#donna finally comes clean with robert | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

route22ny · 5 years ago

Photo

Exterior view, Martinique Hotel, circa 1989 as it was ending its 16 years as a notorious “welfare hotel” prior to its sale and (eventual) renovation. To my surprise my ancient New York Times password worked, and I was able to view two articles about this phase of the hotel’s history which are copied below. Image above is a reworking of a scan of my original photo.

***

Leaving a Welfare Hotel, Reluctantly

By Suzanne Daley, September 14, 1988

New York City's decision to empty a large and notorious welfare hotel has, paradoxically, brought as much fear as joy to the families who live there. No matter how bad the Martinique Hotel is, many are afraid to leave it.

To be sure, there are women like Vera Coley, who, after more than a year in the hotel, is looking forward to cooking a turkey and making banana pudding in her own home.

But there are others who are not eligible for an apartment. For many of them, the prospect of another unfamiliar shelter, even one less squalid than the Martinique, is frightening.

There are also women who have lived in the hotel for so long, advocates say, that, like prison inmates, they can barely imagine independent lives, with bills to pay and appointments to keep. ''Our immediate reaction to the city's decision was jubilation,'' said Robert M. Hayes, a prominent advocate for the homeless. ''But you go in there now and you see fear and trembling on the part of the mothers.

''If you go a little bit deeper, you realize that for them, hell has become a familiar cocoon. It's a subtle, more insidious harm that has been done than just living with rats and broken pipes.''

Last week, as the city began to empty the hotel - a battered 16-story building still bearing hints of a more elegant past - many aspects of life there went on as before. Mothers cooked on hot plates. Children chased one another in the dimly lighted hallways, the walls stained with urine and marred by graffiti.

But outside the building, on 32d Street near Broadway, where city-run vans taking families to look for apartments used to appear no more than once or twice a week, there was a traffic jam of sorts. Now the vans had shown up with a new urgency to help usher the tenants out.

Under the city's plan to stop using the privately owned hotel, families in the Martinique who have been homeless for more than a year are to be given priority for placement in vacant Housing Authority apartments and renovated city-owned apartments. In the past, such families, although eligible for apartments after a year, often did not get them because there were not enough to go around. For that reason, little pressure was put on families to board a van for an apartment-hunting trip if they chose not to.

But now, city officials said, families that do not take one of three apartments offered to them from a still-limited supply of units will be denied further hotel allowances, forcing them to move to large, city-run dormitories.

City officials said that about half of the families in the hotel, most of them headed by women, had lived there between one and two years. Seventeen had been there for three years. Another seven had lived there for more than four years. The cost of a room is about $1,600 a month, 50 percent of which is paid by the Federal government, 25 percent by the state and 25 percent by the city.

The city, facing the possibility of losing $70 million in Federal aid for homeless families, announced last month it would empty the Martinique as the first step in ending the use of welfare hotels by 1990. About 3,500 families live in welfare hotels in New York City.

'I'm Going to Kiss the Floor'

Mrs. Coley, a mother of five who has always wanted to get on a van, now expects to move into a Housing Authority apartment by the end of the year.

''When I get there, I'm going to kiss the floor,'' she said, sitting in the hotel's makeshift cafeteria, where free lunches are handed out. ''I swear I'll die before I come back to a place like this again.''

But others are reluctant to move. In most cases, these women say, the apartments that the city offers them are in distant neighborhoods and in poor condition. They say they have learned how to get by in the hotel and do not trust the city as a landlord.

''I got friends in some of those apartments,'' Janette Holland said, explaining why, after four years in the Martinique, she had never tried to get on a van. ''They're still living on hot plates, in terrible places. The city don't do right. Anything goes wrong they don't fix it.''

Acclimated to Squalor

But city officials and advocates for the homeless say that the reluctance of many women is more than a reaction to the apartments. They say that the women have become acclimated to life in a welfare hotel and used to receiving the special services provided there.

For instance, women in the hotel need only go downstairs to meet with city social workers, who will help make sure they get all the benefits they are entitled to. Twice a week, a medical van comes by offering free care for children. Charities arrange for Christmas presents and other holiday activities. And, day care is available.

''The longer people are in this situation, the harder it is to get them out,'' said William J. Grinker, the head of the city's Human Resources Administration. ''They get comfortable in a situation even though, to an outsider, where they are would seem terrible.''

Burnell Lopez and Yvonne McCullens, who were looking at apartments recently, both said they were not eager to take the city-owned apartments they were being shown. They described life in the Martinique as ''O.K.''

One Towel to a Person

Life there has little to do with what most people think of as hotel living. Most rooms have been converted into small, cramped units. There are no phones in the rooms and no cleaning services. New arrivals are issued sheets, towels - one to a person - and a mop and a bucket.

Usually, three or four people live in a room, in many cases sharing an adjoining bathroom with a family next door. The rooms are too small for a table, and meals are usually eaten on the edge of the bed.

Security guards, swinging billy clubs, patrol the building and cluster around bulletproof booths in the lobby. Residents must show identification cards to get in.

But Ms. Lopez and Ms. McCullens said they had learned how to get by.

'It Ain't So Bad'

''You mind your business and it ain't so bad,'' said Ms. McCullens, who has been homeless for five years. Ms. Lopez, who has been homeless for more than two years, agreed, though when questioned, both women talked of being scared in a hotel where robberies are frequent, drug deals are made, and a handful of killings have occurred.

Property has been stolen from both women's rooms, and Ms. Lopez said her children have been beaten up.

Still, neither woman has jumped at the apartments they have been shown. Ms. Lopez lingered recently in an apartment on West 140th Street in Harlem, unable to make up her mind whether to move there.

The windows offered a straight-on view into an abandoned building next door. There was no hot water; the floors were unfinished, and the appliances had not been installed.

Memories of 2-Family Houses

Even though she was assured that more work would be done on the apartment, Ms. Lopez kept shaking her head.

''I ain't never lived in a place like this,'' she said several times, noting she was raised in Brooklyn. ''I always had a place in a house, a two-family house.'' Finally, however, she accepted it. Those not eligible for apartments are to be sent to shelters offering private quarters and, in many cases, cooking equipment, which is not available at the Martinique.

For the most part, this will mean better living conditions, Mr. Grinker said. But few of the women believe that, and some who have moved from shelter to shelter say they would rather stay at the Martinique than move again.

After four months of homelessness and stays in six different shelters and hotels, Donna Luck sighed at the prospect of a new shelter.

''I'm stationed here,'' she said, ''and now I've got to leave again. What's it going to be like this time?''

https://www.nytimes.com/1988/09/14/nyregion/leaving-a-welfare-hotel-reluctantly.html

***

As a Hotel Is Emptied, The Poor Move On

By Josh Barbanel, December 27, 1988

As a gentle rain washed the dusty marquee of the Martinique Hotel in Herald Square the other day, Madeline Ventura, her five children and two cats scampered up the back of a yellow moving van for a ride to their new home in Brooklyn.

The Venturas are among scores of families who have been hurriedly moved out of the Martinique in the last few days as the Koch administration rushes to empty one of the largest and most troubled welfare hotels in the city by the end of the year.

The Venturas' meager possessions, accumulated during more than two years of homelessness, were sprawled around them in the back of the van.

Bags of Dirty Laundry

There were two dolls, still wrapped in plastic, and a blackened hot plate that served as the family's kitchen. Plastic bags bulged with dirty laundry. A plastic Christmas tree protruded from a box.

The night before, a city worker had knocked on a steel door spray-painted with the number 801, the entrance to a two-room suite at the Martinique, and told the Ventura family to get ready to move the next day.

''I didn't even have a chance to do the wash,'' Mrs. Ventura said.

Last summer, long after New York City's welfare hotels had become a national scandal, and after the city had been threatened with an imminent cutoff of Federal funds to pay the hotel bills, Mayor Koch pledged to empty the 46 hotels it used to house the homeless by July 1990.

The Martinique was chosen to be first, city officials said, because it was one of the biggest hotels, because it was the target of a barrage of complaints in the neighborhood and because it had become a symbol of the horrors of a system that paid exorbitant sums to warehouse families, many already troubled, in shabby, crowded hotels. To rent one room for a family of four costs $1,800 a month.

13 Families Remain

Only last March, 462 families - about 500 adults and 1,500 children - lived along the Martinique's long and noisy corridors.

When the moving was halted for the weekend, only 13 families remained, city officials said, along with a half-dozen long-term tenants and a few squatters.

