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thefanficmonster · 4 years ago

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And My Heart Burned In That Lodge

Michael (Mike) Munroe x Reader (female)

Warnings: Death, Grief, Dealing with loss, Heartbreak, Swearing

Genre: ANGST

Summary: None of them will ever be the same, who knows if they’ll even heal. However, the case is different for Mike. He’s left to be dealing with the guilt, grief and the haunting memory of his friend’s death. He’s angry with himself for all the wrong things he did and all the right things he was too much of a coward to do. Now, his only closure is talking to a gravestone, hoping the wind in the graveyard will pass the message onto the person who the words are meant for.

Requested by Anon. Wish I could tag them, they have such amazing ideas ❤

PS - Sorry this is hella long, I got carried away LOL

I stand aside, watching as my friends place their flowers on her grave. I can hear their cries. For some odd reason I can’t find it in me to feel sympathy or the need to go over there and be with them. I can’t see how that would do anything but make me feel more miserable. Standing here, seeing this scene unfold in front of me, I can’t help but be reminded of how it all started.

Fuck Mondays, man. Fuck them from the bottom of my heart. Even worse, this is the first week of school after winter break so no one wants to be here. Even even worse, this is the first time I’ll be seeing Emily after out breakup. We broke up over text and while I’m aware that’s the worst way to break up with someone, I must admit it was the only way for a lot of arguing and awkwardness to be avoided.

It’s the first time I’m coming to school alone in a while. Without Emily, the car was pleasantly quiet aside from the songs on the radio. Not gonna lie, it felt a bit lonely. Being single for the first time in what feels like forever is both liberating and oddly melancholic. I try to push the self-loathing and the depressing thoughts away as my eyes scan the hallway, looking for the group of familiar faces. My gang. We used to be ten people but we lost two girls during our winter getaway at the Washington lodge. Josh’s sisters, Hannah and Beth, went missing and are presumably dead, all cause of a stupid prank Jess, Emily and I concocted, convincing Matt and Ash to go along with it. In retrospect, I don’t know what we were thinking.

‘Seriously, Mike? From one depressing thought to another? Is your brain lacking serotonin today more than usual or what?‘ I mentally scold myself just as I spot two familiar faces - Sam and Ashley.

It doesn’t take long for me to notice the rest of the gang - Matt, Jess and Chris - all standing near by, surrounding a girl I have never seen before. She sticks out immediately with her long H/C hair and shiny E/C eyes. Jess has her arm linked with the girl, a gesture really out of place for Jess. I mean, her and Emily are pretty close and I’ve never even seen them hug.

“Hey, man. How are you?“ Matt notices me first, lifting his head and smiling at me. His greeting leads the others to look in my direction as well, including the girl. I catch Jess lean down in and whisper something to her. I can’t hear what she’s saying but it clearly aggravates her. I have never received a dirtier look from a girl in my entire life. I usually have the opposite effect on women but I guess there’s a first time for everything.

“Mike...” Jess steps away from the girl and towards me, “this is my best friend, Y/N. She just got transferred here.” She turns her attention back to the girl, “Y/N, this is Mike.”

Y/N looks unamused as she outstretches her arm in my direction. “Nice to meet you” is what she says, but her expression clearly tells me she would like to see as little of me as possible. At least she’s polite, right?

“Likewise.” The handshake is brief and, despite her obvious distaste for me, she still gives me a firm handshake.

“Wait, you were transferred? I thought Jess said you came here cause you moved.” Sam furrows her brows in confusion.

“Well, it’s really a chicken and the egg type of situation.” Y/N laughs, rubbing the back of her neck almost nervously, “We moved because I had to transfer.” Yikes.“ Ashley comments, “Not to pry or anything, but why did you have to be transferred?“

Y/N looks me dead in the eyes, as if she’s sending me a message that I better not overlook, or so help me God I’ll be dead. ”Noses randomly broke when I was around.”

It hurts so much to look back on those times and not pick up on what I was feeling. I foolishly decided that if I can’t give the feelings a name or find them a purpose I should turn a blind eye. I wasn’t that ignorant, I could tell she was the cause, but I could never admit it.

And then there’s the situation with Jess...

“You hurt her, and I’ll kill you.“

I found Y/N by the bleachers and let me tell you, she’s quite the paradox. She’s a straight A, no nonsense, intelligent beyond her years girl. With all these characteristics, you’d think she’d know better than to smoke cigarettes. Wrong! She’s a smoker. Jess can never not complain about the smell of cigarette smoke, it’s a miracle these two get along.

To my ‘hi’ she responded with what looked to be an eyeroll and an annoyed release of smoke through her nostrils. Even though I know I’m not welcome to be in her proximity, I still decide to sit down a little ways away from her, for personal space and all that. Definitely not cause I’m slightly afraid of her. No way.

We just sit in silence until she hits me with the aforementioned threat. I am caught off guard. All I can do is stare straight ahead of me like a deer in headlights. After maybe thirty seconds of absolute confusion I manage to turn my head to look at her. “What are you talking about?” The question is supposed to sound harsh but compared to the way she spit out that death threat it sounded more like a whimper.

“You are such an ignorant asshole.“ She shakes her head, throwing her cigarette on the bench below her. She stomps on it and walks away. I can’t help but stare at her until she’s out of sight. I feel like I’m watching something non-human. A phenomenon you can experience once in a lifetime - if you’re lucky.

She’s the complete opposite of Jess: grounded, smart, rational. The only time I’ve seen her be so unpleasant is around me. I catch her interactions with the rest of the gang. From afar, she seems like the nicest, friendliest girl. And then she catches a glimpse of me and her mood changes. I don’t know what’s her problem with me but I know it most certainly isn’t something I’ve done to her. She’s been like that since the first moment we were introduced, so either Jess has talked a lot of shit about me or she just hates people named Michael. I may never know.

I had no idea what she meant at the time and only found out three weeks ago. Speaking of three weeks ago, the group once again headed for the Blackwood Pines, trying to hide their uneasiness with make excitement. I was pretty hyped when I heard we were going because that also meant our friend Josh was finally starting to get better. He hadn’t been in a good mindset since his sisters went missing and we were all really worried for him but weren’t allowed to show it because he always insisted he was fine.

He wasn’t. He was as messed up as ever and served as only the prologue to the nightmare of a night we had to live through.

But before all that could happen, the night started off well. Better than expected. The eeriness of the mountain combined with the bad memories we had of the place we still there, we could all feel the tension, but we did a good job masking it with jokes and whatnot. I’ll be honest, I wasn’t really looking forward to go and not only because of what happened the year prior.

“Wait, wait, wait. Y/N’s coming too?“ I ask, looking at Josh with wide eyes.

The guy is clearly confused by my overdramatic reaction to him counting down the names of the ones who had already RSVPd ‘Yes’. “Is that a problem or something?”

I sigh, hiding my face in my hands. It’s embarrassing to admit, really. “She doesn’t like me, and that puts it mildly. She hates me.”

He looks even more baffled than before, “Why? What’d you do to her?”

“Nothing, for fuck’s sake. Not a single thing. I haven’t even had a proper interaction with her.“ Talking about this matter exhausts me, mostly cause I can’t even express half the things I’m feeling.

There’s been a time or two I’ve caught her looking at me but her eyes weren’t filled with that distrust I’m used to. She looks away quickly when we make eye contact, as if she can’t put the mean mask on in time and she has to look away to do a system reset. I sometimes catch myself looking at her without realizing. I try to tell myself I do it for the purpose of solving her.

‘Who are you kidding, Munroe?‘

* * *

And here I am, climbing up the mountain to the Washington lodge. I’ve made it a goal to use this getaway to mend things with Y/N. It’s the only way for me to get back to normal. To get my mind back since she’s recently been living in my head rent-free. I’m bullshitting, not just recently. She’s taken over my brain since day one. I can’t place what’s going on with me, I can’t find a term to label it with and I most definitely can’t find a way to stop it. So, I’ve come to the conclusion that if I can’t stop it on my own, she’ll have to do it for me.

Another thing - I’ve never felt nervous or self-conscious around a girl all my life. Never. My friends joke that I’m a ladies’ man and I’d say that’s pretty true. So I have a tough time understanding how I turn into an awkward turtle that’s missing confidence when she’s around.

Once we all get settled in and there’s a fire going, giving the lodge a cozy atmosphere, it’s every man for themselves. Everyone picks a activity they want to occupy themselves with and the living room of the lodge empties out, leaving me there alone.

I scroll stare at the screen of my now useless phone. The thing has no reception and no way of keeping me busy, leaving my attention to wander to the voices that are getting more and more distant as my friends walk out of the room.

I can’t help but overhear Jess say to Y/N, “You haven’t even set your bag down yet and you’re going for a smoke? Jeez, Y/N.”

“You say as though you don’t know me.“ Y/N laughs, the sound of a door opening following after her voice.

It’s such a nice sound, her laugh. I’ve never heard it before. I’ve seen her smile and seen her chuckle at someone’s joke, but it was never actually a laugh. Seems she keeps those for special occasions.

If she’s in the type of mood to laugh, she’s in the type of mood to be civil with me. Before I can talk myself out of the on-spot decision, I mentally slap myself and get off the couch, walking to the door to the side deck.

“You’ve got this, she’s just a person”

“Who’s just a person?“ her voice cuts through the silence of the outdoors.

‘SHIT I SAID THAT OUT LOUD‘

I decide to carry this all the way, no shortcuts. No backing out. Somehow, now that she’s standing in front of me - a cigarette between her fingers, her shoulders tense from of the cold - I find it easier to get the words out. She’s just as human as everyone else. The cold causes her to shrivel up. She’s addicted to tobacco. She’s not some riddle I need to solve, just a person I need to talk to in order to understand.

“You.“ I reply, “Why aren’t you wearing a jacket?“

She shakes her head, her shoulders trembling a bit, “It builds the immune system.”

“No, it makes you suffer.“ I shrug my jacket off, cautiously approaching her and wrapping it around her.

Surprisingly, she accepts it with a nod and a murmured ‘thanks’, holding onto it with the hand that’s not holding her cigarette. “Why were you reminding yourself that I’m just a person? Do I not look like one?” She scoffs, facing away from me to look at the snowy hills ahead.

“No, no, not that. You just make me nervous that’s all.“

She whirls around, giving me this look as though she has no idea what I’m talking about.

“Really? Why’s that?“ she puts out her cigarette on the wooden railing, focusing all her attention on me.

My hand instinctively goes up to the back of my neck, feeling my face start to heat up. “Well, you’re not really fond of me. And I don’t know why, and....” I trail off, sighing in self-disappointment, “And I wanna know why.”

Her expression turns the complete opposite, a smile spreading across her face. “It’s not about something you have done. It’s about what you might’ve done.”

Despite feeling slightly relieved, I am no less confused than I was a minute ago. “And what is that?”

“Break my best friend’s heart.“ She looks a lot more serious now, “You really had no idea she was head over heels for you just a month ago. You were so oblivious and she was so whipped...“ frustration radiates off of her, “I just didn’t want her to get hurt.“ She closes her eyes, stabilizing herself before finishing her statement, “I didn’t want to hurt her.“

“Wait, what?“

The hurt that paints itself on her face is contagious. I feel it too and I don’t even know what’s causing it. “She always told me about you. Mike this and Mike that. She made you sound like the best guy in the world. And...I really wanted to be let down when I met you, but you were nothing but nice to me and to the other people in the group. But you were also such a jerk from time to time. You are just too...Fucking forget it.”

In a blink of an eye she puts my jacket over the railing and runs inside the lodge.

“Y/N, wait!“

Needless to say, running after her was the best decision I’ve made. I didn’t get her to admit to anything, but at least we lied down the armor and agreed to give each other some time to get to know one another. Drop aside the assumptions and give a this acquaintanceship the chance to become a friendship.

Sadly, all good things come to an end way sooner than we want. The rest of that dreadful night I witnessed her transform. When everyone was freaking out, she held them and comforted them. I saw the fear in her eyes but she never let it shine through in her actions. She was the one still holding it together even after she saw that disgusting creature. Her and I were the ones to turn that sanatorium upside down. We were with Josh in the mines. We were the ones to see the Wendigo first. We were by each other’s side the entire time. We had each other’s backs.

I’ve never felt such a connection with someone. I was experiencing the most intimate understanding with a person in the worst moment of my life. It was bittersweet. The poison mixed with the cure.

Even when she knew her death was approaching, her only reaction was a single tear. A single crystal drop running down her cheek.

We can make a break. We can run right out of this hell hole and turn it to ash, all we need is for this fucking to focus its attention elsewhere. Thankfully Chris, Ash and Emily have made it out already and they’re safe. However, Sam, Y/N and I are trapped. The silent looks we exchange are laced with fear and panic. We have to calculate our next moves down to a millisecond and we don’t even know what those next moves should be.

Suddenly, a sharp pain starts spreading from my hand shoulder. My adrenaline is no longer doing a good job blocking out the pain of the fingers I had to sever. I slip up, letting out a hiss. The pain is just that unbearable.

That thing turn at the speed of light, letting out a screech and heading in my direction. My whole body is tense I couldn’t move if I wanted to but my arm is in such a horribly painful position, I think I’ll faint if I don’t readjust it.

“HEY!“ The voice comes from opposite me and my heart drops.

Sam’s next to me. It’s not her. It’s Y/N.

The Wendigo loses interest in me as soon as it hears her yell turning and heading straight for her. It all starts sinking in. Now that it’s facing away, Sam and I can make it out. But she can’t. It’s over for her. There’s no way she’s leaving this lodge.

I catch her eyes from across the room. Her posture says a fighter, but her eyes scream ‘petrified’. She knows it too. She knows it’s game over. A single tear rolls down her cheek, shattering my heart.

That’s the last vulnerable moment, however. She turns her head, deciding to go out without showing a glint of fear to that piece of shit. I don’t have to look at Sam or tell her what to do. We’re both aware that we’re about to make it out, losing Y/N in the process.

It happens in a split second. Y/N spits at the Wendigo and then next thing I see is her laying on the ground in a pool of blood.

The dash out of the lodge is a blur. The last thing I remember is sitting outside of the burning building, staring at the flames. The lodge wasn’t the only thing burning. Years of memories; history; wendigos; and my heart burnt in that lodge.

I see the group leave the graveyard. I struggle to move forward, my limbs heavy. I feel gravity is a lot stronger all of a sudden.

I didn’t go to the final goodbye. I knew it wasn’t her. There was nothing left of her to bury. Sam told me they buried things that reminded people of her and objects she cherished.

Well it’s time I give my goodbye.

I shrug my jacket off - the same jacket from that night - and put it around the gravestone like I put it over her shoulders. There’s a box of the cigarettes she smoked in the inner pocket.

“I hope you felt what I felt, Y/N. I hope I didn’t have to say it for you to notice it. I wish I knew...cause now it’ll haunt me for the rest of my life.” I can’t stop the tears, I’m too weak and I’ve been holding them back for far too long. “I’ve never believed in an afterlife. But I really hope there is one, just so we can meet again.” I scoff, shaking my head, “Who am I kidding, I’m probably going to hell.”

I believe that’s where I deserve to go, anyway. I’m the reason she died. And I will never let myself live that down. I will never forgive myself. A flame like no other burnt out so mine could keep burning. I will make sure it haunts me till the day I leave this world behind.

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unpitch · 4 years ago

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@errorware i can’t stop thinkin abt this which means you get a starter

the time between seasons stretches on for eons. sharp change from the usual blink-and-you-miss-it siestas — this shit’s practically eternal, two years and still going. coffee cup’s announced, but that’s only gonna be a few days a year. other three hundred sixty whatever days are still empty-empty-empty, and jaylen’s alive, really and truly, and has nothing left to fight for.

she doesn’t really remember how to not fight. it’s been six years since she came back, now. longer back than she was dead. it’s been three years since the hall stars fought and killed a god and saved the league — so they say. (new boss, same as the old boss. coin hasn’t spoken up in a while, but jaylen has a thrumming paranoia under her skin. the shares of her debt were sold to someone. she has a bad feeling, and her bad feeling has a bad feeling, and she’s an endless sea of wrongness that’s only partially the fault of necromancy.) no games, just free time, and jaylen doesn’t know what to do with it all. her hands are empty without a ball in them. they curl into fists but it’s not enough.

so she ends up at elliot’s place. long way from san francisco, but being there for three years doesn’t mean it feels like a home; the only place that does is seattle, and half the garages still hate her — or worse, pity her, look at her like it’s such a shame she’s here instead of the happy-go-lucky jaylen she’d been when she was alive the first time, like if they just said the right thing she’d be back to normal. (what the fuck is normal anymore?)

she’s been thinking about baltimore. she’s been thinking about the hall stars fight. thinking about how every time she forced herself to shift back between teams, swapping with that shelled pitcher guy from the crabs, it was death all over again. to be on a team of ghosts, one must be something less than alive. (common sense. still. everyone looked at her like she was being overdramatic when she collapsed on the mound the moment the game was over.)

the newspapers afterwards hailed her as the twice-dead jaylen, but she thinks it must be more than that.

and elliot knows the behind-the-scenes shit. elliot’s easier to talk to than most, for her. doesn’t judge or pity her for the things she’s done to stay alive. doesn’t really get the experience of being a blaseball player, either, but sometimes that’s better — she hangs out with mike and the elephant in the room is always whether the next eclipse is gonna lead to one of them dying again; hangs out with the lovers and it’s always them strategizing about inter-team relationships. hanging out with elliot is different. she can just show up, say some shit, and — well, he doesn’t know how everything works, but he knows more than she does about the behind-the-scenes, and she knows more about what it’s like on the field.

and besides. it’s siesta. it doesn’t actually have to be constant splorts talk, now.

so she’s sitting on elliot’s couch and she’s thinking about baltimore and being twice-dead and being twenty-times-dead and she blurts out ‘ hey, do you know how many times i’ve died? ’ into the silence. ‘ actual question. not rhetorical. i lost count, at some point. ’

#errorware #grand siesta.#in.#so i ran out of arg writing energy but ive been thinking abt this for like a week so. hi heres a starter ily

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jazziehart · 4 years ago

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Character Dissection [Rachel Berry]: Episode by Episode - Season 2A

Hello everyone and welcome back to the character dissection series. Once again I’m going to be on the topic of Rachel Berry. I’ve already covered Season 1 by splitting it into two parts. I’m going to be doing the same for Seasons 2 and 3. Today we are going to be covering the first half of Season 2 which is from Audition until A Very Glee Christmas. I will be breaking down her character episode by episode much like the first two posts. Unfortunately, these posts will not be as positive so reader beware. If you are a Rachel fan, this may not be for you.

Let’s start off with the season 2 premiere of Audition. Rachel starts off the episode much like her usual self. She’s now dating Finn and seems relatively happy. However, this happiness is short lived when she finds a foreign exchange student named Sunshine Corozan. She originally apporaches Sunshine to join the Glee Club thinking that she wouldn’t have much to add, however when she hears Sunshine begin singing, she realizes Sunshine is most likely going to be her main competition and may even be *gasp* better than her. After this Rachel tries to make it her mission to discourage Sunshine from joining the Glee Club. Originally she pays off Karofsky and Azimio to slushie her and some of her fellow glee clubbers in front of Sunshine’s locker to scare her off. When Kurt and Mercedes shame her for trying this, she comes up with a new tactic. This is quite possibly one of the worst things she does in the entire series which is sending Sunshine to a crack house. This is Rachel at her very worst. She’s always been self absored and wanting to take the competition out of her way but this was extreme even for her. I wish she would’ve just sent her to Cheerios practice or even to Sue’s office. It would’ve accomplished the same goal of keeping her away from Glee Club while being a lot less cruel to someone who she barely knew. Anyway, soon Tina and Mike find out and alert Will who scolds Rachel and tells her to make it right with Sunshine. Rachel agrees to and invites her to actually try out for the New Directions which she does and has a fantastic performance which you can see Rachel seething throughout. Unfortunately, Sue has found out about Sunshine and tips off Vocal Adrenaline to take her into their school which makes the club angry knowing she probably wouldn’t have left if not for Rachel. Finn also scolds Rachel for what happened and Rachel fears he’ll break up with her to which Finn tells her that he’d never break up with her which gives some relief to Rachel. Rachel goes to rehearse on her own to prepare to accept the backlash of her actions in Glee Club which is where the episode ends.

Next up is Britney/Brittany, another episode where Rachel has a huge part in. Rachel’s first big scene is when the Glee Club takes tablets courtsey of Carl the Dentist and she is one of the few members whose teeth turn blue which she’s upset about saying she flosses between classes and takes good care of herself to which Carl says it’s probably genetic. Later, she and Finn are talking in the hallway where Finn expresses his disappointment about no longer being on the football team. Rachel, selfishly makes it about her and says she’s glad he wasn’t on the team saying he’d probably leave her for a cheerleader. Finn is upset that she believes this and talks about how he feels bad about himself to which Rachel says she wants to be the only thing to make him feel good which Finn doesn’t take well to. Their conversation is interrupted by Santana and Brittany with Santana snarking at Rachel and Brittany saying she’s more talented. Finn laughs rather than defend Rachel which makes her upset but Finn says maybe Santana has a point and adds that he’s trying to be honest, much like what Rachel said to him before. Rachel then goes for her appointment where she has a Britney Spears fantasy which inspires her to change her wardrobe which Finn doesn’t take well to at all, especially since other guys are constantly looking at her. Rachel talks in Glee Club about how she realizes it’s okay to dress like a pretty girl and feel good about yourself from time to time, something that actually isn’t a bad speech at all but is overshadowed by fan speculation about why Quinn is looking away from Rachel which is something I’ve addressed in a previous post. Rachel comes back to Glee practice later that afternoon to find out Finn is back on the football team which she’s upset about even though she previously gave him her blessing. Rachel soon confronts Finn in the locker room as he’s trying on his uniform and wants him to quit the team trying to make him choose between her and football which is yet another selfish move. Later on she purporsely has Quinn test him by asking him out on a date which Finn declines. Rachel is so happy about this she pretends like she realized she was wrong on her own. This is something that’s always annoyed me about Rachel at the end of this episode. The truth is she tested him and he passed. Can you imagine had he actually taken Quinn up on it and had gotten back with her then how mad Rachel woud’ve been? It would’ve served her right for trying to test him when Finn had done nothing to say that he would just leave her for a cheerleader. I know Rachel brought up how he left her to be with Santana and Brittany but he only went on one date with them and didn’t like it. Besides at that time he was trying to find himself something he had the right to do. Anyway I’ll get more into that when I analyze Finn. The show ends with ‘The Only Exception’ which was actually a poor choice of song for the situation and it was la-di-da Finn and Rachel are fine.

