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yellowocaballero · 4 years ago

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Not Your Queer-Coded Disney Villain: Annabelle & Web!Jon Ficlet

Got bored again today and forced myself to write something that wasn’t gratuitously long. Set in the same universe (or, one of the universes) as The Convention on Chronographer Lane, but it’s completely unnecessary to have read that one before this.

Content warning for (apparent and fake) predation of a student by a teacher, body horror, and spiders. REVERSE content warning for A PSYCH 101 LECTURE WRITTEN BY SOMEONE WHO WAS A TA FOR PSYCH 101. ACCURATE SCIENCE, BITCHES.

“What am I turning into?” Annabelle asked, after a half-second of rapid thought. “Who are you? And what do spiders have to do with any of this?”

Jon smiled again broadly, grey eyes dancing with a barely hidden delight. “You’re fully aware that these are all the same question.”

“Then answer them. You said you’re here to help me. Then help me.” Annabelle narrowed her eyes. “We’ll negotiate a price later.”

“This one is a freebie,” Jon said. He leaned back, face fading into the shadow of the dim yellow light of the hanging light. “You’re turning into something much akin to myself.”

In the darkness, Annabelle saw Jon open his eyes. And his eyes. And his eyes. And his eyes…

Annabelle was sleeping through Psych again.

In her defense, she was really tired. The nightmares had been getting worse every day, and yesterday she hadn’t gotten more than forty minutes of sleep without jolting up in the middle of the night. She had flipped on the light five times during the night, hysterically convinced that bugs were crawling over her and earning the eternal ire of her roommate. Whatever - Irene would forgive her once she bought her an iced coffee from that campus shop she liked. If Annabelle gave it to her later at night, she’d stay up later and would be less likely to bitch when Annabelle inevitably made a stink at three am again.

It didn’t matter. Psych was tediously easy anyway. Not that everything wasn’t tedious, but there were few things more boring than listening to the drone of Mr. Sims’ voice. She had no idea how that guy had a fanclub. Emmanuela Odugawa had asked her if she thought that he recited Piaget’s developmental stages in bed. Barf.

Thankfully, Annabelle had mastered the art of sleeping with her eyes open in class and barely aware enough to recognize when somebody called her name a decade ago, and she ruthlessly used this skill now. She dropped into a half-doze, and was only startled into awareness when she heard the word that had been running in a nonstop track loop through her mind for the past month.

“Phobia: an extreme or irrational fear or aversion to something.” Mr. Sims adjusted his glasses, pressing a button on his laptop that advanced the slides. “It’s an interesting definition, in my opinion. Like many things in Psychology, it is almost infuriatingly vague. How do you define ‘extreme’? How do you define ‘irrational’? Oftentimes, that label is determined by society, science, and our therapists. However, I believe you can argue that phobias are the most rational thing of all.”

Annabelle rubbed her arms, suddenly cold. These auditorium classrooms were always freezing.

“The concept of aversion is heavily rooted in evolution and biology. Anyone here ever eat any bad shrimp?” He didn’t wait for a response. “The smell of seafood probably made you sick for weeks afterwards. Our bodies are primed to detect poison, just as they are to detect danger. Phobias rooted in modern, abstract concepts - clowns, elevators, airplanes - are easy to extinguish. But phobias rooted in real, present, perpetual dangers, the sort of dangers that threatened the lives of cavemen, are far more difficult to ignore.”

Despite herself, Annabelle found herself awake. She found herself listening.

“Snakes. Heights. The Dark. Dogs, bears, large animals. Storms, driving, insects.” Mr. Sims’ looked up at the auditorium, and Annabelle could have sworn that he was looking right at her, he was looking at her. Annabelle’s breath caught, her heart thumping in her chest - a little differently than it used to. “Spiders.”

A horrible clicking echoed in Annabell’s ears. She was afraid that it was her.

Then he looked away, and the spell was broken. “Phobias are one of the most powerful and motivational forces in human evolution. Like mental illnesses, pack bonds, and emotional needs, the perceived weaknesses of the human mind can frequently be some of the most powerful forces that allow the survival of the human species. It isn’t a bug, it’s a feature. I find that a useful way to think of humanity, and of ourselves: that our weaknesses can make us very strong indeed. Next slide…”

If Mr. Sims said anything after that, Annabelle didn’t hear it.

She didn’t pay any attention to anything he said until the end of class, when she shrugged on her cute little silver backpack and merged into the stream of students filtering out of the classroom. A few students had stayed behind to talk to Mr. Sims, and he appeared wrapped in conversation with the giggling girls, but somehow he picked her out of the thick crowd.

“Annabelle?” Mr. Sims asked. “Stay after, please.”

So she leaned against the long sweep of desks, left with nothing to do but squint at Mr. Sims as he spoke with another student about the requirements for the upcoming paper, wondering why he looked so familiar.

All of the other students had assumed he was in his late twenties - “total DILF”, they all inanely assured her - but Annabelle wasn’t so sure. Despite the already graying hair, small glasses, and severe expression, she really wouldn’t put him any older than 23.

Maybe his greying temples were hair dye. Or stress did that to you, right? Annabelle squinted. But when Annabelle looked closer, if she really focused, then she really wasn’t sure it was his hair color at all.

So she looked closer. Her eyes had been itching for the past week. She had caught her skin flaking and peeling, and instead of pink raw skin underneath there was hard and scratchy black necrosis. Her eyes itched now, as if they were striving to split apart, and if Annabelle only let them then they would burst. And as her eyes itched in a horrible, visceral pain, she thought that maybe the white at Mr. Sims’ temples was the thin, sticky webs of spider-silk.

“Annabelle? Are you alright?”

She snapped back to attention, fairly embarrassed. She had been zoning out more in the past month than she had her entire life. Her older siblings had said that college would be rough, but she hadn’t known it would be this rough. This wasn’t like her. None of this was like her.

“I’m great,” Annabelle said reflexively. All of the other students were gone, and Mr. Sims was staring at her over his glasses. “Sorry. Is this about my test…?”

“No. You did quite well on your test. Best in the class, actually.” Mr. Sims smiled at her, as if this was a compliment or important. “Is that why you’ve been so bored in class?”

Ah. Busted. A rare thing for Annabelle. She affected a faux-abashed posture and expression. “Sorry, Mr. Sims. I’ve been staying up ‘til two every morning trying to get my homework done on time. If I’m ever going to go to med school…”

“I thought you were a poli sci major,” Mr. Sims said cheerfully. Annabelle fought a shudder - how did he know so much about her? This class had 200 students.

“Double major,” Annabelle said blithely. “I’m sorry about sleeping in class, I’ll manage my time better. It won’t happen again.”

“Yes, yes.” Mr. Sims waved her apology away, as if that wasn’t what he had been looking for. Then what had he been looking for? “I’m afraid I had somewhat of an ulterior motive for speaking to you today.” He leaned in a little, pulling his glasses down, and his foggy grey eyes - same color as the grey at his temples - focused solely on her. Annabelle made her eyes bigger, and she leaned in too, adjusting her posture so she looked smaller. “You’ve been doing very well in class. I actually wanted to invite you to a meeting. About...oh, your potential for med school. I’m excited to see you succeed. I think you could do quite well in whatever field you choose, and I’d like to help. It would be just us, of course.”

Ding ding ding. Annabelle affected a giggle. “I could totally use the help! Like, in your office? Or, like...lunch, or…?”

“I was thinking dinner, actually,” Mr. Sims smiled. “How’s Bombay Bicycle Club?”

Restaurant and bar, with a casual yet dignified atmosphere. Not formal enough to put up anybody’s guard, but nice enough that a freshman girl could feel treated and be impressed. Most importantly, it was popular among the businessman crowd and almost nobody on campus visited it. Annabelle used it herself to meet up with her sugar daddies all the time.

For a brief, strange moment, Annabelle felt as if he did - but of course he didn’t. But it wasn’t impossible. But if he knew, then why wasn’t he blackmailing her? Was the blackmail for later, once he got her alone? This was probably a power play, getting her off balance by insinuating that he knows but not being explicit about it. He’d probably pull out the blackmail, ‘I’ll ruin your reputation you slut etc’, once they actually got there. Not that he could - Annabelle had contingency plans - but she would have to be careful to actually record him propositioning her anyway. Worst case scenario they had a MAD situation, best case she could squeeze him. Probably not for very much money, since grad students were poor as dirt, and she didn’t exactly need him to boost her grades...get him to slip her the test key and sell the test key? That could work. She could probably get him to strategically cut grades, which was a service that Annabelle could probably sell to students with a grudge…

But then Mr. Sims smiled at her, as if he knew what she was thinking, and Annabelle realized that she had been silent too long. She wanted to come off as panicked, maybe desperate, definitely flattered.

“Sure!” Annabelle said, barely having to feign the anxious creak in her voice. “What time? I have night classes, so…”

“Next Friday at six,” Mr. Sims said instantly. “I’m looking forward to it.”

“Me too.” Annabelle affected Smile #35 - shy virgin. Mr. Sims’ grin widened. Annabelle silently put aside the ‘Catholic schoolgirl’ outfit for Friday. “See you then!”

She turned around, gave him a shy smile, and bounced off. She had just opened the heavy door out of the room when she heard him speak again, freezing her in her tracks.

“Oh, Annabelle - how is the study with Dr. Bates going?”

And his question panicked her so much, made her heart change rhythm and made her skin itch as if something was straining to come out of it, made her eyes itch and crawl and burst, that every calculated move went out the window. She didn’t answer his question, didn’t even give an excuse - she just ran out the door, bright purple vintage boots thumping against the linoleum, breath catching in a chest where she was no longer sure she even had ribs.

Most of her was already calculating. She was already two months into uni, she had to start establishing her power base. The minute her sorority accepted her she’d have greater access to money, popularity, and influence, but she needed reach with the administration too. Mr. Sims was her in. This was a good thing.

But part of her was disappointed, because she had liked him, and she felt a little used. Feelings of disgust, as strong and vivid as in her nightmares, rose in her chest. She squished far down in her chest, familiar with the feeling and effortlessly repressing it.

Annabelle was good with disgusting things.

She had another session with the Arachnophobia study on Monday. Which went fine. It was fine! She didn’t wake up that morning so sick with nerves that she almost threw up. She didn’t stare at her email inbox for thirty minutes, begging herself to cancel and drop out of the study. Nope.

She distracted herself by befriending all of her roommate’s friends and dropping faux-concerned gossip about how cranky and anxious Irene’s been lately, have you noticed she’s been blaming me for how badly she’s sleeping? It was really super sad, frowny face, how do you think I can help, frowny face frowny face frowny face?

So Annabelle went to the Arachnophobia study (it was fine), had increasingly realistic and vivid nightmares about her chest caving in and a nest of spiders crawling out of her chest and eating her eyes, and slept through class. It was all fine.

