#cove energy is contagious

[thxnews]

Love by the Sea: Most Romantic Beach Getaways in America!

Hey there, lovely readers! Let's be honest, we all need that perfect romantic escape from our daily routines. Imagine walking hand-in-hand along a picturesque beach, the sun setting in hues of orange and pink, and the sound of waves softly playing in the background. That's the kind of magic I want to share with you today. So, pack your bags (and maybe a bit of sunscreen), as we embark on a journey to discover the most romantic beach getaways across the USA. These are places where love flourishes and memories are made.  

Cape Cod lighthouse with cove. Photo by Feliks Tsadkin. Flickr.  

East Coast Charms

Cape Cod, Massachusetts: Classic New England Romance Ah, Cape Cod! It's like stepping into a romantic novel. Quaint villages, historic lighthouses, and beaches that stretch for miles - it's the perfect setting for love. My wife and I had our second honeymoon here, and it was dreamy. We spent our evenings sailing at sunset and our mornings enjoying the cozy comfort of a charming bed and breakfast. Highly recommend it for couples seeking that old-school romantic vibe.   Outer Banks, North Carolina: Secluded Beach Serenity The Outer Banks offers a different kind of romance – one of solitude and natural beauty. It's the kind of place where you can forget the world and just be with each other. Horseback riding along the shore was our highlight, especially during sunset. It's peaceful, it's beautiful, and it's undeniably romantic.   Miami Beach, Florida: Vibrant and Lively Romance Miami Beach is for those who love a bit of zest in their romance. The city's vibrant energy is contagious, and the beach views are spectacular. Imagine dancing the night away in an Art Deco nightclub, then walking hand-in-hand along the beach under the stars. It's a blend of excitement and serenity that's hard to beat.  

Melancholic beach in Malibu. Photo by Paolog Gamba. Flickr.  

West Coast Wonders

Malibu, California: Celebrity-Style Getaway If you're after a taste of luxury and perhaps a celebrity sighting or two, Malibu is the place. With its exclusive beaches and upscale vibe, it makes for a glamorous romantic getaway. My partner and I felt like stars as we picnicked on a private beach. It was a splurge, but oh so worth it!   Cannon Beach, Oregon: Nature’s Romance For couples who find romance in nature's majesty, Cannon Beach is a must-visit. The sight of Haystack Rock looming over the beach at sunset is nothing short of magical. Beach bonfires here are a thing – cuddling up by the fire as the waves crash nearby... it's a memory you'll cherish forever.   Maui, Hawaii: Tropical Paradise Maui isn’t just a honeymoon staple for no reason. It's a tropical paradise that screams romance. Watching the sunrise at Haleakalā is an experience of a lifetime – it's like watching the world wake up with your loved one. And the luaus? A fun and festive way to experience local culture together.  

Key West Sunrise. Photo by Max and Dee. Flickr.  

Gulf Coast Gems

Key West, Florida: Island Charm Key West is the epitome of laid-back island charm. Its colorful streets and beautiful sunsets create the perfect backdrop for romance. The sunset cruises here are phenomenal, offering stunning views and a serene environment to express your love.   Galveston, Texas: Historic Beach Romance Galveston's blend of history and beachside charm makes it unique. Walking through the historic district felt like a step back in time. And the live music on the pier adds a lively touch to a romantic evening stroll.  

Amazing aerial of Makena Big Beach, Maui Hawaii. Photo by Drone Picture. Flickr.  

Hidden Beaches for Ultimate Privacy

Looking for something more secluded? There are plenty of hidden gems along the coast where you can enjoy ultimate privacy. These spots are perfect for when you want to escape the crowds and focus on each other.   Final Roundup So, there you have it – a little something for every kind of couple. Whether you're seeking adventure, relaxation, or just a change of scenery, these romantic beach getaways in the USA are sure to rekindle the flames of love. Start planning, pack those bags, and get ready to create some beautiful memories with your significant other. After all, every love story deserves a beautiful setting, and what's better than a beach getaway?   An Extra Tips Remember, the key to a stress-free romantic trip is planning. Look for couple-focused amenities and services. And don't forget to leave some room for spontaneity – sometimes the best moments are the ones you don't plan for!   Sources: THX News & USAGOV. Read the full article

[tommyspeakycap]

request for jack grealish one where he’s really upset over something and you’re there with him to comfort him, lots of physical contact being his love language and you being the only person he likes touching his hair ?

Comfort

You knew from the very second he walked through the door that annoyed would be an incredibly generous word to describe the emotions running through the Brummie boys head. You grimace to yourself, shoulder raising closer to your ears at the sound of the brand new front door slamming heavily behind him with a curse at the fact he couldn't get his shoes kicked off just right the first time he attempted it in the foyer.

The first game was a loss and just about all he'd gotten for the past few days was hate, stress, hate and some more fucking stress. He was exhausted. From Mykonos to Birmingham to get a bag full of clothes so he could meet Villa in London before eventually travelling to Manchester, his sleep schedule has been completely messed up and even when he did have bursts of time where he should have been sleeping, he had been laying awake scrolling through countless tweets criticising his every single move. Add to that the fact his body was exhausted from international duty and that he had wanted nothing more than to curl up by your side and let his worries melt away like he had last gotten to do nearly three whole months ago.

He doesn't know you're here. To the very best of Jack's knowledge, you were still home in Birmingham and he would probably have to broach the conversation of whether or not you'll be joining him up anytime soon, if ever. He lets out a frustrated grunt, but you know Jack better than anyone else and there's the thick sheen of his heart aching tears existing beneath his frustration.

"Hey baby."