About half of those who have left have moved to renovated apartments in city-owned buildings or projects.

The others - those who have been homeless for less than a year - have been sent to family shelters run by not-for-profit groups under contract to the city.

The speed with which the city is emptying the hotel, at 32d Street and Broadway, has raised questions about why such steps could not have been taken sooner and what will happen to the once-grand hotel after the last residents move.

Under a law intended to protect single-room occupancy hotels, the owners of the Martinique are barred from demolishing it or converting it. They have begun lobbying to win an exemption, and have warned that without relief they may lease it to a drug or prison program.

''It is for everyone's advantage to come up with a solution,'' said Howard J. Rubenstein, the public-relations executive who is representing the owners of the Martinique as well as a community group trying to shut welfare hotels in the area.

The Martinique, built at the turn of the century by William R. H. Martin in what was then one of the city's finest neighborhoods, has been used as a welfare hotel since 1973.

In its last days as a welfare hotel, moving vans lined the hotel entrance beneath the French Renaissance facade. The dimly lighted lobby, once alive with the sounds of children, has grown quiet.

Packing Up the Toys

The 18 public agencies, social service contractors and volunteer groups that provided food, medical care, counseling and other services in the hotel's old ballroom have begun to shut down and move out. As Mrs. Ventura walked down eight flights of stairs for the last time, the staff of a day-care center run by the Association to Benefit Children was packing up toys and child-size tables for storage.

''I'm happy this hotel is closing,'' said Lourdes Rivera, the director of the center. ''I wish they were all going to good homes,''

For the Venturas, the closing of the hotel has meant a bumpy ride in the back of the van to a spacious, freshly painted apartment in a housing project at 86 Carlton Avenue in the Fort Greene section of Brooklyn.

The family - including Mrs. Ventura's husband, Peter, who missed the movers because of an appointment at a Methadone clinic - will pay $161 a month to rent a four-bedroom apartment, equipped with a new refrigerator and stove, in a project named after Walt Whitman. The welfare system will pay the rent and give the family $590 in cash each month.

Flypaper and a Sour Smell

The Venturas lived in two squalid rooms for most of the last two and a half years. Before then they had been evicted from their apartment in Far Rockaway while Mrs. Ventura and Peter - her boyfriend at the time -were addicted to cocaine. Neighbors had complained.

Mrs. Ventura's journey toward homelessness began much earlier. She dropped out of high school when she was 16, married, gave birth to a son and divorced a year later.

She later settled down with another man, had four more children, including twin daughters, Angela and Carmen Sanchez, now 9 years old. That relationship faltered and Mrs. Ventura turned to drugs after the death of another child, who was born prematurely.

Suffering from depression, she turned to a psychiatrist for help, and received a string of prescriptions for mood-altering drugs, without much counseling to go with it, she said. From there she moved to other pills bought on the street, and to cocaine.

When the family was finally evicted two and a half years ago, they were placed in the Forbell Street Shelter in Brooklyn, a city-run shelter, and Mrs. Ventura got some help. A city case worker noted the needle marks on Mrs. Ventura's arm and referred her to a detoxification center at Kings County Hospital. The Venturas, both now enrolled in a Methadone program, were married in April.

At the Martinique, Mrs. Ventura was stunned by the widespread availability and use of drugs, particularly crack.

''I've seen kids as young as my son here selling,'' she said, pointing at her son, Rafael Sanchez, 11.

Keeping to Themselves

The family survived in the forbidding environment, she said, by staying out of the hallway and keeping mostly to themselves, Her sons became altar boys at St. John's Roman Catholic Church, a few blocks away.

During their stay in the hotel, the oldest son, James, was left back in the 7th grade. His mother said the stress of living in the Martinique may have been a factor. On moving day, as a photographer recorded the packing, James stayed out of the pictures.

New York City has put up families evicted from their homes or burned out in fires for decades. This system, developed for temporary emergencies, faltered in the early 1980's, when a shortage of low-income housing began turning homelessness into a permanent emergency.

Families, many of them headed by single parents from the least stable neighborhoods and ravaged by poverty and drugs, were crowded in tiny rooms along long corridors. In some hotels they shared communal bathrooms with pimps and prostitutes.

Last July, when Patricia Stanley moved with her 12 children from the Martinique to a city-owned building, she said she saw the impact of hotel life on her children.

Learning About Sinks and Tables

When they moved, her son took his plate and sat on the floor to eat, even though they now had a table. Her daughter, she said, ''put the dirty dishes in the bathtub because that was the way we washed the dishes in the hotel.''

Miss Stanley told her story at a Congressional hearing in Manhattan last week called by Representative Charles E. Schumer of Brooklyn. She identified herself as the character known as ''Kim,'' in ''Rachel and her Children,'' a book about life in the Martinique, by Jonathan Kozol.

Mr. Schumer, observed that the hotel system appeared to have been designed ''to allow everybody to avoid responsibility'' for it. The city filled entire hotels with welfare families, but maintained that it was only renting one room at a time and that it had little control over hotel owners.

3,600 Apartments Allocated

For years advocates for the homeless have pressed the city to get out of welfare hotels, and for years the city said that it lacked the resources to do more than make a dent in the problem - without increased Federal aid.

But after the threat of losing more than $70 million in emergency Federal aid to pay the hotel bills, the city reassessed the problem and decided to allocate 3,600 housing authority apartments to the homeless as they become vacant over a two-year period.

The administration has also developed plans in the last two years to renovate every vacant building shell owned by the city.

But advocates for the homeless remain skeptical over the plans. Even after the city gets out of hotels, they noted, there will still be hundreds of men, women and children in barracks-style shelters. The city does not plan to close the last shelter until 1991.

Series of Crises

The rush to close the Martinique has created large and small crises.

The New York Children's Health Project, a group that provided medical care to children out of a van parked in front of the Martinique, complained that the move was so rushed that for weeks it was unable to arrange follow-up care for hundreds of children.

For Noris and Luis Espinosa, who are still living in the Martinique, the problems were even more complicated. Last October, after their son, Samuel, 5, was injured in a bathroom fall, their four children were placed in foster care.

Because their children are in foster care and the welfare case closed, they are not being relocated to permanent housing. And they say that without permanent housing, they cannot get their children out of foster care.

The case is complicated because Mrs. Espinosa, a native of the Dominican Republic, is not eligible for welfare, and her husband, who is from Puerto Rico, was never listed on the welfare case record. Ann Ormsby, a spokesman for the Human Resources Administration, said the city was looking into the case.

For the Venturas, despite some confusion, the move out of the hotel was a promising start. While the cats cowered in the new living room, the children rushed through the empty rooms, picking out bedrooms, opening closets.

''There is a playground right outside the window,'' Angela exclaimed.

And James, who hid from the photographer in the Martinique, now nudged the photographer's elbow. ''It's O.K. to take my picture now,'' he said.

https://www.nytimes.com/1988/12/27/nyregion/as-a-hotel-is-emptied-the-poor-move-on.html

#1980s #NYC #homelessness #bad old days #original photography

33 notes · View notes

running-on-fanfiction · 5 years ago

Text

Joe Cole - Will that be us?

Could you do more Joe Cole imagines PLZZZZ 😍😍

A/N: More Joe Cole is always fun in my book. Enjoy! -Jules

*Warning: talking of Panic attacks*

The deer in the head lights, look made Joe scared out of his mind. Enough to make him almost fall down the stairs as he raced to you. There was something wrong with his girl and it was trying him nuts. How could a girls lunch make you look like this?

“It’s so good to be out of the house with out Rich or the kids.” Molly rattled off as she took a long sip of her mojito.

“YES!” Donna cheered as she rambled off about how her wife has been a huge bitch lately and how annoying it was that she never placed her clothes in the right dressers.

Donna, Molly, Nicole, Sharon, and you all had been friends since Uni. Knowing each other for almost ten years was a blessing. You were so glad to have met them and watch them all grow into little families.

Donna, had met her wife Shelley the two years ago. They were in the middle of trying for a family.

Molly, met her husband the last year before you guess graduated from Uni. Richard was the stay at home day, since Molly wanted to work. With a two, four, two five, and a seven year old’s at home, it was hard to find babysitting.

Nicole, was single and just enjoying life. Traveling everywhere she could, before she wanted to settle down. She often stayed with you and Joe when she came home. She was never in England for long so keeping an apartment was hard. You and Joe never mind. Nicole always felt like a sister and you two seemed a little closer then the others.

