#but from what he sees of mikael he isn’t sure that can be the case

[kiss-my-freckle]

– Mystic Falls High – Parking Lot of Pouting –

Bonnie Bennet: My boyfriend is spending all of his time with his dead girlfriends!

Caroline Forbes: My vampire werewolf hybrid boyfriend is Klaus’ bitch!

Elena Gilbert: Today’s my one-year anniversary with my boyfriend, who went on a six month long murder spree, leaving a trail of bodies up and down the East Coast, got compelled into switching off his humanity, and is staying in town for the sole purpose of keeping me alive so that an even more evil vampire can use me as a walking blood bank when he wants to make more unstoppable murder machines.

Caroline Forbes: …You win.

– Castle Salvatore –

Damon Salvatore: Hi Stefan! You got sorority sister all over my good carpets!

Stefan Salvatore: Wait till you see what I did to your sheets!

Rebekah: Hi boys! Klaus ditched me so I’m staying here now! Don’t worry, I’ll find my own room!

Damon Salvatore: …This whole “intruding on other people’s lives and making them miserable” is a lot more fun when I’m doing it.

– Mystic Falls High – Lockers of Loneliness –

Jeremy Gilbert: Hi Bonnie! You’re avoiding me!

Bonnie Bennet: Hi Jeremy! Maybe we can hang out again when you aren’t sexing your dead girlfriends!

– Mystic Falls High –

Vicki Donovan: Hi Matt! Would you like to help me do some black magic?

Matt Donovan: I remember when my life was normal.

Tyler Lockwood: You talk to yourself! You’re funny!

– Mikael’s Mausoleum –

Damon Salvatore (on the phone): Hi Katherine! I need you to hurry up and revive Mikael so he can kill Klaus so I can fix Stefan so my carpets won’t get ruined!

Katherine Pierce (on the phone): You’re in luck! A hapless victim just wandered by!

– Mystic Falls High – Hallway of Hopelessness

Damon Salvatore (on the phone): Hi Elena! My brilliant plan of running straight at Klaus without a plan has had an unforeseen consequence! I have a Babriepire living with me!

Elena Gilbert: What about Stefan? Is he doing anything interesting?

Damon Salvatore (on the phone): Hey was that the bell? Don’t wanna be late for class!

Caroline Forbes: Hi Elena! I know what will cheer you up! A school spirit bonfire! Which is in no way endorsed by the school, despite the flyers I’m hanging up all over the place, and which will feature plenty of illegal boozing!

Tyler Lockwood: That sounds great! Almost as great as the fact that I’m an unkillable death dervish that’s dating a hot blond and getting the blood hookup from another hot blond!

Caroline Forbes: Is not amused.

Stefan Salvatore: Hi Elena! Remember how we met in this very spot one year ago today? Things sure have changed!

Alaric Saltzman: Hi Stefan! I think you should GTFO of here!

The Lady of the Manor: Um, Alaric? He’s a vampire, and you’re a drunk.

Stefan Salvatore: She’s right! Wallshove!

Alaric Saltzman: Pout.

– Mystic Falls High – History Class of Histrionics –

Elena Gilbert: Hi Alaric! I’m going to tell you some stuff you should already know, in case anyone was confused by the last episode!

Alaric Saltzman: I’m going to pretend to be a responsible adult with a grown-up job!

Stefan Salvatore: I watched the last history teacher die!

Rebekah: I slept through the last eighty years! I hope you can help me catch up on current events!

– Mystic Falls High – Stoner Stoop –

Matt Donovan: Hi Vicki! I’m unclear on this whole “helping you come back from the dead” thing!

Vicki Donovan: It’s real simple! You just have to help me commit a bunch of murders!

Jeremy Gilbert: Hi Matt! Hi Matt’s sister, who I totally don’t see!

– Mystic Falls High – Bathroom of Bad Omens

Jeremy Gilbert: So yeah, Matt can see Vicki now.

Anna: I sure hope she isn’t planning something unspeakably evil!

– Mystic Falls High – Football Field of Fear –

Rebekah: Hi Caroline! I’m going to slowly dismantle your life!

The Coach: Hi guys! I’m going to run you into the ground!

Tyler Lockwood: Loook into my eeeyes</dracula>

The Coach: See you later guys! Have fun getting drunk at the bonfire!

Rebekah: I can do endless handsprings whee!

Stefan Salvatore: Hi Elena! I’ve been assigned to protect you! I watched a bunch of Lifetime movies about abusive boyfriends to prepare for my role!

The Lady of the Manor: Rebekah is surprisingly limber after spending eighty years in a box.

– Mikael’s Mausoleum –

Katherine Pierce: Hi Mikael! I brought you a snack!

Mikael: I shall not sully these lips with the blood of a human being!

Katherine Pierce: …Everyone I know is lame.

– Saltzman Slums – Gilbert Gymnasium –

Damon Salvatore: Hi Buffy!

Elena Gilbert: I lift weights now!

Damon Salvatore: I can show you the way to a vampire’s heart!

Elena Gilbert: I need a cold shower!

Team Delena: Agrees.

lmfao!! omg, this was the best part...

Damon Salvatore: …This whole “intruding on other people’s lives and making them miserable” is a lot more fun when I’m doing it.

[kylermalloy]

Currently thinking about tiny Klaus, maybe five or six years old, coming across his biological father in the woods by their village.

Obviously Klaus has no idea who he is, but Ansel’s been watching and knows exactly who this is. Esther has forbidden him to speak to the boy, but who would be the wiser?

Anyway, Ansel wants to know absolutely everything about Niklaus but has to limit himself to just a few questions—about Mikael, about home, about what he likes to do.

To little Klaus, it’s such an inconsequential thing. But to Ansel, it’s everything. And it’s painful—because Niklaus can never know the truth, and Ansel can never truly know his son.

[my-arlington-academia]

Kissing the cards of the Crystal 6 goodnight 🌌🌙 (headcanons/scenarios)

Since the crystal 6 can feel a "tingle" when Seeker draws their card from the deck during a reading, that got me thinking: What if they also feel a "tingle" through their card when Seeker is touching it outside of a reading? Or in this case, what if Seeker kisses it? 🤔

Chaya

- Blushes right away

- What she felt... it was lips, right?

- "B-but why would Seeker kiss my card? That’s kind of silly, maybe I’m mistaken..."

- Spoilers: she wasn’t mistaken 😂

- This feeling comes only when Seeker is alone in their room

- Chaya quickly comes to the conclusion that this isn’t just a random feeling she gets out of nowhere, it really is Seeker kissing her card before falling asleep...

- She tries to confront them about it, although really shyly

- "Seeker, I don’t mean to pry b-but... You’ve been doing something to my card lately, right?"

- Seeker just goes silent for a moment

- "So... You could feel that?!? Oh God..."

- Chaya is really confused, she’s unsure of what to do next and just sorta stands there silently until Seeker calms down

- Does that mean Seeker will stop doing that?! Chaya regrets confronting them now, it’s not like she disliked it

- On the contrary, if she had to be completely honest, she liked it. A lot.

- "Will... Will you stop doing it? I’m totally fine with it so you can keep going! Uh- only if you want to, of course!"

- Seeker is not dumb, they got the message: Chaya likes the feeling she gets when they kiss her card

- And so, they get a little bit cocky. Seeker takes Chaya’s card out of the deck and kisses it right in front of her

- As always, Chaya blushes but she covers her face this time, knowing that Seeker is watching her reaction

- "Wh-what was that for?! You can just kiss me directly when we’re together..."

Kera

- Understands what it is right away although she doesn’t 100% get why Seeker is doing that

- Sometimes, she doubts her judgement a bit because of the confusion, though she quickly gets back on track

- "Come on, Kera. What they’re doing is obvious, stop doubting yourself..."

- Tries to ignore it, thinks to herself "What they’re doing alone is none of my business."

- But after mulling it over some more: No actually, it is her business.

- It’s her card and she’s bound to it so she obviously feels everything that’s happening to it

- Why is she trying so hard to ignore this???

- "Feeling shy is not like me." Kera thinks to herself. She finally decides to confront Seeker, and she’s really honest about it

- "I know you’ve been kissing my card from time to time. Could you tell me why you’re doing that? It... It confuses me."

- Seeker tenses up immediately and avoids Kera’s gaze while trying to explain it

- "I see... So you’re attracted to me and kissing my card goodnight pleases you in some weird way? ...Alright."

- Seeker is losing it, well yes, long story short it’s what they said but still...

- "...Don’t look down like that. You can keep doing it. I didn’t want to admit it at first but... Frankly, I enjoy that feeling."

- Seeker is a bit surprised, they’re used to Kera’s bluntness but they didn’t expect her to actually like something of this sort

- Unconvinced, Seeker takes the card out from the deck and places a gentle kiss on it

- Kera tries to stay stoic at the contact, and yet her pale skin betrays her. Even the slightest blush is clearly visible on her cheeks.

Maeve

- Gets it immediately and is eager to tease Seeker about it

- Goes to search for them and finds them quite easily

- "Oh, of course they would be in their room..."

- Doesn’t want to be too aggressive about it so she knocks a few times

- "Heyyy~ Owner? May I get an explanation as to what you’re doing to my card right now? Even better if it’s a cohesive one and not some fresh served BS pretty please~"

- Seeker opens the door in a hurry, cheeks flushed

- "What...! Ugh. Don’t tell me you felt that?"

- "I sure did. ❤"

- Seeker tries hopelessly to dodge the question and change the subject... really clumsily

- "...Wow. You won’t fool anyone with that cute face of yours, you know?~"

- She pinches their cheek and Seeker backs away

- "P-please don’t. You don’t get how mortified I am right now..."

- "Aww come on, there’s no need for that. It felt kind of nice, actually. Why don’t you try to do it again?"

- Swiftly, Maeve steals the deck out of Seeker’s pocket and draws her card, then she holds it in front of their lips

- "No need to be shy~ If you did it once already then surely you can do it again?"

- Reluctantly, Seeker closes their eyes and softly places a kiss on the card

- She would never admit it, but Maeve liked that kiss more than she should have...

- "See? It wasn’t that hard now, was it? ❤ Goodnight~"

Mikael

- Is really perplexed. Why would Seeker do that?

- There’s no way they’re wrong, Mikael is really in tune with their card by now to make this kind of rookie mistake

- Well, it’s not like there’s a need to confront Seeker about it. It was probably just a one time thing although Mikael isn’t sure as to why they did it in the first place

- Spoilers: it wasn’t a "one time" thing 😉

- Almost every evening/night, Mikael feels this pleasant sensation... but why?

- It’s not like them to get so curious but... Well, it wouldn’t hurt to ask, right?

- "Seeker, I’ve noticed that at about the same time every night, I feel some pleasant sensation go through my body. I have the suspicion that you’re the one behind this. Am I wrong?"

- Seeker goes into panic mode

- "O-Oh- Uh. Yes, I’m so sorry, I won’t do it again-"

- Mikael reassures them immediately, they just want to know why Seeker is doing it, that’s all

- "Well I- Ugh, that’s so embarrassing... For a little while now, I got the habit of kissing your card goodnight before I fall asleep... Please don’t think I’m a creep."

- Mikael is taken aback by this, they’re not sure what they expected but it surely wasn’t this

- "No worries. I was merely curious, that’s all. And I like the feeling I get when you do that so please, don’t stop that lovely "habit" of yours. Plus, if you wouldn’t mind..."

- Mikael gently slides their hand into Seeker’s pocket and takes their card out of it

- "...Kiss it in front of me, you’ll see that this doesn’t make me feel unpleasant at all."

- Seeker does as they’re told and seeing Mikael’s reaction to it, well... they don’t want to stop with only one kiss.

Reyes

- Doesn’t fully get it and tries to pass it as "just a random jolt" the first time it happens

- The 2nd time, he wants to believe that it’s just some weird coincidence or something

- But the 3rd time... There’s no way around it, Seeker is doing something to his card and he’s not sure if that "something" pleases him, knowing what it is

- It may be the first time that he’s hoping for his intuition to be wrong

- Tries to ignore it even after having figured out that Seeker is the one doing this (obviously) he doesn’t want to talk to them about this matter... or like, talk to them at all

- It would be kind of annoying... but mostly really awkward to be honest

- However, It starts to happen too regularly so he finally decides to confront Seeker about it

- "Listen here. I know what you’ve been doing to my card these last few weeks and I’d appreciate it if you stopped doing that."

- Seeker is really embarrassed at first but they quickly get a hold of themselves

- "...Aren’t you curious as to why I’m doing it?"

- Reyes actually questioned himself a lot about it, not like he would admit that so easily though

- "...What, you’re really bored or something? You want to annoy me, is that it?"

- "No. I’m just wishing you a good night."

- "I- Y-you know that we can’t actually sleep for real, right? Are you completely stupid?!"

- Oh boy... getting that sweet answer flustered him a lot more than intended, Seeker loves this side of him

- "Details. On that note, it’s getting quite late so..."

- Seeker draws Reyes’s card from the deck and places a soft kiss on it, Reyes flinches at the contact

- "Goodnight, Reyes."

- "You- *sigh* Whatever, do what you want... Goodnight."

Vinn

- Wonders what it is the first time he feels it, this type of thing has never happened to him before

- A little "tingle" from time to time when a Master draws his card from the deck, sure. But this "tingle" has never felt this good...

- It happens more and more frequently and- is that the feeling of lips on his cheek??

- He starts looking forward to that "feeling" every night

- Somehow, it always happens when Seeker is about to fall asleep

- He’s really hoping he’s not wrong and that this "feeling" is caused by Seeker kissing his card

- It’s really romantic in a way, but he’s scared of getting the wrong idea

- And so, he tries asking Seeker about it

- "So... How to say this. Don’t freak out but- you um, you kiss my card every night before going to bed, don’t you?"

- Seeker almost spits out their tea

- "Well uh- H-how...? Don’t tell me you feel a "tingle" of some sort?"

- Vinn places his right hand on the back of his neck, he didn’t expect to feel so shy about this to be perfectly honest

- "More than just a "tingle" actually. It feels really good..."

- "So you don’t want me to stop doing it?"

- "W-What?! Of course not! Why would I not like to be kissed goodnight? I just wanted to make sure that I wasn’t the one making this up because of my wishful thinking.... Actually-

- Vinn points at Seeker’s pocket, understanding more or less what he means by that, they take the deck out of their pocket and draw Vinn’s card

- "...Can you kiss it while looking at me?"

- Seeker is really embarrassed because of this whole situation but seeing how Vinn is also blushing... well, let’s say they’re not the only one to feel this way

- Seeker places a gentle kiss on the card, resulting in Vinn’s blush switching to a darker shade of red. Nonetheless, Vinn smiles cheerfully at them, Seeker’s heart melts at the sight.

[bookstantrash]

A/N: Sorry for disappearing, I promise I have not given up on this fic. Life is kinda of a mess right now. The College Entrance Exams Season has just begun, and I’ve been studying nonstop, which leaves me with little time to write and a brain overheated due to excessive studying.

Good news tho! So far, I have been accepted in the two colleges I’ve already applied for, which leaves me with just The Big Scary Exam in January which also has a second phase that is FIVE DAYS AFTER ACOSF IS RELEASED. And which is pretty much my dream college

But let’s talk about happy things. Get comfortable and enjoy the long overdue Part Four!

In which she makes a friend, Part Four

Cassian woke up in the late afternoon. After a silently breakfast with Nesta, he went to report to Devlon and go over the papers he had left piling up in his absence. Nesta had gone to her room — probably to take a bath and change out of the leathers — and he had not seen her since. He had promptly fallen asleep as soon as his head had hit the pillow, his aching muscles and wings screaming for some well deserved rest.

Cassian debated whether to knock on Nesta’s door or not as he splashed some cold water on his face. He had decided he was going to help her, he just didn’t know how to do that without seeming as if he was just following orders from Feyre. Nesta was not a burden. Would never be. At least not for him. He was going to do this right and make up for the two months he was away.

Gathering his courage, he softly knocked on her door, straining his ears to listen to something that would indicate that she was in her bedroom. When he heard nothing, not even her breathing, he remembered the stone bench. The weather was sunny — with “sunny” in Illyria meaning that the grey sky was more or less free of clouds and the cold not as unforgiving as usual. However, when he opened the front door and stepped outside, he did not see Nesta but the young Illyrian he had seen earlier, Kaelin.

Cassian stayed quiet, taking the opportunity to inspect the kid, which was so busy writing something down in a piece of paper — Cassian could see him biting his lip in concentration and pushing back a stray curl that kept falling on his eyes — that didn’t take notice of his arrival. Kaelin was a question mark that had suddenly appeared in his life. Cassian didn’t know who the Illyrian was, but if Nesta had chosen to trust him — to take him under her care when she could not deign to care for herself — then he was going to trust her decision. And he would ask Kaelin to work with him to help Nesta heal.

“You know, if you’re thinking of growing your hair maybe you should have something to tie it back” Cassian said, clearing his throat to warn Kaelin of his presence.

Kaelin almost fell from the bench in surprise, quickly raising to greet him.

“Please, there’s no need for that” Cassian pleaded, interrupting Kaelin before he did the formal salute “You are living here now, you may address me informally”.

“Yes, sir” he hesitantly answered, as if unsure if he should be treating his superior like that.

The younglings usually liked Cassian. He did teach a lot of them to fly and played with them whenever he had the chance. But Kaelin was in the phase where training got harder, tougher. When the Camp Lords started to separate those who had potential and those who would only be another number in the army.

“Isn’t it better to write inside? The bench looks uncomfortable” Cassian tried, hoping to gain the kid’s trust.

“Nesta said...she said it’s good to read out loud while you write” the tip of Kaelin’s ears turned soft pink “I didn’t want to disturb you, sir”

Nesta was teaching Kaelin how to read.

Cassian didn’t know what to do with this new information. He had really missed a lot on two months.

“I wouldn’t be woken by your voice. I usually sleep like the dead”.

“When I can actually sleep” Cassian thought. His dreams usually turned into nightmares, and he only slept well when he was near the point of passing out from fatigue. Like today.

“Oh, I see. Nesta gave me one of the military books in your living room to practice, I hope that’s fine” the young Illyrian knotted his eyebrows in confusion “She said she didn’t have any books I could read”.

“No, I don’t think she has” Cassian allowed himself a small smile, thinking about the dirty romance novels he knew Nesta liked. He didn’t think they’d have been proper for Kaelin “Feel free to take any books you like. I’ll see if I can get hold of less boring ones for you”.

“I don’t want to burden you!!” he quickly said “Really, they’re not boring. A bit hard to understand, but I usually write down the words I don’t know and Nesta helps me later”.

“It’s not a bother. I was planning to get some books for Nesta. She reads a lot and I think she may have run out of books now”.

Cassian tried to calm Kaelin, making sure it was nothing out of his way. He knew how it felt when you had nothing and people offered you things. The first time he had received a present, a solstice gift from Rhysand’s mother, he had been afraid to accept and had cried afterwards, once he was alone. He could only imagine how it was for the Kaelin. An orphan who once had some and suddenly was stripped of even the little things he had to call his own.

“You and Nesta... you seem close” he tried to appear nonchalant, laying the ground for his intention of gathering Kaelin’s aid.

“She’s nice” he answered, pushing the stray curl away again.

“How has she been? Has she been going out a lot?” Cassian cringed internally at how desperate he sounded, but he could not deny how worried he was that Nesta was not back when it was beginning to darken.

“I’ve know Nesta for two, three months at most”.

“And?” Cassian inquired.

“She does not eat much. Started going out recently” Kaelin eyed him in suspicion “I don’t know if I should be talking with you, sir, about her. I know that I wouldn’t like to have someone talking about me behind my back. Specially with someone who had left me alone for months”.

Cassian realised that, in this conversation, he was the enemy. Kaelin knew Nesta, but had no reason whatsoever to trust Cassian, ranks in the army be damned.

“I was busy. Commander stuff” he didn’t want to talk about how a civil war was most likely to happen.

Kaelin’s only answer was to raise an eyebrow in question, an act that reminded Cassian so much of Nesta that he was momentarily thrown back. Was his idea about to go down the drain before he had even tried it out?

“I wouldn’t have left if wasn’t really necessary”.

“I didn’t doubt you” Kaelin said, the corners of his mouth raising slightly.

Cauldron, he couldn’t believe how he was being played by a teenage boy.

“And I guess I know what you’re trying to do” Kaelin commented, gathering the book, tucking the piece of paper inside it and pocketing the pencil.

“If you know it, then are you willing to be my helping hand?” Cassian remembered why he usually stuck with training the younglings. They didn’t have smart comebacks.

“I cannot possibly train Nesta. I only know the basics I’ve learnt as a kid. But you sir, are a legend” Kaelin’s eyes sparked in admiration.

Mikael had told Kaelin stories about the Commander of the Illyrian armies. Of how an orphan who was supposed to be a foot soldier had the biggest killing power in Illyria’s history.

“I’m willing to do anything to make Nesta happy” Kaelin’s expression saddened “She is not doing well. And I own her my life. It’s the minimum I can do”.

“Thank you. I think she’d listen more to you than me” Cassian stretched his wings “First things first then kiddo. Could you tell me where she is? It’s getting late and she should have someone accompany her back”.

Kaelin gave him a wide smile, and before Cassian could do anything, got airborne.

“Don’t worry about it!! I always walk Nesta back!!”

And with a last goodbye shout, Kaelin flew away to meet Nesta at Cauldron knows where, leaving Cassian no option but to enter the house and get dinner ready.

~•~

To say dinner had been awkward was an understatement.

Cassian didn’t remember ever being so tongue tied before. Nesta had also kept quiet for most of the meal. Kaelin, however, did enough talking for both of them.

The kid had completely lost all shyness regarding Cassian, although he still added ‘sir’ sometimes when it seemed he was going overboard. Keeping his word to help Cassian with Nesta, Kaelin had talked nonstop about the things that had happened in those two months. Cassian learned that Nesta cooked quite well — “Illyrian culinary is different from high Fae but she learned so fast! It didn’t even feel like the food had been kept in the ice box for so long!” — and that she also knew how to sew — “She fixed all my clothes! They fit perfectly now! It feels as if they’re brand new!”.

Cassian would be pleased to just sit there and listen to Kaelin praise Nesta and tell all her hidden abilities, but he saw the way her pointed ears were getting pink and how she stuffed food in her mouth to avoid getting asked more questions. So he changed topics to Kaelin’s training, and he swore he saw Nesta silently thank him by the way her grey blue eyes softened.

The rest of the dinner run smoothly. He was also relived to see Nesta getting a second helping of food. Cassian could bet that she had not had lunch and, as a result, was starving.

He had made rice with cooked vegetables, along with fish seasoned with baniwa, a pepper based sauce. He had also left some fish without baniwa, not knowing whether Nesta liked her food spicy or not. He was happy to see that she choose the fish with the sauce and decided to stick with solid food, not taking any of the Imu Yanisa Kiyauriri he had offered, in case her stomach was not well.

After quietly washing the dishes while Nesta dried them — she had just gotten up and grabbed the kitchen rag, not sparing him a glance as she took the clean plate from his hand — Cassian locked himself in his room, hoping to get a good night’s sleep.

However, lucky was not on his side. He tossed and turned on his bed for hours, until finally giving up sleep and moving to his desk to go over the training schedule and other minor documents. Maybe work would tire him out enough to get maybe three or four hours of sleep.

Cassian was in the middle of a report regarding the preparations for the Blood Rite when he felt a shiver running down his spine. A faint sensation of panic came forth, and he was momentarily thrown back. Shrugging it off as fatigue, he turned back to the paper. But the sensation did not disappear. Had someone gotten over the wards somehow?

“Oh, screw this” he cursed, raising from his chair and opening his bedroom door.

Looking in the living room’s direction, he saw Kaelin completely passed out in the couch, sleeping on his stomach, his wings twitching in his sleep and drooling. The kitchen was clear as well, the same with the outdoor patio and the bathroom. The sensation got fainter, and he almost gave up when he walked by Nesta’s bedroom.

Cassian felt that panic rise within him once again. Felt that sensation of dread and helplessness knock him with full force. Without thinking, he opened her door, all reason flying out of his head to knock or call her from outside. Once inside, the first thing he notice was how cold the room was. She had not lit the fireplace, but it for sure was not due to lack of firewood. Why had she chosen to bury herself under multiple fur blankets then?

Second thing he took notice of was that said blankets had been thrown to the floor. And that Nesta was painting, fists tightly closed beside her body.

“Nesta...” Cassian breathed, slowly approaching the bed. He could see her eyes moving frantically under eyelids. The sensation was stronger now, threatening to consume him. He could not imagine how Nesta felt. Tried not to think why he also felt it.

“No...get away...” she murmured feverishly in her sleep “Take me. Take me instead”

Cassian smelled smoke, and he realised that Nesta’s fists were burning the sheets were they touched, her skin damp with sweat.

“Ness....” Cassian knew that you should not wake up someone when they were having a nightmare, not when they were letting their power lose. That indicated that the person had lost all sensation of reality and imagination, and could hurt whoever approached them. But Cassian could not see her suffering and just do nothing.

Gently, he kneeled beside her bed, and tentatively run his thumb across her forehead.

“You’re safe Nesta. Breath.” he murmured, bringing his other hand to her clenched fists, squeezing in reassurance, the fire around them not hurting him.

“It’s my fault...my fault” she whimpered, and sorrow and guilty hit Cassian just like earlier.

“Shhh.... Nobody can harm you” his thumb kept caressing her, trying to transmit comfort through his touch.

“I’m sorry...” she took a sharp breath, and Cassian could feel she tremble slightly.

“Nesta. Nesta.” he willed her hand to open, clutching it on his “Hush now xe r-endy, I’m here. Îebyr pe ixê.”

He kept talking in Illyrian, and she started to calm down, her breath coming in regularly and some tension leaving her body.

“That’s it sweetheart. You’re safe” Cassian tucked the blankets over Nesta, getting her comfortable.

“Cassian...stay” she grabbed his hand, eyes half open and laced with sleep, her strange and mysterious power faintly shinning on them.

“I will stay until you fall asleep” he replied.

And Cassian spent the rest of the night and early morning sitting on her bedroom floor. Holding her hand. And when the first of rays of sunlight appeared, he let go of her hand.

And he left Nesta’s room.

•

Tags: @sayosdreams @thewayshedreamed @sjm-things @perseusannabeth @arin1030-blog @caotica-e-quieta @vidalinav @swankii-art-teacher @ireallyshouldsleeprn @duskandstarlight @greerlunna @thegoddessaltenia @dayanna-hatter @verypaleninja @awesomelena555 @courtofjurdan @allilal

{Please let me know if you’d like to be added to my tag list.}

[inmyarmswrappedin]

ok now i need to hear more of your thoughts about the remakes and how they adapted even’s favorite films

Hi anon 🎬 Sure!

So, first off, the thing about Baz Luhrmann is that he makes unapologetic love story movies. His movies have elements of action and adventure, but they’re first and foremost love stories, and that makes him stand out from other big movie directors. His movies aren’t even romcoms, first because they don’t have happy endings (as Even notes in the video with Mikael) but also because the setting is never contemporary. Like even aside The Great Gatsby or Moulin Rouge, which are not set in the present day, Romeo + Juliet does ostensibly have 90s technology. But since the characters speak in Shakespearean verse, it gives the movie an atemporal feel. So this is a super tragic, super romantic movie that is actually super toxic for Even to model his life after, because Even is convinced that, in order for him and Isak to be in true love (for any love story to be valid), their story has to end badly. 

In Skam, Even provides the twist himself, by starting to make references (and model his life after) Pretty Woman when he starts to become manic. Pretty Woman is like, far from a non problematic movie lmao. But it does have an unlikely happy ending, and it’s through Isak’s understanding of how Even sees Romeo + Juliet and Pretty Woman, that he is able to ultimately reassure Even that their love story doesn’t have to end tragically.

So anyway, the fact that Even unabashedly loves this super romantic movie makes him mysterious and attractive and passionate, because it’s not a dude bro action or superhero movie. By loving this movie, Even is rejecting the macho persona Isak so badly wants to project.

I’ll start with the examples I like lol:

Only Lovers Left Alive: David identifies with this movie to the point that his cartoon persona is a vampire. Like Adam in the movie, he dresses in all black. He is convinced that he’s a monster who can’t live in society because he will be rejected. So it’s pretty clear how this movie is toxic for David. But I also think the movie is sooo telling of David’s actual desires. David likes to pretend that he can go it alone, that he doesn’t need anyone, that he wouldn’t take anyone with him in the case of a catastrophe. But... The movie is about Adam and Eve, the titular only lovers left alive. By loving this movie to the extent that he does, David is parading his major yearning for a forever partner. And like, of course he eventually asks Matteo to run away with him, but Matteo demonstrates how innately he understands David by telling him he does want a relationship with David, but he doesn’t want the toxicity of acting like they’re two monsters who’ve been cast aside from society. 

Dangerous Liaisons: I think Skam España took an interesting route by choosing to not have Cris verbally connect the dots (like Druck did). The thing is, Dangerous Liaisons is a tragic love story, yes, but a love story between Valmont and Tourvel, whereas Joana projects on the Marquise de Merteuil, who is all but the villain in the story. Tragic story aside, Romeo and Juliet do love each other, as do Adam and Eve. Joana’s idea of romance (and of herself by extension since she projects on Merteuil) doesn’t even allow for loving and being loved back in return, because no one in Dangerous Liaisons loves Merteuil, and Merteuil herself has become so twisted that she can’t even call her feelings for Valmont “love” (though that’s how Joana interprets them). And the thing is, Joana still finds beauty in the movie! She writes Cris a letter with the edges burned out because it reminds them both of the story. She wants to meet at a specific park because it reminds her of the movie. So it’s just so... beautiful, that Cris takes all of this and just gives Joana the Liaisons dangereuses book. Like, she is lowkey reminding Joana that the book is just a book, that Joana is a real person (within the Skam España story I mean lmao) and not a twisted awful villain, that she is loved, and that Dangerous Liaisons can be their thing (like “their” song, but a movie in this case) without having to be the horrible thing that will destroy them. I really like that the writers chose to imply all these things in their minutt for minutt scene, without saying them explicitly. 

Last Man on Earth: Honestly, like I don’t particularly have a big issue with Skam Italia making this Niccolò’s thing, other than it’s so... dude bro-y bland? Like one thing you can say about Romeo + Juliet, Only Lovers Left Alive and Dangerous Liaisons is that they are all such high key romantic (as in, emotions running high) movies, it’s what makes Even, David and Joana so mysterious and attractive and passionate. If I knew someone who told me he projects on Last Man on Earth I’d be like, “The Good Place is better” or “if you wanted to stan a SNL cast member, Andy Samberg was right there.” I mean, I do think Bessegato knew what the point of Even’s movie was, but Last Man on Earth is exactly the type of dude bro material I would expect from him, and would not expect from an Even. 

Polaris: Polaris is an undeveloped motif who seems interesting because of the dark and light aspects, and I claim my five pounds. Polaris is in no way toxic for Eliott, like all the others movies and show (even Last Man on Earth) were for the other characters. It’s just... cute. Cute like everything about Eliott is cute and nothing more. Eliott drawing himself as a raccoon is cute because he has a mask and is nocturnal! Whereas Lucas is small and defensive like a hedgehog! And Lucille is elegant and mean like a cat! Etc. This motif is never really developed or explored, it’s never given a twist, Eliott is in fact still obsessed with it 3 seasons later, just like he was obsessed with it before he met Lucas and it was Idriss he envisioned in the other role. There’s no growth, Eliott just never progresses beyond what Polaris represents for him. It sure is cute as fuck though, which is why the stans love it.

 ???:  Does Sander even have a movie? I heard he likes Baz Luhrmann and maybe even Romeo + Juliet, but this isn’t really explored. I don’t think even David Bowie’s life or sexuality or various musical personas (like you could do something with Ziggy Stardust or Aladdin Sane if you couldn’t think of a movie) are explored. Sander likes Bowie like he could like Iggy Pop or Freddie Mercury, queer music icons who for the most part are “safe” for straight men to stan without their sexuality getting called into question. I assume Robbesander stans think the lack of an Even’s movie motif is a sign of excellent writing, and proves Sander is a better Even because he doesn’t project on anything toxic or whatever the hell, just like Robbe is the best Isak because he was so good at letting Zoë and Senne have drama uninterrupted. 

[throwaninkpot]

There were so many better things I could have done with my time instead of doing a targeted relisten of all episodes that feature Mikaele Salesa, but here we are.

Some notes!

MAG014 - Piecemeal

there's not much here. a victim of The Flesh is losing parts of their body, and tries to strike a deal with Salesa for...something...presumably an artifact that he thinks will save or protect him. but he can't afford it, and is killed by the statement giver shortly after.

MAG038 - Lost and Found

"several crates packed to the brim full of heavy looking volumes" Leitners?

statement giver is struck by Salesa's laugh and isn't sure why; this is a Spiral episode.

thank God Salesa is no longer in possession of the vase, bc I swear, I swear, if it so much as sat on an end table in the same room as Martin or Jon, I would have crawled through my phone to drop the ding dang thing off a building and let it shatter below.

it's in his post-statement notes, while discussing Salesa and how he sells a large amount of artifacts to the Institute, that Jon spots the spider that he smashes, causing him to accidentally break through the wall and discover Jane Prentiss's worms as they prepare to invade the building. which feels significant, given the spider-filled company he seems to be keeping now.

MAG045 - Blood Bag

here's where things get interesting. the statement giver works in a lab studying mosquitos to find a preventative measure against them spreading malaria. the statement giver's boss is distantly related to a doctor who helped stop a cholera pandemic way back when. the boss owns an antique syringe case that belonged to that doctor, and then sells that item to Salesa to help fund this project. it's only after the syringe is sold that things start to go Wrong, and the mosquitos obviously become agents of The Corruption.

why is that interesting? when a statement features an artifact, usually The Fears only show up when that item enters the story, not when the artefact leaves it. The Corruption only starts to infect the mosquitos after the boss no longer has the syringe. especially with its connection to a man who stopped the spread of a disease, the syringe almost plays the part of a talismen against evil in this story, and with it gone, they have lost that protection. which is a curious flip for Salesa (known Cursed Artifact Dealer) to have bought something that might ward off The Fears rather than something that works for them.

MAG066 - Held in Customs

when the statement giver opens the box in Salesa's cargo (an artifact probably equal parts Buried and Lonely), and finds it empty, Salesa looks concerned. I always interpret that as he used to have someone in the box, but the box ate them already.

he warns the statement giver not to fall asleep (as a precaution against waking up to find himself in the box? as a survival tip for when he finds himself in the box?) which reminds me of Gerry trying to help various people survive the Fears, but he also placed a bet with Peter Lukas on whether or not the statement giver would survive, bc might as well get some fun out of it. Salesa contains multitudes.

"whatever this grand game is, Salesa is definitely involved. I just wish I knew whether he was a player or a pawn, or something else entirely." HMMM.

MAG115 - Taking Stock

statement from Salesa himself!

I relistened to Leitner's statement to double-check, and I'm pretty sure Salesa is the only surviving assistant from Leitner's library.

I don't have a lot of thoughts for this one, but get you a man who is so good to his crew that they help him cover up a spooky death without batting an eye.

MAG141 - Doomed Voyage

"he always used to say, he needed a crew to follow him out of trust, not fear" I don't know if this is just the fact I see this same sentiment over and over in Web!Martin fics, but, this reminds me of The Web.

"I don’t know exactly what was different but the whole mood of the ship was off. Kind of sour, somehow. I think it must have been Salesa. Everything always kind of… reflected him. You know people like that? When he was happy, satisfied, everything seemed to run smooth. When he was angry, everyone would be on edge, irritable." hmmm, again: The Web? maybe?

"Once found [Salesa] poring over an old photo album. The ship was there in the pictures, but a different captain, different crew. I asked him who they were, and he just looked at me, eyes sunken like hadn’t slept, and for a second I felt like he was seeing someone else, not me. But then he just shrugged. 'Dead now,' he said, 'doesn’t really matter.' " Hmmmm. what happened to your old crew, mister Salesa, sir?

I wonder if there is a connection between the photo album of his old crew, the final job which is procurring an old camera with a cracked lense, and the fact Salesa's ship is called The Dorian (as in, "The Picture of Dorian Gray").

speaking of the camera. We see the same thing here that happened in MAG045. Salesa and a handful of crew members go to an island to retrieve an artifact. they come back with the aforementioned old camera with a cracked lense, having lost two of the crew members that went with him. and, now the camera is out of its former owner's possession, a storm starts brewing over the island. lightning strikes the trees, and the statement giver can see some vast (nudge nudge) creature below the water surrounding the island, beginning to break the surface. the statement giver falls to the deck of the ship as they sail away, and when he looks back, the island and storm are gone.

just like how The Corruption began to infest the mosquitos once Salesa bought the syringe, The Vast goes after this island once Salesa takes the camera off of it.

CoincidenceIThinkNot.Meme

idk. this is probably me reading too much into it. but it's not entirely impossible that Salesa has been collecting artifacts that ward against The Fears somehow. and if he is, I wonder if that has something to do with how seemingly untouched his manor house has been by the Fearpocalypse.

anyway. when Salesa supposedly dies in an explosion, we only have the captain's word for it (who dies soon after himself). so he might have faked his death.

(and you know what they say. if one cool tank-top-wearing man survived the explosion that supposedly killed him, it's not entirely out of the realm of possibilities that another cool tank-top-wearing man may return from his relaxing kayaking trip. 👀) (I don't really think Tim will come back, but it's nice to dream.)

[misssophiachase]

For @klarolinefallbingo “Did you have to upset the goblins?”  

A/N Thanks to @helpfulfairy for giving me some supernatural tips that were so useful to make this happen : ) 

Mission Impossible?

Kol Mikaelson, the youngest prince of the underworld, is being held captive in the forbidden forest by an army of vengeful goblins. Two separate rescue missions are launched. One by a mysterious mercenary hired by the King and the other his older, and very suspicious brother. Who will come out victorious and what secrets will be revealed along the way? 

I

Yes, he’d upset the goblins. 

So much so that the young prince found himself captive in the deep, dark depths of the forbidden forest. 

Goblins weren’t considered a threat in the supernatural order of things but, at the same time, they could easily be underestimated. Although, the possibility they had joined forces with one of their bigger enemies couldn’t be dismissed either. 

“Your highness.” Klaus turned to see his servant mid greeting. Josh was young and inexperienced but at least he’d mastered his technique. “I come bearing news.”

“Well, how about less bowing and more talking. What news do you have of my brother from the capital?” 

The ruling family oversaw the entire realm and resided in the heavily guarded capital. Klaus, however, had recently taken up a posting in the northern region in order to quell rising tensions against the heirachy. 

This latest attack on his brother seemed too much of a coincidence, even if he probably did do something idiotic to deserve it. Kol was the black sheep of the family and their relationship was strained at times. Although, that didn’t mean he wasn’t anxious about his fate given he was missing. 

Abducted. 

Goblin fodder, according to Rebekah. His sister, the princess, never did possess much empathy or tact. 

“The King is displeased it has come to this,” Josh recited. No surprises there given Mikael was never happy and made his sentiments known on a regular basis. “He wants this dealt with quietly and swiftly so has contracted a highly trained mercenary to track down the prince.”

“This is father’s great plan?” He growled. Klaus was trying to remain composed but this latest news was doing nothing to ease his concerns. As much as Kol frustrated him, Klaus had no intention of leaving his rescue up to a questionable stranger whose loyalty could be bought. 

“I understand that the mercenary in question possesses the requisite skills for this kind of mission.” 

“I’ll be the judge of that,” he replied gruffly. “Do you know this mercenary?”

“No, Your Highness,” Josh replied. “All I know is that he is well trained in tracing, combat and speaks fluent Ghukliak.”

The language of goblins. Not many outside their close knit circle could speak it let alone were fluent.

