.”

Spencer found another chair and placed it next to him so you could sit down, inviting you into the conversation he had been having with the women, which you found fascinating. Every now and then, you would discreetly glance at him and try to get him to talk as much as possible. Although you already knew some things from Diana, chatting with your old friend felt refreshing.

It was uplifting to see both women so calm, and the extra company was so pleasant that the hours passed by like minutes. The afternoon had already turned into evening when you said your goodbyes to your mothers, and as you walked out of the sanatorium, you and Spencer stood there looking at each other for a moment.

Without Diana or your mother there, you both seemed too shy to start speaking, unsure of what to say.

"Did you come by car?"

“No, I was planning on calling a cab to get to the airport.”

“Oh, are you leaving so soon?”

“Yeah, I was thinking of heading back today. I mean… I didn’t expect to see anyone, so…”

“I completely understand! Don’t worry. You probably have other commitments, I don’t want to take up your time.”

“No, actually I bought a ticket for an open flight. So I can take it whenever I want.”

That information carried an implicit invitation, discreet enough that if you squinted, you might miss it, and you didn’t hesitate for a second before speaking.

“You could come over to my place, if you want. Have a drink, dinner, or whatever you’d like. You know, for old times’ sake.”

He immediately smiled, pleased that you had invited him, as he didn’t want to be presumptuous by suggesting spending more time together. After all, he didn’t know if you were as excited about seeing each other as he was.

Spencer happily accepted, and then you guided him to your car, where you set off. You had tried to find a sanatorium close to your house, in case of an emergency, so it only took a few minutes to arrive.

The house, still very familiar to Spencer, was where your mother, your late father, and you had lived most of your life. Now, it looked renewed, as if you had recently painted it, exuding that feeling of nostalgia and warmth.

“It’s still there,” Spencer noted as he glanced at the porch.

Many years ago, when you were children, during the summer heat, you loved sitting on the wooden swing there to eat ice cream in amounts that were probably unhealthy for kids. Apparently, this memory was a fond one for your friend, as he smiled at the sight.

“A while back, we hired someone to varnish and reinforce it. So I guess we could sit here. Like before, huh?”

“Sure,” he murmured, excited by the idea.

You went inside, and once you set down your things, you headed to the fridge to take out some cheese, cold cuts, and crackers you had recently bought, all to pair with a bottle of wine you had been gifted for your birthday.

“I don’t like drinking alone,” you confessed as he helped you carry the tray of food “It depresses me.”

You heard him chuckle as the two of you stepped outside. Night had already fallen over the city, so you turned on the soft, warm light that illuminated the porch and took a seat, with him joining you soon after.

For a moment, once again, neither of you knew what to say. You simply swayed slightly, as if trying to make an idea come to mind, but you decided the best way to break the silence was to pour a couple of glasses. After a while, the wine seemed to make everything lighter, and the two of you began to talk about whatever came to mind.

It was an intimate conversation, almost in whispers, and at one point, you made a silly joke that caused your bodies to lean toward each other by instinct. Your cheeks were already flushed from the wine, not enough to make you lose consciousness but enough to give you a feeling of lightness and confidence.

“Can I confess something?” you suddenly said, your mouth moving faster than your brain.

“Yeah, what is it?”

“When I was a kid…” you began, feeling your heart pounding in your chest. But after a second of silence, it no longer seemed like such a good idea. “You know what? Forget it. It’s absurd.”

“No! Tell me,” he urged, thinking you were about to share some kind of embarrassing secret.

Well, he wasn’t entirely wrong.

“But promise you won’t make fun of me?”

“I won’t,” he insisted, smiling at you sweetly and giving your arm a gentle squeeze, as if encouraging you. “Tell me.”

You inhaled, then exhaled. And before you could second-guess yourself, the words spilled out.

“Well, years ago, when we were friends… I mean, I guess we’re still friends, but… I don’t know, I had this huge crush on you. I thought you were so cute and sweet with your big glasses and protective attitude. You never said no to me,” you sighed, reminiscing. “And it’s funny now, I think. To think that I was in love with you when we were kids.”

Reid just watched you, like he would study a puzzle he didn’t quite understand. He seemed… confused? You hoped he wasn’t mad, of course. And suddenly, you felt foolish for having brought it up, thinking you had completely ruined the atmosphere, making it tense and awkward.

Still, you said nothing. You were embarrassed, but at least your consolation was that Spencer wouldn’t be there the next morning to face the consequences.

“Are you kidding?”

“Why would I joke about that?” you exclaimed, hurt when he finally decided to speak. You weren’t looking at him. “It’s just a childish thing, Spencer. I thought it would be funny, but I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable. It’s just something silly, okay? Let’s not make a big deal out of it.”

“Were you really in love with me?” he asked, incredulous at the idea and ignoring what you had just said.

“Yes! But like I said, it was years ago…”

“Oh,” he exhaled, sounding almost disappointed. That’s when you looked at him, and it wasn’t hard for you to read him: he was nervous. “Yeah, I guess that was a long time ago, right? We haven’t seen each other in years and… yeah, you’re right. It’s funny.”

There was something off in his words. He sounded deflated, more like some illusion had been broken rather than being upset by what you had said.

Maybe it was the alcohol clouding your judgment, maybe it was the way his hands were fidgeting in his lap, or perhaps even the sad expression that had appeared on his face, but suddenly everything about him seemed to scream one thing. It was as if he were calling out to you, saying: kiss me.

And, impulsively, you did.

It would have been wise to stop after the first kiss, just to check if he was comfortable with it and that you weren’t overstepping. But you didn’t have the willpower to stop. You needed to kiss Spencer.

You kissed him again, and then again, and it wasn’t until that moment that he seemed to snap out of the shock he was in, returning the kiss passionately. Suddenly, you were both completely swept up at the moment, feeling as if kissing each other was essential to moving forward; like it was something you should have been doing for years, not just right then.

“I’m sorry…” he exhaled suddenly, as his hand moved to your waist to pull you closer. “Is this okay?”

“It is,” you nodded immediately, feeling breathless. One of your hands went up to gently brush his hair back. “Are you okay?”

He shook his head, almost as if delirious. His eyes had closed, and he looked like he was suffering.

“You kissed me,” he murmured, as if he needed to say it out loud to believe it. “I feel like my heart’s going to burst out of my chest.”

Your fear vanished when you heard him say that, and encouraged by his reaction, you leaned in to kiss him again. However, after a few more kisses, he stopped you.

“Will you visit me?”

“Huh?”

“Will you visit me? When I go back to DC?”

His question puzzled you since you didn’t think it was something he’d ask in the middle of all that.

“I guess… yeah. If you want me there, I could visit someday.”

“You’re not just going to kiss me, and then we’ll forget this ever happened?”

“Do you want that?”

“No,” he sighed shakily. His thumb traced your lips gently as he held your face in his hand. “Do you want that?”

“No,” you replied in the same way, kissing him again.

Although you wanted to, you weren’t going to hint at anything more with your friend, and he thought it wasn’t proper to suggest anything either. So, for a while, you simply continued kissing each other, softly and slowly, as if wrapped in a bubble where time didn’t pass.

“The wine was delicious, by the way.”

“It tastes even better on your lips, I’m sure,” you whispered, lovesick. You kissed him again and then spoke against his lips. “I’m glad you came back.”

You felt him smile.

“Me too.”

[mabelstone]

I Could Be Yours

hozier x f!reader

part one of lullabies <3

hi i have risen from the dead... new matt stone will be coming soon i promise!! i've just become infatuated with hozier recently so i had no choice but to devote a new fic to him <3

i didn't proof read because it's bedtime, i will fix tomorrow if there's any errors!! soz

cw: none really... just a shitty boyfriend and drinking. still 18+

word count: 3.5k

“That’s your man, ‘uh?” The deep voice behind me made me jump, forcing me to peel my eyes from Joe and the leggy blonde he was laughing with.

“Stop doing that!” I gasp, clutching a hand over my chest, jokingly punching Andrew in the arm. “But yes. That’s him,” I sigh, wanting to cut the conversation before it had a chance to start. Andrew was far too friendly to be talking to my walking storm cloud of a boyfriend.

“I didn’t know his sister was playing tonight,” he confessed casually, adjusting the cuffs of his shirt. “Which one is she?”

“He doesn’t have a sister,” I shake my head, quirking an eyebrow at the human tower before me. “Where’d you hear that?”

“Huh?” He played dumb, though a soft pink blush tinted his cheeks, looking like he wished he could eat his words.

“Where did you hear that?” I repeated, the room suddenly too hot for comfort, despite Joe's protests that I was dressed like a 'tart,' in his words.

“I’m sure I misheard, hearing’s a bit shot,” he lied through his teeth, and he must be a fool to believed I'd let him play it off.

“Andy," I faced him now, trying to force him to meet my eyes he was so desperately avoiding. "Who did he say that to?”

“That woman,” his voice sounded pained, as if he were almost ashamed to tell me. He was too smart, he could read me, and if anyone could read the room, it was him. I just went quiet, his warm calloused hand placed on my shoulder, feeling like it might burn a hole in my dress. “You deserve better,” he professed sincerely, pulling that horrid face at me, the type you pull when you feel really sorry for someone.

I huffed some pathetic excuse of a response, forcing my eyes to the ground. There seemed to be a magnetic pull, forcing my eyes back to Joe, hurting my own feelings again and again. I can’t recall a time he’d ever looked that interested in me. Not unless he was trying to bed me, which was usually after a stressful day at work or after a massive fight.

“If you were my girl, every man and their dog would know. You’re too good for him,” his voice was warm, like being pulled from a frozen over lake and straight into an oven. His Irish brogue more apparent than ever, and I cursed myself for the way my heart leapt in my chest.

He just slipped past me onto the stage for his set, unaware that he just made me feel nearly every emotion in the span of two minutes.

“That’s not even a real job,” Joe scoffed, shaking his head indignantly like he always did, as if everyone were beneath him. He’s always looked down at others for as long as I’ve known him. His Napoleon Complex makes him feel like he’s six foot eleven, when in reality, I barely have to tilt my head to kiss him.

I bit my cheek to suppress an angry concoction of insults, swallowing it down and opting for, “so my job isn’t a real job?”

“Babe,” he groaned, one soft hand slipping off the steering wheel onto my thigh. “You know that’s not what I meant. It’s just not very manly, is all. He should be doing something that’s not just for chicks.”

“He’s a carpenter, actually,” I lied, arms barricaded across my chest as I tried to focus on the London Bridge we were rolling over. “Manly enough for you?”

“Could you relax? Jesus Christ…” he pulled his hand from me quicker than he placed it there, sighing emphatically. “You gettin’ your period or something?”

“No!” It was my turn to scoff now, turning to face him. His stupid face was contorted like it always was, as if he’d smelt something rotten. “You’ve hurt my feelings, Joe.”

“Oh, everything hurts your fucking feelings,” he seethed, hooking a turn so sharp I just about fell into the driver’s side. I muttered under my breath, gripping onto the handle at the top of my door, as it was highly likely I was going to need it for the rest of the trip. That’s my Joe. Sickly sweet when you first meet him, then cold and sharp when he drops the act. “I don’t know how much longer I can put up with this shit.”