Moving onto Grilled Cheesus, one of the few episode Rachel actually doesn’t have a lot of storyline in. She lets Finn touch her breast and is once again making a selfish comment when the Glee Club can’t do any religious songs. She over dramatically exclaims that she found the perfect song and it was ripped away from her like Sophie’s daughter. She eventually performs the song anyway when she’s outside with Finn lighting a candle for Burt so I guess it wasn’t ripped away huh? Anyway she doesn’t have much else of a storyline in the episode since she’s Jewish and this was more of an episode about Christianity.

Up next is my personal favorite episode of Duets. In this episode Rachel’s trying to be more selfless and follow in Finn’s footsteps, one of the only times during the entire season that she displays this quality. She thinks that Sam should win so he feels a part of the group which Finn agrees to. She overdramatically says they need to find a way for her to lose a competition. Let me just go on another rant. One thing I couldn’t stand about Glee (this is on the writers end) was that anytime Rachel gave a really good performance the entire club would just vote for her. Meanwhile, when anyone else killed their performance, it was never met with as much enthusiam, case in point, this episode. Everyone voted for themselves except Finn and Rachel who helped Sam and Quinn win. This is something that made me annoyed just because it was a real slap in the face to some of the great vocalists in the club like Mercedes and Santana. Anyway back to the episode, Finn and Rachel end up picking a duet and perform it offensively as a priest and catholic school girl which the club obviously finds awful. They end up getting Sam and Quinn the win and things work out. Rachel soon notices how sad Kurt is and decides to talk to him. She lets him know that even though he’s lonely, he’s not alone and decides to perform a duet with him that is one they both love and the two start to form a friendship, one that actually helped Rachel become more humble as time went on.

Up next is the Rocky Horror Glee Show, another one of the best episodes. This episode starts off with a bang with Rachel once again selfishly claiming the lead female role. When Will says that girls need to split the lesser female roles of Columbia and Magenta, Rachel makes a comment that pisses me off. She said it’s standard Broadway practice to save their voices. If any role should’ve been split, it should’ve been the lead. Rachel should ‘preserve her voice’ sometime but once again nothing is said another than a throw away comment from Mercedes. Anyway Rachel is just jazzed about the musical and doesn’t realize what a toll it’s taking on Finn, though she does come to his defense when Brittany and Santana are making rude comments about his body. Anyway Will cancels the musical saying he was selfish for wanting to put it on in the first place but agrees to let the New Directions put on the production for themselves, something they seem happy about.

The next episode is Never Been Kissed, another episode Rachel takes more of a backseat to. Her biggest part in the episode is when she tries to do the opposite and keep quiet, something no one expects from her and when she once again is the lead in the mashup (so much for opposites am I right?). Anyway the only other storyline she has is when the guys reveal that they’ve been using Coach Beiste to cool off and she glares at Finn who tells her that he’s never done it.

Moving onto The Subsititute which starts off with Will getting sick and Rachel taking over the Glee Club, something Santana doesn’t take kindly to and tries to attack her for once again only wanting the lesson to revolve around herself. The club soon gets a subsititute in Holly and Rachel isn’t fond of her in the least. She finds her to be goofing off too much and tries to convince Will to come back to the school as soon as he can saying Sue (who’s now acting principal) would replace him. Holly tries to talk to Rachel and soon gets her more onboard with her lessons as the two do a duet. When Will is fired however, Rachel is the first one to come to his defense and says he’s the best thing that happened to the school, not her. An unlikely statement.

Up next is Furt which is probably one of my favorite episodes. Rachel tries to rally the girls to get their boyfriends to defend Kurt from Karofsky, something Quinn isn’t too fond of saying that she isn’t dating Sam (yes you are girl don’t lie to yourself you were literally on top of him making out two episodes ago). Anyway Rachel tries to talk to Finn who’s more worried about his reputation which Rachel is upset with him over saying she’s never been more disappointed in him. Later at the wedding she is constantly trying to keep Finn’s attention insisting on him telling her how pretty she looks and the two actually seem relatively happy at the wedding but all that changes in the next episode.

Special Education is probably the most complex episode for Rachel, especially since at the beginning she finds out that Finn lied to her about not sleeping with Santana last year, something she’s clearly hurt about. The two are fighting and it leads Rachel to try to hurt him the way he hurt her. Enter in Puck, she invites him over and makes out with him, fully intending to have sex with him but Puck stops it saying he can’t do that to Finn again. Rachel is upset but seems to understand. Rachel is at her most selfish in this episode especially after she finds out she doesn’t have a solo. She’s constantly rude about Sam and Quinn having the duet and even places ducttape on her mouth babbling about how her talented is wasted in the club (you literally are giving everything don’t even). Anyway Will calls her and the rest of the club out about their bad attitutes and they prepare for Sectionals. Rachel actually is less selfish when she helps out Kurt with his audition for a solo for the Warblers. The two soon are bonding when Rachel reveals that she and Finn broke up after he lied about being with Santana which Kurt was surprised that she didn’t know. Rachel soon finds out the entire club knew about it which leads to a huge argument before the New Directions go on. Rachel isn’t too happy about being background but is glad when the New Directions tie the Warblers and move onto Regionals. She and Finn hug and start to put the past behind them. However, the next day Rachel reveals about what happened with Puck which clearly hurts Finn, especially with what he went through last year with Quinn and he breaks up with Rachel for good. A fitting ending to this episode.

Finally we get to the mid-season finale of A Very Glee Christmas. Rachel tries to win Finn back by singing a song to him and even trying to pick out a tree with him. However, Finn isn’t ready to forgive Rachel for what she did to him and leaves her.

Let’s talk overview. Rachel somehow has become even more selfish this season and I have no idea where it stemmed from or why it happened. Even in the finale she keeps trying to force Finn to get back with her, something he’s told her that he’s not ready to do and still needs to heal. Honestly Season 2 Rachel is probably the worst she is throughout the series. This actually gave me an idea about another subject I wanted to cover in the favoritism that was displayed towards Rachel by the show which will probably be written after my character overview. I hope you enjoyed this. Stay tuned for the second half of Season 2.

#rachel berry #glee #glee season 2 #finchel #Faberry #puckleberry

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miss-musings · 6 years ago

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The Good & Bad of NBC: or, Why “The Blacklist” is everything that’s wrong with TV, and “The Good Place” is everything that’s right (SPOILER EDITION)

(Written Oct. 2018… pre-S6 of TBL and mid-S3 of the Good Place.)

NOTE: THERE WILL BE MAJOR SPOILERS OF BOTH SHOWS. DO NOT PROCEED UNLESS YOU HAVE SEEN THEM BOTH!!!!!!!

In case you haven’t, there is a spoiler-free version of this post here.

(Author’s note: So, if you’re reading this you may or may not have read the other version first. If you have, I’m basically going to be going over the same material with the same structure, with some of the text basically copy/pasted from the first version. But, where I held back on the spoiler-y details before, I’m now going to be going all out. I’ll reiterate: PLEASE DO NOT READ THIS VERSION UNLESS YOU HAVE SEEN BOTH SHOWS!!! Thank you.)

For any of you unfamiliar with my content, I’ve been analyzing different aspects of The Blacklist for the past few years, including calling attention to what I believe are flaws in its plotlines and characterizations.

This April, I happened upon The Good Place on Netflix and absolutely gobbled it up. I watched all of S1 in pretty much a single day; S2, in a similarly short time frame. Now, I’ve probably seen every S1 and S2 episode at least four times, and I’m watching the S3 episodes as they air on NBC before The Blacklist returns in January for its sixth season.

Now, it’s definitely not fair to compare The Blacklist and The Good Place. The former is an hour-long (44 minutes/episode) crime drama procedural that has had 22 or 23 episodes per season in five seasons. The latter is a half-hour (22 minutes/episode) ‘genre’ comedy set in the afterlife that has 13 episodes per season in three (ongoing) seasons.

So, TBL has an approximate 4,840 minute run-time, and TGP’s is approximately 858 minutes (including all of S3).

That means that The Blacklist’s overall runtime is almost SIX times the length of The Good Place.

Even so, both of these feature prominent TV actors, including Emmy Award winners James Spader and Ted Danson, respectively; both center on a relationship between a 30-something white woman and an older white man(whether that relationship is romantic, platonic or pseudo-familial is debated by fandoms of both shows); and both of these are NBC shows.

So, while it might not be exactly fair to compare these two shows, I’m going to do so anyway, because I feel like where the Blacklist struggles, The Good Place shines as a quality television program.

Now, don’t think for an instant that The Blacklist is a completely worthless show or that The Good Place doesn’t have its flaws. There are good and bad aspects of both shows, but I’m going to be comparing the two by focusing on three key things that make a TV show compelling:

Plot Progression

Character Interactions

Character Development

1. PLOT PROGRESSION

I think anyone who’s seen the Blacklist will tell you that this show’s plot is convoluted AF. In S1, it seemed like the show was setting Berlin up to be the show’s overarching Big Bad. But, then he gets killed off in S2 while the Cabal takes the forefront. The Cabal kinda hangs out until the end of S3, really, and then gets mostly forgotten until Ressler kills Hitchen in S4. And, Mr. Kaplan becomes Red’s enemy because she was once Liz’s nanny????

This show is so fucking weird.

It continues to frustrate me that all of the show’s major plot developments/revelations come during a mid-season or season finale, or a season or mid-season premiere. The Blacklist’s plot structure continually revolves around the idea of ‘sweeps week,’ when the network tries to boost its ratings by promising major reveals and developments during certain time frames.

Why not space some of these things out more instead of giving us what is essentially filler? We go along for the ride week after week, hoping to get clues or developments to the overarching story, only to be frustrated at the world’s slowest drip ever.

I feel like the first part of S5b really fell into this trap. It reveals to the audience shortly after Keen’s return that Ian Garvey is a dirty cop. And then we wait like 4-6 episodes (I don’t remember exactly how long) until Liz realizes this too. Jeez. Why drag it out so long?!?!

Now, I will say that the decision to kill Garvey in 5x19, rather than the season finale was a good idea. As it breaks the mold of having to wait until the (mid)season finale for the Arc’s Big Bad to finally bite it.

But, while that might’ve been a small victory, it still doesn’t make up for all the times this show has thought it was pulling the rug out when all it was doing was being predictable AF.

Between Liz “dying,” Kaplan helping her, Kirk being her stepdad, Mr. Kaplan being the one coming after Red, Tom dying, Liz trying to trick Red into revealing his secret by playing like she’s in danger and needs him to rescue her, the bones being the Real Reddington, etc... it continually frustrates me that folks here on Tumblr predict everything that’s going to happen with pinpoint accuracy. It makes the show boring and rote. (Not the folks on Tumblr; more the fact that this show’s plots are so predictable.)

Conversely, the Good Place – per the show’s creator Mike Schur – centers on the idea of subverting expectations. Based on the pilot’s premise, you might assume that the finale will be Eleanor revealing that she doesn’t belong in the neighborhood. But, Schur and his writing team have said multiple times that they focus on trying to make each episode end with a cliffhanger, and doing those big reveals or developments earlier in the season than the audience expects.

As Schur (or maybe some other writer or exec) recently said on the Good Place podcast, 2x09 “Best Self – where the crew leaves the Good Place to head to Bad Place HQ – feels a little like a season finale, despite the fact that there were three more episodes left in S2.

The Blacklist, IMO, also suffers from overdramatic promotions that sometimes make it seem like each episode is going to have some shocking development, when in fact, you could probably skip it and not really miss much (unless it’s a premiere or finale).

I feel like I remember the S2a promos about Liz hiding Tom in the boat, which of course, everyone predicted, really hyped up that reveal so that it was a real let-down whenever we finally got the truth.

TGP, on the other hand, doesn’t really have episodic promos like The Blacklist does, which might work in its favor. (Although, I will say that I was pissed the NBC Thursday night comedy line-up promos ruined the 3x01 Trevor reveal before the actual episode ended.)

I mean, compare how TBL handled the Boat Door Reveal in S2 versus how TGP handled the Michael-sacrifices-himself-to-save-Eleanor development. If TGP had done it like TBL’s, we would’ve known a week or two in advance that someone was going to sacrifice themselves to save Eleanor. It would’ve been these dramatic promos going like “Who! Will! It! Be?!?!!” with like pictures of all the cast members flashing by. And, of course, everyone would predict it would be Michael and/or Chidi, we would all be right and subsequently disappointed.

Also, while I feel like TBL tends to play things safe – very rarely breaking away from the crime drama procedural vibe – TGP doesn’t mind taking chances, so long as whatever they’re taking a chance on fits within the ‘world’ of the show.

If you haven’t seen my rant about TBL’s S5b, I was so excited after Liz woke from a coma to see how the show might tackle that plotline. Would Liz be traumatized? Would she be reluctant to rejoin the Task Force? What if she decided to give up her life with the FBI altogether and raise Agnes? What if she had PTSD? etc.

And, the show went the very predictable route of not showing much, if any, of Liz’s physical therapy or psychological trauma, and having her get back ‘out in the field’ (proverbially speaking) pretty much right away. She pawned Agnes off to Scottie and then kicked it in the woods for an episode.

Whereas, with The Good Place, we got to see major glimpses of Eleanor’s year after her near-death experience in 2x12. Granted, not much of it, but given the show’s time constraints and break-neck speed (in terms of plot development as opposed to TBL), it was nice that we got to see Eleanor become a better person, backslide, and then make a decision on whether she wanted to try to make progress again or whether she was going to stay in her rut forever.

Clearly, you can seen how one’s plot progression is preferable – as a viewer – to the other. It’s also helpful, I imagine, as a writer, to let the plots unfold organically, as fast or as slow as they need to… instead of having to either rush them or drag them out to reach a certain point in the season’s schedule.

2. CHARACTER INTERACTIONS

As said above, both shows focus on the connections between its male protagonist and female protagonists. While ultimately it’s the female protagonist’s journey, the male protagonist is a guiding force in her journey, helping her along and pushing her to make decisions (whether good or bad).

(Although, I guess you could argue that Chidi is really TGP’s male protagonist, but considering that Ted Danson is more heavily promoted, I’d argue Michael is really TGP’s male protagonist.)

And, for both shows, its two main protagonists are part of a six-person main cast.

For The Good Place, the cast is Eleanor and Chidi, Tahani and Jason (two other residents in Eleanor’s neighborhood), Janet (the neighborhood’s anthropomorphized mainframe/help desk), and Michael.

The Blacklist’s cast, as of the end of S5, is Reddington and Keen, her fellow agents Donald Ressler, Samar Navabi and Aram Mojtabai, and their task force director Harold Cooper.

Now, the Blacklist primarily focuses on the relationship between Reddington and Keen; he doesn’t interact with the other cast members very frequently and Keen’s interactions with them are pretty basic and often work-focused. There aren’t very many crucial interactions between non-Reddington/Keen pairings, especially in more recent seasons of the show. While S1 and S2 tried its best to have Keen interact with Ressler, Ressler interact with Reddington, Cooper interact with Reddington, Keen interact with Navabi, etc., S3-5 have more focused on the Reddington/Keen dynamic at the expense of everyone else.

Granted, I like the Reddington/Keen dynamic (in some respects), but giving it more weight in the runtime unfortunately means that the remainder of the cast has to tackle the more procedural aspects by trying to track down the Bad Guy of the Week while Reddington and Keen get to have more of the character-driven serialized moments and developments.

Compare this, though, with TGP and its interactions outside of the Eleanor/Michael dynamic.

Throughout different points in S1 and S2, we got significant interaction between almost every single possible pairing of characters on this show. (And I mean pairing in a non-romantic sense.)

We see Eleanor fall in love with Chidi, become ‘mates’ with Tahani, become bros with Jason, and try to kill Janet and then later give her relationship advice. Meanwhile, Michael has his falling out with and subsequent heartfelt apology to Chidi; he admits to Janet that she’s his most loyal friend; in S1, he seeks out Tahani’s help; and in S2, he seeks out Jason’s feedback. Tahani and Jason’s romantic connection is explored, as is Jason and Janet’s. Chidi and Tahani have an important bonding moment in S1, and even the dynamic between Chidi and Jason is touched on some.

So, while TBL’s cast feels a little separated and almost cliquish, TGP’s six castmembers feel like a cohesive team where any two or three characters can be trusted to carry a scene and have an emotional connection/interaction. The former comes off as weak writing and show structuring, while the other is far preferable to watch.

3. CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT

As I’ve said in several other TBL posts, THIS is probably my biggest grievance with the show … even more so than the weird-ass plot structure.

Despite supposedly being major characters, Ressler, Cooper, Samar and Aram get very little in the way of growth or development. I can barely describe them, their personalities, their desires, their moral codes, etc. in maybe a paragraph for each character. And these are people who have been on this show for FIVE FUCKING YEARS!!! How is that possible that they’ve gotten so little development in so much screentime?

Again, remember, TBL’s runtime is SIX TIMES that of TGP. And yet, I feel like any and all of The Good Place’s major characters get way more development simply in the first season than TBL’s peeps do in five.

I could definitely describe Jason, Tahani, Chidi and Janet’s personalities, desires, moral codes, etc. in like a page for each character.

Now, granted, I suppose the show’s structure lends itself better to that. The characters have to do a lot of soul-searching, so to speak, in almost every episode. Whereas, the Blacklist’s cast has to chase down the week’s bad guys, which takes up at least 20-30 minutes per episode.

Okay, okay. Maybe it’s not fair, considering that TBL clearly doesn’t care about its non-Reddington/non-Keen characters. So, let’s focus on both shows’ two leads and their character arcs.

Let’s look at Reddington’s character development versus Michael’s.

Despite having much more screentime and weight within the show, Reddington’s arc PALES in comparison to Michael’s. Granted, Michael started out as a literal demon whose entire purpose was to torture people. But, over time, we saw his genuine curiosity about humans transform into a genuine desire to understand them and want to be one of them. Yes, he only seeks them out after 802 reboots because he feels he has no other options (thanks to Vicky threatening to blackmail him). But, as he learns ethics alongside the humans, he realizes he needs to become a better ‘person’ (read: demon) to better care of them. Because he OWES IT TO THEM.

Reddington’s character development, meanwhile, seemed to come more in the latter half of S4 when he was trying to deal with Mr. Kaplan coming after him and he was trying to confront this spectre of death that seemed to be looming over him.

Yet, even after all that bullshit with Mr. Kaplan, where he called him out for keeping secrets from Elizabeth that she had the right to know, he still held all the cards and kept his secrets to himself and killed anyone who got in the way.

If Red had really grown, the way Michael did in S2, he would’ve confessed to Elizabeth at some point that he wasn’t the real Reddington, that he stole her father’s identity, and he’d been keeping it from her all this time because of “x.”

While Michael has learned and grown as an individual, Reddington has stayed relatively static in terms of personal growth. Not to say we haven’t seen different sides of him, what he would do when he faced difficult scenarios, like Liz’s death or losing his criminal empire… but the Reddington in the S5 finale is too much like Reddington in the pilot episode. Which is absolutely ridiculous, given how much screentime and emphasis he’s gotten over FIVE SEASONS!!!

Michael has learned to admit when he’s been wrong, apologize and become a better friend to his humans, while Red still has yet to do Liz (a woman he loves immensely in some capacity or other) the basic kindness of telling her that he stole her dad’s identity.

Alright. Now let’s look at Elizabeth Keen versus Eleanor Shellstrop.

Both characters have suffered from character regression, where they start at Point A, then develop and grow over time to reach Point B, and then – for whatever reason – regress to Point A again.

Elizabeth Keen started out happy and bubbly in S1a, went to dark and gritty in S1b-3a, then went back to happy and bubbly in S3b to S5a, then back to dark and gritty again in S5b.

Eleanor started off as an Arizona dirtbag, then became a good person to the point where she decided to sacrifice herself by going to the Bad Place... then got rebooted 802 times... then started as an Arizona dirtbag again, progressed to the point where she was the only one of the four humans who passed her test from The Judge ... then was sent back to earth and was saved from death, so she decided to change her life, backslided and now is AGAIN trying to become a better person.

Now, while Eleanor’s character regression fits within the confines of the show, Keen’s makes no sense. She’s confronted and overcome so many challenges over the show’s the five seasons… so, why hasn’t she learned from them? Why is she still relatively the same, especially considering that x-number of seasons ago, she was so completely different?

Why is she back to being all angry and hateful and dark, etc., when it’s like... she has a young daughter who’s lost her father, she lost 10 months with her after being in a coma.... and she just wants to go beat up dirty cops??? I feel like if they wanted us to see an Elizabeth Keen that had learned from her experience, she would’ve given up her life with the FBI, saying that it’s put her in danger, severed ties with Red (or tried to) because he’s also endangered her (via the bones), and spent time with her daughter, whom she claims is more important than anything else in the world.

And, whereas Eleanor was not a very likable protagonist at the outset but she becomes more likable over time, Keen started out as somewhat likable but has become more annoying as her character continually regresses.

All in all, to quote (or at least paraphrase) some other Tumblr user, “I can’t believe The Good Place literally invented character development.”

TL;DR

Again, just to reiterate, I think there’s good and bad in both shows. But, there’s a reason why I’ve seen every episode of the Good Place at least four times and why TGP S1-2 is currently #4 on my list of All-Time Favorite TV Shows.

The Good Place pushes the envelope by subverting expectations and having major developments earlier in the season than expected; it makes sure that almost every character has significant moments with every other character; and it ensures that each of them has a major character arc that works within the confines of the show.

The Blacklist, in comparison, does what too many other shows on TV do: it treads water plot-wise; it focuses too much on some characters at the expense of others; and even the characters it focuses on don’t show any significant or organic growth.

And, that’s why, IMO, The Blacklist represents everything that’s wrong with television now; and The Good Place represents everything that’s right.