His head snaps around to land his eyes on you the second your sweet voice meets his buzzing ears. The echos of Etihad still burn a bit of his hearing away for now, but he knows it'll return to normal by the end of the night. The tears that had previously been kept on his lash line, pushed back by his will not to breakdown for fear he might not be able to stop if he starts are now past the last line of defence, streaming over his cheeks as he crossed the floor at a pace that would send his fife rating into surefire question.

Your body makes an involuntary 'oof' as he crashes against you, his arms so tight around your body as he stops you from stumbling back with the force of his incoming hug. You don't think he's ever actually held you that tightly before, never with such dire necessity, with such urgency for you to be as close to him as he could get you.

The hair that's been allowed to fall loose from the band he'd earlier had it tied back in tickles the back of your neck as it dangles over the exposed skin. He mumbles something almost incoherent about how much he's missed you into your neck, pepping chaste kisses where his lips have landed against you in this hug. You wished you could enjoy that, but the dampening that has begun to occur over the shoulder that his head is above reminds you of the pain he must be in.

Leaving your childhood club is one thing, but leaving it when everybody else seems to think he's a monster for it is a whole different kind of agony. There were just too many emotions for people to see the kind of things Jack had given for the club and the huge opportunity he had left them with his legacy and with the money they copped for his record breaking sale.

"It's okay, Jacky." You coo, tightening your arms around you as he attempts one tighter squeeze to force the tears back into him. It's a futile attempt, his arms loosening but never dropping away from you as he squeezes his eyes shut and lets those sobs shake his body. "I got you, baby. I've got you."

There was such a mix of emotions running through him that made him feel like the world had just pushed him to the ground and taken the perfect opportunity to give his body a good kicking. First final for England in 55 years, then they lost in a penalty shootout he didn't even get to be a part of after a game he barely got to play in. Then a holiday he couldn't take with you because of work commitments and a sudden coworker needed sooner maternity leave meaning your holiday was completely eliminated. As if those things didn't dampen his spirit, all that transfer business had gone down and it was finally all hitting him.

His exhaustion had caught up, an inevitable burn out that could be messed only by the presence of you in his life. Some of this tears that stream down his cheeks and pool on the grey material of your t-shirt are ones of joy and relief for finally having you back in his arms again for the first time in far too long of a time. Jack vows he will never ever spend that amount of time without you again. Never will he let so much time pass before he gets to hold you, kiss you and tell you face to face how much he truly loves every single thing about you.

"You're my rockstar, you know." You announce, seemingly out of the blue ones his body wracking sobs had died to smaller sniffled and period tears streaking down onto you. "I've literally never been prouder of anyone in my life ever. Not only did you fucking smash the euros, but then you stayed so sweet and so amicable during such a difficult process. You handled everything so well, J. I'm so proud or you and I'm so, so happy for you." You promise, pushing him back so you can take his blotchy, tear streaked face in your head. The expanse of that face is coved in your kisses, pecked all over the surface until he's giggling like the Jack that you know so well, his laugh the most contagious sound you've ever been lucky enough to get to hear on a daily basis. "And I'm so lucky that you let me share this journey with you." You finish, landing your lips softly and perfectly onto his with a warmth and love he had been desperately missing out on for those last vital few weeks of his break.

"S' our journey," Jack mumbles in response against your lips, pulling back every so slightly so he can get a proper good look at the face he had missed so much in person. Your cute quirked eyebrows and confusion tainted eyes make him smile before he elaborates. "Not my journey, it's our journey together. All of this, just the two of us."

His words make your heart sore, flying up onto the space above you in pure glee. You had to admit there was a mild element of fear wondering if he would want you here or if he'd maybe be wanting fresh start, but that was certainly not the case for Jack.

"I love you," he says as you feel him tuck you right back into his chest with a content hum. "I love you too, but you need a wash."

Jack's laughter bellows loudly from his chest beneath your ear at your lightly playful and yet very truthful statement.

"I ran you a bubble bath for you. Bathroom's huuuuge." Your eyes are full of wonder like he thought they might be when he would get the opportunity to bring you out to his temporary Manchester abode. This is you would both stay until he could find a house to place some money down on so he can truly start to settle out the fact he's going to have the next six years of his life here in this area with this club. It makes him more than happy, being here. But something that tickles him in thought as he follows you up the stairs is that he'll get to experience all of this newness with you. You’ll get to explore the new area together, find nee places, making it home together. You had both known Soulihull like the back of your hand, now you could find new places to just be together. He can go house hunting with you. He'll let you drag him through the houses he probably wouldn't otherwise look so much into, talking about what room could be which and silly little things he wouldn't even have noticed.

He could pick a house with you that would have enough room to start a family in together within the next year or so, like you had been hoping to do depending on what the club and transfer season had brought. This brought stability, a team that would function well without a reliance on him if there were some things he had to sit out in order to build this family.

It had been, unbeknownst to you, such a pivotal part of discussions with the Manchester City agents. Jack made it clear he was looking for stability and trophies. He had done so much for Villa and now it was time for him to invest energy in bigger fights with bigger clubs that don't face relegation so constantly. He made it clear to the managers also that the was looking to be in the business of starting a family sometime soon. He was welcomed with open arms still. A club who wanted him desperately and would probably have caved to many more demands from him, not having a fraction of an issue with negotiated paternity pay and leave.

He couldn't wait to find a house and settle down here with you for the foreseeable future, even if things didn't look exactly as he thought they might've looked when you first got together as merely young adults.