Sharon, married Jackson an year ago. She had just given birth to their son, Chandler. It was a shocking to you all, when she said she was having baby Chandler, because she was never the mother type. So far she seemed to love it.

Then there was you. You had met Joe right after you started uni. He lived close to campus and if not for him, you were sure you would have never made it in London. You two were getting married in two months.

“Does Jack do that thing, where he never washes his dish? Just places them in the sink, like some sink fairy will get them?” Donna asked causing Molly to smile.

“Rich does that. I swear!”

“I don’t think Jackson has ever washed a dish.” Sharon scoffed.

You looked over at Nicole, who was shaking her head. She never understood why the girls bitched about their men, when she knows how awful they are to them. No matter what their husbands were whipped and in love with them all. Nicole, could see the worried look on your face, and knew right of the bat what you were thinking. She placed her hand over yours but it was no use. You were already in freak out mode.

“Is that what happens when you get married.” You were a mess, that Nicole had to drive home. You were close to a full blow panic attack.

“I’m just going to marry the man of my life, only to end up hating him after I pop out a couple kids. They loved their husbands and wife when they first got married. Now look at them”

“Y/N. Listen to me.” Nicole tried but you just kept ranting. She stopped the car sharply, making you look at her.

“You and Joe are nothing like them.” She said finally getting you to look at her.

“What do you mean?”

“Sharon, hated Jackson when they were dating. I’m pretty sure she only married him because he found out about Robert and she didn’t want to be alone. Donna, is a pre-Madonna. If she doesn’t get her way, she hates you. And Molly talks like that because her husband does all the cleaning, cooking and taking care of the babies better than she does.” Nicole, looked over at you as she talked.

You knew that everything she was saying was true.

“Joe loves the shit out of you, and you love him just the same.”

You felt a little better, but one look at Joe when you got home made all those worries come back.

“Y/N, whats wrong?” Joe asked as he stumbled down the steps. You didn’t know what you were doing when you ran towards Nicole’s room and locked the door.

Joe, looked over at Nicole who was mentally face palming.

“What the hell?” Joe asked Nicole. Nicole bit her lip as she motion for Joe to follow her in the kitchen. Once there she grabbed two waters handing one to Joe.

“Lunch was a bitch fest and basically Y/N thinks that once you two get married, that you two will grow to hate each other like the goons.” Nicole took a long sip of her water.

“Why would she think that?”

“You know Y/N, she worried too much and think’s too hard. She knows that you two will never be like that, but that’s why she has you.” Nicole said nodding her head towards her door.

Joe, thanked Nicole, before going back over to the door. He didn’t try the door, knowing you locked it, and he could tell you were sitting against the door. He smiled weakly, as he leaned his back against the door. He didn’t need to see you to know that you were smiling a little.

“Do you remember the first day we met. Like the first night.” Joe asked leaning his head back, as he waited for you. He could hear a small sniffle, that broke his heart a little.

“It was the first night, I was at uni.” You let out a small laugh as you remembered how scared you were that first night, so far from home, family, and friends. You moved to London without knowing anyone or anything.

“You were so scared that night, that you took a walk around the local park. It had to be around two in the morning.” Joe laughed himself, as he remembered watching you walk around the chilly dark park in an oversize black hoodie that cover your knees. You looked so small.

“And you came over to me, and told me that, I must have had a death wish to walk about a park in the middle of London at two in the morning.”

“It was in that moment that I knew I wanted to know you for the rest of my life.” He smiled fondly as you did too. Nicole, smiled from the kitchen as she remember the story the next day, when you walked back into uni housing. Her room was next to yours, so she was the first person you told.

“We spent all night talking on the bench, until the sun came up and you remembered that you had class in an hour. I walked you home and after that, we were always side by side.”

Joe, heard the lock, before the door open. He fell a little, but looked up at you laughing.

“I’m always by your side, love. Nothing had changed in almost ten years, and I don’t see it changing anytime soon.”

You smiled down at him, holding your hand out for him, helping him up to his feet.

“I love you.”

“I love you too, Love.”

-Julianne

#Joe Cole #joe cole imagine #joe cole imagines #Peaky Blinders #A Prayer Before Dawn

105 notes · View notes

tessatechaitea · 6 years ago

Text

Team Titans #21

Team Titans is an anagram for a tit stamen.

In this modern era, anything you say online can eventually come back to haunt you. But back before the Internet existed (or was mostly just drunk assholes and minors in AOL chat rooms), the main thing that could come back to haunt a person was writing into a comic book and asking for a pin-up issue. Sure, I had young person crushes on a few comic book characters. But I never wrote to Mike W. Barr and asked him to write a story where Halo spends most of the issue in her underwear. No, I wrote that letter to Jim Aparo. "Come on, Jim! Just have her coming out of the shower in some scene! I can't prove this yet because it's 1984 but it'll probably become common practice to draw characters in towels getting out of showers when artists like David Finch and Tony S. Daniel become popular! And their renditions of adult women will look even younger than your rendition of Halo!" I find the amount of "Ooh la la"s and "Ha cha cha cha"s I've had to read in the letters pages of The New Titans since they published a swimsuit shot of the women of the Titans incomprehensible. And I'd find it incomprehensible even if that amount were just one. Which it was not. I wouldn't be too flabbergasted if I didn't think mostly grown ass men wrote to comic books. I know kids did too! Take Roy Thomas as an example. But no way are young people the majority of letter writers. Speaking of comic books, I just read Terry Moore's "Five Years" and it pissed me off. Mostly because eight out of the twenty pages were blank. After the first blank page, I thought, "That was a weird choice." But it kind of fit because it was squarely at the point in the narrative where the phi bomb goes off in Katchoo's dream. But then a few pages later, it was a double spread of blank pages. Being a Master Comic Book Reader, I thought, "This can't be right." And it wasn't right! Not at all! Now I have to purchase a new copy so I can see what I missed. And, no, I won't be taking this copy back to the comic book store. It has my greasy fingerprints all over that stupid glossy black cover that Terry Moore insists on doing! Not that I think the store would resell it. But I do know they'd have a great set of my fingerprints to use for nefarious purposes. Or possibly legal purposes that would just get me in trouble. At least "Five Years #1" had blank pages so I knew something was missing. It took me 20 years to finish reading Neil Gaiman's Sandman because I didn't realize there were something like eighteen pages missing from The Kindly Ones trade paperback I own. This issue begins with the U.S. military surveying the damage from the Team Titans battle with Lazarium.

Being that Lazarium was only killing Titans, this means the Team Titans have killed 36 more civilians than Lazarium. Way to go, heroes!

Writer Jeff Jensen didn't have the balls to kill all of the extra Titans in the black hole so he decides to have most of the survivors attack Battalion and the other Titans. Enough comic book readers accept the premise that at least half of the battles in comic books have to be good guy against good guy, no matter how stupid the reason. And the reason doesn't get any stupider than having a bunch of Titans that were just battling alongside Battlion to suddenly decide the only sane reaction to Battalion suggesting they clean up the mess is to shoot Donna Troy in the face. At the very least, it gives Mirage a chance to mention that 500 Titans just died. After coming up with Wonder Boy and Two Gallon Hat and Liquid Joe, Jensen realized he was out of ideas so he just killed most of the others. And yet he seemed so excited to build a new Titans universe with hundreds of new characters! I wonder if he did come up with five hundred characters whose names were even worse than Liquid Joe and Two Gallon Hat, so the editors told him he was fucking crazy if he thought DC was going to use any of them. The Titans seek refuges at the Justice League Embassy in New York. I forgot there was a time when the Justice League forwent their headquarters to run embassies all over the world. Giffen and DeMatteis must have thought there'd be big bureaucratic Marx Brothers type laughs in trying to run an embassy. And I suppose there could have been! Did they ever do a story with some Assange-like villain like Calendar Man or The Riddler seeking asylum from Batman's fists? At the embassy, Donna Troy works out a sweet deal with the government to allow the Titans a life free from being blamed for every little problem that crops up in New York.

Great negotiating, Donna! "Do whatever the government wants or be hunted like vermin!" She's the fucking Trump of the Titans.

