victorherreraphotographers

[artofdiana]

 ⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆ Diana  ⋆⁺₊⋆ ☾⋆⁺₊⋆

[dark-is-d3ad]

OK, I'm moving soon, and I'm currently sitting in the middle of my ravaged flat surrounded by boxes, jars, and all sorts of things you never know you even had before it's time to go pack them up.

So here's a bunch of soapghost headcanons about moving in together.

• They end up helping each other to pack things. The flat they chose is a two-bed in Epping, really close to the forest. Easy to get to when they come back for a break, technically still in London, but in a quieter area on the outskirts of the city. Ghost checked for a multitude of things, including ways to get in and to retreat, hidden cameras, and he's making a custom surveillance system for it. You can never be too safe, right?

• The second bedroom is going to become Johnny's art studio. Ghost has dibs on the living room, he's got a huge TV and a PS5. And his humongous bookshelf will also go in there. They plan it out perfectly, so that they can spend time together, but also can have their alone time without bothering each other.

• Ghost refuses help at first, but then Johny just shows up with his portable speaker, and hangs out with him. It's a little distracting, and he has way too many books, they run out of boxes. Ghost never tells him, but he's grateful, it was getting overwhelming.

• Ghost's place looks neat, if not a little barren, his things are all sorted to perfection. He's got a collection of shotguns, too. And a huge table, perfect size to work on them comfortably. Cleaning and servicing guns never fails to calm him down. His favourite is an older one, a Benelli M2. It's in pristine condition albeit a little worn, its barrel needs to be changed because it can only last through so much shots, but Ghost kinda wants to keep it as it is, even though it's not practical. He's sentimental about it. They spend a lot of time packing them all up carefully.

• Johny actually asks him to come over, because his adhd gets unmanageable when he goes through all his things, and it's easier if a very specific person makes him stay on track, otherwise he'd be still stuck there reading his diaries and going through his pile of sketchbooks, and oh, the drawing supplies, he has the urge to use that beautiful box of designer gouache his sister gifted to him literally right now because he forgot about it, and now it's so tempting. Ghost thinks of it as of a mission, so he comes up with a strategy and keeps it tactical. And he makes Soap take breaks every once in a while.

• Soap's stuff doesn't fit into the van. Even with the furniture dismantled and packed, he's got so much things, a lot of them art supplies, a huge easel, half-finished paintings, canvases he forgot about or he hadn't had time to come back to. And his bed is freaking huge. They finally cram it in, but it's a really tight squeeze. Comparing to this, Ghost's was half-empty. Thank god their new place is on the bigger side.

• Ghost gets distracted, too, when they pack the paintings. He's not an artsy kinda guy, yet they are so good, he's entranced. It's Johnny's turn to make him focus. Soap doesn't think much of his art, and Ghost makes a mental note to compliment it more often. He really wants to see more. Hell, he'd even pose, if Soap ever asks for it. He won't tell him though.

• There's a "do not touch" black sketchbook with a little white scull drawn on the cover, and Soap flushes deep red and packs it away in record times. Ghost is intrigued beyond measure. He has assumptions of what's in there, and he sneakily checks it out when Soap goes to pack his clothes. It's full of sketches of him. Soap actually took his time to study him, he thinks, even the tattoos are all looking exactly right. The ones from the shower make him wonder if Soap actually memorised him that well or he got some sneaky reference pics (how did he manage that, the bastard). It's got notes, too. It takes an effort not to read them, but Ghost feels like he already intruded a bit too much, so he puts the sketchbook back where it was. Just in time, because Soap pops out with an absolutely ridiculous coat in his hands, and goes "hey, look what I used to wear when I was 18!"

• Ghost has a freaking lot of random jars. They're all empty. When asked about it, he confesses that he wanted to make jam, his grandfather used to make a lot of it every summer. It's one of the good memories he has, and there's not so many of them. He tried to make it once, but failed, and had to throw away the whole batch. They keep each and every one, although it seems stupid.

• Johnny's art stuff is a whole lot. He's got tree branches and clay, and a fucking mannequin (it scares Ghost every time he walks in Soap's living room, because his side vision registers it as a person, and he can't get over it). The mannequin has a crooked smiley face drawn on it with a sharpie. There's sheets of metal, fabric, a lot of acrylic, and a ton of instruments. He was trying to get into modern sculpture, Soap says, it didn't really work out. Needs more 3d thinking. Ghosts proposes to try again after they move. He's good at fixing stuff, and he's really good at guerilla warfare, they'll find a way to make even the weirdest thing Soap comes up with hold together.

• Soap's got little led garlands wrapped on every vertical thing at his place. At first Ghost thinks it's stupid, but when the night comes, and Soap lights all of them up, it actually feels almost magical. They sit on the floor with mugs of tea and coffee, and, although it's messy and everything is moved out of place, it's still beatiful, and it feels so safe. Ghost finds himself feeling more like a 5 y o than he probably ever did, sitting there just watching lights slowly light up and fade. He's never been good at making his places cozy. He'll ask Soap to work on their new flat to make it more like that. He really wants the lights there, too.

• Johnny's mugs are all different. He's got the "guns and coffee" with a redrawn Starbucks logo, the mermaid holds two pistols. Ghost gets the "under all your tattoos you're still a mainstream cunt" one when it's Johnny's turn to make tea. He pretends to be offended. There is a pink one with "unt" on it. It makes sense when Soap turns it, and the handle finishes the word. There's one with lots of bees, and it reads "bear daddy". Ghost makes the stupidest jokes about it.

• Ghost hasn't got a lot of kitchenware, and all his plates and mugs are white, the cheapest ones from IKEA. And he's only got one chair. No guests - no need. Johnny finds it a little depressing, but says nothing.

• Johnny's spicerack is probably the second biggest collection he has after his art stuff. He likes cooking, and he likes trying new recipes. His favourite go-tos sit separately on the kitchen counter. Ghost has to admit that he's really good. Ghost's spices are just salt and pepper, which gets him "and you live like that? Lt!" from Soap.

• When they finally move their stuff in, a call from Price comes. There's things to do like right now, get ready in 5, be at base in an hour and a half. Ghost likes his work, yet he can't help but get a little grumpy. He really wanted to get it over with. And to see what comes out of it with all things in place. And to have a chill evening with Johnny, watching these little lights again with some quiet ambient playing on the background. "It's OK," Soap says, "we'll get it sorted when we come back."

OK, that's gonna be it for now, I have a sad option and a silly option to go for, but I'd rather make a part two and separate them.

[cassiabaggins]

Wedding

A/N: Part/day six! Thank you all so much for your support! Please leave a comment/reblog if you enjoy this!

Wordcount: 2k

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Tags: @anjhope1 @deathlikessodaandpizza @guardianofrivendell @myrin1234 @wettomatodude @lothloriien @annkdarar @artsywaterlily @hmmm-what-am-i-doing @drowingintheempty @estethell @claraofthepen @kilielweek

Warnings: mention of miscarriage

Summary: Kili and Tauriel are finally wed

Kili has been quiet all day. That's unusual. Tauriel carefully combs her fingers through his hair and rests her chin on his shoulder. He's staring into the fire. 

"You seem distressed," she says gently.

He grunts wordlessly, so she gives him a kiss on the cheek and strokes his hair. "Kili. Talk to me. What ails you?"

Kili is quiet for a little bit longer, putting his hand over hers, before letting out a long sigh. “They want me to get married,” He says.

“Who is ‘they’?” She asks gently. 

“The Council.”

“All of them?"

“No, not all of them, but those that do are quite loud.” He draws his knees up to his chest and rests his chin on them. “They want me to produce an heir.”

“What about your brother? He’s already married!”

“They think his child won’t be ‘pure’ enough.” He puts quotations with his fingers around the word ‘pure’. “First they tried to get him to annul his marriage, then they tried to get him to take a mistress, but he’d rather die than disrespect his wife like that, so they gave up and focused on me.” He clenches his fist. “It makes me so angry! Arranged marriages go against everything I’ve ever been taught about how dwarrow love. All of this does! It goes against our nature!”

Tauriel moves so she’s no longer sitting behind him, but beside him, taking his hand. 

“What do you mean by that, meleth nin?”

“I mean dwarrow don’t arrange marriages! We only love once, and only one person. Mahal, most of us don’t even experience sexual desires until we meet our One!”

“What if you don’t find the One? Or what if they don’t feel the same?”

“Then we don’t marry. We dedicate our lives to our crafts!”

“Is that what you would have done if I hadn’t come back?”

“Yes. Of course I would have.” He notices the sadness on her face and squeezes her hand. “Don’t look like that, amrâlimê, it’s not so bad. You don’t need love to be happy.”

She leans forward and kisses him. “There’s something awful romantic about that, loving only one person your entire life.”

“Aye, it is.” Kili frowns. “But now they want me to go against that and marry some lass from Rhun. She’s nice enough, I suppose, her name is Mhaite, but—”

“But you don’t love her.”

“But she’s not you.”

Tauriel smiles gently at him. 

“I don’t want to marry anyone but you,” Kili says, flopping down into her lap. She strokes her hand through his hair. 

“And I don’t want you to marry anybody but me.”

He sighs melancholically, taking her hand and kissing her wrist. She continues stroking his hair with her free hand when suddenly she is struck by an idea. 

“What if we eloped?”

Kili sits right up and stares at her. “What?”

“What if,” she repeats, “we eloped. If we got married, they couldn’t make you marry her, right?”

“They could try to get me to divorce you.”

“But you can refuse them, correct?”

“Well, yes. They cannot force an annulment if both parties refuse. Especially if Fili doesn’t approve, since only a king or queen can annul marriages.”

"So your brother is behind us, who else?"

"I'm sure I could get Dwalin to represent you," Kili says, excitement leaking into his voice and gestures, "he likes you, though he won't admit it. Ori can draft up marriage documents, Dori can make us wedding clothes, and Bombur and Cassia can cook and—"

She stops him with a finger over his lips, laughing softly. "This is becoming less of a secret elopement and more of a wedding the longer you talk," she teases. 

Kili shrugs and kisses her fingers. "I can't help that I want to get my friends involved."

"Too many people and the secret will leak," she cautions. "The Council will put a stop to it before it can even begin."

He sighs. "Yes, I suppose you're right."

.

In the end, they limit it to just Kili's family, Balin, and Dwalin. The sons of Fundin agree to represent Tauriel's family surprisingly easily, and Kili's mother and younger sister will represent him. Fili will officiate and his wife will be a witness. The wedding will take place in the council chamber of Erebor in two months time, long enough that the wedding beads can be made, but soon enough that the council members who are against the union do not have the time to put a stop to it. 

.

King Fili is looking over a trade agreement in King Bard’s office, the end of his quill in his mouth and his face all scrunched up with concentration in a way that makes him look unnervingly like his younger brother. Tauriel sidles up to him and taps him on the shoulder. She really shouldn't be distracting him, but she needs his advice. Fili scratches out some letters and looks up at her, dipping his quill back in ink. "Hullo, Tauriel," he says with a smile. "What can I do for you?"

"I need help," she declares and the smile vanishes for a worried frown. 

"Is something wrong?" 

"Not in the way you think," she says. Fili gives her a baffled look and Tauriel twiddles her thumbs awkwardly. "Dwalin mentioned I was meant to make beads for when I marry Kili," she explains, "only… I've not the slightest idea how!"

"Is that all?" Fili asks with relief.

"...Yes."

The king slides the paper he's been looking at out of his way. "Well, you came to the right dwarf. Do you have a material you're planning on using?" 

She shakes her head.

"Do you have a design?"

Another shake of the head. Fili sighs. "Oh dear."

"I don't even know where to begin! I've no idea how to craft jewelry!"

"Well, don't panic, there's no rule saying you have to make them. You just have to design them. It's common enough for a dwarf to commission a close friend to help create their wedding beads." 

Tauriel lets out a relieved sigh. "Oh, good." Then she frowns. “Kili will be making mine, though, won’t he?”

“Aye, most likely. His craft is jeweling after all.”

“Then I want to make his,” She declares.

“It won’t be easy,” Fili cautions.

“I don’t care. I want to try.”

"If you do, then far be it from me to try and stop you. Now, let's talk about materials. The most common are stone or metal, but wood or some sort of gemstone isn't unheard of. Any of those catch your attention?" 

Tauriel shakes her head. "I feel as if I need to hold the materials to see what I think."

Fili nods. "Next time I visit Dale, I'll bring you some examples."

She grins. "Oh, good! Oh, thank you!"

"Think nothing of it."

.

The next day, Fili arrives at her home as promised with the materials. He's brought some silver and gold and jewels, but what really catches Taurile’s eye is a beautiful piece of wood. She picks it up and turns it over in her hands. Fili sees her interest.

“That’s walnut wood,” he says. 

“It’s lovely.”

“Is that what you want to use?”

Tauriel turns the wood over in her hands. “Yes.”

“Good choice.”

“Only…” she frowns. “I can see why a material like metal or stone would be used, that can last for centuries, but wood? How do you keep the beads from wearing out?”

“We have charms for that,” Fili says, “to make them last. Don’t worry about that.”

“Oh, good.”

He begins to tie his hair back, pulling out tools from his bag, along with a sketchbook. “All right, let’s get to work.” He flips through his sketchbook to a fresh page and picks up a charcoal stick to draw with. “Any design ideas?”

Tauriel frowns, tapping thoughtfully on the wood. “Well… no.”

“Well, what makes you think about him? When I was designing beads for my wife, I thought of all the things that made me think of her and used those for my design. So, what makes you think of Kili?”

Tauriel thinks. “Uh, stars, and the moon, and mountains, mostly.”

“That’s a good start!” Fili says, passing the sketchbook and drawing stick to Tauriel. “Just… start drawing.”

She frowns and takes them gingerly. “I’m not much of an artist.”

“We can clean up the sketch later, just put down some ideas,” he says reassuringly.

.

In the end, she decides on an image of the Mountain with the moon rising behind it and a star above the moon. It’s simple and pretty, and Fili gives his stamp of approval. Then, the carving lessons begin. Woodworking is not something Tauriel has ever done and it’s not Fili’s craft, but he's a patient teacher and she’s a quick learner. She doesn’t expect to become such close friends with her future brother in law, but she and Fili end up having much more in common than they initially think, including but not limited to their affections for knives and Kili.

It takes time, and lots of practice, but by the day of the wedding, the final beads are done. They’re wide and flat beads with the pattern she came up with carved on one side and their names on the other. 

“Just promise me something?” Fili asks as he looks over the beads one final time. 

“What is it?” She queries. He looks up at her. 

“Please don’t leave him again. I don’t think he could bear it.”

Tauriel wants to tell him she hasn’t the slightest intention of doing that, that she came back for Kili and only for Kili, that not even wild horses could keep her away from him… but she doesn’t. “I won’t. I promise.”

.

There’s no fancy decorations or clothes for the wedding, no festive lights or stars or firemoons, just the dim torches illuminating the council chamber, and Kili’s smile illuminating her heart as they walk to stand together before Fili to be wed.

Tauriel takes Kili’s hand and he smiles up at her. “You look like a dream, amrâlimê,” he murmurs. 

“A good dream?”

“Yes. A fantastic dream.” He turns her hand over and kisses the inside of her wrist. “I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

Together, they turn towards Fili and the wedding begins.

Their vows are in Khuzdul, the traditional words, so no dwarf can say the wedding is invalid. The words are foreign on her tongue, but she knows them and their meaning even in her sleep. 

Bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh, we are two bodies but one soul and my heart is tied to yours. I vow to walk with you and treasure you like the finest of jewels, through this life and the next. 

With those words, they weave the braids and beads into each other’s hair, Tauriel bites her lip as she does so, worried her wooden beads look shabby and silly next to the fine diamond-flecked beads he’s made her. But then, he smiles up at her, and looks at the beads like they’re pure mithril, and she knows he thinks they’re beyond precious. Fili says a few more words in Khuzdul, declaring the marriage complete and valid and handing them each a quill to sign the marriage document. As soon as that is over, Kili swings Tauriel into his arms and kisses her like she's water in the desert and she kisses back just as passionately. She can hear the family, no, her family now, laughing around them. She cups his face in her hands and nuzzles her nose to his. “I love you,” she whispers. 

“I love you, too,” he responds, wrapping his arms around her waist. “My wife.”

“My hus—"

Before she can fully respond, the door to the council chamber slams open. Lord Khar is standing in the doorway. "What is the meaning of this?!" He shouts, "why is that elf in the mountain?!"

"This," Fili says, picking up his quill and signing the marriage document, sealing the wedding as complete, "is a wedding."

"A wedding?! What?! Between who?!"

"Between my brother, Prince Kili, and Captain Tauriel of Dale, formerly of Mirkwood."

"No! Never! I will not accept it!"

"You don't have to accept it, you simply have to be quiet," Fili says. "I wear the crown, not you. And I have signed this document and officiated this marriage. It is done."

Khar looks positively apoplectic, his face turning an impressive shade of red. Kili squeezes Tauriel's hand reassuringly and looks up at her. She knows he won't let anything tear them apart, and she feels the same, responding to his look with a soft smile. 

Lord Khar lets out a wordless, angry noise at the sight of their joined hands and storms toward them, arms outstretched as if he will try to force them apart with pure physical strength alone. Tauriel acts on instinct, swinging Kili behind her (as if a warrior prince of the Line of Durin would need protection) and halting Khar with a harsh blow to the shoulder. "Do not lay your hands on us," she spits. 

The dwarf lord goes purple, holding his shoulder. "You cannot—"

"I suggest you listen to her, Khar," Kili says smugly, "my wife is rather deadly when she is angry." He says the words ‘my wife’ with utter relish, rubbing it in the older dwarf’s face, who snarls angrily and steps away from the two of them. "My Lord King," he turns to Fili, attempting a different tactic, "surely you cannot condone this! This elf has bewitched you, can you not see it?"

"I have bewitched no one!" Tauriel cries indignantly. "I'm no wizard, I wouldn't even know where to begin!"

Cassia, peeking around Fili, lets out a little titter of laughter. Kili laughs as well, but the dwarf is well warned away from him. He turns his blazing eyes on the Hobbit Queen. "Don't think you are any better, halfling! You who would put weak, sickly halfbreeds on the Throne of Erebor, if you could only manage to carry one long enough for it to live."

The uproar is instantaneous. Cassia makes a soft, pained little whimper, placing her hand over her abdomen, Dwalin reaches for a weapon, Balin exclaims condemningly, Dis and the princess cry out in indignation, Kili and Tauriel both step forward, either to protect their friend or hurt the dwarf lord, they don't know. They don't make it far enough to find out. 

Fili punches Khar in the nose, knocking him to the ground. Khar howls with pain, holding his face.

"You've said enough," Fili spits, his eyes blazing with something feral and unhinged. It's an expression Tauriel has never seen on any face, especially not kind, gentle Fili. "Shut your mouth before I shut it permanently."

Cassia gently takes his arm and he takes a deep, steadying breath. “Khar, son of Zodar, as King of Erebor, I am relieving you of your position on the council of Erebor!"

"On what grounds?!"

"Disrespect of your queen, constant undermining of your king, and," Fili crouches down and reaches into the dwarf's pocket, pulling out a golden seal, "unlawful possession and use of the council seal." 

“You cannot just---!”

“I can, actually.” Fili turns to Kili, "I believe you two have a wedding night to get to. I can handle this here."

“Are you sure?” Kili asks. His brother nods. “All right.” He takes Tauriel’s hand and draws her toward the door. “Yasith, let’s go.”

She looks down at him. “Will they be---”

“Fili can handle it.”

They leave the mountain together, returning to Dale, to Tauriel’s home on the outskirts of the city. No one stops them in Erebor at Kili’s command, and no one stops them in Dale at hers. “I have something to show you,” she says, shutting the door behind them. Kili takes her waist and draws her near him. 

“Is it you?” he asks cheekily, standing up on his toes to kiss her. She kisses back, laughing a little. 

“No,” she says, and then hums, “well, yes, but not yet, just… come with me.” She gives him one last kiss and draws away, taking his hand. He weaves his fingers through hers and lets her lead him through the house to the very top floor, and from there, up another flight of stairs and through a door into the open air. 

“You lead me around all secretly to show me the roof?” Kili asks, “Amrâlimê, I’ve been here before.”

She laughs and pulls him forward. Set up in the center of the open space is a mattress and a huge pile of pillows and blankets, surrounded by many candles and lanterns (as yet unlit), a basket of food, and several bottles of wine. “It’s tradition for the marriage to be consummated under the stars,” she says softly, looking down at him. “We don’t have to, but---”

Kili swings her into his arms for a kiss. “This wedding has been all about my traditions,” he murmurs when they come up for air, “I would be honored to partake in some of yours.” And, hand in hand, he leads her toward the bed.

.

The next morning as Tauriel awakens to birdsong, wrapped in Kili’s arms beneath the open sky, she knows this is where she is supposed to be, and she will fight for it with everything she has.

[miracul0us-multishipper]

“You”

A grin spread over Felix' face as he let the charade drop.

“Me.”

The black haired girl he now knew was Marinette rolled her eyes and turned back to her sketch book, a clear dismissal.

“You’re blocking the light. Go bother someone else.”

He sighed and brushed his hair back, decreasing the similarities to his cousin to the necessary minimum.

“Why would I? Everybody else is so boring.”