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stateofloveandnegan · 6 years ago

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Don’t Cry - Eddie Vedder

Could you maybe write an Eddie one shot where he’s all stressed and upset and you find him crying and you just sit there and soothe him comforting because he’s upset he’s not good enough for you

Fuuuuck, why can I only write such short stories lately?! I’m sorry...

I actually don’t like how I wrote this, but I also think it’s kinda cute? I just hope it’s up to your wishes and I promise I’ll try to get back on track with the stories. I’ll try to make them better again :)

Requested by: anon

Eddie and the guys had just come back from tour. Tonight will be another show, a ‘we’re back in Seattle’ kinda thing. I’m so happy for them to have come so far already and I can’t wait to see them again.

They needed some time to unload everything and Eddie said he’d call me when he was free to meet up. The call just never came. Hours went by and Eddie still hadn’t called. At first I thought he just needed more time than expected, but now I’m pretty sure he either forgot, or he doesn’t want to see me. The latter just doesn’t make sense, he would’ve said something before if there was a problem. We’ve been together for almost a year now and we’ve never had any real problems, if there was something that bothered one of us, we would speak up about it and talk it out.

Another 30 minutes pass before I decide to call Ed myself, but he doesn’t answer. It’s a good thing I know where their PJ-homebase is, ‘cause I decide to go over to them. It takes me 15 minutes to reach the small garage they always store their stuff, but there’s no one to be seen. I figure they’re already at the venue for the show, so I head over to it.

“Jeff! Hey, how are you?” I say when I finally see one of the guys. Jeff turns and greets me with his usual smile. “Hey (Y/N), I’m good thanks! A bit tired, but nothing I couldn’t handle. How are you? I haven’t seen you for ages!” he says and hugs me.

I tell him I’m going fine, not mentioning my concern about Eddie. We talk for a bit longer, but he eventually needs to leave for his soundcheck. The evening drags by and in the mean time I’ve spoken to Stone, Dave and Mike as well. Eddie is still nowhere to be seen. I grow more concerned about him every second and when I ask the other guys about Ed, they tell me he’s backstage preparing for the show, not showing any sign of concern. I suppose it’s just me being overdramatic.

The first time I steal a glance of Eddie is when he’s on stage, but his usual wild behaviour isn’t there with him. He still rocks the show, but something’s missing. It’s like he’s not himself, as if something’s bothering him.

“Mikey, have you seen Ed?” I ask Mike after the show. I got backstage just before the end of the show, to prevent being trapped inside a huge mosh pit of sweat and alcohol. Also because I really want to see Eddie and talk to him.

Mike shrugs and leaves me be. I look around for a bit but once again, Eddie’s nowhere to be seen. When I ask the others, they don’t know either.

Something is definitely wrong. Eddie is always so energetic after a show and he never disappears just like that.

I notice a hall with multiple doors at each side. Each door has a small plate next to it with a name written on it. I cross two rooms, the plates saying ‘Stone Gossard’ and ‘Jeff Ament’ and when I reach the third door I see my boyfriend’s name written on the board.

I knock on the door, but I get no answer. “Ed, you in there?” I ask, but once again, no answer.

A few minutes later I realise the door is unlocked and I slowly move to open the door. “Ed?” I ask quietly, I get no response, but I do get a sign of life. I hear someone sniffing and sobbing quietly. When I reach the part of the room where the sound comes from I’m shocked to see Eddie crying. I’ve never seen him cry and it honestly breaks me to see him like this. Especially right now, he should be happy! He just got back from an amazing tour and did a great job at tonight’s show.

I rush over to him and sit next to him on the sofa. He has his face in his hands and leans his elbows on his knees. I quickly put my arm around him and slowly rub my hand on his back. “Ed, baby, what’s wrong? Why are you crying?!”

Eddie doesn’t say anything, he just leans into me, his head on my chest. I put my arm completely around him. “Alright, babe, let it all out then. It’s alright, it’s alright to cry.” I tell him soothingly. I know it’s useless to tell someone to stop crying when they are, it’s best to let it all out then.

“Yeah, let it all go Ed. I’m here for you. You can always come to me if there’s something wrong.” I whisper, not daring to talk louder.

I put my hand in his hair and start playing with it, softly running my hand through it. After a while Eddie’s sobs die down and he slowly moves back up to sit straight next to me. When he’s sat up straight, I move my hand up to his face to swipe away the tears left on his face.

“Hey baby,” I say softly, with a small smile, when he finally meets my eyes.

It takes him some effort to smile, but he does it anyway. “Hey,”

I move forward and peck his lips, they taste all salty because of the tears. When I move back, I move my hand upwards to his hair and run my hand through it once again. “I’ve missed you.” I tell him.

Another tear escapes his eyes, “I’ve missed you too, (Y/N), so much.”

“But that’s not why you were crying, was it?” I ask him, with an apologetic smile resting on my face.

He looks down and slowly shakes his head, “I just-” he starts, but doesn’t come much farther.

I lift his face up with my finger on his chin, “You can tell me, you know that right?”

“I know, (Y/N). It’s just that it was all too much for me. All the shows and all, I needed some rest and when I didn’t get it, I just couldn’t hold it in anymore. I’m glad to be back, I’m glad you’re here with me.”

His words make me weak in my stomach. I feel bad for him not handling the stress, which I completely understand, but I feel happiness when he tells me he’s glad to be back home, ‘cause that’s what I am: I’m glad he’s home. I’m glad he’s back here with me.

“Oh Ed, I love you. Don’t ever scare me again like that, alright? Not calling when you’re supposed to.. I thought you didn’t want to see me again!”

Finally, Eddie let’s out a chuckle, “Why would you ever think that? I love you, (Y/N). You’re the one that keeps me going. I’m sorry I didn’t call. I was just so stressed and- I don’t know I guess I kind of forgot, I’m so sorry.” He adds the last part with a sad expression on his face.

I brush my thumb against his cheek, “Don’t be, I understand completely. I’ve got so much respect for what you do Ed. I’ve got so much respect for you. I’m just happy you’re alright. And for the record: it’s ok to be not ok sometimes.”

Eddie smiles up at me and kisses me softly. “I don’t deserve you.”

“Oh you do. You deserve way more than this, actually.” I say, gesturing to myself.

#eddie #Eddie vedder #Eddie vedder x reader #Eddie vedder x oc #Eddie vedder fanfiction #eddie vedder fanfic #pearl jam #pearl jam fanfic #pearl jam fanfiction #pj

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alexjcrowley · 3 years ago

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Yes.

If I can expand the notion, according to my interpretation (I'm still watching CBS Ghosts so the things I say are based only on a partial knowledge and this is not meant to criticise the CBS show, just my thoughts on the post).

British Captain? Good at his thing, probably a bit of a loner, too much of a square, too rigid, not the quite the social butterfly (see the episode in which he tries to shut down Alison's and Mike's party and Pat calls him a wazzock).

American Captain? Probably the one of the cool kids they hang out with just to secretly make fun of him, but still part of the cool kids bunch, invited to parties, incredibly snob.

Kitty? Everybody finds her a bit too childish, too naive, annoying, even.

Alberta? She may not be everyone's cup of tea, but she act like she is. So much confidence and an actual splendid career as a singer.

Lady Button is a clever woman, good with maths, as we learn, could have handled alone her family's difficult financial situation, she didn't come from riches, but she did all in her power not to fall short of the mark with the expectations society had on her.

Hetty seems way more comfortable in high society, she also look younger, less strict, more fashionable, more lively than Lady Button.

Robin is a caveman. I know his character has way more depth than this (he is my favourite character), but that's how everybody sees him (except Julian and Mary, I think).

Thorfinn is not just a very old dude, he is a hunk. A chad, if you will. A could've been quarterback.

Julian is meant to be this slimy politician who made very wrong choices in his life. You don't see him and think "I wish I could be like him", sometimes you almost feel sorry. He is an old man, in many ways.

Trevor is a Target Jordan Belfort. Your classic rich fuckboy who leads the fashionable, cool luxury life. You don't feel sorry for him, you don't find his ways creepy, the show actually presents him as a cool dude.

Mary is "weird". And, again, I'm saying the show presents her as being "weird", in a way, and I mean she doesn't fit easily, she has a huge traumatic experience going on with the witch trial, she sometimes misunderstands things. I hate to use the term weird, to be honest (that's why I put the quotation marks), but that's how she would be perceived in this imaginary "if the ghosts were at school". A misfit.

Flower is the cool girl (remember the monologue from Gone Girl by Fincher anyone?). Don't even deny it, it's 2022, there's no way her being a hippie or spreading free love (or even using recreational drug) would be seen as scandalous or a bad thing.

Thomas is just seen as pathetic and overdramatic. Nobody respects him as a poet.

Sasappis is the king of drama. Comes is with sassy remarks. Nobody looks down at him.

Pete and Pat are honestly the ones who more resemble eachothers in the shows, but Pete has the upper hand, in a way, being younger and thinner (look, we're still talking about who would be cool in school, right? Take it from someone who was always the fat friend, they make it count as a huge difference. I know at least someone reading this post can confirm it. They don't let it live down).

That's how I see it.

And, to be honest, I've just started watching CBS Ghosts, I've already watched the whole BBC Ghosts, but I'm rooting for my British guys. I liked them best, I can't help it. Maybe the American ones are a bit "too popular" for me.

I didn't write anything about Sir Humphrey and counterpart because I don't know enough of the counterpart.

I don’t know how to explain it but the BBC ghosts characters all come across as unpopular in school whereas the CBS ghosts characters come across as popular in school.

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stansbooty · 7 years ago

Text

unspoken thing iv // reddie

“When are we gonna do something about this unspoken thing between us?”

warnings: minor warning for mentioning underage drinking

words: 3377

ao3 link || 1 2 3

chapter 4: junior year part ii

“I was joking the other day, by the way.” Stan spoke in a hushed tone due to the fact that they were in the library as well as the fact that he didn’t want anyone to hear them. “What day?” Eddie didn’t even look up from the book he was taking notes on.

“At the quarry, when I said you ran from Richie.”

At Richie’s name, Eddie dropped his pencil and tilted his head up to look at his friend. “Oh.”

“Everyone jokes about you two, so I did, too.” Stan shrugged.

“Oh.” Eddie repeated, biting his lip and urging his face to not turn red.

Stan gave him a look, letting Eddie know that he didn’t do a good job of keeping the color away from his face. “Do you actually…?”

“What?” Eddie urged him to continue.

“Do you like Richie?” Stan’s face was nearly expressionless but after so many years of friendship Eddie could detect faint traces of hurt in his eyes.

“What, no! What?” Eddie let out a forced laugh, speaking quickly. “Why? Don’t you like him?”

“Yeah, a little, but that’s irrelevant.” Stan brushed it off and Eddie pretended he didn’t feel the little twinge in his heart. “I would be fine if you did.”

“Cool, but I don’t.” Eddie picked up his pencil and twirled it through his fingers.

Stan’s eyes scanned his face, trying to pick up any sense of emotion, before he let out a breath. “Good, because I would be secretly bitter.”

“You have nothing to worry about.” Eddie looked back down to his book, his throat feeling tight.

“I know.” Stan laughed, but Eddie could feel the tension in his voice. “But we’d never let something as stupid as a crush get in between us.”

“Of course not.”

Stan just smiled brightly and went back to his work.

Meanwhile, Eddie was having an inner crisis. Did Stan know? How could he know, when Eddie himself only figured out he was attracted to Richie days before? Was he obvious with it now? Oh, god, did he say something at the party yesterday? Bev told him it wasn’t bad and Richie confirmed, saying that he just babbled on a little bit, nothing embarrassing or life changing. But maybe he said something to Stan when they weren’t around?

No, he was just being paranoid. Richie messed with him frequently and Eddie messed back sometimes, it could be seen as flirty from an outside perspective. But Stan wasn’t an outside perspective and knew how all their friendships worked, Eddie and Richie’s being mostly founded on bickering.

Eddie clenched his eyes shut, willing himself to calm down. He took a deep breath and went back to his work, but a nagging voice in the back of his head kept telling him that Stan did know.

“Hey, guys!” Eddie looked up to see Bill and Ben approaching their table in the library, Ben waving cheerily.

“Hey!” Stan smiled and scooted over in his chair, giving room for Bill to sit next to him.

“I didn’t know you guys were coming.” Eddie smiled, doing the same as Stan to let Ben sit next to him.

“W-well we didn’t know you w-were here.” Bill chuckled then looked at Eddie. “Working o-off the hangover?”

Eddie rolled his eyes. “I’m fine, thank you.”

Ben pushed his shoulder lightly with his own. “We’re not teasing, just concerned friends.”

Eddie let out a playful sigh. “If you must know,” He started then continued in a more hushed voice. “This morning was hell.” The other three grinned. “I’m fine now though, honestly.”

“I’m surprised you’re already alright, with the amount you drank and the fact that you’re a light weight.” Stan said, leaning his head in his palms.

“It was Richie’s fault.” Eddie grumbled.

“Which is why Richie took care of you the whole night.” Ben pointed out, opening his own backpack to dig out his work.

“He what?” Eddie looked around the table, where his friends were nodding. “I really don’t remember after the third shot, I think it was?” His words came out more like a question.

“Yeah, Richie w-was by your side the wh-whole night.” Bill explained. “Something about s-since he got you into the mess, he w-wasn’t going to leave you a-alone.”

“Oh.” A tiny smile spread across Eddie’s face. “That’s actually really nice.”

“Yeah, also you were all over him.” Ben mentioned. Stan’s head turned slowly to Eddie and Eddie coughed in surprise. “I what?”

“I passed by you guys once and you were laid across his lap and Bev confirmed you were there the whole night.” Ben shrugged and picked up his pencil.

“Interesting.” Stan said slowly.

“I’m just…” Eddie scrambled for something to say to Stan. “A clingy drunk.”

“Yeah.” Stan looked back down to his work.

“It’s n-nothing, really.” Bill spoke up. “You were just b-babbling about god knows what the whole night. N-nonsense really. Kind of like Richie w-when he’s sober.”

Ben laughed and Eddie managed to let out a chuckle. Even Stan was smiling.

After that, the four of them got back to working on their school work, occasionally stopping to talk about random things but the conversation never got back around to anything involving Richie, which Eddie was extremely grateful for. He knew that Bill and Ben weren’t trying to start anything between Stan and himself, but the timing of their conversation wasn’t ideal. Stan technically hadn’t admitted his crush to anyone but Eddie that he knew of, even if it was something that everyone was suspicious of. And although Bill and Mike had joked with Eddie about Richie the other day, Eddie hadn’t, and would never, say anything about the thoughts he’d been having about the other boy.

Eddie just hoped his drunk self wouldn’t try to sabotage himself again.

“Do you ever feel like someone else knows more about yourself than you do?” Eddie asked Bev as they were dancing around the classroom, attempting to perfect their foxtrot.

“Damn, bringing out the deep questions today, I see.” Bev laughed and stumbled for a second before the two got their rhythm back.

“Bev.” Eddie groaned, readjusting his grip on her waist. “I’m serious.”

“Okay, okay. Elaborate, please.”

“Like someone looks at you and just knows something about you and you didn’t even know yourself until they pointed it out.” Eddie said.

Bev paused for a minute, looking off to the side as if she was contemplating her answer. A small smile graced her lips as she looked back at Eddie, her eyes twinkling. “I know what you mean.”

“It’s weird.” Eddie simply stated.

“Very.” Beverly agreed, nodding her head with a smirk.

Eddie looked down at their moving feet, making sure they were getting their steps right before they started doing the more “advanced” moves, as their teacher put it. He glanced over to Mike and Richie who, to be fair, had gotten a lot better in the months since the beginning of the year. It was only October, so a lot of improvement was not expected, but Eddie thought they were looking more graceful in their movements, at least.

He looked at them and felt warmth in his body, the same warmth he felt any time he looked at any of his friends. A warmth that brought along feelings of happiness and gratefulness and comfort. But then, Eddie’s eyes wandered over towards Richie specifically, and he felt his stomach do that flippy thing it had been doing lately whenever he looked at the boy. It filled his body with anxiety and heat and the strange desire to vomit.

“You know it’s okay, right?” Bev interrupted his thoughts.

“O-okay?” Eddie stuttered a little bit, feeling an odd sense of déjà vu from his conversation with Stan a week before.

“We won’t talk about it if you don’t want to,” Beverly started to explain. “But, it’s okay.”

Eddie could only assume she was suspicious he was attracted to Richie, as the majority of his friends were, but he wasn’t about to bring it up and be wrong, unintentionally exposing himself.

“Why does everyone speak so vaguely?” Eddie asked, exasperated. “It makes things a bit difficult.”

Bev smiled, she was always smiling, no matter the situation. It made Eddie a little jealous that she could be so happy but also sometimes unsettled, like she always knew something everyone else didn’t. “I’ll be perfectly specific if you want.”

“Go for it.”

“You like Richie.”

Eddie snorted. “Excuse me, like him? No.”

“Eddie.” Bev had put her stern mom face on, looking up at him (but only slightly).

“Beverly.” Eddie mocked her tone. “I’m not lying.”

Bev shook her head. “Oh, it’s obvious.”

“I don’t like him.” Eddie repeated and then brought his voice down to a very faint whisper, bringing his face as close to hers as possible. “Attracted, yes. Like, no.”

Bev let a massive grin spread across her face and Eddie thought if she smiled any wider, her face would split open in two. She went to speak but Eddie cut her off.

“Beverley Marsh, I swear to any god that may exist, I will murder you without a second thought if you mention this to anyone. Even Ben.” Eddie locked eyes with her. “And it will be a slow, gruesome murder.”

“Alright.” She let out a soft sigh. “Message clear. But it’s not that bad.”

“First of all, keep your voice down. Second of all, what do you mean not that bad? It’s awful!”

“Is this because of Stan?”

“You know about that?”

“First of all,” She was mocking him just as he had done to her only a minute before. “I could tell even before we were friends. Second of all, he told me.”

“He told you?” Eddie spoke a bit louder than he intended on due to his shock.

“Last year. Asked how to get over him. It didn’t really work.”

“You think?” He chuckled bitterly. “I think he wants to kill me.”

“Why’s that?”

“He asked me if I liked him, him being Richie, last week and said it would be fine if I did but he would be secretly bitter.” Eddie explained. “That’s what he said, but his eyes told a whole different story.”

“Ah yes, the eyes are the windows to the soul.” Bev said overdramatically.

“If you find me dead, just know that my best friend of over a decade did it.”

“See right there, you just said why this whole situation would be fine.”

“What do you mean?”

She groaned. “You boys are so thick sometimes. Friends for over a decade? A stupid crush isn’t going to get in the way of that.”

“You don’t understand.” Eddie looked at her with wide eyes. “He used to be obsessed.”

“Used to.” She said, nodding her towards him as if trying to make a point.

Eddie shook his head. “I’m not getting into this. I don’t like Richie, I couldn’t do that to Stan, end of story.”

Beverly looked at him for a while, scanning his face before she pursed her lips. “Okay.”

Eddie was momentarily shocked that she was actually going to let the topic go but he couldn’t say anything else to her before his body was bumped by someone much larger than him. He breath staggered for a minute when he realized who is was.

“Hey, losers.” Richie greeted them, running a hand through his hair.

“I’m your best friend, that’s basically insulting you, too.” Beverly quipped back.

Richie shrugged. “Never said I wasn’t a loser.”

Mike and Richie approaching them reminded Eddie to look at the clock, which showed they only had a couple minutes left of school, their dance class being their last of the day. He knew he didn’t have that much time left when he delved into the conversation with Bev but he didn’t realize it had gone so fast.

“I see you two are improving.” Eddie smiled at Mike, who’s face lighted up at the compliment.

“Thanks! I think it helps that Richie was a lot more tired today.” Mike joked, to which Richie gently pushed his shoulder in response.

“Yeah, tired ‘cause of Eddie’s mom.” Richie said loudly, a couple of students turning their head to give him a look.

“You can’t help yourself, can you?” Eddie asked, more as a rhetorical question than anything else.

Richie, of course, answered anyways. “I’m only speaking the truth, Eds.” He wrapped an arm around Eddie, who didn’t shrug him off. He had started rejecting the other boy’s physically touches a lot less as of late.

“Not my name.”

Richie’s hand was rubbing circles on Eddie’s shoulder and Eddie’s stomach was doing flips that would rival a roller coaster. He could practically feel his heart thumping in his chest as he turned his head to look up at Richie. His eyes wandered across the boy’s face for a second, taking in the highs and lows, before Eddie brought his head back down to eye level, where Bev was looking at him with her eyebrows raised. Eddie just stuck his tongue out at her childishly and removed himself from Richie’s grip. He pretended he didn’t miss the feeling of Richie’s hand on his shoulder.

The feeling came back not even a minute later when the four of the them were walking out of the classroom and Richie grabbed a hold of Eddie and pulled him back slightly.

“Can you come over?” Richie looked at him without his usual joking manner.

Eddie blinked. “Um…”

“I need help,” Richie said quickly. “With my, uh, English paper.”

“Oh.” Eddie let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding. “Yeah, of course.”

Richie reached up to ruffle his hair then caught up to Bev, saying something to her that made her laugh loudly. Eddie just sighed and picked up his pace.

Eddie tried to be the most reasonable version of himself he could be. The version with the least amount of regret and the most amount of decisions he was proud of. Not just okay decisions that lead he life in a direction that wasn’t disastrous, but decisions that he could look back on and say, ‘yes that was the right choice’. Eddie thinks he fully regrets the choice to go over to Richie’s.

It’s not that he had never been to Richie’s house. He’d been countless times, both with the others and by himself. But not since his revelation. And now, he sat on Richie’s bed, legs crossed underneath his body as Richie digs through his backpack on the floor.

“If you could just, you know, read over it, that’d be great, Eds.” Richie said, not looking up from his bag.

“Only if you call me by my actual name.” Eddie retorted.

“Not happening.” Richie pulled out a couple of pieces of paper, slightly crumpled but still in good condition. He handed them over to Eddie and joined him sitting on the bed.