The government's deal amounts to the same deal the Team Titans had already accepted in their future life. The government will provide them with basic necessities and education in exchange for working in small military groups united under some mysterious leader. They all jump at the chance to not do anything different with their lives, especially considering that the other option was to be shot on sight whenever they mentioned their stupid names. The government, with the help of gossip reporter Cokie Roberts, concoct a story to cover up the Titans murder of two hundred people. I know it was reported earlier by me that they only killed three dozen non-Titans. But it turns out, according to Cokie and the government, two hundred non-Titans were killed by the black hole. I suppose they're including all of Lazarium's henchmen and also all the people the government killed when they realized they had the perfect excuse to disappear them with the Titans' black hole. It's interesting that nobody worries about all the people killed in the black hole because that was an "accident" and yet everybody loses their minds when they think about Nightrider killing the guy ultimately responsible for it all. Maybe they're all just grossed out that he drank blood.

I'm just going to assume the Wonder Woman look-a-like's name is Frottage Girl.

Mirage feels badly about deceiving the public since she pretended to be Lazarium so that the world wouldn't know the Team Titans killed him. But Cokie Walters is all, "Don't fucking worry about it, slut! The news lies all the time!" I guess when you're a celebrity gossip reporter, you don't really worry too much about journalistic ethics. A proper reporter wouldn't have lied about this story. They would have just interviewed some government agent who would lie about the story and then they'd shrug their shoulders and go, "Well, I guess that's one side of the issue! If only there were somebody who could investigate the story to find out how true it is. I don't know who that would be though. A doctor? Or an astronaut? It's a mystery!" While the Team Titans film another puff piece with Cokie Walters, Donna Troy approaches Wonder Woman with a problem: she wants her powers back.

If the graph of an argument doesn't look like an ouroboros, Donna Troy wants no part of that argument.

Donna wants to petition the Greek Gods to get her powers back and she needs Diana to be her arbiter. Diana says, "You have my support in everything you do," and now I don't know why I'm so aroused.

Maybe it's due to panels like these that I can't help reading out of context.

Donna confronts the Titans, pleading with them to return her powers. But the Gods have a law: "No take backs. Too bad, so sad." So they send her back to Earth where she lands in the yard of Terry Long's ex-wife. She looks in the window and sees a happy family scene starring Terry and his ex-wife and Terry's daughter and their son. She lets her low self-esteem get the better of her and runs away thinking her marriage is probably over before she can hear Terry yell at his ex-wife for being a snarky jerk. So a happy ending for once! Team Titans #21 Rating:: C-. My main question for Marv Wolfman and Jeff Jensen is this: how the fuck did you manage to make a comic book with this much potential so fucking tedious?! Maybe you need to have a teenager's sense of drama to find any enjoyment out of this comic book at all. Killowat loves Mirage but he's a racist and she's all, "No way! Probably! We'll talk!" And Nightrider needs to eat people but he won't so he almost dies but then he eats a person! Donna Troy was happily married until she saw Terry and his ex-wife getting along for five seconds and now their marriage might be over! Battalion constantly calls people cheeseheads and their heads aren't even really made out of cheese! Terra loves Gar but Gar is all, "The boner you give me makes me feel guilty! Go away!" Redwing is all, "Prester Jon, my brother! We can finally hug!" But Prester Jon is all, "Ew! You're gross with the pointy ears and talons and veiny wings! Get away!" Also, what happened to Deathwing? I really hope Mirage dismembered him. Hopefully Jensen will devote a full issue for a flashback of that scene.

#Team Titans #Teen Titans #DC Comics #DC #Comic Book Review

9 notes · View notes

ladywinchester1967 · 6 years ago

Text

Wildest Dreams

Ours; Chapter 3

Pairing: Dean Winchester x Katlynn Roberts

Warnings: SMUT, drunken behavior, feels, fluff....literally everything.

A/N: Chapter 3 for Ours is finallt here!!! Hope you guys enjoy!! As always, unbeta’d, all mistakes are mine, pics are not!

Wanna catch up?

Chapter 1: Elevator Buttons

Chapter 2: You Really Got Me

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

He’s so tall and handsome as hell,

He’s so bad but he does it so well.

Say you’ll see me again even if it’s just pretend.

At lunch that day, Kat sat with Jody, Donna, Jo and Lisa. Jody, Donna and Jo had been really friendly to start with, as had Lisa, until she found out Kat was Dean's assistant, then she had been somewhat icy toward Kat, though she'd never bothered to figure out why.

“How’s working for Dean?” Jody asked, she had pretty blue eyes, short dark hair and a slim figure.

“Fine, he’s a little rough around the edges but it’s not that big of a deal.” Kat said as she cut into her chicken.

“He put the moves on you yet?” Lisa asked, as if she were demanding an answer, rather than asking a genuine question.

Kat laughed and shook her head “God no,” she lied “it’s not like that with us.”

“Okay, sure.” Lisa said and rolled her eyes.

“Jesus, bitter much?” Jody asked, looking at Lisa

“I’m not bitter,” Lisa said “it’s just same old same old, which is why he can’t keep an assistant.”

“Wait, what?” Kat asked, this wasn't news to her, but it being brought out of the blue by a woman that didn't seem to like her at all, was a little offensive.

“Oh it’s not that bad.” Jody said.

“When was the last time he had an assistant that lasted more than six months?” Lisa asked

The whole group was silent and Donna said “Well, after you there was Charlie.”

“Well, you KNOW why it lasted so long with Charlie, so that doesn't count. The defense rests.” Lisa said and got up. Kat looked at Jody, then Donna and Jo.

“What’s up with that?” Kat asked,

“She and Dean are the reason there’s a no dating policy.” Jo said; Jo had blonde hair and blue eyes and was stick thin. “They dated, it ended badly and the next thing you know, she’s screaming at him in his office. It was a mess.”

“Yeesh.” Kat said

“Look, it’s not a secret that Dean likes to sleep around,” Jody said “everyone knows he-“ she paused

“Gets around.” Donna filled in, fuller figured than Jody and with blonde hair, she had a cheerful, nearly Pollyanna friendliness about her.

“Thank you.” Jody said.

“Like a record.” Jo said and Kat laughed.

Inside her own head she was screaming at herself. Of course he liked to sleep around. Why wouldn’t he? But this made her wonder what had gone so wrong between Dean and Lisa.

“What happened between them?” Kat asked

“Depends on who you ask.” Jo said as she finished up her lunch.

“From what we’ve been able to piece together, she wanted to get married and she started putting the pressure on him. He wasn’t ready and told her to knock it off.” Jody said.

“She wouldn’t and thought he was cheating on her, that’s when the screaming match happened.” Donna said “I mean, sure he’s a tramp, but a cheater?”

“He isn’t,” Jo said “I’ve known Dean literally my entire life, he isn’t the cheating type.”

“But a man whore nonetheless.” Jody said.

“Well yeah, no one’s saying he isn’t” Jo said.

That conversation had given Kat a lot the chew on, but it wasn’t like she could ask Dean about it. One, she wasn’t sure they’d be anything more than a fling anyway, and two, they hadn’t shared much about their lives to start with. She had tried not to let Lisa’s words bother her, if anything it sounded like she was more a jilted lover than anything. Kat scrolled through a few websites to find something to wear to this shindig, Dean had said it was a “monkey suit” thing so she tried to think along those lines.

“Kat, here’s those files you wanted.” Charlie’s voice brought her back to Earth.

“Hey Charlie, for this benefit thing, what do people wear?” Kat asked.

“It’s really fancy,” Charlie said “Like prom.”

“Ah, Okay.” Kat said

“Who are you going with?” Charlie asked, looking excited.

Kat looked around and motioned for Charlie to come closer and she said in a low tone “Dean, as friends.”

“Aw, that’s so sweet. He and I went as friends last year because I didn’t have anyone to go with. I have a date this year.” Charlie said.

“Oh? Who?” Kat asked

“Jo.” Charlie said with a smile.

“Oh, are you two going as friends too?” Kat asked.

Charlie shook her head

“No, Jo is my girlfriend.” she said

“OH!” Kat said, surprised. Now she knew what Lisa meant about why she had been Dean's assistant for so long, they batted for the same team. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know.” and Charlie laughed

“No big, most people don’t,” Charlie said “we’ve been together for almost a year.”

“Aw, that’s nice. Congrats.” Kat said

“Dean’s a great date,” Charlie said “He’s very sweet, don’t let the rumors about him fool you. He’s a real sweet heart.”

Kat smiled, she knew he was a sweetheart.

“Thanks Charlie, for that and the files.” Kat said and extended her hand

“No problem, if you need anything else just shout.” Charlie said and put the files in Kat’s hands.

