#catering by marjorie

[amelianeek]

716 TRANSPORTATION, CATERING BY MARJORIE, BODYWORK MOBILE MASSAGE, CBEE'S CLEANING COMPANY, CYBER EYE INC, CHRONITON MAGAZINE Amelia the Neek | Design: Logos

[thatone-brightstar]

The Bear & The Fox (Carmy Berzatto x Fem!Reader)

Chapter 8: Bear Cubs

Words: 4.1 k

Summary: New opportunities present while ghosts from your past reappear.

a/n: The closer I get, the harder it becomes to write i don't know what it is but I hope you still enjoy. Commenting is always appreciated!

PS. Reader is latina in this cause Carmy seems like the type of man to appreciate a little melanin, okay!

WARNINGS: Smut ahead, oral sex (male receiving),semi public, minors DNI but you'll do what you want so don't say I didn't warn you

Summer came into Chicago with rain. Endless droplets poured in all directions with help from the constant wind, soaking everything and anyone that found themselves unlucky to not find shelter in time. You would regularly find the rain charming, relaxing on a day when all you had to do was enjoy the rhythmic patter and drown yourself in cups of tea. However, you dreaded the days when you had to go out and your sneakers were not a barrier thick enough to keep your socks from absorbing all the moisture that splashed onto them.

The rain from that day had fallen extra heavy, enough that you had to pad around in your socks once you reached the gallery and wait for your sneakers to dry.

“How about these?” Marjorie asked, standing over the set of frames laying on the floor.

“Aren’t they a bit too grim for a charity event?” You asked with your head tilted as you inspected the set of six paintings that depicted the progress of a horse’s rotting corpse.

“Yeah…” She hummed then advanced to the next set of frames with you padding behind her. “Y’know I was thinking..call me nosy, but I’ve been taking a peek at your canvas in the back..” She confessed and your eyes shot from the golden shades of a sunset to her face.

“I’ve uhm, been staying a little longer after closing… I hope it’s not a problem..?”

“No, of course not!” She answered and a wave of relief washed over you. “I actually wanted to offer you the last spot.” She said simply, turning to you with a stop.

You stayed silent for a moment, trying to process her words. “I’m sorry, what?” You asked through a nervous laugh, ‘there’s no way I heard right’, you thought.

“Well, Joy sent me a couple pictures of your works before hiring you and the one in the back sealed it. Your style is absolutely lovely and I believe you could make a great closing set for the showing.”

The moisture in your mouth had evaporated and traveled up to your teaducts where it threatened to spill. You felt like a fish out of water with the way your mouth kept opening and closing because, even though your head was racing with thoughts, none seemed to want to come out.

“You don’t need to decide now, of course, but I do need an answer by next week or we’ll have to go with the decapitated horse-”

“No! No, no I’ll do it!” You said with too much excitement to keep still, throwing your arms over her delicate shoulders. “Thank you Marge, thank you!”

She laughed along with your excitement and softly rubbed your back. You mentally reminded yourself to call Joyce and thank her for the push of bravery she had given you.

“D’you think I’ve given you enough time?” She asked after letting her go and beginning to pick up the paintings that you wouldn’t be using anymore.

“Yeah- no, I think three months is more than enough.” You assured, with the ideas already swirling in your head.

“And if you know of anyone who can cater, let me know. God knows what some people have in their heads these days that they wanna charge you your firstborn for a few canapes! Ridiculous!” 

She began ranting on how some places wanted to charge more for their reputation than the actual quality of the food and you immediately thought of offering The Beef. Sure, the menu wasn’t nearly as luxurious as needed to cater a charity event held yearly for Chicago’s socialites to feel better about ‘giving back’, but you were more than confident in their ability to handle the challenge - especially considering that Carmy came with a built in reputation from his time in various awarded restaurants. So with a little push in the right direction, you pulled out your phone and after browsing through his feed, you showed her pictures of a few dishes he had crafted.

“Oh, wow.” She marveled, adjusting her glasses over her head. “That is beautiful…”

“I can ask him when he’s free for a test try if you want. They could really benefit from the promotion.” You confessed.

“Yes, please. Tell me when your ‘friend’ is free.” She teased and you’re glad your hair covered your beet red ears. You nodded in response, face beaming with a smile.

“Hmm, I see you two all lovey dovey when he picks you up, you make a beautiful couple, by the way.” Marjorie whispered, then sweetly patted your blushing cheek.

You finished picking up the paintings and wrapping them up for storage in the back, then said goodbye for the weekend and made the short walk in the rain to the restaurant, where you had agreed to help out for the rest of the day. 

You reached The Beef huddled under your blue umbrella and by the back door, you shook out your hair from the few droplets that managed to wage their way through. The team was just about to take family by the time you crossed into the kitchen and greeted everyone leaving their stations. You found Syd and Carmy by the front, discussing some new dishes she wanted to add to the menu but he wasn’t quite sure about. You didn’t want to interrupt so you stood a couple feet behind, waiting for their conversation to end.

“Can we please just discuss this later, chef? I plan on adding it -I really do- but new dishes means new products and that means spending money we don’t have right now.” He said while rubbing his temples in frustration.

“I thought you said we finally had a parachute?”

“Yeah and it’s barely keeping us afloat as is. If we spend any more now, we’ll need a fuckin’ miracle to keep this place open.” He whispered harshly, looking around until he spotted your head behind Syd. 

“Go take family, okay? We’ll talk about it later.” He ended the conversation then stalked up to you and leaned down to whisper “Can I see you in the office in a sec?” 

His stare was so intense that all you could do was nod slowly up at him and when he walked away and you turned to Syd, her expression was just as confused as yours. 

“Try to keep it in your pants, maybe.” She said amused, crossing her arms and leaning against the expo.

“Who knows, maybe I can get your risotto on the menu.” You answered back with a wink and turned to walk in direction of the office. 

“That would be a miracle” You heard her whisper before turning the corner.

Carmy had his back to you when you entered the office. One hand rested tensely on his hip while the other seemed to rub away an incoming headache. You closed the door softly, then moved to rest your forehead on his strong back and caressed with open hands from his sides to his abdomen.

“Everything okay?” You asked, but the ragged breaths you felt him take were enough of an answer.

He took your hands and pulled them  tighter around himself as he let out a sigh. “It never is, is it?” He answered with a slight snigger while turning in your arms and taking your head in his hands to kiss you.

You smiled into the kiss and as a sudden idea popped into your head, you began pushing him back until he dropped onto the squeaky old office chair. He smiled confused when you disconnected your lips to turn the lock on the door, then moved back to his side.

“Well I may have two good news that might cheer you up…” You spoke in a sultry voice as you stroked from his chest up to his shoulders and back down. “...but maybe they can wait ‘till after.”

“After what…?” He asked, however, his question was answered the second you stepped in front of him and dropped to your knees without a word.

Carmy straightened up and sucked in a sharp breath at the stunning sight of your torso resting between his parted thighs. You kissed him again more fervently and scratched  a trail up, over the hard denim of his black jeans and to the buckle of his belt.

He sighed your name between kisses. “-Everyone’s outside..” 

A cheeky grin spread over your face as you finished undoing the button on his jeans. “Don’t make too much noise, then.” You purred with a scrunch of your nose, holding his gaze for a few seconds to make sure he was okay with it.

“No one’s ever…”

“I can stop if you don’t-”

“No-no, I just…” He licked his bottom lip and let out a breathy laugh looking into your eyes. “I kinda had a dream about this… once.” He spoke slowly and a red tint covered his face.

Your smile grew even wider at the thought of poor sweet Carmy, dreaming about you blowing him in his office and how now you were kneeling -very real- in front of him. You palmed him through his jeans with connecting sight and it surprised you how hard he already felt under the denim.

“Well then, I’m flattered to be your first.” You whispered.

Carmy’s Adam's apple bobbed in his throat and he swallowed dryly as you released him from the pressure of his jeans. His eyes were fixated on each of your movements, the way your lip caught on your teeth and how warm your hand felt over his throbbing cock. You looked up at him through your lashes and smiled one last time before bluntly licking a stripe along the length of his velvet skin.

“Sshit-” He hissed, throwing his head back, then remembered the team was only a few yards away and bit the inside of his cheek to muffle the remaining sounds.

The soft skin of your hand stroked him at a slow pace, while the other massaged his thigh tenderly. You gave the pink tip a couple kisses, the taste of his precome coating your tongue, then wrapped your lips over it and sucked him into the warmth of your mouth. His hands had fisted at the side of your face, knuckles gone white from contained strength as you bobbed your head rhythmically. 

“I’m not gonna break, y’know?” You breathed out while your hand continued the steady movements. “Go ahead.”

He hesitated for a second before reaching out to feather his thumb over your bottom lip, then extending his hand from your cheek to the back of your neck and pushing you down, back to his lap. You swallowed him gladly, the force of his strong hand applied a new pressure that made you take him even deeper than before and the knot in your abdomen tightened. His soft groans were muffled by the skin of his palm as he clamped it hard to ensure no one outside the room could hear him and how he was falling apart under you.

The thought was ravishing, to have this strong, fucked up and touch starved man trembling in pleasure from just your mouth made your chest swell with pride and your cunt squeeze in anticipation. Too bad you didn’t have enough time or you’d gladly throw everything on the desk to the ground and let him take you on it. You let your thoughts run wild with the idea, speeding up the pace to replace the growing ache between your legs.

His hips stuttered with the constant movements of your tongue and the grip he had on your hair tightened, teeth biting down on the back of his hand from the overstimulation. He knew he was close, but could do nothing more than keep pushing your head down and his hips up to continue the friction. His stomach spasmed with the force of his breaths, you took your hand from his thigh and slipped it under his shirt to run your nails over the sensitive skin.

“Jesus Fuck-” He groaned into the skin of his hand and that was the only warning you got before the thick hot liquid trickled down your throat in short bursts.

Carmy’s grip loosened over your head and you pulled away but kept flicking your hand slowly to ride out his orgasm. His head was thrown back and covered in a thin layer of sweat, the tense expression on his eyebrows long gone. He hissed softly when you put him back into his jeans, the cotton of his boxers too rough on the sensitive skin.

“Better than your dream?” You teased while wiping your mouth with the back of your hand and standing back up.

He let out a relaxed laugh and pulled you by your hips, kissing over your clothed stomach. “Like, by a thousand.” He responded, then pulled you down and groaned into your mouth when he tasted himself. “D’you think they’ll notice if we bail?” He asked against your lips.

“Yo, horndogs! Put your clothes back on and come out! We open in ten!” You heard Richie’s booming voice through the thin wooden door, followed by heavy knocks.

“I think that’s your answer.” You kissed him one last time and turned to the door, readjusting your hair.

“You never told me the good news…”

‘Right, that’s what I came in here for…’

“Remember the charity event I told you about?” You asked and continued once he nodded in agreement. “Well Marge offered me the last spot.” He stared blankly at you. “My paintings are gonna be auctioned at the event!”

He took a split second to react, but soon his brows raised in surprise and he circled his arms around your waist, lifting you from the ground in a tight hug.

“Baby, that’s great! I’m so fuckin’ proud of you!” He cheered, kissing the top of your head. You felt as if the skin on your cheeks would rip from the force of your smile.