No one in this entire city had even realized he was back; not their classmates, not the teachers, not even the brunette fashion disaster that obviously had some experience with deception. Of course his little charade would have to end once Adrien had recovered from the cold that kept him at home, but until then Felix would have his fun. Yesterday he'd spend the entire day in the Bourgeois Spa, fooling the entire staff, the Mayor and his clingy brat. Despite the latter being Adriens “best friend”, not even she had realized who she was really inviting. Getting rid of her had been a little harder, but in the end he'd spent a wonderfully relaxing day in a steam bath and his skin was softer than ever. Courtesy of the ridiculously expensive mud bath he hadn’t had to pay a single penny for.

“Looks like you'd fit right in then.”, Marinette commented and drew an especially vigorous line in her book.

“Ouch. You wound me, darling!”

She shrugged and ignored him. Ignored him! That wouldn’t do.

With a last tug at his no longer messy strands he sat down next to her, leaning into her space as far as he could risk without getting slapped. His last few attempts had thought him that lesson.

“Oh, come on, Marinette, you must to tell me!”, he nagged her, happy when her face turned from concentration to annoyance. “What gave me away? Was it the wink? Or no, it was the greeting, wasn't it? Too much enthusiasm.”

“Why do you even care? You got all the others, didn’t you?”

He clicked his tongue.

“I have standards. If there's one person who can tell the difference, my performance is obviously lacking.”

She huffed and added a little bow to the skirt she was working on. Knee-length and plain colored, decorated with small ribbons. Classic and elegant, yet a touch of playfulness. He would have complimented it if he'd thought she might value his opinion.

“If it wasn’t my words or gestures, what was it?”, he asked on, not willing to give up and admit defeat. It was their little routine by now. He'd come up and try to pass as Adrien, she'd see through him and he would try to annoy her until she either gave him her full attention, or snarked him off. Marinette Dupain-Cheng – despite her cute appearance – could be mean, he'd learned.

“I don’t think I want to tell you.”, she shrugged, but he could see the beginning of a smile tugging at her lips. She'd deny it, but secretly she enjoyed their little battles of wits.

“What?”, he gasped and slumped against her in played shock, conveniently knocking the book out of her hands and onto the steps of the Trocadero. “But why?”

Now unable to draw on, she finally gave him her undivided focus.

“Because you, Monsieur Graham de Vanilly, are a major pain in my butt.”

“Oh? I would have thought you above such pettiness.”, he lamented. “To deny a fellow fashion enthusiast your criticism! To dishonor the sacred solidarity between artists! Truly a shame.”

“You? An artist?” She snickered. “Don’t make me laugh.”

“Hey! Deception is as much of an art as these tiny scribbles of yours. And I am a master of my craft, thank you very much.”

She waved her hand and shooed him back a little.

“The questionable status of your craft aside, I'd hardly call you an expert. You were here for a day and already had the entire class plus three akumas after you. Your play didn’t even last an hour before it blew up in your face. Maybe you should ask Lila for a bit of advice! She's been here for months and is still on her unquestioned bullshit.”

He growled at that, drawing out another of these smug little smirks Marinette so rarely wore. After all his visits she knew how to rile him up.

“Do not compare me to that- that klutz! Anybody could spew some fancy tales and name drop, but that doesn’t mean she has skill. There's no finesse, no authenticity beneath that badly styled hair of her.”

“And there is beneath yours?”, Marinette said sweetly. He huffed and raised his chin.

“Of course there is. I don’t run around as Adrien for the fame, but for the fun of it. And I actually put in some effort. I was only found out because my goal required breaking character, and I still had a score to settle with my dear cousin. You think I only depend on my pretty face, because it looks conveniently close to Adrien? Wrong!”

His chest swoll a little as he spoke. With his accomplishments, he'd earned a little pride in himself.

“True, artful deception requires three things Lila Rossi couldn’t fake if her life depended on it: Discretion, Distraction and the right timing. She only ever barges in headfirst, unable to survive even a second outside of the spotlight.”

She hummed.

“My mistake. How could I ever assume you to be alike, since you obviously care so little about getting attention?”

Snarky little minx. Well, she wasn’t wrong, to be fair.

“Enough of that!”, he decided and eagerly turned back to her. “Now tell me what gave me away.”

“Let me see...”, she mused and pursed her lips. “I guess I could tell you that...”

“Yes?”

“...under certain circumstances...”

“Go on!”

“...it might be...”

“Might be?”

“The scent.”

He blinked. This had been his mistake? What kind of cologne did his cousin even wear?

“The... the scent.”

“Uh-huh.”

She moved to get back to her sketching, but he snatched the book before she could even touch it.

“Nah-ah! First you've got to expand on that. What perfume is he wearing?”

She shrugged and leaned back.

“Oh, isn’t it obvious? Adrien always wears “Manners and Class” N° 5. You on the other hand reek of “Wouldn’t know politeness if it hit me in the face”. A poor choice, really.”

She leaned in.

“You stink.”

It took a moment for her words to register, and he couldn't suppress a gasp when they did. With a satisfied smile she tugged her sketchbook out of his hands and crossed her legs, ready to put the finishing touch on her latest design. Felix fell back on the step next to her.

“That's it.”

“Yup.”

“You've won.”

“Fair and square.”

“I am defeated.”

“Annihilated. But to be fair, that opening was too easy.”

“Perfect set-up. Clean execution. Merciless punchline. You have earned your victory, so claim it properly.”

“I will.”

He fell silent after that, acknowledging his defeat. He lasted all but two minutes before his need for attention beat his shame.

“So? What do you want as your prize?”

“Peace and quiet?”, she proposed, gnawing at the end of her pencil.

He shook his head in disbelief.

“You're more ambitious than that, Dupain-Cheng. Here I am, Felix Graham du Vanilly, offering you everything I can give, and you settle for peace and quiet? Tsk, you can do better than that.”

“Maybe I could ask you to clear the area, while I’m already at it. For the entire week.”

He should leave. He wouldn’t get any real feedback out of her today, and now that he had offered her a prize she might develop some common sense and ask him for his connections, or some favors that could get her publicity. He was stretching his luck every time he decided to pester her again.

But he stayed. Whether it was his wounded pride, or his curiosity ever since she'd sent that little love declaration to his cousin... he couldn’t allow the only borderline interesting person in this city to dismiss him like that. Especially not when he hadn’t been able to get a rise out of her yet.

An idea popped into his mind and he spoke before he could think.

“You could ask me for a date.”

Now Marinette did put her book away.

“Excuse me?”

“You heard me.”

She blinked.

“Did you miss the part where I asked you to leave me to my scribbles, as you put it? Because I am sure I mentioned it a few times, now.”

“No, doesn’t ring a bell.”

She groaned and closed her book. He counted that as a victory.

“Well, then maybe you remember the fact that I’m in love with Adrien. Which you already know, since you watched the video clearly addressed to him. And deleted said video. And replied very rudely.”

He hummed and stood up to circle her. An actor had to have a sense of drama, after all.

“The past is the past. And in the present, I look just like Adrien.”

Now he finally seemed to have broken through her cool facade.

“So what?”, she snapped at him, crossing her arms. “Do you think I like him for his looks? Am I that shallow, in your opinion?”

Of course she wasn’t. But he'd finally struck a nerve.

“You're not?”, he provoked slyly.

“No!”

She stomped her pink flats on the ground with more force than should be physically possible.

“I love him because he is kind. And thoughtful. And funny and confident and fair and so classy, and because he loves to make friends, and because he's loyal and caring and-“

“Okay, okay, I get it. He's your little fairy tale prince.”, he interrupted a little harsher than intended. Clearing his throat he continued. “And you'll be relieved to know that I don’t want to date you either. No offense to you, but I am above such mundane things as crushes.”

She rolled her eyes and sat back down.

“Of course you are.”

“Fact is, my dear Marinette,” he lectured smugly, “that you can’t even say two words to your loverboy without seemingly suffering a particularly unflattering stroke.”

“What a flowery statement, Sherlock.”

“Another fact is that you can talk very fluently to me. Far too fluently, in my opinion.”

Marinette's eyes narrowed with suspicion and he smiled.

“What's your point?”

“My point is,” he finished his circling and came to a stand right in front of her. “that you can use me to practice. Here, I'll even mess up my hair again!”

“Wait, I didn’t even agree to-“

“You're welcome. Aren’t I a dashing little dream prince?”

He posed in true Adrien fashion and Marinette pinched the bridge of her nose.

“Please, just don’t.”

“Pah! Ungrateful as always. Anyway, back to business!”

He spun into a dramatic pirouette and kneeled down before her, taking her hand between his.

“Marinette, my fairest!”, he proclaimed with vigor. “Is there something on that bright mind of yours you want to share with me, Adrien Agreste?”

She groaned again, but didn’t pull away.

“If you'll leave me alone after that...”

“I'll do anything my good friend asks of me! I am sunshine personified!”

“Jesus Christ.”

“Close enough.”

He almost regretted looking for Marinette this late. The sun was about to set and most tourists had already left for locations with a better view. If there had been more, one might have captured a snap shot of Adrien Agreste kneeling in front of a random girl about to confess. His cousin would be delighted when he found out about his scandal in the news.

Alas, it was only the two of them who paid attention to each other. But Marinette was about to begin, so he didn’t ponder on the viewers anymore.

“I... I wanted to tell you that...”

He almost winced at that poor display of rhetorical talent, but she wasn’t done yet. Taking a deep breath, Marinette lifted her eyes off of her shoes and looked directly at him. And for a moment it felt as if she were looking into him. He'd seen these bluebell eyes roll in annoyance, glare in anger and sparkle with mirth, but never had he seen them this piercing, this all-consuming.

“Adrien, there's something I haven’t told you yet.”, she said, and it was as if he'd never heard her speak before. This wasn’t the voice that had teased and bantered with him, or the disinterested lull she mumbled in when she tried to ignore him. This was soft, yet firm and confident. Like tugging the strings of a violin: a clear, pleasant sound that offered a first hint of the potential in this slender instrument.

“I didn’t keep this from you because I don’t value our friendship.”, she said and her fingers tightened around his. Felix was suddenly sure that no expensive mudbath could ever make his skin as soft as hers. “It's the furthest thing from it. I didn’t tell you because I value our friendship so much. And I was scared to risk it.”

She took a step closer and he had to swallow.

“Adrien, you are the first person I think of when I wake up, and the only person I see in my dreams. Every morning, when I walk into class and see you, I feel like there's pure sunshine in my chest and springs under my feet. Like gravity is just a loose suggestion and I could float if I jumped. Like... like I could do anything I ever dreamed of.”

She looked down upon their hands. Disentangling their fingers surprised him, but even more surprising was that this time, she took his hands between hers.

“I know you feel trapped sometimes.”, she whispered and he found himself suddenly very insecure. Was she still acting? Was she this deep in their little charade? Or... or was she truly talking to him?

“I know you put up a smile and try to give everybody what they expect. And that you don’t have a lot of chances to just be you, not the heir of a great legacy. But I... I want to be your escape. Your safe haven. What I am trying to say is...”

She looked back up to him, and her smile was radiant.

“I love you.”

...

There was a tightness in his chest.

Because he wasn’t breathing, he realized.

Odd.

He didn’t have time to overthink this little detail, though. For as soon as he opened his mouth to say something – what, he didn’t know – she blinked and took a step back. The spell faded and his mouth fell shut again.

“So,” Marinette cleared her throat and looked away. “How... How was it?”

“Uh...”, he made, which was admittedly not the smartest reply he’d ever given her. The fact that he still hadn’t remembered to breathe in didn’t make things easier.

Marinette shifted her weight from one leg to the other, uncomfortable.

“That bad?”

Ha.

Ha ha.

He shook his head and finally sucked in some much needed air.

“Good”, he croaked out, which was still not much of an improvement from his earlier statement of ‘uh’.

“It was... really good.”

Ah. The simple beauty of a full sentence.

“You think so?”, she asked, voice high with surprise. “It wasn’t... I don’t know, a little too much?”

“No!”, he answered a little too fast. “Uh, no. No, it was really... really good.”

Marinette's eyes went narrow.

“Are you making fun of me? Because I may be small, but if you did this to humiliate me then I swear to god, I will take this pencil and-“

“I was serious. What you said was beautiful.”

They both blinked at his words. He hadn’t meant to say that. This wasn’t how their interactions went. They were snarky. Mean. Teasing from time to time. But not... this. Never this open. Never vulnerable.

“Thank you.”, Marinette gave back, seemingly unsure herself. “I should... you know, it’s late and my parents are waiting.”

He nodded far too eagerly for his earlier efforts to make her stay.

“Yes, of course. I'll... No, you know the way better than me, probably.”

She laughed at that. It wasn’t a snicker, or one of her smug little huffs. It sounded... sweet.

“Yeah, no need to walk me home.”

She eyed him for a a moment, then the emptying place.

“I could walk you home, though. If you want to.”

Yes.

“No.”, he said and something in his chest roared in disappointment. “Thank you, but it would be quite the detour for you.”

She shrugged.

“Alright. Don’t get lost.”

Shouldering her bag she took her sketch book and moved to leave, but stopped mid movement to turn back around.

“Oh, and if you tell anybody – especially Adrien! – about any of this, you'll find out what I was going to do with that pencil! Got it?”

He rolled his eyes, finally in control of himself.

“Yes, oh great master of pencilmanship. Your weapon is as feared as its wielder.”

Satisfied she nodded and turned around, but stopped yet again. With a groan she dropped the bag, stepped in front of him and grabbed his collar. He'd never admit to anybody that the surprised squeal that followed had come from him. Utterly frozen in shock he could only watch as Marinette came closer and...

“There!”, she hummed and combed back his hair with her fingers. “I like you hair better this way.”

A small nod was all he could muster up, but it was enough for her. Waving him goodbye she turned around for good.

“Well then. See you around, Felix!”

He watched her leave, desperately trying to regain his voice.

“Y-Yeah. See you around, Marinette.”

Only when she had completely disappeared in the nearby metro station he allowed himself to sit down, wobbly knees no longer able to support him.

“What...”, he mumbled to himself, “...the entire fuck...”

What did just happen? Nothing made sense, not this stupid idea and certainly not his reaction to it. Sighing he leaned back against the steps and touched his hair. It was still a little messy, but laid back against his head in its usual fashion. If he concentrated he could almost feel the warmth of her fingers trapped between his strands.

He sighed deeply.

...damnit.

- - -

A little one shot because I hadn't written about canon!felix yet.

[bold-writing]

The One With Whiskey Eyes || 9 || Precious Porcelain, Cracked and Broken

Warnings: Violence, Swearing, Threats.

Words: 3600+

Previous || Next

~9~

Iris and Barry emailed back and forth a few more times over Sunday, usually short and sweet since he was at work and Iris didn’t want to distract him from his job. Luke had surprised her with an email later in the day, saying that he’d bugged Barry into giving him her email address with a wink emoji at the end of the sentence. She’d just shaken her head with a smile as she pulled out some food for a simple dinner.

 She had started her Monday with a positive outlook, having gotten much better sleeps the past couple of nights and therefore back on her game when she stepped into work. Emailing Barry and Luke had been one of the first things that she had done in the morning, somehow feeling right at home with the new addition to her routine.

 The first couple of hours had gone smoothly, and Iris had been relieved to be back in her element with something to do with her time. Her coworkers were especially happy to have her back, thinking that she was going to go back to her usual routine of taking any and all hours that she could get her hands on; instead, she’d called the owner that morning and had discussed getting her schedule changed to allow for more free time on weekends and maybe evenings.

They had happily agreed, since she hadn’t taken voluntary time off since she had started there.

Her day was going smooth and by the book, Iris able to get lost in her thoughts as she priced and scanned the new books they had gotten in while manning the counter. Her coworkers were among the shelves, stocking up the empty spaces and cleaning up the messes that customers left behind.

 Unfortunately, that good day didn’t last long.

 “Miss, I can’t take this book,” Iris denied as she pushed the worn novel back across the counter. “Not only do you not have your receipt, we do not even sell that here.” They hadn’t gone through the painstaking process of transferring all of their files to computer for nothing, Iris was able to search for any book title and know whether they sold it or not.

 “I lost the receipt, sorry! But I bought this book here, just last week!”

 “Well it’s in terrible condition for having been bought a week ago,” Iris answered, motioning to the heavily cracked spine, bent front page and stains along the bottom corner. “We have strict rules here; you must return the book, with your receipt, within fourteen days of purchase.” Iris motioned to the taped up sign that was located just over Iris’s right shoulder, stating the rules that Iris had just said.

 “I would like to talk to your manager,” the woman finally demanded with a deep scowl. She was several inches taller than Iris on flat ground, and she was now wearing four inch heels that made her absolutely tower over the younger woman.

 “Hi,” Iris smiled back, remaining firmly rooted in place as she gave a small wave—almost, but not quiet, mockingly.

 The woman’s face morphed into a livid frown before she snatched the book from the counter and turned on heel so fast that Iris was surprised she hadn’t spun right off her heels. She watched the woman leave, allowing Iris the satisfaction of once more having been able to pull the ‘I am the manager’ card. Iris glanced over to the coworker that was stocking just a few feet away from her, hiding a grin as she tucked more books on the shelf.

 “You enjoy that too much,” she called over to Iris, amusement colour her features.

 “The look on their face is the only thing that makes being the manager worth it,” Iris answered as she resumed her work of unboxing, pricing and scanning the books to put everything in the system. “Makes you glad we put everything on a computer system a couple years ago?” she offered, getting a laugh from the younger woman as she nodded eagerly.

 “I don’t know how you stay so calm when you have people like that,” Jessica, the younger girl who had been there for nearly five years, added on as she finished with the box that Iris had given to her and moved over to collect the other one that Iris had priced for her.

 “It helps that I go into a situation like that knowing they’ll ask for…well, me.” Jessica snorted at Iris’s explanation before the two women returned to their work. Iris pulled her long braid over her shoulder in nervous habit, her eyes double checking the computer screen to make sure that the correct number of copies had been entered before she opened a new page for the next box.

 She was wearing a pair of thin black compression gloves, keeping her hands warm and protecting them from being cut up or dried out by the boxes and books, while also hiding her mark from prying eyes. Those that she worked with had gotten so accustomed to her wearing the gloves; they didn’t usually bring them up anymore. However, now and then they would make bets about whether or not it was a soulmark, and what it might say that would make her hide it.

 The next box that Iris opened was a hardcover sketchbook, one of their best-selling sketchbooks; which made her smile as Barry popped into her mind.

 She had barely tagged one book when the bell over the door signalled that someone else had entered the store. Having heard the same thing every day since she worked there, Iris didn’t even look up from the counter this time. “Welcome to Pages of the World; if you need any help just let me know!” she called from her place behind the counter while sticking another price-tag on the sketchbook.

 “Yea, you can fucking help me, brat!”

 Iris flinched while looking up from her work, the booming yell of a man charging up to the counter making her want to tuck tail and run. Women she could deal with, they always came off as less terrifying to her than men did after all these years. Even Jessica flinched behind the display she was setting up, looking between Iris and the irate man wearily.

 “Excuse me?” Iris stuttered out in surprise, unable to supress the fear that had her leaning back. There was still a counter between the two of them, but Iris couldn’t find the assurance in it.

 “You turned my wife away just because of a receipt? What the hell kinda customer service skills do you have to honestly be a manager?” Oh course it had to be the husband. Somehow, Iris figured that the couple had planned this. They would try to get a free fifteen dollars for a used book that was not from this store; if the wife’s sob story about losing the receipt didn’t work, the husband would come in and try to scare her into doing the non-existent return.

 “Ones that do not concede to liars,” Iris snapped back with more bravado than she actually felt. “The rules are clear, and I do not appreciate your immaturity with the situation; I am a grown woman, there is no need to call me a brat, sir.”

 “Clearly there is! You’re supposed to please your customers, you think I’ll ever come back here?”

 “The best thing about being the manager here is that the owner has assured me that I can refuse service to anyone that I want. I assure you, sir, I do not want you or your wife to ever come back.” Iris’s tone stayed level and calm the entire time she was speaking, not once raising to the point that it could be considered yelling.

 Beneath the counter, Iris subtly slipped off the metal bracelet that she wore around her wrist with the keys she needed for the different locks within the store. When unclipped, it was four inches of metal that held four full sized keys on the end of it. She was not opposed to swinging it at the man’s face if he tried anything.

 His face was red by the time she finished speaking, his jaw locked tight as he fixed a glare on Iris that she was sure was supposed to scare her into relenting. “Now, I will have to ask that you leave this store before I am forced to call the authorities and have you escorted out.”

 Standing behind the display, Jessica was watching the entire thing with wide eyes and a jaw close to dropping. Her manager, tiny little five foot Iris that was about one hundred pounds soaking wet, was holding her ground against a six foot tall man that looked like he could throw her with one hand. Her voice had wavered in the beginning, but then she had successfully collected herself and was able to keep her composure.

 “You go ahead and call them, but I am getting my refund!” the man roared, reaching toward the buttons on the register to Iris’s right—which was rather stupid, since none of them would open the register unless Iris actually unlocked it first.

 Similar to what she had done with Luke in the grocery store, Iris reached out and swung her chain of keys down onto the back of his hand, the man hadn’t even been able to hit a single button before he was recoiling in shock at the sharp pain that accompanied her attack. “This will be your final warning,” she almost growled out, her free hand poised over the phone.

 Majority of the employees here were woman, so the police were on speed-dial just in case ‘911’ would take too long.

 “You fucking cun-”

 He never got the chance to finish what he was saying before he was suddenly slammed down onto the counter, drawing a startled yelp from both Iris and Jessica as the women leapt backward from the sudden action. A pale hand was holding the wanna-be robber by the back of his neck, pressing his face into the polished counter with considerable force, the other hand keeping the man’s arm tight behind his back in a very uncomfortable looking angle.

