#don’t want to just show up at the dealership and say ‘hi i like a pink car :)’ i want to sound SOMEWHAT smart

[pucksandpower]

Man’s World

Charles Leclerc x Ferrari engineer!Reader

Summary: Charles refuses to just stand by and watch as you get disrespected

Warnings: misogyny and lewd comments

You’re admiring the sleek lines of the red Ferrari F8 Tributo in front of you, running your fingers lightly over the glossy paint. The showroom is quiet this early in the morning, just a few employees milling about getting ready for the day.

Charles had to stop by to sign some merchandise for a charity event and asked if you wanted to tag along. You opted to wait out front and enjoy the eye candy while he took care of business.

You circle around to the back of the car, appreciating the aggressive styling and massive rear diffuser. As an engineer for Scuderia Ferrari who often extends your expertise to working on their road cars, you know every detail of this machine intimately. Your hands itch to pop the hood and inspect that glorious twin-turbo V8, but you resist.

This isn’t your workshop back in Maranello.

Lost in thought, you don’t notice the group of guys entering the showroom until one whistles loudly. “Hey baby, those legs look good enough to wrap around me real tight,” one calls out.

You freeze, feeling your heart rate pick up.

“Don’t be shy, we just want to get to know you better,” another says as they swagger over.

You press back against the car, sizing up the situation. Four of them, all clearly well-off based on the expensive watches and designer clothes. But their eyes are cruel as they look you up and down.

“What’s a pretty little thing like you doing in a place like this?” The apparent ringleader asks. “Hoping to sink your claws into some rich guy and take him for all he’s worth?” The others laugh nastily.

You lift your chin. “Actually, I happen to work for Ferrari.”

The man snorts in disbelief. “Yeah right, and I’m Michael Schumacher. There’s no way a woman knows anything about these cars other than where the passenger seat is.”

You clench your fists, biting back a scathing retort. The thought of educating these misogynistic jerks gives you immense satisfaction, but you know it won’t do any good. They’ll never change their prejudiced attitudes.

“Don’t listen to him, darling,” one says, giving you a lecherous look. “I’d be happy to take you for a ride, show you how a real man handles power between his legs.”

You’re about to tell him exactly where he can shove his stereotypes when a familiar voice interrupts sharply.

“That’s enough.”

You look over to see Charles striding angrily toward you, green eyes blazing. The men surrounding you look irritated at having their fun spoiled.

“Can we help you with something, pal?” The ringleader asks sarcastically.

Charles ignores him, coming to stand protectively beside you. “Are you okay, mon amour?” He asks under his breath.

You nod, relief washing over you now that he’s here. “I’m fine.”

Charles turns an icy stare on the men who’d been harassing you. “I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t speak to my girlfriend that way,” he says coldly.

The leader looks Charles up and down dismissively. But then a spark of recognition crosses his face. “Wait a minute … you’re Charles Leclerc!” He elbows his friends. “The Formula 1 driver!”

The others’ eyes widen as they take in Charles with new understanding. “Whoa, seriously?” One exclaims.

The leader chuckles, clearly trying to recover his bravado. “Well, what do you know? The famous racer has a pretty girl on his arm.” His lips curl in a smirk. “Hate to break it to you, but it’s obvious she’s just using you for your money. No way she knows anything about these cars other than how much they cost.”

Charles crosses his arms. “As it so happens, my girlfriend is an engineer for Scuderia Ferrari, so I’d bet my entire net worth — and my car collection — that she knows more about the cars in this dealership than all four of you combined and then some.”

You have to bite your lip to hide a smile at the dumbfounded looks on the men’s faces.

“An engineer?” One sputters. “You can’t be serious.”

You level a challenging stare at them. “Deadly serious. I’ve personally worked on over a dozen projects for Ferrari, including the SF90 Stradale hypercar we just launched.” You point across the showroom. “There’s one right over there, in fact. Mid-front mounted 4.0L twin-turbo V8, delivering 769 brake horsepower combined with three electric motors. First plug-in hybrid Ferrari ever put into full production.” You smirk at the slack-jawed stares your technical rundown elicits. “So yes, I’d say I know a thing or two about these cars.”

Charles grins proudly and squeezes your hand. But the leader is not ready to back down just yet.

“Anyone can memorize a monologue,” he scoffs. “I don’t buy it. You’re clearly just clinging to this guy for his money.”

Fury rises in your chest. You open your mouth to retaliate, but Charles beats you to it.

“That’s my girlfriend you’re talking about,” he snaps, green eyes blazing. “I’d be very careful with what you say next.”

The man smirks, crossing his bulky arms over his chest. “Or what, tough guy?”

Charles takes a step forward, jaw clenched. The man towers over him but Charles doesn’t flinch.

Right as it looks like things might get physical, you quickly take Charles’s arm. “He’s not worth it,” you murmur.

Charles hesitates, nostrils flaring. After a tense moment, he relaxes his stance and turns his back on the leering man.

But it seems the group isn’t done provoking you yet. “That’s right, listen to your sugar baby,” one of them calls out. “Wouldn’t want you messing up that pretty face for the cameras.”

Charles whips back around, shaking with anger now. Heart pounding, you cling to his arm in an effort to hold him back. “Charles, please-”

“No, Y/N.” He shakes off your hand, stalking toward the men. “I won’t stand here and let them insult you.”

You watch helplessly as Charles gets right in the leader’s face, nearly nose to nose. “You need to apologize. Now,” he grits out.

The man narrows his eyes. “Apologize? For what? Stating the obvious?” He smirks coldly. “Face it, your little girlfriend is nothing but a gold diggin-”

He doesn’t get to finish the sentence. With lightning speed, Charles’ fist connects squarely with his jaw. The man stumbles back with a pained shout, hand flying to his face.

“Charles!” You hurry to his side, alarmed. Charles is breathing hard, staring down at the man doubled over and groaning. The man’s friends back away nervously.

Chest heaving, Charles turns to you. “I’m sorry. I couldn’t listen to him insult you for another second.”

You meet his fiery gaze steadily. “It’s okay, I understand. Thank you for defending me.” After a beat, you add wryly, “And remind me not to get on your bad side.”

That startles a small laugh from Charles. The tension in his shoulders eases. He takes your hand, bringing it to his lips for a gentle kiss. “No chance of that, mon ange,” he murmurs. “You bring out the best in me.”

***

“Ow, ow, ow!” Charles hisses as he gingerly holds his right hand. His knuckles are bruised and bleeding.

You sigh, grabbing the first aid kit to tend to your dramatic boyfriend. “I told you not to punch him, Charles. You don’t know the first thing about throwing a proper punch.”

Charles pouts, wincing as you take his hand in yours to examine it. “I was just trying to defend your honor, mon amour. That man was saying such crude things about you.”

You shake your head, amused by his protectiveness. “My hero,” you tease. “Next time just walk away. I don’t need you breaking your hand over some entitled idiot’s comments.”

Charles hangs his head. “I know, I know. I wasn’t thinking clearly. I just saw red when he kept insulting you.”

You smile softly, touched by how much he cares. You start cleaning the wounds on his knuckles with a disinfectant wipe.

“Ow!” Charles cries out dramatically. “That stings!”

“Don’t be such a baby,” you chide. “It’s just a little antiseptic. I have to clean it so it doesn’t get infected.”

Charles pouts some more but stays still as you finish cleaning the abrasions. You apply an antibiotic ointment carefully before beginning to wrap his hand with a bandage.

“I really messed up my hand, didn’t I?” Charles mumbles dejectedly.

You nod. “You definitely did some damage. Nothing serious, but you’ll be sore for a while.”

Once you’ve wrapped his hand securely, you bring it to your lips and place a gentle kiss on the bandage. “There. All better.”

Charles gives you a lopsided smile. “My own personal nurse. How did I get so lucky?”

You grab an ice pack from the freezer and hand it to him. “Here, put this on your hand to help with the swelling and pain.”

Charles sighs dramatically but does as instructed, holding the ice pack gingerly against his injured hand.

You glance at his wrapped hand, the knuckles already starting to bruise beneath the bandage. “Does it hurt terribly?”

Charles considers the question. “Honestly? Yes, it really does. Punching someone is not as easy as it looks in the movies.”

You laugh. “No kidding. That’s why you leave the punching to trained fighters, not Formula 1 drivers.”

“Ugh, this is so embarrassing,” Charles mutters. “What will the team say when they find out I injured myself in a fight? And I’ll never hear the end of it from Pierre.”

You pat his leg reassuringly. “Just say you hurt it working out. No one has to know about your misguided attempt at honorable combat,” you tease.

Charles chuckles ruefully. “Good idea. The last thing I need is for this to become paddock gossip.”

You both sit in comfortable silence for a few moments, Charles icing his hand while you snuggle contentedly against him.

"Thank you for patching me up and taking such good care of me,” Charles gently brushes the hair from your face with his uninjured hand. “Even when I do stupid things."

You grin. “It’s a tough job but someone’s gotta do it. Especially since you did almost break your hand for me.”

You settle back against Charles comfortably. He may be reckless and impulsive at times, but you know he always has the best intentions at heart. And you'll always be there to care for him if those good intentions backfire.

For better or worse, this protective man is the love of your life.

[thaatdigitaldiary]

passenger princess

paige bueckers x fem reader

disclaimer!! i don’t usually write fics, i’m better at writing educationally (lame) but me & my friends wanted me to try something out of my comfort zone so enjoy. criticism is welcome, but be kind!

this is based off of the picture i posted of paige earlier so that’s the context (also on the banner)

tags: @rosemariiaa & @patscorner for encouraging me to do this elohel kisses to yall

enjoy 🤫

it was 10:47 am. the ac blasting throughtout your studio apartment. you tossed and turned in your bed, groaning from the lack of sleep the night before, caused by a stressful day of work yesterday, completely draining you. you were in a slump to say the least, and the only person who could help cheer you up, was your girlfriend. as you picked up your phone, it vibrated suddenly with a notification popping up, “p 💓” it read, and you opened the message.

it was a picture of her and a brand new car, a red cadillac with a black interior. after the picture comes through, another message follows.

“surprise?” it reads, and you’re shocked, not only about the fact that your girlfriend impulsively bought a new car, but how undeniably beautiful she looked.

her beautiful blonde hair, roots slowly coming through, but she made them look so good. she was clad in a gray sweatshirt despite this summer heat, and those stupid, yet adorable 2024 sunglasses you gave her for new years last year perched on her head.

as you go to text her back, you hear a knock at your front door. you fix your hair and throw your robe on, and go to answer it, while a text that just came through your phone appears.

“i’m outside”

“hi baby.” she says standing in front of you, grinning like a kid who just entered a candy store, jingling her new keys.

“paige.” you say sternly, slighting smirking at the fact that she was so excited to show you her new car. despite the fact that you and her have been dating since your sophomore year of college, she still made you nervous.

from her tall, lean figure, to her beautiful eyes that wander everytime you two see each other. she starts talking, but you can’t stop looking at her.

“baby.” she says, laughing a little. you were staring, and hadn’t heard a word she said to you.

“im sorry, did you say something?” you say, chuckling nervously, feeling embarrassed, but paige never found it embarrassing, she found it cute, matter of fact she loved it.

“i said did you wanna come ride wimmie? you gotta be the first in this car and you know that.” she tells you, leaning on your doorframe, taking you in. she looked you up and down and bit her lip, admiring you and your figure.

“of course p, lemme get dressed and fix my hair, i shouldn’t be too long.” you say sweetly, smiling at her and kissing her on the cheek.

she goes to sit on your couch, manspreading per usual, watching you walk away and into your room to find something to wear.

you rummage through your closet to find something comfortable but cute to wear, just in case you two make any stops, which you knew you would.

you do some finishing touches on your hair, leaving it down, just how paige liked it.

you walk out of your room, having a slight sway to your hips as you walk, which drove paige insane. you wore jean shorts and a black tube top, with your “p” necklace sparkling around your neck.

“jesus ma.” she says, whistling while her eyes travel all over your figure.

“what? should i change?” you asked with concern, worried you were overdressed.

“fuck no, you look beautiful, especially repping me like that,” she says, referring to the necklace with her initial on it, as she rubs her hands together and bites her lip, making you laugh.

“we can go wherever you want to mama, i filled the tank right after i left the dealership.” she grabs her lanyard with her keys attached to it out of her sweatpants pocket, and goes to open the front door for you.

“hm, there’s a new spot not too far from here, they got real good breakfast food, me and jana went the other day.”

“anything for you ma.” she tells you, sneaking a kiss in as you approach her car.

“okay this is beautiful p, and shiny as hell jesus,” you say, describing the darkish red colored car your girlfriend just impulsively bought.

“it needs a beautiful girl to sit in it y’know,” and you roll your eyes at her corniness, but you secretly love it. she opens the door for you and closes it behind you, and walks to the driver’s seat.

about 10 minutes pass and you two are almost at your destination. paige hooked up her bluetooth to her car as soon as she got it, you both listening to her playlist and singing along with the windows down and the wind blowing in your faces.

paige watched as your hair flowed in the wind, your smile so beautiful, and all she could think about what was how lucky she was, getting to see you whenever she wanted, hold you, kiss you, and be there for you, all the time.

she rested her hand on your thigh, driving with one hand, and smiling.

“baby,” you said softly.

“yeah ma?”

“i love you.”

“i love you more than anything ma, yk that.”

you two made it to the restaurant, paige disconnecting her phone from the aux, and gets out to open the door for you.

you could really get use to this new car smell, and being paige’s passenger princess for a long, long time.

I HOPE YALL ENJOYED! this might be a one time thing as i could never be too consistent but lemme know any feedback and i love you guys! 🙂‍↕️

[formulawolff]

x. bringing the heat in miami - t.w.

pairing: female driver! x toto wolff

word count: 3.6k

warnings: cursing, mentions of sex, mentions of masturbation, lewd humor, age gap relationship, ANGST, naughty text messages, banter, light flirting, toto being down astronomically bad (like actually in the trenches) yadayadayada

prev. | next.

party in the city where the heat is on 

all night, on the beach till the break of dawn

“welcome to miami”

“bienvenidos a miami"

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will smith’s infamous track fills your ears as you stroll in through the main gate of the track, fans clustered in thick waves. your name is called more times than you can count. posters, caps, shirts, you name it, wave about, begging to be signed. 

the sun shines overhead, casting bright, fiery light all around. although it was only around eight in the morning, humidity clung to the air, creating a sticky, dewy sensation on your exposed skin. fluffy clouds drift along, carried by a breeze as it rolls through. 

god, the weather was perfect.

hopefully it would be like this on race day.

“welcome to miamiiii,” alex bobs his head, singing along to the music, “are you excited? it is your home turf, after all.”

“if we were in phoenix, i think i would feel a little closer to home,” you suppress a giggle, “but yes, i am really fucking excited. everyone loves a race in their home country.”

