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ladykailitha · 3 months

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Icarus Part 13

Hello! I've cut my backlog literally in half with this move and while I hate seeing it that low (seven chapters I have waiting to be published) that is it's point after all.

After the nice meeting with Nancy, Robin brings the news to the boys who have a much different perspective on the issue.

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12

Robin was the last to arrive at Steve’s swanky apartment. Spence was on the grill frying up her tofu burger first so the meat wouldn’t touch hers. Simon and Shane were in a heated discussion about Brandon Sanderson and his contribution to the fantasy genre. Her best friend was coming out of the kitchen with all sorts of vegan options for her to chose from.

She went over and greeted him with a kiss on the cheek, taking a couple of the bowls from him so he could go back and get more.

Once everyone had gotten their food and settled in Robin told them about her meeting with Nancy and Chrissy.

“So she’s going to apologize to our Stevie?” Simon asked around a bite of his potato salad.

Robin nodded stabbing her salad with a fork. “That’s what she said. I’ll believe it when I see it, though.” She took a bite of her food.

“Yeah,” Steve agreed. “Though ti doesn’t surprise me she’s not with Jonathan anymore.”

Robin tilted her head with a frown. “What do you mean?”

He sighed and pushed his food away not feeling very hungry at the moment. “Both of us had been pretty vocal about the white picket fence and the two point five kids. I’ve changed my mind on that obviously,” he waved at all of them. “But Jonathan was always his mom and Will first, especially after Will’s kidnapping. He was never going to be ambitious in the way she wanted.”

“His little brother got kidnapped?” Shane asked in wide-eyed shock. “Holy shit.”

“Yeah, it was this whole thing,” Steve said, nodding and leaning back on his chair, propping his arm on the back. “But everyone knew that despite all his dreams of being a wild life photographer, he was always going to pick somewhere close to home.”

“So yeah,” Robin said rolling her eyes and cocking her head. “She said she as going to apologize, but I told her she had to that and a shit ton of grovelling before I would consider her to rep the band.”

Steve phone went off and he picked it up. He frowned at the number. He answered it with a confused, “Hello?”

“Steve? Steve Harrington?” the cool feminine voice asked.

“That’s me,” he replied sitting up in his seat. “How can I help you?”

“It’s Nancy Wheeler,” she said after a moment. “I got your number from the record label, I hope that’s okay.”

“Uh, yeah,” he said in surprise. “Yeah, that’s fine. Wow, the Nancy Wheeler. We were just talking about your meeting with Celeste earlier.”

“Oh,” Nancy said, “I was hoping to call after you had finished speaking with her about it. I can call later.”

Steve shook his head. “Nah, it’s fine. We were mostly done anyway. We were just having dinner.”

“Are you sure?” she pressed. “If you’re eating, I could call back later tonight or even at a convenient time tomorrow?”

Steve rolled his eyes and Shane covered his mouth to hide the bubble of laughter that sprang to his lips. “I said it was fine. How are you? I understand you’re a hot shot music agent now.”

He could almost feel her smile on the other end when she said, “Something like that.”

She cleared her throat. “I’m actually calling to see you wanted to meet me for lunch tomorrow, I wanted to catch up and well...really to apologize. We were both so young, but that was no reason to treat you the way I did.”

Steve pinched the bridge of his nose and put his elbow on the table to prop up the hand that was holding the phone. “You’re right, it wasn’t. But sure, I have a few days off, I could meet you for lunch tomorrow. What time and where?”

Nancy gave him the information and then rang off. Steve threw his phone on the table next to his plate and threw himself against the back of the chair in frustration.

“Well color me shocked,” Robin said with a raised eyebrow. “I didn’t think she would actually go for it. Chrissy and I were actually going to go through another list of agents to find one more suitable.”

Spence rubbed the bottom of his lip. “I’m not sure I like the idea of Steve going alone. Because she can say she apologized and that Steve was unreasonable and get us blacklisted for other agents.”

Steve felt an uneasy twist to his stomach at that. But not just that, he just didn’t trust her. He didn’t even know how he was talked into letting her into his life in the first place. She was all apologies now, but what about later? What about after she finds out Steve and Eddie are dating? Would that be a conflict of interest? What if she’s homophobic? What if she outs him before he has a chance to do it himself?

“Steve.”

He came to himself with a start. He looked around to see that everyone was looking at him in concern.

“Hey, hon,” Shane said, tilting his head down to look at Steve. “You doing alright? You don’t look so good.”

He didn’t see Robin but as he came further into himself he could feel the warmth of her hand as she rubbed circles around the pulse point on his wrist.

“There you are, dingus,” she said with a teasing lit to her tone. “You really had us worried for a minute. Where did you go?”

Steve let out a shuddering sigh and then another. “Sorry, I guess I just got caught in a spiral of bad thoughts.”

Robin’s other hand came up to squeeze his. “We don’t have to take her as our agent,” she murmured. “Hell don’t even have to go talk to her if you don’t want to. Or we can all go. Whatever makes you comfortable.”

“I don’t think she’s apologizing to Steve because she’s actually sorry,” Simon said with a sneer, “I think she’s doing it because she sees dollar signs. If she signs with us that is going to make her a shit ton of money and open her up to even bigger clients. Corroded Coffin was already established when they hired her but if we hit the stratosphere while she’s repping us she’ll be in a sweet spot to have the doors open for her.”

Robin stood up. “I guess what I’m hearing is that none of you trust her with Steve. She already knows who each of the band is, because she signed the NDA. But just say the word and I’ll walk away.”

Steve took a deep breath and let it out slow. “I want to hear her out. If she’s actually sincere. But you’re all right, I can’t go alone.”

“Take Robin,” Spence suggested. “She’ll expect you to bring your best friend.”

Shane shook his head. “I think he should take one of us. Maybe Simon, he’s the most ripped out of all of us. I want him protected.”

“I’m down,” Simon replied with a grin.

Robin shook her head, a sly grin on her face. “No, no. Take Eddie.”

“What the fuck?” Simon said rearing his head back, offended. “Why him and not me?”

She put her hands on her hips. “Because he encompasses everything we need. A good friend, who won’t let her walk all over him, like me. An imposing guy like Simon. He might not look like much out of the leathers, but in them and he looks like he could snap you in two. Also, he’s worked with her for a number of years and would be a better judge of if she’s being genuine.”

Spence and Shane shared a glance.

“Sorry, darling,” Shane said with a shrug, “I’m gonna have to go with Robbie on this one. Plus, she’s going to have to know about their relationship anyway.”

Spence chewed on his bottom lip fitfully.

“What’s on your mind, Spence?” Steve asked. “I smell your hair burning from here!”

Spence snorted, “Oh fuck off!” But a giggle escaped anyway.

“You got a problem with Eddie?” Robin asked tilting her head to the side as she regarded their drummer.

Spence waved his hands in front of him. “Oh hell no! It’s not about Eddie, it’s not really about Steve going to meet Nancy.”

Simon frowned and put an arm around him. “What’s going on then?”

“Steve is being too nice about this whole thing,” he murmured. “She didn’t just cheat. She didn’t just string him along. She knew going into the relationship what Steve wanted. Yeah, it’s bit unrealistic to imagine marrying your high school sweetheart. But there is a reason it’s so prevalent in all our media. Because it can happen, because it has happened before. And then her excuse was that Steve wasn’t ambitious enough? Why?”

Steve furrowed his brow as he thought about it. That was an unusual dig. He was a senior in high school, how much more ambitious did she want.

Robin shrugged and said to fill the silence, “I’m not sure because I didn’t become friends with Steve until after the whole mess, but my guess is that he wanted to take what the Europeans call a gap year. A year to just be a kid before jumping into college.”

“Something my parents weren’t fond of either, if I’m honest,” Steve scoffed.

Shane waved his hand toward Steve to indicate that was most likely the cause. “And there it is. It’s so insane everyone expecting to kids to go right into school without taking the time to figure out what you want to do with your life. Hell, you have to apply in January. That’s half way through your senior year. You’re supposed to know what you want in life before you even finish high school? That’s fucked up on all levels.” Through the whole rant, he gestured wildly with his hands.

“I didn’t get to into college my first try,” she said, “Because my parents made too much for me to get assistance but not enough for them to pay for it themselves. And then I met you guys and the rest is history.”

There were nods all around.

“It is up to Stevie to forgive her,” Simon said with a grimace. “But some part of me doesn’t want him to.”

Steve straightened up in his chair. “Why not?” He cocked his head to side, looking like a confused puppy dog.

Simon huffed out a sigh and squirmed in his chair, looking down at his food. He poked at the top of his hamburger bun, picking at the sesame seeds.

“You shouldn’t have to sacrifice your ego for us to get a good agent.”

The silence that followed filled the air with a thick sinking feeling.

Steve straightened his spine. “I’m not the weak-willed, touch-starved kid she remembers. I have three of the best mates a guy could ask for, a platonic soulmate, and a boyfriend that loves me for me. If she thinks she can swan into my life and walk all over me like she did before, she has another think coming. I’ll meet up with her and take Eddie. But make it absolutely clear, I have everyone’s backing on this. If I walk away, we all walk away.”

There was still some grumbling, but it was ultimately it was up to Steve. He made the necessary calls and then they settled down to finish their dinner.

Slowly the mood improved as the night went on, but it never did reach the heights of a laid back night with friends.

Part 14 Part 15 Part 16 Part 17 Part 18 Part 19 Part 20

Tag List: Four slots remaining

1- @mira-jadeamethyst @rozzieroos @itsall-taken @redfreckledwolf @zerokrox-blog

2- @gregre369 @a-little-unsteddie @chaosgremlinmunson @messrs-weasley @val-from-lawrence

3- @goodolefashionedloverboi @carlyv @wonderland-girl143-blog @irregular-child @blondie1006

4- @yikes-a-bee @bookworm0690 @anne-bennett-cosplayer @awkwardgravity1 @littlewildflowerkitten

5- @genderless-spoon @y4r3luv @dragonmama76 @ellietheasexylibrarian @thedragonsaunt

6- @disrespectedgoatman @eyehartart @dawners @thespaceantwhowrites @tinyplanet95

7- @iamthehybrid @croatoan-like-its-hot @papergrenade @cryptid-system @counting-dollars-counting-stars

8- @ravenfrog @w1ll0wtr33 @child-of-cthulhu @kultiras @dreamercec

9- @weirdandabsurd42 @useless-nb-bisexual @stripey82 @dotdot-wierdlife @kal-ology

10- @sadisticaltarts

#my writing #stranger things #steddie #ladykailtiha writes #rockstar eddie munson #rockstar steve harrington #rockstar au

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harleyquilt · 4 months

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Misreading Touka (Tokyo Ghoul Meta)

For some reason, I've been seeing more dung being thrown at Touka's characterisation in the series, and since I've been wanting to write a meta for a while now, I decided to do a short one addressing some of the criticism I've seen around. This won't go into everything, of course -- the series is far too dense with analytical potential and I am a busy bee. Just know that I do want to dive deeper into Touken/Kanetou at a later point.

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Touka is not reduced to a simple, meaningless housewife, and I do not understand why this perspective is used to undermine her character so often in the fandom. For the sake of this argument, I will be mostly focusing on her characterisation in ;Re, as that is where this criticism is mostly rooted. Yes, she is less active in the first part of the second series, but between all the other characters, events, and plot points, it is bizarre to me that people see so little in Touka, despite all that she does.

I could dive into how Touka as a whole symbolises key themes throughout both series, and how that relates to Kaneki’s development, but I think I will save that for a separate meta. For now, I just want to discuss how Touka is positioned in the second series, and how it does not weaken the characterisation Ishida set up in the first.

Following the end of the first series, which set its tone as a tragedy, Touka opens the ;Re café to act as a refuge for ghouls, just as Yoshimura did beforehand. To clarify, Yoshimura saved Touka from her miserable life on the streets, giving her the chance to live with some semblance of normalcy following the tragic consequences of her childhood. And now, as an adult, and with Yoshimura gone, Touka strives to recreate that environment once more. There are those that think she has done this for Kaneki and Kaneki alone, but that is clearly not the case, even if she does hope for Kaneki’s return one day; she allows Nishiki to take refuge there while he tries to find Kimi, she saves Tsukiyama after the Rosewald operation, and before anyone argues that she was still not directly involved in either case, she actively takes part in Ayato’s mission to save Hinami. It is there that she then sees Kaneki and allows him a place to stay too, following his battle with Arima. She even provides Akira and Amon a place to stay, reconciling their differences in the process, (underrated chapters, I think).

Up until this point, Touka has been forced to ‘live while losing’, and whether she decides to fight or not, it is an unavoidable outcome when it comes to war. She is simply trying to do what she can without trying to kill herself in the process – a flawed sentiment she has seen in her father and Kaneki before, and even to some extent, Ayato and Hinami.

She fights when she can, runs if she has to. She is forced to make this choice again and again, especially when the underground ward is attacked, and for the sake of her unborn child and other weaker ghouls, she must retreat if she doesn’t want all of them to needlessly die.

That said, it is not as if she leaves without trying to fight first, she just isn’t stupidly overpowered like her opponents, (and that isn’t a jab at Ishida, I’m simply clarifying that she can’t defeat these foes with just Hinami at her side). Even then, she manages to stand her ground for a long time, despite the pregnancy and her hunger. Moreover, her kagune has developed since the first series, and like Ayato, she’s able to create more advanced structures with her ukaku. You just have to read in between the lines to see that Touka has never allowed herself to grow soft in the years Kaneki was away, and that only now, during this battle, can you see more of her capabilities.

And when Kaneki is trapped within Dragon, she finally decides that she cannot lose him – she refuses to lose him, because to do so would bring on too much despair. Just as Kaneki has prioritised Touka, Touka, too, will prioritise him, and so, even with her exhaustion, she battles against Mutsuki, digs through the Dragon’s flesh until her fingers and nails break, and almost succumbs to grief at the thought that he was already lost to her. The chapter is overlooked far too often, her desperate determination conveying to the reader the importance of love as a driving force.

Again, we saw this with Kaneki, who pushed himself past his limits in hopes of reaching Touka. Whether you like it or not, love is a powerful thing, and that has been shown throughout the series with many, if not all the characters. And for Kaneki and Touka, their love is their hope, and to lose that love is to lose their hope. So they fight, again and again, for each other and the light they bring into each other’s lives.

