#but gun to my head i'd say spring day.

[tsuncda]

Also I forgot to mention in my last ask but as a BTS army girly myself, I'm so glad you're in your kpop era now too! 😁

iffah!!!!!!!!!! hello old friend, i hope you've been well! also omg you can't just tell me you're army and then not elaborate!!!!! who is your bias? what's your favorite song? are you into any other groups other than bts?

[nsharks]

bleeding blue | part fourteen preview

Blue holds her arm out, stopping you from taking another step.

"Sh. I see one."

Up ahead, a squirrel stills on a tree, beady eyes unblinking. In a matter of seconds, Blue throws her knife and pins it to the bark through the stomach. 

"Nice," you comment. "You got it on the first try this time."

In your hand is the other squirrel she killed for you. Ghost started working on your bow yesterday. He didn't say anything to you about it, but you spotted him sitting on the porch chiseling away at a hunk of oak. Until he's finished, you've struck another deal: helping Blue skin the rabbits in exchange for her killing squirrels with you. She's better at killing them with a knife than you are, and you needed something to get you off the couch, anyway.

"This is good practice for me." She wriggles the knife out and hands you the kill. "Poor guy didn't see it coming."

"Probably better that way."

She slips the knife back to her ankle. "Do you need more? Or is two enough."

"Two is enough. I saw these flowers by the trench that I think are edible."

"You can eat flowers?" She makes a face. The two of you begin heading back toward the camp. You didn't go off too far with her. Ghost said she wasn't allowed to go past the pond without him. Truthfully, you were surprised he let her go with you at all. 

"Yeah. Pink Sorrel. They taste lemony, and I'll add the leaves, too. Like a salad."

"Yum," she says sarcastically. "Did Paul teach you that?"

You nod. "He knew a lot about plants."

"Are you sure he didn't like you?" 

"Blue," you almost groan. "You've asked me this twice now."

"Well, you seemed to have spent a lot of time with him, and he taught you a lot of things."

"You can spend time with someone and learn things from them without... liking them."

"I wouldn't know," she shrugs, waving her hand around. "There are no boys here for me to spend time with besides Ghost." 

There is a pause as a cloud rolls over the sun, turning everything dim before it passes. The weather these past few days has been fluctuating like true spring. Cold showers in the morning, intense sunlight by noon, and clouds that come and go. The cabbages Blue planted have sprouted fat, juicy leaves. You've mentally scolded yourself for not including seeds in your deal with Ghost. 

"So when are you and him going to start training or whatever?" Blue speaks up, switching subjects.

"Training?" you repeat.

"He told me you wanted to learn some things." She glances at you. "Look, let me just warn you, he can be a real hard ass. One time, he made me climb up and down a tree twenty times without stopping. And another time, he made me throw knives over and over until I hit the exact same spot on the tree again."

Right. Somehow, that last request you made of him has slipped your mind. You did ask him to teach you how to better defend yourself against other people.

It's been over a week now, and the two of you still haven't talked much except for the necessities. Honestly, it's probably best that way. Maintaining a clinical relationship with him should keep the peace and maybe even earn more of his trust. You're growing confident that he doesn't see you as much of a threat anymore. Last night, you ran into him again after waking up sweaty at some odd hour, and all he did was walk past you, step outside for a cigarette, and then go back to his room. He didn't seem suspicious of you being up at all.

That said, the reminder of the 'training' he's supposed to give you makes your teeth snag onto your lip. 

When you don't respond, Blue adds, "What exactly do you want him to show you? I hate to say it, but I don't think he'll give you one of his guns."

"No," you shake your head. "I don't want that. It's not Greys that I'm as worried about. As long I've got distance, I can use my bow for them. It's more about... other people. They get close. Too close."

"Well, you can always bite their nose off," she gives a bump to your shoulder.

You cringe. "I'd rather not have to do that again."

She pauses, looking at her boots. "What did it taste like?"

"Fucking awful. Probably the grossest thing I've ever experienced."

She looks up. "If you were a Grey, you would've loved it."

"Well, I'm human still, and I much prefer these guys." You wag the dead squirrels in front of her face and she laughs. If you could replace all her tears with that sound, you would.

"You still haven't answered my question," Blue tilts her head. "When are you getting started? Because I have some training in mind for you, too."

You arch a brow but don't question it. "Um. I don't know. Ghost hasn't said anything to me about it, and he's busy working on my bow right now."

"Why don't you ask him, then?" She shoots you a knowing smirk. "Are you scared of him, Twix?"

"No," you say all too quickly. "No... I'm not. I just don't know how to talk to him. He's not exactly approachable."

"Just do what I do. I say whatever I want to him. Except when he's pissed, then—" she freezes for a moment and lays a hand on your shoulder. "—it's better to shut up and listen. Believe me."

You speak under your breath. "Noted."

[allbark-no-bite]

Guilty Conscience || Rafe Cameron x reader

summary: the guilty don’t sleep. nor do their girlfriends

warnings: mentions of death/murder

word count: 1.1k

author’s note: set in season 2. this one is one i posted on Wattpad a while back

It's late. Too late to still be awake but the muffled foot steps of Rafe's constant, on-edge pacing have managed to pry my eyes open to the darkness of his bedroom yet again. The soft tread of his bare feet makes a muffled sound against the expensive carpet, and pauses briefly every few seconds while he stands there, biting the edge of his finger nail with his other arm crossed over his chest, and then repeats the process.

He and Ward had returned mid afternoon from the Bahamas with a police escort, both looking worse for wear. I hadn't wanted him to go in the first place, but Rafe had reassured me he needed to do this for his dad, and that everything would be fine. They were supposed to get the gold and come home. Instead they came back empty handed and Rafe even more unnerved than before.

I close my eyes again, wondering how we could have possibly ended up in this situation. And whether there is a special place in hell reserved for the girlfriends of murders.

Rafe killed Sheriff Peterkins that day on the tarmac, no amount of denial is going to change that. No matter how hard I close my eyes, it isn't going to change the fact that I saw him raise the gun, his finger squeeze back on the trigger—

Thunder booms outside and my eyes fly back open. Earlier's ominous looking storm clouds that have been looming threateningly since this evening have finally come through on their promise of a summer shower. Not long after the weather sets in do I realize that Rafe's footsteps have been replaced by the patter of rain against the window pane.

The bed dips beneath me and the springs underneath groan in protest as he crawls back into bed. I shift positions as he wraps his arms around my waist from behind, his chin coming to settle between the crook of my neck. Rafe lets out a long, slow breath from his nose and it sounds like it carries the weight of a thousand worries.

I hug one of his plush pillows tighter to my chest. The one that isn't holding the pillow twists the golden signet ring on his finger.

I watch the rain drops as they slide down one by one and leave blurry streaks along the foggy glass window while listening to the rush of air against my ear as he breathes unevenly, never quite falling into the rhythmic pattern of sleep.

A while later, Rafe's head lifts from the safe crevice of my shoulder and his body partially pushes away from me. The comforter rummages as we both move again, and I roll over onto my other side to face him. The dark bedroom has turned his blue eyes a pale grey, but even so I can see the haunting ghosts of doubt and anxiety filling his gaze. There are shadows of half blue moons stamped under his eyes. Sleep has not been his friend.

"I—I need you to tell me that I'm a good person," Rafe whispers, finally breaking the silence. The mattress creaks underneath his weight as he uses his forearm to prop himself up, leaning partly over me. "It doesn't matter if you mean it or not, please— I just need to hear you say it," he says, sounding so broken and unsure of himself.

The request is almost enough to send the sinner inside of me to my knees. I've watched him struggle with his own mind for months now, fighting an internal battle that I know he can't win and I can't fight for him, no matter how badly I want to.

Ward's been in his head for so long now that most days I'm just picking up the shambles of the broken son he's neglected for years. Sarah was always his golden child, there's no denying that. I know it, Rafe knows it, Sarah knows it.

"You let everyone convince you that you're some kind of heartless murder and you're not," I whisper, gazing up at him.

This I believed. Sure, Rafe was a jerk, I'd known that when I met him, but he was a jerk who could press his lips to my neck, teeth grazing my skin and whisper that he loved me; even when he wasn't sure if he was capable of anything else.

My hand finds his cheek and brushes some of the blonde hair away from his eyes. There's a bruise there that I don't remember him having and a part of me wonders what really happened in the Bahamas.

A painful, miserable looking smile finds its way onto his face, and just once, he laughs into the darkness of his bedroom. "No. I'm just the regular kind of murder."

The soft, hopeful expression falters from my own face and I sigh, letting my forehead fall against his with my eyes closed.

It was hard, sometimes too hard, to admit that he wasn't wrong. Which of course always lead to a reinvestigation of my own conscience and why I was doing this. Why would I lie by omission, never think to say any different when Ward and Rafe gave their statements to the police, faking his innocence. My answer to this question, I find is always the same; because I loved him and I was afraid of what Ward would put him through if I left. He's told Rafe that he would never pick between his children, but I've seen him lie to Rafe enough times to know it was just something he said to cover his tracks.

Ward had done this to him, forced Rafe into lying and thinking that what he was doing was being loyal and helping his family, because he knew that all Rafe ever wanted was for his dad to look at him the same way he looked at Sarah. It was never about trying to protect himself or getting revenge. 

Rafe clings to me, falling into a more relaxed position as he settles himself on top of me. His body is warm and comfortingly heavy a top my chest. My finger tips gently scratch his scalp, something that's seemed to calm him in the past. After a while I wonder if he's fallen asleep, but then the soft tone of his voice speaks.

"When this is all over, I'm going to be better," he promises, speaking into the blue fabric of the borrowed cotton shirt that I'm wearing. His lips press to my collarbone in a subdued kiss and Rafe looks up at me. There's a firmness in his voice, like he's trying to be strong. "I'm gonna man up and get right."

Man up, I think. Yeah sure.

My palm cups his chin, my thumb caressing the bruise on his jaw. I don't say anything, just smile sadly at him and he returns the same type of half-hearted expression. My throat clenches. We both know that it's a weak promise.

"You're in too deep this time, you know that?" I'm fighting my own voice at this point. Incredibly, it doesn't break.

"I know, I know."

[strangersteddierthings]

Gut Instinct: Chapter 3 - Friday

[Art] [Ao3] [Prologue] [Chapter One] [Chapter Two] [Interlude] [Chapter Three]

As suspected, Dustin and Robin are loitering near the gym doors, awaiting their rides. "What would you two have done if I'd kept my date instead, huh?"

"Like that would stop me from getting a ride," Robin says.

"Nancy would have taken me home," Dustin says with a grin and a shrug of his shoulders.

Steve rolls his eyes and does his best to look annoyed even when all he feels is fond. "Alright, let's go. Dustin gets shotgun."

"Yes!"

"What!? Why?"

"I ruined Dustin's game tonight. This is me groveling," Steve answers as he leads them to where he parked earlier that afternoon. They're arguing behind him as they follow, but he's not listening. Now that all the excitement of the night has ended, and the rolling of his insides has settled, he remembers the weird waking nightmare thing.

Once at his car, he unlocks the passenger side door, opening it for Dustin who gives him a suspicious look before climbing in. Steve reaches down, presses the unlock button for the rest of the doors, then shuts Dustin in.

"Robbie, can you stay the night?"

"I have to! I have so many questions. Like, what happened to Heidi-"

"Brenda"

"-why you came into the gym with a herd of nerds, and why you chased Eddie down," Robin finishes as if he hadn't even corrected the name of his date. Not date? Whatever.

"Great. Climb in," Steve says and rounds the car to climb into the driver's seat. He can see Robin fumbling around with her trumpet in the back, having shoved the instrument in first but not far enough to be out of her way.

"If you guys need to have a private conversation, you can just tell me. I'll plug my ears," Dustin gripes.

"No, you won't," Steve and Robin say at the same time.

Dustin doesn't argue. He makes a 'fair enough' face and shrugs his shoulders. "True."

Once they're all buckled in, Steve heads off. He drops Dustin off first. Robin doesn't opt for jumping into the vacated seat just yet. Instead, they sit in the quiet of the radio, even though they're both wound up with the need to talk about the day, neither of them wants to start the conversation in the car. They'll both get lost in it and end up sitting out front of Robin's house for hours.

He stops at Robin's so she can change and leave the trumpet in her room. Probably also tell her parents she's going to be staying over. It doesn't take too long before he watches her shout a goodbye to her parents. He sees she's changed directly into her sleep attire; sleep pants and what looks like a shirt she stole from him.

She flings the car door open and throws a very full backpack between their seats, a strap on the bag whipping Steve in the shoulder.

"Ow! Hey!"

"It barely got you," Robin pulls the door shut gently, though, so Steve accepts her apology. After buckling in she adds, "just be lucky it was just the strap. That thing's heavy. My textbooks are still in there."

"Why?" he asks as he puts the car in drive and starts the drive home.

"I'm in two classes that don't believe in the break part of spring break," Robin groans, flopping back against the seat. "I might get some work done after you fall asleep at nine tonight, or whenever it is your old man body gives out."

"I'm not old!"

"Last time I stayed over you went to bed at eight."

"Because I was up all night the night before helping Erica with-"

"I've heard your excuses, not convinced. You are an old man now, Steve. You've got bills to pay and a lawn to mow and everything. Old people problems."

"I hate you. Why do I let you come to my house again?"

"Our house. And because you invite me. Like all the time. It's like your obsessed with me or something," she shoots him a cheeky grin before sitting up so she can reach the radio. "No wonder Dustin thinks we should date."

"Not to jump the gun but if you still need to get married to get cheaper college tuition you know I'll do it."

Robin gasps. "Steven Harrington. Are you proposing to me on this beautiful spring night? Obviously, yes. Cheaper college, and then when you disappear under mysterious circumstances after I graduate, I won't even have to worry about a mortgage or anything. Just me, the Harrington inheritance, and my mistress, lounging by the pool."

He barks a laugh that Robin quickly joins. They ride in a comfortable quiet, just the radio playing.

Steve parks in the driveway, like usual, and Robin complains about him not using the garage and he says it's just an old habit from needing to keep the garage clear for his parents. An old conversation they have every now and then as they enter the house and make their way inside.

Robin heads right for the living room and Steve jogs up the stairs to change into his own pajamas. Soon enough, they are both settled in the couch, with Back to the Future playing on the TV for background noise. A joke choice that became less of a joke with each serious conversation they have while it plays in the background. It's why Robin is now looking at him, serious but not concerned, because it was the movie he put in.

"Spill," she demands as she snuggles into his side, pointedly not looking at him, which Steve is grateful for. It's easier for him to gather his thoughts when he's not trying to decipher what every expression on her face might mean.