“Wait that’s not all-” You laughed as you freed your head from his grip and looked up at his beaming face. “I may have gotten you guys the catering gig for the event.”

“Wait, seriously?” His grip loosened around you and you took advantage of that to turn to the door and step outside to wash your hands, Carmy following close behind.

“Mhm! She wants to see some options first, but I just know you guys are gonna kill it, so it’s practically in the bag.” 

“What’re we gonna kill?” Marcus asked, popping his head around the corner of his station and causing a laugh to leave your chest.

You turned to a silent Carmy. He leaned on the wall with his hand resting over his chin and smiling mouth. You mouthed a slow ‘what?’ that he just answered with a shake of his head and wrapped a single arm around your shoulders, kissing your head again and whispering a soft ‘Thank you’ into your hair.

He let you go after a few seconds and you walked to the front with a glowing smile, setting up for the presumed ‘hectic day’, though with the way the sky seemed to be pouring down, you doubted anyone would be stepping foot inside.

**********

You were wrong, so very very wrong. But you would not let anyone know that as you took what seemed like the thousandth order, especially not Richie - who was already having a day picking jokes at you. ‘Haven’t seen you in a month hun, got a lot of ‘em saved up’ he said two minutes after walking through the door.

“What can I getcha?” You asked the next person in line. 

Greetings had been lost, maybe fifty or sixty customers back, when you switched with Richie so he could wait on tables because the ipad had gone ‘crazy’ and it was ‘messing with his vibe’, or whatever the fuck that meant. So after clearing the screen from the usual grease, you took his place by the til and began taking the overwhelmingly large amount of orders. 

It was only until the rain turned into a light drizzle, when the line grew shorter and the room less crowded, that you finally felt your phone vibrate with an incoming call from an unknown number. 

“Richie! Cover for me, I gotta take this!” You called over the noise without waiting for an answer and walked into the kitchen with your phone to your ear. “Hello?”

A sudden rush of sharp chills prickled through your skin as the voice on the other end called your name. 

“I-Isaac?” You asked, taken back because there was no way in hell that it could be him, not when you had blocked every one of his attempts to contact you.

“It’s been a while…” He said and you could hear the sly smile behind his words.

You felt the remains of your lunch slowly burn a path up from your stomach.

“Yeah, let’s keep it that way.�� You answered as frigid as possible before hanging up and lunging to the bathroom to spill the undigested meal.

“Yo hurry up, I need to- shit you okay?!” You heard Richie’s voice over by the door you had forgotten to close.

You spit the last taste of bile from your mouth and flushed before putting down the seat and slouching defeated over it. The sudden squeak of kitchen shoes vibrated and soon Syd’s head appeared behind Richie.

“Shit- hey you okay?!” She asked at the same time Richie said “So… what- you pregnant?”

“She’s not pregnant you fuckin’ moron!” She yelled at him and pushed him out, closing the door in his face. “You’re not pregnant, right?” She asked, immediately squatting beside you.

“No Syd! I’m not fucking pregnant!” You answered through soft sniffles. 

“Okay… what's wrong then?”

“Isaac called me.” You said after a few moments of silence.

“Psycho ex, Isaac?”

“Psycho ex Isaac.” You confirmed with eyes fixated beyond the floor and legs bouncing in anxiety.

“Okay… chill it’s not like he’s gonna come looking for you.” Syd said, trying to calm the evident panic attack bubbling under your skin. “Besides, Carmy wouldn’t let him stand in a ten mile radius of the restaurant, anyway.”

Your head shot up from the floor to look at her with worried brows. 

“Because he does know…right?” She asked and the look of guilt slapped on your face was enough of an answer. 

She threw her head back and stood with her hands on her hips. 

“Dude, why haven’t you told him?!” She sneered with a whisper. 

“I-I just couldn’t find the right moment-“

“There is no right moment! Just gotta throw in the bomb and hope for the best!”

“Yes I know, Syd! But I just- I couldn’t bear the thought of him thinking the worst of me, okay?!” You stood up from the seat in defeat and wiggled in the small space to reach the sink and rinse your mouth from the bitter taste. 

“And now it’s gonna be worse cause you’ve waited this long.” Syd whispered behind you. 

Three knocks at the door interrupted your answer and you looked up at Syd with a terrified look in your eyes. She mouthed a frantic ‘what do I do?’ before calling out a wobbly ‘uh… busy!’.

“I know you’re both in there, open up.”Carmy called with a heavy sigh. 

She shrugged her shoulders apologetically and opened the door to a worried Carmy. 

“Cousin said you were throwin’ up, everything okay?” He asked as Syd slid past him through the narrow opening, turning to you and pointing with  wide eyes towards Carmy. 

“Fucking Richie… yeah, something I ate, probably.” You tried saying while patting  cold water on your skin to reduce the heat rising rapidly. 

“Sure? You don’t look too good…”

He turned you to him by your shoulders and cupped your warm cheeks in his hands, looking over your face in concern. 

“Yea- yeah, ’m fine. Probably just a one time thing.” His eyes roamed over your face with a creased brow, not fully convinced of your statements.

“You can head home if you’re not feelin’ up to it…” he suggested. 

“And miss your stupid cousin telling everyone I’m pregnant, yeah no chance.” You said with a smile and the slight crinkles by the side of his eyes returned. “Besides, they’re gonna start thinking you got favorites.” You joked and laid your head softly over his chest so he couldn’t see your own worried expression. 

He rubbed your back slowly, the measured rise and fall of his breathing calmed you down, but only slightly. You could still faintly hear Isaac’s voice bounce off the walls in your head, overpowered by Richie chanting through the kitchen about the little bear cub you were gonna have, and -for the first time since you met him- you appreciated the loudness of it.

The rest of your non-shift passed by in a blur of grease covered sandwiches and slight forming headaches, courtesy of the lack of  food in your stomach and Richie’s constant teasing. There was a point in the afternoon, where your patience had grown too thin and you ended up punching him hard on the arm. It did nothing to him, of course, but it did help in reducing your stress on the train ride back to Carmy’s place.

“Maybe I should get some rain boots…” You commented after making your way inside the empty apartment and immediately kicking off the damp shoes.

“What, like Coraline?” He asked from the kitchen, surprising you. “What?” He asked again when he saw your amused expression. “You think I just watch food movies?”

“I dunno, I assumed you’ve seen Ratatouille but that’s like about it.” You joked.

*********

Carmen had probably used his stove a total of three times since moving back and before you started spending the night regularly, not counting that time he almost set his kitchen on fire while sleepwalking, but you didn’t need to know that. He even made an effort to keep his fridge stocked with other things that weren’t half full cans of Coke or stale bread and that he could actually make into a real meal.

When you arrived home -cause that’s what he liked to call it now- you tried to convince him that it wasn’t necessary to make dinner. But you hadn’t eaten anything all afternoon and it would have been completely fine if he didn’t know, but he did, and letting you go to bed on an empty stomach was not even an option that crossed his mind. 

He liked cooking for you. It was the only way he could express how he felt. When words seemed too complicated to string together in coherent sentences, that stuck like thick honey to the roof of his mouth, he cooked them. Whisked them together with a bit of salt and pepper then fried them until crisp, and fed them to you on his best tableware; hoping this way you could understand all the messages his mouth failed to explain. 

‘Only if you eat with me’ You had whispered as you took the skillet off the flame for the second time, a determined glow heavy in doe eyes and he knew that in a relationship with two people pleasers, arguing over who cared more for the other would be a lost cause. So he settled on making something quick and joined you on his small living room floor, where you sat with your feet wrapped in a blanket, computer and a couple of his cook books, drawing out ideas on what he could offer for the gala.

“Don’t we still have, like, three months?” He asked with a heavy sigh that came from stretching out his tired legs.

“Yeah.. but this way you’ll have more than enough time to see what works and what doesn’t.” You shrugged your shoulders and took a bite from your plate.

He chewed in silence, mesmerized as you lost yourself in the rabbit hole of all the different options they could serve for the event, flipping through his books and putting little colored post-its on the ones you liked the most. He had never seen you this excited and it brought a feeling to his chest that, if he didn’t know it was because of you, he’d probably confuse with heartburn. 

Still, he couldn’t shake the looming sensation off his shoulders, the idea that something lurked around the corner, waiting to pounce. Like how he felt before Sugar called him about Mikey, and when he first learned that The Beef was now his. 

For his peace of mind he decided to blame it on anxiety, he had grown so used to always being alert that his body felt wrong when it wasn’t. 'Its probably just a gut feeling' he thought, and he was never that good at reading his gut, anyway.

Chapter 9.

Taglist: @pearlstiare @teteminne, @beebslebobs, @harrysmatcha and that’s it lmao

[shedidntevenswear]

i just keep thinking about some of the more random and surprising choices on the setlist and how even though taylor is like a businesswoman that knows how to cater to the most people and make a record-setting pop show, some of these more surprising choices really showcase how her artist side wins out and how deeply she loves her art regardless of public reception. like the archer has been paid dust by everyone but the way she sings it and makes sure she made time for it in the setlist? you can tell that one means a lot to her personally. or adding marjorie because she wanted that moment to let her grandma shine and connect with her. 

i dunno i dont think im saying this very well but its just really nice to see her choosing herself and the things she wants and care about most over the most obvious or advantageous or popular options sometimes. she deserves it. 

[chosetherose]

✨Eras Tour Appreciation Post ✨

What. A. Show.

I expected to be amazed yesterday (Foxborough N1) but a few times I looked around the stadium in total awe. The visuals, the lights, the sound, the effects, the dancers, the costumes, the crowd, and TAYLOR.

This was my first time seeing her in concert/real life and I was absolutely stunned by her talent. It’s like I knew it was there, *obviously*, but experiencing it in person gave me a whole new appreciation. She is an incredible performer; every move she makes is designed to give her fans a good time. She floated around the sprawling stage singing terrific vocals, making it look EASY but I know she has put in WORK to be able to do that, physically. She plays up to the audience at the exact right times. Keeps us guessing. Keeps us having fun. In the audience, there’s competing emotions between savoring the moment and excited for what’s next.

I was so lucky to sit in the front row and will keep that experience in my heart forever. Something that really struck me about sitting so close was… well I feel like at other concerts sitting near the stage you can get more interaction with the artist (e.g. Harry Styles). But Taylor’s performance is catering to EVERYONE in the stadium. She glided around near me so many times. 10 feet away? I was RIGHT THERE and I feel like she never even came close to looking at me. What I did feel was she was laser focused on delivering an incredible performance for everyone in the stadium. It was obvious to me that the people in seats the very top were equally as important to her. I felt a lot of respect for her for that.

When fans’ flashlights came on for Marjorie it was chillingly beautiful. I looked all around and it spurred some sort of perspective shift for me. There were so many people there supporting her in that stadium but this wasn’t even a drop in the bucket compared to those that love her around the world. Being there physically gave me more of an appreciation for how delicate it must be trying to merge her public and private lives together to some non-maddening degree.