“we’ll be in austin soon enough in october,,” alex shrugs, “when we’re in austin, i need you to show me how to ride a bull and teach me how to perfect that smooth texas drawl. i want to be like one of those little aunties who always say, ‘y’all come back now!’ like dolly parton! ” 

“you’re ridiculous,” the giggles blossom into a full-on laugh, “you don’t just start speaking with a southern accent. that’s not how that works.”

“sure it is,” alex nods, “hey, your parents are coming out for the race, right?”

“yes sir! they will finally get to see their baby girl in action!”

“they didn’t come out for a single grand prix last year?” alex raises a brow.

“i wasn’t winning races last year,” you counter, “i told them not to worry about spending that money during my rookie year. not everyone’s parents are loaded, you know.”

which, was a true statement. 

your parents had invested their time, hard-earned cash, weekends off, and a portion of their lives to get you here. you didn’t expect them to fly out for every single grand prix, make every event, or pay another dime towards your expenses. 

unlike many of the drivers, you were not born into an extremely lavish lifestyle. your parents were modest people, who happened to have a child later in life. ever since you were born, they lived in the same house, drove the same vehicles, and got by adequately. since they both worked full-time, getting you into the racing world was no simple feat. 

yet, they were determined to make your dreams become a reality. after years of careful coordination to the karting tracks, weekends devoted to races, and thousands upon thousands of dollars spent, you were offered a contract with williams racing. of course, you accepted that offer graciously. 

now, you were steadily paying your parents back for their dedication. once you signed your contract and those zeroes hit your bank account, you went out to the nearest dealership, purchasing a suburu wrx. with the premium package, at that. 

you would never forget your dad’s face the moment you pulled into the driveway, beaming as you placed the keys in his hand. 

that was one of the only moments you had ever watched him cry, wrapping you up in a tight, loving embrace.

“you didn’t have to do this. being your father is a gift in itself.”

“but you deserve it. you’ve sacrificed so much so that i could be in this position.”

“and you deserve nothing but the best, baby girl. you are going to be one of the greatest drivers formula one has ever seen. you make us so proud. keep making us proud. keep defying those odds. keep making history, baby girl.”

keep making history, baby girl.

as you stroll into the paddock, greeting the engineers, pit crew, and other team members, you can’t shake that feeling brewing deep within. 

it’s is a fiery desire, setting you ablaze with determination. 

you were going to keep making history. 

you were going to be the first american to win the miami grand prix. 

you were going to be the first woman to win two consecutive grand prixes. 

you were going to be the first woman to earn that title of world champion. 

you were going to chase that high. by any means possible. 

and nothing was going to stop you now. 

˖⁺‧₊˚♡˚₊‧⁺˖✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧˖⁺‧₊˚♡˚₊‧⁺˖✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧˖⁺‧₊˚♡˚₊‧⁺˖✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧˖⁺‧₊˚♡˚₊‧⁺˖

“look at him,” lewis hamilton shakes his head, “he looks absolutely pitiful.”

“you think his little relationship is on the rocks?” 

“quite the contrary mate,” lewis remarks, folding his arms across his chest, “i think it’s more like the poor man is depraved. obviously the euphoria has worn off. he’s come down from that high. the man is craving more. plain and simple. a hand can only do–”

“i don’t need the mental image of my team principal wanking off,” george russell scoffs, rubbing his temple, “fuck, that is disgusting, lewis.”

toto wolff stood a few meters away from the drivers, engaged in deep conversation with bono and members of the crew. now that lewis knew the truth, he couldn’t help but notice how much power that american girl held over the team principal. it was almost as if he were deep in a trance, under some sort of spell. 

it was pitiful, really. just the sight of her was enough to send the team principal spiraling, intoxicated off her alluring aura. not like lewis could blame toto, though. there was no denying that the woman was extremely breathtaking. 

with her stunning features, witty mouth, unapologetic personality, and angelic presence, she was practically miss america.

well, not practically. 

she was miss america.  

everyone adored her. lewis could barely go throughout his morning without hearing her name being mentioned. whether it was fans, journalists, social media, even members of the mercedes crew, she was the hot topic of formula one, taking the world by storm.

toto was a lucky man. an extremely lucky man. 

if only she was into men her age. 

“my apologies mate,” lewis nudges george with his elbow playfully, “did we have anything going on today? any obligations?”

george’s brow furrow, sunglasses perched on the bridge of his nose, “if we’re being honest, i can’t really remember. i think something to do with monster energy, maybe.”

“perfect,” lewis licks his lower lip, fishing his phone out of his pocket. 

time to text that little assistant. 

in all seriousness, he felt horrible for taking advantage of that young girl. she was only nineteen for fuck’s sakes, a fresh face to mercedes at the start of the 2024 season. that made her the perfect target to do his bidding. 

well, it wasn’t really bidding. 

more like investigative journalism. 

at least, that’s what lewis told himself to feel a little less guilty for what he was about to do. 

hey, do you by chance know toto’s schedule today?

seconds later, little text bubbles appear. 

he was meeting with you guys this morning, then he has an interview with the press around two-thirty p.m. it’s nothing super serious, just a brief session entailing his thoughts for the weekend. at four, he has a zoom call with a few of the mercedes execs. after that, he told me he was going to be out for the remainder of the evening. why? 

hmmm. how convenient. 

i was just curious. thanks for letting me know! i appreciate you, natila. 

of course, mr. hamilton! let me know if you need anything else! :))) 

it was now or never. go time.

after the meeting with the mercedes executives, lewis hamilton was going to knock on toto wolff’s door. he was going to stroll into that office, settling into one of those plush leather chairs. and before toto had the opportunity to speak, lewis was going to confront him about that american girl. 

how he was going to start that conversation, he had no idea. that would come to him in time as he went about his day, meeting with sponsors, flashing that lovely lewis smile, flirting with the reporters just a little. not too much so that it was obvious, but enough to make them blush a tad, giggling as they scrambled to stick to their script. 

but for now, it was time to focus on the matters at hand. 

across the track, a dutch driver strolls through the crowds, a jersey in one hand, phone in the other. glancing down at his screen, he curses under his breath at the throng of people. why were there so many people? where did they all come from? 

pausing for a moment, he taps his screen, thumb gliding through his contacts. 

“hey, where are you again?”

“we’re in the williams paddock!” her voice is an octave higher than usual, more than likely from anticipation, “we’ll see you soon!”

“sounds good,” max verstappen stifles a chuckle as he hears a voice on the other end, the words firm, demanding almost.  

“honey, who are you talking to? who’s coming over here?” 

“mom, please, just let me be on the phone for two seconds,” she exhales, “okay, i have to go. i’ll see you soon!” 

the walk to the williams paddock was excruciating, as max had to bob and weave through the masses to avoid reporters, potential sponsors, and any individual who called his name. it’s not like he didn’t like the fame that came with his success, it’s just that he didn’t like the constant cameras in his face. the prying questions. the intrusive comments. 

sometimes he wished he could just blend in, be like any other face in the crowd. yet, how could he when he was max verstappen? 

yet, as he steps into the paddock, he makes out the williams driver, her parents hovering around her as she introduces them to various members of the crew. at the sight, max can’t help but feel the corners of his lips curl into a smile as he notices the sheer and utter pride plastered across their faces. 

and they had every right to be proud of you. 

you earned it. 

“goedemorgen,” max clears his throat, raising his hand for a small wave, “i just came to stop by.”

the instant your mom realizes who is standing before her in the paddock, her eyes widen, lips parting, “oh my gosh – honey. look who it is!” 

“good morning max,” your laughter rings like bells as you cross over to the dutch driver, “how are you?”

“pretty good,” he nods, sticking out his right hand, “hallo, i’m max.”

your dad shakes his hand, squeezing it firmly, “nice to meet ya, max. i’m tony. this is my wife, heather.”

“pleased to meet you,” max beams, turning to your mom, “i brought something for you today. your daughter mentioned that you were a big fan of mine. so, i brought this jersey for you. she let me know your shirt size, so it should fit perfectly. my signature is on there somewhere, but i just can’t quite remember where.”

graciously, heather accepts the jersey, her eyes glossy, shifting to you as she wipes a tear, “oh, honey, you planned this?”

“of course i did,” wrapping an arm around her shoulders, you pull her in for a hug, “i couldn’t bear the thought of you guys attending the race without meeting any of my friends. besides, you deserve an all-inclusive experience at your first grand prix.”

“besides,” max shoots you a wink, “i wanted to meet the woman who crafted such a talented driver.”

at max’s compliment, your mom’s face flushes, “oh please! i can barely make it on the freeway without having a nervous breakdown. i don’t know how she can drive these things. it amazes me how confident she is and–.”

“i could show you,” max offers, “i have some free time tomorrow. i’m sure we could all meet up somewhere and i could take you for a spin, show you the ropes. how does that sound?”

“oh max,” your mom waves a hand, “you do not–”

“but i want to. it’s no issue. no issue at all.” 

“then it’s a plan,” you can’t help but grin as your moms’ eyes light up, “what time works for you, max? since it’s only thursday, we’ll have some time in the morning before the practice laps. or, we could go after. whatever works for you.”

“let’s go in the morning,” max suggests, checking his phone, “i think i can make a few calls. have someone bring in a car. we’ll take it out on the track.”

“is that allowed?” your mom arches a brow, “i just don’t want you two to get in any sort of trouble. 

“oh mom,” you roll your eyes playfully, gesturing to max, “that is max verstappen. whatever max verstappen wants, max verstappen gets.”

“she’s not wrong.”

“okay fine,” your mom nods, and you feel a giggle forming at her overprotective nature. 

“just don’t give me a heart attack out there, max. i have a very important race to watch on sunday.”

as your parents talk to max, alex making his way into the conversation, you feel the buzz of your phone in your pocket. carefully, you fish it out, ensuring to shield your screen from your mom’s wandering gaze. 

this is unbearable. i need to see you tonight. are you going to have any free time? i vaguely recall you mentioning that your parents were going to be here. i will take no offense if you would like to spend time with them. i know you do not get to see them often. 

i need to be inside you, schatzi. i can’t think straight right now because the only thing i can think about is fucking that perfect pussy of yours. 

i miss my golden girl. more than anything. 

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“lewis? this is a pleasant surprise.”

“how’s it going mate?” lewis hamilton bears a quaint smile as he settles into a chair, face-to-face with the team principal, “things going well?”

“eh,” toto shrugs, his head bowed as he types away on his phone, “same old shit, you know.” 

“things going well with the horseback rider?”

oh, so he wasn’t going to drop it. silently, toto curses the attentive nature of his british driver, “they’re fine.”

“so,” lewis leans back, folding his arms across his chest, “when were you going to fess up and admit that your little girlfriend doesn’t ride horses?”

“i don’t understand what you–”

lewis scoffs, clicking his tongue, “i know exactly who your little girlfriend is because she’s a few spaces ahead of me on the grid.”

shit.

the expression painting lewis’ features is brimmed with satisfaction, his gaze piercing right through the team principal as he shifts uneasily in his desk chair, running a hand through his hair. 

toto was well aware that lewis had completely blindsided him, pinning him in a corner. it was quite literally perfect timing, as the team principal was merely minutes away from organizing his things, shutting down his computer, and heading out the door, well on his way to his golden girl. 

well played, lewis. well played. 

yet, he had to maintain his composure. he had to maintain that poker face as lewis cocks his head, prompting him to formulate some sort of witty retort. 

“i’m not sure what you’re talking about.”

“bullshit,” lewis shakes his head, “you’re not a very good liar, toto. you of all people should know that i can read you like a bloody book. how long has this been going on?”

well, he had to fess up now. lewis would continue to call him out on his shit if he kept up with the lies. letting out a shaky breath, the team principal hangs his head in defeat, his heart thumping against his rib-cage, wiping his damp palms on his slacks.

no going back now. time to come clean. 

“since she won in jeddah. but if we’re being technical, it started in bahrain.”

“wait,” lewis sticks his hands up, squeezing his eyes shut, “pause. this has been going on since the start of the season? for weeks you’ve been sneaking around, meeting up with her in secret or something? was she the one who came to brackley between melbourne and suzuka?”

with all of the questions pouring from lewis’ mouth, toto’s mind reeled, a swirling torrent of anxiety, fear, and disappointment. his cheeks burn with shame, tinged pink. 

“yes, she was.”

tilting his head, lewis’ lips purse, “you like her?”

“well isn’t that blatantly fucking obvious,” propping his elbows on the desk, he massages his temples with his fingers, “how did you find out?”

“it wasn’t hard,” lewis shrugs, “i mean, i see the way you look at her.” 

toto’s eyes narrow at lewis’ vague response, “how. did. you. find. out?”

“natila texted me about it,” lewis coughs, averting the team principal’s beady stare, “she may have heard a conversation or two.” 

“regarding?” toto presses, satisfaction pumping in his veins as lewis starts to crack, shifting in the chair, “come on, lewis. you can’t just march in here and demand answers from me without sharing your sources. what did natila hear?”

“she heard the entire conversation you had with the drive to survive crew while we were in suzuka. they mentioned that they had footage of you walking over to her motorhome. that’s all natila heard. don’t fire the poor girl,” the words were rushed, breathy, “it was my fault. i asked her what she heard. i told her i would pay her if she told me what she knew.”

“well,” toto blinks, swallowing thickly, “did you end up paying her?”

“only like five thousand.”

“that’s quite a large sum over something you could have just asked me about personally,” clasping his hands together, toto raises a brow, “why didn’t you just come to me instead?”

“because you got so fucking defensive the first time i asked about it!” 

lewis did have a point. 

a good point, at that.

it was not like the team principal would have withheld information regarding his developing relationship with the williams driver. it was more like he feared what would ensue if he did share what had transpired. he trusted lewis, he really did. additionally, it wasn’t like this was just some average woman. his career, her future, and so much more were at stake. the benefits of keeping it all under wraps greatly outweighed the risk of discovery. 

more importantly, he was protective of his golden girl. 

she was his little escape from it all. a breath of fresh air after excruciatingly long nights in the paddock or disappointing days on the track. she was his sun, shining her vivid, warm, golden rays into his dreary and dull life. 

sure, toto was a billionaire. but money was not everything. 

nearly every day, toto’s mind wandered to their time spent together in brackley. the way she felt against his skin. the way her shy smile was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. the way her fingers felt intertwined with his. the way her lashes fluttered as she slept, lips parted ever so slightly. the way his hands roamed her curves, relishing the softness of her. 

that memory alone was worth far more than the number of zeroes in his bank account. 

“you’re falling in love, aren’t you?”

lewis’ voice is low, dangerously quiet. yet, there’s a curious glint in his eyes, the bitterness and anger no longer present. his body language is more relaxed, legs crossed, the driver fiddling with his thumbs. 

“i –” toto stutters, scrambling to find the right words, “yes, i am.”