"I. Well, two things. There are two things to talk about. I just don't know which one first."

"Well, I wanna know how you got the entire Nerd Herd to follow you into a basketball game."

Steve chuckles, "Yeah. It's... yeah. I guess both things tie in together. Um, so, I'll just talk about it in the order everything happened and you can interrupt as needed?"

"Oh don't worry, I'll interrupt," Robin says.

So, Steve starts talking. He starts with Dustin calling him to come fill in for Hellfire, about how he'd gotten so nauseous when he barely even thought about saying no that he'd almost thrown up, and about how he'd seen something this time. He can't really recall what it was he saw now but he tries to describe it anyway. "Just, like... Umm, there was a clock. And a cassette? And the school colors, I think? But the part I remember most is Dustin sobbing. Like. Full on crying the hardest a person can. I've never even seen him sniffle with the shit we've seen. Robbie, I'm fucking terrified of whatever makes Dustin cry."

She grabs ones of his hands, sandwiching it between her two but doesn't speak, so he continues.

He recaps the day; agreeing to play, arguing with and then apologizing to Eddie, getting Hellfire to postpone and go to the game instead, helping Eddie load what they'd need to play at Steve's house into the van. He doesn't leave out a single detail. and ends with, "so, I think I might have a crush on Eddie 'The Freak' Munson."

Robin makes active listening noised the entire time he's talking, but the loudest is the gasp she lets out when he's done. "No!"

Her shout makes him jump. "No? What, why no?"

"I mean, not no, like, no not him, but no as is in why."

Steve sputters, indignant, "yeah, okay, says the girl who wanted to be the future Mrs. Tammy Thompson."

She huffs and pulls away, twisting to sit sideways on the sofa, facing him. She pulls a knee up to hug and just looks at him for a moment. "Bad crushes aside, what, um, how are we feeling, about what you saw?"

"Bad," Steve answers immediately. "I feel very bad about it but, like, in a useless way. I don't know what that was."

"It was you seeing-"

"If you say I was seeing the future, I swear on Dustin's mom-"

"Steve. What does your gut say about it?"

He frowns at her, "it doesn't work like that."

"Well, it kinda does. Think about ignoring whatever you saw. Pretending it never happened. You never plan to do anything about it."

With a huff, he does that. Mostly to humor her, because it doesn't work that way- except. Except it does work exactly that way. When he's thinking about doing something, a specific something, that's exactly when his body lets him know. And the thought of pretending he never saw any of it brings a wave of nausea through him just as bad as when he first saw it.

The problem now is that Steve has no idea what to do with this information. He tells Robin as much.

[grandpeachpersona]

It's A Man's World Chapter 4 (Drip)

a/n: I rewrote this chapter 2 or 3 times. I personally think it's not my best, but I hope you like it let me know in my ask ;)

Daft Day

Here we are, the anticipation of Draft Day hanging thick in the air. Don’t even think about asking me what happened after the party or the following day—I honestly can’t remember. I really should add "Don’t Party with the Bengals" to my ever-growing list of things to avoid.

A knock pulls me out of my thoughts “Hey Sierra, you ready? Kyle is here!” Joe’s voice calls out from the other side of the bathroom door, breaking my moment of reflection. 

I do one last check in the mirror, smoothing down my hair and adjusting my outfit before reluctantly opening the door. “Yeah, I’m ready,” I reply, a hint of excitement mixed with nerves in my tone.

“What do you think?”  I asked as I stepped out of the bathroom. I do a little spin to show off my ensemble. I had chosen not to wear a dress, instead opting for a tailored black blazer adorned with elegant gold decorations cascading down the shoulders. Paired with a sleek, short skirt featuring matching gold accents that gave a hint of sparkle, I feel chic and ready for the moment. To complete the look, I slipped on a pair of black heels that added just the right amount of height. 

He looks at me from his spot on the couch “You look stunning just missing one thing” he says as he gets up and approaches me. He reaches up and takes the of his chain off his neck “Turn around” he tells me. 

This boy here is doing things to my soul and he just doesn't even know it. Doing as he says I turn around and he puts his chain on me. He turns me back around “Now you dripping in gold”  

Shaking my head unable to find words I grab my clutch as he moves away and opens the door “Come on Ja’marr and Mia are waiting on us.”

When we arrived at the arena. One of the crew members led us to a section where Mia and Ja’marr were waiting for us.   

We exchange warm hugs and enthusiastic hellos, settling in comfortably on the plush couch. As I take a moment to look around the room, I can't help but notice the sea of nervous excitement among the crowd of players, all waiting for their futures to unfold during the draft. Suddenly, a rush of nerves hits me, and I start shaking my leg unconsciously, trying to calm my racing thoughts.

In my fidgeting, I unintentionally nudge Mia, who looks over at me with concern. “Hey, you okay?” she asks, her brow slightly furrowed.

I nod and glance at her, taking a deep breath. “Yeah, just a bit nervous,” I admit, trying to shake off the anxiety.

She grabs my hand “Just breathe you probably have all 32 teams gunning for you” she reassures me “Any team you're specifically looking for?” Ja’marr questioned. I shake my head “Not really although I would love to go back home and play for the Cardinals don't think I'd grow too much there” I respond with a shrug.

‘Hey maybe the Reds will draft her that way she can't leave Cincinnati” Joe pipes in with a laugh. 

I looked back at him “Naw me cold weather don't get along” 

“Girl no weather and you get along” Mia interjects we all laugh because she is right Winter, Spring, Summer, and Fall if I wasn't playing baseball you have to catch me in the comforts of my bed. 

As we continue to share laughs and stories, the lights suddenly dim, and a dynamic video package begins to play on the large screen, showcasing the highs of previous seasons and the promise of new talent.

The energy in the room surges as the hype package concludes, and the spotlight shifts to the stage. The commissioner of the MLB, Rob Manfred, strides confidently onto the platform, radiating authority and excitement.

“Hello and welcome to the 2021 MLB Draft!” he announces, his voice echoing throughout the arena. “Tonight, we usher in a new era of baseball. You all have worked tirelessly for this moment, and now it’s time to see your dreams become reality. Let’s get started, shall we?” Rob declares from the podium, setting the stage for an unforgettable night.

The first round has concluded, and the results are in—nothing for me. 

As the second round begins, the atmosphere remains tense, and yet, I cling to the flicker of hope that perhaps my name will be called. 

When the third round rolls around, I hear another name—a person named Riley is chosen. My heart sinks as I realize I’m still overlooked. 

Now, as the fourth round draws closer, a wave of anxiety washes over me. I navigate through the crowd, feeling the pulse of anticipation in the air. I approach the bar, the gleaming surface reflecting my apprehension, and the bartender looks up, asking, “What can I get you?”

“Whiskey, straight, please. Thank you,” I respond, my voice steady yet laced with underlying nerves.

She nods, her movements fluid as she prepares my drink. “Coming right up,” she says, and moments later, she slides the glass toward me.

I inhale deeply, trying to release some of the built-up tension. “Thank you,” I say, accepting the drink from her with a slight, grateful smile. 

As I take a generous sip, the smooth warmth of the whiskey hits my stomach, providing a momentary reprieve from my anxious thoughts. Just then, I have the unsettling sensation that someone is watching me intently. Turning my head to the right, I lock eyes with a man making his way over, and his approach feels predatory as if I’m the target in his sights.

“I hope I'm not intruding,” he begins, leaning against the bar with a casual confidence, “but I must say, you look absolutely stunning tonight.” His tone is suave, designed to charm.

I muster a polite smile, aware that I want to deflect this interaction as quickly as possible. “Thank you,” I say, deliberately avoiding his gaze, trying to focus on anything but him.

“My name’s Chris,” he introduces himself, extending his hand toward me with an expectant grin. I glance at his hand, assessing the situation, before shaking my head gently. “Sorry, Chris, but I’m really not interested,” I reply softly, retreating into my glass as I seek refuge in my drink.

He draws back his hand and smirks playfully at me, his confidence evident. “Playing hard to get, I see,” he teases, leaning slightly closer.

I shake my head firmly, dismissing him. “Nope, just not looking for any extra company,” I reply, keeping my tone plain and simple as I mentally strategize my exit from this awkward interaction.

“You sure? You just seem tense,” he probes, inching even closer for comfort.

Before I can formulate a response, I suddenly feel a reassuring hand pressed against the middle of my back. A familiar voice cuts through the noise. “Wonder where you drifted off to. You okay?” Joe asks, his concern palpable.

I turn my head to face him, grateful for his interruption. “Yeah, I’m good. I just needed something to calm my nerves,” I respond, a sense of relief washing over me as his presence provides a buffer.

Joe nods, his expression softening. He motions with his head toward our group. “Come on,” he says, gently leading the way while keeping his hand on my back—a gesture that provides unexpected comfort. As we return to our section and settle into the couch, I lean closer to Joe and whisper, “Thank you.”

Joe takes a seat beside me, casually draping his arm behind me on the back of the couch. His protective stance envelops me in a sense of security.

“Not a problem,” he replies, though there’s a slight edge to his voice that piques my curiosity. 

Was he feeling jealous?

I don’t have much time to ponder this question, as the lights in the venue dim once again, signaling the beginning of the fourth round of the MLB Draft. The anticipation in the air is almost electric.

Rob makes his way back to the podium, confidence radiating from him. “Alright, with the first pick of the fourth round of the 2021 MLB Draft, the Atlanta Braves select…” He glances down at his card, and a broad smile spreads across his face, crafting suspense in the room.

“Sierra Riley, shortstop out of LSU!”

The moment his words register, my heart races. I can hardly believe my ears. Suddenly, everyone around me is on their feet, applauding and cheering, and I feel like I’m floating. Someone pinch me, please—I must be dreaming!

As I stand up, I look at Mia, my heart pounding with disbelief, and mouth the words, “What the hell?” She chuckles, sharing in my incredulity. Joe steps aside, allowing me a clear path to the stage. As I stroll past him, he encourages me with a smile, saying, “Get ’em, superstar!”

I can’t help but grin back at him as I make my way to the stage, ascending the steps with a mixture of excitement and nerves. At the top, I’m greeted by Justin Bell, the manager of the Atlanta Braves, who stands ready with a baseball jersey and a Braves cap.

With a beaming smile, I approach him and wrap my arms around him in a brief hug. “Thank you so much!” I exclaim, my voice filled with genuine appreciation.

He pulls back slightly, maintaining eye contact as he responds, “You’re very welcome, Sierra.” Justin then carefully places the baseball cap on my head, his hands steady as he unfolds the jersey to reveal my last name and number, now emblazoned on a Braves jersey.

At that moment, words escape me entirely, and I shake my head in disbelief, overwhelmed by the reality of it all. Just then, I feel another hand on my shoulder. I turn to see the commissioner standing beside me, a warm smile on his face. “Congrats, Sierra,” he says, genuine joy in his voice.

“Thank you,” I manage to say, still absorbing the significance of this incredible moment. The commissioner's voice breaks through the fog of excitement as he gestures toward the cameras, encouraging me to pose with the jersey. I reflexively smile, showcasing my pride.

As I scan the room, my eyes land on Joe, whose face is illuminated by a broad smile. I see Mia, her eyes glistening with tears of joy, and Ja’marr cheering enthusiastically, like he’s at a football game.

In that instant, it hits me: all the hard work, the sacrifices, and the endless dedication truly do pay off.

As I made my way backstage, the atmosphere buzzed with excitement. One of the reporters from ESPN, eager and enthusiastic, pulled me aside for an interview.

"Sierra Riley, congratulations! You've just made history as the first woman ever to be drafted in Major League Baseball. Can you describe how you’re feeling at this moment?" she inquired, her eyes gleaming with curiosity.

I couldn't help but smile widely. "Thank you so much! Honestly, I feel incredibly blessed right now," I said, taking a moment to gather my thoughts. "It’s overwhelming, and part of me feels like my brain hasn’t fully processed everything yet,” I laughed lightly, shaking my head in disbelief. “But overall, I feel fantastic!"

The reporter leaned in for his next question, clearly intrigued. "What should Atlanta Braves fans expect from you moving forward?"

With confidence, I responded, "I hope they can expect all great things! I want them to know that I don’t take any of this for granted. This moment is huge for me, but it’s just the beginning of my story. I’m ready to work hard and make my mark!"

She nodded in appreciation, her face reflecting genuine excitement. "Thank you once again, and congratulations on this incredible achievement!” she exclaimed brightly before walking away, leaving me buzzing with a mix of joy and anticipation for what lay ahead.

Atlanta here I come.

Chapter 4...Batter Up...

[jackwolfes]

follow on from read me poetry by dead men

(tw: major character death)

There's a funny sort of camaraderie to being dead, actually.

Time is a flattened spring, and the moment Jesper dies is the same moment everyone else he loves does, too. He doesn't know how many years there have been between the moments. Many, he'd have to assume. It doesn't matter much to him, though, and time is a fickle thing.

First comes leather, the petrichor smell of rain and cobblestones, a hurricane, gunpowder, black coffee, toffee apples. He says nothing, but he doesn't need to because the cord between their hearts has never needed to be spoken to remain iron forged.

Besides, that isn't how death works.

“You know, I assumed I went to heaven,” says Jesper, “but if you're here does that mean we all ended up in hell?”

“My mother did not go to hell,” Wylan retorts, affronted.

“If I have to listen to you two whinging for the rest of eternity then I'd say this is hell.”

The raspy edge to Kaz’s voice is a familiar song. Jesper can't hear it without feeling the thrill in his chest when they first met each other in a cold Barrel alley, bloody and bruised with the rush of a fight coursing through their beating hearts. Jesper blinks and sees him living, a halo of sin and a thousand magnificent potential ends framed around his dark hair and boyish face. He was beautiful then and beautiful, in a strange and faintly nostalgic way, now.

When Jesper blinks he's there again, that cold alley with sideways rain and the crash of Ketterdam's revelers on the Stave and his spine slamming into a brick wall. Something wet drips from the back of his neck, rain or blood. He doesn't know. All he feels is a forearm keeping him pinned to the wall by the throat and another hand rifling through his pockets as he tries and fails to kick them. His chin smarts from the place the first thug punched him in the face.

Then the weight on his chest disappears. Someone screams. Jesper grabs his guns and aims with no intent to kill but cocks them anyway because he wants to scare. A force to be reckoned with — a sea storm — a demon — is on both the bastards before Jesper can figure out who's who. Then a gunshot sounds and the familiar fire of a bullet graze tears through Jesper's arm, enough to slice through his shirt and send a thrill dancing up his spine. The boy with the cane is grappling with them, desperate and raw. Jesper spins his pistol and shoots the hand of the grunt who'd been pinning him, inches away from the face of whoever the hell shoved them off Jesper to begin with.