“Excuse me?” I straightened up, my stomach twisting in that familiar nauseating knot.

“You. Your shit,” he rolled his eyes for what felt like the thousandth time, turning his head to me, deadpan. “Constantly starting arguments, whining about everything. You’re exhausting me.”

Then the rest of the entourage strides in on cue. The searing pain in my throat, the tears prickling into my eyes. The shame and embarrassment that pummel me like waves in a storm. Oh, God, the embarrassment. I feel my cheeks glow red, and suddenly the chill of late Autumn is comparable to a sauna, and there’s not enough air in the passenger side to satiate my lungs.

“Don’t cry,” he groans again, refusing to look at me again. And suddenly, I’m twelve again, trying to cry silently in my father’s car. Sigmund Freud would be laughing in his grave right now. “I’m sorry," he sighs, reaching for my leg again. I jerk away. "Shouldn’t have taken it so far.”

Though his apologies are just words at this point. I’ve walked this road too many times to not know any better. The rest of the ride home is silent, my knees pressed into the passenger door, trying to focus on anything but the fact that I will probably never leave. I will board this train wreck until he beats me down to nothing.

"He just has this weird infatuation for you. A blind man could see it," he tsked, shaking his head as if it were my fault. "And you just egg him on. He's a proper knob."

"He's the knob? What'd you think of your sister's set, hm?" I seethed, silently letting the tears fall as if I were in some sappy drama.

We didn't speak for the rest of the night, Joe slamming his car door, storming inside to lock himself in our bedroom. I washed my face in the kitchen sink and fell asleep on the couch in the small hours of the morning.

Joe didn't come to my show tonight, opting for the local pub with his work mates. I can't lie and say I was upset about it. Another thing I couldn't lie about is how Andrew's words played on a loop in my head for the rest of that night and all day today. I know he was just saying it to comfort me, but is it sad that I've never been so flattered?

"Hey," I smiled, the condensation from my breath hanging between us as I walked up to Andy. “Thought you were quitting.”

He was leaning against the brick wall outside the bar, a halfway smoked cigarette to his lips. He looked nice tonight. His usual unruly curls framing his face so perfectly, two layers under his dark denim jacket. He grinned infectiously as always, never once tearing his eyes from mine as he shrugged, “I’m no quitter.”

“Shut up,” I groaned, finding my spot beside him, now pressing my back to the cold bricks.

“So, where’s Jake tonight?” Now his eyes were fixed on the busy street before us, his arm brushing mine each time he’d put the cigarette to his lips.

“It’s Joe,” I corrected with an eye roll, though there was no malice in my expression. “And he’s watching the game with his mates. We’ve barely spoken since last night.” My heart ached a bit at the reminder of what he’d said to me on the drive home. You’re exhausting me. If his wish was for me to rethink the past five years, he certainly got it.

He gave me that pathetic poor you look again. "Come on. I'll buy ya' a drink. I insist."

"Who am I to deny you?" I grinned, following close behind him as he stubbed his cigarette out under his boot, holding the bar door open for me.

He ordered himself a whiskey on the rocks, a coconut margarita for me. We slid into a small booth at the back, the walls practically vibrating from the drunken chatter and the obnoxious drum solo on the stage.

"She's busy tonight, eh?" He half shouted across to me, leaning over his drink.

"I know, right? I've never seen the place like this," I agreed, taking in just how alive the atmosphere was tonight. "Remember me when you're famous."

"You're not easy to forget. You remember me!" He grinned at me, taking a large swig of his drink. I couldn't tear my eyes from his Adam's apple bobbing with each sip, his eyes dark in the dim lighting. I felt extreme guilt, forcing my eyes anywhere but his direction.

He must've sensed it. This man could read me like a book. Thankfully, he steered the conversation smoothly, "what're you playing tonight?"

"Oh, no. I'm not singing tonight," I shook my head, polishing off my drink in a sip a little bit too big for my mouth. "Want another drink? My shout."

"Why aren't you singing?" He ignored me, pulling a face that screamed, are you mad? "If there's any night for it, it's tonight."

"Honestly, I just want to get pissed and be the observer for once." I smiled sweetly, hoping he couldn't see through the facade. "What're you singing then?"

"An original," he smiled coyly, eyes faltering.

"Oh, Andy! How exciting," I cheered, genuinely happy for him. He'd shown me some of his poetry, and with such a beautiful voice, there's no possibility he could go wrong. "You're going to blow the roof off. This calls for another drink."

"As you wish," he grinned, holding eye contact as he finished off his glass, the faintest pink tinge to his cheeks.

When I made my way back to the table, my heart sunk a bit when I saw a girl leaning against our table giggling, tucking thick red locks behind her ears. He was laughing too, body language practically begging for more. I might be exaggerating. Why did I even care? I am in a committed relationship.

Funny, he looks just as amused as Joe did last night.

I made my way to the table, sliding his drink to him.

"Hi, I'm Harper," she smiled wide, a beautiful array of pearly teeth on full display.

"Lovely to meet you. Y/N," I smiled back, unable to look at Andrew. "I'm gonna go watch the show. I'll leave you to it."

I turned my back just as he was about to protest, sipping at my drink as I kept my word, finding a seat before the stage. I couldn't really focus on the music though, my mind reeling over what Joe was up to. He hadn't even texted or calls. His location was off too. I grabbed another couple drinks, bumping into Andrew when I made my way back to the stage.

"Y/N," he reached for my arm, a sincerely apologetic tone to his voice. "I'm sorry for earlier, that was rude."

"No it wasn't," I replied a bit too quick, brushing off the apology. "You're single, you can do whatever."

"I meant having someone at our table," shit. Was that the wrong thing to say? Their margaritas are always too strong. "I was enjoying just having you and I time."

"No worries, there's always next time," I smiled sweetly, though really, I just wanted to get in the nearest cab, pack all my shit at home and move back to Bristol. "You're nearly on! I'll be front row." I turned away again, finding my way back to the nice girls I made small talk with earlier.

Sure enough, Andrew was up within the next fifteen minutes. The announcer, somewhere hidden backstage spoke, "please give your warmest welcome to our absolute favourite, Andrew Hozier-Byrne!"

He walked onto the stage, acoustic guitar hanging from his neck as he awkwardly made his way onto the stage, adjusting the microphone to his height as he did each night.

"Ehm, this song is called I Could Be Yours," he offered a tight lipped smile to the crowd, a few cheers heard here and there. "Thanks guys."

I couldn't help but grin at his shyness, the complete opposite of how he was with me.

I could be soft and sweet, I could be hard and loud.

I could be everything you'd ever need somehow.

Why don't you hear me sing out from the lost and found,

I could be yours, I could be yours, I could be yours.

He seemed to be scanning the crowd, probably for Harper, meanwhile all eyes were on him, basking in his glory. As if he were rain in a drought, not a single soul in the audience not mesmerised by his syrupy voice. Myself included, wide eyed, the epitome of awe.

Why don't you try on me? Why don't you take me home?

I'll match the colour scheme of your bedroom walls.

Oh, take a dose of me, it doesn't hurt at all.

I could be yours, I could be yours, I could be yours.

His skilled fingers danced along the strings, his eyes, when not scanning the crowd focused on his measured movements. To say I was moved was an understatement. His voice thick and sweet as honey, his eyes shining under the stage lights, the hypnotic effect he had on the crowd. Unlike anything I had ever experienced.

Then his eyes found mine. It was almost like nothing existed in the same realm as him and I. Just us.

Oh God, I'd benefit from your sweet tenderness.

Oh, thank God, it could've been, 'cause nothing comes from it.

That'd be a helpful thought if I could remember it,

but I could be yours, I could be yours, I could be yours.

"Thanks," he nodded awkwardly to the crowd, eyes leaving mine as he did the stage, the audience cheering and clapping.

I couldn't put into words the feelings I felt if you held a gun to my head. No doubt my eyes glistened back at his, tears of joy swimming at my waterline, completely estranged from last nights'.

"He was looking right at you!" One of the women I'd met shouted over the cheers, shaking me by the shoulder. I just hummed some response, smiling and beelining for the exit.

The bite of the outdoors was a stark comparison to the warmth of the bar, my nervous system seeming to reset instantaneously. I pulled out my phone and checked the time. 8:45pm. I told Joe I wouldn't be home til midnight and not to wait up for me.

It was wrong to feel this way about Andrew. He was my friend. I had Joe. Even if we had our rough patches.

My phone buzzed wildly in my hand, and when I checked the caller ID, I nearly didn't pick up.

I sighed. "Hello?"

"Hey," Andrew spoke loudly over the drunken chatter, a few good one mate, and, good on ya's here and there. "Where'd you run off to?"

"I, uh, had too much to drink," I lied through my teeth, kicking at the gravel beneath my feet. "I'm just heading home."

"Oh..."

"I'm out the front," I piped up, not wanting him to think he caused this. Or that I was running away. Because I was not. Right?

He hung up and shortly after, his tall figure emerged, his shadow reaching me before he did.

He opened his mouth to speak, but I beat him to it. "Great song, Andy. Really beautiful." I meant it.

"Oh, yeah. Thank you," he smiled, looking down at his boots. "How're you getting home?"

"I was gonna get a cab, or an Uber, or something." I shrugged, acutely aware of how breathy I sounded. Beyond tired. I wasn't lying when I said I'd had too much to drink.

"No need, I'll take you." He offered, digging his hands into his pockets and gesturing with his head for me to follow.

"It's okay, Andy, really," I countered, giving him my must sincere smile I could muster. I was too confused right now. Nobody had ever made me feel this way while I've been with Joe. "Get in there and mingle. They loved you."

"I'd rather know you're safe."

I ended up in the passenger seat of his car. He'd kindly put the heater on full blast, though no doubt, he'd be sweating under all those layers. I protested, but he kept fretting about how red my nose was from the cold.

"You alright?" He asked, my head leaned against his window.

"Yeah," I breathed, struggling to keep my eyes open, though my mind was very much awake and racing.

"You've been acting funny, did I upset you?" He glanced over at me, concern written all over his features. Had he always been this handsome?

"It's not you. I'm sorry," I lifted my head to look at him. Tequila and I are not friends. I flipped down the visor mirror to see a tiny it of smudged mascara under my eyes. I wiped it away, sighing for the hundredth time. "Joe just... things aren't going well. I slept on the couch last night. Well, barely. He's just so mean, you know?" I babbled drunkenly, a huge weight lifting after finally telling someone. "He always picks at everything I do. You complain all the time. You put too much salt in this. That isn't a real sustainable job, babe. We never shag anymore... Shag? Isn't that disgusting, Andy?"

I continued my drunken spiel, probably including more details than I should have. Andrew just kept his eyes on the road, sharing glances here and there to let me know he was listening.

The grande finale, "why can't all men just be like you? You would make a wonderful husband, you know. You wouldn't tell your girlfriend she's too lively in bed, would you?"

"No, I wouldn't," he laughed, shaking his head. He looked at me fondly. For once, it wasn't a look of sympathy. It was kind of sad, almost.