The night of the charity function had finally arrived; Kat had preemptively gotten a room at the hotel it was being held at so she could drink and not have to worry about driving and to get out of her condo for a little bit. She was finishing curling her hair when she got a text from Dean.

Here; where are you?

She quickly replied

Hotel, room 608

Coming up he replied

She cut off the light in the bathroom and went into the room where she took off the robe she’d been wearing to get ready and admired her dress. It was an emerald green, floor length dress with cap sleeves and a lace covered back. She took it down from the hanger and unzipped it. It had enough room where she could step into it and not worry about messing up her hair or makeup, she’d made sure of that when she’d bought it. She stepped into the dress and pulled it up over her body. She’d secured it behind her neck and reached in the back to get the zipper. That was the one thing she’d forgotten to make sure she could do on her own. It was at an awkward angle and she couldn’t quite reach it, no matter how much she tried.

She heard a knock at the door.

“Crap!” She said and went over to the door. She looked out of the peep hole and her jaw nearly hit the ground when she saw Dean. She opened the door and he was wearing a sharp black suit and tie. His eyes met hers and he grinned at her.

“Hey, wow,” she said “you clean up nice.”

“So do you.” he said as he admired her.

She let him into the room, the door automatically shutting behind him and asked “Can you zip me up? I’m on the struggle bus over here.”

He laughed “Sure.” he said and she turned around. “Nice tattoo” he said as he zipped the dress up, his finger tips brushing her back, a shutter running down her spine.

“Thanks,” She said “it’s a phoenix.”

She turned around and he said

“You look really, really pretty.”

“Thank you,” She said “I need lipstick and my shoes and I’ll be ready to go.” and walked into the bathroom.

“Okay.” he said, and walked into the doorway of the bathroom “I’ll have to keep my eye on you and make sure no one steals my date.”

“I’m not your date remember?” She asked, reaching for her lipstick.

“No, you are my date, just my platonic date.” he said and leaned against the door jamb. Kat quickly applied her lipstick, a fierce crimson shade and smiled at herself in the mirror. “You look like someone out of Mad Men.” he told her

“That’s style goals.” she said and he laughed. She left the bathroom, put her sky high heels on and asked “Okay, close enough for government work?”

“Nah,” he said “way better than that.”

Her face broke into a grin as she grabbed her purse and they walked out of the hotel room together. They went toward the elevator and waited behind a group of people that were going down as well. They stood toward the back and Kat felt a hand grab her behind. She looked and realized it was Dean, and he was grinning like crazy.

“Hand. Off. Ass.” She said in a quiet but playful tone “off ass.”

“Sorry,” he said sheepishly “my hands have a mind of their own.”

“Tell your hands to keep away from my ass.” she said with a grin.

He leaned into her ear and said “That’s really hard, your ass looks good in that dress.”

She pulled back from him, her cheeks flushing. “You just-“ she stopped short as he laughed “shut it. Okay? Shut it right now.”

“I have to cop a feel while I can,” he said in a grouchy tone “I can’t touch you once we get to this fucking event, and I haven't touched you in days. This sucks!”

She leaned into his ear and said “If you play your cards right maybe you will after word.”

He pulled back from her, his eyebrows shooting up and down.

“Okay, let’s hurry and get there so we can leave.” he said and she laughed.

When they arrived at the ballroom, they saw everyone from work was there, all gussied up. Donna and Jody signaled Kat and she squeezed Dean’s arm, nodding to them. He smiled and they walked over.

“Ladies.” Dean greeted them

“Kat you look amazing!” Jody gushed and introduced her date, Troy. He was a tall lanky man with chestnut brown hair and a strong jaw line. He shook hands with Kat and Dean and then Jody and Donna gushed over Kat.

“I’m headed to the bar,” Dean said and looked at Kat “want anything?”

“Sure, just get me something sweet.” she said and he nodded. When he was out of ear shot Jody looked like she was going to explode with happiness.

“You two make a really, REALLY attractive couple.” she said and Kat laughed

“Jody!” Donna said “you leave that girl alone.”

“No, it’s fine,” Kat said “neither of us had anyone to go with so we said we’d go together as friends.”

“Aw, that’s sweet.” Donna said

“How’d you get here?” Jody asked

“I’m staying in the hotel,” Kat said “get out of my condo for a night.”

“So, he didn’t come pick you up?” Donna asked

“No,” Kat said “I’m not even sure how he got here.”

“Uber,” Dean said interrupting them and hanging Kat a glass “champagne, the bar tender said it was sweet.”

“Thank you.” she said, taking it from him

“Yeah, I got an Uber in and I’ll get one out so I don’t have to worry about driving.” Dean said

“Well, you’re so sweet to bring Kat as your date.” Donna said

Dean shrugged and sipped his beer. They chatted a while longer and then Kat and Dean made a walk around the ballroom. He introduced her to some of the higher ups she hadn’t met, like Zachariah (head of finance), Naomi (the CEO) and finally Carver, the head honcho. He was a short guy with messy brown hair, hazel eyes and a nicely trimmed beard. When Dean introduced Kat to him, her greeted her with a warm smile and hand shake.

“Nice to meet you Katlynn, welcome aboard.” Carver said.

“Nice to meet you as well, I’ve heard so much about you so it’s nice to put a face with a name.” she said.

“Ah, good things I hope.” Carver said with a wink.

“Only good things, yes sir.” Kat said with a smile.

“Sir isn’t necessary, Carver is fine.” he said.

“Oh okay, sure.” Kat said and looked at both of them “If ya’ll will excuse me, I’ll be right back.” Kat said and trotted off. Carver and Dean watched her go and Carver asked

“She’s always that sweet?”

Dean nodded

“I think it’s from all the sugar she drinks.” he said with a fond chuckle and took a sip of his beer

“Don’t mess it up with this one Dean,” Carver said “I see a lot of potential in this one.”

“Roger that.” Dean said.

Kat went to the bathroom and hitched up her dress to do her business. She heard women chattering and then it quit as the ladies left the bathroom. She heard the door open again and then Lisa’s voice say

“I’m just saying, she’s NOT even that pretty if you really look at her.”

“Lisa, you need to bring it down a notch” she heard Jo’s voice say “You and Dean broke up a million years ago and you’ve moved on.”

“I’m just saying,” Lisa said, she sounded drunk “Why does he always have to parade his tramps in front of me? Do you think he gets off on that or something?”

“LISA!” Jo yelled “Kat isn’t a tramp!”

Irritation hit Kat at her core. She finished up her business and let the hem of her dress hit the ground. She flushed and left the stall, seeing Lisa and Jo standing by the sinks. Jo’s eyes widened with fear as Lisa stared down Kat. Kat washed her hands and didn’t say a word to either of them. She turned her back to dry her hands and Lisa said

“He’s just gonna break your heart you know.”

Kat turned around and said “We’re not together Lisa so I don’t know where this is coming from.”

“But you’re fucking him right?” Lisa asked with a laugh.

“No, I’m not fucking him.” Kat said, her anger rising.

“You sure about that?” She asked “Because he looks at you the same way he used to look at me.”

Kat left the bathroom after that, fuming. She went back into the ballroom and looked for Dean, suddenly feeling eyes on her. She looked for him and eventually found him with Sam. She lightly touched his arm and he turned to see her with a smile on his face. His expression quickly changed when he saw the look on her face.

“What’s wrong?” He asked

She gave her head a little shake and plastered a fake smile on her face.

“Nothing,” She said “I’m fine.”

Dean knew she was lying but didn’t push her any further.

They found their seats next to each other for the sit down dinner. Kat kept looking up and saw Lisa staring her down and whispering to a couple of girls she didn't recognize. All three glared and sniggered at Kat as she tried to keep a lid on her temper.

“Are you okay?” Dean asked, seeing how tense her shoulders were.

“I'm fine,” she told him “don't worry about me.”

“I am worried,” Dean said “you've been tense since you got back from the bathroom, everything okay?”

“Just office bitches.” Kat said and took a sip of her wine.

“Office bitches?” he asked and looked up, catching Lisa's eye. She and the two girls she was gossiping to quickly turned like they hadn't done anything. It clicked for Dean right then and there and he grew angry. “Ah, I see the trouble.” he said “What'd she say?”

“Nothing important,” Kat said and dabbed the corners of her mouth “your gonna be needed on stage in a few minutes and I'm not in the mood for a bar brawl.”