Eddie immediately looked down to start reading over the paper but felt Richie’s eyes still on him so he glanced up slightly, their eyes meeting for half a second before Richie looked away, reaching for his bag again. Eddie looked back to the paper. He flew through the paper quickly at first, trying to catch basic mistakes. Upon not finding many, he read slowly, trying to take in the actual content of the paper. He knew Richie was smart, a lot smarter than he lead people to believe, but Eddie was thoroughly impressed with the paper he was reading. He didn’t understand why Richie asked him for help when he was obviously a lot more advanced than Eddie in the subject.

When Eddie was done reading, he just glanced up from the paper, not announcing he was finished. Richie was working on something else, his eyebrows scrunched up and his tongue between his teeth. Eddie watched as he scribbled things down and erased, scribbling again. It was his math homework and something in the back of his mind reminded him that Richie was in an advanced math class, some college level stuff. Much more advanced than Eddie. In fact, Eddie didn’t have any classes with Richie this year, the other boy in levels far above half of the group.

“You’re, like, really smart.” Eddie blurted out before he could help himself.

Richie stopped his work and looked at Eddie with a crooked smile. “Was that a compliment, Eds?”

“You’re doing college level math right now.” Eddie pointed out.

“It’s only calculus.”

“Only calculus.” Eddie scoffed. “You’re in college level history, too.”

“History is history.”

“Your paper is flawless by my standards.”

Richie pushed his work off his bed, scooting closer to Eddie. “I try really hard. To do well, I mean.”

“It shows.” Eddie smiled.

“I know it doesn’t seem like it, but I actually like learning and it might be the one thing I’m good at.” Richie’s looking down at his hands, messing with his fingers.

Eddie was slightly taken by his response and blinks hard. “Richie.” He sighed and reached out a hand to rest it on top of the other boy’s.

Richie turned his hand over so Eddie’s was resting in his palm. It wasn’t quite holding hands, but it felt almost intimate to Eddie. “I just want to get into a good college. Have something to be proud of.”

“Richie.” Eddie repeated, letting Richie start playing with his own fingers. It seemed to be a nervous habit that somehow Eddie had never noticed before. He wondered how much he didn’t actually know about Richie. “You have so much to be proud of.”

Richie swallowed hard. “Really? Like what?” It sounded like an actual question, rather than someone digging for compliments. Like Richie sincerely didn’t know what else there was to be proud of.

Eddie looked at him, his lips pursed and his eyes still locked on their connected hands, and felt a wave of sadness go through him. “First off, even as someone who isn’t a super sports fan, I can tell you’re good at baseball.”

“I’m alright.”

“You’re good. And evidently, you’re wicked smart. And based on your singing in the car, you have a pretty damn good voice. And don’t even get me started on how proud you should be about the type of person you are.” Eddie wasn’t sure where the words were coming from, but they were flowing out of him before he could stop them. It wasn’t like how he felt when he was drunk, or mad, it was a more peaceful flowing. Like words that were stuck in the back of his head that his mouth never got around to letting out.

Richie finally lifted up his head and Eddie could hear him take a deep breath. Their eyes locked and the air around them shifted. It felt thick and heavy with emotion. Eddie felt like he was struggling to get air into his lungs as he looked into eyes that were swirling with so many emotions it made him feel uneasy. Richie’s mouth opened slightly, soft breathes leaving his barely parted lips. Eddie could see a flush rising on Richie’s cheeks and could feel his own face heating up. Eddie tried to look away but he couldn’t, it was as if he was entranced.

“Eddie…” Richie breathed out, his thumb now stroking Eddie’s hand.

It was that small action that allowed Eddie to look away, sitting up straight, and he attempted to break the spell in the room. “So, stop the pity party.”

Richie instantly shifted away from Eddie with a laugh. “Yeah, yeah, whatever.”

“But your paper really is good, a couple of grammar issues but that’s it.” Eddie picked the paper up from its place on his lap and handed it over.

“Thank you.” Richie’s voice was quiet and soft.

Eddie just smiled at him and thought back to the feeling that coursed through his veins when Richie looked at him, cursing himself for getting into this mess. His heart beat and breathing were slowing coming back to a normal, steady pace, having sky rocketed during the moments when the boys had locked eyes. But then Richie grinned at him, and those shot back up and that’s when Eddie Kaspbrak realized he was truly fucked.

tag list: @gazebhoes @i-is-gazebo @eddieswolfhard @reddietoroll

#hope y'all like it!!#reddie #richie tozier #eddie kaspbrak #reddie fic #it #it 2017 #it 1990 #mine #unspokenfic

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yourprayer · 7 years ago

Text

pop culture - the prologue

“Adulthood in a town like Derry is even worse than childhood. The listless, empty ramblings of days dragging on in a town that felt like one-size-too-small-shoes sat heavier on the recently graduated than the younger children. Before you were eighteen and responsible for your own lunch money, you could spend your interminable afternoons exploring the surrounding environment, friends of friends abound. Escaping to the arcade and seeing the same films six times at the same theater was an acceptable amount of nothing to do at twelve years old. But when nineteen years hit Bill Denbrough and college acceptance letters didn’t, the sudden, overwhelming, nothingness of Nowhere, Maine became too heavy to bear.”

prologue - june (wc: 6.1k)

chapter list here

read it on ao3

want on the taglist?

Adulthood in a town like Derry is even worse than childhood. The listless, empty ramblings of days dragging on in a town that felt like one-size-too-small-shoes sat heavier on the recently graduated than the younger children. Before you were eighteen and responsible for your own lunch money, you could spend your interminable afternoons exploring the surrounding environment, friends of friends abound. Escaping to the arcade and seeing the same films six times at the same theater was an acceptable amount of nothing to do at twelve years old. But when nineteen years hit Bill Denbrough and college acceptance letters didn’t, the sudden, overwhelming, nothingness of Nowhere, Maine became too heavy to bear.

Bill knocked the kickstand back up into the recesses of his bike, trusty ole Silver, that had been with him just as long as the sinking feeling in his bones. Swinging his leg over the seat and his backpack behind him, he thought decrepit thoughts that had been plaguing him for months. As he began pedaling off in the direction of the road leading to Mike’s, his woes repeated like a mantra in his head.

I’ll never get out of here. We’ll never get out of here.

This had been the mindset of the eldest Denbrough sibling ever since the beginning of his senior year. As his classmates (and fellow losers) began declaring their majors and matriculations, he found himself slowly but surely running out of time. After all, the system was simple. Graduate, good grades, great college, leave town. But none of this was achievable without a college to leave to. Having no destination; that was his true fear.

Ignoring a slight pain in his index finger, he pedaled on, hoping an afternoon shucking corn with Mike and Stan would help him forget, even for a moment, how hopeless he was becoming.

______________________________________________________________

Eddie Kaspbrak was dying. He had to be dying.

Or overdramatic.

But most likely dying.

Head pounding, chest constricting from lack of air, he willed himself to keep running, as fast as humanly possible.

Terror-stricken thoughts rushed through his mind, as quickly as the air was leaving his lungs. What would it be like now, to be terrorized as an adult? After the years and years of ceaseless bullying, he thought he would be used to the scrapes and bruises. The words stopped hurting after he got more in touch with himself, but there were always new, more vile things to say. But now that he was eighteen, would the game change? What was harassment in the adult world compared to elementary playgrounds?

He thought of Henry Bowers, and his father. Surely a police officer would never choose the law over their own child. And if it came down to it, could Henry get away with something truly vile?

Sonia used to always say that age made everything worse, and Eddie believed it. His anxiety, his insecurity, his acne, all worse with time. Surely Henry’s sick ideas of a fun Saturday activity would grow more twisted with his age.

Eddie pushed himself even faster, not daring for a second to look behind. He couldn’t hear his pursuer, but something in his body just knew Bowers had to be close on his heels. No matter where his mind ventured, he vowed never to be caught in a situation that would force him to learn the truth. He did not want to know what lied in the heart of Bowers and his cruel friends, and he certainly did not want another fucking scar.

Taking the turn at Mulberry too hard, Eddie skidded into an awkward hunch as he tried to keep his balance. The maneuver slowed him slightly, and when he regained his pace he was off kilter. He could feel himself growing shakier with fear, which was causing his steps to falter and fall unevenly. He tried to take another corner when the street met its dead end, but because his motor control was already in shambles, instead of making the hard right he intended, he tripped over his own feet and tumbled into the tall grass of the empty lot in front of him.

Rolling onto all fours and shaking his head, Eddie took a moment to mourn his inhaler, which he’d graduated from nearly four years previous. He took only seconds to catch his breath before remembering what had led to his fall in the first place. Scrambling to turn around and subsequently landing directly on his ass, he let out a disgruntled yell before glancing up in fear, expecting to see Bowers and/or his entourage of douchebags.

Nothing.

Eddie sat in confusion, staring at the empty street stretching in front of him through the wheat grass slowly drifting in his peripheral. There was no Bowers, no Belch, no bozos to be seen. Just the train tracks in the distance and the sun-dried grass.

He let out a sigh of confused relief as he checked himself for scratches. None to be seen, but there were now slight dirt stains in the knees of his jeans. He shielded his eyes from the sun, now squinting, his face a model of sheer bewilderment.

What the fuck had been chasing him?

He slowly picked himself up, unearthing his shoes, which had somehow become entangled with the grass. With one last glance in all directions, scouting for danger, he decided it was safe, and began walking back home.

______________________________________________________________

“Don’t have too much fun without me!” Beverly Marsh called over her shoulder, smirking at her coworker as she left the diner. She received an exasperated laugh and a sarcastic “of course not” as the door swung shut behind her. Haphazardly folding her apron and sticking it under her arm, she reached in her backpack/purse/contraption for her pack and lighter. Finally fishing them out, along with her sunglasses, she began her walk to the library.

Beverly pulled a cigarette out of the box, sticking it in her mouth. She dropped the box into the bottomless pit she called a bag and knew she wouldn’t find it again easily. She could practically hear the echo it made when it hit the bottom. She shoved her glasses on (after quite a few failed attempts) and lit her cigarette, the lighter quickly joining the pack in the abyss. Taking a long, well deserved drag, Bev smiled to herself with relief. Her shift was finally over, and nothing felt better than dropping the customer service facade and just being. She had quite a bit else to be happy about as well; Ben Hanscom was waiting for her at the library, likely with her favorite sandwich she loves that he makes, and plenty of pages left in her current novel of choice to read. The sun was out, warming her skin and adding vitality to her freckles, and Beverly was happy.

She always felt like a bit of a cheese when she did it, but she often took moments like this to acknowledge when she was doing well. It seemed a bit corny at first, but then it truly started to help. After a childhood of constant discomfort, it was a warranted practice, like the tension leaving an unclenched jaw. The pressures of her father and her fears had dissipated when he had been arrested; the free-floating in that period of time when she didn’t know who she would live with was unpleasant to say the least, but she reveled in the fact that she was untethered. When it was finally decided she could stay with her aunt, and her aunt made the decision to meet Bev halfway and move to Derry, she knew that her fresh start was going to change things.

And how had it. She had a boyfriend, a steady job, a loving family for once, and a great group of friends. Adulthood was shaping up to be a pleasant time for Bev, and she was determined to fight for it. So any time she could, she was going over just how good it was. Positive mind, positive life. Every day she chose to see the bright side.

Finishing her single cigarette for the day, (limiting her bad habits was proving itself to be another source of progress in her life) she paused to put it out on the side of trash can she passed before tossing the butt inside. She was just about to turn to the crosswalk when it happened.

It felt like the wind had been knocked out of her. At first, she thought maybe she had been hit with something. She was on the outskirts of the park, so it was likely to be a frisbee or a football, thrown too fast and colliding with her solar plexus. But her vision started to cloud, and as she collapsed onto the bench next to her, she knew something was wrong.

She saw it again; the bird.

It was all she could see. Not the streets around her, the ground beneath, or the sky above. It was just the bird, sitting in cupped hands, turning its head in the small, quick jitters the way only birds do. It looked at her, eyes a gleaming teal blue, and then took off, flying out of the frame. It was like a locked screen, a camera stuck in place on one shot. Even if she moved, or tried to look around, all she could see was one thing; the hands it left behind.

She would recognize them any day. They were Bill’s hands.

As quickly as it came, it was gone. She blinked, taking a deep breath, and the world was back. Cars rushed by, children laughed, a bird chirped in the distance.

______________________________________________________________

Left. Right. Down. Circle. Richie followed the path of the fly with his eyes as it buzzed around his ceiling.

Right. Up. Diagonal. Right. The fly rubbed its hands together. Richie grabbed his pillow and dropped it on his face.

“I’m so BOOOOOOREEDD.” He yelled, the sound muffled by the cotton.

This brief tantrum was followed by a good thirty minutes of the Activity Shuffle. First, reading. Verdict: book too boring. Next, playing his guitar. Verdict: uncomfortable. It made his side hurt. After that, on and on through the next, cycling between doodling, eating, flipping through channels, singing showtunes obnoxiously at the top of his lungs (which only made his side hurt worse). All failing to hold more than a couple minutes of his interest.

Richie hated vacations. On one hand, it was immensely relieving to live unbridled by the death grip of homework, but on the other… Richie was alone. Vacations just meant hours upon hours waiting around for something to do. When they were kids, it was so easy to bike the short two blocks to Eddie’s, persuade him to go to the arcade, and then spend hours making Eddie play Pacman with him. He could even cross downtown to get to Stans, curl up on his bed, and listen to his best friend read him his favorite books. He could take the half hour to Bills, and spend the day practicing another performance for Georgie, Bill giving him a draft of a story for Richie to lend his great impressions to. But these days Stan was too busy with his college prep and Bill never answered the phone.

He could call Bev… when she got off work in three hours.

He tried Ben’s three times. Not home, apparently, according to the annoyed voice on the other end of the line.

He was about to dial Mike’s number when he remembered the farm didn’t have one.

Sighing, Richie sat down in defeat at his desk. His hunched position aggravated the stitch in his side, so he leaned back into a stretch, looking at the ceiling again. The fly wasn’t there anymore.

Just as they always seemed to do these days, his thoughts wandered back to Eddie. He wanted so desperately to call, see what he was doing. It was a Saturday; surely he wouldn’t be busy. But he didn’t go to the phone, remembering Eddie’s harsh words early their junior year.

“You can’t keep calling me Richie. My mom- she doesn’t want me making long phone calls anymore. It’s not personal, okay?”

Richie was still somehow haunted by that conversation. He was always on edge when he thought about the cryptic things Eddie said about his mother. It was no secret to any of the rest of the losers that Eddie’s mom was crazy controlling, but Richie had a feeling it was way worse than Eddie would ever let on. More often than not Eddie would show up to weekend hangouts looking like he’d had seven cups of coffee and two hours of sleep.

Richie had barely seen Eddie since graduation; hardly any of them had. The only person he was allowed to talk to on the phone for any length of time was Bev, and from what she could get out of him, the reason for his isolation was some fixation of his mother's. Ben theorized that Sonia was afraid of Eddie leaving for college, but Stan shut that down by pointing out the fact that Eddie hadn’t applied for any schools.

Richie’s thoughts were interrupted by a sharp increase in the pain in his ribs, even though he was still in the stretch that seemed to be helping. Hissing in pain, he stood up, stretching a different way before plopping face first onto his bed.

He missed his friends. He missed their group outings and movie nights and campfires. He knew it wasn’t over, but every minute he spent not doing those things felt like-

“Ow, fuck!” Richie clutched at his side, which was worsening by the second. Face screwed up in pain, he rolled onto his side, curling into the fetal position. He tried to even out his breaths, employing a tactic Eddie had taught him to help minimize his pain.

Eddie, who had walked him through breathing exercises as he picked glass shards out of Richie’s knuckles-

“Holy shit fucking fuck!” A string of curses fell from Richie’s lips as the pain worsened, and spread. He could feel it in the majority of his midsection, its center migrating to somewhere near his sternum, and taking hold to stay. Richie was no stranger to discomfort, but this was another thing entirely. Hugging himself tightly, he willed it to pass, but when there was no change he looked down at himself in confusion.

His brain stopped, flat out. All rational thought left him, and for a moment there was nothing but a small quizzical notion in the back of his head, like a softly drawn question mark.

The mark quickly grew into an interrobang as he leapt from his bed and dashed to the bathroom, throwing the lock behind him and bracing his arms on the sink. He took a moment to wince through the resurgence of the pain, before quickly grabbing his shirt collar and shucking it off over his head.

Staring himself down in the mirror, Richie saw it fully. Or rather, didn’t see it. Didn’t see half of his chest as a matter of fact.

A section stretching from his liver to his lungs was completely see through. Where there would have been Richie’s bare chest was the bathroom wall and the towel bar behind him. Everywhere there was pain, there was no more Richie.

A gasp escaped his lips as his mind tried to process what he was seeing. Once he regained control (albeit only a little) of his functions, he lifted a hand to his chest, touching the space where it used to be. His fingers collided with skin; both his hand and his chest registered the contact. But in the mirror was a hand seemingly stopped mid air, thrust up against an invisible wall.

Curling his hand into a fist, he beat his chest, the feeling still there. In the mirror he hit an empty hole, fist stopping short. He let out a cry of shock and stumbled backwards, back hitting the wall, the towel bar jabbing into his shoulder blades, instead of going right through him. The pain in the translucent areas persisted, and Richie found himself beginning to hyperventilate. His knees gave out beneath him, back sliding down the wall as he fell into a sitting position. Looking down, he could see the corner where the floor met the wall through part of his stomach.

He wanted to scream; he wanted to puke. A million thoughts raced through Richie’s mind as he sat, shaking. The pain in his chest was constricting his breathing, and he was so lightheaded he was worried he was going to pass out.

Just as he thought the worst of it was coming, it began to subside. The pain rapidly faded, allowing Richie enough strength to pull in long, gasping breaths. He looked down at himself; the nothingness was receding, folding itself away and being replaced with Richie’s familiar skin, his freckles all returning and remaining in the right places. His chest and stomach were still there, the pain and the strange phenomenon dissipated.

Still breathless and shaking, Richie quickly got to his feet. His mind raced as he scrambled to put his shirt back on.

Surely this was some kind of dream? A fever induced nightmare? He must have fallen asleep watching the fly, he told himself.

He must have.

Taking the stairs two and three at a time, Richie dashed downstairs to their phone. Dialing the number he could recite backwards in his sleep, he held the phone in the crook of his neck with his shoulder as he went to the cupboard for a glass.

“Hello?”

“Hello, Mrs. K! Eddie there?” Richie asked with a shaking voice, turning on the tap and filling his glass.

“No, Richard, I’m afraid he’s not-”

“Do you know where he is?” He asked quickly before she got the chance to start in on him.

“He went out to pick up his prescriptions at the pharmacy, he’ll be home soon.”

Richie gulped down the water before responding. “Can you have him call me when he gets back? It’s urgent.”

“Eddie is going to be quite busy when he gets home, he has his chores, Richard.”

“I know, I know, but Mrs.- Miss Kay, its urgent.” Even over the phone she could hear him batting his eyelashes.

“I’ll let Eddie know you called, but he won’t be able to call you back for some time.” She grumbled before hanging up on him.

“Huh. Guess the nickname didn’t stick.” Richie muttered to himself after the line went dead.

He drank the rest of his glass in one go, filled it again, and drank that one. No matter how hydrated he was, he couldn’t shake the terrible feeling in his bones.

Something really had to be wrong with him. Eddie would know what to do, he kept telling himself. If only I could talk to him.

So he left the house, to do exactly that.

______________________________________________________________

Bill always enjoyed the pleasant ride to Mike’s family farm. The road was only ever traveled by delivery trucks or lost tourists (which were about as common as people who actually wanted to get to Derry) and the views were phenomenal. He kept his eyes on the skyline, admiring the trees and path of the sun. Dusk would settle in in a few hours, and by then he and Stan and Mike would be holed up in the barn with the stolen beers in Bill’s backpack and no civilization in sight. He sighed, taking a deep breath of the mountain air as he pedaled on. As frustrating as this phase of his life could be, he couldn’t help but feel light at moments like these.

Thoughts on the smell of the trees and the cool, crisp air, Bill biked right through the middle of the road, not a soul around.

His reverie was brought short by a sharp stinging in his right pointer finger. It was quick and hot, like a bee sting. Coming to a stop on the side of the road, he lifted his finger to examine the sight, fearing the bee had left its stinger in his knuckle.

What he saw was not a bee sting, nor a bee stinger. Where his right pointer finger used to be was an evergreen branch, small, spindly, and growing out of his hand.

Bill yelled and jerked, his brain going into overdrive. His wild maneuver sent him toppling, both he and the bike tumbling into the center of the road. Still yelling in confusion, he scrambled onto his back and held his arm as far away from him as he could. The stinging pain had faded, but the fucking tiny tree branch where his finger had been was still very much there.

“What the fuck? What the actual fuck!” Bill screeched, both his stutter and volume control leaving him as his hand shook. He tried closing his fingers into a fist, willing the vision to go away, but when he bent his fingers the branch bent with them.

“Oh my god… oh my fucking god…” He repeated, watching as the branch moved along with the rest of his wiggling fingers. He repeated this, over and over again, his panic growing with every second. Suddenly the sting returned, in the base of the branch where his knuckle used to be.

“Ah!” He hissed in pain, squeezing his eyes shut, and opening them to his same five digits that he was used to.

The empty silence of the road surrounded him as his breathing slowed. He stared, shocked to his core, at his right hand, now restored to normal. A bird cawed in the distance, bringing him back to the present. He quickly scrambled to his feet, mounted his bike, and resumed his trek to Mike’s, now at double the pace.

______________________________________________________________

Eddie pulled his key out of his pocket with shaking hands. The rest of his walk home allowed his pulse to calm but unfortunately allowed his mind to wander as well. He could not, for the life of him, figure out why he had so strongly felt the need to run away from something when nothing had been there.

Just as soon as he had closed the front door behind him, another was opening from the kitchen.

“Eddie bear, is that you?”

“Yeah, mama, it's me.” He sighed, locking the deadbolt.

“Did you pick up your prescription?” Sonia said softly, approaching Eddie for a crushing hug.

“Yeah. I got it.” He managed, barely hugging his mother back. Once she released him he started immediately towards the stairs.