"What's going on in that pretty head of yours, eh?" You ask softly, running your fingers gently through his tangled and sweaty hair as he stands there in the middle of the large bathroom. Jack shrugs. There's so much in there today, not really like usual where he could sort through those thoughts and keep his head clear for every day and every game he faces.

"Just stressed," he huffs, allowing you to help him out of the brand new away strip he had been given at the beginning of the day today for his first first game with the new team.

His muscles are achy and tight, body still stiff from the cold that the rain had battered into his limbs as you easily hook off his boxers and tug them down his legs so he can step over the bathtub into the perfect temperature bubble filled water that makes him heave out a heavy sigh of relief the second it meets his skin.

"Talk to me, baby?"

And talk to you he did after he sat down in that bath with you.

He leaned back against you, allowing you to lather shampoo into the hair he trusted very few people with multiple times to massage the ache out of his skull from the previous days tension headaches. He talks about all those messages from so many unhappy people, some even City fans who didn't even want to entertain the idea of him being there. He talks about his worry of sitting on the bench season after season, telling you he was hoping to god those tweets wouldn't be further from the truth. He confided in you some of his greatest pains; the concept that he'd let his Villa teammates down and maybe even made his family unhappy despite the fact they had given him nothing but their full support and unsurprising pride just like everybody else in his immediate circle.

You massage muscle relaxing soap into all of the muscles in his body as he just talks, letting the weight of the world off of his shoulders to dissipate like the steam in the air from the bath. Only once he has everything off his chest and the waters gone cold do you both leave the bathroom, wrapped in towels then into pyjamas where he wraps you up in his arms like he's been desperate to do since the moment he touched off for International duty months ago, and he talks again.

This time, he talks to you instead of just talking out every worry and fear he's ever had.

Jack uses probably the most amount of words he's ever used in such sensible succession in order to paint you a perfect mental picture of a house just outside the city with a huge garden, fenced in for dogs and kids with a pool and enough room for all three of those future kids to have their own room, even though they'll share at first just for fun. He paints a picture of you at his games with two sons and a daughter, his name on each shirt along your back. The kids will call Foden uncle Phil and they’ll love him just like you both do. They'll get to play with the teams kids on the pitch after the games no matter how tired the guys are even if they've been thrashed in a loss. He depicts the kind of life you had both wanted for so long, somehow always deterred by something until right this moment, the time feeling like it had rolled perfectly into place for both of you.

And Jack tells you about how you'll poke fun at him when he starts to get those salt and pepper strands of hair and he'll love you no matter how you look. Your kids will learn what love is from their parents, they'll pick it up and they'll emulate it in their own lives sometime in the future. They'll stamp out hate with the hearts full of love that you will both allow those kids to grow into.

You both fall asleep together that night, wrapped in each others arms drifting off into dreams of kids that don't exist yet in a house you haven't even looked for with a future that each of you wants nothing more than to grab onto with both hands.

Jack's heart hurts for the changes he's made this week. He doubts the pain will ever fully leave him and he hopes that one day his club will welcome him back to end his career on a high note with them. However, until then the pain will be dulled by the prospect of his new future here.

One he can't wait to get stuck right into.

[savagc]

all of them

send me a pair name and I’ll tell you what I think it would be like if they had a child.

@reycs

RAVEN & LUNA

TWIN A - first born.

Name: Felix Reyes.

Gender: Male.

General Appearance: brown hair/brown eyes, warm complexion most similar to Raven's. Felix has Luna’s eyes and Raven’s smile.

Personality:  Felix has his ‘moods’, some days he wants nothing more than to being running around and playing with cove, his mothers, other days he is most content being unbothered, and would rather sit and be more ‘lazy’, though there is nothing lazy about him. he is a thinker, a watcher, and often comes up with the best of ideas and plans, the most intricately detailed ways of helping his mothers and sister in any way they might need. he is quite the inventor...problem solver...and snuggle bug all rolled into one.

Special Talents: ingenuity, he takes pride in vocabulary, fluency in english, trigedasleng, asl, and spanish, his ability to catch ANY Animals he comes across, and he is an excellent chef. Felix knows the stars by name, and plants as well.

Who they like better: Raven ; with raven he gets to put many of his inventions and ideas to the test. but he needs Luna’s arms around him a lot and tries to hide at her side sometimes when he wants to be invisible.

Who they take after more: Luna ; Felix very much takes after luna when it comes to ‘personal space’ and shying away from people outside of his family.

Personal Head canon: approach him with care and at times...caution. Felix does not always like people in his personal space, unless it is his mothers. he has been known to yell at cove for bothering him when he’s ‘thinking’ and he feels horrible for outbursts even in the midst of them. they tend to be nothing that climbing into luna’s lap can’t fix, for a gentle reminder...that everything is going to always be okay.

Face Claim:

TWIN B: second born.

Name: Cove Reyes.

Gender: Female.

General Appearance: luna's curls, raven's deeper brunette color, dark brown eyes, warm complexion, luna's various constellations of freckles upon her body. Cove has Raven’s eyes and Luna’s smile.

Personality: Cove is sassy, and at times very bossy. she does not always take the hint when Felix wants to be left alone and instead will insist that he plays anyway and that he should ‘learn to like it’, [ this tends to be where Cove turns Felix’s vocabulary against him and requires he be accommodating and adaptable ] however...she is very quick to back down when she understands she’s being too pushy, and then does her best to make up for upsetting her brother. it’s because of her soft hugs and her knack for singing comforting songs that makes Felix crave to be beside her often when he’s upset for other reasons. Cove’s loving nature makes it impossible not to forgive her quickly. 