Dean firmly nodded and then leaned over to her

“I'll take care of this, I promise.” he said lowly

Kat snorted at this

“Okay, she's just gonna stop being a bitch to me because you asked nicely?” she asked

“No,” he said “but HR is gonna want to know if someone's harassing my assistant at a work function.”

“Please Dean,” she pleaded “let me handle it. You can't fight all my battles for me.”

Dean stared her down, he knew she could handle herself, but it wasn't fair that she was being dragged through the mud in the first place.

“Okay,” he said “but if it gets out of hand, let me know.”

“You know I will.” she said as he got up and joined Sam on stage with the board of directors. Carver gave a speech about how proud he was of the charitable work they were doing and how this evening alone had raised more than twenty one thousand dollars toward the charity they were sponsoring, which showed kids how to navigate the business world. Kat listened as Carver talked and then he added

“None of this would be possible if it weren't for the Winchesters; John, Sam and Dean, so let me bring them up here.”

Kat was a little taken aback, Dean hadn't mentioned that his Dad would be at this function, but she could see good looks ran in the family. John was a little taller than Dean, with salt and pepper hair and a matching, closely shaved beard.

“Thank you Carver,” John said into the microphone “this is actually a pet project my sons started and got their old man, who at the time was just starting a business, to back them up on. Now, we've given out nearly five hundred business and law scholarships and helped give some kids and young adults a leg up in the business world. I can't begin to tell you how proud I am of these two.”

He gestured fondly to Sam and Dean who both nodded in appreciation. Once the speeches were over, everyone resumed walking around the ballroom and hanging out. Dean caught up with Kat and intorduced her to his Dad.

“Dad,” Dean told him “This is my assistant, Katlynn. Kat, this is my Dad, John Winchester.”

“Nice to finally meet you,” John said as he shook her hand “Dean's told me so much about you, about he failed to mention just how pretty you are.”

Kat laughed as she shook John's hand

“He exaggerates, but thank you. Nice to finally meet you Mr. Winchester.”

“Please,” John insisted “John is fine.”

“Kat's the one that keeps things on the straight and narrow,” Dean told him dad “she's been a huge assest ever since she got hired on.”

“How long you been working for my son?” John asked as he sipped his beer

“We're coming up on six months right?” Kat asked Dean, who nodded “six really good months.”

“Well, keep up the good work.” John said with a nod.

Blushing, she turned to Dean and she asked “How about that drink?”

“Sure, thanks” Dean said, giving her a small smile.

“Sam, anything for you?” Kat asked, turning to Dean's brother.

“No, I’m good. Thank you though.” Sam said

Kat walked over to the bar and saw Lisa start toward her with the other girls she'd been leering at Kat with all night. They stood in line behind Kat and she pretended not to notice them. Lisa seemed to be swaying, like she was having trouble standing up.

“Don’t you think it’s funny that Dean shows up at every event with a different girl?” Lisa asked, loud enough for Kat to hear her but not loud enough to cause a fuss. “I mean this is, what? The third event this year and the third girl he’s brought?” Lisa asked. Kat tried to block her out as she approached the bar. She felt Lisa get close behind her and whisper in her ear “If you think you can tame him, you’re an idiot.”

“I’m gonna need you to take a step back.” Kat said, anger flaring in her chest.

“Or what?” Lisa asked “you gonna make me?”

“No, just get out of my personal space.” Kat said, her temper flaring.

“Come on Red, I know you want to swing on me, so do it.” Lisa said and pushed Kat forward. Caught off guard, Kat tumbled into the bar, she stuck her hands out and missed hitting her head by inches, but she did send glasses and alcohol flying as her side hit the bar. She righted herself as she saw Sam and Dean rush over.

“What the hell?!” Dean asked

“She started it!” Lisa slurred as Sam helped Kat to her feet. Dean looked from Kat to Lisa and back again.

“Lisa, stop.” Dean said

“YOU STOP DEAN!” Lisa screamed and by that time, the whole ballroom was looking at them.

Intense anxiety came crashing over Kat, literally everyone that held her future in their hands was looking at her, wondering what had cause such a disturbance.

“It’s fine, I’m just gonna go get some air.” She said and pushed Sam away.

“You okay?” Sam asked

“Yeah, I’m fine.” Kat said, fighting back tears. Sam let her go as Dean followed behind her.

“Hey, Kat, wait up” Dean said

Kat stopped outside of the ballroom and turned around. “Dean, just. Don’t.” Kat said

“Look, I’ll talk to Lisa but not here.” Dean said

“Don’t worry about it okay? I’m fine.” She said in a clipped tone. This non-relationship, whatever thing they had going on was turning out to be more trouble than it was worth. She turned to leave and Dean grabbed her elbow

“Come on Kat, don’t leave.” he said.

“Dean, stop okay?” She asked “I don’t need drama in my life.”

“What drama? She’s drunk!” He asked.

“Oh, come on Dean, I’m probably not the first girl she’s gone after and I probably won’t be the last.” Kat said, she was hurt and angered by what Lisa had said but she also wondered, could ANY woman tame him?

“Kat, come on will you just listen to me?” He asked.

“Dean, just let me go.” she begged and wrenched her arm away from his grasp.

“Katlynn, please. I just want you to listen” he said.

“No, I want to be left alone.” she said and made her way to the elevator. He was hot on her heels as she smashed the up button.

“Kat, let me explain, please.” Dean begged, his green eyes wide. Kat refused to look at him, she crossed her arms over her chest as the elevator announced its arrival with a ping. The doors slid open and people walked out. Once they were clear, Kat went inside and Dean followed her as she punched the button to her floor.

“No, Dean, go away.” she said and he closed the elevator door.

“Not until you listen.” he snapped as the doors slid shut and he turned around to face her “You’re so fucking stubborn you can’t see when someone’s trying to apologize to you!”

She had her back up against the wall of the elevator and she finally lost it on him.

“And you’re so caught up in finding your next conquest that you can’t see when someone actually cares about YOU and not what’s between your fucking legs!” She shouted at him.

They stared at each other for a few long seconds and in a step and a half, Dean crossed the elevator and crashed his lips into hers. Every nerve in Kat’s body hummed as they furiously kissed, he pressed her up against the back of the elevator, his hands on either side of her head; his perfect full lips closing over hers. Part of her was furious, she screamed every swear word she could think of at him in her head while her body had different ideas. She wrapped her arms around him as their tongues met, hers massaged over his and he gripped her hair tightly. They parted, catching their breath as the elevator stopped. The doors slid open and stayed there. She wanted him, badly. The ache that had been in her body since London re-emerged with a vengeance.

She took his hand and pulled him out of the elevator as people walked in. They walked down the hallway and she silently cursed and kicked herself. This was going to go down in flames, she was going to end up broken hearted while Dean fucking Winchester added another notch to his belt. With her hand in his, the memories of London came crashing back over her, that hand running all over her body, touching every bit of her felt more like a want than a memory.

“God damn it.” she thought as she arrived at her hotel room door. She used the key card to quickly unlock the door and they went inside. The door shut behind them and she turned to face him.

“I’m going to say this loud and clear, you listening?” She asked and he nodded. “I’ll listen to what you have to say, if I don’t like what I hear or if I figure out you’re lying to me; you’re gonna leave this room. I’m gonna ask for a transfer and I’ll never see you again unless it’s absolutely fucking necessary. That clear?”

“What if you like what you hear and I’m not lying?” He asked.

“We’ll cross that bridge IF we get to it.” she said, crossing her arms over her chest. She turned the chair at the desk around and motioned to it. “Sit and start talking before I change my mind”

He obeyed her command and she sat on the edge of the bed. He took a few seconds to collect his thoughts and then said “What you said about by reputation, it isn’t a lie, but it isn’t the whole truth either.”

“Go on.” she said.

“I’ve had one night stands, A LOT of one night stands but I’ve had relationships too. For one reason or another, they didn’t work. I’ve always been up front on why they didn’t work with the girl, I can get that much credit right?” She nodded and he went on “Lisa and I didn’t work because she wanted more than what I could give her. I told her I wasn’t ready to settle down, she kept pressuring me and I couldn’t take it so I broke it off with her. Needless to say, she didn’t take it well.”

“Yeah, no shit.” Kat said

He dragged his bottom lip between his teeth and then continued “It’s different with you,” he said “the truth is, you’re good for me in a way no one else has been. My life has been different in the best way possible since we met and I don’t want to let that go.” Her heart pounded “I never said anything because I didn’t want to ruin the good thing we have going. Then London happened and,” he trailed off with a smile on his face “and I realized I felt differently about you.”