"I've said too much, haven't I?" I probably looked like a kicked puppy at the realisation, but one smile from him eased any disconcertion I had.

"Not at all," he sighed, staring at his hands on the wheel. "I have a lot to say. I just don't think I should be the one saying it."

"Well, now you have to tell me," I countered, lolling my head to the side to face him.

"He's a fuckwit," he shook his head, his grip on the wheel tightening. "He doesn't deserve you. Not even a little bit. He's going to fuck it up and won't realise what he's lost until it's too late. And you know what? Good."

He pulled onto the road before my house with perfect timing, getting out of the car to open my door for me. He took my hand in his, helping me out, and thank goodness he did, because I still nearly rolled my ankle. I laughed and let myself fall into his chest, steadying myself after a hearty, obnoxious laugh.

"Oh my God, I've made a complete fool of myself tonight," I sighed, this time it felt like a release, not a breath weighing me down. "Thank you for taking care of me, Andy."

"Anytime at all," he grinned leaning against his car. I couldn't help myself, lurching forward at him, wrapping my arms around his torso. My head barely reached his shoulder, even when standing on the curb.

"I loved your song," I murmured against his chest, pulling back to grab his face. He turned ghost white. "You are my favourite singer. Ever."

His cheeks darkened as he looked away, chuckling softly with the shake of his head.

"Drink lots of water for me tonight. That's an order as your favourite singer."

"Yes, Mr. Hozier-Byrne," I grinned, turning on my heels and heading for the door. The garage door was 1/4 open. Joe must be home early.

I fumbled through my purse for my keys, finding them after what felt like an eternity of great difficulty. I was going in with a good attitude. I was going to sit him down and hash this out. We can fix this. We've been together nearly 6 years, this is just a rough patch.

I walked up to my bedroom, sure my ears were deceiving me. When I opened my bedroom door, I saw red.

omg angst... just hear me out i have good direction for this one. i hope u enjoyed <3

[steddieas-shegoes]

is it the blanket or is it you?

for @steddielovemonth prompt 'love is asking "do you want a blanket?"'

rated t | 2,107 words | no cw | tags: getting together, first kiss, mutual pining, fluff

💗💗💗💗💗💗💗💗💗💗💗💗💗

one

Steve hadn't left the hospital. He slept in Eddie's room when Wayne had to work and in Max's room when he did.

Tonight he was in Eddie's room, curled up in the chair because the nurses didn't know he snuck in after visiting hours. Wayne got a cot and tried to convince them to leave it in the room even when he wasn't here, but they were so desperate for beds, they took it out between his stays.

Eddie'd woken up a few times for a couple minutes here and there. Steve wasn't ever around when he did, but apparently one of the times, he'd asked for Steve.

Wayne didn't say anything else except he seemed pretty high on the pain meds and at least wasn't in any pain.

Steve was exhausted, but his back was killing him after nearly a week of sleeping upright in uncomfortable chairs.

He watched Eddie for a few minutes, his slow breathing proof that he was too out of it to wake up.

Steve quietly moved his chair so it was flush with the side of the bed, leaving him in a position to rest his arms and head on the bed without risking touching Eddie.

It was cold in the hospital, and Wayne usually left him a spare blanket, but it wasn't in its usual place tonight. He was too tired to get up and try to find one.

He fell asleep almost as soon as he closed his eyes.

When he woke up, Wayne was standing by his side with a confused look on his face.

"Did Ed wake up last night?"

Steve shook his head. "Why?" He looked down and saw the blanket wrapped around him and the hand next to his arm.

"He moved is all. Maybe the pain meds wore off a bit," Wayne shrugged.

Steve was too busy thinking about Eddie using all of his strength to cover him up with one of the three blankets he usually had on him.

He thought about how close Eddie’s hand was to his, wondered if maybe he’d held it at some point while Steve slept.

Hoped that maybe he would hold it again.

—————

two

As Eddie got used to being at Steve’s house, he also had to get used to Steve falling asleep on the couch.

They’d watch a movie together, Steve would help Eddie to the guest room, and then apparently decide to crash on the couch.

He said it was because he was tired and didn’t wanna go up the stairs, but Eddie saw through it.

He stayed there so he’d be close in case Eddie needed him, even after his bites had mostly scarred over and his ribs had fixed themselves. Eddie didn’t push though; He liked having Steve nearby.

The first few times it happened, Steve was awake the moment he heard Eddie’s door open.

But then he started being quieter, sneaking out to the living room to see Steve face down on the couch, arm hanging off the side and drool hanging off his lip.

Eddie shouldn’t do it, he shouldn’t reach out. He shouldn’t touch him.

But he saw goosebumps on Steve’s arm and he had to check if he was cold. It was mandatory.

He gently brushed his fingers against Steve’s forearm, frowning at how cold his skin was.

He pulled the blanket from the back of the couch off and settled it over Steve’s body the best he could. His arm was still hanging out, but hopefully the heat surrounding him everywhere else would warm that up too.

He walked to the kitchen to make them both some coffee.

When Steve woke up 20 minutes later to the smell of bacon and coffee, he curled up under the blanket he hadn’t put over himself before he fell asleep.

—————

three

They took this road trip because they all needed it, but Steve more than anyone.

His parents had just left town for good, but not without forcing Steve to either go to college or never step foot in their house again. He’d thought, and they all thought, that maybe they wouldn’t bother pressuring him since the town was in shambles and he’d been a hero. They all thought wrong.

So for the last four days, he’d been staying with Eddie and Wayne in their new house, insisting on sleeping on the couch even though Eddie has a king bed now that’s definitely big enough for both of them.

Whatever they were, they apparently were not ready for sharing a bed.

Wayne kept giving him these looks.

But he hadn't pushed Steve, especially not after the thing with his parents. He offered comfort in the way he knew would be accepted and then packed everyone up in a rented RV and told Steve to drive wherever he wanted to go.

They ended up at Lake Erie, some campground that was pretty empty due to the fall chill in the air. The kids had run outside the moment they parked, sick of being stuck in the RV for the last seven hours. Robin had nudged Steve's shoulder and joined the kids, silently agreeing to keep an eye on them while he took a moment.

Eddie sat in the passenger seat next to him, waiting for him to speak.

It took a few minutes, but Eddie was always patient when it came to Steve.

"You didn't have to do all this," he finally said.

"I didn't. But I did."

Steve nodded, searching for more words.

"I'm tired," he finally said, sounding every bit as tired as he said he felt.

"You should go to sleep, Stevie," Eddie set his hand on his knee. "The kids will be busy for a while. Robin and I can watch 'em."

"You did all this for me and I'm just gonna sleep?" Steve asked in disbelief. "Isn't that a waste?"

"Not if it's what you need. If you need to sleep for the next two days, then sleep. I'll be right here. We all will."

Steve didn't argue, even though Eddie could tell he wanted to.

He got up and made his way to the couch.

Eddie nudged him further. "The bed. You and Robin can share. I'll take the couch and the kids can take the bunk beds. You don't have to sacrifice everything all the time."

Steve didn't argue. Again. He must be exhausted.

He walked to the bed, fell on top of the blankets Eddie had slipped on before leaving home, and closed his eyes.

"Wake me up in a few hours. Wanna see the stars," Steve mumbled against the pillow.

Eddie watched fondly from the doorway. "Sure thing."

Steve was asleep in less than a minute and Eddie walked over to pull the blanket at the end of the bed over him so he wouldn't get cold.

Robin woke him up a few hours later with a soda and a sandwich, soft smile on her face.

"You okay?"

"Yeah. Warm. Did you tuck me in?" Steve yawned.

"Nope, this is the first time I've been back in here since I left," Robin smirked. "You gonna do something about the Eddie thing?"

Steve nodded. "Yeah, I think it's time to.

+ one

After dropping everyone off at their homes, and leaving the RV at the rental place, Steve rode home with Eddie.

Well, he rode to Eddie's home, which was temporarily his home.

Even sleeping on the couch there felt better than he'd ever felt in his own home, but he didn't really want to admit it. At least not out loud.

But he'd talked to Robin a lot over the last few days, and he'd watched Eddie prioritize Steve over and over again, in ways that were different from how he prioritized the kids and Robin.

He wanted to tell him how he felt, how he'd been feeling for a while.

"Would it be okay if I sleep in your bed tonight?" Steve asked suddenly, interrupting Eddie's steering wheel drumming.

Eddie glanced over at him. "Of course. You okay?"

"Think I just could use your company."

Eddie's half-smile was enough for Steve to know he was on the right track.

"Yeah?"

"You always make me feel warm," Steve admitted.

He watched as Eddie took a breath, steeling himself for something.

Eddie's hand reached over and grabbed Steve's, laced their fingers together. His hand was sweaty, and Steve should be grossed out, but he's only endeared.

"How long you been wanting to do that?" Steve asked.

"Hm. I think when I first saw you when you walked into the cafeteria your freshman year with a fuckin' lunchbox. Something about the way you unapologetically carried a lunchbox not filled with drugs into high school made me fall hard and fast," Eddie smirked around the confession. "It was an unfortunate crush for most of high school that I tried very, very hard to ignore. And then you had to go and save my life and the world and be this really great guy and you got me good, I'll admit."

"I'm sorry, were you seriously judging me for not having drugs in my lunchbox? You do know that's just a you thing, right? Most people carrying lunchboxes actually have their lunch in them," Steve squeezed his hand to let him know he was joking. "You probably could've convinced me to join your table that first day. Tommy had a different lunch block and I was a lost sheep."

"Maybe. But I don't think you would've stayed. I think things happened like this so I could appreciate what you are to me now."

"Are you a secret romantic?" Steve asked.

"It's not really a secret, sweetheart."

"It was to me."

They parked in the driveway of the trailer and Eddie turned to Steve. "You can sleep in my bed every night if you want. Just keep in mind Wayne is the next bedroom over and he can hear everything."

Steve let out a loud laugh. "A bit presumable, aren't you?"

Eddie's face softened into something fond. "Yeah, guess so. But I figured a reminder would be good for both of us."

"Am I that irresistible?" Steve grinned at him, leaning closer.

"You have no idea." Eddie leaned closer, his lips parted, and then he moved up to kiss Steve's forehead instead of his lips. "Inside first."

"You're a tease too? Not even one kiss?" Steve grumbled as Eddie pulled away and got out of the van. "Ridiculous."

Wayne was already asleep when they got inside, so they tip-toed down the hall to Eddie's room.

Eddie immediately started stripping off his layers, pulling on sweatpants and a hoodie. Steve couldn't help but watch now that he was allowed.

"You can borrow some sweatpants if you want. I only have one other pair clean though," Eddie said, finally turning to Steve, who blushed and looked away. "Aw, Stevie! Were you tryin' to take a look? You could've just asked."

"Someone's feeling bold all of a sudden," Steve said as he pulled his sweater off followed by his shirt.

Suddenly, Eddie was right in front of him, in his space, breathing out against his lips.

"I've been wishing for your eyes to be on me for years, angel. Stare all you want."