 “That is not how you speak to a lady, and it’s especially not how you speak to mine.”

 Iris damn near choked on air when she heard the familiar voice, this time with a more average American accent, and looked up the pale arms that had the sleeves rolled up to the elbow, a sweatshirt left unzipped to expose an average undershirt and a necklace of some kind dipping down beneath the fabric. She stopped breathing entirely when her familiar handwriting was brought to the forefront of her attention. It was in her cursive, so she couldn’t read it from here, but there were many scattered along his forearms and another that shown at his left pectoral.

 “What the fuck, man, get off!” the man snarled, though he was still useless to fight against the newest soulmate for Iris to meet. Had it not been for the lack of accent, she would almost think that it could have been Luke, but that would have been pushing it.

 “You don’t talk to people like that, ya hear me?” he demanded while pushing the man’s face down against the counter with more force, getting an uncomfortable groan in response. “Huh?” he pressed again when no verbal response came.

 “Alright!”

 Nodding in satisfaction, her nameless soulmate hauled the man up from the desk and turned to face him with a hard glare. “You ever come back here and you’ll be dealing with me.” Iris had to strain to hear, but the threat was as clear as day. Then he shoved the man to the side, in the direction of the door he’d come through minutes before, and watched to make sure he left without touching any of the meticulously arranged displays.

 Only when he’d ran passed the store windows and disappeared from view did his bark blue eyes turn toward Iris, who had remained silently shocked from the moment he’d first slammed her would-be robber down on the desk. “You alright, doll? He didn’t hurt ya?”

 Iris opened her mouth to respond, but no sound came out. She couldn’t even think of forming words as the world suddenly went blurry around her and she could feel the heat in her cheeks as her blood fled from her already pale complexion.

 Without a word, she suddenly turned and sat on the nearby desk chair that she used while doing paperwork, the sound of rushing footsteps alerting her to someone behind the desk before Jessica’s terrified face came into view. “Iris!” she called, apparently not for the first time, and reached for the older woman’s face to feel her strikingly cold cheeks.

 Another hand against her shoulder, much larger and holding more weight behind it, drew Iris to look to her right with limp neck muscles barely keeping her head up. Barry? No, not Barry. Not Luke.

 Who?

 “It’s alright, doll, you just take your time,” he assured gently, his tone having changed drastically from when he’d first starting speaking to the other man. Even when he’d addressed Iris, he’d sounded more confident and sure, almost proud of Iris’s defense. Swallowing around a suddenly dry mouth, Iris tipped her head back in an attempt to let some cool air get to her face. She knew that to another it would feel cold with lack of blood, but she felt like she was blushing red as a tomato with how hot her cheeks were.

 Suddenly, cool air was blowing against her face gently as Iris took a moment to think through her breaths and bask in the refreshing feeling.

 “Iris? You need me to call someone?” a new voice called timidly. It was Sarah, a twenty-one year old woman who had worked for them since she was eighteen. She’d latched onto Iris immediately, since both women were naturally quiet and usually shied away from loud, extraverted situations.

 “No,” Iris breathed out softly, beginning to feel better from sitting down a moment. “Thank you, Sarah. I’ll be okay. Do you mind taking over here for a moment, though?” Opening her eyes and looking over to her young coworker, Iris was relieved to see her nodding eagerly and stepping around the counter to take Iris’s spot. “I just need some air. Come get me if you need the keys, alright?” Jessica stopped fanning her with the booklet she’d picked up, stepping back to give Iris room.

 “Take your time, okay? We’re perfectly fine on our own for a few minutes.”

 Reluctantly agreeing, Iris turned away from the other two and reached out for her new soulmate’s hand to draw him after her, toward the front entrance. The large windows had benches in front of them for the people walking by to sit, so she immediately went for one of those.

 Her soulmate followed her willingly, sitting down next to her as Iris settled down on the sun-warmed bench. “You alright, darling?” he asked quietly, keeping his tone gentle as he looked at Iris’s pale, pinched expression.

 “I’m sorry you had to see that,” she mumbled tiredly, belatedly thinking that she probably should have thought of something better to say to him for first words.

 “I’d rather I know what you’re going through than to be somewhere else and left to worry,” he answered easily, reaching out to pull her closer across the small bench. It left her pressed in against his side tightly, the warmth of his body helping her to relax somewhat. “That stuff happen often?”

 “No,” she assured immediately, shaking her head before she let it tip to the side and rest her temple against his shoulder. “People don’t usually get so…worked up. When I mention the cops they usually take off running.”

 “That guy was an asshole,” he grumbled angrily with a dark expression blanketing his features. It was not an expression she was accustomed to seeing; both Luke and Barry were more upbeat, they didn’t outwardly glare or glower. “You sure you’re alright?”

 Her mouth and throat still felt abnormally dry and her heart was racing a bit faster than usual, but she could tell that there was blood returning to her face and her hands weren’t trembling like before. “I’ll be okay. I haven’t had that happen in a long time; just got overwhelmed for a minute.” He nodded in something akin to understanding, reaching up to sooth her hair gently with a gentle, assuring touch. “So, it’d be nice to have a name for my savior?”

 He laughed under his breath at her timid tease, nodding in agreement. “That’s true. I’m BT, doll, and I’m damn glad I ignored Barry and came to see you today.”

 Iris’s answering smile was shy and she couldn’t help but to silently agree with his words. “I’m glad, too. It scares me to think what might have happened if you hadn’t intervened.” Lowering her eyes, unable to keep looking into the deep blue—they were darker than Luke’s and Barry’s, she hadn’t thought that was possible. Instead, she looked down to where his forearms were left bare from his rolled up sleeves. Her familiar scrawl was looking back at her, especially one mark that was apparently long enough that it wrapped around his wrist three times.

 A shorter one on the outside of his forearm was familiar to her; Wow, hello. Her words to Luke made her snort in amusement, reaching forward to trace the black cursive that stood out against BT’s pale skin. “It’s so strange to see my writing on someone else,” she mumbled to herself, aware that he could hear her.

 BT leaned away from her suddenly, then proceeded to pull up the side of his sweater and shirt that he was wearing to expose the left side of his torso. I’m sorry you had to see that was written across his side, starting at the base of his ribs and trailing down along to the hem of his pants.

 Her lips parted in surprise as she looked at the dark words, repressing the urge to reach out and touch them. Barry and Luke hadn’t outwardly tried to hide their skin or marks from her, but they had worn warmer clothes when she’d met them and therefore had masked any of their marks. BT was the first to wear something that exposed his marks willingly, feeling as though he had nothing to hide.

 And to go even further, he had gone ahead and pulled up his shirt to show her the words that she had just spoken to him. She was left trying to not look at the cut of his hip that proved something she’d already assumed—he was incredibly fit.

 “I…can’t show you where mine is,” she admitted softly, her cheeks warming with a blush as she remembered where BT’s mark was—curving along her left ribs, following the natural curve that was beneath her left breast.

 “Now ya got me curious,” BT teased gently, not wanting to push her too far when she was still clearly shaken from what had happened. His smile softened as he straightened his shirt and shuffled her closer to him again, returning her to her place pressed against his side. “I don’t wanna leave ya here alone; feels wrong after that.”

 He motioned with his thumb in the direction that the guy had run off, probably hopping into a car that his wife was still waiting in. “I’m not alone,” Iris argued tiredly. “There’s three other people working today, and it’s just a simple bookstore. Things like that never really happen. I do get the odd person who tries to trick us by bringing in some used book for a return, but that guy was…determined.”

 “Is it all girls in there? Because no offense to you all defending yourselves, but I doubt anyone’s gunna be intimidated by four short girls trying not to let him rob the place.”

 “We have David in as well,” she assured. “He’s closing today, because I opened the store.”

 BT seemed to relax slightly as he nodded in understanding, a thoughtful look on his face as he pondered for a moment. “When do you get off? I’ll come get ya!”

 Iris wanted to stop him, to deny him from interrupting his schedule for her, but she already knew that he wasn’t going to take no for an answer. “I finish at four today; come here around quarter after?”

 “You got it, doll.” BT leant forward suddenly to smack a kiss against the side of her head in assurance. “I’ve gotta get going, though. Barry’s already gunna be pissed if he finds out that I came here…well, more like when he finds out. Barry knows freaking everything.”

 Iris stood up with BT, already feeling a thousand times better after she’d had some time to get fresh air. “Thanks for your help, BT. I’m definitely glad you came here when you did.” BT grinned broadly before he reached out to snatch her up, pulling her against him abruptly in a near bone-crushing hug. She was jarred for a moment before she returned his embrace and hugged him back, revelling in the warmth that he emitted. “I’ll see you after four.”

 She backed away from him reluctantly, smiling shyly as she trailed her hand along the covered mark on his left side. BT smirked back, knowing what she was doing, as he nodded his affirmative. “Sure thing, doll. I’ll be waiting out here for you, a’right?”

 “Deal.”

Previous || Next

[somerandomdutchfangirl]

Hetalia family week day 3: Surprise

My third entry for @hetafamilyweek

There's this Dutch tradition called ‘surpise’. Basically, during the holidays people buy small gifts for each other and put them in a ‘surprise’ based on the other person's interests. For example, someone who's really into drawing can receive a giant pencil made with a PVC tube and paper-mache, with gifts like drawing pencils and markers in it. For more examples, search for ''surprise papier mache''.

You’re not supposed to know who has picked who for the gifts (as you draw lots) and you can also make a poem to go with it. Up until this point, the siblings don't know who had picked who.

Names:

Willem = Netherlands

Femke = Belgium

Laurent = Luxembourg

Translations at the end!

Look, when Willem convinced his siblings to do this with him, he didn’t see a reason for any rules. Which was stupid, because of course his siblings managed to be nuisances even when simply exchanging gifts.

As Willem mourned his now glittery carpet (that stuff will never go away again, he'll probably have to buy a new carpet. He should send Laurent a Tikkie, since it was his gift that had caused this monstrosity in the first place), Femke was busy laughing her ass off. Typical.

''You're buying me a new carpet,'' Willem said when he finally managed to get over the shock that came with a sudden explosion of glitter. How on earth Laurent had managed to build a glitter bomb inside of a tulip made of paper, Willem would never know.

''Aww, don’t be like that, Willy!'' Femke said.

''That's easy for you to say, Fem, this isn’t your carpet.''

''Come on, it’s just glitter-''

''’Just glitter’? Fem, dat klotespul gaat nooit meer uit m'n tapijt!''

''Just open the rest of your gifts, alright? We can worry about the glitter later,'' Laurent said, effectively cutting off the argument that would have started otherwise.

''Fine, fine,'' Willem said, before digging through the quite frankly unreasonable amount of glitter, trying to find his gifts. When he finally found them, he tried to get most of the glitter off the wrapping paper, to no avail. Sighing, he gave up on trying to get the glittery mess under control.

''Come on, open them!'' Laurent said, clearly impatient. Rolling his eyes, Willem opened the nearest present. A sketchbook and some pencils fell out. Letting out an appreciating hum, he moved onto the next gift. This one had some tubes of paint and brushes. It wasn't much, but it was personal and that was what counted. Willem loved it.

''Thanks, broertje,'' he said, ruffling Laurent's hair with a glitter-covered hand. Laurent grinned.

''Alright, me next!'' Femke cheerfully said. She twisted around and got a giant paper dog from behind the couch, closely resembling Pelutze. Laurent was already looking exited as he gingerly took the dog from Femke.

When he had finally figured out where the gifts were hidden (in its belly), Laurent stuck his hand in, exited for the gifts. As soon as he did, however, his face showed nothing but disgust, as he quickly took his hand out.

''Femke, wat ass dat?!'' he screeched, as Femke started laughing. His hand was green and slimy. Willem groaned. Great, slime. Was he the only sane sibling?

The answer turned out to be yes, as Laurent scooped up more of the slime and threw it at Femke, who squealed. In return, she reached over to Willem's tulip and scooped up some glitter that was inside of it. Before he could stop her, she had already thrown the glitter at Laurent.

''Godverdomme, stop-'' was all he could say before the slime hit him in his face. Oh, it was on. Scooping up more of the glitter, trying (and failing) not to get any more of the atrocity on the carpet, he quickly made his way over to Laurent.

''No, wait! Please, have mercy!''

''Hmmm, let me think. No, sorry broetje,'' Willem said, not sounding sorry at all as he dumped the glitter on top of Laurent.

''I'll never get this out of my hair and clothes again, what the fuck Willy!''

''Serves you right, you asshole. First getting glitter on my carpet, then throwing slime at me? The disrespect.''

''Come on, Lau, get on with it! Open your gifts!'' Femke said. Huffing, but smiling, Laurent reached into the slime. A few seconds later, he pulled out a gift. He laid it on the table, which happened to be the nearest flat surface not covered in glitter. Reaching into the slime again, he pulled out several more gifts. He then looked at Femke.

''Was that everything?''

''Why, is it not enough?'' she replied with a teasing smirk. Laurent rolled his eyes.

''No, I just don’t feel like touching any more slime for the next century or so.'' Femke giggled at this.

''Don't worry, that was all!''

''Oh, Gott sei Dank,'' Laurent said as he reached over to the nearest gift, which turned out to be a music note necklace. He immediately clipped it on, before moving to his other gifts. Next up was a card deck, decorated with musicians. Next up was a CD from Laurent's favourite band.

''Femke, where did you get this? This is amazing, merci!''

''No problem, Lau! I'm glad you like the gifts!''

''Like them? I love them!''

Naturally, the two of them were now looking at Willem, impatiently waiting for him to give his surprise to Femke. So, he reached behind him and grabbed the gigantic carton waffle. Femke stared at it in awe, mouth agape.

''I thought you were super busy?! When did you make this?''

''I was. Several all-nighters and glue gun burns where faced to make this, but it was worth it.''

''Ge zijt zot, Willem.''

Willem rolled his eyes. ''Just open it. And before you ask, no, there's no slime or glitter in it.''

Femke seemed to pout at that, but quickly found out where the waffle opened so she could reach her gifts. The waffle was filled with shredded paper to make the gifts a bit harder to find, but at least it wasn't as messy as the glitter or slime.

Femke tried to get out all the gifts at once, but it proved futile when she couldn’t fit all of them through the hole in the waffle. When she did get out all the gifts, she made quick work of opening them.

First, there was a bag of cookie cutters in all shapes and sizes. Then, a Delfts blue egg tray and an apron joined the gifts. Lastly, a notebook came out of its wrapping. It was tattered and had lots of other papers sticking out of its pages, making it appear like a journal of sorts.

''Willy, is this... is this your personal cookbook?''

''One of them, yes.'' Femke stared at him, before tearing up and pulling him in for a hug.

''Thank you, I love it!''

''Uh.. Yeah, no problem, Fem,'' he said, awkwardly patting her on the back. Over her head, he shot Laurent a questioning look, to which his younger brother shrugged. Not very helpful, but whatever.

A few seconds later, Femke stepped back, rubbing at her eyes to make the tears go away. Only to pull Laurent close to her and Willem and drag them into a group hug.

Once they pulled back, Femke smiled.

''Let's get this mess cleaned up, shall we?''

-------------------------

Translations:

Fem, dat klotespul gaat nooit meer uit m'n tapijt! (Dutch) = Fem, that stupid stuff is never getting out of my carpet!

Broertje (Dutch) = little brother

Femke, wat ass dat?! (Luxembourgish) = Femke, what is that?!

Willem, ge zijt zot (Flemish) = Willem, you're crazy

If it wasn't clear, this is who had who:

Willem -> Femke

Femke -> Laurent

Laurent -> Willem

[massivedrickhead]

bechloe tattoo shop au? Beca gives Chloe a tattoo?

So I’ve had this prompt in my inbox forever. I started writing it last year not long after I got my tattoo but it wasn’t going anywhere so I kinda gave up on it. But I just started watching Ink Master and I had to finish this prompt. 

It’s kind of pointless but I couldn’t get the idea out of my head, and now I’ve written it I might as well share it.

I also gave Beca loads of tattoos because I’m high-key attracted to the idea of a heavily tatted Beca

Read on AO3

------

“Hi,” Chloe said, approaching the reception desk at Titanium Tattoos and Piercings. There was a blonde woman sitting behind the desk, spinning on her chair.

“What’s up?” She asked, with a heavy Australian accent. 

“I have a consultation appointment,” Chloe said. 

“Cool, what’s your name?” The woman asked, looking down at her computer.

“Chloe Beale,” Chloe said.

The woman nodded. “You’re meeting with Beca?”

“Yeah,” Chloe said.

“She’s in with a client right now, why don’t you take a seat and she’ll be out soon. My name is Fat Amy, give me a shout if you need anything.” Amy said, gesturing over to a collection of couches. 

Chloe nodded and took a seat, her eyes roaming over the art that was hung around the room. She recognised a lot of it from Instagram, and she knew Beca was responsible for most.

Chloe waited for another 10 minutes before Beca came out, followed by a very pale looking man. 

“Okay Jesse,” Beca said, patting him on the shoulder, “keep it clean, no swimming for a few weeks,  and when it starts healing don’t pick it.” She handed him a sheet of paper. “Follow these instructions and take care of it yeah? If you get it infected it makes me look like a jackass.”

Jesse laughed. “Thanks, Beca.”

“Go give Amy your money and give us a call if you have any questions or anything,” Beca said. She spotted Chloe waiting. “Chloe, right?”

“Yeah,” Chloe said.

“Give me a couple of minutes to grab a drink and I’ll be with you. You want a coffee or anything?”

“I’m fine, thanks,” Chloe said, watching Beca rush off to another room.

Chloe’s heart was pounding, and it was only partly due to nerves. Beca was cute. She had seen a picture of her on the tattoo shop’s Instagram but seeing her in person was something else.

Beca returned after a few minutes. “Chloe? Do you wanna follow me?” 

Chloe nodded and followed Beca into the shop. 

“Sorry I’m running a bit late,” Beca said. “My last guy got a bit lightheaded, we had to take a break.”

“No worries,” Chloe said.

Beca showed her into her room and asked her to take a seat.

“So, this is just a consultation, I’m not going to be sticking you with any needles today,” Beca said taking a seat next to her. “What is you’re wanting to get done?”

“I have a couple of reference photos,” Chloe said, pulling up her phone. “I want something kind of floral but a bit geometric too?” She handed Beca her phone who nodded and she swiped through the pictures. “And I also want to incorporate this ‘B’,” Chloe added, showing Beca a specific picture. 

“Okay, cool,” Beca said. She rolled her chair over to her desk in the corner and came back with a sketchbook and pencil. She started drawing as she spoke. “The B isn’t your partner’s initial is it?”

“No,” Chloe said, laughing. “I’m single.”

“Can I ask what it’s for?”

“Don’t laugh,” Chloe said. “But, um, I’m graduating from college next month, and this is the logo of the a cappella group I’m in.”

She saw the corners of Beca’s mouth twitch as she carried on drawing.

“That’s cute,” Beca said. 

Chloe laughed and felt herself blush slightly as she watched Beca draw. She was having a hard time focusing on anything else. Beca’s eye makeup was dark, her ears were pierced in several locations, and both arms had what looked like full sleeve tattoos.

She was distractingly attractive.

“You thinking colour or like black and grey?” Beca asked, glancing up.

“I was thinking black for the flowers and the shape, like kinda simplistic, not a lot of shading. But maybe we could do some colour in the logo?”

Beca nodded. “Awesome. Like the blue in this picture?”

“Yeah,” Chloe said.

“Where did you want it?”

“My ribs,” Chloe said.

This time Beca looked up fully and stopped drawing. “Is this your first tattoo?”

“No,” Chloe said, pointing at her tiny ladybug on her wrist.

“Cute,” Beca said, laughing softly. She ran a hand through her hair. “You sure about getting it on your ribs? It hurts like a bitch.”

“I’m sure,” Chloe said, laughing. 

“Okay,” Beca said, grinning. “How big?” She moved closer and put her hands against Chloe’s ribs. “Like this?”

Chloe felt suddenly light headed. “Yeah,” she said, trying to keep her voice casual.

Beca nodded again. She turned her sketchbook over so Chloe could see and passed her phone back. 

“So I can do something like this. You’ve got the geometric diamond shape here and that contains the flowers, but they’re sort of breaking that barrier here,” Beca said, pointing out different aspects of her sketches. “And then we can put the ‘B’ in the flowers but maybe a bit concealed? To give it some like depth.”

Chloe knew she should be focusing on what Beca was telling her, but she was having a hard time focusing when Beca was this close.

“Yeah, that’s awesome,” Chloe said, finally looking down at Beca’s sketches. “Exactly what I’m looking for.”

“Cool,” Beca said, grinning. “Can you send me that logo? I’m gonna draw up some more designs tonight.”

“Sure,” Chloe said. She airdropped Beca a picture of the logo. “I really love these designs, Beca. They’re perfect.”

“Thanks,” Beca said. “I’m glad you think so, you’re going to have this tattoo for a while.”

“So when can we do this?” Chloe asked, standing with Beca and heading back to the front of the shop.

“I might have some time tomorrow if you’re up for it?” Beca asked, heading behind the reception desk to check her schedule. 

“Yeah, that would be great,” Chloe said. “I’m free all day.”

Beca began typing into the computer. “How about 3pm?”

“Sounds great,” Chloe said, feeling a rush of nerves and excitement. She knew her tattoo was going to hurt like crazy, but somehow she was more nervous about having Beca’s hands on her body.

