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[ewomennetwork0]

Apps That Help Entrepreneurs Optimize Their Digital Marketing Strategy

Did you know that there are 582 million entrepreneurs in the world? With numbers like this, entrepreneurs everywhere need a competitive edge. If you’re building and scaling a business, chances are you’re constantly on the lookout for ways to get a leg up on your competitors. To accomplish this, you’ll need a great marketing strategy that stands out in a saturated market and access to the best digital marketing tools.

In this blog, we’re going to outline nine applications you need to optimize your digital marketing strategy. There may be a few that you are familiar with; others might be new to you. These are the ones that can unlock that door to success you’ve been waiting for.

From project management to outsourcing tasks and simplifying your social media marketing efforts, each of these applications will help you get the competitive edge you’re after. Plus, they’re easy-to-use with minimal technical skills required.

Project Management and Collaboration - Trello

The most important part of starting your digital marketing strategy is communicating and setting expectations for deliverables and deadlines for yourself, and if applicable, your team and stakeholders. In the past, most project management efforts took place via email. However, that traditional process was not created to accomplish the dynamic and fast-paced tasks that digital marketing activities demand. 

Trello is a free digital marketing tool for easy project management. The app displays each project like a “board” containing “cards” with checklists, and the user interface is easy to understand and navigate. Like other platforms, there are upgrades that come as paid features to get the most out of it. But, the basic free service entails checklists, deadline reminders, data filtering, activity logs, email notifications, customizable task categories, and more. It’s the best tool to simplify and organize digital marketing projects.

More info : business networking group for women entrepreneurs

[waynes-multiverse]

Plastic Hearts – Part 23

Pairing: Director!Dean Winchester x Actress!Reader

Series Summary: Los Angeles, 1985. Y/N’s a young actress without any success, hopping from one failed audition to the next until one desperate mistake brings her to her breaking point. Dean Winchester, on the other hand, is a grade A asshole and washed-up director at the end of his career, known for his godawful slasher movies in the 70s and his love for blow, booze, and women. Lost in the toxic Hollywood life, their paths cross when one hopeless little wrestling show changes their trajectory.

Chapter Warnings: +18, language, smut, fluff, angst, quiet hurt & a touch of heartbreak

Word Count: 5.7k

A/N: Oh, you'll hate me again for ending it like this. Have fun, guys 😂

<< 22 || Spotify Playlist || Series Masterlist || Main Masterlist

23. Every Breath You Take

“More?” Dean offers the half-emptied wine bottle and holds it over Y/N’s glass as they sit around the dinner table. The actress throws him a raised look with a little smile playing on her lips.

“Are you trying to get me drunk? You don’t have to. I’m already sleeping here,” she points out in amusement.

“Yeah, but when you’re buzzed, you let me do more shit.” The green-eyed director smirks.

“Ew, Dad!” Claire groans next to him. “I’m right here. This is why I don’t wanna do family dinner with you guys.”

“This was actually a nice idea,” Y/N says with a smile so bright it shows her dimples. “Thanks for cooking tonight. Perfect way to start our last week of filming.”

Dean’s heart stings slightly at her words, but he covers it with a tight smile. The last three weeks passed by rather quickly, and each week, he grew more worried, more nervous, more depressed, and more anxious. This was it. Seven more days before it all imploded. Six more nights before he might not see her again.

He has been wracking his brain, trying to come up with solutions to save the show – to keep her. Cas and Jo are out on fairs, networking with networks and showing their tape to other producers in hopes of getting picked up by someone else, still without any success.

“So, uh, any plans so far? Heard some of the girls are going to auditions, looking for other jobs,” Dean notes and nurses his beer. He doesn’t hold it against them. It’s the business, after all, and everyone’s trying to survive and find their next paycheck.

Y/N bobs her head and sets her wine glass down. “Yeah, actually. I was thinking about taking your advice and going to New York for auditions. I like the idea of doing theater or maybe even a musical.”

Dean forces a supportive smile on his face and hides the heartbreak in his ribcage. “Yeah, you should. You’d be great at it.”

“But, uhm, for now, I’m actually driving to San Diego in a few days for an audition for a musical. I’m not gonna get it, but I figured it’d be fun,” she tells him, and even though she downplays it, Dean can see the excitement sparkling in her eyes.

“Oh, c’mon, why wouldn’t you get it?” he encourages her. He promised himself he’d always be her cheerleader, no matter his own feelings on the subject. He’s trying a new thing these days – it’s called being less selfish.

But God, he hopes she gets it. San Diego is a lot closer to LA than New York.

Y/N snorts into her glass, chuckling. “It’s a Sondheim musical, Dean. I’m not expecting to get it. It’s just good practice.”

“Aiming high, huh?” Dean laughs despondently and takes a big gulp of beer to choke down his tears.

Dammit, Dean thinks. He wishes he could call the dude and tell him what a great woman and actress Y/N is. He’d be lucky to have her in his production. Maybe the director could bribe him to hire her? Would that take things too far?

“How are you gonna get down there?” Dean’s eyes drift to the leg in a cast that rests on a chair next to him.

Y/N gives him a shrug of her shoulders. “I don’t know. Take the bus?”

“I’ll drive you,” he says with a swig of his beer. See? Supportive. He’s really proud of himself, although he wishes he were a lot drunker right now.

“Ooh, uh, Claire, I borrowed two dresses from Alex for you. I put them in your room. You need to pick one for your Winter Formal,” Y/N tells his daughter with a bright smile.

But Claire shakes her head with teenage defiance. “I don’t need a dress. Jack and I are going ironically.”

Dean’s brow furrows in confusion as he blinks at his kid. “What the fuck does that mean?”

Claire rolls her eyes in response and groans. “Ugh, Dad, you’d think for someone who lived through counterculture, you’d understand.” With that, she gets up from the dinner table and takes her empty plate to the kitchen sink.

“I know what she means,” Y/N mumbles nonchalantly.

Dean’s bewildered gaze darts to her. “Really? What?”

Y/N coolly shrugs her shoulders as she sips on her wine before she sighs defeatedly. “Fine, I don’t know. I just wanted to sound cooler than you,” she admits with a cute smile.

Dean snorts a laugh. “Yeah, good luck with that.”

“I’m going to bed. Good night! Don’t be too loud!” Claire yells before the door to her room slams shut.

Dean watches Y/N as she leans back in her chair with a blissful sigh and empties her glass. She has pretty much spent every night at his place since the hospital. At this point, the director has gotten so used to it that he wouldn’t know what to do with himself if one night she didn’t. Why can’t it stay this way?

He never thought he’d be someone who wants to have family dinners every night.

“Too tired for dessert?” he asks with a wiggle of his eyebrows and his signature smirk.

Y/N laughs lightly. “I wish one of these days you’d offer me actual dessert,” she quips.

“Like what? Chocolate cake? Pie? I’d actually love some pie. Maybe we should get one for tomorrow night,” Dean muses, chuckling.

Y/N grins mischievously at him and leans her elbows on the dinner table, resting her chin in her palms. “Maybe you can eat pie off of me.”

Dean curls his lips, his cheeks blushing at the idea alone. His dick seems to like it, too. “God, I love… your brain,” he quickly corrects his course before the wrong words slip out.

And it’s not like it isn’t true. While Y/N hasn’t been able to act and tumble around the ring, she’s been coming up with storylines and basically coordinated matches for the past three episodes. She’s also constantly by his side and mans the booth with him. If Dean didn’t sleep with her and like her, he’d actually be scared she’s coming for his job. She’s pretty much directing at this point, and he just lets her because, well, did he actually ever care?

But his declaration is only a small part of the truth, the full truth being that he loves more than just her damn brain and has for a long while. He’s been trying to say the words for weeks now, started and stopped a hundred times, and tried to pack his feelings into a coherent sentence that honestly shouldn’t be more than three words long.

However, those are some big three words. Monstrous for Y/N. And deep down, Dean knows she might feel like he does, too, but can’t admit it and doesn’t know what the hell to do with it. To her, this little arrangement between them is nothing more than friends who fuck. Only Dean’s aware that they’re actually in a deeply serious relationship, which is maddeningly ridiculous.

But hey, if he keeps his mouth shut, they might make it another five years like this without Y/N running away, so that’s something.

Dean then rises from his seat and offers his hands to Y/N. Her leg is still in a cast, so she has been wobbling around on crutches or hopping clumsily across a room. It’s pretty darn cute.

“Thank you,” Y/N says gratefully as Dean helps her up and slings her arm around his neck before he fully hoists her into his arms. She giggles as he carries her into the bedroom. “You don’t have to do this every night, you know. I can walk just fine.”

“Says you, but truth is, you’ve never seen yourself walk on these things. It’s pathetic,” he teases her and plops her carefully down on the bed.

He flings off his shirt and removes his jeans and underwear as Y/N unbuttons her blouse. The mattress dips as he climbs into the bed and helps her discard her pants. It’s routine at this point, but Dean has really started to cherish the stability. Every morning when he wakes up and smiles at her, he loves knowing that he’ll fall asleep right next to her at night all over again.

Gently, he spreads her legs and slots between them. His lips find hers in the moonlit dark and kiss her with deep affection and burning love, always pouring his whole heart into each kiss and hoping one of these days it’ll stick.

Grabbing a condom from the nightstand, he rolls it over his throbbing length and positions his dickhead at her entrance, slipping into her tight channel till she’s full of him. Her lips part as the same little gasp escapes her that he hears every time he enters her. He loves hearing that noise almost as much as he loves to hear the big one when she comes and the medium ones in-between.

Sometimes, Dean makes her come before, but on nights like these, when she’s already had half a bottle of wine, he rather works quick. While wine makes her louder and more daring, it also renders her quite sleepy.

“Fuck,” she sighs and closes her eyes with a euphoric smile, her pussy gripping his cock tight as she clenches around him. “You’re always so good at that.”

Dean smiles amusedly. Wine makes her chatty, too. “I haven’t even done anything yet, sweetheart,” he remarks.

“Well, I guess I just-… I just love your cock,” she says bluntly and grins up at him. “And those lips.”

See? Wine.

“These ones?” Dean asks teasingly and leans down, pulling one of her nipples between them till she squirms.

“Uh-huh, yes…” she moans softly and cards her hands through his hair, causing a groan to pass his lips. “And that tongue.”

“This one?” Dean lets his tongue roll over that same nipple till it peaks, feeling her arch her back underneath him.

“Yes, and God, those hands and fingers…” she almost whines.

“Those two?” Dean snakes a hand between their bodies, two of his fingers finding her clit and drawing tickling circles.

There’s no more strength left for words. She bites harshly down on her bottom lip and nods vividly. Her cunt clutches him tightly, eliciting a giddy chuckle from him. He loves making her squirm.

Three more squeezes, and he knows he has to move before she grows impatient. He knows her well by now, knows every little detail about her, and loves that he does. They haven’t even been able to do half the things he wants to do to her due to her current injury and inability to move (or bend) as freely.

And yet, he’s still not fucking bored, not in the slightest. He keeps waiting for it, but it never comes.

On the contrary, he appreciates the feeling of knowing someone so deeply and intimately as he knows Y/N. She has become a part of his soul, and he doesn’t know if he could ever cut her out without severely hurting himself. He’s not sure if he could survive a wound this deep.

“Dean, please…”

That was the fourth – like clockwork.

Dean manages to thrust twice before loud punk rock music shakes the walls and drowns out every noise in the entire house. Hell, the whole neighborhood can probably hear it.

Frustrated, his head drops momentarily to Y/N’s shoulder as the actress snorts a giggle. He can feel her body and cunt trembling around him, but not for the reason it should.

“Claire!” Dean shouts angrily. “Turn that fucking music down! Y/N’s trying to sleep!”

“No, she’s not!” his kid yells back through the wall and the unbearable music. “I know you guys are having sex! I don’t wanna hear anything!”

“We’re not having sex,” Dean barks and watches as Y/N gapes at him in sheer playfulness.

“Wow, you lie like that to your kid?” she teases him.

“What d’you want me to say? ‘I’m sorry, you’re right. I’m inside of her now’?” Dean retorts wryly, making Y/N burst into uncontrollable laughter as she snorts into his shoulder. “Can you please stop laughing while I’m trying to fuck you? My soldier’s already retreating.”

But Y/N only laughs harder at that, tears streaming down her cheeks as Dean’s lips purse with a sigh through his nose. She then exhales a deep, long breath, trying to calm herself. He’s seen her do this very move a hundred times during an acting scene.

She clears her throat and tries to force a more serious look onto her features. “How about a little Russian motivation?” she says in her infamous accent and smiles when his cock twitches in agreement. “Maybe some oral manipulation, yes?”

“Oh, fuck yeah.” Dean grins and leans down to capture her lips. “God, I love yo… your pussy,” he quickly corrects himself once more. That was a close one.

Alright, don’t look at him like that and don’t judge him. He’s trying. He really is.

But Jesus fucking Christ, he loves living these days. Who knew his forties would be the best time of his life?

With a big yawn, Y/N rubs her eyes and stretches her arms over her head. The shower in the main bathroom is running with Dean already in it. She grabs her crutches and hops to the window, opening the blinds to let some sunlight in.

She takes a deep breath and enjoys the morning silence for a moment, her gaze drifting out the quiet neighborhood. It has never been this peaceful in the motel. The last three weeks, she has really appreciated waking up in Dean’s bed. She knows she’s probably overstaying her welcome at this point, but he hasn’t kicked her to the curb yet, so she hasn’t been in a hurry to return to the motel, either.

He was right – the memory foam mattress is fucking heaven, especially with a broken ankle.

All in all, she imagined being benched for the show would be a lot worse than it is. Dean’s done a great job of incorporating her anywhere outside of the ring. She’s helping with storylines, training, directing, producing – really anything that could use a few tweaks. The green-eyed director is unfashionably nice to her. Maybe it’s the sex or their friendship or a combination of both. Either way, she’s grateful for him.

However, there’s this tiny voice inside her head that keeps telling her there’s a reason why Dean’s been so nice, and it’s not just the sex. It’s certain kisses and touches and looks – especially the looks – that make her believe there’s something lying underneath the surface. An iceberg so gigantic it could sink the Titanic. Whenever she catches his clandestine gazes from her periphery, there’s this inexplicable feeling that creeps through her veins.

Her peace is disturbed when excessive knocking and an uninterrupted ringing of the doorbell draw her attention to the front door. A part of her expects to find her best friend behind it. Only Jo could be this ruthless and obnoxious.

Y/N hurries to the door as fast as she can, which isn’t fast at all, considering she’s on crutches. Everything is just awkward and slow these days, but she’s been practicing moving around in hopes of joining the show again for the final episode. Billie and Donna have been helping her, too.

But as Y/N opens the door, she’s not greeted by the familiar blonde but by a brunette stranger instead. The only similarity the woman shares with Jo is that she’s incredibly hot and angry, too.

“Can I help you?” Y/N asks with a look of bewilderment, although she shouldn’t be surprised to find a mad woman on Dean’s doorstep.

“I’m Lisa Braeden. I’m looking for my daughter,” the woman says, somewhat impatiently.

Oh.

“Uh…”

Y/N stumps for a moment, eyeing the woman in front of her closely. So, this is Claire’s mother. Dean’s ex. She tries not to feel insecure around her, but it’s hard, considering the woman is a bombshell with perfect curves and flawless features. And if she looks like that now, Y/N wonders what she must’ve looked like seventeen years ago.

The actress suddenly feels very exposed in only the director’s flannel. Truthfully, she looks like she just crawled out of a gutter. Maybe it’s the fact she has just woken up and is sporting major bed-head, but Lisa probably thinks Dean took in a homeless person. The cast and crutches don’t help, either. And then, Y/N wonders why a part of her cares at all what the brunette thinks and reminds herself it’s not a competition.

“Dean? Dean!”

Her voice carries a certain amount of panic that’s probably uncalled for. Yet, it helps. The shower turns off, and not a minute later, Dean stands next to her with only a towel wrapped around his waist, his broad chest still glistening with droplets of water.

He does know how to make an entrance.

Dean’s brow is deeply creased when he takes in the woman at the door, lacking a sense of recognition, however. “What the fuck is all that noise?”

“I’m the fucking noise,” Lisa replies dryly. “I’m here for my kid.”

“Oh…” Dean stumps as well. Then, he swallows thickly and gives her a nervous smile. “Hi, uhm, I’m Dean Winchester.”

“I know who you fucking are, you moron,” Lisa huffs, shaking her head. “You got me pregnant. Where’s Claire?” When neither Dean nor Y/N answer, Lisa rolls her eyes and waltzes past the two inside the house. “Claire!”

“Sure, come on in,” Dean mutters under his breath and shares a wide-eyed look with Y/N, hoping for some guidance.

The actress eyes him up and down, pensively licking her lips. “Maybe you should get dressed.”

With some pants and a shirt on, Dean and Y/N have retreated to the kitchen and sip quietly on their cups of coffee while Lisa and Claire scream at each other. It’s a classic mother and teenage daughter battle. Claire fights for freedom, while Lisa fights for control.

“I had sex with that woman seventeen years ago. Now she’s in my house, yelling at my kid,” the director voices his thoughts out loud, a hint of trepidation shimmering in his green eyes.

“Yup, life has a way of catching up with you. Kinda learned that this year,” Y/N notes with pursed lips and sends him a smile. “But hey, they’re your family now. Kinda nice, right?”

“I can’t tell if you’re joking,” Dean huffs with a bitter look and watches Y/N place her mug in the sink.

“I should probably go. Leave you guys to figure this out,” Y/N announces, one hop on a healthy foot away from walking out the door. “I’ll call a cab.”

“No, don’t! You can’t leave me here alone with them,” Dean pleads, the sheer panic and desperation visible in his eyes and audible in his voice. His gaze bores into her. “C’mon, I need you. This is one of those, you know, friendship moments. Like abortions and getting over coke addictions.”

Y/N lets out a small sigh. How could she leave him after everything he’s done for her? She basically has no choice but to stay and help him through this. “What d’you want me to do? Mediate?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.” Dean shrugs helplessly. “I just know I’m gonna say all the wrong shit at the wrong time. Please. I don’t wanna lose my kid. Help me.”

As she catches his gaze, there’s that inexplicable feeling creeping through her veins again. This time, it even tugs on her heart.

“Okay, uhm, alright. I’ll stay,” she promises him, offering him a small smile of comfort.

Unbeknownst to her, though, Dean comes close to saying the three ominous words once more. It’s getting harder every day to keep them inside. How long does he have until he bursts? He feels like a ticking time bomb.

“Maybe we should all sit down and talk?” Y/N suggests as soon as Claire has stormed into her room and slammed the door in upset.

“About what?” Lisa barks, half-annoyed as she rests her hands on her squared-off hips. “She’s been lying to me for months.”

“Okay, in my defense, she told me you were crazy,” Dean explains with an innocent shrug.

“I don’t care if she told you I beat her and locked her into the basement. If a kid has run away from home, you call their mother,” Lisa retorts furiously.

Dean purses his lips in defeat for a moment, especially when Y/N seems to agree. She’s kind of his moral compass, but he’s not ready to accept his loss yet. “Well, you didn’t call me to tell me you were having a kid. My kid,” he argues and knows it’ll probably backfire. He can tell by Y/N’s frown.

“Oh, excuse me for not calling the guy who didn’t stay for breakfast,” Lisa counters with an eye roll.

Dean’s brow furrows, shaking his head. “I don’t think that’s what happened.” Granted, he’s been high for two decades now.

“I asked if you wanted pancakes. You said, ‘No, thanks, but that was fun.’ And then you got into your car and bolted, never to be seen again,” Lisa recalls, frowning.

“Uhm, that sounds like it was a long time ago,” Y/N interjects in his defense, chuckling nervously. “He’s a different and more mature person now.”

Dean’s heart swells to twice its size. It’s probably the nicest thing anyone’s ever said about him. Although, he can tell she only said it to win Lisa over. She’s a good actress, making even him believe her words. But she’s helping him, so it’s the thought that counts.

“Thanks for the input. Who are you again? Are you his fucking maid?” Lisa arches a brow at her, eyeing her up and down.

“No, she’s not my maid,” Dean replies fiercely but then doesn’t know what else to say. Girlfriend? Lover? Friend? Nothing sounds right. “She’s my, uhm, she’s my actress. She’s my… You know, she’s… She’s Y/N.”

At that, Y/N’s brow draws together in the middle with a tilt of her head. Dean surmises that answer probably sounded even weirder.

“Yeah, I can see you’ve changed so much.” Lisa scoffs sarcastically and folds her arms over her chest, her patience running low.