“does she know?” 

“no,” he inhales sharply, “she doesn’t.”

“you want to tell her though, don’t you?”

“it would just feel rushed,” the team principal dismisses lewis’ inquiry, his voice hardening, “i have to be realistic here. no one falls in love that quickly. that’s just petulant.”

“well look at it this way,” lewis offers, “if you’ve had your eye on her for some time, then it’s really not that rushed. clearly, if you’re feeling those emotions so deeply, then it’s accumulated over time. i don’t want to pry, but how long have you been attracted to her?”

“you don’t want to know,” a chuckle rumbles in the team principal’s chest, “it’s embarrassing, really.”

“no, no, no,” lewis tuts, “tell me, toto. how long?”

“december 2022, when she signed her contract with williams. when i saw that photo of her, i knew i had to have her. last summer, in monaco, i may have slipped up and approached her at the afterparty. i flirted with her, but she dismissed me. so, i kept my distance. however, it was just growing harder and harder to stay away. it was impulsive, that night in bahrain. but i wanted to make a move before anyone else got to her.”

as toto finishes, he can’t help but notice lewis’ smirk, “holy shit, toto. you’ve been wrapped around her finger for quite some time then, yeah?”

“i wouldn’t say that–” toto begins, clicking his tongue, yet, he’s swiftly cut off as a new figure cracks open the door. 

george russell leans against the doorframe, arms folded across his chest. his lips are pressed together, forming a tightly wound frown. 

“way to include me in the gossip session, guys. what did i miss? clearly, quite a lot. if you don’t mind, i would like to join the conversation. toto, would you start from the top? even though i’ve already heard most of it, when were you going to bring it to my attention that you were fucking that bloody williams driver?”

˖⁺‧₊˚♡˚₊‧⁺˖✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧˖⁺‧₊˚♡˚₊‧⁺˖✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧˖⁺‧₊˚♡˚₊‧⁺˖���₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧˖⁺‧₊˚♡˚₊‧⁺˖

taglist: @younxii @toldyouitwasamelodrama @kravitzwhore @persona1lies @pucksandpower @k3ira13 @prettiest-at-the-party @martwll @annewithaneofthegreengable @zoeyjadetice2010  @sinners-98-world @laura-naruto-fan1998 @nebarious @joalslibrary @swifth0lic

as always, if i forgot to include you, please let me know! thank you all for the continuous support! i love y'all sm!! <33

[blondieeu]

Would you be okay writing some sfw & nsfw on what it would be like dating Connie? I know the reader is married, but he just interests me so much. I love how you based him on Rio, he’s my favorite.

i’m so passionate about connie being based off rio too it’s ok i love writing for him

been away. connie (constance) s.

“you good?”

and you’d just look at him. a moment for the two of you to be vulnerable together in a car you had no business being in, about to smoke a blunt you shouldn’t have been smoking, with someone you especially had absolutely no business being with.

“what’s wrong”

“can’t park here, my husband could see.“

he laughed, starting the engine as loud as he could while he looked at you, a bored expression. his eyes were low and his lips almost sparkled in the moonlight from the lip gloss you kissed hello him with.

“your husband mama?”

“yes!”

constance wore a white wife beater and some sweatpants, tattoos and muscles on full display to everyone who say him, but you knew it was only for you.

his prized gold chain laid across his collar bone. said his mother gave it to him when he was little. his car smelled like him too, the car you helped him pick out at the dealership. smelled like the color navy blue, if that made sense.

“yea ok. tell him your real man s’ takin’ you out.”

and he’d pass you the blunt, tattooed fingers grazing against your untouched ones and handing you a lighter before putting the car in drive and pulling off.

constance hated your husband, maybe you did too. he never listened and was always out, giving you the freedom to do the same. you weren’t a monster though, not like you didn’t care for him, just didn’t love him.

you loved constance— or as you knew him, connie. you knew you loved him when you started to worry about him when he told you he was ‘goin to make a play’ in the middle of the night. or at the point where you’d think about him, regardless of you being in a bed with a whole other man, your husband.

“where we going connie?”

“same place we go everytime girl. unless you want me to fuck you in this car.”

you squirmed in the passenger seat at the thought. wouldn’t be the first time but he could never not make you hot at the thought of having sex with him again, always gave you butterflies. made you feel like a virgin again. it wasn’t always about sex with him though, he was real with you.

when you got to his house it was like clockwork, order food, take a shower, put on some of his clothes and eat together. eventually deciding to eat in the living room and watch some bullshit show you’d been obsessed with recently.

so here the two of you sat. you laying with your head in his lap, and him with his hand rubbing on your butt and the other with the remote.

his house was like a second home to you, he said it was your home too. could come whenever you wanted to, move in if you wanted. got you a copy of the house keys, front door and mailbox.

“gotta move if you don’t wan’ fuck right now, you keep rubbin’ onnit.”

and again, like clockwork you’d work his sweatpants and then his boxers off to pull out his lengthy cock. he had a tan shaft with a pretty pink tip. connie always got so hard for you.

you wrapped both your hands around him but it still wasn’t enough to cover the whole thing. starting off you kissed the side of it, making sure to do it on both sides and even on the top before you took him all the way down into your throat.

connie would moan, head rolling and a tatted hand coming to push all of your hair up into the messiest ponytail you’d ever had. your free hand rubbing up connie’s tan stomach, pushing his wife beater up.

“fuck baby”

with your head bobbing at a decent pace, tongue flicking around his pink tip and getting a faint taste of his pre-cum. the sound of your boyfriends moans drowning out the tv show.

“want you to put it in connie”

you whispered as you let your head come down from his cock, still stroking while you looked up at him. his eyes were a little red from the blunt you smoked earlier. the tv illuminating his rough features, like the small scares on his face.

“so take your panties off then mama”

blondieeu xx

[rafeandonlyrafe]

i am a rich man

words: 1k

warnings: misogyny, brief mention of violence, reader is a kook

a/n: im on vacation starting tomorrow monday 1/22-friday so i will not be posting any new fics for this week!

“have you decided what car you want baby?” rafe asks, pressing a kiss to your cheek as you scroll through the dealerships website.

“i’ve narrowed it down to two.” you tilt your phone towards rafe, letting him look at one car before navigating to the other tab to show him.

“why don’t you test drive both and decide after that? and if you like both, just buy both.” rafe shrugs. it was weird for him at first being with someone who had even more money than his family, but now he’s grown used to it, liking knowing you can support yourself if needed, even though rafe likes to buy most things for you.

“good point.” you hum. “i’d have to park one on the driveway though, my dad is only giving me one spot in the garage.” you pout. your dad has a mild obsession with sports cars, and therefore three of the four spots in the garage were already taken.

“lets not worry about it now, figure it out after you see them in person.” rafe says, and you nod, getting up off the couch to head to the dealership, glad that rafe agreed to drive you and test the cars with you, mainly because you didn’t want to spend the day without him.

it’s a long drive to the nearest dealership that had cars in your price range, but you don’t mind as you sing along to your favorite songs playing through rafes trucks speakers, always letting you be the dj even if he can’t stand some of the girly pop songs that you play.

“almost there.” rafe reaches over, squeezing your thigh as the dealership finally comes into view.

“thank god.” you groan. “my butt is starting to go numb.” “don’t talk about your butt when we are about to be in public.” rafe warns, glancing over at you as you giggle.

“sorry baby.” you say, in a voice that tells rafe that you’re not at all sorry.

“let me drop you off at the front, i’ll park the car then join you inside.” rafe says upon pulling in and realizing that there are no close parking spots, and he doesn’t want to make you walk outside for longer than he has to.

“mmkay, thanks baby.” you lean over and press a kiss to his cheek, always extra appreciative and lovey on rafe when he does sweet things for you, even if its just something little.

you hop out of the truck, heading inside the main showroom of the dealership.

“hello, ma’am!” a sales associate instantly hurries over to you. “i’m john, did you have an appointment?” “no, but i’ve checked out your inventory online and i know what i’d like to test drive today.” you say with a fake smile right back, already not liking the condescending attitude that john is giving off.

“alright, well lets take a seat at my desk and you can tell me your budget.” john walks you over to his cubicle, and before he can begin talking you’re joined by rafe.

“this is my boyfriend, he’s helping me pick out a car today.” you say as he sits down next to you, reaching over and looping your fingers through his, already eyeing up john as he tries to size him up.

“hello, sir.” john smiles. “so what is your budget?” he addresses the question at rafe, making your eyebrows scrunch together.

“well,” you answer, making johns gaze flick quickly to you, “budget isn’t an issue. i know what two cars i would like to look at.”

“okay, if you just want to tell me the models i will pull them up.” john turns the computer screen so you all can see as you tell him the two cars that peaked your interest the most.

“and i assume you will be financing?” he hums. you glance at rafe, shocked that he would have the audacity to assume anything.

“no.” rafe answers for you. “in full.” “okay, that makes sense that you will be paying, sir.” john says, nonchalantly as if he didn’t just imply that you wouldn’t be able to afford the car.

“as said before, i will be the one purchasing the car, so while my boyfriend is here to help me, i am your customer.” you clear up, hand squeezing rafes as you try to hold back your anger, knowing you can get just as fired up as him.

“sorry, just don’t see many young women being able to buy cars like these outright.” he says before quickly switching the subject, going through some of the specs of the vehicles. “and the cost on that one is $94,000.”

“wait a minute.” you rub your forehead, getting tired of this mans bullshit. “while i said money was no issue, that doesn’t mean that i’m going to let you get away with scamming me. that car is worth no more than 75.” “well, ma’am, there are various-” “no.” you shake your head. “i have done my research on these vehicles and i know that ever 75 is on the high end.” “let me double check my figures.” john swallows nervously, turning the screen so only he can see it as you send a look at rafe, seeing he’s struggling just as much as you not to reach across the desk and smack the misogynistic sales associate across the face.

“my apologies, i must have accidentally selected an additional maintenance package. it is $74,000.” john says.

“that sounds much more reasonable, but i will not be purchasing a car from someone who tries to scam me out of my money just because they think i’m a dumb girl. get me a different sales associate, now.” you command.

john scurries away from the desk, the stark opposite of the cockiness air that he had when you first arrived.

“jesus, you’re hot when you’re scary.” rafe says, looking you up and down as you smirk at your boyfriend, knowing while you’re usually sickly sweet, when a man irks you wrong, it brings out your full wrath.

taglist: @winterrrnight @bejeweledreverie @drewstarkeyslut @rafecamerongirl @f4ll-for-you @dilvcv @jjmaybankswifes-blog @rafescokenostril @jjsmarijuana @jjmaybankisbae @seeingstarks @angelofcigs @cece45450 @babygorewhore @vanessa-rafesgirl @michelleisheres-blog @outerbankspov @drewstarkeyswifehoe @cutielando @kamninaries @buckyswhxre @rafeinterlude @bellbottombaby @deeaardiary @rubixgsworld @emma77645

[bucksanklescrews]

car shopping- e.b. x fem!reader

Warnings: None, pregnant!reader, fluff

"I'm not driving a minivan," Evan said, his voice stern, but a hint of amusement still shined through.

You ran a hand over your bump. "Jesus, Buck, how many of them do you think are in here?"

Evan chuckled, shaking his head as he looked at you with that familiar mix of affection and playful defiance. "I don’t care if it’s one or five, I’m not trading in the Jeep for a minivan."

You rolled your eyes, a smile tugging at your lips as you ran a hand over your growing bump. “Come on, Buck, don’t you think you’re being a little dramatic? It’s not like we’re starting a soccer team.”

He grinned, leaning back against the counter, his arms crossing over his chest. “I’m just saying, this Jeep has been with me through a lot. I’m not ready to swap it out for something... practical.”

"I said practical, which means a Jeep that doesn't stutter when it starts-"

"I made an appointment for it next week!"

You placed a hand on your hip. "And what about the appointment last week?"

He sighed, knowing you had a point. Despite all the love and care he had poured into maintaining his Jeep over the years—new tires, a well-kept motor, and a slightly faded paint job that he swore added character—it was clear that the old Jeep was reaching the end of its life. It had racked up miles and had started showing signs of wear, no matter how much he wanted to deny it. Sure, his car had been fine before, but now that you were expecting, the last thing you wanted was to worry about Buck and your little angel stalling at an intersection or, worse, being stranded somewhere.

Evan ran a hand through his hair, the reluctance in his eyes giving way to a resigned sigh. “Alright, I’ll look at new cars... but I’m not making any promises.”

You smiled, knowing it was the best you were going to get from him. “That’s all I’m asking.”

Car shopping turned out to be more of a challenge than either of you anticipated. Every car seemed to have something wrong with it—too worn, too expensive, too small, too impractical. The first dealership was a bust, with Buck dismissing every option the salesman showed him. The second one wasn’t any better, with Buck complaining about the lack of character in the newer models. By the time you reached the sixth dealership, you were starting to lose hope.

Then you spotted it—another Jeep, practically identical to his. It was a little newer, with fewer miles on it, and in good condition. For a moment, you thought this might be the one. Buck approached the Jeep, his eyes lighting up as he inspected it closely. He ran his hand over the hood, checked the tires, and even peeked inside the cabin.

You watched him, hopeful that this could be it. But as the salesman approached to seal the deal, you noticed the look on Buck’s face. The excitement had faded, replaced by something more subdued. He thanked the salesman politely, but instead of heading back inside to discuss numbers, he started walking back to your car.

You followed him, your heart sinking a little. “Evan?”

He glanced back at the Jeep, then at you. “It’s just... it’s not the same, you know? It doesn’t feel right.”

You sighed, understanding where he was coming from. “I get it, Buck. But we need something reliable, something safe. For all of us.”

He nodded, though you could see the reluctance still lingering in his eyes. “I know. It’s just hard to let go.”

You slipped your hand into his, giving it a reassuring squeeze. “We’ll find something that feels right, I promise. But maybe it doesn’t have to be another Jeep. Maybe it’s time for something new.”

Buck considered your words, his gaze softening as he looked down at your intertwined hands. “Yeah, maybe you’re right.”

As your due date approached, just over a week away, the anticipation was palpable. You sighed, flipping through yet another car catalog, this one featuring used cars being sold directly by their owners. Your hand absentmindedly rested on your bump as you turned the pages, glancing over sedans and SUVs, none of which seemed to stand out.

But then, you spotted it. Another Jeep, just a few shades darker than his current car. It had low miles and was moderately priced, a rare find that immediately caught your attention. You smiled to yourself, thinking maybe this was it, the compromise between nostalgia and practicality. You turned the catalog towards Buck, who was sitting next to you on the couch, and pointed it out.

“Look at this one,” you said, your voice laced with hope. “It’s just like yours, but with way fewer miles. What do you think?”

Buck’s eyes lit up for a second as he took in the image, the familiar look of excitement flashing across his face. But then, just as quickly, he seemed to hesitate, a small smile tugging at the corner of his lips.