“Sweet,” Beca said grinning and typing into her computer. “So, I would recommend you don’t drink any alcohol tonight and please don’t drink any tomorrow. Make sure you eat too, I don’t want you passing out in my chair.”

“I don’t want that either,” Chloe said, laughing. 

—

Chloe arrived the next morning with a stomach full of butterflies but feeling excited. She was looking forward to seeing Beca again and she couldn’t wait to get her new tattoo, despite how much pain she was about to go through.

Beca called her through after she had been waiting for a couple of minutes.

“I usually take a girl for a drink before I ask this, but can you take your shirt off?” Beca asked.

Chloe laughed and pulled off her t-shirt, leaving her in just her bra. “Can I keep this on?” She asked, tugging at her strap.

“For now, yes,” Beca said. “Let’s get the design on there and see how it sits.”

Beca placed a piece of paper against Chloe’s ribs and applied the stencil of her design. When she peeled the paper away, a blue stencil remained.

“Have a look in the mirror,” Beca said. “Try it on for a bit while I get set up. Move your arm around, see how that’s going to affect the tattoo. Just make sure you’re 100% happy with it. Anything you wanna change or add we can do no problem right now.”

Chloe looked at the stencil in the mirror and did what Beca advised, twisting her arm and side, making sure it didn’t distort the tattoo in any weird way. 

She loved the design Beca had made, and she couldn’t wait to wear it.

“Happy?” Beca asked.

“Yeah,” Chloe said. “I love it.”

“Anything you want to change?” 

“Nope,” Chloe said, stilling grinning at the design in the reflection. 

“Okay, then let’s get started,” Beca said. She patted her chair which had been folded flat like a bed. As Beca pulled on a pair of black latex gloves, Chloe lay down on her side, her back to Beca’s chair. “Ready?”

“Yeah,” Chloe said, feeling her heart race as Beca placed her hands on her ribs.

“Here we go.”

Beca hadn’t been lying when she said the ribs hurt. Each line felt like a knife was being pulled slowly across her skin. 

“How’s it going?” Beca asked after about thirty minutes.

“Yeah it’s uh, it feels great,” Chloe said.

Beca laughed. “Liar.”

“It fucking hurts,” Chloe said, laughing lightly. 

“You need a break or anything you let me know, okay?” Beca said, wiping away some ink and blood.

“Will do,” Chloe said, clenching her hand as Beca carried on tattooing. 

“How come you picked this design?” Beca asked, eager to keep Chloe’s mind off the pain she was putting her through.

“I just really wanted a way to commemorate the Bellas,” Chloe said. “They’ve been my family for like the last four years. They gave me confidence and - ah fuck - and a support system. That last line really hurt.” Chloe laughed, feeling tears prick her eyes.

“I know, I’m sorry,” Beca said. “We’re making progress though.”

“Good,” Chloe said. “What’s been your most painful tattoo?”

“My ribs for sure,” Beca said. “I had some big pieces planned for them but after I got some lyrics tattooed there I totally changed those plans. So if it makes you feel better, I think you’re metal as fuck right now.”

Chloe laughed again. “That does make me feel better.”

“Your next tattoo is gonna be way easier now,” Beca said. 

“My next one?”

“Yeah you’re gonna get the bug, trust me,” Beca said, wiping away some more ink and blood. “It hurts like a bitch but I kinda like it.”

Whatever Chloe had planned on saying disappeared as a string of expletives flew out of her mouth.

“Damn I did not expect that from you,” Beca said laughing. She could see Chloe gripping the side of chair. “You doing okay?”

“Mhm,” Chloe replied, jaw clenched.

“No you’re not,” Beca said, stopping her machine. “We’re taking a break.”

“Thank you,” Chloe said, letting out a slow breath. 

“Stay where you are, I’ll get you some water,” Beca said. She pulled off her gloves and dropped them in the trash. “If you wanna sit up wait until I’m back, okay?”

“I’m good down here,” Chloe said.

Beca left and grabbed a bottle of water out of the fridge and a straw. She stretched her back out before heading back in.

“You still with me?” Beca asked.

“Sure am,” Chloe said.

Beca pulled her chair around so she was sat by Chloe’s head, and passed her the bottle and the straw. 

“Your bedside manner is excellent,” Chloe said, smiling as she took a drink.

“I just don’t want anyone having a bad experience in my shop,” Beca said. “Plus if you passed out I’m way too tiny to lift anyone off the ground. You ready to finish this bitch?”

“Yeah,” Chloe said, drinking some more and then putting the bottle down.

“Awesome,” Beca said. She pulled on a new pair of gloves, pulled her chair back up to Chloe’s side, and started her machine back up. “We’re almost done with the line work now. Then it’s just some shading and some colour.”

“Cool,” Chloe said, thinking it still sounded like a lot to do. “So have you got any tattoos you regret?”

“Uh, not really. I mean I have some kinda shitty tattoos, but I think even bad tattoos tell a story,” Beca said. “I do have an ex-girlfriend’s name hidden under a cover-up though. That’s why I’ll always try and dissuade a client from getting their partner’s name on them.”

Chloe laughed. “Yeah I think that’s good advice. Is there anything you’ll just refuse to tattoo?”

“Oh yeah,” Beca said. “I won’t do any Nazi shit, or any other racist stuff. Nothing homophobic or anything like that. Like it’s just a straight up no, and once I know they want something like that I won’t tattoo anything else on them either.”

“That’s awesome,” Chloe said.

“Yeah, I don’t want bigot dollars,” Beca said. She stopped tattooing and wiped down the ink and blood again. “Okay the outline is done.”

“Thank god,” Chloe said, letting out a breath of relief. 

“You’re doing great,” Beca said. “Not much longer, I promise.”

As Beca carried on the tattoo, they carried on talking, each learning a little more about each other. 

Chloe learned that Beca also made music, and spent a few evenings a week DJing.

Beca learned that Chloe volunteered at an animal shelter, gaining experience for when she went to veterinary school in the fall.

After hours of tattooing, Chloe was finally done.

Beca helped her up, and Chloe admired her new tattoo in the mirror.

“Beca, it’s so awesome,” Chloe said, grinning. “I love it.”

“I’m really glad,” Beca said. “Can I take a quick pick for the Instagram before I get you wrapped up?”

“Yeah, of course,” Chloe said.

Beca took a few pictures and then cleaned and wrapped Chloe’s new tattoo, before handing her a sheet of paper on aftercare.

“Please take care of it. No scratching, no picking, no getting it dirty,” Beca said. “Follow these instructions and you’re gonna have a beautiful, nicely healed, tattoo in about a month.”

“Thank you so much, Beca. It’s exactly what I wanted, it’s perfect,” Chloe said.

“You are very welcome,” Beca said. “You sat like a champ. I’ve had grown men cry in my chair getting their ribs done, you did great.”

“So, um, what’s the deal on drinking now?” Chloe asked.

Beca laughed. “Give it 48 hours at least. This sounds gross but you’re gonna be bleeding and… oozing for the next couple of days, you don’t really want to thin your blood.”

“I can drink by Saturday then?” 

“Sure,” Beca said. “You got big plans?”

“No, I was just kinda hoping I could go on a date with this cute girl on Saturday,” Chloe said. Having survived her tattoo, she was suddenly feeling invincible.

“Sounds like a lucky girl,” Beca said. 

“Beca, would you like to come for a drink with me on Saturday?”

Beca couldn’t stop the grin that spread over her face. “I see. I’m the lucky girl?”

“You can be.”

“Sure,” Beca said. “It isn’t often I get asked out by clients after I put them through three hours of pain. Let’s do this.”

[ayellowcurtain]

Could you do something sweet and soft where lucas had a bad day and eliott wants to spoil him so he makes him a nice romantic dinner?

Lucas tries to read the same sentence for the fourth or fifth time, his eyes always wandering to his left, the locked bedroom door. He looks around at the messy floor that he can barely see, mostly covered with all his and Eliott’s dirty clothes. He needs a break and he can't leave so he stands on the bed and jumps down, grabbing all the dirty clothes, pulling the basket from inside their closet, putting all their clothes inside to take to the laundry once he's free.

It's been over an hour and Eliott knows Lucas is not patient. Locking him inside one small room can only make him even less patient. But it's a fuzzy, feel-good type of anxiety this time.

It's not like Eliott locked him inside to have a fight later. He's planning something and if Lucas knows his boyfriend even a little bit, it's probably something big and extreme and so romantic and cheesy. And Lucas will love every second of it because Eliott is the one who made it.

Lucas laughs at himself for being so disgustingly in love after years of dating, the feeling exactly the same as it was when they met for the first time. It's easier now with no Chlóe or Lucille in the middle.

After cleaning up the floor, Lucas looks around, he makes their bed - doesn't change the sheets because it might need an actual change later, hopefully - but makes their bed all pretty and comfortable, even caring enough to put the extra pillows they keep inside the closet on top of their normal ones to make it look like they're in a fancy hotel.

Eliott left all his sketchbooks open in the small table they have set up in front of the bed, right under the window. It was a nightmare when they bought the table but Lucas thought it would be better to have a proper place for Eliott to draw whenever he wakes up a little too early and wants to keep himself busy.

He can't lie, Lucas loves when he wakes up to find a shirtless Eliott sitting on his chair, his pale skin still marked with wrinkles of their mattress and pillows. Eliott will always sense when he's waking up and he'll always look back over his shoulder and smile at Lucas. And Lucas will always ask him to come back to bed just for a quick good morning kiss before Lucas can leave him alone with his sketches while Lucas gets up to make them some breakfast.

Lucas closes the sketchbooks carefully and puts them in a pile on the windowsill, putting the pens and pencils inside the vintage cup Eliott bought over a year ago to organize his day-to-day favorite pencils. He cleans the table and puts the sketchbooks back in the middle.

He looks at the door again and whines, leaning against it to see if he can hear anything coming from the outside world.

“Eli?” He asks, almost shouts to make sure he's heard wherever Eliott is in the apartment.

“Yes?” Eliott answers after a second and Lucas rolls his eyes, feeling the smile in his voice. Lucas wants to punch him while kissing his whole face.

“Let me out…” He tries to use his softest voice and not laugh because he's the only one in the room, extremely aware of how stupid he sounds. Eliott would think it's cute but when he's alone, Lucas feels so dumb doing it.

“Wait a little more. Five more minutes. Ten if I run late.” Lucas carefully turns the door knob but it's still locked but he can still see the shadow under the door and by the way he can clearly hear Eliott this time, he's sure his boyfriend is just on the other side of the door.

“Five minutes it's a lot.”

“You should be studying. This is supposed to be a little something just to make you relax. So go study, Lucas!”

Lucas grunts, resting his forehead against the door before turning himself around to go back to his books still open on his pillow.

“Five minutes, Eliott! I'll put a timer on you.”

“Yes, sir!”

Lucas waits until the shadow under the door is gone and he sits down, trying to go back to that one line he was struggling with before. He has to finish this homework in the next five minutes too because there's no way he'll find the will to go back to it later or before tomorrow's class. Yann will kill him if he asks again to use his homework as a guide because he's done that a little too much. Yann keeps asking when their honeymoon phase will be over.

When Lucas puts all his mind to work in his books and before he can feel anxious again, he hears the door being unlocked and Eliott's head appears inside with a coy smile on his perfect lips.

“You ready?”

“Fuck yes!” Lucas slams his book closed and jumps to the floor again, waiting for Eliott to step back and open the door so he can go.

“I hope you like it, baby. It's just a little something.”

Lucas smiles, pressing his lips against Eliott's, smiling against his lips, “I'm sure it's something so far from little. Come on, let me out!”

He whines and pushes Eliott back and he finally opens the door completely. The very yellow hue is the first thing he notices, unable to unseen it because everything is so warm and yellow it feels like they're inside one of those pompous movies Eliott loves so much.

Lucas walks down the hall and notices the fairy lights all wrapped around their side lamps on the living room, going over their books on the shelf on top of their fireplace that doesn't work well, over their couch and wrapping every bowl on their island, a bunch of japanese food Eliott must have ordered for them. There are some candles on the coffee table and on the island and kitchen counter too.

It's not a special date, Lucas confirmed that over and over again on his calendar while he was waiting and it makes all of this extra special. Eliott didn't have to do all of this. The curtains are closed and there's a bouquet on the couch with a card in between the flowers.

“I was thinking about the days that I spent in the flat with you and I briefly remembered that you bought me flowers once and I never returned the favor or thanked you for those, so…”

“You didn't have to…” Lucas whispers as he feels Eliott hugging him from behind, his chin on Lucas’ shoulder.

“I wanted to. Thank you, my love, for the flowers. Sorry for being an asshole.”

“You're lucky you're an asshole and a cutie in the same ratio.” Lucas smiles and Eliott kisses his cheek over and over again.

“Lucky me.”

“Lucky us.” Lucas moves his head to the side so he can see Eliott better, “Thank you for tonight.”

“I hope you're hungry. Hopefully we can watch a movie after dinner.” Eliott lifts his eyebrows and Lucas imitates him, nodding his head while brushing their lips together again.

“We can definitely watch a movie after dinner.”

[cilant-lis]

Hi! I really liked your recent wardrobe study and all the details you put into your inquisitor's design. How did you get around to putting it together and what inspired you? (No pressure to answer if you don't want to ^^)

thank you so much :') i'm beyond happy there are people out there who enjoy my art

so! this is going to be kind of long so i'm putting it under a read more

i'm hardly qualified to give any ~professional~ advice, but i will try my best to outline my process.

most of the outfits from taremis's wardrobe study were already designed in my sketchbook, and i just wanted to put them together and refine the details. i also made a pinterest board with silhouettes, colours, patterns, fabrics, jewellery etc. as inspiration (i don't feel comfortable sharing it because it has some art in it that was uncredited and i wasn't able to find the original artist)

first i sketched out little thumbnails of each outfit, very rough, just to get the general silhouette of each outfit. at this stage i was thinking about the 'vibe' of the character, so in taremis's case, i wanted his clothes to be flashy, but not over the top. he likes jewellery and flowing fabrics and embroidery so i went with these elements. i also decided on common elements that would tie the entire thing together for example: silhouette: loose puffy sleeves, tall boots, wide belts and low necklines, detail: plant motifs, floral embroidery and intricate jewellery (which you can barely see because i made the drawing too small lmao)

i also like including repeating elements in the design to make it more realistic. for example, taremis wears the inquisition brooch he got in haven throughout multiple outfits, or he wears the same boots in a couple of the outfits, or his jade pendant necklace he always wears

then i got to refining the colour palette. i chose the main 3 colours (green, brown, gold) and a few minor colours for details (teal, darker brown, red, light blue, depending on the outfit) i usually associate my characters with a particular colour so this was not hard for me (taremis=green, alvea=blue, hawke=red) i also used colours to signify the change in the character, that's why during trespasser taremis wears very dark colours and swaps his usual gold to silver and the darker colours remain as he recovers, but the flashiness is back too

in the final stage i got to the finer details, my favourite part. i designed the embroidery and patterns on fabrics separately before putting them on the design base. i also came up with tiny details, like the bandage around the anchor as it starts to spread or the changing eye colour. then i clean up the flat colours, shade and it's ready to go!

as for inspiration, i was inspired by 19th century evening wear, 15th century male court fashion, the in-game dalish clothing, ancient roman jewellery, art noveau jewellery and slavic embroidery (serbian, croatian and ukrainian in particular)

[wowweeharrystyles]

Part 1 | Kindness & The Perfect Fit | 9.2k words

‘Sequins & Zippers’ Summary: An internship with Harry Lambert transformed into a job of a lifetime - Aurora Del Gatto finds herself touring the world with the one & only Harry Styles as his ‘Head of Wardrobe.’ Aurora is nothing but nerves & excitement as she packs her bags & almost 100 custom designer suits that belong to an unbelievably kind rockstar. She never thought she’d fall in love on top of it all.

A/N: So here’s part 1 of Sequins & Zippers. A MASSIVE shoutout to @niallhoranapologist​. If it weren’t for Gwen I probably wouldn’t have continued to work on this story. Thanks for always helping me brainstorm ideas, listen to me talk about these fictional characters all the time & for continuously supporting my writing. you da best. 

“Ugg, this is useless,” Aurora groans as she throws the t shirt she had in hand across the room. Aurora has been attempting to pack her suitcase for hours now. “How the hell am I supposed to pack 4 months worth of clothes in a single suitcase?” she whispers in defeat to herself.

“Rory? Everything alright?” Aurora’s mother calls from the other room. Rory is the nickname her mom gave her when she was only a baby. Her mother walks into her room and sees the frustrated look on her daughter’s face. 

“25 countries? The weather is gonna be different in every freaking country,” Rory lets out a frustrated sigh, falling onto her bed. “I can barely pack properly for a weekend trip.” 

“Hey, you’re thinking too hard and overwhelming yourself,” her mother says softly as she sits on the bed next to her. She places a hand on her shoulder, “Let me help. We’ll figure it out.” 

Aurora is currently trying to pack for her new job. After the craziest year she’s ever had, packed with graduating college, moving to London to work with one of the most well-known stylists in the fashion industry and having the time of her life doing what she loves most, she was offered a career-altering job for the next 4 months. Never did Aurora think she would be sitting in her room back home in a small suburb of New York surrounded by cardboard boxes labeled with things like: “NYC Apartment - kitchen,” “London - winter clothes,” “School things,” “London Flat - bedding,” “I have no idea, from london.” Organized Chaos explained her life best right now. 

“Rory, sweetie, where’s your list?” her mother asks, looking around to locate the papers she’s been carrying around for the past week that’s covered in scribbled notes, lists upon lists and small sketches here and there. “Should’ve really been keeping that stuff in a journal or something.” She finds the papers scattered on Aurora’s desk and a few laid on top of boxes. “Probably wouldn’t be so overwhelmed if you could be a little bit more organized,” her mother sighs gathering the papers into a stack, tapping the bottom edges on the desk to line them up. “You’re normally so much more organized,” her mother continues before pressing a kiss to Aurora’s hair. 

“It’s a lot, Mom. I don’t know where to start.” She stands up from her bed and grabs her phone as it dings, indicating she’s received an email. “Finally!” she exclaims with a sigh of relief. “Harry’s just sent me my official itinerary and all of my flight info.”

“Harry Styles himself emailed you your travel plans?” her mother asks in disbelief. 

“No, mom, Lambert. Harry Lambert, my boss.”

“Oh yeah, of course,” she laughs lightly, “How many mix ups has there been with that name?” 

Aurora’s new job is ‘Head of Wardrobe’ for Harry Styles’ Arena World Tour. In all honesty, she has no idea how she got here. Well she does, but it still doesn’t feel real. Lambert’s original hire for the tour ended up needing to stay in London to help him with his styling work there and she was next in line, but she still isn’t too sure how she got this lucky. The past year happened so fast and it was one opportunity after another that landed her here. She’s barely had a moment to breathe after the holidays and some small jobs here and there to keep her busy. Last January, just over a year ago, Aurora traveled to London for a six week menswear design course at Central Saint Martins for some extra credits before her final semester of college. During this course, she was lucky enough to met Harry Lambert. After he saw her collection of work from the past few years, what her thesis plans were and what she had been working on during the CSM course he kept her information on file for the future. When Aurora left london at the end of the course she had no idea if she would ever hear from Harry Lambert again, but around mid march she received an email from him about an internship position he needed to fill and thought she would be perfect for. Starting the internship in NYC before she even graduated, May was a whirlwind and was the perfect indication on how the rest of her year would be. She moved to London in June and was put to work without a second to spare. 

“Okay, so here’s what we’re gonna do,” Aurora’s mother starts before launching into a detailed plan on how they’re both gonna tackle packing up Aurora’s life for the next 4 months on the road, traveling. They’ve got barely 3 days until her flight leaves for London.

Nearly 4 hours later and they’ve organized Aurora’s room. Unpacking the appropriate boxes, written a new packing list, and they’ve also written a shopping list. They’ve got organized piles surrounding them. Again, Organized Chaos best describes Aurora’s life, always. 

“Oh, what about that long pleated skirt you made last year? The emerald green one? You definitely need to take that.” Aurora’s eyes lit up at the idea. She loved that skirt, it was versatile enough that she could pair with heels or sneakers. Versatile pieces were key to packing she found out quickly. Her mom reaches into her closet and searches for it. “Probably at the back, haven’t worn it in awhile,” she motions towards her closet while sorting through the box of her bags, making decisions on which ones she’ll need with her. 

“Oh gosh, Rory, look what I found,” her mom emerges from the closet with a handful of rolled up posters. 

Aurora goes bright red knowing exactly what is on those posters. “Oh no. I kept those?” her mom sets them down on the floor but keeps one to unroll. Once the tape is off and her mom has got it flat, she turns it around to face Aurora. It’s a large poster of One Direction from a TigerBeat magazine. Aurora drops her face into her hands. 

“Remember when you couldn’t see a bit of the wall cause of these posters? If I remember right, you liked that blonde one yeah?” her mom laughs, rolling the poster back up. “Maybe you should take one with you and have Harry sign it? He’d get a kick out of it, I’m sure.” 

“Mom!” Aurora whines. “This is my job, my career. I have to be nothing but professional.” 

“I’m sure he wouldn’t mind a joke or two. Gotta have fun still and honestly, he’d probably think it’s cute.” 

“Mom, it’s embarrassing and I’m gonna be working with him and his team for the next 4 months.” Her mother can see the panic on her face. “I cannot just show up with a One Direction poster.” 