Y/N subtly clears her throat, deciding to step in. God knows the director needs all the help he can get. “Okay, uhm, it doesn’t really matter who I am,” she says and shares a look with Dean, who anxiously chews his bottom lip raw. “What matters is that Dean has really connected with Claire over the last few months. He’s enrolled her in high school, she has joined AV club, she’s got a really nice and sweet boyfriend.” Dean grimaces at that last part, but Y/N skillfully ignores it and continues, “They’re going to Winter Formal tonight.”

“Yeah, I’m chaperoning,” Dean announces proudly. “This dance is very meaningful to her.”

Lisa snorts a laugh, clearly amused. “My kid does not go to dances.”

“Yes, I do!” Claire suddenly stands in the middle of the living room with the brightest smile. It’s freaky, really. She gleefully holds up the two dresses Y/N brought over last night, feigning her excitement. “Which one should I wear?”

Lisa and Dean disagree on the dress choice, but when Y/N sides with Lisa, Claire takes the hint and quickly disappears back into her room.

“It’s just one night, and it will give you two some time to catch up. Figure this out,” Y/N advocates suggestively.

“Yeah, what she said,” Dean agrees and clears his dry throat, wishing he had a bottle of booze in his hand to calm his nerves. Man, in stressful situations like these, he does miss coke sometimes. But fucking Y/N has been a great substitute, so maybe he’ll just do that as soon as that crazy woman leaves his house again. “Look, I get that you’re angry. But I’m really trying here, okay? She’s doing great at school, I gave her a curfew… I wanna make up for lost time,” he explains sincerely. Y/N sends him a proud smile.

“Fine, one night, but tomorrow we’re leaving,” Lisa relents with a sigh. ��I’m not gonna indulge this fucking father-daughter fantasy,” she huffs and then finally storms out of the house.

Y/N exhales a long sigh of relief. “Well, that went better than expected.”

“You think?” Dean checks insecurely. He doesn’t know what he would’ve done if Y/N hadn’t been here to support him. “You’re coming tonight, right?”

Surprised by the request, Y/N’s brow meets her hairline. “You want me to go to your daughter’s Winter Formal with you?”

“Yes, obviously,” Dean states matter-of-factly and blinks at her. “You can’t leave me alone with that woman.”

Y/N heaves another sigh as she looks at him. “Okay, fine,” she surrenders.

Sitting on the bleachers of a fully decorated gym, Y/N realizes she has kind of missed high school. At least, everything used to be much simpler back then. Your crush would ask you to go steady, you’d say yes or no, and then you’d be broken up shortly after prom.

Adulthood is complicated. People are complicated. And love is goddamn unfathomably complicated.

“It’s so weird seeing her with her first high school boyfriend,” Lisa notes with a small sigh next to her. “I still remember her drawing with crayons. Now, she’s running miles away, lying, and making out with a boy.”

“Yeah, teenage romance is a lot more intense,” Y/N says, chuckling softly.

“She won’t wear a dress to my wedding. Refused to. Screamed bloody murder,” Lisa says thoughtfully. “But after spending a few months with her estranged father, she suddenly puts one on.”

“People are complicated,” Y/N reiterates her earlier sentiment.

Claire is complicated. Dean is complicated. And Y/N? She might be the most complicated of all.

“My fiancé is not,” Lisa says, a delicate smile playing across her lips. It’s enough to show her happiness. “I always used to date these guys that would run so hot and then completely cold the next minute. I never knew where I stood. It was exhausting.”

“Yeah, I get it…”

Y/N’s eyes drift to Dean as he chats with one of the other dads by the buffet. She doesn’t know what the director wants from her. She doesn’t know what their relationship even is. One minute, it feels epic, like a love so legendary it should only exist on the silver screen. And the next minute, it feels trivial, like it should’ve never existed at all.

But Dean’s not the problem. Deep down, she knows what that creeping feeling in the pits of her stomach is. And she knows she’s not ready for it. Truth is, Y/N has no idea what she wants and feels lost. Because if she admits one thing, it’d mean the end of another. If she stays in LA for a guy, what would that mean for her career? She doesn’t want to end up like Jo. She’s finally about to have it all, only to realize both at the same time are a mere dream.

And worst of all, even if she did know what she wanted, she’s doesn’t know if she deserves it.

“So, what d’you do, son?” an older man next to Dean asks. He’s already balding and gray, as is the scruffy beard he’s sporting. His suit jacket with a name tag that reads “Chaperone” looks a little worn and sleazy, too. The director figured he’d be one of the oldest dads here, so this guy comes as a pleasant surprise.

“I’m a director of a women’s wrestling show,” Dean replies and takes a sip from the fruit punch. None of the kids have spiked it yet, which is quite the disappointment. What’s happening to today’s youth, huh? “And you?”

“Oh, nice.” The man nods with a smile and pulls out a business card from his suit jacket, handing it to Dean. “Bobby Singer. I own a small chain of strip clubs, although my wife Ellen would probably like me to tell you I’m a small business owner.”

“Got it.” Dean chuckles and glances at the card in his hands. “Bobby’s Body Shop. Oh, hey, I know this one! ‘Where the girls are hotter than the asphalt,’” he quotes the club’s tagline proudly, grinning. “I’m there all the time! Actually got one of your girls in my show.”

Bobby chuckles. “Well, next time you’re there, ask for me. I’ll get you a discount.”

“Thanks.” Dean smirks. And Cas claims you can only network on the fucking golf course. “Oh, hey, you should catch one of our shows. It’s our last one this week. It’s pretty badass. We’re over at the old gym in Watts.”

“Alright, I’ll see you there,” Bobby says with a smile.

Dean’s eyes then drift to Y/N on the bleachers. Last time he checked on her, she was still chatting with Lisa, but the brunette has since left. And as he glances at her now, Y/N has found herself encircled by a group of horny teenage boys, causing his brows to draw together and meet in the middle. They’re like fucking vultures.

“Shoo!” Dean barks sternly at the young men as he approaches the group and watches them scurry away with their tails tugged between their scrawny legs.

With an amused smile, Y/N arches an eyebrow at him. “Glad you’ve decided to join me. It was getting crowded. I’ve turned down about twenty offers to dance.”

“Look at you, you little heartbreaking cougar,” Dean retorts with a teasing smile. “You’re gonna turn me down, too?”

“I have a broken ankle. Did you forget that part? I can’t dance,” Y/N replies.

“Oh, c’mon, that never stopped you before. ‘Sides, I’ve got two working legs and can’t dance, either. So, what d’you say, huh?” Dean holds out his hands for her to grasp.

“Fine,” Y/N relents and grabs his hands, hopping to her feet. “Let’s do some awkward swaying.”

“That’s the spirit.” Dean laughs and rests his palms on her hips, helping her stand as she locks her arms around his neck.

“Is that what you had in mind?” Y/N asks teasingly as she looks up and meets his gaze.

“Kinda.” Dean dips his head and catches her lips, deepening the kiss with his tongue slipping inside her mouth.

“Dean,” she scolds him softly with blushed cheeks and a giggle that surely won’t keep him from doing shit. “There’s people here. Teenagers.”

“So? It’s nothing they wouldn’t do,” Dean remarks mischievously. “And no one’s here that we know. Claire’s caught us like a million times already, and Lisa doesn’t care. C’mon, we never get to do those things in public,” he appeals with a wiggle of his brows.

“Alright,” Y/N surrenders with a small sigh and a smile, tiptoeing up on one foot to press her soft lips back on his. She feels him breath into the kiss, cherishing every second of it. His hands wander from her hips to cup her cheeks, causing her to almost topple over as he forgets that he’s been steadying her. “Whoa, Dean!”

Her giggle interrupts the kiss as she tightens her grip around his neck before he moves his hands back to their place on her hips, offering her support again. She leans her head against his chest, and he rests his chin on her crown.

“Sorry, got carried away there for a moment,” he apologizes with a snicker, pecking the top of her head gently.

“Yeah, that happens with you sometimes,” she teases and buries her head deeper into his shirt. “Your heart’s beating really fast. Are you on something again?”

Dean wants to say it’s love, but that sounds too fucking cheesy.

“Nope, still clean,” he replies instead and doesn’t take offense in her question. “Just nerves, I guess. There’s something I wanna tell you,” he says and licks his lips, swallowing thickly.

Y/N looks up and finds his green eyes, her brow knitting in curiosity. But there’s a perceptive shimmer in her orbs, and Dean knows she can already anticipate what’s coming next. Judging by her shift in weight, he can tell she doesn’t want him to say it out loud.

“Shit, uhm…” She squeezes her eyes shut and fumbles for an excuse. Dean gives her a plethora of time to find a believable one. “I have to go. I promised the girls we’d work out a plot for the finale together tonight, celebrate our last week.”

Dean’s lips quiver but manage to find a smile. “You sure?”

Reluctantly, Y/N still nods and lets out a tense breath. “Yeah.”

It feels like dancing around a big, pink elephant between them. Both of them pretend it’s invisible, although it’s painfully not. It’s even roaring or hooting or whatever the fuck elephants do.

“Alright, I’ll drive you to the motel,” Dean capitulates with a resigned nod.

“No, uh, stay,” she tells him and clumsily hops back to the bleachers to grab her crutches. “I’ll get a cab. You should spend your night with Claire. Figure things out with Lisa.”

“Okay,” Dean caves once more but then grabs hold of her, pulling her to his lips. The kiss is fervent and heated and desperate. So fucking desperate. “One for the road,” he says with a painful smile as he draws back. He doesn’t want to admit that it might be the last one they have shared.

Y/N’s look tells him she feels the finality, too. It’s the epilogue of the best book he’s ever read. The end credits of his favorite movie. The final episode of a show he loved.

“I’m sorry,” she says quietly with a hesitant lip bite and a harrowing swallow.

“Don’t be. Have fun, okay? I’ll see you tomorrow,” Dean says and sends her one last weak smile before he watches her walk away with an aching heart.

24. Don't Dream It's Over

Honestly, even my cold, cold heart weeped at the end there. Poor Dean 😢💔 But as you can guess from next week's title, we're not done yet 😉

TAGS:

Everything Jensen: @alwaystiredandconfused @xlynnbbyx @lyarr24 @deans-spinster-witch @blackcherrywhiskey

@deansbbyx @foxyjwls007 @ladysparkles78 @roseblue373 @zepskies

@agalliasi @yvonneeeee @hobby27 @iamsapphine @globetrotter28

@mxltifxnd0m @lacilou @feyresqueen @suckitands33 @onlyangel-444

@syrma-sensei @perpetualabsurdity @deans-baby-momma @yoobusgoobus

Everything Dean: @SnowAyumi

[girlsdressingrooms]

Iris Barrel Apfel, Decorator and Fashion Stylist

(August 29, 1921 – March 1, 2024) 

Ms. Apfel was one of the most vivacious personalities in the worlds of fashion, textiles, and interior design, she has cultivated a personal style that is both witty and exuberantly idiosyncratic.

Her originality was typically revealed in her mixing of high and low fashions—Dior haute couture with flea market finds, nineteenth-century ecclesiastical vestments with Dolce & Gabbana lizard trousers.

With remarkable panache and discernment, she combines colors, textures, and patterns without regard to period, provenance, and, ultimately, aesthetic conventions. Paradoxically, her richly layered combinations—even at their most extreme and baroque—project a boldly graphic modernity.

Iris Barrel was born on Aug. 29, 1921, in Astoria, Queens, the only child of Samuel Barrel, who owned a glass and mirror business, and his Russian-born wife, Sadye, who owned a fashion boutique.

She studied art history at New York University, then qualified to teach and did so briefly in Wisconsin before fleeing back to New York to work on Women's Wear Daily, and for interior designer Elinor Johnson, decorating apartments for resale and honing her talent for sourcing rare items before opening her own design firm. She was also an assistant to illustrator Robert Goodman.

As a distinguished collector and authority on antique fabrics, Iris Apfel has consulted on numerous restoration projects that include work at the White House that spanned nine presidencies from Harry Truman to Bill Clinton.

Along with her husband, Carl, she founded Old World Weavers, an international textile manufacturing company and ran it until they retired in 1992. The Apfels specialized in the reproduction of fabrics from the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries, and traveled to Europe twice a year in search of textiles they could not source in the United States.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute assembled 82 ensembles and 300 accessories from her personal collection in 2005 in a show about her called “Rara Avis”.

Almost overnight, Ms. Apfel became an international celebrity of pop fashion.

Ms. Apfel was seen in a television commercial for the French car DS 3, became the face of the Australian fashion brand Blue Illusion, and began a collaboration with the start-up WiseWear. A year later, Mattel created a one-of-a-kind Barbie doll in her image. Last year, she appeared in a beauty campaign for makeup with Ciaté London.

Six years after the Met show she started her fashion line "Rara Avis" with the Home Shopping Network.

She was cover girl of Dazed and Confused, among many other publications, window display artist at Bergdorf Goodman, designer and design consultant, then signed to IMG in 2019 as a model at age 97.

Ms. Iris Apfel became a visiting professor at the University of Texas at Austin in its Division of Textiles and Apparel, teaching about imagination, craft and tangible pleasures in a world of images.

 In 2018, she published “Iris Apfel: Accidental Icon,” an autobiographical collection of musings, anecdotes and observations on life and style. 

Ms. Apfel’s apartments in New York and Palm Beach were full of furnishings and tchotchkes that might have come from a Luis Buñuel film: porcelain cats, plush toys, statuary, ornate vases, gilt mirrors, fake fruit, stuffed parrots, paintings by Velázquez and Jean-Baptiste Greuze, a mannequin on an ostrich.

The Museum of Lifestyle & Fashion History in Boynton Beach, Florida, is designing a building that will house a dedicated gallery of Ms. Apfel's clothes, accessories, and furnishings.

Ms. Apfel’s work had a universal quality, It’s was a trend.

Rest in Power !

[pwhl-mybeloved]

The Professional Women’s Hockey League is officially preparing for expansion.

The league — with six franchises in Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa, Minnesota, Boston and New York — will add up to two teams as early as the 2025-26 season.

League officials have not shared where they plan to send their request for proposals — which marks the first step in expansion — only that the league is looking for the right market size, fan base, facilities and economic opportunity.

“It’s about finding the best market, the best fan base and the best partners,” Jayna Hefford, the PWHL’s senior vice president of hockey operations told The Athletic after Tuesday’s announcement.

It’s still very early in the process, but here are our top eight potential PWHL expansion teams.

Pittsburgh

It’s fair to imagine Pittsburgh will be among the top contenders for expansion. The Penguins — backed by Fenway Sports Group, which owns the Penguins, the Boston Red Sox and Liverpool F.C. — have been staunch in their support for women’s hockey and desire for an expansion franchise.

The Penguins hosted a PWHL game at PPG Paints Arena last season with almost 9,000 fans in attendance — the ninth-most attended game in the regular season. A women’s team could play its home games at PPG or at an expanded Lemieux Sports Complex in Cranberry Township, which is around 22 miles north of the team’s downtown arena.

The facility serves as the Penguins’ practice facility with two NHL-sized sheets of ice and land on which to build. Penguins president of business operations Kevin Acklin has suggested that a new third sheet of ice, with seating in line with modern arenas for NCAA Division I programs, could serve as a base of operations for a PWHL team. That would include offices for management and coaches, locker rooms, training and medical areas — essentially anything and everything a professional team would require, want and “deserve,” Acklin told The Athletic in January.

Games could also easily be broadcast on SportsNet Pittsburgh – a regional sports network FSG acquired in 2023 – which already carried some PWHL games last season, even without a team based in Pittsburgh.

Detroit

The city affectionately known as “Hockeytown” would be a natural choice for an expansion franchise. Hefford basically said as much at the neutral site game hosted at Little Caesars Arena last season, which set a U.S. record for attendance at a women’s professional hockey game (13,736).

“It just seems like an obvious (spot) for a hockey market that we’d love to be a part of,” she said. “And although not in our Original Six, it’s somewhere that we still, I think, have our eyes on. And tonight has just been another proof point that this is a market that loves hockey and I think loves women’s hockey.”

Given the attendance at the game last season and the fight for a Division I women’s team at the University of Michigan, there is an appetite for women’s hockey in the state and a strong grassroots system, with programs like Little Caesars and HoneyBaked Hockey Club. According to USA Hockey, Michigan ranked fourth in female hockey registration last season only behind Minnesota, Massachusetts and New York – three states that already have PWHL franchises.

The biggest issue with Detroit is the venue. The Red Wings and the NBA’s Detroit Pistons are full-time occupants at LCA, which also hosts plenty of concerts and other events. USA Hockey Arena in Plymouth, Mich., less than 30 miles outside of Detroit, is a potential alternative, but with a 3,500 capacity it would be on the small side.

PWHL fans can pack venues such as Scotiabank Arena in Toronto. But what’s the best size and scope for every game of the season? (Mark Blinch / Getty Images)

Washington, D.C.

Before the PWHL officially selected its original six markets, D.C., often came up as a potential landing spot, and it made a lot of sense. The Washington Capitals hosted two successful Professional Women’s Hockey Players’ Association events that served as the barnstorming precursor to the PWHL. Back in April, Monumental Sports & Entertainment majority owner Ted Leonsis told CNBC he wants to make D.C. “the capital of women’s professional sports.”

Like Pittsburgh, a Monumental-backed PWHL team would have broadcast infrastructure via the Monumental Sports Network. But, like Detroit, it could struggle to find an appropriate – or available – arena. Capital One Arena hosts the Capitals, the NBA’s Washington Wizards and the Georgetown men’s basketball team. The Capitals practice facility, where the PWHPA events were held, only has seating for around 1,200. Entertainment & Sports Arena – home of the WNBA’s Washington Mystics, which is also owned by Monumental – would be an upgrade in size with around 4,100 seats, but it’s unclear if the facility has the capacity to accommodate a hockey rink.

Chicago

If the PWHL wants to lead its first wave of expansion with a major American sports city, Chicago will be tough to beat.

It’s a strong grassroots hockey market, with several youth programs and a number of notable home-grown national team players including Hockey Hall of Fame inductee Cammi Granato, Kendall Coyne Schofield, and Abbey Murphy – who could graduate from college and be the team’s first-ever draft pick. You have to admit, that would be very cool.

Not to sound like a broken record, but the venue will be the biggest hurdle when it comes to a city like Chicago.

The United Center is likely too big and too busy. Wintrust Arena, where the WNBA’s Chicago Sky play, is interesting with around 10,000 seats. But it’s largely a basketball venue. Could it facilitate a sheet of ice? That remains to be seen.

Allstate Arena, home to the AHL’s Chicago Wolves, seems like an easy alternative. It’s around 20 miles from the downtown core in Rosemont, Ill., where Chicago’s O’Hare Airport is located. It’s a big venue (18,500), but shouldn’t be as hard to get in as the United Center.

It’s also worth noting the Minnesota Frost are the only team in the American Midwest; a Chicago expansion could fix that.

St. Louis

Speaking of Midwestern cities, St. Louis checks a lot of the boxes. It’s a dedicated hockey market – the Blues’ attendance figures have hovered around 18,000 for over a decade now – with strong girls youth hockey participation.

The Blues have invested in growing girls and women’s hockey in St. Louis, with learn-to-play programs and previously hosting PWHPA events. CEO Chris Zimmerman has also been open about the team’s desire to host a PWHL game in the city.

Figuring out facilities in St. Louis seems less complicated than some other destinations. The Blues are the primary tenant at the Enterprise Center and have a new $83 million practice rink just outside of the city, the Centene Community Ice Center. The facility is home to the NCAA DI Lindenwood hockey teams and has capacity for over 4,500 people – a fine size for a new franchise.

The Minnesota Frost are currently the only PWHL team in the American Midwest. Expansion to Chicago or St. Louis could add another. (David Berding / Getty Images)

Halifax

While the first five cities on this list have been in NHL markets, a potential NHL partnership is not a prerequisite. Neither is being in the United States, although there certainly seem to be more major U.S. markets than what might be possible in Canada. That being said, Halifax is an interesting prospect, especially if the league wants to consider markets outside of Ontario or the greater Toronto area.

Nova Scotia is a smaller province than Alberta, Manitoba or British Columbia but it is geographically closer to where the league currently operates, which is largely in Northeastern U.S. cities and Eastern Canada.

The Scotiabank Centre – home of the CHL’s Halifax Mooseheads – has a capacity of around 11,000 and will host Game 6 of the Canada-USA Rivalry Series in February. The arena also hosts pro lacrosse. Truthfully, it would be surprising if Halifax was the seventh PWHL franchise, but the Rivalry Series game could prove to be an critical audition for pro women’s hockey in the Maritimes.

Quebec City

On Wednesday, the PWHL officially announced Quebec City will host a neutral-site game between Montreal and Ottawa this season. City councillor Jackie Smith has already called the game the first step to landing an expansion franchise in Quebec City, according to the Associated Press.