The next thing he knows they're running and his wallet is in a puddle on the cobblestones. Jesper stoops down and grabs it, breathing heavily, then touches the back of his head. No blood.

“If you shot first I wouldn't have had to come out of my way to keep you alive,” a raspy voice says.

(One day, unlike that day, Kaz Brekker will lead him into a fight that ends with blood and broken bits of bone in the place his skull meets his neck; one day, Jesper will follow Kaz right to his death. But one day — today — tomorrow — yesterday — Kaz will die too, and they'll be together again. Time is a flattened spring.)

Jesper looks up at this boy, this monster, and knows from the very beginning that he'll do horrible, wonderful things for him.

[antisocialxconstruct]

some GC writing I'd been on the fence about posting because [vague static sounds] but I think it provides some important context for the other thing I want to post... tomorrow, maybe. So:

5.3k, Maksim reacts poorly to Ilya saying extremely normal things (aka Maksim Experiences The Horrors). Nothing really to warn for here... some brief extremely oblique references to why Maksim has issues with physical intimacy.

This takes place after Ilya's "conversation", and before the interrogation.

---

The first time he told Ilya where his apartment was they laughed. "So do you ever eat," they had asked, "or do all your payouts go into the rent?"

And he had simply explained, "I got lucky. They were running a deal," and left out the skull-splitting migraine he nursed for two days after manufacturing that deal in the mind of the property manager.

Ilya still wrinkled their nose at the thought of whatever upper-crust snobs he must be surrounded by, and assured him (unprompted) that he would never have to worry about unannounced visits because they wouldn't be caught dead in a neighborhood like that. So it's a relief to see them standing very much alive in the hallway, albeit bristling and out of place, but it is equally a curiosity. At least they kept their promise that it wouldn't be unannounced. [Where are you] had been an unexpected enough text to receive at two in the afternoon that he’d followed up immediately.

>[Home]

[Boring. Door #?]

And he’d told them, and half an hour later they were on his doorstep.

He wants to question them, or at least rib them a little for debasing themself enough to set foot in Oceanview, but this is an uncomfortable intersection of two very different sides of his life and he also wants them out of view of any prying neighbors. Before he says anything he steps back and beckons them in with a tilt of his head.

Ilya doesn’t immediately volunteer an explanation either, hovering only a few paces past the door as Maksim retreats back to the couch, where his manhunter lays field stripped and half cleaned on the coffee table. He spares them another glance as he sets about wiping down the frame, saying, “there’s no one you need to impress here.”

“This is so weird,” Ilya muses, turning in place to take in his living room before finally meandering closer to his place on the couch. “It doesn’t even look like anyone lives here.”

Maksim blinks, looking up at them again with a puzzled scowl. He sits back to gesture at himself, at the gun and the kit in front of him, a wordless statement of little more than I’m literally sitting here.

Ilya snorts. “You know what I mean. It’s… I don’t know, sterile?”

“It’s clean,” Maksim volleys back. “I don’t believe you came all the way here just to judge my decor.”

“No…” Ilya’s gaze begins to wander again, and now that Maksim is watching them more closely he suspects it’s not just the unfamiliar surroundings making them tense. There’s something in the way they’re holding themself, the way their eyes dart back to him and then flick away again… a question hanging in the air between them. Eventually, somewhere in their nervous inspection of his space, they find it. “Did anything… happen last night? I had the weirdest conversation at the bar, after the run, I haven’t been able to shake it.”

Maksim cants his head, giving them an analytical once-over. By now he knows what a noteworthy ‘conversation’ at the bar entails, but he also knows the extent of Ilya’s resilience. Still there’s an impressive bruise sprawled across one side of their jaw, fresh enough to stand out dark against their tan skin and telling the story of at least one blow that would have been heavy enough to lay out someone with even marginally less chrome. He drops his attention back down to his original task, turning his attention to the barrel and spring assembly as he says, “weird enough to send you home with quite a headache, I assume.”

Ilya manages a laugh and a nonchalant roll of their shoulders in spite of their obvious discomfort. “I mean it was nothing I couldn’t handle. One suit and some muscle, way too far from their own turf.”

“How far?” Maksim prompts, a smile flitting across his own features as he fits the manhunter’s slide back together. Ilya’s tension was starting to leak into the room, he’d rather keep them on a subject they’re comfortable with.

“Man, I don’t know,” they say, exhaling a sharp puff of air. “Sounded like UCAS somewhere… east coast, maybe?”

And the smile gets wicked away as a chill pours itself down Maksim’s spine. He doesn’t look up.

It could be a coincidence.

If it was, why would Ilya come to him with it? What are they angling at?

The manhunter comes back together with the soft scrape of metal on polymer. He steals another glance at them without moving his head, and both the initial unease and the subsequent brashness are gone, replaced by a look he can’t interpret in the brief moment he has to examine it.

It can’t be a coincidence. They know what they’re doing.

“I can’t imagine what they would be looking for in California,” he remarks.

“Actually the suit was asking about you.”

Maksim grits his teeth, hoping it doesn’t show on his face the way those six words just turned his stomach. The silence settles too fast and too heavy between them, punctuated only by a hollow click as Maksim points the newly reassembled pistol at the floor and pulls the trigger. Racks the slide, does it again.

Calm, controlled. Everything operating as it should.

It was only a matter of time until they tracked him down again, he knows that. It’s a bad sign that they’re close enough on his trail to know they could get to him through Ilya… They’ve never tried anything like that before, but then he never stayed in one place long enough to have contacts before. It’s a worse sign that Ilya is here now, holding this over him, waiting for… for what? For him to negotiate? To beg? There’s no reason to panic yet, though. He can salvage this. And if he can’t… He slots the magazine back into place, sets the manhunter down deliberately on the table in front of him, and finally looks up to meet Ilya's gaze.

“What did he offer you?”

Ilya's poker face is at least as good as his, but he catches the subtle hint, the furrowing of their brow as their gaze darts to the gun and then back to him. Not quite unease… confusion? This is a gambit they’ve seen before, they should understand what he’s signaling. I’m not escalating, but I’m prepared to. Their voice sounds uncharacteristically hesitant as they ask, "does that matter?"

Maksim takes in a slow breath through his nose, exhales as he rolls his eyes. "Of course it matters," he says, with all the patience he can muster. "You don't have to be coy about this, if I can beat whatever they're offering you I'd rather-"

“Maksim.” There’s something in Ilya’s voice that stops him short, some tone he doesn’t think he’s heard before. Not from them. They’re wearing the bemusement more openly now, but underneath it, he thinks there’s something else. “Did you think I was shopping for a better offer? I’m not just gonna sell you out like that.”

That’s not what he was expecting, and for what feels even to him like an uncomfortably long moment Maksim just stares. He figured there were only two ways this conversation could go, but they’re already off-script. Something… shifts, a thin fissure opening up between the calm and control he'd weighed himself down with. Some sort of unnamed discomfort bubbles up out of it and he tries to swallow it back. “Why…?” he asks, and he hates the way he can hear his own voice waver.

Ilya frowns, furrowing their brow and cocking their head at him like he’s speaking gibberish. “Because we’re a team…? I don’t… is this a problem?”

The discomfort continues to well up into Maksim’s chest despite his efforts to bury it, congealing into a sort of dread, a certainty that something is wrong. A problem. This is a problem. “Yes,” he blurts and winces, instantly regretting the honesty as his eyes fall searchingly to the floor as he presses the back of his hand to his mouth. He feels sick, like the dread is going to spill over, viscous and far too real. Ilya’s chuckle in response is brief and uncertain, and when Maksim holds their gaze again, whatever they see in his expression evaporates that momentary attempt at mirth.

“Why? I’m… I don’t get it.” 

No more than a second’s hesitation. He drops his hand back into his lap. “Because I-” but this time the answer breaks apart on Maksim’s lips in a burst of self doubt. Because I thought we both agreed that was the arrangement. Because it’s what I would do in your place. It’s this thought that ricochets back out of his subconscious, twisted into a question he doesn’t want to answer, and his next breath comes short and quick, accompanied by a sudden stab of fear.

Wouldn’t I?

It only takes that momentary uncertainty for the dam to break on the terrible reality of the situation, for all the other inevitable questions to come flooding in after it. Did the dynamic change? When? What signs did he miss? Where do they stand now? What is Ilya expecting of him? How has he failed them already? How does he get out of this?

A wave of lightheaded nausea crests over him and he leans forward, trying to ignore the sensation that he’s about to pitch himself off the couch onto the floor. The horror pooling in his chest is hardening, crystalizing, jagged against his ribs as it presses the air out of his lungs. Elbows braced on his knees and thumbs pressed to his temples, he stares hard down at the pistol in front of him. Not with any sort of intent, simply because it’s the easiest thing to focus on that isn’t Ilya. It’s the only thing in his immediate perception that seems stable. The next words he speaks come out small and strangled. “You need to…  can you leave?”

He doesn't look up but he can hear Ilya take a step closer. "Look, if you just tell me what-"

"Ilya, can you just leave?" he says again, a little sharper, a little louder this time. He's well past the point of being able to construct a better counter-argument. He has to fight back the temptation to dig a telepathic hand into their brain and make them leave, whether they want to or not. If he didn’t already feel like he was going to be sick… Instead he appends the request with a single word. "Please?"

Maybe it's the fact that he’s begging that settles things. Maybe it's the way he keeps involuntarily flexing his claws, fingers laced together over his brow so he can feel the carbon fiber tips pricking against the backs of his hands. The silence stretches out into several long, uncomfortable seconds before he finally hears Ilya turn, retreat to the front door without a single word more, and step out. The door latches softly behind them and the only company Maksim has left is the sound of his own ragged breathing.

What is this…?

What this is, is bad. He’s been on the run for over two years, dodging repercussions for something he still firmly maintains he didn’t do but never managed to shake off anyway. Something that broke some part of him, permanently warped his relationship to his own body. He doesn’t even know for sure who’s coming after him, what kind of retribution they’re looking for, he only knows that they’re persistent. He can’t run any further west than San Francisco, and if they kept up with him through three different territories it won’t matter if he starts going north or south next. They’re close, practically breathing down his neck, and they’re playing by different rules now. Rules he doesn’t know and can’t defend against.

And right now he can’t worry about any of that.

Because right now the problem is Ilya.

This… this has happened before–the confidence, the certainty that he understood the parameters of a relationship and was working within them, and the gut-churning elevator drop of realizing all at once that he was wrong. When a girl in his teen social circle had declared to the rest of their friends that they were dating he’d gone along with it, did all the things he understood fell under the label of “boyfriend,” and six months later when she justified cheating on him on the basis that he didn’t take her out enough for it to be a “real” relationship, he conceded and assured her they didn’t need to be in a fake relationship either. When an artist in Rostov had become enamored with him, he’d agreed to steal away to the studio whenever he could to play the role of muse, and after a year and a half when the artist confessed he had never once felt that Maksim was truly “present” with him despite their time together, he apologized for wasting the man’s time and then stopped showing up. After the army he’d spent the better part of his travels across Europe in lockstep with a fellow hitchhiker, only for them to become irate at being rebuffed when they tried to act on the “signals'' Maksim hadn’t been aware he was sending. By then he had concluded that the only safe way to navigate any encounter was to project outward what he had always felt but internalized as an inappropriate response to new people–flat, passive disinterest. The last time a fellow runner had remarked on how much ze valued their friendship, and wondered if Maksim might ever want more out of it, he had been quick to clarify that he had never thought of them as friends.

It’s difficult to say how long he sits there, bent forward on the couch and floundering in the mire of his own thoughts, but by the time his heartbeat and breathing have leveled out and he feels like he can move without fainting, the afternoon light has fully given way to the soft rusty hues of a California evening.

He stands, unsteady at first, and shuffles away from the couch to stretch the tension out of his limbs. He needs to move, he needs to do anything else. After a bit of aimless pacing he finds himself in the kitchen, rifling through the cabinets for the unopened bottle of whiskey that a neighbor had presented as a housewarming gift, which then got shuffled away into a back corner because Maksim didn’t bother explaining to her that he doesn’t drink.

Anymore. He doesn’t drink anymore. But under the circumstances…

He uncovers it eventually, pours a couple fingers into the first glass he finds, downs it, coughs as it hits the back of his throat with a vengeance. It’s a blessing that he’s in the apartment alone, grimacing through the mid-tier burn of his first drink in two years. But it blankets his nerves enough to tamp down the burst of nervous energy, and the second shot softens the focus around the brittle edges of his thoughts just enough for him to be willing to face them again. He does the third pour the courtesy of actually sipping it as he sinks back into the pits of unwelcome self-reflection.

He always had a simple solution for this, for every fool who thought they were close when he thought he was being cold, every asshole who thought they were enemies when he thought he was being civil–disengage. Whatever the dynamic was, abandon it, let it dissolve, never think about it again. He’d never invested himself in any relationship–romantic, platonic, or work-related–so much that he wasn’t willing to end it at a moment’s notice, so if the other party didn’t like it, what did he care? He’d tried that once with Ilya already, pulled back and insisted that he had no interest in being friends, and it had rolled off their back and left them entirely unfazed. But they didn’t leave. So he had assumed they had an understanding. We’re not friends. This partnership ends as soon as one of us has better prospects. He doesn’t know when Ilya started thinking of them as a “team,” if that’s all they think, if it’s his fault again, but it should be grounds for a more final liquidation of the dynamic to avoid any further misunderstandings. And yet none of that aligns with his reaction tonight. It doesn’t explain the lingering dread, dripped down out of his ribcage to sit heavy in the pit of his stomach. It doesn’t explain why the idea of letting Ilya down, the possibility that they might want something he can’t give them, makes him feel ill.

It would be easy to remove them from his life if he really wanted to. It’s a big city, they never moved in the same circles anyway, if they stopped meeting on purpose he’d probably never see them again. He has enough credibility now that he could find another team, even if that meant finding another fixer. He’s not so loyal to Violet that he would miss em. It would be quick, it would be practically effortless… and when he tries to envision it, tries to formulate the final conversation with Ilya before they part ways for good, his chest constricts like someone’s got a vice grip around his heart.

Someone…

It doesn’t quite hit him like a lightning strike, like a tidal wave, like anything especially poetic.

Moreso it comes crashing down on him like the contents of a precariously packed closet, finally succumbing to the structural instability of removing a single item from the bottom, leaving him stunned and dismayed and with a clear, perfect view of the absolute mess laid out around him.