Klaus felt his chest constrict, his instincts telling him he was right to question his father’s motives and that the supposed mercenary probably wasn’t who they purported to be.

Klaus knew someone who fitted that description. 

Someone he loved probably more than he should. 

But it was a she not a he. 

She was brilliant, that much he knew from their time together. She spoke multiple languages and dialects. In fact, they’d met when she worked as a translator at their annual summit which brought together representatives from all supernatural orders.     

He also knew she was handy with a weapon given that time she ‘accidentally’ stabbed him in the foot during an impromptu and mock fencing battle. Well, afterwards she maintained it wasn’t an accident because he was being an ass. Rather than incensing the hot blooded prince it only made him want her more. 

And more. 

But they were from two different worlds, so much so that their possible union would be considered a curse that could bring down the ruling heirachy and everyone they presided over.  

Suddenly, all of the good memories were replaced, not by their wretched circumstances, but by a renewed and sickening fear for her safety along with his brother. 

“Bloody hell,” he cursed aloud, unable to help himself. 

This was not a game, so what was she playing at? 

“I’m sorry, my lord, is there something I can do...”

“Summon Elijah and prepare the horses. We’ll be leaving at first light.” Elijah had been visiting when Kol disappeared, so Klaus figured the least he could do was lend a helping hand, especially given what they faced.

“But the King.” 

“Not a word, Josh, if you value your life,” he hissed, spinning on his heel and leaving the room without a backward glance.  

II

“I think my behind has gone to sleep.” Caroline rolled her eyes wondering not only why she’d opted for a companion but chosen this particular one. The fog was thick in these parts and for once she was glad her friend couldn’t properly gauge her reaction. 

Caroline was trying to tell herself she made the right decision. Katherine Pierce was a revered witch in these parts so was more than qualified for the mission but every minute they rode and every single complaint was telling her otherwise. 

“Luckily you’re not doing the work then is it?”

“I’m doing plenty.”

“Complaining doesn’t count.”

“I’m heartbroken, the least you could do is give me some pity,” she growled. Before Caroline could reply she continued. “In case you’re wondering, that means my most vital organ has been shattered into a trillion, tiny pieces.”

Drama really should have been her middle name. 

Caroline wanted to be that supportive friend who knew the right thing to say. Unfortunately, she’d had her most vital organ broken too and, not that she’d admit it to anyone, still hadn’t fully recovered. Well, not enough to give any helpful advice. 

“He’s not worth it,” she offered mechanically, thinking that line had been thrown at her enough times.

“I beg to differ.”

“You’ve never even mentioned anyone and now suddenly he’s the love of your life?” 

“What can I say? It all happened very quickly.” Caroline knew that feeling all too well. “He’s not my type at all so I wasn’t expecting it to hurt so much.”

“So, who is he?” Her friend gave her a look which said she wasn’t going to divulge his identity anytime soon. “Fine, then you can stop whining and let me concentrate.”

“Why are you doing this?” The question wasn’t completely unexpected but at the same time it was a difficult one to answer. “Not to mention pretending to be some kind of mercenary which we both know you’re not.”

“I have the skills required,” she argued.

“But mercenaries don’t possess loyalty or hold allegiances, nor do they care for anyone but themselves. We both know you are far good to be that way.”

“I might have misrepresented myself, true, but let’s just say I owe someone.” 

She’d been the one to leave in the middle of the night, to flee when their circumstances became too difficult. Caroline knew he would have fought to the death for her and a life together. 

She knew if she couldn’t give him that then the least she could do was help his younger brother. Someone she’d grown fond of in the short time they’d spent together. It wouldn’t fix them but she hoped it would make some amends at least.  

“You gamble? That I wasn’t expecting,” she offered. Caroline wanted to correct her but thought better of it. 

“Maybe I liked you better when you were complaining about your love life.”

“Fine, if I tell you his identity it stays between us.” Clearly they were back to her mystery man and Caroline was immediately regretting her clumsy segue. “Promise?”

Caroline only nodded by way of response, there was only so many theatrics she could take in one day.

“It’s Prince Elijah.” 

Caroline’s head flicked around to face her friend. Now that she wasn’t expecting, even if she did know him. She needed to conceal her surprise. “Well, now it makes sense that prince of the underworld isn’t your usual type. How did this all come about or do I not want to know?”

“We met purely by accident on the streets of the capital. He’s handsome, yes, but it was something else.”

“Let me guess, some imaginary magnet was pulling you towards him.” 

Caroline knew that feeling all too well when she’d been with a certain prince that happened to be his very own brother. 

“And how do you know that exactly?” She’d clearly said too much. 

“Uh, so, how exactly did he break your heart then?”

“He had to leave the capital on assignment. I must admit finding out you wanted help rescuing Kol Mikaelson seemed like a weird coincidence.”

“Does Elijah know?” Caroline did not need that complication. She knew Elijah and that, although they quarrelled, he was extremely loyal to Klaus. If he found out Caroline was on a mission to rescue Kol he wouldn’t let that stand. 

“Of course not,” she replied. “Although I did tell him I had business with you and I could have sworn I saw a flicker of recognition in his eyes. Do you happen to know why that would be?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Caroline could have kicked herself for being such a bad liar. 

“Okay, so tell me about this debt you owe, it’s the least I deserve.”

This was going to be difficult to explain without giving everything away. 

III

“I thought father said there was a mercenary rescuing Kol?” Elijah asked as they made their way through the forest the following day. 

“Well, if you’re not up to it, older brother,” Klaus responded emphasising the word ‘older’ on purpose.

“I was merely pointing out that it seems excessive given we are currently fighting wars on multiple fronts. But Kol does like to be the centre of attention so will appreciate the added effort, I’m sure.”  

That last part Klaus couldn’t argue with. 

“I’ll be sure to tell Kol you said that after we save his sorry ass,” Klaus joked before growing serious again. Something had been playing on his mind since he found out the possible identity of his father’s chosen ‘mercenary’. “Do you trust Mikael’s intentions?”

“Is that a rhetorical question, Niklaus?” 

“I find this whole situation unsettling. It seems all too much of a coincidence that father has sent us outside the capital and now Kol is missing. You don’t think that he...”

“What? That he Is trying to kill the heirs to the throne and his very own children? Mikael has many faults and he’s certainly not going to win father of the year but I think you’re being a tad ridiculous.”

“I know I’m the cynical one but think my suspicions are justified.”

“And what makes you think that?” Klaus hesitated briefly. He had no intention of mentioning Caroline, not yet, but when it came to her he couldn’t contain his feelings or his composure for long.

“I believe the mercenary father hired is Caroline.”

“Forbes?” He questioned dubiously. “Why would you think that?”

“She speaks multiple languages, a skill the very mercenary possesses.”

“Well, last time I checked she isn’t a mercenary but fallen fae royalty.”

“Watch how you talk about her, brother.” Klaus growled. He couldn’t help the over protectiveness, it just seemed to envelop him when anyone spoke adversely against her. Even after she left him he still couldn’t let her go. 

“Finally,” he acknowledged. “I admit I only said that to incite you, Niklaus, given she was the best thing to ever happen to you.”

“That I don’t need to revisit, brother. But we both know that nothing good could come from our union.”

“Remind me, was that before or after she stabbed you?”

“Elijah has a sense of humour who would have thought that?” Klaus drawled. “Clearly I’ll never live that incident down but right now, given present and urgent circumstances, it doesn’t matter.” 

“I must admit, I’ve been distracted.” That Klaus wasn’t expecting. His brother was the epitome of law and order and not much more. 

“I’m almost too scared to ask.”

“There’s a woman.”

“And here I thought you were celibate for life,” he chuckled. 

“Hilarious, Niklaus,” he shot back. “Although, given our brief discussions, apparently she’s travelling with the very girl you are pretending not to seek.”

Klaus was struggling to control himself. Not just because he wanted to kill Elijah for dropping that clue without warning but because the thought she was close only made him want her more. 

TBC - You Reap What You Sow for @klarolinefallbingo

[malethirsty]

Loyalty - Tyler Lockwood

Summary: When Klaus’s #2 makes eyes with you, Klaus sets the two of you up. But when you encounter an issue, it’s down to you to pull through for the both of you.

Warnings: M/M smut (21+), Bareback (However Orgasm occurs once Tyler pulls out, make of that what you will), Homophobic comments, Elena and co. become villains

Inspired by: https://twitter.com/MaleThirst/status/1196818509830819841

Life had changed drastically since Klaus had found out how to make hybrids. He moved you quickly into his house & got his new army to guard you in case Elena and her friends tried to pull any punches, The Council did indeed cut you off, but the Mikaelson fortune was extended to you by Klaus & the day spent shopping with Rebekah helped you both to bond. What was the most surprising thing was that you were now spending more time with Tyler Lockwood. You expected Elena to surround a support group around him, or ask him to spy on Klaus, but she ditched him, as it had been found out that Klaus had sired Tyler, and thus Tyler was now fiercely loyal to him. It was good to have someone else to share an admiration for Klaus & on days when the Original Hybrid had to battle against Damon & Mikael, you took time with Rebekah to train the newest hybrid. It was a Friday night that you all finally got to take a break from hecticness of it all. “Don’t you usually go to the Mystic Grill on Fridays, love?” Klaus pondered as he saw you flopped down, trying to find something on Netflix. “I mean I would, but Elena and all her friends are there, and I know they’ll send me out of the bar.” Klaus could tell you were still a bit down following your exile & leaned in to give you a kiss “Y/N, You need to boost your confidence. I’ll send Rebekah to watch from afar, but also, to make them that much more pissed, tonight I’ll send you out to the Mystic Grill with Tyler as a date, make Caroline jealous.” You snorted, it did sound like a good idea but “Is Tyler up for this?” You asked, you wanted it to be his idea & not Klaus planting him there “I asked him, he said yes. He also said he has a thing for you as well, so I’ve booked you next to her hotel room where she’s staying for the night before flying out for some Miss Virginia thing, keep her up all night.” “And how would I do that?” Klaus leaned up to whisper in your ear “You know how love. Do you always do with me every night” you knew that Klaus meant to fuck Tyler and while the idea sounded good.

“I’ll let Tyler know to be ready at a quarter to 8.” Klaus smiled, dimples on show as you headed into the closet, to pick out some good clothing. In next to no time, whether it be a need to impress you or due to his newly acquired speed, Tyler was ready & waiting as he walked you down the street, hand in hand. Right behind you was Rebekah not only your escort but also giving dirty looks to those who were giving you & Tyler side eye, which was comforting to you, it was nice to know Klaus, Tyler & Rebekah at least cared about your wellbeing, even if the world around you was less than sympathetic. As you entered the Mystic Grill, you saw the majority of the building taken up for Caroline’s big title party. Rebekah positioned herself near the door as You & Tyler selected the same secluded booth that you had gone to the night You & Klaus became partners. Ordering your usual Chips & Garlic Bread, Tyler ordering the same with a massive burger, you eventually opened up the conversation. “So Klaus told me about you having a thing for me.” Tyler gave a slight grin “When did you know & why didn’t you tell me earlier?” “Well it was a while ago, after Dad died, I realised I was free from his vileness, and I was going to tell you after the funeral, but then everything with Mason and turning happened, I threw myself into what I had become instead of managing both my crush & that.” Tyler swallowed, clearly not used to letting out a lot “It’s alright Tyler, you went through a lot so quickly, I’m not angry and you had every right to work on yourself before hand.” Tyler grinned as his burger got placed on the table “Jesus Christ, That’s massive! How are you gonna get through that?!” Tyler shrugged “You know that before I was a hybrid, I played football right Y/N? I’ve always had a big appetite.” “What exactly is the appeal of football? I’ve never understood.” Tyler shot a grin at you “Y/N, tonight I’m gonnna give you a crash course.”

And indeed he did, outlining the rules of the game, his favourite team and some spectacular moments that he had achieved with Mystic Falls during his tenure as a player. Usually you’d scoff at sport talk but Tyler was so engaging in great conversation, that you didn’t mind a second, and as much as you listened to him, he listened to you discuss your likeness of musical theatre with the same enjoyment plastered on his face as you had when he talked. “Y/N, I’m having one of the best date nights ever, Little Miss Blonde over there couldn’t compare” you were about to start laughing when at that exact moment, Elena’s group came over to your table. “Well hello there” Damon said somewhat curtly “Hello Damon, I guess you’re here to intimidate us” you responded, “Now Y/N, me intimidate, never!” Damon mockingly feigned outrage “Well it’s not for the bourbon since there’s none at our table” you quipped back, Elena stepping in. “No we aren’t here to intimidate, we wanted to take a look at the man who stabbed me in the back last week, who sold us all to Klaus, who made me a blood bag, how you had the nerve to show up at our bar and stage some sort of mock date to get under Caroline’s skin”. Whilst Elena was right about trying to get Caroline riled up, she had no business questioning Tyler’s feelings for you, which made you angry, and looking over to where Tyler sat, you noticed he was gripping his fists angrily, trying bot to let an outburst emerge and ruin the night. Looking to your left, you saw Rebekah had heard what was going on and had stepped up from her table, with your own group of friends ready to back you up, you decided that you might as well strike back, wasn’t as if she could do worse “Wow Elena, your ass is jealous at the amount of shit that just came out of your mouth” Seeing Elena’s shit eating grin thinking that she had intimidated you fall was quite possibly the sight of the year, but you weren’t done, not at all “Firstly, Tyler was close to dying, so if I hadn’t said anything, he wouldn’t be here, also when was the last time any of you acknowledged me in your supernatural group of expertise? I didn’t owe you a God damn thing. And this ‘mock date?’ How would you know that Tyler’s feelings are genuine?” “Because I dated him for several months & as an ally I can tell when someone has feelings for men.” Caroline said now stepping forwards next to Elena to survey the scene. You turned to face Caroline, intending to give her the same verbal lashing as Elena “It’s about time someone told you Caroline, but having a group of Gay Friends who help you shop & quoting lines from RuPaul’s Drag Race does not make you an ally, it makes you an insufferable cunt.” A snorting laugh came from your left, and without turning, you knew that Rebekah had enjoyed your comment Now Caroline was looking like she’d been hit over the face with how red she’d turned, embarrassed she’d been called out at her party, good.

“Why would you have even gotten up with Klaus though?” Inquired Bonnie, “Yeah, what did he offer you: Money, Power, Immortality?” Jeremy seconded. “Nothing, what he did do was tell me about his loneliness & I remembered the times I felt pushed out and I thought if others could give me grace after being tossed to the side, the least I could do is return it to others.” “Oh Boo Hoo.” Damon prodded in, “Klaus is making an army without asking any of the wolves if they want in.” “How-” Tyler began angrily and Rebekah’s feet began to stomp towards the table, which Elena & Bonnie had acknowledged by the look of intimidation on their faces, however you stood up very suddenly, determined to stand your ground “How’s Vicki? Did you make sure she wanted to be immortal? You know, after you gave her your blood & snapped her neck.” An uncomfortable silence filled that section of the bar. “Bonnie, how is carrying Anna’s death going? You know the woman your current squeeze was dating? How were all the vampires minding their own business going before you tripped up the device & caused so much disaster, that almost caused Jeremy to die? Wasn’t that because all vampires were the same?, a pity story after your Grams passed, yet you stand with Damon and have the audacity to lunge after me. And you two” Y/N pointed at Elena & Jeremy, “You two are cut from the same cloth. Jeremy you knew about Bonnie tripping up the device, killing Anna & yet you two are dating and Elena you complain about Klaus needing your blood for something so little as turning which is somehow so bad, yet when Katherine didn’t open her legs to welcome Damon, he snapped your brothers neck, yet you forgave him somehow. I’m not saying you can’t forgive him, but if you’re going to let Damon’s miniature things go, then you need to let Klaus’s go. I’m aware that Klaus isn’t the picture perfect idea of humanity you all want, but you keep excusing the darkness in your own supernatural partners, not to mention yourselves, so you have some nerve isolating me like I’m the only one lavishing in it. Stay the fuck away from me.” You grabbed Tyler’s hand and marched out of the Mystic Grill. “Nice work-“ Rebekah began, but in your angry mood, you marched right past her with Tyler in tow. “Rude” she muttered under her breath as she reached for her phone to tip off Klaus that whilst you’d blown her off, you finally grew a backbone.

You walked several streets in a huff before stopping to breathe, at that point, Tyler hugged you. “T-Tyler, are you alright?” You questioned, “Yeah, it’s just that you could see me getting angry and you stood up for me instead. You were so scared of being confronted by them, but you stood your ground to their faces. You may not have faced down a vampire or a wolf, but you Y/N are the bravest out of us all.” You smiled “Thanks Tyler” he leaned in & kissed you. You took a moment to let Tyler endulge before you began to kiss back, running your hands down Tyler’s back before you were slammed into the lamppost. Whilst you wanted Tyler, you didn’t want to be written up for public sex, so you broke the kiss “Let’s get back to Klaus’s and continue this there.” “But what about antagonising Caroline?” Tyler questioned, but you had your answer ready “I think we’ve antagonised her enough, besides she’d probably rub herself to your moans and shit, I don’t want to give her the satisfaction.” Tyler let a cold smirk cross his face, he knew you wanted to be fucked hard, and that’s what he planned to do. Deciding to test out Tyler’s compelling skills on a homeless person, you gave him the room Klaus had booked out & you both made your way back to The Mikaelson Compound. It was empty, so you & Tyler could fuck as loud as you could, so he sped you up to your room and as the door closed, Tyler slammed you up against it, kissing you passionately, the same as he did on the street, however this time, your clothes were removed with vampire speed. Standing there naked, Tyler took in your nude form with a twinkle in his eyes, you blushed slightly which made Tyler smile “You’re cute when you’re flustered Y/N.” Tyler commented and with that he began to undress as well, intending to take time so you could see the goodies under his clothes.

As he removed his shirt, Tyler pulled you in for a kiss, his tongue sliding into your mouth as he deepened it. You began to feel around his shirtlessness, tweaking at his nipples which make the newly turned hybrid moan in your ear, the sound like molten gold to you. Suddenly you were thrown with all of Tyler’s might onto the bed, Tyler made sure you were looking up as he disposed of his pants and underwear in one go, his cock standing proud and hard. He began to walk towards you, cockily flaunting all the while “You want this dick don’t you Y/N?”, you nodded, but that didn’t appease the hybrid who sped towards you and gripped you by the neck, softly yet dominant “Talk to me Y/N, do you want me to fuck you all night?, have you crying my name as I make you cum from my stroke? Answer me.” He spoke the last part cooly as he playfully tightened his grip on your throat, making you feel a bit light headed “Yes Tyler, please fuck me as hard as you can.” You moaned out, making him laugh “As hard as I can? God this is gonna be good.” He laid his hand out, spitting onto it before stroking his hard member, coating it with the makeshift lube all the while looking at you all sprawled out, naked for him, and while he tried to maintain his cockiness, you could see from the ripples of pleasure on his face. Once he had lathered himself up enough, Tyler didn’t waste anymore time and used his newly acquired speed to to thrust deep into your ass, making you cry out at the sting. “Fuck, shit, your tighter than Caroline.” Tyler moaned out, you couldn’t even form words from how big he was and how he was stretching you out so right, all that came out was a mewling cry, which the hybrid smirked at. Rocking his cock deeper inside your tight canal, he began a passionate pace, looking down into your eyes as he fucked you deep so he could see how you crumbled apart for him, how desperate you were to take his dick. He locked you in another kiss again, moaning into it as you trailed your hands down his back, until he slammed in balls deep, colliding head first with your prostate, you cried out & instictively tightened your grip, sinking your fingers into Tyler. “Sink it in pretty boy, scratch down my back till you draw blood while I fuck you the way Vicki & Caroline could never handle, but you can, you fucking slut.”

The rough dirty talk emerged a desire in you to meet Tyler’s challenge head on. You dug in harder as Tyler cried out from the mix of pain and pleasure, all thoughts of Caroline and the confrontation gone, all you both wanted to do was chase down your orgasms. Your fingers began to feel a bit moist and you took them away from Tyler’s back to see you’d got him deep that there was blood dripping “Taste it” Tyler panted in your ear “Taste me Y/N, I know you want to.” With Tyler’s encouragement, you locked eyes with him drew your tongue across your fingers, tasting Tyler’s blood. You moaned out from his taste, knowing it would incense him into fucking you rougher and indeed, Tyler began to rock into you so hard that the bed began to slam into the wall with every thrust. ”God, this is amazing, keep this up and I’ll cum for you Y/N.” “Do it Tyler, cum.” Once again Tyler squeezed your neck “I’m the hybrid here baby, you’re the human, I control you, I won’t cum till you cum apart from my dick.” Tyler’s words were accompanied by a sharp thrust deep inside you, well and truly smashing into your prostate, the driving force combined with his words was what it took for you to reach your peak and crying out Tyler’s name, you came in spurts over yourself. “Fuck, that’s hot, seeing you cum for me. You want to taste me again?” You nodded and began to move your hands to Tyler’s back again, intending to leave new marks, but instead you were met by Tyler’s full force as he slammed your hands to the bed. Groaning and spluttering out of ecstasy, his body also rippling with the same energy, Tyler pulled out and with a few simple strokes let out a loud moan as he came all over you, splattering you with even more hot cum.

As he calmed down, Tyler wiped his hand in his load, covering his fingers with the sticky white substance and held it up to your mouth “Taste it” he said again, reminiscent of when he wanted you to drink his blood, except this time, there was a more erotic tone to his voice, he wanted all of his essence inside you. Never losing eye contact with the Lockwood, you licked across your hand, taking in his salty sweet seed, even sucking it off your fingers while moaning which made Tyler grin “Fuck, if people only knew how perfect you are.” He breathed out “I do” came a distinctive british voice that could only mean... “Klaus!” you both exclaimed as you looked over to see the hybrid standing in the doorway, watching you both with a smirk on his face “I thought you were at the hotel making Caroline sulk.” “No, you should have seen though, Y/N pretty much tore them all a new one” “I don’t doubt that, Rebekah texted me and told me about it. She also told me you’d left without talking to her.” He eyed you closely “I was in an angry mood” you tried to explain, but Klaus held his hand up to silence you and you obeyed his command. “I have to say nice technique Tyler, you wanted Y/N to take his fill you of you and that you did. But now I want you to step back” With the sire bond in affect, Tyler took several steps away from the bed, Klaus grinning at his power as he walked towards you and to your excitement began to strip his clothing off “You’re going to watch as I now fuck Y/N, cause while you know how to fuck, you don’t have a thousand years of experience to you. You can masturbate to us if you want, as long as you cum once we have.” Klaus stopped at the foot of the bed, Tyler nodding as he fisted his hardening length “Good. Now love” he turned his gaze to you “Tyler’s got you ready for me, like a good sweet progeny, ready for another hybrid cock inside you.” He palmed at himself and nodding, you threw yourself back on the bed, spreading your legs. Oh yes, this was the life.

[lady-salvatore]

Never, Ever (Part Two)

Pairing: Stefan Salvatore x Klaus Mikaelson x Reader

Desc.: After your interrupted wedding, you try to get to know Klaus again and re-examine your relationship with Stefan.

Taglist: @going-insanx

“I told him! I told him not to ruin the wedding!” Caroline was yelling to Bonnie, who had her hands on her temples and her eyes closed.

You, Caroline, Bonnie, and Elena were having an emergency sleepover the night after the wedding. You were supposed to be in Italy with Stefan, but your honeymoon was, obviously, put on hold.

“I just don’t understand how this happened,” Bonnie muttered. “Run me through it again.”

“We knew Nik in the twenties,” you said, your arms curled around your knees. Your eyes were still sore from crying. “I fell for him. Stefan and I knew each other then, but... but we didn’t have feelings for each other. I had eyes for Nik only— wait, should I call him Nik or Klaus? Niklaus?”

“That is so not what you need to be worried about,” Elena said. “What are you gonna do?”

You shrugged. “I don’t know. I’m so confused, I mean... I love them both.”

Elena took a sip of champagne she’d salvaged from the reception. “Been there.”

You pressed your hands to your eyes and sighed. “I mean, I’m not even sure which I loved first. I fell for Nik in the twenties— he compelled it away. I fell for Stefan— Nik compelled it all back. I just...”

Caroline wrapped an arm around you. “It’s okay. Just breathe.”

Then, the door flew open.

“Guess who has a solution?” Damon asked, striding inside.

You looked up. “Damon, honey, I’m not in the mood-“

“I’m serious!” he replied. “I have a great idea. The bachelorette.”

“Huh?” you asked, tilting your head.

“The bachelorette!” Damon repeated, excitement in his eyes. “You’ll go on dates with evil, evil Klaus and my sweet baby brother and then you’ll make a decision!”

Caroline considered it. “That... isn’t the worst plan you’ve come up with.”

“Thank you.”

“It’s worth a try,” Elena offered to you. “But only if that’s what you want.”

You looked over at Bonnie, who shrugged. You sighed deeply, and looked back to Damon. “So, how would this work?”

Damon’s plan was simple, and it lasted a week. You and Stefan would have a date on Monday, and then you and Klaus would have one Tuesday. Until Sunday, when you made your decision, neither man was allowed to contact you.

The plan made you nervous. The dates made you nervous. The deadline made you nervous. But worst of all, Stefan and Klaus made you nervous. How would you face Stefan after walking away from your wedding? And how would you face Klaus after a century of abandonment?

“And why don’t I get to go first?” Klaus asked, lounging in Damon’s chair in the living room of the Boarding House after Damon finished telling him the idea.

Stefan rolled his eyes. “That’s your concern?”

“Calm down,” Klaus said, glaring at Stefan. “You don’t want to mess with me.”

“Actually, I think I do,” Stefan said, glaring right back. “In case you forgot, you ruined my wedding and tried to steal my fiancée.”

Klaus pursed his lips smugly. “Is she really your fiancée any more, mate?”

Stefan stood up, Klaus standing up after him. You ran between them, looking Stefan in the eyes.

“Stefan, baby, please,” you whispered, tears in your eyes. “Don’t let him get to you, okay? And as for you,” you whipped around to look at Klaus. “Stop teasing my fiancé.”

Klaus attempted to look smug, but his eyes betrayed him. Even if nobody else did, you could see the hurt in them. “Alright, love.”

You sighed. You didn’t want to admit that it felt so good for him to look at you like that, for him to call you love. “Good. That’s another rule I’m establishing. No fighting.”

“Added to the list,” Damon said dutifully, grinning like the cat who ate the canary. He was enjoying this all too well.

Stefan smiled down at you, and you felt your heart flutter like it always did when he smiled. It was comforting. Even if a lot of things had changed, the way you felt about Stefan didn’t.

That also made everything infinitely harder.

-

That Monday was your date with Stefan. You were getting ready in one of his favorite outfits on you, a cute denim skirt and a pretty white blouse he adored. You let your hair flow in loose curls and did your makeup just a little fancier than usual.

You went down the stairs to your date.

Stefan was making dinner in the kitchen. It was one of your favorite things to see him do. He was a great cook, and you thought it was so romantic when he did it for you.

He’d set the table with candles and a buffet— steak, lasagna, pasta, and anything else you could have wanted.

Stefan turned to see you, and then looked embarrassed. “I wasn’t sure what you were in the mood for.”

You smiled and walked into his arms, embracing him. “Stefan, this is so sweet...”

He laughed softly. “I just wanted it to be perfect. It’s honestly been a while since we’ve been on a date.”

You kissed him. “And hopefully there will be plenty more to come.”

The two of you sat down to eat, and then he sighed.

“I hate that I’m nervous,” he muttered, mostly to himself.

“I hate it, too,” you said, holding his hand over the table. “But don’t worry. We’re gonna put all this behind us by this weekend.”

Stefan seemed relieved, but you weren’t. In all honesty, every second you grew more unsure.

The date with Stefan was nice. It was perfect. It reminded you of everything you loved about Stefan— romantic, considerate, kind...

Everything you loved about him was, coincidentally, everything that made this so hard.

-

By Tuesday, you were sick. You couldn’t eat or sleep, only agonize about what was to come.

Klaus was back. Back for you. But then again, he had abandoned you a very, very long time ago.

Klaus texted you, informing you to put on your best dress.

“Well, obviously, this is your best one,” Elena said, pulling a sleek black floor-length gown out of your closet. “I’m jealous, by the way.”

You tried to laugh, but it felt foreign in your throat. “Don’t envy me right now.”

Elena smiled softly, placing a hand on your shoulder. “(Y/N), it’ll be fine. By the end of tonight, you’ll probably know.”

“I’m scared to know,” you blurted out, panic on the edge of your voice. “What if it isn’t Stefan?”

Elena sighed. “I asked myself the exact same question once. And you know what?”

“What?”

“It’s something only you can decide,” Elena said, nodding. “And you have to admit your feelings to yourself, or your decision won’t be true.”

You nodded. “You’re good at this.”

“I’ve been through the ringer,” she said, laughing. “I have advice on pretty much everything by now.”

You got into the dress, and you had to admit it looked great. You’d probably picked it up during the twenties, you thought sourly.

After Klaus had left you, you supposed.

Elena did your hair and makeup for quite some time. Almost abruptly, she stopped.

“Stunning,” she said with a smile. Then, she handed you a mirror. “Look!”

You took the mirror in your hands and looked into it.

Oh.

You couldn’t deny it, you looked amazing. Your eyeliner was perfectly winged, and your lips were painted lush red.

Elena, about to leave you, gave you one last reassuring smile. “Whatever your choice is, you’ll be happy in the end. Remember that.”

She shut the door behind you, and you put on your heels. You figured you’d be almost as tall as Klaus in them.

You exited your room and descended down the stairs, but paused on the staircase as you heard voices.

“Don’t do anything to hurt her.” The voice was Stefan’s, and it was low and tight, scolding. “I’ll kill you myself.”

“Worried, mate?” The second voice was Klaus.

“No, because I know she’ll choose me. When it’s all said and done, I was the one who was there for her, not you.”

Klaus nearly growled. “You can’t begin to understand the relationship between she and I, so bite your tongue, Salvatore.”

“I understand enough to know that you abandoned her for a hundred years.”

“If I never would’ve left, we’d have been happy.”

“But you did leave,” Stefan replied dryly. “I didn’t.”

Tears pricked your eyes. You were putting both of them through so much pain. You couldn’t stand it. Not only that, the pain of the past was all coming back. Klaus left you. Who says he wouldn’t do it again?

You took a deep breath and went down the rest of the stairs, faking a smile. “Hello.”

Klaus turned to you, stunned at the sound of your voice. Then, a small smile grew on his face. “(Y/N). Are you ready to go?”

You nodded, not trusting your voice to betray your feelings. You felt guilty as you noticed how nice Klaus looked in his suit and tie. It reminded you of all those years ago.

You took Klaus’s arm and went out the door, leaving Stefan standing alone in the Boarding House.

He listened as the car engine fired up and drove away.

“The way he looked at her...” Stefan muttered to himself, his heart lurching like a restart.

“What about it?” Damon asked him, downing bourbon. Stefan could tell that he was worried too, even if he tried not to look it.

“With all the adoration in the world,” Stefan said quietly, starting up the stairs.

That was when he knew, even if you chose him, he didn’t have a chance. He never would, because no matter what happened tonight, Klaus would never leave you again.

Never, ever.

-

Klaus held your hand in the car. You didn’t want to, but you didn’t stop it either.

“Stop the car,” you whispered suddenly.

Immediately, Klaus stopped the car and pulled over to the side of the road. He turned in his seat to look at you. “What’s wrong, love?”

The question that had been on your tongue for days finally came out. “Why did you leave me?”

“What?”

“All those years ago, Klaus,” you said, meeting his eyes. “Why’d you leave me all alone?”

Klaus sighed, pulling his hand back into his lap. He looked down, ashamed. “I wanted to protect you from Mikael.”

“Back then, I’d have spent a lifetime running from Mikael if it meant being with you. But you left me, and now you interrupt my wedding-“

“I’m not sorry,” Klaus said tightly, looking back up to meet your eyes with fierce determination.

You furrowed your eyebrows. “How could you not be sorry? You abandoned me.”

“Because that’s what was best for you,” he growled. “It was what kept you safe and alive. I never would’ve forgiven myself if...”

“If what?”

“If something happened to you,” Klaus muttered.

Tears spilled from your eyes. “I’d have died that night if it meant dying beside you!”

“Don’t you say that,” Klaus said, his own eyes shining with tears. “Don’t you ever say that.”

“I’ll say what I want!” you replied, crossing your arms. “I have a right to be honest with how I feel. I gained that right when you left me.”

“I took the pain of it away, what else could I have done?” he pleaded.

“You stole my memories!” you said, grabbing his suit jacket. “You stole a century of me being with you! And the worst part is, it didn’t help at all! A part of me, the part of me that was compelled away, the part of me that loved you, has spent a hundred agonizing years missing you! And you compelled all that pain back!”

Klaus froze. “What?”

Tears were pouring from your eyes now. “I’m feeling it all. Even if I couldn’t remember, there was always a part of me that loved you and missed you... and when you compelled that part back...”

His eyes widened. “(Y/N), love, I didn’t mean to... oh, God, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

You cried, throwing yourself into his arms. “It hurts, Nik. It hurts so much.”

“I’m so sorry, if I’d have known...” Klaus was whispering into your ear. “I’m sorry...”

You cried for a while before finally regaining composure.

“You should have let me choose my fate,” you said, pulling away from him. “But I know why you did it.”

He cradled your face in his hands, and you felt the safest you’d ever felt. “Every day since I left you has been agony. I never stopped loving you for a second.”

He glanced at the clock, and grinned. “Well, we’ve missed dinner. But I suppose it’s for the best.”

“Not much of a date, huh?” You sniffled, wiping away some of the makeup running down your face. “God, I must look-“

“Beautiful as ever,” Klaus interrupted. “And don’t worry, I think I’ve got a solution.”

He pressed play on his car radio, and soft music started to play. With a fluttering heart, you recognized it— the last song the two of you danced to.

“How about a dance?” Klaus asked, speeding to your door and opening it. He offered a hand.

You laughed, taking it.

As the song played, you danced slowly and caught up on everything for the past hundred years.

“I love you,” he whispered, closing his eyes. “I’ve been dying to say it, every day for the last century. I’ll tell you I love you every day. I didn’t tell you enough back then.”

“I love you, too,” you whispered, the words tumbling from your lips before you could think. But it was the truth.

You looked up at him, into those blue eyes you were feeling a century-long yearning for. And, hesitantly, you kissed him, long and slow. It was like they had never stopped being made for each other.

No matter how much you loved Stefan, it could not compare to how you felt for Klaus.

“I’ve made my choice,” you whispered against his lips.

“Are you sure?” he whispered back.

“Yes,” you replied, staring up into his eyes.

And there was no going back.

Never, ever.

[xxwritemeastoryxx]

Painted Souls Part 7

Author: xxwritemeastoryxx

Pairings: Elijah Mikaelson x Reader, Klaus Mikaelson x Caroline, Damon Salvatore x Elena Gilbert

Word Count: 1.4K

Warnings:  Possible bad crime references. But nothing else I can think of. 

Author’s Note: I do apologize that this one is on the shorter side. I wanted to make it longer, but it just wouldn’t happen, no matter how many times I’ve tried. So I left it where it was at. I promise the next part will have a lot more in it. 

Feedback gives me life and motivation for future things. ♥

"Greta Sienna." Elijah said as he placed his hand out in front of him. "Its a pleasure as always."

A smirk pulled at the woman's lips as she took Elijah's hand. "Likewise. Though I must say that I am rather surprised that your father has asked for you to take on this case."

"We are surprised as well." Freya said with a nod as she moved to shake the woman's hand. "Though I assume you'll be taking this as a challenge like you normally do."

"Of course," Greta said with a nod. "Where would the fun be if I had simply taken a step back and let the Mikaelsons have it all?" A chuckle came from the siblings at her words.

"It will be a challenge indeed." Finn said with a nod.

Elijah gestured for them to all take their seats a moment later. While this was just a meeting between lawyers, they figured it was best to see what they were up against—both in the case and their opposing side.

"This case is unique in its own." Greta began as she pulled out her file. "Lucien Castle has been on the radar for quite some time. While for mostly smaller crimes, this one has everything else beat."

"Do you really believe that he is, in fact, the killer that has been going after soulmates?" Finn asked as he held up the file. "There isn't anything here that can tie the cases together."

"A soulmate went missing," Greta looked at Finn. "Once that soulmate had been found, Lucien's prints were all over the place. That's enough to move forward with convicting him."

"That's where it will be our job to prove otherwise." A smirk pulled at Freya's lips. "We have a meeting with Lucien later this afternoon. We'll be sure to present his side of the story."

Greta nodded her head at the information being provided. "Then this will definitely make one hell of a case between us."

The Mikaelsons knew this was going to be a tough one on its own. While there was little evidence present, it all lead straight to Lucien. If there was a way to prove Lucien's innocence, it would be this family. And they never backed down from a challenge.

_____

"Y/N," Elena said as she walked up behind her, looking at the painting she had been working on. "That is amazing."

Elena's eyes wandered over the painting. She took in the several different colors that been placed onto the canvas. Each one brought up a distinct feature in itself and made the art look lifelike. This was something Elena could never create on her own.

"It's still not finished just yet." Y/N said with a tilt of her head. "It's missing something, and I just can't place my finger on it. "

"Maybe you should take a step back from it. Why not go find the rest of the paintings you need for the showing and then come back to it?"

Y/N sighed softly. "I know I should." She looked over at Elena. "Joyce knows I have plenty finished already. Creating more isn't going to help the fact that I still have yet to get the pieces for the arrangement."

Her showing was just days away. Y/N had given Joyce all of the ones she had in the dorm, but there were several of them that Y/N had to get out of storage. She just needed to head down there and get them.

"I'll go with." Elena said with a nod. "That way, you won't have an excuse to not tell me about your night with Elijah."

Y/N shook her head and chuckled. "It's not my fault you guys were still out when I got home. Otherwise, you would have known then."

Elena laughed. "Like I said, no excuses now."

Y/N rolled her eyes as she stood from her seat and grabbed her keys. "Alright, fine. I'll tell you how it went on the way there."

The shock was written all over Elena's face by the time Y/N finished telling her everything. They had just pulled into the storage units when Y/N explained that she met the Mikaelsons before, but neither remembered it.

"This whole time you could have known him." Elena said, shaking her head slightly.

"Not necessarily. Things changed, and it's not like we knew were soulmates at the time. I think we came back into each other's lives when we needed it the most."

After spending most of the evening with Elijah, she hadn't cared that they weren't together all those years ago. They were still young and getting to know who they were as a person. Life was different for them back then. Finding out that they were each other's soulmates now was the best time for both of them.

"I'm happy for you." Elena said, giving her a smile. "You found out who was on the other side of this." She tapped her own skin, talking about the bond. "And now you'll have someone to spend the rest of your life with."

A smile pulled at Y/N's lips. "Take it easier there. We've just started talking to each other. I don't expect us to jump right into marriage just because the universe says so."

Elena chuckled. "You know what I meant."

"I know. At least with you it will be easier." Y/N noted. "Once Caroline finds out she'll go straight into wedding planner mode."

"And that is why Damon and I are going with a small wedding." Elena said with a nod.

A fake gasp left Y/N's lips. "And deprive Caroline a chance to throw an extravagant wedding? How could you?"

Both girls broke out into laughter as they made their way up to the storage unit. Y/N pulled out her keys and unlocked it before lifting up the door.

Elena's eyes widened. "Holy shit. I thought you had a lot at the dorm."

Y/N chuckled and took a step into the unit. "I told you I had a unit full of them."

_____

"I'm telling you, I'm innocent." Lucien said as he looked at the lawyers before him. "I'm being set up here."

"The only evidence that was in the room pointed straight to you." Finn said with a shake of his head. "If there is something you can give us that would help with your case, we'd use that to prove your innocence."