“Eddie. Come here for one minute.”

“Mom, I still have my chores-” Eddie sighed, turning to face her with one foot on the bottom stair.

“We need to have a talk about those friends of yours again.” Sonia glared, placing her hands on her hips.

“I wasn’t with my friends today, I just went to the pharmacy.” Eddie protested feebly.

“I know that, dear. But while you were gone that Tozier boy called you again and-”

“Wait, Richie called?” Eddie interrupted, instantly worried. Richie had been careful not to call the house after Eddie’s warning, so there had to be something wrong.

“And insisted you call him back, which you are not to do until you’ve finished your chores.”

“Did he say what was going on?” Eddie pressed, worry growing in the pit of his stomach.

“Just that he had an urgent matter to discuss with you. You know I really am not fond of that Richard-”

“I know mom, you’ve told me.” Eddie cut her off as he began dashing up the stairs. He was determined to finish his chores as quickly as possible so he could call Richie back.

Every terrible thought possible about what could have happened to the other boy swam through his mind as he cleaned his bathroom and took out the trash. Richie had been good, so good, about not calling unless he knew Eddie’s mother wasn’t home. Something must have upset Richie deeply if he was so carelessly calling the house.

His last task consisted of gathering and sorting his laundry so his mother could start the load, then after that he was home free. He rattled around his room, grabbing stray socks from corners and throwing them into his whites bin. One had even managed to land in between the little potted succulents on his windowsill.

“Eddie-” came Sonia’s knock on the door.

“Almost have my laundry together mom, one minute.” He said as he grabbed the sock.

“We didn’t finish our conversation earlier.” She started, opening his door. “It was very rude of you to run off like that.”

“I’m sorry, I was just trying to get done quickly. I really need to return Richie’s call.” Eddie tucked his now full laundry basket under his arm, anxiously waiting for Sonia to vacate his doorway so he could get to the washer.

“I don’t think you should do that.”

“W-what?” he sputtered. “Why?”

“Eddie, sweetie, that Richie has never been a very good influence on you. One mention of him and you’re running around like some kind of clueless child. You forgot your manners and you forgot your dishes.”

The dishes. Crap.

“I can do those while I’m on the phone, mom!”

“Eddie, I don’t want you calling that boy back! In fact, I don’t want you calling him ever! You’re grown up now; it's time to start acting like it.” With that she plucked the laundry basket from his hands, turning to exit his room. “You can do the dishes tomorrow, but for now I think you need to spend some time catching up on your reading.”

Eddie’s face went pale.

“No, mom, I- I already read my book for the week.”

“Then you can get started on the next one, sweetie. I’ll come get you at dinner time okay?” She smiled at him, her terrible, cold smile, and closed the door as she left. Eddie stood stunned as he listened to the sound of the lock turning inside its mechanism.

She hasn’t done that since I was fourteen.

He swallowed back the bile that was threatening to rise, anger bubbling next to the worry. He willed himself to move, to make a noise, do something, but he knew he couldn’t argue his way out of it. He would be trapped in his room for the next five hours, at best.

Reeling, he sat on his bed. How could his mother be so… so… psychotic? He was eighteen for God’s sake! She was right in assuming he’d use the phone behind her back anyways, but surely she didn’t need to lock him in his room.

Eddie sat for a long time like that, just fuming over his mother’s audacity. He stared at his hands, which were clenched so tightly into fists that his fingernails left white crescents on his palms. He studied them, counting his breaths, trying every tactic he could to soothe the rage in his head. It didn’t subside for a long while; and Eddie didn’t see the shift as his smallest succulent changed into a flowering cactus, silently on his windowsill.

______________________________________________________________

Ben Hanscom had been waiting at the library for nearly an hour, lunch bag beside him and book open on the desk in front of him. Ben had been waiting, and loving every second of it. The rays of sunshine outside matched his mood to the tee. His morning shift at work had been pleasant and uneventful, his date with Beverly was soon to commence, and the rest of his life? Set. Opportunity stretched out in front of him like an oceanic horizon, gleaming and vast. Graduation had brought Ben everything he wished it would; from his first kiss with Bev under the balloon drops to his acceptance letter at the University of Southern Maine. It got even better when they gave him his gap year, letting him stay in Derry with Bev and the rest of the losers while they figured their futures out.

Not a lot was able to break Ben from his high spirits these days, but the look on Beverly’s face as she walked over to his table sure did.

“Hey, Bev, what’s going on?” Ben immediately caught her shaken demeanor, taking her hand in his as she sat down.

“I’m… not sure, actually…” She said slowly as she hugged at her purse.

“Did something happen at work?” Ben’s brow furrowed.

“No, actually, work was great. It’s just…” she scrunched up her face, thinking hard, but stopped after a moment. “Nothing. Nevermind.”

“It’s clearly not nothing.” Ben said gently, not wanting to push. “But if you don’t want to tell me, that’s okay.”

“No, it’s not that. It just doesn’t really make sense.”

“Well, then we can make sense of it together.” Ben smiled, trying to dispel his trepidation.

Bev watched a cloud move behind Ben’s head through the window. “I think- I had a vision.”

Ben gave her a quizzical look. “Like, psychic vision?”

“Yeah.” Beverly looked at him, confusion and timidity written all over her face. “I was walking here, from work, when…”

“Yeah?” Ben prodded. Bev looked at another cloud drifting into view.

“It was like I couldn’t see anything else. It was just- these hands, holding a bird.” She cupped her hands in her lap, mimicking the hands she had seen. “They were… they were Bill’s, I’m sure of it.”

“So you saw Bill holding a bird.”

“Yeah, but just his hands.”

“And only that? Not anything around you?”

“Like a moving picture. Just one spot.” Bev trailed off as the sky through the window grew the bright gray of midday overcast.

“Has this happened before?” Ben said after a moment of quiet pondering.

“The vision? No. But I have seen the bird.”

“Where?” Ben perked up.

“In a dream I used to have, when I was little.”

They both sat in silence, the sunlight streaming into the room growing dimmer.

“You’re right, that didn’t make sense.” Ben attempted a laugh, earning a small smile from Beverly.

“You’re right, it doesn’t.” She smiled and relaxed, prompting Ben to start getting their lunch set up and to tell her about his book. And just as quickly as it went, the sun came right back out to play.

______________________________________________________________

“You left it next to the barrel, right Stan?” Mike called over his shoulder, searching his end of the barn with his eyes.

“You’re gonna have to be more specific Mike, there’s like… twenty barrels in here.” Stan chortled as he scanned his side.

“Okay, well, I thought it was this one.” Mike turned back to face Stan, hand resting on the barrel in question.

“I’m gonna be honest with you, I don’t remember where I left the shovel. There’s a chance it’s still outside.” Stan called back, turning to face Mike from the other end of the barn.

“You’re supposed to be the responsible one, Stan!” Mike joked as they both walked towards the double doors.

“Not since you came on the scene. I retired and passed the hat to you. Too many years of babysitting Richie. It’s my turn to have fun.” Stan smirked as he walked outside, turning to see the sought-after shovel propped up against the wall. “See! Told you I left it outside.”

“I don’t remember you doing that, but okay.” Mike rolled his eyes as he picked up the shovel. “Wheelbarrow?”

“Over th-” Stan stopped mid-point as he realized the wheelbarrow was not, in fact, in the path of his finger. “The fuck?”

“Okay Stan, it was funny the first seven times-”

“I swear Mike, I haven’t been moving shit!”

“Then you must have been extra forgetful today, this is like the tenth time you’ve ‘misplaced’ something.” Mike laughed, using air quotes.

“Seriously, I don’t know what’s up with me.” Stan sighed, beginning to walk around the opposite side of the barn. “Did we even go over here earlier?”

Mike swung the shovel up onto his shoulder and followed Stanley. “No we didn’t. And yet…” He stopped as they came to the wheelbarrow, upside down in the soil directly in front of them. “You somehow still managed to put it here.”

Stan glared. Mike smirked.

“I swear you’re playing pranks on me.” Stan started unearthing the wheelbarrow.

“Tell it to Big Bill. I’m sure he’ll protect you from mean ole me.” Mike teased as they turned the thing over. After filling it with dirt they set out down the driveway, off to patch up some potholes on the road, hoping to catch Bill’s arrival in the process.

“He said he was coming after four, right?” Mike asked after a few silent minutes of their work.

“That’s what he told me on the phone.”

“Huh. Well it’s close to five thirty now…”

“His house is further away than mine. You’d have to add like, twenty minutes travel time.”

“Right, right, other side of town.”

A pause.

“Has Bill seemed a little off to you lately? He hasn’t seemed… himself.” Mike stopped, leaning on the shovel for support.

“I mean, he wasn’t too excited about graduating-”

Stan was cut off by a loud shout of his name, echoing through the trees. It took him a moment of confusion before looking down the road to see Bill barreling towards himself and Mike, yelling his head off.

Before Stan or Mike could respond, Bill was skidding to a stop in between them, out of breath and in a daze.

“Bill, what the-”

“Guys, guys- listen. L-listen I have to t-tell you s-s-something.”

“Slow down Bill.” Stan said calmly, placing a hand on his shoulder.

“No, n-no you d-don’t understand, something f-f-fucking crazy just happened to m-me.” Bill panted, dismounting from his bike. “I was b-biking here a-a-and-”

“Bill, deep breaths!” Mike reminded him with a firm pat on the back. “We’re not going anywhere.”

“M-Mike, would you listen? For j-just a-” Bill paused to fill his lungs with air a few more times, trying to soothe their burning walls.

“What happened?” Stan asked calmly after Bill’s breathing slowed enough.

“M-my finger turned into a f-fucking tree.”

Another pause.

“I’m sorry, what?” Mike sputtered, his brain refusing to process the sentence.

“On the w-way over here, I was j-just b-b-biking and, and all of a sudden I f-felt this sting, on my fing-finger. I thought i-it was a bee sting, so I looked at it, a-a-and, it was a fuck-fucking tree branch! Right wh-where my finger was. Th-then I felt the, the sting again and it was g-gone!”

Stan and Mike shared a look.

“Are you drunk?” Stan asked after a moment.

“No! Stan, I’m s-serious! I’m fucking fr-fr-freaked!”

“Okay, okay.” Stan threw his hands up in surrender. “Look, its not that I think you’re a liar or anything-”

“But this is pretty hard to believe, Bill.” Mike cut in. “Are you sure this, you know, happened in real life?”

“I-its not one of my st-stories, Mike.” Bill retaliated. “This r-really happened.”

Mike and Stan shared another look, but didn’t spare one for the wheelbarrow, which was now five feet away.

______________________________________________________________

After getting Bill to finally calm down and fully explain his experience, Mike and Stan were still rightfully skeptic. They decided to call off their night plans in favor of Stan taking Bill home and making sure he got proper rest. He and Mike were convinced that what Bill had seen had been the result of the past few months of self-induced mania, and while he resented the sentiment, Bill did have to admit he had been driving himself up the wall, so he caved and let Stan take him home for the night. Mike managed the rest of the chores on the farm just fine alone, though he always had more fun doing them with his friends.

It took him until just after sundown to get everything done, and now all he had to do before heading off to bed was gather the sheep to come sleep in the pen. Picking up the old kerosene lantern that was hanging on a hook underneath the eaves of the barn, Mike attempted to light it, only to no avail. The flint mechanism seemed to be knocked out of place, as the lantern itself still had a long enough wick and plenty of oil. Mike fiddled with it in the dark for some time, trying and trying to get the damned thing to light.

Just as he was about to give up and start his task in the dark, his last frustration fueled attempt proved successful. The flame burst into life and Mike smiled to himself, triumphant. He grasped the handle of the lantern tightly in his left hand and set off to gather his flock.

______________________________________________________________

Derry was known for two things; the primary of which being that there was nothing there to be known for. But the secondary, a fact known all too well by its citizens, was that this was a town where nothing exciting was ever destined to happen.

But three nights ago, in the depths of the forests surrounding Derry’s own barrens, something did happen; something very exciting indeed.

______________________________________________________________

authors notes:

okay so this is my first actual fic for this fandom and im quite excited about it! if you couldn’t tell already this is a bit of a superpowers/supernatural elements au. a huge huge thanks to my lovely beta and friend sara @richiefreakingtozier who has been an immense help in making this happen! if you’re interested in being on a tag list for this fic shoot me a message here and i’ll add u on! if you like this please give it a like or a reblog and stay tuned for more! this fic is probably gonna end up being hella long knowing how i am so i hope u all enjoy the ride! thanks for all the love and i hope u enjoy whats to come (;

tagslist: @gazeboseddie @richiefreakingtozier

83 notes · View notes

harringtonandthehair · 7 years ago

Text

Best Friend’s Brother

Will, El, and Max all consider Dustin their best friend. That doesn’t mean they don’t think his honorary older brother isn’t cute, though. Oneshot.

“We are only here,” Max said, glaring around the table, “because Dustin can’t mind his own damn business.”

“Um, no.” Dustin shot her a dirty look. “We’re here because you guys have a crush on Steve.”

Mike choked on his drink, sending incredulous looks to Max and Will. Max stared defiantly back, while Will blushed and looked down.

“So what if we do?” the red-haired girl challenged, narrowing her eyes. Next to Dustin, Lucas just frowned.

He liked Max very much, after all.

Dustin looked positively horrified. “What do you mean, so what if you do? He’s like my brother! It’s weird!”

“It’s not like we’re flirting or asking him out,” Will mumbled half-heartedly, “We just said he was, you know...attractive. That’s all.”

This was in fact a very humiliating moment for Will Byers because Dustin was a little right - it was weird. He knew that everyone else knew he liked boys, but Steve was a different case. He was kinda Dustin’s honorary brother. And Will knew he’d feel weird if a party member had a crush on Jonathan. He supposed it was the same thing.

Mike was shaking his head at Max. “Out of any high school boy, you could have a crush on -”

“Crush?” El asked softly, joining the conversation from her place next to Mike. “What is that?”

Max jumped in to answer before Mike could - she probably had a better grip on the meaning anyway. “It’s like, when you like someone a lot and - and you want to kiss them and run your fingers through their hair and be with them a lot -”

“Alright!” Lucas shouted, covering his ears overdramatically as Dustin pretended to gag. “We don’t need to hear more, Max!”

She rolled her eyes. “Oh, relax, stalker. Like Will said, we just think he’s attractive. It’s not like I like you any less.”

(That made it better, definitely).

“Crush,” El said decisively, and then leaned in and whispered as though she was telling a huge secret, “I have one crush too.”

Mike grinned. Will smiled at her encouragingly.

“Nice to know you wanna run your fingers through Mike’s hair, El.”

Eleven frowned at Dustin’s words and shook her head slowly. “Not Mike’s hair. Steve’s hair.”

“What!?” all the teens shouted at the same time. The girl jumped in her seat, staring at them with wide eyes.

“S-Steve?” She was looking worried. “His hair is nice and he’s…pretty.”

Mike groaned and buried his face in his hands as Max guffawed, with Lucas clapping Mike on the back and Dustin looking as though he wanted to kill them all.

“Does anyone else have a crush on Steve?”

“Loads of people do, Dustin.”

They froze.

Steve was coming down the steps of the Wheeler basement, a grin on his face. El felt her cheeks burn, as did the other two crush wielders, but not quite as intensely.

She had just been talking about him and now he was here and he would think she was a weirdo if he knew. Or maybe he already thought she was a weirdo.

“So, why are you guys discussing my love life?” Steve ruffled Dustin’s hair over his cap. For his part, Dustin didn’t say anything, just gave all of them a challenging look.

Max rolled her eyes. She was smart enough to know that anything she felt was just because she was at an age and Steve was a cool and fairly handsome guy who hung out with them. Of course it wasn’t a legitimate crush. But that didn’t mean she wanted to ignore it. It didn’t mean that she could stop the butterflies that came whenever Steve cracked a smile at her.

But she didn’t want him to know - besides, Will and El looked downright terrified.

“We’re deciding who’s going to end up most like you in high school, like with the most crushes and whatever,” she said, shrugging, “so far, we think it’s gonna be Mike.”

Mike knew that she had only said it to annoy him, and it worked. He scowled at her as Steve’s eyes lit up in amusement.

“Really, Wheeler the Dealer?” He raised a brow, determined to call Mike anything but his first name. “You’re gonna be King Mike?”

All the kids shuddered at that title, and Mike claimed he would rather die. Will looked up, clearing his throat, and said, “Are you here to pick up Dustin?”

He wanted Steve to hang out with the rest of them too. Maybe he saw them as kids, but at least he took them seriously. And then they’d all be treated to more staring at him.

“And the rest of you little shits.” Steve laughed and ruffled his hair - dammit, did he notice Will flinching? “I’ll drop each one of you off, come on.”

Eleven was the last to get up, giving Mike a lingering hung before she followed everyone else. She knew it was okay for Max and Will to have that...crush, but she was supposed to just like Mike, and no one else. And she did. Then why did she feel so weird when she came around the older teen?

She wanted to cry. Something was wrong with her.

Steve came back in the house. “Come on, Jane, everyone’s in the car - hey,” he said, face softening when he saw her looking upset. “What’s wrong?”

El swallowed, looking down and mumbling, “I - I’m a...bad person.”

“What?” He kneeled down and looked at her - and she was only supposed to like Mike’s eyes, so why -? “Jane, you’re the coolest person I’ve ever met.”

She felt a tear slipping down her cheek and suddenly felt very stupid - she wasn’t supposed to cry right now. What was she doing?

“I’m a bad person because...because…” She took a deep breath - if she had already made a fool out of herself, then she might as well tell him. “Because I’m supposed to like Mike.” She sniffed. “But I like you. Both of you.”

Steve’s face went from one of confusion to surprised quickly, and he stared at her incredulously.

He hated her, probably.

“The one and only Jane Hopper likes me?” He tweaked her chin and said, “Then I’m a pretty lucky guy, then. It’s okay to have crushes, kid. You’re still young.”

“But Mike -”

“Mike might have crushes too. You don’t need to promise yourself to each other, you guys aren't that old.” He bit his lip. “You see what I’m saying?”

“A little.”

“A little is good enough for me. I’m not saying you and Mike don’t love each other, but that maybe it shouldn’t be love yet. Okay?”

“Okay,” she said, feeling a little better.

He hugged her and El pressed her face in his chest, taking a deep breath. Besides the one before, no tears had come out. That was good.

“Max and Will too,” she said, because if it helped her to tell him, then it would help the others too. “They like you.”

Steve’s eyes widened as though he didn’t think it was possible. He lowered his voice down to a whisper.

“Well, let’s just keep that our little secret, okay? It’s probably best to let them decide if they wanna tell me or not. Okey dokey, Jane?”

“Okey dokey, Steve.”

They intertwined pinkies (a trick Lucas had taught her) before going to the car. Dustin was on the seat next to the driver’s, Will was pressed against the window, and Max was tucked into Lucas’s arm, smiling softly.

Maybe Steve was right.

Maybe they weren’t ready for love yet.

Maybe she loved Mike, and maybe she didn’t.

She definitely loved Steve more after tonight, though, but it wasn’t as a friend, and not quite as a crush, either.

Maybe she could ask Max to explain the feeling to her later.

I don’t know, it’s almost midnight and I thought it would be cute for some of the kids to have crushes on Steve and then it turned to focus on El and I’m just sleepy now.

#stranger things #steve harrington #eleven #jane hopper #mike wheeler #lucas sinclair #dustin henderson #will byers #max mayfield #valkyrie stories

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megaphonemonday · 7 years ago

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I absolutely love your prompt alot an i have yet to find a sickfic prompt of pitch yet so i was wondering please if you do one of ginny get sick with the flu during off season and Mike takes care of her please please

Thank you! Also, Super sorry for making you wait so long on this one. I’d say I have a good reason, but that would be a total lie. Hope you saw the other sick!fic I posted back in May, though :)

cheap medicine | ao3

Mike was just getting back from his afternoon bike ride—another ploy to get his cardio up while keeping the strain off his knees—when his phone skittered across the kitchen island. He’d tossed it there face down when he came in, or he would have just glanced over to see who’d texted him. As it was, he was busy chugging down water and monitoring his heart rate to prove that all this low-impact bullshit was beneath him.

Maybe if he hadn’t wheezed up that last hill, he’d believe it himself.

It wasn’t until later—a totally normal amount of time later, thanks—after Mike stopped feeling like his lungs were on fire and had washed away all the sweat, that he remembered the message waiting for him on his phone.

He padded back into the kitchen, towel wrapped around his waist, to see what it was.

A few other notifications had come in while he was distracted, updates from the ESPN app and an email from his agent, but only one text message.

From Ginny.

Mike was pretty sure it meant something that just the sight of her name on the screen made him smile, but that wasn’t a thought he was allowed to have.

So, he settled for getting on with it and opened the message.

Ginny Bakerwhat was that movie u told me about?

Shaking his head, Mike returned, You’re gonna have to be more specific, Baker.

Almost immediately, a bubble and three little dots popped up.

Jesus. Didn’t she have anything better to do?

ugh. u know. the one u with the guy and the thing.

Real helpful.

Shaking his head, Mike hit the dial key. Might as well just hash this out in one go rather than volley back and forth while Ginny tried to figure out what she was talking about.

The line rang a few more times than Mike was used to, especially since Ginny had to have her phone close by. Frowning, he rattled around the kitchen, filling another glass of water while he waited on his teammate to pick up.

Finally, the ringing stopped, though Ginny didn’t say anything in greeting. Instead, there was muffled coughing.

“Baker, if you think that’s going to keep me from making fun of you, you’re wrong. There aren’t many movies I haven’t told you to see. After Livan, you have to be the pop culture weak link on the team, and he grew up in a dictatorship.”

Mike could’ve kept going, but honestly, it wasn’t often that Ginny let him get that far without interrupting him, and he’d definitely given her plenty to interrupt.

“You there?” he asked, pulling the phone away from his face to see if the call had been dropped.

Nope. Ginny was just unusually quiet.

Finally, after a long moment, came a croaked, “I’m here.”

“Jesus, what happened to you?” Mike demanded. Ginny’s voice was naturally a little raspy, but this was something else. Had she been out partying last night? Hard enough to completely lose her voice? No way. That would definitely have gotten attention and the google alert he’d set up would’ve told him if there were any new pap shots.