She should have gone to Oxford. It still made her a little bitter. She had been smart enough to get in, but she hadn’t been smart enough to get the full scholarship. She couldn’t afford it, so instead she was stuck in University of Surrey, where dreams went to die. Future politicians should go to Oxford. Yeah, Surrey had some peers and Parliament members, whatever. She needed better, Oxford and awards and money. From there, from some swotty school or another, it was easy street. Annabelle deserved easy street, and she deserved Oxford, and it just wasn’t fair -

After another three am nightmare, Annabelle blearily scrolled through her sibling groupchat. Barney was doing great in med school. Tricia had posted her maternity photos. Wow, look at that, Robin had gotten a commendation at his law firm. Whatever.

No hope of distinguishing herself in the world. No hope of distinguishing herself in her stupid family. She was smarter than any of her siblings, brighter and better than those doctors and lawyers and accountants, but nobody cared. Mum and Dad were living their retirement in comfort and cooing over their grandchildren, finally rewarded in old age for all their hard work.

If Annabelle dropped off the face of the earth, nobody would even notice.

It should have been a depressing thought. The idea that nobody cared about her, not really, that nobody knew the real her. But somehow it just made her heart beat faster in excitement.

The idea of disappearing from all of this, of cutting herself free from a thousand threads that brought her plummeting down to earth...in the cold hours of that dark morning, to an eighteen year old terrified and alone in uni, it was a siren song.

It was a siren song that sounded, oddly, like the chittering and scuttling of a thousand tiny bodies, but Annabelle was learning to look beyond that.

By the time next Friday rolled around, Annabelle was considering breaking her self-imposed rule against drugs and popping a Xanax. But that wouldn’t help her exhaustion, the persistent bone-deep frazzled sensation of going a week on almost no sleep whatsoever, so she settled for an espresso as she wriggled herself into a tight, slinky plaid dress paired with a puffy olive green windbreaker. She wasn’t sure if she owned any clothing that was made after 1990 - a habit born from a childhood of shopping from thirst stores, and continued voluntarily into high school when she started making her own money online fleecing suckers. It was her, so much as anything was.

“Hot date?” Irene asked, bending over her Physics textbook without looking up. She glanced at her vibrating phone, scowling. Poor baby - her friends were staging an intervention. “New guy or old guy?”

“New guy,” Annabelle said vaguely, carefully picking out a bold red lipstick - or did that seem too forward? Should she go for a natural look? “If I’m not back by midnight call the police. I’ll text you a picture of his car.”

“Roger.” Irene flipped a page of her textbook, oblivious to the fact that she was one of the few people Annabelle genuinely liked. Not enough not to screw with her, but she liked her. “He’s not good enough for you, something something.”

“Darling,” Annabelle said, winking into the mirror, “nobody is.”

She hoped Irene believed it. She didn’t.

It wasn’t a frequent occurrence that Annabelle wished she was stupid, but today she wished she was stupid enough to take a power nap during her ten minute Uber ride. Her mind felt frazzled and frayed, as if it had been taken out of her scalp and spread out with a rolling pin onto a floured countertop. She felt as if she was melting, her vision spiralling into fractals or blurring out. She wanted to sleep. God, she’d do anything for some sleep -

So she blared Bad Romance in her frayed earbuds instead, clutching her iPod Touch tightly, pulling herself together. Gaga, give her strength.

By the time that she tipped her driver, effortlessly found Mr. Sims’ car in the parking lot of Bombay Bicycle Club and texted Irene the license plate (Volkswagen, obviously), she had dragged herself into focus. She stapled on her confident posture and walk - no, we’re going with ingenue today, make it shy and hesitant - and slipped inside the restaurant, making a show of holding her clutch tight to her chest and looking around with big eyes.

She saw him instantly. He was sitting in a corner booth, head down and texting on his phone with a half-smile. The corner booth was poorly lit, light dampened by the wood panelling and soft leather seats, and half of his face was draped in shadow.

Great. She had even arrived ten minutes early just so she could pick a brightly lit, intimate little table in the center of the room. This guy - he was almost like her. He was almost like her, but he was better.

Annabelle fought the urge to grind her teeth. She smiled instead, waving cheerfully until he raised his head. He smiled back at her, wriggling his fingers, and Annabelle wove around the tables until she could slide into the seat across from him.

“This is cozy!” She said brightly. “Thank you so much for inviting me out, Mr. Sims. It’s been ages since I got away from my books -”

“Oh, cut that shit out,” Mr. Sims said, bored. “I’m not going to sleep with you.”

Annabelle’s mind shut down. Error 404, blue screen of death.

“I’m sorry,” she said pleasantly, smile frozen on her face. “What?”

But Mr. Sims just shrugged listlessly, slumping against the cushioned wall. His expression was no longer fond, indulgent, haughty. He just looked bored now, as if he was too tired and underpaid to deal with eighteen year olds. “I don’t want to sit through this entire dinner fending off flirting. We have actual business to talk about, and I am uninterested in beating around the bush when there’s no point. You aren’t even subtle.”

“Excuse me -” Annabelle started, enraged, but Mr. Sims put up a hand and cut her off.

The change was instant. On a dime, Mr. Sims straightened his posture, swept a finger through his hair to transform it from slicked back professor type to windswept, adopted a friendly and casual expression, and leaned in as if he was happy and excited to be sitting with Annabelle. In a moment he dropped ten years. Barely a second after his transformation the waiter approached them, holding a notepad, and Annabelle realized with a start that he had noticed the waiter coming before she did.

“How are you two doing tonight?” the waiter asked politely, smiling at the both of them in a rote routine that Annabelle remembered from her own days waitressing.

“Doing great!” Mr. Sims said, and even his accent was different, closely matching her own. He glanced back at Annabelle, nothing but open and friendly. “Mum says get whatever you want, dork. It’s on her bill, so let’s run her out of house and home.”

Instinctually, Annabelle shot back, “Aren’t you old enough to take me out to eat with your own money, loser?”

“Not with your stomach!” Mr. Sims laughed, and the waiter chuckled along too. Mr. Sims effortlessly rapped out an order for the waiter, before Annabelle even got a chance to look at the menu, and when she floundered Mr. Sims just rolled his eyes and ordered for her too. It was, somehow, her favorite food.

He waited for the waiter to move onto the next table, eyeing him carefully, before he let the persona drop. Mr. Sims sagged again, dropping the friendly act, sizing her up from half-lidded eyes.

“How did he even believe that,” Annabelle said flatly. “We don’t look anything alike.”

“White people will believe anything,” Mr. Sims said, rolling his eyes. “I have the Belgian government convinced I’m an Iraqi scientist and most high profile Australian celebrities think I’m Egyptian royalty.”

“...does Egypt have -”

“Nope.”

Annabelle was beginning to feel a little like the star actress in the school play who got upstaged in every way by the villain’s performance. Nobody did what she did. Nobody did what she did, but better.

“Don’t feel insecure,” Mr. Sims said, as if he could read her mind. “I’m a good actor, and I’m excellent at reading people. But I can’t plan or plot like you do. I’m shit at thinking three steps ahead, much less thirty. You can keep plots and schemes going for years - decades, even, if I were to guess. I’m not sure how someone as competent as you can have self-esteem issues.”

Annabelle bristled. “You try having nobody care about you for - how do you even know that shit about me?” Something terrible occurred to her. “Are you some kind of stalker, Mr. Sims?”

Mr. Sims shuddered in real disgust. “It’s Jon. And no, of course not. You just aren’t as subtle as you think you are.”

Yes, she was. She was subtle to everyone on the planet - everyone save, maybe, Jon. Annabelle narrowed her eyes. “What do you want?”

“Absolutely nothing,” Jon said immediately.

“Liar. Everybody wants something.”

“I’m here altruistically,” Jon said, the perfect picture of innocence. “Really. I’m here to help you, Annabelle.”

“You are stalking me.” Annabelle leaned forward, but Sims didn’t move. “Are you even a real graduate student?”

“Absolutely not. I’m twenty three, I got my Psych degree last year and I’ve been bouncing odd jobs since.” Jon shrugged, as Annabelle felt silently vindicated. Nothing about this man acted like a twenty three year old - she remembered her siblings at twenty-three, there was nothing adult about them - but it was probably just another persona. She wondered how far she’d have to scratch to get to the real Jon Sims.

“So you were just at Surrey to spy on me,” Annabelle said slowly. “I don’t know what country you’re from, but in England that’s definitely stalking.”

“I’d call it scouting,” Jon said. The waiter dropped by to place their drinks on the table - Jon had gotten a mule for himself, and he had ordered water for Annabelle in a move uncharacteristic for a sketchy guy. He waited until the waiter left to continue. “Call me a recruiter.”

“For who? What kind of job recruiter teaches a class for two months just to get to me?”

“How’s your study with Dr. Blake going, Annabelle?” Jon said, almost randomly, and Annabelle shut up. He must have seen something in her eyes, because a sharp little grin stretched in the corner of his narrow and sharp face. “Thought so. What do you dream of, Annabelle? In the cold corners of night, what fears come to life in the dark recesses of your mind?”

Maybe, Annabelle thought inanely, this was a dream too. Just an extended nightmare, one she hadn’t woken up from. It felt like that: distant and strange, hyper-real and unreal. This strange man sitting in front of her, who swapped faces so easily even Annabelle couldn’t keep up, was far too out of place to truly exist.

Or maybe he was the first real person she had met in a very long time.

Jon continued talking, as if she had responded. Maybe she had. “I am not a hero in this story. If I was, I would have come earlier. I would have deleted your name from the pool of subjects, and I would have made it so that you never got that call.” Jon looked away from her for the first time, letting a little sadness show on his face. “I couldn’t. No - no, I could have, I simply chose not to. You’re important, Annabelle. And I didn’t want to rob you of something that you may grow to treasure. I’m afraid that the choice you make now may not be much of a choice at all - but, perhaps, there is still a chance. At the very least, I would like to make this transition a little easier for you. It is a terrible thing, to have to do it alone.”

That…

“That was so vague it was completely meaningless.”

Jon barked a laugh, strangely delighted. “It’s not fair to speak in circles to somebody who’s gone a week without sleep!”

“But you’re doing it on purpose,” Annabelle said, too dead inside to feel mad.

“Oh, absolutely. I am not taking the risk of taking you on at full power.” Jon smiled at her, as if they were friends sharing a joke. “I saw what you did to that Walker boy in secondary.”

Despite herself, Annabelle smiled. “Hear he gets out on parole in five.” Something else occurred to her, a bit belatedly. “You are stalking me!”

“Does a spider stalk the fly that strikes a string on its web?” Jon asked cheerfully. “Or is it simply investigating an encroachment into its territory?”

“Does that mean that you’re going to eat me?” Annabelle said archly. “Thought you said you didn’t want to fuck me. Rude, by the way.”

Almost hilariously, Jon wrinkled his nose. “Sex is a waste of time, resources, and my attention. Can’t imagine why people are so obsessed.”

“I know, right!” Annabelle burst out, before she could help herself. “Do you have any idea how much money I get a month from guys just to talk to me? It’s like they’re aliens! Why do people fuck or date if it’s not to manipulate someone?”

“Right! It’s ridiculous.”