"How about an ironclad alibi that no one bothered to check?" Lucien asked. "The night of her disappearance, I was out with friends. Open tab and everything. But no one has checked."

Elijah's eyebrow raised at that. "Why wouldn't they check your alibi? That's usually one of the first things they would do to ensure they've got the right person."

"His finger prints all over the scene voided it out." Freya noted handing the file over to Elijah.

Elijah shook his head. "We'll look into your alibi. You'll just have to tell us where you were at."

"Some place called The Local Bar in Richmond." Lucien said with a wave of his hand. "I got there around eight and was there until the last call."

"Alright, we'll make sure we look into it." Freya nodded. "If this is a case of someone framing you, we'll be able to get you out of here."

"Good to know I have a team of lawyers on my side." Lucien nodded.

"You can thank Mikael for that." Finn said as he began grabbing his things.

"He did say you three were the best he's got." A smirk pulled at Lucien's lips.

"Let's hope so." Elijah said with a nod.

The moment the meeting ended, and Lucien was taken away, Freya had pulled Elijah off to the side. There was a look on her face that Elijah knew all too well.

"What is it?" He asked.

"The Local Bar," She began. "That is where Klaus said he was meeting Marcel at when he left for Richmond. It's also where the victim's husband said she was at the night of her disappearance."

Understanding came over Elijah. Y/N and her friends spent the majority of their nights out there. Elijah shook his head. "If Lucien is telling the truth, there wouldn't be enough time for him to grab her and still make his alibi solid. We'll have to check into it."

He wanted to keep his mind off that Y/N could be in any danger.  If Lucien was the soulmate killer, he was behind bars and away from her. But if he was innocent, the killer was still out there. And that alone created an unsettling feeling within him.

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[soveryanon]

Reviewing time for MAG181!

- Little nice touch: the fact that time was passing normally inside of the house… immediately felt through the sound of the clock in the background, marking the passage of time:

(MAG180) SALESA: [SAD SIGH] [SILENCE BUT FOR CLOCK TICKING IN THE BACKGROUND] ANNABELLE: I did say this might happen. SALESA: You did, you diiid. Well… so much for my big reveal… Shame.

(MAG181) [CLICK–] [CLOCK TICKING IN THE BACKGROUND] [CLASSICAL MUSIC IS PLAYING; LOUIS SPOHR’S “SECHS DEUTSCHE LIEDER FÜR EINE SINGSTIMME, KLARINETTE UND KLAVIER, OP. 103: N°2 ZWIEGESANG”] [SOUNDS OF CROCKERY AND LIQUID BEING POURED] SALESA: Hmmm.

(I still have the reflex of associating the sound of a ticking clock with Elias’s office, so I was expecting Big Talk from the get-go! Aaah, I wonder if we’ll “hear” Elias’s office again, before the end…)

As they discussed, time was quantifiable again, existing outside of Jon&Martin (even when they were sleeping), not solely as events succeeding to each other. … On the other hand: it’s concerning that the tape’s case number was still “########-21”: time passes and is quantifiable on a day-to-day basis, Martin was able to conclude that it was daytime thanks to the light, but there was still no date inside of the house. It’s a “little bubble” of normalcy and time, but still existing in the middle of a chaos.

- In the same vein as last episode it was also neat how we could already understand that this space was operating differently, since Jon&Martin needed to physically take care of themselves again:

(MAG180) SALESA: Ah, well. We can talk after they’ve slept, I suppose. Urgh! And had a bath. And some food. No rush. [SOUNDS OF CROCKERY MOVING] We have all the time in the world.

(MAG181) [CLICK–] [CLOCK TICKING IN THE BACKGROUND] […] SALESA: Come in! Did you sleep well? Have you had something to eat? Annabelle said she’d shown you the pantry? [SALESA CEASES THE MUSIC] ARCHIVIST: [UNCOMFORTABLE] I, er… We… slept. I, I don’t know… H–how long’s it been? SALESA: About seventy-one hours by my clock. […] Come on, sit down, have a drink. [CLINKING SOUNDS OF GLASS AND ICE] MARTIN: You’re… sure? What time is it? I– Oh, huh. Huh! I can actually ask that question here! SALESA: You can indeed. MARTIN: And the sun’s high, so… SALESA: Good eye…! Martin, was it? MARTIN: Uh, uh… Yes. SALESA: Well Martin. It’s about ten in the morning, more or less. […] You’re sure you won’t have a drink? We definitely had some tea around here somewhere. MARTIN: Uh, I… already had some, thank you, uh! Some of us know how to be polite guests. ARCHIVIST: [SHARPLY] I don’t intend to accept anything offered by Annabelle Cane.

They slept, drank and ate! (But did they bathe. We don’t know if they did bathe. Though, Salesa would have probably commented on it again, if they didn’t.)

And on the one hand, I’m laughing really hard that they needed to sleep for three whole days to compensate for time spent in the apocalypse (that’s a long nap.), on the other hand… that’s weirdly optimistic for the rest of humanity trapped out there: I was fearing that if Jon&Martin managed to turn the world back, everyone would just collapse and die on the spot from exhaustion/hunger/thirst but, no, it seems like they could recover in this case?

- More on the differences between Jon and Martin later, but I like how it was quickly clear that Jon was less in control than his usual, and very aware of it: Jon was “disorientated”, his sentences were more hesitant, while Martin was quick to notice things, bouncing off from Salesa’s or Jon’s sentences, able to make small jokes. I loved and got sad over the Beholding one, since:

(MAG181) SALESA: How’re you feeling? MARTIN: [BLOWING AIR] ARCHIVIST: Disorientated. It’s like, hum… li–like I’ve lost my sight o–or, uh… SALESA: Well, you have, haven’t you? [HE CHUCKLES. IT ISN’T THE FRIENDLIEST SOUND] Annabelle tells me you work for “The Eye”. [PAUSE BUT FOR CLOCK TICKING IN THE BACKGROUND] ARCHIVIST: … Well, I–I wouldn’t exactly say I, I “work” for it… MARTIN: Uh… Well, I–I mean, you say that, but when you stop to think about it, it was literally our employer, Jon, so… Mmh! ARCHIVIST: I, I suppose.

They were actually talking about two different levels, each correct in his own way? Back in season 4, Martin had already pointed out to Jon that working in the Archives meant working for Beholding (MAG129: “I just– I worry. You’re working for someone… really bad!” “Yes, I’m not an idiot, Jon, but it’s no… worse than working for something really bad, so…” “At least, The Eye hasn’t gone after our own. Lukas has vanished two people!”); but on the other hand, Jon… has tried to distance himself from The Eye and what he wanted (by stopping to take live statements, by refusing to indulge in any contentment induced by the apocalypse, by deciding to stop the smiting spree): “working for” is both true (as a neutral stance, since they were tricked into working for Beholding through the Archival contract) and wrong (“working for” also implies some level of active participation?). It reminds me of Melanie’s stance about it (MAG150: “I didn’t say I was going to quit. I said: I’m not going to do my job. No researching; no filing; no… field trips. Nothing that is going to help the Institute in any way. […] Because this place is evil, Jon! And so… doing this job… Helping it out… even in small ways, i–is in some way… evil too! Every time we try to use it to do good, it just seems to make everything worse, and… and I will not be a part of that anymore. […] If I’m… just another cog, er… Maybe I can’t leave the machine, but from this moment? I–I–I’m not turning. I’m… jammed.”), and makes me wonder whether Martin and Basira’s ties to Beholding have been more or less protecting them in the apocalypse… Basira said that she thought she had been protected from the first wave because she was in the Institute, and Jon told her he couldn’t ensure her safety if they went their separate ways, and it didn’t prevent Daisy (who had been bound to the Archives by her own archival contract since season 4) from losing herself to The Hunt, but I still wonder if their ties to the Institute will factor in at some point…

- Blowing kisses in Martin’s direction for being a Polite Boy… and also absolutely doing with Salesa what he did with Peter and Simon – he KNOWS how to play older and potentially terrible men like cheap whistles and/or to get information out of them, and how to get them to like him!

(MAG120) MARTIN: W… what… What are you doing here, mister Lukas? PETER: Please, call me Peter. MARTIN: N–no. No, I think I’m okay.

(MAG151) SIMON: Let’s start over. Simon – Simon Fairchild. Peter asked me to look in on you and… have a small chat. Well! A big chat, really. Answer all those… nagging questions. MARTIN: Simon Fairchild. [PAUSE] [NERVOUS CHUCKLE] Wait, “Simon Fairchild” as in… SIMON: As in “all those people who said I did horrible things to them and their loved ones”? Yes. They have been in, haven’t they? I’d hate to think I’m underrepresented in here, not when Peter tells me that that… “bone” fellow has at least half a dozen. MARTIN: N–no, no, [NERVOUS CHUCKLE], not… not at all. Y–you’ve sent plenty of people our way. […] Right. SIMON: Sorry. Too “big” picture? I get that a lot. MARTIN: No, it’s… [INHALE] Thank you. This has… actually been quite helpful.

(MAG181) MARTIN: Uh… Mr.… Salesa? SALESA: Mikaele, please. Come in!

(MAG126) PETER: He managed to convince himself that he could get his ritual off first, which would have made all of this a… bit moot, but that’s not really an option anymore. So it’s down to us. You and me. The dynamic duo.

(MAG151) SIMON: And he’s not at all certain the world as we understand will come out the other side. MARTIN: And let me guess – you think he can’t see the “big picture”? SIMON: [INHALE] I see why he likes you! MARTIN: [SIGH] […] I thought you said that the maths doesn’t work. SIMON: Oh, you are a quick one! […] And this has been fun! [INHALE] Now. [CHAIR SCRAPES ON THE FLOOR] If we’re about done– MARTIN: We’re not. Sit back down. SIMON: Boooold~ [CHUCKLE] [CHAIR SCRAPES ON THE FLOOR] I like it.

(MAG181) MARTIN: Uh… Well, I–I mean, you say that, but when you stop to think about it, it was literally our employer, Jon, so… Mmh! ARCHIVIST: I, I suppose. SALESA: [FRIENDLY CHUCKLES] I like this one! [SHUFFLING] Come on, sit down, have a drink. [CLINKING SOUNDS OF GLASS AND ICE] MARTIN: You’re… sure? What time is it? I– Oh, huh. Huh! I can actually ask that question here! SALESA: You can indeed. MARTIN: And the sun’s high, so… SALESA: Good eye…! Martin, was it? MARTIN: Uh, uh… Yes. […] [SCOFF] In my experience, open books can actually be pretty dangerous…! SALESA: Ha! I do like this one! […] MARTIN: [LAUGHS] So–sorry, sorry! Y–you did look kind of funny, it was… li–like, like you were flunking an exam or something! SALESA: [CHUCKLES] Yes! Exactly that! […] MARTIN: Look, fo–for what it’s worth, I’d, I’d also quite like to know how this all happened? SALESA: … Fine. I’ll tell you how it happened. But you must sit quietly while I tell it.

I love Martin’s ability to get what he wants by weaponising his politeness/social niceties/a sense of familiarity.

- How Dare You, Salesa.

(MAG181) MARTIN: [SCOFF] In my experience, open books can actually be pretty dangerous…! SALESA: Ha! I do like this one! [SOUNDS OF CROCKERY BEING PUT DOWN] Now you mention it, you actually remind me of Jurgen a bit. In his– MARTIN: Ah, uh… SALESA: –younger days of course.

That was SO RUDE (who, in their right mind, would like to be compared to Leitner), and:

* Martin’s comment was quite interesting given that he never got directly involved with a Leitner, unless there is a Secret Story incoming from the time he worked at the Institute library, before the start of the show? But statements-wise (the ones Martin recorded, at least), the “DIG” book from MAG088 hadn’t been identified as such… and Martin had however speculated that Dexter Banks’s book, destroyed by Alexia in MAG110, was “a Leitner”. And it was a Web one.

* Not a direct experience, but he witnessed someone use one:

(MAG158) MARTIN: … That’s a Leitner. PETER: It is! MARTIN: And the, hum… the blood on it? PETER: That’s Leitner too! MARTIN: … Riiight… PETER: Do you want to see how it works? MARTIN: Uh, n–no; no, I’d really rather you didn’t mess it up– PETER: No, I insist! Watch. [SILENCE] MARTIN: Very impressive. PETER: I’m reading. Shush.

… And had been the one to discover the body of Leitner himself, alongside Tim, at the end of MAG080. Martin, especially Martin, wouldn’t want to be compared to Leitner given how he lived his life and how he ended.

* “In my experience, open books can actually be pretty dangerous” says Martin, who WANTED TO TOUCH THE BOOKS:

(MAG113) MARTIN: Ooh! Ooh! There’s a book in this one. ARCHIVIST: [HASTILY] Don’t…. touch it! MARTIN: Ooh… OH! Right. Yes. ARCHIVIST: Let’s… not touch any books we don’t know. MARTIN: Right.

(The books, and the plastic explosive. Arsooooon!)

- … So, Martin hadn’t had a direct first-hand experience of how dangerous ~open books~ could be, but meanwhile, someone who had a direct encounter with a Web one withdrew from the exchange and only chirped in when prompted, and to be distrusting of the Spider person. Jon wasn’t having a perfectly excellent time at the moment, uh?

(MAG181) SALESA: You’re sure you won’t have a drink? We definitely had some tea around here somewhere. MARTIN: Uh, I… already had some, thank you, uh! Some of us know how to be polite guests. ARCHIVIST: [SHARPLY] I don’t intend to accept anything offered by Annabelle Cane. MARTIN: [SIGH] SALESA: Oh, you know Annabelle? [SILENCE BUT FOR CLOCK TICKING IN THE BACKGROUND] ARCHIVIST: … Sort of. You do know she’s part of The Web? SALESA: [SARCASTICALLY] No? I assumed the thread holding her head together was due to a childhood knitting accident! [CHUCKLES] MARTIN: Ha!

* … I’m REALLY, REALLY, ABSOLUTELY NOT SURPRISED that Jon, especially Jon, would want to avoid any “gift” from a Spider-person, given how 1°) he read enough statements about Hill Top Road to know that Raymond Fielding was making the teenagers eat apples full of spiders to turn them into eggs sacks (don’t accept the Spider’s food!), 2°) it mirrors guests bringing gifts to Mr Spider in the hope of not getting devoured. Was Jon internally panicking during their stay, fearing that Annabelle would take Martin like Mr Spiders had taken the gifts and the people bringing them, including Mr Horse’s son…? (I doubt that Martin made that “guests” comment on purpose; I’m still not sure he knows the details of Jon’s childhood encounter with The Web? He knows that Jon hates spiders and is wary of them, that he has suspicions about Annabelle Cane, but did Jon tell him the whole story about the book?)

* … However, that brings to mind the lighter again: Jon “I don’t intend to accept anything by [Web-related individual]” has kept the Web-design lighter since he realised it had been delivered to him in MAG036, had been unable to question it when prompted by Gerry (MAG111) and Daisy (MAG136), complete with static-indicating-that-something-supernatural-was-going-on in the latter case… So, hum. Jon, your lighter. Think about your lighter, Jon. Was it a gift, and for what, Jon. Is it a 100% Web-flavoured gift, or is there a bit of something else (Desolation, Agnes) in that one making it more acceptable, Jon.

* Uh, so quite strangely, we got confirmation that Annabelle does look like the description we previously had of her, with her head injury:

(MAG069, Darren Harlow) “With a sudden, unexpected motion, he charged at her and slammed his full weight into her side. The attack took her completely off guard and she fell hard against the edge of the broken window, the side of her head making a god awful crunching sound as it hit. […] I looked at the crumpled form of Annabelle Cane just as it started to get back up. I could see the side of her skull had been caved in, and beneath the wet mess of blood and bone, I saw a mass of dull white cobweb.”

(MAG123, Angie Santos) “As he told it, she was young, rail-thin underneath an oversized brown hoodie, which she kept pulled up, trying to cover up a network of pale stitches that stretched over one side of her head. […] All through it, she just kept staring at him, hands pressed into the pockets of her hoodie – occasionally pushing long, spindly fingers out against the fabric, smiling to herself.”

(MAG136, Alison Killala) “It was almost six months ago when the woman came to our door. She looked like a film student, and at first I took her for a fan. […] I was about to ask her to wait while I checked with him but as I started to speak, she turned her head, revealing a mass of white thread, criss-crossing all over the side of her temple, standing starkly against the dark brown of her skin. She told me to sit down. And I did.”

… Which is… rather distinctive, so how come Jon apparently got a bit of trouble recognising her immediately when she opened the door?

(MAG180) [DOOR OPENS] [MUSIC CAN BE HEARD PLAYING MORE CLEARLY] MARTIN: Oh. Oh no, uh… [FOOTSTEPS] ANNABELLE: Good morning. ARCHIVIST: [FAINT GRUNT] MARTIN: Uh… Yes… ANNABELLE: Come on in. He’s waiting for you. ARCHIVIST: Oh. And who exactly– MARTIN: J–J–Jon. Jon. ARCHIVIST: What? MARTIN: I think… Hum… Annabelle? Annabelle Cane? ANNABELLE: Come on. He’s very excited, you know. [FOOTSTEPS AS SHE TURNS TO LEAVE] MARTIN: [FAINT GROAN] So, do we… follow or…? [PIANO CEASES] ARCHIVIST: I… I suppose. [FOOTSTEPS] [DOOR CREAKS] [STATIC RISES ABRUPTLY, WITH A GLITCH, AND FADES] ARCHIVIST: Oh… MARTIN: Oh, hum… ARCHIVIST: Oh. [PIANO RESUMES] [DOOR CLOSES] [FOOTSTEPS ECHOING AS THEY GO] MARTIN: [INHALE] [SIGH] ARCHIVIST: So… Annabelle, what are you playing at, what are you doing here?

Was it Jon recognising her but not making a fuss about it? Being so used to relying on his powers that he didn’t even have the reflex of connecting the dots himself? Was Annabelle’s head covered, or was she showing another side of her head?

- Letting The Web do whatever is confirmed as the most popular tactic to deal with it, uh.

(MAG121) OLIVER: Honestly, I’m… still not exactly sure why I’m here. But… you know better than anyone how the spiders can get into your head. Easier to just do what She asks!

(MAG147) ARCHIVIST: I’m sure the flares will work fine. … I mean, un–unless it’s all some… elaborate… plot… to have us… burn this place down again. BASIRA: So what if it is? ARCHIVIST: I don’t follow…? BASIRA: I mean. Anything we do could be part of the “Grand Master Plan”. So – what, we do nothing? Just… sit on our hands, and hope that’s not what the spiders want? ARCHIVIST: [SIGH]

(MAG148) BASIRA: Or that we were being stalked by some freaky spider woman. Don’t tell me you didn’t know about that! ELIAS: Ah, uh, y–yes… W–well… To be honest, I’d… advise you to leave that one – well alone. BASIRA: Oh yeah? ELIAS: Uh! Look, look, look. I’ve… been doing this a long time now and, if there’s one thing I’ve learned about The Web, it’s that it plays its own game. All you can really do is… hope it doesn’t get in the way of whatever your plan is. Because the Spider usually wins…!

(MAG150) ARCHIVIST: O–kay. [SIGH] It’s just… The Web can be subtle, you understand? MELANIE: And? For all you know, its plan is to paralyse you with indecision…! ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] MELANIE: Leaving you… sitting here, terrified that… everything you do is somehow all part of its Grand Plan… And who do you think that fear is gonna feed? ARCHIVIST: Yes, well. [INHALE] You are… not the first, to make that point.

(MAG181) SALESA: Of course I know she’s with The Web. ARCHIVIST: … And that doesn’t bother you? SALESA: Not especially. And even if it did, what good would it do? MARTIN: … Uh, so what’s the deal with you two anyway? SALESA: It’s an odd situation, but not a complicated one. Shortly after I decided to stay here, she arrived; wandered in from the chaos out there and told me she was going to stay with me. I didn’t get this far by pitting myself against The Web, so I welcomed her in. ARCHIVIST: … “And”? SALESA: And sometimes she cooks. ARCHIVIST: She “cooks”? SALESA: I don’t know what you want me to say, it’s a big house and I don’t see her much. Can’t even say which corner she’s made her nest in! Whatever she’s doing… all I can do is hope it doesn’t wreck my little oasis. And if it does… then I hope that by keeping her in good graces, she’ll at least do me the courtesy of killing me first? MARTIN: Mm-mm… SALESA: … Anyway. Let us talk of happier things, or perhaps just take a moment to enjoy not being out there…! […] She keeps… mostly to herself, and when she does talk, it’s usually more of the sinister monologue variety– MARTIN: Ah! SALESA: –or cryptically telling me I’ve got “guests”…! […] ARCHIVIST: I… It’s going to be difficult to relax, with a spider lurking around. MARTIN: [SIGH] SALESA: … It gets easier with practice.

I mean, as mentioned by Salesa, there is still the risk that Annabelle will kill him or make him suffer worse, and has just been using him for her own goals… But also: not worrying about it means not feeding The Web? Unlike Jon, who spiralled so heavily into paranoia during season 4, worried about being trapped in The Web’s plans, about being potentially influenced and threatened by it.

I love how Salesa depicts Annabelle’s arrival and behaviour towards him: it’s… absolutely spider-like? She entered the house, made herself at home (she even has a “nest”), and gets rid of the insects. She had told Martin&Jon that Salesa was waiting for them:

(MAG180) ANNABELLE: Come on in. He’s waiting for you. […] I’m just helping out around the place a little bit. Making myself at home. You know how it is. MARTIN: … Jon, I don’t like this. ANNABELLE: You can relax, Mr. Blackwood. You’re safe here. […] Well. There you go, then! Just in here. [OPENS THE DOOR] Your guests are here, Mikaele. [PIANO CEASES] SALESA: Hoo-hoo-hoo! Excellent! Come in, come in! Ah, a pleasure to meet both of you. Thank you, Annabelle! ANNABELLE: You’re quite welcome. [PIANO RESUMES] Have fun.

… but it was initially her who just Informed Salesa That Yep, He Has Guests Coming, Lucky You, and Salesa rolled with it.

- On the one hand, Salesa is going with the flow hoping that Annabelle doesn’t intend to make him suffer much even if she needs/wants him dead, and sounds pretty rational about it… But on the other hand, OOFT, BIG RED FLAG that Salesa, who sounds like his situation is still on his terms… was and is at the same time shown as a heavy drinker, who could potentially die from over-consumption:

(MAG141) FLOYD: He was drunk for the next two days, and we kept sailing on towards Cape Town. We no longer had anything to deliver there, but no-one was really sure what else to do. Whenever there’d been similar disasters before, Salesa was quick to make a new plan, let Captain Gaultier know what the next steps were. It was one of the reasons the crew trusted him so much. He just always seemed to know what we needed to do next. This time, though… felt different. He was distant, quiet. His words, when he spoke to you at all, were blurred with alcohol and regret. Nobody knew what the plan was, so we just kept going.

(MAG181) SALESA: Well Martin. It’s about ten in the morning, more or less. [PAUSE BUT FOR CLOCK TICKING IN THE BACKGROUND] MARTIN: … And you’re drinking. SALESA: Of course! Even in my little bubble of peace, I find drinking after dark leads to some rather morbid thoughts. […] And when I realised that the power moves with the camera, well, hm!, let’s just say I loaded up a truckload of supplies and went on some journeys of my own, before I found… this place. [MORE CLINKING GLASS AND ICE] No reason to not live the apocalypse in style…! [STIRRING NOISES] In the end… I find myself quite happy. I’ve supplies, for a good few years, and then I… plan to take my own life. I think perhaps that’s the greatest blessing the camera can bestow: I – can – die – here. Escape this place. Not yet, of course; and maybe the wine will do me in before I have to take matters into my own hands, but still… it remains a comfort. Anyway, no more stories, I think. Let us relax, and talk, and drink […].

Which. Is self-destructive on its own, and clearly indicating that Salesa hasn’t been quite as fine as he likes to pretend (assuming his role, hiding himself behind it with his friendliness and knack for stories), but also concerning when associated with Annabelle’s presence:

(MAG147, Annabelle Cane) “Looking back, of course… and remembering the crunch of used syringes beneath my feet, I realise that addiction… is one of the strongest vectors of control there is.”

We-oops.

- Did Annabelle gossip about Jon&Martin here and there?

(MAG181) SALESA: Annabelle tells me you work for “The Eye”. […] Your powers won’t work here, Jonathan Sims, Head-Archivist-of-the-Magnus-Institute-London! The Eye can’t see this place…! […] You know, Gertrude once used that little trick to ask if I was trying to sell her a forgery? Admittedly I was, so I don’t hold a grudge; but I didn’t much care for the experience. Anyway.

He knew about the compulsion from Gertrude, as well as the nightmares induced by giving a statement (MAG115: “So I suppose if it’s a statement you’re wanting… it’s no inconvenience to me. I don’t sleep well anyway.”), Annabelle apparently introduced Jon&Martin a bit (and had warned him that they would pass out when entering his “little bubble”)… but what about Jon’s title as “Jonathan Sims, Head Archivist of the Magnus Institute, London”? It was Jon’s way of introducing statements from season 1 to 3, not Gertrude’s (“Gertrude Robinson recording.”)

Did Annabelle make him listen to a few tapes? Specifically the ones about Salesa? Or did she report the way Jon used to introduce himself, a lot, to the point of Salesa internalising it as a way to chide and make fun of Jon?

- Oh JON…

(MAG181) ARCHIVIST: What is this place, how did you find it? SALESA: [SLIGHTLY CURT] I didn’t find anything. I made it. ARCHIVIST: [COMPELLINGLY] Tell me what happened. SALESA: … “No”. ARCHIVIST: I– Uh… Wh… Wh–what? SALESA: [DEEP AND LONG CHUCKLES] The look on your face! [CHUCKLES] Look, he’s so confused! MARTIN: [LAUGHS] ARCHIVIST: Martin! MARTIN: [LAUGHS] So–sorry, sorry! Y–you did look kind of funny, it was… li–like, like you were flunking an exam or something! SALESA: [CHUCKLES] Yes! Exactly that! MARTIN: [CHUCKLES] SALESA: Your powers won’t work here, Jonathan Sims, Head-Archivist-of-the-Magnus-Institute-London! The Eye can’t see this place…! [SILENCE BUT FOR CLOCK TICKING IN THE BACKGROUND] ARCHIVIST: … So what now? SALESA: Ah, no need for the suspicion, I’m not going to hurt you…! You’re quite safe! I’ll tell you soon enough; like I said, I have no secrets. But it will be… in my own time. ARCHIVIST: … Right. SALESA: You know, Gertrude once used that little trick to ask if I was trying to sell her a forgery? Admittedly I was, so I don’t hold a grudge; but I didn’t much care for the experience. Anyway. For now, just relax, and no doubt I’ll get there eventually; I haven’t had anyone to talk to properly in months! MARTIN: I thought… What about Annabelle? SALESA: She keeps… mostly to herself, and when she does talk, it’s usually more of the sinister monologue variety– MARTIN: Ah! SALESA: –or cryptically telling me I’ve got “guests”…! MARTIN: Uh…! Yeah, that sounds familiar. ARCHIVIST: I’m trying to be less cryptic…! MARTIN: I know, I know.

* That was incredibly rude of Jon, technically, so I laughed altogether with Salesa&Martin! Jon… is not used to people refusing to answer anymore, uh? But, on the other hand: YIKES that Jon is not used to people refusing to answer him and that he would try to rely on his compulsion… on someone who had been pretty chill and friendly so far, and wasn’t actively hiding anything or saying that some topics were forbidden. Jon was cut from The Eye in there, so it’s really… him, and him alone, who still has the reflex to ask / order people to give him an answer? It’s him and him alone trying to rely on his powers to gain control of a situation, when said powers weren’t currently influencing him? He wasn’t asking/ordering for The Eye or pushed by The Eye? I wonder if the few days he spent in the house helped him a bit to think about the habits he grew as Archivist, what had become a reflex that he had to let go of…

* Keyboardsmashing over Salesa cheerfully explaining that Gertrude had compelled him to check if he was trying to swindle her, and that he was, so he found it fair. Though, “I don’t hold a grudge”: he might have been a bit more pissed at the moment? I remember his MAG115 statement, where he was clearly annoyed and frustrated and toying with her, after one of his artefacts caused damage in the Institute – I like the permanent ambiguity, in Salesa’s words, making you wondering if he’s absolutely sincere… or “playing his role” of the good-natured and jovial merchant, who does awful things but is above feelings like regrets, heartbreaks or annoyance. There is definitely a bit of unreliable narrator vibe to his whole persona?

* Sarcasm was through the roof, tho (Annabelle’s knitting accident, Jon’s face when failing to compel, Annabelle being cryptic), but AHAH for Martin joining him – he’s getting to see many new deluxe Jon faces! (Pretty sure Martin must have found Jon’s bewilderment super cute?)

- I love how Martin can be laughing and the instant afterwards be firm about words that could cross a line:

(MAG181) SALESA: So what’s it like out there? I assume the Archivist must be a rather… powerful position, since you seem to be travelling through it pretty freely? ARCHIVIST: It’s, uh… Uh… Hum… MARTIN: … Jon? ARCHIVIST: Uh, sorry, I–I just, uh… Hmm. MARTIN: Uh, i–it’s bad. Really bad. [SIGH] It’s, it’s all carved up between the powers, and everyone has just been, sort of… scooped up and chucked into their deepest fears, it’s just… it’s just nightmare after nightmare after nightmare, and… I… uh… Why are you smiling? SALESA: I’m sorry. You’re quite right, it’s inappropriate. It’s simply… [INHALE] I have spent the last decade preparing for this to happen. Not just something like this, but almost exactly this situation. There was every chance, in fact, the great likelihood… that I was wasting my time, and throwing away years of my life on a ridiculous precaution. But I was right. I. Was. Right. … And now here I am, safe, warm and comfortable while out there the whole world screams! I don’t mean to sound… uh, uh, a–as if I’m happy that people are suffering– MARTIN: Good, ‘cause it does sound a bit like that. SALESA: … Then I apologise. I’m just not sure I can fully communicate the sense of… of vindication that I feel, all those long nights I spent wondering if I was paranoid or overreacting. But no! I am here. And I am safe. MARTIN: [SIGH] I mean… I guess that makes sense?

* So, unlike other avatars, who were able to tell on sight that Jon had a “powerful position” in the new order, Salesa deduced it from facts! That was a nice touch.

* … Worried over the fact that Jon… didn’t seem able to describe the apocalypse spontaneously. Was he trying to “know” about it from inside the house, once again hitting a blank wall, just like when he tried to compel Salesa? Has he lost the habit of just… storing, remembering and using information regarding what he experienced? It’s interesting that there was no static at all during the whole exchange: Jon was indeed unable to use his powers there.

* LOVE HOW QUICKLY MARTIN REACTED when he saw Salesa’s reaction; Martin was probably gauging him? He had been quick to ask for smiting (and was even planning for the possibility when they were at the door of the house), so… did Salesa dodge a bullet. (Martin, please.)

* Salesa has been shown to be quite prideful, uh? “I made it”, “it will be… in my own time”, “I was right”… (And I can’t tell whether he’s absolutely sincere about that pride! Is it, genuinely, an absolute comfort, or is he grasping at straws because what’s the point of being right when you’re alone and basically waiting for your death with a few luxuries?)

- So, confirmation that Annabelle does know about their journey! It was rather obvious but technically… we didn’t know for sure, since Martin had bullshitted a bit when reporting her words to Jon:

(MAG166) MARTIN: Just, what do you want? ANNABELLE: I want to help you, of course. [SILENCE] MARTIN: … No. Thank you. ANNABELLE: It’s a hard place to find yourself in, maybe I can be of some… assistance…! MARTIN: You can assist me by giving the… “creepy phone” thing a rest…! ANNABELLE: He is more powerful here than he’s ever been, isn’t he? [PAUSE] And you’re not sure what that means for you. MARTIN: [INHALE] I’m hanging up now. ANNABELLE: Does he even need you at all?

(MAG167) ARCHIVIST: Help us with what? MARTIN: ‘xcuse me? ARCHIVIST: Annabelle, help us with “what”? Our–our, our journey, killing Elias, vanishing the Entities – what? […] So. What did Annabelle say? MARTIN: She offered to help, but she didn’t say what with; she… asked us where we were going. I didn’t tell her, but… [SNORT] it was pretty obvious she had a good idea.

(MAG181) SALESA: So what of you two, what, what, wh–where are you going? You seem to be travelling with some purpose…! ARCHIVIST: Did Annabelle not tell you that? SALESA: She said you were travelling to the Tower, the, hm, “Panopticon”, she called it? Whatever that might be; she didn’t say what for. [SUSPICIOUSLY] Nothing that might cause me trouble, I hope? MARTIN: We’re going to try and end this. Turn the world back. ARCHIVIST: Martin…! MARTIN: Wh–what? Okay; maybe he can help. We could use some support and it’s, it’s not like he wants the world to stay like this either! SALESA: You are right. To a point. [INHALE] I would welcome a return to the real world. Eh! To be the only man to weather the greatest disaster in history of reality, utterly unharmed… What an achievement that would be, quite the boast! But alas, no, [INHALE] I can’t help you. MARTIN: What? Why not? SALESA: I have nothing to offer. Well, except perhaps some… basic provisions. I have food, drink, a few luxuries, but none of that would help you out there, and I’m certainly not going to follow you. No, I think the best thing I can do is to welcome you to stay in my sanctuary as long as you wish…!

* Annabelle at least knew their destination already; which means she might have a good eye on the map, and would know that (according to real-world geography) they’re also coming closer to Hill Top Road…? Also: was she expecting them to change their mind about their initial plans to turn the world back? Or did she not tell Salesa because she assumed it was doomed already, or in order to not worry Salesa too much?

* … I keep hearing Salesa and going “Welp, that’s someone who is VERY depressed and also good at hiding it”: the way he jumped with such curiosity and passion on Martin&Jon’s current journey, the fact that they had a “purpose”? It feels to me like someone who currently doesn’t have any, is missing company, and wants to hear about anything that could manage to break his routine.

* Martin had mentioned with Helen already that they were lacking allies, and he&Jon just separated from Basira… So he really craves any help they could get, uh… AND AT THE SAME TIME: Martin is very good at weaving truths when he’s trying to manipulate people; he did that with Elias to make Elias accept (/feel like he had decided) that Martin would stay behind at the Institute in MAG116, he did that with Peter all through season 4 (believing in The Extinction, wanting to stop it… but also, loathing Peter and refusing to serve his plans)… so was he trying to do the same with Salesa, sneaking into his good graces and pretending to be absolutely transparent, nothing to hide sir!, before evaluating whether Salesa was a threat to be disposed of or just harmless?

- … So, Annabelle had been there for at least a month, so she definitely banked on them finding this place on their way… or did she find ways to influence their journey in order for them to walk by the house…?

(MAG181) SALESA: It’s an odd situation, but not a complicated one. Shortly after I decided to stay here, she arrived; wandered in from the chaos out there and told me she was going to stay with me. I didn’t get this far by pitting myself against The Web, so I welcomed her in. […] ARCHIVIST: … Alright, I… [INHALE] I guess we can stay. Just for a bit. SALESA: Excellent, ah! I haven’t had guests since the world ended. ARCHIVIST: [FLAT] Lovely. SALESA: Oh, saying that, I suppose there was that insect thing that stumbled in here a month or so back… MARTIN: Oh, uh, uh, in–“insect thing”? SALESA: Some creature of the Crawling Rot. Anyway, it didn’t actually make it into the house before Annabelle managed to get rid of it. So, I refuse to count it as a guest. MARTIN: Mmm. ARCHIVIST: I suppose that makes sense…! SALESA: Of course, I can’t actually stop things crossing the border into my hideaway, as you both discovered. Another reason I’m content to leave Annabelle to whatever schemes she might be weaving.

Or did she influence Salesa in taking residence there? The fact that he would be there and that Jon&Martin would come close enough for Jon to notice that the whole area was weird (and that they both agreed to take a look) is… a lot of coincidences. Jon “baited” Basira when they were close enough, and they then hunted Daisy; and as for Helen, she has been explicitly following them – those weren’t coincidences, but intended. On the other hand, the current layout is a bit more suspicious?

… It also takes us back to the start, for a Web-affiliated person to go against a Corruption-thing. We had witnessed this since season 1: spiders attracted by worms because they’re food (as Martin suspected in Carlos Vittery’s building), a spider warning Jon of the incoming Prentiss attack (end of MAG038), big spiders eating worm corpses in the tunnels under the Institute…

(… Salesa mentioned that Annabelle was cooking, WHAT IS SHE COOKING. DID SHE COOK THE CORRUPTION THING… DID SHE FEED THEM ALL WITH THE CORRUPTION THING…)

- Aaaaah, I’m having so many feelings over Jon asking so many questions and being so curious!!

(MAG181) ARCHIVIST: What is… this place? SALESA: I just told you. It’s my little bubble. My silver lining on an otherwise cloudy day. ARCHIVIST: [HUFF] That’s not an answ– SALESA: Now tell me […]. ARCHIVIST: … So, you wouldn’t mind answering a few questions? SALESA: [SIPPING FOLLOWED BY CONTENTED SIGH] … I am an open book. […] ARCHIVIST: What is this place, how did you find it? SALESA: [SLIGHTLY CURT] I didn’t find anything. I made it. ARCHIVIST: [COMPELLINGLY] Tell me what happened. SALESA: … “No”. ARCHIVIST: I– Uh… Wh… Wh–what? […] How big is your safe zone, is it… is it always the same size? H… How did this happen? SALESA: [CHUCKLES] Look at him! Not three days without his master spooning knowledge into his head, and he can’t bear it! I thought ignorance was meant to be bliss? ARCHIVIST: [FRUSTRATED SOUND]

Same as last episode, that was Jon! It was Jon being himself and curious… Georgie had pointed out that it was Jon’s personality (MAG093: “If your job is asking questions, I mean. You were always the one who pushed too far, and asked smart-arse, awkward questions. I always was surprised you never got punched.”), even before the influence of The Eye – and now, we have the additional dimension that Jon might have grown a bit too accustomed to, indeed, Knowing things, and to getting people to answer him whenever needed or desired… But still. It feels like he was back to his roots?

(And Salesa was doing his best to frustrate him, cutting him off or commenting on it, pfft.)

- While Jon was more pressuring and blunt, I’m reeling over Martin who sugarcoated his approach a bit (joking with Salesa, sometimes agreeing with him or not antagonising him too much while having clear limits)… and got Salesa to give up his story:

(MAG181) SALESA: Of course I know she’s with The Web. ARCHIVIST: … And that doesn’t bother you? SALESA: Not especially. And even if it did, what good would it do? MARTIN: … Uh, so what’s the deal with you two anyway? […] Mm-mm… SALESA: … Anyway. Let us talk of happier things, or perhaps just take a moment to enjoy not being out there…! You are, of course, welcome to stay as long as you like. MARTIN: Uh, that’s… very generous…! […] I thought… What about Annabelle? SALESA: She keeps… mostly to herself, and when she does talk, it’s usually more of the sinister monologue variety– MARTIN: Ah! SALESA: –or cryptically telling me I’ve got “guests”…![…] I am here. And I am safe. MARTIN: [SIGH] I mean… I guess that makes sense? […] SALESA: No, I think the best thing I can do is to welcome you to stay in my sanctuary as long as you wish…! MARTIN: … Oh, well. [EXHALE] Thank you. I–I think we just might. Jon? […] Look, fo–for what it’s worth, I’d, I’d also quite like to know how this all happened? SALESA: … Fine. I’ll tell you how it happened. But you must sit quietly while I tell it. MARTIN: [CHUCKLE] Don’t worry, I have had lots of practice. SALESA: … And you? ARCHIVIST: [DISGRUNTLED SOUND] MARTIN: He’ll behave. SALESA: … My story is not a long one.