(It was for the sake of the team, all right? Mike had to know what bullshit they were getting up to. He had one for all the guys.

If he’d set up Ginny’s first, and then worried about being seeming like a creep, that was immaterial.)

She cleared her throat, not that it did her much good. “Nothing. I’m fine. Just tell me the movie.”

“You never take my movie suggestions,” he returned. “Why need one now?”

Ginny huffed and again, it probably meant something that Mike knew the exact expression on her face, but, again, that wasn’t a thought he could be having.

Lately there’d been quite a few of those.

“Fine,” she sighed. “I’m not feeling too hot and figured I could use the down time to make fun of your taste in movies.”

Mike had never known Ginny to need down time, no matter how shitty she felt. Hell, the afternoon after her wild night out in LA, going off next to no sleep, she’d come in and gone hard during the pre-game work out and warm ups. Probably too hard for the day after a start. But she thought that she had something to prove and God forbid anyone tell her she didn’t.

“How sick are you?” he asked, knowing that whatever she answered, he’d probably have to multiply by a magnitude of three or four to approach reality.

“It’s just a cold,” she sniffed, though Mike honestly couldn’t tell if it was disdain or because her nose was dripping.

“A cold.”

“Yes,” she hissed, clearly regretting the decision to divulge even that scant information.

“Bullshit, Baker. How do you know it’s not walking pneumonia?” he demanded, bracing himself against the counter, phone tucked between his ear and shoulder. If she was going to downplay it, he could afford to be a touch overdramatic.

“’Cause it’s not.”

“So your doctor ruled it out?”

There was a long silence over the line before Ginny reluctantly croaked, “… No.”

Mike’s eyes slid shut, his patience tested. “Have you even been to the doctor?”

“No, because it’s just a cold, old man.”

Had she always been this maddening? Straightening and scrubbing a hand across his face, Mike moved on. There was no point in arguing with Ginny when she was perfectly healthy. He had a feeling that being sick just made her more stubborn.

“Sure it is. Who’s taking care of you?”

“Huh?”

The utter confusion in her voice shouldn’t have been so adorable, but there were a lot of things about Ginny that Mike wasn’t supposed to find so adorable.

Patiently, he replied, “Who’s making sure you medicate and eat? That you don’t go out and try to run a marathon?”

“Oh, uh. Me?”

“What.”

“What?” she whined back.

“No one’s taking care of you?”

“Uh, no.”

“Why the hell not?”

“Because I’m 24 and live on my own? I don’t need someone to take care of me while I have a cold.”

Well, she could think that all she liked, but it didn’t make it true.

While she spoke, Mike started hunting around the kitchen for one of the reusable grocery bags his housekeeper used. Inexplicably, they were stashed under the sink, along with the cleaning supplies. He resolved to start washing his produce more thoroughly, and began rummaging through his cabinets for soup and crackers, not trusting Ginny to have much more than protein shakes and grape soda in her kitchen.

“Baker,” he said, packing up his supplies and making a list of things he’d need to pick up at the pharmacy, “you sound like you’re on death’s doorstep. Clearly, you need someone to come keep you alive.”

“I told you,” she protested, “I’m fine.”

Mike would be more inclined to believe her if she hadn’t had to pause in the middle of her protest to hack out a lung. She only just managed to rasp out “fine,” which sealed the deal.

Car keys and supplies already in hand, he told her, “I’ll be over in twenty minutes. Try not to die before I get there.”

“Fuck you,” she wheezed, hanging up.

Mike just chuckled, shaking his head. “This should be fun.”

He was halfway to his car before he realized he was still wearing just a towel and ran back inside to get dressed.

Fun indeed.

Ginny’s head was killing her. Her mouth was dry, but she could feel the mucus from her nose draining down the back of her throat, a slick, grimy ooze that kind of made her want to throw up. If she thought she could actually make it to the bathroom without dizzily stumbling into something, she’d consider it. As it was, she wasn’t going anywhere any time soon The pile of used Kleenexes on the floor practically barricaded her into her nest on the couch. It was so tall, that if she rolled off the cushions, she wouldn’t drop an inch. She knew she was too warm, but she couldn’t stop shivering.

But she was fine. Really.

The fact that the room spun when she hauled herself upright when her buzzer went, didn’t mean much. The creak in her back and joints didn’t mean much, either. She’d been through a hell of a lot of pain in her life, this wasn’t that bad.

Still, she shuffled towards her condo’s front door, where the intercom was still buzzing insistently. It hurt too much to pick up her feet and take real steps. Plus, wearing her fuzzy socks, this was kind of like sweeping. She was multitasking.

She giggled blearily at the thought, but had to stop and wait for everything to steady when it sent her head off into a rapid swirl.

Once she arrived at her goal, Ginny jabbed at the key that would make the buzzing stop and open the lobby door. She didn’t bother to say anything, just unlocked the front door and shuffled back to her nest. If it wasn’t Mike, she wouldn’t be able to put up much of a fight, but with the way she felt, maybe getting crazy axe murdered wouldn’t be such a bad thing.

It would definitely be better than getting woken up by her captain shaking her awake, gruffly demanding, “What the hell are you doing?”

Ginny couldn’t say how she’d managed to fall so thoroughly asleep in the three minutes between buzzing Mike into her building and him making his way up, but she startled awake, thrashing in her blanket cocoon and nearly toppling off the couch.

Once she had her balance back, she glared at Mike. “I was sleeping,” she grouched hoarsely.

“With your door unlocked? Anyone could’ve wandered in!”

She squinted up at him, resisting the urge to flop back into her nest and ignore the worry wart. When he looked ready to start in on a speech, and, really, her head could not take that right now, Ginny finally replied, “And yet, you still felt welcome to let yourself in.”

“Just to make sure you were still alive. I did knock first.”

She shrugged, pulling her blankets tighter around her shoulders as a shiver raced through her.

Mike eyed her critically, though he did soften upon appreciating how pitiful she really was. It was a testament to how godawful Ginny felt that she didn’t start needling him to push against the pity, rile him out of feeling sorry for her. All she could do was cough and sniffle weakly.

“When was the last time you ate?”

“Uhh…” God, why did it hurt to think? She shook her head, eyes shut tight against the way her entire reality shook with it. Finally, she settled on, “I don’t know.”

“All right, lie down before you hurt yourself.” Ginny acquiesced, letting his concern wash over her. “Are you nauseous or just too tired to get food?”

“Second,” she murmured, eyes already drifting shut.

There was a rustling as Mike shoved her secondary pile of Kleenex off the coffee table—the garbage can and floor already full—to make a space for himself. Once seated, the back of his hand settled on her forehead and his skin was so cool that Ginny didn’t even bother not to lean into his touch.

“You’re too warm, Ginny. Do you have a thermometer?”

Ginny was far more interested in the way her name rolled off his tongue, but still managed to shake her head no. Mike’s hand lingered, and he didn’t say anything, prompting Ginny to force her heavy eyelids up and open.

He was staring. Staring with this dangerous mixture of exasperation and fondness that had Ginny’s stomach swooping.

There was probably a better time to lick her chapped lips.

Mike’s gaze darted down, following the path of her tongue. Ginny felt like she was going to burn up, and it had nothing to do with the fever. She kind of wanted to do it again, see if she could get more than his eyes to follow the movement, but Mike shook himself and leaned over to rummage through the bag she honestly hadn’t noticed until now.

“You’re lucky I knew you wouldn’t have one,” he said, pulling out an oral thermometer and shoving it unceremoniously in her mouth. Ginny squawked a little as it jabbed the soft underside of her tongue, but her captain ignored her, unpacking the rest of the bag. A box of saltines, more Kleenex, cough syrup, decongestants—actually it seemed like Mike had cleared out the entire cold/flu aisle at CVS. “I also knew there was no way you’d have any of this stuff, let alone food—”

“Don’t need food if I’m too tired to make it,” she muttered around the thermometer, curling on her side and trying not to get overemotional.

Mike was taking care of her. She hadn’t asked—had very specifically not asked—and he was still here, trying to make her feel better.

“You’ve got to eat to get better,” he replied. “Sleep’s good, but you need food, too.”

Ginny scrunched her nose, just in time for the timer on the thermometer to go off. Mike plucked it from her lips and frowned at the display.

“Definitely too warm. When was the last time you took a shower?”

“Are you trying to tell me I smell, Lawson?” she teased weakly.

“I would never,” he gasped, though Ginny could recall at least three separate times he’d told her she sweat like a pig. Then, giving her a critical once over, tilted his head to the side and continued, “I might think it, though.”

“Aren’t you supposed to be nice to me?” she pouted. “I’m sick.”

Her captain just shook his head, rueful. “I’ll be nice when you answer the question.”

That seemed unlikely, but Ginny still replied, “This morning. I cut my workout short, but I thought it might make me feel better.” She left out the fact that she’d had to sit on the floor, too dizzy and out of it to trust herself on the slippery tile.

“You still went to the gym?”

“I didn’t feel as bad this morning,” she lied.

Mike’s glare clearly said he saw straight through her, though he let it slide. “Well, you need another. You need to cool down and then get some food in your system.”

Ginny grumbled, but started peeling away the layers of blankets she’d shrouded herself in. She didn’t have the stamina today to go head to head with Mike. Still, she couldn’t resist getting in a parting shot as she shuffled off to her bathroom.

“Did you at least bring the movie I wanted?”

Wordlessly, Mike held up a stack of DVDs.

She sniffed and swept—which sounded so much better than shuffled, even if it was less accurate—off, ignoring her captain’s snort of amusement.

Mike was old enough that he didn’t quite trust digital libraries. He liked having physical copies of things, though whether that was due to his age or his childhood, he was disinclined to speculate.

Either way, his movie collection was nothing to sneeze at, though Ginny literally did once she settled herself back on the couch. Having inhaled three bowls of chicken noodle soup after padding out of her bedroom, curly hair staining the shoulders of her t-shirt with water, she looked slightly more coherent. Even if she was demonstrating her terrible taste in movies.

She’d shrugged at both The Sandlot and The Bad News Bears, and eventually admitted the only baseball movie she liked was A League of Their Own, which Mike would allow was excellent. She hadn’t seemed impressed by Monty Python and the Holy Grail or My Cousin Vinny or Clerks, though the copy of The Princess Bride that had made it out of his marriage got a fond smile.

Mike didn’t need anything more, plucking the case from Ginny’s hands and going to figure out her ridiculous entertainment system. He would bet good money on this being the first time she’d used it to do more than keep tabs on sports news for all it was the off season. She’d been going so hard at her rehab, Mike was a little surprised she’d allowed herself to give into being sick. Then again, she’d had a fever of 103.8º. There hadn’t been much choice in the matter.

When he succeeded in getting the TV set up and came back, he definitely intended to sit in the armchair and let Ginny stretch out on the couch. It seemed safer. Even with Ginny running a fever.

But Ginny was sitting up and patted the cushion beside her.

It wasn’t as if he could deny a sick woman in good conscience, right?

So, he settled in next to her to watch Peter Falk read his grandson a story.

Mike got up a few times to get a cool wash cloth for Ginny’s forehead, but it wasn’t like he was missing anything he hadn’t seen a hundred times.

Aside from the way Ginny mouthed some of the lines along with the movie, laughing before a joke even landed.

“You know my movie suggestions were supposed to broaden your cinematic horizons, right?”

She shrugged, unrepentant. “I know what I like, now be quiet,” she hushed, “you’re missing the best part.”

(As it turned out, there were a lot of best parts according to Ginny. According to Mike, watching her light up and laugh, even if sometimes a cough broke in, was any day’s best part.)

In a testament to how much she loved this movie, Ginny managed to stay awake for the whole thing, though by the end she was definitely using Mike to remain upright.

He laid his hand against her forehead again, relieved to find that she was slightly cooler to the touch. “You feeling better?” he checked, just to be sure.

Ginny nodded, humming in contentment, but made no move to get up or remove herself from his side.

“Want to watch something else?” he teased, having watched her eyelids flutter closed and her head jerk at least four times in the past ten minutes. Clearly, what she needed was to go to sleep.

She just shook her head. “I don’t think any of these were the movie I wanted,” she admitted, leaning sleepily into his shoulder and gesturing vaguely at his selection of movies.

“I hate to break it to you, Gin, but I have no idea what movie you were talking about.”

“It wasn’t a comedy,” she replied after a moment’s consideration.

“Well, that’s all I brought. You have heard that laughter’s the best medicine, right?”

Her head lolled to the side so she could squint up at him suspiciously. “That explains why you brought the whole CVS with you, huh?”

Mike rolled his eyes. “I figured a little codeine couldn’t hurt, either.”

Ginny settled back against his shoulder, though her forehead definitely brushed against the bare skin of his neck, chuckling weakly. “Whatever you say, Mike.”

“That’s right,” he said, scrambling to get his bearings and ignore the way she felt, all pressed up against him, warm and relaxed. Not only was she sick, but they would be playing with each other again in less than a month and they still weren’t talking about this. He needed to backpedal, and fast. “Now can I get that in writing? For spring training when you undoubtedly shake me off fifteen times a game?”

“Sure,” she murmured, her dark lashes kissing the tops of her cheeks. “When I wake up.”

“No, no,” he laughed, scooting out from supporting her and dragging the drooping pitcher to her feet. “If you’re gonna fall asleep, you should do it in your own bed.”

Ginny only made cursory protests, especially once Mike looped an arm around her waist and she could lean on him for the short walk to her bedroom. The protests died completely when she fell into the cool sheets of her bed and Mike settled another damp washcloth on her forehead. He smoothed the blankets over her and within moments, she was asleep.

Mike only allowed himself to admire how peaceful she looked for a few seconds before going back out to the living room to begin cleaning up.

Just because he wasn’t going to watch her sleep didn’t mean he was going to leave before her fever broke. Someone had to make sure Ginny would survive to see next season; it might as well be him. (That he didn’t want it to be anyone else’s responsibility was entirely his business.) Just, he’d avoid hanging out creepily in her bedroom and do his best to make himself useful.

And, surveying the wreckage of Ginny’s couch and the pile of dirty dishes he knew were piling up in the kitchen sink, Mike knew exactly how he would do that.

When Ginny awoke, feeling groggy and disoriented, but without the dizzy haze that’d characterized most of her waking hours for the past few days, she was relieved.

A little confused as to why Mike wasn’t there—which was confusing all on its own—but relieved.

She padded out into the living room, and was not all that surprised to find that her blanket nest from earlier had been untangled and folded into a neat pile at one end of the couch. Her coffee table and floor were free of Kleenex and the trash can in the corner had been emptied, too. The personal pharmacy that Mike had supplied had moved to her kitchen counter, along with the pile of DVDs, a note stuck to the top.

Ginny—

How did just reading her name in his scrawl, imagining his low, rumbly voice saying it, tie her up in knots? She didn’t even have her cold-induced weakness to blame.

Your fever broke while you were sleeping. I would’ve waited until you woke up, but my agent wouldn’t reschedule our meeting, so I had to go. Text me to let me know you’re still alive and I don’t have to explain to Oscar that I’ve let his star pitcher die.

Watch the movies, and not just the ones you’ve seen before. Eat the food I left you—don’t just order a pizza and wings—and take the cough medicine.

P.S. Don’t roll your eyes at me. You’re the one who said, “Whatever you say, Mike.”

P.P.S. I still expect that in writing.

Ginny couldn’t help but grin, even as a cough rattled her lungs and left her throat sore. She found her phone and fired off a message to her captain.

still alive, old man. thx for keeping me that way. p.s. ur gonna be waiting a long time

His reply came back, nearly immediate.

MikeThat’s okay, rookie. I can wait.

The bright shock of laughter left Ginny breathless and wheezing, but it was okay.

She felt better than she had in a long time.

#5sosmukefan2015 #bawson #bawson fic #pitch #pitch fic #i wrote something #idk what to tell you #aside from the fact that #mike lawson would be so so #good at taking care of sick people #ginny baker in particular

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sadbirdmusic · 7 years ago

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Thoughts on Linkin Park - One More Light

The new Linkin Park album, "One More Light" was released 19 May, 2017. From someone who has been a fan of their music since Hybrid Theory, knows almost every song by heart, and owns every single song they have made public, I feel morally obligated to voice my thoughts on this “controversial” album.

There was a recent comment made by Chester Bennington to "Get the f--- over" Hybrid Theory. In a less crude way, he was basically saying that Linkin Park is not the same band they used to be. They started out as many of us know as angsty and heavy. Their fan base is probably one of the worst music fanbases I have ever seen - and I'm part of it. Linkin Park fans, in a large majority, are so overly opinionated in favor of Hybrid Theory, so much so that they even hate on Meteora. Then Minutes To Midnight happened and all bets were off. These "Fans" ripped MTM to shreds, only accepting "Bleed It Out" and "Hands Held High" as a couple of the only slightly acceptable songs. As A Thousand Suns (My personal favorite album by them) came out, that was when these fans were so far gone that they more or less gave up on LP. 1000 Suns was the final nail in the coffin for their gradual change in style. LIVING THINGS didn't happen. That just wasn't a great album in general, setting aside the "expectations" for LP. Hunting Party was a sweet redemption for these Hybrid Theory-obsessed fans. HP was what i believe to be a perfect blend of all of the styles they have ever done. There was a comment made by Mike Shinoda that this change in hindsight looks really fast and unpredictable, however, it was over years. These guys have been around since the late 90's with their first signed album in 2000.

One More Light is something very different from Hunting Party, let alone anything else they've done. The closest album they have to OML is Minutes to Midnight. The album feels more poppy and softer than they have ever been. Musically, this album is very enjoyable, though short at 35 minutes for 10 songs. There is a certain compositional feel that LP has generally had in their past 6 albums that seems to be lacking in this album. I don't know how to explain this style, but it's the idea that you would know a Linkin Park song when you heard it, even if you heard it for the first time and took the vocals out.

They definitely conformed to an extent in this album. It' not a bad album, but it id not at all what I would have expected as an original fan who's okay with changing styles. The songs feel more electronic in the studio versions, but from what Mike Shinoda has said, the live versions have significatly more instrumental takes. IN my opinion, I wish they did that instead on this album. It feels like it's only Mike Chester, and Joe with a touch of Rob, Brad and Phoenix in the background. This album just doesn't feel like a pure Linkin Park album - not in the stylistic sense, but rather the compositional sense.

Setting aside the idea that this is a Linkin Park album and listening to simply by the music itself, it really is a great album. The music is enjoyable, well-produced (of course), and captures a wide audience. There is nothing properly wrong with this album. But as I stated previously, the composition just doesn't feel like Linkin Park. Also, many of these songs are very remixable - so rejoice, fellow EDM producers!

My personal score: 7/10 (With Hunting Party at 8/10, Living Things at 5/10, A Thousand Suns are 10/10, Minutes to Midnight at 7/10, Meteora at 8/10, and Hybrid Theory at 10/10)

Favorite songs: Sorry For Now, Talking To Myself Weakest songs: Halfway Right, Battle Symphony, Heavy Chester Bennington needs to chill out a little more - he’s getting really overdramatic about people not liking this album. I feel like Mike is that older brother who’s trying to calm down his spastic younger brother.

#music #linkin park #new music #music blog #one more light #hybrid theory #mike shinoda #chester bennington #music review #album review

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justasmallbloginabigklainefandom · 8 years ago

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The Great ATOG Reread; Grey part 8

Cause I can’t stop reading. This is a liveblog.

Chapter 25

And Kurt thinks, I can endure this. I've endured worse. No. He hasn't.

Ah, young love. Sebastian, our resident bag of dicks, is awful for both of them.

I could write a lot of shit about this and about how Blaine’s on the Phalanx rollercoaster again (even when he’s not Phalanx, I will refer to this as the Phalanx rollercoaster now), but this passage does it all justice.

He tips his cup around, feeling guilty. He wants to be friends with Sebastian. He wants something in his life to be normal. He likes being greeted with a glance confirming that he's wanted, what's so wrong with that? Agent Sylvester treats him more like the Ghost's pet than his partner, the internet can't make its mind up whether he's the sidekick or if he's carrying the helpless Ghost, Blaine doesn't know that some days. Kurt's been weird for a long time, and Blaine can keep attributing it to bad nights on the streets, that team - at its worst, he knows what that team did to him - his job, now this situation with Sebastian; but the truth is just that Kurt is being weird, and Blaine's relationship with Kurt was one of the few normalities he had left to grasp at in his life. Is it so wrong to just want to have something ordinary? Because even Cooper looks at him differently now, like he's still working out if he likes the difference. Maybe even Cooper doesn't know if he does, behind the appraisal in his eyes there is fear: for all he knows every night of Blaine's life is that burning theatre, and it's only a matter of time before the night it's too much. It's weird seeing Cooper scared. The end of Blaine's placement and the end of his course is coming up and if he admits it he is fucking terrified of the real world, of having to actually face people and try to make them better. He's scared of fucking up his course because he never has enough sleep or time, he's scared of having to look for a job, what if he can't find a job? He's scared of not having college's timetables to keep to, the disruption of the life he's managed to keep just on this side of orderly is going to be utter and he's scared. He doesn't know who he is and he can't know how he'll cope with these things. And he would tell Kurt, talk to Kurt, but - But everyone calls him the sidekick, and he can't look so pathetic and lost in front of him . . .

God fuck damnit problem 2.

It’s kind of sad that they’ve reached the point where it’s easier to be the Ghost and Phalanx, because being Kurt and Blaine means hurt and miscommunication. It’s kind of sad they’re aware of the fact that their relationship without masks is getting worse, and they both don’t know how to handle it, so they hide behind their trusted masks.

(Oh, and, uhm... birds)

Oh mother-

Oh. It’s already time for Phalanx to almost fucking fall off that rollercoaster.

(Remember, this is a liveblog, not a review written after I’ve read this crap)

He needs to protect him, he has to protect him, he has to shield him, but - but it's only now facing him saying it that he realises that it's not for Kurt's sake that he's doing it anymore, he needs to be a shield more than he needs to protect him, and he doesn't know how this happened, how he became . . .