“It’s nice,” he admitted, nodding appreciatively. “But... I already found something.”

You quirked an eyebrow in surprise. “Oh? And when were you planning on telling me?”

Buck chuckled, pulling out his phone. “I was going to surprise you, but since we’re on the topic...”

He scrolled through his photos, searching for something specific. You watched him curiously, wondering what he had found. Finally, he stopped on a picture and handed the phone to you.

The image on the screen was of a new Jeep, a different color from his current one but still unmistakably in the same spirit. It was slightly newer, with a sleeker design, but it still had that rugged, adventurous look that Buck loved so much.

“I saw it when we were on a call,” Buck explained, his voice carrying a mix of excitement and nostalgia. “It was parked on the street, and I just couldn’t take my eyes off it. I jotted down the number before we left, and I went back to see it with Eddie before heading home.”

You looked at the photo, then back at Buck, and couldn’t help but smile. There was something endearing about the way he was so attached to his Jeep, and yet willing to find something new that still honored the old.

“You really like it, don’t you?” you asked softly.

Buck nodded, his eyes twinkling with a mix of excitement and a touch of sentimentality. “Yeah, I do. It’s not exactly the same, but it feels right, you know? Like it’s time for something new, but it still reminds me of the old one.”

You leaned over, pressing a kiss to his cheek. “I’m glad you found something you love, Buck. And if you’re happy with it, then I am too.”

He smiled, wrapping his arm around you and pulling you close, his hand resting protectively over your bump. “Thanks, babe. I know it’s silly, but this Jeep... it means a lot.”

You rested your head on his shoulder, feeling the warmth and love between you both. “It’s not silly at all. It’s a big change, and I’m glad you found something that feels right.”

As you sat there together, the car catalog forgotten on the coffee table, you couldn’t help but feel a sense of contentment. The Jeep was just a car, but it symbolized so much more—moving forward, making room for new memories, and embracing the future together as a family.

[undead-supernova]

Masterlist

plot: when you suggest that you and Eddie should quit smoking cigarettes, Eddie struggles to believe in his capabilities. but there's just something about the way you challenge him...

pairings: modern!bestfriend!Eddie x bisexual!fem!reader

important note: this is a one-off of my High Tolerance series! Somehow I can't get enough of Eddie and Weirdo and I can't help but come back to them. (this is six months before Part 1 of the original series!)

warnings: fluffy fluff fluff fluuuuuuuuuuffffff, talking about smoking, a small argument, Southern culture, country music, reader has an accent, (why are Eddie and Weirdo so horny as friends? shouldn't they have known sooner? idiots)

wc: 2.4k

thank yew @strangergraphics for your adorable dividers!!!!

It was unusual, the way it all started.

Just a normal Tuesday with the bitter cold of January and the crowded highways blocked off by unnecessary construction. Honks muffled by the sound of Guns ‘N Roses’ “Welcome To The Jungle” coming through your speakers. You were clad in a black turtleneck and jeans. Eyes lined in black, maroon-lipped. Spiked bracelets and nine shiny rings dappling light around the car.

Eddie was riding shotgun, sighing alongside you at how slow the traffic was moving when you first said it.

“I have a proposition.”

He raised an eyebrow at you. “A proposition?”

You nodded. “Yeah, and I want you to hear me out.”

“Uh, okay?” he said, unsure as to what was about to come out of your mouth.

“I think we should stop smoking cigarettes,” you stated simply, looking back at the road as you inched forward. “A New Year’s resolution.”

“Nuh-uh,” he said, throwing his hands up, his rings reflecting off yours. “No way. Nope.”

“What! Why not?” you exclaimed, now throwing your hands up before promptly putting them back on the steering wheel.

Eddie had his own reasons, like how he’d been smoking for nearly ten years and the irritation of working at a dealership where rich idiots badgered him for just doing his job. The stress of bills and keeping his music career afloat. Not to mention how fucking sweet a puff of nicotine was whenever he got drunk or cross-faded. Nothing beats that feeling. Even you knew that.

“I just don’t want to.”

“Even if I did it with you?” you asked, voice growing soft.

He looked at you, confusion falling over his features. Your eyes seemed a little solemn, like you were disappointed by his refusal. And it was in your expression that he felt drawn to the idea. Because, yeah, if you actually could stop, maybe he could, too. But…

“We wouldn’t stop smoking weed, you know,” you added, cutting off his thoughts. “Just cut out the cancer sticks.”

“It won’t be as easy for me,” he said, sighing defeatedly. “I, uh, I don’t know. It’s complicated.”

“You always doubt your own strength, I swear.” You shook your head. “You’re so smart but so, so stupid sometimes. I say that affectionately, by the way.”

Before Eddie could think about some witty comeback, he heard the sound of the next song starting. It was different from your usual genres. It was the picking of a guitar, all folky and twangy and…

Country.

“What is this?” he asked, eyeing you.

You smirked, cranking the volume up as you started singing along.

         “Well, I was raised up beneath the shade of a Georgia Pine

         and that’s home, you know

         Sweet tea, pecan pie, and homemade wine

         where the peaches grow."

Eddie groaned. “Dude, what the fuck is this?”

You merely shook your head, your tone as playful as your expression. “It’s Zac Brown Band, god dammit! Show some respect.”

He was struck by your Southern accent popping up out of seemingly nowhere. And before he could even remotely process that or protest again, you cleared your throat and started screaming.

Not singing. Screaming.

         “A LITTLE BIT OF CHICKEN FRIED

         A COLD BEER ON A FRIDAY NIGHT

         A PAIR OF JEANS THAT FIT JUST RIGHT

         AND THE RADIO UUUUUUP!”

“Please turn it off,” Eddie pleaded, dragging his hands down his face. “I think you’re killing me.”

“Nope,” you said simply. “My car, my music. It’s the least you can do when we’re stuck on this highway and you’re refusing to quit smoking without even trying.”

“Oh, come on,” Eddie huffed. “Like it’s that fucking easy.”

“Have you ever tried to stop smoking?”

Eddie thought about it for two, maybe three seconds before feeling a twinge of embarrassment.

There had never been a singular thought given to the idea of quitting. Not once. Smoking was just something he did. There wasn’t much else to it. No secret shame or guilt. No bargaining or grief. No, it was just something he did.

“No,” he admitted, avoiding your eyes. 

“At least think about it, okay?”

Eddie nodded before glancing back at you. You continued humming along to the god awful song and tapped the steering wheel, as pretty as ever. And he was surely in love with you. Really, he was. But he thought he was going to explode from how much he hated this song. It wasn’t just the sound, but the lyrics and how you knew every single one.

If he didn’t want a cigarette before, he surely wanted one now.

By the time the bridge hit, you cleared your throat, straightened your posture, and threw up a salute.

Eddie stared at you like you were crazy. “What the—”

         “I thank God for my life!

         And for stars and stripes

         May freedom forever fly, let it riiiiiiing.”

“Oh, I swear to god. I’m losing my mind.”

         “Salute the ones who died

         The ones that give their lives

         So we don’t have to sacrifice

         all the things we looooooooooove.”

Rolling his eyes, Eddie decided to throw up a quick salute himself. “Aye, aye, boys. Yes, okay,” he sighed. “Can we please change it?”

You nodded then and Eddie was severely grateful to hear the beginning notes to “Rebel Girl” by Bikini Kill.

Thank god.

But you didn’t let up. “You can’t just live in the South for three years and not listen to at least one country song.”

“I did a reaaaally good job up until now.” That made you laugh. “I didn’t know you listened to country.”

“I contain multitudes, Eddie. Multitudes. Layers. Like an onion.” He rolled his eyes. “It’s in my blood. Don’t hate on country music just ‘cause you don’t get it. There’s more out there than just jeans, beer, girls, and tractors.”

“Don’t forget trucks.”

You snorted before exaggerating your accent. “Yeah, and I’ll run you over with one, boy.”

Despite his frustration at the grating music, Eddie stopped itching for a cigarette. No, the desire had disappeared entirely. He was looking at you, all giggles and lighthearted apologies, and couldn’t help but laugh along at how utterly goofy the encounter was.

And once he took a second to think about it, he realized that your accent had bled through the entire song. Your sweet little Southern accent that rarely popped out had been on full display for him and only him. That paired with your eyeliner and your spikes and your lips and your everything. It was…cute. Like, very cute.

You were always just so genuine. It was in the way you just fucking cared about things. How you just wanted to try and how it made him want to try, too. You always knew there was more inside of him than even he knew. How you did it, he couldn’t say.

It was hard to say no to you.

It was hard not to love you.

“Okay,” he said finally. “Let’s do it.”

You gawked at him, rapidly flicking your head back and forth from him to the road as traffic began to finally pick up.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

And like every addiction, the first week was the hardest.

If Eddie was sitting, his legs were bouncing. If he had a moment to spare, he was drinking coffee and scarfing Red Vines. Kept a toothpick in his mouth as if it would do anything. Frustration ran down his limbs in shivers that turned into unprovoked anger. It was fucking killing him.

You weren’t doing too hot either. When you called, you complained about a sore jaw from the three packs of wintermint gum you’d gone through. Bitten cheeks and lips. Irritation from anything and everything that came across your path.

So, when you saw each other that weekend, Eddie said flat out, “I don’t wanna quit anymore.”

You dropped your scrubber back into the sink, turning your head to gawk at him in shock. Mouth wide open, showing off a pitiful piece of gum you’d been chewing on for maybe two hours.

“What?”

Eddie shrugged, suddenly intimidated by your gaze. “Don’t you think this is, I don’t know, too much?”

“Too much?” you asked, voice hardening.

“Yeah.”

“Eddie, you haven’t even tried yet.”

He crossed his arms over his chest, that incessant frustration rising up his chest and into his mouth. “I have and it’s not working.”

“You have not!” you argued, placing your hands on your hips. “It’s been a week and, yeah, this is fucking hard. But it’s just temporary. Robin said it takes at least a week or longer for it to, like, detox. Probably longer for us.”

Barking out a bitter laugh, Eddie challenged you. “What if I don’t care what Robin thinks?”

“Then you’re giving up and you’ll spend the next however many years killing your lungs because it was hard for a week.”

“You’re one to talk! You’ve smoked for the same amount of time as me.”

“And yet I’m still fighting for it.”

He watched your chewing seemingly turn aggressive, knowing that you were disappointed in him. And it was actually hurting. 

That first flare of guilt hit him then. 

“Why do you want me to quit so bad?” he wondered.

“Because I know you can do it!” you exclaimed. “This shit sucks, Eddie. I’m literally gonna lose my mind some time soon. But it’s not forever.” 

He rolled his eyes. But he realized it was most definitely a mistake when you stepped forward and put a finger to his chest, eyes locked on yours as your breath seemingly washed over his neck.

“Because after everything I know about you, your past, I know you wouldn’t be here right now if you were someone who gave up. If you didn’t fight just to try to have a better life.” Eddie stayed silent, watching your eyes grow soft. “And if you can get through all of that other shit, you sure as hell can quit smoking cigarettes.”

In that moment, Eddie couldn’t help but love you that much more. You were a challenger, a pusher. But it wasn’t unjustified and it wasn’t excessive. No, you were just a force to be reckoned with. When you knew something to be true, you hardly let up. Some called it stubbornness, but Eddie knew it to be determination.

Oh god, how he loved that about you. How you told him what to do and pushed him to do better.

And, oh god, did he have to try his hardest to stop getting a tiny bit hard thinking about it. This was not the time.

“Fine, I’ll keep trying.”

Your shoulders slumped, clearly exhausted from your argument. Leaned your head on his shoulder and heaved a sigh before stepping back.

He cleared his throat. “I’ll try. But don’t expect me to stop complaining about it.”

“As if I won’t. Hell, I’ll go first. Having an oral fixation sucks,” you admitted. 

Eddie’s eyes immediately went to your lips. And, Jesus, even all bitten up and cracked, he wanted nothing more than to kiss you. To call this argument to a close by throwing you up against a wall and devouring you until this bout of irritation dissipated from your bones.

“Yeah,” he whispered. “You’re telling me.”

He could’ve sworn your eyes flickered to his, your own lips nearly quirking up into a smirk. And, fuck, did it seem like you were chest-to-chest, all sidled up and ready for the next fight.

“Why’re you looking at me like that?” you asked.

“Like what, Weirdo?” he deflected, unable to keep himself from leaning in just a little bit further.

You pressed a finger into his dimples. “Like that.”

What, like I want to kiss you silly and massage your cheeks and then kiss you again and take that gum out of your mouth and make it mine and be gross and stupid? Like I want to say I’m sorry by taking you in this kitchen right now? Like I’m going to lose my mind from how much I fucking love you?

Eddie took a deep breath and closed his eyes. Took a step back.

“I think I’m going crazy.”

“Come on,” you said with a smile. “Let’s go get Taco Bell.”

He smiled back, feeling the heat start to subside from his face. And, most importantly, his dick. 

“I could always use a Baja Blast.”

Things weren’t so bad after that first month. Or the second. Or the third.

And by the time you guys hit the six month mark, Eddie didn’t even crave it anymore. If anything, he couldn’t believe how much better his mood was. His chest felt lighter. Head clearer. 

For once, life felt good without a cigarette.

He noticed the same in you, how smiley you were at any given moment. No need to duck out to get a quick smoke in or beg for one after a crying spell. It was like a weight was lifted off of you. He couldn’t believe that such a small thing made up of tobacco, paper, and cotton could have such a big impact on, well, everything.

In the past, you were always looking forward to a cigarette. So, the two of you devised a plan. Every week or every other week, you and Eddie would go to Jailbait Hemp and try out a new product. Split the cost. Go find something to do. Just let loose and see where the day took you.

Today you were at Piedmont Park, passing a joint back and forth as people filtered in and out. You were lying on your backs, a blanket beneath your figures. Both barely able to see each other through the blinding sun because, predictably, no thought to grab your sunglasses. 

“We should try that THC syrup next Thursday,” you suggested.

Eddie turned his head, squinting back at you in the sun’s glare. Tried to see your pretty face the best he could. Sneaked another glance at how breathtaking you were in your sundress.

“Oh, yeah?”

You nodded. “Yeah, why not?”

Eddie couldn’t help but chuckle. “Fuck it. Let’s do it.”

“Where do you wanna go to try it out?”

Summer lasted longer in the South. You’d have the Georgia heat to yourselves until mid-October. Eddie had no idea what you’d do until then. Drink, laugh. Play games, go to karaoke. Work.

Maybe things could change. Maybe he’d even get the courage to ask you out one of these days. It was funny what one could do with all of the money they once set aside for packs of cigarettes.

It was July and Eddie was in love. Had been for nearly four years. 

And some part of him knew as he watched you search the clouds that he’d continue to fall harder every single day. 

He knew exactly where to take you next week.