(GRUMPY JON WAS SO CUTE… JUST LIKE AN ANNOYED CAT…)

Martin has had experience with Peter and Simon, knows how to be strategical, and it worked. Salesa was clearly craving to give his story, to be the centre of the attention (the main star of the show?), and Martin… played the right cards to get him there?

There was no static, Salesa pointed out that Jon couldn’t use his Eye powers here, Salesa insisted that his statement was on his own terms… but I still wonder if he wasn’t compelled a bit? We didn’t learn much, it had a bit more flourish than our usual (but it’s not unheard of: avatars were shown to be very happy to portray themselves at their best during them), there were some potentially unreliable bits here and there (not unheard of either), but it was also… pretty coherent. Flowing naturally. A long tirade going straight to the points.

Could Salesa have been influenced by Martin? Simon had made it clear that Beholding had compelled him (through Martin) to give him his piece. Or was it… the tape recorder, somehow? It turned on when Jon&Martin were arriving (so, when a discussion would happen), and turned off after Salesa was done:

(MAG181) SALESA: Anyway, no more stories, I think. Let us relax, and talk, and drink, and… not worry about who might be… listening. [CLICK.]

So it was there for Salesa’s statement. Did it compel him?

- I like how we technically didn’t learn much through Salesa’s statement! Well, not much factual info, at least: we already had gotten a recent-ish written statement from him (MAG115, from January 2007); we knew that he had been Leitner’s assistant and had fled when he understood what Leitner was dealing in, that he initially mostly wanted to use his list of clients and had ended up dealing in supernatural artefacts almost coincidentally, that he let (rich) people acquire the artefacts they wanted and too bad for them if they caused them misery, that he was getting angstier between 2011 and 2014, culminating in the last mission to retrieve the camera, and that he had then vanished, presumed dead.

But I feel like we mostly learnt about his personality, in contrast to MAG115 (in which he was a bit more on the defensive, given that the Institute and/or Gertrude was going at him for a Slaughter artefact that had… got out of control) and MAG141, in which Floyd Matharu, who clearly kinda liked and respected him (“He was a good boss.”), had given us another look on Salesa: someone who was tired, who had lost people and was growing tired of this life. I find it really interesting to compare MAG141 and MAG181 since, in this episode, Salesa is clearly putting on a show of his own story:

(MAG141) FLOYD: Once found him pouring over an old photo album. The ship was there in the pictures, but a different captain, different crew. I asked him who they were, and he just looked at me, eyes sunken like he hadn’t slept, and for a second I felt like he was seeing someone else, not me. But then he just shrugged. “Dead now,” he said, “doesn’t really matter.” […] I followed slowly, unsteadily, but got there just in time to see Salesa throw both him and what looked like a blank rug over the side and into the ocean. Then he collapsed against the railing, a look of intense exhaustion passing over his face, and I left him there. He was drunk for the next two days, and we kept sailing on towards Cape Town. We no longer had anything to deliver there, but no-one was really sure what else to do. Whenever there’d been similar disasters before, Salesa was quick to make a new plan, let Captain Gaultier know what the next steps were. It was one of the reasons the crew trusted him so much. He just always seemed to know what we needed to do next. This time, though… felt different. He was distant, quiet. His words, when he spoke to you at all, were blurred with alcohol and regret. Nobody knew what the plan was, so we just kept going.

(MAG181) SALESA: But the years, they wear on you, and as I talked to more and more people versed in that secret world, more acolytes and would-be cultists about “rituals” and “destinies”, I began to come to a conclusion. As the number of people in the world grew, and the amount of fear grew with it, I began to become convinced that it was only a matter of time before one of them… succeeded. Before the world was transformed into… Well. You’d know better than me…! So I began to plan for my… retirement. I spent most of my fortune preparing. Some on supplies, but mostly hunting down an artifact that I hoped might give me some… protection. One I had sold right at the start of my career: an old broken camera. One that through some… quirk had the ability to hide you from the Powers…! […] Staging my death was a… comparative, erm, afterthought. In some ways… just a happy accident. And so I waited, and lived out my days in comfort. For the longest time I thought that, well… maybe I had simply entered normal retirement really dramatically! But then… well… I was right.

* “a happy accident”, says the person living with a Web person who knew he was there and threw Jon&Martin at him. (What happened, back then? Why the explosion, why did Gaultier report that they had been “betrayed”? Was someone else after Salesa, or “helped” him hide? If Gertrude was behind the explosion, it would have been mentioned at this point… Was it Annabelle, to ensure that Salesa would be a reliable trump card in the apocalypse?)

* It had been addressed during Arthur and Gertrude’s discussion, and has been a reccurring theme in the series: who really are these characters?

(MAG145) GERTRUDE: What was Agnes like? ARTHUR: … What? GERTRUDE: Well, for all The Web bound us together, I never actually met her. What was she like? ARTHUR: I… [PAUSE] I don’t know. Not really. You got as many answers to that as… folks who met her. Never really knew what she felt ‘bout any of it! Not really. Not in her own words. Guess that’s the thing about being the… Chosen One, or… I mean, Agnes was always quiet; but even if you spend all day, every day, throwing out commandments and… laying down parables… At the end of it, you’re always just the… point of someone else’s story. Everyone clamouring to say what you were, what you meant, and… your thoughts on it… all don’t mean nothing.

Is the real Salesa the self-serving and self-centred man who explained his story to Jon and Martin, all about money and then self-preservation, not giving any retrospective thought about his crew and the people who were following his orders and yet died because of it? Is the real Salesa the “good boss” Floyd had described, who was clearly nostalgic and affected by the losses throughout his life (why keep pictures of the deceased, if they hadn’t mattered at all)? Or is the truth somewhere within the mix, every statement a bit of it – how these characters used to be perceived, how they want to be perceived right now, how they acted then and how they act now?

* There is a bit of a parallel with Jonah, with the way both reached the fatalistic conclusion that someone would eventually manage to bring forth the apocalypse:

(MAG160, Jonah Magnus) “Why does a man seek to destroy the world? It’s a simple enough answer: for immortality, and power. Uninspired, perhaps, but – my God! The discovery, not simply of the dark and horrible reality of the world in which you live, but that you would quite willingly doom that world and confine the billions in it to an eternity of terror and suffering, all to ensure your own happiness; to place yourself beyond pain, and death, and fear. It is an awful thing to know about yourself, but the freedom, Jon, the freedom of it all…! I have dedicated my life to handing the world to these Dread Powers, all for my own gain, and I feel… nothing but satisfaction, in that choice. […] Of course, this desire did not manifest overnight. When Smirke first gathered our little band – Lukas, Scott and the rest – to discuss and hypothesise on the nature of the things he had learned from Rayner… I felt what I believe we all felt: curiosity, and fear. But as he compiled his taxonomy and codified his theories on the grand rituals, I began to develop a very specific concern. Smirke was still so obsessed with his ideas on balance, even as our fellows began to experiment and fall to the service of their patrons: I began to worry that if one of them successfully attempted their ritual, then I would be as much a victim as any, trapped in the nightmare landscape of a twisted world. At first, I attempted prevention, but the cause seemed hopeless. The only way to ensure I did not suffer the tribulations of what I believed to be… an inevitable transformation, was to bring it about myself. So what began as an experiment… soon became a race.”

Both came to the conclusion that an apocalypse would be likely to happen, and both of them worked on a way to mitigate the effects for them and them only, instead of ensuring that others wouldn’t succeed. … And in both cases, it doesn’t feel like they realised how they might have been used rather than in control: Jonah could have just NOT LAUNCHED ANY RITUAL when he discovered that anyway, a ritual would never work unless all the Fears were to be brought through together; and Salesa… had a few holes in his story? Admitted that there was an “accident” leading to his official death, allowing him to go into hiding? Is drinking heavily while having a Web-person as housemate, who explained how “addiction is one of the strongest vectors of control there is”?

- I wonder whether Salesa knew what had truly happened to Leitner, or not at all?

(MAG181) SALESA: … My story is not a long one. Not the parts that you care about, at least. The Powers I first learned about from Jurgen Leitner – you’re familiar with him? Then I don’t need to explain further. When I say I was one of his assistants, you know exactly the kind of education that would be. Terrifying, fascinating, misguided. The man was a genius, and an idiot. It didn’t take me long to see what he was blind to his whole life: that trying to control the Fears was a good way to get yourself killed, or worse. … I left long before he got what was coming to him, and tried to forget what I knew.

He probably assumed that Leitner had died when his library was attacked? Not brutally pipe-murdered by Elias.

(And sidenote, but: Salesa wasn’t presented as an avatar but he also joins the list of people in season 5 not even mentioning Jonah at all as an agent who matters, while Jon was identified as A Big Deal in the apocalypse. I don’t know if Jonah is still in any state to know and watch these things (merged with the Panopticon? Trapped within his old decaying body at the centre of the tower?), and he was certainly not able to see anything inside of the camera’s domain, but I hope that it Stings.)

- I’m not so surprised that Annabelle and Salesa seem to be getting along, since they both sound aware of their “role” in the overall narrative frame:

(MAG147, Annabelle Cane) “Now, I believe the tradition is to tell you the story of my life; the sinister path that led me inevitably to the sorry state in which I now find myself. Well, let it never be said I do not dance the steps I am assigned.”

(MAG181) SALESA: I lived my life, and I lived it well – successful, wealthy, and a little bit feared…! Smuggler to the rich and famous! There wasn’t an art dealer or curator out there who didn’t pretend not to know me! But the trouble is, once you’ve seen backstage, it’s hard to believe in the show anymore. You understand, I’m sure. You can never quite shake off the desire to have a peek…! To see what’s waiting in the wings…! […] Again, I made a lot of money, and remained untouched. It’s the sort of thing to set a man thinking about his life, you understand? I began to think hard about the world, about my place within it, and about fear! About the figure of the merchant, the trader who deals in strange and dangerous goods – how it can be found in so many myths and fables, dealing in second-hand nightmares. And how rarely the merchant themself is ever punished in those stories. […] To tell you the truth, I got a real kick out of playing my role. To think of myself as a purveyor of curses, walking softly through the most dangerous edges of reality, so that the rich and arrogant could buy their own doom.

(+ in some ways, Peter, too: “Thinking about it now, perhaps one of the reasons I lasted as long as I did was that I was, at the end of the day, predictable. A ‘known quantity’. I had my little patch, sending my poor lost sailors to their Forsaken end, but I rarely stepped outside of it. When I think of all those I met who travelled in this secret world we found ourselves in – Gertrude, Simon, Mikaele, even Rayner… there are plenty whose lives might well have been easier with my death, but it was rare that I strayed outside my habits.” (MAG159))

- So, who was the thing/person Salesa was “working for”?

(MAG181) SALESA: Sometimes people would come to me for solutions, protections or talismans to ward off the attention they had already called down on themselves. I sometimes did what I could to help, but I had to be careful. I could never afford to forget who I actually was working for.

Himself? The Fears, given how he made them more impactful by digging out and spreading cursed artefacts?

(Also, aaaah, I’m guessing that Noriega had been asking for help, back in MAG016, while he was suffering from Angela’s curse and had met with Salesa…)

- Salesa reminded me a bit of Leitner, and he would haaaaaaaaaaaate it? Leitner also wanted to take on a “role” and it… had backfired very badly:

(MAG080) LEITNER: I… thought that I could control them. That I alone had the knowledge to contain them. Back then, I believed they were simply books. Horrifying, powerful, yes; but with rules, limits that could be charted. … I was a fool. I had no idea what forces lay behind them, or that they had other servants that might come searching. […] I saw myself as a guardian, a reverse Pandora, gathering the evils of the world and locking them away. And so I branded them with my seal. I told myself that if any should escape such a mark could help me retrieve them. But I think, in my heart, I dreamed of my work becoming known. That “The Library of Jurgen Leitner” would stand as a symbol of courage and protection. Hubris. I suppose it is fitting punishment that my name has become a watchword for evil, spoken by those who only know it as marking the darkest, most terrible of secrets. My name has become a curse.

Is the merchant truly never punished in all these stories? Quite clearly, Salesa has it waaay better than the people out there (he’s not trapped in a personal nightmares, forced to relive terrible experiences over and over again)… but it’s also such an empty existence, with him having become what he used to loathe – as someone who felt like he was punishing the rich, he’s now living in luxury (Upton House, playing the piano, listening to classical music, drinking alcohol in the morning in nice crockery and assuming that said alcohol might end up killing him)…

- Aaaah, I love how the way the camera works does feel like it makes sense within that universe:

(MAG181) SALESA: So I began to plan for my… retirement. I spent most of my fortune preparing. Some on supplies, but mostly hunting down an artifact that I hoped might give me some… protection. One I had sold right at the start of my career: an old broken camera. One that through some… quirk had the ability to hide you from the Powers…! It was in the possession of another scared old man, one who had long been running from his own supernatural debts. I believe it operates as a sort of, uh, battery, charging itself on all the quiet worries that come from living in hiding, and then when the sanctuary collapses, eh!, all that fear flows out at once. … No doubt if my oasis breaks before I die, The Eye will get quite the feast from me. But in this new world, I would hope it has other things to keep itself busy. […] it hid me from The Eye, which, in the new order of reality, also protects where I am from the hellscape all around us. And when I realised that the power moves with the camera.

I also like that… just like a regular camera, it puts some distance between the one who is protected and anybody else, cutting them from reality. It explains why everything went to hell on that island after they took the camera (MAG141) and might be a curse in itself: feeding from the fears of the people into hiding… and anticipating their demise? (We also got told how Salesa could “end”, if it happens offscreen: if Annabelle’s plan is to use the camera without him… either she’ll be charitable and kill him, or tell him in advance for him to kill himself beforehand, either she will just leave with the camera, and Salesa will have it worse than everyone else.)

Also explains why Jon didn’t “know” anything about Salesa’s fate after talking with Floyd, and why he might have been drawn to him? Since he was a blind spot for Beholding, someone hidden from it. It’s quite interesting that we’ve seen so many different ways to get a (temporary or permanent) protection from Beholding? Gertrude was cutting eyes from pictures all around her (and Elias admitted that she had grown quite good at hiding from him); Leitner had the A Disappearance book, preventing Elias and Beholding from seeing him; Eric and Melanie discovered that gouging out their eyes freed them from the Archives; and now, Salesa pointed out that the camera was even specifically anti-Eye – thus, Jon not being able to use his powers around it… Was it initially a Dark artefact? Or an Eye one, just with a delayed reaction (as the fear of “being watched, being followed, having your deepest secrets exposed”)?

- CRIES, because it was to be expected that Jon wouldn’t fare for long in this place:

(MAG181) [PACKING NOISES] MARTIN: You’re sure we can’t stay longer? ARCHIVIST: Yes, I–I–I’ve been, hum… Uh, these last few days I–I’ve been… getting weaker. Dizzy spells, vagueness, you’ve seen it. Being cut off from the Eye, i–it’s not good for me. MARTIN: Yeah, but if… [INHALE] If you’re that connected, that… dependent, what happens if we actually, y’know, do manage to– ARCHIVIST: We’ll cross that bridge when we come to it. For now, I just need us to be moving on. MARTIN: Hm… […] Feeling better? ARCHIVIST: Uh… Yeah. I’m afraid I am…!

And he reminded me a lot of how he sounded during his partial withdrawal (from live statements), in the second half of season 4: raspier voice, tiredness, the feeling unwell…

(MAG150) ARCHIVIST: … Still feeling weak. Restless. I want to be proactive, but there hasn’t…! That hasn’t been going quite so well for us lately.

(MAG152) HELEN: Hungry, are we~? ARCHIVIST: That’s not…! I haven’t done anything– HELEN: Yet. [SILENCE] ARCHIVIST: I feel like if I don’t… I might die. Fade away into nothing.

(MAG154) MARTIN: No, ’t’s fine, I ju– You just surprised me, that’s… Jesus, you all right? You… you look like hell. ARCHIVIST: Oh! Uh, right, I, em… ki–kind of weak. Hungry, I–I guess, sort of. I–I’ve been trying to a–avoid, being, hum… Sticking to old statements?

(MAG155) ARCHIVIST: I feel weak. Like I’m… fading away. Do I restrain myself, keep my appetite in check, even at the cost of my life? Or do I try to rationalise what I am, like… Ms. McHugh? I find myself… hating her, her… callous self-deception. But am I so different…?

Except that, back then, Martin hadn’t directly witnessed it – Jon went without statements after MAG159, for three weeks at most (after taking Peter’s live statement), and he sounded mostly fine if eager to read when they received Basira’s statements. Here, it feels like Jon’s degrading state went much quicker and more impressively… and it was a reminder of Jon’s connection to The Eye. Jon cut the conversation short, but they really will have to talk about it, and about how setting the world back, as of now, really sounds incompatible with Jon’s survival…

(Sob at Jon’s “moving on”, because it echoed MAG180’s title: back then, “moving on” had given the feeling of… reaching another chapter, accelerating after a stagnation? But now, “moving on” means returning to the apocalypse, the Fears, their journey towards the Panopticon, and did they learn anything that could help their quest inside of the house? The camera could be useful, maybe, but then…)

-I am HOWLING at Martin’s outburst of rage towards Annabelle because AHAHAH, who used to accept her tea and be a ~polite guest~?

(MAG181) SALESA: Did you sleep well? Have you had something to eat? Annabelle said she’d shown you the pantry? […] You’re sure you won’t have a drink? We definitely had some tea around here somewhere. MARTIN: Uh, I… already had some, thank you, uh! Some of us know how to be polite guests. ARCHIVIST: [SHARPLY] I don’t intend to accept anything offered by Annabelle Cane. […] [FOOTSTEPS] [A DOOR CREAKS OPEN] ANNABELLE: All packed? ARCHIVIST: Mm. MARTIN: Oh! Finally showing your face? ANNABELLE: I’m sure I don’t know what you mean. MARTIN: Oh, pffft! All week, you scuttle around with… with food and drinks and all that other stuff, whatever we need, and just when we need it, but if we actually try to talk to you, you’re gone. ANNABELLE: [SMILINGLY] I’m very busy…! ARCHIVIST: Martin, don’t… bother, we–we’re not going to get any answers out of her. MARTIN: You–you’re joking, right? She’s been lurking at the edges of this whole thing since the beginning, and now we can finally actually talk to her, and…! What, you’re just going to pass? You don’t have any questions, nothing at all?

WHO usually provides food and drinks to get some results with people?

(MAG053) MARTIN: I was just going down to the café, did you want a sandwich? ARCHIVIST: Uh, that, that depends. Are you… hum, are you going to keep hovering around me if I go to the canteen? MARTIN: [SIGH] I just worry. You needed five stitches after you “accidentally” stabbed yourself with a breadknife. If you’re still claiming that’s what happened. ARCHIVIST: I am. MARTIN: Then you’ll forgive me for worrying when you use sharp knives. ARCHIVIST: [SIGH] Fine. I’ll come with, just… give me a second to grab my coat.

(MAG069) MARTIN: … Look. Jon… when was the last time we all just… talked? Just talked, without all of this– ARCHIVIST: Thank you for the tea, Martin. MARTIN: … Oookay. Fine. [DOOR OPENS] He’s not wrong, you know. [DOOR CLOSES]

Annabelle is just doing The Usual Martin Things, and Martin accepted it at first, probably thinking that it could put her into good dispositions to talk, except that tactic is NOT working with her and he’s SO PISSED about it =D Oh, Martin…

I’m super amused at Annabelle having so much fun being domestic and taking care of the guests while looming in the background; it’s an interesting dynamic where you can clearly feel like… everything is happening on her terms, and Martin and Jon don’t have any control over it. (And Martin is SO annoyed at the lack of control, ooooh Martin…)

(- And this is how Web!Martin can still w- (No but, seriously, I thought about how spiders can be territorial and usually don’t share the same living area?))

- I adore how you could HEAR Annabelle’s smile while she was clearly having fun.

(MAG181) MARTIN: Oh! Finally showing your face? ANNABELLE: I’m sure I don’t know what you mean. […] ARCHIVIST: Look. I–it’s no accident we finally meet face-to-face in the one place I–I can’t get any answers out of her. ANNABELLE: [SMUG] I’m sure I don’t know what you mean…! MARTIN: … Why are you here? Mm? What’s your game? ANNABELLE: Perhaps I just value my privacy. MARTIN: Fine, fine! Why did you call me before? ANNABELLE: Perhaps I thought you could use a friendly voice…!

Not committing to any answer, and it was driving Martin mad, uh.

- LOVING HOW MARTIN IS JUST “RESENT AND REMEMBER”:

(MAG166) ANNABELLE: He is more powerful here than he’s ever been, isn’t he? [PAUSE] And you’re not sure what that means for you. MARTIN: [INHALE] I’m hanging up now. ANNABELLE: Does he even need you at all? MARTIN: Bye! [BEEP] [SIGH] [LOUDER, CLOSER HOWL] … I know, right?

(MAG181) ANNABELLE: Perhaps I thought you could use a friendly voice…! MARTIN: “Friendly”!? You told me Jon didn’t need me! ANNABELLE: Objectively true. MARTIN: [AGGRAVATED SIGH]

(Jon was out of it for most of the exchange, but… If he had been in a better state of mind, he might have reacted to this: Martin hadn’t told him about that part of the phone call, Martin hadn’t shared that with him in the following episode. So, that was new information… unless he had already “known” about it from Martin’s mind and didn’t tell Martin?)

And! We! Still! Don’t! Know! What Annabelle! Wanted! To Achieve!

(MAG181) ANNABELLE: And more importantly, perhaps I thought you might need a little bit of righteous indignation to help you power through the next steps. […] For what it’s worth, I’m sorry. The call was… clumsy. There were so many things to keep track of at the moment. I must confess it did lack my usual… nuance. ARCHIVIST: And perhaps you’re now just trying to humanise yourself so we underestimate your next move…! ANNABELLE: Perhaps.

* What was that “righteous indignation” about? At this point, Martin was already pro-smiting. Did she want him to focus on his resentment towards her? Did she want to prompt a conversation between Jon&Martin, as it happened in MAG167, leading to Jon admitting to Martin that he was his “reason”? I still feel like if that exchange hadn’t happened, Martin would have had it way worse in the Lonely house a few episodes later…

* It feels like the “Jon does(n’t) need Martin” might be about two different things? It’s objectively true that Jon would still be fine without Martin… but would he keep going on his quest without him? Jon said that Gertrude likely would have given up (implying that his difference with her is that he had “a reason”, in Martin). And Jon himself had told Martin, that it wasn’t just about what he needed in the “survival” sense; it was… about what he wanted for himself:

(MAG159) ARCHIVIST: Listen – I know you think you want to be here, I know you think it’s safer and w– … well, maybe it is… But we need you. I need you. MARTIN: [DISTANT, VOICE ECHOING] No, you don’t. Not really…! Everyone’s alone, but we all survive. ARCHIVIST: I don’t just want to survive!

- Martin and Being Manipulated~~

(MAG126) MARTIN: But if I could just explain– PETER: And how do you think Jon’s going to react, to that explanation? Hm? Do you think he’ll accept it calmly? Come through with a well-considered, rational response– MARTIN: That’s not fair– PETER: –or would he assume he knows better than you and do something rash? [SILENCE] MARTIN: … I don’t like being manipulated. PETER: That’s fair. But I’m not wrong.

(MAG181) MARTIN: … I, I don’t like being manipulated. ANNABELLE: Then we probably aren’t going to be friends. MARTIN: Urrrgh! [SIGH]

(And both times, about Jon.)

- Jon was exhausted, but also kind of fatalistic over the fact that they couldn’t do anything against Annabelle anyway; had Salesa been right when he had told them they would get used to it? And in a way, Jon being less angsty over it… might be good for him – not spiralling into paranoia, being just aware that anyway, he can’t know anything for sure about Annabelle. (… Or is the feeling of powerlessness feeding her anyway?)

(MAG181) MARTIN: So, so that’s it, then? We, we’re just going to leave her here? ARCHIVIST: Yes. MARTIN: We could make her tell us. ARCHIVIST: No, we couldn’t. I don’t have my powers, if it came to a physical fight I really don’t rate our chances…! MARTIN: Hey, I can handle myself! ANNABELLE: But can you handle me? [SILENCE] MARTIN: … I don’t like you. ANNABELLE: I know.

GNIIIIIIIIIIIIH over Martin just. Being absolutely too honest and just telling her, to her face, that he doesn’t like her. Martin, you rude brat.

I got Michael flashbacks, too, because it wasn’t the first time that:

(MAG079) MICHAEL: I think I might also kill you. It would be easier than killing the Archivist; none of you are protected down here. MARTIN: No, no, now hang on… MICHAEL: You are going to try and help him. And I want to see what happens without you there. TIM: Martin… MARTIN: No, no, okay, because there’s two of us and there’s one of you, okay. He’s not killing anyone! TIM: Martin, look at his hands! MARTIN: Oh.

MARTIN WAS READY TO THROW DOWN.

- YIKES over what Annabelle has ~in mind~:

(MAG181) ANNABELLE: Don’t worry, Martin. We’ll meet again. Hopefully when you’re feeling a little bit more… open-minded…! MARTIN: I wouldn’t count on it. ANNABELLE: I would. MARTIN: [SIGH] ARCHIVIST: That’s the trouble with old houses, I suppose. Full of spiders. ANNABELLE: You boys better take care of yourselves. I’m sure we’ll see each other again very soon. Here! Why don’t I show you out?

* Was the “open-minded” a reference to the fact that her own head was opened and is currently stitched together thanks to spiders.

* So, they’re meeting again “soon”… at Hill Top Road, maybe?

* Annabelle is implying that they were refusing something about her, as if there was currently an offer on the table – what was it? Was it about the fact they were antagonising her? Jon didn’t trust her (or at least raised the possibility that she could be trying to make them underestimate her; she had explained that “I have always believed that the key to controlling people… is to ensure that they always under, or overestimate you. Never reveal your true abilities or plans” in MAG147), they were wary of her… and were they right about it? She made sure they drank and ate, she encouraged them to be well; she needs them functioning and still going, but what for? I’m still really curious about Annabelle; it felt to me that she needed them to reach a certain conclusion by themselves, and that they have failed so far… Or is it way more sinister than that, is she waiting for them to ask for her help regarding Jon’s current state?

* Overall, it feels to me like she’s focusing on Martin more than Jon, as if Jon was a “given” in her equation but Martin a more active and rebellious piece?

- Ooooh, Salesa… he really was craving for company, uh.

(MAG181) SALESA: Aaah! You are off, then? [FAINT SOUNDS OF MUSIC IN THE BACKGROUND; LUDWIG VAN BEETHOVEN’S “9TH SYMPHONY: FINALE”] ARCHIVIST: … Yes, uh… MARTIN: Uh, thank you, for all your hospitality. SALESA: You are sure you won’t stay a little longer? You’re more than welcome! ARCHIVIST: N–no, I, uh… I got to, hum… leave. MARTIN: What he said. SALESA: Ah, such a shame. And you’re sure I can’t give you a little something for the road? Uh, food, wine? MARTIN: Uh, no, thank you. Uh… [SIGH] Nice things, they… tend not to stay nice out there. SALESA: [SCOFF] True enough.

And sob about the fact that Martin has learned to not trust “comfort” too much. (What about the tea he had stored in his own bag? And the bandages he used on Jon didn’t turn against them either, so a few things stayed safe.)

- I love how Annabelle and Salesa seem to be getting along with their cruel humour:

(MAG181) SALESA: Well: best of luck I suppose. And if in the end, you can’t save the world… you know where I am. ANNABELLE: Actually, he doesn’t. SALESA: [CHUCKLES] Of course. What a shame. [INHALE] Well then, I guess it really is goodbye. Travel well. Don’t be Strangers! [MORE CHUCKLES, LOWER AND DARKER]

(SOB, Salesa, “Don’t be strangers” had been copyrighted by Georgie in season 3 already!)

… Really curious that Annabelle seemed to already know that Jon would quickly forget about the place, as soon as they would leave; in the same way that she predicted that they might pass out when entering the domain protected by the camera. She… knows… stuff… and understands how things work, uh…

- Cries about Jon just fading from conversation, it REALLY was time for him to leave:

(MAG181) ARCHIVIST: Yes, I–I–I’ve been, hum… Uh, these last few days I–I’ve been… getting weaker. Dizzy spells, vagueness, you’ve seen it. Being cut off from the Eye, i–it’s not good for me. […] MARTIN: You don’t have any questions, nothing at all? … Jon? Jon! [CLICKS HIS FINGERS IN FRONT OF THE ARCHIVIST] ARCHIVIST: [DISTANT] Wha… Oh, yes, uh, sorry… Look. […] MARTIN: God, fi–fine. Fine! [BAG IS GRABBED] Come on, Jon. ARCHIVIST: [VAGUE] Mm… Oh, I’m… sorry, what? MARTIN: We’re leaving. […] SALESA: You are sure you won’t stay a little longer? You’re more than welcome! ARCHIVIST: N–no, I, uh… I got to, hum… leave. MARTIN: What he said. […] Y–yeah, uh, come on, Jon. Let’s go. ARCHIVIST: Mm, what? Oh. Yes, ri–right. Yes…

Jon prompted their departure, but it sounded like he forgot about it multiples times during the conversation… He was absolutely drained and ready to collapse, uh?

(Or is it linked to his other memory losses, such as forgetting his bully’s name, or that he had gone for ice-cream with the assistants for Martin’s birthday? I think it really was exhaustion in this particular case (head empty), but…)

- … Jon’s sense of humour…

(MAG181) MARTIN: Feeling better? ARCHIVIST: Uh… Yeah. I’m afraid I am…!

“Afraid I am” – said he, who is currently back to feeding on fear.

- I’m glad that Jon apologised for making them leave, was aware of what Martin had to give up for him, but also that Martin was clear about his Priorities (and differences from Salesa, who was satisfied being protected and safe in his “little bubble” while others are suffering) and absolutely not holding it against him:

(MAG181) ARCHIVIST: I’m sorry, I… It would have been nice to stay. MARTIN: [WISTFULLY] Yeah… I’d almost forgotten what it was like, you know? A bit of peace, eh! ARCHIVIST: I mean, you could have… MARTIN: No, don’t say it, Jon. You know I never would. I–I can’t just “forget” about all the people out here! Besides, I’d rather be trapped in a post-apocalyptic wasteland with you than spend one more moment in paradise with her. ARCHIVIST: [FAINT CHUCKLES] That might just be the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me!

… But it also makes me worry about the alternatives Martin didn’t mention: what about “spending time in paradise without her nor you”, or “going back to the normal world without you”…

- I personally interpreted the last scene as the camera taking back the memories with it, since it was supposed to protect itself and the perimeter around it from The Eye, and Jon knowing/remembering about it would mean giving Beholding access to it:

(MAG181) [STATIC RISES] ARCHIVIST: Ah… Pity. MARTIN: What? ARCHIVIST: It’s, uh… It’s going away. That… peace; the, the safety, the memory of ignorance… MARTIN: That’s… [INHALE] Yeah, I guess that makes sense. [STATIC FADES] Do you… remember any of it? Wha–what Salesa said? Annabelle? ARCHIVIST: Some. I–I think. It’s, uh… Do you mind filling me in? MARTIN: Wait, you need me to tell you something for once? ARCHIVIST: I guess so! It’s, uh… It’s gone. Like a dream. … What was it like? MARTIN: … [SIGH] Nice. It was… It was really nice.

(“Ignorance” both as willingly ignoring something you’re aware of, and not knowing what’s happening out there…)

But CRIES about the tinge of nostalgia, at the fact that Jon had been so hopeful during MAG180 while discovering this place (… and was now walking out of it with mixed feelings), and the fact that… these nice memories are stored within Martin, and Martin only.

… And the tape which recorded Salesa’s statement.

- WHAT ARE THE TAPE RECORDERS…

(MAG181) SALESA: Hmmm. [SHUFFLING] Interesting… […] Now tell me, do you know why there’s a tape recorder here? I noticed it just now, but I don’t believe I actually own one. ARCHIVIST: … Uh… Not really. MARTIN: They sort of just … follow us round? SALESA: Hmmmm. Interesting. Did you carry it in? Things shouldn’t be able to manifest in here like that. ARCHIVIST: … You had one in your… bag, I–I think, Martin, did, did you drop it here? MARTIN: Uh… I, I don’t think so…! SALESA: … Very well. In that case, we shall leave it to be. It’s hardly valuable, and it’s probably best not to upset whatever it might be involved with. Besides! I have no secrets to hide. […] Anyway, no more stories, I think. Let us relax, and talk, and drink, and… not worry about who might be… listening.

Jon had already told Tim back in MAG114, but the fact that this place was an anti-Eye zone kinda confirms they’re not Beholding? But outside of that…

* It’s interesting that Jon immediately asked Martin if it was his. Did Jon have his own in his pocket and could tell it wasn’t his? When did Martin acquire one: was it the one drifting alongside him in the water (or not water), in MAG163? Or was the one in MAG170 different?

* We’ve seen with the mention of the Corruption creature that people can go inside of Salesa’s property. We’ve seen that Jon was cut off from Beholding, but what about other powers? Jon was still fearful of Annabelle – so The Web could still be active inside of it? Is the recorder Web, another power?

- Why did Annabelle want them there? Was it for them to learn about the camera, to use later? To close the Salesa chapter? To give them some respite, for funsies? To introduce herself properly while in control of the situation, where Jon couldn’t compel her? To make them lose time because something was happening outside?

- It’s getting clearer and clearer that there are maaaany holes in Jon’s pseudo-omniscience: he’s unable to see inside of the Panopticon. He can’t see the future. He can’t know about The Web’s plans due to it being too fragmented and complex. He doesn’t know about Melanie&Georgie. He couldn’t know about Salesa’s “little oasis” since it was safe from The Eye.

What else is he missing from the big picture?

- So now, what’s coming next?

* If it was indeed Upton House, they’re getting pretty close to London, and with a slight detour, Oxford (and Hill Top Road) could be on their way; given how Annabelle told them they would meet again “very soon”, they might revisit the house… well, Martin would be visiting it for the first time. It was already weird before the apocalypse; how is it as a place, now?

* We still haven’t seen Georgie&Melanie, so they could be coming soon, unless Jon is reuniting with them in MAG189, right before the hiatus, in the same way as they managed to trap Basira in MAG176 as the ending to Act I… (And as usual, where are they? Unlike Annabelle, Jon had been able to hypothesise that they could be in London (MAG164: “Hm! I’m… I’m not… sure, I–I can’t really see Melanie o–or–or Georgie. […] if they were dead, I– I think I would know that, I just… I–I don’t know… where they are, w–what they’re doing. L–London, maybe?”). Are they in the Institute? Behind Helen’s door? Protected because Melanie cut her connection to The Eye and Georgie can’t feel fear, putting them off Beholding’s radar?)

* Basira was supposed to meet them again at the Institute; given that Martin&Jon stayed at Salesa’s for a while, I wonder if she’s ahead of them, now…?

* Last time we saw Helen was in MAG177, and we know that she was usually spying on them…Was she able to materialise her Door into Salesa’s house, or not even? I’m guessing she could be popping up soon, if she couldn’t get her hands on Jon&Martin for a while… (Oh no: given how she liked to casually torment them, she probably witnessed Daisy’s death and bring that topic back on the table just for funsies…)

I’m a broken record, but wow, MAG182’s title is concerning (WHEN IT SHOULDN’T BE…). Spiral (and Helen), Corruption or Lonely stuff? And with the second meaning, a discussion about Jon’s status in the apocalypse? (I’m also thinking about The Admiral ;_;)

[alexiaugustin]

"This season isn’t about toxic relationships please watch skam españa s3" i wanted to ask you what you thought of how skam españa handle that topic? I thought they did a rly good job but i'm interested in your opinion considering your experience (if you want to talk about it ofc!) thank you anyway, take care

Thank you so much for the ask actually, I always wanted to write a review for this season but wanted to wait until the end of the season and then just never did it so this is a great reason to do it now<33

Okay where do I start.. first of I loved this season like a lot. It's probably one of my favorite skam seasons ever it might even go hand in hand with skam france s3 as my two favourites. Nicole and the writers did an, in my opinion, amazing job at portraying a toxic relationship and the consequences of it in a really realistic and relatable way.

When I started watching this season I was pretty sure that they would go down a very different route than the other seasons and that Mikael would turn out to be trouble- maybe a mix of the og Nico and also the Willhelm character. But I told myself: watch this season and pretend that you don't know anything about the storyline and see how you'll feel about the characters and their relationships to have a "real" reaction to their actions

And what's shocking and very realistic at the same time is that I, too, would have probably fallen for Mikael the same way Nora did. I mean at the beginning everything was fine he was taking her out on romantic dates, they had a first rooftop kiss, he made efforts for her and so on. What I loved really just loved about this season was that they portrayed that everyone can fall into toxic relationships in such a realistic way. It can happen to everyone. It doesn't matter whether you're a feminist, it doesn't matter whether you could recognize such toxic behavior on tv shows or in other people's relationships,, it can still happen to yourself in real life.

You see I of all people who should have known better, who's been through shit like that for years would have still fallen for Mikael just the same in the beginning and that really hit me.

And why is that? Because you can't recognize such behavior from the beginning. Toxic people aren't just black and white. If the person would treat you badly from the beginning you wouldn't get yourself into a relationship/be friends with them. The problem is that toxic people are way more complex and the situation is more complicated than that. At first everything is fine, you're happy and you feel safe with that person, you trust them, you spend a lot of time with them and then slowly from time to time your abuser starts doing questionable things like in Nora's case Mikael blocking Alejandro's phone call when he was calling her, his facial expressions when he saw Nora talking to other guys... little moments like that but when it happens you you don't really think much about it.

So your abuser starts behaving toxic more and more, you get manipulated, you slowly start losing parts of yourself, do stuff just because your abuser wants you to and so on. I'm sure that looking back Nora wouldn't even be able to tell you at what point Mikael started to become toxic for her because that's always very tricky to tell and the lines are blurry. It's all those little things abusers do, turning you into someone you don't want to be at all, that add up to eachother at the end. And as soon as you realize what's happening to you it's too late and very hard to get out of there again.

And skam españa really did an amazing job at portraying that. Not just in the big scenes but in all those little moments too. I felt and understood Nora's feelings and pain like I've never understood any character ever before. When she started getting nervous whenever Mikael didn't respond to her texts and she started freaking out because she thought that he might be mad at her- I felt that. The way she panicked and felt like shit whenever they were actually fighting, that desperate need to make up with him so everything would be okay again, not just because she missed him but because you feel like absolute shit and are actually afraid of what your abuser is gonna do when you're not getting along well at the moment- I felt this. The way her hands were shaking, the way she cried and felt overpowered and helpless. The way Mikael always made sure to be above her, seem smarter and wiser, make her feel stupid so she would listen to him and agree with everything he says- I felt it all so so very much. There's no other show that ever made me feel as represented and understood than s3 of skam españa.

The scene that actually hurt watching the most was the scene when she and Mikael are lying next to eachother and she sits up and finally tells him that she wants to break up with him. I literally needed to pause the video several times while watching because this scene reminded me of everything I ever wanted to do. Seeing Nora being able to be brave enough and stand up for herself and saying all the things I desperately wanted to tell the toxic person in my life broke my heart because Nora did what I couldn't do and said exactly what I never managed to put into words myself.