Special Talents: making up her own songs [ most are about flowers and animals and her family and make no sense when it comes to ‘flow’ ] but her voice is soft and precious considering she has trouble with her r’s. Cove can create and sew her own clothing, she can make anything grow, and knows nearly as much medically as Luna does. often she assigns herself as head nurse to animals Felix finds. 

Who they like better: when Cove needs her energy spent...she follows luna around and helps with gardening, cooking, and in equal measure she’s at raven’s side happy to be a momma’s girl and see pride in raven’s eyes when she learns something new from her.

Who they take after more: Raven. when it comes to physical energy, Cove is entirely Raven’s daughter, the same is to be said when it comes to her determination to follow-through. overall, she is a good blend of luna and raven’s compassion, leadership, and flexibility.

Personal Head canon: there are days, usually following Cove and Felix fighting, where Cove will not talk to luna or raven. she will only speak to her twin brother using sign language until they both feel better. this once went on for three days, not because Cove had upset Felix, but because Felix had upset Cove by releasing a garden snake back to the wild without giving her a chance to kiss it goodbye.

Face Claim:

KODY & LUNA

Name: Isla Li Nolan-Kaiser

Gender: Female

General Appearance:

Personality: Isla tries her hardest to be a tiny grown-up, independent and opinionated and with the sweetest heart. she does not like liars or information being kept from her. very empathetic, understanding, finding reasons for the tiniest of mysteries in the world around her and in the people around her. she is often quiet, watchful, but her smile is contagious and she tries her best to spread it to everyone that she meets. stranger danger is something luna and kody have had to work on teaching her due to how friendly she is with everyone she meets. isla's heart is easily broken if she feels she may have upset her mothers or family members.

Special Talents: cooking, ballet and hip-hop dance, knowing how to drive [ a little ] because to Luna’s dismay...Kody taught her. speaks english, spanish, german, takes stuffed animals apart and sews miss-matched parts together, calls them little monsters and thinks they’re hilarious. 

Who they like better: she would be upset if she was expected to like one more than the other. absolutely offended and shattered if she were asked to choose such a thing.

Who they take after more: a perfect blend of them both.

Personal Head canon: Isla was an on-purpose accident, when it comes to conception. her mothers both had to grow up a bit quickly when they learned they had a baby on the way, but they had never been more happy to. luna and kody learn just as much from Isla as she learns from them. both woke up a little late one morning and found Isla in the kitchen in a mess of making breakfast, before they realized they didn't have many of the ingredients to do so. turns out Isla had taken their debit card just across the street to the small grocery store and bought the things that she needed, having accompanied her mothers grocery shopping countless times before, she knew well how to do it herself. this was the day that she made friends with a neighborhood cat, and the store bagger lady named Millie. The cat, Isla called Millie from that day forward too. She won't go to bed without setting out a bowl of milk. [ the cat is not a stray it's collared, tagged, and overly fed, living its best life. ]

Face Claim:

MAX & COREY

[ bonus bc even though neither wants kids i stumbled upon an fc too good not to show at least so i did a shortened response. ]

Name: Juno Lennon Parker.

Gender: Male.

Face Claim:

[lady-divine-writes]

The Prince of the Sea and his Child of Fire (Rated NC17) - Chapter 3/15

Summary: Blaine is a water sprite, prince of the undersea kingdom and sole heir to the throne. Five days away from turning seventeen and his big coronation, he decides to take a journey to the surface, to seek out a legendary flame said to be tended by an evil witch. Instead of a witch, he finds something else entirely ...

Kurt is a fire fairy, prince of a race of fire fairies and heir to the throne. Five days away from turning seventeen (on the night of a full solar eclipse when he will transform and become king), he sees for the first time in his life a water sprite - a member of a race that he's been raised to hate.

What will happen when these two mortal enemies fall in love? Is there any way for them to escape destiny and be together?

Read on AO3

Chapter 3

��Blaine! Wake up!” Trent pleads to his prince’s unconscious face. After hours of swimming, Trent - physically and emotionally drained, his energy reserves tapped - begins to lose hope. Blaine is still breathing but he hasn’t woken, hasn’t blinked, hasn’t moved for hours, not even in the ways someone normally does while they sleep.

And Blaine is a notorious sleep talker.

The thin, sensitive skin of Blaine’s eyelids has been stained black with ash, and a larger, angry-red burn marks his brow, but otherwise he seems uninjured. Trent looked Blaine’s body over as soon as they were far enough away from that accursed cove to risk stopping, trying to find any other burns on his skin, but there aren’t any.

Trent isn’t a doctor, but he takes that to mean that whatever is plaguing Blaine is happening inside his body.

Perhaps he’s enchanted! he thinks. Perhaps that fairy put him under a spell! Or maybe he was a witch! A powerful witch, and now Blaine has been cursed to sleep for the rest of his life!

“Please!” Trent cries, terrified that he’s lost his best friend forever. “Wake up, Blaine!”

Trent swims all day, stopping from time to time to check on his prince and to rest, keeping Blaine to the parts of the ocean untouched by daylight. Daylight in any form will hurt a sprite, but exposure to direct daylight out of water will kill them. By late afternoon, Trent finally makes his way back to the castle. He miraculously avoids being seen and sending up any sort of alarm. He hides with Blaine in the garden beneath the splayed fingers of a yellow Elkhorn coral, blocked from the view of passersby and the castle windows above.

“Blaine, I need you to wake up,” Trent says, his voice wavering as despair takes over. “You’re my best friend. Besides, I don’t want to go to your father and tell him his only son is dead.” Trent withers at the thought. “You know he’s going to kill me, too.”