“No clue,” he lied, smiling to himself. “But it’ll be a damn good time.”

[sensei-venus]

(Unedited) ( @gemini-sensei ) (Based off this post 👀)

Imagine thy after they get everything worked out with a new car for her she tells them that she has to thank them for all the help. The two say it’s completely fine, she just needed help finding the right car. She still swears up and down she needs to thank them somehow. She offers to take them out to dinner. They tell her it’s fine and they can’t let her go out of her way to take them out to a nice dinner, but she not taking a no.

She finally wears them down and they agree to go out with her.

She’s all smiles as she leaves the dealership in her new car. Her bump sitting perfectly in the front seat as she drives off.

The LaRussos tell the kids they are going out to meet a friend which the kids raise an eyebrow over but don’t question. They tell them to just order a pizza or something don’t wait up for them.

When they show up to the nice little restaurant, that is fancy, they are in awe when they see Reader waiting for them at the entrance of the restaurant. She’s all dolled up in a pretty little dress, it shows off her curves and bump perfectly. The fabric stretching over her tight belly. She has light makeup on and she’s wearing the most pretty little flats ever.

They all sit down together, Reader in the middle. They opt for a round booth. Reader is so sweet and kind, she tells them all about her job and what she’s doing. Amanda asks all kinds of questions about the baby, trying to be as nice as possible about it. They find out that she was in a long time relationship with the father, years together, before he got her pregnant and ran off with a younger woman with more money. She’s a bit down about it but she keeps talking about how excited she is to have this baby.

She can’t stop rubbing at her bump. She’s so excited to be having her first baby even if she’s by herself.

Over dinner, the couple slowly makes their move. Both Amanda and Daniel start by rubbing her arms, getting closer to her. Amanda slowly lets her hand travel down Reader’s arms and slowly down her belly and to her thick thigh. She’s gently gripping the flesh, Daniel scoots over to her and brushes up against her. His eyes won’t stop staring into hers the whole night.

Suddenly they are in the back seat of Readers new SUV.

“Want to see the best feature of this car?”

Her eyes are wide as she watches Daniel hits a button in the car and the back seats completely fall down and disappear into the floor of the car. Before she can stop herself, both her and Amanda are giggling and shuffling into the back of the car. Daniel smirks before getting into the car and locking the door behind him. He’s secretly glad that he had the whole car tinted.

Reader doesn’t stop giggling as she falls on her butt, Amanda laughing with her as they start kissing. Amanda is pulling at her tight dress and gets up enough to sit right under her big bump. Their kisses are soft and long.

“Did you wear this just for us?”

Daniel questions as he takes note of the black thong she has on, barely covering her mound and folds. Reader bits her lip in a bit of embarrassment.

“I feel like I’m to old to be blushing over wearing some stupid underwear-“

“Don’t be, you look sexy as hell in them, and your not old. Your still young. And it’s obvious you can still have some fun~”

Amanda is pulling her own dress off, her breast falling from her dress bra cups. Her own  panties getting wet from excitement. She smiles as she watches her husband unbutton his dress shirt and unzip his dress pants. He pulls both his pants and briefs down just enough.

His hard dick sprang out and slapped against his belly, the head threatening to spill pre at any moment. He smirks down at the two women. Amanda lays down behind Reader and fondled the other women's swollen and heavy breasts. She bits her lip as she smiles up at her husband. Reader is trembling from their treatment, she can't help but keep her eyes on Daniels cock. It's heavy and leaking now.

He gently pulls her thighs apart and then throws her legs over his shoulder.

He presses into her and they both moan out at the new feeling. She's so tight and wet and it's all for them.

He's gently fucking into her and bottoming out in every thrust. She moans and whimpers out so pretty as she is pushed back into Amanda. Amanda is rubbing her clit as she watches her husband fucking the women's pregnant pussy. She can't get over how sexy she looks getting to watch her husband's dick get wet. She can't get over the nasty filthy wet sounds from between them.

Suddenly Daniel is picking up the pace and fucking into her hard and fast.

She's grabbing at his forearms as he pounds into her, she's leaving all over him and she knows it. Her eyes are barely open as she looks up at him. She can't help the loud moans and gasps that leave her lips as he pounds into her, her legs shake as she feels herself losing what little grip she had. Her cunt clenched and the band in her belly was ready to snap.

They both cum hard and fast. Daniel thrusting into her hard and stilling inside of her as they both ride the high. There’s cum leaking from around his cock as they sit there for a moment. The both of them panting, and Daniel’s lips crash into hers as they kiss. It's short but sweet as he kisses from her lips to her neck. They pull away as they take turns kissing Amanda who has already cum from her own fingers and watching the two of them orgasm.

Ultimately they all drive back in Readers' car, the LaRussos saying they will have someone pick up their car tomorrow from the restaurant. They end up going back to the house. They sneak ain't the house and are thankful the kids are already asleep in their rooms.

They get to their room and clean Reader up. They all take a shower together where they all tiredly clean each other. Daniel grabs all of his most baggage clothes and dresses her in some sweats and a t-shirt.

They all end up cuddling in the LaRusso's big bed with Reader tucked between them.

They all pass out for the night, not even thinking about tomorrow.

[asgardianangel]

oh lord forgive me if this is just too much but i would just die if you wrote something with saul along the lines of … “i know some very bad men that would pay very good money for a sweet little thing like you”.. angry dark possessive sexy saul mm

A night you would never forget

Saul Goodman X Innocent fem! Reader

Summary: Your love for your ill grandma sent you in a desperation for money and into the arms of a possessive lawyer

Warnings: 18+, bad language, dark possessive Saul!, mentions of sex working, threats, naïve! reader, allusions of NSFW, deception, age gap, forced relationship, implied stalking

Living in Alburquerque New Mexico was hard to say the least. Going from one job to another it just wasn’t enough for you. You were financial drained and it was a call for desperation by the reveal of your ill grandma’s medical bill. She was in and out of hospital and unfortunately things didn’t look to be getting better. 

Your love for her encouraged you to pull your weight on earning money tremendously more. She was the only family you had and losing her would mean the end of the world to you. 

You were desperate to the point you started to consider selling your body to willing men. The idea came to you when your friend Anna unexpectedly visited you, she was in the whole ‘sex worker business’ or ‘lady of the night’ that’s what she liked to call it unlike some people. 

Anna giggled showing off her new designer handbag “guess how much this beauty cost?” she asked you raised a brow in a thought “I’m not too sure hundred maybe?” you guessed.  

“More like five hundred” she answered with a grin and you mouthed a ‘wow’ in disbelief. “I wouldn’t have guess” you say. 

“How’s your dear old grandma?” Anna asked and your stare down at your coffee with a sigh “not good and truthfully, I’m financially fucked to pay for her possibly lifesaving treatment” you responded with a saddened tone.  

Anna looks at you with sympathy “you know Y/n you are really beautiful and if you're that desperate why don’t you start doing what I do” she suggested and you stare at her in shock. 

“I-I don’t know about that” you stutter a little and Anna just smiles at you “C’mon it’s not bad besides my customers are nice and generous sometimes they just want someone to talk to” you in thought about what she was saying. 

“Like I said you are beautiful and young you could really earn a lot from it. These men they love innocent looking girls like you” Anna giggles again. You were totally innocent you had three relationships in the past but they all didn’t end well. It’s not like sex wasn’t something you had never heard of before. 

“Listen I have to go now call me if you want to go through with it. It will change your life.” Anna waved in goodbyes. 

After another unfortunate call from the hospital, you were left with no choice. 

- 

It was a Friday night and you carefully memorised tips given by Anna like ‘might sure you flirt with them most of the night’ and ‘make sure they know what you are worth’. 

You hardly recognised yourself in the mirror after she gave you a makeover. 

Anna made it easier for you by sending one of her clients your way claiming ‘he’s a big lawyer guy that makes a lot of money’ so you sat at a local bar waiting for his arrival. After one or two drinks you realised, he was late of the time Anna gave him. You started to get anxious as you pulled on the tight dress you were wearing. 

Maybe he changed his mind. You didn’t know if it was a good thing or a bad thing. Glancing at the clock behind the bar he was now half an hour late. Sighing you pulled out your purse ready to pay up and leave. 

Then there was a man's voice “you must be Cat” you turn around hearing the fake name Anna made up for you. He was much older then you. Appearance was very much smart like a lawyer but his colour choices were usual to say the least. Reminding you of those inflatable men outside car dealerships and whatnot. But he looked oddly familiar. 

You gave him that sweet smile of yours “that’s me handsome” you tuck a hair behind your ear.  

The man laughs “what a charmer my name is Saul and it’s nice to meet you” he introduced and it struck you he was that late night lawyer guy you have seen on TV. Saul sits on the empty stool next to you. 

It felt awkward you didn’t know what to say to him as you finished your second drink “you want another one of those sweetheart?” he asks and you nod. “Yes please” you say quietly. 

Saul seemly was admiring the way you looked his blue eyes would drift from your bare thighs to your cleavage. “God you are beautiful” he mused and you blushed “thank you”  

Given you were so awkward Saul kept the conversation afloat telling you all funny stories about his clients and you laughed along with him. “Wow you deal with all sorts of characters it sounds like fun” you say and he takes a sip of his beer “yeah it is- you got any stories about your clients?” Saul asks and you almost choke on your drink.  

What could you say?  You hesitated for a bit “I bet you have loads of guys chasing after you- I don’t mean that to insult you given well your job” he rambles and you snigger. 

“It’s okay I don’t get interesting clients” you lie and then Saul raises his brow at you “wait a minute-am I your first client?” he questions at you just gave him an honest look “oh sweetheart” Saul awes in understanding. 

“Just so you know we don’t have to anything tonight. I’ll still pay you for this nice company” he reassured you. Not sure if it was just the drinking or the good conversation but you were starting to become attracted to the older man. 

Saul was so gentle and charming. 

“Do you wanna have sex with me?” you asked curiously and Saul just smiles “I think you are very beautiful doll face and easy to talk to” he sighs honestly but it wasn’t the answer you were looking for. 

Then he gave you a clear answer “Very much so- if you want to” staring at each other he placed his hand over yours. Saul moved in for a kiss and there was hint of shyness with you “sorry I’m just not used to this” you tell him. He started caressing your cheek “it’s okay we can just go slow” he advised you softly.  

You felt comfortable around him so you gathered up the confidence and kissed him gently. It started off slow and then you granted his tongue access and you tasted the beer he had been drinking. As you wrapped your hands around his neck. After some intimate kissing at the bar, he then asked you the question. 

“I have a room booked upstairs if you wanna-” you interrupted by kissing him again  

It was certainly a night you wouldn’t forget. 

- 

A whole month had passed and you started to notice changes. You didn’t really know what type of relationship you had with Saul. But there was one thing for certain...he was behaving strangely.  

Ever since that first night you shared with him Saul made you vow to be at his side  

‘Tell me you are only mine sweetheart and I will take care of you’ he whispered tracing circles along your shoulder blade pecking kisses on your soft skin. 

In exchange for the sex and downright obedience he solved all your financial worries. The sex was amazing but you felt as though each time Saul would become rougher and controlling. 

Grabbing at your throat and slamming into like a man possessed. 

“You belong to me in each and every way I own you”  

 On the lighter side of things your grandma was recovering smoothly. You tried spending as much time with her as possible but recently it became hard with Saul demanding you to be with him every second of every day. 

On top that you had an eerie feeling that you were being watched. 

You thought you would be able to have some decent time to yourself knowing Saul was a busy man. But that didn’t stop him. 

It started to become unbearable. Your body was sore and oversensitive.  

As he called you in his office you started to question the relationship you had with him. But that was interrupted the displeased look on his face.  

“I can’t fucking believe you sweetheart” Saul seethed as he closed the door behind you with a slam. Why was he so angry? Staring at him confused. 

“Don’t look at me like that! You know what you have been up to!” he shakes his finger at you like a parent scolding their child. Still unsure what he was even talking about you utter a “what?” and he laughs sarcastically. 

“Conspiring to leave me when you know exactly who you belong to. I know about your little meetups with your bitch of a friend Anna” His words withheld so much venom and you were in shock. “You were spying on me?” you questioned and he nods with another chuckle. 

It explained the feeling you always had since seeing him.  

“Why would you do that?” you asked and you started to wonder how long has he been doing it?  

Saul steps closer to you with a big smirk on his face “I just wanted to keep an eye on my doll and you have deeply upset me” there was a look in his eyes like never before. No gentleness or warmth but possession. 

He was no longer the man that you went to the hotel room with that night. 

 You're back hitting against the wall Saul had you caged between his arms “please just let me leave” you quietly begged. “Oh, that’s how you going to repay me for taking care of you?” Saul questions with a tusk.  

He presses his lips against your ear “do you want me to tell you a secret?” His voice husks and you gently nod. Feeling disgusted and shocked by his true demeanour  

 “I’ve known you long before you became a wannabe sex worker doll. You see Anna owed me big time for defending her in court. She was going to be sentenced away for a looong time if it wasn't for me and she offered me her body. But I didn’t want her” your eyes widen in disbelief as his hand traced up to your breast.  

“I wanted that sweet and innocent friend of hers who was desperate to take care of her beloved grandmother” his voice purred pecking down the side of your neck you struggled against him trying to get away. 

You couldn’t believe this was happening to you. How can Anna do this to you? 

But the older man was quick to slam you against the wall “you are so ungrateful after anything I’ve done for you” he seethed in your ear. His hand was held tight around both your wrists holding them above you. 

“i know some very bad men that would pay very good money for a sweet little thing like you” he threatened  

“I suggest you stop struggling and bend over my desk for me because I can make that happen sweetheart trust me”  

[jamiesfootball]

One of the things that’s been noodling in my head since the finale is how Ted Lasso plays the forgiveness card in regards to the Tartt Sr situation.

Yes, I’ve banged on this drum before. I shall bang on it again. Buh-dum.

Bear with me as I start from the outside and work my way in by first referencing a moment from a different show.

In Leverage, there’s an episode where they convince the guy they’re trying to take down to break out of police custody by making him think he’s in the middle of a deadly epidemic that’s being covered up by the government. The details of this aren’t important, but when Nate is explaining why it worked, he says something along the lines of ‘there’s a part of your brain that’s meant to question and make judgements. What we did was we tapped into the emotional center of his brain, so that he would forget to question anything.’

Now I'm paraphrasing, but this is actually a good summary of how a lot of cons work- they create an emotional story and a sense of relationship, to make you forget to ask ‘wait does this guy just want my money.’ Think of scary voicemails telling you your student loans got sent to collections and you need to call now. Think Nigerian Prince schemes. Think car dealerships.

Because that is the power of a story when the narrative structure follows all the guidelines. You become invested, and you believe the narrative. (This is also why Jump the Shark exists, when a narrative has wobbled so off its tracks that the belief becomes suspended, but I digress.)