This is my favorite quote from that scene and from this whole season in general because Nora put everything I've felt but never knew how to say perfectly into words here: "Look, do you want to know what's wrong? That you always turn things around, ok? And I always end up doing things I don't want to do. I've never forced you to do anything. Never. Well, no and yes. I don't know when it's me who decides or when I'm doing things because you want me to or because I think you want me to." This hit me and hurt the most while watching this season

Also I really really loved how they portrayed all of this in a hopeful way, how this show never did anything too over the top or from drama and shock value. It was representation of horrible and realistic things people experience every day and skam españa said: no matter what, you are not alone with this, you have a support system, Nora has her friends who will protect and help her as soon as Nora finds the courage to reach out for help. You should do the same, don't be afraid to ask for help there are always people who will support and help you in situations like this." They did that!! They made girls support girls while at the same time showing how it can be hard to reach out for help especially in the beginning when you're still manipulated by your abuser. They portrayed how hard it is to recognize what's going on when something like that happens to your friend/family and not knowing how to help the person at first (Eva and Emma who both noticed how Mikael changed her)

The ending gets me everytime because it's so simple yet so meaningful. It doesn't end eith a huge party or Nora getting back together with Alejandro and being happy and in love again like other shows would have done. The ending is really bittersweet, she is surrounded by her friends, yet she is still hurting, struggling and most of all healing because it's a progress and doesn't happen over night. She's getting better and is slowly getting back to the old Nora (13 M poster) but also knowing that she will never be able to fully get her old self, the Nora before Mikael back. But she is growing and healing and getting better every day a little more with the support of those around her and this was the perfect and most wonderful ending to her season

[dutten-does-the-fanfic]

I Want You Here With Me (Is It Too Much to Ask for Something Great) ch. 6

Title:  I Want You Here With Me (Is It Too Much to Ask for Something Great) ch. 6 of 14 (ch. 1) Pairing: Isak Valtersen/Even Bech Næsheim Word count: 28016 Warnings: Language, internalized homophobia

AO3

Summary:  The one where it’s been two years since Isak last saw or spoke with Even, and no one knows that Isak ever knew Even at all.

Present

The week seems to just drag on and on and come Friday, Isak is exhausted. It takes just about everything to get out of bed, his limbs feel all heavy and his head feels like it’s been stuffed full of cotton, and overall he feels like he’s coming down with the flu or has the worst hangover of his life.

At least Friday is the only day he doesn’t have morning classes, but even getting up at 9 o’clock instead of 6 doesn’t do a whole lot for him – not when he’s spent the better part of the night tossing and turning because he just can’t seem to fall asleep. At all.

Isak’s always had a bit of tendency to insomnia, something that had gotten severely worse after – well, after. But after a while, when he’d really started to get on with Jonas and was figuring things out with Mahdi and Magnus, it had gotten better. Mind you, there was still the odd night with no more than two hours of sleep, but those were the exception rather than the rule.

Things haven’t been this bad for a while and Isak can feel the anger bubbling away inside of him.

He had been getting better, he was going to be better this year, and now he feels all out of sorts in his own home. He’s terrified of walking around in Oslo or on campus grounds because what if he runs into Mikael, what if he runs into Even – no matter that by studying bio-science he’s in a completely different section of the university, the thought that Even could be within walking distance at any moment in time makes Isak terrified.

Isak stumbles around the flat noisily as he tries to get ready. He splashes water onto his face three times, but it has little effect on waking him up and no effect on getting rid of the slowly turning more prominent dark circles underneath his eyes. The two cups of coffee help a little wake him up, but he also ends up feeling a little sick from drinking too much hot coffee too quickly and too early.

He’s always been organized about his things so it doesn’t take long to gather his books, his notebook – just in case, because mapping out formulas and equations on a laptop can be goddamn awful – his laptop, the charger and stuffed his phone in his pocket, he should be ready to go.

He’s already put on his jacket and a beanie to hide away the atrocious state his hair is in, he should probably be bringing out a scarf soon if the wind is going to be so persistently cold already.

It’s that thought that makes him take one last look around his room. He isn’t even looking for his scarf, isn’t looking for anything in particular, but maybe that’s what sets him off.

Isak’s room isn’t empty. It’s furnished, he has curtains up, posters on the walls; one of the periodic table and another of the atomic structures for alcohol, caffeine and adrenaline drawn with funny faces on them. He has bed sheets and lamps and a bedside table and everything that should make his room feel like a home.

And it just, doesn’t.

It feels like someone has cut Isak’s strings and everything just feels so overwhelming for a second, like that walls are trying to close in on him, this apartment that he three years ago never would’ve thought would need to be a reality, his reality. Because Isak’s reality had been Even and their shitty one room apartment on the fourth floor with no elevator and their tiny kitchen and it had been their life together.

Maybe it’s from his surprise run in with Even or maybe it’s the recent thought he’d had walking through the apartment, how there are personal pictures hung around everywhere but his room, but now the thoughts and the feelings are there and they won’t go away.

All of it has just been building up to this moment and now that it’s finally here it hits Isak like a freight train and all he can do when his knees give out is aim at landing on the bed.

He bounces, once, but it’s enough to make him almost slide down onto the floor. Isak curls his hands into the duvet, scrunching it up and making crease marks that go across the stripes printed on the fabric. He keeps looking around the room frantically, like maybe the next time he looks, something will have changed, something will be different and he’ll be okay.

Because the truth is Isak isn’t dealing with it. He hasn’t been dealing at all for all of these years, and as much as he is constantly running on fumes and denial, it isn’t helping him. Not in the long run, and Isak hates that he can’t continue like this, because as much as he hates the anxiety and the constant stress of worrying, it’s much more preferable to the thought of everyone knowing.

Isak stuffs his wrist into his mouth in reflex to muffle whatever noises threaten to slip out. He can’t remember if it’s always been this hard to breathe.

OOOOO

As much as Isak lets himself struggle when he’s on his own, when he’s in public, no one would be able to tell there’s anything different from this Isak to the one two, three, four and so on weeks ago.

He walks the halls with his back straight and an indifferent look on his face, like nothing in the world could possibly bother him. He pays attention in class and takes notes and tries desperately to look like he actually understands what’s going on, tries so hard to focus in on the words droning on and on and not on anything else. And if people stop to talk to him, he smiles and he laughs and he makes nice all the while ignoring how every single interaction drains him until he’s worried there will be nothing left of him by the end of the day.

While the bigger part of his first year had been a bit of a shit-storm, once he’d gotten on Jonas’ good side it had seemed necessary to fall in line with how he, Mahdi and Magnus had been acting, which meant all the university parties Isak had only been attending to get embarrassingly drunk he was now attending to still get drunk, but under the guise of talking and trying to get with pretty girls.

It had been stupidly easy to imitate the guys, so easy to mimic their body languages, to smile at the girls like he was letting them in on a secret just between the two of them, easy to talk smoothly and slowly gain the reputation of a flirt despite not having kissed a single person.

What wasn’t easy was everything that came after that. Girls wanted to talk to him, but most of the time they wanted a lot more than just talking, and Isak has absolutely no reason to feel guilty about the prospects of getting to hook up, but guilt is a lot easier to handle than the at best indifference and at worst disgust at the thought of having to hook up with girls.

He could explain the guilt away – just gotten out of a serious relationship, he still feels weird about being close to other people, blah, blah, blah – but the other parts? Those were a dead giveaway.

So he makes nice and counts down the minutes until he can go home.

During the last fifteen minutes of a lecture, his phone pings with a message from Sana reminding him about their scheduled study session he honestly had forgotten everything about.

Remember we’re meeting in the library in 20

Isak groans and ignores the dirty looks the people next to him send for interrupting. He gets another text before he can reply.

You did remember, right?

Isak scoffs even though he knows Sana won’t know.

Course I did. See you there

Guess he’s doing this, then. His body feels heavy at the thought alone, so he stops at one of the on-campus cafés and gets two large coffees to go.

“Hey,” Isak greets as he sinks down into the chair across from Sana, bringing out his laptop and debating whether he should get out his book already as well or if they’re probably just going to be browsing the internet.

The internal debate means Isak ends up not realizing the complete silence from the other side of the table before it’s been stretched out long enough to be uncomfortable.

Isak looks up – sure enough, it is Sana, he hasn’t gotten the wrong table, but it’s a Sana who looks like she’s just bit into a lemon the way she’s scowling at him.

“I’m not late,” Isak snaps, because he isn’t.

Sana scowls even harder.

“And I didn’t forget we were meeting.”

He had forgotten.

“You did,” Sana replies. Isak doesn’t even bother looking outraged or protesting because, yeah, he had, sue him. “That’s not my problem.”

Isak has enough problems already, thank you very much. A deep sigh escapes him involuntarily, and he regrets it immediately because all it amounts to is Sana now looking angry as well. “What is your problem, then?”

Sana doesn’t reply. She looks at something past Isak’s shoulder, and Isak almost turns around in his seat to see if he isn’t the problem but someone behind him is – which, honestly, would be a well-needed break clearly brought by the gods above finally looking out for him.

“You need to do something for me.”

Hold the phone, sister. Isak’s hand freezes from where he’d been about to type in his password on his computer. “What?”

Sana rolls her eyes. Isak can only just manage to see it from where she’s now scowling into her book that’s opened on the preface.

“I think it’s called, ‘I need you to do something for me,” Isak points out. “At least, that’s how you ask it when you need a favor from someone.”

Sana shrugs and still doesn’t look up at him. “I said what I said.”

Isak stares incredulously at her. Honestly, what?

Sana sighs long-sufferingly and finally looks up at him. “It’s only because of something Noora said.”

Noora? Isak mentally goes through every single girl he’s ever shared a class with who also probably has shared a class with Sana and comes up with… no one.

“Noora?”

Sana stares at him like he’s the idiot and not the one who apparently has to know every single person in the science department.

“Yes, Noora,” she bites at him. “Friends with Eva and Vilde? Don’t you know her?”

Isak knows a Noora – the possibility along with the probability of it being the same Noora should be quite slim to none. He does remember that Eva has a friend called Noora, but he can’t recall her for the life of him.

“No.”

“Well, Noora is our friend, moving on,” Sana slams her book shut when it’s clear she can’t keep on the pretense of it being more important than what she’s trying to talk about. “You need to –“

“Hold on,” Isak interrupts, holding up a finger to silence her before she gets too far ahead. “Are you asking me for a favor?”

And Sana has just taken another bite of a lemon.

“Because it sounds an awful lot like you’re asking me for a favor.”

“I’m not asking you for a favor,” she makes a face at the word like it has personally offended her. “I’m merely proposing working on a common interest.”

“In which I will be doing all the work and have absolutely no idea about what interest I have in it?” Isak clarifies.

“Common interest,” Sana repeats, leaning back in her chair. Her eyeliner is heavier today than it had been the last time Isak had seen her, and if she’s wearing it for the intimidation factor Isak has got to give it to her that it’s working. “We need you to get Magnus’ head out of his own ass.”

Isak lets out a mix of a surprised whine and an indignant squawk of outrage for someone who has probably only met Magnus a handful of times to talk like that about him.

Sana, being Sana, just fixes a glare at him. “Him and Vilde.”

“What’s wrong with Magnus and Vilde?”

“The fact that they since the start of the second semester have been trying to get together only to cockblock themselves every single time?”

Isak pauses. “How?”

To be honest, he hadn’t even noticed Magnus had been trying to hook up with Vilde. With every single party the boys dragged him to, it always seemed like it was a new girl for all of them except Jonas, who’d dutifully spend the night looking after Eva unless they were smoking.

“All they ever talk about is cats!”

“Cats,” Isak repeats, deadpan.

“Yes,” Sana snaps. “Cats.”

“Are you sure they’re not talking about –“

“Cats.”

“Alright!” Isak holds up the palms of his hands and leans back in his chair to get some space between them. “Again, why?”

“If I knew, do you really think I would be asking for you to interfere?”

Isak came here to study, not be berated about his friend’s life decisions. “You don’t think it could just be a… bonding thing?”

By the look of it, Sana does not particularly look like she thinks it could be a quote unquote, ‘bonding thing’.

“Like, a, ‘hey, do you prefer dogs or cats’, kind of thing?” Isak winces when Sana raises one eyebrow at him. There are weirder conversation-starters and icebreakers – Isak would know. So far he’s never met anyone else whose first conversation involved ISO-settings and a B&E. Without actually breaking anything. An E.

“They’re meowing at each other.”

“Jesus,” only Magnus. Or, apparently, only Magnus and Vilde. Isak rolls his eyes and shakes his head to stop looking at Sana. This really wasn’t what he’d been prepared for when he sat down.

It’s difficult trying to wrap his head around any of this. He’s exhausted to the bone, he’s spent the entire day trying to pay attention and stay busy. Having to suddenly think about woes of love hits a bit too close for Isak not to lose his breath.

Different situation, different people, he tries to keep in mind when he turns back to Sana.

“I don’t know what exactly you expect me to do,” he tells her. “I don’t even know when they’ll be in the same room, let alone talking to each other!”

Sana frowns quizzically at him. “Do you not know about –“

A sudden flurry of movement to Isak’s right startles them both out of their bubble. They both snap their necks to the side so quickly Isak feels a crick already forming from the mild whiplash.

“Hey!” Emma grins. Oh no.

Oh no. Isak’s day is going badly enough already, he does not need this.

‘This’ referring to the first year eagerly waiting for a slice of Isak’s attention to be on her like it’s all that’ll ever matter. She’s practically vibrating where she’s standing next to him, all bright-eyed and enthusiastic about life and Isak doesn’t know how to connect with her, besides the obvious reason.

Emma’s a sweet girl, really. With her journalism major and outgoing personality, she isn’t exactly lacking friends or popularity. She just, apparently, hasn’t gotten the memo that Isak doesn’t stick around, isn’t there for anything serious, and also isn’t there for something not serious.

So now he’s got a lot of unanswered DMs he can’t even bring himself to leave on ‘read’.

Isak’s just staring at her. It actually feels like his mouth has been sewn shut. Isak is usually the one who approaches girls; he doesn’t get approached outside of a party, and now that he has it feels a bit like he’s been thrown into the deep end.

What is he supposed to say?

He only startles out of it when the hardcover of Sana’s book smacks against the tabletop with unneeded force.

“Hey,” Isak tries to smile back. He has a feeling it looks more like a grimace, especially from the way Sana is looking increasingly amused, but Emma doesn’t seem to pay too much attention to it, thankfully.

“You kind of disappeared last time I saw you,” Emma toes an inch closer and Isak has to resist the urge to scoot backwards to maintain the distance between them. She shrugs. “’S a shame.”

Isak doesn’t recall having been anywhere near her, doesn’t even remember the last time he’d seen her.

While he doesn’t know a lot about girls, he does know you do not tell them something like that.

“Yeah,” Isak stutters out instead, shrugging in lieu of an apology. Maybe he can pull off the you know how it is half-assery. “Hopefully you weren’t too disappointed.”

It always leaves a bad taste in his mouth, flirting with anyone, even if he only ever flirts with girls. Maybe that part also contributes to the sour taste that sticks with him for the rest of the day.

Emma giggles, all prettily and Isak thinks he should like her; she’s pretty with the short, brown hair and big, brown eyes. Isak has to bite himself in his cheek when his thoughts try to stray towards blond coifs and blue eyes.

“Maybe you could make it up to me?” She casually puts her hand on the table, only a couple of inches away from where Isak is resting his arm. It would be too obvious to pull away, even if that is all Isak wants to do.

Jesus, that sounds like a line. Isak pointedly ignores the snort Sana attempts to mask as she slides further and further down behind her book and laptop that are propped open in front of her.

“Oh, uh –“ Isak fumbles. He should keep on looking at her, any guy would keep on looking at her. Isak looks around the room to find inspiration for any apology or let down he can give her without it coming back to bite him in the ass. “How would I –“

Emma was clearly just waiting for that opening, even if Isak doesn’t get to finish it. “I heard you’re having a shindig?”

A what?

“I’m having a what?”

Sana snorts again from the other side of the table, but Isak is magnanimous enough to fully ignore her. He repeats to himself that he shouldn’t divert his attention away from Emma, because none of the other boys would’ve done that.

“A shindig,” Emma laughs, reaches her hand out to lay it on his arm and squeezes once. Isak’s arm burns uncomfortably when she pulls her hand away again. “Or your housemates are. It sounded like it was for all of you.”

A what?

“So?” Emma smiles, bats her eyelashes once. “Am I going to have to beg for an invite?”

She takes another step closer. By now she’s close enough that Isak can smell her perfume, it clogs together in his throat, but he barely pays attention to it from how fast his thoughts are racing through his head.

A what?

Emma falters when she see Isak floundering. “Are you… okay?”

“Yeah,” it comes out too weak, so Isak clears his throat and tries again. “Yeah, I’m – I’m great, yeah. Uh, I don’t – I don’t actually know anything about any kind of ‘shindig’.”

It sounds like a lie. It feels like a lie, and it isn’t even one. For once Isak doesn’t have to lie to get out of something, yet it’s also the one time no one seems to believe him. Emma most certainly doesn’t look impressed, and Sana, who isn’t even a part of this conversation, doesn’t really seem to fully believe him either.

“Right,” Emma says. It sounds too clipped and she takes a couple of steps back, putting some distance in-between them. Shit.

Isak tries to grin. “It must be a pretty exclusive party if I can’t even get an invite.” And that also sounds like an excuse.

“Right,” Emma repeats, but it comes out too stiff and a bit clipped. Her arms are folded across her chest and Isak wants to stuff his face into his hands and groan from having to deal with this on top of everything.

He doesn’t.

“What did – where did you hear about it?” he asks instead.

Emma’s looking everywhere but at him. “I just heard it around. Supposed to be the place to be tonight.”

Isak gulps. Shit, that does not sound good. Both in the sense that if this is true, his home will be flooded with drunk students and he’d rather not deal with the aftermath, but also that, if this is true, Isak hasn’t been told about it.

Isak… doesn’t quite know how he’s supposed to feel about that.

“Oh.”

Emma looks uncomfortable, looking down at her shoes she keeps scuffing the toes of around. Isak doesn’t doubt he looks uncomfortable as well.

Whatever Jonas, Mahdi, and Magnus are planning aside, Isak can’t spend the night also having to worry about Emma. The way he constantly has to be thinking, is this the right way to behave around her, am I actually pulling it off, does it seem like she likes me, and most importantly, when can he leave.

But he also can’t afford to just turn down a girl without an obvious reason, and right now everyone seems to be on the Emma-boat and Isak is left to drown.

“Why don’t you keep your phone open, then?” Isak tries to grin, but he feels a bit too shaky. It almost feels like he’s coming down with something; cold shivers running through his body and he feels clammy, but he knows he isn’t getting sick.

Emma’s phone starts to buzz in her pocket. Her eyebrows are furrowed as she switches between looking at Isak and fishing the phone out of her coat and check who is calling.

“I’ll text you if I find out about something?”

He sounds too hesitant and Emma doesn’t look convinced either, so Isak pinches a small bit of skin by his wrist in-between two fingertips to pull himself together. It doesn’t hurt as badly as the rest of him does.

“After all, is it really a party if you aren’t there?”

She looks a bit more placated at that, even as most of her attention is on the phone. “Text me later, then. Or next week – we’ll do something. Hello -”

Isak doesn’t get the chance to reply before she’s bounded out of there again, leaving him staring into the air of her vacated space.

A snort sounds from across the table.

“What?” Isak snaps, rolling his shoulders back to try and relieve some tension. “Shit.”

“I’m sure she would’ve taken it much nicer if you’d just let her down easy instead of talk your way around it,” Sana leafs lazily through her book despite that they both know she isn’t looking for anything.

Isak scoffs. “Can’t exactly let her down easy when I don’t even know what she’s talking about, can I?”

Sana stops mid-motion, the page falling down onto its place without her assistance. She blinks once, twice, then looks up at him. “Huh?”

“’Shindig’?” Isak quotes, knocking his arms out. “What the hell is this?”

Sana doesn’t move, doesn’t stop looking at him either. It’s unnerving as all hell and Isak would just like to get some answers, thank you very much.

He doesn’t get any. Sana just shakes her head, closes the book and turns her attention onto the computer. “Take that up with the troublesome trio you live with. Let’s get started!”

OOOOO

Isak hears cupboards banging in the kitchen and he follows the noise until he can see Jonas bent over in front of their chips-and-other-miscellaneous-unhealthy-crap cupboard, riffling through the contents as a note and a pen lie on the counter in front of him.

It used to be so easy. Isak could walk up to Jonas and just say, ‘Hey’ or ask about coursework or football or how Eva is, how are the both of you, all of it seemed so easy.

Now he’s staring at Jonas, mouth snapped shut and no matter how much he begs his body to, it won’t open. He’s screaming the questions in his mind, but no sounds gets out and he doesn’t know why he’s feeling like this, this panicky anxiety that’s filling his body. Just the thought of actually saying something is making him twitchy.

“Hey!” Jonas smiles when he sees him standing there. “Did you borrow my scarf?”

“Are we having a shindig?” tumbles out of Isak’s mouth before his brain can catch up that he should probably answer Jonas’ question first.

Jonas frowns at the change of topic, but diligently answers him. “Yeah? Didn’t Magnus tell you?” and then realizes what he’s just said.

Jonas squeezes his eyes shut so tightly his nose and cheeks wrinkle from the force of it. “Shit, sorry, man, should’ve just told you myself. It’s been planned for a couple of weeks by now.”

A couple of weeks, holy shit. Isak stuffs his hand into the pocket in his jacket to hide how much he’s shaking. A couple of weeks puts it right before the night, and if Magnus didn’t have a tendency to get distracted already, he definitely would’ve had enough reason to when he ran into his idol.

“Right,” Isak stammers out when Jonas doesn’t seem inclined to give him any more information.

“It’s just a small thing!” Jonas hurries to placate, but that only makes Isak feel worse.

A few weeks ago there wouldn’t have been a need for him to be placated about his friends holding a party. Yeah, he’d be grouchy he wasn’t told, panicky about who’d been invited, but nothing like what he’s feeling now.

“Swear,” Jonas doesn’t pause so he probably hasn’t even noticed Isak’s internal struggle. “Eva and her friends are the only ones who are definitely coming. Although, Eva mentioned that Noora might be bringing someone.”

Eva and her friends, so Sana is coming. If anything, he can just hang up against her all evening with the excuse of getting to know his study-buddy. Something that is so like him and not likely at all to raise questioning eyebrows. Shit.

Jonas scratches the back of his head. “Mahdi’s invited a couple of people from the football team, and I think Magnus has invited some from his media classes. But none of them RSVP’ed, so…”

Jonas shrugs like that’s that, like that means it’ll still just be a small gathering of Eva and her girl power group, when Isak knows that they’re not exactly the generation to ‘RSVP’ and that he himself more than once has crashed an invites-only party, it’s bound to come and bite him in the ass at some point.

Also the fact that people are apparently talking about it like it’s the party of the year doesn’t exactly bode well either.

“Do you want to hit some people up, ask if they can come?” Jonas sounds hesitant. Isak feels so out of place in the doorway to his own goddamn kitchen. He isn’t supposed to be feeling like this. “It’s a bit last minute, but maybe someone is free?”

Isak can’t tell if he’s angling for Isak to invite some girls over, maybe even Emma, but Isak feels sick and uneasy enough already, he doesn’t need the added worry if he looks straight enough.

He shakes his head. “’s all good.” He doesn’t mention there’s no one for him to invite – no one he’d want to come. “Hey,” he clears his throat and points down the hall in the direction of his room. “I’ll go finish some, uh, stuff. Just get me if you need help with anything, yeah?”

Is that an appropriate thing to ask? Should he just barge in and ask directly if there’s anything they need him to do? It’s not that he minds Eva or Sana and he hasn’t really met the three left, but it doesn’t change the fact that this ‘shindig’ that supposedly was for all of them is feeling a lot like it’s only for some of them and Isak is only invited because he lives here.

Jonas nods, something guarded in his eyes that makes it difficult for Isak to swallow. “Yeah. Yeah, man, definitely.”

Isak nods, and then once again when he doesn’t know what to say, what to do. In the end, he just slowly starts to shuffle towards his room, leaving Jonas behind in the kitchen.

OOOOO

“Oi!” Magnus pounds his fist against Isak’s door so harshly it slams up against the wall. “Isak, my bro, my best bro, have I told you recently –“

“I’m not helping you get laid,” Isak groans before rolling onto his stomach, any following dismayed noises muffled when he shoves his head into his pillows.

“Please!” Magnus whines, throwing himself on top of Isak with zero regards to his spine. “I’ll help you!”

Isak snorts, or he would’ve, had he any air to do so.

“Get off of me,” he groans and tries to turn onto his back, but Magnus is stubbornly persistent in not moving until Isak agrees.

“You always know what to say and what to do,” Magnus whines, rolling onto his back until he’s awkwardly planked horizontally across Isak, his back forced into a unnatural arch. “Teach me your ways, I beg of you!”

“Your only bargaining tool was you would help me get laid, yet I’m the only one who knows how to do it?” Isak asks, except his face is smooshed into his pillows and Magnus is honest to god quite heavy, so it comes out a muffled garble of mour mon marg moo mou mel maid mam meon mow moo-hmm.

Magnus stills on top of him.

“Alright, I didn’t understand a word of that.”

Isak folds his arms up underneath his torso and pushes up until Magnus has to roll with it or be pushed onto the floor. Magnus yelps, his arms flailing as he nearly topples over, before he clings onto Isak’s hoodie, holding on for dear life.

“Isn’t this a problem for the crisis window?” Isak grumbles, referring to the nook in the kitchen, the window that’s just long enough that all four of them can sit side by side on the sill that had unintentionally turned into their version of a psychiatrist’s couch – too little room on the couch, and it feels like an invasion of privacy in their rooms. Or just a place to smoke if that’s what they’re in the mood for.

Magnus frowns. “Would you actually move into the kitchen for me?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Then it’s a problem for Isak’s bed!” Magnus moves around a worrying amount.

“I don’t know what to tell you,” Isak flops onto his back before Magnus can climb back on top of him, “considering I didn’t even know we were having a party two hours ago.”

Magnus winces apologetically and looks at Isak with those big, sad eyes he knows no one can resist. Manipulative bastard.

“I didn’t mean to forget!” Magnus insist, snuffling closer to Isak in a way that’s probably meant to look like a puppy begging for forgiveness, but just makes it look like he’s stuck. “And I did say I’m sorry.”

Isak sighs and rolls his eyes, but he lets it go. There’s so much else going on in his head, he can’t deal with having to be angry about a missing invite to a party. “Alright, then,” and asks. “Who’d you invite to the party?”

A long list of names bubbles out of Magnus’ mouth, none of which ring a bell, which could both be a blessing and a curse, but then Magnus starts categorizing them after which class they share, which tutorial group, friends before going to university, the lady in the grocery store who, admittedly, had looked a little too old to be interested in a uni party, but Magnus is still holding out hope she’ll actually show up.

Despite rejecting his offer immediately after Magnus had told her about it.

“So what you’re telling me,” Isak interrupts once it becomes clear Magnus is about to go off topic about what he wants to suggest they watch in film club, “is that you want my help with hooking up –“

Magnus nods wildly.

“– when you haven’t invited any girls?”

Magnus stops nodding.

Isak shakes his head. “There’re only so many miracles I can perform in one night, and your requests are starting to increase in size.”

Magnus snorts. “Like the size is what’s stopping you from fulfilling my hopes and dreams.”

Oh, that one’s just too obvious. “Maybe it’s only one miracle we need if the only thing we need is to change the size of your –“

“Hey!”

Isak’s grown up enough to admit the punch to his shoulder was probably well-deserved.

“Asshole,” Magnus grumbles, rolling onto his stomach when he flops around uselessly. Isak honestly can’t tell what he’s trying to do.

Isak should feel worse about kicking Magnus when he’s already down, but there’s a few hours left until the shindig ahem-party-ahem is supposed to start, and Isak had hoped he could spend at least some of them asleep.

So he should probably try to actually help Magnus, then. Jesus, Isak doesn’t have the emotional capacity for this.

“Alright, ignore who is and isn’t coming,” Isak tells him. “You see a girl you like – what do you want?”

He does feel a bit bad when Magnus looks up at him with these big eyes, like he hadn’t thought Isak would actually help him.

Yet he’d still turned to him for help. These damn creative-minded artsy kids – Isak honestly has no idea how their minds work.

“I –“ Magnus hesitates, biting his lip. “I want to say something funny so she’ll laugh.”

Isak nods, that’s a good start. Seem approachable, relatable, try to be funny. Smiles are good when humans want to connect with each other.

“And then, later on, I’d like to press her up against the wall and –“

Isak groans like he’s dying, because he honestly might be. Magnus isn’t even deterred when Isak gets the pillow under his head out and smothers his face in it.

This was not what he’d signed up for.

Although, he probably should’ve been expecting it – Magnus has never been particularly quiet about what he likes, including what he likes in bed, which is what Isak’s currently being painted a lovely picture of.

A lot of leather is involved – a bit surprisingly – a lot of sex in various positions, most seem unbelievably unrealistic – not surprisingly at all – and how good it’ll be.

Something that is surprising is when Magnus doesn’t stop at the end of the night.

“I can’t cook pancakes,” Magnus reminds Isak. “So either one of you guys could do me a favor, or – oh! Maybe she likes cereal! Most people do after all – I could get her my special mix, you know the one where I mix –“

“You want her to stay for breakfast?” Isak interrupts, frowning.

“Yeah?” Magnus looks honestly perplexed. “We’ve just had the most incredible night together, why would I want her to leave?”

“Erh, well, you see –“

“I can’t expect her to stay and not feed her.”

“That wasn’t really the point I was trying to make –“

“Oh! And then, after breakfast, we could go into the city – no, wait! I could take her to breakfast at a café!”

“That definitely isn’t really hook up protocol –“

“Yeah, that’s probably a way better idea. I don’t want to scare her off with my bad cooking!” Magnus is laughing and Isak is grimacing.

“No, yeah, but –“

“And then after we’ve eaten, we could come back here and have sex again. You know I saw this thing in a porno once, where the girl ended up stuffing –“

Gross, gross, gross! Where is the bleach, Isak needs it. Desperately. Goodbye hearing, goodbye brain, there is literally no need for either if he has to spend the rest of his life remembering just exactly what, where, and how much that poor girl had stuffed.

“And in the evening I could take her somewhere nice. There are all sorts of romantic places in the centre of Oslo, right?”

“There are, but –“

“So we could go there and be all cutesy-and-shit,” a description every girl wants their relationship to have, “and then we go swing ‘round her place to get her some clothes. Or! We could just come back here again, and the next day she’d just have to wear something of mine. That’s hot, right?”

“Objectively, it is, but –“

“And I could fall asleep all folded up around her, and make sure she’s warm enough and comfortable. She could fall asleep on my chest – wait, no! We’re spooning – and I’m the big spoon,” he points at Isak like he dares him to disagree with that.

It honestly isn’t the bit Isak has the biggest issue with.

“And the next day we could get ready for the week together. We could do homework together and she could tell me all about her degree and her modules and her essays, and she’d listen to me rambling on about –“ Magnus pauses for a second, like he just remembered it’s Isak’s room he’s in. It doesn’t leave much doubt what he was about to say, but Isak’s frozen in his seat so he doesn’t comment on it when Magnus clears his throat and continues like nothing had happened. “ – and my education, and my work.”

Magnus gasps dramatically with a sudden epiphany, any lingering awkwardness at the near slipup clearly forgotten. “I could show her Even’s movies! Do you think she’ll like them? Oh, I really hope so, because we’re watching all of them. And she could show me her favorite movies – we could do several film nights!”

Isak’s mouth feels too dry. He’s pretty sure his tongue is stuck to the roof of his mouth permanently now.

“And I would find little pieces of hers all over in my room, like, some clothes lying on the floor, or a hair tie, or a book for class. And I could clear out a drawer for her things, and she could slowly take over everything in my room so I have the drawer I’d originally cleared out for her –“

Isak stills as what Magnus has described registers. His heart beats a little too fast and he feels cold all of the sudden, even as he can feel that his skin is actually rather warm.

It’s all said so matter-of-factly, like Magnus has never experienced the rush of emotions, the giddiness and the excitement and the happiness and the nerves and everything related to falling in love, because that’s what Magnus is describing. Love.

Isak doesn’t have a lot of expertise in the hooking up culture; he’d been so young when he’d met Even, just at the age where his classmates were only starting to gain interest in parties and kissing, so he’d never learnt what it meant, what you had to do and why it was supposedly so fun to participate in.

But what he’d lacked in that area, he’d learnt a lot more in another. And what Magnus is talking about? Isak already knows enough to know that isn’t what you do with a hookup, that’s what you do with a person you’re in a relationship with.

It’s suddenly very difficult for Isak to draw in another breath.

“Doesn’t that sound nice?” Magnus finishes, letting out an exaggerated sigh. “Really wish I had invited some girls to hook up tonight now –“

“Magnus,” Isak interrupts, a bit clipped. “That’s not what you do when you hook up.”

“Huh?”

“That’s what you do in a relationship.”

Isak’s so terribly thrown off kilter. He’d expected to bluff his way through guiding Magnus into getting a hook up, but now he has to fake not knowing about what Magnus is talking about, because Isak’s done all of that and no one knows. He doesn’t want to share it either, but it’s like something is being ripped from his past that he’d tried so hard to bury, and it’s both painful and makes him feel numb at the same time.

Magnus glares at him, but there’s no fire behind it. “What do you know about relationships?”

Isak feels freezing and boiling hot at the same time. It’s like it takes everything in him to put on a strained smile – luckily, Magnus isn’t looking too closely.

“You basically just described Jonas and Eva, you know that, right? You’re not interested in finding someone to hook up with. You want to find your Eva.”

Magnus hums, rolls onto his back to stare up at the ceiling. “Suppose,” and then out of the blue asks, “Is that what you want, too?”

Isak’s skin feels too tight and the laughter that bubbles out of him is too high-pitched, too wrong. “Why do you think that?”

Magnus shrugs. The fabric of his t-shirt snags against the fabric of the duvet, making it look like a weird, awkward shuffle instead. “Like, is Emma your Eva?”

“What?”

“I don’t know, man!” Magnus knocks his arms out. “I just – don’t you think it could be nice? If that isn’t what you get to do with a hook up, then what’s the great thing about it?”

Isak can’t answer, because he doesn’t know the answer. He hates that he doesn’t know the answer, he should’ve figured it out ages ago, yet here he is.

“The freedom,” Isak tells him stiffly, but he tries to make it come out light and excited, like he should be feeling. “You can do whatever you want with whoever you want.”

A knot forms in Magnus’ brows. “Doesn’t that get lonely?”

It’s hard to swallow.

“Nah,” Isak leans back so he can look up at his ceiling. The familiarity of it is comforting; the same cracks and patterns as all the other times he’s looked up at it. “Think the other way around gets too crowded.”

Shit, Isak needs to get the conversation moving to somewhere else. He’s going to end up saying or doing something he’ll regret if he doesn’t.

“Maybe you’ll meet someone tonight, though.”

Magnus snorts. “Yeah, going to meet lots of girls to a party where none of us has invited any.”

Isak rolls his eyes. “Eva’s coming,” which, maybe don’t bring up a girl who already has a boyfriend – a boyfriend you’re currently sharing a flat with at that, “didn’t Jonas say she was bringing her friends along?”

Magnus lets out a disheartened sigh. “Going by my track record, I don’t think any of Eva’s friends are going to be in my league.”

Alright, that’s any melodrama Isak can handle for the day, he needs to figure something out. If Magnus doesn’t think he has a chance with any of Eva’s friends, then he’s just going to have to –

Eva’s friends.

Sana is one of Eva’s friends. Sana has already mentioned another one of Eva’s friends.

He has an honest-to-god light bulb moment. He might as well pull up a ding to go along with it – Isak’s sure there’s an app for it. There’s an app for everything, nowadays.

“What about the one you’ve spoken to before, then?” Isak tries to ask casually. “What was her name – Mille? Hilde?”

“Vilde?”

“That’s the one!” Isak snaps his fingers, like that’ll make this conversation go faster.

After this, Sana can never claim he’s never done anything for her. This favor extends very, very far.

Except Magnus doesn’t start blabbering on about Vilde. He remains quiet, twiddling his thumbs in circles and carefully avoids looking over at Isak.

“I don’t know,” he finally says. “I don’t think she really likes me.”

Jesus Christ, Isak is getting a scientific degree for a reason – he doesn’t know how to do this, never learnt how to be confident enough in himself to spread it to his friends.

“Course she likes you. Why wouldn’t she?”

Magnus shrugs again, but he doesn’t add anything to it. So it’s actually serious, then, if Magnus doesn’t want to talk about it.

“It’s just –“ Magnus sighs. “Nothing seems natural. I always seem to say the wrong thing and – I don’t know. Shouldn’t it feel easier, somehow?”

Isak doesn’t feel like he’s in his room, on his bed, talking to Magnus. He can vaguely see his desk and his books, but it feels like it might be in a dream and he’s only seeing what his brain is creating for him to see.

“Falling in love should be easy – that’s what all the movies make it seem like. The pain usually comes after, once something has gone wrong, not during.”

Panic is sizzling away underneath his skin and Isak both simultaneously wants to get up and run away and stay here and get under the covers to hide away from the world.

“Shouldn’t it feel like a whirlwind from the start? Completely crazy and all-empowering and all you can think about?”

He’s tired. He’s tired of trying and constantly failing, because this was supposed to be his year, yet all he’s done is manage to fuck everything up. He was supposed to make it work with the guys, both by being a better friend, but also figuring out how to be a good flatmate, but so far he’s managed to scare them so badly they’re constantly walking on eggshells around him and Isak doesn’t know how to feel at home in his own apartment in fear that they’ll say one thing, one thing, and they’ll figure it out.

“Like you’d do anything to be with them, to be near them. You’d do anything to make them smile and you want the best for them. I think that’s what I really want the most out of anything.”

It’s stupid to think it, but the thought still somehow sneaks in, because what if that is the reason Magnus is talking about this? So many things just hitting a little too close to home, how easy it was to fall in love with someone, how overly encompassing it was, all the emotions and how it seemed worth it that it might bring pain, because it had also brought love. Isak has spent so long trying to forget all of that.

It’s what makes him finally snap, because he needs for Magnus to shut up. “If what you want is a relationship, maybe go talk to the Casanova, instead.”

“But Isak,” Magnus replies in a sing-song voice. “You’re the Casanova. Jonas would be, I don’t know – Romeo or something.”

It makes the anger swirling in his stomach boil over until it spews out everywhere. There are so many things Isak has spent ages avoiding getting near or getting into conversations about, and now he feels like tearing out his own hair and screaming and crying and he wants to hurt someone, anyone. One person.

“Get the fuck out of here with that shit.”

He sounds furious, voice dripping with venom and it’s surprising Magnus doesn’t pick up on it.

“So Emma isn’t going to be your Juliet, then?” Magnus nudges him playfully, but too many of Isak’s red flags have been prodded at and he can’t take it anymore.

“Absolutely not.” It comes out too harshly. “And I really can’t help you if what you want is some fairytale meet-cute, go talk to Jonas.”

“But isn’t that what everyone wants? Isn’t that the point of going out and meeting people, to see if you find someone worth sticking around and hurting for?”

Isak laughs. It sounds mean. “It really isn’t what everyone wants.”

Magnus is looking a bit confounded, what with the way he’s frowning at Isak with furrowed eyebrows, biting his bottom lip as if he’s contemplating something. “What about you, then?”

There might be a bit too much contempt in Isak’s voice when he tells him, “I have no interest in Romeo and Juliet whatsoever.”

OOOOO

The bass is pumping from the speakers and Isak can barely hear his own thoughts from where they’re being drowned out by the music. There are people all around him, talking, screaming, dancing, making out, taking shots. This is what uni is supposed to be about and Isak can figure out how to fit in, even if he isn’t going to be drinking excessively throughout the night.

It all feels a bit foreign, and it shouldn’t, because this is what Isak’s entire first semester of university had been about; booze and blunts and the noise, because that had seemed to be the only things that made his head quiet and body numb. Maybe it’s just the lack of alcohol swimming around in his body that makes Isak feel like a fish out of water.

At least it’s much less of a party-of-the-year and more in the likes of a pregame. Isak’s already heard several people talking about finding a club somewhere after, so he just has to hold on a few more hours.