I could go on and on. I’ll wrap up by saying I took off my analyst hat I love to wear around here and I simply enjoyed the concert. I was jumping, screaming, dancing, having the time of my life. I noticed things here and there 😊 but first and foremost I was having FUN.

💖 CTR

P.S. I knew she was beautiful but my oh my she is a goddess on earth, simply stunning.

P.P.S. My jacket had rhinestones but I must have bought the wrong kind because Taylor’s (that were probably actually crystals) were blinding from across the floor. It made me irrationally happy.

- - -

I have so many videos I want to share with you all! Too many. So I made my favorite close ups that I took into GIFs. Enjoy! ☺️

[azriel-sama]

Twisted Wonderland Characters as Taylor Swift lyrics/verses

Riddle : You wouldn't last an hour in the asylum where they raised me (Who's afraid of little old me)

Ace : Don't call me kid, don't call me baby, look at this idiotic fool that you made me (Illicit affairs)

Deuce : I just wanted you to know that this is me trying (this is me trying)

Cater : You're not my homeland anymore, so what am I defending now? (Exile)

Trey : Everyone's push and shoving, you're in the kitchen humming, all that you ever wanted from me was sweet nothing (sweet nothing)

Leona : My team is losing, battered and bruising

I see the high fives between the bad guys

Leave with my head hung, you are the only one

Who seems to care (Miss Americana & The heartbreak prince)

Jack : Boys will be boys then, where are the wise men? (Miss Americana & The heartbreak prince)

Ruggie : Forever is the sweetest con (cowboy like me)

Azul : I wake up screaming from dreaming

One day I'll watch as you're leaving

'Cause you got tired of my scheming (Anti-hero)

Jade : Pick your poison babe, I'm poison either way (imgonnagetyouback)

Floyd : This is why we can't have nice things, darlin'

Because you break them, I had to take them away (This is why we can't have nice things)

Kalim : The world was black and white, but we were in screaming colour(Out of the woods)

Jamil : Perched in the dark

Telling all the rich folks anything they wanna hear (Cowboy Like Me)

Vil : "Babe, you gotta fake it 'till you make it" and I did

Lights camera, bitch smile

In stilletos for miles

(I can do it with a broken heart)

Rook : Don't blame me, Love made me crazy (Don't blame me)

Epel : I've never been a natural, all I do is try try try (Mirrorball)

Idia : I hate it here so I will go to secret gardens in my mind (I hate it here)

Ortho : Take pictures in your mind of your childhood room

Memorize what it sounded like when your dad gets home

Remember the footsteps, remember the words said

And all your little brother's favorite songs (Never grow up)

Malleus : Who's afraid of little old me? You should be. (Who's afraid of little old me?)

Silver : Should've kept every grocery store receipt, 'cause every scrap of you would be taken from me (Marjorie)

Sebek : What must it be like to grow up that beautiful? (Gold rush)

Lilia : Keep your helmet, keep your life, son

Just a flesh wound, here's your rifle

Crawling up the beaches now

"Sir, I think he's bleeding out"

And some things you just can't speak about (Epiphany)

It was all originally going to just be lyrics, but some verses were just too fitting for some characters U4HRJR

Most of these are from genuine character analysis and my understandings of them, but some of them are kind if iffy since I don't get them ykyk

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

John Deering, Arkansas Democrat Gazette

* * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

January 25, 2023

Heather Cox Richardson

Democrats are generally staying out of the way and letting Speaker Kevin McCarthy and the House Republicans make a spectacle of themselves. In order to get the votes to become speaker, McCarthy had to give power to extremists like Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), and now has openly brought her on board as a close advisor, making the extremists the face of the new MAGA Republican Party. If McCarthy appears to have abandoned principle for power by catering to the far right, Representative George Santos (R-NY) hasn’t helped: stories of his lies have mounted, and financial filings yesterday suggest quite serious financial improprieties.

Even the Senate Republicans seem to be keeping their heads down while the House Republicans perform for their base. Demanding big cuts in spending before they agree to raise the debt ceiling has put the House Republicans in a difficult spot. They have been clear that they intend to slash Social Security and Medicare, only to have Trump, who was the one who originally insisted on using the debt ceiling to get concessions out of Democrats, recognize that such cuts are enormously unpopular and say they should not touch Medicare and Social Security. Senate Republicans have said they will stay out of debt ceiling negotiations until the House Republicans come up with a viable plan.

While the House Republicans take up oxygen, the Democrats are highlighting for the American people how, over the past two years, they have carefully and methodically changed U.S. policy to stop the concentration of wealth and power in the hands of the few.

In July 2021, President Joe Biden signed an executive order to promote competition in the economy. Since the 1980s, he said, when right-wing legal theorist Robert Bork masterminded a pro-corporate legal revolution against antitrust laws, the government had stopped enforcing laws to prevent giant corporations from concentrating their power. The result had been less growth, weakened investment, fewer small businesses, less bargaining power for workers, and higher prices for consumers.

“[T]he experiment failed,” he said.

Biden vowed to change the direction of the government’s role in the economy, bringing back competition for small businesses, workers, and consumers. Very deliberately, he reclaimed the country’s long tradition of opposing economic consolidation. Calling out both presidents Roosevelt—Republican Theodore, who oversaw part of the Progressive Era, and Democrat Franklin, who oversaw the New Deal—Biden celebrated their attempt to rein in the power of big business, first by focusing on the abuses of those businesses and then by championing competition.

The administration put together a whole-of-government approach to restore competition based on the 72 separate actions outlined in Biden’s executive order. A terrific piece today by David Dayen in The American Prospect suggests that the effort has worked. Overall, Dayen concludes, the executive order of July 9, 2021, was “one of the most sweeping changes to domestic policy since FDR.”

While administrations since Reagan have judged whether consolidation is harmful solely by its effect on consumer prices, the Biden approach also factors in the welfare of workers, including their ability to negotiate higher wages. It has also taken on the sharing of medical patents that have raised costs of drugs and equipment like hearing aids by preventing others from entering the market. It has taken on large businesses’ strangling of start-up competitors simply by buying them out before they take off. And, crucially, it has claimed the ability to review previous mergers that it now deems in violation of antitrust laws, citing the 1911 breakup of Standard Oil.

Dayen notes that one of the causes for a sharp drop in mergers and acquisitions in the second half of 2022 is that government agencies are willing to enforce antitrust laws. “Just about everything on competition has been hard-fought,” he writes, “[b]ut there’s plenty of evidence of real movement.”

Not only government agencies, but also the Democratic Congress—along with some Republicans—passed a number of laws that have shifted the economic policy of the nation. Biden is fond of saying that he doesn’t believe in trickle-down economics and that he intends to build the economy from the bottom up and the middle out. New numbers suggest the policies of the past two years are doing just that.

The December jobs report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics showed that job growth continues strong. The country added 223,000 jobs in December, and the unemployment rate went down slightly to 3.5 percent. The last two years of job growth are the strongest on record, and the country has recovered all the jobs lost during the pandemic. According to the White House, 10.7 million jobs were created and a record 10.5 million small businesses’ applications were filed in the past two years.

On Monday the Wall Street Journal reported that median weekly earnings rose 7.4% last year, slightly faster than inflation. For Black Americans employed full time, the median rise was 11.3% over 2021. A median Hispanic or Latino worker’s income saw a 4.8% raise, to $837 a week. Young workers, between 16 and 24, saw their weekly income rise more than 10%. Also seeing close to a 10% weekly rise were those in the bottom tenth of wage earners, those making about $570 a week. The day after the Wall Street Journal’s roundup, Walmart, which employs 1.7 million people in the U.S., announced it would raise its minimum wage to $14 an hour, up from $12.

Democrats promised that the CHIPS and Science Act would bring “good paying” jobs to those without college degrees by investing in high-tech manufacturing. A study by the Brookings Institution out yesterday notes that the act has already attracted multibillion-dollar private investments in New York, Indiana, and Ohio and that two thirds of the jobs they will produce are accessible to those without college degrees. Those jobs do, in fact, pay better than most of those available for those without college degrees, although Brookings urged better investment in training programs to make workers ready for those jobs.

The Inflation Reduction Act gave Medicare the power to negotiate drug prices with pharmaceutical companies and capped the cost of insulin for those on Medicare at $35 a month (Republicans blocked an attempt to make that cap available for those not on Medicare). It made hearing aids available over the counter, making them dramatically cheaper, and it also expanded subsidies for the Affordable Care Act. Today the Department of Health and Human Services announced that a record number of Americans enrolled in the ACA in the last open enrollment period: 16.3 million people.

Greg Sargent of the Washington Post notes that much of the investment from these laws is going to Republican-dominated states even though their Republican lawmakers opposed the laws and voted against them. The clean energy investments of the Inflation Reduction Act are going largely to those states, bringing with them additional private investment. A solar panel factory is expanding into Greene’s own district despite her vocal opposition both to alternative energy and to the Inflation Reduction Act.

For 40 years the Republican Party offered a vision of America as a land of hyperindividualism, in which any government intervention in the economy was seen hampering the accumulation of wealth and thus as an attack on individual liberty. The government stopped working for ordinary Americans, and perhaps not surprisingly, many of them have stopped supporting it. Biden refused to engage with the Republicans on the terms of their cultural wars and has instead reclaimed the idea that government can actually work for the good of all by keeping the economic playing field level for everyone.

Biden and members of his administration are taking to the road to tout their successes to the country, especially to those places most skeptical of the government. If they can bring the Republican base around to support their economic policies, they will have realigned the nation as profoundly as did FDR and Theodore Roosevelt before them.

—

Notes:

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/01/23/us/politics/kevin-mccarthy-marjorie-taylor-greene.html

https://www.politico.com/news/2023/01/23/senate-republicans-kevin-mccarthy-debt-00079126

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2021/07/09/remarks-by-president-biden-at-signing-of-an-executive-order-promoting-competition-in-the-american-economy/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/1987/07/19/bork-and-the-pro-business-bias/f98206ec-5d73-4e1d-b1fa-066eab789284/

https://www.brookings.edu/research/with-high-tech-manufacturing-plants-promising-good-jobs-in-ohio-workforce-developers-race-to-get-ready/

https://www.wsj.com/articles/bidens-green-subsidies-are-attracting-billions-of-dollars-to-red-states-11674488426

https://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/empsit.pdf

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/press-briefings/2023/01/24/press-briefing-by-press-secretary-karine-jean-pierre-12/

https://www.cnn.com/2023/01/24/business/walmart-raising-wages/index.html

https://www.hhs.gov/about/news/2023/01/25/biden-harris-administration-announces-record-breaking-16-3-million-people-signed-up-health-care-coverage-aca-marketplaces-during-2022-2023-open-enrollment-season.html

https://www.wsj.com/articles/biggest-pay-raises-went-to-black-workers-young-people-and-low-wage-earners-11674425793

https://prospect.org/economy/2023-01-25-pitched-battle-corporate-power/

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/01/25/biden-place-based-industrial-policy-muro/

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[from comments]

TCinLA

Writes Thats Another Fine Mess

TPM is now reporting that House Republicans want to pass a series of "clean" debt limit suspension bills that brings the debt default crisis to coincide with the new fiscal year, to create a mega crisis of default/government shutdown, and that they will then be putting the most egregious of their spending bills up for votes over the summer before the mega crisis arrives. Interestingly, this will benefit Democrats if they do this, since the Democrats will be able to point to all the egregious cuts the crazies want. Also, enough Republicans have now stated they do not intend to touch Social Security, Medicare, Obamacare or Defense that McCarthy does not have a majority to push those cuts, leaving them very few places they would have to cut heavily to achieve their goals.