Steve nodded. "You said something about sweatpants?"

"Yep!" Eddie pulled away and grabbed sweatpants from his drawer. "Here they are."

"Eds, these are not pants." Steve giggled. "These are barely shorts. What exactly are these?"

"Comfy pants! Or shorts! Or boxers that are just too big for me?"

Steve shook his head, but took off his jeans and pulled the sort-of shorts on over his underwear.

"I'm exhausted," Steve said as Eddie pulled the blankets back on his bed. Honestly, Steve had expected his bed to be unmade and his room to be cluttered. Other than some dirty clothes on the floor by the dresser, it was a pretty organized room.

"Get in bed. You want this blanket?" Eddie held out the blanket that Steve usually used on the couch.

"Maybe I could share yours?" Steve asked hesitantly.

"I was hoping you'd say that." Eddie sat on the bed and patted the spot next to him. "I'll keep you warm."

Steve felt like he was melting into a puddle. He got in the bed and curled on his side, facing away from Eddie in hopes that Eddie would...

"Like this, angel?" Eddie asked as he settled in behind him, pulling the blanket over both of them.

"This is perfect."

Eddie kissed the back of his head and started humming. Steve couldn't resist the pull of sleep after that.

[cookinguptales]

Can I ask you to do a post about Disney & disability please? You mentioned it and I’d love to know more!

Well, my notifications can't get any messier, so why not?

This post got very, very long because I ended up talking about a lot of the accessibility solutions in detail (and... ranting about how accessibility at Universal was so bad that I got physically injured there) so I'm putting it under a cut for you.

To preface this, I have mobility issues (as well as a lot of food intolerances/allergies) and general chronic illness, my sister is Deaf, and I have friends who regularly attend the park with autistic family members with high support needs. These are the disabilities I have experience with, so while I've heard a bit about others (such as portable descriptive devices for visitors with visual impairments) I can't speak as much about those accommodations.

I have also traveled quite a bit, mostly as a disabled adult. I can work from anywhere and my family enjoys traveling, so I've been very lucky in this regard. I also used to live in central Florida, not too far from Disney, and benefited from their FL resident rates.

So I'm coming at this from a person who has a lot of experience traveling while disabled and a fair amount of experience going to WDW, though I haven't been nearly as often since I moved out of Florida.

(Good fucking riddance.)

So know that I am speaking from experience when I say I have never, without exception, been to a single place half as accessible as Walt Disney World. It is literally the reason my family would go there; it was one of the only places we could all safely go together. One of the only places I've been on earth that even approached their level of thoughtful accommodations is Barcelona, which apparently did significant renovations throughout the city in order to prepare for the 1992 Paralympics.

(Hey, if anyone is reading this from Barcelona: I teared up the first time I used one of your curb cuts in my wheelchair, just so you know.)

Going through those parks in a wheelchair is a breeze, though you will probably have to fight a lot of clueless parents with strollers who are hellbent on using resources intended for wheelchair-users and then glaring at you when you try to use them yourself. Level ground, spacious sidewalks, accessible transportation, well-kept gradual ramps, roomy buildings, lots of accessible restrooms, alternate entrances at many rides for wheelchair users, special wheelchair rows in movie theaters that we're loaded into first, accessible queues in most rides designed or renovated in the last fifteen years, special viewing areas for shows/parades/fireworks so you don't end up staring at able-bodied butts for a half hour...

Like, structurally-speaking, the parks are very easy to get around in if you're a wheelchair user. That was built in and you can see a lot of very mindful design choices. As far as the rides go, most of their rides actually have special cars that you can load into while still in a wheelchair. They're pretty neat. I can transfer, but that means often leaving my wheelchair and/or cane with a cast member during the ride. They are always, without fail, waiting for me on the other side of the ride, no matter how far the exit is from the entrance. I have never once had a problem with this. A cast member will be there to put my assistive devices in my hand before I even have to think about getting up. Guaranteed.

Wheelchair users always used to be able to skip the line, but there was unfortunately a problem with able-bodied people pretending to be disabled to skip lines (because god forbid they not have access to a single thing we have to make our lives livable) so now there's a system where if you cannot wait in a line, they'll basically give you a special time to come back that's equivalent to the length of the line. Which feels fair to me as someone who often cannot be in even an accessible line for extended periods. (I have problems with sunlight, heat, and often need emergency food or restroom.)

More important than all this, though, is the fact that cast members are impeccably well-trained in all of this. Any disabled person can tell you that the most accessible design on earth isn't worth shit if the people working there aren't well-trained. (More on this later, when I take a giant shit on Universal Studios.) But Disney trains their employees, many of whom are disabled themselves, incredibly well.

Every employee will know where the accessible entrances are. Every employee will know the procedure for getting a return time. Every employee will know about first-aid centers, and every employee will know where the quiet areas are for people with sensory issues. Every time you make a reservation for a meal, hotel room, transportation, etc. they will ask for all accessibility needs and they'll be ready for you.

Every waiter you have will be incredibly careful and knowledgeable when it comes to special dietary needs, and chefs will often come out to discuss them with you. They often have specific menus for different dietary needs, and they are scrupulous when it comes to allergens. I have a few intolerances that suck and allergies that could kill me and I have always felt very safe in their hands. This ranges from fancy sit-down restaurants to quick service burger places.

And -- honestly, I have just always been treated with respect. I know that sounds like a low bar, but most people do fail to clear it. Disney has their employees very well-trained on how to interact with disabled guests. People speak directly to me, never to the able-bodied people over my head. They never treat me like I'm a child. They never ask invasive questions or make uncomfortable jokes. They never, ever get impatient with my accessibility needs.

The few times I have misjudged things and have injured myself or gotten extremely ill, they were professional and caring as they provided much-needed first-aid. It's kind of embarrassing to be doted on by a costumed character while you wait for a doctor to come help you sit up again, but also kind of endearing, I'll admit.

They also, in addition to captioning all videos in the park, have some of the best sign language interpreters in the world, bar none. They're very personal and professional, they're easy to reserve, they will always be in a visible place during shows, and they're incredible performers as well as being very technically proficient. In addition to the professional interpreters, many cast members, performers, and characters can sign as well.

In addition to that, and this brings me to my next point, you'll meet a lot of disabled employees throughout the park. In front-facing positions. Deaf employees, employees using mobility aids, etc. They're well-known to hire disabled people and treat them well. This is. Fuck, this is incredibly rare, I say as someone who was never able to find a job in Florida with my health conditions. It's the moral thing to do to hire disabled people, but also -- selfishly, there's something so heartening and normalizing about seeing people who look like you working at the park. I'm happy every single time.

I have a little less personal experience when it comes to accessibility for neurodivergence, despite being neurodivergent myself, but I've been told that Disney is very, very accommodating for people on the spectrum. A lot is done to lessen crowding, waiting, sensory overload, etc. for autistic guests. Cast members are usually super good at this; finding designated quiet areas, helping autistic guests avoid more crowded areas, keeping them out of long lines, making sure they have access to any particular experiences that are special to them, etc.

For folks who need help from their group, whether that's an autistic child who needs to be with a parent or a disabled adult who needs someone to push their wheelchair or anything else, Disney has a rider switch-off model. In other words, if you're there with both of your able-bodied parents, for example, and you need one of them to be with you at all times and you don't want to be on the ride yourself, Disney will allow one person to go on the ride while the other waits for them to finish, then will allow the second person to go on without any additional wait. This makes sure that everyone in the family gets equal access without leaving disabled people alone. (Which... can be a very shitty feeling, I assure you.)

I know that Disney has also pioneered a lot of assistive technology. The accessible rides, obviously, which can be ridiculously cool (like Toy Story Midway Mania has an accessible car with alternative "guns" for people with dexterity limitations so they can play the carnival games as well) but also handheld assistive devices for visually impaired guests, etc. Like they are literally inventing new forms of accessibility technology, which is so cool.

And honestly, I'm always learning about new ways they assist disabled guests. I've stayed in Disney's accessible hotel rooms before (they're very nice!) but I don't like to swim so I've never been in the pools. But even just this week, someone told me that Disney has pool lifts for disabled guests, which I had never even considered. That's so cool.

The best part about accessibility at Disney is that in some ways it's very casual. A lot of their design decisions are so intuitive that you never even notice how accessible the parks are until you go somewhere where that's... not the case.

Like -- just so you don't assume that any of these things are industry standard, let me tell you about the two times I went to Universal, a park very close to Disney. I went there once for an event and once with my family.

The first time I went was for an event at the opening of the Harry Potter park. (This was before JKR made her most appalling views public, to be clear.) It... was frustrating. Guests asked if there would be food and drink available for people with special dietary restrictions (such as sugar-free butterbeer) and were pretty much told that no, that was not something they were interested in pursuing. It became very obvious very quickly that the park itself was so narrow that it only barely fulfilled ADA standards -- when empty. We were told that JKR had actually specifically insisted that it feel "cramped". Which is a nice way to say that I couldn't actually get around in any of the stores while people were in them.

It was overall a frustrating experience, but it was like. One night. I figured it was probably a fluke and they were still ironing out all the details. So I ended up going back with my parents later.

Y'all, it was a shit show.

Broken elevators that prevented disabled guests from accessing rides. Performers being up on raised platforms/sidewalks so disabled guests couldn't get to them. Sidewalks being made inaccessible by putting movable signs directly in the middle of them. Stores (even outside of the HP part) that were so damn narrow that I actually ended up getting hurt trying to navigate one of them. And no -- it was not easy to get first aid.

And my god, was the training bad. We went to one of the new HP rides, asked if there was a specific entrance for disabled guests. We were told no. We waited for a very long time in a line that honestly I shouldn't have been waiting in, but I wanted to be a good sport. I was pretty sick by the time we got through it, and the line itself had some very dangerous inclines/turns for wheelchair users. We get to the front of the line -- and the employee asks why we didn't just use the accessible entrance. 🙃

(Side note: several of their rides are also just unrideable if you don't fit within a pretty narrow body type of thin and able-bodied, so... there's that.)

We'd asked repeatedly and gotten incorrect answers, and I'd been put in physical danger as a result. Wild. I started to notice that if you asked different employees, you'd get different answers about almost anything, really. Just exceptionally poor training. Even stuff that should've been a no-brainer, like loading wheelchair users into a stationary movie theater, ended up creating chaos when they did it incorrectly and we had a giant wheelchair pileup.

Like -- let me stress to you that many of the things that happened could have caused actual injury to people. Some of these situations were dangerous. And some of them were just alienating, like when I'd have to wait outside a store while my family could go in.

I never went back after that. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ We just kept going to Disney.

One thing that'll probably show how good Disney is at accessibility is the whole Make-A-Wish thing. A lot of people know that it's a popular Make-A-Wish request, and you're likely to see at least a couple kids with Make-A-Wish buttons during your visit if you keep an eye out. One reason for this, is that, y'know, Disney World is fun. Kids want to go there. But more important, I think, is that Disney can accommodate people with at-times severe medical needs. Those kids can safely go anywhere and do anything in those parks that able-bodied kids can, and that's important.