A few people shout his name as he makes his way past them. They’re all grinning and raises they various drinks, cans and bottles at him in greeting, probably inviting him to come join them.

Isak nods a greeting, but doesn’t make his way closer. He doesn’t recognize any of them, figures they’re probably some of the blurry person-shaped edges he has in his memories of those nights back during first semester.

“Hey, man,” Jonas comes up to him from behind. He’s looking at Isak like he has to be careful of something, and it isn’t helping with whatever dangerous cocktail of emotions currently swishing around in Isak’s body.

Isak raises an eyebrow and tries to tease, “Bit of a ‘shindig’, huh?”

Jonas winces and looks at him apologetically. “Yeah, things may have gotten a bit out of hand.” And as much as Isak hates that the boys didn’t tell him, he hates this more – this, this guarded carefulness they all have whenever they’re speaking to him. It’s driving him insane and makes him want to scream, but that would only serve to make them worse.

So he tries to laugh and ignores the tightness in stomach. “There’s no problem. This is fun, right?”

Jonas doesn’t look convinced, but Isak doesn’t know how to convince him anymore.

Usually, he would’ve flung his arm around Jonas’ shoulders and shouted too loudly in his ear, ‘let’s go do some shots!’ and that would’ve been it, but he doesn’t do that anymore – drink heavily, or the other bit, actually, come to mind, because Jonas constantly looks guarded around Isak, and Isak can’t tell if that means he wants him close or he doesn’t want him close.

He doesn’t have to worry about it for long, because the front door bangs open when Eva lets herself in.

Jonas lights up like he always does when he sees her, and she sashays her way over to him to kiss him hello. And then some. Isak ignores the pang in his heart at the sight and looks over to the side of them to look at the rest of the gang.

Sana rolls her eyes when he nods at her, so of course he has to roll his eyes back. It’s basically their thing by now, as much as they both seem to hate it.

“Halla,” she greets. “Found out about the ‘shindig’, then?”

Isak feels short of breath, but it’s still easy to put the mask on, grin and pretend like everything’s okay. “Little less than two hours ago, actually,” and tries not to sound self-deprecating or like there’s something wrong.

He doesn’t pull it off. Sana’s frowning – when isn’t she, but all her attention is on Isak, which it usually isn’t, because that isn’t normal.

And he can’t have her say anything, he doesn’t know what he would reply, what would be appropriate and what wouldn’t, what could be worked as a joke and what would just give him away. “Worked wonders for not having to set anything up, though.”

She snorts and takes a step back, going further into the apartment. “Knew you were a slacker the moment I met you.”

“Hey!” Isak protests, whines a bit, but Sana doesn’t wait around to hear whatever defense he could manage to pull up, disappearing into the kitchen with the girl who never stops giving Isak bedroom eyes – Chris, he thinks.

An arm slings around Isak’s shoulder, the smell of beer more pungent than the smell of weed – Magnus, then.

“What the fuck?” Magnus points over at Jonas and Eva who are locked at the lips and oblivious to the world around them. “Is this allowed?”

“Stop,” Jonas breaks away long enough to groan, but Eva’s quick to cup his jaw and draw him back in.

Vilde’s standing next to them by now, and it looks like she’s only giggling politely with little clue to the context of Magnus’ comment, but Magnus’ is grinning back like he’s just won the lottery.

Usually, Isak would at least try and be a good mate and play up whatever had just been said, make it funnier than it actually was without drawing the attention onto himself, but his head had barely been in the game when the party had started, it definitely isn’t when the supposed Noora and her plus one enter their flat.

Because Isak knows that plus one.

“Now the party can sta-ha-ha-art!”

Isak knows that voice.

Isak knows that voice.

Eskild is dressed as loudly as his voice – neon pink and, oh god, are those feathers? – and crazy sunglasses that most likely don’t work if Eskild can stand wearing them inside.

“Ho-ly mother of God,” Magnus breathes out, eyes wide as he stares at Eskild. “Who on earth is –“

“Isak!”

Isak doesn’t even have time to wince from his name being bellowed straight into his ear before he has an armful of Eskild clinging onto him and shaking him around as he hugs him – or squeezes the life out of him.

“What are you doing here?” Isak’s voice is muffled from where his mouth is pressed against Eskild’s shoulder. At least Eskild’s close enough to be able to make it out anyway.

“Noora brought me!” Eskild steps back, but doesn’t let go of the arm he has slung around Isak’s shoulders. He points over to the blonde girl standing next to Sana.

“But – but –“ seriously, Isak’s mind is melted. “But that’s Eva’s Noora.”

Things do not compute.

“Are you telling me,” Isak continues, magnanimously ignoring Eskild’s snort, “that Eva’s Noora is also your Noora?”

“Technically, my Noora is also Eva’s Noora, because I had her first,” Eskild insists indignantly, pointing accusingly over at Eva who only rolls her eyes fondly, skips on close to fold her arms around Eskild’s side. “She’s just lucky she’s cool enough for me to hang out around her as well.”

“Yes, of course, darling, that’s why,” Eva laughs and then bounds on into the kitchen to get something to drink.

“But –“ Isak’s worlds are collapsing. He – but – what?

Eskild barks out a laugh. “Oh my god, that face is excuse enough for ghosting me the past couple of weeks.”

“I haven’t ghosted you,” Isak tries to protest, but Eskild doesn’t let him. It’d be a lie, anyway, kind of. He just – Eskild will know, because that’s what Eskild does, and Isak can’t – he can’t have people he cares about worrying about him again, can’t let them know that their faith in him is wasted. He can’t lose everything else too.

He finally catches sight of Magnus and Jonas out of the corner of his eye, both of them looking frantically between Isak, Eskild, and then finally over to Eva and Noora for some type of explanation.

“Oh, uh –“ Isak wracks his brain for the words that seem to be evading him. “Gutter, this is Eskild – Eskild, this is –“

Eskild holds up his hand in front of Isak’s face, startling him badly enough that he stops talking. Isak blinks confusedly.

Eskild narrows his eyes as he stares at Jonas and Magnus. Jonas and Magnus’ eyes, in turn, widen at the scrutinizing glare they’re currently on the receiving end of. Isak’s been in their place before, when he’d sneak out to see Even and come back in the early morning to Eskild hiding his worry behind reprimanding scolding and demands that he leave his GPS on next time he wants to go out ‘partying’.

Isak doubts Eskild ever thought he was out partying, mostly because he never came back hung over or drunk still, and he didn’t reek of booze, no more than the beer or weed Even would share with him on rare occasions. But it’s not like Isak could tell him what he was actually doing, and it’s also not like it was outside the realm of possibility considering how Isak and Eskild first met.

“Don’t tell me,” Eskild removes his hand from Isak’s face to point between Jonas and Magnus. “Are they the ones you left me for?”

Isak blinks, again. Magnus still can’t get his eyes off of Eskild, but Jonas is looking decisively more worried in Isak’s direction.

Isak sighs when Eskild keeps pointing. “I didn’t leave you –“

“Aha!”

Magnus jumps a foot into the air and nearly trips of the doorstep leading into the living room. He bumps into one of Mahdi’s jock friends instead, who in turn spills beer all over the floor. Great.

“So they are the ones you left me for!” Eskild finishes, not the slightest bit perturbed over the chain of events he’d just put in motion.

“What are you even, they – no,” Isak flaps his hands about, resorting to poking Eskild’s shoulder when he looks less and less inclined to believe him. “This is Jonas and Magnus, whom I’ve only been living with along with Mahdi for less than a month, and you know this, because I told you this back in July.”

Eskild mulls it over, still glaring at Jonas and Magnus, apparently to Noora and Eva’s amusement, but whatever he finds can’t be too bad when he immediately switches over to a blinding smile and introduces himself to them properly.

Isak hadn’t realized he’d been holding his breath, nearly still doesn’t until it all comes rushing out of him and he suddenly feels a little weak in the knees.

“How d’you know Isak, then?” Jonas asks, sounding more polite than terrified, which is more than what Magnus is managing to do.

Eskild opens his mouth, ready to launch into the tale of woe of how the two of them had met, and Eskild playing the part of the hero and taking in the lost duckling wandering the streets, drunk and completely out of his mind.

It’s not like it’s something Isak’s ashamed about, and he knows Eskild would never tell anyone about the part where he’d apparently begged him not to make him go home, but Isak –

Isak’s entire life is built on lies upon lies – lie about your mom not feeling well, she’s fine, she’s just stressed, don’t tell anyone you’re gay, don’t tell anyone about Even, and on, and on, and on, and somewhere along the way, Isak’s sort of forgotten how to share any parts of himself that aren’t just on the surface.

So he cuts in right as Eskild gets out how it was a cold, dark night – which isn’t true, because it was spring, so it was at most chilly – and says, “I used to live with him in a Kollektiv, back before uni.”

Magnus’ eyes widen impossibly further. “Shit, you’d already moved out in high school?”

Isak shrugs, ignores the feeling of Eskild’s eyes on him, considering how he was technically barely in high school by the time he moved in, and ignores how incredulous the looks he’s given from the people who don’t know the story make his stomach feels like it’s turned to lead, or maybe the opposite, like it’s so light he might be sick.

Eskild saves him. Eskild always saves him, and it doesn’t make his stomach feel any less like it’s filled with lead when Isak thinks of how he has been blowing him off and ghosting him.

“And then he left me. Depraving me of my son –“

“Fuck off –“

“My only son –“

“And I didn’t leave you –“

“Herre Gud,” Noora laughs. “How dramatic were you when I left for Spain, then?”

Noora is a goddamn savior and Isak will go down fighting for her. He can’t help the wince, though, because he knows, and he’s fairly certain that Noora knows too, just how much Eskild can talk once he gets going, and nothing can get him going more than Noora literally fleeing the country.

He physically takes a step back, and whilst Magnus is still looking incredibly confused, Jonas is now looking mildly concerned, and Noora, bless the girl, is trying her best to keep face.

Eskild narrows his eyes. “If you take away the ‘s’ in Spain, what are you left with?”

Isak frowns. Judging by the put-upon look on Noora’s face, this isn’t the first time she’s heard this.

“Pain,” she sighs.

“No,” Eskild sasses. “You’re left with me, in Oslo, where I’ve been abandoned.” Pauses dramatically. “And the only feeling I was able to feel when you abandoned me.”

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Isak groans, pinching at Eskild’s side to get him to let go of him, then flays his hands around in everyone’s direction. “Kitchen’s that way, living room’s the other, do not have sex in my room, Eskild.”

“Why am I being singled out?”

Isak doesn’t deign to answer, just levels Eskild with a look until Eskild nods, goes, “fair enough,” and giggles with Eva.

God, Isak wants a drink. He wants many drinks, but the thought of having more than the one beer he’s been nursing so far makes him feel a bit ill, so he heads into the living room instead of the kitchen.

He doesn’t know why it’s so difficult. It doesn’t make sense. He doesn’t know why the thought of standing near Eskild makes him feel so anxious, why he feels angry when he sees Eskild laughing with Eva or Noora, why he can’t be at ease just like them. Guilt and shame mixes uncomfortably in the pit of his stomach. He plasters on a grin when four guys recognize him, cheering and waving their beers at him.

He doesn’t walk over to them. He’s fairly certain they’re in some of Jonas’ classes, but he’s not certain enough he’s willing to chance making a fool of himself. He feels like he’s slowly creeping out of his own skin, like he’s inches from falling apart. It’s exhausting. Isak’s exhausted. And the apartment’s in a tip and he can feel a headache coming on from the music, and he doesn’t know when he became this person.

Or – he does, but he doesn’t want to think about it.

This is better, Isak tries to convince himself. If it isn’t better than – than that, then it’s at least better than when he was drinking himself into oblivion any waking hour, when he was drinking so much he’d wake up still drunk and then just start drinking again. The fact that he came away without having to get his stomach pumped even once is more of a miracle than Isak thinks anyone will ever get to experience.

There’s a movie playing on the television, the same one they’ve had streaming pretty much since it was released. It’s one of Even’s. Somehow, Isak doesn’t know why, but somehow Magnus always manages to talk them all into giving him TV-rights to choose what will be playing, and it’s always one of Even’s movies.

This time it’s ‘Circles’, Even’s newest one that Isak hadn’t been strong enough to not watch it in the middle of the night about a week after you’d been able to stream it. The recommendation taunting him whenever he’d wanted to relax until he’d caved. But he’d been strong enough to not check out any of the reviews for it. Except then Magnus had ended up yelling how it’s been nominated for an award, but Isak still counts it as a personal win that he hadn’t looked it up himself. Baby steps. Just enough to fool himself into believing he’s getting better.

Maybe if he fools himself long enough he’ll actually start to believe it.

At least either the volume is too low for Isak to hear any of it, or everyone around him is too loud for Isak to hear any of it.

He finally makes his way over to the window. He wants to crack it open, but he knows that’s a bad idea. They’re bound to get a noise complaint sooner or later, opening the window would only make it much sooner.

Maybe he should open the window. He can see Jonas and Eva’s reflections in window, can hear Magnus’ laughter from another room, can see a glimpse of Mahdi chatting up some girl Isak doesn’t recognize. He scowls at all of them, feels something ugly swirl around in his stomach.

No. No, he reminds himself, presses his face against the glass pane, shivering at the cold shock it brings. They’re his friends – his best friends – and just because this year, the year that was supposed to be Isak’s year, has gotten off with a bit of a bad start doesn’t mean Isak can take it out on his best friends. It’s not their faults Isak’s such a fuck up.

Besides, it’s not like it’s too late, really. Surely if Isak just tried harder, things would go back to normal. Better than normal, even, because that had been Isak’s goal when he moved all his stuff into the room at the end of the hall, put on his blue-striped bed sheets and listened to Magnus waxing poetry about some sex dream he’d had and Jonas and Mahdi taking the piss out of him.

It’s not just the boys, though, is the thing. Isak knows he’s been shitty to Eskild too. He can hear him out in the kitchen, laughing and chanting chug, chug, chug and generally encouraging a mess Isak’s bound to be the one cleaning up later.

This is the year he’s supposed to get things right, to stop feeling so wrong all the goddamn time, and that’s not going to happen if he’s sulking in a corner the entire night.

He’s just got to get better at acting, Isak convinces himself. Squares his shoulders, straightens his back, and just breathes.

If he gets better at acting, then the boys will stop acting so awkward around him. They’ll stop walking on eggshells and they’ll stop looking at Isak like he’s a stranger in their house.

He walks away from the window, hand clutching his beer bottle. He’s shaking and his palm feels clammy from sweat. He really hopes it isn’t noticeable, any of it. Not just the shaking and the sweating.

“Isak!” A hand clamps down onto his shoulder so harshly it jostles Isak’s forwards until he nearly falls flat on his face. “Jesus, how much you had to drink?”

Isak turns to see some guy, one of Mahdi’s football friends by the looks of it, going off of the build and the muscles.

Isak tries to grin as he worms his way out from under the guy’s hand until he’s facing him. “Not nearly enough.”

The guy cheers and holds up his own cup of brown sludge that Isak doesn’t particularly want to witness him downing.

He’s lucky for once. Football-guy gets distracted when a girl accidentally puffs to him when she passes. He spends approximately fifteen seconds staring at her ass as she continues on her way, all of which Isak spends judging him.

“How you been, man?” the guy tries again. “Haven’t seen you since that party at Mikael’s.”

Something lurches through Isak’s body, cold dread that he has to fight to clamber down into nothing he’ll accidentally give away. He should open his mouth, he’s about to – should say Oh, yeah, wasn’t feeling well, and then immediately follow it up by a question that’ll give the guy talking.

Except he’s saved from having to do any of that.

“Who is Mikael?” Eskild slithers up from behind Isak. He tries his best not to jump or tense up, because it’s Eskild and there’s no reason for him to be tense. It’s stupid. He’s stupid. It’s all stupid. “And why have I not been introduced to him?”

Isak still tenses at the touch, but it’s Eskild, so Isak tries to not make it too obvious.

“Magnus’ friend,” Isak has to twist his head to the side so he’s nearly shouting directly into Eskild’s ear. “I don’t really know him.”

Present tense, because Mikael might’ve changed. He might not make the same kind of jokes or like the same action movies with far too many explosions for them to be contributing to any kind of storyline anymore. He might not like a cool glass of saft when he comes home or to lounge around outside when the weather’s nice anymore. He might not even be in contact with Even anymore and the party had just been a one-off.

“Oh. By the way, Mahdi told me to give you this and to tell you to stop leaving it around everywhere,” Eskild sounds bored as he hands over Isak’s hoodie.

Isak’s heart feels like it’s stuck in his throat when he grabs on to it.

“Can’t believe you’ve still got it, it’s so old.” Eskild turns his attention onto the jock instead. “And who might you be, then?”

Isak rolls his eyes so hard he actually misses the introduction. He tunes back in when Eskild lingers in the handshake and the guy is grinning nervously, switching between looking at Isak and looking at Eskild.

“I didn’t know you had a boyfriend,” the guy says when Eskild has buggered off somewhere else, even as he had walked away while looking over his shoulder on too many times for it to be anything other than intentional.

Fear flashes through him. Half of the sip of beer splutters out of Isak’s mouth while the other half blocks his airways until Isak is coughing and red-faced and looking incredibly unattractive.

“Eskild?” Isak grimaces. “No. No, no, no. Definitely not my boyfriend.” Shit, does that sound like he’s denying it too much, thus reversing the intention and effect of a denial?

Why would he even be asking that? Is it only because of Eskild or has Isak done something that would warrant – Shit, Isak can’t think about it now, he’s at the middle of a party in his own home, he can’t leave.

“Oh,” the guy looks taken aback, even as his eyes wander off towards the direction Eskild had disappeared in. Oh, indeed. “There’s nothing going on between –“

“He’s my old roommate,” Isak cuts in, and says with a finality that hopefully sticks, “that’s it.”

“Oh,” the guy repeats. He isn’t even looking at Isak anymore. “Do you mind then if I –“

“Go for it,” Isak slaps him on the back, steps around him and gets the hell out of dodge. Jesus, has he unintentionally become the designated matchmaker? A lot of people seemingly have a lot of faith in him for that particular job, despite Isak having zero interest in most people.

The flat is a mess already and the party has only been going for about an hour. There are empty cans and bottles on every flat surface and Isak shouldn’t, he shouldn’t start cleaning. He should be mingling and helping Magnus hook up with someone and rip into him with Mahdi and Jonas when he starts asking the wrong question. He shouldn’t be isolating himself by cleaning.

Isak sighs, deep and long-sufferingly, and grabs a clear plastic bag from the cabinet and starts collecting the cans, avoiding any he can feel liquid still swishing around in the bottom. The metal clanks against each other in a way Isak more so feels than hears over the music pounding in the entire flat. They’re going to get noise complaints, for sure. Isak has no idea how the guys had thought this would ever have been a good idea.

Except, had they asked him those weeks ago if he wanted to help host a party, Isak probably would’ve agreed to it. He would’ve been keyed up and he would’ve participated, and he would’ve been drinking properly instead of how he’s been nursing his single bottle of beer for the entire night before he’d finally given up after a few sips.

He doesn’t know how he’s come to feel like this, doesn’t know why he’s feeling like this. He’d promised himself that he wasn’t going to be drinking excessively, that this was the year he was going to actually try and succeed. So far it’s only felt like one failure right after the other.

He hasn’t become a better friend. Instead, they’re all tip-toeing around him because they’re too afraid when he’s going to snap and run off again. The need to run is constant, but Isak has a feeling that the snap will be happening because of something else entirely if the boys don’t cut it out.

He hasn’t become a better student – he’s barely understood half of the lectures and he’s less than impressed with the homework he’s been doing. Sana’s going to kill him if he doesn’t get his act together soon.

Failure after failure. But the not drinking part, that Isak can gain control over, or so he hopes. Maybe he doesn’t fully trust himself, hence why he hadn’t dared more than the beer.

There’s a couple making out up against the wall next to their front door that’s open and has more people spilling in. They all clap Isak’s back when they pass him, seemingly knowing him because they all shout out his name in greeting. Isak doesn’t recall meeting any of them ever, and wonders if it’s because he’s just inattentive to anyone he doesn’t think of as his friend, or if he’s actually met these people and just can’t remember them because all they’d been was a means to get drunk.

“How are things looking?” someone, Sana, yells into his ear.

Isak stumbles back, startled, but it just turns to annoyance when he sees Sana looking way too smug. He opens his mouth to tell her off, but she seems to be able to predict what he’s about to say so she just rolls her eyes and interrupts him.

“With the plan.”

Isak groans. The plan. The plan he was supposed to have but most definitely doesn’t.

“I tried!” He hadn’t. “It’s just that –“

Oh god, one of Sana’s eyebrows arch up into her forehead. Shit, Isak’s in trouble.

“Last I checked,” she drawls, actually drawls, “I haven’t seen you near Magnus, and you didn’t even say hi to Vilde when she came in.”

The most amount of trouble. Sana levels a very unimpressed look at him.

And Isak doesn’t have a single excuse.

To be fair, the Eskild-thing had kind of distracted him quite a bit, but he doubts Sana has the empathy required to let him get away with such a statement, so Isak doesn’t even bother.

“Magnus is in the kitchen, go.” Sana pushes him along the way, making him stumble over the floor.

He turns around to level a glare at her, but she’s managed to disappear before he can, and then when he turns around again to head into the kitchen, he nearly runs over Vilde in the process.

“Fy faen, Vilde!” he exclaims, reaches out to grab onto her shoulders to steady her, even as he hadn’t actually touched her. “Shit. You can’t just stand behind –”

Vilde’s frowning at him. “Why does Emma Larzen think she’s welcome here?” she asks in lieu of a proper reply or greeting. “Isn’t she a first year?”

The dread isn’t a welcome feeling. It’s chilling and hot at the same time, and Isak feels clammy and disgusting as his heart picks up its speed and he glances around the room, whatever of the hallway, frantically, but trying to downplay it so Vilde doesn’t question him about it.

“Is she here?” he manages to get out.

“No. But she DM’ed me, asking for your address and said you weren’t answering your phone.”

Isak wants to groan, wants to throw his head back. Wants to kick all of these people out.

He wants to go to bed and sleep for an eternity, or maybe just go to sleep and never wake up, but that’s a bit too gloomy for his own taste, so he ignores that stray urge.

“Just –“ he tries to think of something that wouldn’t seem odd. “Just ignore her.”

That just makes Vilde frown further. “I can’t just ignore her,” she protests. “I’ve already read her message. I can’t just leave her on ‘read’.”

“Well, you’re going to have to,” Isak side-steps her and heads for the kitchen. Jesus, this isn’t going very well, but it’ll be easier to finagle Magnus into doing his bidding than it would be Vilde, Isak is fairly sure.

Unless Jonas is there. Or Mahdi. Then everything will be downright impossible and Isak will sue Sana.

Both Jonas and Mahdi are in the kitchen, and they’re both talking to Magnus, as if they can’t stand in group formation literally any other time during the day, because it’s not like they live together or anything. Fuck, this is going to take a lot more effort than Isak had originally imagined.

Mahdi is the one who spots him first. He looks annoyed, but not at Isak at least.

It’s not helpful enough to not make Isak feel horribly out of place, though.

He shuffles closer at Mahdi’s beckon just in time to hear Magnus blurt out some nonsense that doesn’t make sense out of context, something about word just spreading.

“It’s a lot more people than we’d agreed on,” Mahdi fills him in once he’s close enough. He looks at Isak like he expects him to back him up, which – alright Isak isn’t thrilled either, but he wouldn’t have been thrilled with half the people who’ve shown up either. He wonders when that happened; when did he become the grumpy friend who just wants to stay in and be alone? And why can’t he shake himself out of that funk?

Jonas is frowning, eyebrows curling and filling most of his forehead. “Alright, so it’s a couple more people than anticipated, but – why are you so mad? You’re usually pretty chill about everything –” and shuts up at whatever face Mahdi makes at him. Isak elects to ignore it, though, as he’s fairly certain Mahdi was gesturing to him.

Jonas does have a point, though, but Mahdi is also the first one to give any of them shit for messing up. Isak is definitely willing to count the group of girls giggling about a spilled vodka bottle a mess-up.

“What happens if we get a noise complaint, huh? If our landlord sees this mess, we’re fucked. We’re never getting that deposit back.”

Magnus snorts. “We weren’t getting that back anyway – remember the incident when we moved in?”

“We agreed not to mention that ever again,” Mahdi glares at him.

“Hey, I covered that up fantastically, thank you very much. We could’ve at least fooled him into giving the money back,” Isak protests, magnanimously ignoring Jonas snorting about handyman Isak, which had been a nickname Isak had worked extremely hard to get rid of. “Why don’t we – let’s just start cleaning, alright?”

Shit, he hadn’t meant to sound so tired. Jonas is giving him ‘the eyes’ again and Magnus is looking at him oddly for no going bigger on the ‘I told you so’ he’s never been shy at shoving in their faces. God, how did Isak manage to fuck up twice in one sentence?

“Isak –“ Jonas starts, but Isak doesn’t let him finish. Doesn’t want for him to.

“I’ll start getting rid of the cans. Just –“ he turns to Mahdi, “relax, alright? We’ll fix it,” and then hurries to get out of there before one of them can grab a hold of him.

It’s surprisingly easy enough to ignore the feeling of his heart being wrenched out of chest and the insurmountable panic and worries looming over his head when the music really is so damn loud and there are so many people within the enclosed space. Isak has to push over a couple making out in front of the built-in closet where they keep the cleaning supplies and the clear bin bags, and the soundtrack of lips smacking together disgustingly shouldn’t overpower the sound of the stereo, but somehow it does.

They shuffle over willingly enough, at least, probably barely noticing they’re being moved if Isak’s being honest with himself.

And whilst he’s being honest with himself, Isak knows Mahdi’s issue isn’t the party or how many people have shown up or how much a pigsty their flat is currently in, or whether or not they’ll get back that stupid deposit that wasn’t that much in the first place. No, Mahdi never would’ve even noticed all those things if it had been any other evening before the party at Mikael’s, before Isak started acting weird, because Mahdi would’ve been in the bathroom or his own room smoking from his stash and making friends and probably figuring out which girl he’d want to kiss at the end of the night.

What Mahdi’s issue is, is Isak. And Isak hates that feeling clawing at his chest at the thought. Hates that he knows that’s what this is about, that the boys can’t even be subtle enough to hide it.

It’s not even the fact that the only reason Isak isn’t being interrogated by them is because of how much he apparently scared them with his disappearing act that’s bothering Isak. Or that they’ve supposedly been so focused on Isak and whatever the hell his problem is that they’re walking on eggshells around him, yet he was still so forgettable they didn’t even mention they were throwing a party that he not only was to attend but also invite people to join. It’s not the guilty, pitying glances they keep throwing him, and the halfhearted explanations and apologies that won’t stop no matter how many times Isak insists, “it’s fine, just an honest mistake, don’t worry about it, we’re good, I’m fine.” It’s not that he’s entirely unable to sleep anymore, just tossing and turning in his bed instead until he slips into a fitful slumber in the wee hours of the morning until his alarm wakes him up.

Or maybe it’s all of those things. Because what’s bothering Isak is how he can’t get this to quiet down.

Not the party. Parties are always loud, and this one is no exception. He doesn’t need people around him to stop talking, because lord knows the guys are already filtering out most of their sentences and conversation just to not accidentally say the wrong thing. It’s inside his head he can’t get things to shut the hell up.

He rips two bags off before figuring he probably won’t keep at it for long enough to fill them up, and then stuffs everything back in the closet. There’re already plenty cans and bottles lining every single flat surface, so it’s easy enough to pick up two empty cans and make his way back into the kitchen to make sure they’re fully drained.

Mahdi isn’t there when he gets back. Both Jonas and Magnus are still there, but Magnus is talking to someone Isak doesn’t know, and Jonas has Eva pressed up against the wall. Isak has a foreign twinge to go over there and so something stupid like, right in front of my salad?, because that’s something he would’ve done – has done, back when they were moving in and Eva was helping out, because who’d know how the place would’ve ended up looking like if they didn’t make a system from the get-go.

But then the other feeling is back, the one he can’t seem to shake. The one that makes him walk over to the sink instead, turn his back on both Magnus and Jonas, and just stare as a couple drops of beer spills into the sink and he can dunk the bottles into one of the bin bags.

There are enough empty, used, and opened bottles and cans on the kitchen counter as well, so Isak systematically goes through each; drains them, dunks them, repeat. He can hear people talking around him, laughing, cheering, and it feels oddly isolating not to be doing the same.

“Hey,” he hears, his heart jumps into his throat and he whirls around only to see Noora.

She’s nursing a glass of water, Isak fairly sure because he doesn’t think she drinks. There’s a tiny smudge of red on the rim of the glass from her lipstick, but it isn’t noticeable on her lips. She’s smiling at him, small and friendly.

“Hei,” he greets back, maybe straining too much to sound happy for it to come off as authentic, but Noora is nice enough to not let her judging show or to react to it at all. “Everything alright?”

She nods, takes another sip of water. Isak’s hands itch to do something, but he thinks it’s too rude to turn his back on her to continue what he was doing, so he can’t do anything but let the twitchy anxiety settle over him.

“Du vet, with all the times I had Eskild moaning how you never did any housework, I never expected to see you get started on cleaning with the party still going on.”

Isak laughs, ends a little too short and stilted. He feels weird talking about Eskild, guilty at not having spoken to Eskild for so long. He’s gotten so used to no one knowing anything about his life previous to university – besides just very general things. It had been easy to play along when the boys had been moaning about how simultaneously hard and freeing it was to finally have moved out of their parents’ home instead of having to admit Isak hadn’t living his parents for years at that point. Having someone know that, having them know about Eskild, and having Noora who’s lived with Eskild too and knows exactly his quirks and personality traits and how much of a saint he can be but also how goddamn annoying leaves Isak feeling on edge around them.

“Nei,” he looks down at his feet so he won’t have to look at Noora. “Mahdi was freaking out about the mess, though, so I figured I’d just get a head-start, you know?”

She doesn’t nod and doesn’t say anything, and Isak doesn’t know what to do with that.

“Anyway, it’s nice to be able to see the counter,” he tries, then actually looks at the counter and wrinkles his nose. “Or maybe not. God, I swear it’s not usually this gross.” He chances a touch and instantly pulls back much to Noora’s amusement. “Christ, that’s sticky. Alright, don’t touch that.”

“You can’t still be grossed out a sticky stuff after having lived with Eskild, can you?” she laughs. “God knows what the state of his bedding was like when I wasn’t cleaning it for him while you lived there.”

Isak blinks. Why would she – why would Isak know what the state of Eskild’s bedding was like? Why would she think he was in Eskild’s room, on Eskild’s bed? Was she –

“Hallo!”

Isak jumps, startled out of whatever spiral he’d fallen into that only would’ve ended with him pathetically defending his straightness and possibly yelling at Noora, to look at Sana pissed face. Fuck, Isak does not need any more problems.

She arches an eyebrow at him, like that will do anything. Isak tries arching one back, but he thinks he just ends up raising both of them.

She scoffs at him, which – still isn’t helpful – and then levels her best glare at him. Isak does a body wiggle he knows to be equally unhelpful, and he only relishes a little bit in how Sana manages to look even more annoyed with him at that.

In the end, she only needs to say two words. “The plan.”

Fuck.

Isak is so done.

He levels his own glare at her, sneers a “Fine,” that at least sounds more sassy than angry, and worms his way through Noora and Sana with the two bin bags only partially filled.

He’d just seen Magnus, he could definitely get him to follow him around until they end up bumping into Vilde, who better not have already found someone to make out with or Isak will actually leave.

It’s by total accident and perfect surprise when he turns around to get to Magnus and accidentally bumps into Vilde for the second time that night.

“Ah, Vilde, perfect!” Isak hands over the two bags filled with empty bottles. “Do you mind taking these down to the first room on the left? I’ve kind of got my hands full here,” he shrugs, all apologetically and the worst part is that it works brilliantly.

Vilde is wide-eyed, as she always is when someone starts speaking to her, and she clearly isn’t fully prepared when Isak transfers the handles over to her hands – her phone is in one of her hands like Emma is still trying to get a hold of the party info – but all it takes is a gentle puff and she’s on her way down the hallway.

Isak counts to five until he snags a hand around Magnus’ elbow, drawing him out of whatever conversation he’d been having.

“Shit, Mags, there were some weird chirping noises coming from your room. Did you leave your window open again?”

Magnus groans and shoves his half-filled beer bottle at Isak, who barely manages to catch it without spilling it all over himself. “If there’s a freaking dove inside my room again, we are moving, I don’t even care –“

And off he goes. Isak should put this on his resume – professional cupid, as long as it doesn’t concern his own relationships where he will flop epically.

Yeah, maybe not. Except for how Sana looks begrudgingly impressed with Isak’s ingenuity. That’s a novel look on her.

“You know,” Noora clinks her soda can against Isak’s newly acquired beer. “You shouldn’t refer to girls as birds.”

Isak snorts. “I’m just introducing them to a different version of the ‘cat and mouse’-game. Cat-and-bird, in this case, I think.”

Noora groans. “Oh god, no more cat-talk, please.”

“I don’t know,” Isak raises the beer to his lips, ignoring the voice in his head screaming about germs and the other quieter one, telling him he’d agreed to stop. “Maybe this is the push they needed to get the cat out of the bag.”

Noora rolls her head back. “Det var kattens.”

“Are you two seriously just making cat-puns over there?”

OOOOO

It’s just gone past half two in the morning when enough people have fizzled out of the apartment that Isak doesn’t feel guilty for sinking down on the couch with a heavy sigh. There’s a boy and girl making out in an armchair in the corner of the living room, too wrapped up in each other to notice how few people are left. Maybe Isak should get up and tell them to head out, before the state of that armchair will be questionable at best and ready to throw out at worst, but Jonas is closer and has spotted them already.

Besides, Isak’s exhausted, physically and mentally. He’s just – done.

He blinks tiredly as Jonas gets the couple’s attention and nods towards the door. The girl giggles, fixes her clothes as she gets off the guy’s lap and stands up. Thankfully neither of them get mad for the interruption – Jonas looks tired, too, but happy tired. A I’ve-spent-the-entire-evening-having-fun kind of tired. A tired completely opposite to Isak’s kind of tired.

There are bottles and cans lined up on the coffee table that Isak knows he should probably clean now before they have permanent stains on the surface. Eva will fuss over those every time she comes over, but it’s too hard work trying to get his limbs to cooperate, let alone actually get up and do something, so Isak just remains there, sitting and staring and thinking of all the things he should be doing instead of this.

Eva’s half-asleep on the other couch, leaning against Vilde who keeps sneaking glances over at Magnus incredibly non-subtly – well, then again, everything is relative, and she certainly is more subtle than Magnus’ blatant staring – as she talks to Noora about something.

It’s startling a bit, the contrast of how quiet it’s gone. They still have some music on in the background, but it’s a lot quieter than what had been playing earlier, and someone’s changed it from the party-playlist to the one with miscellaneous calmer songs they’d jokingly put together to play whenever one of them are in a bad mood. It’s been mysteriously absent considering just how much Isak’s been messing things up the last little while.

Eskild slumps down next to him, or, more so fully on him. He’s warm and sweaty and Isak is at least a little bit grossed out, but then he remembers that the first time he met Eskild, he’d vomited on his shoes. Suddenly, warm and sweaty doesn’t seem as bad, even if there is a threat of other bodily fluids still being on him.

“How was the big jock, then?” Isak teases. Eskild smiles up at him dopily, all dazed and blessed out, and maybe Isak would worry if he didn’t know what that particular face means.

“Klaus,” Eskild corrects, making Isak rolls his eyes, “was great, thank you very much.”

“You done enough hooking up for the night?”

Eskild sighs, very put-upon in the exact way he always does when he’s about to sprout off some older ‘wisdom’ at Isak. “This is a university party, Isak, not some little high school gathering you might be used to.”

Isak rolls his eyes, but doesn’t interrupt Eskild to remind him this is his second year at university.

“I don’t waste my time on menial hook ups.”

“What have you been doing for the last hour, then?” Isak questions before he can consider the consequences. “Discussing refugee crises?”

“Very funny,” Eskild dead-pans. “And don’t ask questions you don’t want the answers to. Unless you’re prepared to know exactly the places my mouth and his mouth have been –“

Isak lets out an unintelligible string of noises to cut off Eskild. “You just said you didn’t kiss him!”

“’Kissing’,” Eskild uses two fingers on each hand to make quotation marks. “You never mentioned anything about sex.”

Isak groans, rolls his head back onto the couch while Eskild cackles as he sits up properly next to him. “Please tell me you at least didn’t do it in my room.”

Eskild shrugs and rolls his eyes. “Like it would’ve been the first time.”

Isak definitely does not squeak. He yells out indignantly.

“It was the room with all the fit lads plastered onto the walls,” Eskild takes a sip of his beer. “Can’t have been your room, then, your straightness would’ve felt attacked by the mere presence of someone cuter than you near your bed.”

Isak rolls his eyes again, but doesn’t comment on it. Mahdi’s room then, if Isak guesses correctly based on the various FIFA paraphernalia Mahdi has collected over the years. He should remember to remind Mahdi to wash the sheets before he falls asleep there.

Maybe not right now, though, he thinks as Mahdi falls down onto one of their beanbags, laughing back over his shoulder at something Magnus has said.

It doesn’t matter that Eskild is technically as ‘out’ as one can be, the thought of gossiping about what Eskild, a boy, has done with another boy is enough to get Isak’s heart pounding a beat too fast.

He hurries to look away from both Mahdi and Eskild, turns his head to the left instead and looks as Jonas wrinkles his nose at the armchair that had nearly been used by strangers. Isak makes a mental note not to get close to the chair for the next while unless he be the one getting stuck with cleaning it.

Jonas sandwiches himself down on the other couch between the armrest and Eva, who immediately leans up against him, grinning widely. Magnus drags a chair over, Chris claims the other beanbag, and Sana settles on the opposite armrest to Jonas’, the one next to Noora, who immediately wraps her arm around Sana’s middle to keep her from falling off.

It’s unnerving how seamlessly it all plays out, like this isn’t the first time they’ve all been together at the same place, with all of them aware of the others’ presences, at least.

“Are you seriously telling me,” Mahdi groans, ”that out of all of us, only one got lucky tonight?”

Isak immediately notices how both Magnus and Vilde flush a brilliantly matching red and refuse to look at each other, but he thinks he might be the only one with how Eskild’s cackle and Jonas’ immediate complains steal everyone’s attention.

“Yeah, yeah, you’ve got Eva which means you’re perpetually happy,” Mahdi waves off Jonas without listening to anything he’s said, and holds his fist out for Eskild to bump.

“I think this might be the straightest thing I’ve done all night.”

Isak snorts. “That doesn’t say a lot,” and tries to smother his laugh at Eskild’s affronted look.

“Noora,” he immediately whines when Isak refuses to give him any sympathy. “Come sit with me instead of this grumpy boy,” batting his eyelashes for extra effect, as if that’ll be enough.

Noora coos at Eskild from the other couch, but doesn’t move. She does, however, diplomatically add, “I’m quite sure dissing is reserved for those who haven’t gotten laid.”

Isak grumbles unintelligibly as Eskild gleefully grabs onto his shoulder and shakes him around. It’s mostly groaning noises coming out of Isak’s mouth, but it doesn’t really matter with how loud the rest of them are being.

“C’mon, baby grump,” Eskild needles him, still managing to poke him more often than not despite Isak’s best attempts. “Gimmie the gossip, the 411.”

He’s waggling his eyebrows dramatically until Isak rolls his eyes and pushes his face away.

“Oh, come on! It’s the least you can do after practically dropping off the face of the planet for the last forever!”