In other words, the wheels are coming off the clown car already. Who could have expected that? I ask you!

[pashterlengkap]

Was the DNC’s silence on trans rights at the an omen for Kamala Harris’ presidency?

The Democratic convention was, by any measure, a huge success. The party faithful were bursting with energy when it was over, which will translate into help getting out the vote. Fundraising went through the roof; the campaign raised $82 million last week, with the single best hour for fundraising the hour immediately after Vice President Kamala Harris finished her acceptance speech. And the television ratings far outstripped the GOP convention’s, much to the annoyance of Nielsen-obsessed Donald Trump. From the pundits’ perspective, what made the convention such a hit was that Democrats used their weeklong jamboree to aim for the political middle. That effort started with the campaign’s decision to embrace “weird” as the description of MAGA. But the convention amplified that message a thousandfold. Democrats were suddenly the party of freedom and patriotism. In her acceptance speech, Harris promised the U.S. military would be the “most lethal fight force in the world,” language typically associated with Republican hawks. Related A Biden official at the DNC explains the secret ways Democrats fight for equality Matt Hill, a gay former White House official at the Democratic National Convention, explains the ways Democrats will keep advancing LGBTQ+ rights. As much as Democrats were ecstatic during the convention, Harris’ speech made it clear that she wasn’t there to cater to the base. She was aiming for the relatively small number of swing voters that she needs to win. And nowhere was the focus on that group sharper than when it came to the silence on trans issues. Dive deeper every day Join our newsletter for thought-provoking commentary that goes beyond the surface of LGBTQ+ issues Subscribe to our Newsletter today Unlike the past two Democratic conventions, this year’s convention did not feature a trans speaker. That’s shocking, considering how much the right has made the trans community a focus of attack in the past four years. The Republican National Convention made attacking trans people a theme, with Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) getting applause for declaring, “There are only two genders.” In their effort to tack to the center, Democrats were a lot more subdued than in the past. Yes, lesbian Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel wowed the convention by telling the Supreme Court, “You can pry this wedding band from my cold, dead, gay hand!” But a lot of rhetoric in support of trans rights was a little less straightforward. For example, Michelle Obama talked about “demonizing our children for being who they are.” If you are sufficiently tuned in, you’ll know what she’s talking about. If not, well… Melissa Michelson, a professor of political science at California’s Menlo College who studies LGBTQ+ politics, said the DNC’s avoidance of mentioning trans rights was part of a wider strategy to seek out independent voters. Avoiding trans issues was seemingly a conscious strategy by the Democrats. “If you look at who was featured in the prime-time slots, it’s middle-of-the-road people,” Michelson told NBC News. “It’s people who are going to appeal to that chunk of swing voters in the Sunbelt, in the Rustbelt, those swing states, and transgender rights are not a high-priority issue for those voters and not the way they’re going to decide their vote.” Instead, Democratic leaders apparently believe that those voters are motivated by appearing a lot less woke and a lot more centrist. Harris has been able to benefit from this because of the bizarre circumstances of her ascent. Typically, in a primary, candidates have to appeal to the base and then try to move to the center for the general election. Harris didn’t have to do that. So she’s a blank slate for most people, who barely (if at all) remember her failed presidential campaign four years ago. Harris has gotten an assist from Trump in this regard. Because Trump has been so rattled that he’s not running against Joe Biden anymore, he has wasted critical time he could… http://dlvr.it/TCP1kZ

[allinonecc]

Moronism: The Fastest Growing Religion in America

In recent years, a seemingly unlikely religious movement has captured the attention and support of a significant portion of the American population. Moronism, also known as MAGA, has emerged as the fastest-growing religion in America. With its roots in the political slogan "Make America Great Again," Moronism has transformed into a full-fledged belief system that encompasses both spiritual and secular aspects of life. This rise of Moronism can be seen as a reflection of the global phenomenon of a resurgence in public religion and spirituality. 

While the term "Moronism" may raise some eyebrows due to its similarity to the word "Mormonism," it is important to note that Moronism and Mormonism are two distinct and unrelated belief systems. Moronism, or MAGA, as a religion represents a unique blend of political ideology and spiritual beliefs. At its core, Moronism, or MAGA, centers around the idea of American exceptionalism and the restoration of a perceived golden age. This concept resonates with a substantial number of individuals who view themselves as marginalized or disenfranchised within the existing societal framework. 

One of the key factors contributing to the rise of Moronism is the appeal of embracing an alternative narrative or worldview. This alternative narrative goes beyond traditional political ideologies or policies and instead offers a formulation of freedom for the individual. In this narrative, common rules of civility do not apply, and reality can be changed at will. This allows individuals to shape their own realities and interpretations of events, even if they may seem unreasonable to those with a more traditional perspective. According to David Brooks, this deviation from the traditional American narrative is what makes the rise of Moronism so compelling to its followers. Brooks argues that Moronism's appeal lies in its ability to cater to the desire for individual freedom and the ability to choose and promulgate any version of reality that suits one's beliefs. 

Furthermore, the rise of Moronism can also be attributed to the role of elite partisan communication in shaping public opinion (Enders et al., 2022). This is evident in the study conducted by researchers, who found that certain beliefs and behaviors associated with Moronism were influenced by the rhetoric of Donald Trump during his presidency. Additionally, the rise of Moronism can also be attributed to the role of social media and online platforms. These platforms have provided a space for the dissemination and amplification of Moronist ideologies, allowing like-minded individuals to connect, organize, and further spread their beliefs. The rise of Moronism, or MAGA, as the fastest-growing religion in America has sparked discussions and debates about the intersection of politics and spirituality. The phenomenon of Moronism, or MAGA, as the fastest-growing religion in America reflects a broader global resurgence in public religion and spirituality.

The Republican Party has seen a rise in influential figures who adhere to Moronism, a belief system characterized by delusion and incoherence. These individuals, often referred to as Morons or MAGA-Morons, have become influential within the party and shaped its narrative and policies (Ware, 2016). Their adherence to Moronism is evident in their actions, statements, and support for former President Donald Trump. One of the key characteristics of Moronism is the rejection of traditional American narratives and the embrace of a different worldview centered around individual freedom. This worldview allows Morons to promulgate and believe in versions of reality that may seem unreasonable to others. 

It is important to understand that not all Republicans subscribe to Moronism, but the influence of Morons within the party cannot be ignored (Froehlich, 2021). These Morons, such as Marjorie Taylor Greene, Matt Gaetz, Lauren Boebert, Speaker Mike Johnson, Jim Jordan, and Byron Donalds, have garnered significant attention and support within the Republican Party. Their influence is manifest in their ability to rally support for Trump and his agenda, often targeting Republican members who fail to align with Trump's views. These Morons have created a disinformation ecosystem, where alternative facts and conspiracy theories thrive. 

Their interpersonal connections, media outlets, political and social organizations, and associations are what fuel this disinformation ecosystem (Enders et al., 2022). It allows them to construct a narrative that reinforces their beliefs and undermines objective facts. One source explains that Trump's ability to rally his base against Republican politicians who do not support him makes these politicians vulnerable to primary challenges from the right. This source highlights how Trump's support base incentivizes politicians to align with him, leading to the rise of Morons within the Republican Party. 

Another source points out the role of disinformation and epistemological failures in reinforcing Moronism within Trump's support base. According to this source, human beings often fail to monitor and evaluate incoming information correctly, which contributes to the spread and acceptance of Moronism within the Republican Party. While it is essential to acknowledge the influence of Morons within the Republican Party, it is important not to generalize and categorize all Republicans as such. In summary, Moronism refers to a subset of individuals within the Republican Party who embrace a different worldview centered around individual freedom and reject traditional American narratives. 

References:

Ware, A. (2016, July 1). Donald Trump's Hijacking of the Republican Party in Historical Perspective. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-923x.12275

Froehlich, T J. (2021, September 8). A Disinformation-Misinformation Ecology: The Case of Trump. https://doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.95000

Enders, A M., Klofstad, C A., Stoler, J., & Uscinski, J E. (2022, November 10). How Anti-Social Personality Traits and Anti-Establishment Views Promote Beliefs in Election Fraud, QAnon, and COVID-19 Conspiracy Theories and Misinformation. https://doi.org/10.1177/1532673x221139434

[whole-sale-925-silver]

What Do Toe Rings Mean? A Cultural Insight

Toe rings are a small but significant piece of jewelry that has been worn for centuries by women around the world. They have a wide range of cultural meanings, depending on the region and beliefs of the wearer.

The Significance of Toe Rings in Various Cultures

The humble toe ring, adorning the often-overlooked feet, carries a surprising amount of cultural significance across the globe. Its meaning transcends mere fashion, imbuing it with symbolism of marital status, social standing, health beliefs, and even spiritual connections.

India

Perhaps the most well-known meaning of toe rings comes from India, where married women traditionally wear a silver or gold ring called a "bichiya" on the second toe of both feet. The bichhiya is not just an ornament; it's a powerful symbol of marital bliss, believed to bring good luck and prosperity to the couple. Some even attribute medicinal properties to the bichhiya, claiming it regulates menstrual cycles and eases childbirth.

Egypt

Ancient Egyptians adorned their toes with rings crafted from gold, silver, and even faience, a colorful ceramic. These rings served as ornamental pieces, believed to possess magical properties linked to health and well-being. Some toe rings depicted gods and goddesses, imbuing them with spiritual significance.

Rome

In Ancient Rome, toe rings were primarily a fashion statement for wealthy women. Made from precious metals and embellished with gemstones, they symbolized status and luxury. On the other hand, Roman men occasionally wore iron-toe rings for practical purposes, protecting their feet during athletic activities.

Toe Rings in Western Cultures

In Western cultures, toe rings are a fashion accessory with no inherent symbolic meaning. They gained popularity in the 1970s and have since become a staple of summer style, often paired with sandals, flip-flops, or bare feet. However, their history goes beyond just a trendy ornament.

History

While relatively recent in the West, toe rings have a rich history in other cultures, dating back to ancient Egypt, India, and Rome. In these contexts, they often symbolized wealth, status, marital status, and even fertility.

In the West, the concept of a toe ring as a fashion piece gained traction in the 1970s, thanks in part to Marjorie Borell, who opened the first "Original Toe Ring Boutique" in New York City.

Initially worn primarily on the second toe of the left foot, toe rings are now adorned on any toe and come in various styles, materials, and designs.

Material and Design of Toe Rings

Toe rings come in a dazzling variety of materials and designs, catering to different styles and preferences.

Precious metals

Gold, silver, and platinum are classic choices for toe rings, offering elegance and durability. They can be plain or embellished with gemstones, pearls, or intricate designs.

Stainless steel

 A more affordable and hypoallergenic alternative to precious metals, stainless steel is a popular choice for everyday wear. It's also resistant to corrosion and tarnishing, making it ideal for beach days or poolside lounging.