Trent bends over and rests his ear on Blaine’s chest in search of a heartbeat. It’s there, and it’s strong, but that might not be enough to counter that blasted fairy’s magic. Trent doesn’t know. Very little is known about the fire fairies above except they’re evil, and not to be trusted under any circumstances. But what else is there that needs to be known?

“Please, Blaine,” he mutters, tears starting in his eyes. “Get up … please, get up.”

Trent hears a cough … then a huff … then a snort. He looks up to see his friend’s eyelids struggle open, weakly parting, unfocused eyes searching his face.

“What are you going to do next?” Blaine asks in a raspy voice. “Profess your undying love to me?”

Trent feels a rush of unabashed joy for a single second before anger sets in.

“You jerk!” Trent snaps, pushing away from Blaine. “What’s wrong with you?”

“Awww, admit it …” Blaine sits up, pressing a hand to his spinning head “… you were worried about me.”

“I was worried about being ground into chum and fed to the sharks, that’s all I was worried about.” Trent rises to his feet and brushes off his pants, offering Blaine a hand up regardless of his anger. “What happened to you? I thought you were dead!”

“I … I was knocked out cold, I guess. Nothing more.”

“So you’re not going to grow wings or burst into flames then?”

Blaine snickers. “No. None of that,” he says, but subtly peeking at his back to make sure.

“Great. That’s just great. Well, back to business as usual, I guess.”

“Guess so.”

“By the way, your royal ass-ness, you are officially late for another war meeting.”

“Wha---?” Blaine brushes at his clothes, grimacing at the scorch marks curling the hem of his pants. He looks up, peering at the position of the light in the water, the direction of the current. He slaps a palm to his forehead. “Aw, crap!” he groans, half out of pain and half out of irritation. He scrambles out from under the coral, feet pushing into the wet sand as he propels himself forward, kicking up clouds in his wake. He circles around the castle, heading for the entrance. “Couldn’t you have gotten us back here any faster?” he yells at Trent, clambering behind him, fighting to keep up.

“Maybe I could have gotten here faster if I had dropped the dead weight I was dragging, you dugong’s behind!”

Blaine grins at his friend’s comment as they backtrack through the hallways, taking the same path they had earlier, dashing through the maze of corridors till they get to the main hall, feet sliding across the slick floors. Blaine rounds the corner to the war room, continuing on alone (which he wouldn’t normally but he owes Trent one), stopping at the door and straightening what is left of his singed pants. He doesn’t have time to race back to his room and grab his royal sash not to mention a shirt, so shirtless and unadorned will have to do. It’s a serious breach in protocol (or so he’s been told numerous times) but one good thing will come from that.

His dad will hate it.

Blaine can hear voices from the war room echo out into the hallway before he enters.

“The situation is getting serious. We should attack now before anyone gets hurt!”

“I agree! We must move quickly! Take them by surprise! We cannot delay any longer!”

“General, with all due respect, we cannot go to war over an isolated incident! That will cause far more trouble, and damage, than it’s worth!”

“We’re not talking about an isolated incident. It seems an army of jellyfish attacked the outlying area a full moon ago, my king. And there are reports that a larger army is amassing west of the whale graveyard.”

“Send an envoy. Try to reason with them first! Perhaps your son could …”

“Jellyfish are brainless! They cannot be reasoned with!”

“If they can organize forces and mobilize, they can most definitely be reasoned with!”

“The outlying area … the whale graveyard … those are fairly remote areas to be building an army and launching an attack. Do we have any idea why they would choose there?”

“It’s not heavily guarded and …”

The guard at the entrance clears his throat when Blaine enters, wincing at the sight of Blaine’s blackened eyes and ruined pants.

“Presenting His Royal Highness, Prince Blaine!”

Blaine barely makes it a foot through the doorway when the entire assemblage stops cold, turns in his direction, and stares open-mouthed. His father, the massive black figure at the far end of the room, revolves around slowly and to dramatic effect. The oldest among the water sprites, he fills the room from nearly floor to ceiling. His once pale skin now an oily pitch, he absorbs every inch of light in the room, making it seem darker than it really is. Unlike other water sprites, he’s developed thick, rugged tentacles from years of scouring the ocean floor and rarely swimming. His eyes, once golden like Blaine’s, have become large yellow discs with no discernible pupils. He’s a fearsome monster to behold, the leviathan of nightmares and legends.

And Blaine gets to call him father.

The Great Sea King takes one look at his son and closes his yellow eyes in disgust.

“Leave us,” he says, gesturing with his tentacles to those gathered around the room.

Without a word, the entire council stands and leaves, eyes adverted as they pass the sprite their king shows so much disdain for.

“Close the door,” the king commands. The heavy door closes. Blaine and his father stand on opposite ends of the room - alone.

Blaine steps forward, back straight, shoulders square, head high – as much the countenance of royalty as he can muster. But when his father opens his eyes again, he is unimpressed by his son’s posturing.

“Father,” Blaine starts, clasping his hands behind his back to stop their shaking, “I apologize for being late, but I …”

“Look at you,” his father sneers, addressing his son with a grimace. “Look at your clothes, your face. You are a mess, and late to yet another important meeting.” The king turns his back on his son, staring at the wall behind him. “You make a poor prince. What sort of king are you going to be? You are a disgrace.”

Blaine glowers at his father, for all the good his sour face does when his father refuses to even look at him.

“If I’m such a disgrace, then don’t make me king,” Blaine says bitterly, disguising the hurt in his voice.

“If I had any other choice, I wouldn’t,” his father says, sighing heavily from the burden of his troublesome son. “We are done here. You may go.”