Isak’s stomach churns with guilt, and it’s so familiar – especially over the last little while – but also so dizzily overwhelming Isak nearly throws caution to the win and just chugs down the remaining half of the vodka bottle from earlier that he knows is still in the kitchen.

He doesn’t.

He remains sitting on the couch, surrounded by his friends and he doesn’t touch a drop of alcohol.

“It hasn’t been that long,” he tries instead, even though it has. He makes half-assed attempts of excuses, because he’s apparently both a shitty person and a shitty friend. And he sees how Eskild just knows it’s all bullshit, but because he’s Eskild he doesn’t comment on it and just lets Isak get away with it, probably realizing that confronting him right now would amount to nothing seeing as Isak is a mess barely holding on by a thread.

Mahdi and Magnus are suddenly worryingly quiet compared to the girls and Eskild, and Isak knows, okay, he fucking knows what they’re thinking about, what the real ‘411’ is. How a world-famous, award-winning-and-nominated movie director apparently knows Isak, and how Isak would literally rather run away than deal with it, scaring his friends into keeping quiet even as they can tell something is really, really wrong.

That gossip. Shit, Isak feels sick. He always does nowadays, and he’s sick of feeling sick.

He can’t tell if Jonas thinks he’s being sly or not, the way he looks at Mahdi and Magnus as if reminding them to keep quiet, Isak can only tell that he really fucking isn’t being smooth or covert about it at all, but pointing it out also means pointing everything else out, so Isak stays quiet. As always.

“You can go into his room and stare at his four non-decorated walls, and then you can walk to campus from classroom to classroom and go visit the library,” Jonas lists on his fingers. “That’s the extent of Isak’s 411.”

Eskild blinks comically.

“That’s it?” he blurts out, much to Sana’s amusement. Isak levels a glare in her direction that she not so smoothly pretends not to have seen. “Seriøst?” and levels a majorly unimpressed look at Isak. “Seriøst?” he repeats.

“What?” Isak knocks his arms out. “What did you expect me to do? Go frolicking at a uni club? Hook up in a storage closet? Chug my body weight in shots at the student union?”

“Yes. All of the above.”

Isak wrinkles his nose. “’Seriøst?’” he mocks.

“Seriøst!” Eskild doesn’t even comment on the sass. “Where are all the stories? The juice? The mind-blowing sex parties and crazy exes?”

Mahdi snorts and his face is relaxed, but his shoulders are tense. “Pretty sure Isak is the most drama-free out of all of us.”

Isak almost wants to laugh at that – if it didn’t seem more tempting to fall down a hole and stay there for eternity – or at the very least at Eskild’s very comically disbelieving face.

“Isak?” Eskild asks, pointing at him. “This Isak? This very specimen of an Isak? Are you sure we’re talking about the same Isak?”

“You forgot about the coffee shop he insists on visiting before a study session so he’s late for every single one of them,” Sana deadpans, her façade only cracking when Isak flips her off.

“Coffee dates, at least?” Eskild asks him hopelessly, slumping back on the couch way too dramatically when Isak shakes his head. “So you don’t go out – does that mean there’s just a slew of people coming in and out of this place?”

“Hey!” Isak objects, vaguely affronted at the insinuation, smacking Eskild’s arm. “And just how many times did I have to walk in on you doing it because you couldn’t move from the living room to your bedroom?”

Eskild doesn’t even have the gall to flush – life is unfair. Both Noora and Eva are cackling and pointing at each other whilst wheezing out half words, but it’s enough for Isak to conclude Eskild probably hasn’t stopped that habit after Isak moved out.

This is good, though. Moving the topic away from Isak’s antics when everything in his head is screaming at him, too close, too close, they’ll find out, they’ll just know.

“You never bring anyone back!” Magnus calls out and why did he think now was a good time to rejoin the conversation – and with that remark?

Eskild gapes over at him. “Isak isn’t scoring anyone?”

Magnus frowns. “I mean – I guess he isn’t. Shit, I hadn’t even thought about that.”

“That can’t be, though,” Chris interrupts. “I’m in an entirely different program, but even I hear girls talking about him.”

“Uh, hallo, I’m sitting right here,” Isak reminds them, thankfully sounding more sassy than terrified. Fuck, his throat feels tight.

“Lots of talk,” Noora agrees, holding the rim of her glass against her red lips. “It’s got to be the curls.”

“Must be,” Eskild frowns as he looks Isak over. “That grumpy frown is an instant mood-killer, after all.”

“Not to mention the ugliness,” Mahdi agrees, grinning when Isak gapes over at him in faux betrayal. He doesn’t know how he manages to play it off so well – his heart is pounding and he’s scared Eskild’s sitting close enough to hear it.

“It’s your fault Emma Larzen has been blowing my phone up all night,” Vilde adds, and Magnus – still not able to look at her – snaps his fingers in her direction.

“He even had one served on a silver platter,” Magnus holds his hand out flat like he’s a waiter presenting said platter. “Ready for the picking, and he turns her down.”

A flush rises to Isak’s cheeks as he tries to groan indignantly. “I told you! I’m getting all these psycho-vibes from her, I don’t –“

“He doesn’t have to get with her, if he doesn’t want to,” Jonas points out, but it sounds half-hearted and falls flat even to Isak’s ears, which, admittedly, are mostly filled with the thrum of his pulse and his blood rushing.

Mahdi looks at Jonas like he’s stupid for even thinking that, and Isak doesn’t dare look at any of the girls, just in case he’s secretly breaking unspoken guy-rules only girls know about, and by breaking them they can tell something is up.

“Is he still sneaking out all the time?” Eskild asks, as if it hasn’t already been made abundantly clear Isak’s life is excruciatingly boring, meticulously so, because the last time Isak let his life not be boring things ended up really fucking shitty.

Isak steadfastly ignores how Jonas is looking over at him. He grabs one of the bottles on the table instead and starts scratching at the paper already peeling by itself from the damp caused by the condensation.

It’s stupid, because it feels like the only reason why is because Jonas knows, that he’s managed to figure it out and he knows, but that isn’t logical. It’s Isak’s fear playing tricks on him, but knowing that doesn’t lessen the actual fear one bit.

“Thought you were being all smooth, did you?” Eskild laughs, kicks lazily at Isak’s leg with his knee. “Thought we didn’t hear you coming and going and locking yourself in your room for a, seriously, insane amount of hours.”

“What are you, my babysitter?” Isak grouses, feels Jonas’s gaze burning a hole into the side of his head. He tries to scratch at a spot that sticks stubbornly to the bottle, but all it amounts to is a wet lump of paper falling off next to the spot Isak had been focused on.

Now he also doesn’t dare look at Eskild. He doesn’t want to see if he’s pretending to be or if he’s genuinely hurt from Isak constantly being an asshole to him about being overprotective, when Isak knows exactly why Eskild has always treated him a little gentler than he would anyone else.

“This is great!” Magnus laughs, nearly toppling off the chair when he throws himself backwards too hard. Mahdi catches his leg at the last second and hauls him back upright – Magnus doesn’t even look the slightest perturbed at possibly having avoided breaking his neck, and yet Isak is over here, physically safe but feeling like he’s one look away from a full-blown panic attack.

There’s only so much mean comments and eye-rolls can cover up, and going off of how consciously Isak can feel Jonas looking at him, Isak guesses he’s at the end of the rope.

Somehow, for some reason, his brain interprets that as if it means that’ll be the end of the traumatic, off-handed comments that can be spewed off about him for the rest of the night.

Maybe that’s why what comes out of Eskild’s mouth next leaves Isak so stunned – or maybe it’s just the revelation itself.

“I swear to God,” Eskild nearly spills his beer with how far he leans forward, “I’m pretty sure he was never alone in his room, like, ever.”

Suddenly all the noises that had built up fall away – in his head. Around him, there’s laughter and a wolf-whistle, and Isak hardly hears anything.

His heart is pounding.

He’d always known Eskild knew he had someone over, mostly because that was the only times Eskild would ever knock on his door instead of just plainly burst in, but he never stopped to think about how much does Eskild know?

Could he hear that the voice inside his room was deep, clearly male? He’d been careful never to leave Even’s jacket or shoes out in the hallway, but had he slipped up? It only would’ve taken once and everyone would’ve noticed. Or had he noticed how articles of Isak’s clothing kept disappearing, and then new yet clearly worn ones would pop up in their place?

“I didn’t –“ he licks his lips. “I wasn’t –“

All the sounds rush back. The others’ laughter is so loud, it feels like drums, like the noise is closing in around Isak and he’ll have to tear his way out of there.

Surprisingly, Noora is the one who helps him. “Like you’re one to talk, Eskild!” she laughs, plops herself down between Eskild and Isak and slings her arm around Eskild. “Or do I need to remind you of that one time where I –“

“Okay,” Eskild sasses. “You’ve made your point.”

She removes her arm from around him and holds them both up, palm flat in front of her chest instead. “I’m just saying – who has ‘The Lion King’ on their sex playlist?”

Jonas guffaws and there’s a round of sniggering, but Chris is leaning forward in her chair.

“Depends,” she points at them. “Which song was it? Personally, I’m quite partial to ‘Be prepared’ on my sex playlist.”

“Oh my god,” Eva wheezes, holding a hand over her face.

“What?” Chris knocks her arms out. “Way more appropriate than ‘I Just Can’t Wait to Be King’ or ‘Hakuna Matata’.”

“’Can You Feel the Love Tonight’,” Mahdi calls out. “How did you miss ‘Can You Feel the Love Tonight’?”

“Shit!” Chris swears and goes to knock the palm of her hand on her forehead, except she’s still holding her bottle of beer.

They’re all giggling messes when Chris has spilt beer into her hair and onto their beanbag, and the girls are trying to help her, but they’re all laughing too hard and Chris keeps moving because she’s laughing too hard.

And Isak finally feels his lungs expand so he can get in a lungful of air. His heart is still racing her he breathes it out heavily through his mouth, but it doesn’t matter.

He got to breathe.

The next morning, or more like afternoon, Isak wakes up, cramped up on the couch with Magnus’ feet shoved in his face. Mahdi is folded up on the beanbags and Jonas is simply passed out on the carpet they really need to vacuum before the day is over.

 Past

For ages, Isak’s teachers had been screaming about how big a change it would be to start high school, and now that Isak’s a first year it’s incredibly underwhelming.

Maybe it’s because there just… isn’t a whole lot different. It’s still just a school; he has classes and homework, but at least now he gets to take more science classes and gets to look at new people – or at least people other than Elias, who, if word on the street is correct, has become a bit of a dealer, so good riddance.

Or maybe it’s because something that’s supposed to be scary just doesn’t compare to all the actual scary things that have already happened in Isak’s life – including the things that aren’t supposed to be scary but are so fucking terrifying anyway.

Having to move out of his childhood home after his dad left and his mom got too ill and freaked out, meeting Even and daring to be with him, even if it’s just behind closed doors, and working so hard to keep the existence of the two of them secret from everyone. Changing tram stop really doesn’t compare.

Out of all of that, it’s probably the secret that weighs the heaviest on Isak’s shoulders and in his heart.

It’s not that he wants anyone to know. That’s not it. There are times where he looks at Eskild, and he knows it wouldn’t matter in the grand scheme of things if Isak were to tell him, “Hey, I have a boyfriend,” yet the thought of opening his mouth and letting the words out make him feel ill in the worst way possible, mainly disgusted with himself.

Having people know something like that about him? Absolutely not, no thanks.

It’s not about Even, either, it’s about Isak. There’s nothing wrong with being in love with Even, anyone who’s ever met him and hasn’t fallen head over heels in love with him doesn’t have their head screwed on right, according to Isak.

He’s not even sure about what it is he’s so scared of. All of it, maybe. Definitely. The thought of the looks following him around wherever he goes, hearing people talk about him, about it, behind his back, knowing that everyone knows. Being called names, even if he should be used to it at this point, what with how much he’s been called homse for ages by now, but it still makes his pulse spike. Having people determine what he’s like before they’ve even met him, just because he’s the gay guy when in reality he’s just Isak – an Isak who met his Even and got to fall in love with him. The thought of being reduced to nothing but his sexuality is enough to make any stray, however brief, thought of just saying it out loud disappear faster than sunshine in Bergen.

Isak doesn’t exactly know what Even’s reasons are for not wanting to say it either. Probably a bit of the same, he reasons, when he takes the time to observe Even as he’s thinking about it.

Maybe there’s something else, too, but something Isak can’t quite put his finger on. The way he moves, how he talks sometimes. The way he looks at Isak, like he’s simultaneously in love and scared in the same way as Isak but also differently. The way Isak has out of the corner of his eye caught him looking when Isak has to leave for a little bit to avoid Eskild knocking to check in – like he’s both bracing himself for the sight of Isak leaving and is resigned to it. Isak doesn’t know what that means, but he hates that that is how Even always looks whenever Isak walks away, like he’s expecting it.

The actual ‘keeping it a secret’ part is different for the two of them, as well. In some ways, Isak grumbles that Even has it easier, but in others Isak can admit that he’s the one with the advantage.

Keeping a secret is easy when there’s no one else but you, when you’re all alone. Even has parents; parents that he still lives with, and Isak doesn’t. Parents, who ask him where he’s going, where he’s been, and for how long he’ll be gone when he leaves next.

Even has friends he has to keep up appearances with. The only people Isak comes into regular contact with that he doesn’t mind are Eskild and Linn, and it’s rather easy to just walk out of his room and into the kitchen or into the living room and talk to them or watch a movie so that they don’t constantly question what he’s doing.

Although, Isak can and does argue, Eskild, whilst nothing close to being Isak’s parent, can certainly be as overbearing as one, coming to knock on Isak’s door to check if he’s still alive, which always serves to send a stab of fear through his heart when Even is in his room with him.

Even has his bus. Though most of the people there are his original friend-group, so Isak doesn’t think that should count fairly high. Still, there are people there that Even chooses to socialize with beyond his immediate squad, and Isak… doesn’t do that. Doesn’t dare to. The more people he keeps close, the more time he has to spend lying, and Isak is just too high-strung and exhausted at the mere idea.

Even’s got a job. That bit is still fairly new – just a few months ago when one his many media teachers mentioned an old friend of a friend in the Norwegian film industry had been looking for an assistant, and if that was something Even was interested in.

Needless to say, it definitely was, so now Even’s the assistant to an assistant to an assistant to so many links of assistants Isak can’t wrap his head around it to an actual film director. And Even gets to be on an actual set – in the very background, but on the set – and witness his dream career in the works. Isak loves seeing Even like that when he finishes a shift and heads straight for Isak’s room, still reeling off of excitement and complete giddiness and full of stories.

Seeing Even excited, though, doesn’t quite make up for the unpleasant jealousy inside him that flares up when Even suddenly doesn’t have as much time for Isak during the day. It’s an ugly possessiveness he’s struggling with when he already has to spend all of his time with Even in hiding. It’s childish and stupid and Isak actually hates himself for it, which is why he makes such a big deal out of never letting Even know.

It doesn’t really matter, in the long run, Isak can admit to himself when he forces himself to think rationally about it. Because technically, Even can stay overtime at work, he’s allowed to, but he always comes back to Isak on the dot instead. He chooses Isak, and that’s enough to reel the disgusting green monster back from tearing apart everything that Isak loves.

Even chooses him.

He goes to the Kollektiv, even as it’s a twenty minute longer journey from his workplace than if he’d just gone home. He tells Isak as the first person all about his day, and he shares his dreams of when he doesn’t have to observe the work from the back wall but be right in the middle of it all.

He never hesitates to lean down and kiss Isak when Isak tilts his head back, lips pursed just the slightest if he wants Even to move even quicker than usual, and he never waits for Isak to prompt him before he just has to lean down and kiss him, even if he’s technically in the middle of talking.

It’s easy, Isak observes, his arms folded underneath his chin as he rests on his stomach, and Even sits at his desk supposed to be finishing up some homework but just too distracted to actually be productive. It’s easy to be content and excited and happy and ecstatic all in one when they’re like this.

Isak’s lying on his bed, wearing boxers and Even’s hoodie and Even’s seemingly can’t stop taking his eyes off of him.

It’s one of Even’s favorites, the hoodie, Isak knows, because he’d spent ages painting the drawstrings multiple colors that he’ll tell everyone who sees it they’re just the colors he had when Isak knows it’s the colors of the rainbow and the pink, yellow and blue for a reason.

The tiny i-s he’d written on the backside of the left one maybe should’ve brought Isak into a state of panic, because that’s just too close, too big of a hint, but it doesn’t. And every time he can get away with it, Isak steals this particular hoodie, because it’s soft and too big and it smells like Even.

It’s an added bonus that Even loves seeing him in it, loves seeing him wearing only that, and Isak can’t resist giving him coy smiles whenever he catches Even looking.

I want to marry him keeps repeating in Isak’s head. He can’t stop smiling. I want to marry him.

OOOOO

Isak doesn’t mean for it to happen the way it does.

It’s summer. The weather is so hot it leaves all the rooms in the Kollektiv feeling stifling and clammy until its residents-plus-one can’t stand to wear much more than shorts and the thinnest t-shirt in their closets.

It seems like the sun takes forever to set these days, and Isak both mourns the relieving chill of winter and relishes in golden colors and red spots dancing across his eyelids as he basks in the sunlight, sitting propped up against the foot of his bed.

Eskild’s gone out for the night to some southern European-inspired party to celebrate the unusually hot weather, and he’s dragged Linn with him to make sure she actually gets some vitamin D when she insists on sitting cooped up in her room all day.

Isak had, naturally, high-fived her when she pointed out that most people got plenty of vitamin D in the bedroom, and then Linn, after all of Eskild’s scowling, had gone with him without complaint.

Even’s working late this evening, staying overtime at the studio for the experience more than the money. Isak had texted him half an hour ago that the coast was clear whenever he does make his way over.

Even had texted back a heart ten minutes later but no possible timeframe on when that might just be, so Isak’s resigned himself to sitting back and melting into a puddle on the floor for Even to find.

He’s not sure he likes the silence.

It’s rare to find himself home alone in the Kollektiv – Eskild usually zooms his way through as he does with everything else in his life, but Linn is pretty much a constant presence in the small home they’ve made for themselves.

And if his flatmates aren’t home, Even is usually there with him, and time with Even has never made Isak feel alone in the way keeping secrets from your friends will do to you.

He feels… isolated, maybe, is the closest word to the tightening of his chest. Whether it’s isolation from the world or from himself, Isak can’t tell.

What he can tell, however, is that there is only one person in the world who makes Isak’s chest tighten in an entirely different way, in the best way.

It’s the third project Even’s been hired on to help with. This time around it’s a drama following around five different people’s stories; the only thing connecting them is the feeling of loss settling so deeply inside their bones they can’t escape from it.

Isak had joked Even’s eyes had practically lit up at the depressing nature of the theme, and then he’d spent the better of an hour kissing Even’s pout away and telling him over and over again how proud he was of him, how proud he was that Even was working towards something that makes him happy, until Even had been pink-cheeked and lips slackened and wet, and he’d been kissing Isak just to get him to stop talking.

Even when Isak’s sitting here now, in an empty home and waiting, in a room bathed in gold and with the door open in a silent invitation for the one person who’s invited in, even when he’s feeling the most alone he doesn’t feel lonely.

The Kollektiv feels like it’s waiting with baited breath for Even to arrive, and Isak’s right there along with it. The sun is moving further and further down the sky, but it’s still shining just as brightly as ever. And even with the proof of the day slowly coming to an end, with the actual embodiment shining right in Isak’s face that Even is later and later, he still only feels the need to laugh in complete giddiness and relief that he won’t ever have to feel that crippling loneliness ever again.

Waiting for Even for mere hours feels like nothing, doesn’t feel like the slightest sacrifice compared to what Even gives him back just by being there.

Isak is in fucking love, and even now, with so much time having passed since he first met Even, he still feels like he’s either about to burst with it or implode from working so hard to keep it all bottled up.

He never wants to give this feeling up. Never, ever, ever. Can’t even imagine the day he’ll have to. He hopes it never comes.

Maybe it’s stupid. Maybe he’s being both young and stupid – he’s barely turned seventeen, Even’s his first boyfriend. Isak knows the clichés, knows he’s the exact personification of the naïve child thinking they’re all grown up now, but he doesn’t feel young or stupid. He feels like he’s in love.

He tips his head back, the duvet warm underneath his head, but his body is slumped too languidly for him to actually move or do something about it. It’s soft, at least, and Isak lets the remaining bit of the day’s sunlight warm his face.

The door slams shut. Isak hums happily when he hears Even call out his name, still not moving from his spot, but he tilts his chin a bit more pointedly when he feels Even’s presence in the doorway.

Even laughs, practically bounds over to him and leans down to kiss him.

“Halla,” Even grins between kisses, rubbing his thumb soothingly along the line of Isak’s jaw.

Isak reaches up to tug Even’s mouth back to his and ends up mumbling his own greeting into Even’s mouth. It mostly ends up as nothing more than a hum, and then Even hums back, so Isak hums again.

Even’s warm. Isak can feel it radiating off of him, like he’s the actual sun and he’s the reason why Isak’s being bathed in gold and feels so loose and happy. He smells of his cologne and a hint of sweat from a long day working in this heat.

Isak tightens the grip he has on Even, kisses him harder at the happy little noise Even makes. He never wants to let go.

They do part, though, after a little while. Even starts telling him about his day, about how far they’ve gotten and how he got to chat with the director for a couple of minutes before the guy had been whisked away to deal with an issue.

He’s sitting by Isak’s desk, had gone there when Isak had moved his stiff limbs up onto the bed. His laptop is open and his body is angled weirdly so he can look at both Isak and the screen, but mostly just ends up facing the window. He’s finished regaling Isak with stories from his day, sitting there in silence for now as he tries to find something he’d been working on and had wanted to show Isak.

The sun isn’t quite setting yet, the summer days too long for it to be that late yet, but it’s started its descent and Isak knows the light will soon fade behind the tops of the opposite buildings.

Right now, though, the sun hits Even beautifully. Had it been anyone else, Isak would’ve felt weird for staring so much. It being Even, though, he can’t tear his eyes away.

He looks good, Isak notes the way you always do when realizing something you already know about someone you see every day yet are suddenly reminded of. He looks ethereal. He looks like the best damn thing that’s ever happened to Isak.

Isak doesn’t mean for it to happen.

He’s just so fucking happy, so fucking in love, and he never ever ever wants it to end.

“Marry me.”

It slips out of Isak’s mouth before his brain can catch on. He doesn’t want to take it back, though, so he just waits with baited breath for Even to say something, anything.

Even’s gaping at him, the look of surprise evident, but Isak had hoped there would’ve been a slight twinge of happiness or excitement there too – he hadn’t ever counted on Even looking sad.

“You don’t want that.”

“I do,” Isak insists. He wants to reach out and squeeze Even’s hand, but he has a feeling if he moves closer to Even, Even will pull back and flee so he just lies there.

“You don’t,” Even whispers. There are tears threatening to leak out of the corners of his eyes and Isak’s breath hitches.

He didn’t mean for that to happen. He never meant for… for Even to –

All of it doesn’t come down crashing on Isak, crushing him in the rubble, but bits and pieces do crack apart, and suddenly Isak does feel both young and stupid.

Of course Even wouldn’t want that. It’s – it’s not necessarily too soon – they’ve known each other for ages by now, have been together for just as long pretty much, and they’re basically cohabiting already with brief intermittence of Even having to leave to keep up appearances with his parents that he definitely does not have a boyfriend and that there definitely isn’t an Isak in Even’s world, like there isn’t an Even in Isak’s.

Isak had just thought –

He doesn’t know what he thought. Or, he does know, but being in love isn’t always enough to warrant that kind of proposal.

He just proposed. Holy shit.

He should’ve taken more time, more care. Even’s a romantic, he broke into the Botanical Garden just to impress Isak and get his attention, he likes big gestures, and here Isak’s blurting it out like he’s asking what Even would like for dinner. He should’ve gotten a ring – although there are a lot of questions if even that would be a good idea given their situation.

Maybe – maybe that’s it. Maybe Even does want to get married, he just doesn’t want to get married to Isak.

Isak doesn’t doubt that Even loves him, that’s not it. There’s always a nagging thought at the back of his mind when Even tells him that he does, that it would be easier for Even if it was someone else, but Isak’s selfish and he wants Even.

It’s just that there are easier people out there for Even to love, and it would be cruel of Isak not to realize that.

Maybe Even wants someone he can do the big gestures for, that he can show off, someone he can put a ring on their finger and not have to worry about pronouns and nouns and them just being the wrong gender. That person isn’t Isak, and Isak can’t ever imagine being that person who so light-heartedly can do that.

It doesn’t make it hurt less. And it doesn’t explain why Even said Isak couldn’t be the one to want that.

“It’s okay if you don’t want to,” Isak mutters. His cheeks are burning, and he simultaneously can’t stand to look at Even, but he also can’t stand to look away, so he ends up switching between glaring at the wall behind Even and lowering his eyes to the floor, wishing for it to swallow him up. “Just – never mind. Forget it. Don’t mind me.”

Stupid, young, and a fucking idiot.

“That’s not –“ Even’s voice breaks, his words sound thick and like it’s a struggle to speak past a lump in his throat. “That’s not what – that’s – Isak.”

“Forget it,” Isak repeats. He almost wishes he was wearing a sweater, despite how bad the heat already is around him, just so he could curl up and hide away. God, he never should’ve opened his stupid, stupid mouth. “It was – it was dumb. You wouldn’t – let’s just –“

“Isak,” Even breathes out, sounding just as lost and heartbroken and Isak doesn’t understand.

It is fine if Even doesn’t want that, no matter the why, but Isak doesn’t understand why it makes Even react like that.

“That’s not –“ Even tries again, but he doesn’t get further than he did last time either. “You don’t want that. It’s not me – it’s. Isak, you don’t want that.”

The panic is still threatening to overwhelm him, to swallow him up whole until there’s nothing else left, the flight or fight instinct just too present a reaction to the hurt that’s also threatening to overtake him.

But that – that just doesn’t make sense. Isak wouldn’t have asked if he didn’t want that.

Obviously, now he’s having second thoughts, but not because he doesn’t want to be with Even forever and ever, as it seems like Even is insinuating, that is tearing him apart to insinuate.

“Why –“ Isak shakes his head as if it would clear his mind of all unwanted thoughts and make him able to think rationally once again. It doesn’t work. “Why do you think that?”

“Because –“ Even’s hands are shaking. “Because I never should’ve gone over to talk to you.”

Isak’s stomach drops. Along with his heart. And his entire body. He feels like he’s weightless, floating around like nothing at the same time as he feels like he weighs a metric ton. What – what?

“You deserve so much better,” Even’s struggling to get the words out, sounds like his throat is too thick. There are tears starting to gather in his eyes. “Always, always. You – you deserve everything, and I –“

He cuts himself off. Isak doesn’t feel like he’s present in his own body, feels like he’s forgotten how to open his mouth and use his words to shout you, you are the one who deserves everything.

“What are you talk-“ Isak manages to get out, though it sounds wrong and not like it’s him who’s speaking. Even cuts him off before he can finish.

“I’m bipolar.”

He says it like it’s the answer to everything, everything bad, that is. It’s –

Isak honestly doesn’t know what to think. He always knows what to think, always has a thousand different thoughts running through his head, either knowing everything about anything or wanting to find out everything about anything. Now, there’s nothing except Isak’s growing panic as bipolar repeats in his head.

“They’d just finalized the diagnosis, and I –“

Even licks his lips, tries to buy himself time, but time for what Isak doesn’t know. Even looks like he’s just finalized his own death sentence, and that everything that comes out of his mouth past this point isn’t an appeal but his final words, his last chance of redemption before a new life.

“I just had to get out of there. I just left – the hospital and my parents. I just had to get out of there. Scared the shit out of everyone,” he laughs a bit self-deprecatingly. It sounds wrong when someone is as close to crying as Even is right now, like it’s less of a laugh and more or a sob. “I just wanted to go for a walk.”

Isak’s bottom lip is quivering. He tries to bite down on it to make it stop, but that just makes it seem like the entirety of his face is shaking.

“And I saw –“ Even cuts himself off, sniffs and shakes his head at himself. “I should’ve left you alone, I know that, because you – but you were just –“

He laughs. It’s not an amused laugh, sounds more self-deprecating and sad and desperate than anything else.

“You were lying in the dirt in the middle of the night, cursing up a storm about how the pictures you were taking of flowers in the middle of the night were turning out shit, and –“

Even’s eyes are wet, but he looks impossibly softly at Isak when he finally meets his gaze. Isak thinks he might be crying too, or at least is close to it.

“You were the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen,” Even confesses, so quietly Isak nearly can’t hear it, but he does. He hears it. “And I should’ve just left you alone, but I’m selfish. It was like – like you were magical, like I was in a movie and you were what everything had been leading to.”

Isak wants to reach out to him, wants to run his fingers over his skin, let his hands curl around his cheeks, but he knows Even will draw back if he does that.

He also isn’t certain he could actually manage to do it as it seems like his entire body has stopped working, including his heart, and his lungs, and his mind, because there’s only one thing continuously whispered, bipolar, bipolar, bipolar.

Isak doesn’t know a lot – anything – about bipolar disorder. Knows the obvious or just the stereotype, maybe. He figures he could probably see hints, looking back, should’ve maybe noticed the hints way back then. Thinks that Even ranting about other people invalidating his feelings, about the tight smiles when Isak would tease how multiple sleepless nights would naturally end with him conking out for days on end, should’ve been enough to tell Isak that something, that not everything was what he’d been led to believe, that there was more to the story.

Maybe Isak should be scared. He’d spent ages trying to help his mother, been there when she wasn’t well and things were so shit he just wanted to scream.

But this isn’t his mother. It’s Even and Isak’s so unbelievably in love with him.

“I’m glad you came up to me,” Isak blurts out before he’s really thought it through. He doesn’t regret it, though. He squares up instead, stares directly into Even’s eyes and keeps his back straight.

Even’s lips are pressed tightly together, and he has that pinched look to him that tells Isak he’s about to argue with him, probably ask if he hasn’t heard a thing he’s told him, but Isak doesn’t let him.

“I don’t tell you how to feel,” Isak reminds him, has to swallow when he sees the stricken look on Even’s face. “And you don’t tell me how to feel. That’s how we work.”

He lets the ‘right?’ hang unspoken in the air, but Even still nods in agreement as if he’d said it out loud.

“And I’m telling you,” Isak has to swallow – for how steady his voice sounds, he feels incredibly shaky, “that if you thought meeting me was something magical, then me meeting you was a miracle.”

Even’s shaking his head again, looking ready to argue, but Isak won’t let him. Not with this, never with this.

“I was barely alive, back then,” Isak tells him. Even knows some of this, has probably gathered enough from what Isak hasn’t told him, all the blank spaces left unsaid and untold but with enough given to hint why they’re like that. “I was just waiting for each day to pass until one day I’d finally get to live.”

Even knows what he’s leading up to, Isak can tell that he knows. That he’s already heard the ‘you were what made me finally feel like I was living and not just surviving.’

“You saved me,” he insists. “And that’s how we work. What happens after you save me?”

Even shakes his head. His eyes are teary, and his lips are pressed together tightly. “Isak –“

“What happens?”

Isak feels the sigh Even emits all the way inside his bones, feels how it makes him heavy. Such a startling contrast to how light Even’s reply makes him feel.

Even’s voice is quiet, so, so quiet, Isak nearly doesn’t hear him. “You save me back,” is said softly, kindly, lovingly, but also tinged with a sadness that has Isak forget everything but utter hopelessness.

He refuses, though. Not when Even knows what he’s saying, what he’s trying to tell him.

“You would’ve felt like that anyway,” Even argues, is still minutely shaking his head. He’s frowning, but Isak thinks it might be to stop himself from crying. “Eventually. You still would’ve gotten to feel that.”

“I would,” Isak agrees, because theoretically, he probably would’ve. “Eskild gave me a lot. Maybe I would’ve started to feel it when I started at university. Maybe I’d only start feeling it once I got a degree and started working. Maybe I’d meet someone and fall in love and that’s when it would start.”

It’s such a foreign thought, that he could ever fall in love with someone who isn’t Even. Even also looks a bit like the thought of it is breaking his heart, even if it’s one of the points he’s trying to make; that Isak would be alright without ever having had Even in his life.

“But nothing would ever feel like how I feel, right now, and have felt all this time, with you.”

Even still doesn’t really look like he believes him, but he also looks a bit like he knows, because that’s how he feels too, so it feels a bit impossible to argue against it, like it’s a moot point.

“I don’t know a lot about it,” Isak admits, doesn’t clarify what it is, there’s no need. “And you know me – I’ll go on a research bender, and I’m going to drive you insane with it, so you’re going to have to tell me when to stop.”

Even doesn’t look pleased at the prospect of having Isak interrogate him, but he does nod curtly.

Isak digs at the skin around his nails, picking at hangnail until he’s nearly bleeding. It doesn’t make it easier to gather his thoughts, but Isak doubts anything would be helpful.

It feels a bit like someone’s swept the floor out from underneath him. He feels dizzy from it, feels like he’s lost the center of his gravity, which is stupid, because it’s still just Even. Nothing has changed, nothing important, but still –

Isak knows there are a lot of things neither of them talk about. Their entire relationship is founded on lies and secrets that’s always been more of a security blanket than whatever this feeling swirling uncomfortably around in Isak’s stomach is.

It’s not like he has told Even everything there is to possibly know about him, but he knows the important parts, and Isak – Isak just hadn’t realized they were apparently also keeping secrets from each other.

He doesn’t blame Even, that’s not it. On a scale of secrets this one is huge, and it’s not like Even isn’t allowed to keep secret, it’s more that.

That Isak thought Even trusted him.

Finding out he doesn’t, doesn’t feel very nice. It feels absolutely horrible, in fact.

“What are you thinking about?”

Isak’s never heard Even sound like that; small and insecure and maybe even a little afraid. Isak scares Even, and Isak also doesn’t know what to do with that, what to do with anything.

“I –“ he tries to swallow through the lump in his throat. It nearly gets caught instead and breathing feels even harder to do afterwards. “I just – why didn’t you tell me?”

Even looks small, sitting there on the desk chair. He feels miles away from Isak and that doesn’t feel good. He’s never seen Even look small, he’s always been larger than life, even when he was quiet and sleeping for an entire day – crashing, Isak reminds himself – Isak’s heart had always felt so full and overwhelmed whenever he looked at him.

“I still didn’t know what to think about it at first, when I met you.” Even when talking, Even is quiet. It’s awful. “And then, later, I kept telling myself you had to know, that it was only fair, but I – I didn’t want to lose you. And then you told me about your mom, and how that was why your parents were always fighting and that’s why you left, and I couldn’t –“ his voice cracks when he breaks off.

Isak’s jaw is clenched. Blood trickles out from his hangnail when he accidentally digs too hard.

“It’s not the same.”

Even doesn’t look like he believes him, but Isak doesn’t know how to explain it. It’s the only thing he keeps thinking – that it’s not the same, because it isn’t.

“It’s not,” he repeats.

“How?” Even looks resigned, and Isak would’ve thought he would sound tired, but for the first time ever that Isak’s heard, Even sounds bitter. “How isn’t it the same?”

“Because I don’t blame you for being ill, how about that?” Isak snaps. He can feel years upon years of anger and resentment and shame welling up to the surface, and it’s making something ugly inside him want to crawl out, want to lash out at everyone around him, when that really isn’t something Isak wants to do. “I’m not ashamed of you being bipolar. It’s not some ‘character flaw’ that I’ll do my damndest to avoid because it would be inconvenient for me.  I wouldn’t make the people closest to you lie about it just to avoid the social consequences of associating myself with you.”

Maybe it’s not entirely fair. Maybe there’d been lots of other shit going on between his mom and dad that Isak had never bothered looking into, because everything else was already too much and he wouldn’t be able to handle one more thing piled on top of the rest.

He’s not ashamed of Even. He’ll never be ashamed of Even. It sounds like a lie, considering the great lengths they go to, to keep each other a secret, to keep them a secret from the rest of the world, but that’s not Isak being ashamed of Even – no more than it is Even being ashamed of Isak.

“Maybe it will be,” Even points out stubbornly. His cheeks are flushed red and he’s staring straight into Isak’s eyes, but it’s like there’s something between them, something clouding Even’s eyes and twisting his mind until he can build his walls up again and protect himself from Isak. “Next month, next year – you don’t know you won’t resent me for sticking around.”

And Isak –

He wants to scream, wants to cry, both wants to prove he’ll never be like his father and abandon them, but at the same time wants to just bail, and that just makes it worse. He feels the fury inside him and wants to let it out, to show the world just how much can go wrong in a relationship and how much things going wrong can fuck someone up.

But Isak also knows this isn’t Even talking. Or – it is, but it also isn’t, because this is Even protecting himself from when shit will hit the fan, so that he isn’t caught off-guard, so he won’t end up in that doctor’s room again with pitying and worried looks constantly thrown his way until he’ll feel like he’s suffocating.

“It’ll happen,” Even promises, so sure and with certainty in his voice, that Isak wants to cover his ears and scream to block out all the noise. “I’ll hurt you, I know I will.”

In this moment Isak does feel incredibly young and a little out of his depth, but he doesn’t feel any less in love. Of all the uncertainties floating around his head, that isn’t one of them.

“You don’t know that.”

Even huffs, not believing him, and Isak’s tired. He’s tired and he’s going out of his mind and he still wants to never let go of Even, so he gets off the floor and strides over until he’s standing right in front of Even.

The room feels so much darker now compared to when Even had first gotten here, greeting Isak with a kiss and stories. God, that feels like hours, days, ago, not twenty minutes.

Even looks smaller like this, him sitting and Isak standing, but also from his shoulders hunching and body curling in on itself as he tries to convince Isak that he’s better off without him.

“No, you don’t know shit about that. Maybe I’ll be the one to hurt you – did you ever think about that, huh? Maybe neither of us will hurt each other. At least not so badly we can’t fix it.”

Even opens his mouth probably to protest, but Isak’s done. Done with all the hypothetical scenarios and what ifs of all the ways they can go wrong.

He wants to focus on the ways they can go right.

By slowing down time. He curls his hands around Even’s jaw and tilts his head back so he can’t avoid looking him the eyes. They’re impossibly blue and shiny from the wetness threatening to spill over the edge. Even when he’s upset like this and clearly wants to hide from the world, from Isak, Even accommodates him, lets him maneuver him into facing him.

“Why don’t we, just, take it completely chill,” Isak whispers, thumb rubbing soft circles along the line of Even’s cheekbone, “and we stop worrying about all that. Life is now, and so all that matters is, like, the next minute.”

“The next minute?”

God, Even is usually the one to say cliché things about how Isak is his baby, is his boy, and in this moment can’t help but be reminded how reciprocal that feeling is. Isak’s gorgeous, beautiful boy with a heart of gold and future bright and full of dreams.

Isak nods. “The next minute. That way we don’t have to worry about all the ways things can go wrong.”

Even sniffs. “Because even we can’t manage to fuck up irreparably within a minute?” he jokes, but Isak hears everything past the lighthearted tone, hears the worries and the anxiety and the guilt and shame and the hope.

So Isak smiles softly, continues rubbing his thumb and doesn’t comment on it when a catches a trail of wetness. Then he lets Even hide his face in his t-shirt, his forehead digging into his sternum.

Isak cards his fingers through Even’s hair, bends down far enough that he can press tiny kisses to the back of Even’s head, to the top of his neck.

“Sorry,” Even sniffles, not really crying but also not-not really crying. He’s still hiding away, so Isak just hums soothingly, only stopping when Even starts repeating himself. “Sorry, I – I should’ve told you, I know. I’m so sorry, that was – that was so fucked up of me to do. I should’ve come clean the second we started getting serious, I should’ve let you know –“

“Okay,” Isak just says, because he doesn’t want to tell Even he understands why he didn’t say anything when he’s only certain he partly knows why Even didn’t tell him specifically, and he’s also not going to lie and say he doesn’t feel fucking confused and slightly hurt at Even not telling him.