Now I can argue all day about how Touka is far more active in the series than people care to admit, but I do not think that is why Touka is labelled as a housewife. I’ve been in the fandom for a long time and this label has been around long before their relationship was canonised, and I think it’s to do with the fact that Touka is clearly more feminine in ;Re.

I’ve already explained that in terms of action, Touka still has plenty of moments to speak of, and personality-wise, I really don’t think she’s as different as people claim her to be. Yes, she’s calmer, but that shouldn’t be seen as a bad development. She’s an adult now, and with adulthood comes maturity, (or it should, anyway). She doesn’t need to fight anyone and everyone to prove herself, that is simply a childish perspective to take. Besides that, she’s still curt in the way she talks, is sarcastic and blunt, though not as harsh as she was before, and she still carries herself with plenty of pride and dignity, which was what was so appealing about her in the first series. Ffs, she confronts the whole CCG and tells them to eat shit because their arguments were annoying her. It’s ridiculous to me that people think she is a shadow of her former self, when there’s plenty of great moments involving her.

As for her more maternal depictions, that is also something that has always been present, if you take a moment to connect the two series together. She was forced to grow up quickly when she became responsible of Ayato, and she effortlessly took Hinami under her wing after the death of her parents. This is an attribute that she continues to exhibit throughout ;Re, watching over the children and trying to comfort them. It’s a touching image, one that circles back around to her pregnancy. And to deem this progression as detrimental is rather…strange to me. In a time when we see women as strong and powerful for everything we represent – our hardships, both physically and emotionally, as well as our strengths – why is it seen as weak when female characters are utilised to represent the strength of womanhood. Because she’s a woman married to a man? Don’t be so childish. If you respect her characterisation at all, you will acknowledge how she continues to exhibit her strengths as an adult, whether that be in battle or beyond it.

After all, Ishida could have easily written it so that she is no longer involved in anything past the discovery of her pregnancy. Except he doesn't, and instead, she fights even more, even harder, in spite of her pregnancy. Because of her pregnancy. And yet, this is somehow weakens her character? She is quite literally going beyond her limits to fight for her future, I see nothing weak in that.

It might be that readers dislike how she changes aesthetically, and that’s fine, but from that comes arguments that excuse why they don’t like her character. I could argue against every little argument I’ve seen about her, but at the end of the day, I feel like most of these points are made just to excuse a personal preference. And that is not an effective use of critical reading. You can’t make the story something it isn’t, and you can’t assume Touka was going to be a character she wasn’t written to be. If you don’t like that or disagree, then maybe this series isn’t for you and it’s time to move on. For now, at least, please give her characterisation the respect she deserves. Her role is so much more than the shallow labelling this fandom tends to give her.

#touken #kanetou #touka kirishima #kaneki ken #tokyo ghoul #my writing #meta #character analysis #good lord can't believe these things still need to be said #smh as if she hasn't been dragged through the dirt enough for existing

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catboymoments · 5 months

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Why do you dislike Vivziepop if I may ask? Because there are reasons to dislike her that I think are valid, but some come from drama she's already cleared up and/or apologized for

Largely the controversies stem from art she made in 2016 that she has since apologized for in 2018 and 2019, sometimes she gets hate due to false information people spread about her and her ocs, and more of the recent issues get more complicated than one perspective can give.

A video that you'll find a lot of information for many of the most common things ppl bring up to cancel Viv are covered in this video:

"Why Everyone Hates Vivziepop" by ayy lmao on YouTube -> https://youtu.be/XrWiFcz1yzc?si=WhnmQy6AJUpOHY5Z

This is a whole playlist (by ayy lmao) discussing various situations you can educate yourself on:

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLOWIXPh0p7CzgQoUIl7rqd8oz2Ym6V9XY&si=o4u_RoNgBjVTouyk

(if you don't want to search the links since I'm on anon, which is fair enough, then you can just look up "ayylmao Vivziepop drama" on YouTube and you'll find them.)

She is seriously overhated and I'm not gonna share this to change your mind, but just to spread a little awareness just in case. Many ppl bring up stuff from the past when new updates for Viv and her stuff happen

I get not liking Vivziepop and as I said Im not gonna try to change your mind, but I hope you can agree some of the efforts to cancel her are blown out of proportion. Please educate yourself if you haven't already.

Putting this in your inbox JUST IN CASE your reason for disliking her stems from bad faith haters that won't look further to realize many of these dramas have already been resolved.

Hopefully they are helpful pls educate yourself if you haven't already. Then after you do, I hope you remind & inform others

I think the sausage party Nazi ocs and the fact that everyone who’s worked with her says she’s a nightmare to work with and the way she treats her friends just puts me off from liking her at all

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katerina-marie · 3 months

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The Uncertainty of Domesticity

Toji Fushiguro x Female Reader

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 of 3

Toji Fushiguro wasn’t afraid of much, though he definitely felt so when he became a widower in the same moment he became a father. Years later, he felt it again when you came along with the same hopes and dreams for a future he never thought he would experience again.

Content: JJK universe but no canon events / strangers & neighbors to lovers / medium burn idk / female reader and referred to as such but left descriptively vague / no y/n / out of character and soft Toji / single-father Toji / NSFW - vaginal sex so please avoid accordingly - but I can't write smut to save my life so it's not very explicit / Megumi-Mama/Mamaguro dies in childbirth and its mentioned once or twice / cutie pie child Megumi / fluff / slice of life / light angst from Toji's inner turmoil / discussions about having children / pregnancy and childbirth for reader in part 3 (pending) / more notes below

WC: 7.9k

Notes: Slow burn? *Shakes head* I don't know her. I find in my fics that I like to write from a farther out, outside looking in perspective, or in a more snapshot-esque view. Pacing is hard for me in terms of how to write authentic relationship progress, so forgive me if it comes across a little too fast. Though, that is somewhat intentional with this story. I like the idea of Toji and reader going all in cause life can be short and cruel and who's to say that you can't?

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Toji wasn’t entirely sure about the Itadori family.

Yuji was fine enough, if not a bit empty-headed, but his two older brothers caused his eyebrows to raise every time he saw them. The one with pink hair had a temper that rivaled his own and was somehow covered in various black tattoos despite the fact he was still a young teenager. The other one didn’t seem any better to Toji, with dark circles around his eyes as if he was in a constant state of sleep deprivation, and he too had some odd black mark across the bridge of his nose and cheeks. The father was something else as well, but they were kind and accommodating to his son, and it didn’t escape him that they lacked a mother too. All in all, Megumi needed friends, and apparently he picked the odd ones, so Toji would tolerate their peculiarities for the purpose they served. Namely, acting as spare babysitters when the occasion called for it.

But of course, the one time he really needed them, the whole Itadori household had come down with the stomach bug. Since Toji had already done his time with such an illness with Megumi before, he wasn’t so inclined to do it again. Thus, he was sufficiently out of babysitters. Usually if the Itadoris weren’t available, Toji would bribe one of the more trustworthy older students from the school to watch Megumi in exchange for cash and pizza, mostly for nights involving a failed date or something less noble that never felt worth it the next morning. However, in an unfortunate turn of events for such a pleasant Saturday, it was his job and students that were requiring his attention. The principal had rung him twenty minutes earlier to demand his presence in helping with a situation no doubt caused by a particularly troublesome twosome, and Toji wasn’t keen on his last resort of bringing Megumi with him.

That left you. Toji wasn’t sure why he was so nervous about the idea. You had offered again since the first time just last month to watch Megumi for him, but he hadn’t yet found a reason to do so. He wasn’t going on any dates, at least not since you moved across the street, and if Megumi was over spending time with you, Toji had a feeling he’d be itching to do the same.

However, time was ticking, and the longer he stood at the window that afforded him the best view of your house and snuck another glance through his blinds, the more likely he was to forgo the idea entirely. Thankfully, Toji could feel the weight of Megumi’s eyes on his back and since it felt very much like his son was thinking of him as something close to moronic, he yanked his phone out of his pocket and dialed your number before he could stop himself.

“Hello, neighbor,” was your standard choice of greeting for him, but the way it flowed off your tongue and lit upwards at the end always had Toji trying to calculate in his head how many times he could reasonably call you in a week before he could be seen as desperate.

“I have a favor to ask,” he said tightly, and he turned from the window to pace along the back of the sofa that Megumi was currently sitting on. “Can you come over and watch Megumi for a couple hours? Work is being a pain in my ass and I’m needed there, but Yuji’s family is sick, so I don’t really have anyone else to watch him.”

You didn’t miss a beat before squealing your reply into his ear. “Of course! Give me five minutes and I’ll be right there.” Toji, the grouch that he was, couldn’t deny that your enthusiasm for the prospect of spending time with his kid made him feel soft and warm in a way that he usually found unappealing for himself.

“Thank you,” he said back, and he could hear you bustling about on the other end of the phone, “the front door will be unlocked, so just let yourself in.”

After a quick, “sure thing,” you ended the call, and Toji let out a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding on to. He looked down at Megumi, and from the grin on his face, Toji could tell he knew exactly what was going to happen.

“You better behave, you hear me?” His son nodded so quickly—enthusiastically—that Toji was shocked his head did bounce right off. “You know your schedule for the rest of the evening, so don’t try to weasel anything extra out of it, else I’ll find out.”

Toji walked back to the window to glance through the blinds again. “And don’t tell her anything weird about me either.”

Megumi made a confused noise. “Like how you look for her out the window all the time?”

Toji dropped the blinds so quickly one would think they turned animate and bit him, then spun around to stand up straight. “I don’t do that,” he said gruffly, but Megumi wasn’t paying him any attention, clearly unimpressed by his father’s patheticness, and was instead focused on the book in his lap. Instead of trying to argue with a kid who wasn’t yet six, Toji dashed off to the bathroom to double check its state of cleanliness. He had just finished up when he heard a faint knock at the front door and then your voice greeting Megumi a second later.

Upon coming out and seeing you standing behind the couch while Megumi pointed at something in his book, Toji suddenly wished he didn’t have to leave at all. You were clad in a blue lounge set that looked as soft as he imagined you felt, and under your arm was a bag stuffed with puzzles, movies, and Megumi’s favorite bag of chips. The smile you gave him when he walked up to you didn’t help his motivation either.

“Hi,” you chirped, and Toji didn’t miss your swift head-to-toe onceover of his work clothes that you didn’t even try to hide this time around.

“Hey,” he answered back, and god, he’d be lying if he said that looking down at you while you gazed up at him through darkened lashes wasn’t his one of favorite things as of late. “Thank you again for doing this. I owe you one.”

In the first instance of touch since he had hugged you a couple weeks back after losing Megumi at your house, you placed your hand on his upper arm and squeezed just a little. “It’s no trouble. I promise.”

As the two of you shoved him out the door, clearly catching on to his reluctance to leave, you gave him a cheery promise to keep him updated on everything he’d miss, and as the day wore on, seeing your name on his screen followed by a photo evidence was an extra pump of adrenaline to his system.

You and Megumi sitting outside with ice cream cones that dripped down your fingers.

Megumi’s look of elation when he finally fit the last piece of a puzzle together.

A sheet pan of chocolate chip cookies fresh out of the oven with the assurance that you wouldn’t let Megumi eat more than two (an hour).

You perched on the side of Megumi’s bed with a book in hand while he was snuggled under the blankets as a yawn took over his face.

Each and every one ended up being saved to his phone, and Toji didn’t have any explanation as to why other than because he had wanted to.

By the time he was finished and leaving the school, the sky was black and the air was quiet. The time on his watch told him that Megumi had been in bed for close to three hours now, and Toji wondered what you had been doing in the time since then.

How would you look curled up on his couch with a book? Did you fall asleep to some movie that you had put on the TV? Would he be wrong to imagine that you would glance at the door occasionally and wish that he would walk through it at that moment?

Thoughts of you kept him occupied on his drive home, and once there, he hurried to park the car and bound up the couple steps to his front door. When Toji finally pushed through it, you were sitting in the corner of his couch, TV on and a plate scattered with cookie crumbs in your lap. You craned your neck back to look at him, and the slow smile that stretched across your cheeks had him aching for the nights long passed when there had always been someone to welcome him home.

“How’d things go?” You turned the TV off and shifted in your spot to place your hands on the back of the sofa and then rested your chin on top of them to watch him expectantly

“It was…fine,” Toji managed, and it occurred to him that there was a whole other world he kept hidden from you. At some point, should you indicate that you wanted something more from him, he would have to divulge that pertinent information to you. However, that was getting ahead of himself, and he racked his brain to come up with an explanation that would satisfy your curiosity, but wasn’t so detailed that he couldn’t explain it away if necessary. “Our school was hosting an event with another a couple hours away and, naturally, our resident trouble-makers did something they shouldn’t.”

“Sounds fun,” you remarked sarcastically.

Toji huffed a quiet laugh and considered moving from his place in front of his door to sit next to you but only managed one step before you were making a move to get up.

Another missed opportunity.

“I, uh, really appreciate having you watch Megumi for me today. It seems like the two of you had a good time. But I’m sorry this is how you had to spend your Saturday night.”

“Don’t be. I don’t mind at all,” you told him as you stood and bent down to grab your bag off the floor. “Megumi is a great kid, and I love children.”

The adoring look on your face combined with the wistful way your words came out had something twisting uncomfortably in Toji’s stomach. He clenched his hand around his car keys until they dug into his skin painfully. “You do?”

“Mhm,” you hummed, coming around the couch to stop in front of him. “I don’t get to spend much time with them—I only have a few friends that have one or two, and I never had the patience to be a teacher.” You poked a gentle finger into the meat of his shoulder in a way that was teasing, but for once he couldn’t bring himself to react.

Neither do I.

“So you want your own one day?”

Your expression shuttered and went uncharacteristically blank, and Toji suddenly wished he could turn back time. His words must have come out strained, or maybe disapproving. He didn’t intend for them to sound like so, but something about them set your jaw tight and had your eyes drooping in what looked a lot like disappointment.

In a brief flash of self-pity, Toji found himself missing his wife. He missed having someone that would be patient with him in his foul moods and curt way of speaking. Someone who guided him through the tangled web of his emotions and helped him coax out something gentle and palatable instead. Toji wished he was better at whatever this was just so he had a chance at keeping you near him.