It was the first time anybody had ever agreed with her on that. It was the first time she had even told anybody she felt that way. For a brief second, Annabelle felt connected to Jon. It was the first time that happened in...a very long time.

Jon was the first person Annabelle had ever met who was like her. Everybody in Annabelle’s life had always been either useful or useless. Jon seemed above that, somehow. To be beyond utility, to exist on your own power...what did that look like? To be the powerful, instead of the powerless?

No matter how hard she tried, no matter how many puppet strings Annabelle tied around her fingers, she was never powerful. Not really. She was eighteen, from a nothing family, and no matter how many molehills she made herself queen of she would never rule the mountain. She couldn’t get as far as she wanted with what she had. The only reason she had even volunteered for the stupid Arachnophobia experiment was because she needed to crush out weakness in herself, erase the hidden flaws in her mind.

But Jon said her flaws were strengths. What made her weak could be turned into power.

Annabelle needed more, more, more. She needed everything, if she was to have anything. She needed what Jon had.

Everything Annabelle said had a purpose. Every word she used was chosen carefully, every little gesture or body language was calculated. She said nothing without thinking, and she could do it so quickly nobody even noticed. Jon would notice, a con man as perfect as she was.

Let him. Give her two straight days to sleep, and they’d have a real battle of wits. In the meantime, she just had to pick her questions strategically.

“What am I turning into?” Annabelle asked, after a half-second of rapid thought. “Who are you? And what do spiders have to do with any of this?”

Jon smiled again broadly, grey eyes dancing with a barely hidden delight. “You’re fully aware that these are all the same question.”

“Then answer them. You said you’re here to help me. Then help me.” Annabelle narrowed her eyes. “We’ll negotiate a price later.”

“This one is a freebie,” Jon said. He leaned back, face fading into the shadow of the dim yellow light of the hanging light. “You’re turning into something much akin to myself.”

In the darkness, Annabelle saw Jon open his eyes. And his eyes. And his eyes…

All eight of Jon’s glittering black eyes shone in the darkness, straining her own and making her head thump. It was wrong, outside of humanity or reality, and it felt as if the very sight was straining the fabric of her delicately maintained life so tight it would tear. It felt as if it was tearing her, right in two, ruining her forever. Her eyes felt like they were going to burst out of her head.

She didn’t want to know what would replace them. But she had the feeling that she already did.

“Then what,” Annabelle gritted out, “are you?”

“I am the eldest and most treasured Son of the Mother of Spiders,” Jon said. He smiled at her, just a little, almost apologetic. “Sorry about that. I know you’ve always wanted to be an only child.”

Ah. Duh. Obviously. She should have known.

“...do I want to know who the Mother of Spiders is?”

“Your mother, should you choose to accept her,” Jon said cheerfully, leaning back into the light, and his face was normal again. Human as ever. Strange and foreign as ever - possibly everything, possibly nothing. “I know you aren’t strictly in the market for adoption, but you may not have much of a choice. You’ve felt her scratching beneath her skin. She’s going to tear out of you, and soon. Did you know some species of wasp lay their eggs in the body of spiders to provide food for the grubs?”

“During the next experiment,” Annabelle said dully, already filtering out Jon’s useless tidbits of information. That was a guy who spoke for the sake of hearing himself talk. “That’s when it’s happening. When I’ll...change.”

“Yes. It’s a painful process,” Jon said, and it was almost apologetic. “My own happened when I was fifteen - quite young, all things considered. I still remember the sound of my bones snapping as -”

“Don’t.”

“Of course! Anyway, I thought I’d make sure you had...to use the psych term, informed consent, before you entered the crucible. Our - my, sorry - Mother often foregoes true consent in our operations. The beauty of nature!” Jon laughed, as Annabelle felt sick. “Agnes wanted to put together a pamphlet, but then we let Gerry go wild on the clipart and...well, it’s better if I just explain. I can’t give you the full story now, but I’ll tell you as much as your mind can comprehend.”

Annabelle wasn’t sure she could even comprehend this. It was so much, and she was so tired. She had just heard that her body was going to rupture like a cocoon and give birth to a giant spider that may or may not also be her, and all she could think about was the fact that she wanted to go back to bed. Somehow, all she could ask was -

“Why?” She asked, so stupid and pointless, as if she was stupid, as if she wasn’t her at all. “Why are you doing this?”

“It’s like I said.” In the dim yellow lighting, Jon’s eyes glittered pure black, and in that brief and stupid second Annabelle felt as if they were the same in that way. “Nobody should have to go through this alone and ignorant.” Then the moment was over, and his eyes were a human grey again, just left of normal. “Besides. Siblings stick together, right?”

“I hardly need more siblings,” Annabelle snapped.

“You’re about to lose seven of them real soon,” Jon promised, extremely worryingly, “so I’d take what you can get right now, Annabelle.”

“Are you going to kill -”

“Unfortunately, you may have to fake your own death!”

Then their food came, and Annabelle received her first lesson in the class of hard knocks.

They talked for hours. It took hours, to even just get a picture of the story. Jon was patient, answering every question, and Annabelle strained so hard trying to fight through her exhaustion, trying to understand the answer, Jon’s motivation in answering it or what he could be leaving out, that by the end of it she felt as if she had run a marathon. She had never felt so tired in her life, in the most dangerous situation in her life, with the most dangerous person she had ever met.

By the end of it, Irene was texting her to ask if she was dead, and Annabelle was falling asleep at her chair. Jon cut an end to their conversation when he slid out his wallet, covered the bill with a black Amex card, and slid a business card against the table. Annabelle squinted down at it.

The text in the center just said [FREELANCERS]. That was it. She stared at it.

Underneath the vague word, she saw a phone number [555-555] and an email [[email protected]]. Annabelle looked up to stare at Jon. “Are you for real?”

“Almost never,” Jon said cheerfully, “but the card will make sense when it needs to. Let me take you back to your dorm, alright? You can get some sleep in the car.”

If he was a creep, she was dead anyway. Annabelle didn’t bother arguing. She grabbed her jacket and got in the passenger seat of his car, and true to his word Annabelle drifted asleep almost immediately. She even felt as if the ride took longer than ten minutes, as if he drove in circles just waiting for her.

For the first time in a week, Annabelle slept uninterrupted, and had no dreams.

Annabelle wanted what Jon had.

And a week later, she took it.

Shivering in an alley, clothing ripped to shreds, her own skin hanging off her triple jointed limbs, she dug out a creased and torn business card. She had been worrying at it intensely over the weekend, staring and it and clenching it tightly as if it was her only lifeline. It was, of course. But Jon had known that.

The card looked different now. The text now looked handwritten, but with a beautiful and old-timey slanted handwriting. It now just read:

‘To Annabelle, with love. From your new friends Gerry, Jon, and Agnes’. There was a number underneath, and Annabelle frantically dug in her tattered leather jacket pocket to draw out her cracked phone.

Annabelle hated taking favors from people. Everything she had, she had fought for herself. She would scrape, borrow, beg, and steal whatever she had to. But, when it came to siblings...maybe, then, it was okay.

Dizzily, as Annabelle let the phone ring, she thought: this is my supervillain origin story.

The thought sent a slow smile crawling across her inhuman and warped face.

Sounds like fun.

#AROACE ANNABELLE RIGHTS #tma #tma fanfic #the magnus archives #the magnus archives fanfiction #annabelle cane #jonathan sims #web!jon #realized while writing evilcon that annabelle was seven while jon was twelve #and that their sibling relationship must be a NIGHTMARE #anyway i'm trying to convince myself not to write a web!jon agnes and gerry fic where its basically a leverage au #and i am failing miserably #so i wrote this instead of that #GRIFTER!JON AND IN THIS ESSAY I WILL #my writing

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maedarakat · 5 years ago

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Covered in Mud

——

The sky had been threatening to spill all day, all gray clouds offset by deep threatening purples. Nobody could predict when it would happen, but when it did, the clouds seemed to crack open like an egg, coating the Edge in a sudden shower of hailstones, rain, wild gusts of wind and crackling peals of thunder.

It was a truly impressive act of Thor, Astrid thought, drinking from her mug under the Clubhouse roof she had mended and patched herself before the rain season came. Not a drop so far. She was feeling a little smug, especially because Hiccup had waved away all her reminders to fix his own roof in a timely manner and was now grumpily carrying in an armload of drenched blueprints, notebooks and maps to dry out in front of the fire.

Toothless sneezed as he followed after, ears flat and drenched to his skin. More wet scrolls were sticking out of the saddle bags and Astrid came over to help unload them and spread them out.

“No, no, I got this,” Hiccup sighed. “I brought it on myself, you were right. I should have fixed the roof.”

“I didn’t say anything,” Astrid said.

“You didn’t have to. I can tell you’re dying to say ‘I told you so’ because that’s the expression you always make when you’re about to.” Hiccup’s tone was playful but also not, and Astrid tried her best to navigate the tricky waters of what he really meant to say.

Passive-aggressiveness, Ruff had supplied once, when both of them were in their cups and Astrid had found herself venting. It was nice to have a word to it, but what an oddly perfect word for every situation with Hiccup she seemed to find herself in lately.

Right now he either wanted her to reassure him and apologize, or go back to her warm drink and leave him alone. Neither option seemed ideal, but she was saved from the guesswork by a frustrated groan from Snotlout who tossed some dry wood and a pile of bundled kindling out of his cloak onto the floor.

Lout was wet, but a few hours worth of firewood had been rescued thanks to his quick thinking and the sacrifice of his cloak. Grumbling, he started stacking it into a pile. Astrid gladly went to help with that chore instead, and Hiccup huffed. He’d wanted her to choose the first option apparently, but it was no good to backtrack now - no matter what she did, it would become an argument later that everyone would pretend they hadn’t heard. She didn’t engage, playing dumb to his irritated glances and once the wood was stacked, she checked on the stew.

He was having trouble keeping one of the maps from rolling back up instead of laying flat. Astrid knew better than to suggest getting small stones from the potted flowers outside to weigh down the corners. It would be insulting somehow.

“What did you make for dinner?” Hiccup asked, just giving up and holding down the corners with his hands. He was apparently going to stay like that for a while.

Astrid sighed inwardly. “Yak stew.” Hiccup didn’t acknowledge the answer or look up at her, seemingly deep in thought and scowling.

“I’m tired of yak. When can we have boar or venison again?” Snotlout butted in and really, honestly, bless him. Astrid hadn’t wanted to hear Hiccup’s attempts to dodge out of eating any. He never seemed to be hungry on days when it was her turn to cook.

“When the rains let up, we can go hunting. But yak meat is what we have the most of.”

“Who first decided to eat a yak anyway?” Ruff asked, walking in with Fishlegs. “They’re like giant adorable sheepdogs with horns. That you can practice braiding on. They just stand there and let you. What ‘honorable viking’ decided to ‘hunt’ that?”

“Well, sometimes during famines when there’s not a lot of food to hunt -“ Fishlegs started, until Ruffnut gave him a withering look. “Oh you weren’t really asking, never mind.”