Blaine jerks back. In his father’s presence less than five minutes and already dismissed. Must be some new record. A younger Blaine would have apologized, fallen on his knees and begged for his father’s forgiveness, begged to be given another chance, but this more jaded Blaine knows better. Even at his best, Malek, the King of the Sea, has never seen any worth in his only son. So Blaine simply turns on his heel and storms out of the room.

His face burns bright with embarrassment, but he no longer cares who sees him. It’s no secret what his father thinks of him.

He only prays his father’s opinion isn’t contagious.

He expects to find Trent loitering in the hallway waiting for him. He hopes to find no one. He needs a moment to himself to remember why it is he doesn’t take to the waves and swim as far away from the palace and his father as he can.

One reason, he knows, is because there isn’t anywhere in the sea he can go that his father can’t find him.

But also because Blaine wants to be a good king. He does have opinions about how to handle the ravaging jellyfish hordes that have been attacking unchecked for months, but his father doesn’t want to hear them.

His father wants Blaine punctual, but mostly quiet at all times.

That’s not something Blaine is prepared to do, not when it comes to the safety of his kingdom.  

That will all change when Blaine becomes king. He’ll call the shots and will answer to no one. Regardless of his immaturity at times, Blaine loves his people. He loves the ocean and every creature in it. It would be nice if, before he’s given the crown, he could make his father see him for the king he will be, not the disobedient prince Malek thinks he is.

If he could only find a way …

“Running away from responsibility again, Blaine?” a snide voice asks from the shadows.

“I’m not running away from anything,” Blaine growls, turning to face the eavesdropper leaning against the wall, legs crossed at the ankles, looking exceptionally comfortable hiding in the dark. It’s his glowing blue eyes Blaine sees first, then his golden mane of hair, and that knowing grin that Blaine so often wants to smack off his face. “Maybe you should stop hanging around where you aren’t welcome.”

“My father is still the king’s steward,” Hunter says, “so technically, I am welcome here.”

“Your father is welcome here,” Blaine sneers, “and just barely. You, on the other hand, are nothing. You have no rank and are therefore unwelcome. Permission to remain in the palace has been granted solely as a courtesy to him, but it can be repealed.”

“You know,” Hunter continues, ignoring the prince’s remarks, “you look like you’ve been under a lot of stress lately.” His eyes sweep down Blaine’s body, stopping on the scorched portions of his pants and traveling up to the burn on his forehead, staring with a curious eyebrow raised. “If you can’t handle the numerous responsibilities of being appointed Sea King, I would be more than happy to take it off of your shoulders, Prince Blaine. All you need do is ask.”

Blaine rolls his eyes at this overconfident sprite who used to be a dear friend – a long time ago before a jealous and ambitious Hunter discovered he could be next in line for the throne if anything unfortunate happened to Blaine and his father turned the position down.

“No, thank you,” Blaine says, sauntering away. “I’ve got it covered.” He stops mid-step and turns, walking back toward the cocky sprite staring daggers at Blaine’s back. “And by the way … you may want to start packing your bags, because the second I get that crown on my head, you’re out of here.”

Blaine pats Hunter’s cheek condescendingly, then walks lazily off to his room. Hunter watches Blaine swagger down the hallway and out of sight, laughing to himself.

“We’ll see,” Hunter mutters, catching a glimpse of the morose Sea King before heading in the opposite direction. “We’ll see.”

[jessicalynnfitness]

💙💙The JessicaLynn Fitness studio is bringing in a new instructor!💙💙 ***MEET CHANTELLE🙋🏼‍♀️*** Chantelle Kotyk has studied dance from a very young age. Originally from Burlington ON, she made the move to Sarnia in 2017. Chantelle graduated from the dance program at George Brown College in Toronto, in 2004, and taught dance and musical theatre at various programs throughout the GTA. Through her experience in the dance industry she fell in love with barre fitness! Obtaining her certification to teach from Barre Works in Toronto, in 2018, Chantelle has been teaching classes at various studios in Sarnia ever since. Currently studying nutrition at the Alive Academy of Natural Health, she is also working towards her Holistic Nutritional Consulting Diploma. Chantelle is very excited to join the team here at The Cove and share her passion for barre and dance with everyone! @chantelle_chillinn . . . . I am SO happy to have Chantelle joining our fam jam here at @thecovewellness 💖 Her energy and positive vibes are absolutely contagious; she's going to bring a whole new flavour of fun into our classes!💃 Chantelle's first class is 👉NEXT THURSDAY: Barre Sweat at 815am. **Sign-up for the new 6-week series through the link in bio** . . https://jessicalynnfitnessschedule.as.me/catalog.php?owner=15917239&action=addCart&clear=1&id=627677 . . . . . #newinstructoralert #meetmeatthebarre #barreplease #ladyfit #sarniafitness #barreworks #holisticwellness #bodymindandsoul #lovetodance #welcomehome #findyourtribe #hangryfamjam #nutritionlove #foodie 📸@casscrowe 👗@onetoothsarnia (at The Cove Wellness) https://www.instagram.com/jessicalynnfitness/p/BwHX-z6n71T/?utm_source=ig_tumblr_share&igshid=cxpfpfa9o2rd

[earlyback]

he could see tiny particles of dust drifting in the air between her ankles, each fleck tumbling individually in and out of the sunlight, and there was something intensely familiar in their arrangement. It was love.

for the witty, piquant, minded and exquisite women in my life. these numbers are for both of you to understand my stand for you. just pick up the moment and understand the scene and lyrics. love you.

I believe with all my heart that the cliches are true, that we are our own best friends and best company, and that if you're not right for yourself, it's impossible to be right for anyone.