“I do,” you finally replied, but the words were hushed and dismissive in their finality. Toji couldn’t think of anything else to do but nod, lest he open his mouth again and dig himself deeper into something irreparable. He turned his attention over your shoulder and down the hall to where Megumi lay sleeping so he didn’t have to keep subjecting himself to how you were now looking at him like you wished he was something else.

“Well,” you started, and Toji hated how your voice was clipped and forcibly light. You stepped around him to reach for the front door. “It’s late, and I want to make sure we all get some rest. I’ll see you two later, yeah?”

You were already mostly out the door by the time Toji was able to call out a goodbye and you disappeared with a quick flash of your fingers. Resignation lingered in the air after you left and it made Toji feel like he had done something very wrong.

------------------------------------

If you thought about it hard enough, you really had no one else to blame but yourself for the maelstrom of your emotions.

It was almost frightening how quickly disappointment had tempered the giddiness that crackled under your skin that evening in Toji’s house. He looked like he had seen a ghost when you mentioned your love of children. His question had come out sounding like he had swallowed rocks, gargled and strained and like it took every ounce of his effort to get the words off his tongue. When you had confirmed it for him—that you wanted children one day—his nostrils flared wide and the entirety of him tensed so visceral that it looked painful. You had kindly seen yourself out at that point as you were certain his body had unknowingly entered a state somewhere in between flight or fight, and you didn’t wish to aggravate it further.

If his reaction to a question that didn’t have anything to do with him at all on the surface—maybe the underlying tension was a cause for that—then you didn’t know why it felt like the floor had fallen out from under your feet, or why your stomach had dropped so heavily it actually pained you. But that was a lie, and you knew that somewhere in the last six months you had grown inexplicably attached to Toji Fushiguro and his six year old son. It wasn’t quite that you had already picked out names for children that had your hair and his eyes, but the possibility of something more with him had felt so close to fruition, almost tangible in your grasp, that having the hope of it dashed so suddenly was crushing in its own right. You would not bend in your desires for your life, at least not one so significant as that, but neither would you expect Toji to give himself to something that he didn’t want, not when it would require all of him.

So, as you had read about but never quite experienced, maybe there wasn’t anything quite as painful as “almost.” When you had returned home that evening, your first stop had been your shower as it was the most proper place to wail about opportunities missed and allowed for the dramatics towards a situation not yet fully understood because it all could be washed away with the swirl of a drain. And, in your most infinite wisdom, the only way to recover from such a figurative loss was to choose the mature path and avoid the thing that caused the pain in the hopes that detachment would prevent any further attachment.

-----------------------------------

The longer Toji stared at his phone with his thumb hovering over the button that would dial your name, the more imbecilic he felt.

He had been skirting around you for the same amount of time you had been acting weird (three weeks and two days, but he wasn’t keeping count), but when Megumi looked up at him this morning with a pouty lip and imploring eyes, begging him to invite the pretty and kind neighbor over for his birthday this weekend, Toji knew he was going to be have to be the one to wave the metaphorical white flag.

For what exactly? He had no idea. But clearly, his son had gotten just as attached to you as Toji was, and he couldn’t blame Megumi at all for it. Not when you always stopped to listen when he spoke, remembered the name of his favorite stuffed animals, and asked about his best friend Yuji. Even more so now that Megumi had figured out you kept a stash of his favorite snacks in your pantry for whenever he found himself over there, a frequency that had been increasing until lately.

Toji hadn’t really minded having to go over to your house and fetch his kid, not when he could wager with himself (the only form of gambling he permitted nowadays) on what you’d be wearing when he walked through the doors. Sometimes it was the well-tailored fabric of your work clothes, and other times it was some combination of skin skimming pants and shirt that was somehow just as appealing as the little dress that swung around your hips with every step. You had knocked the wind out of him with that one a while back.

Yet, all of that was negated by the fact that you had started to distance yourself ever since that night you babysat Megumi. After stewing over the stilted conversation for the rest of the night after you left, Toji chalked it up to nothing more than an awkward misunderstanding. Though on the following Monday, when you had come home early from work while he and Megumi had been playing outside, you offered nothing more than a brief wave and a smile that seemed less enthusiastic than normal before shutting yourself inside for the evening. Megumi had looked as dejected as Toji felt and to their frustration, the rest of your interactions followed suit.

To make things increasingly worse, on Tuesday evening just last week, Toji happened by the opened window in his living room and saw a car a whole tax bracket nicer than his sidle up to your driveway. You had gotten out, smartly dressed, and a tall man equally well clothed had stepped out of the driver’s side. The two of you chatted animatedly the whole walk to your house, but Toji had turned away before he could witness whatever was about to happen on your doorstep.

The memory had him angrily mashing his thumb into the dial button and bringing the phone to his ear.

“Hey,” you answered on the fourth ring. Your voice was still light and chipper, but lacked the warmth and enthusiasm you usually held for him.

“Got time to talk?” Nerves had Toji reaching straight to the point. “Megumi’s with Yuji for the next little bit.”

A beat or two passed before you answered, but it was long enough that Toji squirmed in his seat on the couch. “Sure. I’ll come over there?”

Toji gave you the same instructions as last time: to let yourself in. Two minutes later the knob of his front door was twisting, and he was up in a flash. You greeted him with a half-hearted grin as you stepped over the doorway, and he held his arm out to direct you to the couch.

“You’ve been avoiding us,” he said bluntly as he closed the front door behind you.

You winced, shame making your cheeks warm. You took a seat and Toji plopped down next to you on the couch just as you got settled in, and the weight of him dipped the cushion enough that you slid a little closer to him. You righted yourself before speaking. “Ah. You noticed?”

Toji looked thoroughly unimpressed and none too pleased, and in the silence you swallowed thickly. His living room suddenly became the most interesting thing. The TV stand against the front wall only held the large flat screen and nothing else. The window to the left of the room looked out over the street. In front of the sofa was a pale wooden coffee table with a half-done puzzle. In the corner to the right of the TV, there was a shelf layered with some knick knacks, a couple of Megumi’s books, and if you squinted hard enough, you could just make out a small framed photo of Toji and a woman with dark hair.

“I felt like I had hit a nerve unknowingly that night, and I didn’t want to linger around and make you uncomfortable,” you finally admitted when the quiet became too much. Toji had been watching you with those unnerving eyes of his and he let out a stream of breath as he leaned back against the sofa. He laid his arm across the back of it and when his fingers landed just a hair's breadth from your shoulders, you would have sworn they twitched outwards to try and graze your shirt.

“Maybe a little,” Toji said, scratching at the back of his head with his other hand,“but you didn’t know, and that’s not on you.” His eyebrows furrowed and it seemed like he was concentrating on something, maybe remembering something you had said. “Aren’t you scared?”

It was your turn to give him a quizzical brow, and while you weren’t sure where exactly he was going with the question, you had no doubt about what he was asking. “About having children?”

Toji nodded and you let out a little noise of understanding. He watched as you tilted your head to one side, peered up at his ceiling and chewed at the corner of your lip as you collected your thoughts. You drew your feet up onto the sofa, facing him, and pulled your knees to your chest to relax further into the corner, and Toji had to fight the urge to nudge you into speaking. Your toes wiggled from where they sat just a half foot away from his leg.

“Maybe a little,” you considered, and Toji’s face slackened. “I’m sure you know that having them is a huge change and an enormous responsibility, but it’s worth it, no? In the same vein, I’d be scared of not having them even though I want to just because I’m nervous. I think having to live with such significant regret would be just as terrifying—at least for me. But that’s part of life, isn’t it? Doing the things that scare us because we want the chance of happiness that they could bring?”

He studied you, seemingly perplexed by your decision and his inability to understand it, but you didn’t squirm under his gaze and you willed yourself to remain quiet in the hopes that he would respond. His fingers behind you thrummed against the sofa, and his eyes darted once to the picture frame on the shelf.

“My wife died giving birth to Megumi, or right after technically.” Toji saw from the corner of his eye how your face fell, but you didn’t open your mouth to offer your condolences, so the rest of the story—his tragic past (minus the parts about the things that went bump in the night. That was for another time)—spilled out without a hope from him to stop it. By the time he was done, Toji’s nails were clawed into the fabric covering his knees, and at some point you had shimmied across the sofa closer to him so you could rest a reassuring hand on his arm.

“I’m so sorry,” you said, voice delicate and just above a whisper. The emotional aspect of it all made it feel like his skin was crawling, but Toji worked past the sensation. “I hope I didn’t come across as insensitive earlier. All those words only apply to me and how I feel. Your choices for your future, no matter what they are, are plenty valid.” You ducked your head down to meet his eyes better, and when his met yours, the sorrow in them made your chest ache.

“I owe you another apology,” you added sheepishly, and when Toji opened his mouth to disagree, you moved the hand from his arm to hold it up to him in hopes he’d hear you out. “I acted poorly. Childishly.”

You suddenly looked everywhere but at him, and your voice was hesitant when you spoke again. “I was being presumptuous in thinking that my decision to have children one day would matter to you. I got ahead of myself.” The whole thing felt very reminiscent of grade school “love” confessions and secret meetings. Hot embarrassment made your palms sweat and you itched to flee to the shelter of your home.

Next to you, Toji made a wounded little noise in the back of his throat, and his spine stiffened when understanding hit him and he realized that—no matter how far-fetched it seemed at the moment—you had considered him in a glimpse of your future. The image of it, something that he hadn’t seen for himself since the day his wife died, appeared in his mind and nearly stole his breath away.

Megumi. A wife—you this time. Children. Happiness and peace. The same terror that it could all be ripped away and he would be left alone again.

If he had you, Toji knew he wouldn’t be able to deny you anything, but there would be no solace for him those entire nine months, and even after, should he find himself in the same shoes again. Tentative excitement and abject fear would war inside of him from the moment the two of you would commit to the idea, and if he was lucky, maybe it would abate in some reasonable amount of time after you delivered his child and lived long enough to enjoy it with him.

Toji knew the odds of such a tragedy occurring again was low, but likelihoods and probabilities mattered little when he already knew their worst case outcome.

“But that’s part of life, isn’t it? Doing the things that scare us because we want the chance of happiness that they could bring?”

“Presumptuousness is okay sometimes,” Toji murmured, and though your expression was hopeful, you shook your head once.

“Maybe,” you conceded, and he could tell you weren’t entirely convinced. He could see as doubt trickled into your features and turned down the corner of your lips. “The topic of children isn’t something to be left undecided or uncertain.” Your lips stayed apart and moved slightly even though nothing came out.

“I like you,” you breathed out once you seemed to regain yourself, and hearing the words out loud was a balm to Toji’s ears. “But I’m not willing to sacrifice my own happiness, not for something like this. And that’s okay. It’s also okay if you don’t want them, but that means this,” you gestured between him and yourself, “doesn’t go any father and that there’s someone else out there for each of us.”

The memory of the man walking you to your door left a horribly bitter taste in his mouth, but Toji knew it wasn’t jealousy or possessiveness that drove his desire for you. The craving for domestic bliss, to have a person that loved him and his son had him yearning to pull you close, but the anticipation of something sinister lurking and waiting to snatch it away made him falter.

“It’s not that I don’t want them,” Toji said, and he made sure to hold your eyes with his. “I’m scared of what happens if history repeats itself.”

When he turned his head again to the shelf in the corner, the conversation and his reactions from that night seemed to make more sense. And now, when Toji stared at you in a way that was a little helpless and a little entreating, you were powerless to do anything but give into the thrill that hopefulness brought forth.

“Well, your fear isn’t unfounded,” you told him gently, and he nodded in agreement, “though I’d like to think that this would be worth it.” You let your hand drop onto his and used your nails to scratch gently on the back of it. Tension bled out from his shoulders and Toji shifted forward just so he could be close enough to share the same air as you.

Perhaps the emotional turmoil of a tragedy passed wouldn’t cease to exist overnight, but if hopeful optimism could be found in the eyes of a person who set one’s heart alight, then maybe the two of you would be just fine.

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Time seemed to move slowly and all at once from that afternoon, and each interaction afterwards brought forth an emotion well known but newly rediscovered in light of emerald eyes and a scar in the corner of smirking lips.

Humor when Toji had wandered off to the kitchen after your talk to get a glass of water and surreptitiously inquired about the man in a suit at your door last week. There was a clatter of dishes when you made a casual off-hand remark about the quality of the view from his window, and when he returned to you without a glass in hand, looking like he was trying very hard to appear nonchalant, you couldn’t help but giggle at his expense. You had to explain that the man in a suit was just your boss dropping you off after a conference and that he came to the door to receive the gift you had for him and his wife to celebrate the arrival of their new baby. Toji had looked a little embarrassed by the end of your explanation.

Disappointment when you found out Megumi’s birthday coincided with a non-negotiable event at work and you’d have to miss it. You weren’t sure whose face was harder to look at when they each turned their pouting lips and begging eyes on you. However, when you had knocked on the door late in the evening on Megumi’s birthday, a little breathless and carrying a balloon and gourmet cupcake, the little boy had thrown himself at your legs in a fit of giddy laughter. Toji looked at you with a swirl of emotion on his face, something heady and warm, appreciative and awe-struck, a little bit adoring at the frazzled aura surrounding you.

Abject disbelief a month later when Toji told you about things that went bump in the night and about a school that was a lot more than it seemed. You couldn’t quite wrap your head around the concept, but Toji answered any question you had, even if apprehension made him want to grab onto you and never let you go. Somehow, for some reason, you accepted it well enough with the promise that you didn’t talk about it unless absolutely necessary. Toji assured you, with a grin that was confident and proud, that he was there to ensure nothing ever happened to you.

Love-sick even though it might have been too soon when Toji wrapped a large hand around your wrist after you said your goodbyes to him underneath the golden glow of his porch light. Megumi was already in bed, tired from a day spent out playing in fresh February snow, and when Toji tipped your head back to kiss you, the size of him became so apparent up close that it had butterflies erupting in your stomach. His hand could span your cheek while his fingers threaded into your hair. He bowed over you when his other hand pressed into your back to arch you into him, then his arm followed to encircle your waist in a grip that was ironclad. Toji chased after you when you pulled away to take in a gulp of air, and you knew right then that refusing him was never something you’d be very good at.