And it is a mess.

With a groan he leans forward to rest his elbows on the counter, runs a hand over his face, hangs his head and laces his fingers over the back of his neck. Then he quietly and very somberly tells the empty glass in front of him, “жизнь ебет меня.”

Because he doesn’t want to disengage. Whatever he and Ilya actually have, he doesn’t want it to dissolve. He just wants a name for it.

It still takes two days after the revelation before Maksim finds the nerve to contact Ilya again, and even then only through text.

>[Can we meet?]

The hour between when he sends it and when they respond feels like one of the greatest agonies of his life, no matter how many times he tells himself they could simply be busy.

[Are you sure?]

>[Yes]

He hesitates, types I owe you an explanation, deletes it. Too open ended, he doesn't know if they'll show up with questions he can't answer. He tries I'll tell you as much as I can, then It's important, scraps them both. Pointlessly ominous. What is he trying to say? What does he want them to think he's trying to say? Finally he settles.

>[Caporal, lunch?]

This time the answer comes quickly.

[I can be there at 1]

El Caporal Restaurant & Bar is one of the precious few middle grounds they were able to settle on in the time they’ve been working together. Its atmosphere is pragmatic and unassuming, far less trendy or quirky than most of the establishments in the Mission, and it’s close enough to the Haight-Ashbury slums that the staff aren’t likely to bat an eye at metahumans or anyone who comes off rougher than an ordinary wageslave, convenient for both of them especially when they’re together. As an added bonus the food is even half-decent, not that Maksim can find much of an appetite beneath his tangled nerves.

He gets to the restaurant just after 12. Enough time to linger at the front and strike up a conversation with the hostess, who’s just the right mixture of “bored on a slow day” and “afraid of looking like she’s slacking” to indulge him. Once he gets her laughing along with a joke at the expense of the management–”you can’t say that,” she giggles conspiratorially–he knows they’re on the same side, and moves on to his real intent.

“I won’t tell if you don’t,” he says, winking playfully. “Listen I probably shouldn’t keep you, and I hate to be more trouble, but could I ask one last favor?”

“Sure, what do you need hun?” her posture shifts slightly, more attentive, ready to engage the customer service protocols.

“I need your patio, actually.” He looks past her, lifting his chin to indicate the double doors at the back. “I’m waiting for a f-. A friend,” he clears his throat, pressing on before she can notice the hesitation and before he can properly wonder why the label didn’t roll off his tongue like any other lie, “it would mean the world if we could just have some privacy to catch up, if you think that’s doable.” He keeps his tone and smile bland, taking care not to weave any sort of implication into his words. Let her decide if this is some sort of back-room deal or just two friends looking for a quiet reunion. El Caporal manages to be a passable location for either one.

“Oh!” The hostess steals a glance over her shoulder, then turns back to him. “Yeah… I think we can manage that,” she says with a wink of her own. “I doubt we’re going to see much of a crowd this afternoon anyway.”

He still ends up sitting alone outside for another twenty minutes, a cigarette in one hand and the steady drum of fingertips on the glass tabletop becoming a quiet metronome behind his thoughts as he stares blankly down at the menu. Most of that time has been spent half heartedly sipping sangria and fighting his own instinct to start writing an internal script for this conversation. With his luck, it’ll veer left a few minutes in and he’ll be completely out of his depth all over again, made all the worse for the inability to let go of what he had planned. Best to speak as freely as he can handle.

Best to speak from the heart.

He grimaces, immediately disliking the mawkishness of his own thoughts, but shakes it off just as quickly when he hears the double doors open. He straightens, meeting the hostess and Ilya with the same pleasant demeanor he’d entered with. “Ah there you are,” he laughs, fixing Ilya with a pointed look when he sees the uncertainty suddenly flit across their features. “I was starting to think you were lost.”

“Well… you know how it is,” Ilya offers, doing a quick inventory of the scene and catching on fast even if the code-switching isn’t as instantaneous for them. They’re on time, but it’s obvious he’s been waiting anyway. “Traffic’s a bitch.”

“Can I get either of you anything to start out?” the hostess chirps, all professional courtesy now.

Ilya takes another second to eye Maksim’s drink, then turns to her with a light smile of their own, not quite as plastic as Maksim’s feels but a level of politeness he knows they reserve for people they don’t actually want anything to do with. “Anything you’ve got on tap with a bite would be great,” they say, then break away to take their seat as she heads back inside.

There’s a graciously short span of uncomfortable silence before she returns, sets the glass down in front of them, and then picking up on the fact that neither of them has shown much interest in the lunch menu, bustles away again with some noncommittal pleasantries.

Finally, once he's reasonably confident they won't be bothered again for a while, Maksim exhales sharply and lets the facade slip away, rubbing his eyes with his palms until it brings little bursts of color to the surface of his vision.

"Well this is... more intimate than I was expecting," Ilya comments, and when Maksim opens his eyes again he can't tell from their expression whether it was a joke, an observation, or a complaint. Either way they look at least a bit like they're suddenly doubting they were allowed to say it at all.

"I just wanted privacy," he explains, maybe a little too quickly. Too eager to justify. Then, "you... I thought you deserve to know why you were attacked."

A sharp little smile does tug at the corner of Ilya’s mouth as they raise their drink to their lips. “‘Attacked’ is giving those goons a lot more credit than they deserve.”

Maksim takes a second to study their face again. The bruise their confrontation left behind has begun to fade, purple giving way to an uneven brown of healing tissue. Several conflicting thoughts pile to the front of his mind, it’s my fault that happened to you and why didn’t you just take the deal and they’re not going to get away with that. He pushes them all away and stubs out his cigarette, then leans back to fish the pack and lighter out his pocket. He so rarely chain smokes, but it’s apparently been a week of giving in to his worst impulses.

Finally he dives in, speaking through the first mouthful of smoke. “I know people talk… there was a botched run on a CAT warehouse in New York City a couple years ago, did you hear about it?”

Ilya doesn’t respond immediately, their expression becoming slightly pinched, and when they do speak there’s a note of what Maksim would hazard to call guilt underpinning the single word. “Yeah.”

He sighs again, but regards them with newfound curiosity. “You never brought it up.”

“I didn’t see a point,” Ilya shrugs. “All I ever heard were rumors from a lot of people who weren’t there and seemed to think they knew exactly what happened.”

Maksim nods slowly, trying to fit this neatly into his impressions of Ilya, of the terms of their relationship. “Well…” he pauses to take another drag. “Ironically, I was there and I’m not entirely sure what happened,” he says this with a light, apologetic smile, hoping to convey that it’s at least partly a joke and not just a tragic confession. “But I can tell you what I remember.”

“Hey, you really… you don’t have to-” Ilya starts, but Maksim holds a hand up to stop them.

“I just think you deserve some context,” he says. Then, with a last deep breath to steel himself, he presses on. “It really should have been a milk run. There were guards at the entrance but a warehouse is a warehouse… It was a tax shelter, full of worthless art, but apparently whoever it belonged to accidentally got their hands on something real… some catholic…” he rubs his eyes, makes a vague gesture with his hand. When the word doesn’t come to him he simply presses on. “Five runners seemed like overkill to get it but Alabast was paying well enough for a five-way split to be worth it, I guess they wanted it that badly.” He pauses again and frowns down at the table, taking a moment to reorganize his thoughts, weigh out which details Ilya actually needs and which ones would be wasting their time. “Of course I didn’t know we were working for Alabast until I was in Denver,” he muses, “I don’t know why I got into such a bad habit of never asking for details.”

Realizing he’s gotten ahead of himself, he closes his eyes and gives his head a quick shake before meeting Ilya’s eyes again. “There was something else in that warehouse with us… or someone, I don’t… I never found out. But while the five of us were still trying to figure out their cataloging system, it got in-” the end of that sentence gets swallowed by a sudden shudder that runs up the length of Maksim’s spine, as if the temperature had suddenly plunged around them. He hunches forward onto the table, shoulders pulled in tight and defensive, screwing his eyes shut again as he pinches the bridge of his nose with his free hand. He thought if he just said it, simple, matter of fact, that would strip away some of the power the memory still had over him. Instead it just feels like a hit-and-run.

“Maksim…” Ilya cuts in softly, but he waves their attempted reassurance away only to backtrack a moment later.

“No, you know, you’re right, this isn’t really important,” he concedes breathlessly, his gaze wandering aimlessly across the table as he wills himself to uncoil. “The point is, it went wrong, two people died, the three of us still alive had to scrub the run with nothing to show for it, and everyone blamed me. For a couple months after that I was traveling a lot for…” he glances at his hands, idly extends and retracts his claws. “Research. Visiting showrooms. Talking to surgeons. Talking to loan sharks.” He flashes Ilya another thin smile. Another joke. Sort of. “So I didn’t know how the rest of the team was dealing with the fallout, but I know when I got back into the city one of them wasn’t happy to see me and the other was telling me I needed to get back out. I thought I’d lay low in Chicago for a while until I could sort out what happened, but when I realized even that far out I was being followed, I…” he lets his head fall back slightly, rolling his eyes up toward the sky as he shakes his head again. “I panicked. And then ran a little further every time I got a sense someone was keeping track of me. I had some time in Denver after another surgery and had the sense to do some research, until that put a spotlight on me and I had to start moving again.” He sighs deeply, running a hand over his hair until it comes to rest at the back of his neck, one finger tapping idly against the tip of the reflex trigger where it peeks out from his shirt collar. “I really thought they’d give up before I hit the west coast…”

“But no such luck,” Ilya provides, maybe just to assure him that they’ve been keeping up.

“No,” Maksim confirms with a grimace.

“So Alabast…” Ilya says the name with a thoughtful intentionality, testing the sound of it, or possibly testing it against their own knowledge. “What do they even want? Why bother with you instead of just finding another team?”

Despite himself Maksim responds with a weak chuckle. “I wish I knew,” he says. “I haven’t exactly stopped to ask. I was hoping they gave you some idea.”

Ilya shakes their head, frowning. “The suit was pretty light on specifics. Conspicuously.”

“Of course.”

The conversation hangs there for a beat as Maksim grasps for a way to tie it off. A script really would have been helpful. He wasn’t going to ask for anything, he didn’t have any plans to put forward… he just needed an excuse to talk to Ilya again, pull them back in without having to address the real question simmering between them. The fact that they’ve let him talk this much is unexpected, he had been anticipating more questions, a demand to explain his behavior…

It’s Ilya who breaks the silence. “I know this wasn’t the point but, for the record I believe you.”

He blinks a couple times. The comment draws him back up out of his thoughts but leaves him wondering if he missed something. “What?”

“About the run…” Ilya continues, only to hesitate as another flash of uncertainty passes over their expression. Then with a quick inhale they add, “you don’t have to tell me exactly what happened. I believe it wasn’t your fault.”

“Oh…” Maksim breathes, and internally he’s thinking you can’t keep saying things like that to me. You can’t keep acting like you get it, like none of this is a problem for you. What am I supposed to think? What he says is, “thanks.”

[carolmunson]

doing this fun little tag game that @hard-candy-writing and @hellfiremunsonn tagged me in while i take a break from deep cleaning my house.

if you were in Stranger Things: what would your style be?

if we're basing this on my actual high school personality i was that theater girl but also listened to a lot of sad girl emo music so if we're rewinding the clock we'll just say i was into rock and was an art girly who liked to wear vintage inspired fits. girly with an edge. likely not a metal head because i wasn't a huge screamo scene girl (though i was partial to blessthefall at the time). so, here's some insight into what i might have been wearing (assuming i was skinny like the girls in these pictures.)

how did you get involved in the upside down? Since when I was in high school I was a theater girly dating a boy in band I'm gonna definitely hand it to Eddie or to Robin. My high school ex-boyfriend is very Eddie coded and I can only assume he worked on sets for the drama club and we'd kiss backstage (but also hate each other). Robin absolutely was involved in theater and maybe I ask her to run lines with me one day and she can't and let's it slip that she has to help Eddie and and I'd be like -- 'He's on the run for murder bestie, what do you mean?' and then it would go from there. I'd have to avenge him because those sets NEED to be done before the spring Musical in which I am the lead or I'll kill someone. (Anyway we obviously save him and I confess my dumb stupid fat crush on him and we makeout behind his painted backdrops. and what's your weapon of choice?

Definitely guns. I wanna say something cool like a switch blade but I feel like I'd shoot the gun once and be like 'Oh, hell fucking yeah,' and wanna keep doing it.

NO PRESSURE TAGS: @newlips @courtingchaos @loveshotzz @sweetsweetjellybean @jo-harrington @abibliophobiaa @superblysubpar

[acourtofthought]

I love your blog. I'm a huge fan of Elucien and I look forward to their story, although, I admit I do not think their book is next. Selfishly, I'd love both books back to back, but I know Sarah does not write as quickly as she once did, now that she has a growing family. I sure miss the TOG/early ACOTAR days. YES, Elucien are in in the book and SJM plots major seeds of their future in ACOSF, but in terms of the plot in "present" terms, Azriel, Nessian and the Valkyrie make most sense in the chain of events. Sarah said Nesta's story is not over and it make most sense now that we know she will have some involvement in CC3, the 8 point star was always a huge clue, and because she has a budding friendship with Az, and Az may be Gwyn's mate, her story would continue in a Gwynriel book, not an Elucien book. It just seems SJM main focus right now is the crossover and the characters most likely involved. Of course, we have yet to read the book and Elucien could be involved, not sure how, SF made it obvious they'd go to spring court and travel, but we never know. I'd be ecstatic if we got some elucien clues.

SJM is managing a lot of characters' a lot of plots, it not unheard off to put some initial favorites and plots "on hold" when new ideas come to mind.

I think some people are not ready to admit SJM is favoring other characters and plot lines more right now, it does not mean she does not love Elucien, I'd be so sad if she didn't do them justice, and if I'm being honest with myself, I rather she write their story when she is inspired and focused on THEM vs this crossover! Gwynriel make sense in the crossover, she set up the leg work for them to be involved, so I can envision it. Whereas Elucien, I just can't right now. I get what you're saying about how would Elucien be set up in a Gwynriel book, well, that is kinda why I think the rumors of a novella could be true, one to set up a tandem. But if not, I can still see Gwynriels book next, a Novella of some sort, then Elucien, but she is signed up for more books, so things could change.