All in all, the parks are just so accessible and you will never, ever be made to feel like you're lesser for needing those accommodations. You will be treated so well and you will not have to worry about accessibility because the cast members are always doing it for you. They'll usher you into the correct entrance as soon as they see a mobility device, and they'll do it with a very warm welcome. It's one of the very few places on earth where I have never felt like a burden.

Again, y'know, I know that Disney does not have a perfect track record on a lot of issues. I would never defend them from rightfully earned criticism. I strongly support labor action against them, and I do think they should be criticized whenever they fuck up. I have been uncomfortable with the sheer amount of power they have both in Florida and in the entertainment world just because no one should have that much power. But I am far more uncomfortable with that power being stripped away for blatantly discriminatory political reasons.

I do have some loyalty to Disney just because there is no other place on earth where I've been able to safely have fun with my friends with so little agony. That's... I mean, it's important, really. To be able to just exist in public without getting grief for it. And I have some loyalty to them because they were a safe space for me as a young, queer kid who was not safe being out in other areas of my life.

(Like, I am talking about actual literal safety. I kept seeing notes on my post saying that Disney didn't care about creating a "safe space for queer people" but as someone who lived in Florida for the entirety of my teenage years? It was the safest goddamn place there.)

I do not have enough loyalty to defend them when they do immoral bullshit, but I do have enough to make sure that people know the good that they do as well.

I want other businesses to follow Disney's model for disability. I will praise them forever for what they've done in that regard because if I don't, there's no reason for other companies to follow suit. I want to praise them for the good things they've done so they have incentive to keep doing it, and other companies have an incentive to do it as well.

Like bro, I just wanna be able to move around and be treated with some dignity, y'know? My bar is so low. lmao

But yeah. That's why you always see so many disabled guests at Disney. It's literally the only place some of us can go to have fun.

[mrspasser]

I saw you on the train - Sterek Fanfic

Sterek fanfiction, shamelessly based on this Tumblr post by @tsaiko. (OP, please let me know if I overstepped!) This is also on A03.

I saw you on the train

Derek gets on the subway after work, mentally bracing himself for having to deal with people because he didn’t charge his phone last night. Or he did, but his pup chewed through his charger cable and he frankly didn’t notice the nearly empty battery until he was already at the office. Any other day he loves his old brick of a phone, but today it was a bit of a bother that nobody had a charger that he could borrow. Ergo, he has no music to drone out the conversations of the other passengers.

He makes his way a little down the train car and sits down in an open seat. Across the aisle and one seat down are two men, mid to late twenties. They’re having one of those whisper-shout conversations with each other, where the words at the end of each sentence get louder with their anger, before they remind themselves that they are in public and go back to furious whispering. Derek can tell they are trying to be quiet, but emotions are high. Things are tense between them, it’s obvious within a few minutes of involuntary eavesdropping.

He knows he should try to ignore them, but it’s pretty hard to do. They’re in Derek’s direct line of sight and one of them has the most mesmerising whiskey coloured eyes he has ever seen. Right now, the lines around the young man’s eyes are hard and stressed, yet Derek can imagine the twinkle that would be there when he’s in better spirits. It fits the slight uptick of his nose. Somehow he just knows the guy can be a nuisance in all the best ways. He has an expressive face, which makes him far more interesting to Derek than his more generically handsome partner, who has neatly styled brown hair and blue eyes.

It’s an easy guess that the two of them are in a relationship, even though the expected easy chemistry is missing. But there aren’t many people that would be fighting in public, except when they’re in a close, intimate relationship. It’s a bit odd that they chose to have a discussion about the future of their relationship on the subway during rush hour, but whatever, they probably had a head of steam up on this topic. 

It's a relationship drama that doesn’t involve Derek, yet he’s kind of forced to listen to it as one of the few people without headphones in the direct vicinity. There’s an older woman that glances curiously in the direction of the two men every now and then, but she’s reading a travel guide in a language that Derek can’t place, so chances are her English isn’t good enough to know what the two are talking about. 

The gist of their discussion is that the one with the blue eyes wants to move forward with their relationship, maybe move in together, while Whiskey Eyes wants to slow down. Suddenly, Mr. Generic breaks in with a story about how his mom hates the city, but she moved to New York to stay with his dad and has lived there for twenty years now. And then he actually says the words: “Because relationships are about sacrifices.”

Whiskey Eyes looks like he wants to argue that point - which Derek can understand - yet he decides to follow his boyfriend’s reasoning. “And what have you sacrificed for our relationship?”

The barely hidden sarcasm in the question is apparently lost on Mr. Generic, because he has the audacity to come up with something or other he missed out on because he went with his boyfriend to a wedding. “We flew all the way back to California for your step brother’s wedding. I even had to sleep on the floor of your childhood bedroom!”

Like Derek, Whiskey Eyes is totally unimpressed with that answer and even rolls his eyes. Of course, his boyfriend doesn’t like that and their whispered argument continues. Derek can’t exactly hear what they’re saying, though it’s apparent that things aren’t getting better. Then, in a voice clear as day, Whiskey Eyes asks: “Name one thing I’m interested in.”

Mr. Generic freezes. He does a pretty decent impression of a store mannequin, with the vacant expression and the empty eyes. Derek can almost hear the dial tone coming from his brain. It’s clear that he can’t come up with a single thing that his boyfriend likes. On top of that, he looks confused as to why he’s even asked that question.

Things are quiet after that. The boyfriend tries to talk to Whiskey Eyes a couple of times, but he ignores him and just stares straight ahead. There’s a grim expression on his face, his jaws clenched. Still, the boyfriend doesn’t seem to understand the trouble he got himself in. 

The train pulls up at the station, Derek’s stop, and Whiskey Eyes gets up. “Baby?” Mr. Generic frowns at his partner. “This isn’t our stop.”

Whiskey Eyes gives him a cold glance. “It’s my stop now.” The doors open and he walks out. Just fucking walks off and leaves him on the train. 

Derek almost forgets to get off himself, he gets out just before the doors close. The boyfriend comes to his senses too and he jostles roughly past Derek in his hurry to go after his partner. Or ex-partner, probably. Because Derek sincerely doubts he can recover from that. He almost feels bad for the idiot. Or not, since the contents of Derek’s messenger bag go sprawling across the platform because of his rude shoulder check. 

The platform of the small station empties out quickly, leaving Derek to pick up the notes that spilled from their folder. When he looks up, still on one knee and with his papers in hand, he sees the couple from the train. They’re standing halfway between Derek and the exit and he’s just in time to see Whiskey Eyes pull his arm loose from Mr. Generic’s grip. Their voices echo in the empty station.

“We are through, Matt. I should’ve realised before that it wouldn’t work out, this thing between us.” Whiskey Eyes gestures angrily between them. “If there ever was a thing, because I’m starting to think I was the only one who was really invested.” 

Mr. Generic - Matt - scoffs. “You’re overreacting. And for what? Just because I couldn’t remember the name of your favourite movie from the top of my head? It’s Star Track, or something.”

“Star Trek,” Whiskey Eyes corrects, emphasising the last word. “And my favourite is Star Wars, not Star Trek.” He looks like he’s completely done with his ex-boyfriend’s bullshit. “Good bye, Matt. I’ll ask Lydia to pick up my stuff from your place later. Don’t follow me please.” He turns on his heel and walks to the stairs. 

“Baby…” The now definitely ex-boyfriend tries to keep up with him, but he’s quickly shot down.

“Don’t follow me.” The words are cold and clipped, making the ex-boyfriend stop in his tracks and just watch Whiskey Eyes disappear up the stairs.

Derek briefly makes eye contact with the asshole ex-boyfriend as he too makes his way to the exit. The man ignores him, mumbling something about ‘stupid nerd shit’ as he fumbles his phone from his pocket and simultaneously checks the board for the next train.

Yeah, Derek doesn’t feel sorry for him.

He does feel sorry for the whiskey eyed young man he finds standing forlornly just outside the exit of the train station. The guy just looks so lost that Derek can’t help but go up to him. “Are you okay?” he asks, startling the other.

“What? Oh, yeah, yeah, I’m okay,” Whiskey Eyes hurries to say. Then he looks around him and huffs a small, sad laugh. “Actually, I’m not. I don’t have a clue where I am and I just realised that I left my keys at home and my roommate won’t be home until late tonight.” 

“Shitty day, huh?” Derek remarks, showing him a sympathetic smile. 

“You can say that again,” is the blunt answer. It sounds almost rude, though it’s followed by a rueful smile. “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t… I mean, I didn’t want to…” Derek isn’t really sure what he’s apologising for and neither seems he. “Sorry. Again. You caught me at a bad time. I just broke up with my… Well, my ex-boyfriend now.”

“I know,” Derek answers and he winces, because it’s clear he was listening in to things that were none of his business. “I mean,” he tries to course correct, “I couldn’t help but overhear. I was on the train too.” 

“You were?” Whiskey Eyes blushes a delicious shade of red. “Fuck. That’s embarrassing.” 

“Nah.” Derek shrugs. “If anything, he’s the one who should be ashamed. Like, who doesn’t know Star Trek apart from Star Wars?”

“I know, right?” He’s still blushing, but it goes well with his smile. 

Derek usually isn’t this forward with strangers, but right now he feels like taking a chance. He could be mistaken, but he doesn’t think he is, not with the shy way Whiskey Eyes is rubbing the back of his neck. So he asks: “Would you like to get something to eat? I’m on my way home and I was planning to get some take out, but if you want, we can go grab a bite together?” 

“Uh, sure!” Whiskey Eyes is only a bit taken aback by his question and seems eager to distract himself from the situation from earlier. “Yeah, why not? I have to wait until my roommate gets home anyway.” Then he holds out his hand. “I’m Stiles, by the way.” 

“Derek.” He takes his hand and is pleased to find it warm and firm. “How do you feel about Thai food?” 

They settle down in the window seat of the small Thai place a block or so from Derek’s home. Stiles declares it the best Tom Kha Kai he has ever had and they discover that they’re born in the same county in California. Derek’s family moved out when he was about twelve years old, yet Stiles’ father still lives there. And so does his recently married step brother.

Conversation flows easily and Derek is happy to discover that Stiles indeed has a very appealing sparkle in his eyes when he’s amused. 

Four months later, they kiss for the first time. Another four months later he finds himself lying on a thin camping mattress on the floor of Stiles’ childhood bedroom. There’s a large Star Wars poster above the bed, with the letters of the opening crawl. Glow in the dark stars that have long lost their shine dot the ceiling. 

A little above him, Stiles rolls so he can look down over the edge of the bed. “I’m sorry my bed is so tiny,” he whispers. “Are you sure you’re okay down there? We can switch!”

Derek catches the hand Stiles extends to him and presses his lips to the knuckles. “I’m fine, sweetheart. It’s just for a couple of nights anyway.”

Stiles smiles fondly at him. “Okay, if you’re sure.” 

“I’m sure,” Derek nods. He presses another kiss to the back of Stiles’ hand. “Now go to sleep, you’ve got a big day tomorrow.”

Stiles yawns and nods. As only son and best man he’s invested in making his father’s wedding day a success. “You really don’t think he’d let me walk him down the aisle?” 