“Ror, I’m just having a bit of fun with you. You need to relax or you’ll just be frustrated and stressed the entire time.” She sets the posters aside and goes to join Aurora on the floor. Placing a hand on her cheek, “Baby girl, my baby girl, promise me you’ll have some fun? This is a chance of a lifetime and I know you’ll work your butt off and do your job perfectly, but you need to enjoy it too. Okay?” Aurora nods slowly. She knows her mother is right, she always is. 

“Okay,” she says softly giving her mom a weary smile. 

“You’ll be okay, I know you will,” her mom says before leaning in and hugging her daughter. “I’m so proud of you.”

Aurora and her mother continue bustling around her room until the sun sets. By the time there is no daylight left there are 2 large suitcases completely full, all organized and packed with Aurora’s belongings. They spend the next hour packing up Aurora’s rolling caboodle. The large, rollable, sturdy set of drawers and compartments is from Aurora’s days as a competition dancer. It used to carry her stage makeup, extra pairs of tights, accessories and an emergency sewing kit. It was always covered in glitter and there were bobby pins in every nook and cranny, a few stray sets of false eyelashes too. But for the past 4 years, she’s used it for all things sewing and design. She never went to class or the design studio without it. Aurora and her mom empty the drawers and reorganize the contents. They make another list of things they need to pick up at the local sewing store the next day. Aurora pulls out her old sketchbooks and sets them to the side and adds a new clean book to the now empty drawer along with her cases of Micron pens, drawing pencils and prisma coloured pencils. 

Aurora continues to organize each little compartment as her mother prints out small labels and adds them to the section dividers. Aurora loves to be overly organized and have everything in its place. It keeps her calm and stops her from getting overwhelmed in stressful situations. There’s nothing she hates more than being backstage at a fashion show and needing a simple needle and thread to fix a small seam quickly and having to dig through the drawers to find what she needs. Backstage life, anywhere, fashion shows, dance competitions, or even a world tour, can be stressful if you’re not prepared properly. 

“Oh, keep the box of sequins and swarovski crystals in there. I actually might need them.” Aurora finishes the sentence with a giggle as she’s setting her scissors in their respective home. 

“Really?” her mom laughs too. 

“Yeah, some of the looks for this tour are actually pretty sparkly. You never would’ve thought. I actually might have to bedazzle a few things on the road.” 

“You’re home!” her mother sing-songs. They both laugh again thinking about the countless hours they spent bedazzling dance costumes with 100’s of crystals. 

After saying goodbye to her parents through a continuous flow of tears, Aurora got on an 8 hour flight. She kept herself busy on the flight to occupy her mind and stop her from overthinking or panicking about the next 4 months ahead of her. She landed in London on the 3rd of March, just a few days till she’d be back at this exact airport with the same luggage plus a few crates labeled ‘Wardrobe’ that she’d also have to care for. She made her way to the Air B’N’B that had been set up for her for the next few days and headed straight to bed. One thing Aurora, jokingly, prides herself on is the ability to sleep anywhere at anytime. 

When the morning rolls around and her alarm wakes her, she’s preparing herself a cup of coffee when her phone rings. She notices Lambert’s ID on the screen. She answers and they exchange good mornings before he asks her about her travels from the day before. 

“Okay, so, I’m sending a car to where you’re staying in about an hour to bring you to the arena.”

“Arena? I thought we were meeting at your studio?” 

“Oh no, change of plans, sorry should have mentioned that in an email. Harry is in full rehearsal mode and everything for the tour is at the mock stage space at Wembley Arena. They’ve just finished the final tech rehearsals and Harry will be there today to start running the show,” Lambert continues. The new knowledge of Harry Styles being there on her first day makes Aurora jittery, small butterflies erupting in her stomach. She’s met Harry before. They’re friendly, but she was only just Lambert’s shadow anytime they were together. He was sweet and kind, just as everyone always says, but she was still a tad nervous. She will be with him almost everyday, on her own, without Lambert there to be a buffer. Aurora tended to be a nervous person, especially if she doesn’t know someone all that well. She can keep her nerves at bay and save a proper panic for after the situation ends most times, which is the best she can do right now. It’s something she’s working on. It’s what she hates most about herself, not being able to keep her nerves in check. 

“Oh yeah, makes sense,” Aurora responds, surprisingly with no jitters evident in her voice. 

“Great, I can have the run of show lookbook all put together for you when you arrive and we’ll go through it and make notes.” “Do you mind if I actually set it up when I get there? I would feel much better and more settled doing it myself as we do a walkthrough of the wardrobe.” 

“Of course, Aurora, whatever you think will work best for you.” 

She thanks him and they end the phone call after confirming the time and car that will be picking her up. She finishes off her coffee and heads to the living room where she left her suitcases last night. One of the large suitcases was lying on the ground, opened, exactly where Aurora left it last night. She ruffles through the contents of her suitcase, moving around different packing cubes until she finds the cube that contains her favourite black jeans. She locates a creme hooded knit sweater and some clean undergarments. She pops into the shower and continues to bustle around the small flat getting ready. At some point she turns on some music to distract her mind. There’s an airy feeling in the flat, the sun shining in london for a change and it calms Aurora down despite the nerves running through her veins. Aurora checks her watch, 10 minutes until her car is due to pick her up. She slides on her all white leather court sneakers and laces them up, tucking in the excess laces for a clean finish. She grabs her black bomber jacket and slips her arms in, then pulls out the hood from her sweater so it lays comfortably on the outside of the jacket’s collar. She takes a quick look in the full body mirror that leans up against the white brick wall across from the large, unmade bed. She’s reminded by the reflection in her mirror to text her mother and thank her for convincing her to pack her favourite clothes instead of all her fancy stuff. She looks put together but is still extremely comfortable, prepared for anything today has to offer her. 

There’s a short honk from the street in front of the building. Aurora grabs her rolling caboodle and her purse before rushing out the door to meet the driver. 

20 minutes later she finds herself stepping out of the car and thanking the driver for holding the door. He grabs her caboodle from the trunk and hands it to Aurora and wishing her well and to have a nice day. Harry Lambert greets her at the door giving her a big hug and exclaiming about how excited he is to have her there. He takes her an office where the tour manager, Michael is set up. The office is busy with several people working at desks on laptops and people taking phone calls. Lambert introduces Aurora to the team and gets her set up with her tour pass and all the nitty gritty stuff. Within half an hour she’s all set for tour and has her new lanyard tied to her on a belt loop. They walk through the never ending halls plastered with signs that state “Treat People With Kindness” and Aurora smiles everytime she sees another. Lambert points out different places, important notes posted on bulletin boards and casually introduces her to people as they quickly pass. 

Everyone seems to be on a mission, darting in and out of rooms and talking on headsets. It’s a busy atmosphere but nobody seems stressed or upset. Aurora appreciates the hustle that everyone seems to have. There’s smiles and high fives passed between crew members and coffees getting pass along. Lambert points out where Harry’ band’s dressing room is and then Harry’s as well. Harry’s reads “Hershel” on the sign that sticks out from the wall. 

“Hershel?” Lambert chuckles when he sees the confused look on her face. 

“Yeah, Jeff, his manager, you’ve met him, calls him Hershel 95% of the time.” She nods along with a smile. After making their way through a few more halls they reach a larger dressing room. “Okay, so here’s our space for the week.” Aurora rolls her caboodle and sets it against the wall near the door for now and sets her purse down on an empty space on the counter that lines one of the shorter walls. On the wall directly across from the doorway there are 3 large black cases that stand about 6 feet tall, opened and filled with garment bags. 

“Is everything here already?” Aurora makes her way towards the case farthest left. 

“Hopefully!” Lambert picks up a large binder that’s sitting on the table across from a small leather couch. “That’s where we’re starting. Checking through each night’s look and making sure it’s all here.” She takes the binder that Lambert has handed her and opens it up to the first page.” 

“Oh wow. I almost forgot how beautiful these suits are.” Towards the end of her internship in London, Lambert let her help him pick some options for the tour. She thumbs through the book quickly to get a glimpse of the beautiful designer suits. She notices quite a few of her favourites made the cut. The 2 of them sit down and devise a plan to best get through this large task of double checking the 60 looks in front of them. They’re about ¾ the way through around 1pm when they mutually decide to take a break and grab some lunch before they power through the rest of the wardrobe. After meeting more members of the crew and grabbing another cup of coffee, Lambert and Aurora make their way back to their dressing room. 

“Hey, let’s go take a look at the stage,” Lambert said as he made a sharp turn in the opposite direction of the room they’ve been working in. “I haven’t seen the final setup yet.” 

“Oh, I’d love that!” Aurora’s face lights up at the idea. They enter from the back of the stage. The stage itself is fully constructed but the light trees are currently hanging low to the ground and crew members are working carefully to change the direction, colour or size of each bulb. Lambert excuses himself as he takes a call, telling Aurora he’ll meet her back in the dressing room in 15 minutes. Aurora continues the theme from today and introduces herself to the stage crew. “Mind if I check out the stage?” she asks Jack, one of the crew members who introduced himself as the Stage Manager. 

“Go ahead, just keep an eye out, we haven’t cleaned up much.” She nods and smiles while walking up the metal steps at the side of the stage. She takes careful steps as she steps to center stage. She looks out into the empty arena. The lights are low and the noise from the powertools is echoing through the arena. 

Though there isn’t any music, the stage lights aren’t shining, and she isn’t in one of her rhinestoned costumes, she still feels at home standing center stage. The nerves she’s been holding on to all morning wash away as she takes a deep breath. Her eyes flutter shut for a moment and she remembers the last time she performed on a stage like this one. It was her senior year of high school at nationals in New York City. It was her farewell to her dance career. A smile starts to grow on her face, the nerves from this morning, the the whole trip to get here, completely washed away now. 

“Oi!” a voice booms through the air, making Aurora jump and she searches for where it came from. She turns around, her hair following her as she turns. Her hair continues to follow her movement, falling in front of her face a bit but she can still make out the face the voice comes from. “What’re you doing on my stage?” She’s met with a smiley, broad shouldered Harry Styles. He’s got his hands in the pockets of the tartan trousers he’s wearing. The strong feeling of embarrassment brings heat to her cheeks as she looks down at the black and white vans he’s sporting. 

“Oh gosh, I’m sorry, I-,” she starts rambling apologies. She watches his vans take a few steps closer to her. Aurora’s fumbling with her hands, a nervous tick of hers. “-I was told, told, I could, could, check out the stage,” she’s stuttering over her words and pointing in the direction of Jack. She finally stops talking when she meets Harry’s eyes. He’s still beaming and her stomach drops at the fact that he’s enjoying this situation. His confidence paints an incredible stark difference from her mumbling nervousness. Her brain is a bit fuzzy right now but that doesn’t stop her from noticing the way his eyes sparkle. 

“I’m only joking, love” he says as he pulls his hands out of his pockets with a chuckle. “The stage suits you.” 

“I’m sorry,” Aurora offers again. “I’m-” She’s reaching her hand out when he cuts off her introduction.

“Love, we’ve met. How could I forget you, Aurora.” She’s startled a bit when her name comes out of his mouth. “Ya fixed the hole in my pink jacket, remember?” He’s stepping closer to her and before she’s able to process what’s happening he’s wrapped his arms around her torso, his tattooed arm rubbing her back briefly before pulling away. 

A small laugh leaves her mouth, “I remember, didn’t think you would is all.” Her voice is soft and trails off towards the end of her sentence. 

“Not got much a reputation then if I’ve got people that work with me thinking I’ll forget them.” He lets out a soft chuckle and his smile elicits a dimple on his cheek. 

“No, no, you’ve got a much better reputation than that, promise. You must meet a lot of people day to day is all.” Aurora is calming down, now, realizing that there is no reason for her to be so nervous around him. She’s interacted with him before, this shouldn’t be so jarring to her. Though this time is different. She wouldn’t be working behind Lambert or running errands. She’ll be with Harry just about everyday and she terrified she’ll never be comfortable, always anxiety ridden. Although his life is much different from hers, she’ll be getting a real taste of it and they’re close in age. They’re bound to find something in common. Right?. There’s a bit of silence before Aurora speaks up. “Well, your suits aren’t gonna organize themselves. I better go find Lambert.”

“Yes, of course. Don’t let me stop you from your work.” Aurora nods. She excuses herself as she makes a comment about how she thinks the stage looks great so far. Just after she’s walked past him she feels him grab her hand. “I’m excited to have ya on tour with us, love. Happy to have you making sure I sparkle just right on this stage.” He’s let go of her hand and presents his arms out to the sides as he mentions the stage. 

She’s beaming back at him. “Packed extra rhinestones just for you.” She’s almost skipping down the stairs after that. A weight of relief falling from her shoulders in a light sigh.  First, interaction with Harry? Check. She finds her way back to the room she’d been working in all morning. She settles down on the couch again, pulling the large binder into her lap. She jots down a few notes and adds to the ever growing list of things that need to be done. She stands up and walks over to one of the open wardrobe cases. She’s sliding hangers across the rack before she gets to the next look. Aurora takes the hanger off the rack. The sleek black hanger is labeled Yves Saint Laurent and an emerald green sequined button down shirt hangs off of it. There’s a pair of black straight leg trousers folded over the hanger as well. Aurora carries the ensemble across the room and hangs it on one of the vanity bulbs that sticks out from the light bulb framed mirror. She fixes the collar so it’s sitting straight. She takes a step back with one hand on her hip and another on her chin. 

“What’re you thinking?” Lambert asks when he sees Aurora’s furrowed brow. She hums, still processing her thoughts. 

“You know Michael Jackson’s black sequin jacket? The one he wore when he did the moonwalk for the first time?” He nods, following along. “Think we could play with that idea. What if Harry wore this open, with the Calvin tank?” In the small section of a wardrobe they’ve already gone through is a slew of clothing articles that will be used for multiple shows. The Calvin tank she’s referencing is one that will be, in Aurora’s opinion, an iconic, staple for the entire tour. It’s a simple white ribbed tank but on the left side, “Treat People With Kindness” is embroidered in black. “It’d be closer to Michael’s ‘Billie Jean’ performance in Munich that same year, but it’s the iconic sequin jacket that will sell it.”  

“You really know your stuff huh?” Lambert chuckles, impressed by her knowledge and the way her brain works. Lambert walks away and grabs the tank from the rack and brings it back to Aurora. 

A smile creeps onto Aurora’s face. “My mom loves Michael Jackson. Loves him like everyone loves Harry. I grew up dancing around the house to his music.” She takes the tank from Lambert after he slides it off the hanger. She’s quick to unbutton the YSL shirt in excitement but does it as carefully as possible. She hangs the tank under the shirt, turning it into a overshirt now. The smile on her face is growing. She’s in her element, doing exactly what she’s always wanted to do. Lambert places a hand on her shoulder and gives it a squeeze. A silent approval. Aurora walks back to the table and writes down their decision for this look in the notebook she’s been working with. They go through a few more suits and make a note that they’ll need an extra white button down from Gucci. Lambert is sending Aurora there sometime this week to pick a few more things up that are getting finished and some extra shoes for Harry as well. Lambert says Harry likes to wear his shoes to dust and that Aurora will have to make sure he doesn’t go on stage with holes in his shoes cause he will, especially his rainbow loafers.  They finish going through the rest of the suits before calling it a day. Lambert fills her in on the next few day’s timeline to prepare her for the week. Aurora leaves the arena feeling like her heart could burst. She couldn’t have imagined a better first day at her new job. Aurora heads to bed early, after she orders a Domino’s Pizza, to rest up for the days ahead and beat the jet lag that’s bound to hit her in the next few days. 

When she gets to Wembley the next morning, Aurora grabs a coffee from craft services and says hello to a few people she recognizes from yesterday. She’s thankful that everyone has a lot to get done and people are jutting off to their own areas to get to work. Aurora would be lying to herself if she didn’t acknowledge that she’s a bit overwhelmed by all of the new faces. She knows faces will become familiar as time goes on but right now she’s content with her coffee and knowing that she’s walking to a room to work on her own for awhile. 

When she finds herself in the familiar green room she sets herself up for the day. Aurora pulls her laptop out of her leather bag and presses play on her current spotify playlist. She likes working alone, but not in silence. After collecting her notebook from yesterday and the envelope of images that Lambert left for her she sits down and starts putting together the final look book for tour. She’s organizing the book by tour dates, making a section for each city. 

“Basel, Switzerland” is written on the top of the 1st page in bold all capital letters. Aurora tapes an image of the black glittered Gucci suit that Harry will wear for the opening night of his world tour. She copies any notes she made about this look from yesterday onto the space underneath the photo. After she’s finished the page for Switzerland she goes to the large cases and pulls the black glittered Gucci suit to the empty rolling rack that she set up yesterday. Each of the traveling cases will need to be organized by date to make traveling and set up easier throughout the tour. She continues this process for the next 2 hours. Once her coffee is empty at the end of the 2 hours she has almost 6 cities complete. Aurora takes her empty coffee cup as a sign for her to take a break. Before leaving the room to get more coffee she checks her phone. There’s a few notifications, emails from lists she keeps forgetting to unsubscribe to and a string of texts from her mother. She laughs at the first text - “I know you’re probably fine, but you’re in a different country and I need to hear your voice to make sure you’re still alive and it’s not some kidnapper texting me back” - then another text about 20 mins after that one reads “I love you, I know you’re busy, but please call me” and the last one delivered just a few minutes ago, “I’m your mother, it’s my job to worry.” Aurora shakes her head and feels a bit guilty because she hasn’t texted her mom as much as she probably should have and before knocking out last night she texted her back apologizing for not calling after her first day and that she was just too exhausted. 

Her mom doesn’t answer and is greeted with an automatic voicemail greeting, “Classic,” she chuckles as she hangs up without leaving a message. She shakes her head, standing in the doorway as she sends off a text saying she’s taking a break and to call her back, adding a “I’m good, everything’s amazing! Just calling to chat” as she always does so her mother doesn’t worry any more than she is. As she finishes the texts she mumbled a bit to herself about how her mother is always worrying but never picks up her dang phone. It isn’t until a familiar voice rings through the hallway that she realises she was mumbling quite clearly. 

“Sorry, everything alright, love?” Harry’s distinct voice travels closer to her as she looks up from her phone to him. She’s made her way into the arena hallway completely now. There’s a small furrow in his brow but a slight grin on his face. 

“Ah yeah, didn’t realise I was talking out loud.” She holds her phone up, “You know mothers, always worrying but never actually answering their phone when you call.” Harry laughs, his shoulders shaking. “She sent me this string of texts about being worried and 2 minutes later doesn’t pick up when I call her.” She sighs before sliding her phone into the pocket of the track jacket she’s got on today. 

“My mum does the same. Always saying we don’t talk enough or that she misses me and when I do get the chance she’ll text me back saying she’s out with friends drinking wine or s’thing like that.” Aurora laughs along with him. When she takes a proper look at him she notices he’s wearing black adidas joggers today with a white t shirt and a black nike jacket. 

“Looks like we both had the same idea when we got ready this morning,” she continues to laugh while gesturing between to two of them. They’re dressed almost identical right down to the white sneakers. Aurora’s got on her favourite black lululemon leggings instead of joggers but her tshirt and track jacket look just the same as Harry’s. Harry takes a good look at what he’s got on and back to Aurora and his eyes begin to crinkle and his nose scrunches up before he’s laughing. The laugh is almost a giggle and Aurora has to hold back from flashing him the most endearing smile. 

“Guess it’s a good thing that my Head of Wardrobe and I match. Must mean I’ve got the right person taking care of my clothing then.” He swings his arm around her shoulder before asking if she’s got a minute to grab a snack. 

“Probably should eat and I definitely need some more coffee,” she replies with a smile and shoves her hands into the pockets of her jacket not knowing what to do with them. There’s something about Harry, it’s that thing that people always talk about, his ease around everyone, the way he makes you feel like you’ve known each other forever. His kind demeanor relaxes Aurora and she’s sure this is how he makes everyone feel. Harry starts to go on about different things that are happening around the arena as they walk to the green room, pointing out different people and what they’re working on. Harry doesn’t know this, but the more Aurora knows about her surroundings and the things people are doing, the more comfortable she feels. Aurora likes knowing what’s going on. She knows it’s got something to do with wanting control over as much as she can but she also knows that there is so much going on that she can’t control anything and she especially knows that it isn’t her job. But knowing is good for her. Just as they turn the corner to the green room her phone rings. She pulls it out of her pocket and “Mother” with a pink heart is flashing on her screen. She shows the phone to Harry and she slides out from under his arm. “Rain check on the snacks?” she offers him before answering the call. She smiles as he shoots her a grin and voices an ‘of course’ before he turns around and goes back the way they had came. She questions his actions for a moment before saying hello to her mother. 

Aurora pulls out her notebook while she’s in the car the next morning to review what she needs to get done today. Written in red, at the top of the page under today’s date is: final fitting with Harry @ 12pm. She’s excited to get some of the newer pieces on him and finally have all the looks together. She’s nervous too. Lambert won’t be there again today or barely at all the rest of the week, her part time buffer ripped away sooner than expected. She knows there’s nothing to be nervous about. It’s just Harry. ‘Just Harry,’ she continues to mumble under her breath. 

“Miss Del Gatto, we’ve arrived,” Steven, her driver, who she’s come accustomed to after the past few rides, announces. Aurora looks out the window and sees the Gucci store front. 

“Thanks, Steven. I’ll only be a few minutes.” She smiles at him before stepping out of the car. She got dressed this morning in slightly more put together outfit that she had on yesterday, knowing she had to stop into a few stores on her way in to pick up some pieces that were still missing. Her black chunky heeled leather boots make a clacking sound as she walks towards the entrance. Before she can even reach for the door, she’s welcomed by a man in an all black suit that is welcoming her into the store. 