Gemstones

Gemstones like turquoise, amethyst, garnet, and opal add a pop of color and personality to toe rings. They can be set in precious metals or embedded in resin or other materials.

Conclusion

toe rings are much more than a simple fashion accessory. Their cultural significance varies greatly around the world, reflecting a rich tapestry of beliefs, traditions, and practices. In India, toe rings symbolize marital status and are believed to have medicinal properties. In ancient Egypt, they were thought to possess magical properties related to health and spirituality. In Ancient Rome, toe rings were a symbol of luxury and status among wealthy women, while Roman men used them for practical purposes in athletic activities.

In Western cultures, the toe ring evolved into a popular fashion accessory, particularly in the summer months, largely devoid of the symbolic meanings it holds in other parts of the world. This transition from a culturally significant ornament to a trendy fashion item demonstrates the diverse ways in which a single item can be interpreted and integrated into various societies.

The materials and designs of toe rings also vary widely, from precious metals like gold, silver, and platinum to more affordable options like stainless steel, each offering a different aesthetic and appeal. The incorporation of gemstones adds further diversity and personalization to these pieces.

[marjorierosen]

An Overview of Garden Etiquette

Marjorie G. Rosen has managed several distinct business properties throughout her career, from Arts Britannia, Ltd., in London to the hanging garden containers she designed while living in New York City. Marjorie G. Rosen is interested in horticulture and has engaged with several botanical gardens and conservatories worldwide.

A botanical garden, sometimes known as a botanic garden, functions as a grouping of living plants arranged with aesthetic intention and, much more importantly, in a manner that illustrates the complex relationships between various plant groups. Botanical gardens differ from arboretums because the latter focus primarily on trees and wooded landscapes. Individuals interested in how different plants interact and learning about beautiful flowers from around the world may wonder how to dress and behave while attending a botanical garden event.

Botanical gardens are designed with beauty in mind and can be the setting of a charity fundraiser or other event. That said, visitors are encouraged to dress comfortably, as they would for any other outdoor event. Gardens are not uncommon to be open to the public year-round, meaning individuals should dress for comfort and warmth. Gardens typically feature clear pathways, but individuals should still wear comfortable shoes, which may get dirty.

In terms of packing for a day at the botanical garden, individuals should prepare for a low-intensity hike, bringing along water, sunblock, and snacks. Most gardens do not permit on-site eating, but botanical gardens are sometimes located near or within public parks with picnic areas.

Botanical gardens do not typically cater to cyclists or dog owners, though individuals can inquire about service animals. Visitors should always stick to marked paths and never touch the plants on display. Individuals should also refrain from removing plants, feeds, fruit, or any other garden aspect.

[twizzleenthusiast]

Marjorie Lajoie and Zachary Lagha | FD | Lombardia Trophy 2019

[kaedeakeshisworld]

Prologue

Duo: Sugar daddy Leonard Burns, Black fem y/n- so black features, setting is a modern au

Relationship status: Sugar daddy/sugar baby (does it evolve into something else, idk we finna see that) both are possessive towards each other

Content warning: A lil' sprinkle of plot, no joking from the beginning this is too smutty panty sniffing( for some reason he really nasty- kept it as a gift), daddy kink, age gap (y/n is in her mid -twenties and Leo is his early fifties), dry humping, cunnilingus, clitoris bumping nose of the person giving oral(f! receiving-idk what to call it really), fingering, squirting, licking arousal from fingers...

pet name use such as dove, honey, darling, my girl and cinnamon bun (I’m wheezing)

Aperçu: y/n is someone that had never given a second thought to the idea of dating. But now because she is in her mid twenties, she decides that it wouldn’t be that bad to give it a try. Thanks to her friends, she explores the world of dating through a different kind of lens that is none other than the sugar daddy bubble. Let’s see where this journey leads her to…

word count: 4 k sum

Well, you had what could represent a happy life. You had friends, a roof over your head and you were a self made person. Every single thing you had ever owned you had financed it, you did not like gifts, it felt really awkward and inappropriate to accept them just like that. Let’s say ma raised an independent woman, right?! Also something that made you quite unique compared to your friends is that you have never been interested in men!( This my specific case but the gag is I don’t really feel attraction towards anyone really) and sometimes you did wonder if something was wrong with you.

You decided to discuss with your friends about that matter and see if there was a possibility for you to develop a lil’ game in the dating sphere. You had discussed plenty of options with them but you had never really found common ground until the idea of being a sugar baby was announced. At first, you were like there is no way I’ll trade my cunny for some old fart like that even if he rich as fuck! But then your friends Bianca, Theresa and Marjorie had all the tea on how to get you to join the community (I deadass thought about getting one but the the independent feminist my mum raised could not do it!) They went over all the possibilities that could be suitable for you and they had even mentioned this option where you could get a sugar daddy that would provide you with everything and you wouldn’t have to give him sugar. 

You thought this was the best option that would be convenient for you. So with your friends' encouragement, you decided to go look up on the site www.sugardaddiesheaven.com( I totally made it up- I don’t think you’ll find something) for a very attractive man that would be willing to cater to your needs and you were surprised with how popular this site was and the reviews were immaculate! Your research did not take too long, something like 2-3 days and you had found your perfect match.

This long haired man was extremely well built, you had to double check his pictures through social media and Oh lord have mercy, how is it possible to have a body like that at that age!?!? You were gobsmacked as much as you were salivating to touch him- wait hold up why is it that I want to touch him like that? Why all of a sudden carnal desire is appearing in my life, hold on AM I STRAIGHT( this is me literally panicking anytime I simp for a anime/manga character that is a man hehe)

You decided to calm yourself down. It was okay to experience these feelings matter of fact, call it relief, because now you finally felt like you had something to hold onto other than yourself and the thing you had always wanted but never admitted it. 

You started analysing his profile, he was the CEO of Fire Force company, was in his early fifties, looked like a greek god had sculpted his body among many other features that he visibly had for instance the visible dick print on his tight pants like *clears throat* you do not have a little amount of shame huh, do you?! But that did not matter anyway, you were enjoying every bit of it! You mustered the courage to message him and were extremely nervous, as soon as you had sent it you decided to do something else to forget about it. An hour later, you checked your computer and he had answered. More surprisingly he had answered right away after you decided to leave your room. His reply was short, precise and concise: he asked if you would like to meet him before anything became official.

You both agreed to meet at this new hyped elegant restaurant so that way he could wine and dine you without no pressure at all on a day where you were free.You decided to showcase the body you had built over the years of hard work and honour it all with a simple yet effective hairstyle which consisted of a half up half down locks that would allow you to fully harness your inner goddess. (I love to see black women flaunt their natural hair as well as rocking whatever they decide to rock, it makes me smile so hard that as a result my cheeks hurt!) You were stunning, your brown skin was draped with this backless metallic orange satin dress that perfectly hugged your curves, you had black heels on, the penultimate touch of this amazing outfit was your earrings completed by this discreet purse .

You looked spectacular, smelled deliciously great and were a sight to behold. Your backside was stealing the show more than your actual back was supposed to but it’s fine to flaunt what ma gave you! It didn’t take long to get to La Plaza (I made that up as a place to eat at) by car, the interior had a refreshing vibe, it was fairly modern, and the beige aesthetic defined this place. You parked your car, got out of it and headed towards the restaurant.

You walked up to the reservations employee to ask for your possible future sugar daddy’s last name and before he could provide you with the information you were looking for, the legend appeared behind you and seductively whispered in your ear "You surely were beautiful on your profile picture but," he pauses for a few seconds before continuing "Oh my goodness, up close you are extremely gorgeous."

You were startled, you wanted to scream, it really caught you off guard! You calmly counted until ten and decided to face this person. For a couple of seconds, you no longer knew how to breathe as you were eagerly appreciating the man standing before you. He had a man bun( I really dig these for some odd reason). He was irresistible, remarkably good looking, you certainly won the lottery with this sugar daddy. He had a jawline gifted from the divine being adorned with a well groomed beard, emerald eyes. He already had white hair but that only did increase the magnetism he had. 

You knew that he could definitely make you ride his face, give you beard burns(pun intended) and whatnot (foreshadowing). Inner thought -Oh no, I think I am falling for this dude- let me check if I still want money without being dicked down.-

Just admiring him was making you wet and your pearl was steadily pulsing under that dress. The reservation’s person interrupted both of your hazes by clearing his throat and signalling that you were making people behind you wait. This time, Leonard said "May I lead you to our table so we can start our lunch" while he offered his hand. You answered with an unintelligible "Yes" before taking his hand and following him. 

While you were following him towards the table, you noticed his broad back, his well built frame and that he also had a nice backside! You were literally drooling so much that you had to stop gawking at this sight. The table at which you were going to eat was fairly secluded from the others, a bit of privacy was necessary. The truth is he just wanted you for himself. Maybe you did not get it but ever since you entered the place, everyone’s predatory gaze was on you.

Therefore, he wanted to ensure you would only be his prize for his eyes to look at. You go ahead to pull your chair but he stops you in your tracks and announces "No, I’ll do it, you are my guest here" and pulls the chair for you to sit down. You nod that you’re well seated and while he goes towards his, your gaze lingers upon his big veiny forearms, biceps, broad back then how huge his hands are.

You know you’re high key undressing him with your eyes but again *cough* he had no business looking like that! He was simply dressed but with such elegance! He had a black buttoned up shirt with rolled sleeves, two buttons open showcasing a lil’ of his torso, black chino pants and brown loafers. He had this watch on his left wrist, a gold chain on his neck needless to say he looked like a snack.

He has clearly grasped that you are enthralled by him, he chuckles and states "You can stare all you want dove, anytime you want and however long you want. I’m only yours" You gasp, you don’t know what to say, your mind is racing, his profile back on the sugar daddy site did not mention that he was this direct. Oh, now you remember your terrible skimming habit and how you tend to purposely not look over things that do not seem important.

You play along and strike your most genuine laugh to tell him "I didn’t think you would say this right away in our first encounter!" He declares the following: "There is no way I am letting you slip through my fingers, I wouldn’t forgive myself If I did such a thing!" You happily suggest "Interesting, you’re good looking, charming, smell extremely good, a gentleman so it makes me wonder, is there anything that you don’t have?" His response is definitely not what you expected but it certainly sparks your interest "I", he begins "don’t have you by my side yet. After that is settled I will not need anything else".

You exclaim "oooh, I like that kind of answer but you seem too sure for my own damn taste honey!" He bites back with "Don’t worry, there is not a single thing I told you that I can’t back up. Trust me I know what I am talking about darling" and he winks. You two are in front of each other and you decide to start the conversation because you had not said much from the moment he caught you by surprise. 

You express "How would you like me to call you?" He looks up from the menu and answers "Leonard or Leo. You can call me however you like, maybe later you’ll find a nickname that suits me and how should I call you too?" You tell him "Y/n it is." He utters "It’s a pleasure to meet you y/n" ,you respond with "same here Leo."