When the days were still cold and Megumi could only tolerate being outside so long before the tip of his nose froze pink, most of your time together was spent cuddled on one of your couches as an endless list of movies played on the TV. Sometimes Toji would be situated in the middle with Megumi splayed across his lap and you tucked under his arm, a blanket thrown across all of you. Other times, your feet would lay on Toji’s thighs while Megumi sat back against your chest. On nights Toji would fall asleep mid-movie and his snores would be too loud to continue, you and Megumi would find yourselves in the kitchen waiting for hot chocolate to bubble on the stove while you listened to him chatter animatedly about whatever happened at school the previous day. When the hot chocolate finally cooled enough to sip on without scalding your tongues, Toji would shuffle his way into the kitchen. Megumi would be perched atop the island, legs kicking happily, and you would be leaning up against. Toji’s eyes would still be bleary with sleep, but you’d offer him your mug and he’d drop a kiss to your hair and let his hand grip at your waist.

When the weather began to warm enough in the late spring, many an evening the three of you would sit on a blanket in the grass of a nearby park. Megumi would throw a ball or fly a kite, and you would recline in between Toji’s bent legs with a book in hand. On more than one occasion he’d stop you as you began to turn a page, and you realized that he’d been reading along from where his chin was perched on your shoulder.

“You read too quickly,” Toji huffed, and he lifted his hand so he could flick back the page with his thumb. You angled your head back to glance at him and he used the opportunity to place a kiss on your temple.

“I wasn’t aware you were following along.”

“Yeah, well, I wanted to see what about it kept hogging all your attention.” Toji’s fingers danced up and down your rib cage and you shrunk back into his chest to try and flee from the tickling sensation. “Turns out it’s just some sappy romance,” he complained.

When you recovered from laughter that pained your sides, you settled upright and brushed the hair from your face. “I’ll have you know it should get quite interesting in the next couple chapters.” You kept your voice innocently flirtatious, but Toji caught the insinuation nonetheless, and you could feel the deep hum in his chest against your back.

As it turned out, sex was hard to come by when there was a six year old running around the house, careers to be worked for the both of you, and limited time for just the two of you. There had been nothing more for the two of you than stolen kisses around a hallway corner when Megumi was eating lunch in Toji’s kitchen and lingering looks promising something more when given the chance.

Toji must have finally had enough just a couple weeks later when he had called to inform you on a Friday afternoon that Megumi would be gone at Yuji’s for a couple of hours. You were just leaving work and had promised to be over in the shortest time you could manage, but it still felt like an eternity by the time you had stopped by your house to freshen up and change before knocking on his door. Not a second passed before he was wrenching it open and tugging you inside with a grin that was downright wicked.

As soon as the door to his bedroom slammed shut, Toji peeled your shirt off while kissing down your neck as you fumbled with the button of his jeans. You snuck your fingers up under his shirt to run them over the muscles of his lower abdomen, and when he shivered in response you felt pride well up under your skin, but that faded quickly when Toji cupped you under your thighs to lift you and spread them around his hips. When he turned and fell back against the bed, you laughed as you caught yourself on his chest, and the smile that stretched his cheeks and the brightness of his eyes had him looking boyish, and the sight of him below you had you tearing the rest of your clothes away in a hurry.

Toji was impressive in every aspect of himself as you would now know, but you didn’t have the opportunity to dwell on the matter when his hands were on your breasts and his lips sucked a mark just below your collarbone. He made space for himself between your legs and kissed you softly when the size of him knocked your breath away. He remained patiently still until you rolled your hips up against his and tore a moan from both your throats, and he didn’t let you know a moment’s peace until his name rang from your mouth at least three times.

The sun was almost set when Toji’s phone pinged with a text from Yuji’s dad that they were on their way to drop Megumi off. He groaned in exhaustion from where his head rested on your stomach, and you could tell he was reluctant to pull away from how your fingers scratched at his head. With no time to waste, you managed to claw yourself out from under him to slip back into your clothes even though you had to bat away his wandering hands every other minute. Toji was quite proud of himself when he managed to steal away another couple minutes of kissing you senseless. Luckily, he had just finished pulling on his shirt as the two of you made it to the living room as the doorbell rang.

You watched with an amused smile as Megumi staggered inside with his backpack falling off one shoulder. The poor kid was clearly worn out from a day playing out in the sun, so much so that he could only give you a half-hearted wave as Toji directed him towards his room to get ready for bed.

When Toji came back from tucking in Megumi, you didn’t get up to gather your things and say your goodbyes. Instead, Toji leaned over the back of the couch to kiss you and whisper something in your ear that had you flushing hot from head to toe, and you didn’t resist when he led you back to his bedroom so that the two of you could indulge in one another all over again, albeit much quieter that time around.

-----------------------------------

You woke the next morning with a quick inhalation of air through your nose, your body still attuned to the internal clock of the work week. Even though it was Saturday and the sky had just begun to blush pink, your mind urged you out of restfulness. You stretched the languidness from your muscles and took note of all the places where soreness twinged, and in favor of chasing the last remnants of blissful sleep, you rolled from your side onto your stomach and buried your face into the plushness of the pillow below.

A puff of pine scented shampoo wafted into your nose and you blinked the rest of the room into awareness. You were not in your bed; you weren’t even in your own home, and the unfamiliar sounds around you came into focus. A fan thrummed faintly, a breeze rushed past the windows and drowned out any early noise from the street, and Toji snored softly to your right. His charcoal colored sheets were tangled up under his arms, and you recalled having to fight him for them in the middle of the night when you woke up shivering only to find out that he had a penchant for hogging the blankets. Toji hadn’t even budged at your attempts to yank them out from under him, and you eventually gave up in favor of snuggling in as close to him as you could. Thankfully, your skin sliding against his roused him enough to lift an arm for you to tuck yourself under, and you sighed at the warmth of him, your insides going soft when he curled his arm around your back so his hand could engulf your hip. You fell back asleep almost immediately after.

At some point in the night you had drifted away from him, and now, as you were able to watch the steady rise and fall of his chest and noticed how his fingers twitched occasionally, you knew that every night you’d spend in your own bed alone would feel empty and unfulfilling. While staying overnight hadn’t been unplanned—Toji had insisted—what happened in the morning hadn’t been discussed, and you became acutely aware of the fact that there was a little boy sleeping a couple rooms down who would, most likely, be waking with the rising sun, and you had no clue as to how his father wanted to proceed.

You sat up slowly, keeping the sheet clutched over your chest, and you scanned the floor of Toji’s bedroom to locate all articles of your clothing that you had shed the previous night. You had no intention of sneaking out, not when that alone would be detrimental to the newly cemented relationship, but you would feel more prepared for the conversation upcoming if it wasn’t done in the nude. With a swing of your legs, you made a move to push yourself off the bed, but a rustle of sheets behind you, followed by the feel of Toji’s hand skimming up your arm made you pause.

“You leaving?” His voice was still roughened with sleep, and when you looked back over your shoulder at him, he was using his other hand to rub at his eyes.

“No,” you said simply, “not yet. Just getting dressed.”

Toji’s fingers tightened around the top of your arm and he tugged gently. You didn’t hesitate to follow and fall back into him. He curled you into his chest and you shivered in delight when the fingers of the arm you rested your head on found their way into your hair while his left hand reached across his body to squeeze at your waist. A pleasant sigh lifted and lowered Toji’s chest when you skimmed your fingers across it, and you had the briefest curiosity for finding out if he was as eager for you this morning as he had been last night. When he suddenly rolled on top of you and you parted your legs to make room for him, the answer became evident, because yes, he certainly was. Toji’s nose found itself in your neck as lips nuzzled into your skin, and the deep inhale he took of you made you ache. All of him was distracting, enticing in every way, and the feel of the muscles in his back shifting under your fingertips nearly had you forgetting any rational thought aside from having him again. But when the yellowing sunlight began to filter in through the window as his hands pushed up your thighs, mindfulness took the place of lust and you cleared your throat pointedly.

“I hate to interrupt,” you whispered, and Toji paused in his pursuit of being inside of you, “but it’s almost daylight, and Megumi…” you trailed off, unsure of what to say—how to broach such a subject—and Toji made a low noise of disappointment in your ear before letting go of your legs. He lifted his head to look at you, and wiggled out from under him to sit up. You brought your knees to your chest and fiddled with the sheet around your ankles while Toji fell onto his back with a huff next to your side. The pout on his lips amused you.

“I wasn’t sure if you were ready for him to see me with you this early in the morning, especially in yesterday’s clothes.” Toji sighed and lifted his hands to rest them under his head, and you could tell indecision warred in his mind. “I’m not against slipping out and going back home. I’d understand,” you offered to him.

“That feels kinda wrong though,” he said, and the inside of his cheek caved as he bit down on it. He removed one hand from behind his head to trail his fingers down your spine and you shrugged lightly.

“It’s alright. We can talk with him later.” Toji finally nodded and blew a breath of air out of the corner of his mouth before sitting up to press a kiss to your lips. His eyes were bright when you pulled away.

“Want to come back after a while and take the kid to breakfast?” he asked. A grin took over your face and you bit down on your lip as you nodded.

“That sounds like a good idea. I’ll head back and you can let me know once he’s up.” You narrowed your eyes at Toji in feigned annoyance. “I need a little bit to clean up , anyway.” He smirked, clearly proud of himself and not at all ashamed, and you squeaked out a noise of surprise when he launched himself at you.

An hour and a half later found you back at the Fushiguro residence, freshly showered and dressed for a morning out. You didn’t bother knocking, and you had just opened your mouth to announce your presence when you heard bickering from down the hall.

“It doesn’t matter what shade of blue your shirt is, Megs.” Exasperation was barely hidden in Toji’s voice. “Just put this one on so we can go.”

“It does too,” Megumi argued, and you could clearly imagine the way Toji and his son mirrored each other's stances, arms crossed and lips twisted in a scowl as they stood adamant against the other. You giggled to yourself as you made your way down the hallway.

“Put this one on, Megumi. I gave you a choice, but now I’m choosing. This one matches your pants just fine.”

“Nuh uh. I don’t like it.”

Toji sputtered. “But you told me to grab them!”

You popped your head into Megumi’s room and rapped your knuckles against the door to get their attention. “Trouble getting ready?”

Megumi spun to face you, and Toji turned to you with a heavy sigh of relief. Stress twitched a muscle in his cheek, and you took notice of the repeated clenching of his fist. Nothing else about his appearance though could betray his anger or frustration, and you knew the amount of self control and effort it took for him to patiently parent his son. When his eyes turned helpless, you crouched down in front of Megumi.

“Not sure which shirt to wear?” you asked, and the little boy nodded shyly. You hummed in understanding and reached out to take one of the shirts that Toji held in his hand. You brought it close to you and held it up against the fabric of your dress, something light and casual for the morning, and lowered your head to peer into Megumi’s eyes.

“How about this one,” you offered, “I think it’s nice, and it nearly matches the color of my dress. Wouldn’t that be fun?” Megumi’s expression lit up and he held his hands out eagerly for the shirt of choice. After passing it to him you stood, smiling softly at Toji as he mouthed a ‘thank you’ and then backed out of the room. “I’ll wait for you guys out here.”

Just as you made it halfway back down the hall, you heard Megumi sigh in a way that sounded years older than he was.

“Your choice was ugly anyway, Dad.”

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Y'all, I swear I reread my fics to proof and edit them, but surely I'll find a mistake every run through, so please forgive me for any that I didn't catch.

Thank you for reading if you do<3

#toji fushiguro #toji x reader #toji x you #toji fushiguro x you #toji fushiguro x reader #jujustu kaisen #jujutsu kaisen x you #jujutsu kaisen x reader #jjk #jjk x you #jjk x reader

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samgirl98 · 3 months

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Mending a Family 44/?

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Two days after Tim left, Jason regretted giving him his phone number. Not because the kid was trying to convince him to return to Gotham but because he would text him at the most random times with the most innate things. Seriously, did he ever sleep? Why was he trying to find out who robbed a store and took only the left socks?

Okay, the last one was interesting, but why was he doing it at 2:42 a.m.? Go to sleep!

Jason rubbed his eyes and continued setting up the snacks for the first book club meeting. Ghost Writer was literally glowing at the prospect of the first meeting. Jason constantly reminded him to stop lighting up if he didn’t want to freak people out. After telling him the sixth time, Jason wondered if meeting in Ghost Writer’s bookstore was a bad idea.

He sighed, “Too late, now.”

Jason had used the bookstore’s website so people who signed up could also vote from six choices. It had been a close call, but most people chose Sense and Sensibility. Jason couldn’t overstate his happiness that the first book would be an Austen novel. Jason might not have read it in a while, but he had it almost memorized and found himself more engrossed than usual in the novel. They only had to read the first five chapters for the first meeting, but Jason couldn’t help but finish it in one sitting while Jazz had had the kids.

Jason looked up as the bell over the door rang. A middle-aged woman entered the bookstore. Jason recognized her from the school and greeted her warmly. Then, an older lady entered. She had curly, short silver hair and thick glasses that made her eyes look huge. Jason greeted her and pointed her toward the snack bar. Next was a couple who bickered with each other. It wasn’t loud, but it felt overwhelming in such an enclosed space. Jason hoped that they wouldn’t continue arguing with each other the whole time.

Next, a young woman who looked to be college-aged showed up. Her hair was in a bun, and she was dressed as if she were going to an interview. Jason looked down at his ratty T-shirt and holey jeans and suddenly felt ragged. A few minutes later, a guy with a bushy beard and covered in tattoos entered. He looked like a biker.

Jason couldn’t help but be excited as he talked to the people who had entered. Barring the couple, everyone seemed happy to be there. Jason heard the bell ring once more. His smile fell when he saw the person who had entered.

Avril fucking Dubois. Fuck.

Jason ignored Avril as much as he could. He refused to let her ruin this for him.

They went around and introduced each other. The couple, Henry and Vanessa, went first. Halfway through introducing themselves, they started bickering. Jason quickly went to the next person.

The older woman was Agnus.

“I’m so glad this book club started. I love literature, and most of the people I used to talk to are gone now. I hope being around you young people will give me new perspectives.”

“Welcome, Agnus,” Jason said. He had a feeling he would get along with her. Next was the college student.

“My name is Charlotte. I’m here to find like-minded people who enjoy reading as much as I do. I can bring new insights and hope to learn from other people’s points of view. I hope to be a good asset to this club.”

“Um,” Jason had no idea what to say in response to that introduction. “Well, welcome; just having you here is awesome.”

“Hello, Jay. I know you know me, but for everyone else, my name is Carrie. I love to read but have very little time to do so with my children. I decided I needed some ‘me’ time, so I joined. I can't wait to discuss literature with other like-minded people.”