Quebec City has an NHL-caliber rink – the 18,000-seat Vidéotron Centre where the neutral-site game will be played – that could host a full-time PWHL team with little to no scheduling issues.

Not to mention, the city is a hockey hotbed that hasn’t had a major professional hockey team since the Nordiques left in 1995. The Los Angeles Kings and Boston Bruins played in front of a packed building during this year’s NHL preseason. The Quebec Remparts, the city’s QMJHL team, are typically among the leaders in attendance across the CHL.

It’s easy to imagine the city embracing a PWHL team.

Western expansion

League officials have said they are not putting any guardrails on potential expansion franchises – meaning they aren’t shutting down expanding far outside its current footprint.

Calgary has had successful women’s professional sports franchises in the past – the CWHL’s Calgary Inferno won the last-ever Clarkson Cup in 2019. The Seattle Kraken hold the record for attendance at a U.S. women’s national team game on American soil (14,551). The Vancouver Canucks are a billion-dollar-franchise and British Columbia has become a hotbed for elite young talent, including Canadian phenom Chloe Primerano. There’s California to consider, too, where many of PWHL owner Mark Walter’s franchises – the Los Angeles Dodgers, Los Angeles Lakers and Los Angeles Sparks – are currently based.

There are places in Western Canada and the Pacific Northwest that could and eventually should be home to PWHL franchises. However, adding a team on the other side of North America would come at a significant cost at a really early – and still growing – stage of the business.

Of course, it’s all going to depend on what is proposed. If, say, the Seattle Kraken are offering the kind of support and infrastructure we saw during the Rivalry Series, maybe the league won’t be able to say no.

[that-one-anxious-mango]

F.O.U.R Letter Word

a message from your network: hello! and welcome to the pilot episode of Four Letter Word. this series is loosely based on the hit show Sex and the City! this is also my first roman reigns/jimmy uso fic...ever. so please any and all feedback is welcome. happy ' watching'

starring roman reigns x black! oc, jimmy uso x black! oc, black! oc x poc oc!

content warning: nsfw, explicit language, tiny angst, alluded themes of mental health mentions, mild smut. also may cause happiness from viewing.

rated: tv-ma

not rated for viewers under 18+ (mdni)

running time: 10.5k words

Once upon a time in the city of angels , a young and freshly graduated black girl found herself stumbling around through the busy traffic ridden streets hoping to not get hit by carriages or pieces of the sky, better known as construction beams, while navigating through the many characters and creatures it had to offer.

She’d moved to the city to begin her job of dressing and tailoring to the princes and princesses of a small New York Theatre. 

 A dream of hers she had since she was a child.

But while this opportunity was a dream come true, it wasn’t exactly all she’d wished for on that little star each night before bed.

No, she’d also dreamed of the one thing she knew in her mind would help her fairytale become a happily ever after sequence: A Husband….or Wife. 

So, while she continued to work and construct her craft professionally during the day, at night she was looking for someone who could help construct and build her life alongside theirs  personally.   

Upon this search she would encounter men whose true personalities and intentions appeared upon the midnight hour, both women and men whose magic spells of attractiveness didn’t exactly work in person the same way it did on the phone, and overall people who just were always turned out to be too good to be true. 

After what seemed like months of tiresome searching,  her glimmer fainted into a small gleam, and she held tight onto all the magic and hope she had left with all her might. 

And she was right too, because without it she may have never believed her eyes when she met him underneath the full bright moon and under the bright theater lights that warm and magical May night. 

All because he needed help navigating the system of the NY streets. Offering what little help she could, in return for her help he himself offered her a dinner at one of the places in the city where the dishes probably washed themselves.

Accepting, within the course of that two hour dinner, she hadn’t denied the spark that she’d felt.

That zing..

That pop…

That thing you could only find in the movies…

And besides that she also learned in this short time, that he was everything she’d ever dreamed of to find in a man. 

Handsome, kind hearted, sweet, intellectual, driven, established, and last of all wealthy.

All things that crossed her box. 

But soon after the dinner she also would get to cross off another important box off her wish for a spouse: Good in Bed.

And so quickly a romance ensued.

Date nights, long weekend trips, holidays spent together, stupid monogrammed initials in the towels she kept at his place kind of romance. 

Yes, of course like all other great love stories there were certain…dragons to be slain…or towers to climb. But hey what great love story didn’t…no matter how many.

That is why when he gave her the fairytale proposal of her life, she’d eagerly said yes.

But on the day of the same fairytale wedding they planned, worth a pretty penny, and with the gathering of all their closest family and friends. 

She would find herself heartbroken when he didn’t say I do…or I don’t.

In fact at that altar he never said anything…because dear friends….he never showed. 

She’d been stood up at the altar.

And on that day, with tears in her eyes that same young, freshly graduated girl with dew on her cheeks and glitter in her eyes would soon trade out her perfect pink for shoes, for boots made to walk all over all of his burned shit outside in the backyard of her parent’s home.

That young girl had been twenty two years old at the time of this heartbreak.

And now at twenty eight my cousin, Celine St. John, was all grown up and trying living in the harsh reality of the day. 

That those princes or princesses didn’t exist, and only she herself had the power to make her dreams come true.

But again, sadly my friends, this still didn’t completely take her magic or her will to keep looking for her happily ever after…in someone else. 

Which is why like something out of a fairy-tale, four Los Angeles princesses found themselves swimming in a sea of scurvy men with no prince or even handsome pirates in sight, at the Lonely Pearl Bar. 

“ Can you believe it? Four years ago today I stood there dressed in my grandmother's pearls and his mother’s wedding dress outside ready to go to the altar in front of three hundred people, with my life packed up, ready to abandon all my hopes and dreams like a dumbass, waiting for a man who never had any intention of showing up.”  Celine could only laugh at young naive past self as she took another sip of her Jack and Ginger.  

“ In the high heat of an August heatwave no less.” She added, “ Even though when I said yes that night, I knew in my heart he’d never commit. That he’d never love me the same way I loved him.” 

“ An important part of the tale indeed. But, hey, don’t feel bad. We’ve all been delusional a time or two. It happens. We’re young and improperly influenced with stories of fairy tale endings and men who actually may be decent human beings.”  I said, playing with the circle stained napkin in front of me from my Corona. “ So, as always I don’t blame you for using the extreme benefit of the doubt. It happens.” 

“ Oh no. Speak for yourself." Anthea quickly objected, “ Baby that wasn’t any regular ass delusional you experienced. That was some straight Disney fairytale shit, we’ll live happily ever after in a Louboutin shoe, type delusion. Which brings me to the main issue.”  

The three of us exchanged looks present with all of the curiosity and skepticism we could muster.  

“ See, I think the problem here ladies isn’t that you all can’t find someone to indulge the perfect Cinderella fantasy . It’s the fact you’re looking for someone to date in the first place. It isn’t like  Beauty and the Beast where you love and nurture the gruff of man until you get this shiny new prince. Most men nowadays are all beast, no prince."

“ Men nowadays are all the same. No matter how much you want them to commit, date, or marry you, it’s all the same. A man will either tell you upfront he’s just looking to fuck, or he is going to indulge your little fantasy of something serious until you finally let him in the draws and then he’s out the door to the next bitch.” She explained, smiling as if her logic was the only right one.

Anthea Olivet, as she will tell anyone within earshot, was sexy, fabulous, wildly successful and had the ego of any man attached. This alone made her 5’3 stature in any situation feel seven feet tall. She was a prolific defense attorney to the stars, who took charge in not only in the courtroom, but in every aspect of life she could. 

“ Bottom line . Men will fuck you and then get the fuck on. If you can find it within yourself to accept those facts, then maybe you too can  enjoy the ‘ happy endings ‘ you get from them just as much as they do the ones they take from you.” She happily shrugged, taking a sip of her shirley temple.

“ Well what if I liked the way the beast looked pre transformation." Celine mused, “ I personally don’t mind some gruff and fur. Then you gotta remember he had generational wealth, he was well read, owned property, plus his tongue in that one scene wasn-” 

Celine’s verbal venture into beastiality was cut off by a chorus of laughter and bewildered look from Maraget, “ Ce, you’re sick ." Tears springing in her eyes from laughter, “ And you can count that as a professional diagnosis free of charge.” 

Celine shrugged, “ Nothing we didn’t already, darling. But no, seriously back to the topic at hand. It just feels like I almost had it, ya’ know? And now I just feel like at the age I am now I should already be set up for the life I wanna live.  Ya’ know the house, kids, husband, property, dream job, whatever…” 

She sighed, “ And it seems like all the other pieces of the puzzle are falling into place but this one.”

“ Which is what? Love? Because you know there are other areas of life you can find that in, right?" I reminded. 

“ I mean look around. Do you really fucking think we’d all be sitting in this poorly air conditioned ass bar with these weak ass drinks if we didn’t love your ass. You betta’ look around and recognize QUICK.” I quipped at her, making a motion to the three of us surrounding her with my finger.

She smiled, playfully rolling her before saying, “ Yes. I definitely recognize I’m loved ya’ll thank you. However…” 

Strong collective groans came from every direction, but still not strong enough to deter her from her declaration, “ As much as y’all love me and I love y’all,  none of ya’ll can hold and kiss my hand, buy a house with me, raise babies with me, or eat me out on a Caribbean island with manuka honey and ice the way I need.” 

“ We just letting all our little fantasies out tonight, huh?" I muttered to my left side, low enough for Anthea to hear.

“ Seems like. But let's not kink shame. It’s not polite.” She quietly sing-songed. 

“ Even though I’ve had my ass burned, literally, I’m still not giving up on the idea that someone is out there for me." Celine urged, “ It just gets harder and harder keeping up the faith out here in these streets when at every fucking corner there is a weirdo or bum. But it is easy to weed those out once I come right out with it and say I’m looking to date to marry.” 

“ Yeah, that’ll unfortunately slim the pickings.” I agreed, taking a swig.

“ Which I wouldn’t care about if I wasn’t twenty eight already!  I’m not getting any younger. I need to find someone who will both poach quail eggs for me in the morning and then crack my eggs up at night.” Celine concluded. “ I need to find my person. Yesterday.”

Margaret nodded, “ I understand. But you don’t think that maybe you’re just putting a bit too much pressure on yourself, Ce. That’s a lot to try and carry. Maybe you should think about taking the pressure of the gas a bit, hun.” 

" I agree '', I chimed in, “ Especially in this cesspool we call dating here in LA. You don’t necessarily need to lower your standards but maybe a little adjustment may be good. Or you could even try and sit on the bench for a little bit and focus on you. Make sure those other pieces of the puzzle just ain’t falling, but that they're in that bitch permanently.” I took a sip of my beer.

Still she shook her head unfazed by our words, “ No no no. I can’t. It’s bad enough I’m the age I am now with little to no prospects as is. Plus I can already hear that clock starting to tick s-"

“ You better take the batteries out of that bitch and keep pushing." Anthea sharply interrupted, startling a poor Margaret,  “ FUCK THAT CLOCK! It’s bullshit. Don’t force yourself to go on a million dates with these lame ass niggas just because mother nature is pushing up on you.” 

“ You better go collect and freeze those eggs. It’s never too late.” Anthea declared, holding up her class of pinot. “ If you want marriage. Do it. But don’t rush just because you're afraid. It won’t end well.” 

“ She may have a point. Think about it.” I agreed.

Quickly I was called out by a now semi-offended Celine , “ Oh no! You Miss Thing...” She pointed a finely manicured finger at me, “ Do not get to have an opinion on a subject like this. You don’t even date forreal.” 

I immediately felt my face contort into a deep frown, “ That is not true.”

From down the row I heard Margaret's voice, “ Now, Kalin.” 

“ Yes, Margaret.” I shot back, a playful coyness invading my tone, making us both smile,

 “ No, but seriously! Y'all make it seem like a bitch don’t date. I DATE! Maybe not as much or like how y’all do. But I get out there…occasionally.” 

I felt my own conscious frown at me in skepticism and judgment. 

“ Girl PLUHEASE! You don’t date Miss I’ve Taken a Vow of Celibacy because my last relationship shot to hell.” Anthea laughed, involuntarily reminding me of my last serious attempt at a situation. 

“ Hey! My vow of celibacy doesn’t have anything to do with my last attempt at a relationship, but has everything to do with my attempt at a relationship with myself and my well being.” I stated proudly. 

“ I decided that if I truly wanted to get to know myself and see all that I had to offer then I needed to get exclusive and serious with ME! Which meant eliminating distracting factors like sex and other people from our relationship.” 

“ Plus.” I cleared my throat, “ As you all know I also had some…past things. I’ve been working on. And I finally feel like I’m at a place where I have a manageable handle on said things.” My eyes quickly cut to Margaret who offered a somber and supportive smile. 

“ Now look at me. A young black successful New York Times best selling author of not one but soon to be two series. I have a budding publishing house, I’m thick and fit, and I’m a hell of a good dog mom. So, I’d say this celibacy journey was worth it.” I argued, sipping on the almost empty glass bottle. 

“ And more power to you, honey.” Anthea patted my shoulder, “ But after three years, minimal dates, and at least four vibrators, plus the cost of batteries every month that probably is the equivalent of a decent house note. Don’t you think that maybe it’s time to open things up. I dunno get into a polyamorous relationship with you, yourself, and somebody’s dick?!"

“ Oh my gosh.” I groaned, silently unamused at her obsession with the prospects of my sex life. 

“ Anthea behave.” Margaret softly scolded before turning to me, “  But on a more serious note, not to pull out the PHD in Psychology and Mental Health counseling…” 

“ I know das’ right.” Anthea hyped her up. 

“ But as someone who literally counsels and assesses people for a living on how well they can function in life healthily and independently, I’m pretty confident in my recommendation that you’ve done enough self growth and foundation laying over the last three years to where I’m content with sending you out into the wilds of the LA dating scene without major fear for you, friend."

Her words made my heart swell, “ Besides that, as your friend. I’m even more damn proud of you! It takes a lot to want to put that kind of work into yourself. I say all that to say…if you’re ready. Then it’s time.” Margaret encouraged lifting up her bottle of lemon sparkling water. 

“ Amen Sister Dr. Girl. Tell her again.” Celine threw up a goofy fist. 

“ So, I guess the question still remains, what is stopping you from getting back out there? " Anthea follows up.  

“ Absolutely nothing! Nothing is stopping me y'all." My body produces a laugh under the pressure of the microscope presented by my peers, “ When I come across a man that I’m interested in. Then I’ll date. But until then I’m cool just seeing…me.”

And just like that, a smirk almost eerily identical to the Cheshire cat appeared on Anthea’s face,  “ And when you say that, do you mean that there’s a specific type of guy you’re looking for? Cause I know some people I could-” 

“ NOPE! While I’m flattered that won’t be necessary. Thanks.” I quickly held up a hand of refusal, “ But to answer your question. While I don’t have a specific list of things like how tall he has to be or what he does for a living, or this, that, and the third like other women may. I do have certain…preferences that I keep in mind when I see someone I think is attractive.”

“ Such as…” Anthea beckoned forward, not even attempting to be sly about her approach. 

“ Such as….he has to be able to practice CMTDB.” I stated, smirking. 

Immediately her eyes lit up with what I knew only could be a thought she could formulate, “ Ouu! What does that stand for? Can make the dick bounce? Can mash the D’s back? "

Laughter from every which way, plus a horrified look for Margaret, moved down through the row of us. 

“ NO NASTY! It means CAN MIND THEIR DAMN BUSINESS.” Patrons had begun to stare at the four us who were now obnoxiously loud,  but we didn’t care, “ Like damn. If I wanted to be interrogated by three old ass biddies I would’ve called Mama and the Tias.” 

“ Aye watch who the fuck you call old, na’." Celine, barely able to breathe said, “ I may be kicking thirty in the ass, but my best years are still ahead of me. Watch.”

“ I know das right! Haven’t you heard thirty is the new twenty. Means we’re just really getting started.” 

I groan laughing, “ God! I hope not. I’d like to see my thirties be different. Feel more mature and happier. Not like my early twenties which really just felt like the encore of my teenage years at times.” 

“ That’s exactly what I was going to say bu–” The abrupt sound of Margaret’s phone paused her thought, she didn’t hesitate to pull it from her pocket, just the same way she didn’t hesitate to return just as swiftly and avert her eyes back to the conversation at hand. 

An action she’d repeated twice since we’d all met here under the slightly mildew kissed lamps of the place two hours ago. 

A look was exchanged between Celine and I, and while us two were ready to sweep the action under the rug; Anthea of course was not, “ You’re not gonna get’ that. That’s like your third call, tonight. Could be important.” 

“ I promise it’s not. It can wait.” She affirmed, hands awkwardly tapping the bartop, “ Besides I’m busy helping a friend here.” 

“ Who mind you doesn’t require help.” I added in.

“ Yeah right.” Celine laughed, “ You so do. But that’s alright. Cause mark my words. Before the year is over we gone find someone to knock the cobwebs up out that thang’. ”

My eyes cut at her, “ No cobwebs here, heifer. Don’t ever try it.” I waved a hand, “ Besides….” 

“ From my mouth to the universe's ears, it will send me a man who not only is ready for me, but I too am ready for him. Which being honest, I don’t think is anytime soon. So, until then I’m going to keep on loving on me, buying batteries, and making money to pay my expensive beverage habits. ALRIGHT!”

They all looked around to each other before muttering in agreement.

After a couple more laughs, some life updates, and a toast to remember Celine’s bullet she dodged, both Anthea and Celine announced their respective departures, which also triggered Margaret's reluctance to go home. 

“ Never know….” Margaret spoke up, “ He could stumble into this very bar tonight.” 

Still I laughed her off,  “ Yeah, right. Okay Miss Cleo, thanks for the delulu. I love you and kiss my godbaby goodnight when you get home. And to you other two… Have fun and be SAFE…in all areas of life.” 

“ Will do. Night, pretty girl.” Anthea placed a kiss on my cheek, before heading over to the pool table to collect her victim of the night.

“ Goodnight, Beautiful. I will tell her in the morning. If you want I’ll have her call you so you two can talk over breakfast.” Margaret offered making me smile at the thought of my five year old goddaughter. 

“ I would love that. Thanks.” 

“ Alright. Before I go I’m gonna step outside and take a phone call.” Margaret leaned down and kissed my head. 

“ Okay.” I said, suddenly feeling a weight on my back.

“ Goodnight, Smush. Love you. Don’t stay out too long.”  Celine hugged me from behind.

“ Love you too, Smuckie. And I won’t. Text me when you get home.” I waved.

And then all within five minutes I’d found myself just how I knew the evening would go, alone and mulling. Just only at a bar. 

I figured at this rate I may as well have another beer, call a cab, and set up shop at my computer until my eyes either started to burn or the computer died. Whichever came first.

A couple minutes had passed and I had just ordered my last when a voice rose above the buzz of noise next to me.

“ This seat taken? "

When I turned my head I was met with a rather large and stunningly attractive man dressed in a dapper suit and tie. He looked as if he'd just hopped straight off a Forbes magazine page, dressed head to toe in what I’d recognized to be the number 3’ line up from the recent Ralph Lauren’ spring line. I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that he put the model to absolute shame. 

This had to be some kind of fucking joke. Who had sent this man over here to fuck with me.

“ Doesn’t look like it…so please feel free.” I motion toward the tattered bar seat.

“ Thank you.” He replies, flagging down the bartender, “ Hey, man. Can I do a Blue Moon. Thanks.” 

As he ordered his drink I couldn’t help but steal a few glances at the man beside me to further my inspection. Quickly I was able to gather that if I’d thought he’d been handsome standing over me before, I’d damn sure thought he was fine now up close now.

He had a strong jawline draped with a particularly well kept and healthy looking beard peppered with noticeable streaks of gray . All around his cheekbones and around his nose bridge were kissed with tiny hints of freckles. When he talked his smile was a perfect replica of a colgate commercial, and it helped to bring brightness to his eyes that had a certain softness and slant to them.

All in All…again I say..the man was fine. 

“ Something on my face? " His voice startled me since I’d really thought I’d been stealthy with how much side eye I used. 

I’d been caught.

Quickly I had to recover, “ No. Nope, nothin’ on there. You’re actually just in my line of sight.” I tried playing it off, “ Just trying not to be obvious about looking out the window there past your face. My friend is outside in a possible spat with her husband, and I don’t wanna make it seem like I’m being nosy.” 

 “ But you are. Being nosy that is.” He remarked, smiling and taking a sip of his beer.