“Oh shit.” she thought as she looked at him. She didn’t have a witty retort or a sarcastic comment ready for this. This was a mistake and it was going to ruin everything, she felt it in her bones. She stood up, placed her purse on the desk and went over to him. If this was the atomic bomb that would ruin her life and career, at least she’d enjoy it before the impact.

She leaned down and gently kissed his lips. He responded, kissing her back as she placed a hand on the back of his head. She pulled back from him and said

“Dean, I want this, but.”

“But what?” He asked

She had to know, she moved her hand and placed it on his cheek.

“You’re not lying to my face just to get some are you?” She asked

He shook his head, his hand covering hers.

“No; I’ve lied about things to get with a girl, but everything I just said? Probably the most honest thing I’ve said in months.” he told her.

She studied his face; his eyes always gave him away if he was lying. The impact hit as she realized he was, indeed, telling the truth. Her mouth went slack as he stood up, his fingers running over the back of her hand. He leaned his head down and kissed her. Her heart beat thundered in her ears as she kissed him back, their lip lock becoming more intense. His hand slid down her arm and rested on her shoulder, he tentatively put his other hand on her waist as she opened her mouth for another kiss. She laced her fingers together behind his neck and they parted.

“Dean,” She said quietly, her breath sending little puffs of air on to his lips.

“Mhh?” He asked, gripping her shoulder and hip tightly.

She bit her lip and said “I want you.”

Suddenly, there was a knock at the door.

“Kat?!” They heard Jody’s voice call “it’s Jody, you okay?”

“Fuck!” Kat swore and looked at Dean “You aren’t supposed to be here, hide!”

“I’ll say I’m comforting you.” he said

“Yeah, with red lipstick all over your mouth?” Kat asked “Like she’s gonna buy that!”

“Damn, you’re right” Dean said and went into the bathroom as Kat worked up a few tears and took her shoes off. “Too bad you’re taking those off, I kind of wanted those around my ears tonight.” he said with a wink.

“You’re a pervert and I love I.t” she said and he closed the door to the bathroom. Kat opened the door to the outside and Jody stood there.

“Hey, you okay?” She asked tenderly

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Kat said “she’s just a bitch that’s all. Brought back some not so fond memories of high school.”

“Do you want to come back down? I think they made her leave.” Jody said and Kat shook her head.

“No, I’m fine. I’ve got room service and HBO.” Kat said with a laugh.

“Is Dean here? I saw him leave with you.” Jody said, looking into the room.

“He was, but not any more,” Kat lied “he made sure I was okay and he left.”

“Okay,” Jody said, buying it “you sure you don’t want me to hang out for a bit?”

“Nah, go have fun, I’m fine Jody. Really” Kat said Jody hugged her and asked

“See you Monday?”

“Yep, see you Monday.” Kat said and Jody left. Kat closed the door and Dean came out of the bathroom.

“Aw, that was sweet.” Dean said, his tone genuine.

“Look at me, making friends.” Kat said

“I’ll be your friend” he said with a devilish smirk and wrapped his arms around her shoulders and guided her back to the bed.

“Friends don’t do what we did in London,” Kat said, her hands around his waist “or what we’re about to do.”

“And what’re we about to do?” He asked

“Use your imagination Winchester.” she said

His lips crashed into hers, their tongues mingling together. When he pulled back he said “Say it again”

She gently kissed his lips and said “Dean, I want you.”

His mouth over took hers, his tongue winding its way into her mouth. He slid his hand around to her back and to the zipper on the back of her dress. She reached to the hook and eye clasp on the back of her neck and unhooked it, the front of the dress falling down and she shimmied out of it. The top of the dress hit the floor, leaving her in a strapless bra and panties. Dean pulled back and looked at her.

“Wow.” he said

“Wait,” Kat said “good Wow or bad Wow?”

“Good,” he said “better than good. Excellent.”

She smiled and he took his jacket off, casting it aside. He sat on the edge of the bed and she straddled his lap, kissing his lips. His hands slid up her back and back down again as she gripped the hair on the back of his head. He unhooked her bra and tossed it aside. He then unbuttoned his shirt. She slid it off of his shoulders and it fell away. He laid back on the bed and she lay on top of him while still kissing him. He rolled her so that she was on her back. She reached down and pulled off his under shirt, seeing his bare chest for the first time. She knew he was fit but even her imagination couldn’t guess how fit he was. She grinned as he looked up at her.

“I’ve seen what you can do with your mouth,” he said “now you get see what I can do with mine.”

“Oh dear god” she thought as he began his kissing adventure down her body. He got to her waistband of her panties and helped her shimmy out of them. He settled between her legs and kissed from her inner knee up to the apex of her thighs. He licked the length of her, making her moan and her back arch. His mouth closed over her and then his tongue set to work. He licked and flicked his tongue all over her, making her whimper.

He wasn’t lying, he was GOOD at this.

He sucked on her clit, a near pornographic moan coming out of her mouth.

“Dean, Dean!” She cried gripping the sheets by her head. This didn’t stop him, he flicked his tongue in and out of her and she cried out again.

“Fuck,” she sighed “oh fuck!”

He expertly slid his tongue in and out of her, his fingertips teasing her clit.

“Dean,” she moaned “oh fuck, that feels so good!”

He kissed back up her body and she could hear him unbuckling his belt and unzipping his pants. Their mouths connected and she gripped his shoulders hard.

“I️ want you, now.” she told him fiercely

“Okay.” he said and slipped out of his pants, underwear, socks and shoes rather quickly.

“Condom in my purse.” she told him

He raised an eyebrow and asked

“You PLANNED this, didn’t you?”

“Well, not the getting pushed into a bar part,” She said “or the following argument, but yes, the sex was premeditated.”

“I️ like the way you think” he said and opened up her purse and found a bunch of condoms in it. “How much sex were you planning on having?” He asked

“Never can be to careful.” she said with a grin. He shrugged as he ripped one open and rolled it on.

“Good point.” he said and made his way back over to her. He crawled on top of her and kissed her before pushing inside of her. Having him inside her was better than she’d imagined, she sighed as he pushed in deeper and kissed her. He finally filled her, and got his hips into a rhythm.

“Mmmhhhh,” she moaned against his mouth. She hooked her leg over his hips and rolled so that she was on top of him. She braced herself, placing her hands on his chest and syncing her hips to the rhythm he had started. His hands ran over her butt and rested on her hips, his finger tips digging into her flesh. This position also pushed her breasts together, making them look bigger.

He breathed out a mix of a sigh and her name as his head lolled back. She bit her lip, wanting to hear that again. Without warning, he sat up, his arms wrapping around her and their mouths crashing together. She pulled back from him and kissed his neck.

“Dean?” She asked in his ear.

His hand gripped her hair

“Yeah?” He asked.

“Say my name again.” she said and playfully bit his ear.

“Mh, Katlynn” he sighed and she smiled.

“All mine.” she thought her hand running through his hair. She locked her mouth over his and picked up the pace with her hips. He held her tighter against him as he kissed her slowly and passionately. He rolled her on to her back, positioning himself over her, he took both of her hands off of his shoulders and placed them by her head. He slid his hands up her arms and then laced his fingers through hers as he slowly and deliberately kissed her lips. It was then, she realized, that this wasn’t a quick fuck for him. He was making love to her. Deciding to go along with it, she let him have control.

“Dean, mhhhh, Dean!” she sighed as he started kissing her neck and shoulders.

“That’s right sweetheart.” he murmured as he thrust into her. She whimpered as she climbed higher and higher. She squirmed under him, wanting him to go harder and faster. She told him as much and he gave her a smirk

“I’m taking my time with you, I️ want both of us to enjoy this.”

His tongue slipped in and out of her mouth, he released one of her hands and smoothed her hair with his free hand. She squeezed his other hand in hers and hooked her legs around his hips. He thrust a little harder into her as he kissed all over her neck and throat. She moaned and cried out, as he scooped an arm under her and picked her up so that she was straddling his lap again. He placed his hands on her hips, moving her in the rhythm. She wrapped her arms around him and kissed him, whimpering against his mouth as he hit her sweet spot. She ran her hands through his hair and said

“Oh God, Dean I’m gonna come!” her body couldn’t hold on any longer.

“Come for me sweetheart.” he said in her ear as he drove into her harder.