“Name’s Jerry,” Biker dude said, “I’m here to broaden my horizons and to see more of the world through books. Happy to be here.”

Jason smiled warmly toward him. He loved that Jerry didn’t fit into the stereotypical bookworm category. It made Jason feel validated somehow. Of course, Avril had to ruin by sniffing at Jerry’s introduction and haughtily introducing herself.

“My name is Avril Dubois. I’m the president of the PTA at my children’s school.”

Why would anyone care about that?

“I studied literature and English in college, so I thought this club would be a good way to continue my love of literature and help spread what I know. It’s certainly nice to meet such a…interesting band of people.”

Jason gritted his teeth at Avril’s blatant insult and decided to introduce himself.

“Hello, my name’s Jay. I started this book club so I can talk and discuss with others the books I read. I am so glad to have so many people here who share my passion for the written word. I would also like to thank Mr. Edwards for letting us use his bookstore for this little club.”

Ghostwriter waved a hand and sat by Jason. Thankfully, he looked like a very pale man and wasn’t glowing.

“I put a little poll online, and Sense and Sensibility won. I’m excited to talk about this book. Austen is one of my favorite authors. So, did everyone read the first five chapters?”

The discussion started, and Jason had to admit (at least to himself and not Roy) that this was a good idea.

Jason couldn’t help but feel joy being in a group of people arguing whether or not it was Mrs. Dashwood’s fault that Elinor had to have sense and had become a parent due to Mrs. Dashwood’s habit of letting her emotions take over.

Even the couple stopped bickering with each other to gang up on Jerry and Agnus. At one point, Jason and Avril were on the same page. Well, weirder things, he guessed.

When the first meeting ended, Jason felt his core humming with happiness.

Jason personally saw everyone out—even Avril.

“Well, I was pleasantly surprised, Jay. Who knew you had some knowledge of Austen? Don’t be late to the PTA meeting tomorrow, if possible.”

Even Avril’s backhanded compliment didn’t bring Jason’s spirits (ha!) down. He couldn’t wait for the next meeting.

Quick disclaimer: I have never read Austen.

I tried to read it for this chapter, but it's not my cup of tea, so I did something I have never done before: I used cliff notes, lol. I kinda wish I could've gotten into it because I see so much of Jason in Marianne. For example, Jason uses his emotions to live his life, and it has caused him problems with his family

Likewise, I see bits of Jazz in Elinor. But since I can't really go into it I decided to put it here on the notes.

anyway, enjoy

@itsberrydreemurstuff @idontgetpaidenoughforthisshit @skulld3mort-1fan @theauthorandtheartist @emergentpanda-blog @jaggedheart11 @fisticuffsatapplebees @booberrylizard @fantasticbluebirdfan @thegatorsgooseoose @cyrwrites @kjoboo91 @crystallicedart @amaramizuki666 @spekulatiusmuffin @meira-3919 @kilasmess @bubblemixer @lexdamo @wonderland-daisy @mj-arts-n-stuff @amyheart19 @dolfay @the-church-grimm @undead-essence @aph-mable @lizisipancardo @purrloin77 @writer-extraodinaire @charlietheepic7 @sinfulloccultist @nootherusernameworked @coruscateselene @chaoticchange @itsberrydreemurstuff @gmkelz11 @feral-bunny31 @paroovian @thatonegaybitch68 @d4ydr34min9 @overtherose @fandomwandererer @vipower001 @thordottir45 @blackrabbitt3t @rosecinnamonbun @bianca-hooks123 @epilepticnerd @dat1angel @consouling @flamingenchiladadragon @all-mights-asscheeks @ender-reader @fuyu-bitch @ravenswife @randomafterthought @chaos-and-wtv

#mending a family #dc x dp #dp x dc

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butterflydm · 13 days

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this is random but i just remembered that ages ago i saw an ask game for asking fic writers their 5 favorites/ones they're most proud of of their own fics, and i would love to know yours if you're up for it! it would be so interesting to hear a Butterfly Career Retrospective haha

feel free to be flexible on the number and discuss as many or as few fics as you feel like, and to count a whole series as a single entry (like voice, although if you have any particular favorite installments or interludes within that that you'd like to note i'd be curious to hear that too!)

This took a while but I finally got it done, @markantonys!

I have written a lot of fics, so this was a difficult challenge. I am somewhat helped out by the fact that old fics tend to fade out of my memory… but then if I reread a bit of them, I tend to remember why I wrote them and what I loved about them. I did not limit myself to five fics (I tried!) but these are roughly in reverse chronological order of when I posted them.

not in the stars, but in ourselves - trying to bob and weave and make something that feels narratively satisfying out of the mess that is Mat Cauthon's late series arc has become something of a hobby of mine! This is fic is one of several where I narratively examine parts of the canon that didn't work so well for me and try to rearrange them into something that feels like it rings true for the previous characterization and choices.

This fic in particular really made me see how the roadblocks that existed in each of the character's main plotlines was so much easier to solve if they had access to the other main characters (and I suspect that's part of why Jordan kept them so unnaturally separated during these arcs).

I also really enjoy the romance in this fic, and how the characters interact with prophecy in more unexpected ways, and how Rand and Mat help each other through their traumas, and how each of the members of the polycule bring their own perspective to the relationship.

the caffrey exception in White Collar fandom - this fic languished mostly unfinished on my harddrive for a long time before polyweek gave me an excuse to finish it up and post it! I wasn’t really in White Collar fandom, was the problem, and I always write and post more consistently when I have fellow fandom people to encourage me. I also was originally watching WC with my (now ex-)girlfriend and I stopped watching after we broke up, iirc, so I didn’t actually finish the show until years later. And by the time I was writing it, I didn’t feel like there was all that much visible fandom around. But it had a nice little response during polyshipweek, so I was really happy with how it all turned out. Makes me think that one day maybe I’ll finish up and post that RENT fanfic that’s been on my harddrive for eighteen million years.

negotiating with the truth in The Wheel of Time fandom - you can tell I got fancy with this fic because I gave the chapters titles, lol. This fic leans hard into Mat being an unreliable narrator and playing around with that, and it was a lot of fun to focus on and explore that part of him. I do love a lot of the fics I've written in WoT so trying to narrow it down more was tough (and I still only managed to narrow down to three!) but I really loved writing this one and exploring the differing ways that Mat and Rand were approaching this relationship of theirs and how they come to a compromise in the end. I think I really liked that they genuinely do have different wants and desires that need to be navigated.

voice interlude: feels like falling for the first time in The Wheel of Time fandom - this is, a little bit, subbing in for the Voice series as a whole, but I wanted to pick out a complete story and not something still in progress. I am pretty hopeful that Voice will get finished (there are three more main fics in the series, I think — one that mostly spoils through bk9: winter’s heart; one that mostly spoils through bk12: the gathering storm; and then one with whole-series spoilers) but I have some fairly long unfinished works in past fandoms, so eggs and hatching & etc.

What makes this fic in particular stand out to me is how I was able to really take this one moment in time in the series and expand on it so that I could deep-dive into Mat’s characterization and what he was thinking and feeling, and it’s such a revelatory moment for Mat. I enjoy showing characterization via writing about sex, and the interludes in the Voice series really allow me to do that.

my mouth (your lips) my hands (your hips) in The Magicians fandom - This fic where Margo and Eliot approach Quentin on this more equal ground (of them competing to see which of them can land him first) and it developing into a true polyam relationship… I really loved exploring how messy but ultimately loving it was. I also loved delving into Margo as an aromantic character in this fic, and how the great love of her life is her best friend.

A lot of my own fears and pains and worries made it into the three main characters in this one, though all in ways that make sense with their own base characterization, I think. There’s this one line that Eliot thinks - “he had always been better at self-preservation than bravery” and that is 100% canon Eliot but… yeah, it’s also me. One of the things I am working on in therapy is loosening the stranglehold of my self-preservation so that I can be a little braver when it comes to reaching out to other people.

If you like my poly fics in WoT fandom, you might also enjoy my marqueliot fics (but I wouldn’t recommend the show tbh. Or, well, I might rec it up until the episode “All That Hard Glossy Armor”. That’s a good one to end on. And it’s a Margo episode!).

searching for a sound (we hadn’t heard before) in The Magicians fandom - I wrote some serious fix-it fics in this fandom. But this fic was me taking the kind of ridiculous angle on a plotline that I think that the show might have actually pulled off, if it had been so inclined. This fic was also me balling up all my frustration at the poor writing choices and lobbing it at the show’s forehead. It was very cathartic to write. And I think it’s pretty funny too, so that’s a bonus.

(I’m Not Calling You A) Liar for Steven Universe fandom — I am cheating here and including a vid. This vid is… if I sliced up my heart (Hannibal style) and laid it out on a plate, it would look something like this vid. I actually started watching Steven Universe because I saw the “Stronger Together” clip with Garnet but soon after I started watching… holy shit, Pearl and her deep heartbreak over Rose just grabbed me by the throat and did not let me go. Watching her slowly process and begin to resolve her grief was a very healing experience when I was watching the show. There was something very much intensely yearning about Pearl at the start of SU, and how she was trying so hard to hide it (from Steven but from the other gems as well). But she can’t move on until she confronts and heals!

My favorite of the vids that I’ve made, I think, and the one I’m proudest of. There is maybe one single clip that I would change now if I went back to edit it again, but that’s it. I’m fully satisfied with the rest of it; and this is not the case with most of my vids. My Yuri! On Ice vid is probably the other one that comes closest to feeling like I wouldn’t change anything now.

Enyo’s Daughter in MCU fandom — so I am a bit of an odd one out in MCU fandom, because the ship that I liked the best, over any other… Tony and Natasha. Iron Man and Black Widow. It’s a complex and thorny ship, but I liked exploring it. Tony and Natasha both get to be messy and fucked up and exploring situations like that can be interesting. It was written pretty soon after the first Avengers movie came out, if I recall correctly. I never did finish the sequel to this fic, which I am kinda sad about.

Any fandom where canon is currently developing can be kinda tough for me to stay ahead of, in terms of writing any big fic series(es) — this is also why my big Star Wars WIP is destined never to be finished, tbh. I started writing it before a lot of the current canon even exists, and trying to go back and finish it would be difficult because the new shows & movies have changed so much and it can be hard to mentally reconcile what I knew back then vs what I know now when it comes to canon. Once the new MCU movies after Avengers came out, this fic was kinda doomed to never get the sequel finished, alas. And this is why WoT having a closed book canon has made writing fic for it easier, I think.

Melt into Time from American Idol RPF — time-travel fic! I’ve attempted it from time to time, but this one I actually finished. I don’t remember the actual process of writing this anymore, because my memory is for crap, as I mentioned at the start, but it is probably my favorite fic that I wrote in this fandom overall. It deals with second chances and a lot of yearning and people being emotionally messy (a theme for me, for sure).

Justice, Be Not Blind from Dexter — my one and only Dexter fic. What I remember most about writing this fic is that despite how short it is (less than 1k), I did so much research. Miguel Prado was hands-down my favorite character who ever appeared on Dexter and so I wanted to write a fic for him, but I wanted it to sound as true to his character voice as possible. I don’t even really remember the extent of the research that I did and it’s been so long that I couldn’t tell you anymore whether or not the character voice is accurate, but I remember how much I wanted to get this right and how much work I put into trying to get Miguel to feel genuine.

Travelers Without Map or Compass for Doctor Who fandom - cute romantic fluff, but I’m very fond of it. It captures a sort of vibe in the Doctor & Rose relationship that was very appealing to me, and I enjoyed exploring and expanding my thoughts on some of the rooms in the TARDIS.

Another Nameless Planet in the Star Wars (Prequel) fandom — I wrote longer fics in Star Wars fandom but honestly I think I captured Anakin best in this small fic that’s not really about anything in particular except Anakin wanting to be treated as an equal (by Obi-Wan specifically).

I have fics that I wrote before this point, but most of them I genuinely don’t remember writing to the point of going, “huh, oh, wow, I guess that was me, huh?” lol. But going back over my fics… man, it really is like having the deepest yearnings of your heart spread out in front of the world sometimes, isn’t it?

Thanks for sending me on this journey to the past! I hope you enjoyed it. <3

#markantonys #replies #fanfic #wheel of time #white collar #the magicians #steven universe #fandom stuff #'five fav fics' or maybe twelve in this case lol

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sbdskate · 2 years

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Laws of Attraction (Part 2) - DR x lawyer!fem!reader

Summary: McLaren is in breach of contract, dr3 hires a lawyer to deal with the aftermath. Tropes ensue. Slow burn. Enemies(kind of)-> Friends/colleagues->Lovers

Pairing: lawyer!fem!reader x Daniel Ricciardo

Warnings: language, alcohol consumption, sexual themes, NSFW for a hot sec

Word Count: 3,698

A/N: Thank you everyone who read Part 1! As a first fic, I didn’t think this was going to get as much traction as it’s gotten and I’m happy I was able to spread some joy. Part 2 didn't come as easily to me, so again, I appreciate any and all feedback both positive and constructive. Enjoy and stay tuned for part 3 xo

---

After weeks of exchanges of redlines, it was clear negotiations with McLaren were going nowhere fast. You showed up for your first in person meeting with McLaren’s attorneys after Singapore, your nerves and imposter syndrome back with a vengeance. Thankfully Joe did not abandon you this time, and ensured you he would be taking the lead for the discussion. Yet you found yourself in Daniel’s dressing room before the meeting, needing a private space pull your thoughts together before the negotiation. As you always did to calm yourself, you power posed in the mirror and repeated your mantra.

“Um. Can I help you?” Daniel stood in the doorway trying to hide a small smirk. He understood this must be a ritual of yours, no different than anything he might do before a race. Yet from an outsider’s perspective, it was objectively a silly sight to behold.

Your face turns red at the realization he found you out. “Power posing… How long have you been standing there?”

“Long enough.” He paused. “Nervous?”

You sighed. “Yeah, a bit,” you admitted. You knew you shouldn’t make the client you’re representing aware of your insecurities on their own case, yet there you were.

“You’ve been working your ass off on this, I trust you.” He was trying to be supportive, which you appreciated, but you knew the reality of the situation. You spent a lot of time around Daniel the last few weeks, giving you a glimpse into work-life at the paddock. You hoped you would be able to pick up hints of a hostile work environment to bring to the negotiation, but there was no glaring evidence of such. You simply did not have enough bargaining power against McLaren.