If you don't want to tear off the clothes of the person you're on a date with and jump into bed with them, then what's the point? I'd never date; instead, I'd have lots of good friends and hug them a lot and life would be easier and neater and uncomplicated.

Rachel Machacek, The Science of Single: One Woman's Grand Experiment in Modern Dating, Creating Chemistry, and Finding Love

In our memories the stories of our lives defy chronology, resist transcription: past ambushes present, and future hurries into history.

it was as if these memories had been hibernating in him, not dead but merely dormant, weathering out, and now they stumbled out of their thousand dens.

You ever hope for something so much ? So much you can't sleep, so much your skull hurts? but the thing is, you don't even know if the thing you're wishing for is possible ? You don't even know if it could happen ? and it's all out of your control ?

but have heart. hope is something that can be very dangerous but without it life would be horribly dry. Impossible, even. take it from me.

hope was a sunrise, a friend in the alley, a whisper in an empty corridor.

Every second a million petitions wing past the ear of God. let it be door number two. get Janet through this, make the pain go away, make this key fit. If I fish this cove, plant this field, step into this darkness, give me the strength to see it through. help my marriage, my sister, me. What will this fund be worth in thirteen days ? In thirteen years ?

to be in love was to be dazed twenty times a morning: by the latticework of frost on his windshield; by a feather loosed from his pillow; by a soft, pink rim of light over the hills.

he could see tiny particles of dust drifting in the air between her ankles, each fleck tumbling individually in and out of the sunlight, and there was something intensely familiar in their arrangement. It was love. he excavated a boot print she'd left on the snowy step outside his apartment and preserved it in his freezer.

Anthony Doerr, About Grace

We all come into existence as a single cell, smaller than a speck of dust. much smaller. divide. multiply. add and subtract. matter changes hands, atoms flow in and out, molecules pivot, proteins stitch together, mitochondria send out their oxidative dictates; we begin as a microscopic electrical swarm. the lungs the brain the heart. Forty weeks later, six trillion cells get crushed in the vise of our mother’s birth canal and we howl. then the world starts in on us.

What mazes there are in this world. the branches of trees, the filigree of roots, the matrix of crystals, the streets her father recreated in his models... None more complicated than the human brain, Etienne would say, what may be the most complex object in existence; one wet kilogram within which spin universes.

to men like that, time was a surfeit, a barrel they watched slowly drain. When really, he thinks, it’s a glowing puddle you carry in your hands; you should spend all your energy protecting it. Fighting for it. Working so hard not to spill one single drop.

Marie-Laure smiles, and he laughs a pure, contagious laugh, one she will try to remember all her life, father and daughter turning in circles on the sidewalk in front of their apartment house, laughing together while snow sifts through the branches above.

after she has gone back to sleep, after Etienne has blown out his candle, he kneels for a long time beside his bed. the bony figure of Death rides the streets below, stopping his mount now and then to peer into windows. Horns of fire on his head and smoke leaking from his nostrils and, in his skeletal hands, a list newly charged with addresses. gazing first at the crew of officers unloading from their limousines into the chateau. then at the flowing rooms of the perfumer Claude Levitte. then at the dark tall house of Etienne LeBlanc. Pass us by, Horseman. Pass this house by.

because of the diamond in your coat pocket. because I left it here to protect you. all it has done is put me in more danger. then why hasn’t the house been hit ? Why hasn’t it caught fire ? It’s a rock, Papa. a pebble. there is only luck, bad or good. chance and physics. remember? You are alive. I am only alive because I have not yet died.

Anthony Doerr, All the Light We Cannot See

04.26.21.06 am | a happy new day wishes - I want morning and noon and nightfall with you. I want your tears, your smiles, your kisses. missing  you and no.1 virtually matter till we meet again - for us being in love. One love, one heart, one destiny. | clip upload : 20.14 pm

04.26.21.06 am | a happy new day wishes - I want morning and noon and nightfall with you. I want your tears, your smiles, your kisses. missing  you and no.1 virtually matter till we meet again - for us being in love. One love, one heart, one destiny. | clip upload : 14.02 pm

04.26.21.06 am | a happy new day wishes - I want morning and noon and nightfall with you. I want your tears, your smiles, your kisses. missing  you and no.1 virtually matter till we meet again - for us being in love. One love, one heart, one destiny. | clip upload : 14.04.26 pm

04.26.21.06 am | a happy new day wishes - I want morning and noon and nightfall with you. I want your tears, your smiles, your kisses. missing  you and no.1 virtually matter till we meet again - for us being in love. One love, one heart, one destiny. | clip upload : 14.12 pm

04.26.21.06 am | because I am quite certain it would be nearly possible to live with you, somehow I knew that it wouldn’t be at all difficult to love you. missing you and no.1 virtually matter till we meet again - for us being in love.

You - m i S S

#3579

to them - listen adequate music : c - d - s - k - k - a

post time : 14.26.21.14 pm

VW - SN - us being in fervent love.

pic : www.sonyakhegay.com  - check this link and feel virtual Sunday high tea at your place. miss me. see you in late evening.

[longislandweekly-blog]

Thomas Pynchon

You can’t really call Thomas Pynchon the Greta Garbo of American literature. There are actual photos of the reclusive screen star. Nor can you say he’s the J.D. Salinger of modern literature. Salinger, too, was briefly a public figure. Since his 1963 publication of V., Pynchon, who was born in Glen Cove and who graduated from Oyster Bay High School, has been both the most reclusive figure in American literature, while remaining on the cutting edge of modern fiction.