“Welcome to Gucci.” His voice is deep but bright and welcoming, she thanks him with a smile. 

Once she’s a few more steps into the door she adjusts the small gold airplane necklace that is sitting on the outside of her black turtleneck before speaking up. “I’m here to pick up some shoes for Harry,” she rattles out. A questioned look appears on the man’s face. “Harry Lambert and Styles.” She clarifies. 

“Aurora Del Gatto, yes?” another woman’s voice speaks up from across the store. 

“Uh, y-yes,” she stammers while turning towards the women. 

“I’m Lauren. Nice to meet you, Aurora. Harry told me to be expecting you this morning.” Aurora shakes Lauren’s hand with a smile. Lauren looks like a seasoned pro, her black suit fits her perfectly and her greying hair is pulled up into an elegant low bun. “Go ahead and make yourself comfortable,” she says motioning towards the plush dark purple couches. “Would you like any water or coffee, dear?” 

“Oh, I’m alright actually, thank you.” 

“I’ll be right back with everything.” Aurora nods in acknowledgement while sitting down on the couch. She slides off the lightweight, long, camel coloured coat she’s wearing and drapes it over the couch next to her. She checks her watch to make sure she’s good on time. She’s got to stop at Calvin Klein as well before heading to arena to prep for Harry’s fitting. It’s just gone on 10am, she’s got plenty of time but still anxious at the thought of arriving just before the fitting, not getting a chance to set up. She’s brought back from her thoughts when Lauren returns with 3 shoe boxes in her arms and a garment bag.

“I think there are only 2 pairs of shoes I’m supposed to be picking up,” Aurora questions, “the rainbow loafers and the Spring 18 leather boots.” Lauren’s face lights up in a smile. 

“Yes, those are both here and there’s a pair of sneakers here for you as well.” Aurora’s face reflects exactly what is going through her mind: surprise, shock, and other emotions she couldn’t put words to. Her jaw has dropped and her eyes are wide. “Harry called last night and wanted us to fit you into some Ace Sneakers for the tour.” 

“Lambert said that?” Aurora is confused, giddy and nervous, always nervous. She doesn’t even know how to accept a gift like this. She’d also be lying if she hadn’t been looking at these sneakers forever. 

“No, dear, Harry Styles.” Aurora is beyond caught off guard at this point. 

“I’m sorry, I think there must be a mistake. There’s no reason for Harry to be giving me anything.”

“He specifically called these in for you. I don’t know the details, he just wanted to make sure you walked out with the perfect fit.” She set 2 of the boxes down on a glass table and brought over the 3rd box. “I grabbed the 7.5, I’m normally pretty good at guessing.” 

“Well, you would be right.” Aurora laughs nervously. She slides off her boots in order to avoid the overwhelming thoughts in her head. She’s afraid if she doesn’t keep moving she might go into shock. She’s trying on the sneakers before she speaks up again, “Uhm,” Aurora starts to speak, “Does Harry, uh, do this often? I-I mean, uh call in for gifts?” 

“I wouldn’t say often, but I’ve fulfilled a few of his gifting requests over the past few years. Just a handful though. There really hasn’t been many, if I’m honest.” 

Aurora smiles to herself. She’s still confused about it all but still that same familiar feeling rushes through her when she’s reminded of Harry’s incredible kind demeanor. And before she knew it, she's walking out of Gucci with a smile on her face, a tingle in her fingers, a garment bag and not 2 but 3 boxes of shoes.

She’s setting up one last suit on the tall silver rolling rack before she checks her watch. 11:59. She made great time getting to Wembley after grabbing the pink plaid jacket and custom boots from Calvin Klein. There’s a light knock on the slightly ajar door seconds later. 

“‘Ello, love,” Harry’s voice booms through the small, concrete walled room. Aurora turns towards the door. “All ready!” He exclaims as he makes his way towards her. 

“Hi Harry,” Aurora responds before Harry has a hand at her waist and is placing a light kiss on the top of her cheek. 

“How’s your morning been?” He’s now made his way to the rolling rack she had just filled. 

“Good,” she wants to ask him about the shoes but she doesn’t know how to bring it up. “I did uh- I, I-”

“Can I try this one on?” Harry interrupts, suddenly distracted by the garments he hasn’t seen yet. She’s grabbing her book from the table across the room when she hears the sound of hangers hitting the floor. “Oooff,” there’s a chuckle that follows. “That one’s a bit slippery.” 

“Oh gosh, yeah I need to add some hanger loops to that one,” Aurora sets her book down and rushes over to pick up the fallen garments and hangers. Harry utters a few sorry’s before stepping away. She swears she hears him mumble about being in the way. Once she’s got the fallen garments gathered on the crook of her arm, she grabs a hanger adorn in the pink plaid Calvin suit. “That’s what you get for being so nosy,” she quips at him and hands him the suit. His jaw drops slightly but before he can say a thing Aurora’s speaking again, “Try this one on first, please.” Aurora lingers on the please and shoots him a sweet smile. “There’s a small room through there you can change in.” She turns around after motioning towards the door and sees that Harry already has his trousers down to his ankles. “Orrrr you can change right there.” 

“Oh, don’t wanna make you uncomfortable, darling,” he responds as you quickly turn away, sliding the plaid trousers all the way up and buttoning them just as fast.

“Oh no, you’re fine, don’t wanna be rude is all.” Aurora is flipping through her book finding the section for Stockholm. “The black ribbed tank was on the hanger with the jacket, yeah?” She asks as she skims over the page in front of her. He hums back letting her know it’s there. Aurora lifts up her coffee cup from earlier this morning to her lips, turning around to find Harry fully dressed in the Calvin Klein suit she picked up this morning. She frowns realising there’s no coffee left in her cup. 

“What?” Harry asks, his brows knitted together in concern after seeing the frown on her face. “Does it look that bad?” He’s messing with the way he’s tucked the shirt into the waistband of the trousers. 

Aurora giggles at his frantic hands. “Harry, nothing could look bad on you.” She shakes the empty cup in front of him. “I’m out of coffee.” 

“Well, that frown was badly timed. I’ve got a brand new suit on and that’s the first reaction I get?’ 

“Oh you’ll be fine, rockstar. Plenty of ego pumping in the near future,” Aurora quips backs at him as she makes a circle around him. “They did great with this one,” she’s pulling at the shoulders of the jacket so it sits just right on his broad frame. “How do the trousers feel?” She asks as she smooths down the fabric of the sleeves before rounding back to face Harry straight on. 

“The trousers? Yeah they feel good. Fit perfect, I think.” He’s pulled up the bottom of the jacket and is twisting his hips round. “Wha’ d’ya think?” 

“I think Calvin Klein knows exactly what he’s doing,” she says with a smirk. “Okay, that one’s all set, go ahead and put this one on now.” She hands him another pink jacket, this one velvet with embellishments and it has a Gucci tag on it rather than Calvin Klein. She hands him black trousers with a gold trim as well. “You’ll wear this with a button down but just try with the tank. I just need to make sure all the alterations were done properly.” 

“Did you stop at Gucci this morning? Lambert mentioned you were going,” he asks while handing her the plaid suit he just took off. Aurora busies herself with hanging them up. 

“Yeah. Got your loafers and boots. I also-”

“Oh nooooo, Aurora,” Harry’s voice is panicky. 

“Wha-,” is all she gets out before she sees and hears the beads rolling on the floor. “Ahhh I had a feeling that was going to happen. And THIS is why we try things on 100 times. Wouldn’t want you unraveling on stage.” She runs over to her kit that stands in the corner.

“I’m sorry, not sure what I did,” Harry’s face shows worry like he’s done something wrong. 

“Hun, you didn’t do anything, promise. I think it might have been from the alterations.” Aurora is tying a knot in a piece of thread before walking over to him. “I’m just gonna close this strand up while it’s on you and I’ll re embellish it later.” The piece that’s come undone is on the right shoulder. She slides her hand under the jacket to find the back of the spot she needs to fix. Her hand brushes the skin of his shoulder, reminding her he’s only wear the tank underneath and he flinches. “Sorry, my hands are probably cold. This will only take a second.” 

“S’alright, love.” There’s silence while she focuses on the work in front of her. Once she’s finished she carefully slips a small pair of gold scissors underneath the jacket and cuts the thread and needle she had been working with loose, detaching herself from Harry’s shoulder. “That was quick,” Harry says with a tone of surprise and Aurora thinks she can hear a little bit of disappointment as well. Aurora shrugs her shoulders in response. 

“Could you put on the black version of that jacket for me?” Aurora asks as she grabs a spool of black thread. “Think we might have the same problem with that one too.” She slides the needle she’s threaded with black thread onto the cuff of her sweater so she doesn’t lose it. She helps Harry into the black jacket and hangs up the one he just had on. 

“Aannddd there it is,” Harry says with chuckle as a strand of beads comes loose on his right sleeve. Aurora gets to work on the one on his sleeve as 2 more make themselves known on his back. “So you got my boots and loafers this morning? Up to anything else before I came in and ruined all the garments?” Aurora laughs and moves to his back to take care of the broken pieces there. 

“Uhm picked up that Calvin jacket and your custom boots. Let me tell you, those boots are glorious. The glossed leather with the steel tip will look incredible with your suits. ”

“Oh can I see them when we’re done?”

“‘Course you can!” There’s some silence between them again as she concentrates on the job in front of her. She catches a glimpse of the white gucci bags that are sitting by one of the wardrobe cases and it’s like those new sneakers are burning a hole in her head. It clicks in her head now that he’s been directing the conversation this way trying to get it out of her. “Hey Harry,” she’s met with a hum, “can I ask you about something?” She continues to work on the jacket, keeping her hands busy. She’s thankful that the strand she’s working on is on his back so she doesn’t have to make eye contact with him. 

“‘Course, Aurora.” 

“Uhm, at Gucci this morning, they uh, they fitted me for sneakers,” Harry hums in response, “and um, I-I, um, that was very kind of you.” She’s stuttering through her words. It wasn’t until now that she got a tinge of nervousness. “Y-you didn’t need to do that. Really.” 

“Aurora, I wanted to. And I thought you deserved some new shoes.” She can’t see his face but she can hear the smile that’s formed on his face. “We’ve got a few countries to trek around the next few months.” 

Moments later she’s finished repairing what she can and she’s sliding Harry’s jacket off his shoulders. “Thank you, Harry,” she says finally after the black jacket is hung back on its Gucci hanger on the rolling rack near them. “Seriously, too kind.” 

“No such thing as too kind, Ror,” he quips back and before she can comment on the nickname, he’s talking again. “Now what else do you need me to try on?” 

The afternoon goes by quickly and Harry is patient with her. He stands up straight in each new piece and asks questions about different things she’s making notes of or checking off of her thousands of lists. She checks her watch quickly as she’s making one last note. 

“How is it 3 o’clock already?” Aurora stammers out. “Sorry to take your entire afternoon from you.” 

“Don’t worry about it, Ror.” Harry’s pulling down the hem of his white tshirt he walked in wearing earlier today, “Nice to spend some time with ya and seems like you’ve been able to check a lot off your list.” 

“You probably have a list a mile long of things that need to be done this week too, though,” she rebuttals. “Or do you have someone to take care of those things for you?” she jokes. 

“Oh yeah, don’t remember their name, but I just tell them everything I need done and they do it for me.” The look on Aurora’s face is utter disgust, unable to politely react because she wasn’t expecting that answer.  There was no hint of sarcasm in Harry’s voice. Harry’s face is still and he’s silent for a moment before his nose scrunches up and a giggle erupted from his mouth. “Ror, I’m totally kidding.” He’s placed a hand on her shoulder now, rubbing his thumb soothingly. 

“Harry,” she’s giggling along now too, “you had me for a second.” 

Harry thanks her for her work and the time spent together today and leaves only after giving her a hug and a short kiss on her cheek. 

The next few days are spent hand stitching gold and silver beads onto those 2 Gucci jackets, labeling every single piece of the wardrobe and then organizing the giant crates for the travel managers to take and get ready to fly. She walks through all of the wardrobes multiple time and completes fittings with all of Harry’s band members as well. Brief 1 hour time frames are scheduled with each of them, Clare, Sarah, Adam and Mitch. Lambert pops in to make sure the final fittings went well and pays complements to Aurora’s new sneakers she’s sporting with a knowing look on his face. 

There’s one day left till the first tour stop and the arena is just about empty. The stage is packed up, the wardrobe crates have been taken from Aurora and the number of people in the arena is starting to dwindle down. Since everything is already loaded on a truck making its way to the airport Aurora didn’t have much to do today but she kept herself busy at the apartment she’s been at all week for the majority of the morning. She’s repacked multiple times getting everything to fit perfectly, almost committing the perfect folding techniques and order of adding things to her suitcase to memory. Everyone is to arrive at the airport early the next morning but Harry has arranged for a group lunch at the arena for one last collective meeting before the tour starts.

Aurora arrives a few minutes early to the lunch and says hello to a few crew members she’s gotten to know. Lambert is there too - seems that Harry has invited anyone who has helped with the prep of the tour regardless if they’re coming along or not. She also meets a few more new faces like Ayae, Harry’s hair and makeup stylist. She’s new to the tour group and hasn’t been needed for prep so this his her 1st time meeting a lot of the crew too. She sits down with Aurora and Lambert at a table and is engaging in a conversation about this and that when Harry comes up to the table with Jeff. Jeff is a familiar face to Aurora even though she has only interacted with him a few times.  Jeff always seems to be everywhere - Aurora always makes mental acknowledgment about how he is consistently working on something but always is seemingly available to everyone. 

Alicia, a woman probably in her late 30’s, is following Harry and Jeff with a grey rolling cart like you would see in an old cafeteria and it’s filled with large cardboard boxes. Aurora has met Alicia and remembers Lambert introducing her as the Tour Merchandise Manager. 

“Aurora, Ayae, Harry, great to see all of you! Doing alright, I assume?” Jeff asks while rounding the cart and reaching a hand in the box. 

“Got some tour sweatshirts for everyone, treat people with kindness and all that,” Harry adds in, running a hand through his hair. It isn’t until now that Aurora notices the length of his hair. It’s not as short as it was when she first met him but it’s nowhere near the length she remembers him having while still in One Direction. There is one curl that won’t stay back no matter how many times he runs his hand through it to push it back. The lone curl falls against his forehead one last time before he gives up. 

“Oh, very humble of you, Harry,” Ayae says with a chuckle while examining the sweatshirt Alicia had just given her.

It’s a plain black Champion hoodie with 2 small pieces of embroidery, 1 on the left of the chest and the other on the inside of the right arm. Ayae is referring to the large embroidered “Harry” on the chest. Underneath his name is ‘World Tour 2018’. Hah. He’s gotta love this shit. His name written on everything. Clothing, signs, his name is branded everywhere. 

“Heyyyyy,” Harry’s voice is slightly whiny, both of his eyes scrunch up and his brows furrow. The ‘hey’ turns into a giggle and they all laugh along with him. Harry then hands Aurora her sweatshirt. “Here ya go, Ror.” She thanks him softly after taking it from him. 

Post lunch, Harry, Jeff and a few others talk about how excited they are and how successful the prep went all week. The Head Travel Manager, Daniel, reminds everyone to double check their itinerary when they get home tonight and to double, triple, quadruple check they’ve packed everything. Harry yells something about making sure everyone’s got their passport cause “long story short” he forgot his once and it was not a day full of kindness. The large group chuckles at his little antidote before the room begins to clear out and everyone heads home to get ready to travel the next day. 

Thanks for reading !!! Feedback & comments are always welcome !!! 

[mcrmadness]

I’m just wondering about ADHD again and how the doctors here say that there’s no need for testing me for ADHD because I had “no signs of ADHD in my childhood”. Well, I was born in 1991. The whole terminology and the knowledge over ADHD was different back then.

I was talking about this with my mom a couple of days ago and she said that I had troubles with homework - not that I would have not understood them, I just had such a hard time focusing on them. She said that she constantly had to remind me that I need to focus on the homework and not draw doodles or do other stuff. She sais she asked even from the school how deal with a child who cannot focus on their homework and from school they just said “Make sure the table is completely empty so there is no distractions.” but my mom told them “Do you really think that helps? All they need is a piece or paper and a pencil.” and those were the tools I had - my school books and pencil. I didn’t need distractions on the table in order to get distracted from homework.

She then also said that back then no one even talked about ADHD. It was still known as MBD aka Minimal Brain Dysfunction Syndrome and since I was not “stupid” and definitely did not show signs of learning/developmental disabilities - in fact I was learning faster than other kids - there was no need to worry about this syndrome. (Nowadays it’s apparently removed from the Finnish list but can still be used as an umbrella term for things like ADHD etc.)

I was trying to google this term now, to understand when was the term replaced by “ADHD”. I only found that this was done in the US already in the late 80s but I could not find anything about Finland, but I know for sure that what comes to things like mental disorders and neurodiversity, Finland has always been running late when compared to e.g. the US... I could only find some sort of Finnish ontology and thesaurus website and it says that the article about MBD was created in 1986, but the article about ADHD only in 2000. That would mean I was 9 years old (and my social anxiety and selective mutism were starting to really grow), and ADHD was still considered very much the “disorder of hyperactive boys”. This website does not even know the term ADD so I have no clue when did they start using it for the first time (in Finland). I just know that my sister got the diagnose along with an Asperger’s Syndrome somewhere in the mid 2000s. Now I’m starting to feel like I want to go find some old books about psychiatry just to see when did they start talking about ADHD and ADD in Finland and how did they describe it as BEFORE they discovered it exists also in girls (and since I’m afab, I most likely have the inattentive version), because this is just driving me so crazy.

I just... I don’t know. I just feel stupid because why is it me who needs to read about the history of psychiatry? Shouldn’t it be the psychiatrists doing so? But I do wonder what would he say if I went to him and really said that “no wonder they never suspected AD(H)D in me as a child when the term literally did not exists in Finland yet”. I just feel like I need to start writing down something like a book about my experiences. Collect EVERYTHING I can find that I have written over the past 15 years in the internet and copypaste them into a file and print this out to him. My brain just empties itself when I’m supposed to talk to a doctor but then I just face these things in everydaylife 24/7. And he just wants to give me antidepressants for anxiety. Okay, he did offer me occupational therapy too but I am afraid that it will just... kill my creativity again. I mean, look at my “timetable” for one week if we think I’d have a random person visit me once a week, let’s say e.g. on Tuesdays:

Monday: Nothing - the resting day after weekend aka no way I’m gonna get anything done. Know that there will be occupational therapy next day - don’t get anything done because mentally trying to prepare yourself for that. Tuesday: Hypothetical occupational therapy. Not possible to get anything done beforehand. Afterwards you’re so tired and the day is done so just sit around the flat and feel like going crazy from bored but be unable to do anything because TIRED. Wednesday: Nothing - the resting day after the therapy. The next day is a grocery store day. Start mentally preparing for that. Can’t do shit because of that. Thursday: Grocery store day. Can’t do shit before or after. Before because can’t start anything in case unable to stop in time - and when having to force a hyperfocus to stop when it’s not stopped on its own, it makes me so irritable and absent minded because can’t think of anything else but that one thing I was hyperfocusing on. Friday: Nothing - rest day after grocery store day. Mentally prepare for the weekend on which I usually always visit my parents on both days. They live in the same city, just less than 2km away but I still can’t start anything before that really, and I come back home so late I won’t be able to do much. Weekend: Visit parents on both days.

And then repeat. So when am I gonna draw? Edit videos? Write? I always do the creative things at night because PEACE and because my brain just works better at nighttime - ALWAYS has. I even found a diary entry I had written when I was 13 or 14 and I had been fighting with my parents because I always did my homework so late and my dad didn’t understand that, and I was then screaming in my diary that they just don’t understand that I am not ABLE to do my homework earlier than in the evening/at night, it’s just not possible to do them right after school.

Already now as I have about 3-4 free days in a week, sometimes even 5, I feel like I need more free time from my free time. I’m constantly thinking about how I want to do this and that, like I want to draw, write, edit videos, write... they are on the top of my mind 24/7 but still it takes weeks or months to get anything started. I just wrote about this yesterday that I feel like I have two moods: either too little time AND energy or too much time but a plenty of energy. There’s no in between. Now I am lucky to have too much time for myself but it also means I have all the time in my hands so I can always procrastinate and do everything the next day because I have time. Which means I won’t do shit, because I have no deadlines, and I start doing those things only when everything lines up perfectly. It’s never a decision to take my sketchbook and start drawing. It’s more of an impulse - I just feel like now it’s the day for drawing and suddenly find myself holding the papers and pencils in my hand.

Same happens with chores, chores just never make me feel good unlike doing one of these fun things. Oh and chores are also something that will make it hard to do the fun things because I kinda... don’t let myself start doing the fun things if I have the not-so-fun things undone. Which means again procrastinating and postponing something like dishes for days. I am not sure where have I got this mentality. Because like... wouldn’t it be a lot smarter to let myself to draw instead when I KNOW I can’t start doing the dishes, instead of punishing myself with “no washing dishes, so no drawing either”? Because as a punishment it does nothing. It does not motivate me with the dishes. They will be there for days or weeks anyway and they will be done only when I get that impulse to finally do them. Or, usually it’s not an impulse even. It’s just me needing food and in order to get food, I need to cook and in order to cook, I need clean pots and pans and in order to get those, well, I need to do the dishes.