But just given her recent interviews its night and day how she talks about Az. All she said about Elain recently was we'd see some form of her, and she did not sound excited at all, I think she was annoyed and not personal about Elain, but still, the interviews promoting ACOSF, before and after, she was overjoyed talking about Az. She specified his crumbs. If it was Elain and Lucien, I'd imagine she'd start to tease and hype readers, not keep it so secretive while talking about someone else, it makes no sense. When has an author ever kept the next main characters from conversation and major present plot lines?

He just seems to be a character she's grown attached to recently, maybe because she was able to write him into some of these CC3 plot lines, because you are right, before he did not have any major plots outside loving Mor in the triology! He seems to be the perfect candiante to work into the crossover and maybe that is when expanding his character and wanting to tell his story grew! She's done it before, she originally only planned for Chaol to have a short novella but she was so excited to tell his story it became a novel, he met the love of his life and I think it is some of her best work, even though it delayed KOA. I kinda look at Elucien as KOA.

With all that, if we do get an Elucien book next I would be happy! Like I said I love Elucien, Elucien was my first fave ship aside from Feysand, so I've been looking forward to their story for a very long time, so it is a win win for me no matter what, but if you held a gun to my head and asked me who's book I think is next, it is Gwynriel just given recent interviews since 2021 and the books right now.

I think you're in good company and that's what a lot of Elucien's / Gwynriels also feel so there's a good chance I'm the one viewing this all wrong. I won't bore you with all the ways I see it differently because I know I've done that with a lot of my recent posts. And I do see where the Gwynriel as ACOTAR 5 arguments come from, I'm not going to sit here and pretend they aren't completely valid. Really, it's a me issue. When something doesn't add up in my mind, I become very fixated on it, trying to twist it and view it from every which way until it all makes sense to me. And when I take at all the info, past interviews and plotlines, and add into it what we know of Elain as sort of this "mystery" as well as the only female to have a bond immediately snap, Elucien next and Gwynriel setting up the next round of ACOTAR books related to the crossover is how my puzzle pieces finally come together. But, the way my brain works is not any more valid than the way someone else's brain works (it's just different). And there's a good chance that SJM's thought process is more in line with what the masses are thinking and I'll end up the odd one out. I'm ok with that though. I want to put out my ideas just in case but if I'm wrong, it's no big thing and I'll be happy for everyone who ended up predicting it correctly.

[27gigahertz]

I read a bunch of Ray Peat (who unfortunately died recently) articles the other day and went fact-checking it since a lot of what he says trips "citation needed" in my head. His blog posts are actually pretty nicely well cited (older professors and academics do this a lot, it's really nice) and include footnotes but sometimes he'd throw out something like

Heart damage is easily produced in animals by feeding them linoleic acid; this "essential" fatty acid turned out to be the heart toxin in rape-seed oil. The addition of saturated fat to the experimental heart-toxic oil-rich diet protects against the damage to heart cells.

which seems like where I'd expect a citation but didn't see one. But the interesting thing was how often, when I found something like this on his blog, it turned out to be an active warzone in medicine and nutrition. I looked briefly to see what opinions were about linoleic acid and heart disease and found some reasonably large studies showing the effect either way. Peat alleges a powerful seed oil lobby that makes sure studies showing that linoleic acid reduces CV events are published easily, and, well, yeah, I could see that. People sell all kinds of dumb shit and get in so deep that quitting would wreck them, so even if there was a smoking gun they'd still want to keep selling. So I'm not really sure what to make of it either way. It did make me spring for olive oil, though.

Ray Peat tended to "sell" three things (he never sold them, but did recommend them): Coconut oil, progesterone over estrogen for osteoporosis, and ice cream. Progresterone had the same thing, where the literature seemed to disagree with itself.

I'm not really going anywhere with this but I was very glad I chose an easier field

[400legends]

Enter Hex (Day 182)

“You make that sound so easy, kid.” Cosmic Peanut shook her head. “Something tells me Rux ain’t a pushover.”

Requiem looked around the table. “Anyone have a better idea?”

We had gathered after our virtual encounter with the Veruxian cosplayers to debrief and plan.

I raised my hand. "I like Requiem's idea. Rux is their courier. They will be expecting her. If we can at least approach the prison ship without a fight, that seems preferable."

"That's all fine," said the captain. "But like I said, she ain't gonna give up her ship without a fight." She picked up her handheld. "We need a little help. Let's see who might be for hire right now."

A few minutes later she said, "Ooof, not a lot to choose from. A security consultant - that could mean anything from hacker to safe cracker, you know? We got a researcher, and we got a hired gun."

We all looked at each other for a moment, and then Requiem said, "Hired gun." Nods all around.

"Ok. They're at the Warp 'n Go #8. About half a day. It's gonna cost us about 9,000 credits."

I raised my hand again. "Rux gave me 5,000 credits to update my VR costume. It seems fitting to use it to take her ship."

"Can't argue with that," said Requiem. "I got the rest."

***

We arrived at the Warp 'n Go #8 and docked. Cosmic Peanut, Merrin, and Esmae decided to go to the rendezvous. I wanted to review the prison ship schematics that Nyla Brassjaw had provided, and Requiem felt it was better to stay out of sight. "It's a greasy spoon asteroid, but who knows if I'd be recognized. Better to lay low."

Cosmic Peanut nodded. "We'll be back in an hour or two. Keep your comms open just in case. EDI, set your security perimeter."

An hour later, they were back with a human male in tow. As they came aboard, I heard the captain say, "I get it, 3 credit minimum, 3 hour max, but if we hadn't contacted you, you would have had to eat anyway."

"The pie looked really good," said Esmae.

The man rumbled, "You gonna quibble about 20 credits?" He glanced around the ship. "Looks like you can absorb 20 credits, friend."

"That's not the point," said Cosmic Peanut. "The point is, you woulda had to eat anyway."

"How do you feel about constructs, Hex?" This from Merrin. "I have a companion named Ping." Slight shrug from the gun for hire. "How about, uh, abominations?"

"Am I killing it?"

"No," said Cosmic Peanut. "Come meet the crew."

Requiem held out her hand. "I am Requiem. Pleased to meet you."

He shook her hand and said, "Huh."

"Quinn? Meet Hex."

I put aside Nyla's schematics, stood, and bowed. "I am Doctor Quinn. Captain, I would wish that we had more information on the prison ship. You see--"

"Later, Quinn. Let's get Hex settled in."

"Of course! Is anyone hungry? I could--"

Everyone shook their heads. "Couldn't eat a bite," said Merrin with her hand on her stomach. "I had a-- I had coffee at the Waarfull Horse. It was really filling...." Her voice trailed off.

Of course I'd had a few cooking failures, but I didn't think my cooking was all that bad. "How about you, Hex?" I smiled at the man.

"Spent 12 hours eating pie. I'm good." He sat down, only to spring back up as Screeech said, "Niiiice! Warm!"

"What in the....?"

"That would be the abomination," said Merrin as Screeech hooked a claw into Hex's back pocket and tugged.

"I think he wants you to sit on him," said Esma. She shrugged. "He's a good weird."

Hex lifted Screeech's claw and said, "Maybe later, little dude. Looks like I should bunk down in the hold, Cap. Gonna settle in."

Once he was gone, Cosmic Peanut said, "We need a plan. We need a rendezvous plan; we need a prison plan."

I said, "With Rux's private access code and Merrin and EDI's help, I can try to find out who she really is."

"I can ask to tag along for a run to the prison," said Requiem. ""Your job sounds so exciting.' No. 'Is it too forward of me....' No. I'll work on that. But that seems like a perfect way to meet up with Rux."

"Nyla gave us blueprints of the ship?" asked Esmae.

"I wish," I said. "But this drawing does give a basic sense of where the entrances are and where the prisoners are kept."

"If it's accurate," said Merrin.

"I need a phone, though." Requiem blurted that out. "I can't use my comms to call Rux."

"I gotta phone you can use." Hex was leaning against the galley threshold.

"How did you.... I mean, are you always that sneaky?" I said.

"I do alright. So, let me see if I got this: You're gonna steal the ship of some kinda Verrux sympathizer, take it to a Verrux prison ship and break out some prisoners." He paused. "Seems pretty standard."

"Of course," I said dryly. "Verrux prison ships, who hasn't cracked one, right?"

Hex gave a single laugh. "Heh, no. Verrux are not to be trifled with. Their priests? They have no regard for their own wellbeing, seems to me. And that makes them dangerous. Real dangerous. Everyone has a weakness though."

"Dammit. Mikhail," said Requiem. "Rux is not going to be alone. She's got her own red priest, Mikhail."

I groaned. "The priest on Lush, with his needle drones, he almost killed me."

Merrin said, "Why was he on Lush?"

"He called Iota 'Chosen One,'" I said.

"OK, but why was he there?" Merrin said again.

Requiem looked at Cosmic Peanut. "Why was he there?"

The captain shrugged. "Recruiting? Gambling? Rendezvous? All I know is Inevitable D&D said she had a red priest who needed a ride, but then he tried to kill us and take Malaka when the shit went south."

"What do you say to calling her again and asking what she knows about him?" asked Requiem.

"I could contact Two," I said. "She might remember something from her time on Lush."

"Let's do it," said the captain. "We need all the info we can get." She shook her head. "I hope I don't regret this."

[wonderlandleighleigh]

Catskills fluff? Any verse of your choice, but maybe a waaaaay down the road Spring and Summer? Loved the most recent chapter!

(Spring and Summer (Every Other Day), 1963)

Lenny is fascinated by the transformation that Midge's family undergoes in the Catskills. Abe is more chipper. Rose is friendlier. Even Midge seems happier.

And the bizarre thing is that the other Steiner guests seem a little afraid of the Weissman family. Sure, everyone is friendly, but Pauly gets a brief, yet oh-so-intense look of dread in his eyes when he sees one of them coming.

And while Lenny isn't thrilled about being here (his manager had shooed him out of the city, away from the legal drama going on. "Let the lawyers handle it, Lenny. Go somewhere you can't make headlines, the lawyers will do what I pay them to do"), he's completely, utterly transfixed by his girlfriend and her family's strange transformation.

Also, his daughter is having a great time. So. Added bonus.

He's settled on the loveseat on the porch of their bungalow, early in the morning. He had wanted to read, but he cannot help but watch Abe at the edge of the dock in his romper, doing his calisthenics.

It is a deeply odd experience. I brings to mind one of his few vivid, good memories of his own father, at the beach on Long Island, early in the morning, taking an early swim.

It actually sounds pretty good. He slips back into he house, and back up the stairs, changing quickly from his jeans into his swim shorts and a thin t-shirt.

Lenny rounds over to the bed before he leaves, kissing Midge.

"Be back in a bit," he whispers.

"No," she pouts, still half asleep, reaching out and grabbing him by the waistband.

He chuckles. "I promise. I'm just gonna swim a little."

An eye cracks open. "You swim?"

"I do, sometimes. I did grow up in a place with 'island' in the name," he reminds her, kissing her again. "Be back."

She pulls him in for one more kiss before letting him go, and he slips out, leaving her to sleep in, heading back down the stairs and out the door, heading toward the dock as Abe heads in his direction.

"Ah. Lenny."

"Abe."

"You've seen my romper."

"Yes."

They stands silently.

"I'll see you later," Abe says abruptly.

"Yep."

He keeps heading towards the dock and and takes a breath when he gets to the edge, looking out at the quiet lake in the almost-dawn.

He's two years clean. His career is stable, despite the arrests. His kid is living with him now. Things with Midge are really fucking good. They've been talking about getting married; about making all of this official, but they've both been married before and they're both a little gun-shy on the topic.

Still.

He takes a breath and dives in, swimming out from the dock, stopping and looking around him, lifting his hands to push his wet hair away from his eyes.

He takes another deep breath and dips under, staying submerged with his eyes closed. It's calm and quiet under the water, and Lenny finds himself staying under as long as he can, enjoying the cool silence.

It becomes an imperative to come up for air, and he surfaces, wiping the water from his eyes and his hair from his face one more time. When he looks back to the dock, it's to find Midge sitting there with her legs in the water, looking out into the distance. She's clearly wearing her swimsuit with a coverup over it.

Lenny swims back to her, catching his breath for having swum faster than before.

"Good swim?" Midge asks, smiling down at him.

He nods. "It's nice this early in the morning."

She nods, taking a breath. "Mhm. Peaceful."

He hops back up on the dock to sit next to her, leaning in to kiss her cheek and she laughs, pushing against him a little.

"You're soaked!"

"I swam."

"I know."

"I figured you'd sleep more," Lenny says.

Midge smirks. "I would have, but I couldn't stop thinking about you in your cute swim shorts."

He chuckles. "Yes, I am quite fetching. If there were a Mister Steiner swimsuit competition, I'd be a shoe-in."

She laughs softly. "You kick all those other guys' asses. But you couldn't compete, because as much as we are joined at the hip, we are not married."

Lenny snaps. "That's right. Shit. I'd be stuck being the sash boy."

"But you'd look hot doing it," Midge tells him.

He grins and looks out at the water again. "Midge."

"Yeah."

"Should we?"

"What? Start a Mister Steiner pageant?" she asks, giggling. "Pauly might actually have a heart attack and die."

He lets out a short laugh. "No. No, I mean-" he turns and gazes at her, shrugging helplessly.

"Oh," she says softly. "That."

"We practically are anyways," Lenny reminds her. "You spend more time at my place than you do at your own some weeks. You even bring the kids over. I'm in a good place. So are you. It seems like...maybe..."

Midge takes a breath and stares into his eyes. "Do you want to because it's just...the next logical step? The path of least resistance?" She pauses and takes a breath. "Or do you want to because you love me, and you want to spend our lives together?"

He takes her hand, stroking her fingers gently. "I love you. One way or another, I'm expecting to spend our lives together. Wedding ring or no. It is the next logical step. I suppose...I suppose my answer is that it's both."

"Kitty and I could move in with you. Add to the deep chaos in your life," Lenny offers. "It'd certainly give you more material for your act."

Midge takes a breath, looking back out at the water. "It feels a little strange to get married to you and have you move into the apartment my first marriage started in. We could find a new place. One that's just ours."

Lenny grins, bumping her shoulder with his gently. "Does sound nice."

She smiles, and despite his continued dampness, kisses him.

[bruhstories]

Dazed and Confused

Summary: You and Connie have been friends for ten years, crushing on each other like a bunch of idiots who can't confess their feelings for one another. Until you go on a trip with your friends. Pairing: Connie Springer x Fem!Reader Warnings & Content: 18+, language, oral sex (female & male receiving), unprotected sex, weed smoking, alcohol consumption, f l u f f Word Count: 4.2 k

A/N: I got so pissed at that last anon that I finished this oneshot quicker lol. @fiaficsxo here it is!