He was carrying a Maces and Talons board and the rule book. It had become necessary to have the rule book present; while playing, the twins liked to bend and tweak the boundaries of every single one. Astrid had to admit, it was thrilling to watch. Hiccup might even forget his bad mood and have a good time.

The only one missing now was Tuff.

When dinner was ready, and had been roasted thoroughly as well as stewed, Tuff had still not shown up.

Astrid left it up to the others to serve themselves and carried a covered bowl for Tuff toward his hut. It wasn’t like him to be late for dinner unless he was dramatically late. She relaxed when she saw a candle on in his window and the chimney putting out smoke.

“Hey, Tuff. Get attacked by a wolf or something?” Astrid asked automatically when he opened the door. She’d said it carelessly, an inside joke between all of them, but Tuff’s appearance took her aback.

He was a wall of mud with eyes and stiffening braids. He currently held a peeping ball of damp fluff in a towel draped over his hand - apparently trying to dry off the chicks before seeing to himself.

The storm had caught everyone at least a little off guard but ... “Why are you covered in mud?” Astrid asked.

If Tuff could have looked any angrier, the mud surely would have baked and fallen off him in crisp pieces.

“Because that ... that absolute waste of feathers-“ he started, absolutely fuming.

“Peep,” the chick helpfully interrupted.

“Excuse me - because your father,” Tuff said instead to the chick, voice dripping with scorn. “Would not come inside when he was directed to before the storm hit, oh no - Fustercluck knows best! Fustercluck thinks a rickety old toolshed is the best place to keep his chicks safe during a storm like this! And so he led me on a merry f-“

“Peep.”

“-cking chase around in the mud with half of you guys unhelpfully following him, until I finally grabbed him so you would follow us all inside.” Tuff sighed dramatically and Astrid shook her head, grinning. He was more a mother hen than Chicken. It was endearing.

“Imprinting’s a fine concept and all, really,” Tuff said, like he was letting her in on a secret. “Less fine when there’s a complete doorknob standing there on hatching day. Sorry, I won’t be hanging with you guys tonight, A. I gotta get them dried off so they don’t catch colds. I can’t come to dinner looking like this anyway.”

“So did you let your dumbass rooster inside or did you throw him back out to stay in his shed?”

“Oh I wanted to, believe me.” Tuff made a face and jerked his thumb over his shoulder. There, on a perch made for two, Fustercluck and Chicken were preening each other’s feathers and burbling lovingly. “She wouldn’t have it.”

And he wasn’t anywhere near that heartless. Astrid knew that better than he seemed to himself. She came in, set the bowl on the table and picked up a towel. “Tell you what. After we dry off the chicks, I’ll help you get all this mud off you.”

“Oh. Okay, thanks,” Tuff said, offering her a smile and a different wet chick.

They got them clean and fluffed up and Chicken accepted them into her nest for the night, preening them the rest of the way dry. Tuff closed them in and noticed the bowl on the table. “Could I have some of your soup if you aren’t going to eat it? It’s going to get cold.”

Astrid smiled. “It’s yours, I brought it for you. In case you were sick or reading or decided to paint a wall.”

“You did?” Tuff didn’t give her time to take the offer back, picking the bowl up and draining it. He loved it when people cooked for him - Ruff had told her that.

She set a pot of water on his stove to heat up and looked for towels while he shed all but his leggings. He was trying to tie his hair back and out of the way but his braids were heavy and caked.

Astrid took over, making him sit in a chair and lean his hair back into a basin of clean warm water. Another pot of water was set to warm up on the fire. Poor Tuff would need more - probably most of it for his hair.

He sighed blissfully as the first soak drew the worst of the dirt and mud away, turning the basin water immediately opaque. “It feels like the fifty pound Night-terror napping on my head just woke up and flew away.”

“Yeah, I bet. This is mostly clay. You guys should put a potters wheel in your hut.”

“I’m not going to make anything resembling a normal piece of crockery,” he vowed.

“That’s alright. I’m sure Ruff won’t be making anything resembling a non-offensive piece of crockery,” Astrid said, and Tuff laughed.

He helped her change out the water to do his hair once more until it was closer to its normal golden color. A swim in the morning would help get the rest of it clear.

Astrid dabbed a towel into hot water and gently ran it over the patches of mud on his skin that had caked dry. When it was softened, she wiped the dirt away just as gently. Tuff followed her motions, getting his chest and arms and legs while she got his back.

Tuff sighed softly when they were finished, his exhaustion and relief tangible. “Thanks, A,” he said. “Did you have dinner yet?”

“No, but it’s fine. I’m sure there’s plenty of yak stew left over,” she said wryly.

“Stew would be cold by now. Here.” He got up, and headed to his pantry. He gifted her with a plate of cracked walnuts, dried apricot slices, goat cheese, and a few hard boiled eggs.

All put together, it looked like a feast for some warrior elf maiden traveling Midgard. Astrid smiled and cleaned her plate of everything that had been offered, eating slowly while Tuff - clean and in much better spirits - laughingly recounted his madcap adventure of chasing a very stubborn rooster all across a muddy, slippery, hole-filled yard. Barf and Belch had dug a man-sized pit earlier to hide their favorite bone and it had filled up quickly with a foamy slurry of mud and rainwater. Tuff had apparently forgotten this and went down with a splash.

Astrid couldn’t stop laughing - not at his story but at the way he told it. “I wish I could have seen that! You probably looked like some ravenous troll clawing its way out of Niflheim - no wonder the chickens freaked out and ran away! I would have run too, if you’d just popped out of the ground! And with all that lightning and thunder -“

“You would have run from a troll? You?” Tuff scoffed. “That poor thing would have been tied to a chair in an hour, begging you to call his mother to come pick him up.”

She cackled and rubbed at her cheeks, which were seriously aching by now. Astrid hadn’t laughed this hard in a while. It was definitely good for her.

They said their good nights a little while after Ruff came back to the hut, not drunk but definitely not sober. “You guy’s missed a really dumb boring match in which everyone followed the same dumb boring rules.” She stared at her brother, still casually shirtless, only wearing his leggings. “And apparently you guys played strip-poker instead. And my brother ... lost? Won? Who knows. Not asking ‘cause I’m gonna forget everything in the morning anyway!” Ruffnut stomped cheerfully up to the loft to pass out across her own bed.

Tuff still had his face in his hands by the time her snores drifted down and Astrid was beet red, snickering helplessly.

“On that note, we should probably get to bed too,” she finally managed, wiping her eyes.

Tuff nodded, getting up. “Yeah, I’ll walk you to the door. Thanks for everything. This was a good night.” He grinned at her, soft and hopeful and Astrid leaned in without thinking, and kissed the corner of his mouth.

She pulled back and they stared at each other, neither one wanting to blink first.

“Goodnight,” Astrid managed to squeak out finally, because her mom had told her that shield maidens never started what they couldn’t finish. “See you tomorrow?”

Tuff hand went up to touch where she had kissed him and then he seemed to remember himself and dropped his arm down. “Yeah. S-Swimming, right?” It was an offer to stay friends, if she thought she had made a mistake.

“Sure, I’ll dress for it. See you at dawn?”

“Yeah.” Tuff stared at her from the doorway and she really wanted to kiss him again. Astrid thought of Hiccup still trying to dry his papers and feeling slighted that she hadn’t stayed to help him. She weighed the pros and cons of tipping her boat over and refusing to navigate anymore of his confusing waters ever again.

Happily, Tuffnut leaned forward and caught her lips, solving the equation.

#httydrarepairbingo #tuffstrid #tuffnut #astrid #httyd

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vvirgils · 5 years ago

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Chronicles of Straith #2-The Witch’s Dragon:Chapter 18

Chronicles of Straith #1-Fate’s Door///Chapter 17/Chapter 19//Masterpost

Well, Virgil had to tell them her feelings at some point. Which was not going to be that day, when they coped with seasickness and she stared at the passing riverbank. Or the next day, because then they were both too nervous about making it to Lyrwrithe.

It was midday, the sun burning bright on the ship, known as the Dark Thought. If you leaned over the railing just enough, and took care not to fall off, shining silver lettering spelled the words out on the hull. Jessie had done that several times today, being the only passenger on board who wasn’t seasick.

She ran across the dock to where Virgil and Roman were standing at midday. “I’ve taken this route dozens of times,” she told Virgil, a cheery smile still on her face. “You get used to it.”

“I’m sure you do,” Virgil said, wondering if Jessie actually was a mermaid, the way that she looked so happy at sea. Almost as if, like the poor sailors of legend, she would drag Virgil down into the river and leave her to die.

At least then, Virgil wouldn’t have to deal with Roman’s seasickness. Her friend was much less attuned to being on a boat, especially one this big. She knew they’d never been on a ship for a long period of time, and well, were overall sensitive and royal.

“I don’t like boats,” Roman said after Jessie bounded to the other side of the ship.

Virgil rolled her eyes at them. “Suck it up, princess. Some little choppy waves aren’t going to kill you.”

“What if they do, Virgil? What then?” Roman widened their eyes, as if trying to persuade her with just a gaze.

“Then it’ll be just me and Jessie on this hellcraft of a ship. Oh, and Epos will take over back in Straith. So basically, life will suck. Fortunately, the waves won’t kill you,” Virgil said, giving Roman her best look of disappointment.

“Random question—do you like Jessie?” Roman asked, dropping the part of their seasickness that was an act. They leaned close, as if exchanging secrets.

“She’s pretty cool, I guess. I don’t know her that well yet, but I don’t dislike her,” Virgil said, confused as to why Roman was asking in an undertone.

“No, do you like her?”

A thousand lines of thought in Virgil’s head knotted together, and she recalled one of their lunches back at Straith. She’d nervously rambled about finding girls cute, wondering if the cashier at the brand-new apothecary liked her. Which reminded her of liking Roman, which reminded her that she was going to tell them at some point here…what was the question again?

Oh right, Jessie. “Nah, she’s not really my type,” Virgil said, knowing that the blush rising in her cheeks had nothing to do with Jessie. “Why do you ask?”

“Just curious, I guess. You talked to her a lot this morning,” Roman said, shrugging it off. “Ugh, I feel like I’m going to barf.”

“Do it over the railing,” Virgil told them. She looked out at the passing shore, wondering for the millionth time today if the ship would reach Lyrwrithe in time. Or if the dragon was safe in the hold. She hadn’t checked on it since yesterday, when she’d been even more seasick than now, not to mention confused about her feelings.

Letting go of the railing that had been steadying her, Virgil tried to pretend the floor wasn’t spinning under her. She walked down to the cargo hold, wondering as she did how Laurus was faring. The little dragon hadn’t been enjoying the boat, and had been hiding in and around the cargo since yesterday.

Retracing her steps from the day before, Virgil found the purple bubble sitting where she had left it. Which would be fine, and normal, except that the dragon was moving beneath it.

Memories of blue flames and ruined buildings flashed in Virgil’s mind, and she stepped much more slowly towards the beast. It looked at her and snarled, blue flame turning the purple surface black for a second. She cast a quick sleep spell on the dragon, and its movements became more sluggish. The fire stopped.