You start thinking that he smells too good, that you would not mind breathing in this fine cologne all day long because it is really intoxicating. You’re developing some urges for this handsome man such as longing even though being a sugar baby truly isn’t about that also possessiveness is settling itself in your head. He is right in front of you and he is only going to be yours, you tell yourself. His fate is sealed with you.

He orders a Dom Perignon P2 Plenitude Brut Rose for the table that is 1.5 k dollars and you just let him do his thing even though on the inside you are bewildered because he ordered that for the first meal you share.

For him, he orders a Caprese salad, a medium steak, Spaghetti alle Vongole and  lemon sherbert. You are going over the numerous options this fine restaurant has and you have finally chosen what you would like to order: for you it consists of a greek feta salad, a medium rare wagyu steak, kimchi stir fried rice, salmon nigiri your fave kind and for dessert a lindt lindor milk chocolate truffle cheesecake.

While you were ordering your food Leonard’s gaze was scrutinising your face, how your make up was flawlessly done, your beauty marks that looked like a constellation upon your face, your hair, your big eyes, your pretty face. He was getting enamoured the longer he looked at it. Then his eyes wander from your face to your shoulders and he sees your stretch marks, how they compliment your frame and add an exquisite feature that makes your uniqueness which says there is no other being out here exactly like you.

It was a delicious meal, you thanked him for it and said that "Pleasure was all mine." He added "A fine woman like you would never pay for anything as long as you are with me." 

A few moments later

He signals a waiter to give him something he needs right now that you didn't quite catch, and in less than a few minutes the waiter is back with a folder saying "Here you have it Sir Burns. Is there anything else you desire?" Burns answers "no, the service is excellent as always thank you, congratulate the chef for this delicious food!" He smiled and left. Now, you were intrigued by the folder Leonard held in his hands and soon you dropped the question "Is that anything of my concern?" with an insistent gaze he chuckles and affirms "yes honey ( oh no, he already started) these do concern you more specifically, what could eventually happen between me and you" and he ends his phrase by licking his lower lip.

He tells you that you should join him in his car to discuss this paper and you do follow him like a lost puppy without asking questions any further. His car is of course a luxurious one but he is not the one driving it because he gets in the backseat with you and before he starts talking about the documents he tells his personal driver to wind up the electric window that divides the driver's seat from the back one. He starts talking "So I have a contract with me that designates what you and I can and can’t do, requirements to meet and what I want- to quickly sum up, it is a mutual agreement where I do not deprive you of your freedom and just request 3 hours of your day 4 times a week if possible that you can still negotiate if it does not suit you?"

 "Why such negotiations now" you say "a while back in the restaurant, was it all talk then, I am disappointed" you pout your lips "I thought you truly wanted to ensure that I was yours!" 

He discloses "I always do this whenever I meet a new sugar baby because not all of them are willing to do this without a written agreement." At this point, you’re becoming jealous. Such questions that emerge in your mind are why is that he had other ones? Aren’t you meant to be my one and only but then it hits you that you have been staring at him and his voice takes you back to reality "Y/n, y/n are listening to what I am saying?"

You decide to become a little assertive, you did not like that he mentioned other girls, any other person other than you really. You asked yourself why hadn’t you found him earlier oh your independent woman pride kept you from it. First, you grab him by his gold chain and lead him closer to you and tell him the following "I want you for me, myself and I only. I do not want to see you flirting with any. other. woman. if I catch you it’s on sight, you finna lose all o’ this”- your left hand goes from the top of your head to your toes addressing what he could potently be deprived of if he does not follow your rules thoroughly- "and last but certainly not least, who I want and what I want Imma get it because that’s how my world works"

His eyes never left yours only when you motioned your hand from top to bottom, he swallows, seems visibly pleased by what he just heard and reveals his conditions "You’re right," you let go of his chain and he manspreads on the seat "I love women that are very much like me, territorial." He adds "I like where this is going so I might as well tell you how I do things" he gets closer to you and whispers in your ear putting his big hand on the back of your head making you lean onto him "Whatever I tell you to do you have to" he pauses and breathes in your ear, this makes you shudder. It is torture. Why is he doing this to you now?! He pursues with is current monologue "no questioning is tolerated, you are only mine and when we fuck, it is your duty to call me daddy otherwise you will regret it" he lets go of your head and looks at his watch "I still have a little bit of time ahead of me so let’s get it started" You give him an inquisitive look and he notifies you with "also give me your g string now"

You were shocked. First: how did he know that you had a g string(This mf had been viciously admiring your backside to figure it out ) and second out of all he could ask you to give him he wants this!? But you knew better, you couldn’t ask after you had imposed your rules upon him so you took your lace g string ( I had Avant-Nuit ones in mind when I wrote this) off and gave it to him. He tells you to put it on his face, sniffing it for a good amount of time with the evident traces of your arousal on it. This mf deadass put your g string in his pocket, you were flabbergasted. As if nothing had happened, he declares "I knew you would smell this sweet, the only thing left for me to do is to give your lovely bud the attention it needs!" you tell him "that’s fine with me shall we start then" He’s like "oh word, get it on then princess remember I’m all yours" and he smiles.

Smut ahead

You lifted your dress up, straddled his thighs, your heated core was right above his strained erection confined by his pants and asked "Can I please rub my pearl on your dick to get off daddy? I know you want me too, your eyes hardly ever leave my kissable lips. You want them on you don’t you?" This man was too stunned to speak and he only grunted a yes for you to start doing your thing. You started kissing him and grinding above his hard on to get off, it was good but not quite what you needed. Grunts and mewls alongside the loud squelch of your wet pussy are the only thing both of you hear. He grabs your left hip grinding in sync with you, satisfied by the friction and starts to shamelessly smack your butt with his right hand. At this point, you don’t even ask him why he is doing it it just feels good so you drop him "Harder daddy, please spank me harder daddy"

"You’re such a nasty woman, you know that"

"Yes, but don’t lie to me you’re into this kind of nasty too"

"Ah shit, I am living my best life at fifty while my girl is getting off on me"

"Yes, yes, yes please don’t stop, I am almost there"

Your orgasm is rapidly approaching, you feel it and all of a sudden he keeps you from moving your hips on him. 

"Why is that you’ve stopped me, you are not keeping your promises. I am heading home!" you threatened him but he doesn’t move, he’s just sitting there heavily breathing. So, as you’re trying to quit his lap he tells you "You’re going to get off on my face, I know that is what you want. You have been eyeing my beard for too long, I’m sure you want to ride it honeysuckle."

He commands you to sit down, spread your legs and takes a look at your dripping folds. He exclaimed "you’re drenched, you’re always like this when with somebody else?" 

"No," you sigh "this is only for you too enjoy."

He sniffs right on it "I can never get enough of your essence" He puts his arms under your  thighs to lift you up a little bit and pull you towards him to have easy access to your slick folds. Before he starts eating you, he mumbles "itadakimasu" and dives in.

He is tirelessly lapping your clit, drinking your arousal, kissing, sucking it. He is doing all of this while looking at you and how you arch your back on the seat. “Fuck, Leo don’t stop, keep at it right there. Your tongue feels so good!”

He hummed and it made your clit vibrate. Your denied orgasm is quickly getting there and this time he plans on giving it to you. You grab his hair and force him to really get in there

( sis tryna drown him oh my days hehe 🤭y/n evil out here)  

"I’m cumming" and you start shaking for a whole minute before getting your breath steady again. 

"That is one" he utters, with his glistening beard "Now for this time, you ride my face"

"I don’t think it would be a good idea to do that"

"Why is that"

"Well, I wouldn’t want to get a beard burn"

"Ah, you’re right that is why I told you to ride it. You’re the one doing all the work now"

"Ok, you promise you won’t move?" 

"Yes I do"(this impatient mf lying, just wait)

He lowers his mouth on your pussy and you guide his head for him to stay put like that. You slowly start to go up and down and your clit continuously bumps his nose. It hurts so good that you are melting into the backseat and you really don’t care if people outside are able to hear you, today you are having the best orgasms of your whole existence! This man was definitely something else, he did pretty much not leave any room for you to compare him to any other sexual intercourse you had ever had. He lets you ride his nose for some time before he takes back control and starts vigorously assaulting your bud, bringing you to your second orgasm of the afternoon.

"For this last time I am going to finger you, is that okay with you?"

"Yes but hold up, you have only gotten me off what about you?"

"Sweetheart, don’t worry about me" he says stroking your cheek "making you come undone is my favourite thing to do"

Then, he starts fingering you and eating you out at the same time. You now know why these hands were big, what they could do and oh my these fingers were long, thick as hell. He did not let you catch your breath for a single minute. He enjoyed the show he was witnessing. You were gasping left and right. He was relentlessly bullying your clitoris, his thick fingers were fingering your cunny extremely fast and you knew that this time your orgasm would be different because of the overwhelming amount of stimulation. He carefully studied all the expressions your face showed, how you threw your head back when he sucked your clit, the whimpers that left your mouth when he did figure eights on it with his skilled tongue. Every single sound that came from you was honey for his ears, you were really magnificent to look at even in this dishevelled state.

You squirted all over his face, you’re surprised too because this had never occurred and you are panicking but also your third orgasm is making you sleepy. Still, you decide to mumble an apology. You tell him "It was not my intention to do that. I  did not know I could do that"

He responds "I am glad I was the first one to give it to you and you know who to come back to if you need it" he smirked. He was licking his fingers that were inside your vagina a few minutes ago with a wicked smile on his face saying "This was the best meal of my life thank you, my cinnamon bun" but you had already passed out on the seat. So, he decided the least he could do is keep you with him and take you to his place. While he was making sure you slept comfortably he called his driver on his phone to tell him "Marco, take us home"

"Understood sir" 

Comments and reblogs are immensely appreciated!

2022 © All rights reserved to @kaedeakeshisworld. Translations, modifications, replicas or even property of my achievement are not allowed without my approval. Do not repost/ recommend/ share it elsewhere!

[wilwheaton]

Even if Republicans toss Greene on her duff, the larger problem — that the party is catering to a radical minority who supports the insurrection and has soured on democracy itself — remains in place. We know this because Republicans are doing everything they can to shield Trump from the consequences of inciting an insurrection. If Republicans really wanted to clean house, they'd start by convicting Trump and barring him from running for president again. Their unwillingness to do this shows that the GOP really is the party of QAnon now, regardless of what happens to their most obnoxious new congresswoman.

Mitch McConnell isn't fooling anyone — Marjorie Taylor Greene is the true face of the modern GOP

[mariacallous]

Joe Biden needs to lawyer up. He’s about to see an onslaught of investigations into him, his appointees and their conduct that will now be launched by Republican-controlled congressional committees. It’s not impossible that a Republican-controlled congress could even try to push for his impeachment.

The Republicans squeaked out a bare majority in the House of Representatives this week, with a final tally of 218 Republican seats to 211 Democratic ones. The Republicans performance was abysmal compared to the predictions, with anger over abortion bans and Republican antipathy toward democracy driving voters into the Democratic tent. But the huge structural advantages of being the opposition party in a midterm election, along with some help from gerrymandered redistricting plans blessed by the Republican-majority US supreme court, pushed the Republicans over the top. Now, they are poised to use their new investigatory power in Congress to launch a slew of inquiries into the Biden administration, over matters ranging from the grave to the absurdly trivial.