This past May, Pynchon celebrated his 80th birthday. Following the publication of Gravity’s Rainbow (1973), Pynchon was the most celebrated fiction writer of his time, with that ambitious novel declared as the finest work of fiction to come out of the 1970s. Pynchon is Long Island’s most accomplished literary figure since Walt Whitman. Unlike the Good, Gray Poet, there aren’t any highways or boulevards or high schools named for the man. Still, Pynchon is one of the most influential novelists of our time, as generations of fiction writers have long hailed him as an important innovator in the development of the novel.

Pynchon’s style is postmodern, a form of literature that emerged in the post-World War II era, where satire, black humor, surrealism and despair, rather than a more conventional social realism wrought with moral themes, sought to illuminate the times. Pynchon was a natural writer, proving, once again, that creative writers are born, not made, even though the actual work is long and strenuous and generally unrewarding. A high school student in the 1950s, Pynchon displayed a talent for writing, contributing short fiction to the school newspaper. After a stint in the U.S. Navy, Pynchon enrolled at Cornell University, where he studied under the legendary Russian novelist, Vladimir Nabokov, a writer who also excelled in gallows humor and unconventional story lines. At Cornell, Pynchon became friends with Kirkpatrick Sale, later a prolific social critic. As important was his friendship with Richard Farina, who later penned an acclaimed cult novel, Been Down So Long It Looks Like Up To Me (1966). Pynchon would become more prolific than Farina, a man who died at age 29 in a motorcycle accident, but Pynchon, it can be said, looked up to Farina. He even dedicated Gravity’s Rainbow to the late novelist.

From the start, Pynchon displayed impressive energy. After college, Pynchon worked as a technical writer for Boeing in Seattle, WA. But he didn’t waste his evening watching television. Instead, he plunged forward with his fiction, writing and publishing V., a novel that drew from the author’s earlier life in the Navy. V. won a William Faulkner Foundation Award for best first novel of the year. This allowed Pynchon to resign from Boeing and begin writing full time. In 1966, he published his second novel, The Crying of Lot 49, another black humor effort about a corporation that uses the bones of dead American GIs to make cigarette filters. That novel won the Richard and Hilda Rosenthal Foundation Award.

All the while, Pynchon was living in southern California and working on Gravity’s Rainbow. The novel, when published in 1973, was a best seller that solidified Pynchon’s position as the leading postmodern novelist. With its World War II setting and themes highlighting the dehumanizing aspects of the total warfare that characterized the final stages of that war, the novel is similar to Kurt Vonnegut’s more accessible Slaughterhouse Five. Both novels appeared at an opportune time, when disillusionment with the Vietnam War was at its peak and war itself in a world made by mass technological advances seemed more barbaric than ever. At the same time, the novel had its critics. It won the National Book Award, but was rejected for the Pulitzer Prize, with some judges claiming that the novel was, “unreadable,” “turgid” and “overwritten.”

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Thomas Pynchon guest starring on The Simpsons, 2004.

The author voiced himself twice on the long-running animated series.

His reputation secure, Pynchon took some time off from publishing. He also remained a recluse. In the mid-1970s, The Soho Weekly News ran an article that claimed that J.D. Salinger and Thomas Pynchon were one in the same man, that Salinger was now using “Thomas Pynchon” as his author’s name. After discovering the article, Pynchon reportedly wrote back to the publication, telling them, “Not bad. Keep trying.” And indeed, throughout the 1970s, that gold-colored paperback edition of Gravity’s Rainbow was as commonplace as the maroon-colored paperback of Catcher In The Rye. Either way, the article only highlighted the growing mystique around Pynchon. At a time when novelists expertly used the mass media to bring attention to their work, Pynchon was doggedly reclusive. And that’s the way it would stay.

In the 1980s and ‘90s, Pynchon resumed publishing. In 1984, he published Slow Learner, a collection of early short stories. The coming years would bring a number of ambitious novels on the scale of V. and Gravity’s Rainbow: Vineland (1990), Mason & Dixon (1997), Against The Day (2006), Inherent Vice (2009) and Bleeding Edge (2013). Reviewers made the same criticism of some of these novels as they had of Pynchon’s earlier works, namely they could be rambling and overwritten. Still, Pynchon’s legend made each a literary event. Pynchon’s most recent novel, Bleeding Edge, is also his most conventional work of fiction, an entertaining story of a single mother of two living on the Upper West Side who makes a living as a daring private investigator. An angry young man who raged against the world he was born into, Pynchon has cooled in his later years. Pynchon was a product of the booming postwar world on Long Island. He also grew up in the shadow of World War II , a generation that later collided head-on with the Vietnam War. As with any fiction writer, he was shaped by the times. And so, his fiction is concerned with the impact of a material world on the human soul. The results are not terribly optimistic. Still, his style has been contagious, influencing a number of prominent novelists, among them Don DeLillo, David Foster Wallace, T. Coraghessan Boyle, Salman Rushdie and Rick Moody.

Long Island's Thomas Pynchon, a reclusive figure in American literature, has remained on the cutting edge of modern fiction. Long Island Weekly's literary historian Joe Scotchie discusses the influential novelist, who recently turned 80. You can’t really call Thomas Pynchon the Greta Garbo of American literature. There are actual photos of the reclusive screen star.

[kelmelreviews]

Blaq Tuxedo - Tap In

Blaq Tuxedo – Tap In

It’s been a minute since we coved Blaq Tuxedo.  When we found out they were dropping a new project, we were pretty excited as they give some good music with One the positive side everything is well-produced and the brother sound great on every track.  Whether they are giving us nonchalant flows or doing a little vocal ride, they bring energy to every track and their enthusiasm in contagious.  The…