Derek chuckles quietly. They’ve been over this before. “Just leave that part to Scott and his mom. Don’t steal their thunder.” 

“Right.” Stiles caresses the side of Derek’s face one last time and then tucks his arm back underneath his blanket. “Good night, Der. Love you.” 

“I love you too. Good night.”

[gallusrostromegalus]

How does trash pickup, Recycling centers, &/or Hazardous Material Disposal work for Soul Society in AEIWAM? Is there a Kido-based ritual to break things down into Reishi? Are there Tech Repair Shops?

Sewage in Soul Society works really well but very dangerously because those fucking idiots built the city directly on top of an active supervolcano.

Let me back up:

There isn't a good consensus on how big the Seireitei is (Yoruichi says it takes 10 days to walk 1/4th of the way around the circumference, but whether that's her speed, the average person's or how long a patrol group takes is unclear), Or any real maps of the place, but it's generally agreed that

the city is LARGE. Yoruichi says it would take her and the kids ten days to walk to the next gate 1/4th of the way around the city. Maybe that's 8 hours average human walking speed minus 'trying to herd a bunch of teenagers' but that's still a long trip!

Even before the Seki-Seki stone wall was put up, the city was pretty much circular.

Unlike pretty much every real city, there's no river running through it. Where are they getting their water?

There is a Small but substantial and TOTALLY ISOLATED mountain in the middle of the city made of apparently hard-to-mine rock. A Lonely Mountain, one might even say.

The only visible natural sources of water I've seen evidence of are hot springs in both the Yoruichi/Urahara Super Secret Training Ground/Love Nest and the first division grounds.

Soul Society is run by jackasses and if there's a stupid way to do things, that's the way they're doing them.

In fact, the Soul Society as a whole is almost suspiciously Amestris-shaped, but instead of nefarious alchemy, it's negligent civil engineering

...all this leads me to believe that Seireitei is built DIRECTLY ON TOP OF the caldera of an enormous supervolcano. The city gets it's water from the aquifer of rainwater that's collected in the underground cracks and fissures of the Caldera, and the seki-seki stone wall is set up around the really convenient geographic barrier made by the rim of the caldera.

"Hey!" I hear some of you nerds objecting "Aren't calderas usually concave? Seireitei is convex, if anything!"

You're right! Most Calderas are concave! But they will absolutely fill in with sand and dirt over the true floor of the caldera over time and develop Mounts like the thing at the central part of the city and start to rise WHEN THEY'RE ON THE VERGE OF A CATASTROPHIC ERUPTION.

So yeah! The Gotei-13 has an almost infinite supply of hot water, and probably less than a century to figure out what to do before The Big Kaboom.

Anyway, back at sewage:

There's been a city where the Seireitei is since time immemorial, and even though it's done the istanbul-not-constantinopple shuffle a few times, very little of the actual infrastructure has changed. Empires rise and fall but the desire paths stay the same.

This is especially true in Seireitei, because unlike very nearly every major IRL Municipality, it doesn't have a river running through it, something that usually necessitates Sewer updates By Force. But compared to a river which is constantly moving around in it's bed, a volcanic aquifer doesn't move much until it moves a whole fucking lot real fast, so the undercity of the Seireitei has really had time to... Develop isn't quite the right word.

"Ferment" is closer.

Above-ground waste management is the provenance of the actual local city government- yes, there is a Mayor of the Seireitei that the Gotei-13 has to pay property taxes to. Yamamoto maintains a lot of goodwill with the Mayor by dint of sentencing ill-behaved shinigami to shore up the municipal labor pool, and by knowing the mayor's family for the last millennium. So you'll see Shinigami doing things like trash collection and street-sweeping, but they're just there on probation.

-But nobody wanted to deal with the undercity. It's got a soul of it's own. Washington DC, which is less than 500 years old as a city and on top of a swamp, has an undercity that goes down over half a mile. Imagine how deep the sunken buildings, abandoned secret tunnels, and sewer system of a city that's millenia old, not sitting on actual mud and constantly subjected to high levels of magical background radiation might develop.

An Appetite, for one thing.

The 11th likes to talk a big game, but the reason the 4th is in charge of sewer maintenance is because the only people with the guts for it were people who got degrees rummaging in the guts of living people. Sewer maintenance really is a lot like abdominal surgery, if you were able to walk around inside the patient.

It was Retsu Unohana's idea, actually. Chigiri was a battle medic and aged rapidly for a shinigami. She was old when the court guard finally went from "Yamamoto and his gang of assholes" to "A for-real governing body". Her successor, Kirinji was more interested in traumatic injury recovery than preventative medicine, for obvious reasons- his triage was constantly full of combat casualties and early kido experiment victims Blood Loss was still his #1 Killer.

But Retsu had been reincarnated in and spent her youth in South 80, in the utterly undeveloped conditions there, and held deep, personal grudges with Dysentery and Cholera. For all his talk of healing waters, Kirinji had no sense of the importance of water sanitation, and it was a continuous point of contention between them for her apprenticeship.

"FINE!" He shouted one day after a particularly nasty row. "IF IT'S SO GODDAMN IMPORTANT TO YOU, YOU HANDLE IT! FORM NOW ON, YOU'RE IN CHARGE OF SEWAGE, SLUDGE QUEEN!"

She made her first descent the next morning.

She did not return for six weeks, and Kirinji almost thought he'd resloved that particular problem when she reappeared from the depths, a changed woman. That long in the darkness, alongside the buried secrets and skeletons of the city, with the horrors that did not dare brave the sunlight- it would change anyone, and most would come up looking at least mildly haunted.

Retsu Unohana is not most.

She looks radiant, almost like The Kenpachi again, covered in the horrors of the underground as she used to be covered in blood. She thrives on a challenge, and excels at the art of purification, and now, she has been given the single greatest challenge of purification in history. There is something beautiful and terrible in her eyes as she explains that it does down at least five miles, look at this, she thinks it's from the neolithic era, and there are incredible boneyards of thousands of skeletons, and fungi the likes of which she's never seen before- She is ecstatic- a creature kept in captivity, finally released into it's natural habitat.

It's hardly a surprise, if you consider Minazuki. Stingrays are benthic creatures, right at the bottom of the river, deep in the muck and decay.

It's been a little over eight hundred years into her tenure as a medic, and she has tamed much of the beast. The upper levels are well-mapped and have been made clean and well-lit, enough that even the civilian sanitation forces of the city can regularly enter and work in them without any particular unease. Infant and preventable disease mortality has dropped astronomically. Nobody's had cholera since the 1800's . While they have other jobs, all members of the 4th division are required to take at least one tour in the depths of the undercity.

Horrors still lurk in the depths.

They're pretty sure they lost Tokagero Kenpachi chasing one of those, shortly before Unohana became captain, and she's been reluctant to let other divisions assist since then. The Fourth Division's Fourth Seat, rumored to be the unluckiest post in the entire Gotei-13, is permanently stationed underground, and she loves it that way.

It's only recently that the 11th has been allowed to come along on descents, after Zaraki vanished for two days and then emerged victorious from a manhole in the 5th division with a tentacled horror she'd been tracking for decades that lived at least three miles down. He apologized- he had meant to come up in the 4th to present it's corpse to her directly, but well, you know what his sense of direction is like. Anyway, I saw it scuttling around in the rain aquifers and we don't need it tracking literal shit into the water supply so I went after is and d'ya think maybe I can take the lads down sometime? They' get lazy between deployments and you have a triage up here to manage.

Charmed, she agreed.

---

Hm. I just re-read that ask and it's actually about dry waste managment.

Sorry. I got very excited about the sewers.

I am now about to get worse about trash.

I don't think they have plastic in soul society- given how bug-themed the 12th division is, I'm pretty sure the casing on Rukia's soul pager is made of Chitin, and if you break it, it bleeds. Also it makes people with shellfish allergies break out in hives.

Since pretty much all the waste in Soul Society is either recyclable or organic matter, I think those trash pits Yumichika and Ganju were fooling around with are really more like Kido-enhanced composting centers. All waste goes into them and the bottom of the pit is pulled out in a tray, like with a vermiculture tower, if the worms were eighteen and a half feet long and hungry enough to swallow anything that falls in the pit, because Mayuri is incapable of making anything that is not at least slightly awful.

The compost is then shaken out for any spare glass or metal that made it into the compost and that's sent off to the 12th division forges to be recycled. it's baked to kill any dangerous pathogens and Giant Garbage Worm Eggs so they don't breach containment, and measured for nitrogen, phosphorus and other important plant nutrient content. Based on it's composition, it's then shipped out to farmers in the upper districts of the rukongai because "Free, A+ grade fertilizer if y'all don't start revolutions, pay your taxes and give us first dibs on crops" is an amazing incentive for rural farmers to not start backing the local warlords.

It was 12th division founder Uhin Zenjohji who came up wth the scheme- he remembered the lengths upper-district farmers were willing to go through to make sure their land remained fertile, what kind of demand Nitrogen was in, and the ravages of phosphorous runnoff, so he could kill two birds with one clod of shit by supplying farmers with 'free' fertilizer that kept them loyal to the court and was tailored to that area's nutritional needs and watershed capacity.

The fact that it kept a lot of swamp and waterway areas pristine so he could indulge his birdwatching hobby was a nice benefit too :).

NORMALLY, those pits are covered, clearly marked, and usually the site of a major traffic jam because that's the local collection point, but when Ichigo and friends arrived, Aizen had whipped everyone into believing they were being invaded by an elite force of super-assassins and not like. 4 high schoolers and a furry. All the street signs and markings came down, civilians shuttered themselves inside, and generally made the Seireitei as difficult to navigate as possible.

I wonder how much Zaraki's rotten sense of direction was exacerbated by that.

ANYWAY! That's my thoughts on trash! Deep undercity horrors and giant compost worms over an active volcano!

[catwhispers0]

✧༝┉˚*❋ Silly Pickup Lines ❋*˚┉༝✧

Featuring - 

Cyno, Al Haitham, Tighnari, Kaveh, Zhongli, Xiao, Scaramouche, Neuvillette, Wriothesley

gn reader - pronouns: you/your

Tw and authors note - might be a lil suggestive for some lines, i dont play genshin 😭😭 so if any of the characters are kinda goofy its cause im too poor for that game, ooc, bad grammar 😬 VERY LIGHTLY EDITED, annoying reader lol

minors shoo shoo as always

✧༝┉˚*❋ Cyno ❋*˚┉༝✧

“do you believe in love at first sight, or should i walk by again?”

finally, its my time to shine

“do you have a bandaid? because i scraped my knee falling for you.”

“are you a time traveler? because i see you in my future.”

“if we were socks, we would make a great pair.”

if anyone were nearby, they would be gone now. you would surely attract a crowd of people who appreciated the little pickup line competition more, if you werent in the middle of a library. 

“are you a loan? because youve got my interest.”