I think this mentality partially comes from my school time. I aways knew how to prioritise my homework so that I get them done the most efficiently I could. Which meant that I always made the less-interesting homework first and the homework from subjects I liked, the last. I did this because when I started with the stuff I had harder time focusing on, it made it easier to focus on the interesting stuff. If I had started with the interesting stuff, I’d have had a lot less concentration and energy left for the less interesting homework and the chances of understanding a word of what I read would have been very minimal.

I still pretty much use this with everything I do - work first, fun later. I guess for neurotypicals this is not a big deal and probably something they all do, but my brain really wants to do the fun first and the work never. (By work for myself I mean things like chores etc. When I was actually working, it actually went: work first, fun never - because I was so tired after work I could not do anything that involved brains.) If I start with the fun, I literally will never do the work part. So I have to have the work first, even when it means I will procrastinate with EVERYTHING else too. But that is the only way to get it done at least at some point. It’s just that I feel like my life is nothing but work. I always have to shower, do the dishes, clean the kitchen table or start cooking. (Let alone the rest of the stuff like cleaning the HOME.) It’s a neverending worksite. I barely have time for fun because I don’t let myself to do that because the work is not done yet. But it just... never ends.

I think the reason why I hate chores is because no matter how many times I do them, I still always have to do them again soon. I shower, but I need to shower again in a few days. So it feels like it’s a waste of energy and time! Why to shower now when I have to do that after a couple of days anyway??? I do the dishes but there they will be again in a few days as I keep eating from them! Washing a plate after every use is also not an option - then “it’s just one plate” so it’s easy to put it in the sink because it’s not a big deal to wash it with other plates after a couple of days. Until it’s been 2 weeks and there’s again the rest of my plates in there and I hate my life again because I never remember how much washing the dishes also makes my back hurt but I need clean utensils because food.

But when I create something or play a video game, there is always a finish line and once you get past that, you don’t need to start over UNLESS you want to! When I draw something and it’s finished, it will stay like that! It’s not going anywhere, it won’t fade, I don’t need to draw it ever again if I don’t want to! So it’s not waste of my time, it’s something that will last almost forever. And I love the dopamine rush I get when I look at a finished product, but I don’t have the dopamine rush when I look at my cabinet with clean plates because I know they won’t stay like that forever. They won’t stay like that even for a few days. And that literally kills my motivation with every chore I need to do.

[lulendrea]

Process pictures for the previous piece (I'm really glad people liked it. I appreciate all the sweet comments people left in the tags ☺)

This was my first time actually doing the whole thing from start to finish digitally. I was always afraid of doing the sketch on the tablet, because it felt awkward and I had no patience for it. I always felt like I was a worse artist on a computer than with pencil and paper. But I'm glad I did this. It taught me that I can make a good piece if I just give myself the time and keep at it.

1 - Thumbnail.

I had actually done one more thumbnail before this one in my sketchbook, but it's basically the same thing, just really tiny, messier and just generally incomprehensible.

2 - First sketch

Building upon the thumbnail, I tried to get a better idea down and clear up some things. No reference at this point.

Between step 2 and step 3 there were a LOT more sketches done. I flipped the canvas a lot, made a lot of passes, and looked up references for the characters. Some of the characters came out really easily, like Jinbei (surprisingly), and others like Robin and Zoro just wouldn't come out how I wanted them to. Right now the only one I'm not happy with is Zoro (he just doesn't feel right to me).

I tried to also focus a lot on the composition. I made sure that the biggest lines and the eyes of the characters all lead back to Luffy. I also tried to make a clear path that would take the gaze of the viewer from Usopp all the way to Sanji, then from Sanji to Brook, then from Brook to Franky and then back to Luffy. I don't know if it really worked as I intended, but I hope so.

3 - Lineart (before clean-up)

I put in this step just because I wanted to show how much time I wasted making lineart for things that would ultimately get covered up. The problem is, I did every character separately. So I would first do a quick sketch of the character to get down the general position and composition in relation to the ones that were already made. And then I hid the layers of the rest of the characters and worked on the current one individually. Then once it was finished, I just moved it into place. This created quite a few tangents that I had no more energy to fix.

4 - Clean lineart

Nothing much to say here. I just erased all the lines that would be behind another character.

5 - Picking the colors from reference

I wanted to be mostly accurate to the source material, so I got a bunch of references and color picked the colors and then I just chose the average between those.

6 - Flats

Self-explanatory. Once I was done I had to adjust all the colors one by one, so they wouldn't clash against each other. Jinbei's skin especially didn't fit in with the rest of the colors. (Unfortunately I don't have the comparison of what it looked like before I adjusted the colors).

At the end the colors all looked different from the chart I made in step 5.

7 - Lights and shadows

Here I was really focusing on trying to make pleasant and clear shapes with my lights, which is why I'm showing it now without the lineart and the flat colors. So, I tried not to draw exactly where the light might realistically have been, but instead where it would show best the form and shape of the characters.

I set the lights layer (which I painted with a dark blue color) on divide and the shadows on multiply. (This was made in Krita, so I don't know how the layer modes might differ in other drawing softwares).

8 - End result

Final touches and details.

Also, I should say it took me roughly a month to make. (I'm extremely slow in general and me doing time-consuming things that I knew would not show up on the final piece did not help),

[quickspinner]

April Kisses - Day 9

More April Kisses

8. Laying a gentle kiss to the back of the other’s hand.

“Luka? Are you okay?” 

He looked up in surprise. “Hmm?”

“You keep moving your hand like it hurts,” Marinette said, tilting her head slightly. 

“Oh.” Luka looked down at his left hand, which he had been stretching. “I’m fine, I just overdid things a bit this week and I’m a little sore.” He gestured to the books he had strewn over her chaise. “It’s why I’m doing homework instead of playing.”

Marinette put her pencil and sketchbook down on her desk and turned, rolling her chair towards him. “Would you like a massage?”

Luka looked up at her, eyes widening slightly. “Sorry?”

“Would you like a hand massage? I do them for Papa all the time when he gets sore.” 

“Oh,” Luka said blankly. “Well...sure, yeah, if you don’t mind. Not if you’re busy though.” 

Marinette brightened. “I can take a break for a minute. Hang on, I’ll be right back.”

Luka moved his books out of the way and turned so that his feet were on the floor, fidgeting a little nervously. He didn’t mind Marinette touching him, not at all, and his hands did hurt, but…

But it was one thing to cuddle a girl while she cried and kind of another to have her touching him quite so deliberately. Then again, it was just his hand. He could handle having a pretty girl that he was completely crushing on rubbing his hand. It would be fine.

Marinette came back with a towel and a small container. She draped the towel over her lap and scooted her desk chair up close so that they were knee to knee. 

“Sorry, it’s just olive oil,” she smiled with a slight shrug. “We don’t use the fancy stuff. No allergies, right?” 

“No, I’m good,” Luka said, slipping the ring off his index finger and dropping it in his pocket. He watched as she rubbed a little bit of oil on her hands. Marinette held out her hands and Luka placed his sore hand in hers. 

“Be gentle,” he joked, and Marinette glanced up and winked at him.

“Of course. But do tell me if something hurts, okay?” She dripped some oil on his hand and began stroking it, smoothing the oil over it. “It’s supposed to feel good.”

“Yeah,” Luka said, swallowing. “I will.” It did feel good. Her hands looked tiny, holding his, but when she began to glide her thumbs over his wrist, the pressure was firm and even. Luka shook his head slightly, smiling a little. “I don’t know why I keep being surprised at how strong you are.”

“Too much?” Marinette asked, pausing to look up at him. 

“No, not at all, it’s nice. Where did you learn this?”

“My mother,” Marinette replied absently, dropping her gaze back to her hand and resuming her ministrations, moving slowly down his hand. “Sometimes I get hand cramps from drawing or sewing, and she would help me this way. Eventually I learned so that I could help her and Papa the same way. I guess you could kind of call it a family skill, we all work really hard with our hands around here so we all got good at it.”

“That’s awesome. I’d love it if you could teach me,” Luka grinned. “I’d have a lot more leverage in the family chore bargaining.”

“Your family does chores?” Marinette teased. 

Luka snorted. “Maman might not be big on cleaning in general but the boat still needs maintenance. You haven’t done chores until you’ve been elbow deep in grease, flat on your back, choking on diesel fumes in the boat’s engine room.” 

Marinette wrinkled her nose. “Ew.”

Luka shrugged. “The independent life isn’t as glamorous as we make it look sometimes,” he teased with a wink. “Anyway, if you can teach me at least I’ll be able to return the favor sometime.” 

That made her blush prettily, and Luka bit down on his smile, a little more grateful than usual for the reminder that she was affected by him, Adrien or no Adrien. Because he was definitely affected by her. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly.  

“I like your hands,” Marinette blurted suddenly, and her blush deepened. 

“They’re kind of rough,” Luka replied, rubbing his free hand through his hair. “Between the guitar and the boat and the bike…” 

“That just means they work hard,” Marinette smiled up at him for just a moment before dropping her eyes to his hand again. “They’re so big,” she murmured. “You hands, I mean. Not like Papa’s—”

“I don’t think anyone has hands like your Papa’s,” Luka laughed. 

She grinned up at him. “That’s true. But yours are nice too. Capable, I guess that’s the word I was looking for..”

Luka smiled. “I like your hands too, Marinette. More and more every minute, actually.” 

Marinette ducked her head slightly and cleared her throat. “Is it helping?” 

“I’m not really sure yet, but it feels really good.” 

Marinette was very thorough, working over the back of his hand and then over his palm to loosen his stiff muscles, and pausing to press what he assumed must be pressure points. 

He got through that much okay, but sitting through her working her way up each of his fingers individually was a special kind of torture, and Luka mentally cursed the inconveniences of being a teenage boy as he tried to keep his breathing even. 

“Hopefully, that should help,” she said, stroking his hand slowly. 

Luka opened his mouth to respond, to thank her, but he lost all capacity for speech as Marinette lifted his hand and placed her lips against the back in a soft kiss. “There,” she said, sitting up with a smile. “All done. How does it feel?” 

He opened and closed his hand absently, suddenly unable to look away from her face, nor to wipe the sappy smile off his own. “Amazing,” he said finally. 

“Should I do the other hand?” she asked, and Luka froze for an instant. Oh, hell, could he really sit through that again?

Luka opened his mouth to decline, but his traitor mouth said, “Sure, if you don’t mind.” He sighed at himself as he gave her his other hand. He really was just a glutton for punishment when it came to Marinette.

[whosmorales]

Heya are requests open? I really want to ask a spider noir x reader. The reader loves showing noir all kinds of colourful things, mostly painted scenery she made herself. One day he finds a sketch of him asleep, when he tells the reader she becomes flustered and everything cute and fluffy please. Thank you so much!

A/N: Omg that’s so cute aaaah I’m melting 🥺💖 I know I haven’t posted in forever but this is so cute and I have a ton of ideas I’m working on rn :) !!

Work of Art - Spider Noir x Reader

Warnings: swearing, oblivious reader

“Shit” you muttered as rain started to come down. You and Noir had been walking home from a mission and as if the bruises and cuts all over you weren’t enough, it just had to start pouring rain.

“Language y/n.” Noir said monotonously.

“Sorry, sorry.” You said in your most sincere and sweet voice, before grinning cheekily under your mask and standing on your tiptoes so your faces almost touched. “I meant to say Fuck.”

Noir shoved you playfully, and even though you couldn’t tell, he smiled fondly at you laughing at your own joke. “Come on, we gotta get to Aunt May’s place. Peter B is probably worried sick right now.”

“First of all, you know Peter B is definitely not worried sick. He’s probably off on a date with MJ in his dimension or something. And second of all, let’s just spend the night at my flat or something. It’s closer, and it’s already getting dark.” You said matter of factly, giving him a light push on the shoulder.

“Fine.” He muttered over dramatically.

Besides, the Aunt May of your dimension would always make jokes about how you and Noir were head over heels for each other. But it didn’t matter, ‘cause those jokes were just stupid. Right?

You guys walked in comfortable silence until you arrived at your flat a few minutes later. You opened the door and felt a little bit of embarrassment wash over you when you saw how messy it was. Pencils and paint bottles sprinkled the floor, half finished paintings covered your desk, and your sketchbook rested on your bed. You groaned in embarrassment and walked in and attempted to clean up at least a little.

Noir picked up a bottle of paint and tilted his head in confusion. “This is....green?” He guessed.

“Nope.” You replied as you grabbed your colored pencils and shoved them into your pencil case.

“Purple?”

“No.” You stifled a laugh at his absolute confusion over the paint.

“Blue!” He said with so much confidence that he sounded like one of the characters on scooby doo figuring out who the bad guy is.

You chuckled and rolled your eyes. “Look, if I tell you what color it is, will you chill out?” You smiled.

“Sure.” he said with full sincerity.

“It’s orange. Thought you’d figure it out since you’re a detective and all.” You stated boredly.

“Very funny.” He said sarcastically, pulling off his mask. Because of the rain, his hair fell in its natural state, with messy waves falling over his forehead. He caught you staring and instinctively pushed his hair off his face, running his hand through his hair.

You mirrored his actions and took your mask off, wincing when it made contacts with the cuts on your face. Noir’s eyes went wide at the sight of you without a mask on.

“What?” You blushed as he scanned your face with worry.

“Your face is covered in cuts, y/n.” He stepped closer to you, lifting his hand to touch your face.

Time seemed to freeze for a brief moment when his eyes met yours, with his calloused hand grazing your cheek and your faces only inches apart.

“Does it hurt?” He asked, his voice was soft, almost in a whisper. You took in a shaky breath and shook your head no. He nodded curtly and removed his hand from your cheek and the tension in your body faded, tension you hadn’t even realized was there.

Noir, on the other hand, had walked over to your desk to admire your paintings.

“Did you make this, y/n?” He asked, looking between you and a painting of a sunset sky, eyes full of admiration behind his thick glasses. You nodded, a slight blush growing on your cheeks. He smiled softly and looked to the painting. “It’s beautiful.”

You blushed harder. “Thank you.” Your voice was slightly shaky. He turned back to make eye contact with you and you guys stayed like that for a second. He smiled at you with softened features and pushed his glasses up before turning away.

You broke the silence. “Um, I was gonna make some food, so if you wanna get cleaned up while I do then you can.”

He nodded and you grabbed a towel and passed it to him, pointing him to the bathroom. He walked out and you buried your face in your hands. Why did he have to make you so flustered? It’s not like you like him or anything.

You grabbed two packs of instant ramen and put them in the microwave, even though it was already almost 10:00. Now left alone with your thoughts, all you could seem to think about was Noir, the way his hand rested on your cheek, wondering if he does that when he kisses. God, you have to snap out of this!

You stirred the ramen and heard the bathroom door open and close. You looked up to see Noir, in just the white tee shirt and boxers he’d been wearing under his suit and you absolutely totally 100% did NOT stare when he put on his glasses and ran a hand through his soaking wet curls of hair.

You handed him his ramen and grabbed yours, sitting on your bed to eat. Noir slowly sat down next to you, as to not spill his ramen.

“Hey, are you sure you’re okay?” Noir asked, his tone hushed. He rested his hand on yours, causing you to tense up. “You’ve been awfully quiet doll.”

You nodded, still not turning to face him. “Yep. Just a little tired.” You ate as quickly as possible.

You guys ate in silence and you sat up as soon as you were done. “I’m gonna go take a shower.” You said, finally turning to face him, forcing a smile, but the smile became genuine when he smiled back and nodded.

You turned on the shower, letting the water rush down your body, cringing whenever it came in contact with a cut. You closed your eyes and hummed it yourself as you washed your hair.

As soon as you were done, you changed into a black tank top and a comfy pair of sweatpants. You peeked your head out the door of the bathroom to see Noir at your desk.

“What ya doin there Peter?” Your voice was sweet and gentle, as to not scare him. He turned around and grinned widely.

“Painting. I hope you don’t mind that I borrowed a canvas for it.” He said, showing you a painting of a sunset he’d done. It was similar to yours, except instead of being in shades of pink and orange, he’d used greens and purples.

You smiled widely at his painting, and then him. “I love it.”

His smile got even wider, if possible, before it was interrupted by him yawning. “I hope you don’t mind doll, but I think I should get to bed, it’s been a long day.”

You nodded gesture to your bed to signal he could sleep there. “I’ll join you in a bit, I just have to clean up.” You said, and by the time you’d finished your sentence, he was already passed out.

You cleaned up the paint spilled across your desk and grabbed your sketchbook from next to Noir. Your eyes flicked between him and your sketchbook and you had an idea. You sketched him, including every freckle, every stray curl of hair, every scruffy bit of stubble. You’d been drawing so long that you’d lost track of time and by the time you checked the clock, it was 12:30 in the morning.

You yawned to yourself, setting down your sketchbook and plopping down next to Noir, who sighed in content when he spider sensed you next to him, wrapping an arm around your waist and pulling you close.

Your spider sense woke you up that morning to see Noir, reaching for your sketchbook. In one swift movement, you jumped up and attempted to grab the sketchbook, before he caught your hand in his.

“Give it back you fucking asshole.” You muttered, hoping you sounded intimidating, though your voice shook with worry.

“It’s just a book, isn’t it?” He asked, his curiosity now growing from your arguing against it. Noir grabbed it with both his hands and gently pushed you away as he flipped through the pages.

His face softened as he saw the drawing of him. You’d made him look so beautiful, so peaceful. You attempted to grab it back from him, now jumping up to grab it. You finally decided on shooting a web at it and got it, but Noir only grabbed it back so the two of you were now connected by the sketchbook.

His gaze on yours was soft, not angry like you worried it would be. You contemplated just letting go and letting him have it. You’re staring at each other, and his eyes flick between your eyes and your lips.

He frees his hands from the sketchbook, and cups your cheek in one hand, just like he had when checking on your cuts yesterday. The other hand rests on your waist, which he uses to hold you so your bodies practically pressed together. He gently pulled you closer so your faces were only a few inches apart. You freeze and he presses his lips against yours. You kiss back almost immediately, and the sketchbook falls to your feet as you free it to let your hands run through his hair.

You guys pulled apart for a moment to rest your foreheads against each other, your breaths short and your faces smiling.

“You’re a work of art y/n.”

[sunflower-swan]

Wolfstar Chapter 8

A/N: Here’s what you need to know: I created this story for Writer’s Month 2020. Every day is a new prompt, and therefore a new chapter. This is an AU Wolfstar where Remus is a tattoo artist next door to Sirius who manages a flower shop. James and Lily are alive in this universe and own a coffee shop across the street. And to make parts of the story work with the prompts, Remus is about 10 years older than Sirius. It also takes place more or less in present time, minus Covid-19.

This is chapter 8 of a multi-chapter work. If you’d like to start from the beginning, here is chapter 1.

Disclaimer: I don’t own these characters. I just like to play with them.

Day 8 Prompt: Eight

Rating: Teen and Up

Word Count: 1917

Tags: angst, language, humor, friendship

Chapter 8

Remus

Dropkick Murphys, “Rose Tattoo”

A rose that shines down from above

I signed and sealed these words in blood

I heard them once, sung in a song

It played again and we sang along

Remus stood and set his cup down on the coffee table. “Wait here. I’ll get it ready for you.” He walked toward the bathroom. Before he entered, he turned to cast a wary eye upon his friend.

Sirius had returned to laying in the fetal position on the couch. He had a pillow over his head, and his shoulders were trembling.

With an internal sigh, Remus entered the bathroom. He turned the tap to fill the tub with water, and then dropped in his last Lavender Vanilla scented bath bomb. It was his favorite to use when he felt stress, anxiety, and pain. But Sirius needed it more than him right now, and he made a mental note to pick up more next time he did the shopping.

Then he grabbed a towel from the linen closet and set it on the sink. He looked in the mirror over the sink at his reflection. The wisps of grey at his temples and the beginnings of lines forming at the corners of his eyes mocked him. They hinted at a man aged, through complicated circumstances, beyond his actual years.

He remembered being on his own during his own grief, and how the darkness had consumed him. Sirius didn’t know it, but his friendship had helped Remus finally find his way out. Whatever he could do to return the favor, he would do it. Remus closed his eyes and took a deep breath. The lavender vanilla scent was already percolating through the air, and it helped to calm him. 

James, Lily, and Remus had decided it was probably best if Sirius didn’t stay alone at his own flat tonight. So Remus found his largest pair of athletic shorts, which had never fit him but would hopefully fit Sirius well enough, and a clean undershirt. He set these next to the towel, and went back to the living room to fetch Sirius.

He was right where Remus had left him. Sirius had shifted positions on the couch, and was now laying on his back. His eyes were staring blankly at the ceiling, one arm draped across his stomach, and his other rested on his forehead.

Damn. And I thought I was broken, he thought as he looked at Sirius.  “Come on, mate.” Remus helped Sirius to his feet and led him to the bathroom.

Sirius took a long deep breath, and let it out. “Smells nice.”

“Yeah. It’s my favorite.” Remus cleared his throat. Sirius didn’t need to know how often he needed to be calmed or comforted, or that it was often enough to keep a stock of bath bombs handy. “Uh, anyway. Towel and clean clothes are here.” He patted the pile on the sink. “And you take all the time you need. I’ll be out there.” He gestured with his thumb over his shoulder.

Suddenly Sirius threw his arms around Remus. “Thank you,” he whispered into Remus’ shoulder.

“You’re welcome.” Remus melted into his embrace, and silently vowed again to help hold the broken man together. 