I frown, “ Not really. Concerned more than anything. I mean she is standing outside by herself. It’s getting dimmer and dimmer out and I’m just making sure she’s okay. I mean look at her. Look how tiny she is…” I laugh, “ One tiny gush of wind and she’ll be all the way in the valley."

He turned his head to get a good look at my Margo before nodding, “ Well since you put it like that. I guess I understand the nosiness now.” 

“ Mhmm.” I agreed, going back to nursing my beer.

The air held quiet for a moment, both our eyes seemed to briefly train on the game playing on the TV overhead until…

“ So, you come here often to be nosy? “ His gaze shifted to me and he flashed me that almost blinding smile again.

And in that moment, suddenly, for some odd reason,  I’d begun to feel a tad smaller under the weight of it, like he was this giant…something and I was just…me. 

His presence felt..oddly…Big.

In an attempt to hide my nerves I opted to look down the bar at the waitress while answering, “ Occasionally. Decent place to drink a beer,  shoot a bear, be nosy into others life problems. All of it makes good material, ya’ know.” 

“ For? " He questioned, pulling my attention back.

“ I’m sorry? " I blinked.

“ You said that all makes good material, right? So, for what? “ He furthered,  the corners of his lips upturned.

For a moment  I contemplated lying to him about my life’s profession just to avoid the common follow up questions I could never escape, but for some reason I’d decided that even if he did ask them, he was worth the explanations tonight. 

“ I’m an author.” I revealed, “ So, you could say I take good chunks of inspiration from things as simple as eavesdropping on conversations or what some call ' people watching' I guess.” 

“ Published? " He probed.

“ Yeah. I have a couple things out and under my belt." I nodded, “ Nothing you’ve read I’m sure, though.”

His eyebrows rose in curiosity, “ Oh really? What? Do I look like I don’t read or something? "

I shook my head, “ No. No, that’s not what I said. I’m sure you’re very well read."

 Your reading material probably consists of contracts and checks with lots of zeros from the looks of it.

“ I’m just positive you’ve never read anything I’ve written. My genre probably isn‘t your thing." I clarified.

He took another swig of his beer, “ And what genre would that be? "

I smile knowing I had him, “ Young adult romance and fiction.” 

He looked almost surprised when I told him, only indication of this being the shift in his seat.

“ Huh." He hummed before going back to nursing his flat beer, my brows touched.

“ Huh? What does ‘ huh ‘ mean?" I questioned, wanting to know the diction of his sound. 

He laughed, finding amusement in my displeasure with little noise, his baritone floating in the air, “ Huh means I wouldn’t expect a young adult romance and fiction author to be getting her material from a bar."

I nodded understanding that he wasn’t the first person to share a sentiment like that I’d met. But still part of me could have wondered the same thing about him.

What was a man like him with such a large presence doing sitting at bar and and having a casual drink with a woman at a bar who secretly was in a place in her life where she felt as small as can be.

“ Huh." I sounded, purposely using the previous tone of his just for a reaction.

I got it.

He smiled, “ Now, what’s up with your huh? "

Having the nerve to start feeling shy, my head turned up to the game, the Celtics were nailing the Raptors, “ I just wouldn’t have expected a man in a almost six thousand dollar suit to be sitting at a bar whose most expensive drink comes in a glass with a plastic pearl floating in it.” I shot back.

He laughed. 

 “ Touche. " A nod was earned, “ I’ll put your ‘ huh’  to rest though by telling you that the only reason I’m here in this ridiculously overpriced suit at this little ole’  shithole in the wall bar, is because the guy who owns this place happens to be a lifelong friend of mine. And whenever I’m in town I stop in and say what’s up.” 

“ Would that be often? " I turn. “ I’ve never seen you in here before.” 

The corners of his mouth upturned, “ See. Nosy? " He pointed at me, triggering an eyeroll.

                The small smile on my face spread, “ No. Not nosy. Conversationalist.” I countered, holding up a finger. 

 “ Mmm." He mused. “ Well in that case, quite often. I travel back and forth for work. And before you ask in a more innocent conversational way, I’m in the hospitality business. I help my family run a chain of hotels and resorts.” He said.

Explains a lot. 

“ Nice! Not a bad profession to be in especially if you have to travel.” I noted. He nods, “ No it isn’t. And between us…” He moved a bit closer, and I seemed to stiffen a bit when I got a whiff of him. He smelled….indescribable, “ I don’t come here for the drinks, just to support my friend. If I’d wanted a real beer I'd have just gone to one of the hotels. Our tap is wayyy better.”  

“ Really? And what about being nosy? Your bar good for any author looking for some material?" I teased.

He smiled, “ It’s especially good for someone nosy like you, yes. “ He stated matter of factly, I mean c’mon now. Think about how many people we get that travel back and forth through there and stop to have a drink to calm the nerves, drown sorrows, or are like you and just wanting to be in the atmosphere. You definitely meet some characters.” He pointed out.

With a thought put to it, it sounded like it made perfect sense to me.

“ I bet. Sounds like an interesting place to pick up on something.” I agree.  

“ I know." He nodded, “ But, please don’t take my word for it. You should come see for yourself."

He’d caught me by surprise with his invitation, “ I’m sorry? ” 

I could tell he took pleasure in startling me this way,  “ I said come and see it for yourself. What’re you doing Sunday night?" He posed, reaching for his suit jacket while accidentally flashing me a better glimpse at a watch that I was sure amounted to my entire four year tuition at WU. 

Immediately in my mind images of my routine Sunday night of walking around in oversized clothes and fuzzy slippers while looking like the thing they pulled out of the black lagoon as I sifted through chapter drafts and notes  flashed through my brain.

Still I decided to play it cool…as I could, “ I’m not exactly sure. I should be free, but I still need to double check. Just in case a random event I can’t remember at this particular moment is occurring." I shrugged my shoulders in a pitiful effort to sell the  sudden nonchalant attitude.

But the smirk on his face let me know he was staring straight through me, though politely he played along, “ Well, you do that. And when you figure it out. Give me a call, I’d love to have a drink and maybe help you source up some material with some pretty quality.” 

He casually handed me off a business card.

Joseph  Anoa’i 

Chief Operations Officer 

Grand Maivia Hotels Inc. 

I had to keep my eyes from bucking out of my head when I read the card.

The Grand Maivia Hotel and its variants were notorious for being one of the most inclusive, luxurious, and successful hotel chains. They were minority founded, owned, and operated with their brand expanding to sit at the table with giants like the Four Seasons, St. Regis, and the Hiltons. 

Knowing the information I knew now, explained why his presence gave off such big vibes.

But this time I was determined to keep my face neutral and not give an inch,  “ Cool.  Nice to meet you Joseph.” 

“ Joe," He corrected, “ My friends just call me Joe.” 

I arched an eyebrow, “ Ah. So we’re friends now? I mean I don’t know. I wouldn’t take you for the type to have nosy friends.” 

He laughs, “ Not letting that go, huh? "

“ Nope! " I popped the ‘ P’, digging into my purse to pull out a stray business card of my own. “ Not since you started it first. But I figured if we are then you might want this."  You handed him the card.

Caramine Lewis 

Writer and Publishing Talent 

Alma House Publishing 

His thumb ran over the name inked on the card carefully, “ It’s nice to meet you, Caramine? That short for something? “ 

“ Umm…not really.  Caramine is just my pen name. My writing alias." I watched the corners of his eyes spread in curiosity. 

“ I see. So what’s the real name?"

I smiled, a mischievous thought passing over my lips, “ Whose nosy, now?"

He laughed, “ If you can call it that. I think intrigued would be a better term."

“ C’mon what? Don’t tell me that you’ve never kept an alias before? Ya’ know have your Bruce Wayne or Clark Kent moment. Adds a good element of mystery to something.” I said, hoping that this poor attempt at flirting I was doing may have been rubbing off somewhat. 

“ No. I’m quite familiar with the idea of an alias. But I think the thing I find most interesting about them is when you get to unmask the true person behind it." He wasn’t shy about the quick survey his eyes did on me, a certain look in them appeared that I hadn’t, “ Get to know the real them.” 

I couldn’t help the heat that descended upon my cheeks, “ Well, you’ll come to find that us authors love keeping our readers intrigued by a more slow and revealing approach. Ya’ know, can’t give you everything at once.” 

“ Is that right?” His tongue fleets across his bottom lip. His eyes haven’t left mine for a hot minute, and I can feel an array of nerves  heat all over my body with every passing second they’re under his gaze.

“ Yeah.” I said, “ So, to keep you intrigued until I see you again. I think the notion of my name will be enough.”  I said, I’d noticed the involuntary pur I’d elicited into my voice now.

It hadn’t been on purpose, but I just couldn’t help myself.  

At this he moved to stand, coming a little bit closer to me until one of his knees touched mine and I was forced to tilt my head up just to meet his gaze. God, the atmosphere felt like it kept getting warmer and warmer by the minute, and for the life of me I didn’t know how much longer I could keep my cool. 

“ I guess it’s a good thing  I’ll be seeing you soon then. I’m not exactly the patient type when it comes to these things. Read the ending first kind of guy and then go from there. I like knowing what I’m getting into.” He stated.

“ So, you could imagine how easy it could be for me to just google it now. Find some kind of article that’ll tell me.  And then let those ‘ notions ‘ you speak of take hold after.”

“ You could." I agreed, “ Skip over the delight of the wonderment I mean. And just go ahead and spoil it for yourself. But something tells me you won’t.” 

He perked, a hand rested on the counter now dangerously close to mine, “ Why’s that? "

His eyes were peering down at me now, almost with a certain curiosity to them he used to mask his suspected arousal, it made my breath hitch.

“ Because you say you’re the kind of guy who likes to skip til the end and then go backward. Yet, here you are still trying to get a good read on the cover.”

“ So that patience you think you don’t have, you have it.” I concluded.

I watched the smile spread across his lips that further poked at the heat of gaze coming from his eyes which were locked on mine, “ Maybe.” He said.

“ I can work with maybe.” I said allowing myself to fully take in his features from this angle as we still held this oddly…interesting eye contact that I just in the moment couldn’t explain. 

Figuring I needed to leave before I started salivating at the mouth, I quickly announced my leaving.

“ Well Mr. Joe. As lovely as this meeting has been, the life of an author calls.” I got up to gather my things, “ I have a deadline tomorrow and I need to make sure everything is all set on my end. So this is where I’ll have to leave you…for now.”

“ I see. Well I actually should be heading out too. Got a bunch of boring back to back meetings tomorrow and they start early.”  

“ How early?" I inquired.

“ Early." He shot back without a knowing tone.

I nodded already knowing it had to be before the rooster crows.

“ Well that sucks. But hey, I guarantee you're not the only person who will be up that early. There are those who never sleep in this city, like the uber and taxi drivers. I should know, I'm taking one now." I said.

Immediately I watched him frown, “ You planned on taking a taxi home…by yourself.” 

 “ I did. And I AM.” I giggled in confirmation, taking note of his displeasure.

“ Not anymore you’re not. I’ll call one of the car services from the hotel to take you home.” He reached in his jacket pocket to produce a phone. " We're not too far from there, so it won't take too long to get here."

And just how his frown was immediate so was mine when I protested, “ Oh no. Truly that isn’t necessary. I’ll be fine. I’m a big girl who can take care of herself. Have been for a long time.” 

His eyes pulled away from the typing on the screen for a once over of me and then back to his task when he said, “ And from the looks of it you’re doing a hell of a job. But just because you can doesn’t mean you should always have to.” 

“ Plus..I wouldn’t be able to sleep tonight knowing I let you get a cab instead of offering. Can’t always trust cabs or Ubers or whatever. Especially here. ” He affirmed, once he was done on his phone he looked back to me, “ You ain’t ever seen the bone collector, sweetheart? "

He referenced the 90s creepy mystery thriller staring Denzel Washington and Angelina Jolie.

“ I have." I nodded, “ A very scary movie indeed. But I hope it eases your mind when I tell you that I rarely take Ubers or taxis. I usually drive myself every which way besides when I know I’m probably going to have a bit to drink. Because in that instance I wanna be responsible and not drive.” 

“ Understood. Well for tonight at least you won’t have to worry about a cab. And if you decide to come have a drink Sunday, let me know ahead of time and I’ll be happy to arrange a driver for you for the night.” He proposed. 

“ Joe, while that’s sweet it’s really not ne-” 

“ It is to me though. So like I said, let me know.”

I watched him stand to his feet in front of me…well maybe more like over me since he easily bested my five’ seven stature by the way my face came just to meet the top of his chest. Which only heightened the smell that wafted from him. It smelled…delectable.

He was...delectable.

“ For mine, the lady, and her friends drinks.” I watched as he laid down a thick wad of cash onto the ring stained and corded wooden counter. It had to have been the amount of all our drinks five times over, “ Keep the rest for yourself. And tell Dean that Roman said the beers are still flat.” 

Roman? 

I thought we’d established his name was Joseph—Joe.

I began to wonder where the nickname had come from and why, it was definitely a bit of a sharp turn away from the name Joe. 

As if he could read my mind, he sent a knowing smile my way , " C'mon your rides’ on the way.” He beckoned me to follow him outside, he reached a hand and motioned for me to walk in front of him. 

Quickly I tried to gather myself and my belongings, my heart felt a flutter when I could sense his hand hovering just over my hips as he maneuvered us through the crowd of people. 

It was fascinating to watch the way people parted for us- Him. The smiles and nods as he moved through the room only solidified the size of his presence in the space. The acknowledgements and greetings didn’t end until we were outside in front of the bar with the cool LA night air kissing our cheeks. 

As if on cue the all black GMC SUV gilded in before us. 

“ This is you.” He motioned, “ And don’t worry. Whatever you tell him is confidential. I’m not gonna show up to your crib or start sending things. Like a nut job That ain’t me. My mother raised me better than that.” He explained.

I felt a chamber of my heart relax at the genuineness I believed I was hearing in his voice about the respect of my privacy, which had been a cause of concern when the offer was first presented.

“ Thank you for mentioning that. I appreciate it…all of it really.” 

“ You don’t have to thank me. It’s nothing. All I ask is that when you do get home, just shoot me a text and let me know.” He moved closer as we inched to the door of the truck.

“ I can most certainly do that.”  I agreed.

“ So, I’ll be seeing you Sunday night? " He asked, head tilted down just enough for the 

“ Maybe.” I answered, purposefully. 

He smiled, tongue fleeting his top lip, “ I can work with maybe.”

As he leaned down closer I couldn’t stop myself from mentally panicking at the mere belief that this handsome ass, big ass, sexy ass man was about to kiss me. 

To say my heart and mind were both collectively and desperately trying to communicate when in reality all lines of proper thoughts had been temporarily...shut down…stunned…made unavailable by the blocking signals being sent up from nether regions that I wasn’t even sure still worked.

It didn’t help that he’d gotten close enough to the point where if I’d leaned up, our lips wouldn’t have any trouble meeting. 

So it was then when he stopped leaning and said, “ Good night.” 

That all I could muster was a repetition of his words, “ Good night.” 

Like as if I was in a daze I allowed him to open the door, usher me in, and see me off as the wheels started rolling against the cracked pavement into the night air that had just become ripe with possibility. 

And all I could think was…. GotDammit Margaret.

Back Inside…

Margaret tried to compose herself as she walked back to the bar, head beginning to throb with the ghost of her husband's disappointed tone in her ear. 

At first she’d taken the call under the fluorescent light of the neon pearl sign of the building, hoping that it would offset the dreary and dark feelings of the conversation she was having. When it got more serious she’d moved to her car ready to start it up and give in to the guilt being placed on her. 

But once the call ended, she wasn’t sure if it was the effects of the asbestos from the bar, or the lingering warm feelings she had from seeing her friends, but she’d gotten out of the car and went back into the bar.

Almost as if something was drawing her back inside. 

Also, not yet wanting to leave and face the small monotony of her life, she decided one more shot of lemon infused agua wouldn’t hurt before she ventured home.

Plopping down on the bar stool in between two bar-goers, she flagged down the bartender to ask him for another bottle of lemon sparkling water to sip on while she watched the very basketball game she’d been previously fated to attend. 

She sat there for a minute not really watching the game, but rather letting it watch her, when…

“ You a fan? " A voice appeared next to her on the right. 

When she turned, at her side sat a man…

He had caramel skin and long dark hair with maroon colored tips all pulled into a low makeshift bun on his head. He wore a denim hoodie jacket and a white shirt that made the chain around his neck stand out against his intricately tattooed skin. His face was mature but his features screamed boyish, right down to the wide toothy smile on his face.

He was handsome to her… in an odd boy next door kinda way. 

“ Um…sorta. My husband legally represents the team, so we usually get season tickets we go to, but this is the first game I’ve missed since he started.”  Margaret answered, mindful to move herself over a bit to give him room. “ He’s a big fan and loves to go. So, we go.” 

“ And how long ago was that?" He inquired, eyes heavily trained on the individual in front of him. 

“ It’ll be six years in March.” A soft smile peaking at the thought of her husband’s accomplishment. 

The man's eyes shifted in curiosity to the screen, “ Wait. Hol’ up. You mean to tell me you’ve been to every single Kings game in the last six years? Even the away games? "

Margo was quietly amused with his disbelief, “ Even the away games. Either courtside or in a box somewhere. They may prove hard to manage sometimes but I always make it in the end. Only this one I couldn’t because my friend really wanted me here tonight and it’s a special occasion.” 

The man nodded, “ Wow. I get it. That’s just some real commitment right there. How long y’all been married for if you don’t mind me askin’ ?" He reached to take another sip of his drink.

Water sloshing around in a shot glass. 

“ Seven years this August. Together for nine though." She recalled just how long she and Reece had been together, internally she winced at the thought.

“ That’s wassup. Congratulations to you both.” He continued to nurse his drink.

Curious, she turned to him, “ And what about you? Married?"

This time the man downed the rest of his drink before responding, “ Engaged. Going on five years.” He revealed, only Margaret took notice of the hinge to his voice. As if he’d tasted something bitter on his tongue. Maybe his words , because it couldn’t be the water.

“ You don’t sound too happy to me for someone being engaged.” She noted.

He shook his head, “ It’s not that I’m not happy I’m engaged. I just know I’d be happier married is all.” 

Would you really? Because trust me…it ain’t all it's cracked up to be.

Caty’s lips pursed together before she spoke, “ So, then what’s stopping you? From getting married that is."

“ Her." He simply stated, “ She’s at a pivotal point right now in her career and wants to wait. Says she can’t really find the time to fully commit to things like the planning and shit like that. Bottom line, the hold up is her.” 

“ Well I can see why you’re frustrated but, at the same time it’s hard to commit to something and someone knowing that it’s not just you anymore, but rather you and I now. It can be scary committing." She reasoned, picking up her glass of water.

“ Yeah. But you did it, right? “ He threw out, “ Seven years, never miss a game, and even still you’re sitting here watching it in a bar full of alcohol having lemon water. That’s commitment, uce.” He stated, “ That shit shows you care. Your husband is lucky.” 

Only if he knew that.

Ignoring his synopsis of the information given to her,  Margaret decided to instead indulge in the latter of his statement, “ Uce? What is that? Like some islander term used or…” 

He smirks, “ Sum’ like that. It’s like the samoan version of ‘ cuz ‘ or bruh? "

“ Nice well…Mr…” 

“ Jonathan Fatu.” He stuck out his hand for her to shake, she reached out, the minute the palm of their hands touched a slight shock of electricity ran through the center of her hand and up her fingers that made her quickly pull away with a feeling of small lighting traveling up her in arm in the most peculiarly pleasant way. “ You can me Jon, though’. ” 

“ Well Jonathan. Sometimes being with someone does mean making certain…sacrifices to ensure the overall health of the relationship. It’s a give and take situation.” 

“ Yeah, I get that.” He nodded in agreement before asking her, “ But what happens when you feel like the majority of the sacrifices have been made by you? Where’s the balance in that? What do you get to take away for yourself? "

Questions Margaret couldn’t answer…not only for him, but also for herself. 

As a licensed professional she was sure she could conjure up some technical answer she would tell her clients in session, but this wasn’t what this was. 

There was no notepad in front of her to jot down notes or logistics sheets, there was no timer set, and she wasn’t sitting opposite from him across the room.

In this moment sitting next to him, side by side, she felt like a regular person. So that’s why she found it somewhat easy to give him the regular response of, “ You know. I’m not exactly sure.” 

“ I mean we all make sacrifices for the people we love but only you yourself truly know when you’ve had enough of it. You know when the sacrifice is too much and when to say when.” She followed up.

“ And you’ve never felt the need to say when about goin’ to all these damn games. I mean I could understand if you said you had to sit through a couple of Warriors games or even the Lakers. But the Kings ain’t even really on shit forreal." He motioned to the scoreboard where the Kings were still in fact getting destroyed by Celtics. 