Virgil still couldn’t exhale, since it was still awake. Mustering all her frustration at seasickness and the ridiculous demands of Epos, she thought about sleeping well and not sleeping in the same bed as Roman. Gray curled into a ball at the bottom of the floor, unmoving like the gargoyle it so resembled.

She reapplied the spells that kept the dragon carrier from sliding around the hold, figuring it was better safe than sorry. Wondering where Laurus was, Virgil sent out a bolt of magic to search for him. It bounced back to her in a minute, telepathically transmitting Laurus’s message. He was fine, but didn’t want to move.

It was warmer down here, so Virgil stayed. The cots for her, Roman, and Jessie were set up nearby, but it was too early. In the meantime, she sat in the warmth, hoping that they would reach Lyrwrithe tomorrow morning.

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babiemya · 6 years ago

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Blooming Days | Hwang Hyunjin

pairing: reader x hyunjin ft. jisung

genre: barista!au; fluff; crack?? mainly bad puns and way too cheesy

length: 1.5k words

summary: You fell for the charming boy who would come to your job almost every day

+ @squishynaty in conclusion, hyunjin = babie

»———————————————————–✄

The sky had a thick layer of gray clouds. It had been raining for hours and barely anyone was outside. Only the occasional scurrying umbrella was seen as you looked out the library’s window. Luckily, you loved the rain. You have loved the rain ever since you were a child; playing in the mud and getting drenched was something you loved doing even though it would result in a scolding from your mother and getting sick. Though, now as an adult, you love the way the rain hits the window in the pit-pat way provided a calm atmosphere for you. If it weren’t for the fact that you needed the extra cash, you would’ve left your job at the library/cafe a long time ago and walked around.

At least that’s what you have been telling yourself for the past 45 minutes. You tried to entertain yourself with a book but it didn’t work as your coworker, Han Jisung, kept pestering you with questions. Deep down, you know exactly why you were still at your job. You were waiting for the cute dimpled guy who would come every-other-day and ask for the same thing, a small iced caramel macchiato. It had only just occurred to you that maybe he wasn't coming today because of the weather. It was a bit childish... desperate even. Staying just to see the boy with a laugh that is bright and livid. A laugh you could only compare to the literal sun if the sun could laugh. The boy who’s laugh and smile reached his eyes. The boy who’s eyes held all the stars in the galaxy. It was just something about him that made your heart flutter whenever he would rest his arm on the counter while watching you make his drink with your mediocre skills. Or maybe it was the way that he learned your name and would wink whenever you asked if he wanted the usual. Or maybe it was the way he scrunched his nose whenever he would laugh. You were head over heals for this boy and you barely even knew him. Maybe you just need to go out more and socialize instead of hoping things will magically happen like in books.

“Listen, I just don’t understand why you don’t just leave. That guy is probably stayed home since it’s raining.” Jisung said for the nth time.

“For fuck’s sake Jisung, I’m not here for a boy. I need the extra money.” You replied while ignoring the blood rushing to your cheeks at the mention of the guy with the cutest laugh. You’re such a bad liar that it physically hurts you.

As much as you hated it, Jisung was right. The poor boy you were waiting for is probably home playing video games like your cousin does on rainy days. There’s no way he would even be outside in the rain since, from your knowledge, he doesn’t have a car... but that doesn’t mean he also doesn’t have an umbrella or raincoat.

“I call bs because it’s so obvious that you guys like each other. It’s like I’m watching some sort of drama where everyone knows the main characters like each other except the main characters themselves.” Jisung snorted.

“Hey Han Jisung, do me a solid and switch with Felix because at least he knows the difference between a frappuccino and a cappuccino.” You said while feigning smile.

“Ouch. At least I have the guts to ask someone out.” Jisung said with a smirk you wanted the slap off his face.

“As if you would ever have feelings- oh my god.” You freeze mid sentence as you spotted the familiar brown hair outside the rained-spotted window. You internally panicked as you watched him walk in. Jisung’s stifled laugh didn’t go unnoticed.

“Aww did my favorite barista wait for me?” Hyunjin teased as he walked towards the counter with a smile that made your heart swell.

You held your breath as you looked at the boy that was drenched, his hair was matte against his head with the exceptions that some strands were wavy. His clothes were a shade darker from the rain, making what would’ve-been bright yellow hoodie a muddy gold color. He really came here... in the rain... without an umbrella?

“Hyunjin- you’re drenched! Why were you outside in the rain? You’re gonna get sick!” You rambled while grabbing the first clean towel and rushed to his side. You didn’t leave the glance your coworker gave you unnoticed. The boy in front of you just shyly smiled, putting his hands behind his neck.

“You sound like my mother.” Hyunjin said playfully rolling his eyes, the smile he had was still prominent on his features. You watched as rested his head on the counter, his eyes were sparkling as they looked into yours.

“There’s no way I’m going to give you an iced drink. Is hot chocolate fine?” You questioned, already making it without his response. Hyunjin nodded and ran his fingers through his hair.

“Oh! Make sure to make it as sweet as you, princess.” Hyunjin added, flashing you wink. You were sure your soul left your body as you felt your face heat up.

“I don’t think you’d want it bitter.” Jisung answered. You debate what you’re one second away from doing; holding Jisung in a choke hold or risking it all and wrapping Hyunjin in a warm towel and squishing his cute cheeks. You swear you could see Jisung’s shit-eating grin from a mile.

“What are you talking about bitter? ___ is literally the most sweetest, wholesome person I know.” Hyunjin argues. If he doesn’t stop being cute, you’re going to barf rainbows.

“God, I can’t tell if you lack brain cells or if you’re blind or if you lack something up there because you are so dense.” Jisung said while he rubbed his temples.

“The way you guys stare at each other is literally the heart eyed emoji and it disgusts me.” Jisung mumbles, loud enough for you to hear. Ignoring whatever just happened, you topped the hot chocolate with whipped cream and then handed it to Hyunjin. His eyes lit up as he saw the drink and flashed you the cutest smile you have ever seen and handed you the money, which you swatted away.

“Hyunjin, it’s fine. It’s on me.” You said. You noticed how he held the cup with both hands. You watched as he licked a bit of the whipped cream before it occurred to you that staring is weird.

“So Hyunjin, I have a friend that came by the other day and she saw you walk out or something like that- Anyways! She basically wanted to know if you were seeing anyone.” Jisung questioned, leaning on the counter while texting. It took all the energy you had to not put Jisung into a choke hold for the nth time the past hour. Hyunjin paused and looked between you and Jisung.

“Hmm... Am I interested in someone? Yes. Am I seeing them? Yeah, I’m looking at them right now actually.” Hyunjin said, not breaking eye contact with you. You felt yourself tense up and you were pretty sure you were about to go into cardiac arrest by how fast your heart is beating. You weren’t sure if you were breathing.

Jisung cleared his throat, “Would this be a good time to say that this person has been whipped for you for the past... I don’t know... century? Anyways this is a y’all problem so Imma go”, and leaves the area.

All the alarms in your brain are going off as you try to process what the boy, with the prettiest eyes you have ever seen, said. You cleared your throat as you tried to compose yourself so that you can speak, “I- I- you’re interested in me? As in like... you like me? As in like... you’ve been intentionally flirting with me and making my brain malfunction?” you asked.

“Yeah because you do that adorable thing where your eyes go wide and your cheeks get all blushy and dear god you’re the fucking cutest.” Hyunjin mumbled hiding his face in embarrassment with the sleeve of his hoodie. “So uh... I didn’t plan to ask you out this way but- do you wanna go to the fair this weekend? And then we can hang out with Kkami.” He added, lifting his head as he waited for your answer,

“What type of question is that? Of course I would, you goof.” You said as you squished his blush-dusted cheeks, and god knows how long you’ve been wanting to do that. You and Hyunjin turn your heads with you both hear clapping from a distance. Han Jisung was leaning against the wall watching you two while he munched on pistachios.

“Aw you guys finally realized you’re soulmates. Now please get out, I don’t want PDA in here. I don’t care if it’s raining.”

++ bonus :)

“Han fucking Jisung, I’m going to shove my foot so far up your ass that you’ll feel it in your throat.”

“Kinky. I like that. But is that any ways to talk to cupid?”

“Cupid my ass but go off I guess”

“Wow I expected more from you, Hyunjin.”

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susanthejournal · 7 years ago

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GOOD MOVIES / Tyler Brewington

A movie about the evils of environmental degradation and ecological destruction, but it’s a making-of documentary about the original movie, which was abandoned by the filmmakers when they realized that the best way to honor nature might not be to make a movie about it, as moviemaking in general and film processing in particular involves the use of various harmful chemicals and staggering amounts of water.

A movie in which I do not have to watch a woman being brutalized in order to learn that the brutalization of women is bad.

Gender Essentialism, a movie about the confusion that results from the passage of a law which requires moviegoers to articulate exactly what they’re paying to watch. “I’d like to see A Profoundly Heterosexual Work of Art,” the characters keep saying. “One for A Profoundly Heterosexual Work of Art, please.”

A movie that convincingly recasts the Bible as a disposable piece of direct mail marketing.

A sequel to that, called Public Instruction in Goodness, which is a sort of sermon on everything genuinely good and worthwhile about Christianity. The running time is a tight 35 minutes, but if you see it, you think about it for the rest of your life.

A movie unafraid to be subtle.

A bobcat and a rabbit, an eagle and a trout, a fox and a vole, wolves and a deer all dying in a documentary about Canada, produced by BYU––there is, apparently, an entire BYU channel––screening now above the emergency room bed where my dad was violent and now lies restrained. They want him to go ahead and barf but he keeps swallowing. They’re worried about his lungs. He’s writhed almost completely sideways and clawing at his neck brace. An owl’s tearing at something gray and the whole scene is oddly bloodless. What comes out of the moth when the bat bites into it?

A movie about everything Mormons are reluctant to show you.

Plot: the desire to watch movies is a survival mechanism generated by my body.

A movie called Freedom that follows people as they learn how to thank their bodies.

A movie called Dad about feeling indifferent to the eclipse, but moved when the lights come on and the birds go quiet.

Movie about how, after his first stroke, he spent a couple of days replacing his nouns with bird. “That fucking bird,” he would say, gesturing at the Jesus nailed to the cross nailed to the wall of his room. But Father Whoever insists on a visit. “I hear you didn’t go to church much but you liked to ski,” chuckles the chaplain. “Well, you know, there’s a God on the slopes, too.” “Bird,” Dad says.

My brother and I were recognized as my father’s children, so the men at the guard station at the entrance of this or that air base would salute us. A coming-of-age movie about me called Fat White Child of Unearned Salutes.

A movie about watching a movie with someone you like who doesn’t like you back, but then you turn to whisper to each other at the same time, and your foreheads touch.

Imperialist Death Machine, a movie in which I explain to the tattoo artist that I’d like a tattoo of the kind of jet my dad flew, “but gay.”

A documentary about starfish, after which everyone experiences unobstructed joy and access to their life’s deepest calling.