So the issue for me with regards to the James Tartt Sr story line, is that from a technical standpoint the wider Story of Ted Lasso did meet the minimum requirements for ‘believable.' My coworker, for instance, absolutely loved how ALL the story lines tied up in the finale, including that one. She couldn’t explain why, she just said it was ‘really nice and it worked for her.’

But I’ll highlight that bit in the middle—she couldn’t explain why—because that’s the thrust of the situation. The Story, from her perspective, told a satisfying emotional conclusion by hitting all the correct points. It essentially did what a con does, and in the resulting emotion she failed to question it.

And I think therein lies the trouble with the Jamie's dad story line. Because it is being told within the scope of a broader narrative, it is allowed to coast on the merits of the rest of the narrative. For three seasons, the show preaches forgiveness and second chances and people having depth, so when it asks you to do it again at the end - with Jamie's dad, hell I'd even say with Rupert for a hot second - you already have within you all the emotional build-up to say 'yes.'

Except that the buildup doesn’t happen with James, or even Rupert, it happens to the people that they hurt. Jamie’s the one who learned how to be better. Jamie is the one who tried to make amends to the people he hurt. Jamie is the one who had to un-fuck his whole life. Jamie earned all of that emotional payoff.

His dad did not.

So the show sells you one emotional story, and at the end shuffles in another to reap the benefits of it.

But just like a con only works as long as you don’t start to question it, the second you question the James Tartt Sr storyline the more you realize how much of that work happened elsewhere in the story.

You know those youtube videos that are cut together scenes of ‘every time This Character talks about Big Plot Point’? Think of those videos. Sometimes they’re a concentrated dose of very high tense moments, but sometimes they’re a little anemic, aren’t they? Sometimes you watch those videos and realize just how much heavy lifting other scenes did just to imply that the narrative was moving forward.

Well if you made a youtube video of ‘all the scenes that mention / have James Tartt Sr in them’ and cut them together, you definitely do NOT get an emotionally satisfying ending. In fact you go from someone who implies that their father is violent, to seeing their father be violent, to seeing their father threaten violence to his kid, to seeing him inflict that violence on someone else in place of his kid, to the kid confiding in someone else that even more fucked up shit happened, to the kid’s mom trying to console him, to the kid literally showing symptoms of PTSD at the idea his father might be around-

-to someone asking him if maybe he should try to let that go

-to their dad being proud of them

-to reestablishing contact

-to a happy montage of them smiling together the end.

At bare minimum there is an entire confrontation missing. And that is minimum. Minimum narrative work said this storyline should have had a climax. But this is a storyline that did not breathe on its own- it relied on a dozen smaller, unrelated, moments to give it the illusion of a satisfying ending.

And since it was weaved in with the rest, to some people – people who were too in vested in the story to question it – that was a great ending. That was a perfect ending.

That’s the illusion of telling a story- people are predisposed to believing the story that is being told, to the point where they will forget to ask questions.

When people talk about this kind of narrative being a dangerous one? That’s where that comes from. That’s what it means. It’s not just that someone depicted a story of someone forgiving their abuser, it’s that the did it in such a way that that isn’t even what happened. Most of the time it is the narrative that forgives the abuser, not the character. The character doesn’t get to scream and cry and let out all the pain they suffered. The character doesn’t get to set boundaries and learn to experience the world safely. The character, often times, isn’t even worth an apology from the person who hurt them.

It isn't the character who gets closure in these narratives; it's the audience who does. And it’s so insidious that it can very nearly trick a person in real life into thinking that maybe they too will get closure if they forgive someone – without ever realizing that in these stories, the narrative was never on their side in the first place.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Gail Godwin is one of our finest writers. Godwin's latest book "Getting to Know Death," will be published this month by Bloomsbury U.S..

This excerpt appears in Harper's Magazine.

>>>>>

DARK KNIGHTS OF THE SOUL

I have been close to people who one day found themselves in the desperate place and didn’t make it out.

I remember struggling to write a letter to a young man whose father had just hanged himself. The father had been the builder of our house. He was charming and talented and proud of his son. I wrote these things to the son and then came the point in the letter where I was supposed to write something hopeful for the future. All I could think of to convey was No, you’ll never get over it, but the time will come when you will be glad you can’t get over it because the loved one remains alive in your heart as you continue to engage with the who and the why of him.

Two people in my family didn’t make it out of their desperate place: my father and my brother.

Though I had seen my father only twice when I was a child, I sent him an invitation to my high school graduation. Mother said not to expect him to show up, but he did. He, his new wife, and his brother drove from Smithfield, North Carolina, to Portsmouth, Virginia, for the ceremony. In the early-summer weeks that followed, we wrote letters to each other. He had elegant handwriting and prose to match. He wrote that he would like more than anything to get to know me better. Could I—would it be possible for me to spend a few weeks with them at the beach this summer? I was in my first desperate place at that time and decided to tell him about it—though not all of it. I ended up going to the beach and returning with them to Smithfield and entering Peace College in the fall, paid for by my father.

My father had been doing some personal bookkeeping of his own. At the age of fifty, he had at last achieved a measure of stability. Finally, after thirty years of intemperate living, he had managed to stop drinking, had married a new widow in town with a prosperous brother-in-law, and was manager of sales at the brother-in-law’s car dealership. My father confided to me during the weeks we spent at his brother-in-law’s beach cottage that he regretted not having made more of himself. “You mustn’t let it happen to you,” he said. “Nobody is prepared for how quickly time passes, and you don’t want to be one of those people who wakes up in the late afternoon with nothing to show for it.” But later, in a radiant moment while we were lying on the beach working on our tans, he told me that I had come along at just the right time, and if he continued to win his battle against depression and alcohol, and if automobile sales continued like this, well, the future didn’t look so hopeless after all.

As we lay side by side, congratulating ourselves for finding each other, I had no idea that old disappointments were biding their time, stealthily building like waves, which in less than three years would drown him.

One winter afternoon when I was a junior at Chapel Hill, he phoned his brother at his office. “Just felt like saying hello, old son,” he said. “Son” was what the brothers called each other. After he hung up, he lay down on the floor of his bedroom in Smithfield and shot himself in the head.

Losing ground. Was that the thing that ultimately killed him? In his twenties, he began losing jobs, losing status, but always got back on his feet. A charming, handsome man, he did not need to keep a steady job as long as his mother was alive. And after her death, there would be other admirers waiting in line for whom his looks and charm were enough. By the time he met my mother, he was an alcoholic. After that came the mental disorders, given different psychiatric names as the years went by.

When they were driving back to Smithfield after my high school graduation, he came with a raging toothache. They found a dentist along the road who pulled the tooth. But the pain continued, and when they got home, the dentist told him it had been the wrong tooth. “I should have known,” he would finish this story, laughing. “I should have known when we drove into the parking lot and his shingle read: doctor payne.” He still had the charm but the looks were going.

This is from a June 16, 2018, New York Times op-ed, “What Kept Me from Killing Myself,” by the Iraq War veteran Kevin Powers. “Throughout that summer and into the fall . . . just below the surface of my semiconsciousness, was the constant thought: Maybe I won’t wake up this time.” Powers continues:

I doubt much needs to be said about the kind of despair that would make such an idea a source of comfort, despair that came not from accepting that things were as bad as they were going to get but, worse, that they might go on like that forever. The next step felt both logical and inevitable.

This sounds along the lines of what my twenty-eight-year-old brother might have been thinking in the hours that led up to his death.

In the last week of his life, Tommy was working on a long poem. He left behind two drafts. He titled one “Why Not Just Leave It Alone?” and the other “Why Change the World?” One line is the same in both drafts: “My pride is broken since my lover’s gone.” Both drafts end with the same image of the poet being laid to rest in his wooden home, “With my trooper hat on my chest bone.”

It was October 2, 1983. What happened, what we know happened, as opposed to all that we can never know, was that on the Sunday afternoon after Mother’s birthday, Tommy ironed a shirt at his parents’ house, where he had been living with his three-year-old son. He told Mother he was going over to see J., the woman he loved, a nurse who also had a three-year-old son. They had planned to marry; they had even made out a budget. Then J. suddenly broke it off. Tommy told Mother he was going over to ask J. to reconsider. “I’m going to settle it one way or another before the afternoon is out,” he said, and drove off alone.

COUPLE FOUND SHOT was the headline in the newspaper the next morning.

The day before, on Mother’s birthday, I knew Tommy was unhappy. But Tommy was always unhappy. He “felt things more than most” was the family euphemism for his troubled nature. He most took to heart the family’s fractures as well as the world’s. Drawing you in with his shy, closemouthed smile, he would offer his latest tale of woe. But always, always in his stories, there had been a quality of suspense, of entertainment. He starred in them as the knight-errant, complete with pratfalls and setbacks, but a knight-errant who picked himself up, dusted himself off, and set out on his next mission. Tommy was a modern Samaritan who carried a first-aid kit and a blue emergency beacon in his car in case he came across an accident.

We were in the kitchen and he told me the story of J. suddenly breaking up with him. But this time something was different. I was not, as usual, deriving the usual listener’s satisfaction from his story. Many years later, when remembering that kitchen scene, I realized what had spooked me about it: Not only was there not a trace of the shy, closemouthed smile, there was no knight-errant starring in my brother’s story. The tone was new: one of bafflement and resignation. There was no sense of any future missions. There was no tug of suspense. It was like a story that had already ended.

Tommy would be sixty-three now. He was born the same summer that my father drove from Smithfield to Glen Burnie, Maryland, and rescued me from my desperate place. If on that October afternoon twenty-eight years later there had not been a pistol handy in the glove compartment of J.’s car, would Tommy have remarried somebody else and raised his son and reconciled himself to a fallen world, as long as he had a firstaid kit and a job that gave him the satisfaction that he was rescuing people from injustice?

But now I do hear his voice, the old Tommy voice, just as it was in life, chiding me as he defends the position of his beloved National Rifle Association with its singsong refrain: “Gail, guns don’t kill people. People do.” I continue to engage with the who and why of my father and my brother.

During my life, I have found myself in the desperate place four times. But that first time, at age eighteen, was by far the worst.

Summer 1955 in Glen Burnie, Maryland. Everybody seemed to have a future but me. I had received a letter from Mother Winters, my mentor from ninth grade. She congratulated me on being salutatorian, asked about my plans for college, and brought me news of some of my classmates. “Pat has won the four-year Angier Duke scholarship to Duke, Carolyn will be going to Radcliffe, Stuart and Lee to St. Mary’s in Raleigh . . . ” Here I stopped reading and felt . . . what? A dry mouth, a pang in the chest, a sense of going down, of losing myself. All I knew to do was mark my position.

My position. At the time, I couldn’t hold all of it in my mind. If I had tried, I might have despaired, or lashed out and hurt myself or somebody else. I had so little experience to draw from and there was no escape.

Since my early teens, I had been building my life on false premises. I was creating a persona that was more extroverted than I really was. She pretended to more confidence and security than I felt. I became a pro at embellishing and editing my history. When I entered a new school, I “went out” for things I was good at that would bring me attention. The school paper, the drama club, painting posters and scenery, entering competitions—and, of course, getting high grades. I dated lots of boys, made it a point to be cagey and hard to get until each got fed up and moved on, usually just as I had begun to appreciate him.

That was the outside of things. At home, other dramas were playing out. We were not free people. Our embattled breadwinner, who was angry much of the time, sometimes knocked one of us to the floor for challenging him. There was no money for us except what he doled out and no going anywhere he didn’t drive us. As I entered my teens, the bread winner, who was only twelve years older than me, often spoke of how he “loved” me. His voice trembled. At night I would wake to find him kneeling in the dark beside my bed, his hand taking liberties.

My mother had shed her former confident self. As a child, I knew a mother who arrived home on the 10:00 pm bus after her wartime job on the newspaper, a woman who taught college and on weekends typed up love stories that earned one hundred dollars apiece. This powerless woman seemed more like someone I was visiting in prison. Only I was in prison with her. She suffered because there was no money to send me to college. She made phone calls to a private college in Baltimore to see if I could go as a day student. The registrar said a partial scholarship might be arranged, given my academic record, but where was the rest of the money to come from? There was no “rest of the money,” my stepfather reminded us, as though we were dim-witted. He suggested I take a year off and find a job, “maybe in sales work,” and save up for college next year. He added magnanimously that I could continue to live under his roof for the time being without paying rent.

That’s the way the ground lay that June 1955 morning in Glen Burnie, when the girl sat cross-legged on her bed, the letter from her old teacher clutched in her fist. “Pat to Duke, Carolyn to Radcliffe, Stuart and Lee to St. Mary’s.”

This is my life, but I may not get to do what I want in it.

I can’t see a way out of this.

Things will not necessarily get better.

In my novel Unfinished Desires, about life at a girls’ school, two old nuns are being driven back to their retirement home from a doctor’s visit, and one says to the other, “There was a sentence this morning in that Prayer for Holy Women: ‘In our weakness Your power reaches perfection.’ What do you think it means, Sister Paula?” Sister Paula thinks for a minute and then replies, “I think it means you have to admit you can’t save yourself before you’re fully available to God.”

That morning in Glen Burnie, God was undergoing some very slippery changes in my psyche. He had ceased being the attentive Heavenly Father who was always aware of me. All I could be certain of that long-ago summer morning was that I could not save myself.

But something else did, something already embedded in the tissue of my particular circumstances: the earthly father who had been the absent father. In a mood of defiant resignation, I decided to send him an invitation to my graduation. Of course he wouldn’t come.

But he did come. And when we were lying beside each other on the beach, he said, “When I opened your invitation, after I got over being pleasantly surprised, I thought to myself, Well, this is one thing I did that came to fruition. And then, after we began to write letters to each other, it struck me that I might be the rescuer you needed.”

Art Work: "When Day Touches Night," a painting by Michael Ho, whose work was on view last month with Gallery Vacancy at the art fair Independent New York.

(Follies of God)

[legend-the-dumb-jock]

<a href="https://whynotfat.tumblr.com/" style="text-decoration:underline;">whynotfat</a>: <p>My 52 year old marathonist uncle keeps giving me shit for being overweight and out of shape. Can you help me get back at him by completely wrecking his body? I want him to get out of breath after a single flight of stairs.</p>

Of course I can’t help. Let’s really show him what it’s like being wrecked. I just say your uncle might be a marathon runner but I was surprised to see how well he took care of himself. All muscle.