“ I mean shit, do you even like basketball?" He laughed, emitting a small one from her.

“ Not particularly. I don’t mind it. But it’s not my first choice of a sporting event to go to. Though not a lot of people may like my picks so there’s that.” 

“ Which are? " He pressed.

She couldn’t explain why but she felt a twinge of excitement in her voice when she said, “ I like going to Tennis matches or Rugby games. I also don’t mind going to Derby games with my friends. But truly I adore going to swim meets, it’s one of my favorite things in this world…ever.” 

“ What? Swimmin’?” 

She nodded, a large smile spreading on her face at the mere notion of the water, “ Yeah. I can’t get enough of being in water. I’ve swam my entire life. Ever since I was like eight I was in youth group swimming, and then on both middle and high school swim teams. Went to college on a scholarship for it and everything."

“ Where to?" 

“ Duke.” 

“ Oh shit. That’s wassup’." He gave a grin, “ Must have been good.”

Margaret didn’t mean for a frown to spread on her face at his notion of ‘ good ' , but she couldn’t help herself when the words began coming out her mouth, “ Good? If you can call finishing the 200 yard breaststroke in one minute and fifty six seconds good.” She lifted up her lemon water to take a sip, “ Then yeah. I was pretty decent.” 

Jon smiled at the sense of pure arrogance and smugness that reeked from her upon the topic. The two hadn’t been talking all of thirty minutes, but he couldn’t tell this was something she probably didn’t do often from the way she was trying to still downplay this incredible ass record off. 

“ Ooooo WEE.” He chirped loudly, making a grinning Maragret look around, “ So you got that motor on you huh? I see you. Them sound like some Olympic ass numbers to me. I can’t see yo’ feet but you must have some flippers on you or something cause gahdamn girl!" 

The woman couldn’t help but be entertained and indulge in his theatrics, “ Hey! My feet are not that damn big. I wear a size nine thank you."

“ Alright. You may not be bigfoot but you're up there, dammit. Got some weight on em’. While you playing, them motherfuckers probably extend or some shit like Austin Powers.” He goofed.

Playfully she side eyed him smacking her lips, “ Whatever. I seen them big ass Jordans you wearing when I sat down. Big foot! " She teased, “ Can’t be the pot calling the kettle black.”

“ Touché ..Touché” He laughed, allowing their shared laughter to die down for a second before he spoke, “ But seriously though. Why you ain’t stick wit’ it. With numbers like that is some Olympic gold medal material. Why ain’t you somewhere biting the gold right now.” 

Margaret looked at him, a somewhat sullen look springing to her eyes as he asked more questions that she already asked herself over and over again for ages.

“ I could have, I’m sure. But guess you could say it goes back to our earlier topic of sacrifices." She revealed, “ I could have made the team I’m sure with my stats, even as a freshman, but by the time any of those opportunities rolled around I had to make a sacrifice that made all that impossible.” 

He nodded in understanding. He too had been in situations like that where he had to make a choice between his dream for himself or his reality that affected others, “ Sorry to hear that.” 

She shook her head, “ Don’t be. It went the way it was supposed to. Lead me to my other passion of life, so please don’t feel sorry for me.” 

“ Oh yeah? What’s that? " He questioned, giving her his full undivided attention. 

It was strange to her the way she felt heat collecting at the apple of her cheeks as a result, why did she feel bashful talking to a complete stranger? 

Being so deep in thoughts she hadn’t noticed that his eyes still hadn’t left the canvas of her face, he secretly took the time to study her features for himself, once he reached her lips…he studied the fullness and natural rose of them, hints of a smile danced on them that peaked his curiosity into her thoughts. 

“ What’chu smiling for, uce? Got somethin’ on your mind.” His voice luring her away from the lands of her mind and forces her to meet his eye contact full on. 

“ It’s nothing. I just thinkin’ about how I feel bad that we keep talking about me. I usually don't talk this much about myself, let alone to a stranger." She took a sip of her water, feeling suddenly parched, “ I’m known to be more of a listener.” 

“ But you did though. You listened to me whining about my life stuff earlier. Now we talkin’ about you. “ He said, “ It’s your turn to have the floor. It’s all about you right now, girl.”

It’s all about you right now. 

The words vaguely rang around in her ear, sounding every bit of foreign to her mind.

Nothing had ever been all about her in her life. Ever. 

“ Guess I’m just not used to that then. People listening to me talk. I usually get my fun the other way, by listening.” 

She watched a look appear on his face, one that she refused to believe was a look of more than…friendly appearances. The man was engaged after all. 

And how could she forget she was married. 

“ So, you saying talking to me is fun then? "

Without pause she nodded, " I’m enjoying myself, yes. But I don’t wanna be the only one talking you gotta want t-"

“ Don’t worry about me. I get enough of talking about myself on a daily basis. Trust me.” He stopped her, “ Right now I wanna hear what’s on your mind.” He declared, shifting his body to lean more into hers while still keeping a comfortable space between them.

“ So gon’ head and talk." He encouraged, “ Tell me about this passion of yours. Cause I’m listenin’ .” 

While Margaret was downtown discovering the joy of being the sender of the conversation rather than the receiver, some of us uptown were realizing that dialogue on a Friday night, just might be overrated.

“ Fuck! That’s good.” Anthea’s declaration of lust bouncing off the walls of the man’s place. 

It did well to harmonize with the sounds of his thighs repeatedly beating off the skin of her ass, as he had her legs suspended over his shoulders and head buried in her neck by her ear.

That was the shoulders of the man she'd involuntarily picked up at the bar on whim as she made her way outside.

Just as she’d thought back at the restaurant, she was sure in her spontaneous pick of night. Upon getting in the car he’d made her cum within minutes with the thickness and calculations of his fingers. 

She was pleased to say that hadn’t disappointed with his particularly thick dick either, well that was until…

“ Yeah. Right there, honey! You’re right on my spot. Don’t stop!" She moaned, reaching out to dig at the ridges of his chiseled abdomen. 

She felt him press a run a hand over her naked ass as he said, “ Yeah you want me to cum all in that ushy gushy pussy, baby. Give you my slimey cum all in that shit. Make that pussy leak that watery shit all over my dick. Make it moist.” 

And in that moment maybe she could have ignored all his disgustingly horrible banter the man was spewing out of his sudden sewer of a mouth, but the last word he used had been found to have the opposite effect on Anthea as the word's intended meaning. 

Like when the world turned on it’s axis and dried up the once ocean filled Sahara, Anthea felt herself being thrown off her belt of pleasure only to feel herself dry up and shrivel to uncomfortability. 

Without thought she immediately tapped the groaning and sweat slicked man to cease his movement, “ Sweetheart, you’re done.” She began wiggling out of his grasp only to be stop by a hand on her thigh as her head rushed companion said, “ Awe naw, baby. I ain’t but I’m on the way.” He groaned, still attempting to thrust in her.

This time Anthea figured a more stern approach was needed, “ Yes, you are on your way. Out of my apartment that is. Please get off me and collect your things so you can leave.” She made quick work of pushing him off of her, not hard but with enough force to move a bewildered him to the side.

Shocked and obviously frustrated at his ruined moment, he asked, “ Woah, baby. What happened? I thought we were both there. Didn’t you feel good having me in you like that? Talking you through.”

Anthea had now moved to her feet going over to grab her vintage 1993 Chanel Terry Cloth Robe from her vanity as her head whirled around at words.

“ Talking me through it?!" She gaped, “ No, hun. if anything you were talking me out of it. Out of my fucking orgasm and you out of my apartment. So, please. Grab your things while I call down and let the valet know to bring your car around.” She reached for her.

And of course as expected he got to grumbling to retrieve his scattered Men’s warehouse clothes muttering profanities as he dressed, much to Anthea’s disinterest.

Eventually he made his way to the door with Anthea following behind, still upset and pouting like a child denied their favorite treat. 

When he stepped to the hallway, Anthea leaned against the doorframe to make sure he retreated to the elevator, he turned to say a final, “ Fuck you. Ole’ bougie ass bitch.” 

Smiling with the enjoyment of knowing she’d gotten under the man’s skin she said, “ I wish you could. Fuck me that is. But sadly the only thing you managed to do was finger me half decent in the car, slobber all over my fucking thigh for thirty minutes, and thrust in me for another hour while you talked to me like I was the fucking attendant at local sewage plant. So, no. Not fuck me, it’s you needing to learn how to fuck.” And with that she shut her door in satisfaction, which quickly morphed into self reflected anger.

Angry at herself for not just going with her first mind and saving herself both the effort and time by just going ahead and resorting to her personal version of ‘ ole’ faithful ‘. 

Her thumb hovering over the contact with both reluctance and need, she knew if she did this it would only make her situationship more complex than what it already was.

But then again she knew that above all other pleasures, this person could offer her something that others like them couldn't; Discretion. 

Which in line of work, was valuable. 

As predicted the line only rang twice before a soft voice could be heard on the line, sending chills through her spine.

“ You can’t keep doing this. It’s not healthy.” 

The corners of Anthea’s mouth upturned at the routine attempted guise of respectability, “ Yet every time you answer without failure. Hypocritical much?” 

Before the third ring at that. 

“ I never said you were the only one making unhealthy decisions here. I always own my part, don’t I? " 

Anthea agreed, “ You do quite well. Which is why I think this works so well. We both know our roles and play our parts. Maximum effort on both ends.” 

“ Indeed." The voice sighed, “ So, how soon do you need me?” 

Her bottom lip stuck under her perfect porcelain teeth for a moment before she spoke, “Hmmmm. Three hours ago would’ve been nice, but I’m willing to settle for now.” 

And then the words she’d wanted to hear so eagerly graced her ears,  “ I’m on my way.” 

As soon as the ‘ click ‘ of the phone was heard, the hot and tingly feelings anticipation ravaged Anthea’s stomach, just the way she hoped this person would. 

And at home Celine was also having some more abrupt feelings come up those being ….reminiscence….longing….and confusion. 

The Polaroid picture in her hand of her and her past lover only fueled them further as she flipped through the memories they once shared in what felt like a lifetime ago. 

Within the box before her sat almost three years worth of pictures, letters, etc from their relationship.  

But alongside these mementos also sat the secret police reports and medical records she always kept with her as a reminder of the past. A past that no one else knew of…not even her family.  

Just like in a similar instance, her friends didn’t know about the message she’d received at the top the morning in her email inbox. A key fact she was keen on keeping to herself as she tried to sort through the file folders of her feelings by her lonesome. 

The message that read:

SDJ@delmontpremiers.com: All I need is a chance to set the mess I made right. I’m in the city again. Permanently. Call me when you get this. My number hasn’t changed. Please, Celine. I miss you.

[mariacallous]

Imani Smith, a rising senior at Howard University, was out grabbing food with friends when her group chats with her sorority sisters “started blowing up.” Smith, on a social media break at the time, rushed to re-download Instagram to see article after article about Vice President Kamala Harris running for president. She called her parents, excited.

“Representation is so important,” she said. “Just as a fellow Bison, just as young Black women, being able to see someone who looks like us rise to this level … seeing her take this on, it’s really inspiring. When we look at her, we see ourselves, we see our mothers, our grandmothers.”

Smith sees herself in Harris not just as a student at Howard, the historically Black university Harris attended. Smith is also the president of the Alpha chapter of Alpha Kappa Alpha, a Black sorority more than a century old with chapters across the country. Harris joined AKA as a student in 1986 and has been an active presence in the group ever since.

Smith isn’t the only AKA member celebrating—and organizing. The sudden ascent of Harris to the top of the Democratic ticket has been met with enthusiasm from many Black women, not least of all her “sorors,” as AKA members call one another.

The sorority, founded at Howard, is part of the Divine Nine, a group of nine historically Black sororities and fraternities with vast networks across the country. Their up to two million members could prove a powerful force to galvanize Black and young voters—whose support for President Biden’s re-election had appeared to slip before he dropped out—to go the polls in November.

Black Greek life organizations are nonpartisan and nonprofit, so they can’t and don’t endorse candidates. But individual students and alumni involved are throwing their support behind the Harris campaign. Many AKA members convened on a Zoom call of roughly 44,000 people for the group Win With Black Women, which met the day Biden dropped out of the race. The group raised $1.5 million for the Harris campaign in one sitting, The New York Times reported. The Zoom inspired a spate of similar calls since that have raised millions of dollars for Harris. Social media has been buzzing with posts from sorority members calling on each other to organize and canvas and advertising get-out-the-vote swag in the sorority’s signature colors, pink and green.

“Seeing her rise to the possibility of holding the highest position in the land, you’re almost unable to even put it into words,” said Deidra Davis, graduate adviser to the Alpha chapter and a member of Xi Omega, Washington, D.C.’s Alpha Kappa Alpha chapter. “We have worked so hard for so many years for equal rights, for women’s rights, for civil rights. And to see this come to fruition, we are just bursting with pride and hope and just overall elation.”

Donna Miller, a county board commissioner for Cook County, Ill., who’s an AKA member, was at a party with friends from the sorority when she heard the news that Biden had endorsed Harris. Miller also attended the Win With Black Women call.

“We just all immediately said, ‘OK, now we have to get busy,’” she said. “We have to get to these swing states and volunteer and knock on doors and talk to voters.”

Harris is a regular at AKA events and spoke earlier this month, before Biden left the race, at the sorority’s annual Boulé, a national gathering. She gave a shout-out to those who attended Howard with her and spoke of how the organization influenced her since her “earliest days,” given her aunt joined AKA in 1950.

“Sorors, all of us here are clear: While we have come a mighty long way, we have more work to do,” she said. “For 116 years, the members of our sorority have been on the front lines of the fight to realize the promise of America. This year, let us continue that work.”

She was also greeted with enthusiastic applause when she addressed Zeta Phi Beta, another sorority in the Divine Nine, at their Boulé on July 24 after becoming the presumptive Democratic nominee.

“In this moment, our nation, as it always has, is counting on you to energize, to organize, and to mobilize; to register folks to vote, to get them to the polls; and to continue to fight for the future our nation and her people deserve,” Harris told the Zeta Phi Betas. “And we know when we organize, mountains move. When we mobilize, nations change. And when we vote, we make history.”

During Harris’s vice presidency, leaders of the Divine Nine have visited the White House on multiple occasions, including a visit to the Oval Office in May. At that meeting, Harris recounted thanking the organizations in a speech after her selection as Biden’s vice president and reporters asking what the Divine Nine was.

“And to myself I say, ‘You’re about to find out,’” she quipped.

‘Anticipation and Expectation’

Danette Anthony Reed, international president and CEO of Alpha Kappa Alpha, said the sorority plans to focus on registering voters and “supporting and advocating for justice,” but “without centering on any particular individual.” Before the big news about Harris, it had already launched a campaign, called “Take 4 or more in 24,” which encourages each of its members to get at least four people to vote. The group is also asking members to canvass and make phone calls to register voters and walk them through their voting options. The sorority further plans to help would-be voters address any obstacles to voting, such as “transportation barriers and voter suppression tactics.”

Reed said that as the first Black sorority, the group sees itself as “at the forefront of breaking glass ceilings.” AKA members are meeting Harris’s campaign with “a mix of anticipation and expectation.”

Reed also emphasized that the sorority, which has upward of 300,000 members, and the Divine Nine as a whole have long been a political force to be reckoned with, “despite often going unnoticed.” They regularly lobby federal and state lawmakers in support of policies and raise significant amounts for causes to benefit Black communities. She pointed out, for example, that AKA once raised $1 million for HBCUs in a single day.

Meanwhile, the leaders of the Divine Nine, the National Pan-Hellenic Council of Presidents, were planning a major get-out-the-vote effort, which they announced the day after Biden left the race.

“We, the Council of Presidents of the National Pan-Hellenic Council (Divine 9), have met and agreed to meet this critical moment in history with an unprecedented voter registration, education, and mobilization coordinated campaign,” a statement from the council read. “This campaign will activate the thousands of chapters and members in our respective organizations to ensure strong voter turnout in the communities we serve.”

Davis said the Divine Nine are in lockstep, or “all singing from the same hymn book,” when it comes to focusing on “making sure that people are getting out and exercising this right that so many of us were denied just a few decades ago.” She noted that the Alpha chapter plans to launch an informational campaign to ensure out-of-state students at Howard understand the absentee ballot process.

Students are also mobilizing. Smith said her chapter hosts an annual event called Freshman Move In where members of the sorority bring water and help Howard freshmen move their belongings into their dorms as they settle in on campus. This fall, that event is going to include a voter registration drive for both the first years and their parents.

Tyrone Couey, founding member and president of the National Historically Black Colleges & Universities Alumni Associations Foundation, expects Divine Nine voter registration efforts will particularly pay off with young voters, both at HBCUs and the many predominantly white institutions with active chapters. He emphasized that this kind of activism from the Divine Nine isn’t new, but noted the groups are enjoying a new spotlight, given Harris’s proud affiliation with them.

Some aspects of that limelight have been fraught. For example, Fox news commentator Brian Kilmeade drew backlash from HBCU alumni and others for allegedly calling Zeta Phi Beta a “colored” sorority when discussing the recent event Harris attended. (Kilmeade claims he actually said “college sorority.”) Renewed attention to these groups has also prompted social media discussions about whether non-Black Harris fans should avoid using AKA symbols, like donning pink and green garb, doing signature step routines and invoking the sorority’s classic “skee-wee” call.

Davis sees this spotlight moment as a “great opportunity to educate” people about who these groups are, what they do and their history. “We’re not new on the scene,” she said.

Miller has no doubt the groups’ prominence and power will soon become clear. She believes the organizations’ get-out-the-vote initiatives and members’ personal efforts to support the Harris campaign are going to make a difference.

“There are so many individuals who are members of the Divine Nine in so many different capacities, whether they’re elected officials, whether they’re leaders in corporate America, whether they’re entrepreneurs. All of these different entities coming together … is what’s going to make a huge impact,” she said, “because they are organizing like never before.”

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Rebecca Crosby at Popular Information:

Major corporations, including Mastercard, Meta, and Coca-Cola, are quietly sponsoring a Canadian conference headlined by Christopher Rufo, a far-right activist and crusader against diversity initiatives. Many of these same companies, however, champion diversity in their public communications.  Rufo is listed as a featured speaker for the Canada Strong and Free Regional Networking Conference 2024, which will be held in Alberta, Canada on September 21. The event, which was first highlighted by DeSmog, is billed as an “enriching exploration of conservatism in Canada.” On X, the organization promoted the event using a photo of Rufo with the text, “Fighting the left and wokism.” 

Rufo has been credited with creating the hysteria around Critical Race Theory (CRT) in educational settings. In 2020, Rufo appeared on Tucker Carlson’s former show on Fox News and called on Trump to end CRT training. Within days, the Trump administration released a memo outlining a ban on diversity training in the government, and Trump issued the executive order shortly after.

When it became clear that CRT is a complex legal theory that is not taught in K-12 schools, Rufo shifted his attention to lambasting diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives. Rufo appeared with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) as DeSantis signed the Stop W.O.K.E. Act, which limits workplace conversations about diversity and race. (That aspect of the law has been enjoined by a federal court as unconstitutional.) Rufo has also been a leader in the crusade to ban discussion of LGBTQ issues in schools. On X, Rufo insinuated that people were attempting to indoctrinate pre-kindergarten students with information about “gender transitioning, exotic pronouns, and simplified Queer Theory.” Rufo has also said that “parents have good reason” to be concerned about “‘grooming’ in public schools.” 

In 2023, Rufo was appointed by DeSantis to the board of trustees at the New College of Florida as part of a right-wing takeover of the liberal arts college. In his newsletter, Rufo bragged that New College was “the first public university in America to begin rolling back the encroachment of gender ideology and queer theory on its academic offerings.” In an interview with the New York Times, Rufo said that New College previously enrolled too many women, which turned it into “a social justice ghetto.” On X, in response to pictures of dozens of books at the college being thrown away, Rufo said, “We abolished the gender studies program. Now we’re throwing out the trash.”  Companies who claim to support diversity are sponsoring the upcoming event promoting Rufo and his ideological agenda. Mastercard, for example, prides itself on being one of the leaders for DEI initiatives among major corporations. Mastercard’s website states that “[d]iversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) are what set Mastercard apart by making us more adaptable, more innovative and more creative.” Mastercard says that DEI “makes us better” and is “part of our core values and underpins everything we do.” 

Why are major corporations sponsoring an “anti-woke” conference in Red Deer, Alberta, Canada featuring right-wing paranoiac Christopher Rufo.

Rufo helped foment the manufactured crusade against “CRT” in K-12 schools, LGBTQ+ inclusion policies, and DEI in businesses.