Sirius released him, and he took the opportunity to leave, closing the door behind him. He let out a heavy sigh and went back to his favorite chair, grabbing a sketchbook and pencil on the way. Flipping open to a blank page he began to draw. Mainly for something to keep his hands and mind busy, and not thinking about the naked Sirius in his tub.

Forty minutes later, he had sketched a beautiful rose. Lots of detailed petals spiraling into the middle, and a few spiked leaves sticking out from underneath. The rose itself seemed to embody the sorrow he knew Sirius was feeling. At that moment, he heard the lever flip to drain the tub, and the sound of Sirius getting out of the bath. Setting the sketchbook on the coffee table, he went into the kitchen to make more tea. 

“Did you draw this?” Came a voice from the living room.

Remus poked his head out and saw Sirius holding the sketchbook.

“Uh, yeah. Did that while you were in the bath.”

“This is it.”

“What do you mean?” Remus asked, entering the living room with two fresh cups of tea.

“This is what I want.” He fixed Remus with a pointed stare. “Will you tattoo this on me?”

“Erm...yeah.” Remus handed him a cup. “We can do it in the morning, yeah?”

“Now.”

“Now?” Remus worried Sirius was feeling a little reckless and not thinking this decision through. “Why don’t we sit and have some tea and talk about it a bit first.” Sirius was undoubtedly feeling emotional, and Remus didn’t want him to let that control his decisions.

Sirius rolled his eyes in a huff and accepted the cup offered to him. “Fine.”

The two men sat, Sirius back on the couch and Remus back in his favorite chair. Remus sipped his tea and studied Sirius over the cup.

He was still staring intently at the drawing. There was an intense fire consumed in his flitting eyes. Remus sensed a recklessness disguised as adrenaline in Sirius.

“I decided...in the bath I decided I wanted to get a tattoo in remembrance of Silas. And when I saw this,” he was still holding and looking at the rose, “I knew this was it. I want it right here.” He placed his right hand over his left chest and shoulder and looked at Remus through misty eyes.

He continued to study Sirius for a long second. If this is what he needs to begin to heal, then I can do it. Remus' heart ached for himself and for Sirius when he finally said, “Ok.”

Sirius gave him a sad smile and closed his eyes. “Thank you, Remus.”

~~~~~

Sirius stayed on Remus' couch that night. James had popped by in the evening to see how he was getting along, and brought him a change of clothes. He also managed to convince Sirius to not be alone at his flat for the night. He was worried about what Sirius might get up to if left to his own devices right now, a concern he shared with Remus. Although Remus never had company. And sort of forgot come morning, that he had a guest on the couch.

Remus’ alarm went off, and he slammed his hand on the button on top. With a tired groan, he hauled himself out of bed. Bleary eyed and wearing only his boxers, he stumbled to the kitchen. He poured himself a glass of water from the tap, paid the Daily Prophet owl, and wandered back through the living room. It was at this moment he noticed the human shaped lump on his couch.

What the...he wondered, squinting at the mass.

One of the eyes of the mass opened. “Remus, the dragon boxers are very flattering, but put on some trousers, mate.”

Remus jumped as the recollection of the prior evening ricocheted around his brain -- Silas death, Sirius bath, James stopped by, Sirius stayed the night -- and he remembered what and why and who was on his couch. Of course, this jump also caused him to spill most of the contents of his water glass all over himself. “Sweet Merlin and Godric damn-it anyway!” He covered the front of his boxers with the newspaper, and side-stepped into the bathroom.

A few minutes later he emerged from the bathroom, thoroughly embarrassed but fully clothed and dry. Which was more than he could say for his overnight guest. Remus stopped in his tracks. Sirius was lounging on his couch wearing only jeans, his feet propped up and ankles crossed...reading a book.

A Wrinkle in Time, Remus read on the cover. One of his favorites, despite it being considered a children’s novel. He found inspiration in it’s ideas of friendship, individuality, courage, and nonconformity.

Finding Sirius relaxing on his couch, and reading his books, however. Well, that made his insides squirm in a way that was not appropriate given the situation and circumstances.

“I see you’ve made yourself at home,” Remus remarked. Casual. Be casual.

Sirius turned a page. “Well, I figured if you’re going to do my tattoo this morning, then there was no point in putting on a shirt.” He looked at Remus with a wide, toothless smirk.

Oh, yeah. While Remus was covered almost head to toe in tattoos to cover his scars, he noticed Sirius had a few specially placed so you’d never know they were there if you never saw him with his shirt off. The one that stood out to him most was on the inside of his left forearm.

“Canis Major,” Remus said.

Sirius moved his hand from holding up his head and held his arm out to examine it. “The star Sirius is right there.” He pointed with a smile. “The Dog Star.”

“How many tattoos do you have?” Remus asked, sitting in his favorite chair. 

“Seven. Today’s will be eight.” Sirius swung his legs down to the floor. “The constellation dog was my first. Then I got this one.” He held up and pointed to the inside of his right bicep. “For my brother, Regulus.” It was the Leo constellation within a lion.

“Then, when Reg died, I got this tribal band.” It was two lines encompassing a band of triangles with every other one flipped.

“The day after James proposed to Lily, I got this one.” He showed the outside of his right bicep, with an intimidating stag surrounded by colorful orange lilies. 

“Then I also got this motorcycle.” He leaned back and showed off the left side of his abs. “I think motorcycles are a brilliant Muggle contraption.”

“And this Gibson guitar head.” It was on the outside of his left bicep. “Shortly after I started learning how to play guitar, and I realized it was going to become a big part of my life.”

“What about the one on your sternum?” Remus was most interested in this one. It was very familiar to him, despite having never seen it on Sirius’ body.

Sirius looked down and touched this tattoo with a chuckle. “Oh. Got this one shortly after leaving Hogwarts.”

“The rest of your tattoos have special meaning though.” This one looked like a weird letter Y with lines through the bottom. He recognized the sign. “What does this one mean?” Does it mean to you what it means to me?

“Ok. So, I’ll tell you, but you have to promise not to freak out.”

“Ok…”

“It’s an amalgamation symbol. It kinda means like...a merger or a mixture.”

Remus could only stare and blink. “Ok…”

Sirius scratched his head with a grin. “Erm...James and I figured out how to become animagi while we were in school. That’s why his tattoo is a stag, because that’s his animagus form.”

What the hell? Remus had been on the edge of his seat throughout this explanation, and at this revelation he fell back. “What?”

“I’m an animagus.”

“And so is James?”

“Yes.”

“No.”

In the time it took Remus to blink, there was a big black dog sitting on his couch where Sirius had been moments before. He jumped. “What the hell?!”

The dog hopped off the couch and padded over to where Remus sat, and looked up at him with great puppy dog eyes. Then in another blink of the eye, Sirius crouched in front of him.

“Let’s go do that tattoo now.” Sirius said with a grin and a slap to Remus' leg.

Next Chapter: Chapter 9

[every1studio]

“UNIVERSITY OF KQ” [ateez]

genre: reverse harem + fluff + fem reader

ficstyle: bullepoints + oneshot + long

prompt: You just moved back to Korea to enroll in the University of KQ.. Little did you know, that you attracted some attention from some of the most popular guys on campus.. (YOU ARE V OBLIVIOUS/CLUMSY)

note: did a high school one for SKZ so I thought I would draw inspiration and do a college one for ATEEZ

You got into the most hard-to-get-in art university in South Korea and since it was your first choice; you gladly took the offer and moved there. You wanted to find some sort of hobby or interest since you’ve been so focused on school up until now. You wondered how was your life going to be here at University of KQ when....

WOOYOUNG

“you’re blocking the stairway..”

you turned to see a well-built guy wearing a black tank top, gray sweatpants and a duffel, leaning on the railings waiting for you to move

he looked like he just came from the gym or something

not gonna lie, you took a while to register that he was talking to you

he smirked at you by your flustered actions as you moved out of the way

he walked up to you so that he was standing in front of you 

“checking me out?” he asked as he leaned in closer to you

“n-no, I was just-”

you were taken back by his actions, you stumbled back; almost falling down the stairs

but he swooped his arm in around your waist in time and pulled you in close to his sweaty body

“you’re the cute and clumsy type huh..” he chuckled as he detaches himself from you

he points to the door next to yours, “that’s my place”

then he points to himself, “and I’m Wooyoung”

Wooyoung pinches your cheeks then waves to you as he makes his way to his apartment

“see you around, Y/N~”

you furrowed your brows, “how do you know my name?”

Wooyoung was known to be a playboy; a heartthrob

but he seemed to have broken his character after seeing how innocent and oblivious you were

he snorts as he looks at the ground for a bit, “it’s on your school ID that you’re wearing on your lanyard..”

before you could open your mouth to say something, your alarm went off

you were late for class

“oops sorry! see ya, Wooyoung!!” you dashed down the stairs as he watched you crossing the street

he liked how his named rolled off your tongue

(she’s interesting... and cute) Wooyoung would think as he ruffles his hair 

MINGI

you were trying to make it to your first class of the term; philosophy 

Mingi was munching on his burger as he saw you running

he saw the whole incident

it was like a scene out of a movie

you had tripped on flat ground and fell quite comically

he never put down his burger so fast; he ran to you

“you good??”

as you looked up, his heart skipped a beat

the sun was shining on your face and you brushed off the pain 

“oh yeah, this is no big deal” you jumped up and straightened yourself up

“I gotta go, I’m late. thank you!”

but he felt an urge to make a move and he did

he held you back by your wrist

“what class are you going to? how are you gonna go to class all bloodied up?”

you looked down to see both of your knees covered in bloody skid marks 

“I can’t walk into philosophy like this...”

his eyes lit up, “you have it with Dr. C. Williams?”

you nodded as you found a classmate, “yeah! I’m Y/N!”

“I’m Mingi”

“...aren’t we going to be late?”

he realized that he was holding onto your wrist a little too long so he embarrassingly shook his hand off of you 

he seemed like a cold person, but if he, a stranger, helped you out.. that would mean he wasn’t a bad person, right?

you looked at your phone 

“class is in 1 minute and I still don’t know where it is..” you sulked, you didn’t want late to your first class on your first day

“didn’t you check the email last night? class is cancelled..”

you frantically checked your email and he was right

you slapped yourself on your forehead, “are you fricking kidding me??”

he gave a small smile as he led you back to his table “at least you have time to clean yourself up”

you watched him take out some Hello Kitty band-aids; they were the opposite from his tough-boy exterior so you chuckled under your breath

he notices it and tries to clarify with you as he cleaned your wounds and patched you up, “I needed some band-aids the other day and these were the only ones they had left okay!”

“HEY MINGI, CAN I GET A BAND-AID TOO!!”

both you and Mingi turned to see..

SAN

you both saw a smiley-eyed boy dashing towards the table

but was stopped by a couple of what seemed like high schoolers visiting the campus

you heard them asking him for directions and squealed as he helped them out with a smile

they thanked him and loudly whispered some things on the line of “omg I cannot believed we talked to him”

San was known in the area for busking by himself on Friday nights

when he looked back at you and Mingi, he became a little shy

“oh I didn’t know you were with sucha pretty friend, Mingi.. sorry for intruding” 

he was about to walk away until you spoke up, “didn’t you say you needed a band-aid?”

you reached out for his visibly-cut hand, “what happened?”

“I was trying to pet a cat but it obviously didn’t like me..”

he watched as you were cleaning his cuts; he hissed in pain

you looked up at him and back down at his cuts as you whispered, “sorry..”

you continued as you blew on the area as you wiped it over with sanitizing wipes so that it wouldn’t hurt as much

he couldn’t help but smile as he watched you put band-aids on him so lovingly and with care

he felt the jealous glares from Mingi and he spoke up

“so how do you know Mingi?”

you looked at him after you finished tending his wounds, “I just met him, didn’t know I had philosophy with him.. oh! I’m Y/N!” 

“oh yeah?”

you reached out your hand for him to shake

but to your surprised, he looped his arms through yours

“I’m San, guess we’ll all be best friends since I have that class with him too~”

he was excited to be friends with someone as pretty and loving as you

maybe.. you could be even more than a friend to him one day...

SEONGHWA

you had to split ways with Mingi and San since they had another class to head to 

with nothing else to do that day, you decided to go onto your online classes for the term to see what you can work on so that you won’t have to worry about them later

you are the type of person to get things done as early as possible; which got you ahead of classes so that you can have more time for other things

the grumbling of your stomach made it hard to focus on anything than your hunger so you went over to the campus map to find out where was the closest eatery was

you sighed as you scratched your head; your stomach grumbled again but this time, it was louder than the first one

there was a little chuckle as you closed your eyes in embarrassment before turning around

you saw the literal statue of a Greek God

“I assume you’re hungry.. this cafe has a stacked menu and it has good wifi too..”

you thanked him and bowed as you went back to the maps to take a picture of the cafe so that you won’t get lost

you missed a couple of turns and blocks but you finally arrived at the cafe

it was pretty big; there were 2 stories and it had a veranda seating area

you walked in to the comforting smell of roasted coffee beans

there was a long line; with females taking up 89% of the cafe

(I wonder why there were so many girls here at this cafe..)

that was when you got to the counter and you finally understood

that Greek God guy was behind the counter giving you a smiled widely as he saw you; you felt the glares of the other girls on you since he only gave them a retail-worker smile

but you didn’t know that

“oh! I was wondering what was taking you so long to get here..” he continued to smile at you as you were trying to fiddle with your phone case

“I got lost...”

he bursts out in a kind laugh, “at least you’re here now, what can I get you?”

you bit your lips as you scanned the menu, “honestly I don’t know what to get, I’m not picky and I’m indecisive...”

“you look like you’d be into something simple... how about a taro latte and a hearty chicken avocado sandwich?”

you laughed, “that’s a simple order? I’ll take it”

that was when Seonghwa wanted to see more of that smile

“can I get a name with that order?”

you looked down at his nametag before answering, “Y/N”

you went to go get your wallet from your bag but he spoke up, “my treat!”

“Seonghwa, you don’t have t-”

but he slid his employee’s card already

“I’ll get your order ready for you,” he winks at you

YEOSANG

after you got your order from Seonghwa

you walked up to the veranda seating area

there were outlet on the tables so you didn’t have to worry about sitting near a wall or anything

you sat down and saw a boy sitting on the table across from you

he was munching down on a big slice of chocolate cake 

he looked so cute and happy to be eating 

but then he looked up to you smiling at him; he quickly looked down in embarrassment

but so did you

(I probably looked like a lunatic eating such a big piece like that)

(I probably looked like a creep watching him eat like that)

for some reason you both looked up at each other and nodded at one another in acknowledgement

you went back to working from your laptop and eating

Yeosang looked up at you again; you were focus on your work as you used your electric pen to scribble across your screen 

he too took out his art materials; the typical sketchbook, #2 pencil and a trusty eraser 

you both were in the moment; enjoying the sunshine on your skins and the refreshing breeze tingle through your hair

after a while, Yeosang had to get up to leave

he was contemplating on giving you a drawing of you; was it creepy or was it romantic?

he signed his name and number after he finished but he didn’t want to actually give it to you because he wasn’t that confident in himself yet

so he purposely left it on his table and packed up

he nodded at you once again before dashing downstairs

you noticed there was a piece of paper on the table

“wait! you left this!” but he was long gone

you flipped the paper and saw a stunning sketch of yourself

you didn’t think you were pretty or anything special but the drawing gave you a sense of confidence

“Yeosang..” you read out loud as you smiled at his artwork 

JONGHO

you packed up a while after that

you were planning to explore the campus even more

to find out where your other classes were so that you didn’t have to struggle trying to find them later on

you went to the closest bus stop

when you walked around to find a seating area, you saw a young lad wearing headphones

he was totally in his own world; jamming out to his music

seeing how he was into his music made you want to listen to music too

you sat down next to him and opened your bag to try to find your headphones

but OF COURSE, you probably left them at home

around that time was when another guy appeared; it seemed like he was a music major or something because he was trying his best to woo you or something 

you smiled at the ground with wide eyes because you were overwhelmed by his “swag”

the guy sitting next to you finally realized that you were sitting next to him and you looked super uncomfortable by this obnoxious rapper

you were probably one of the prettiest girls he’s ever seen and he wanted to do anything to help you out

he took of one of his earbuds out and nudged it to you

he nods at you for to you take it and you do

BLESS HIM; you rather block one ear off than to have both of your ears bleed from bad rapping

you listened to the music a little bit more before turning to the guy sitting next to you, “hey I listen to this artist too!! I’m obsessed with them!”

he smiled at you as he tried to keep eye contact; the way you just looked at him without blinking much made his heart flutter

“they give me inspiration..” he comments

the bus catches his attention but he doesn’t want this conversation to go to waste

“OH THE BUS IS HERE!” you got up, forgetting that you were sharing earbuds with him; causing his phone to drop out of his hands

“OH GOSH I’M SO SORRY!”

“it’s oka-”

you both reached down for his phone as your smooth fingers grazed his guitar-calloused fingers; he pulled away first

“here ya go~” 

you both saw the rapper get on the bus first and you quickly grabbed the guy’s hand 

“let’s find a good spot on the bus.. uh..” you weren’t sure if you guys introduced yourselves yet and you had already forgotten

“Jongho..” he beamed at your contact

“Y/N~”

YUNHO

you and Jongho separated ways after getting off the bus

he was headed to the studios and you were heading over to the performance arts building

you’ve always been interested in dancing and you had intro to hip hop the next day so you wanted to prepare yourself 

maybe even bust some moves to be hyped for the next day

you heard the muffled sounds of music playing in one of the dancing studios

the sounds of footsteps and floor scuffings became prominent

you found yourself became immersed with the dancer in the room

he had strong movements yet they were fluid?

he probably had one of the best facial expressions ever

right when he was done, you quietly clapped as your jaws were still on the floor

he looked through into the mirror at you standing at the doorway in awe

you probably couldn’t tell but he was getting even more red from blushing

“you’re probably the BEST dancer I’ve ever seen!!”

he ruffled the back of his sweaty hair, “no way.. I definitely have room to improve..”

you blinked furiously at him, “room to improve? if that’s the case, I need one whole building to improve. you’re seriously amazing, I was totally captivated”

captivated is what Yunho felt when he saw you for the first time 

“wait, you dance too??” he felt a light surge of excitement knowing that you dance as well

you scrunched your face as you shrugged, “I like to dance but I’m not good or anything.. just a little hobby..”

“if you’d like, I have a class tomorrow here in this room if you wanna swoop in and dance!”

you cocked your head in confusion, “wait, you have a class here tomorrow? are you Jung Yunho?”

he broke out into a smile as he nodded, “yeah, that’s me!”

“I didn’t think they would have young and good-looking teachers here..” you mumbled as you looked over your classes again; double-checking what time you were going to be in his class tomorrow

but Yunho was caught up with the fact that you called him good-looking

“what’s your name?” he manages to ask

“Y/N-”

“excuse me~ we’re gonna clean this room soon so if you could pack your things, I would be grateful~” the tired custodian announced

you looked back at Yunho, “I’ll see you tomorrow.. teacher~”

he smiles into his fist as he picks up his duffel, “well, you can say your goodbyes after I walk you out..”

HONGJOONG

Yunho only walked you out to the entrance of the building

“where are you heading off to now?” Yunho wanted to walk you back to your apartment but he had work to do 

“I wanna check out the campus a bit more...”

“alright I’ll see you tomorrow~”

“see ya, teacher~”

you both waved until you swiveled around to make your way to the recording studios

it was golden hour; the sun shined against the windows making it look like mirrors

the performance arts building was sitting on top of the slope; giving you full access to the whole campus

you were admiring the view as Hongjoong was also on his way to the recording studio

he was frustrated

he had no inspirations; no muse

and that was when he was walking behind you; he didn’t notice you until you turned around and ran into him

you were literally so sick of how many times your clumsiness caused problems for other people, “I”M SO SORRY!! I’m the clumsiest person ever...”

“it’s okay, it was my fault too..”

you bent down to collect the guy’s notebook and mp3 player

“I haven’t seen these bad boys in a long time,” held up the mp3 player to him

you were just squatting there, basking in the golden sunlight

Hongjoong finally found a muse and it wasn’t just any muse; it was you

“o-oh yeah... if I record songs, I rather not have distractions like games and social media..” 

you got up and you nodded in agreement, “that’s pretty smart”

he smiles as he walks over to the doors to the recording studios and waits for you, “are you coming to the studios too?”

you nodded as you waddled on over

he couldn’t help but smile at your cute little actions

“what brings you over here?” he asks as he sees your backside looking around the building

you look back at him as you answered,��“I’m just exploring. seeing if anything sparks my interest.. wondering if I should pick up a new hobby.. finding a new routine for myself here at the University of KQ.. you know?”

he was already so in love with you

was this what it was like to fall in love at first sight?

“I’m Hongjoong, by the way..”

“I’m-”

“HEY Y/N!!” you heard a group say in unison

You looked over to see Wooyoung, Mingi, San, Seonghwa, Yeosang, Jongho and Yunho walk over to you and Hongjoong. You thought it was weird that everyone who you ever interacted with today was all gathered here in one area. They were all confused, “wait how do you know Y/N?” 

You furrowed your brows, “y-you all know each other?” 

Hongjoong nodded, “yeah, we’re called the KQ Fellaz. Just a little group we made for ourselves.”

Yunho chimed in, “we make our own songs and choreography.”

“Would you like to be our manager? Since you already know all of us, we don’t even have to do an interview to look for one!” San asked as he looped his arms around yours. You looked around the group and they all had puppy eyes, “guess I know what to do on my free time now..” 

~end