Biden and his administration won’t need to commit any grave misconduct to attract this kind of official scrutiny over the coming two years. Just being Democrats will be enough; combined with the paranoia and tendency for dark conspiracies that now pervade the American right, the House Republicans are likely to assume that they’ll find something amiss in the Biden world.

Through the House Oversight and Reform Committee, the Republicans are likely to launch a slew of investigations: into the origins of Covid-19 and the lab leak theory; into immigration through the US-Mexico border and the chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan; and into their favorite topic of conversation, the president’s perennially slimy ne’er-do-well son, Hunter Biden. These inquiries will bloom and multiply, persisting even if they find no real evidence of wrongdoing – like old world witch hunts, or voter fraud investigations after a Democratic electoral victory.

In some sense, this is typical: oversight investigations always ramp up when Congress and the White House are controlled by different parties. But this will not be a divided government like we’ve seen in decades past, with mere gridlock and ineffectualness. This will be messier, more base; it will be degraded, and nationally embarrassing.

The conspiracy-peddling Georgia Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, a rising star in the Republican party, is reportedly vying for a seat on the committee, giving some sense of the tenor that Republican investigations will take. The Republicans will now embark on a two year public attack on the Biden administration, equipped with subpoena power and the ability to command national attention.

With Speaker Kevin McCarthy desperate to control every member of his boisterous but narrow caucus, it’s likely that the Republican leadership will find themselves obliged to cater to the fringe grievances of even their most extreme members. This means that they will use their House majority to gin up controversies out of minor or imaginary misconduct, to cast aspersions on the honesty and character of Biden and his sympathizers, to suggest malfeasance where there is none, and above all, to create clips that look good on TV – the kind of 10-second snippet that can make a Republican voter angry, and which provide the quick rhythms of a 2024 attack ad.

Biden administration officials are downplaying all this. Some of them told Politico off the record that they think the investigations might even be a good thing for the Democrats. “There is a growing confidence in the White House that the House Republicans clamoring for a hodgepodge of investigations will overreach – and that their attempts will backfire politically, with key voters recoiling at blatant partisan rancor.” “It might make the base feel good,” said one White House ally, “and it’s going to give Matt Gaetz and Marjorie Taylor Greene something awesome to say on their live stream, but it’s not going to be what convinces suburban women in Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania.”

Maybe the source is right: maybe the Republicans will overreach with their oversight power, the way they overreached with election denial and abortion bans, and voters will be repulsed. But to me, this sounds like wishful thinking – or like the kind of blustering optimism that a politician would project to a reporter in order to keep the public from seeing how screwed he is.

The fact is that the Republicans have long been much more successful than the Democrats at dictating the terms of the national conversation – a disparity in skills that this past midterm cycle has only made more clear. They are bolder and more aggressive; they are almost preternaturally talented at putting the Democratic party on the defensive. The hearings that arise out of these investigations are not likely to be very substantive; they are not likely to be edifying for voters or healthy for the republic. But they’re certain to be good TV.

There are a lot of tasks that Republicans will take up as they assume their majority. They’ll obstruct the Biden agenda; they’ll stymie his foreign policy priorities; they seem determined to hold the national debt hostage in order to force drastic cuts to Social Security and Medicare, the two programs that provide support to America’s elderly. But no one should underestimate their appetite for investigations, no matter how trivial or pretextual the investigations might seem.

When Republicans assume control over the House of Representatives in January, they will form a majority coalition that is even more rancorous and punitive than they were when they last held the chamber in 2018. The Republican party has changed since Trump was forced from office. Some, like Florida governor and 2024 hopeful Ron DeSantis, seem to think that the party is ready to move beyond the cult of personality that it became in the Trump years, ready to pursue Trumpism as an ideology separate from Trump the man.

But the revolution that Trump led within the Republican party is complete. Dissenters have been purged: It’s a fully Trumpist party now, both in the sense of its extremist, anger-driven politics, and in the sense of its shameless bombast and tactical hyperbole. The Republican Congress that will now take power is one that is much less committed to democracy, and much more beholden to baseless conspiracy theories.

Above all, it is a party laser-focused on partisan grievance, in thrall to a base whose identity as Republicans, and whose hatred for Democrats, seems to compose greater and greater proportions of their psychic life. The Republicans – and their core voters – are obsessed with punishment and revenge against Democrats, an obsession that seems likely to persist even after the chastening midterms. We should expect they will use every new power this election has given them to pursue it.

[tanlace]

summary: jj is working a wedding at the country club and has no choice but to watch blair from afar as she bathes in all the riches he could never give her . . . holding the hand of a boy who can.

word count: 2.7k

The parties thrown by The Island Club were tasteful, though a little loud, and the post-wedding celebration thrown mid-November was no different. With the crystalline chandeliers, far too big to be hanging from ceilings no matter how high without being considered a security hazard, and the bars lined with all kinds of unpronounceable liquor, something about it threw the guests back in time. As the music swelled, it was the ‘30s again and the shimmering dresses were reflecting the bright, disco-like-lights. The pool might as well be filled with champagne; it couldn’t make anyone drunker.

It was on a whim that Marjorie Wilkins and Owen Fischer had decided to get married and, within half the evening, everyone was invited. All the residents of Figure Eight, that is. The only way a Pogue could ever step foot at an event as lavish as a Super-Kook wedding was either as a server running with platters of bite-sized-entrées, a caterer who did not get the deserved credit, or a Goddamn janitor that would run around the unsatisfied old folk the entire night.

JJ Maybank was unlucky enough to be part of the group, damned with having to distribute whiskey glasses all night long. When he stood in front of the mirror twenty-minutes before the celebration, he had cursed his entire family line because he was poor and they were rich, and because he could not operate the bowtie his boss was forcing him to wear during the event. He slicked his hair back slightly and used Kiara’s makeup on a nasty bruise on his cheekbone, where his father’s touch had broken blood vessels and caused red to blossom all the the way from the bridge of his nose to the slope of the bone. It burned; he cursed. He was doing a lot of that lately.

Of course, though he was amid the lively crowd, all he could do was watch from afar. It was in moments like those that he missed the summertime and simply waiting tables for half-a-day, which usually didn’t run too late because they wanted all the best servers for when night dawned upon the island—so they could wait the poker games, of course. JJ was cold in his rented tuxedo, all black-on-black, and couldn’t stop stealing glances at the people in the heart of the action.

Because right in the middle stood the girl he could not get out of his head, a girl that had covered every inch of him like ivies around a stone house. Blair Cameron was dressed in grey, a shimmering, shining low-cut dress that stretched all the way above her ankles. A slit tore the fabric to her mid-thigh. She walked skillfully on the highest heels she owned, stilettos that matched her dress. With her hair pinned at the back of her head, leaving rebel strands to frame her refreshened and beaming face, she looked like a figure straight out of a daydream. And if he could get drunk on the warm, sugary vanilla perfume she had sprayed on the sides of her neck, he would. Truthfully, he’d shed his skin for so much as a taste of her dark lipstick.

He planned on stealing glances all throughout the night, and he knew she’d look back whether she was conversing with people she found a little loud-mouth or dancing with her sisters in the limelight. An obstacle had walked through the door as he filled up the rich folk’s champagne glasses however, and it was then that JJ Maybank discovered that his greatest enemy, his deadliest rival, was no more than a handsome boy with slicked-back hair in a sharp suit.

Now, the blonde boy knew that Sage Okamoto would be his downfall from the moment he saw his arm slither around Blair’s waist. She had pretended to be unbothered, but he could see the slight discomfort in her shoulders from where he stood. It made him want to smash a plate or two, throw them across the room and watched as they shattered against the wallpaper-covered wall.

He was the son of a very wealthy man, Sage, and he oftentimes hooked Rafe Cameron up with the greatest weed Figure Eight could access. Sometimes, when he’d lay with Blair on the rooftop of the country club (which he happened a couple times, and she never told JJ about it), he’d say: “I’m thinking about stepping up my game. Selling more expensive shit, you know?” And she had always known he was talking about drugs. In truth, she understood why he wanted to build an empire that would force him away from his father’s, but that didn’t mean she approved of it. So she’d always tell him some bullshit about how he was too good for that and no one would trust a well-mannered boy with a pretty face like his.

And then he’d lean in to kiss her but she’d pull away—when she got back to her house and JJ sneaked in through the window, she’d keep it all in the pit of her stomach.

So he watched them then with his jaw clamped shut, tight. “Aren’t you the sweetest pair!” a woman exclaimed as she twirled the lace hem of her glove with the fingers of her other hand. She stood between them, arm hooked through her husband’s, traces of red lipstick on her falsely-white teeth. “This island’s greatest legacy, I believe. Because, let me tell you”—then she leaned in towards them, barely glancing at the newly-married couple—“it certainly isn’t them.”

Blair had laughed simply to be polite. She was not enjoying that conversation the slightest. She held a tight grasp on her purse and the other on the collar of Sage’s suit, selling it as she believed her father wanted her to. “Don’t be mean, Belinda. Marjorie and Owen were meant for each other,” she commented with a bright but all-too-fake smile.

“She was supposed to marry rich,” added Betty Marsh as she inserted herself into the conversation. Her husband, Blake, wandered off by the sweets table with Belinda’s own, Sebastian, where they would pretend to listen from away.

“Yes, yes. Instead, she fell for a boy who can’t even provide her with the most basic of things. She’ll have to wear last season clothing for the rest of her life, you know,” Belinda pointed out.

JJ didn’t mean to pry, but he could not resist the impulse. So he made his way to the bar and pretended to be filling up the shots. What a great trophy husband he’d make.

“She fell in love,” Blair insisted, throat dry. “Money shouldn’t matter if you are.”

Belinda let out a bellowing laughter, so greatly superficial. “Money always matters, sweetheart. It’s simply not enough for the woman to provide, she must marry a man who can spoil her. I very much enjoy Sebastian’s gifts every weekend, over an expensive steak or salmon dinner.”

“Believe me, she might think she’s satisfied with the little things now, but not having it all will get old very quickly,” was what Betty added. She had lipstick on her teeth too, peach.

Sage had leaned in softly, so close his breath fanned on Blair’s cheek. “Good think Blair has someone that’ll spoil her and then some,” he teased, making the women laugh before they were on their way to annoy their husbands again.

JJ slammed the bottle down so harshly on the counter that the bartender that chastised him couldn’t sworn he cracked a hole in the marble. He left everything right there on the table, then fled the party like there was nothing holding him back. And, really, there wasn’t.

He thought long and hard about what the devil’s spawns were telling the girl he believed was the love of his life, so much he had actually created a knot in his own stomach thinking about it. It was killing him, that entire ordeal. For the longest time, he convinced himself that he would somehow find a way to climb all the social ranks separating him from the top before he got on one knee, but he was slowly beginning to realize that there were simply too many steps to that staircase.

With his prospects and his academically skills, JJ would go nowhere. Really, the furthest he’d make it is off that island and onto another one, where he’d spend his evenings by the sun. He had never planned on having a place for money—especially an excessive amount—in his simplistic future and now he had to pay the price. Now, because his father was a fuck-up and what little fortune they had left, his mother had taken with her when he was three, he’d never be able to be with the girl he valued most. JJ never thought he’d be the kind of guy to get attached, and now he couldn’t find it in him to cut the string.