You loved parties. Not the loud music and thick smoke, not the booze and smell of vomit, but your friends. Every time they gathered at someone's place, your heart fluttered, filled with happiness and content and long-lasting memories.

Connie had the brilliant idea of spending a week in the mountains during your spring break, and you wasted an entire night searching for the perfect cottage to rent. Luckily everyone was down with his suggestion, the only problem was how you'd sleep. Historia obviously wanted to share a room with Ymir. Mikasa and Eren were an item now, so they'd have to sleep together. Armin wanted to try his luck with Annie, so no one objected to that. Jean declared that he wanted to bunk with Connie, like the two eligible bachelors they were, and that left you and Sasha to share a room together. You didn't mind it, in all honesty you loved Sasha with all your heart — but you secretly hoped someone would pick up on your feelings for Connie and let you sleep with him. You weren't that lucky.

You packed your bag the night before the trip, obsessively ticking everything on your list and double checking every item and pocket. It was ready, with one item missing — the white lace babydoll smoothed on your dorm bed. You chewed the pen cap, debating whether to bring it with you or not. You bought it for special occasions, but you haven't had a dick appointment in a long time, and you doubted you'd have one this week. With a shrug, you decided to bring it — you never know what might happen. Nighttime passed quickly and you soon found yourself all dolled up, albeit still sleepy from all the tossing and turning, excited to make more memories with your friends.

The train station was packed with people, especially students who went back to their hometowns for the break, and you were relieved to find Armin and Mikasa there. You three were always punctual, followed by Jean and Annie. Eren, Sasha and Connie were always late, which is why you told them the train leaves at 7 am instead of 7:30. It was a dirty strategy, but no one wanted to miss such a fun opportunity because of those lazy fuckers. And lo and behold, they decided to appear at 7:15.

"That was some good thinking." Jean shook his head, hand sympathetically placed on your shoulder.

"I'm only glad you guys rolled with it." You laughed without noticing the way Connie stared at you, and even he didn't understand exactly what he felt. Was he grumpy because he hated morning, or was it Jean's hand on you that irked him?

"It's not polite to stare." Sasha pulled Connie out of his thoughts.

"I wasn't staring, I was looking." Connie rolled his eyes, gripping the handle of his suitcase a bit too tightly.

"I just don't get it why you don't tell her you like her." The girl popped a bubblegum baloon, proceeding to chew it very loudly.

"Are you kidding me? She obviously likes Jean. Look how she's laughing!"

Sasha placed an arm on his shoulder, a sheepish smile on her face. "You, my friend, are a dumbass."

"Takes one to know one."

To say that your friends were loud during the train ride was an understatement. They didn't really care about the nasty glares other passengers shot at them, opting to talk, sing, eat and practically embarrass themselves. But two hours later you arrived, and the fresh, crisp air of the mountains was a blessing. You didn't regret coming, all of you deserved a break after all the exams, studying and all-nighters you guys pulled.

"We could visit the military museum!" Armin suggested, but Connie scrunched his nose.

"We came here to get high, drink and spend time together, why the fuck would we visit some old ass building?"

"I'd like to go to the museum." You awkwardly smiled, earning a 'see?' from the blond. Mikasa, Eren and Annie backed you up, and since it was a democracy, you ended up leaving your bags at the cottage and touring the small town to find the military museum. The building wasn't massive, and inside it was dark, with crimson carpets and dim lights. It was actually quite a romantic atmosphere, had it not been for the weapons and armours displayed in glass cases. Connie watched you intently, taking in every movement, every flinch, every hair tucking, every scrunch of your cute nose. You absorbed the information, hungry for knowledge. This was something you and Connie didn't share — yes, you were down to drinking and smoking, but you were also eager to learn and study, while he always preached how 'you can always retake an exam but you can't relive a party.' He wasn't stupid by any means, but unlike you, Jean, Armin and Mikasa — who alwaysstudied and never skipped lectures — Connie would wing it and somehow end up getting better grades. His strategy didn't always work, and sometimes, when you were in college, he'd ask you to tutor him. Now you were second year undergraduates, and while you were studying different subjects, you still made time for each other.

"That's a nice, uhh..." Connie squinted, "...shotgun."

"It's a musket." You chuckled, your fingers accidentally brushing his as you turned around to face him.

"Shotgun, musket, same thing."

"Actually, muskets are muzzle-loaded and fire a single bullet, but shotguns pack multiple pellets in one shell." You explained. "I'm sorry, you're probably not interested in my ramblings."

"No, no, it's... interesting. I just wasn't expecting you to know so much about guns." He rubbed his nape and smiled at you.

"Well, I do study history, in case you forgot."

"How could I forget that?"

"What's that supposed to mean?" You awkwardly elbowed Connie. Why was it so hard for you to just tell him your feelings? Oh, right, because you've been friends for ten years and if he didn't like you back, it would only ruin a great friendship.

"It means you brag about it so much it's kind of hard to forget." He told you, quickly realising just how insulting that sounded.

"Oh, I'm sorry. I didn't know that's how you felt..." You sighed, eyes darting back to the weapons.

"No, I didn't- forget it." Connie shook his head. Well played.

Back at the cottage, with enough food and booze to last the group a month, you decided to stay in your room for the rest of the day. It wasn't the first time you had embarrassing moments with Connie, but this particular one made you anxious to be around him. Did he really dislike you that much, or was it just friendly banter? If you were to ask him, you could find out, but every scenario in your head had a bad outcome, so avoiding him for now was the smartest choice. Sasha pleaded with you to spend the evening in the living room with everyone else, but you brushed her off, telling her you weren't feeling quite well.

"Text me if you need anything." She told you before leaving. It was immature to act this way, you knew that all too well, but it wasn't like Connie cared, right? You eventually decided to go downstairs after finishing a long episode of your favourite tv show, your stomach begging for nourishment. As silently as possible, you tiptoed behind the couch. The hallway was dim, the sun had already set, and the only lights were the ones from the wide TV screen in the living room where your friends were watching some corny horror movie. You could cut the suspense and tension with a knife, and when you dropped a teaspoon, everyone jumped.

"Sorry, sorry! It's just me!"

"Jesus Christ, Y/N, you almost gave me a heart attack." Jean got up from the floor and walked behind the couch. "How are you feeling? Sasha said you're ill."

"I'm fine, don't worry." You picked the spoon up and threw it in the sink. "It's just a headache, I'll sleep it off."

"Good, we need you here." The man wrapped an arm around you. "You're missing how Connie's crapping his pants at this shitty movie."

From the outside it would seem like you and Jean were a couple, but the truth was far from it. You two grew up together, his family was friends with your family, and what you had was nothing more than a brother-sister relationship. Jean's little remark earned a disgruntled look from Connie, you quickly picked up on that, and so you playfully jabbed him in the stomach.

"Connie's crapping his pants? You're the one who almost had a heart attack." You grinned.

"Oi, that was only because you dropped your stupid spoon. I was invested in the movie."

"Mhm, sure you were."

"Hey, you sure you don't want to join us?" Mikasa waved at you from the living room. You pondered over her question. Perhaps it wouldn't be too awkward to sit with them.

"Alright, sure, why not?"

"Come, sit next to me." Sasha shuffled to the side, but what she really meant by that was 'sit next to Connie', because she shuffled to the otherside.

The following two nights were surprisingly quiet, all you did was play board games, watch movies and walk around the town taking pictures. The tension between Connie and you seemed to dissipate, and you both forgot the unpleasant interaction you had on the first day. But on the fourth night, that's when shit hit the fan. Annie and Armin left for a date, and Eren and Mikasa wanted to spend the night alone in their room, leaving you, Sasha, Jean and Connie unsupervised, bored and tipsy. There was absolutely nothing good to watch on the TV, and you almost wanted to scream when your friends wanted to play truth or dare. It was one of those games you despised, because the whole point of it was to put the players in uncomfortable situations. And you didn't like being uncomfortable, unlike your friends.

"Jean, truth or dare?" Sasha beamed.

"Dare, duh."

"Alright, I dare you to switch roommates for the rest of the week." She sipped her blackberry cider.

"Okay? So, I'll stay with Y/N, then."

Good lord, if looks could kill, Connie's would annihilate Jean and Sasha off the face of the Earth.

"No, no, you'll stay with me. Y/N will stay with Connie."

"Eh? Why does your dare involve us?" You asked, confused and curious of your friend's proposal.

"Because." She shrugged. "Don't pussy out."

"I'm not pussying out. A dare's a dare." Jean scoffed. "I'm gonna go take my shit in your room and shower."

"Y-yeah, I'll go bring mine, too." You got up, using this time to hyperventilate alone. What the fuck was Sasha even thinking? Was this some stupid joke? But your friends wouldn't harm you, so why would she suggest such a stupid thing?

You took a quick shower before curling up in the bed, blankets covering you from neck to toe. Connie wasn't back yet, and you didn't want to go after him, that would just be odd. You were hoping you'd fall asleep before he returned, to avoid any unnecessary fuss, but just as you closed your eyes, the door opened. Maybe you could pretend you were asleep? He struggled to find his pyjamas in the dark, stumbling over furniture and knocking things down, and you turned the bedside lamp on to ease his search.

"Did I wake you up?" Connie bit his lower lip, and through the dim light you watched the way his grey eyes glistened, the way his short brown hair was ruffled, and how the sage green t-shirt hugged his toned abdomen.

"No, no, 's alright. I wasn't sleeping. I can't exactly fall asleep." You clutched the blanket at your chest as you shook the intrusive thoughts away. Connie was your friend, damn it, there was no room for romance between you.

"I can sleep on the floor if you want."

"Oh, God, no, it's... stiff."

"Um, yeah, it kinda is. Alright then, I'll jump in the shower real quick before going to bed." He stumbled into the bathroom and you really wanted to fall asleep now.

But you couldn't. Every time you closed your eyes, Connie's face popped in your head. So much for resting. You tossed and turned on the mattress, trying to find a comfortable position to sleep in, but nothing helped. It didn't take long for him to finish his shower, and you mentally chastised yourself for not falling asleep when you felt him shuffle under the same blanket that was covering you. For a minute, you didn't utter a word, you barely breathed, afraid to disturb the silence in the room.

"Are you asleep?"

"Nope." You heard the click of Connie's phone and turned around. You couldn't see him, but you could hear him.

"Do you wanna talk about something? Until we fall asleep, I mean." You suggested.

"Hmm, sure." He turned on his side and you felt his breath fanning over your cheeks. You were too close to him. "Actually, d'you wanna smoke?"

"Aren't the others gonna be mad if we smoke without them?"

"They don't have to know. Besides, you and I never smoked together." Connie was already up, rummaging through his backpack with the flashlight of his phone. "And then we can talk as much as you want."

"Alright, I'm down."

You laid on the floor, your head next to Connie's as you looked at the ceiling, smoke leaving your lips. He took the joint from you, fingers touching yours and you blushed, the haze of the weed melting your worries away.

"Do you want me to skip the song?" Connie asked, and for a moment you forgot there was a song playing.

"No, I like it." You confessed. "I didn't know you liked Led Zeppelin."

"There's lots of things you don't know about me, Y/N." He passed you the joint.

"Okay, tell me something else I don't know."

"I like it when you randomly say historical or scientific facts."

"Didn't you say I brag too much about it?" You took one final drag before you stubbed the joint out in a makeshift ashtray filled with a bit of water. By this point you were high as a kite, every trace of rationality gone.

"That doesn't mean I don't like it." Connie smiled and you could feel it in his voice. "Now you tell me something I don't know about you."

"I can't sleep with open doors. It freaks me out." You sat up, a breeze blowing through the window sending shivers down your spine. "It's a bit cold, do you mind if I close the window?"

"Go ahead."

You got up and picked the ashtray up but before you could close the window, you stumbled over a chest of drawers, the ashes mixed with water spilling over your t-shirt.

"You okay?" He quickly crawled to you, concern written all over his face.

"Yeah, I'm just clumsy." You laughed it off and waved your free hand. "I'll go get changed, I should have a spare shirt."

But you didn't have a spare shirt. All you had was that stupid white babydoll, and anxiety seeped through your veins. You couldn't exactly show up in that in front of your crush. And you didn't want to ask him for a shirt either. Fuck it, what else could you do?

You peeked out the bathroom door and saw Connie back in bed, lazily scrolling through his phone. God, this was embarrassing.

"You look like you've seen a ghost." He laughed, but when your facial expression didn't change, he frowned. "Y/N?"

"Um, so, I didn't have a spare shirt and- Jesus, this is awkward." You opened the door and his eyes widened. "Is it alright if I sleep in this?"

"Oh, I get it now." Connie scoffed.

"Get what?"

"You were hoping you'd share a room with Jean, right?" He sounded almost disgusted.

"Excuse you? Where did you even get that idea?" You slammed the bathroom door shut, arms folded across your chest.

"I'm not stupid, Y/N. I've seen the way you two act. Do yourselves a favour and just fuck already."

You were speechless. Completely reactionless. The weed amplified your anger, but his words brought tears to your eyes.

"You... you fucking asshole! You think I brought this for Jean? I brought it for you!"

"Eh? M-me?" Connie was confused, and you were pissed.

"Yes, you. Jean's like a brother to me, oh my God! Ew!"

"Wait, so you and Jean are not in love with each other?"

"In love?? Connie, how high are you exactly?" You walked closer to the bed, arms still crossed.

"But- Fuck, I am stupid." He shook his head, the memories of you flirting with him flashing before his eyes. "I fucked up, didn't I?"

"A bit..." Your muscles relaxed and you sat on the mattress. "Really, Connie, I... I like you. A lot. But you're always giving me mixed signals."

"That's because I always thought you liked Jean!" He threw his hands in the air in exasperation.

"No, you're the only one."

"Huh, guess I've really been dazed and confused."

Calloused fingertips ran across your hips leaving goosebumps in their trail. Your hands roamed his back and the way Connie kissed you was better than any high you've ever experienced. He was touch-starved, and you were just as needy. His knee found its place between your thighs and you moaned when it barely brushed your cunt.

"I've been dreaming for this moment for as long as I can remember." Connie breathed into your neck, the hot breath tickling your skin.

"Me too, you blind bat." You laughed and he turned you over, hovering over you.

"'M sorry I didn't notice quicker." He kissed you again. One hand travelled lower, pushing your underwear to the side before he pushed two fingers between your folds. "Fuck, you're so wet."

"Well, at least now I don't have to finger myself thinking about you." You whimpered with a grin.