A movie like a new nickname from a crisp, healthy voice you have no reason to mistrust. A voice like a carrot snap.

A movie about love in which a dentist replaces all of your teeth with stones and bits of antler. But the softest stones––polished agates, tumbles for centuries in the cleanest rivers, and antlers coated with the fuzz of rutting season.

Much rewarded but little-seen but prestige drama in which no one is ever unfair to their mom. Near the end, I don’t lose my temper; I say, “Mom, I find it unhelpful when you talk about wanting him to find inner peace. There is nothing more peaceful than death, and nothing more interior than a brain. Parts of his brain have died, and are therefore at peace.”

Movie in which I know how to comfort anyone who needs comforting.

A movie in which dad recognizes mom when I take her to the hospital.

Movie in which mom watches me kneel in front of dad to trim his fingernails. “You’re so good with him,” she says. She isn’t crying because she sees my lifetime of learning to be intimate with men.

A movie in which I see how others see my body, but it’s not traumatic.

Nobody dies, but still, the movie doesn’t make you want to die.

Movie that shows you where to buy––or even better, how to make––100% ethical sweaters. You leave looking great.

A movie that mitigates the catastrophe of a compliment.

During the movie your brain relaxes and releases something quite obvious which had been unclear to you: One way to deal with surfaces is to go beneath them.

A movie you leave immune to the casual scorn of white ladies at the grocery store.

A naughty movie called Bats Alone, shot during a succession of spring twilights only during the minutes when bats wake up, that erases all of your self-limiting beliefs.

Just the one scene: I walk in and his face lights up because he remembers me.

A movie that convinces everyone that history didn’t start with their birth.

A movie that isn’t over until weeks later, when the ending comes to you in a dream. ⁂ Tyler Brewington is the author of the chapbook Dear Stray Volcano (alice blue, 2015) and, with Kelly Schirmann, the collection Boyfriend Mountain (Poor Claudia, 2015). His poems have appeared in PEN America’s PEN Poetry Series, Salt Hill, Powder Keg, Sixth Finch, and elsewhere. He is a contributing editor at Seattle-based Gramma Press (gramma.press) and received an MFA from the Vermont College of Fine Arts. He lives in Boise, Idaho, and is @bylertrewington in all of the places.

#tyler brewington #susan the journal #good movies #movies #dad #gay #queer #queer poetry #bird #god #father

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fine-not-fine · 7 years ago

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all for Valentino, Sylvia, and Tobias

1: their voiceValentino: Ver smooth and rich, it has that lower alurring ring to it but he’s not that deep a voice. Sylvia: typical sweetie high bell voice, not painfully high but very much has that sweet cartoon mom feeling. Tobias: Deep low voice almost like a drum or a large bell. It has its light notes but he has a very charming wave in his voice. 2: their smileValentino: his smirk can ranged from eerie to scary to cartoony charming but his real honest to god smile is the sweetest dorky thing ever. His teeth are all visable and he’s so goofy with his cheeks flushed rosey. Its adorable. Sylvia: she has that casual small happy smile she uses a lot but her little smile is adorable with her cheeks getting even chubbier in joy.Tobias: That bold warm smile that brightens up your day and makes to feel secure. It’s just a honest harty smile. 3: their greatest achievementValentino: getting out of the asylum or finding Sylvia I’d say-Sylvia: surviving Drake’s birth-Tobias: getting out of that explosion alive4: their insecuritiesValentino: Everything, his weight, how he acts, how he looks, the way people see him, his emotions, his scars.Sylvia: her naked bodyTobiasL his weight, his graying hair, the way his eyes look5: their shortcomingsValentino: Brash, distants himself, heavily emotionalSylvia: too forgiving and won’t assert herself as a personTobias: unwillingness to change for the better6: how they deal with griefValentino: anger then pure distrought emotion (if he cared about the person)Sylvia: going numb to the point she needs a resetTobias: denial7: how they like to dressValentino: hoodies and things that are warm but easy to manage. Sylvia: cute stuff! espeically themed thingsTobias: tee-shirt and some cargo pants8: what they like to eatValentino: if he could eat normally he’d eat a lot of sweet stuff or junk foodSylvia: she loves fresh bread and peaches! but she likes most fruitsTobias: kiwi and scrambled eggs9: their themeValentino: wolf guy with a murder streakSylvia: bubbly round cute momTobias: That guy in the neighborhood who has no clue what he’s doing in his life and always seems slightly melancholy10: their fashion senseValentino: punk ish casualSylvia: anything cutie and light coloredTobias: work casual or sport casual11: their family lifeValentino: raised by his Uncle in a rather bad part of town pretty poorSylvia: she doesn’t remember but her as Alexander grew up in a huge familyTobias: standard household12: their romantic lifeValentino: his first ex was the worst and she’s dead now- so its been mostly one night stands- if i can call it thatSylvia: none but gets flirted with quite a bitTobias: his wife was his everything when she died his life fell apart13: their embarrassing memory from years agoValentino: not knowing how to play pool and accidently shooting the ball across the table-Sylvia: put baking soda in a blender-Tobias: slipped and fell of the porch screaming like it was a ten foot drop- when really his porch is barely off the ground14: how they react to burning their tongue on foodValentino: “fuck you too” eats it more and screamsSylvia: does that fanning her mouth thing bc PAINTobias: “what doesn’t kill me makes me stronger” keeps fucking eating it15: how they react to a brainfreezeValentino: “OH GOD WHAT THE FUCK”Sylvia: “QMQ” then laying down to help it go awayTobias: “Fuck-”16: their dreamsValentino: dying or getting better somehowSylvia: watching her children grow up Tobias: finding joy again17: their ambitionsmore or less the same18: how they sleepValentino: can sleep anywhere but mostly fetal positionSylvia: on her side kinda curled laying on her inner armTobias: Soilder style19: their reaction to betrayalValentino: murderSylvia: hurt but forgives-Tobias: you can see the death in his eyes20: their reaction to a mystery love letterValentino: he laughs it off trying to hide that he can’t readSylvia: blushes and writes one backTobias: confused and startled depending on if he knows the person or not21: how they react to painValentino: it makes him more frantic or wildSylvia: brushes it off usuallyTobias: takes it22: what they’re like on two hours of sleepValentino: stupid jokes a verbal barfingSylvia: trying so hard to keep it together- quieter and more airheadedTobias: will run into everything can’t think he’s much quieter23: how they act when they’re sickValentino: mumbly and grumpy normally or whiny and poutySylvia: seems more sad and kinda sluggish tired eyesTobias: is a hot mess but tries to hide it24: what motivates themAll: loved ones25: why you enjoy themValentino: interesting feral/human person very emotionally complex and fun to play withSylvia: best mom warms my heartTobias: need to work on him more

#ocs

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anti-gruvia-blog · 4 months ago

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Tell me does that look like the face of a woman Gray needs to be with??

#anti gray x juvia #anti juvia lockser #gray fullbuster #juvia sucks #anti juvia loxar #gruviugh #fairy tail #gruviugh makes no sense #anti gruvia #anti juvia #episode 25 #episode 41 #episode 110 #ft dragon cry movie 2 #juviugh #juvia rant #but i feel like barfing now... poor gray....#juvia needs to find a heart because she sure as heck doesn't have one right now

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theoddcatlady · 8 years ago

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Lost at Sea

9/17

Lucy, you’re gonna be so mad when we’re back, but maybe knowing I’m keeping this daily just for you will make it all better.

Alex was right, I’m actually a natural sailor. Luke’s already ate shit on the deck twice, his face is all banged up because he doesn’t have his sea legs. Better than poor Jake already though. He’s been barfing below deck this whole time. Fucking gross.

But oh man, once the heat dies down at home, we’ll be back, and we’re gonna be so rich. It’ll all be worth it babe. All worth it.

9/18

Same old shit today. Mostly planning on how to spend the money. It’s gonna be sick. I think I wanna buy a house with you. I can’t get you off my mind. Alex is being an ass and telling me that you’re just another girl, but I know you’re more than that. Any girl I hook up with after you will probably be after me for the money, but I know you love me for me. And now I’ll be able to take care of us.

I really like the ocean though, maybe we can get a boat! I’ve been out here for almost a week and I still love it! The air smells nice, I can dive in and swim whenever the fuck I want, and we’ve brought enough supplies to last us months. I would stay out here the rest of my life.

Except I don’t have you. That’d be the one thing I’d change.

9/19

Jake’s still puking. Alex’s worried he’s gonna get dehydrated. But he’s looking a little better today. And Luke’s finally stopped falling over every ten minutes. Still a damn klutz, always will be, but he’s cool. He’s starting to like it out here too.

I’m making a seagull my pet. I just throw this one dude with a funny black mark on his wing my crusts and he’s chill. I had to kick him once or twice when he tried to steal my meal but he’s learning. I’m naming him Pat.

9/20

You will not believe this, babe. I saw a whale!

I was out early this morning checking on everything and deciding if we should try fishing again when I saw its tail flip out of the water. I started screaming so loud everyone thought I’d seen the damn Kraken or something. By the time they got up there though it was gone. I’m so mad that I don’t have my cellphone, Alex made us trash them all.

This thing’s tail fin had to be the same size as my boat. Alex’s told me I’m exaggerating and there ain’t a whale that size but I’m serious! You’d believe me. I hope I can spot some dolphins for you, tell you about it. I know how much you love dolphins.

9/21

Ugh, now I’m seasick.

It’s probably just food poisoning, we’re all agreeing Luke’s not allowed to cook anymore. I’ll be ship cook again once I stop blowing chunks into the wastebasket. Alex’s kept on the radio with a buddy of his. I know you’re probably super confused right now and hurt about what happened, but I promise, it’s not what you think. It must’ve happened after we got out of there. We’re not killers, babe. I promise.

9/22

Nightmares AND sea sickness. Fucking fantastic.

Staying below deck today. Alex’s starting to get a big head. He’s always had one, but it’s only worse cuz he’s the only one out here with sailing experience, so we kinda have to take his word on everything. You know how he is.

Jake’s taken over cooking duties. I can only eat small portions but he’s pretty good. Not as good as me though. I’ll be making pancakes for you when I’m back, with strawberry sauce. Your favorite.

9/23

Hah! Jake saw the whale too!

I stumbled on deck when I heard him start hollering, and I saw its back for just a second before he dived. I’m gonna be smug for the whole day.

Jake’s really spooked though. Keeps saying it’s ‘too big’ for a whale.

A whale. Whales are fucking big. That’s their thing. God he’s an idiot.

Sky’s super dark already and it’s only five. I hope it’s not gonna storm.

9/27

It stormed four whole damn days. I’ve had no time to hit up my journal, I’m glad we’re still alive. I thought the boat was gonna capsize. We stayed afloat though. No one got hurt, well, not too badly. Luke knocked out a tooth during some part of it. He looks super miserable.

It’s all good now though. Really gray out. Really gloomy. I think I saw a dolphin, but I couldn’t be sure. I’m getting real tired of eating canned shit though. It’ll be worth it though. All worth it.

9/28

Shit fuck. Holy shit fuck.