It was only when he reached for his phone to call his friend for a pick-me-up that he realized he had left it inside, in the employee room, inside the same locker he hooked his coat and hat. So there he stood, freezing, ankles-deep in bright, white snow, vulnerable as ever under the ivory moonlight.

“JJ!” he hadn’t spun around the first time, but did so the second time she yelled out his name to find her not too far behind, still in her open heels and short dress, bare arms exposed to the icy cold that had already reddened her skin. “JJ, what the hell happened in there?” she questioned, brows furrowed in confusion.

His hands immediately shot to the collar of his suit’s jacket, and he shrugged it off in instants before crossing the laborious distance between them and draping it over her shoulders. “Blair, do you want to freeze to death?”

“No but, clearly, you do!” she exclaimed, quickly looping her arms through. “Why’d you run off like that?” Her teeth were clattering and every breath created a cloud of smoke that made her look identical to her mother whenever she’d smoke cigarettes on the front porch.

And he couldn’t stop the words from rolling off his tongue. In truth, it wasn’t a roll as much as it was a Goddamn boom. “Because I’m a fucking Pogue! I’m a Pogue, Blair Cameron, and I’m not meant for these types of events. I’m not rich or intelligent or witty or whatever the fuck these irritating people are. I don’t drink cognac. Hell, I don’t even know how to pronounce it!” He scoffed as tugged him further from the club’s entrance. It hurt him. “There’s a reason why you’re hiding me, Blair, why you don’t want anyone to find out. You’re ashamed of me.”

“I am not,” her mouth fell open but her words were stern. “Maybank, get in my car,” she stressed. It was the first one in the parking lot. “Now!”

All of a sudden, he was the one who felt ashamed. For all he had done and for all he planned to do. Because, for so much as a brief moment, he wanted to walk up to the window, pull her into his body, and kiss her. Right there, out in the open for everyone to see. He wanted Sage to envy him and he wanted her brother to run out and punch him in the face. He wanted to get his knuckles bloody for her and prove that he deserved her.

But all he could do was silently get in her car.

He stared out the window, jaw clenched, and the inside of his mouth tasted like metal. She shut the door gracefully after her, but he could feel the anger and hurt radiate off her skin as she sunk into the leather. Her arms were wrapped around herself in a foolish attempt to try and regain some bodily warmth; his fingers were folded in his lap, knuckles white.

“What you said is bullshit and you know that,” she stated. Blair didn’t even allow him to question himself on the subject. “I’m not ashamed of you, JJ, I’m ashamed of them. You heard the way they speak, the way they view things. I don’t want to give them the opportunity to think about you like that.” She tried to meet his gaze, but his eyes were fixated on the snowed-in beach. “I’ve never killed a woman with a stiletto and I’d like to keep it that way.”

He smiled meekly at her joke, but still said no words. She sighed, laced her fingers through his restless ones.

“What’s going on, JJ? Tell me,” she pled softly, and he squeezed his eyes shut.

“I don’t like the way he was looking at you,” JJ whispered, lowering his head. A tuff of blonde hair obstructed his vision as tears clouded his eyes. Blair pursed her lips and squeezed his hand. “Sage,” he clarified, “he looks at you like he knows he’ll be spending the rest of his life with you.”

Blair shook her head and chuckled drily. “I don’t like him like that. We’ve been friends for the longest time, and I’m only with him to—“

“Satisfy your father?” JJ interrupted, eyes finally meeting hers. There was a storm within his cerulean irises, a Goddam tsunami. “See, that’s exactly what I mean. I can’t give you fancy gifts or buy you a car or a house.”

“Good, because I can give myself fancy things and a car and a house,” Blair laughed. She made him feel like his words were the most stupid thing a human being could ever utter. “None of that matters, you know that. I’ve told you time and time again that I don’t care.” Her emphasis hit him like a punch to the stomach. “I like the way I feel around you. I like that I can be me without ever having to think about the public eye. I like you, I really do.”

He frowned and repeated, but as a question: “You ready do?”

“I really do,” she confirmed. Blair leaned towards him and pressed their foreheads together. “Remember what you told me? We can do this for as long as we wanted. Do you still want it?”

“Yes,” he replied. No hesitation.

So she smiled widely and connected their lips, giving him what he had longed for the entire night. His fingers tanged in her hair in an instant and he tipped her chin with his other hand as she balled up his button-down with her own. She muttered that he’d mess up her lipstick, but that only made him kiss her harder. When they finally pulled away, breathless with smiles on both of their faces, they both were as warm as one would be in the summertime.

Another grin, and she grabbed his hand. “Let’s go,” she said as she opened her door, nodding towards the wide entrance of the club. It looked like a chalet, almost, under the thick snow. The soft flurries made the moment magical. “I’ll save you a dance.”

He jumped out of the car and shut the door behind him, with no anger this time. He brought her hand to his lips, pressing them against her knuckles softly. “You better.”

She fanned at her face, pretending she was going to faint. So he grabbed a fistful of snow and tossed it at her face.

When she had finally made her way back to the ballroom after fixing up her makeup (and making out with her secret boyfriend) for half an hour in the bathroom, she had resumed her superficial activities as though not a single thing had happen. And when the lights were off and everyone had gone back home, Blair and JJ had gotten their dance in the dead center of the room and made the most of it like only they knew how to. Perhaps Betty and Belinda were right: Blair was the woman of the next American dynasty . . . But he’d be her last man.

[melisa-may-taylor72]

Record Mirror- 08-25-1984

Ministry Of Works

Did you know that Freddie Mercury wants to make a reggae record? And that Roger Taylor would be selling flowers if he wasn't in Queen? Read on for more fascinating facts

MAYHEM IN Munich! Freddie Mercury is cavorting with a scantily dressed transvestite and it's only three in the afternoon. Are you man or woman enough to read on? Then swallow your vitamin pills and follow me.

Queen are limbering up for their forthcoming tour in Germany and to celebrate another single rising majestically up the charts, they're holding a little press bash in Munich's P1 club. A place even more decadent than the South Finchley Whiskey A Go Go.

The ghost of Adolf Hitler probably wanders around here on dark nights, as The Fuhrer used to store his paintings and other plunder in the club and the building next door. Unfortunately there's nothing left around today.

Instead, the club has gems of another kind. A selection of Queen's videos including the notorious 'Body Language' — and champagne and wine flowing like Niagara Falls.

The cabaret is Freddie's own idea: a group of well passed it drag artists, so outrageous in G strings and lingerie that they make Divine seem as tame as Marjorie Proops. Freddie's more than willing to join in when one of the girls does a rendition of 'I Want To Break Free', but the rest of the members of Queen look on shyly from the comforts of the bar. Everybody, but everybody is here to witness the event, including a film crew from the US air force, tramping around in full combat gear making a nuisance of themselves.

Freddie's doing well considering he's in quite a lot of pain. He remains tight lipped about the full details but he injured his leg after an incident in a club. A physiotherapist has been pummelling at it nearly every day.

"This c+ + + kicked me," says Fred. "I'm hoping my knee will be ready in time for the tour, but it's still giving me a lot of trouble. It might mean I will have to cut down on some of my more elaborate gorgeous stage moves."

FRED'S ALSO been hobbling around a Munich recording studio putting the finishing touches to his first ever solo album which should be out in January. Gadzooks, could this be the start of a split with Queen? Is it true Limahl's going to take over?

"Not at all. I've wanted to do a solo album for a long time and the rest of the band have encouraged me to do it. Some of them are even featured doing a few bits and pieces to help me out.

"There are a lot of musical territories I wanted to explore, which I couldn't really do with Queen. I wanted to cover such things as reggae rhythms and I've done a couple of tracks with a symphony orchestra. It will have a very rich sound."

Fred's also done some work with Michael Jackson, but he still doesn't know when this is going to see the light of day. They've done a selection of tracks together in Michael's home studio. For a while, Fred was even in the running to do 'State Of Shock'.

"I was out of town at the time so Mick did it instead," he says. "I don't mind at all. I'd like to release something with Michael because he is a really marvellous person to work with. It's all a question of time because we never seem to be together at the right time. Just think, I could have been on 'Thriller'. Think of the royalties I've missed out on.

"Michael has been a friend of ours for a long time. He's been to our shows and enjoyed them. We make a great team."

One of Fred's songs 'Love Kills', is being used on the soundtrack of the reactivated 'Metropolis' film and he hopes to make a 20 minute video using four or five of his own songs.Freddie and all the members of Queen have a long standing appreciation of 'Metropolis', which originally came out in 1927. Their stage set, in the shape of a futuristic city, has been inspired by it.The lighting rig measures 74ft by 50ft and the original design was so heavy they had to change it because it was in danger of bringing theatre roofs down. What a way to go, crushed by your own equipment.

AFTER THE European tour. Queen will be taking the whole shebang down to South America, headlining a 10 day festival in Rio. The place they will be playing is an amphitheatre down by the sea that can seat 300,000 people a night. It all makes Castle Donington seem like just another night at the Marquee. A local radio station in Rio held a survey to see who the most popular bands were and then some local promoters went out and booked them for the extravaganza. Naturally, Queen came out top.

Queen will also be doing some shows in South Africa. This is more than just a little bit controversial. Especially with the memory of Nelson Mandela still very warm.

"We've thought about the morals of it a lot and it's something we've decided to do," says Brian May. "This band is not political, we are not out to make statements, we play to entertain anybody who comes to listen. The show will be in Botswana in front of a mixed audience."

The band wanted to play Russia but the authorities objected. This situation might change now though, considering that Iron Maiden have been let into Poland to wreak havoc. *

"The Russians still think we're very decadent," confides Roger Taylor. "We want to play China as well, and Korea. John and I spent a holiday in Korea and it's a fascinating place. They're finishing work on the Olympic stadium for the next games!

Perhaps the Ruskies heard about Roger's high living on Ibiza. He's bought a house there and enjoys powerboat racing. Play time is over for the time being, though. After their two year break. Queen have been working more than 12 hours a day rehearsing.

"It's strange how rusty we are, and so we're trying to blow the cobwebs away," continues Roger. "It's taking a lot of work. Usually we rehearse until about nine and then we eat together and decide what we're going to do in the evenings. The clubs here are really fun. Something to cater for every taste or perversion.

"On the tour we'll be playing a lot of the old material and we'll be giving the audience what they want. A lot of the music I hear in the charts today doesn't interest me. I just can't see how anybody can get excited over Spandau Ballet. It doesn't send shivers up my spine. I like listening to Bruce Springsteen."

They might be old stagers, but Roger claims that tickets for Queen's British shows sold oul in three hours flat and they could have easily played another 12 nights here.

"We still have the rock and roil gypsy mentality," he says. "Even after 12 years without a line-up change we still really enjoy the buzz from playing live and the fact that we have hit singles. Some bands in our position might take it all in their stride, but we're still like kids, we get very excited.

"You've got to have a laugh haven't you? If Queen wasn't any fun, then I'd jack it all in and go and sell flowers."

Robin Smith

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