"Oh?" Connie arched a brow. "Is that what you've been doing?" He curled up his fingers and you threw your head back with a moan. "I thought you were a prude."

"T-there's lots of things you d-don't know about m-me!" You replied back between oh’sand ah’s, imitating his words from an hour ago. That only earned a sneer from Connie, his head dipping between your thighs. "Wait, what are you do- ooh fuck!"

His tongue lapped at your cunt, fingers pumping in and out of you, and you completely sunk into the mattress, moaning his name over and over again. You gripped the sheets, flexing the muscles in your legs as you squirmed and thrashed. Connie stopped and you almost crushed his skull with your thighs at the empty feeling. He pulled your underwear down and shoved the cotton panties in your mouth.

"Don't wake everyone up, Y/N. You don't want them knowing what a little slut you are, do you?"

You shook your head and Connie went back to circling your clit with his tongue, adrenaline rushing through your entire body with each lick, each suck. Tears of pleasure pooled at your eyes, nose and cheeks red from the thrill of your incoming orgasm. The way he was sloppily eating your pussy and moaning while doing it drove you insane, and within seconds you came undone, thighs trembling with delight. In fact, you were so sore you had to push his head back, begging him to stop so you could return the favour.

"You taste so sweet." Connie licked his lips. You don't know what possessed you to pull him into a kiss after you removed the makeshift gag, but he was right, you were sweet.

"Can I...?" Your eyes drifted down to his twitching cock, your voice soft and quiet.

"You wanna suck it?"

"Yes."

"Later. Right now, I wanna fuck you."

Connie gave you no time to protest, his elbow pushed one of your things to the side, the blushing tip of his cock grazing over your overstimulated clit, up and down your slit. Inch by inch it disappeared into your cunt and he let out a satisfied sigh. You bucked your hips, manicured nails digging into his shoulders with each thrust.

"Shit, you're so fucking tight!" Connie growled, head lowering to kiss you. You could still taste yourself on his lips and that only made you clench your spongy walls around his cock. That seemed to please him, because he rocked his hips harder and faster. "You like it?"

"Oh, God, yes!" You gasped, beads of sweat forming on your forehead as you clawed his back.

"Fuck, I want you to ride me." He gripped your hips tighter and turned you over. You tried your best to get in the new position without letting his cock slip out of you, and when you finally adjusted yourself, it was a whole new challenge. Gravity pulled you down, and his tip brushed your cervix, your eyes squinting at the slight pain. "If it hurts, stop-"

"No!" You cried out, your hands resting on his chest. You bounced up and down, the uncomfortable feeling slowly replaced with pleasure. Connie's hands traced your thighs as you rode him, another wave of heat flushing through your core. His palm met your cunt, thumb circling over your clit. "I can't c-come again!"

"Yes, you can. And you will cream on my cock."

The disgust words worked like magic and you flexed your thighs, bouncing faster, head thrown back, hair cascading down your back. "You're so beautiful, Y/N."

"Connie, I-" The words stopped in your throat, the pressure too much for you to handle.

"You what?"

"I'm- oh, God!"

"Atta girl!" He praised you when he felt your silken walls relaxing and your thighs quaking. The second orgasm was so intense you let yourself fall over his chest, dizzy and tired. You thought he'd give you a break, but Connie wrapped an arm around your back, holding you in place before giving your oversensitive cunt a few more thrusts. "Now you can return the favour."

You mustered up some strength to get up and kneel in front of the bed, between his legs.

"Please don't come in my mouth." You asked him before wrapping your pretty lips around his cock.

"Gotchaah-" Connie choked on his words when he felt himself in your hot mouth. You bobbed your head up and down, cheeks hollowed and eyes on him. You didn't break eye contact when you pulled away and spat on the tip, hand pumping his cock to smear the spit. "Hot." He mumbled before you went back to sucking. You felt the throbbing, tightening your lips around him and picking up the pace. "Y/N-"

It all happened in a flash — Connie yanked your hair and pulled your head back, thick ropes of milky white cum shooting all over your face and neck.

"Eew!" You scrunched your nose, hand under your chin to stop it from dripping down the floor.

"What do you mean ew? That's, like, a billion kids!"

"Actually, a fertile man produces around-"

"Don't start. Do not." He pressed his index finger over your lips. "Let's get you cleaned up."

You woke up sore, especially between your thighs, but damn, was it worth it. Connie wrapped an arm around your waist, mumbling something about how pretty you are, but you assumed he was still sleeping — or still high. The sun shone through the blinds and you squinted, annoyed by the brightness, and so you turned around, watching the way your crush snored peacefully.

"Cute." You smiled and planted a kiss on his forehead, waking him up. "Oh, I'm sorry!"

"Why?" Connie rubbed his eyes. "Waking up to you is a blessing."

You couldn't hide the tinting of your cheeks and the grin on your lips. "I didn't think you were the romantic type."

"There's lots of things-"

"I don't know about you. But I'd like to know those things. If you let me, of course." You bit your lower lip, eyes filled with hope.

"Can I be your boyfriend?" He sat up, his eyes serious.

"I thought you'd never ask."

Okay, so maybe Sasha knew a thing or two when she dared Jean to switch roommates.

You walked into the kitchen after getting ready for the day, with Connie following behind you. Everyone was eating their breakfast, and Jean instantly dashed to you.

"Connie, bro, take me back. Sasha's leaving crumbs all over the bed! I can't sleep like that!"

"I can't, man, I wanna spend the rest of the week with my girlfriend." He sneered and you elbowed him.

"I forgot to mention Jean's overprotecti-"

"Your what? Hands off my sister from another mister, you creep!"

"Creep? You're the one who was sexting someone's sister last night." Sasha chimed in, mouth full of cereal.

"Thanks, Sash." Jean rolled his eyes. "For real, how did this happen?"

"You see, mate, when a man and a woman love each other-"

"Nope. I will not hear this."

[thebowerypresents]

Earl Sweatshirt and Action Bronson Cap Off a Two-Night Run in NYC at Terminal 5 on Thursday

Earl Sweatshirt/Action Bronson – Terminal 5 February 17, 2022

Thursday began as a beautiful, unseasonably warm day and the night brought along show No. 2 of Action Bronson and Earl Sweatshirt at Terminal 5, with windy weather whiplashing the city from its temporary spring back into winter. You’d be forgiven for feeling similar whiplash going from Bronson to Sweatshirt, two rappers who share producers, skills and friends but are wildly different personalities and rappers. Bronson you may also know as Bam Bam, Bronsolino, Mr. Baklava, the Flushing Grizzly, the Rap Dennis the Menace or Mr. Wonderful. He’s also perhaps the only person you know to have come out of the pandemic a hundred-plus pounds lighter and ripped, despite many of us saying we’d do the same.

Although slimmed down, the larger-than-life charismatic Queens native was as charming as ever, even with some here-and-there start-that-agains. “You could put a fucking gun to my head and I would not have remembered that second verse,” said Bronson mid-set through one such instance. “This is an anti-drug commercial.” Bronson teased a new album in the works, something that was hard to catch the exact title of, just the very Bronson-esque follow-up explainer: “The most prehistoric predator alive! It’s a love story.” He brought out longtime pal and frequent collaborator the Alchemist for the performance’s finish, air-strumming along to the wistful guitar sample on “Terry” before the set self-immolated into the sunny, psychedelic “Easy Rider.”

The show wrapped with Earl, the introverted, world-weary and wise rapper, with his signature easy flow spilling out of his low register. Pacing the stage, he tore through verse after verse, bringing out just about any guest imaginable, from opener Boldy James to Zelooperz, Mike and the group Armand Hammer. “You can stay up here, hang out,” Earl would say after they finishing, slowly amassing a large collection of guests in the shadows behind the DJ booth. “Every single person I know is here right now, every single bitch in my life.”

The set was heavy with songs off his latest, Sick!, firing off effortless bar after bar, some genius enough to bounce around in your head forever. “Bend, we don’t break, we not the bank” I'd hear on a loop on the walk to Columbus Circle, watching the rain and wind whip through the Manhattan trees. —Dan Rickershauser | @D4nRicks

Photos courtesy of Andrew Pintado | www.drewmartinphoto.com

[dorindameddler]

a braving light in a world so dark: a georgie/melanie playlist (spotify)

1. first love/late spring - mitski // 2. unforgiving girl (she's not an) - car seat headrest // 3. strange girl - laura marling // 4. reach out - sleater-kinney // 5. safe tonight - bat for lashes // 6. crying in public - chairlift // 7. don't delete the kisses - wolf alice // 8. it's not just me - let's eat grandma // 9. sick of spiraling - bachelor // 10. shut up kiss me - angel olsen // 11. marauders - thao & the get down stay down // 12. half colored hair - black belt eagle scout // 13. stay with me - margaret glaspy // 14. don't go puttin wishes in my head - torres // 15. walk with you - oceanator

selection of lyrics under the cut

first love/late spring

Wild women don't get the blues/But I find that lately, I've been crying like a tall child/So please, hurry, leave me, I can't breathe/Please don't say you love me/Mune ga hachikire-sōde/One word from you and I would/Jump off of this ledge I'm on, baby/Tell me, "Don't," so I can crawl back in

unforgiving girl (she's not an)

Well, everyone learns to live with themselves/And you're not the only one who's been through hell/So give me a sign that I'm not making love to myself/It's an unforgiving world/But she's not an unforgiving girl

strange girl

Woke up in a country who refused to hold your hand/Kept falling for narcissists who insist you call them 'man'/You work late for a job you hate that's never fit the plan/Stay low, keep brave/I love you, my strange girl/My lonely girl/My angry girl/My brave

reach out

Reach out, touch me, I'm stuck on the edge/Reach out, darkness is winning again/Reach out and see me, I'm losing my head/Reach out, I can't fight without you, my friend

safe tonight

Lying in the dark and I am out of time/There's a demon in my heart that I'm not sure we’ll survive/The shadows come around one too many times/Baby, I need you to tell me I'm safe tonight

crying in public

Take all my defenses in two words/And throw them away/ Tell me, what kind of monster/Have I been today?/But you smile and call me “tough guy”/To the opposite effect/It's a flower in the gun/And your tough guy's a wreck/Sorry I'm crying in public this way/I'm falling for you, I'm falling for you/I'm sorry I'm causing a scene on the train/I'm falling for you, I'm falling for you

don't delete the kisses

What if it's not meant for me?/Love/What if it's not meant for me?/Love/A few days pass since I last saw you/And you've taken over my mind/I'm retelling jokes you made that made me laugh/Pretending that they're mine/I wanna tell the whole world about you/I think that that's a sign/I'm losing self-control and it's you

it's not just me

Because the point is that I see it's not just me/The point is that you feel my company/You know I'll never be too far if you're looking for somebody/I'm here/It's not just me/I know you're feeling the same way/And I can't fail to believe/When you're feeling the same way/It's not just me

sick of spiraling

Walking alone at night/Clutching a cheap gas station knife/Love, the danger is in the car/Who couldn't see me it was too dark/As the brakes slam to the floor/Missing me just inches short/I thought, "If I can't have my own back/How the fuck can I have yours?"/You are a braving light in a world so dark/And I'm sick of spiraling out and I need your touch to stop/You are a braving light in a world so dark/And I'm scared out of my mind and I need your love

shut up kiss me

I could make it all go away/Tell me what you’re thinking, don't delay/We could still be having some sweet memories/This heart still beats for you, why can't you see?/Shut up, kiss me, hold me tight/Shut up, kiss me, hold me tight/Stop your crying, it's alright/Shut up, kiss me, hold me tight

marauders

My darlin', your patience, rain it on me/I know daughters of marauders are just so hard to please/I got that poison, carve it on out/Barely served me then/Only hurts me now/But you look like I could stay/Let all my intentions fall away/Kill all my defenses where they lay/Say all that's left to say

half colored hair

How you look at me/In the brightness of your room/Imagine the lightness of my fingers on your face/Run through your hair/Across your neck/Light breaks across your room/I never knew I'd like half colored hair so much/But in the light

stay with me

I've had nothing but trouble/And bad news on the line for such a long time/The only break I get is laughing 'tiI my eyes are wet/With you, you/Won't you stay with me?/I'll be on my best behavior/When it all shakes down—/Who's the clown, and who's the savior?

don't go puttin wishes in my head

I know promising forever's not your thing/But now if you don't want me to go dreaming/Don't spend your mornings and your evenings in my bed/If you don't want me believing that/You're never gonna leave me, darling/Don't go putting wishes in my head/So if we're calling off the funeral/Then I'm calling for a hitching/For a while, I was sinking/But from here on out, I swear I'm swimming

walk with you

When you were depressed and/You put your head on my chest and you told me/That you were tired of being tough/I took you by the hand and/Told you I understand and you told me/That could never be enough/But I will walk with you down the avenue though the streets are made of glass/And we will tread lightly on our heavy feet and avoid all of the cracks/It's a fragile place that we've ended in and one wrong move could shatter/But in the end will it matter?

[blackssuunn-mandoandyodito]

Tabaco y Brea

Part two

Pairing: Javier Peña x DEA! reader

Rating: M, eventually. Now? PG-13

Words: 3.5k

A/N: well, the first part didn't get many notes but I really love this story. If a single person reads it and likes it, then it's enough for me :)

Warnings: shouting, fighting, swearing, is eating a warning?,jealousy.

Taglist: @dynphomaniac

Part one here

The days passed faster than you would have liked. With so much paperwork added for the Cali mission, you stayed late almost every day. Javi, in an unexpected change of events, stayed with you. He didn't do shit, of course, but his company was comforting. He would softly hum songs sometimes, or get out a book and read it out loud to you. 

The night before, he had been singing the Rocky soundtrack for most of it, turning to Led Zeppelin when he finished. You still remember how after you heard on the radio that John Bonham had been found dead in September 1980, he had left the office for a second and stayed in complete silence outside. 

And then again in December, when they announced they were going to split. You never mentioned it, and you knew he wouldn't admit it even with a gun pointed at his head, but you were sure you had seen a tear run down his cheek. He was a huge fan, apparently.

Tonight, he was reading Cien Años de Soledad (One Hundred Years of Solitude), by Gabriel García Márquez. You loved that author, but you weren't sure if you had ever mentioned it to him. Maybe he knew you enough to figure it out without the need of hearing it straight from your mouth.