“Look, I need to level with you. You know I’m going to fight for you as hard as I can, and I hope I can take them for all they’re worth. But I don’t know what’s going to happen in there. We don’t have as strong of a stance as we thought and I just – I want to manage your expectations on what the outcome might be with this.”

He moved from the doorway to step closer to you. “You think I don’t know that? This whole situation… is shit. And at this point I just want the season to be over so I can take a step back, whatever that means. Yeah it would be nice to get a bit of money out of it, but it’s not even about that anymore. I just want to be heard and acknowledged. I feel like that shouldn’t be too much to ask.”

Your eyes met and you again fought off the urge to grab his hand. You pivoted, putting your emotions back in a jar. “Just remember you don’t have to sign anything today, we’ll negotiate an extension and we’ll do what we can.” He sensed your change in demeanor, whatever window you briefly opened to him was now closed. He had gotten used to this pattern over the last few weeks. You seemed to catch yourself by surprise every time you let your guard down and you quickly corrected yourself. It was infuriating, but fortunately (or unfortunately) for you, Daniel was persistent.

“Right… So, can I – uh - power pose with you a little before we go out there?” He succeeded in earning a small grin from you. You instructed him to widen his stance and put his hands on his hips.

“Do I have to say ‘I’m a boss ass bitch’ too”?

“Technically, no. Should you? Yes, because you will feel like a boss ass bitch. But you can say whatever makes you feel confident.”

The two of you stood there for a few more minutes exchanging manifestations before building the courage to return to the hallway. You found Joe waiting outside.

“Y/n, there you are. How ya feeling kid?” You forced a smile.

“Never better.” Your client may have seen you crack, but you were not going to let your boss see any sign of weakness.

Zak Brown and the McLaren legal team rounded the corner, unsurprisingly encompassed by a group of gruff middle aged men who vaguely resembled thumbs. You all dispersed into the boardroom, exchanging introductions. One of the lawyers turns to you: “Can you get us some coffee, sweetheart? We had a long flight.”

Based on your discourse over email, your expectations were low and this was something you had prepared for. You opened your mouth, about to say something you would surely get you fired, but the partner beat you to it.

“Her name is y/n and you will address her as such. She is a valuable member of our team and I will not tolerate any level of disrespect towards her or anyone else. If that’s too difficult for you, we’re happy to take this to arbitration.” The man pursed his lips together and gave the partner a curt nod, still not bothering to apologize or acknowledge you. You didn’t care, you were above concerning yourself with the opinions of small men. You mouthed thank you to your boss as you sat down.

As you expected, it was a hard negotiation and the McLaren team were a bunch of assholes. Nonetheless, you were able to get them to concede to a not-for-cause termination. You knew it was aggressive to try to get them to agree to a full year severance for 2023, but ultimately were able to get them up to six months which you were satisfied with. Once the meeting was over, the three of you debriefed privately over drinks at the hotel bar.

“Can you believe he called our proposed language cute? Actually, scratch that. I can believe it, but it’s still infuriating.” You were careful to not over-vent around the partner or client, but you had to get some of your frustrations off your chest.

“You handled it like a champ. People don’t like awkward silences, just wait for them to dig themselves in a hole.” It was a relief to receive validation from your boss. You smiled thinking back to the moment. You had simply asked the lawyer to explain what he meant by the statement and sure enough he turned into a stammering mess and fell into the trap of negotiating against himself. You took a well earned sip of scotch.

“I don’t think we’re going to get many changes beyond what we achieved today, but I think we’re in decent shape. Obviously Daniel you don’t have to sign anything you’re not comfortable with,” Joe looked to him for confirmation.

“No, I’m really happy with where we landed. I’ll sleep on it just in case but I think I’m ready to sign. And I just want to thank you both for all your help.” You nearly fell out of your chair though when he turned to Joe and said “I hope you know how lucky you are to have y/n on your team, I don’t think I could have gotten through this without her.”

You were thankful for the dim light of the bar that disguised your growing blush. It shouldn’t have given you any sort of rise, it was an innocent compliment and positive client feedback was gold when it came time for annual reviews and bonuses. Yet you bit your bottom lip to curb your smile before taking another long sip of your drink.

Joe smiled, not thinking about anything other than all the hours billed on the case. “I think we can cheers to that.”

Your eyes met as you clinked glasses, this time you did not avert your gaze. You relished the burn in your throat from the alcohol snapping you out of your trance.

“Now, let’s find you a home for 2023.”

After a long day, you were so tired you didn’t even bother washing your face. You put your pj’s on and climbed into bed, instantly falling into a deep slumber. Your mind wandered back to the boardroom, except instead of other lawyers and red-faced execs, it was just you and Daniel. He walks you backwards until you bump against the boardroom table, finally your lips clash in a feverish kiss. Wandering hands starting at your waist move lower, as your hands move their way from his strong chest to the nape of his neck playing with his soft curls. When he gets to your ass he lifts you onto the table, and you take the opportunity to wrap your legs around his waist, grinding against each other. Neither of you bother undressing, only moving articles of clothing aside barely enough for him to enter you. It’s desperate and messy. Your skirt bunched up at your waist, panties slid to the side, and his pants pooled by his ankles. He nuzzles his face into your neck as he picks up the pace, kissing, sucking, and licking. You throw your head back as you let out a succession of moans, you’re close to reaching your high and –

Your eyes flash open when your alarm goes off. Panting, you lay there a moment after turning off your alarm, finally rolling over to scream into your pillow. You chalk it up to the fact that you’ve basically only been hanging out with Daniel for weeks and 90% of your work has revolved around him, exacerbated by scotch and jetlag from the night before. Still, you feel embarrassed – both at the shame of your sordid thoughts about a client and the disappointment at the lack of friction in real life. You squeeze your thighs together, wanting desperately to continue the fantasy. Instead you settle for a short HIIT workout in a pathetic attempt to relieve the tension and take your mind off of your subconscious creation. It doesn’t work.

You make your way to the paddock, kicking yourself for agreeing to accompany Daniel for press day. Daniel and Lando spot you, both of them smiling and waving you over. Nope, nope, nope, nope. You make a ninety degree turn and keep your head down, not exactly sure where you’re going but you’re positive at this point you can never look him in the eyes ever again.

“What’s gotten into her?” Lando asks.

Daniel frowned. “I have no idea, I’ll go check.”

You found yourself in the kitchen, thankful that it was empty. Pacing the room, you took a moment to regain your composure. This was ridiculous, it’s not like anything remotely close to that actually happened in real life, it only existed in your imagination. But my, what a curious imagination you had. You were chugging a glass of water when you heard footsteps behind you.

“y/n?” Shit.

“Good morning, Daniel.”

“Are you ok? You look a bit flushed.” Shit, shit, shit. You grit your teeth.

“I’m fine, just a little under the weather is all.” He puts the back of his hand on your forehead, your face turning beet red at the contact.

“You do feel a little warm. I know yesterday was a lot, why don’t you take a day off?”

You feigned distress at the idea, but were relieved at the suggestion. “Oh no, I couldn’t leave you like this.” You added a fake cough for good measure.

“I can handle myself. Go home and rest -”

“I suppose you’re right.”

“- so you can be here for qualifyings and race day!”

You wanted to smack your head against the wall. Obviously, you couldn’t hide from him forever. And it would make things weirder if you avoided him for too long. At the end of the day, he was still your client until he got signed with another team and until then there was no escape. You gave a weak smile.

“I’ll do my best.”

You made it for Saturday’s qualifying as promised. You still brought your work bag to keep yourself distracted and occupied. You settled in a corner of the garage so that you were out of the way. The organized chaos of the mechanics, engineers, and slew of other personnel provided nice background noise to help you focus. Everything was fine, until you spotted Daniel out of the corner of your eye. He was helping a mechanic move something heavy, stripped down to his fireproofs and race suit half on. The ripple of his back and arm muscles shown through the fabric. His sleeves were rolled, exposing his forearms. From the comfort of your discreet corner you openly ogled at his form, jaw going slack. Feeling no shame, you let your imagination wander this time, counting the ways he could probably manhandle you. You felt like a dirty Victorian man trying to get a glimpse at a woman’s ankle from under her petticoats.

“You’re drooling.” Eyes wide, you slowly turned your head to find Lando giving you a sly grin. From all the time you spent following Daniel around, you accidentally found a kindred spirit in the young driver. Attorney-client privilege prevented you from speaking with him about your work, but it forced other topics of conversation out of you. You were both a little weird and awkward, but it was a recipe for an unlikely friendship with lots of laughs.

“I was working,” you mumbled, subconsciously wiping the sides of your mouth just in case he was right.

You looked at your screen – you had literally just been hitting random buttons on your keyboard for the last five minutes.

“I know you weren’t actually sick on press day.”

“Keep talking, I will literally fuck your dad and make you my step son,” you deadpanned. He found your empty threats amusing, like a teddy bear holding a knife. He could tell you kept a tough exterior for your job, but underneath the thin façade you were really just a goofball with a big heart. He had also sniffed out your now not-so-secret blossoming crush, so of course he was going to give you shit for it. The two of you continued bickering for a few minutes, unaware of the honey badger approaching you.

“Uh, am I interrupting something?”

Lando didn’t skip a beat. “Y/n was just saying how excited she is to go out with us after the race this weekend.” You tried to burn a hole through Lando’s head with your retinas.

Daniel broke into a wide grin at the news. “I thought you were doing important lawyer things?”

“What can I say, I’m full of surprises,” you said through a forced smile and gritted teeth.

“How are your karaoke skills?”

“I have the voice of a dying frog so for your sake I will not be participating, but I will happily support you two in your endeavors.” The boys chuckled and you joined in with your own forced laughter.

“Ha ha ha ha ha ha– I’ll cut you” just loud enough for Lando to hear. You checked the time, desperate to find an excuse to switch focus to literally anything else. “Don’t you guys need to go - oh I don’t know - race?”

As if on cue, Michael Italiano showed up to drag Daniel away. He was all smiles as he waved to you on his way out, and instead of being normal, you threw him some finger guns. Why. When Lando knew Daniel wasn’t looking, he mockingly threw fingers guns back at you in slow mo with raised eyebrows. You weren’t sure where they came from either, but you were mortified. When they were both out of sight, you let out a breath you didn’t realize you had been holding in. You needed to find a way to maintain your professionalism with your client despite your new schoolgirl crush - you couldn’t allow it to become anything more.

Everyone woke up on race day on edge. Lando and Daniel secured p10 and p11 respectively, which wasn’t terrible. But the rain was coming down hard, and worry set in across the paddock. As for Daniel, you could sense the weight he carried was becoming too heavy for him. Despite the fact that he and Lando performed well in Singapore the week before, the way his team treated him over the last year was taking its toll and he was still reeling from being the most recent victim of the Monza curse. Concerned for his safety, you researched every FiA rule on inclement weather as if your own work would have any impact on the race itself. It meant nothing, but it made you feel like you had some semblance of control over the situation.

The feeling quickly dissipated when the race actually started and Carlos aquaplaned in the first few laps. It was incredulous that they were allowed to drive in these conditions. You weren’t religious, but there was nothing you could do but pray and hope that everyone just finished the race in one piece.

You didn’t care what the results were, all you knew was that Daniel and Lando were in the garage unharmed after the race. Professionalism was the furthest thing from your mind. Without thinking you ran over to them, first engulfing Daniel with the biggest bearhug you could muster, wrapping your arms around him like a tree trunk.

“I was so worried,” your words came out muffled as you buried your face into his chest. It took a minute for the taller driver to register what was happening, unfamiliar with the intimacy you had bestowed upon him.

He finally returned the embrace, his chin resting on top of your head. “It’s ok. I’m ok,” he whispered.

You finally pulled away. Your eyes locked for a brief moment that felt like eternity, before you turned your attention to Lando. You squeezed him as well, “I’m just so happy you’re both safe.”

Lando on the other hand was far from sentimental, and was less enthused with the contact. He hesitantly patted your back in an effort to get away from you, “Please, we’re not dead yet.”

You pulled away finally giving them space, but your tone was serious. “You’re not, but you could have been. You guys had zero visibility out there, it’s absurd that you were forced to race in those conditions. And the whole thing with the tractor out on the track under a yellow flag?? I’m going to write a strongly worded letter and file a complaint with the FiA and if they don’t listen I will burn them to the ground -”

“I hate to burst your bubble, but you don’t actually have any standing to do that,” Daniel pointed out. He was right, you weren’t a driver and you weren’t part of a team.

“I don’t care. I’ll write under a pseudonym. Or you guys can sign it. Or all of the drivers could sign it, like a union!” Daniel let you continue your scorched earth rantings. You had been so hot and cold since the two of you met, he could never tell if you actually liked him or if you simply tolerated him. At the very least it was now clear you cared for him.

Lando finally shut you up. “That’s nice and all but can we talk about this another time? I could use a drink right now.”

You still weren’t thrilled with the idea of karaoke, but you understood the need to take the edge off after the stressful day these guys had.

You woke up the next morning with a pounding headache, memories of the night before flooding back. As it turns out, Lando had the alcohol tolerance of a sixteen-year-old girl. He decided Whitney Houston’s “I Wanna Dance With Somebody” was his moment to shine only three drinks in. The stereotypes about lawyers were definitely true – you had been to enough open bar firm-sponsored events that you could hold your liquor and still felt sober at that point. But you were a good friend and couldn’t let him flounder up there by himself so you happily danced and provided backup vocals. After a few more sake bombs though you had caught up enough to think that the beautiful and ambitious 1991 classic, “Emotions” by Mariah Carey, was a good idea. As you previously warned, you did not hit a single note and the whistle tones were basically just you screaming which divulged into full belly laughter at your own vocal inabilities.

At the end of the night, you and Daniel had to practically carry Lando back to his hotel room. You exchanged amused looks during Lando’s slurred mumbles and drunk-girl-in-the-bathroom speech.

“You guys are just like, mybestfriends. Y’know? Yer just really great.” he drawled. Not being sober yourself, you indulged his nonsensical musings.

“No Lando, you’re really great,” you giggled. Daniel rolled his eyes out of both annoyance and amusement. Who would’ve thunk that Daniel Ricciardo would be the most sober of the bunch and had to be the voice of reason in this situation.