I know by now how Phalanx feels about homophobia and how it hurts him. I mean, how does it not hurt? But most night, Phalanx has learned to ignore it, but that wasn’t the right solution. Whereas I agree with the Ghost 100000%, Phalanx needed to do this to get it out of his system.

He’s tired.

So fucking tired.

Coping has become something he’s gotten used to, because with the life he’s living, all he can do is cope and it still hurts.

AND OG SHIT IS THIS THE MOMENT WHEERE PHALANX ADMITS TO THE GHOST WHAT HAS BEEN DONE TO HIM OH HOD I AM NOT READY?

(Once again, I have the urge to scream. This part always makes me want to scream)

His voice is shaking. "That I don't know who I am."

Oh Jesus, I know I’ve listed Blaine’s problems, but there’s actually only one. Problem 1, 2, and 3 are combined. He has an identity crisis because people keep seeing Phalanx as less than the Ghost, which leads to him regretting some choices he’s made and longing for some normal stuff, which only makes him feel guilty because he doesn’t know what that does to him and who he is and what he’s capable of.

He always says the Ghost is unpredictable, while really, in his eyes he’s the one who is unpredictable.

"Phalanx." He squeezes his hand hard. "Oh my god. Do you actually do this, you sit around comparing yourself to other people's ideas of other people? Like there's not enough in our lives to drive us insane before you start listening to them? Because they don't know us, you know they don't, that's the point. The way they talk about me isn't me. And you know that and I know you know that so why would you think that anything they say about you . . . because I never wanted you to be another me, you know I didn't, you're - better -" "No."

Of course, the Ghost is so confused. Because of all this shitty miscommunication, the Ghost hasn’t noticed any of this at all.

What’s the best solution?

Throwing yourself off a building.

Oh how I love the Ghost.

He’s right about Phalanx, though. Phalanx should stop seeing the Ghost as a victim. Phalanx does not get to decide whenever the Ghost needs to defend him. He’s the Ghost of New York City for fuck’s sake.

And Phalanx is Phalanx.

There's a lot to take in. There's so much to take in and some of it is - heavy and dark like a bruise he has to accept, he knows he just has to bear, but mostly he feels - mostly he feels - He feels so light it's like he has wings, straining for flight in the air this high over the city. Because he told him. He told him. And the Ghost - Kurt -

I almost started crying, but this time from happiness. I feel the exact same thing. This fic is kind of burden for a reason, and finally it feels like there’s this heavy thing being lifted from my shoulders.

He laughs, can't stop it, he feels so light, he feels - lifted - out of all those dark places, all those confusing shadows, the Ghost took a look at his dark places and he's not afraid of the dark. He just marched into them for him and said, There's nothing here. It's just shadows. There's nothing scary, look. If there are any ghosts, they can do him no harm now. Maybe they never meant harm to begin with.

Enjoy your coffee, boys.

genderflipped ghostlanx hell yes \o/ I hate when assholes only flip *one* of them because thanks for erasing their queerness guys, but girl-on-girl ghostlanx srsly does do it for me <3 An m/f couple is not automatically a straight couple yeah, but given how heterosexist thr world is anyway, I have no faith that people are being *clever* when they only flip one, they're 90% probably just being a dick.

Shit, fandom is on a roll. (They’re both right)

For the first time in this entire verse, Ghostly is high key freaking out. We’ve seen her freak out before, but now you finally get what’s going on and why she rejects BB. Given the fact that they’re both adults, age isn’t important, and Ghostly knows that.

But Ghostly, the woman made of steel, is afraid.

Or not 'as soon'. That's the worst thought. What they would have done to him. How long it could have . . . it would never have been just death.

Phalanx is back on the rollercoaster, but this time the Ghost has strapped him in his seat. He’s slowly realising that all the dark thoughts that have been nagging him... aren’t that big of a deal.

BUT

You know what I love about Grey? The solutions to the problems are so small and so easy, and they make those problems feel like nothing. Yet, they’ve suffered. They’ve suffered a lot.

Yes, looking back on them, those problems were fucking easy, but that doesn’t mean they weren’t bad. Rainjoy is a genius for doing that. The problems and the suffering were still valid. As a reader, you’ve seen how much this has fucked Phalanx up. You’ve seen that, even though the problems seem relatively easy to handle, they’re not easy and unimportant at all and Phalanx’s pain and suffering was real and valid.

Some stories fall in the “YOU’VE BEEN OVERREACTING ALL THIS TIME GROW A PAIR” trope, which is just awful. Rainjoy doesn’t follow that trope. Rainjoy writes reality.

He's allowed to struggle. He's allowed to not be sure. He's allowed to find it hard. That's what life is. And the joy of being allowed to fuck up, he could cry, he never knew how hard he was trying until he was told that he could forgive himself for it.

YES!

Oh wait, this is also the chapter where he gets poisoned? HE REALLY CAN’T HAVE NICE THINGS, EH.

I hate the Pink Dagger. How can someone be such a great, yet awful, villian?

Chapter 26

Oh shit, all that was just ONE chapter? This is what happens when I liveblog.

Phalanx is dying. AGAIN.

Why does this always happen to Phalanx? This and the fucking rollercoaster I named after him.

Phalanx means so much to him, he’s willing to break all the rules? Driving with Finn? Cool, why not? Stopping in front of Mike and Tina’s apartment and making it obvious they know each other? Sure? Willing going to meet a villian, knowing it’s a trap? Yeah?

Two things to remember about the Pink Dagger. One is that he does have an incredibly twisted sense of honour when it comes to the superhero vs. supervillain game; he understands the rules they're supposed to work by, and he sticks to them. If he said that he made an antidote then he almost certainly did. He's not actually evil, not as the Ghost knows evil. He might want to take the Ghost down out of sheer petty spite but he's got very little against Phalanx, and if he said that he made an antidote, in his ridiculous, overdramatic way, he probably did. The Ghost does have a chance to save Phalanx's life - if he can actually get that antidote. Two is that he's a coward.

OH god. Again, he’s one of the most brutal villians, but he’s also awful at being a villian? This is why Rainjoy chose Sandy Ryerson to be a villian.

Why is he so dangerous? This is awful. He’s forcing the Ghost to relive his worst memories and to make his worst fears seem real. It’s so bad the Ghost fucking gives up.

But he does that. He fucks up the rules for Phalanx.

Mike picks something up from the night table, lets a breath out like he needs to steel himself, and injects it into the drip running into Kurt's arm. "He's been drugged. His fear responses are - I'm trying to regulate them. He was calm enough when he got back, it's only when he started waking up that he -"

Can’t these guys get some rest?

They need a vacation, but Mike and Tina will have to pass for now. They’re good people.

It is awful. Blaine knows that what the Pink Dagger did to the Ghost was supposed to kill him. That he's alive at all is because he had people to help and because he's incredibly fucking strong, and, Blaine knows, because he's incredibly fucking proud; Kurt might die, but not to someone who calls himself 'the Pink Dagger'. But he hangs, still, on the precipice of how weakened he is. What was done to him should have killed him, and what he teeters on the edge of isn't just that his heart beat itself so hard it could have ruptured, that his lungs could have suffocated him by breathing too hard. He was dying of fear. He didn't have a clue where he was, he didn't know what was happening, he just knew that he was terrified almost to the point of it killing him and for all he knew alone in it, and Blaine doesn't know what desire Kurt could have left for waking up. He leans to his ear, brushes his hair behind it with his fingertips, murmurs to him, "Finn's here." He strokes his wrist. "You going to wake up and say hi . . . ?"

FUCK.

Kurt’s recovering, but he can’t fully wake up. Blaine is still recovering too, but at least he’s awake, and he can think. Kurt seems incapable of doing anything.

Finn carries him, over his shoulder and unresponsive, down to his car. They only get a few stares, the incredibly tall man carrying the smaller unconscious man like a rolled up carpet, the shambling little guy leaning on a much taller and very bruised man with a woman carrying the bag to the car behind them almost in tears. People have seen weirder. This is New York.

Bless.

And Kurt gave Blaine his life back: Blaine will never fail him now.

Double bless.

I feel bad for Rachel though, since she’s not used to this, but that’s life.

This is so fucking hectic and sad, at this point I even miss the fandom.

Because Kurt gave him a new mirror to see the world with, and now that neither of them are on their feet, he really has the time to look into it, to see the world reflected the right way. To see himself reflected the right way, finally.

Thee times bless. I am just so happy for him that Blaine’s feeling so good about himself, even though he’s half-drugged.

But now he has time to think and slowly,

God. Blaine's not the only one struggling with what other people say about him.

he starts to realise that they’ve gone too far and that they need to talk. Kurt has changed to world the day before, and Blaine wants to do the same.

Both Blaine and Mike know medical shit (I don’t), so they both know the awful truth: Kurt doesn’t want to wake up. Well, Blaine’s not gonna let that happen.

The line opens, and he says, "Hi, Mr Hummel."

Chapter 27

Oh, you get Kurt’s POV.

This is kinda sad.

He’s so defeated. He’s ready to die.

Thinking Blaine will always have Sebastian anyway. Well fuck that bag of dicks.

It's not just the streets, it's every magazine he opens, every time he turns the TV on, every time he overhears another joke in a café, every time he goes online. Be yourself! society sings, and then, You're doing it wrong. Kurt can't do it right.

Please, don’t die.

Well shit, I know you won’t die. I mean - JULIO.

But it’s so sad to read about someone who wanted to give the world everything, but got nothing back.

He got stopped by the police, once. Came back to Kurt's apartment on a Saturday afternoon and the showers at his gym were out of order, he'd travelled back hair sweat-wrecked, more Phalanx than Blaine, still in his gross boxing gear and not the neat polo shirt and bow tie packed in the bag over his shoulder. And he'd been - his smile was a little wrong, too broad, as he recounted too amused that a couple of cops had stopped him for questioning (for walking while in possession of a suspicious skin colour?), like it was funny, when Kurt stared at him thinking, What? The police have never stopped Kurt. Not for all those years Kurt actually was performing illegal activities every night, no-one ever looks at Kurt and thinks of trouble, and looking at Blaine making light of it Kurt thought, They never would have stopped me. Not if I came straight from aikido looking like I'd just been in a fight. They would never stop me just for being on the street. Blaine had shrugged, grinning, and gone to use Kurt's shower. They both knew he was more startled by the incident than he'd let on, but Kurt suspects that he's the one who remembers it more often than Blaine does now. Because Blaine makes light of it so he doesn't feel hurt and angry, and Blaine's inherently sunny nature pushes these things out of his mind, and to Blaine, of course, this is only one incident amongst all the incidents that make up his life and can be catalogued as such - but to Kurt this was new and appalling, it was sickening. The one tick box that never will hurt Kurt: the cops who stopped Blaine knew nothing at all about Blaine that mattered to them except that they could tell that he wasn't white, and for once, his appearance didn't even 'pass'.

What good does it do Blaine, how will it possibly help him survive, if the only difference between them is that Blaine is forced to live by two tick boxes that will never be right instead of one . . . ? No wonder he claimed that he didn't know who he was, how can he? Caught between straight enough, male enough, white enough and the boxes that forces him into, how can that make him feel about the other halves of himself? Be yourself! society sings. Just not like that.

Is it weird I think about this a lot? I recently made a doodle of Phalanx and Incendiary, in costume, looking unamused and it read “NOT WHITE, BUT NOT A CRIMINAL”

Blaine isn’t black, which is kind of a terrifying thought. The way people stereotype black people is fucking awful, but I sometimes feel people forget that all PoC have this problem. It doesn’t matter what colour your skin is, as long as it isn’t white, they will look right through you.

Society says, Be yourself! We have already designated which 'yourself' is acceptable.

Shit son.

BUT FUCK YEAH PAPA HUMMEL IS HERE, READING VOGUE.

Really Kurt, wake up.

"Buddy, I hate to do this to you, but you gotta start wakin' up. You're scaring your doctor. Don't even get me started on your boyfriend. Kurt." He nudges his cheek again, until Kurt drags his eyes back open. "You're scarin' me."

WAKE UP.

AND HOLY SHIT

NON

THIS

OH I AM NOT READY

GHOSTLY

I wish I could put the entire passage in this post, but it’s too much. Ghostly. I’ve read a lot of good Ghostly stuff over the past week, but this is the best of all of them, because she’s right. This wears you down.

So here is the second thing I'd suggest, before the next time you treat someone else like shit because it's less effort than stopping to think before you start to type: imagine a mask on every person you see. Imagine that *they* deal with impossible shit you haven't got a clue about, imagine that they suffer such crap that other people throw at them, imagine that *they* make sacrifices to make the world a better place and that they deserve our respect for it, because you know what, fandom?

Ghostly, I love you.

This part of this chapter is needed, because you delve right back into the pile of shit that is Kurt Hummel’s current mental state.

Blaine stares at his coffee, then shakes his head, slowly. He takes a sip of coffee, holds it in his mouth and thinks before he swallows. Blaine has spent too long letting other people dictate to him how he should think and feel and live; Kurt has spent half his life coping with things he can't cope with by living for other people instead. And it's only now they've hit this wall that Blaine realises that neither of their coping methods work. Blaine can't let himself be pushed and pulled by other people, can't let what other people think dictate to him who he is but Kurt can't keep on disappearing the way he does, just submerging himself into other people's needs, fading himself away because he thinks that someone else needs something more.

Blaine is realising that they have missed so much. Kurt really had no idea what Blaine was going through, and now Blaine understands that Kurt’s been coping on his own too. Burt Hummel reminds him of that.

They don’t necessarily have to talk about heavy shit only. Just knowing they’re both awake and together is enough.

Amused, now, "How was your day, Blaine?" "I sang a medley of nineties girl group r'n'b in the shower." Kurt's laughter ripples under Blaine's cheek, sunlit water over stone. "I know, I could hear it." "I really enjoyed it." "I could hear that too."

Chapter 28

Something was finally restored to him in all that shouting, all that spent grief, something more than just Blaine's body was healed by that antidote. Returned to Kurt again is the boy he first met, wiser but still bright and enthusiastic and sweet, chivalrous and hopeful and kind, he looks at Kurt and it's like he sees him. His eyes are actually on him. He's actually smiling because of him. And he actually seems to look at him. He actually seems to listen and hear him. Because for so long now they've been so used to each other, Kurt felt himself so dull to Blaine as Blaine went for coffee with Sebastian and what was Kurt anyway, Blaine already knows Kurt and Kurt is hardly the most interesting creature on the planet, the most interesting part of Kurt is the Ghost. Blaine fell in love with the Ghost first, it's not like Kurt ever could complain, but, but - How long has it been since Kurt felt noticed? Phalanx and the Ghost were for so long so much steadier than he and Blaine were, in that costume Phalanx paid attention to him, in all that dull grey the Ghost was actually noticeable.

Welcome back, idiots.

It’s still so shitty how defeated Kurt feels. It’s like he has a time bomb strapped to his chest. He seriously thinks he’s going to die. He stops caring. Why care? One day, it will all be gone.

And Kurt goes with Brian, because whatever. Blaine is with Sebastian anyway.

Both of them are just... sigh. Kurt realises what’s Brian after, and Blaine realises Sebastian is a bag of dicks.

Fuck Sebastian and fuck anything Sebastian says. Blaine is defined by the choices he makes: now and every time, he's choosing Kurt.

Good. Sebastian is disgusting. You know who else is disgusting?

So if Ghostly's not here to yell at everyone for like expressing an opinion, I DO FIND THE WAY HE STANDS REALLY ANNOYING OK. Like Jesus we *get* that your gay already I'm sorry, I didn't realize people needed telling this, the fandom's angriest woman having stuff going on in her life doesn't mean that you're not a dick. *Fuck* you.

Fandom. I take back what I said, I don’t miss them anymore.

paleandghostly wrote a thing once about how people want to see puckzilla as a monster because its easy but hes more complicated than that i liked her, noone writes puckzilla meta, hope youre ok paleandghostly xxx

Dude what. You say something reasonable for once.

Was it just because he was still too drained to go back to work, he should never have gone out, and he panicked at his body failing him? Blaine knows how hard Kurt pushes himself and how Kurt's shortened limits might scare him right now. If he felt himself too ill to get home on his own, could that have kicked him into . . . ? But he hasn't done that in months. He hasn't for months and months, Blaine's been so proud of him, Kurt practising meditation breaths and reading up on CBT, Kurt so determined and strong. He hasn't done that in months. How worn down must he be to go back to that old fear, like no-one exists who'll protect him and he can no longer protect himself?

UHM YES TO TALKING ABOUT THIS.

Oh Jesus. The “break-up” is heartbreaking, because Kurt is drowning in his lack of self-confidence and Blaine can’t help him.

Kurt’s problem 2 is really suffocating him.

And he's been strange for months, because of - This. Because of this. He's been strange for months while he was disappearing and didn't - couldn't - tell him - "No. No."

NO.

#lb 2017 #i need to stop #lb reading #atog grey #the great atog reread

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gleefail · 4 years ago

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Glee Memories: 1x12 MATTRESS

A long, long time ago, as Glee was approaching graduation in Season 3, I found myself nostalgic with some rare free time on my hands. So I decided to rewatch the series from the beginning and jot down some memories, discrepancies that have arisen since, fave quotes, tally solos - all that good stuff, strictly for shits and giggles.

8 years later (eek!) and once more I find myself with an unexpected abundance of free time. With so many revisiting or being newly introduced to the show between binge watching during Quarantine and all the tragedy that has surrounded the show since it went off the air, I figured I’d finish what I started. And by finish, I mean go through the end of S3. Cause I truly cannot acknowledge what happened after that. Except for 5B.

Kicking this off by reposting the first 15 episodes I already went through. Enjoy!

1x12 MATTRESS Yearbook pictures. Ruh roh. I remember this ep. It ended sad for me. :(

Ken thinks he’s gonna drop 20 pounds in less than a week. Oh boy.

Remember that time Ken totes planned his and Emma’s wedding the same time as Sectionals so she couldn’t go, then pretended he didn’t, then Emma stood up for him when Will caught on? That was fun…douche Ken.

“Got myself a bit of an eyelift. And while they were in there I told em’ go ahead and yank out those tear ducts. Wasn’t usin’ em’.”

Is Sue right – do yams really draw the water out of the skin? Hmm…yam diet, eh?

“We have all felt the cold humiliation of a slushie in the face” Not yet, Kurt. But apparently you ALL will. Still double-checking that. Rachel, Finn, Quinn, Puck, Kurt, Mr. Schue.

“What’s a patriotic wedgie?” “It’s when they hoist you up the flagpole by your undies.” “Strangely it did make me feel more American.”

It is TERRIFYING, the fates of these kids in previous glee yearbook photos whose pictures were defaced. OMG.

“He barks at my mom.”

Alright. I gotta say it. It is totally not right or legal I’m sure for Figgins to ask for Glee to pay for their own photo. He’s saying that’s what a full page ad costs…but the school doesn’t pay a thousand dollars for each club’s picture. Shenanigans.

Okay. So I’m watching this post-Props/Nationals. And I’m pissed. Rachel just came storming into Figgins’ office to petition for a Glee yearbook photo. She says “As you may know, this is my first year in Glee Club” – THE FUCK?!?! So she wasn’t in Glee her freshman year?!?! So she started the same time as Tina, Artie, Kurt, and Mercedes?!?! So we DIDN’T miss a year of her ‘earning it’ more than anyone else around her? THE FUCK, Glee?! THE FUCK, I ASK YOU!

Hey, remember that time that Rachel joined every club possible? Hey, remember how 2 seasons later she’ll say she doesn’t have extracurriculars for her NYADA audition application? Hey, remember how in Props she says she’s involved in 6 clubs? WTF? #oops

Quinn wants her kids to look back on her yearbook pics and be proud. “Not the bastard one I’m carrying now…” Ha!

Quinn is gonna get in that yearbook photo for the Cheerios and back on that squad whether Sue Sylvester likes it or not. Quinn is braver than I’ll ever be.

Terri is so supportive. She just told Will to wear the tie for the Glee Club photo that’ll go best with the cool kids defacing of it.

“Oh great. Why don’t you take the food out of the refrigerator and give that to the kids?” hahaha. Overdramatic and exaggerating, but still funny.

Will is going behind Terri’s back to pay for the photo. Yup. That’s a strooooong marriage they got there…

Ok. Rachel just said if she is in one more club she would officially be the most involved student in the school. Yet she HAS to run for Senior Class President because she has nothing for her NYADA application and she is convinced she won’t get Maria…and even after she GETS Maria, she still doesn’t drop even though her ‘friend’ Kurt really needs it and really wants to be prez to make a difference while in the position. She is awful. They turned her into an AWFUL human being. That we’re no longer supposed to laugh at, but admire. And honestly so far in the series, she’s not so bad. So…lemme see if I can pinpoint in my rewatching when the decline of her character started…

The look Kurt has when he just gets up and walks away from Rachel’s GayLesbAl suggestion. Hi. Lar.I. Ous.

And Mercedes is chillin’ with Matt and Mike. I’m tellin’ ya, I thought she was like, a popular girl!

“I nominate Rachel.” “Second.” Kurtcedes love.

…two things: 1. I think Will uses Emma’s counseling services more than any student. Or all of them combined. 2. He does know she’s not a psychologist, right?

haha. Emma and Will are acknowledging how annoying Rachel is. It’s cruel, but..yes. Teachers do that.

As captain of the Glee Club, did Rachel (or Finn) ever have to do more than have the responsibility of this first yearbook photo? I know at times Finn tries to take on a leadership role but…it’s such a useless position.

:) Aw.Rachel went to Mercedes first to be co-captain. I like that. Maybe it’s cause I’m thinking of TroubleTones and how well and fairly she led them.

“Because I don’t wanna be in a picture with you, it’ll get defaced.” “No it won’t.” “Yes it will, I’ll be the one doing it.”

Rachel is saying that the football players and cheerleaders are only in Glee because of Finn. Hmmm….well, Quinn kinda but more cause of Rachel trying to steal him. We don’t know exactly why the football players joined but it was after they won that game and danced with Kurt and Mr. Schue…and wasn’t it Finn that didn’t choose Glee over football when all the rest of them did? Did I imagine that? No? Just checking.