“if you were a vegetable, youd be a cute-cumber.”

that was the breaking point of the poor librarian, who hoped you two would just stop on your own. but nothing could stop you before you could fluster cyno, and he could go all day and night before he would fluster you. 

so, yea, yall got kicked out of the library, but at what cost? honestly, yall never stopped throwing terrible pickups at each other, much to the pain and disappointment of anyone around you (cough tighnari cough).

but depending on your strength against cynos charms, you may last either forever, or give cyno a new hobby of flustering you whenever and wherever he could.

✧༝┉˚*❋ Al Haitham ❋*˚┉༝✧

“do you have a name, or can i just call you mine?”

Al haitham just looked up from his book, confused. 

“i have a name, did you really forget it?”

well this was odd, he thought you were smarter than this. forgetting his name, really?? of all the things you could forget, his name was one of the most, no, THE most offensive one. 

maybe you tripped and hit your head on the way in. he didnt think you were the smartest person in sumeru, but surely you werent stupid enough to forget the scribes name. 

“no, i know your name, but can i call you mine?”

he somehow found a way to look even more confused. ‘can i call you mine’ who is ‘mine’?? oh. wait. mine!! 

by the time he finally realized, you walked away with a cheeky grin. he was left in the dust, flustered. and to think he thought you were dumb. 

now, how was he going to work for the rest of the day?

✧༝┉˚*❋ Tighnari ❋*˚┉༝✧

“arent you tired of running through my mind all day?”

he put his head in his hands in defeat, dropping the papers he was working on. with his ears flat against his head, he groaned. 

“...are you ok nari?” 

“no.”

“...”

after a moment, he looked up at you. he had a disappointed, dead-panned expression. his ears were still flat and he just stared at you, ridiculing you in awkward silence. 

he thought he would only have to deal with one idiot in a life time. why were you so..? annoying? no, thats not it. alluring? maybe… he didnt understand how through all of the shenanigans you pull him through, all the terrible jokes and one liners, youve sill managed to capture his heart and let him keep you around. so yea, alluring.

“... do you wanna hear another one?”

*sigh* “sure, but only if its good.”

his reluctance was apparent in his voice, but the agreement was a good sign. 

you gave it a beat of time to dig through your head for a clever one that would sweep tighnari off his feet. 

“i think i need to see an optometrist, because i cant keep my eyes off of you~.”

“...”

“...” “get out.”

“...ok”

✧༝┉˚*❋ Kaveh ❋*˚┉༝✧

“i must be in a museum, because youre a work of art.”

The architect nearly chokes on his drink and spits it out. you scramble to help him out of concern though there was little you could do in the first place. 

so pat him on the back awkwardly as he endeavors his coughing fit. sometime through the hacking, you notice it has shifted to laughter. 

“what are you laughing about?? are you ok??”

“-yea, im fine, you are just too cute! you caught me off guard.” 

with this, he picked you cheek adoringly. you gave him an incredulous look, this man really choked on his drink and now he demeans you? absolutely not. 

you turn on your heel and walk away after giving him a look of a mix of disappointment and exasperation. 

he follows quickly after to try and pester you for the rest of the day on ‘how adorable you are’.

✧༝┉˚*❋ Zhongli ❋*˚┉༝✧

“are you a geo user, because you rock my world! *wink*”

a small smile and a giggle does little to hide his growing flush. he looks away for a moment, letting your words settle in the air. 

why did you have to be so cute? and you look at him expectantly - waiting for a reaction. you didnt think he would fall that easily, hm?

-though, he does appreciate a challenge. 

sure, hes heard plenty of one-liners in his time, most when and about his dragon or archon forms. but he didnt expect you to exchange one with him, he doesnt know what to do or how to feel. 

“you are something, my dear. are you hungry? its about time for my lunch break, i thought you wouldnt mind the offer, seeing as you seem to want to sweep me away so badly.”

“something?” 

what was that supposed to mean? a good something or a bad something? his reaction did little to answer, but you took him up on his offer. maybe tomorrow you would get him. 

gotta keep that old man on his toes afterall. 

✧༝┉˚*❋ Xiao ❋*˚┉༝✧

“are you an adeptus, because youve reached a depth of my heart.”

at first, Xiao thought it was some adepti pun, but as the day went on, he wasnt so sure. 

it had become such an issue, the yaksha had began pacing around with his finger to his chin and a furrowed brow. 

he was overthinking it, he knew that, but he needed to know what it meant to be in a “depth of your heart”. did you mean it as friendly dialogue? or was there something more…? 

was this a sign? a hint? a clue? a puzzle? he didnt know. how could you do this to him, what is he supposed to make of this?

could you have put him in a depth of your heart that noone else was? Perhaps it was wishful thinking. archons, why were mortals so complicated?! 

by the time he had worked himself up to confront you about the issue that plagued his heart, the sun set and the stars had risen. 

‘maybe tomorrow then, ill let you rest for now.’ he thought as he watched you sleep peacefully, protected. 

✧༝┉˚*❋ Scaramouche ❋*˚┉༝✧

“im not a photographer, but i can picture us together.”

*silence*

“scara?”

“no.”

“what?”

“no, you are not doing this.”

aaaand he walks away…

as much as you try to talk to him after that, he avoids you. it doesnt last long though, maybe 2-3 days. 

still, not very nice. you knew he wasnt the best person in the communication department, but wow.

anytime you tried to bring it up, he would shoot it down or avoid confrontation. 

how nice would it be if he would just tell you if he was uncomfortable with teasing like that? 

with all the teasing he makes you go through, you would think he could endure some himself. maybe he wasnt used to it though, or maybe you connection with him didnt abide by the rules of hypocracy. 

maybe you should shun him back? a taste of his own medicine. 

so thats how you ended up with indigo eyes piercing into you soul. as soon as you gave him any hint of a cold shoulder, his disappeared. 

hes a stubborn man, he wont just go talk to you like a normal person. and all this over a cheesy pickup line. 

its more than that though, the way he treats you is much more that what he can handle himself. be gentle on him, he doesnt know these things. 

he doesnt know this feeling that arises every time he looks at you, when you say his name in that pretty voice of yours, the faces and reactions you make that are too precious for anyone else to see. 

so when you hit him with a one-liner, maybe the feeling is too unbearable for the guy. 

go reassure him, he needs it. 

✧༝┉˚*❋ Neuvillette ❋*˚┉༝✧

“your lips look lonely, can mine keep them company?”

Neuvillette nearly dies on the spot. this is the most romantic gesture hes ever heard of - he loves poetry, you know.

“why of course, my love.”

okay

okay, you just kissed the chief justice of fontaine. wow wow wow cool cool okay dont freak out. 

his face is still so close to yours - hairs away. his eyes meet yours, full of love and adoration. 

his lips are still parted, you can feel his breath against your lips. 

they were soft and gentle. would he mind if you went in for another? surely not..?

and just amd you closed your eyes, they were startled open. a melusine opened the door and interrupted your moment. 

oh well, how could you be mad when the look neuvillette snuck you screamed 'meet me again and we can pick up where we left off'.

✧༝┉˚*❋ Wriothesley ❋*˚┉༝✧

“you should lock yourself up, ya know, stealing is prohibited. “

he plays along immediately, smiling, but doesnt lift his eyes from his paperwork. 

“and i am so very sorry for your lunch, perhaps you could let me go with a fine, my generous love?”

your lunch? oh, hes gonna pay for this! you didnt even know about it until now, too! 

“my lunch?! what did you do to it?!” 

he looks up finally. 

“you dont know? oh well never mind dont think about it, love. its for… the better…”

how mysterious. if you could deadpan him harder, you would. 

“...so, what else did i steal?”

the audacity.

“well if you have to know, it was going to be cute and romantic, i was going to say you stole my heart but you can just give it right back, along with your lunch.”

and you walk away, off to check where you put your food. 

some wishful thinking said that he was just joking for a bit, but knowing him, you cant always be sure…

---------

if u want any other characters, drop a request in my mail/ask box ❤️❤️

[writingforatwistedworld]

Self-aware au

WARNINGS: Yandere themes, murder, death, poison, possessiveness, obsession, implied manipulation, unhealthy relationship

I do not take any responsibility for you reading this no matter which age group you are from

Entering your world

Returning home one day and finding a character from a game in your supposedly save heaven was definitely not something that was on your “definitely want to experience” list

But here he was, Vil Schoenheit himself… and he was crying the moment he saw your face?

Total confusion. Yeah, I understand.

After him apologizing, his reasoning for crying was being too happy to be in your presence, he explained how he went to sleep and woke up here

Did this remind you of the typical isekai trope? Yes but who were you to complain?

After all, you had a magical model sitting there on your shaggy couch

For the next few days, you expected some other character to pop up or Vil to suddenly undergo a magical girl transformation like they were used so many times in anime but thank goodness that didn’t happen because you weren’t sure if your heart could take any more surprises

Living with Vil was surprisingly relaxing though

It is no secret that Schoenheit is loaded from all his modeling and acting so you expected him to be more or less useless when it was about making himself useful

But would you look at that? He was actually pretty good

So good in fact that you had already dubbed him your househusband and even saved him under that name on your phone after he got his own

Of course, you never said that to him in his face

And for that, I thank you

You see, Vil wouldn’t do this for everyone he met. Oh no. He would probably just throw money at them to pay some sort of rent and then go on with his day

But you were the Overseer! The hecking OVERSEER!!!

When he first saw you, tired eyes and hair that could only be described as being a bird nest looking at him from a long day of work, he could not hold himself back

Tears of joy streamed down his cheek, him thinking that he died and ascended to heaven

Only after you asked him how he got here and offered a place to stay did he finally understand that this wasn’t just some sort of delirium or dream, no he was with you

He nearly started to cry again and his thought process, his head being filled with screams of happiness, must have been a copy of his own fans whenever they saw him

So he took his job as your househusba- *ahem* “roommate” seriously

What he might not even admit to himself was that he didn’t do this just because he thought so highly of you. No. It just meant easy access to your more private areas of your life

Your room was just so nice! Your bed felt like he was laying on clouds and it also smelled like you! Oh, did you save him under “house husband” on your phone? In that moment he squealed

He might even keep some things from you. Nothing too bad. Just a shirt or hoody… maybe he took more than just one

But the Overseer forbid- wait that saying doesn’t work here

But goodness forbid you bring someone into the small bubble of him and you

They don’t even need to do something bad. Vil will just see something that isn’t even there

That one friend of yours? Oh, they threw some disgusting looks in your direction. (They didn’t, he just imagined it)

I would like to remind you that TWST is apparently a place where it’s totally cool to teach teenagers how to make poisons

Yeah, he might not have a lab or certain equipment here but he can work with what he got. Especially since househusbands are always surrounded by chemicals

Suddenly that person is gone. Apparently, they have eaten something wrong but the doctors are just confused about how and why and so much more

The longer he stays the more possessive of your attention he gets

Mention someone and suddenly they also fall sick

And all he did was hand them a homemade meal. People are so picky about what they eat these days…

[aziraphales-library]

Hi,

Could I ask for some roommate fics? A little pining is great but I'm not a huge fan of too much angst.