“That’s nice Lando but we have to get off the elevator. Can you two please pull it together just a little bit?”

“Ok dad.” You and Lando giggled again. Trying to herd the sheep, Daniel bit back his own laughter.

After you tucked Lando in, Daniel walked you back to your room and it was your turn for your drunken ramblings.

“Do you think Christian Horner and Ginger Spice make love to 2 Become 1?”

Daniel laughed. “I think you should ask him during your next meeting.”

You touched his shoulder. “Ohmygod I’m gonna ask him everything about Ginger Spice, you’re so smart Daniel.”

“Not as smart as you,” he chuckled. He went to move your hand from his shoulder, but you interpreted it as him trying to hold your hand. Sober You would have been mortified, but Drunk You went with it. So you happily held his hand as he walked you to your door. Drunk You didn’t notice the look of shock on the driver’s face at the gesture.

As you lay there in bed, you thought about how you should have been overwhelmed with embarrassment at your drunken shenanigans. You were a little. But you realized it was the most fun you’d had in a while, so instead you smiled and took some Advil.

#daniel ricciardo fanfic #daniel ricciardo x reader #daniel ricciardo imagine #daniel ricciardo #dr3 #dr3 x reader #f1 #f1 fanfic #formula one #formula one fanfiction #formula 1 #slow burn #suits #lawyered #honey badger #ginger spice #laws of attraction

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herejusttosufferalong · 3 months

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Alright, I know I’m a bit late to the conversation, but I can’t get over the Deuxmoi debacle. Seriously, what on earth is going on? How can anyone think the whole incident was a coincidence or believe the girlfriend was the one who arranged it? It's painfully obvious it was orchestrated. With so many people talking about it—PR anons, is there ANY chance A could have been the one to call the paps? I just don’t see how she’d have access to those resources.

Now, about Luke’s behavior during all this—it’s baffling. If you arranged this, at least try to act like you care about the girl. Walking ahead, refusing to properly hold her hand, come on. The picture that annoys me the most is the one where A is pointing at the car while Luke is in the background signing autographs. It reeks of attention-seeking. Where is his sister? Why is she acting like she’s the one the paps are there for, which technically they are, but still.

I’ve been thinking a lot about why Luke appeared so aloof with his girlfriend. Here’s my theory: have you ever made a decision and, when it comes time to execute it, something in the back of your mind tells you it’s not right? Like your body REFUSES to let you do it??? I think that’s what happened with Luke. He might’ve thought, "How romantic would it be to claim my girl on the premiere day of the show where I’m the lead?" I can see his girlfriend and friends encouraging him. Heck I can even see A and S picking out that dress she wore. I really fucking hope that wasn’t deliberate. Maybe he did this to distract from the debacle with A’s mom, but I also think he genuinely thought it was a good idea. But on the day, he froze. Almost like it hit him why this wasn't a good decision. He couldn’t bring himself to hold her hand. As frustrating as that was, it gave me hope that he knows deep down what his priorities should be and that he’ll work towards them.

Nic is really starting to annoy me. Don’t get me wrong, I still love her and Luke, but she’s getting on my nerves. Her friends say she’s too good for her own good. HARD FUCKING AGREE. Clearly, Luke and his girlfriend don’t care about any of this, so why is Nic even bothering to help? It seems like she’s done with it for now, at least. Luke won’t learn if Nic keeps stepping in. Let him deal with it and figure it out on his own.

And finally, about polaroidgate—Nic knows people are watching. I think she kept it at first without thinking, saw the traction it got in Australia, and decided to keep it longer. Every time people saw it, they went crazy, myself included. I’m not saying she kept the polaroid solely for PR reasons, but I do think she’s holding onto it until the buzz for season 3 dies down. Honestly, I don’t think she cares that much. One day, she’s just going to remove it while on set in her little fairy costume. Can’t wait for it! Sorry, I know this was a bit of a rant but had to get it off my chest.

Just wanted to give a shoutout for this blog. It's really cool to see a place where different perspectives are welcomed and encouraged. The way you keep things balanced makes the discussions way more interesting. Thanks for all the hard work you put in. You really help keep my delulu alive, really appreciate it!

Thank you for sharing your pov of events!

Sorry it took me so long to get to your message

#this is all opinion

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sshbpodcast · 25 days

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Character Spotlight: Seven of Nine

By Ames

While we definitely miss Kes, her replacement on Star Trek: Voyager definitely succeeds in filling her shoes and then some. Seven of Nine may have been introduced on the show as an obvious thirst trap to boost the show’s sex appeal, but she is so much more than that. The ex-Borg bombshell, with the acting chops of Jeri Ryan and some excellently written story arcs, grows into more than just the sum of her nanobots.

Get assimilated with your hosts from A Star to Steer Her By as we explore the many facets of Seven, whose journey to regain her humanity pairs so beautifully with the Voyager’s journey to make it back to the Alpha Quadrant. Scour through our astrometrics records below for our usual Best and Worst Moments lists and listen to our hivemind discussions over on this week’s podcast episode (jump to 1:32:36; featuring some bonus moments from guest star drone Carl!). Resistance is futile!

Best moments

Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor abyss of space After Seven has [reluctantly] joins the crew, one of the first thing she does is start helping out in the astrometrics lab, and in “Message in a Bottle,” she discovers the relay network that our heroes use to send the EMH over to the Dauntless and pass communication to and from Starfleet. It’s an early glimmer of hope after years of tooling around in the Delta Quadrant.

All by myself. Don’t wanna be all by myself anymore. We get an absolute showcase in acting from Jeri Ryan in the stunning “One,” in which she’s left to guide the ship through some nebula or other while the rest of the organic crew members wait in stasis. Seven’s battles with her own demons of isolation, loneliness, and self doubt play out as hallucinations, but she keeps it together enough to save the whole crew from nebula gas!

A single Borg among billions of individuals When home seems to be in reach because of a starship Arturis brings them to in “Hope and Fear,” Seven initially determines that she doesn’t want to go on this roadtrip because of how daunting she finds returning to Earth. Watching her deal with those feelings until she comes out the other side feels like a win, even if Arturis’s scheme turns out to be too good to be true.

The robot has been neutralized. May I leave now? This is just one of those little moments from the show, but I like it enough to include it. In “Night,” when Tom is trying to pass the time during months of monotony, he’s playing some Captain Proton with an unimpressed Seven, who simply deactivates Satan’s Robot with one of her patented “I am Borg”s and it’s just so charming and funny that I’ve got to hand it to her.

Are you my mother? By the time we hit “Drone,” Seven’s able to help her sort-of son One learn the merits of individuality weighed against the dangers that the Borg exemplify, no matter how tempting they may seem. Her taking this new breed of Borg under her wing shows just how far Seven has come in the season since her introduction, and her heartbreak at losing him is real and lovely.

Part of me not unlike your replicator. Not unlike the Doctor. Like Kes before her, Seven develops a rapport with the EMH that is built on trust and their outsider perspectives (oh, and horniness because the Doc can be a bit of a cretin sometimes). Seven fights for his rights in “Latent Image” when she urges Janeway not to blank his malfunctioning memory again – something you couldn’t do to one of the solid crewmen.

You and I wouldn’t be able to play Kadis-kot anymore Another great friendship we see Seven develop is with Naomi Wildman. The young Ktarian starts out terrified of the ex-Borg drone, but by “Bliss,” the two are teaming up to take on the bioplasmic organism, as the only two people on the ship not affected by its hallucinatory effects. They bond over how they don’t have anyone waiting for them on Earth, but they have each other!

Time is the fire in which Braxton burns You know I’ve got to give some love to one of my favorite time-travel stories! Seven really gets to shine in “Relativity,” jumping through time to prevent some sabotage to the Voyager and brilliantly uncovering Braxton’s madcap plan. She knowingly puts herself in danger with repeated trips through time because she knows the importance of this mind-boggling mission.

No really, are you my mother? If you liked Seven’s friendship with Naomi, you’re gonna love her relationship with the dronelings we meet in “Collective.” We meet the Borg children adrift on their vessel and threatening anyone who comes by like puffed-up stray kittens, but Seven tries to save them from themselves and takes in the four survivors (and the Borg baby!), acting like their foster mother.

Definitely in contention for worst parents in Trek While the SSHB team tends to prefer Mezoti because she’s the best, Seven takes a particular liking to Icheb. Like a mother honey badger, she protects him when she smells the danger that his parents pose to him in “Child’s Play.” She figures out their scheme to sacrifice their child and saves Icheb from getting reassimilated, even if it would help his terribly flawed people.

They’re tryna build a prison for you and me to live in By season seven, Seven’s come so far in her character development that she fights for the rights of Iko, the death-row prisoner in “Repentance.” She determines that he can be rehabilitated and given the chance he deserves because he feels true remorse. If Seven got the chance to regain her humanity after everything she did as a Borg, shouldn’t this guy too?

Their isolation may limit their potential, but if that isolation ends, so will a unique way of life This one may not be a particularly good episode, but it’s always nice to watch Seven learn a life lesson. Though she doesn’t initially understand why she should prevent the Ventu culture from getting corrupted by the Ledosians in “Natural Law,” Seven befriends the primitive people and comes to understand the value of allowing them to develop on their own terms.

—

Worst moments

Scorpions are not to be trusted Speaking of things Seven does as a Borg, when we first meet her in “Scorpion,” Chakotay is reluctant to trust this scorpion in Borg’s clothing, who is certainly going to betray the agreement she made with Janeway. And whaddaya know, Seven immediately betrays the agreement she made with Janeway! Just like the scorpion in that parable that Chakotay totally lifted.

Nevertheless, I am willing to explore my humanity. Take off your clothes. Once Seven gets deborgified, it becomes clear that she’s first and foremost here for her sex appeal. And the show is going to remind you of that. A lot. No one is more aware of that at first than Harry Kim, especially in “Revulsion” when Seven just offers to sleep with him to lessen the tension, having no idea how inappropriate that is. How else are we to notice she’s hot???

Quoth the raven: We are Borg Like Data in “Brothers,” Seven feels compelled by some unnatural force to take over a ship and fly towards her homing beacon in “The Raven.” Unlike Data, she’s not just programmed by some Soong or other, but instead is hallucinating all over the place and would like to be reassimilated by the Collective. She even holds Tuvok hostage until she learns the corvid truth.

Jenny, I got your number: Species 847-2309 A big speed bump to Seven’s reintegration comes in “Prey” when the Hirogen are demanding the crew hand over an injured being from Species 8472. Janeway tries to teach her the value of compassion for a helpless creature, but Seven loses any trust that’s she has built up by deciding on her own to issue them a death sentence and beam them over to the Hirogen vessel to be murdered.

Sometimes your words just hypnotize me While we’ve already thoroughly put most of the blame for this one on the EMH’s shoulders, Seven isn’t entirely innocent when it comes to the episode “Retrospect.” She’s quick to believe his quack psychiatry and accuses Kovin of violating her just because the Doctor tells her to. If anyone was going to view the facts first, even under duress, it should have been Seven.

From Alpha to Omega The Borg strives for perfection, so Seven gets super into the Omega particle in “The Omega Directive” so much so that it becomes an infatuation. She stops considering reason and the danger of the situation that this highly unstable particle poses, which seems entirely unlike Seven most of the time. Like, it’s a cool particle, but don’t get everyone killed just to look at it, lady.

This is a starship, not a nature preserve After living among the crew for close to two seasons, you’d think Seven would have a slightly better handle on tact by the time we get to “Someone to Watch Over Me,” but apparently she’s just as inappropriate as ever just so the writers can make a joke. Frankly, watching her study Tom and B’Elanna’s mating habits makes me roll my eyes at the inanity.

We will add your biological and technological distinctiveness to our own Oh, and we can’t forget all the assimilating that Seven did as a Borg, even if it’s hard to blame her as a person for it. But she sure does, so we’ll take that pass and run with it. We have a perfect example of it in the flashback story in “Survival Instinct” when she forces the little mini collective who’ve been showing signs of individuality to assimilate, ruining their very lives.

It’ll be like a simple night's sleep I can’t help but harp on this moment in “Dragon’s Teeth” when Seven opens up all the crypods and releases the Vaad’waur from stasis… for absolutely no reason. Scratch that: the reason was to move the plot forward. But really. Seven of all people should know better than to release swarms of randos without investigating the circumstances first. They could be assholes!

The caretaker array is turning the frogs gay! Okay, while I’d admit that this one might inadvertently (or maybe advertently?) be the funniest episode of Voyager, you’ve got to admit that Seven downloading all the logs into her Borg brain in “The Voyager Conspiracy” is hare-brained. Like when the Doc turns himself into Mr. Hyde in “Darkling,” Seven tampers with her mind and ends up turning into a conspiracy nutjob.

Fun will now commence On the flipside, some of the moments that are meant to be comedic fall flat in “Ashes to Ashes” when Seven teaches the dronelings a basic educational curriculum. She has no idea what she’s doing in providing the basic education of the kiddos… and it’s not her job! It’s clear the writers have only stuffed her in these circumstances for some chuckles, but I see through it!

We aren’t far from the boner of your people While I’ll be the first to stand up for the Chakotay-Seven relationship (rushed though it was), any time there’s weird romantic and/or sexual bullshit in the holodeck, I admit the red flags go up. So when Seven makes herself a holo-Chakotay in “Human Error,” that’s a no no. We’ve chewed out La Forge and Janeway for this before, and just wait until our surprise spotlight next week!

—

Turns out resistance wasn’t futile! We’ve just got one more bonus Voyager character spotlight before our Enterprise series wrap – and it’s a doozy! So make sure you’ve got this holoprogram running, follow the page for future spotlights and blogtivities, celebrate with us as we get through the rest of Enterprise on SoundCloud or wherever you podcast, chat with our hivemind over on Facebook and Twitter, and we are Borg!

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qwuilty · 1 year

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How Postal 1 is a playable Tragedy and how Postal 2 followed with a Comedy after it. - A semi formal essay about the narrative and story beats of the beginning of Postal

That's right! This was not an april fool's joke! The only april fool here is me! It's an idea ive been brewing on for a while and it's probably very rambly, but such is life, i hope you enjoy it regardless <3

Before I begin this essay, I would like to clarify a few things.

One, I want to address right away that while I do try to be critical and non-biased on these sorts of discussions, due to my own personal attachments to specifically Postal 1 Dude, I don't think I will ever be able to make a fully unbiased view of him. Again, I will try my best to, but I hope pointing it out here will make it so you can decide if that’s something you’re okay with.