I did my usual following him around. Listening to him. Absorbing all his hates and faults that he couldn’t stand. Everything I would use to make him different. And then it was time. I knew what I was going to do within a matter of hours. Your uncle was in the middle of a meeting at work when I took control. He immediately screamed when I took control. I then continued his meeting as if nothing happened. But while doing so I began to undress in front of the company directors. As if everything was normal. Step 1 was to take your uncles security away. And by the time I got down to the underwear and socks security was already at the door. The president of th company telling me I was fired ! I grinned the whole time. Step 1 was complete. And since this was a business where word travels fast. You’re uncle would never climb this corporate latter again. Next was to get rid of his life style. Walking to his car fun. Everyone in the public parking fuselage looked at me as I walked to your uncles car in his body in nothing but underwear. I wanted people to see him for the fool he is. And remember it well. I threw on a shirt and some shorts from the back seat. And drove the Porsche to the dealership. Selling it for cash was easy. Your uncle didn’t need to drive a car like this anymore. He wasn’t going to be able to afford the upkeep! I replaced it with a ratty old truck. One of the kinds that he really hates. The kind that you don’t know if it’s going to break down or not. I laughed when I signed the title with your uncles name making him the legal owner of something he would hate. Getting to his apartment I decided then they some more changed we’re going to have to be done. Your uncle lived in a luxury condo. Not something he would be affording again. He couldn’t keep this up. I got some stuff from his apartment that I needed. Birth certificates. Socials. The things I needed to be able to continue on with the next steps. This would be the last time your uncle ever stepped foot in this condo.

A few miles outside of the city I was going to start a new life for your uncle. Pulling into a trailer park with a sign that has for rent on it the truck fizzled out and died. Perfect for your uncle. I rented a trailer where you uncle would now live. I walked into the old run town trailer and I felt at home instantly knowing that your uncle would never be able to escape the confines I was setting for him now. But there is still one issue. I’ve changed his job, his lifestyle. But his body is still just too perfect. I looked in the mirror and seen the reflection of the 52 year old marathonist. I closed my eyes. And began to focus. Letting all the desires I had for your uncles body take over as my magic flowed through him changing him. Smooth skin would be a thing of the past as I would wrap your uncle in body hair. Itchy greesy body that would smell of Bo. He would always be scratching at his skin as if he has fleas. Hair would now fall from his head making him permanently bald. The facial hair he did have would grow in faster than ever. Even after shaving in the morning he would have a full beard again by that afternoon. Making shaving pointless. And the hair would be white. Like the way a 52 years should look. But your uncle was still too good looking. Again I focused. Making him shrink from 6’ to 5’7”. Taking him down a few pegs would certainly help this cause. I turned sideways and seen the hair that wrapped up his back now. Now for some who ran all that time he she have knee problems don’t you think ? As his ankle and knees swelled slightly from inflammation. He would feel the pain everyday now. But still. This was not enough for me. I need to really take your uncle over the edge. I leaned forward on the bathroom county and looked at his bearded bald head in the mirror. “Here goes nothing”. I closed my eyes again and began to focus. Slowly and then quickly I started making your uncles body gain weight. What started off as abs disappearing quickly turned to a small belly. Then a gut. At I made more weight grow I knew that I just had to keep going. Working s couple of minutes I had forced your uncle to gain enough weight to really bend his frame out more. Knees and ankles hurting even more. As he would be carrying a beach ball beer belly around. One that he would find impossible to get rid of matter how much he tried to run. I took away all his endurance. Making that greesy sweat generating hair on his body to get even slicker for filth. You uncle would struggle to walk from one end of this trailer to the other now without breaking a sweat and getting beat red from carrying this gut around. I struggled to make it to the kitchen not realizing the effects i what I had done. Plopping you’re uncle in a steel legs chair as he would have to have these from now on. All others would break. The kitchen filled with unhealthy foods. Foods he would be forced to eat as his body would go on auto pilot and he each them. Cupboards that would restock with little Debbie cakes instantly once he ate them. A fridge that refilled with beer. Final adjustments I made turned your uncle was making him the white trash loser he was meant to be. Stuck in a low wage job at a fast food joint. I even changed his name to something to fit his new form. Now whenever you visit you can make fun of him. And watch as he forced by magic to eat box after box of junk food snacks. All keeping him looking like the beaches whale you wished him to be.

November 20th, 2021 9:37pm male transformation bodywrecker

[theminecraftbee]

17 & 29?

17. What’s something you’ve learned about while doing research for a fic?

i think the funniest one is the time i posted stuffed bird and like, okay, i did a bunch of research into how to hotwire a car. fun fact: you can't hotwire modern cars physically the way you see in movies but there ARE tools to do it via the diagnostics ports in the car. as i showed in the fic. anyway. and my friend who works at a car dealership then messages me afterwards to go "yeah we don't keep our keys in a safe" and i go "WHAT" because look, i didn't think i had to research that,

29. Share a bit from a fic you’ll never post OR from a scene that was cut from an already posted fic.

oh lets role the wheel of google docs... oh hey want to look at some sailor moon i considered writing as a pinch hit for an exchange before someone else claimed it so i didn't? (under the cut because it's a bit long.)

When the pregnancy test comes back positive, Usagi doesn’t tell anyone but Mamoru. They stand together in the apartment they’re renting together on his doctor’s wages and her job as a kitchen manager and that he’s never home in and that she struggles to keep clean and stare at the little line that says she’s pregnant.

“This is a good thing,” Mamoru says.

“Yeah,” Usagi says. “Yeah, it’s a good thing. A miracle,” she says. “Are you—are you sure?”

“It’s your choice,” Mamoru says.

“We knew it would be in my twenties,” Usagi says. She had turned twenty three weeks ago. She missed her period officially about two days ago. She took the test today. She’s on birth control, she’d told herself. She’s on birth control. She’s not good about remembering to take it, which means it doesn’t work, but they’d used a condom, too. It’s nothing to worry about. Forgetting to take the pill regularly had just fucked up her hormone levels.

The pregnancy test showed positive in their little messy bathroom today.

“It’s your choice,” Mamoru says, gently. “You don’t know it’s her. Not yet. It’s not anyone yet.”

Usagi’s hands shake. “No, you don’t understand. I know,” she says. “Sometimes, Mamoru, you just—you just know things. Or, maybe you don’t. I do. I don’t talk about it, but sometimes, I look at the sky, and I—”

“Okay,” Mamoru says.

“Okay,” Usagi says.

“We should still wait to tell anyone,” Mamoru says.

“You worry too much since you started working in the trauma ward,” Usagi says. “I know it’s her. I’ll—”

“Not until we have a date,” Mamoru says. “Not until then. If it’s not, it would be cruel, if…”

“Okay. You’re right” Usagi says.

“A miracle,” says Mamoru.

“We always knew she would be,” agrees Usagi, and she looks out the window. It is sunny. The weather is normal. Cars drive past outside, even at the late hour, and it feels like every other day they’ve had waiting for the end of the world. It’s just everything is much, much closer now. A little line on white paper tells her so. So she doesn’t tell anyone but Mamoru. Not yet. It would be cruel if it wasn’t. You understand.

[secretswiftymarvelfan]

Fixer Upper: End of the Road - Mechanic!Curtis x Reader

Summary: All good things must come to an end....

Word Count: 1.1k

Warnings: Angst! Lil bit of Fluff!

Dividers by @firefly-graphics​

Masterlist / AU Masterlist

You could barely breathe you were sobbing so hard. Every gasp of air hurt, your lungs starved of oxygen. Everything just hurt, you never expected this to happen. It had always been one of your worst nightmares, you just didn’t expect it to ever become reality.

But it was happening, and there was nothing you could do to stop it. You thought everything was fine, great even, but maybe you were just ignoring all the signs. That maybe if you didn’t acknowledge them, they wouldn’t be true, you wouldn’t have to deal with it.

But it was true, so here you were curled up into a ball on the couch. Your knees hugged close to your chest, which was also probably impacting your ability to breathe. Your head buried in your knees, just desperate to block out the cruel, cruel words.

“Sweetheart…” Curtis muttered from his spot beside you.

“Don’t. Please don’t Curtis I don’t want to hear it” you managed to gasp out, looking over to see his solemn expression through the blurriness of your tears.

“I’m sorry” he sighed, his hand moving to rest on your shoulder but stopping when you flinched “you had to know this day would happen eventually”

You let out another choked sob hearing that because no you didn’t. You didn’t think this could ever happen.

“Please stop crying, you’re worrying Jacques” Curtis says, Jacques whimpering from his spot on the floor in front of you.

“I wasn’t the one who started this conversation” you snap glaring over at Curtis before groaning, your head dropping your hands “I’m sorry” you mutter hands running up and down your face.

“No it’s okay, it’s understandable to lash out after getting bad news,” Curtis says gently.

“Bad news is a bit of an understatement,” you say with a watery scoff, trying to wipe away your tears “is there really nothing that can change this?” You ask pleadingly.

“Not really” Curtis admits shaking his head “Dougie is a very old car, even with constant maintenance it's not going to last forever,” he says rubbing your back soothingly.

“I don’t want to get rid of him, he means too much to me” you sniffle, leaning into Curtis’ embrace.

“We don’t have to,” Curtis says wrapping his large comforting arms around you “we can keep him in the garage, where it's warm and dry, and take him out occasionally for day trips to give him a run”

“I guess” you sigh snuggling closer into his chest.

“But you can’t keep driving him everywhere, every day because it’ll just kill him, that’s what I did to my old car and I don’t want you to go through that”  Curtis sighed kissing the top of your head.

“You’re right” you pout with a long sigh “still sucks though”

“I know, but look I know where all the good car dealerships are so we can go get you a nice new one this weekend” Curtis offers as you look up at him.

“None will be as good as Dougie” you mutter.

“No but it’ll stop me from worrying that you’re gonna break down somewhere every time you drive it,” Curtis says with a knowing look.

“Hey Dougie breaking down is what brought us together” you point out.

“I know, and I’m very grateful” Curtis chuckles kissing your forehead.

As promised that weekend Curtis took you to a car dealership to find you a new car. You were still pouting about the whole situation so you were more than happy to let Curtis take control.

Which was also good because you had no clue what kind of things you wanted, nor what kind of car. You also didn’t know what kind of things were good or bad. As you listened to Curtis talk to the dealer it sounded like a foreign language to you.

“You might be in luck, we have a car that just came in yesterday that has everything you’re looking for and for a good price” the dealer nods with a pleased smile “let me show you”

The dealer leads you out of the dealership and onto the lot. When he reached the car he gestured for you to get in, but you held back both expecting and thinking it was best that Curtis took the lead again.

“It’s not my car sweetheart, you need to like it,” Curtis says gently pushing you towards the car.

You let out a small huff “I’m not gonna like it as much as Dougie” you say quietly enough that only Curtis could hear you.

He let out a small snort of laughter shaking his head at you “c’mon” he smile pushing you towards the car.

You sighed in resignation, walking over and climbing into the front seat of the car. The first thing that caught you by surprise was how comfortable the seat was, the leather was scratchy or saggy.

“Okay, so I’ve already explained all the stats to you both already so I’m just gonna show you all the toys and gadgets instead” the dealer explains as he points at the central console.

The more the dealership pointed out the harder it became to ask uninterested. This car had things you didn’t even know it could have, like self-parking, reversing cameras and heated seats.

When the dealer was done he climbed back out of the car and Curtis took his place “so what do you think?” He smiles over at you.

“I’m in shock! This is like iron man's car or something there’s so many gadgets” you exclaim shaking your head in disbelief “it also has heated seats too!”

Curtis chuckles “wow I didn’t realise the bar was so low, so shall we get it?”

“Yeah it’s amazing” you admit “it’s not Dougie” you quickly correct “but it's great, I love it”

“Okay good, so the next important question, what is its name?” Curtis smirks.

“Ooh, I dunno!” You say trying to rack your brain for one.

“What about your favourite movie character?” Curtis suggests making you laugh.

“Well considering my favourite movie character’s name is Me, I don’t think that’s gonna work” you chuckle.

“Okay, what about your second favourite?” Curtis smiles.

You rest your head back against the headrest pursing your lips as you thought, a smile tugging at your lips as you decided on your answer “Frankie”

“I thought that film always makes you cry,” Curtis says frowning slightly, but still with a smile on his face.

“It does but because it's such an emotional scene, and the main character is someone who’s a bit grumpy and closed off but secretly a big softie,” you say smiling over at him.

Curtis gives you a bashful smile “well Frankie it is then” he says leaning over and kissing you softly.

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Masterlist / AU Masterlist

I don’t have a tag list by follow @secretswiftymarvelfanlibrary​ and turn on post notification to keep up to date!

[zappedbyzabka]

OH MY GOD I JUST HAD THIS IDEA WHILE READING RUSSOLAW STUFF

WHAT IF OLDER DANIEL AND HIS TWIN BILLY WITH A YOUNGER JOHNNY OR THE OTHER WAY AROUND WITH OLDER JOHNNY AND YOUNGER BILLY AND DANIEL

YES👀

The image of two scrappy little guy’s fight for the pretty older guy🫠 The image of two hot older men fighting over a lovely younger guy🫠

Johnny met Daniel first; maybe he worked at the country club as a cart girl type (because Johnny in that outfit🤌). As much as Daniel likes to say he’s a calm guy who never feels jealous, he’s a rabid chiwawa about Johnny.

Sure, the kid isn’t his property or anything; he just happens to work at the club Daniel frequents and always shows up in his cart with Daniel’s favorite carbonated alcohol. Always in tight khakis, the shortest little shorts Daniel’s ever seen on a boy, or a godforsaken short skirt—long legs on display for him to ogle guiltily when Johnny is fetching him whatever he asked for (like a good boy.)

Johnny is used to the attention from perverted old men and cougars who terribly misread him at the club, getting patted on the rump by richies and slipped tips for "Being such a doll," as one woman put it. He definitely gave some trouble, he wasn’t especially polite or cheery on the job, but he made up for it plenty with flirtation. Daniel was the first guy there that Johnny genuinely sought out and dressed up for.

Billy coming to Cali was definitely not on Daniel’s radar, especially since they aren’t on the best terms.

He allows the guy to stay with him, though—he still loves him even if he is a prick; he’s family.

But it became very obvious that Billy still doesn’t know how to act because he caught him up with Anthony eating doritos and playing video games at 3 am when Anthony had school the very next morning—that ended in a big argument. Billy convinced him he’d stay out of trouble if Daniel got him out of the house and showed him his workplace, what he did all day.

"Come on. You ashamed to have me as a brother or somethin’? I’m so bored!”

“Yep. You’re a criminal.”

“I am not! You know I’m not!”

The dealership was thankfully uneventful. Amoush and the rest were there, but Amanda had already met him/knew about him and so did Louie (of course.)

It was the country club that Daniel should have never taken him to. He had gone to get a margarita when he heard a sweet "Hi, Mr. LaRusso!" Behind him.

He only turned around for a quick second, smiling at the sight of Johnny walking in his general direction, before turning back around and thanking the bartender.

To his horror, Billy was the one Johnny had gone up to mistakenly.”

"…But that’s life, doll. Can’t complain when there's pretty things like you.” He told him with a smile, rubbing his knuckles on Johnny’s burning cheek.