"José Arcadio Buendía, que era el hombre más emprendedor que se vería jamás en la aldea, había dispuesto de tal modo la posición de las casas, que desde todas podía llegarse al río y abastecerse de agua con igual esfuerzo, y trazó las calles con tan buen sentido que ninguna casa recibía más sol que otra a la hora del calor." (José Arcadio Buendía, who was the most enterprising man ever to be seen in the village, had set up the placement of the houses in such a way that from all of them one could reach the river and draw water with the same effort, and he had lined up the streets with such good sense that no house got more sun than another during the hot time of day. )

His voice was very soothing to you, even more when he was speaking Spanish. You didn't know if he had noticed, but it got more raspy and deep when he changed languages. It reminded you of the summers spent in México with your father, when he would tell you stories about his childhood in México City or the trips he would do to Nuevo Laredo with your grandma.

He stopped reading for a second and you looked up to see why was that just to find him already staring at you.

"What's wrong?" you asked, not wanting to tell him you were enjoying his reading.

"Do you like this book?"

You nodded, a slight blush spreading in your cheeks. You tended not to give him compliments, his ego was big enough as it was without you contributing, but you figured this one wouldn't hurt.

"He's one of my favorite authors."

He smiled. "I figured"

"You brought that one because you thought I'd like it?"

It was just teasing, of course. You didn't think he'd do such a gesture for you, and the idea of him knowing you so well scared you a little bit.

He ignored you and kept going. " En pocos años, Macondo fue una aldea más ordenada y laboriosa que cualquiera de las conocidas hasta entonces por sus 300 habitantes. Era en verdad una aldea feliz, donde nadie era mayor de treinta años y donde nadie había muerto." (  Within a few years Macondo was a village that was more orderly and hard working than any known until then by its three hundred inhabitants. It was a truly happy village where no one was over thirty years of age and where no one had died.)

You stopped working for a moment, listening to the words he was saying instead. 

Did he know how sexy his voice was? How good he sounded? He was one of the smartest people you knew, and you had been to enough places and met enough people to say that with confidence. His mind was sharp, could run 10 miles per minute if the situation required it.

He noticed you were staring and stopped again. His frown got more pronounced, looking at you intrigued.

"What are you looking at?" his tone was defensive. He didn't like it when you stared at him too long, it felt like you could see straight through him, and there were some things he didn't want you to know.

You shook your head and laughed. "You look tired"

With a shrug, he returned his eyes to the book, but you stretched your arm to stop him. 

"Now what?"

You took the book from his hands and placed a clean sheet of paper from your desk between the pages he had been reading and closed it. With a soft sound, you let it fall on top of the table.

"It's getting late, we should go"

He straightened, surprised. Usually, he was the one to prey you away from all the paperwork. If he didn't stay with you, he would probably find you there still working the next morning.

"You are telling me we should leave?"

You nodded.

"Quick, before I change my mind."

At that, he stood up like a spring and started collecting his things. You chuckled as you saved the files on the drawer and put your jacket on.

"Let's go"

Two days later, he approached you without no greeting and in a very bad mood.

"The gringo's here"

What a great way to start the morning, you thought.

"Weren't we supposed to pick him up or something?"

Javi shook his head. He seemed frustrated, but you didn't know if it was about the arrival of your new partner or something else. With Javi, you could never guess.

His shoulders were tense, the beige suit he was wearing along with the striped tie and his yellow aviators made him look older and more serious. Had he dressed up to meet the new guy? Really?

"I'm gonna meet him outside at the Embassy's parking lot, wait here"

You nodded and kept filling the paperwork for the Cali raid as he left. You were going to take the new guy with you. You couldn't just dump him, he wasn't brought here to sit around and watch from the sidelines.

You just hoped he did his work.

A few minutes passed when you heard a pair of footsteps walking through the corridor.

"We're going to Medellín?"

That definitely wasn't Javi.

You stood up, turning around to the voice at your back. 

You had to suppress a laugh once you took a glance at them.

Their suits were almost the same color, Javi's just a shade darker. Steve Murphy was wearing a light blue shirt along with a navy blue tie, had a mustache similar to Javi's too (but it made him look weird, if you were honest). His hair was dark blonde, combed to one side, and his face gave away a little nervousness. He was also taller than Javi, meaning you had to crank your neck up to meet his eyes.

"Murphy this is Bera. Bera, Murphy." Javi pointed at you as Steve shook your hand. His hold was strong, and he squeezed with enough force to be firm but not enough to hurt you. That came appreciated, every single man who met you always treated you as if you were made of porcelain. 

You glared at Javi and told Steve your real name, then clarified, "But everyone calls me Bera" 

"Bera?" he asked. You smiled in return. 

"Long story, you'll get to know it later"

He smiled too, and they left for the ambassador's office. 

As it was everyone's knowledge at the Embassy, she didn't like Javi very much, so you dealt with it when you had to ask her for something. She had a soft spot for you, you guessed it was because she knew how hard it was to be a woman in this line of work. Maybe she didn't like him because of his methods of getting info, you weren't sure.

Once they got out, Javi stood up behind his desk and started moving the few papers he had there. You wondered how he managed to have such a mess considering he only read intel, made calls and left you with everything else.

"Ahora qué se te perdió Peña?" (What did you loose now Peña?)

He glared at you and kept moving his papers. His actions were getting desperate, frustration from before about who knows what affecting him.

Murphy was looking back and forth between the two of you, standing awkwardly between your desks. You didn't know if he had understood what you said, but judging by his face, you guessed he hadn't.

"Recuerdas la informante de la que te hablé?" (Remember the informant I told you about?"

You rolled your eyes. Of course you remembered, he had been seeing her frequently over the past few weeks. He wasn't one to be constant about his hookups, but apparently, she was good enough to keep a streak with him. He hadn't seen her since you had been staying late, but last night you had left early and he went straight to search for her. You didn't have to be a genius to guess what had happened when he found her.

"Helena Sotomayor?" you asked, venom filling your voice. You didn't have anything against her or what she did, but jealousy wasn't something you could avoid easily, especially if you knew how Javier felt about her.

"Si"  his voice got deeper as he got angrier, "habrá una reunión de narcos en Medellín, y se irá a la fiesta que harán después"

(Yes, there's gonna be a reunion of narcos in Medellín, and she's leaving for the party they're hosting after)

"And what? You can't get another girl for the night?" you snarled, your tone hard and resentful. Steve looked at you with his eyes wide open, subconsciously getting closer to Javi.

"It's not about that!" Javier raised his arms exasperated, "you don't seem to understand. There's gonna be a meeting with different leaders of cartels, and they're surely planning something"

You scoffed, "yeah idiot, I get that! What I mean is what the hell are you searching for that has to do with her?"

Suddenly his back straightened, and you knew you weren't going to like what he was gonna say next.

"I need to fill a visa request for her"

You felt how your face got red and warmth spread through your body, filling it with jealousy and anger. Your eyes crossed with his and suddenly it had turned into yet another one of your fights. So that's what was bothering him. 

Steve looked at Javi, alarmed. 

"Is your informant really a prostitute?"

Javi didn't even look at him, "Everybody works for somebody"

You abruptly stood up and took your jacket off of your chair's back, walking fast towards the exit.

"A dónde carajos vas?" (where the fuck are you going?) he screamed, fisting his hands at his sides.

You turned around and showed him the finger.

"It's none of your fucking business!"

Javier and Steve stood there as you left, stunned. Your heels making a clicking sound that resonated in the office. Javier was used to your fighting and your screaming, it was part of your dynamic, but he didn't understand why you had reacted so bad this time. Sure, he knew you weren't fond of his way of finding intel, but you never really did more than glare or tease. This was new.

"Is it always like this with you two?" Steve asked. Javi moved his head from side to side, crinkling his eyes.

"A little less explosive, but yes"

Steve let out a sigh. This was going to be some long couple of months (or years?) for him, he just knew it.

As you walked, your eyes started to fill with tears, but you didn't know if it was out of rage or hurt. You were not one to cry, so you wiped them before they fell and rounded the corner to the right towards the diner you usually ate at.

Once you crossed the street and rounded another corner to the left, in the middle of the street was a big sign that spelled Salomé in cursive. You got inside and sat down at the table from the corner, taking out the money of your jacket's pocket. Catalina (or Cata), the cute old lady that managed it, smiled at you from the counter and walked towards you. You smiled back, doing your best to conceal your feelings.

"Qué hace mi niña preciosa aqui?" (what is my precious girl doing here?) . Her voice was soft, filled with affection. His tone was motherly and you knew she had noticed something was wrong.

You smiled sadly at her. "Solo tengo hambre"( I'm just hungry )

 Cata immediately sat down in the chair across you and took your hands between hers. She heard something off in your voice, and she didn't like it one bit.

"Ahora qué hizo ese chamaco malcriado?" (What did that spoiled brat do now?) Her tone changed to playful but angry in a matter of seconds, her frown accentuated even more than it already was by her age.

You shook your head, laughing. Cata was also very fond of Javi, but she knew how much of an idiot he could be. Surprisingly, you had met her before he had, one time you were hungry and the food at the Embassy didn't sound very appealing to your ears or stomach.

"Nada Catita, ya sabes cómo es" (Nothing Catita, you know how he is). You tried to smile and she cupped your head between her hands, caressing your face with his thumb. You put your hand above hers and gave it a soft squeeze.

"Qué quiere comer mi niña?" (What do you want to eat my girl?)

A grin spread across your cheeks. "Ajiaco con pollo, porfa." (Ajiaco with chicken, please. it's a typical food in Colombia, commonly found in Bogotá. It consists of shredded chicken, pastusa, sabanera and/or creole potato, corn and maybe cream milk)

She nodded and stood up, sadness forgotten for a moment.

"Con aguacate y arroz aparte?" (with avocado and rice aside?)

You nodded eagerly. "Sabes que si" (you know it)

The curtains hiding the kitchen opened to her as she walked inside to cook your food. Your heart warmed and clenched a little at how much love she showed you every time you came here, how she genuinely cared for you.

The tablecloth was made of white lace, and you passed your fingers through the surface. It felt gritty to the touch, but its beauty completely overshadowed it. Cata had gifted you one to take home once, and it was now decorating your little table at the living room in the apartment.

The noises of Bogotá surrounded you. It was easy to hear children playing and their mothers screaming at them; people selling fruits, clothes, arguing and laughing. People doing their best to keep living, even with the crisis they were dealing with, the number of narcos that were raising and how much hell they were surely about to unleash in this beautiful country.

 It was your job to stop them, to do your best at helping these people get their normal lives back. 

The sound of Cata approaching took you out of your thoughts.

"Aquí está mi dulce niña, justo como le gusta" (here it is my sweet girl, just how you like it)

You took the plate of food and tilted your head, thankful. "Gracias Cata" (thank you Cata)

You quickly set your spoon to the food and as you took the first bite, everything you were worried about banished for a second. Javier, the DEA, Escobar, Steve, everything flew out the window.

That's why you had come, because everything could be forgotten for a moment if you choose the right dish to stuff your mouth with.

Cata laughed at your eagerness, patting your shoulder with her soft hand. "Tranquilícese muñequita, que la comida no se le va a ir" (Calm down little doll, the food is not going to get away)

With your mouth full you could only nod, giving her an apologetic smile. She shook her head, eyes soft as they looked at you.

The rest of your meal was spent in silence, his presence comforting to your aching heart. She knew when to speak and when to stay silent, you always talked when you wanted to and it was pointless to try and make you.

Once you finished, you took a napkin and cleaned your mouth, handing her much more money than the food cost. She immediately gave it back to you, shaking her head.

"no no mi niña, llévese eso." (no no my girl, take that away)

Standing up, you took her hand and placed the money in her palm. 

"Yo no lo necesito Catita" (I don't need it Catita) With a kiss to the top of her head, you swiftly got out of there, her sigh reaching your ears as you walked back to the Embassy. 

You felt much lighter, the pain in your chest gone and your muscles relaxed. You entered the building and walked down the stairs to the basement, heading straight to your desk. Javi was sitting at his, filling what you guessed was the visa request for Helena. You didn't give it importance, sitting down at your chair and stripping off your jacket. The office was getting hot again, so you tied your hair up in a ponytail and started working as if nothing had happened.

Steve gives you a funny look from his seat between your desks. He won't have his own for at least a week, so either you let him use part of yours or Javier will.

You pray he's an organized person and wave at him.

"Come on Miami, get over here"

He sits straight and gives you a visual similar to a puppy being called, then stands up to pull his chair to sit across you. His desk will probably be on the opposite wall of yours anyway, may as well get used to his face.

"Do you need help with anything?"

His words sound like heaven in your ears, and you're sure your eyes even sparkle a little bit. Finally, someone is going to help you.

"Could you help me fill these formats, please? I'm sure you know how to"

He laughs a little and takes the bunch of documents you're handing him, nodding. He never liked doing paperwork either but didn't hate it as much as Peña seemed to do. He can't help but think that leaving you with everything is too much of a dick move and decides to help you as much as he can from now on.

Both of you start to work without another word, the air feeling a little tense now that Steve feels like less of a stranger at the office. He can't do much about the rigidness between the two of you, though.

Javier raises his head from the request he's filling out and a pang on his chest makes itself present once he gets a good look at the scene in front of him.

In all the time he's known you, he has never seen you so relaxed while working. Your cheeks are flushed from the heat that's enveloping the entire place, strands of hair falling to your face as you're bent over whatever document you're working on. Your shoulders are less tense than he's seen in weeks, and he can even see a faint smile forming at your lips. Steve is reading through the papers you gave him, his posture loose and easy.

With new people, you're usually slow to warm up to, you hate anyone who isn't him getting close at your workplace, and even then you're hesitant. Despite this, you seem to be getting used to Murphy pretty quickly, and the thought creates a knot right at the center of his stomach. 

He shakes the thought out of his head and keeps working on the visa request, but he can't shake the warm, burning feeling that has spread all over his body.

The day goes quickly, with Murphy helping you with everything you ask for and things getting easier between you two. With every laugh and joke the two of you exchange, Javier feels his body get hotter and hotter, but refuses to acknowledge it. 

Soon it's time to leave and for the first time in weeks, you don't need to stay late.

"Vamonos compañera" (let's go partner) Javier says, but his words come out hard and tense.

It only gets worse when you shake your head as you stand up.

"Hoy no Javier, tomaré el colectivo" (not today Javier, I'm taking the bus)

He grits his teeth and fists his hands at his sides but otherwise nods. He takes his jacket off the rack and rounds his desk, waiting for you and Steve to walk in front of him.

As the three of you get out of the building,the sun has barely set and it's a good change from the pitch black night you had gotten used to. You bid each other goodbye and he silently watches how you walk alongside Murphy through the alley with a clenching heart and a hot face, jumping into his Jeep and closing the door with much more force than necessary.

"pinche gringo" (fucking gringo) he mutters as he drives away.