Secondly, while i will try to reign myself back a little and not just spew words at you here, i do tend to ramble a little and have trouble connecting points to other points, so if i do please forgive me there. This is meant to be a semi-formal essay, but still I am not a professional writer. Additionally, while i do this analysis of this series, i do not think it is what the creators intended, please do not take this as full canon and all. This is simply for fun and to recollect on the first two games of the series.

I hope you will understand, and with those disclaimers out of the way, we can begin with the essay.

We begin this essay with Postal (Which I will be calling Postal 1 for the sake of clarity, by the way), a PC-Rom game released in 1997 by the company Running With Scissors, originally published by Take Two Interactive before publishing moved over to Ripcord Interactive. The game was marketed to be intentionally provoking and intense. One example is through fictional interview quotes talking about how he seemed to be fine before the events of the game with a simple question below.

What went wrong?

With little more than that, a picture of an M-16, an invitation to find out at their website below, and a short talk about how to get the demo, it leaves a striking impression on the viewer and a burning curiosity to find out what did go wrong. Other advertisements for the game are similar in nature, being very eye-catching and intense to draw in the reader to want to see more.

Described by the studio as “The game every gamer wanted and no one else dared to make”, it’s very clear their intention was to bring you in with its more intense subject matter as this game that dared to go where no game had before, to either acclaim or great critical disgust. It is described by the promotional material as a psychological thriller, preparing the incoming viewer for the expectation this game would be intense.

From the advertisements though you can already get the idea there may be something else to this game, introducing Paradise as a town where everyone is out to get you (or are they?), and that whether it is Conspiracy or Insanity, you have no time to question, only to act. This narrative carries over to the game itself, as there is no formal introduction to a story given to the player unless they actively decide to read the manual included in the game’s case (or chose a higher difficulty in the remake, Postal Redux), you are more an outsider to what happens after you press play guiding the Dude through this hell.

However, I think to truly enjoy Postal 1, it is important to consider the journals themselves to get the inner perspective of your player character. Those who do not choose to may take the game at a more surface level with the “dark” cutscene texts and gorey gameplay then simply leave it behind, but the hidden story adds a whole extra level of depth and truly establishes Postal 1 as a tragedy.

To explain where I am coming from at that point, I would like to establish what makes a tragedy, specifically with Postal 1 being a Domestic Tragedy. (A tragedy in which the characters are middle-class or working-class people instead of nobility or rich people)

Aristotle’s tragic plot structure starts at the beginning, goes through action, leads to the realization of error, then goes through the falling action and emotional impact of it, eventually releasing the emotions of pity and fear through to the catharsis as the story ends and fear is removed.

While the game does not give much of an actual explanation of what happened in the Dude’s life before the events on October 17th, 1997 even in the diary entries that show his viewpoint, it’s easy to infer there was a rise even before then that he was not doing well mentally. He describes a rising paranoia, belief that the people there are sick, how “I hear gunshots, screams after dark. Now the phone calls, sayin’ i’m being thrown outta this house. My house.”, constantly arming himself with a sidearm and kevlar vest preparing for the incoming perceived impact that he ultimately makes reality.

From there we have our beginning, the game’s levels acting as the actions through the story that lead him on this journey through Arizona. Though initially he tries to find help and contact a sheriff, because he is seemingly so far gone, those efforts are in vain and his belief that everyone else is infected is reinforced. It separates him further from the people around him, believing that he is the only one who can save them from this sickness and that though the journey is bloody, it is for the good of mankind.

It’s likely at the beginning he intends to save them, but after a while, comes to the conclusion that the area is simply beyond saving, and that he needs to leave a scorched earth behind so he can warn those outside. His condition worsens the further the player goes, covered in blood, bullet wounds, body aching but unable to stop until he sees this desired resolution. As quoted from The Industrial Complex journal, “Too far to quit now. Whatever waits at the Base, I’m going to see it with my own eyes.” and from the Air Force Base as he tries to resolve himself to finish what he set out on, “Me or them. Can’t delay, can’t risk infection.”

Notably in the game’s manual there was no journal given for the ending cutscene in the original game, though I think the one for Redux is also fitting. “I’ve been here before. I know it. But… Something’s changed. Will they understand me? Forgive me? Is this where I find salvation?” One of the main things you’ll probably hear about relating to the differences of Postal 1 and Redux is the ending being changed.

In Postal 1, the game ends with the Dude making his way to an elementary school in a haze, the player no longer in control as he desperately tries to take aim at them, but nothing he does seems to affect them. Considering unfortunate tragedies in real life, this ending was changed for Redux, where instead the Dude walks up to the end of a church, watching as a coffin is lowered into the ground either alone on Easy to Medium or with two mourners on Hard to Nightmare, and the hostile count goes down from one to none as soon as it’s in the ground.

Either way, it ends with the Dude collapsing down to the floor, and the game finally ends with pictures of Dude in a hellish confinement and a voice speaking over top. The final speech talks about the stress of modern life before further mentioning how he had perceived himself as a hero against impossible odds, but in reality will now only ever be seen as a mad man who hurt hundreds, if not thousands of lives.

Some may say this ending is an anti-climax or a bad reward for the game, but i think through the lens of a tragedy, it is a perfect ending. Our ‘hero” through the entire game has kept himself standing because he thought he was doing the right thing, that his actions were horrible, but it would be justified by the good he was doing. He does not want them to writhe and suffer, the journey is a horrific nightmare, and there is no sense of pride or that he’s finally getting some kind of vengeance on those who wronged him. But he persists, he moves onwards because he so desperately wants to end this and stop the madness, one that only he sees as reality.

That is where we get the action, right after the Air Base is the Recognition, the point of realization that it was all for naught. In Postal 1, it’s likely this comes at the moment he realizes that he’s not doing anything to them, and unable to simply destroy this ‘threat’, he is forced to stop and think if he’s even been going against any threats at all. How far has he gone to the point he was going to harm innocent children? How many more innocents has he harmed? With Redux that realization is more up to interpretation, whether the casket is where he’s in after he dies and realizes that there’s no recognition of him after his death, or if it’s the last hostile he has to kill, only to realize even with them dead, the world around him has not gotten any better, only worse because of his actions.

The pity and fear comes from the moment inside the cutscenes, and from there the "catharsis", when he is ultimately institutionalized with no seen trial, no fanfare, and is given an analytical view from an off-screen doctor before the game ultimately ends. And again, I think for the game that Postal 1 is, it’s the perfect ending. Because truthfully, was there ever going to be any good ending for him after his collapse? The player either knows or discovers along with him that his journey was for nothing, he killed countless people including potentially civilians who had just happened to get caught in the crossfire, and the grand threat he fought against did not even exist. There are no heroes, there is no triumph, it was all for nothing, and now he is confined to a cell as several hundreds of families have to cope with the loss.

With all of this, I think Postal 1 Dude (and subsequently Postal Redux Dude) is a great tragic “hero” figure, as deep down he wants to do good for the world. If you take the advertisement interviews and hints from others as a sort of semi-canon, it’s implied he was doing good, he was kind to others and liked well enough, but likely due to an untreated and ignored illness began to fall in on himself into a paranoia so deep he could never crawl out. I hear a lot of the notion that he “snaps out of nowhere”, and that he’s just “crazy”, but I think that’s a gross oversimplification of his character.

Even in the moment of it all, he initially tried to go to a higher authority for help but found himself all alone to try and stop this ‘sickness’. His journey is his own personal burden, taken to try and stop anyone from being hurt, at the cost of his health and potentially his own life. But it’s also important to not just consider his intent, but the action caused afterwards.

Because while he did mean to save others, he still hurt hundreds of people. There are hundreds of families who will never see their partners, their siblings, their children, their friends, all because of one overzealous man who decided he was going to be humanity’s savior. Perhaps it is not just conspiracy or insanity, but instead the poor judgement of a man who truly believes he is doing right being guided along by an outside force who makes him see it through to the end.

In Postal 1, you are the audience to a grand scale tragedy, bringing a man on a journey through hell to a shallow grave where no one is saved, no one is cured, leaving you back on the title screen to think about what you’ve done to him and the people of Paradise.

In Postal 2 you can smoke crack and piss on people.

Okay, sorry for the whiplash, but I had to transition somehow.

After the release of Postal 1 and subsequent expansions, there was obviously a backlash as well as critical acclaim. The game was banned in several countries, Running With Scissors was personally given a letter by the USPS about the name, and it was pulled off the shelves of several stores. Many books about video game violence and newspapers talked about the game and admittedly got quite a lot about it wrong, like believing the Dude was an ex-postal service worker despite the game never saying so, that there was some sort of score based system for “killing as many innocent victims as possible while they begged for mercy” (Stop Teaching Our Kids To Kill, Lt. Col. Dave Grossman and Gloria DeGaetano, Chapter Two, 1990s: Video Game Violence Increases.), not to mention how many were quick to try and pull a connection between it and horrific tragedies in real life.

(Quick unprofessional note, the amount of times i saw this one damn quote about a specific killer killing himself “JUST LIKE HOW YOU END LEVELS IN POSTAL!1!” despite that NOT being how you end levels in postal or even the game makes my head physically hurt.)

With this reception of Postal 1, it does make sense for Running With Scissors to decide to take a change of focus when they began work on Postal 2 after the cancellation of their next game, Flesh and Wire. While Postal 1 was more intense in tone and serious, Postal 2 was set to be much more parody focused and had a drastic shift in the appearance of the main character.

While Postal 1 Dude in the concept art and promotional image notably looked disheveled and scared, Postal 2 Dude felt more laid back, engaged in the chaos around him and able to dish it back just as hard. There’s a very noticeable shift even before the game came out, from a man huddled in the corner with a rifle or seemingly startled holding an M-16 (note, i'm pretty sure it is? I am not a gun person, sorry </3) to a man standing with his body facing the player, brandishing his rifle as chaos ensues behind him.

The town of Paradise goes through a similarly drastic change, from a somewhat toned down and realistic feeling environment made of cool and dark colors to a much more exaggerated parody of a small town in Arizona full of bright, warm colors. The game begins with a sweeping view of the town, passing by a road sign warning to “watch for psycho assholes”, a drunk man dancing in the streets as a cat falls asleep, a man is beat by a police officer, and the player can already see several satirical billboards on their way to Dude’s trailer.

The introduction to him is also drastically different, now speaking directly as he wakes up in his obviously run down trailer and gets into an argument with his wife about moving to Arizona to pay for his crack habit, the AC being broken (which he obviously doesn't make better by shooting at it), about chores until he makes his way out of the trailer and kicks away Champ, his car not working, and the Bitch reminding him to get her rocky road. This immediately sets up Dude in this game being much more cynical and snarky, someone who’s been chewed up and spit up by life, and now is dealing with a pretty rough morning.

The game itself follows a pretty similar tone, gone are the unsettling journals, the morality of it all, in this remodel of the series the game has effectively gone from Tragedy to Comedy. More specifically, I think Postal 2 falls under a Farce, which according to the Wordsmyth dictionary, is “a comedy that depends for its humor on quick and surprising turns of events and on exaggerated characters and situations, or the type of humor characteristic of such a play.”, which I feel is very fitting. Running With Scissors put more emphasis on physical comedy, slapstick yet still grotesque violence, bodily function humor, and of course, a lot of satire and parody of life at the time.

The game itself plays as if it were a comedy, each day functioning as a new act as the chores act as the separate jokes, returning jokes such as the Dude’s relationship with his wife and introducing new ones such as the incredibly zealous anti-book protestors burning down a library on Tuesday or the cannibalistic butchers of Thursday. The main sources of these jokes in the game come from two factors, that being the world around Postal Dude is insane and absurd but he still has to make it through each day somehow, and an extreme form of Murphy’s Law, in which anything that could go wrong will, and at the worst possible time.

The ability to make it through these insane events in one piece is what mainly separates Postal 2 Dude from Postal 1 Dude, as while Postal 1 Dude holds onto his sense of justice and morality in the horror he saw and ultimately ended up hurting himself and those around him, Postal 2 Dude is adaptable, able to keep his head above water and make it home despite it all. The game’s increase in the story’s conflict as each hate group begins to target Dude is still joking in nature, just another group of people who hate him and try to kill him on sight, but you’ve got errands to do so you just gotta deal with it.

The ultimate climax of this increasing rise of stakes leads to the final event of Friday, quite literally a full blown apocalypse (complete with a nod to Postal 1 on the newspaper about mind altering gasses and the military being involved) where cats and dogs rain from the sky and everyone and anyone is trying to kill each other, especially you.

It’s the final big obstacle as you book it back home, this massive hysteria that serves as the big crazy finale until you finally make it home and things shift back to a mundane that now becomes comedic in its own right. Dude returns home, having made it through figurative hell only to be reminded of a joke that comes full circle from the start, the fact he forgot the Rocky Road. The final joke ends with a loud gunshot, implying that while he could make it through all he’s been through that week, having to be there even a moment more made him decide he’d rather spend the night in a hospital or a grave.

In conclusion, the drastic difference between Postal 1 and Postal 2 is incredibly fascinating to me, especially through the lens of them as a traditional Tragedy and Comedy in video game format. While the series has leaned much more to comedy after the release of 2 and Redux did not do as well financially, i think it’s still interesting to look back at the beginning of the series and their adaptation of it later on to see how the Dude began.

From a desperate and hopeful but ultimately misguided self imposed martyr of humanity who was going to drag along as many as he needed to “save” those outside to a cynical and sarcastic man living in a trailer home making it through each progressively more crazy day to make it home and start a new day after that, you can fully feel the shift in tone from the soundtrack to the design to the gameplay of the games itself.

I do think it was probably for the best that Postal had turned more comedic as time went on, it seems to be more where Running With Scissors are able to fit their writing, however i still look back at Postal 1 very fondly and hope to see more of those tragedy elements come back for a bit in the jokes. It’s a compelling narrative and even if they say it has no story, i’ll always think the story it DOES have is very underrated.

Here’s to hoping for that Postal 4 weekend expansion?

#postal dude #postal 1 #postal 2 #character analysis #i included some drawings inbetween to break it up a little so its not all just words #i hope p2 looks okay i dont draw him as much as i do p1-#again i hope you all enjoy this ive been thinking about it very much #Postal 1 you may have no story according to others but you have all the story according to me <3

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