Haha. Smile. I like this song. I had a friend who hated Glee because everyone loved it. He’s one of those “If everyone loves it it can’t possibly be because it’s good, it’s cause it’s a stupid fad” people – you know the type. He was into this girl and I knew she liked the show so I liked to tease him about how he probably watched it with her. I think he said this song was the first time he saw any of the show and he was confused. I remember I was like “oh, you saw like, the first time they did a song that made no sense in the moment at all. Like, it wasn’t used to further the story, it was out of context except the title of it and it wasn’t supposed to be a performance either. They never do that though. Watch it again.”. Wow. Thinking back on that now…this was the first moment that happened. And it ended up happening SO many more times. Just…wow. Historic moment right there.

And still, this song is such an odd choice for learning to pose for a yearbook photo. It could’ve been cut completely. Why wasn’t it? It didn’t even bother to further the Finchel storyline either. It was cute and fun and I like the song and I’m glad they did it so I have it on my ipod for workouts, lol, but…unnecessary.

It annoys the crap outta me when they act like they’re sightreading sheet music on this show. No. You are not. And you do an awful job pretending like you are. Just stop.

Ooh, Brad’s getting his jam on, lol.

hahaha. Karofsky just asked how to spell loser. Really? Also, is he officially a football guy now instead of a hockey guy? Ok. Sure. Why not.

I always wonder how people act to a pre-recorded voice-over of inner monologue when there’s more than just “I’m sad” happening with their sub-text. How do they sync that up to the acting journey so well like in this moment that Rachel’s giving her self a pep talk in the mirror? It’s like magic to me, lol.

“I can cry on demand. It’s one of my many talents.”

“Aside from nudity and the exploitation of animals, I’ll pretty much do anything to break into the business.” It’s funny cause I saw Lea Michele topless in Spring Awakening prior to this.

Finn bitches about Glee bringing down his reputation, take three.

“Do you think I have a potato head?”

haha, I do love love love how Rachel shames Finn during this scene. Every time she says his name it’s like a bitch slap for bailing on the yearbook photo.

they’re reeeeeeal excited about selling mattresses. Wanky.

Oh, this brilliant brilliant script for the mattress commercial: *sigh* “Ah me” “What’s wrong?” “We just lost our jobs. At the factory. And we can’t get a good night’s sleep” (emphasis on ‘night’s’)

“We should perform.” “Perform the lines…as I wrote them.” I wonder if that was a shoutout/threat to this cast from RIB. Or how many times they’ve heard that if they ever bring up continuity etc. Just me?

Oh Jump. Ok. Let’s talk about this. Super fun number. Great vocals. Also the first time I realized AmberRiley is the shit. Except it took a couple people to make me realize it wasn’t just cause I love listening to her, it’s cause she’s a one of a kind, super rare talent. My one friend pointed out the actual notes she’s belting like it’s a fuckin’ hiccup. ‘Ain’t no thang. I’m Amber fuckin’ Riley. What? Can’t everybody belt that?’ That’s what I imagine she thinks when she pulls off shit like this. Also, one of my students ALWAYS requested this for warm-ups because “she’s so fucking amazing”. And despite the profanity, I was so proud of him for realizing that, even though he was a 16 year old popular-ish boy and she wasn’t the cheerleader or super popular hot chick on the show. And watching my students reacting to her in this and praising her. All of that combined made me go “how did I miss this? Normal people can’t sing that way.”

Will just found the pregnancy pad. Oh shit. Shit’s about to get real. Terri did tell a very convincing lie, without batting an eyelash about how it was just so she could try on clothes for the coming months. That says a lot.

This scene is good. To the point it makes me uncomfortable.

“This marriage works because you don’t feel good about yourself!”

“Quinn Fabray”. Ugh. I can’t even imagine being Will in that moment. How deceived and betrayed he must feel. Man. I’m uncomfortable watching this.

It drives me nuts when people bring up promises made under false pretenses. Terri brings up now how Will promised to remember how happy they were and that they loved each other…at the fake ultrasound. Yeah. Your lie negates the promise, idiot. Rachel does something similar in regards to “you said you’d never break up with me” to Finn in season 2 after she cheats with Puck. People are fools.

Seriously though, how does Will not even question those mattresses and just bust one out. And couldn’t he have slept on it without taking it out of the plastic? High maintenance much? ;) Honestly though, if I found a stack of MATTRESSES delivered to my drama club kids saying “thanks for all your hard work”..I’d raise a fuckin’ eyebrow and question what they’d done to earn that. It’s sort of suggestive, is it not? Or do I just have a dirty mind?

haha. Something I’ve always loved about this moment when Sue overhears the mattress commercial at the tv studio is that moment where she thinks she just hears Rachel Berry near. Her reaction, and me always thinking “what would I do if I thought I heard Rachel Berry outside of the one place I’m forced to have to” always makes me laugh.

“oooohhhh, I got nuttin’ to say to you, preggo.”

They’re disqualified from Sectionals!!?? Oh no! Lol. This was before I knew what RIB was capable of. When I thought they’d go the honorable, legit route with this show. I was wracking my brain to figure out how they’d get out of this one. Oh how wrong I was.

“And what if I were to innocently murder you, William?”

“I’m sorry, but Glee club is over.” “It’s. OVER!” Dun dun dun!

“It’s like looking at a porno star in a nun’s habit.” re: pregnant Quinn in her Cheerios uniform. Amazing.

Season tickets to Cedar Point!! Yay for accuracy, Glee!

Listen. Quinn has a lot of rage. She’s talking to Sue like she’d talk to Rachel or some other underclassmen ‘loser’.

Quinn just quit Cheerios sorta to be in Glee club instead. We’ll find out, but my memory is that she’ll start wishing she was back on that squad and complaining about it real soon. No?

Okay. HOW is Will disqualified for being paid for what he does…when he gets PAID to RUN the Glee Club? Makes noooo sense. He should be fine.

Charlie Chaplin Smile. Such a sad song. This montage is so good though. It’s one of those times Glee kinda moved me. I got choked up. And my heart dropped to see people defacing this photo when they’d all taken a step forward and were so proud. This is hard to watch right now with Glee Graduation mere days ahead. :(

Also, I miiiight still listen to this song when I’m having a hard day to try to turn it around. Good song.

Aw, Karofsky figured out how to spell loser. Good for him.

Okay, so I’m pausing this to take a look at the comic brilliance of these cool kids defacing the picture. They gave Santana a pitchfork. No shit, Sherlock. They’ll all call her Satan in Glee soon enough. They gave Kirt a skirt and boobs. Cause he’s gay. Brilliant. :/ They gave Finn buck teeth. Matt got a fro (RACIST!). Puck got devil horns. Mercedes got…a cigar? No, giant buck teeth and…a lollipop? They drew a happy face on Tina (? The fuck?). Nothing to Mike Chang or Britany. Artie got devil horns and a mustache. Rachel got a pitchfork. Quinn got..a giant Rabbi beard? They crossed out Rachel’s face and wrote ‘lame’ with an arrow pointing to her. This is the most UNcreative defacing ever. I’m disappointed. Be better bullies! Or funnier ones at least! SOLOS: Rachel (3), Finn (3), Mercedes (1) MERCEDES TAKES THE GLORY NOTE: 3rd time

#Glee Memories #Glee #lol Glee #Glee Mattress

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theartone · 7 years ago

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A Study in Miscommunication -Chapter 10

<<Chapter 1 <Chapter 9

----John's POV----

It was going to take me ages to get down these stairs and Sherlock looked so worked up! It was obvious that he'd be long gone by the time I made it to the front door. Why on earth had I bothered to come here? I thought it would be more exciting. Sherlock made it sound like it would be like something from American television. Full of gore and perhaps a little drama.

Some officers walked up the stairs, ignoring me; one going so far as to nearly cause me to fall over. 'I don't belong here. I belong over there, back in Afghanistan, where I can be useful and help people.' I thought.

Once out of the building I saw Sherlock left ages ago, as expected. Why did he drag me along if he was just going to leave me there? Was it fun for him to waste my money? Was my lack of funds a game to him? He had to know I was uncomfortable. I was glad I kept the small amount of money in my wallet but I was sure it wouldn't pay for a ride from here to my flat. I might not even be able to make it back to Sherlock's flat. I wasn't sure of the underground schedules here. Humiliating, that's what it was.

"He's gone." That woman, Donovan said.

"Who? Sherlock Holmes?"

"Yeah, he just took off, he does that." She gestured to the other side of the cordon.

"Is he coming back?"

"Didn't look like it." There was an odd mixture of pity and laughter in her voice.

I expected the negative response but not the laughter. This was not funny. "Right." I looked around again. Well, pity was the better choice of the two; I might be able to get a free lift. "Right." Ok, time to do this. "Yes." I turned to the woman. "Sorry, where am I?"

"Brixton."

Ok, look small, pathetic... "I..." I couldn't pretend I didn't know where that was. "Do you know where I can get a cab?"

She stared, open-mouthed.

"It's just, uh." God, maybe the laughter was better. "Well, my leg." Yes, there wasn't an ounce of pity in this woman. This whole night was a disaster. Sherlock had probably forgotten all about me. I bet he wouldn't even call tomorrow to see if I wanted the flat.

"Try the main road," Donovan said, lifting the blue and white tape.

And if he did I wasn't going to answer.

Was everyone rude now? She couldn't even call me one? Or the man, pretending to be invisible and refusing to even look at me? God!

"Thanks." But, by the time I limped over she had lowered the tape so I really had to stoop.

"Look," she said once I was on the other side. "you're not his friend."

I had thought that Sherlock was rude to these people first. It seemed reasonable, he was quite rude to the DI and the man seemed nice enough. But now, seeing what London had turned into in my absence I guessed that the mere idea of having a consultant here was enough to set these people off.

"He doesn't have friends."

Who the hell did this woman think she was?!

"So, who are you?"

I thought of the coffee woman. Well... Sherlock might not have friends. Mike was always friendly. Either way; if Sherlock did, I certainly wasn't one of them. "I'm..." Not his flatmate, not his assistant. "I'm nobody." That was a bit too honest. I felt positively empty now. "I just met him."

The woman seemed to warm to me a little, "Hey, bit of advice then: stay away from that guy."

"Why?" I demanded. Why did she feel she could tell me what to do? Why does she hate him so? Because he knew about the affair? That was on her, besides, he didn't say anything loudly.

She paused, judging me. Probably seeing my worthlessness. "You know why here's here?"

'To solve your crime because you can't?' I thought loudly.

"He's not paid or anything." Her voice broke a little like she read my attitude. "He likes it."

'If it were more action so would I, what's your point?'

She continued with more confidence, "He gets off on it."

What?

"The weirder the crime the more he gets off and you know what?" She looked away like it was a secret, "One day to Sherlock it just won't be enough."

Or maybe she was lying.

"One day we'll be standing 'round a body and Sherlock Holmes will be the man who put it there."

That was crazy. And I was quite sure she was wrong. But, she knew him better. "Why would he do that?"

"Because he's a psychopath."

'What the hell is wrong with you?' I didn't say that aloud; an argument with the police wasn't one someone could actually win.

"And psychopaths get bored."

"Donovan!" The DI yelled.

She went over and I wondered how on earth she ever got her job when she was so horrible at reading people.

"Stay away from Sherlock Holmes."

I would be dead, I realized. I would be dead right now if it weren't for Sherlock. The gun was still at the bedsit. Would Sherlock have seen that in me? Would he have known? Was that why I was here?

Should I go back?

Either way, I needed transportation. A phone rang in the booth next to me. I supposed I could have called a cab, but I needed the walk to think.

----

"Taxi, taxi!" I called, as by the time I made it to the main road I was desperate to get off my leg. I'd made up my mind. I was going to go back to the bedsit. Maybe call Harry. See if it all was worth it.

No taxi stopped. None of them even bothered to slow for me.

A phone was ringing loudly in a restaurant. I paused to watch. On my walk, I realized the other phone in the booth seemed to stop ringing right when I decided to pass it by. That was odd. Normally I didn't notice odd things but this murder had me on edge.

As soon as the employee reached for the receiver the ringing stopped.

I felt a creeping feeling like when that homeless bloke was following me. I continued on, wondering if it was a coincidence and was in the process of passing another phone box when it started to ring. Maybe the person calling was trying to reach someone nearby who stepped away for a smoke. I decided that this would bother me all night if I didn't answer. I was almost positive it was some kid, playing a prank by random dilating or something. It didn't stop ringing after a moment like the other ones had so I stepped into the red booth and answered the phone.

"Hello?"

At worst, it'd be one of my rugby mates or army buddies playing a prank. They collected all the numbers from along the route when they saw me coming (now that mobiles had internet it would be easy enough) and thought this would be funny.

"There is a security camera on the building to your left." I didn't recognize the voice. It sounded like something out of a bad movie; some overdramatic villain, trying to be scary by lowering his voice but actually sounding rather dumb. "Do you see it?"

"Who is this?" Suddenly I remembered that weird American movie Phone Booth. I didn't remember much of what happened other than there was a sniper and a psychopath. "Who's speaking?"

"Do you see the camera, Doctor Watson?" The man on the other end of the line sounded like he was smiling.

I stared at the camera. "Yeah, I see it."

The camera was moving up and down. "Watch." The voice commanded and the camera spun. The new angle made it so I wasn't in view.

I started looking around, trying to see if anyone was staring at me and trying to find another camera.

"There is another camera on the building opposite you. Do you see it?"

"Mm-m." I murmured. I suspected this man didn't need verbal confirmation.

That camera spun away too.

"And finally at the top of the building on your right."

The camera moved around, making sure I could see it and reading my expression. As I watched the little red light winked out. The camera turned to point at nothing. "How are you doing this?" I wondered aloud. The best thing to do with evil masterminds was to keep them talking.

"Get into the car, Doctor Watson." A shiny black government looking car glided in front of the booth. "I would make some sort of threat but I'm sure your situation is quite clear to you." The door opened and a beefy man wearing a suit exited. He opened the door to the back and waited.

The line went dead. 'I've no other choice.' I thought rather gleefully.

----

The city lights flew by. There was a woman in the back with me, her thumbs constantly moving across her phone. Another victim? "Hello."

"Hi." She smiled and went back to her phone. I noticed she was wearing a ring on her right hand, but not her left.

After I moment it became clear she was working for the megalomaniac. "What's your name then?" 'Octopussy?' I wondered if it was worse.

"Ahhh..." Her fingers never paused. "Anthea."

"Is that your real name?" From the way she paused it clearly wasn't.

She looked at me and smiled. "No." Not Anthea admitted.

Glancing around I realized I had no idea where we were. We were off, somewhere, by some warehouses.

"I'm John."

"Yes." She said, barely restraining laughter. "I know." She didn't bother to look up from her phone.

"Is there any point in asking where I'm going?"

"None at all." I didn't realize she was looking at me until I saw her attention move back to her phone. "John."

"Ok." Well, at least she was honest.

We passed through a small shopping district before stopping in a giant warehouse.

The headlights illuminated a man standing cross-legged with an umbrella all wrapped up in a three-piece suit. After closing the door as I was limping up the man said, "Have a seat... John." It was the same voice, higher pitched.

Well, clearly Not Anthea was talking to her boss the whole time. Probably sent a million texts. I couldn't imagine the bill.

"You know, I've got a phone." I walked toward him. "It's very clever and all that." I came closer. "You could just phone me." You must have my number. "On my phone." Since you seem so fond of them. I came to a stop close enough I could use my crutch as a weapon.

"When one is avoiding the attention of Sherlock Holmes one learns to be discreet."

Really?

"Hence this place."

This was discreet?!

"The leg must be hurting you." The man attempted a smile but it was like whatever creature controlled him had no idea how to work his facial features into the anything other than a sneer. "Sit down."

"I don't want to sit down." I was already at enough of a disadvantage. Who knew what all that umbrella hid. A sword easily. A gun?

"You don't seem very afraid."

Well, I have nothing to lose, do I? "You don't seem very frightening."

"Ha, ha!" He did that weird toothy sneer again. "Yes. The bravery of a soldier." The pod person dropped the act. "Bravery is by far the kindest word for stupidity, don't you think?"

I was not stupid enough to pick a fight with him over the insult.

"What is your connection to Sherlock Holmes."

Why was everyone obsessed with him? "I don't have one." And my relationship with him? "I barely know him." I'd just been over this with Donovan. "I met him..." It took me a bit to think because it felt like aeons and minutes at the same time. It couldn't only be a day, could it? Yes, only a day. "...yesterday." Not a lifetime.

"Mmm. And since yesterday you've moved in with him and now you're solving crimes together. Might we expect a happy announcement by the end of the week?" He said jealously.

"Who are you?"

"An interested party." The man oozed.

"Interested in..." What, exactly? "...Sherlock? Why?" What was he planning on doing with the lanky brunette? "I-I'm guessing you're not friends." I stuttered foolishly thinking about all that pale skin laid out instead of the creep in front of me.

"You've met him." The man in the suit said flatly. "How many friends do you imagine he has?"

Yeah, Sherlock was a bit of an arse but here was another person saying Sherlock had no friends. No one. I could see it, actually. Sherlock pushing everyone away before they hurt him. How lonely he must be.

"I am the closest thing to a friend Sherlock Holmes is capable of having."

"And what's that?" I demanded, praying this wasn't some perverted ex-lover.

"An enemy."

Wait, what? "An enemy?"

"In his mind, certainly." The tall man brushed the statement off as if he didn't care although it was clear it hurt him. "If you were to ask him he'd probably say his arch enemy." He paused for dramatic effect. "He does love to be dramatic."

I managed not to laugh out loud while looking at my surroundings. "Well, thank god you're above all that." Score one for me.

The sound of a train going by could not hide the sound of my phone receiving a text. The man started aghast. I maintained eye contact longer than necessary to rub it in. Then I looked at my text.

-Baker Street. Come at once if convenient.

I stared at the use of punctuation and the thought of even bothering to type out convenient on a mobile. Plus the initials. Good god! How did he manage to get those on another line?

"I hope I'm not distracting you."

"You're not..." I glanced back down. "...distracting me at all." I put my phone back in my pocket.

Now that he had my full attention he started talking again. "Do you plan on continuing your association with Sherlock Holmes?"

"I could be wrong but," I was done with this conversation. "I think that's none of your business."

He stared into my eyes, pupils dilated an unnatural amount. "It could be."

I nearly growled. "It really couldn't." I shook my head for emphasis.

The umbrella wielding man reached into his pocket. "If you do move into, um..." He opened a little book. "Two hundred and twenty-one B Baker Street-"

Oh, god. Oh, my god, this maniac knows where Sherlock lives. Jesus Christ!

"-I'd be happy to pay you a meaningful sum of money on a regular basis to ease your way." The slimy man said as he put away the little book.

"Why?"

He pretended to act confused. "Because you're not a wealthy man."

"In exchange for what?"

"Information." He paused but I didn't respond. "Nothing indiscreet. Nothing you'd feel... uncomfortable with-"

Yeah, because being dragged to a warehouse against my will is so comfortable.

"-just tell me what he's up to."

No. "Why?"

He looked me dead in the eye. "I worry about him." After a long pause, he added, "Constantly."

How? In what way? "That's nice of you."

"But I would prefer for various reasons that my concern go unmentioned. We have what you might call a..." He inspected the tip of his umbrella "...difficult relationship."

The sound of another received text interrupted the conversation.

I watched him as I pulled out my mobile again.

-If inconvenient, come anyway.

That text explained everything. Even though Sherlock abandoned me he still wanted me to come back. He still expected me to. Even after being a giant arsehole he didn't even act like he did anything wrong. He probably didn't know.

"No." There was nothing this man could do or say that would get me to change my mind.

"But I haven't mentioned a figure."

I made sure he could read my expression. "Don't bother."

The tall man laughed in disbelief. "You're very loyal very quickly."

"No. I'm not." I wasn't either. But, Sherlock... "I'm just not interested."

While watching me the man reached into his breast pocket again. "Trust issues." He held up the notebook. "It says here."

No. "What's that?" That was confidential. How dare he?!

He didn't look up from the book; it seemed he was reading all my information from my meetings with Ella. "Could it be that you've decided to trust Sherlock Holmes of all people?"

"Who says I trust him?" I bluffed.

"You don't seem the type to make friends easily."

"Are we done?" I demanded.

He looked me in the eye again, this time his pupils were normal sized. "You tell me."

Studying the man for a moment I tried to figure out if he was going to kill me while my back was turned and if it was safe for Sherlock if I left now. A tilt of my head as a test; the man's body language said no to the first and yes to the second.

"I imagine people have already warned you to stay away from him but I can see from your left hand that's not going to happen."

I was already a few steps away and I knew I should have kept going but I couldn't help it. "My what?" I spun back around.

"Show me." He demanded then smirked awkwardly, this time mouth closed.

We stood there for a bit until I raised my left hand so he could see. I kept my distance.

He strode forward and reached for it.

"Don't!" I pulled away.

The man looked at me like one would a child trying to hide vegetables in a napkin.

I put my hand out flat, palm down.

He reached out, touching it. He had a ring on his right hand too. It looked the same as Not Anthea's. He held his perpendicular to mine before commenting, "Remarkable."

"What is?"

"Most people blunder around this city" he spun turning his back to me, waving the black umbrella as he spoke, "and all they see are streets and shops and cars." His voice turned softer. "But when you walk with Sherlock Holmes you see the battlefield." He turned around to face me again. "You've seen it already, haven't you?"

"What's wrong with my hand?"

He looked back down. "You have an intermittent tremor in your left hand."

Yes, I know.

"Your therapist thinks it's Post Traumatic Stress Disorder."

I knew that was in there!

The man's voice got louder. "She thinks you're haunted by memories of your military service."

"Who the hell are you?!" How did you get this information?! I am. Every night I am. Every day. Every hour, every bloody minute. "How do you know that?"

"Fire her. She's got it the wrong way 'round. You're under stress right now and your hand is perfectly steady."

I could feel he was right. My hand didn't so much a tremble.

"You're not haunted by the war, Doctor Watson. You miss it." He waited until I looked at him to whisper, "Welcome back."

He walked away twirling his umbrella and my phone trilled with another text.

The man couldn't resist a parting shot: "Time to choose a side, Doctor Watson."

Chapter 11>

#chapter 10 #asim #moved from ao3 #a study in miscommunication

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