I’m so glad you’re not here babe. You’d be so upset. I saw half of a dolphin. Several, actually. That was all that was left.

I smelled something like pennies or rust and I looked overboard to see it floating up. At first I thought it was a dolphin coming to say hello. But when it surfaced, I screamed and threw up. It must’ve met a shark or something. Its upper half was scratched up and its bottom was just. Gone. There was no tail.

And then a lot more bobbed up. Fins, heads, all bloody and torn up. I sobbed like a bitch, Lucy. Those poor dolphins. Alex told me to man up but I just couldn’t deal. I’m not like him.

RIP Dolphins. There was at least six. I’d pour one out for you, but I can’t waste beer without Luke bitching at me. I think he’s drank more beer than water at this point.

9/29

Woke up last night to Jake screaming again. He saw the whale again. But this time he’s swearing up and down it’s not a damn whale. He was just going up to take a leak when he saw its shape below the boat. Apparently it’s long and has trailing fins. He’s scared shitless. Almost stole the lifeboat to start paddling home and to turn himself in.

Alex punched him so hard that I think he went crosseyed for a bit. I mean, I can’t blame him. If Jake turns himself in we’re all fucked. The cops will come for us and we’ll all get thrown in jail for something that Alex did.

Still probably shouldn’t have hit Jake so hard though. Like. Damn. That had to hurt.

9/30

I miss you so much Lucy. I thought I heard you singing when I was trying to get to sleep. It was so nice to hear it. Then I woke up and realized I was imagining things. God, I’d almost take prison if that means I could at least have you visit me sometimes.

But I gotta wait it out. When I get back with my cut of the cash, and the jewels, and the gold, you’ll never have to work at that stupid diner ever again. We’ll be able to raise our baby with nothing to worry about.

I found the pregnancy test. That’s why I agreed to help Alex in the first place. I might give you this journal and hide in the other room. It’ll be worth it. I can’t wait to be a daddy to a mini Lucy or a mini Blake. Maybe we won’t take them sailing for a few years though.

Maybe. Even if the weather’s still shit.

10/1

The radio’s broken. Someone took a hammer or something to it. It’s smashed to pieces.

Alex was screaming, I was screaming, we ALL were screaming. Then Alex turned his rage on Jake, asking if this was his idea of a joke. Jake’s swearing it wasn’t him. Luke is too. Sure as hell know it wasn’t me. But that’s it.

We gotta head back. We need that damn radio. It’ll take maybe another week, as long as we don’t get lost. I’m praying we don’t get lost.

10/2

Again with the singing in my dreams. I’m really homesick.

Alex’s not sleeping. I think he’s worried about making it back. But we know we’re on the right course. We gotta be. We just gotta be.

Jake’s been kicked to the deck, he’s no longer allowed below since the radio was broken. Alex is sure it was him. I brought Jake up his shit when he tried to point fingers at Alex, but I know it couldn’t have been him. He’s the one always manning the damn thing.

10/3

That isn’t a whale. It isn’t a whale. I don’t know what the fuck it is. But it’s not a whale.

We all saw it this time. Jake’s miserable after sleeping above deck, I don’t think he slept at all. Eating lunch, tastes like garbage. I hate it. We all hate it. I want something with flavor, if I brought it up Luke would bitch at me though.

Then its head surfaced.

I heard the water and I looked to see its smooth head breach the surface. It’s smooth, like a dolphin, but green, dark green. Its three pairs of eyes looked at me, right at me. They’re bright yellow. I couldn’t move. If it wanted to eat me at that moment, I’d be lunch.

Then it went below the water and disappeared.

After it really hit us what we saw, we panicked.

Luke pissed himself, I could see the stain on his shorts. Jake began to babble nonsense and Alex bolted to the wheel. We were tearing out of there so fast I don’t think any Satan water snake could keep up.

Jake’s still sleeping on the deck. Alex refuses to let him down. I keep telling him that we gotta let him up, god knows if we’ll see that damn THING again, but he won’t. Luke’s being a fucking pussy and siding with Alex. I’d sleep up there with Jake… but I guess I’m a bit of a pussy myself.

10/4

Jake’s gone.

We didn’t hear anything. The lifeboat’s gone. So are a lot of the supplies. Luke’s rationing out everything to stretch it out longer, but we’re mostly worried about water. That’s what’s gonna be a bitch to make last.

I’m so pissed. I’m fucking scared. Alex is super quiet. Luke’s jumpy as hell. I’m just. I want to see your face again Lucy. More than anything.

10/5

We killed the Ortega couple.

I thought we were just gonna scare them a bit. That’s why the guns, and the hammers, that’s why. When Alex broke Mr. Ortega’s hand, I told him to knock it off and get the shit downstairs.

When Jake and I were down at the truck with the final load Luke and Alex shot them. So many times. I lost count of how many gunshots I heard by the time I got upstairs. Mr. Ortega’s head was fucking paste. Poor Mrs. Ortega was still alive somehow, that old bitch. I know we didn’t like them, they hated us, the poor kids, we made the neighborhood look bad. But god. I didn’t want to kill them.

The look in her eyes was desperate. Scared. Maybe of death, maybe of the pain, but she was scared. So fucking scared.

I think this is how she felt, how I feel right now.

The singing isn’t in my head. It’s in the water.

Luke’s gone up there, just to get a look he said. He’s not coming back. I think I caught a glimpse out the window, of something with hands pressing against the glass. Hands with claws two inches long.

10/10

Alex killed himself. He took the sharp edge of one of the can lids and slit his throat before jumping overboard.

I’m the only one left. But I’m not alone.

The serpent’s circling around the ship. It’s still staring at me. It’s not going to break the boat. It doesn’t have to. It knows what I’m going to do.

Forgive me, Lucy. Forgive me.

#horror stories #scary stories #sea monsters #sixpenceee stories #creative writing #my stories

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magicalsamandholly · 6 years ago

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Chapter 7: Mudbloods and Murmurs

Holly Hippogriff: This chapter has it all - slugs, signatures and snakes.

Sam Skrewt: It really did! I liked this chapter a lot!

HH: A lot happened - we got a lot of information about the wizarding world and the set up for the main event. And most surprisingly for me, I think this was the first chapter I actually liked Hagrid!

SS: Truly! Let’s start there because Hagrid was amazing this chapter. He really has Lockhart’s number and is the perfect person to puncture all of his bullshit, because he’s not worried about looking good or being polite. And he was great even beyond that - being super chill about Ron barfing up slugs, illegally growing giant pumpkins, his concrete fudge - all so good.

HH: He was the def right choice to go to with Ron’s curse, which is not exactly what you’d expect from the first book, but practical knowledge is where he really shines. I liked how he immediately recognized Lockhart for a sham and also teased Harry about the attention Lockhart was giving him (combining Lockhart’s love of being photographed and Colin’s paparazzi attempts to photograph Harry).

SS: Oh yes, forgot about that, so good since Hagrid is rarely intentionally funny. Can we backtrack to the slugs for a bit? An iconic moment, obviously, but my first question - are none of the teachers at this school concerned that Ron’s wand is clearly malfunctioning and putting him (and everyone else) in danger?

HH: Clearly not - you’d think as a teacher, after a malfunctioning wand smacked you in the face and gave you a boil you’d be like, I’ll pay the 25 Galleons to get you a new one. But then again, apparently a teacher’s note can completely override reserving the Quidditch pitch well in advance, so it’s total anarchy there.

SS: Great magicians clearly don’t make great administrators.

HH: Well again, letting Lockhart anywhere near teenagers just proves that. Although as Hagrid pointed out, there was literally no one else to do it. Which brings me to my question - would you rather do detention with Filch or Lockhart?

SS: Ooh, I’m going … Lockhart? He’d be funnier. Although polishing is better exercise, haha, so depends on whether I’d gotten up at some godawful hour for Quidditch practice.

HH: I can’t believe it! I thought you’d take anything over spending time with Lockhart. I would take Filch, because he’s worse than Lockhart, but I didn’t grow up with magic, so I’m down to do chores with my hands. Harry’s detention was a fun interlude with Lockhart’s original catchphrases though, and I totally forgot we got to meet the basilisk this early.

SS: Well, we are more than a third of the way through, so it’s probably good that the main plot driver is finally here, haha. I like the Basilisk, it’s pretty spooky.

HH: Ha, true, I’m used to adult book pacing I suppose. It’s truly not that long of a book.

SS: It is short! We haven’t even touched on the most fascinating part of the chapter yet - Draco’s use of the slur, “Mudblood”. I’m not ready to proclaim Rowling some progressive trailblazer yet at this point in the books, but I do love that she raises these issues of “pure blood” and hierarchies in society, and you can’t help but draw comparisons to racism.

HH: It’s really cool that she used bloodlines as the way to do it! It’s not something you can see, like today’s racism typically uses, but is obviously something you’re born with and ultimately has no meaning (loved poor Neville being used as the pure blood who barely knows which side of the cauldron goes up). And just in general, I’m obviously pretty dim that the comparisons didn’t occur to me until well into adulthood, but I love how she uses terms that are more couched for kids yet clearly get the message across (even just “dunghead” for “shithead,” let alone more complex moral topics).

SS: Right! And obviously, things are still pretty black and white (the villain is the one who espouses these views and they aren’t subtle, they’re blatant) but the issues feel totally relevant today. And in that way, I kind of like that it’s black and white - it’s very clear that it’s wrong, full stop.

HH: Very true, I appreciate that there’s no gray area about using an inappropriate slur. It was actually remarkable to me that everyone reacted to Malfoy from that (if not trying to punch/curse him, by yelling at least). And it’s good to have that full determined as wrong now, since of course as the series goes on, that viewpoint will be examined in a little more detail.

SS: Absolutely, it’s a great way to introduce the concept.

HH: Another solid chapter down. Now off to answer my fan mail with signed photos.

CC: Wait wait, lemme take ten thousand pictures of you first.

#book2

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3one3 · 7 years ago

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The Sequel - 878

In Sickness

André Schürrle, Juan Mata, other Chelsea/BVB players, and random awesome OC’s (okay they’re less random now but they’re still pretty awesome)

original epic tale

all chapters of The Sequel

“Ready for some soup?

“I need to pee. I hate getting out of the blanket though. It’s so cold, and my legs don’t work.”

“We’re not doing a bed pan, Prinzessin.”

“Ew.”

“As long as you’re getting up, do you want a clean shirt or something? Can I air out the bed?”

“No! Then it won’t be warm when I get back in. You can get me a shirt though.”

André helped Christina out of her bed-nest and literally turned her body in the direction of the bathroom. She was wobbly, her thighs were bright red, and he could feel the fever radiating from her skin. I should make her take more acetaminophen, he thought on his way to find a fresh tee for her. He flicked on the light in her dressing room and paused in surprise. It was kind of a mess. She hadn’t unpacked her things from the Spain trip, but had ripped some items out of the bags and left laundry all over. The footballer shrugged and stepped around a rolling suitcase to get to the drawer with her around-the-house shirts. I think she’d rather maybe have some hives from too much acetaminophen than have the fever, he continued, acknowledging his wife’s occasional allergic reaction to excessive amounts of the over the counter drug. How about one of these super soft James Perse ones? That should feel nice. Or is she going to be afraid of barfing on it or something? Ehh, she probably isn’t thinking that far ahead. I’ll bring this one. André selected a light gray tee on the basis that light colors feel cleaner than dark ones, and then turned around to look through the drawers on the small island in the middle of the room to find a clean pair of underwear for her too.