[sjsmith56]

The Gilded Age, Part 3 - Courtship

Summary: A bouquet of lilacs, symbolizing early love, is sent to Amelia, where a secret admirer professes his love. Proposing to meet through an intermediary, Amelia agrees. Everything seems to be going well, until a man from both their pasts suddenly appears.

Length: 5.5 K

Characters: Avengers, Amelia, James Buchanan Barnes, John Walker.

Warnings: John Walker opening his big mouth, description of physical and psychological abuse, revelation of closely guarded secret.

Author notes: Remember this is an AU story. However, I have retained many of the customs of the time involving dating. Even with her liberal upbringing, Amelia is still quite naive. Barnes, as a gentleman, will respect her reputation and strive to keep their public encounters appropriate for the time period. Alvan Clark made telescopes were among the finest made at that time. Several of the larger models are still in use today. In researching court-martials in the US Army, the information for that time period frequently conflicted. I wrote the judgement to suit the plot. Divider by vecteezy.com.

<<Part 2

Part 3 - Courtship

The aftermath of the altercation with HYDRA was dealt with in the days after the events of that evening. Clues had been missed, but considering the notice had been given late, it was understandable. Secretary of State Fury, who visited the Society personally the next day, took the blame for that, while denigrating himself for not providing the cavalry to back them up from the beginning. They did inflict damage on the enemy, interrupting and even damaging their operations enough for the dark organization to slink back into the inky waters of anonymity for a time. The mission confirmed that the owner of the docks, Wilson Fisk, by day a supposedly well-respected member of the New York business community, was involved with HYDRA, although any evidence that could be used to prosecute him either disappeared or was destroyed. The Avengers own ground support team, led by Mr. Hogan, suffered no fatalities, although there were several injured by gunshot wound or sword wounds. Young Peter's vigilante acquaintance, who the citizens living in Hell's Kitchen referred to as The Daredevil, had been there, helping in the clash. He sent word that he would keep an eye on the docks, utilizing his own network of people who lived in the underbelly of that locale. Their mutual friend, a blind lawyer by the name of Matthew Murdock, visited to assure himself that Peter would recover, sitting with the young man as he was confined to his room for the week. His Aunt May and her maid / companion, Mary Jane, also visited which bolstered the young man's spirits considerably.

Clint and Vision concerned themselves with looking after their beloved ladies, Natasha and Wanda. Both men doted on them, making sure the two women were comforted in every way possible. Dr. Banner did not return to the headquarters of the Society for two days, although it appeared that Hogan and his men were able to keep track of him. Apparently, the doctor was upset at himself that his other being, the green hulking giant, had only presented itself for a brief time during the heat of the battle then had inexplicably retreated. Banner, ashamed of what he saw as his failure, went on a bit of a bender. When he finally passed out in a tavern that had been paid to watch for him, Hogan went to retrieve him and bring him back to the safety of the Society headquarters. No one ever confronted the man about it, or even mentioned it in passing. Amelia, still getting used to the routine in the building, took it to mean that it had happened before and would likely happen again. Since the good doctor was already hard on himself about it, it wasn't seen as helpful for anyone else to be.

As for Amelia, it seemed that the intimate experience of providing medical treatment to Sergeant Barnes, signalled the beginnings of an increased awareness between them, at least it seemed that way to several of the others. Captain Rogers, who admitted to Sam Wilson that he considered beginning a courtship with the young librarian, noticed it first. Every time Amelia and Barnes were in the same room together, she glanced the Sergeant's way and smiled, while he conducted himself in a gentle manner around her person. Small acts of service, such as pulling out her chair for her, or getting a book from the top shelf, then gazing at her from a distance were apparently how Barnes expressed his interest in this particular member of the fairer sex. As exasperating as it was for the Captain to be relegated to the side, he was also happy for his friend, knowing that since Barnes was rescued from the clutches of HYDRA, the man had shunned any romantic entanglements.

Ten days after the altercation with HYDRA, everyone was in the common area of the 21st floor. It was a beautiful spring day, and the morning sun shone through the large windows, making the space feel warm and inviting. Natasha, although still not wearing a corset was well enough to dress and leave the confines of the apartment she shared with her fiancé. She and Clint looked at images of Paris in the stereoscope, contemplating a visit there for their honeymoon. Rogers, Wilson, Thor and Loki were playing billiards. Wanda played the piano, while Vision sat next to her and turned the pages of the music sheets. Peter was writing a letter, while Mr. and Mrs. Stark worked together on a word cross puzzle in the newspaper. Dr. Banner, Sergeant Barnes, and Amelia were all reading a book. Hogan called up from the lobby to say that a bouquet of flowers had been delivered for Miss Winston. Instructed to bring it up, everyone perked up when he walked in carrying a large bouquet of purple lilacs, placing it on the table next to Amelia, then leaving.

"Someone has declared himself," said Natasha, knowingly. "Purple lilacs symbolize early love. Who are they from?"

Amelia opened the card and read silently what was written. You have captured my heart. This is but the first of many expressions of my ardour for you. If you would but grant me the honour of your company at a time and place of your choosing, please send a message through Mr. Hogan. He will be discreet for both of us. I am at your mercy, sweet Amelia.

She looked up at everyone. "It isn't signed. But it appears I have an admirer."

Leaning close to the flowers, she breathed in deeply, her face taking on a dreamy expression. Without delay she stood up, picked up the vase and left, presumably to take the flowers to her apartment. Everyone returned back to their amusements, except for Captain Rogers who noticed his friend, Sergeant Barnes still looking in the direction of Amelia's departure. After the small pang of loss he felt at being too late in declaring his own interest in her, Rogers hoped this bold step, taken by his longtime friend, would lead to lasting happiness for both of them.

It was another two days, before Amelia requested permission to leave the Society headquarters for personal reasons. Both Mr. and Mrs. Stark, who she directed her request to, smiled at her as she stood hopefully before them.

"You do not have to request permission to conduct your own life," stated Mr. Stark. "You are a grown woman, after all. Your hours of employment are not set in stone, since like all of us here you are available for any task at any hour. Go, take what time you need and enjoy yourself."

With a smile and nod thanking them, Amelia returned to her apartment and placed a straw boater hat on her head, securing it with a hatpin. She secured a short jacket around her upper body, then checked her small pocketbook, ensuring there was enough money to return home on the subway if she became stranded. For a moment, she hesitated at the thought that in less than two weeks she was already thinking of this building as home, but it was. Other than the intensity of that first night when she was thrown into the figurative fire of being a nurse tending to the injured, she had felt safe and secure here. The people in the building had become dear to her, almost as dear as her own father and brother. If her secret admirer was one of them, it could signal the start of a turning point in her life, one that she was eager to experience, having never being in love before. Satisfied with her appearance she left her apartment and took the elevator down to the lobby. Hogan was there and came out the door with her to help her into a waiting hansom cab.

"I was going to take the subway," she protested.

"No, Miss Winston, the gentleman was emphatic that you take the safety of a cab as New York can be dangerous. He has engaged one to return you back here as well." He persisted, leaving her no choice but to take his hand as she stepped into the interior. He looked at the driver. "Drop off the young lady as close as possible to the boathouse in Central Park."

The driver touched his cap and with a short command from his lips, set off in the direction of the large green space, already famous for its location in the middle of the large metropolis. Sitting inside the cab, Amelia watched the life of the city pass by her, as the route went through several neighbourhoods. When it finally stopped and the driver dismounted to help her out, he pointed in the direction she had to walk for a short distance. With thanks to him, she set off and approached the lake, where boaters and gondolas were already in abundance on the blue green waters. Approaching the spot where she agreed to meet her admirer she waited only a short moment, then heard footsteps behind her.

"You came," said a familiar voice that set her heart racing. "I was afraid you would change your mind."

Turning around to look up into the face of Sergeant Barnes, whose soft gaze at her couldn't disguise the emotion the man was feeling, she smiled.

"I hoped it was you," she answered. "No one else has me thinking of them as much as you do ... James."

"Amelia," he responded, "dearest, sweetest Amelia. How I've longed to hear my name from your lips and to say those words to you."

Offering her his arm, he placed his other hand on hers briefly when she took it, as they began strolling through the park. Sergeant Barnes, until this moment, had never thought he could live a life like this, of walking openly in public with a sweetheart, not consumed with dread over whether he was recognized and avoided as something distasteful. In the years since he was rescued from HYDRA, he had lived a mostly reclusive life, staying indoors at the Society headquarters, reading, tinkering with Anthony Stark in the basement on the engines they both were fascinated with, occasionally observing the night sky through the six-inch Alvan Clark refractor telescope in the small observatory on the roof, or improving his marksmanship skills in the firing range also located in the basement. Almost all of his excursions were when they went on missions, mostly at night. It was a lonely existence, made bearable only by the patience and understanding of his colleagues. From the moment he was introduced to Amelia, it seemed like a curtain had been drawn back, letting in the bright light of life. Although she was considerably younger than him, being with her just felt right, as her warmth and zest for knowledge and enjoyment, provided what he had been missing for so long. Every fibre of his being longed to not just cherish and protect her, but also to support her as she explored all that life had to offer. He meant every word of what he told Samuel Wilson; that a woman like her should stand next to her man as his equal, not as a subordinate. If he was so fortunate to win her hand, he would spend a lifetime making sure of that.

A small kiosk was set up with small bags of food for the ducks in another pond. Reaching into his pocket, Sergeant Barnes withdrew a nickel to purchase one, and they approached the water. Opening it to her, he watched as her small, gloved hand dipped in, coming back out with dried corn and peas. She tossed her fare into the water, sweeping her hand in an arc to reach as great an area as possible. More ducks hurried in as they realized food was at hand and she reached in again, scattering the food to feed many of them, at least with a small morsel. He watched her face, as she frowned at some of the ducks attempting to prevent others from reaching the floating meal.

"Even though I try to scatter it to as many as possible there are always some who want the food all for themselves," she stated, reaching her hand inside the bag again. "It must be innate in most species, not just humans."

"Yet, humans are capable of the greatest tenderness and sacrifice," he answered. "Our intellect and reason make us humane. I wish we could witness it more."

Amelia looked up at him, seeing a moment of painful remembrance on his brow, then he smiled softly at her and checked inside the bag, noticing it was almost empty. Turning it over he emptied the contents into her waiting hands and smiled as she tossed the food away from her, then brushed her hands together to remove the crumbs. A passing breeze had blown a small fleck of dried food onto her face and he gestured with his right hand to remove it. Looking up at him again, she gazed into his blue eyes as he gently brushed the fleck off her cheek. For a long moment, his hand stayed there as if he wished to cup her cheek in his palm. Then the moment passed, and he dropped his hand, before offering his arm to her again, as their walk resumed.

"May I ask you a personal question?"

She glanced up at Sergeant Barnes, hoping he was amenable to the request.

"You may."

"How old are you?"

"I turned 33 on March 10 of this year," he answered, then continued speaking. "My father fought in the Civil War, for the north, and was anxious to start his family upon his mustering out. I am the oldest of four children. The others are sisters, ranging in age from 23 to 31, all of them but the youngest married with children of their own. She is being courted by a serious young man who will not ever say no to her."

"Were you ever married?"

"No, I enjoyed the company of several women when I was younger but never entered into a formal courtship with any of them. I had decided to join the military and felt certain that the life was not one favourable to the formation of a family. Although I still wear the uniform, as officially I am on secondment to the Society, I now live as a civilian." He glanced down at her. "Your turn, Amelia."

She blushed and smiled. "I am 24, and you already know I have a father and brother. My mother died when I was five years of age, of scarlet fever. My father never remarried, choosing to devote himself to raising my brother and me while practising law. I graduated from the Armour Institute in Chicago with a diploma in library science, as it was one of the fields where a woman could be successful in her own right. I worked at the public library in Chicago until I received a letter from Mr. Stark six weeks ago, asking if I was interested in this position." She smiled a little. "He wasn't fully forthright in what it would entail, grouping my additional responsibilities under that heading, with the caveat "as needed," but I have no regrets. I feel very energized by my position. In fact, I was just thinking before I left that I am very much at home there."

"I'm glad," replied Sergeant Barnes. "I was concerned about you on that first evening. It was a harsh introduction to your other responsibilities, but you were steadfast, and I admired you for it."

For a moment, Amelia looked away, then she returned her gaze back at him. "When did you know? About how you felt about me?"

"Almost from the moment I met you. Definitely when we worked on the cryptograms together. You were so focused but I had a hard time doing the same. I think the actual moment was when you were tending to my injury. Every part of me wanted to hold you in my arms, and convince you that it would be alright, since I was there with you and would be whenever you needed me. Of course, that would have been highly inappropriate considering the brevity of our acquaintance and the lack of clothing on my part."

She breathed out quickly then stopped. "I wouldn't have been offended. The gesture would have been welcomed."

This time he did rest his fingertips on her cheeks, regarding her with intensity.

"You are too kind to trifle with me. Would you entertain the possibility of me formally courting you? My intentions are honourable. I have never felt this way before and every part of me longs to be near you, always."

"I would like that," she replied. "Although my father has encouraged me to make my own decisions, I would like you to meet him, and put forth your request to him in person, out of respect. He has already written that he is coming to New York within a fortnight to meet with a gentleman who requires representation for building a factory in Illinois. Until then, would you be offended if we kept our future assignations private?"

For a brief flicker of time, he was disappointed at her caveat, but she was correct. Given the difference in their social status, it was a prudent request. In this matter, he would defer to her.

"I agree that we should keep this private for now. It will be difficult to keep a neutral attitude towards you as a colleague, but I will endeavour to do so."

"We can still meet, James," she smiled. "If Mr. Hogan is amenable to continue assisting us, I'm sure we can find a way to meet privately without the others being in the know regarding our intentions."

He laughed. "You're aware we are a society of spies. Being in the know is part of our job. They will find out."

"Then let them enjoy the hunt while we lead them on a merry chase."

How her face lit up at that declaration, a look that filled him with elation. She was truly a formidable woman. When he returned her to the spot where the hansom cab was already waiting, he helped her up into the interior. Removing her glove from her right hand she offered it to him. He removed his glove to take it, then bent over her hand to kiss the soft skin of her fingers. Their eyes met and stayed on each other as the cab pulled away to return her to the Society headquarters. Ten minutes later, Barnes hailed his own cab, and spent the entire ride home feeling happier than he had in a long time.

In the interval since that first meeting, they had managed to meet privately three times. Their next meeting was attending the opera together in a private box that afforded them anonymity to the other patrons. During an emotional rendition of a romantic aria between the soprano and tenor performers in the third act, Amelia linked her fingers with his. The sublime look on her face during the performance would stay with Sergeant Barnes forever. Even though their hands were gloved it was confirmation that their attachment was fated to be. Once again, he kissed her bare hand in farewell when he sent her home ahead of him.

Their subsequent encounter found them enjoying dinner together in a private dining room followed by dancing to a string quartet provided just for them. With both of them in evening dress, the Sergeant found himself entranced by the shape of her shoulders revealed by the cut of her gown. Her natural beauty was almost hypnotic in its power over him. When he offered her his hand to dance, he couldn't quite believe she was in his arms, gazing into his eyes while he maneuvered her around the small dance space. It took all of his discipline not to kiss her fully on the lips, as he wasn't sure he could stop.

Their most recent rendezvous was spent riding in Central Park on this warm Sunday afternoon. For the latter meeting, she arrived with her long hair loose down her back, wearing a skirt split in such a way that she could ride her horse western style. It was very daring of her to wear that style of skirt, and wear her hair down like that, but Sergeant Barnes appreciated the practicality of her clothing. As for her long locks, he longed to run his hands through the silken tresses, despite the inappropriateness of such a display in a public setting. Removing his own hat, he left it at the stable. They rode as closely together as they could, enjoying each other's company, not realizing a storm cloud was approaching their sunny vista. Deciding to rest their horses, Sergeant Barnes dismounted, then grasped Amelia around her waist, effortlessly lifting her down to the ground. In the process she placed her hands on his chest, an act considered almost inappropriate for an unmarried couple, even though they were unofficially courting. As neither wanted the moment to end they didn't move. Instead, they enjoyed the close interlude.

"Amelia Winston, what are you doing in New York?" said a man's voice and she turned to see someone she never expected to see again.

"John Walker. I live and work here now for SHIELD."

Immediately, Sergeant Barnes whole body stiffened, and he turned towards the other man, who also stiffened when he recognized the Avenger.

"Sergeant Barnes."

"Lieutenant Walker."

"I'm not in the cavalry, anymore, Barnes. I'm a U.S. Agent with the Secret Service." Walker looked from one to the other. "You are courting? With him?"

"It really isn't your business, is it Mr. Walker?" Anger flashed briefly on Amelia's face. "You made it very clear in Chicago that my family's wealth and connections weren't enough to warrant your attention."

He hummed a little. "But Barnes ... you do know about him, right?"

"I think you've said enough," stated Sergeant Barnes, darkly. "Good day, Agent Walker."

Grasping the reins of both horses with one hand and taking Amelia's arm in his other, he turned to leave but Walker's voice reached them both.

"Does she know what you did, Barnes? Is she aware of your court-martial?"

She looked up at him. "What is he talking about, James?"

He kept walking until she pulled her arm out of his and stopped. With a sigh, he turned back to her.

"Please, let's return the horses to the stable and I will explain but I won't do it here, not where anyone can listen as it is a private matter."

"But you were court-martialed? Why did you not tell me before?"

"Amelia, please, not here. Back at the Society. Captain Rogers will verify what I tell you. I beg you to indulge me on this."

He waited, pleading with his eyes for her to accompany him back to the stable. With a nod, she walked towards him but wouldn't put her arm in his. For the five minutes it took to reach the stable, they didn't speak. All that Sergeant Barnes could think of was that it was over. Once he told her, she would have nothing to do with him and he couldn't blame her. From the stable they walked to the hansom cab stand and both of them got in. Again, they didn't speak, and the tension grew between them. The trip back seemed to take forever with Barnes feeling more and more ill as they got closer to their destination. Several times, Amelia looked at him with concern, but he was so lost in his misery that he didn't notice.

"Why are you sharing a cab together?" asked Hogan, when he stepped forward to open the cab door. "What's wrong?"

"Walker," stated Barnes and he went to the door, then turned to Amelia. "Please."

She nodded and went through the door ahead of him. As soon as they entered the lobby Hogan phoned up to the 21st floor.

"John Walker has appeared," he stated. "Sergeant Barnes is quite perturbed. Miss Winston is with him and is also unhappy. I surmise that Walker is the cause."

By the time they got up to the 21st floor almost everyone was there. Looking from face to face in confusion, Amelia wondered what was so dire that everyone felt compelled to be there. Mrs. Stark stepped forward and took Amelia's hand in hers.

"Exactly what did John Walker say?"

She related the short conversation, surprised when the others swore openly.

"What is going on? Why would he say such a thing? Is it true that James was court-martialed? Please, I need to know."

From where he sat, with his head in his hands, Sergeant Barnes looked up, pure agony on his face.

"I told you about my being a prisoner of HYDRA. I wasn't the only one."

"Yes, you already said Captain Rogers was taken."

"So was Lieutenant John Walker," said Mr. Stark. "He was taken at the same time as Buck, but he made no attempt to escape, find the Sergeant or rescue him, even though he was uninjured. When Captain Rogers was taken and transformed with those injections, he immediately realized his strength would allow him to escape but he wasn't going without Buck. By the time he got to a fort with him, having carried him in his arms for miles, Walker was already there ahead of them. He accused Buck of cooperating with HYDRA, of performing an act so cruel that he should be shot at once."

"He was in no condition to do anything when I found him," said Rogers. "He didn't know up from down, yesterday from today, or even who I was. He couldn't walk and the arm they put on him was like a lead weight, weighing him down. What Walker accused him of wasn't possible. He said Buck attacked a farmhouse where women and children were taking refuge from the range wars and killed them with his bare hands. He didn't do it. I know Buck, like a brother. He wouldn't do such a thing. But Walker had connections, high up in the military and they arrested Buck. Secretary of State Fury was our colonel then and he agreed that it was impossible given the condition he was found in to perform that act of savagery. Despite Walker's insistence on a summary judgement, Fury was able to delay it so that medical treatment could be sought for him."

"Even then they treated me like an animal," said Barnes, staring blankly ahead of him, as if he was reliving it once more. "Shackled at my wrists and ankles, dragged by my elbows and thrown into a paddy wagon. I was placed in a prison first, beaten and starved. It took an intervention by the President himself on appeal by my mother to release me to a medical hospital where Dr. Banner was working." He looked at the doctor, smiling wanly at him. "I will never forget his kindness as he helped me. It was him who told me what those injections did to me based on his study of my blood."