There is one roommate fic I remember that I'd love to find again, it was set during lockdown, and azirphale was a virgin but was talking to Agnes on zoom with plans to date. Crowley offers to teach him about sex, and it gets physical, even though they're straight buddies ..of course. 😏

Thankyou

We have a #roommates tag. Here's the one you're looking for and a few more to add...

Not a Mounted Dildo but a Fuck Machine by NaroMoreau, summerofspock (E)

Aziraphale and Crowley have lived together for three years when lockdown goes into effect. When Aziraphale meets a nice girl on Tinder who he thinks is his perfect match, he's delighted. There's just one hurdle: that pesky virginity thing. Lucky for him, Crowley has always been there for him. He's helped Aziraphale with every other problem through the years, why not this one?

Tinder Dates Gone Wrong by OceanLace (E)

Aziraphale decides to take a risk and brings a man home but doesn't realize that his roommate and best friend had the same idea. Things don't turn out the way either of them were expecting but end up exactly how they wanted.

Principles of Proximity by Cannebady (E)

Crowley's plan is to get through grad school in one piece and then live his bachelor dream life. With a less-than-wholesome upbringing and no real human ties to speak of, he's made a life for himself. It's just fine, actually. And he's fine too, while you're at it. Enter new roommate, Aziraphale, who just might teach him the benefits of putting down roots.

…And They Were Roommates by Mimsynims (E)

“You know… I just remembered that Richard and I were going away for a few days next month.” Something devious came over him. “Richard paid for it, but the booking is in my name.” Crowley quickly caught on to what he was getting at. “Ooh, I see. That’s convenient.” He grinned. “For us." When Aziraphale's boyfriend Richard (Dick) breaks up with him, he and his roommate Crowley hijacks an intended couples' vacation and uses it for themselves. Lines that had started to blur even before their trip gets even more blurry - which perhaps isn't the best thing when both are hiding a crush on the other (and communication isn't their strong suit).

make it with you by NaroMoreau (E)

PAID RESEARCH OPPORTUNITY: A romantic couples study!! ------ Aziraphale and Crowley are broke roommates who are struggling to keep up with rent and a harsh landlord. After Crowley loses his job and Aziraphale's bookshop hasn't managed to make enough profit, they'll resort to anything to save what they love, and when they come across with the idea of a paid study for couples... Because some ideas are good until they aren't.

You Can Stay At My Place (And We Can Fall in Love) by IneffableToreshi (E)

Anthony Crowley is an art student with a heart of gold and a broad assumption about himself and his own (apparent lack-of) sexuality. When he meets literary student Aziraphale, he thinks he's found a great friend and possibly the perfect roommate. But when an exceptionally idiotic idea turns into Aziraphale reluctantly agreeing to pretend to be Crowley's boyfriend, Crowley rapidly realizes that he may not have been nearly so asexual as he originally thought...

10,000 Hours by AnnaTheHank (E)

Rich playboy Anthony Crowley has finally broken the last straw. He's been disowned by his grandmother, and turned away by his family. With no money and no where to go, he heads to the old family cabin to lay low until it all blows over. Romance writer A.Z. Fell has been given use of her publisher's cabin to get away from the city and work on her newest book-her first erotica. Neither expected the other to be there, but there they both were. And AZ finds that Crowley's vast knowledge of sex may just make up for her own lacking knowledge when it comes to writing her book.

- Mod D

[kangaracha]

QUEENMAKER | CHAPTER 5

---

pairing chan x reader

genre ninth member au, enemies to lovers, angst, fluff, coming of age, social media, cancel culture, anxiety, depression, forbidden love,

summary To JYPE, the solution is simple; take the sole trainee that will not debut with your brand new girl group, and use her to replace the missing vocalist in your male group that insisted on starting as nine.

Unfortunately, to the fans and the members themselves, it isn't that simple.

status ongoing

taglist OPEN

a/n apparently it has been 28 days since the last chapter, but the good news is i now have 4 chapters written in advance so january at least will have content. for those who haven't seen the random announcements on my blog, i've been sick and honestly probably will be again in january so your patience is appreciated, and i'm sorry, i'm not usually this sporadic with a project like this! to my editing team, who are feeling betrayed seeing this surprise chapter in their notifications, my chrissy new years gift to you is not asking for edits in the holiday season, roast me in the chat if anything is wrong (keeps, that last part doesn't apply to you)

previous | masterlist | next

---

Even as you knock on the door to the studio, you're nervous.

Maybe you shouldn't be; it's been nearly a month exactly now, and you're fairly sure at this point that none of the boys hate you, though calling some of them friends has been easier said than done. Maybe that's why you're nervous in the first place, because it's been so long and you're still unsure where you stand within the group, especially with the one you're supposed to meet now...

It's not your fault. Well, maybe it is a little bit - you're aware that you're struggling to relax in their company, the way you had with the girls in Midnight or other trainees. But your schedules are so different too, you only see the others in practise, or in passing in the halls. Some days you practise on your own, while they are off on one schedule or another, living the life of idols that have built up their name, other days only half of them are there. Sometimes there is no dance practise scheduled at all, their own individual lessons or other commitments taking precedence.

It won't be like this forever, you just keep telling yourself. Three weeks more, and then you debut with the rest of them, and you're part of the group for real. Three weeks of hard work, and then, maybe, it gets easier.

Maybe. You've thought that before, only for an opportunity to slip away through your fingers. You wouldn't be surprised if it happened again.

The door opens - Chan, leaning over from his chair to tug on the door handle before he returns to his desk. "Come in," he says warmly, an arm gesturing you towards the couch behind him. It's already occupied by Changbin, who makes you smile when he gives you a hello and a wave. "Sit with me," he says, in Korean and then again in broken English, patting the cushions. "I'll be quiet, I promise."

You're reminded suddenly of how loud he can be, during practises or even when everyone is just sitting around, but you hesitate to mention it, sitting quietly beside him instead. "You can tell him to leave if you want," Chan adds, his back turning to his laptop. "He's not actually here for anything important."

"I'm here for emotional support," Changbin claims, only he puts on such a voice as he says it that it makes both of you laugh. "It's an important job."

"Okay, well." Chan's hands spread, like he doesn't have any say in the situation. "If you don't need support, you can tell him to leave."

"He can stay," you answer readily, and you don't really doubt your answer at all. Out of all the members, Changbin has been one of the friendliest; he'd been so warm and accepting on your first day, and gone out of his way in days since to talk to you or pull you into a joke when you were on the outskirts watching. Even if he was only doing it because you looked pathetically out of place among them, you appreciated it. 

"Cool," Chan says, and then he shifts in his chair like he's uncomfortable, his eyes straying towards his laptop momentarily. "So. I wanted to talk to you about the comeback."

"I figured as much," you reply, aware that your hands are fidgeting nervously in your lap.

Chan's mouth opens, like he's going to say something, and then he hesitates, glancing away again. Apprehension rises in your throat, bitter like the taste of bad coffee as you swallow it back down again. It's one thing if you're nervous - but if he is unsure about what he's about to say too, then it could be-

"I've thought about it, and I've decided that you're not going to debut with us on this album."

Bad.

Your heart stops and then starts again, your chest tightening around your lungs even though you've heard this story before. It shouldn't even surprise you by now, the let-down; thinking you might have now, finally, done the work and reaped the reward, and yet every time you seem to let the hope creep into your chest just so that you can crumble twice as hard. You hadn't even realised you'd become this married to the idea of joining Stray Kids in the last three weeks, and yet the idea of getting dropped again hurts like a pain in your chest.

This was your last chance. No one else will debut you. The world isn't that kind of kind.

"Okay," you say, through a jaw that feels like it won't move enough to form the words. "It's - I understand. I'm sorry that I couldn't do it."

"Hang on," Chan says, a hand hovering between you like he's ready to catch you if you turn to leave. "Just hear me out - it's not that you're not good enough, okay? I just think it will help you if we wait a little bit longer, and the company were happy to agree."

"You've worked hard," Changbin says beside you, his face earnest. "No one thinks you can't do it."

"No," Chan agrees. "I'm just looking at the timeline, and the schedule they've drawn up for you, and I think you'd do much better if we push debut back to our next comeback in September."

September. Three more months away, rather than three weeks; three more months to push through, nose to the grindstone, that deadline looming over your head. Three more months in which someone might realise they've made a grave mistake and pull you right back out again, when you'd been so close to that finish line. Three more months feeling like an imposter in these boys' lives, waiting for life to even out into some kind of normal.

"Is that okay?" Chan asks, and you bite down the spiral of thoughts that pulls your mind down towards a big, black hole and nod, trying to pretend that it's nothing. The frown on his face doesn't look convinced, nor does the sheet of paper that he reaches behind him to fetch, shoving it into your hands.

"I want you to understand," he says as you look down at the paper, forcing your fingers to only hold it gently before you can rip it. A schedule, the next three weeks of your life laid out in a neat little chart that is detailed down to the minute and overflowing with things to do. "This is the choice they've given us; either we push you through this schedule and extra dance practise and debut in three weeks, or we wait sixteen weeks, and you do all of these things with the rest of us in a reasonable timeframe. I've been looking at it all week, and...I think it's too much. Waiting gives us a song prepared for nine members, takes the pressure off of the managers, gives you time to get to know everyone..."

You're forced to swallow the lump in your throat as you read the schedule and realise that Chan is right; the next week is full of photoshoots and content creation, with no room left for the dance practise you know you need to keep up with. It's rushed, and it's daunting, and at first look you're not really sure at all how you would handle everything. It's the life you've been training for for years now, and yet so many of the things on this list you feel like you haven't trained for at all.

"You're right," you admit, around a tongue that sits too heavy in your mouth. "I don't know why they thought this would work in the first place, when I'm so-"

"Someone high up had a great idea, and wanted it seen through as fast as possible," Chan says before you can finish. "Stray Kids haven't had a really...successful year. Maybe they were thinking of dropping us unless something changed, maybe they just really liked you. They've already agreed to push your debut back to September anyway, so it's not something we need to worry about now."

"As long as they still think it's a good idea in September," you say, and you manage to keep your tone light even though it doesn't sound much like a joke to you at all.

Changbin is the one to speak up, his hand slapping the arm of the couch. "They can't mess with us like that," he declares in the kind of voice that says he has complete confidence in what he says. "You want to be in Stray Kids, you're in Stray Kids, and you're not leaving."

"Exactly," Chan says warmly, and you manage to muster up a smile even though that tension still squeezes tight in your chest at the thought of another three months of limbo, not knowing if you'll stay or if you'll go. "Now," he says, turning back to his laptop, "I have better news; I've got a part for you in God's Menu that I want to hear, and I can play the next title track for you..."

TAGLIST

@kokinu09 @rainfallingfromthesky @lixie-phoria @mysweethannie @chlodavids @hanniemylovelyquokka @tfshouldidohere @lauraliisa @puppysmileseungmin @kalopsian-thoughts @puppy-minnie @readerofallthingss @dvbkie099 @kthstrawberryshortcake-main @acker-night @d-chagi @lynlyndoll @borahae-reads @ihrtlix @yienmarkk @minhwa @i2innie @jinnie-ret @conwunder @amesification @starssongs98