Her fancy all black and a little bit white closet was designed to accommodate more clothes, shoes, and accessories than she had when she moved in, so she took advantage of all the extra drawers by spreading things out. She had a drawer full of “sexy” panties- the lacey ones, pairs with little bows, the tiniest thongs, etc. There was a drawer just for the nude thongs and bikini-cut panties she wore under her white breeches, the boyshorts that she preferred for working out, and high-cut styles she liked for riding in when she wore other breeches. Then there was one for all the other underwear, like her cute prints, the vast Calvin Klein cotton collection, stretchy hip-huggers, barely-there mesh, etc. She had three drawers of bras too, split by largely the same criteria. André was aware of the sorting because he once tried to put her laundry away as a nice gesture and quickly found himself overwhelmed. He went for the “everyday” underwear drawer to find some Calvins for her to be sick in, on the basis that he believed those to be her favorite for most things.

“Oops,” he muttered when he heard a picture frame topple over. There was a long, narrow white marble tray in the middle of the island, with a glass cube of fresh cut white flowers, desk-sized photo frames, and a dish of black “galaxy” eads that made the room smell nice. He accidentally hit one of the pictures when he reached up there to put the panties with the shirt while he squatted down to the drawer to try to put everything back where it belonged after he rifled through it carelessly to find what he wanted. I’ll bring her this too, he decided when he stood up to right the shiny chrome frame. A violent and painful sounding coughing fit was starting up in the next room. Maybe she’ll pay more attention to the drugs and food on her nightstand if Dirk is there as well. He took Christina’s selfie with Dirk free-jumping in the background with him. It was the picture Juan gave her as a gift the previous Christmas.

“I’m so cold,” she rasped through all-over shivers as she hurried to get back into bed.

“Hang on. Time to change.” André tossed the photo on the comforter and sat on the edge of the mattress near her spot so she couldn’t just retreat into her nest again. Poor Prinzessin, he thought, noticing how violent the shivering was. When did the doctor say the fever should break? I wonder if we shouldn’t go back to him in the morning if she’s still like this... “You do these; I’ll help with the shirt.”

Christina pushed her black Calvins down and pulled on the proffered red pair, and then reluctantly let her partner lift her clammy shirt off and quickly replace it with the fresh one, shaking all the while. All of her joints felt so tired. Holding her arms up felt like lifting a hay bale onto a stack after unloading 50 of them. André slid down and opened up the sweatshirt-like comforter for her to get back into her spot, and then rubbed vigorously at her arms and legs to help accelerate the warming process.

“The soup is warm. Ready to try?” he asked. The flu victim nodded and folded the blanket down from her chin a little. He stirred the broth and rice around in the oversized mug and then offered her some on the spoon. He knew she could have managed feeding herself, but she just looked so miserable and helpless. Christina slurped from the spoon a handful of times and then quit when he tried to get more rice in her system than the clear, mild broth. The cringe that accompanied each swallow was no put-on. “Where should I put Dirk?”

“Wha?”

“I brought Dirk for you,” the footballer explained while she turned over to get more comfortable and he put the cup of soup on the table. He then showed her the photo and began clearing a space for it where she could look at it whenever she wanted. “Every time you think “Oh it’s time for my medicine but I don’t want to take it because it hurts,” you’ll see him and realize the sooner you take it and get better, the sooner you can go get kisses from him, yeah?”

“You’re sweet,” his girl smiled on her pillow. She already had Lukas the baby zebra tucked up under her chin.

“Not really. I’m about to make you sit up again to take the pills and the cough syrup.”

“It’s not time yet. Another hour.”

“Fine.”

“Stay?”

“I told you I will.”

“Pants off.”

“Obviously.” André smiled back and then kissed two fingers to touch to her forehead. She wasn’t getting any real kisses. There was no room in his recovery program to get sick. He was even keeping his own pillows on the couch by the window so that the invalid in his bed couldn’t drool or sneeze on them, so he brought those over to use after discarding his jeans. It surprised him and threatened his hope to remain germ-free when his girl rolled over and snuggled into him as soon as he lay down. Christina put her head on his shoulder and arm, and wedged her ice cold feet between his legs.

“I don’t feel good,” she mumbled as she clung on and nuzzled her cheek on his shirt.

“You should have told me sooner that you wanted some company, pretty girl.” I thought she wanted to be left alone to suffer in peace. “What are we watching?”

“Murder She Wrote, season 39.”

“Are you warm now?”

“No.”

“Are you gonna be sweating again soon?”

“Yes.”

“Do you think you’ll make it? Or should we start digging a hole for you in Dirk’s field?”

“I dunno.”

“Marco sends his best. He was disappointed about cancelling Marco and Chris time, and wants a rain check. He’s like really obsessed with getting you eccentric shoes.”

“Tell me everything about your training, ‘til I fall asleep.”

“’Til what? I can’t hear you, pretty girl. You sound like a very quiet forest troll right now.”

Christina wanted to ask how he knew what a forest troll sounds like, but talking hurt. And the whole point of asking him to talk to her was so that she could keep quiet and reap the benefits of having him near and having his familiar voice to distract her from the runny and stuffy nose, the headache, the periodic coughing fits, the upset tummy, and the inability to find a comfortable body temperature. Being sick was lonely, and boring, and a self-feeding problem. Her symptoms were stressing her out and making it impossible to rest and get better. It had been a long time since the rider had a nasty flu, so it was extra hard on her. Being really sick seemed almost fun when she was a kid, and it meant staying home from school, watching The Price Is Right, having her mom around to bring or make her anything she wanted, cats to nap with her, and a youthful immune system ready to fight back against the bug while she just enjoyed days off. Being sick as a grown up with responsibilities just sucked. There was no novelty factor whatsoever. Getting her favorite blonde pillow to stay with her was the first non-terrible thing about it.

His very presence was supposed to help. All the sweet and caring texts from Juan in the world weren’t going to make her feel physically better, and that was the primary problem for him with their long-distance/double-life arrangement. That was the first time she fully got to experience the thing he complained about all the time- about his partner not being right there. But she knew she had André, and that he’d be home from training eventually, and then he’d come back from the grocery store, and he’d be back again after dinner. He’d always be around when she needed him, and on top of all the crummy side effects of the flu, Christina was stressed about how crummy the Spaniard had it all the time when he knew she wasn’t going to be around. Being sick and desperately wanting someone to make her feel better, and only having his texts, was one of the most elaborate illustrations of his problem that she’d experienced to date.

“’Til I fall asleep,” she repeated with as much oomph as she could get from her raw throat and expired vocal chords.

“You have to stay up long enough to have your medicine, but okay.”

André rubbed her back and her butt and gave the full tick-tock of every single thing he was doing each day at Brackel to try to improve his strength and fitness and be ready to train with the team after the international break. He thought the details were mostly boring, but explaining them was actually kind of satisfying. It gave him a chance to reiterate the arguments for and against certain things made by the coaches and doctors and physios, and that in turn fortified his belief in what he was doing. It was also a nice experience to be able to tell Christina all about something without having her backchat. She didn’t butt in to question anything, to play devil’s advocate, or to drag him off on tangents. She didn’t even really care what he said, and she fell asleep sometime before the hour passed. The BVB man was watching the time on his phone so that he’d know when to stop talking and get her to take the medications she was due for, but then the time came and he realized the sniffly, boiling little creature hanging on him was making a rhythmic hissing sound because she was sleeping and her mouth was open so that she could still breathe. He didn’t have the heart to wake her.

Espen tiptoed in a while later to say that Lukas was tucked in and she was headed home. She also delivered Lukas’ get well card. It was a picture of a gray blob with a trunk and tusks, and a red blob with a bunch of little legs. André decided they were an elephant and a crab, respectively. The second blob also could have been a spider, but the color pushed him toward crab. There was also a red heart with “Mom” inside spelled out in letter stickers. He decided to wake Christina to show her the drawing and get her to take the pills and cough syrup.

She adored the card, but not the drugs or the cold soup he persuaded her to eat. Both the drugs and the soup came back up not too long after going down. She had rice coming out of her nose along with rivers of greenish-yellow snot. She was crying because it was so unpleasant, and because her throat hurt so much. There was a good 10 minutes of dry heaving even after the meager contents of her stomach were ejected, and that just worsened the cold sweat. Her body was covered in it. André tried to wipe her of with a damp washcloth after she cleaned up her face, and got her another shirt to wear. The patient was furious with him for making her eat in the first place, but then still curled up on him to continue her progress toward death once she was clean and dry again. He texted his personal trainer to ask if they could bump his first session at Brackel back a couple of hours so that he could take her back to the doctor in the morning, convinced that there must have been some kind of prescription-strength remedies for her symptoms, or some more tests to do that would change the diagnosis, because he was sure she should have been getting better by then.

Christina obviously didn’t want to go see her new doctor again come morning, and she protested a little while her husband called the office to see if she could be seen. Her misery was overwhelming enough that she agreed to go though. Her temperature wasn’t going down and that concerned her. She wanted to feel better, even if it meant a terrible car ride. André put her in head to toe adidas sweats, gave her a blanket, a barf bag, and a box of tissues for the car, and sprayed some bathroom air freshener at her to try to cover up the unpleasant odors of her dirty hair and un-brushed teeth.

“My tummy is sooooooo barren,” the stricken rider moaned to him while they waited in the office to see her physician. She had her blanket with her, and bunched it up on his shoulder to use like a pillow. Her nose was red and peeling. Her neck was sweaty inside her hoodie, her hands were inside her sleeves to keep them warm, and her lips were slightly stained from the cherry flavored throat lozenge she took from a bowl on the receptionist’s desk. The Dortmund forward flipped through a magazine and tried not to think about how gross she was. “It’s gone from sunken in like a starving child to bloated and ballooning like...a starving child.”

“You’re bloated from the salt in the sports drink, probably. That’s all you’ve had for two and a half days,” he replied absently.

“Oh.”

“Are you warm enough right now?”

“Yes.”

“Okay.”

“Thanks for being nice to me while I’m dying,” Christina sighed.

“In sickness and in health, pretty girl. In sickness and health.” I still want another R8, he thought, attention on an Audi ad in the magazine. We should sell hers now that she has the Ferrari. It’s old and things keep needing replacing anyway.

“Yeah but you’re not always nice to me when I’m sick in other ways, so...thank you for being nice. And taking care of me. And risking my plague.”

“I’m always nice to you and I always take care of you when you let me see that you’re sick. I can’t do it if you don’t show me. I don’t know the difference between sick and angry when I don’t see you.”

“Mhm.”

“Thank you for letting me take care of you.”

“Welcome.”

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