In hindsight it does explain a lot of things; the sleepless nights, the moments Even went from geared one day to little more than lifeless the next time he’d see him, the surge of text-messages to the bare minimum. Jumping from one project to another without finishing any or become hyper-fixated on one and working on nothing but.

Isak doesn’t realize why he hadn’t paid attention to it before – or, maybe he had, just a bit, felt that at times Even’s behavior was slightly off, but he never really went as far to think that – It never seemed natural to assume that.

“Breathe,” Isak reminds Even softly, the fingers on one of his hands moving down to trace the line of Even’s throat, running along his pulse. Even with the light touch Isak can feel it’s beating too fast. “Baby, you need to breathe.”

Even’s breath rattles when he lets it out. It feels warm and damp through the light material of Isak’s t-shirt, makes his already sticky skin feel clammy with it, but he just presses another kiss to Even’s hair.

“Is that what we’re doing for the next minute?” Even asks, speaking slowly to not make it as evident his body is still thrumming on the remains of adrenaline and panic, making him short of breath. He doesn’t sound mean about it, though.

“Yes.”

“And the minute after that?”

Technically, that’s against the rules, but Isak isn’t up for reminding Even of that.

“The minute after that,” he tells him instead, “we’re going to kiss.”

“That’s chill.”

Isak exhales amusedly at the irony.

“That’s chill.”

OOOOO

“Do you think,” Even wets his lips. Isak can’t tell if it’s a nervous tick or to just draw out time. “Do you think there’s a universe where I’m not like this? Where I’m easier to deal with?”

Isak’s throat tightens. He wants to cry.

It’s in the middle of the night, but Even is still lying awake next to him in bed. Eskild and Linn have long since gone to bed, Isak and Even did too, and they really should’ve fallen asleep by now, but they haven’t.

“It’s not like I’m easy to deal with either,” Isak reminds him.

Even scoffs, moves as if to turn to his side, turn his back to Isak, and Isak can’t have that. His hands fly out underneath his own body so quickly he slaps Even’s shoulder in his hurry to grab onto his t-shirt.

“I’m not,” he insists. Even’s still lying on his back and he’s not actively struggling against Isak’s hold that he doesn’t yet dare loosen. “There are probably hundreds of universes out there where – where you won’t have to hide behind closed doors to be with me, have you thought about that? Where I’m – where I’m a girl, or you are, and there’s no reason for all of this bullshit. Or maybe there’s one where no one would bat an eye at the both of us being boys, where we wouldn’t have even stumbled over the thought.”

Isak moves one of his hands up from Even’s shirt to lightly stroke against the hair curling at the nape of Even’s neck. It’s more awkward than anything, but that’s because it’s the arm he’s lying on and not because Even is resolutely staring into the ceiling, refusing to look at Isak.

“Maybe there’s one where I don’t give you a reason to leave.”

Isak shrugs, tries to calm down his absolutely pounding heart. “You haven’t given me a reason to in this one.”

Even scoffs again, but he doesn’t try to move away from Isak. Small wins.

Isak doesn’t know what happened to make Even so certain people, Isak, will leave him because of this. He figures maybe it had something to do with those boys that he’s occasionally seen him with by accident, when they’re reminded of just how small Oslo really is and that despite meticulous planning, they can’t always avoid running into each other in public.

Even talks about them, sometimes, and Isak’s always been desperate for every single bit of information he can get of Even’s life – the part of it that Isak has never had access to, anyway – so he feels like he already knows the entire group, but… the way that Even talked about them always made him curious. It made it seem like they were his long-lost friends, not people he saw every single day up until they graduated together back in June.

Even doesn’t have to say what he’s thinking, what he’s obviously close to saying, only holding himself back to avoid an argument, to avoid revealing his soul to such a terrifying, vulnerable degree, even if it’s to Isak. Or maybe because it’s to Isak.

Isak knows what Even wants to say. He wants to say that he’s already given him a reason, and if not then they just have to wait for a major episode, or maybe just a small one, and then Isak can see there’s a reason to break this off.

But this isn’t something Isak wants to break off, not for any reason. Reminding Even of that, though, wouldn’t mean anything to Even who won’t let himself process it, won’t let himself belief that it’s true, that there’s still hope for them, that they can still be ‘them’, so Isak changes tactic.

“Maybe there is one where I leave. Hell, maybe there are multiple universes where I leave you.”

Even’s not breathing next to him. Isak can make out his eyes in the darkness, but he can’t tell if they’re shiny from unshed tears or completely dry as Even remains stoic. He doesn’t seem it, though. He seems to be feeling the exact same emotions as Isak; frayed and like someone is unpeeling him bit by bit until he’s exposed for the world to see with nothing holding him together.

“But not in this one.”

Even draws in a deep breath. It sounds shaky.

“In this universe, I stay with you. In this universe, I choose you.”

“This feels like therapy,” Even grouches, but he’s still looking at Isak with that look that always serves to make butterflies swirl around inside of him, even if it’s a little withdrawn and Isak can still tell that this isn’t, that they aren’t okay yet. “I hate therapy.”

Isak can’t help but grin shyly. “Pretty sure it’s not therapy until you start paying me.”

It startles a bark of a laugh out of Even that comes out a little too wet. “You expecting me to pay you, now?”

And it’s fun, because acting like this with Even is always fun, but this, this right now, is Even talking around the subject.

“’Fraid I only accept boyfriend payments,” he says carefully, watches with heavy heart as Even stops smiling and starts looking ready to argue again.

Isak hates having to make him stop smiling, but it’s necessary. They need to do this, can’t just let it hang in the air. They do this with everyone else; talk in half-truths and leave things unsaid and just entirely in secret, but not with each other. Even knows everything about Isak, and Isak had thought he knew everything about Even, too. He’s not angry to find out he doesn’t – confused, a little, maybe a lot, hurt, but he’s not angry.

He probably would’ve been, had he found out any other way, if Even had never confessed to it, if he’d just left it unsaid until one day Isak would find out when either everything was going to shit, or it was just too late entirely.

Even must come to something close to the same conclusion, because the fight leaves his body, and when he starts talking, he answers Isak truthfully.

“I have…” he hesitates before continuing, “almost a sort of love-hate relationship with it. To it?”

“How come?”

Even tries to gather his thoughts, figure out what to say, how to explain. “I hate how it makes me feel, how out of control everything can seem. I like being the one who can decide things and it – it takes that away from me.”

Isak blinks. “And the – the other part? The love part?”

Even wets his lips nervously. “I hate feeling sick,” he says. “I hate how it takes away any feeling of control. I hate how it makes other people look at me like I’m weak, like I’m breakable.”

Isak waits. Allows for Even to let it all out.

Even’s breathing heavily, not quite panting for air, but it’s irregular and mostly superficial. Isak doubts he’s actually getting any air in, but at least he’s not panicking.

“But, if I hadn’t had that appointment, if I wasn’t ill,” Even adds, “I wouldn’t have left my parents’ side that night.”

Isak tilts his head to the side, a slight, confused frown pulling down the right corner of his mouth.

“I wouldn’t have gone to Birkelunden, and I wouldn’t have met the cutest boy I’d ever seen, lying on his stomach in the dirt, trying to get a picture of a flower.”

Isak flushes, as he always does when Even talks about him like this, squirms with a bit. It’s almost like he can feel Even’s heart beating in tandem with his own; a little too quick and a little too hard.

It’s impossible not to feel it, and feeling it so strongly makes it impossible not to say something.

“I still want to marry you,” Isak whispers into the darkness.

It’s the first time Even’s stayed over for the night since he told Isak. Isak’s spent the past hour just about debating whether or not he should say something before he just went ahead and did it anyway.

Maybe he shouldn’t have, shouldn’t push these things. A lot of the websites spoke about needing a stable environment and avoiding stress factors, and Isak has this nagging thought in his head that this entire thing they have going, this – this sneaking around and keeping secrets from everyone in their life, having an entire secret relationship, everything that Isak is to Even, is quite a big stress factor.

But he doesn’t want to leave this hanging in the air, not like he’s done with so many other things. This should never be something he grows to regret not saying, and it shouldn’t be something Even should worry about was legit or not.

Even is tense next to him. It sounds like he’s holding his breath, and Isak can’t tell if it’s from anxiety or from waiting for Isak to continue or if he gearing up to argue.

The latter, Isak fears, because Even still has that look in his eyes, the one that says he still fully believes everything he said about how he was too selfish and that Isak deserves more, when Even to Isak already is everything.

“I know you’re probably thinking – hell, you’re thinking too much to keep up with, but you’re definitely thinking I’m only saying it because I said it before and now I don’t want to admit to it being a pity thing, but that’s –“

Isak cuts himself off, shakes his head, not harshly enough the bed shakes, but he can hear how his hair shifts against the pillowcase, causing crinkling noises that fill the sudden silence.

“I don’t know how to convince you it’s not,” Isak admits instead. “I don’t know how to make you believe I’m so in love with you that I never want you far away from me, that I can’t imagine having to live a life without you. I can’t think of anything other than telling you, again and again, as many times as it takes, but I also don’t know if that will ever be enough.”

Even swallows loudly next to him. He doesn’t turn around and he doesn’t say anything, and Isak doesn’t know what that means. His heart is pounding in his chest.

“If you really don’t want to marry me, then I’ll never mention it again,” he promises. “But if the only reason you have for not wanting to marry me is because you think ‘I deserve better’, then I’m going to ask you again. I’m going to ask you every single time I can’t believe I could possibly love you any more than I do in that moment.”

He doesn’t say anything after that, wants for Even to say something, to reply, to just let him know – something, anything, that Even is ready and willing to give him.

It makes it easy to hear how Even tries to control his breathing, tries to keep it slow and heavy, make every inhale deep, all the way down into his stomach. He hears it every time Even opens his mouth only to close it again. Until he finally manages to get some words out.

Isak expects – maybe he doesn’t quite know what he expects. A rejection, maybe, denial about everything Isak just said.

No matter what, he doesn’t expect, “Move in with me,” to be what comes out of Even’s mouth.

Isak blinks. Doesn’t really matter in the darkness, but he still does it. Blinks again, even. “Huh?”

The sheets next to him crinkle as Even shuffles around to face him. Isak’s gaping in his direction, he knows, but it’s too dark to see anything besides his silhouette.

“Move in with me,” Even repeats, voice deep and slow.

It’s almost like how he usually sounds when he’s close to falling asleep or just waking up, but he’s neither right now. His voice is steady, he sounds sure in himself, while Isak feels like he’s stuck on a rollercoaster.

“I’m serious,” Even says when Isak just keeps on staring. “Move in with me.”

Like Isak was questioning how serious he was. He’s been working really hard to not let those parts of the websites influence him, refuses to see Even as a child in need of a firm hand to keep him safe, but this kind of question feels so horribly impulsive the thought is the for a shameful second before Isak manages to kick it out again.

“A place just for the two of us,” Even starts painting the picture as beautifully as everything else he does. “We won’t have to sneak around, won’t have to wake up at crazy times just to avoid getting caught. You could finally wear my clothes without worrying, I could get to cook you breakfast.”

Isak’s heart is starting to pick up its pace again, for an entirely different reason now.

“Think about it,” Even prompts. “You said that Noora’s coming back from Spain soon, that’ll be one more person to sneak around, plus there aren’t enough rooms. You’d still have your safety net – you’d still have Eskild to fall back on. We could only put my name on the lease so you wouldn’t have any obligations if things fall through.” If they fall through, Isak knows that means.

“We’ll have to anyway, you’re the only one out of the two of us who’s turned eighteen,” is what comes out of Isak’s mouth instead. Holy shit, he keeps thinking, feeling, maybe, too. Holy shit.

Even lets out a startled laugh that’s too loud for the hour, but Isak’s feeling too shaky in the best of ways to shush him. Even clamps a hand over his mouth himself anyway, tries to smother his giggles behind fingers and the duvet. He sounds every bit as much of the holy shit being continuously repeated in Isak’s head.

“Are we really doing this?”

Isak feels like his feet have been swept off the ground, feels like he’s floating, flying around. It doesn’t feel scary, though. Not when he knows Even’s there, ready to catch him.

“I’m serious about you,” Even whispers once he’s gotten his laughing fit under control again. “Always. And always want to be. And I want to marry you, want to get married to you.”

Isak’s heart tha-thumps loudly in his ears as he waits for the ‘but’.

“I just want you to know what you’re getting into. I never want you to regret anything.” This, me, us.

It’s every bit the but Isak was expecting, fearing, but it’s not the worst but he’s imagined hearing.

“The same goes for you, you know,” Isak reminds him. He grabs Even’s hand, laces their fingers together and squeezes. It somehow feels more intimate than a kiss would’ve. “I never want you to regret choosing me either.”

It’s in the middle of the night on a hot summer’s night, and Even’s eyes are sparkling even in the dark and his thumb is rubbing along Isak’s hand in small circles, and Isak’s in love with him and discussing their future together. He hopes fervently that in every single universe out there, there’s an Isak and Even who find each other, and that there isn’t a single universe where there’s an Isak stupid enough to leave their Even behind.

“I won’t,” Even promises.

‘Forever’ suddenly seems impossibly short when Isak will get to spend it with Even.

Next part

[kylermalloy]

In the TO pilot, as Elijah tries an array of techniques to entice Klaus to stay in New Orleans and protect his unborn daughter, he says something very interesting: “I think this child could offer you something you never believed you’ve had—the unconditional love of family.”

That line can be a little confusing, especially since Elijah proceeds to stand by Klaus unconditionally for the next two seasons, despite him pulling some seriously dodgy crap. Even when their bond is seemingly fractured, Elijah always comes back.

So the problem, as Elijah says, isn’t that no one in their family loves Klaus unconditionally—Klaus just doesn’t believe that they do. Mikael imparted in him such a fear of failure, of retaliation and denouncement at the slightest mistake, that even a thousand years later, he believes his siblings can snatch away their love just as easily.

I feel like this is a large cause of a lot of Klaus’s behavior toward his siblings—since he thinks they’ll never love him fully, without reserve, it frees him to do whatever he likes. He can treat them badly, punish them for any menial thing, because it doesn’t matter. He won’t lose them—can’t really lose them—and if he does he can just force them to stay with him one way or the other.

The series is in large part about him unlearning that mindset, that behavior. As he learns what it means to love someone innocent, to love his child unconditionally, so he learns to love his siblings the same way—and accepts their love in return.

Elijah’s feelings are almost the exact opposite—he does love Klaus unconditionally, so how Klaus feels about him almost doesn’t matter. In spite of the countless times Klaus has pushed him away, Elijah will stay by his brother’s side...

...doing monstrous things, but who cares? This family is too old to worry about moral quandaries. Elijah says it outright in one of the few good TVD scenes—“I helped him because I loved him.” It didn’t matter that they were plotting to murder an innocent, trusting girl for her blood. Klaus wanted it, and Elijah loved him enough to want to help him.

(Sidenote: Elijah’s full TVD line is “I helped him because I loved him...that’s changed, now he must die.” and I have to laugh at how untrue it is. Elijah’s quest to kill Klaus was almost...a mercy killing. How can you tell me that even in s2 of TVD Elijah didn’t love Klaus?)

So while Klaus’s idea of unconditional love (or lack thereof) is a freeing notion, Elijah sees it as...almost confining. And I don’t mean that Elijah feels shackled down...but he very well might be, in a metaphorical sense. His love for Klaus causes him untold pain and heartache and misery—and ultimately costs him his life.

So what’s really my point here? Who knows, definitely not me—my blog is titled “Unfocused Ramblings” for a reason. Essentially, the Mikaelson promise of Always and Forever is meant to be a vow of unconditional love, but it’s interesting to see how it’s kept/not kept over time. One of my wishes for the show would’ve been to change the focus of Klaus’s character arc from “redemption” to learning unconditional love. It wouldn’t really change the trajectory of the narrative—it would still have Klaus changing for the better and make sacrifices for the people he loves. But it wouldn’t ring quite so false when he backslides and does bad things, like slaughter innocents. The point of the show wasn’t for Klaus to magically become Huggy Bear; he was supposed to learn how to accept and give unconditional love to not only his daughter, but his family. A redemption is a little different, and @aeruthien already articulated it much better than I could.

And yet? The show also makes a case for unconditional love to not be such a good thing. We see the toxic side of it with all that Elijah has suffered and lost and given up because of Klaus. Unlike Rebekah, he doesn’t leave. His dedication is honorable, but man does it get ugly for him.

In the end, though, I’m not sure if the show was equipped to give us an outright answer. I just think the idea of unconditional love and what it means to various characters is incredibly fascinating. This even inspired some Thoughts about Sam & Dean—but I hate mixing fandoms, so that’ll be another post.

[the-magnus-archives-archiver]

Lost and Found

Case: 0120606

Name: Andre Ramao Subject: A series of misplaced objects lost over the course of three months Date: June 6th, 2012 Recorded by: Jonathan Sims, Head Archivist of the Magnus Institute, London

Thank you for lending me your pen. I thanked you when you handed it to me, but I don’t know if you’ll remember. I wonder, will you... forget you lent it to me and believe that it was my pen all along? Maybe instead you’ll forget that I ever had one to begin with, and think of me as an idiot who turned up to give a statement without a pen, so you had to lend me yours. My own fault for putting it down, really. Assuming I did ever have one. I’ll try to keep a slightly closer hold on this one.

I’ve been in the antiques business for a long time. It’s not what it used to be. 

[Nervous chuckle] 

I’m sorry, I know. I always did that, try to make myself feel more comfortable with jokes. There’s a follow up to that one, you know. Something along the lines of the joke being so old only an antiques dealer would be able to sell it. I love that one; I think it’s clever, but in my whole life it’s only ever gotten a laugh once. That’s why I remember buying the vase so clearly. I remember that the seller laughed. 

In the old days, I never would have considered buying wares from the likes of Mikaele Salesa. He has a good reputation for quality, but a... bad reputation for legality, as it were. I’ve had more than one acquaintance sell on a particularly valuable find they got from him, only to discover that it didn’t have proper import papers, or that it had been reported stolen years before. Charlie Miller even did some jail time over a Georgian brooch he bought off him, so as a general rule I’d have given Salesa’s stuff a wide berth, but... Well, the antiques business isn’t what it used to be. That isn’t a joke. I had to close up my shop a few years ago, you see. Actual antiques don’t sell to the mass market anymore. Oh, young people will snap up vintage clothes or have any number of cheap faux-antique replicas strewn about their living rooms, but as soon as they get a look at the price tag for the real thing? They’re out of there like a shot.

So I went the same way as a lot of my peers. Lose the premises, start selling only high-margin goods direct to specific clients who can afford them, or shift a few guaranteed sellers on the auction. It’s the only real way to stay afloat in the business nowadays, but the competition is intense, and getting the calibre of artefact you need has become a more cutthroat affair. I’m not the only one in the business to recently soften their attitude towards buying from people like Mikaele Salesa.

It was my first meeting with him, back in March, and I was nervous, so I told my joke. Just off- hand, almost a reflex. I didn’t expect any reaction, really, I... I certainly didn’t expect him to laugh. But he did, this sudden, deep, throaty laugh that seemed to come out of nowhere. He didn’t say anything afterwards, just continued discussing business. But it stayed with me. There was nothing particularly strange about the laugh, not really. Why do I remember it so clearly?

Salesa was taking me through his ‘showroom’. There was a fancy-looking sign above the door, but it didn’t do much to hide the fact that it was basically a warehouse. More of the antiques were still in their packing crates, and I couldn’t help making a note of how quick and easy it would be for him to pack everything down and disappear if he needed to. Still, I’d made a few good purchases already and was cautiously optimistic. I’d bought a pair of cavalry sabres from the Revolutionary War, absolutely excellent condition, and a British artilleryman’s tunic from World War I, a few other bits and pieces as well. I recall I felt a moment of relief that I didn’t deal in books, as I caught sight of several crates packed to the brim with heavy-looking volumes. I was looking for something big, though. Something that would make an actual dent in the mountain of debt I’d been piling up. 

I found it in that old Chinese pot. From the Jiajing period, so Salesa said, and the construction seemed to back him up. The glaze and the workmanship fitted with mid-to-late Ming dynasty, but there was something... off about the actual design. Instead of the pictures or scenes common to the ceramics of the period, the blue glaze was painted on in crisp, thin geometric lines. They repeated perfectly and seemed to get smaller and more intricate the closer I looked, but the shapes they formed never lost any of the precision, seeming to continue on however closely I looked. The effect was disorientating, and made the vase seem smaller than it actually was. It made my head hurt a bit when I looked at it for too long. It was amazing.

When he saw me staring, Salesa clapped me on the back and named a price that almost made me choke. We haggled a bit, and eventually reached a price I considered only a little bit unreasonable. I hurried my purchases home, feeling slightly soiled by my visit to the warehouse, and very much hoping it would be a good few months, if not years, before I was in such dire straits that I needed to go again. I got home, had a shower and some food and immediately started to look into finding a buyer for my latest acquisitions. I remember I was planning to make a few calls, but my headache got so bad that I had to have an early night.

The problems started soon after. It was little things at first. Like my shoes. I’m not a particularly fashion-conscious man at the best of times, so I have three pairs of shoes. Comfortable loafers for everyday use, a pair of walking boots for hiking, and some well-shined, polished, leather brogues for fancier events. Well, I had a rather upmarket auction that I needed to attend, so I went to put on my nice shoes, but they were nowhere to be found. Not the shoes, not the box I kept them in. Instead there was bag containing two shirts that I know for a fact I threw away the year before. When I asked my husband, David, about it, he told me point blank that I had never had any such shoes. Claimed I always wore my loafers when I went to auctions or parties. 

I know that compared to some of the ghost stories you must hear in this place, a pair of misplaced shoes seems perfectly trivial, but something felt so... wrong about the whole situation. In the end I did go in my loafers. I don’t remember if anyone at the auction noticed.

It was about a week later that I got the invoice from Salesa. It was a pleasant surprise, far less than I thought we’d agreed on. That feeling lasted until I looked through the itemised list and realised why the cost was so low. He hadn’t charged me for the Ming. I’ll admit that I was somewhat conflicted over whether to raise the issue, but in the end I decided that even if Mikaele Salesa did work with thieves, I was not going to be counted among them. So I phoned him to try and explain the mistake.

He seemed to be in a fine mood when he answered the phone, and asked me if I’d had a chance to try out the sabres yet, which I’m pretty sure was a joke. I told him that there was an item he’d missed off the invoice, and he said that no, everything had been double-checked and was correct. I was getting suspicious at this point, and thought he might be trying to pull a fast one of some sort with me, maybe get me to take the blame for some illicit scheme gone wrong. I told him so in no uncertain terms, and described our encounter and the vase in minute detail. He was quiet for a few seconds, and then asked me if I could send him a photo of the pot. His tone was different, and he sounded oddly wary when he made the request. I was very on edge by this point, but could come up with no good reason not to agree, so I took a few pictures with my phone and sent them through to him.

It was a long time before he spoke again, and when he did he sounded... different. Almost scared, I thought. He told me that I could keep it. No charge. I began to protest again, but he ignored it. I remember his exact words: “I do not remember having that thing, which means it belongs to you.” Then he hung up. 

This was all very strange, of course, but even then I wasn’t worried. Not like I should have been.

It was my book next. A signed copy of Catch-22, my favourite book. Vanished from its place on my bookshelf, leaving only an empty space behind. David just gave me another blank stare when I asked him about it. I admit I almost lost it at him then. Shoes were one thing, but that book meant a lot to me. I accused him of playing some stupid joke, and tried to remind him what I’d gone through to get it, flying over to America for Joseph Heller’s last book tour, queuing for hours and then that dreadful evening I thought that sudden rainstorm had ruined it all. By the end he was looking... very alarmed indeed and started to ask me how I was feeling. He wanted to know if I’d been under a lot of stress at work, if there was anything I wanted to talk about. I left.

Maybe he was right. Maybe I am crazy. It makes a lot more sense, doesn’t it? It would make it neat. Except no. No, I would need to have gone mad a long, long time before this for the idea of it being in my head to hold up. My perceptions are the only ones I can trust. Maybe. I don’t know.

This went on for months. The tie I got for my last birthday, my grandfather’s teapot, the tunic I bought from Salesa, things just kept going missing, and every time David would tell me that whatever it was didn’t exist. Or it wasn’t mine. Or I was misremembering. For a while I thought he was actually trying to gaslight me, make me think I was losing my mind, but when the tunic went missing I called Salesa again. This time he laughed when he told me that he didn’t remember selling any World War I items to me on my visit. I checked the invoice, and it was no longer listed there. Just empty, accusing paper where the words had been.

I know these things were real. I know they existed. Why won’t anyone just believe me? 

This is where I started to come undone a bit. To be honest I don’t think anyone would do much better in my situation. I hadn’t made any connection between the old Chinese pot and the disappearances. I mean, why would I? But I also hadn’t been able to sell it. Whenever I tried, something would get in the way. The other person would forget to send through a crucial email, or they’d stop responding. Once I managed to get it as far as posting it out to a buyer, but it was returned immediately with a note asking why it had been sent to her. Gradually, I began to get suspicious of the thing. Sitting there, with its cascading, maddening patterns in that vile cobalt blue. Trying to tell me that I things didn’t exist, that they hadn’t vanished when I know they have.

I took to watching it. I wasn’t getting much sleep and David was worried sick about me. I know he was talking to various doctors about getting me help. There were certainly a couple of points I was worried about him having me sectioned. None of it helps in the end.

It was about a month ago. I had placed the vase in the centre of the table, and was sat staring at it. Keeping an eye on it. Checking for... god knows what. This had been my ritual for the previous week, keeping my vigil into the small hours, but that night... that night I fell asleep in front of it. I don’t remember my dream. Running, maybe? I know I woke with a start sometime around 2 in the morning. As I tried to rub the sleep from my eyes, I heard a sound from the table in front of me. It was the dull thump of a heavy book hitting the tabletop. I looked and, sure enough, there was my copy of Catch-22, just lying there in front of that strange ceramic thing. And not just my book, there was a small pile of objects around the base. My shoes, a tie, things I don’t even remember losing. One by one they rose up out of the mouth of the vase and tumbled to the table. It didn’t matter how big they were, they all seemed to fit.

And then came the moment when everything had been disgorged. I saw all the things that I had lost, and I thought it must be over. It must be done. What else could possibly come of there? And I saw the pale shapes of long, thin fingertips begin to creep above the lip of the pot. I remember thinking that it couldn’t be a normal person living in that pot, because the fingernails were too dirty. Isn’t that an odd thing to think at a time like that?

I ran, of course. Turned around and sprinted out of the door and into the street and didn’t return until morning. Maybe I should have called the police, but I was in no state to do much of anything except shiver under a tree for hours. David was gone. I allowed myself some brief hope that maybe he’d just left me, maybe he’d escape with just a divorce. But no. One call to the housing association confirmed that, as far as they were concerned, I’d always lived alone. 

I want to smash that thing. I want to dash its maddening patterns to the ground and stomp on it until there is nothing left but powder. But it’s also disappeared, of course. I can’t find it anywhere. It’s still taking things, though. Sorry about your pen.

Archivist Notes: 

Before I dig too deeply into the background of this statement, I feel I should mention something that puts much of it in a slightly different light. Tim actually managed to find a copy of Mr. Ramao’s marriage licence. It exists, is signed, dated and official, and half of it is blank. Only Mr. Ramao’s details are on the document, and if it wasn’t for the context of this statement, it would appear he was married to nobody. But he was married.

This is not the first time Mikaele Salesa’s name has come to the attention of the Institute. Even discounting the incidental role he played in case #0112905, he appears to have something of a knack for locating objects displaying more... disconcerting phenomena. I believe some of the more bizarre things in the Artefact Storage area were purchased from him. It has been something of a—

[Urgh. Urgh.

[SOUND OF CHAIR SCRAPING]

I see you...

[THUMP... THEN SOUND OF COLLAPSING SHELVES] [NOISES OF EXCLAMATION] [DOOR OPENS]

Sasha: Alright?

Archivist: Ah... Yeah. A... spider.

Sasha: A spider?

Archivist: Yeah. I tried to kill it.... the shelf collapsed.

Sasha: I swear, cheap shelves are... Did you get it?

Archivist: Ah... I hope so. Thinks so. Nasty, bulbous looking thing.

Sasha: [Chuckles] Well, I won’t tell Martin.

Archivist: Oh, god. I don’t think I could stand another lecture on their importance to the ecosystem.

[SHUFFLING NOISES]

What?

Sasha: Look.

Archivist: Oh... uh... Got dented when the shelf collapsed, I guess.

Sasha: No, it, it goes right through. I, I thought this was an exterior wall?

Archivist: It should be.

Sasha: Hmm. I, I think it’s just plasterboard.

[LOW NOISES OF DEBRIS]

Do you see anything?

[QUIET, BUILDING SOUND OF WET WRIGGLING]

Archivist: No, I don’t think so, it...

[WORM SOUND INTENSIFIES]

Sasha, run. RU—]

[ortegatrash]

Second Chances

Name: Mikael Hansson | Puppet: Eden | Villain name: Thorne Cautious / anonymous / tech-savvy / tactician / anarchist Outsider scar, truth Warnings: Temporary (then corrected) misgendering/use of deadnames, self-blame

So I headcanon my sidestep Mikael as having been kidnapped from his loving family while on holiday in America as a child. Have a family reunion.

Fandom: Fallen Hero Rebirth

There is a little red house down at the end of the lane.

There is a little red house down at the end of the lane in a quiet little country town in Sweden, on the edge of a great lake.

There is a little red house with faded white timber framing and a roof that leaks when there's a particularly bad storm to the point that the iron bucket placed underneath the hole has rusted into place permanently.

The air is disconcertingly fresh, And you suppose the pastries are particularly tempting.

Maybe that's why you force yourself up the steps, feeling like you've lost control of yourself. Lost control of your own body. Your own life.

Maybe that's why you press the doorbell, knowing that its chimes are just ever so slightly out of tune and shivering despite yourself at the sense of déjà vu.

For the pastries, of course. Seems like they're having a coffee break inside, of course there's always time for fika. Time which you've just interrupted from the way the chatter inside stops at the sound of the doorbell.

"Were you expecting a visitor-?"

"I think it might be the package I ordered, I'll be right back."

Your throat goes dry.

The middle-aged woman who comes to the door looks tired. Tired, but kind, the crows feet at the edges of her eyes softening into polite confusion as she takes you in. "Oh, hello, may I help you?" Is this young man lost?

"I…" You lose all the words you had planned, dying unconceived in your throat. Because you, you weren't sure you could trust your memory, could scarcely hope to believe these strange dreamlike visions could have been anything real.

That they were real. That you, too, were once like them, human and real and happy-

"-Are you quite alright? Do you need help?" She looks slightly alarmed at the way the tears are streaming down your face and you can't help but to break into disbelieving laughter.

You swallow it down as best you can, try to compose yourself. Your voice is rusty and unsure, it's been so long since you've spoken anything other than English - but somehow the words come to you like in a dream. Like they were something you'd always known, you'd just forgotten that you knew. "Kristina, you are Kristina Hansson, yes?"

"That is me. What exactly is this about?"

She doesn't…

She doesn't even recognise you. You'd somewhat expected this, it feels like a completely different lifetime ago that you once knew her and she would not be expecting to see a man's face in the place of a little girl's.

"Did you...did you happen to have a daughter named Mia, once?"

The woman's face shutters as she draws inward. "Yes," she says, simply. "Once. But it's been more than a decade since they took my little girl. If you have nothing new to bring me on her case, I would rather not speak of it."

You wince, you hadn't meant to bring up old wounds like this. How strange to be the one putting her in this position. That just leaves you with the issue...how do you even bring up something like this delicately?

You take a deep breath in. "When I couldn't sleep, I used to beg you to stay by my side and sing me lullabies. I was so afraid of storms as a child, but you would tell me not to be afraid because it was just Thor striking his hammer."

Her brow creases, eyes wide with the implications and yet not daring to believe. "What...please, if you are planning on using my daughter's memory to con money out of me, you should know better-!"

You don't let her finish. "-And that got me into reading those marvel comics about Thor. I was fascinated, I remember. I told you I wanted to be a superhero too, raining down lightning from the sky."

You'd eventually settled on letting Ortega do the frying people and you suppose you were a hero for a few years too - so in a way, you really had managed to achieve your childhood dream.

She's trembling. "M-Mia? But- How?" She can't help but let the tentative hope and disbelief bleed through, wanting so badly to believe and being tired of being disappointed one too many times.

The shaky smile that makes its way onto your face threatens to ruin you. "I go by Mikael nowadays," you note, your attempt at a deadpan tone ruined by the lingering vulnerability that comes from being afraid. Afraid of hoping. Afraid of rejection.

The arms that fling themselves around you are an answer in themselves. "Mikael," she whispers, like she's trying it out to see how it feels on her tongue. "Mikael, Mikael, Mikael!"

It.

It's all just too much at once and you finally allow yourself to break down for the first time in a long, long time in your mother's arms.

"Mamma," you whisper. "I'm finally home."

---

Pappa sits at the coffee table, hoarding all the biscuits. "Oh! Ah. Do we have a visitor?" he mumbles with his mouth full, looking equally embarrassed and guilty before holding out the packet. "Per Hansson, I don't believe we've met. Would you like a biscuit, Mr…?" He trails off, not quite able to look you in the eye.

You take a biscuit with a fond smile. "Hansson. Mikael Hansson, and I believe you would be mistaken. We do, in fact, know each other."

He blinks before going bright red. "Oh? Ah, my memory must be going, I'm terribly sorry…"

Your dear old man. You plonk yourself down on the seat beside him and steal his tea as he's reaching for it with a wry, cheeky grin (you'd always been able to count on him backing you up on your shared hatred of coffee.) "You would have known me better as 'Mia', back then."

The shock of your rudeness at have stolen his tea from out under his nose is still taking a moment for him to process, his mouth open in a perfect circle as he blubbers at you. Begins to say something and then snaps his mouth shut again.

"I-" he begins. "What? ...How? ...What even?"

You smother the tiniest of giggles in his your teacup, regretting your decision as you cough and choke on how hot it is.

To his credit, he just shakes his head at you, eyes glassy with emotions as he reaches in to embrace you. "Oh, my little gir-, er. Little one. All grown up. Alive and well." He leans back to look at you. "Well. Alive, at least. I wouldn't want to presume about what happened to you...but I never thought…"

He's starting to lose grip of his emotions with the way he's just clutching at your clothes, as if he doesn't even think you could be real. It's...surreal.

There are so many things you want to say, so many things you want to ask that they all tumble over themselves on their way to climb out of your mouth. That's why you say nothing but: "Wait, how do you know it's really me without confirming it? I could be a paid actor, sent to con two grieving parents out of their money. Mamma thought so."

Why do you sabotage yourself like this?

But Pappa is laughing and ruffling your hair like he used to and telling you: "Silly child, as if I couldn't see the bird's nest of hair I gave you once I knew to look! As if I couldn't see the colour of your mother's eyes when I look into yours or the way you both make the strangest faces like a bewildered cat when you're confused, like you're doing now!"

What- You do *not* look like a bewildered cat!

"Oh, but you were always too much like me. With the terrible taste in facial hair…"

"There's nothing wrong with my moustache!" You're sure even the tips of your ears are bright red by now. You'd...you'd forgotten just how *embarrassing* he could be.

(It's not a bad thing.)

---

She bursts into the house with tears in her eyes and clenched fists (and years worth of things she never got to say). "Is it real? Oh my god, is my baby sister finally home after all these years?"

You stare at her, mouth full of biscuits. Then: "Baby brother now, you know. I didn't go and spend all my hard earnt money on black market hormones just to grow a moustache for fun…" It's hard work maintaining your (beautiful, dammit) moustache, no matter what they say. A moustache probably full of crumbs at the moment.

Margareta blinks at you, and oh, she still looks like a confused little deer when she does that even if those soft baby cheeks they teased her about have finally sharpened into cheekbones strong enough to cut yourself against. And then she's pulling you in for a back-breaking hug (and god isn't it so strange to find yourself taller than your big sister now?) and getting snot all over your jacket as she sobs.

It's fine, a dry-cleaning bill is nothing compared to seeing your sister again.

She has to reach up to cup your face between her hands, which gets an instant huff from you. You hadn't….you had completely forgotten she used to do that and squeeze your cheeks and tease you about how adorable you were…

But the look on her face is sorrowful. Maybe it's something in the lines of your face, the permanent shadows under your eyes  but she looks like she's the barest slip away from breaking down in front of you.

"Margit," you begin. "What's the matter?"

She covers her face. "I'm so sorry, you should hate me."

"Hate you?" That takes you aback. "Whatever for? Are you not happy to see me?"

"Of course I am!" Her reply is so strong and full of conviction at your words you can't do anything but blink. Blink at the way she uncovers her face in the moment and you see just how distraughtly she looks at you.

"Then...what?"

Her eyes train themselves furiously on the floor. "...I failed you. Oh, god, I'm so sorry, I failed you so badly, I didn't mean to take my eyes off you in that moment…" She's beginning to hyperventilate.

Pappa is by her side looking concerned and mamma's footsteps are hurrying your way at the commotion.

"Hey, steady now. Don't tell me you blame yourself for what happened?" You were just a kid, a kid more interested in lingering near the toy store than listening to his annoying older sister prattle on with her friends. You were tired and grumpy and too annoyed to listen when she told you to keep up.

You didn't mean to linger behind…

"It was!" Margareta says it with such miserable sincerity that you understand in this very moment that she's indeed been blaming herself for your kidnapping all these years. "I was responsible for you and everything that happened to you and I...I really fucked up. I thought I got you murdered, you have to understand. I thought I had sent you to a painful, horrific death and the last thing I had said to you was how much I hated you for being so annoying."

You take a deep breath. "I won't lie. My life has...not exactly been easy, since. But…" She's looking at you with the most wretched resignation in her eyes, accepting of whatever verdict you pass upon her. "But it's not your fault. You were just a kid then, too. None of us could have known what would happen…"

"He's right," Pappa murmurs. "I don't think anyone could have prepared for the heartbreak that would occur."

You just about manage to hide your wince at his phrasing.

"Things might not ever be the same," -Mamma's voice floats over to the three of you huddled in an impromptu family hug- "But we have a second chance we never thought we'd get. I'm not going to waste the chance to try and build something new together."

A second chance.

Maybe…

Maybe you really have been lingering too much in the past.

Maybe you really should give second chances a go.

"What are you smiling about, Mikke?"

You wipe the tears from your face with a wry expression. "...There's someone I'd like you to meet." ---

You can't see Ricardo's face over the phone but you can certainly imagine his expression.

"Wait, did I hear that right? You want to bring me to meet your family?"

"Yes?"

"It's been a long time coming." He sounds so immeasurably smug. "But since when did you...I didn't even know you had a family anymore?"

You blink. "Did you think I popped out of a tank fully formed?"

"...Maybe?" Okay, that's fair. That's what they told you as well and you're not really certain if it's completely a lie, either. It's possible the other Re-Genes were grown in artificial wombs like they said.

"Well, they're alive and well. And they want to meet whoever's 'got me blushing so hard,' in their words." You are NOT blushing at the memory. Absolutely not.

"You know of course I'd be honoured to. To be honest, I just figured you didn't have a good relationship with them when you told me you didn't have a family all those years ago…"

You smile despite your sigh. "Yeah...I do have a bad habit of saying things that aren't technically lies but might be a bit misleading, don't I?"

"Mikael…" His voice is reproaching. Reproaching, but fond. "We have time to work on that. Unraveling all the secrets between us. This is our second chance, remember?"

You're certain he can hear the smile in your voice.

"Yes. I'd like that." Like to finally be yourself and surrounded by the people you love. "...Our own second chance."