"Why didn't you tell me?" Amelia's eyes were glassy. "I would have believed you."

"Then you would have been one of the few. My fate was to be decided by three high ranking officers, Colonel Fury, General Alexander Pierce, and General Howard Stark, Anthony's father. A friend of Fury's, Colonel Rhodes, represented me. He was magnificent, calling in Dr. Banner and Steve, other men from our unit to provide character references, even calling in a HYDRA prisoner that had been taken to verify that I was unable to do what they said I did. He took one look at the tribunal, grasped a gun from the guard and shot himself in the head. Right there, in front of all of us."

"Captain Rumlow was the prosecuting officer and he brought in other HYDRA prisoners that said Buck did it, but you knew they were lying. They were terrified." Rogers sat next to Barnes and placed his arms around his shoulders. "I wasn't going to let them railroad the judgment. I was prepared to break into the prison and take him out of the country if I had to. Then Rumlow offered a deal. Buck plead guilty to one count of accidental death, accept a sentence of one-year hard labour and he would be free. They went from a summary execution to a one-year sentence. It wasn't right."

"No, it doesn't sound right," agreed Amelia. "Did you accept it? I mean, James is here, alive and free."

"No, I refused it," said Barnes. "I didn't do it. Two out of the three superior officers agreed, Fury and Stark. Pierce voted guilty. According to military law, a unanimous decision is required to find a soldier guilty. Since it wasn't unanimous I was free to return to duty."

"But with your name still blackened from the charge and the one officer who found you guilty," said Amelia. "There is something dastardly about the whole affair and you think John Walker was involved?"

Barnes exchanged a look with Steve who nodded his head curtly. "The HYDRA prisoner who was going to testify on our behalf said it was Walker. He was also injected and transformed. To prove his strength and loyalty to HYDRA for the gift they gave him, he killed those people. Now he's in the Secret Service, privy to all sorts of top-secret information."

"What?!" Anthony Stark jumped up. "He's a U.S. Agent? There is definitely something rotten in Washington. I'm calling Fury. He needs to know this."

He rushed off to his apartment while the others sat quietly. A cough from Loki drew attention to him.

"Sergeant, I owe you an apology," he said, sounding shaken. "I never knew the whole story, only what was gossiped about in the newspapers. I assumed the worse about you and it wasn't right. You have conducted yourself with honour while I've known you, but I was too wrapped up in my own petty prejudices to see it. Please forgive me."

Barnes smiled slightly and nodded his head at the man, then stood up in front of Amelia.

"I didn't mean to hide this from you, but I didn't know how to tell you. It took a long time for me to trust that people would believe I could never do such a thing. I didn't give you a chance to decide for yourself and I'm sorry."

"Oh, James. I do believe you but why would Walker be against us courting? That was his intent, wasn't it, to stop us from being together?"

"I knew it," grinned Natasha. "It's written all over them."

Barnes smiled at the vivacious redhead. "I can only think he doesn't want me to be happy at all. He never did like me. Steve had to reprimand him more than once for harsh treatment."

"Well," stated Mrs. Stark, standing up. "We have a dinner guest to prepare for. Amelia's father, Harris Winston is visiting tonight. We're going to give him the grand tour to show him that his daughter is a vital part of our organization. I want everyone in their best clothes and on their best behaviour this evening. Drinks are 7 pm. Dinner is at 8. Don't any of you dare be late." She laughed. “Anthony’s not the only poet.”

"I forgot he was coming," said Amelia. She looked up at the man she loved. "It will be alright. He will like you and I'm sure he will give his blessing to our courtship."

The man couldn't help himself. Now that their unofficial courtship was in the open, Sergeant Barnes did what he wanted to do for weeks. Removing the glove from his right hand, he placed it on Amelia's cheek, then leaned down, gently pressing his lips against hers. It wasn't a chaste kiss, but it was sweet enough that the others who witnessed it sighed at the obvious display of love between the normally reserved Sergeant and the young librarian. When he wrapped her in his strong embrace after, as she rested her head against his chest, everyone felt like something wonderful had just happened for the couple. It was beautiful to witness.

Part 4>>

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[invisible-pink-toast]

was going through my files and found some unfinished old fics from maybeequeen week back in 2022! i'm going to work on finishing a couple of them but probably will never complete this one, still it's just a little snapshot into chloe's life and her relationships. it was for the birthday prompt:

On Chloe’s 11th birthday, the best part of the day was supposed to be that her mother had promised to be there. Audrey was in London doing some fashion critic thing with British Vogue. Normally the flight over from New York was too long, but the flight from London to Paris was only an hour.

But around lunchtime, Chloe got a voicemail from her mother’s assistant, saying that Audrey was busy with a fashion show, but she wished Chloe a happy 10th birthday. Chloe had curled up on her bed, holding Mr Cuddly as tight as she could, as she tried not to cry. Her mother hated crying. 

In the evening, Andre Bourgeois threw Chloe a party. It was very fancy and sophisticated and Chloe felt very grown up. Unfortunately most of the people who’d been invited where her father’s friends, business associates, political sponsors. And given that it was an eleven-year-olds birthday, all of their wives and husbands and partners and children were invited too. A family event.  ‘We should never waste an opportunity to network, sweetheart.’ Her father had said, fixing his cufflinks, as a stylist did Chloe’s hair. It’s not like the other kids from school would have wanted to come anyway. At least Sabrina, Adrien and Felix were going to be there. 

When the party started, Chloe went around with her father and smiled and introduced herself. She answered the polite and uninteresting questions, gracefully accepted birthday wishes and clenched her teeth as her cheeks got pinched by women who had apparently known her since she was a baby, even though she was sure she’d never seen them before.

Sabrina arrived and Chloe showed off her new dress and new jewelry and told Sabrina all about her new presents, as Sabrina gasped and admired and begged to borrow things. But the real best part of the day was the surprise Chloe got was when the Agreste’s showed up. 

She’s in the middle of falsely smiling at one of the hotel board members when hands grab her around the middle from behind. She yelps, but is only pulled into a hug by a laughing Adrien. 

‘Happy birthday, Chlo!’ He yells in her ear, and then she’s laughing too. A real one, not the simpering little giggle she’s been putting on all night. She turns in his arms and hugs him back. 

‘Adrikins! You came!’ 

‘Of course! But you’ll never believe who else did…’ He says mysteriously, before grabbing her hand and pulling her through the crowd. 

Aunt Emilie has been awfully sick. She’s been sick for a long time now, but whenever Chloe would ask about it, her godmother would wave away her concerns and say she was fine. Chloe still doesn’t know what she’s sick with. Over the last few years, Emilie’s only gotten worse. She has terrible coughing fits, bouts of confusion or anger that come out of nowhere, and terrible spells that Uncle Gabe calls “episodes”. Chloe has never seen one of the episodes, but Adrien told her they were awful, and made him so scared that he couldn’t get them out of his head.

Several months ago, Emilie took time off of work so she could stay at home, to try to rest to get better. Chloe thought that was a good idea, when she was sick she got to stay home and eat as many sweet things as she ordered, at it always made her feel better. Adrien stopped going out as much, staying at home to keep his mother company. At first Chloe would go over all the time to see them. But as the months passed, Emilie didn’t seem to be getting better. So Uncle Gabe said his wife needed proper rest, and that Chloe should give her the space to do so. Chloe started shortening her visits, then decreasing her visits - first to twice a week, then once a week, then every fortnight - always under her godfather’s watchful and disapproving gaze. Her last visit got cancelled because Emilie needed a visit from the doctor, so Chloe hasn’t seen her for almost a month. 

So when Adrien pulls Chloe through the crowd, she’s expecting to see someone like Jagged Stone or the President. Instead she sees Uncle Gabe, frowning like he always does nowadays, but beside him, grinning without a care in the world, is her Aunt Emilie. 

Chloe gasps and races forwards (in a very undignified way) and throws her arms around Emilie. 

‘Careful, Chloe!’ Gabriel snaps, steadying Emilie with his hand, but Emilie shushes him and wraps her arms tightly around the birthday girl. 

‘I didn’t think you could come?!’ Chloe says, her face still buried in her aunt’s jacket. Emilie runs a hand over Chloe’s fancy hairdo. 

‘Well, I couldn’t miss your 11th birthday now, could I?’ Emilie says, tucking a strand of Chloe’s hair back into place, and Chloe smiles up at her. ‘It’s a very important occasion. Happy birthday, dear.’ 

‘Yes, happy birthday.’ Gabriel echoes. 

Chloe sniffs, and steps back, remembering herself and smoothing out her skirt. ‘Thank you for coming.’ She says politely, but she’s still smiling brightly. That’s when she gets a good look at her aunt. She’s very pale, supporting most of her weight on her cane, and she’s wearing a winter coat even though it’s September. But her smile is just the same as ever, so Chloe puts it out of her mind, and eagerly shows off her party and her presents to her new guests. 

[coochiequeens]

Another example of something that never happens.....

By Anna Slatz December 22, 2023

CONTENT NOTICE: This article contains explicit references to child sexual abuse, as documented by the Federal Bureau of Investigations during a predator sting. Reader discretion is appreciated.

A transgender pedophile in Vermont has been sentenced to 11 years in federal prison after being caught in a law enforcement sting targeting predators. Scarlet Moon Shadows, also known as Dragongurl69, pleaded guilty to attempting to entice a minor into sexual activity.

As previously reported by Reduxx, Shadows, born Randy Emillion Goodreau, first appeared in federal court last year after being arrested in Albany, New York while trying to meet who he believed to be an 11-year-old girl for sexual abuse.

The incident began after Shadows messaged a social networking account established by the FBI seeking to attract predators. The profile was made to look as though it belonged to a woman in custody of an 11-year-old girl, and included a number of pedophilic “dog whistles” in the biography section. Shadows messaged the account, and, after a brief exchange in which he expressed interest in “teaching” the child sexual acts, the two moved their communications to an encrypted messenger.

Shadows then asked to speak to the child directly, and began messaging with a second undercover agent posing as the girl.

According to an affidavit submitted by Special Agent Jenelle Bringuel, Shadows quickly offered to “date” the girl and introduce her to sexual acts. He also sent the girl several photos of his “breasts,” and plotted how to keep their relationship a secret from the public.

“We can be a real couple when we are home, but in public [kisses] have to be on the cheek. Can probably still hold hands though,” Shadows said, using text-lingo to convey his point to the minor. He continued: “We can kiss on the lips, like at home or in car rides depending how busy traffic is … at home [we] can do whatever you want. We can make love if you want to.”

Approximately one month after beginning to communicate with the undercover agents, Shadows travelled from Vermont to Warren County, New York with the intention of having sex with the child. Shadows was arrested after arriving at a meet-up point, and was found to have had an engagement ring, condoms, and gifts for the child on his person. During questioning, he claimed the sexual texts were nothing more than “roleplaying.”

A psychosexual assessment of Shadows revealed that he was subjected to a viewing test which indicated his interests in juvenile females, adolescent boys, and very young girls. The assessment also revealed that he had a “high interest” in infant females.

A press release put out by the Department of Justice detailing the case referred to Shadows using she / her pronouns and gave no indication that he is male or that he identifies as transgender. According to the DOJ, the investigation was conducted by the FBI and its Child Exploitation Task Force, which includes members of federal, state, and local law enforcement agencies, including the Colonie Police Department and the New York State Police.

In April, Shadows pleaded guilty to Attempted Enticement and Coercion of a Minor. Shadows has been in FBI custody since, with a number of delays occurring during the hearing process. In October, his public defense attorney abruptly dropped his case, citing “conflict of interest,” and the case was put on hold until a new defense attorney could pick up the sentencing negotiations.

On December 20, Shadows was sentenced to 11 years, one year more than the mandatory minimum of 10 years the defense had been seeking.

Shadows was active on Facebook prior to his arrest, and made multiple posts utilizing the trans pride flag and calls to “cherish trans women.” He also uploaded his own poorly-drawn artwork to his account, some of which featured disturbing themes. 

In one pen-work picture, Shadows shows what appears to be an older man with a much-smaller girl. 

“We will never brake, not even from our darkest sin. The devil is no longer in charge. We are the new rulers of hell,” the picture reads.

Two posts seen on Shadows’ Facebook account.

While it is currently unknown where Shadows will be incarcerated, he will be under the jurisdiction of the federal Bureau of Prisons, which currently has a gender self-identification policy in place for housing transgender inmates. 

On January 13 of 2022, the Bureau of Prisons revised its Transgender Offender Manual, which included guidelines previously scrubbed by the Trump administration with respect to gender self-identification for federal inmates. Under the Trump administration, inmates were housed based on biological sex as a sole consideration, but the Biden administration renewed Obama-era guidelines requiring gender identity be considered when making housing assignments.

There are currently 1,500 federal inmates who identify as transgender. According to Keep Prisons Single Sex USA, almost 50% of trans-identified male federal inmates are in custody for sex offences. This is compared to just 11% of the non-trans male federal inmate population.

[ewomennetwork0]

Building Networks that Empower: How Women Can Create Effective Business Networks

In the realm of business, networking is not just about building a list of contacts—it's about cultivating meaningful relationships that can provide mutual support and opportunities for growth. For women in business, these connections can serve as a springboard to overcome hurdles, achieve professional goals, and pave the way for future generations of women leaders. Today, we'll dive deep into how women can create effective business networks and how such networks can empower them to reach new heights in their careers.

Understanding the Importance of Networking for Women in Business

Research has repeatedly shown that robust business networks play a crucial role in the success of entrepreneurs and professionals alike. It's through these networks that we gain access to essential resources—knowledge, opportunities, mentorship, and support. However, the gender disparity within business networks is not insignificant. Women in business often find themselves contending with male-dominated networks, where access to resources may be limited. As a result, it's vital for women to build their networks proactively, focusing not just on quantity but also on the quality of connections.

Navigating the Networking Landscape

The world of networking can feel overwhelming. It's teeming with networking events, online platforms, and various groups that can sometimes feel more daunting than helpful. For women looking to build their business networks, it's crucial to navigate this landscape strategically. Consider your professional goals and target industries, and identify networking opportunities that align with these parameters. Seek out events and platforms where you're likely to meet peers, mentors, and potential business partners who share your interests and aspirations. The more relevant your network, the more empowering it will be.

Building Meaningful Connections

Once you've identified the right networking opportunities, the next step is to build meaningful connections. Networking isn't just about exchanging business cards—it's about engaging in authentic, mutually beneficial relationships. This means asking insightful questions, offering your knowledge and expertise where appropriate, and maintaining regular contact. Networking for women in business isn't about conforming to an "old boys' club" model; instead, it's about fostering relationships based on respect, empathy, and mutual

More info : Women's Entrepreneur Conference 2024

[jourdepluie91]

The Rise and Fall of Diddy: A Deep Dive into the Life of Sean Comb

Sean “Diddy” Combs was one of the most powerful men in music. He is a rapper, singer, actor, producer, and record executive, and one of the most influential figures in the American music and entertainment industry.

On September 16 (U.S. time), Diddy was arrested in New York on multiple charges: rape, sex trafficking, coercion, abuse, and using extortion and violence to control victims. Diddy is currently being held in a jail under strict surveillance to prevent any suicide attempt.

This incident has shocked not only the U.S. but the entire world, implicating numerous big Hollywood stars and other powerful figures. Many are now questioning just how wealthy and powerful Diddy must be to manipulate all of Hollywood.

As one of the most prominent and successful rappers, Diddy has been nominated for the Grammy Awards 14 times and won 3 times. He was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1995. In 1997, Guinness World Records awarded him the title of the most successful Rap Music Producer.

With his achievements in music, Diddy built a diverse business empire, spanning music, fashion, liquor, and media. His influence in the music industry extends beyond producing and performing; he is also known as a businessman who continuously expanded his ventures into multiple industries.

In 1993, Diddy founded his own record label, Bad Boy Records. Three decades later, he has expanded his influence in the music industry, amassing an enormous fortune, the largest in the hip-hop world, making him considered the richest rapper of all time. In 2022, according to Forbes, Diddy’s net worth hit $1 billion. While this figure has since decreased, it still remains above $600 million.

From the 2010s, Diddy ventured into acting. He starred in a comedy film that grossed $95.5 million at the box office. Besides that, Diddy has also appeared in several reality TV shows. In 2013, he launched Revolt TV, a cable television network focused on music and culture.

Diddy also has a collection of supercars from various brands and price ranges, including a Lamborghini Gallardo Spyder, Maybach 57, Rolls-Royce Phantom, Chevrolet Corvette, Ferrari, and more.

Given his immense wealth, it’s no surprise that Diddy leads an extremely lavish lifestyle, owning luxury mansions and real estate. He has two main residences in Los Angeles and Miami, as well as multiple other properties scattered across the U.S., each typically worth tens of millions of dollars.

Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs indictment explained: alleged ‘freak-offs,’ drugs and prostitution

Alleged drug-fueled orgies, force and coercion, prostitution and a cover-up are at the core of a searing three-count federal indictment against Combs.

Combs is depicted as the leader of an alleged criminal enterprise, subjecting women, men and even minors to a pattern of physical and sexual abuse, according to federal prosecutors.

Houston attorney Tony Buzbee said he expects lawsuits to be filed within the next month, with most expected to be filed in New York and Los Angeles. Buzbee described the victims as 60 males and 60 females, and that 25 were minors at the time of the alleged misconduct. One individual alleged he was 9 years old when he was abused, Buzbee said. The allegations cover a period from 1991 to this year.

Investigators allege that, over a span of years, Combs would ply victims with narcotics and even resort to violence and intimidation during days-long sex sessions.

Numerous social media videos describe Diddy’s alleged “freak off” parties as multi-day sex orgies involving heavy drug use, gallons of alcohol, and large quantities of baby oil and lubricants.

These events, according to reports, would start after his famous “white parties,” which attracted celebrities like Leonardo DiCaprio, Will Smith, Paris Hilton, Jennifer Lopez, Bruce Willis and Mariah Carey.

When the A-listers left, a more secretive, hedonistic party would begin in back rooms, featuring Diddy and a select group of friends.

Michael Kaplan of the New York Times explains how as the night wore on, only a few select guests would remain for the more debauched events.

Kaplan also recounts a drug dealer’s testimony from one of these parties, where he allegedly witnessed male-on-male sexual activity among rappers, which shocked him.

According to federal prosecutors, Combs did not act alone, although no one else has yet been charged in the case. Combs allegedly had assistants, managers and security staff who made sure that women and male prostitutes were present at these "freak off" events and that the hotel rooms where they were staged were stocked with supplies like baby oil and lubricant.

Some of the alleged conduct also took place at auditions where “many times, especially young people, people wanting to break into the industry were coerced into this type of conduct in the promise of being made a star,” Buzbee said.

Combs has been locked up at the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn since pleading not guilty Sept. 17 to federal charges that he used his “power and prestige” to induce female victims into drugged-up, elaborately produced sexual performances with male sex workers in these “freak offs.”

Other alleged victims have already filed lawsuits against Combs that include allegations of sexual assault.

Combs has pleaded not guilty to racketeering conspiracy and sex trafficking. His attorney said he is innocent and will fight to clear his name.

[dailyanarchistposts]

Chapter 1. Human Nature

Haven’t humans always been patriarchal?

One of the most ancient forms of oppression and hierarchy is patriarchy: the division of humans into two rigid gender roles and the domination of men over women. But patriarchy is not natural or universal. Many societies have had more than two gender categories, and have allowed their members to change gender. Some even created respected spiritual roles for those who did not fit into either of the primary genders. The majority of prehistoric art depicts people who are either of no determinate gender or people with ambiguous, exaggerated combinations of masculine and feminine traits. In such societies, gender was fluid. It was something of a historic coup to enforce the notion of two fixed, idealized genders that we now consider natural. Speaking in strictly physical terms, many perfectly healthy people are born intersexed, with male and female physiological characteristics, showing that these categories exist on a fluid continuum. It makes no sense to make people who do not fit easily into one category feel as though they are unnatural.

Even in our patriarchal society, in which everyone is conditioned to believe that patriarchy is natural, there has always been resistance. Much current resistance by queer people and transgender people takes a horizontal form. One organization in New York City, called FIERCE!, includes a wide spectrum of people excluded and oppressed by patriarchy: transgender, lesbian, gay, bisexual, two-spirit (an honored category in many Native American societies for people who are not identified as strictly men or women), queer, and questioning (people who have not made up their minds about their sexuality or gender identity, or who do not feel comfortable in any category). FIERCE! was founded in 2000, mostly by youth of color, and with anarchist participation. They uphold a horizontal ethic of “organizing by us, for us,” and they actively link resistance to patriarchy, transphobia, and homophobia with resistance to capitalism and racism. Their actions have included protesting police brutality against transgender and queer youth; education through documentary films, zines, and the internet; and organizing for fair healthcare and against gentrification, particularly where the latter threatens to destroy important cultural and social spaces for queer youth.