The boy looked way too into it. “I like this new shaggy look, sir.”

"Billy!"

Johnny’s head turned towards him immediately, confusion written all over his face. “…Mr LaRusso?”

“Hiya, Danny. Why didn’t you ever mention…” he looks over at Johnny. “I don’t believe I asked your name, sweetheart?”

The blonde gets that look on his face again, like he wants to pounce as he almost purrs. “I’m Johnny.” and gives Billy his hand.

Daniel digs his nails into his palm, trying not to give away his jealousy and frustration. “This is my twin, Billy. He’s here for a short visit.”

“Oh, I’m gonna stay a long time.”

"Why didn’t you ever tell me you had a brother? A baddass one at that!”

Daniel clenched his jaw. "I mentioned I had a sibling before. I must’ve."

He didn’t. He didn’t want Johnny to know about Billy because the boy surely would have gone looking for photos of him—realizing that he’s the bad boy version of him and liking him more than Daniel. And Daniel knows Billy has the exact same type as him, would take one look at the boy and start licking his lips like Sylvester the cat.

Well, Billy is a fraud. He’s never been cool or a real rebel—what kind of idiot thinks he’d go to jail over tuna?

But Johnny is extremely attracted to Daniel because he’s a wholesome dad, a good man with hairy arms and nice hands. A guy who can barbecue and could win in a fight nine times out of ten. A true manly man in Johnny’s eyes, no matter his height.

And boy, was he a hottie back then too. Johnny would have let that stick hit any time.

He enjoys his company and hearing what he has to say, even if it’s something cringy like asking if he’s “down with GOT”.

He’s just so kind and dreamy.

But LaRusso—the new one—is just as hot to him. He loves bad boys, especially the shameless ones. The ones that eyefuck Johnny, stare at his behind and don’t even try to hide it. The ones that whistle at him and tell him he has pretty lips. Johnny’s spread his legs for the bad ones as much as the good ones, and now it’s like he’s in a personalized wet dream having these opposites of each other that look exactly alike wanting him; he wonders how different their dicks are, he knows Mr LaRusso’s is big. He saw it when handing Daniel a towel in the sauna.

He’d already been drooling over it just from seeing it through Daniel’s trousers, but seeing it uncovered left him feeling even more desperate, felt like he had a fucking fever that night. He wonders if he could get them to plug him up on both ends and fuck him at the same time. (Cough. He can.)

And gosh golly do I love russolaw with Billy thrown in the mix and wanting to fuck the pretty older fella.

I’m putting tkk3 Daniel as a rival for Billy because the cute chub matches—but I also love twiggy tkk1 Daniel fighting him.

So…milfy and grabbable…so pretty—who wouldn’t wanna hit that. Look at those thighs. I’m sure he’d love having Billy and Daniel scrap with each other over who gets to walk him to his car after class. Last one is him teasingly scolding Billy/Daniel, who are fantasizing about getting between his legs mid word and fucking him him breathless—they’d even settle for pressing their dicks between his chubby thighs while he kept running his mouth.

Young Daniel weaseled his way into Johnny’s life, heart, and pants—which are what Daniel decided to bring up as a conversation starter when they met.

("Hey, I like your jeans." Johnny looked sort of confused as to why Daniel was telling him that, and he certainly didn’t seem to believe it. "Yeah?"

"yeah! Uh…Can I have your number?"

Way too quick, LaRusso.

The corner of Johnny’s lip twitched. "What do you need that for?"

Don’t chicken out; be straightforward, Daniel thought. "I’ve seen you in those flyers, and I…." Thought you were so hot “I’m interested in joining?" Dammit.

Johnny laughed, a little less on guard. "Could have sworn Aisha put the number for the dojo on there, but…" He gave Daniel a once over. a twerp with gentle eyes. Probably a monster cock that takes up half his body weight hiding in his pants. "Sure, I’ll write it down."

Daniel could have jumped for joy when Johnny did so, handing him a disposable coaster with his personal phone number on it.

"Anything else?"

He didn’t want to leave him just yet. "Yeah. What brand are your jeans?"

johnny shrugged. "Don’t remember, I’ll let you know when I take them off tonight." )

Maybe it was the typical bar meeting, or maybe Daniel and Johnny met at a construction site; either way, Johnny likes him. He also likes his fluffy hair and the way he stared at him like he was beautiful, not old and pudgy. He liked those guilty glances he shot him even more, like he just couldn’t help it. (Johnny’s tits are almost eye level with him, but he tries not to look and it’s cute). Kid is such a hopeless romantic but horny as a rabbit.

So maybe Johnny had his fun with that—bending over directly in front of Daniel, straddling him during training, laughing at his jokes, and crossing his arms like a girl trying to show off her cleavage—which is exactly what he was doing. Getting him hard on purpose, then doing nothing about it.

it was just so fun to give the kid blue balls. It was too adorable how he clearly wanted to tear off Johnny’s clothes and make him take it, but never attempted to ask or do so—too polite and traditional, too nice to straight up tell Johnny how badly he wants to gag him on his dick and watch him cry because he’d look even prettier on his knees. No, Daniel kept taking him out for dates, bringing him presents, and asking for nothing but to take him out again.

the next time Daniel came over with another potted flower and his favorite takeout, Johnny kissed him. He had just barely been able to wait for Daniel to set down the food and plant before he did so. Daniel told him he looked great the moment he walked through the door and smiled like he was genuinely just glad to see him—as if Johnny weren’t in just a tshirt and small briefs. Daniel himself smelled like plants and dirt and looked incredibly attractive.

Yet they still didn’t sleep together that night because Daniel is ever so the gallant and felt like showing Johnny that he didn’t only want him for his looks—like he hadn’t made Johnny feel special all month. Johnny wanted to at least jerk him off (he’s even done that for his own friends), finally touch the dick he’s been needing, and have something to think about later, but he didn’t want to push it and scare the kid off.

Billy, however, was not afraid to fuck Johnny immediately.

He brought Johnny things too: beef jerky and milkshakes, different kinds of beer he wanted him to try out, and flowers he found outside a gas station that he thought would look nice behind his ear.

He takes Johnny on drives in his beat up Miata, takes hims wherever he wants to go, and more. He’d ask him continuously for all his stories about the cobras and his motorcycle. About his glory days.

And he fucked Johnny not even a week after meeting him. Showed up for one of their little adventures and got invited in to "relax for a bit". Billy had been heavily flirting, dropping innuendos, and making it clear what he wanted, but also that he liked him and wasn’t only hanging out with him for some ass and a grope.

Johnny loves his leather jacket, greasy hair, crude talk, and nicely shaped, chapped lips; he reminds him a little of Dutch, which makes him like him even more.

But Johnny moved onto being a cocktease to both Billy and Daniel. Keeping eye contact while he’s sucking on something, ("Look at his blowie lips, Dan—" "Don’t talk like that about him.") and leans forward so they can look up his shirt. Not to mention all the things he does that are just cute. Like getting confused as to how any sort of technology that isn’t a Walkman or flip phone works and needing their help. Or the way his voice gets a little higher and airy when he’s around them.

Daniel knows his brother has been with Johnny, but that just makes him spoil the blonde more. He tries to show him that he’s the one who could really take care of him; he’s the one who loves him, but he starts to rethink his plan the more he catches Billy and Johnny making out while Billy’s hands—identical to Daniel’s—were touching the curvy body of the man he’s been holding himself back from.

He and Billy fought the first time Daniel walked in on him in the middle of fucking Johnny. Johnny’s wrists were tied to the bed and his mouth open and pink, mewling for Billy and looking like he was above cloud nine with tears running down his face and his legs spread wide. Daniel didn't need to see between them to know what was going on, especially when Billy wouldn’t shut the hell up, kept murmuring filth, and spanking Johnny indulgently"So fucking tight. Best ass I’ve ever laid eyes on, made to be fucked. That’s why you’re such a bitch sometimes; you just needed a good cock to calm you down."

Daniel just grabbed him without thinking when he said that, pushed him off of Johnny, and punched him in his dumb matching face. "Daniel, Billy, what the hell?!" Johnny yelled, but that didn’t stop them from squabbling and rolling around on the floor. Spouting insults at each other like they did in middle school. He kind of liked watching them fight, but the way his heart pounded at being entirely defenseless when there’s fighting around him was mostly from fear—which…also kind of turned him on, but he doesn’t want the boys to actually hurt each other. "Stop it!"

They ignore him or just don’t hear him. "Stop it, please!"

They finally stilled, bleeding and panting and staring up at him like puppies, both of whom were just rabid a second agoz

"Untie me. Now."

Both of them jumped to listen, each untying a wrist while Johnny chastised them.

"I’m sorry, Johnny, sweetheart. Don’t know what I was thinking."

“Sorry, angelo.”

Johnny wonders if he could get them to stand right next to each other with their thick, perfect cocks out so he could go back and forth between who he’s taking down his throat and who he’s jerking off. Maybe they’d let them press the tips together so he could lick them both—maybe they could even try and get as much of their dicks as they could in his mouth at the same time (spoiler alert: he can get them to do all of that and he can keep them both locked down.)

[jones-friend]

Lol. Lmao.

I started watching One Tree Hill bc what I saw through my now estranged sister was absurd, and bc of the John Oliver clip where a dog high on marijuana eats Dan Scott’s replacement heart. I first watched all the finales back to back to back then decided to give the whole thing a run through.

In one tree hill a number of souls are shackled within the purgatory of Tree Hill, a place that causes characters to stagnate professionally and emotionally while giving illusions of growth through platitudes and unearned emotional moments. You cannot escape Tree Hill. Death isn’t even enough to escape Tree Hill. You can fall onto the pitcher plant but you cannot climb out. You are one with Tree Hill.

This is a show with no less than three serial killer arcs, a show so hungry for drama it consumes every teen drama concept before the second season leaving it nowhere to go, a show with two near fatal bridge accidents, with real ghosts that help and haunt, where teenagers and small children talk like aged adults, where we get to see the progression of culture and technology from early 00’s flip phones to early 10’s smartphones and social media, and teenagers promising rebellion instead become the forces they were so much so against in early seasons as cycles are broken yet perpetuate. This is a show where a teenager can afford an apartment by working part time at a mall food court. Its also got an incredible reinforcement of heteronormative ideals.

In this show, Ball is Life.

The biggest issue with One Tree Hill working is there needs to be a source of drama caused by the main cast. The way this works out in writing is characters often backtrack their growth to cause more drama again.

I do have a few positives. After S4 there is a time skip of 4 years. I think this actually gives good weight to S4’s finale, letting it keep that weight. And they give new struggles to the cast that don’t trivialize their previous successes while giving us something to root for. The friendship between Nathan and Lucas has genuinely compelling moments as they learn about themselves and each other.

Dan Scott is also a source of great enjoyment for me. He makes the show work. You have plotlines like “Lucas and Brooke are having relationship issues”, “Nathan wants to play basketball more”, and “Dan uses a school shooting to kill his brother Keith bc Dan was convinced he was drugged and left to burn in his dealership when really it was-“ and its just absurd every time.

I will do a character rundown of the main 5 peeps:

Lucas is the original protagonist of the show. He is half brother to Nathan and the “underdog” of S1 where he plays the river court compared to Nathan playing varsity bball. He’s described to be the more emotionally driven one between Nathan and Lucas but as the show goes on he just becomes the dumber of the two. When it comes to relationships he can’t make up his mind and goes with whatever the girl he’s with wants. This leads him to cheat multiple times and as his gf gets mad at him he squints off into the middle distance like there’s something going on but we all know there’s nothing going on behind those eyes. After the timeskip he continues dwelling on the past writing a book that is both super successful and terrible at the same time and the show just kinda makes him a washed up writer before giving him and Peyton a fairy tale ending and saying goodbye S6.

Nathan Scott is the “rich boy” bball player who starts the show as an asshole until the show decides he isnt. Nathan is the only good person in One Tree Hill. He’s the only one who’s level and tries to make reasonable choices without flying off the handle. He does have a few hilarious moments with how seriously high school bball is taken where a mafia is pressuring him to shave points off games bc they bet a lot of money on him. The biggest letdown with Nathan is he continues to beat himself up over the unrestrained anxieties of his wife-

Haley is the worst character in the show. She accuses Nathan of cheating at least 5 times in the show despite nothing indicating that, the most egregious of which is when she snoops and finds Nathan’s valentines day gifts for her and accuses them of being for someone else. This is second to a rando accusing Nathan of sleeping with her after he becomes famous and after a few days she decides to believe the rando over her husband of 4-5 years. She just lets her anxieties get the better of her and it makes her mean to Nathan for 75% of their screentime.

Brooke! One of my least favorite characters of s1-4 and one of the stronger of 5-9. Brooke starts as a party girl who just kinda starts shit for the sake of starting shit. When the show needs drama they turn to her for it most times and it makes her later high school bits feel less genuine. After the timeskip shes in charge of a multi million dollar clothing company (if you’re noticing a trend the timeskip changes characters from relatable high schoolers to wildly successful in their field). She matures out of that shit starter mentality and slides into Lucas’s spot as protagonist (a loose term with so many characters). Her and Nathan undergo the most growth. I also did appreciate and resonate with her graduation arc in that she didn’t really feel the same drive as her classmates.

Shit with Peyton is wild. She has 3 sudden family member reveals: one is Laura Palmer who dies almost immediately, one is serial killer arc #1, and the last is one of the show’s rare black characters who’s a marine thats very quickly sent out to war (Bush era politics). She is a musician, artist, she dates the lead singer from Fallout Boy somewhat seriously (that’s canon, its not the lead singer as a character, in universe he’s also the lead singer of Fallout Boy. He comes by in a limo and goes on tours). Her and Lucas are supposed to be the will they won’t they but with three female leads and two male leads Brooke kind of gets left behind S4 in a smaller capacity. In the timeskip she goes on to become a producer instead of a musician which always felt odd, then after her and Lucas depart they beach ball her label around without knowing what to do with it. Also casting has an issue where they hire sameface women and Peyton was the only one I could reliably identify.

If youre interested in watching One Tree Hill it depends how much time youre willing to sink into it. S1-8 are 22ish episodes long each and each episode is 42mins. I don’t think every episode is worthwhile unless you come at it with the analytical mind of having watched good prestige TV so you can pick apart characters more than the show wants you to.

For those just looking for a casual good time watch S1E1 then watch all the finales back to back to back. Its wild, so much happens you just have to adjust for. Its actually great.

If you REALLY wanna get your hands dirty the entire show is a nostalgia trip into the 00’s complete with famous bands of the time, tech, and norms. This is good and bad as you’ll watch them try to handle a bisexual character in the early 00’s. Also watching Dan Scott dunk on literal high schoolers never gets old.

I DON’T WANNA BE ANYTHING OTHER THAN WHAT I’VE BEEN TRYIN BE LATELY