At the time of this writing they are particularly active in a campaign to stop the gentrification of the Christopher Street Pier, which has been one of the only safe public spaces for homeless and low-income queer youth of color to meet and build community. Since 2001, the city has been trying to develop the Pier, and police harassment and arrests have multiplied. The FIERCE! campaign has helped provide a rallying point for those who want to save the space, and changed the public debate so that other voices are heard besides those of the government and business owners. Our society’s attitudes about gender and sexuality have changed radically in the past centuries, largely because of groups like this taking direct action to create what is said to be impossible.

Resistance to patriarchy goes back as far as we care to look. In the “good old days” when these gender roles were supposedly unchallenged and accepted as natural, we can find stories of utopia, that upset the assumption that patriarchy is natural, and the notion that civilized progress is bringing us steadily from our brutal origins towards more enlightened sensibilities. In fact the idea of total freedom has always played a role in human history.

In the 1600s, Europeans were streaming to North America for a variety of reasons, building new colonies that exhibited a wide range of characteristics. They included plantation economies based on slave labor, penal colonies, trading networks that sought to compel the indigenous inhabitants to produce large quantities of animal skins, and fundamentalist religious utopias based on the total genocide of the native population. But just as the plantation colonies had their slave rebellions, the religious colonies had their heretics. One noteworthy heretic was Anne Hutchinson. An anabaptist who came to New England to escape religious persecution in the old world, she began to hold women’s meetings in her house, discussion groups based on free interpretation of the Bible. As the popularity of these meetings spread, men began to participate as well. Anne won popular support for her well argued ideas, which opposed the slavery of Africans and Native Americans, criticized the church, and insisted that being born a woman was a blessing and not a curse.

The religious leaders of the Massachusetts Bay Colony put her on trial for blasphemy, but at trial she stood by her ideas. She was heckled and called an instrument of the devil, and one minister said, “You have stepped out of your place, you have rather been a husband than a wife, a preacher than a hearer, and a magistrate than a subject.” Upon her expulsion Anne Hutchinson organized a group, in 1637, to form a settlement named Pocasset. They intentionally settled near to where Roger Williams, a progressive theologian, had founded Providence Plantations, a settlement based on the idea of total equality and freedom of conscience for all inhabitants, and friendly relations with the indigenous neighbors. These settlements were to become, respectively, Portsmouth and Providence, Rhode Island. Early on they joined to form the Rhode Island Colony. Both settlements allegedly maintained friendly relations with the neighboring indigenous nation, the Narragansett; Roger Williams’ settlement was gifted the land they built on, whereas Hutchinson’s group negotiated an exchange to buy land.

Initially, Pocasset was organized through elected councils and the people refused to have a governor. The settlement recognized equality between the sexes and trial by jury; abolished capital punishment, witchtrials, imprisonment for debt, and slavery; and granted total religious freedom. The second synagogue in North America was built in the Rhode Island colony. In 1651 one member of Hutchinson’s group seized power and got the government of England to bestow him governorship over the colony, but after two years the other people in the settlement kicked him out in a mini-revolution. After this incident, Anne Hutchinson realized that her religious beliefs opposed “magistracy,” or governmental authority, and in her later years she was said to have developed a political-religious philosophy very similar to individualist anarchism. One might say that Hutchinson and her colleagues were ahead of their times, but in every period of history there have been stories of people creating utopias, women asserting their equality, laypeople negating the religious leaders’ monopoly on truth.

Outside of Western civilization we can find many examples of non-patriarchal societies. Some stateless societies intentionally preserve gender fluidity, like the Mbuti described previously. Many societies accept fixed genders and division of roles between men and women, but seek to preserve equality between these roles. Several of these societies allow transgender expressions — individuals changing their gender or adopting a unique gender identity. In hunter-gatherer societies “a sharp and hard division of labor between the sexes is not universal... [and in the case of one particular society] virtually every subsistence activity can be, and often is, performed by either men or women”.[7]

The Igbo of western Africa had separate spheres of activity for men and women. Women were responsible for certain economic tasks and men for others, and each group held power autonomously over their sphere. These spheres designated who produced which goods, domesticated which animals, and took which responsibilities in the garden and market. If a man interfered in the women’s sphere of activity or abused his wife, the women had a ritual of collective solidarity that preserved the balance and punished the offender, called “sitting on a man.” All the women would assemble outside the man’s house, yelling at him and insulting him in order to cause him shame. If he did not come out to apologize the mob of women might destroy the fence around his house and his outlying storage buildings. If his offense were grievous enough, the women might even storm into his house, drag him out, and beat him up. When the British colonized the Igbo, they recognized men’s institutions and economic roles, but ignored or were blind to the corresponding women’s sphere of social life. When Igbo women responded to British indecency with the traditional practice of “sitting on a man,” the British, possibly mistaking it for a women’s insurrection, opened fire, putting an end to the gender-balancing ritual and cementing the institution of patriarchy in the society they had colonized.[8]

The Haudennosaunne, called the Iroquois by Europeans, are a matrilineal egalitarian society of eastern North America. They traditionally use several means to balance gender relations. Whereas European civilization utilizes gender division to socialize people into rigid roles and to oppress women, queer, and transgendered people, the gendered division of labor and social roles among the Haudennosaunne functions to preserve a balance, assigning each group autonomous niches and powers, and allowing a greater degree of movement between genders than is considered possible in Western society. For hundreds of years the Haudennosaunne have coordinated between multiple nations using a federative structure, and at each level of organization there were women’s councils and men’s councils. At what might be called the national level, which concerned itself with matters of war and peace, the men’s council made the decisions, though the women held a veto power. At the local level, women held more influence. The basic socio-economic unit, the longhouse, was considered to belong to the women, and men had no council at this level. When a man married a woman, he moved into her house. Any man who did not behave could ultimately be kicked out of the longhouse by the women.

Western society typically sees the “higher” levels of organization as being more important and powerful — even the language we use reflects this; but because the Haudennosaunne were egalitarian and decentralized, the lower or local levels of organization where the women had more influence were more important to daily life. In fact when there was no feud between the different nations the highest council might go a long time without meeting at all. However, their’s was not a “matriarchal” society: men were not exploited or devalued the way women are in patriarchal societies. Rather, each group had a measure of autonomy and means for preserving a balance. Despite centuries of colonization by a patriarchal culture, many groups of Haudennosaunne retain their traditional gender relations and still stand out in sharp contrast to the gender-oppressive culture of Canada and the United States.

[herbrokenmelodies]

DANCE WITH THE OCEAN, MOVE WITH THE SEA, LET THE RHYTHM OF THE WAVES, SET YOUR SOUL FREE 🌊 cerberus corp has been watching Himiko Yamada.  some of the public has dubbed them Songstress because of Siren Song gifted by drowning at some D-Listers Party having been an extra ordinary since 2011, they’re doing a good job at hiding  Strained Voice, Sore Throats and Constant Champed Lips when they aren’t working their day job as a Nightclub Manager, they are fond of Retail Therapy and are never seen without American Express Gold Card. at first glance they seem Charismatic & Confident, though their close friends know them to also be Manipulative & Money Driven.  they consider themself a anti-hero

bio ┋ musings ┋ connections ┋ playlist ┋ pinterest ┋ navi

name  himiko yamadanicknames  himi, miko

age  thirtydfive date of birth  1st june 1988zodiac  gemini place of birth  yokohama, japan current residence  new york

gender  cisgender women

pronouns  she/hersexuality  bisexual occupation  nightclub manager at the abyss

faceclaim  satomi ishihara

height  5'7 feet

tattoos  none piercings  ears distinguishing features  scar on bottom back positive traits  charismatic, confident, hard-working, fun-loving, upbeat, talkative negative traits  manipulative, money driven, dramatic, annoying, boastful.

labels / tropes  [coming soon...]

inspirations london tipton {suite life}, madisynn king {she-hulk}

...more coming soon

likes  retail therapy, partying, dancing, music, glitter, themed parties, fancy over the top cocktails,dislikes  small talk, silence, fears  drowning, permanently loosing her voice, no wifi, credit card getting declined, being sober for too long hobbies  mixology, partying, yoga, pilates,spin class,making money from people who need her powers, shopping, online shopping,habits  sleeps about three hours, never misses a sale, thriple checker, glitter havoc, always presentable

002.  EXTRA ORDINARY

TW: DROWNING, ALCOHOL

near death experience…  Himko wanted to be famous, it was always as simple as that but to make or break in the big city, no matter how much money that her daddy has, she still had to network in order to get it. she was not the best with business conversations  or stale dinners or drinks in rundown bars, she was more a girl who was the life of the party and so exactly that is what she would do. She managed to sneak her way into some D-Listers Celebrity party with samples. Yet she got a little more carried away with partying, one tequila...three...tequila....four tequila, floor....of the swimming pool. She was little too drunk to remember but woke up in Urgent Care and was told she was lucky she made it that night. From their she got a pity recording studio time...that helped her work out her powers. Not so much a record deal.

power…  Siren Song, the ability to enchant and compel others who fall influence under the hauntingly beautiful voice of the siren song. However, it is not as simple as Himiko singing and all falling under her enchantment. For people to succumb to her Siren Song, she must sing a song backwards that contain the name and command that she wishes the listener to obey. The influence only lasts for 10 minutes and 43 seconds after the song has concluded after which the enchantment would fade away. The Siren Song is only temporary. Her power is best used for interrogation, assisting in short tasks.

drawbacks / vulnerabilities… Those who have been influenced from her song will remember they have been influenced unless they song states otherwise. The more awareness that someone has of her power, the higher a persons resistance will be to her Siren Song. That being said, those of strong will are able to break the enchantment instantly compared to those who may be intoxicated as their mind is far more impressionable. Himiko is able to compel at most 3 people at a time, anything more than that her voice will be strained until she gets her voice back. Side effects include, a dry throat, constantly chapped lips and possible strained voice.

codename…  Siren...would have been the obvious choice for her but she decided to name herself Songstress at it has a slight air of mystery to it. She picked it and did the marketing for it, to the right people.

[fans4wga]

"Are Influencers On Strike Too?" from the New York Times

By Madison Malone Kircher

"Hollywood’s actors are on strike. Many social media influencers have joined them. So what happens now?

SAG-AFTRA, the actors’ union, has allowed select content creators to join since 2021 under its influencer program. And many influencers work directly with movie studios and other Hollywood entities, who pay them to promote shows and movies, whether it’s on TikTok, YouTube or the red carpet.

Well, not anymore.

This week, SAG-AFTRA announced specific guidelines for influencers during the strike. The rules are broad. Influencers are advised to “not accept any new work for promotion of struck companies or their content.” That means no TikToks about Barbenheimer or red carpet walks for “Meg 2: The Trench.”

And SAG doesn’t care if influencers are being paid for those posts or not. Any posts about struck work are considered to be crossing the picket line. An influencer who films a “Get Ready With Me” video by putting on a pink dress and heading out to the theater to see “Barbie” could be in violation — and anyone deemed to have crossed the picket line will be barred from joining SAG in the future.

A number of creators I talked to this week see joining the union as a goal, one they don’t want to jeopardize.

Creators are divided. Some have gone full Norma Rae, vocally turning down lucrative deals and encouraging their viewers to support the strike. Others have no interest in joining SAG and will probably be continuing business as usual, or they are dubious that the consequences will ever arrive.

“I just think that’s an empty threat,” Jessy Grossman, founder of the networking group Women in Influencer Marketing, told me. “Enforcement of that is going to be impossible.”

Erin Orsi, a self-described “tiny content creator,” went a little bit viral on TikTok after announcing she had turned down a potential $5,000 sponsored partnership from a company working with a major superhero franchise. For Orsi, who has just under 20,000 followers, that’s a lot more money than she usually gets paid to post. Still, she took a pass.

“I’m trying to push this to be my full-time thing,” Orsi said. “I don’t know what the future holds. I would not want to close the door on an opportunity like joining the guild.”

Darcy Michael, one half of the comedy duo Darcy and Jer, told me a network offered him a $25,000 sponsored deal in the days leading up to the strike. He was initially interested, particularly given that the rate was higher than usual for such work, but he ultimately declined to pursue it further after realizing the impending strike was probably what was driving up the rate. (Michael lives in Vancouver and is in ACTRA, the Canadian equivalent of SAG-AFTRA.)

“I told my team, I was like, ‘in no uncertain terms until the strike is over. We’re not crossing picket lines,’” Michael said.

“I also just feel like this strike in particular is monumental for all industries,” he added. “I think we’re leading the pack in making sure that workers are protected, especially from A.I. intervention. If it means that we’re going to pinch our pennies for a few months, we’re going to pinch our pennies.”

Influencers who indicated in videos that they planned to ignore the guidelines have found the online reaction to be swift and sharp. At least two entertainment creators, including @collinnurrmom and @straw_hat_goofy, have already deleted such videos. The latter now has a “SAG-AFTRA Strong” image as his TikTok profile picture.

“I spoke way too soon on my page and upset a lot of people,” Collin Everett, a.k.a. @collinnurrmom, wrote in an email when I asked about the now-deleted videos. “I do not believe that I am scabbing,” he added.

Some small creators are just plain confused. Rosa Romero runs a TikTok page of memes about TV shows including “The Bear” and “Succession.” “It’s really hard for me to categorize myself as an influencer in this sphere,” Romero said. “It’s really just my personal page that accidentally ended up having 11,000 followers.”

Romero sent SAG-AFTRA an email asking whether it was still OK to post about movies produced before the strike went into effect (specifically, “Barbie”). Still, Romero worries that doing so might generate backlash online. “Any questions or clarification is treated like someone’s trying to cross the picket line,” Romero said. “It’s just unfortunate.”

John Monterubio, a senior counsel at Loeb & Loeb LLP who advises influencers and advertisers, said the firm had fielded questions from influencers and brands about how the strike would affect them.

People who are not in the union and don’t have their hearts set on joining have a decision to make, Monterubio said. “They’re not legally bound one way or another,” he said, “but they have to think about how their decision will impact them in the future.”

Influencers are not the only ones confused, he added: "The different agreements are quite complicated, even for attorneys to figure out.'"

[xtruss]

Griselda Blanco is suspected of being involved in 40 murders across the U.S., including all three of her husbands. At its height, her network was pushing $80 million a month in cocaine. Photograph By GDA/El Tiempo/Columbia/AP

The Real-Life Rise and Fall of Griselda Blanco—Cocaine ‘Godmother’ of the ‘70s

How did a Girl Who Grew-up in Poverty in Colombia Become an International Narcotics Queenpin Pushing $80 a Million a Month in Cocaine?

— By ParissaDjangi | February 2, 2024

The Godmother. The Black Widow. Queenpin. Griselda Blanco’s many aliases and nicknames speak to the notoriety she gained by heading a billion-dollar, blood-soaked drug empire that stretched from Colombia to the United States.

Now the subject of the Netflix series Griselda, Blanco’s life blurred the line between fact and fiction as she clawed her way to a position of power in a violent world. So, who was the real woman behind the myth?

Griselda Blanco’s Rise

Blanco was born in Colombia on February 15, 1943. Her homeland would soon be torn apart by La Violencia, a period of mass violence and unrest which began on April 9, 1948, when popular politician Jorge Eliécer Gaitán was assassinated on the streets of Bogotá. By the time La Violencia ended a decade later, 200,000 people had been killed.

A black and white image shows a car overturned and the the whats left of the build photographers closely photograph the car.

This is a view of some of the destruction that rocked Bogota, Colombia, shown April 15, 1948, in the aftermath of the assassination of populist leader Jorge Eliecer Gaitan on April 9. This is the corner of Carrera Septner with the burned out Renina Hotel in the background.

Left: A diplomatic car was overturned and burned in the rioting and looting of April 9, 1948, in Bogotá, Colombia. Right: Some of the destruction that rocked Bogotá is shown April 15, 1948, in the aftermath of the assassination of populist leader Jorge Eliécer Gaitán on April 9. Photographs By William J. Smith/AP Photo

Blanco came of age against this backdrop of violence. As historian Elaine Carey pointed out in Women Drug Traffickers, Blanco and her contemporaries learned that “power frequently came through violent acts.”

Growing up in poverty in Medellín, Blanco initially didn’t have much power. She cut her teeth in the criminal world at the age of 11, when she allegedly kidnapped a local boy and murdered him after her ransom attempt didn’t pan out. In the coming years, she added pickpocketing and counterfeiting money to her resume.

Michael Corleone Remembers His Mom, Griselda Blanco. Blanco's son was interviewed for National Geographic's show "Narco Wars."

Blanco met and eventually married Carlos Trujillo, who made a living falsifying papers and trafficking humans. The marriage produced three children but ended in divorce. And by the mid-1970s, Trujillo was dead. Some say Trujillo died from health issues; others claim Blanco was really behind his death.

Making White Gold a Family Business

The disco boom of the 1970s sparked a growing market for illicit drugs like cocaine. By the middle of the decade, Colombia had emerged as the center of the cocaine trade, which brought opportunities for staggering wealth––and danger.

Together with Alberto Bravo, a drug smuggler and Blanco’s second husband, they built a cocaine empire based in New York. They relied on smugglers who wore specially designed undergarments to conceal drugs across international borders.

As the empire grew, Blanco’s relationship with Bravo deteriorated. Though the specifics of what exactly happened remain disputed, Bravo was killed in 1975. Blanco later claimed that she personally shot him in the mouth.

A womon in a dress patterend with overlaping stripes in red black and white lays on a cushion brown cushion cntered around a flowers that fill the background behind her.

Griselda Blanco is pictured in a scene from the 2006 documentary Cocaine Cowboys. Photograph By Magnolia Pictures/Zuma Press

Bravo’s death cemented the image of Griselda Blanco as the “Black Widow,” a woman who got rid of her husbands by killing them.

At its peak, Blanco’s network pushed $80 million worth of cocaine every month. Her biggest markets included New York, Miami, and Los Angeles.

Blanco’s cocaine empire earned her the nickname “The Godmother,” Colombia’s answer to The Godfather’s Vito Corleone. Blanco seemed to lean into the mythology. After she gave birth to her fourth and final child in 1978, she named him Michael Corleone in honor of the film’s central character.

Blanco’s Reign of Terror in Miami

Violence was the foundation upon which Blanco built and maintained her empire. It was the oil that kept the engine of her network running––and it transformed Miami into a battlefield in the drug wars.

One of the most public attacks happened on July 11, 1979. Two men, likely at Blanco’s bidding, gunned down a cocaine dealer and his bodyguard in a liquor store at Miami’s Dadeland Mall.

Police say two men in a panel van painted with ''Happy Time Complete Party Supply'' were enforcers for Griselda Blanco. They shot and killed a rival dealer and his bodyguard inside Crown Liquors July 11, 1979. Photograph By David Poller/Zuma Wire

In another Miami incident, Blanco ordered the murder of her associate Jesus Castro, who had reportedly kicked one of her children. But when her hitmen attempted to do the job in 1982, they mistakenly killed Castro’s two-year-old son Johnny instead.

According to Jorge Ayala, one of her assassins, Blanco welcomed the error. “At first she was real mad ‘cause we missed the father. But when she heard we had gotten the son by accident, she said she was glad, that they were even.”

The shootout in broad daylight at Dadeland Mall is widely seen as the beginning of the ''Cocaine Wars'' in South Florida. Photograph By David Poller/Zuma Wire

Blanco’s children witnessed violence firsthand. In 1983, she probably ordered the death of her third husband, Dario Sepúlveda. He was killed in front of Michael Corleone, their five-year-old son, in Colombia.

In total, officials suspected Blanco’s involvement in no less than 40 murders across the U.S.

Blanco’s Fall

Blanco managed to stay one step ahead of the law—for a while, at least. The United States Drug Enforcement Administration worked with informants to track her down and build a case against her.

Officials arrested her in Irvine, California, on February 17, 1985, and the resulting trial sentenced her to 15 years in prison. Nine years later, more charges came, this time for the murders of Johnny Castro and drug dealers Alfredo and Grizel Lorenzo.

Blanco was deported to Colombia in 2004, and lived quietly in El Poblado, Medellín’s wealthiest neighborhood for eight years.

On September 3, 2012, 69-year-old Griselda Blanco stepped outside a butcher’s shop in Medellín. Suddenly, two shots rang out––they had come from the gun of assassins on a motorcycle, which quickly fled the scene. Blanco collapsed. The woman who had forged a bloody path away from the poverty of Medellín’s streets ultimately died on them.