She finished with such intensity, it felt like she went blind for a few seconds. She cried out as he groaned in her ear as he finished, gripping her hair tightly as he did. They sat there for a few seconds and then he finally pulled out and they laid down on the bed. He disposed of the condom and she crawled under the sheets while he was gone. When he came back, he joined her, wrapping her into his arms. She laid her head on his chest and said

“I’m sure you hear this a lot but, holy shit. That was awesome.”

He laughed, stroking her hair.

“Not as often as you’d think, but I️ have heard it.” he said

She picked her head up and kissed him. When the kiss was over, she asked

“I'm curious, about something you said earlier.”

“Shoot,” he said

“You dumped Lisa because you weren’t ready for marriage correct?” she asked

“Correct.” he said

“Is that something you’re even remotely interested in?” She asked

He shrugged

“Truth be told, I️ haven’t given it a lot of thought before her” he said “don’t get me wrong, it had been brought up before then but it was more in casual conversation rather than a “Hey would you want to?” kind of thing.”

“Fair enough.” Kat said

“After her and now, I️ can’t give a definite yes or no.” he said “Would it be nice? Sure, I️ guess. I’m just focused on my career right now.”

Kat nodded

“What about you?” He asked

She shrugged

“I️ haven’t met someone I️ can honestly say I’d want to spend the rest of my life with this human.” she said

“Smart thinking.” he said

“Kids?” She asked

“Again, can’t give an honest yes or no,” he said “I️ have friends that have kids and they’re fun, but one of my own? I’m not totally sure about that.”

“Again, fair enough.” she said with a smile

“You?” He asked

She sighed

“It’d be nice,” she said “but” she paused.

“But what?” He asked.

“This is a safe zone right?” She asked.

He looked around

“Um, we’re laying naked in a five star hotel room, I’d say this is pretty safe.” he said and she laughed, shaking her head “What? That was funny!” He said

“It was stupid!” She exclaimed.

“So stupid that it was funny.” he corrected her.

“No, just stupid” she said and he kissed her “Come on, but what?” He asked

She chewed on her bottom lip and said

“The last guy I️ was serious with dumped me because it’s difficult for me to get pregnant.”

“What? Seriously?” He asked and she nodded

“We decided we wanted kids right?” She asked “and we weren’t having any luck, so we both went to the doctor and he checked out fine. Me, on the other hand, my body produces sperm antibodies. My body literally hates sperm.”

This made him laugh and he said

“I’m not laughing at you, that phrasing was funny.”

“Nah, you’re good” she said “it isn’t impossible for me to have kids, it’s just very difficult.” she told him “he decided it wasn’t worth it to him and he dropped me like a hot potato.”

Dean rolled his eyes

“I’ve met some douche bags in my time but he’s toward the top of the list right now.” he said and she shrugged

“I️ didn’t lose sleep over it.” she said and he gave her a look “What?” She asked

“I️ find that hard to believe.” he said

“Okay, so I️ moped around. Like a lot.” She said

He kissed her forehead and said

“I️ better get going.”

“Nah, you don’t have to.” she said

“Oh is this a slumber party now?” He asked

“I’m not exactly kicking you out so yeah, if you want to stay, you can.” she said

“Ah, what the hell? We already broke every rule in the handbook.” He said and she laughed

“Yeah, we sure did” she said.

The next morning, Kat felt her shoulder being lightly shaken.

“Sweetheart,” Dean said “I'm gonna go ahead and go home okay?”

“Hm?” She asked sleepily and he repeated his statement “Text me later?” she asked with a yawn.

“Yeah, I will.” he said, his knuckles brushing over her skin “Promise.”

He gently pushed her hair out of her face and kissed her forehead. She smiled up at him, tiredly and said

“Miss you all ready.”

“Trust me, if I don't leave now, someone's gonna see me and we're gonna get busted.” he said and she nodded before going back to sleep.

When she woke up and checked out later that day, she was driving home when she got a text from Dean.

Hope you had a good morning, mind if I come by you place later and see you so we can talk?

When she arrived home, she answered with

I did, thanks for checking on me! Sure, come on by! And included her address

Twenty minutes later, Dean arrived, wearing a backwards baseball hat and aviator sunglasses.

“You didn't have to come in disguise.” she said as she let him into her condo.

“Disguise?” he asked “This is how I dress outside work.” he said as he took his sunglasses off and walked in.

“Oh, well then.” she said and closed the door behind him. He looked around the condo, which was sparsely decorated, but there were boxes in a few places.

“Moving out or still moving in?” he asked

“Still moving in,” she told him “my boss is a slave driver.”

“Mh, I'll talk to him about that.” Dean said and tilted her face up to his and kissing her. “Missed that this morning.” he said quietly.

“Yeah, me too.” she told him, her hands on his hips “Gotta admit, I feel bad that you had to do the walk of shame.”

“Shame?” he asked “We called it the stride of pride when I was in college.” she laughed and he said “Seriously, I got laid, what's there to be ashamed of?”

“All right, point taken.” she said. She stretched to her tip toes and kissed him again. He smiled against her mouth and the returned the kiss, her hands tightening their grip on his jeans.

He wrapped his arms around her and held her close, he had one hand between her shoulders and the other gripping her ample backside. His lips worked down her neck as he tasted her skin.

“Is this what you meant by talk or did you ACTUALLY want to talk?” she asked breathlessly “Because I'm good with this.”

“No,” he said “I actually meant talking.” his lips skimming over her skin.

“Okay, well then you better quit,” she told him “or the only talking we'll be doing is the dirty kind.”

He laughed and released her, she in turn let him go before striding to the kitchen.

“It's nice outside, do you want to sit on the back porch? Beer maybe?” she asked him.

“God, you're good.” he said “I'll take both of those.”

She nodded and grabbed two beers out of the fridge as he opened them and handed her one.

“Such a gentleman.” she said and led him by the hand to the back porch that over looked the walkway to the next condo buildings. They got comfortable in the chairs she had set outside, the crisp autumn air around them. “So, what did you want to talk to me about?” she asked

“I've been giving it a lot of thought,” he said “you and I.”

“And?” she asked, not sure she was ready to hear what he had to say.

He took a long pull of his beer before answering

“I want to be with you,” he said “I mean for real. You and me, together.”

“Really?” she asked

“Really.” he answered, making her smile. “But at work, we're not. Strictly professional.”

“So, we’re not together?” Kat asked

“As far as anyone at work knows, we are not,” Dean said “Outside work? On like Donkey Kong.”

She laughed “That’s the best description ever.” she said

“You can use that as long as I get credit.” he said

“You will” she assured him, she bit her lip, apprehensive “Can we make this work?” She asked.

He took a drink from his beer and said “We have so far, I don’t see it being a problem now.”

“But,” She said, unsure of how to word her next sentence.

“Just say whatever it is you’re thinking,” he said “you make a face when you’re over thinking. It’s cute.”

“It’s gonna be hard for me NOT to talk about my boyfriend” she blurted out “but I can’t say YOU’RE the guy I’m gushing about. I’ll have to make up a code name for you.”

“Let’s see how creative you get, I’m interested.” he said “I’ll have to come up with one for you too because the thing about my girlfriend? She’s awesome.”

“Shut your face.” she said and picked at the label on her beer bottle

“What? I call it like it see it” he said and she smirked, her cheeks turning pink.

“I’m glad we’re doing this,” she said “for real.”

“Me too.” he said and offered up his hand to her. She took it, lacing her fingers through his. She looked at him with a smile.

“You realize we’re risking everything right?” She asked him “both of us could lose our jobs if anyone finds out. Though they’ll probably get rid of me before they get rid of you.”

He nodded. “Yeah, I know” he said, taking a sip of his beer. They were silent for a few seconds and he finally said “But it’s worth it to me.”

“What makes it worth it to you?” She asked him.

He sighed and said “How I feel about you is different than I’ve ever felt before,” his eyes connecting with hers “I can’t deny it, and I don’t want to let you go, if this is what you really want. But, what about you?”

She looked down at their hands; his, big rough hand in her small one and she slowly smiled. Everything in that moment felt right.

“I don’t want to let you go either, so if we’re both in this one hundred percent, then it’s worth it to me too.” she said and looked up. He was grinning back at her. He picked their hands up and kissed the back of her hand.

“My lady.” he said and she laughed

“My lord.” she answered and he grinned wider.

“C’mere, you’re too far away.” he complained and she rolled her eyes, getting up.

“I was comfortable you know.” she told him as she made her way over to him.

“I’ll make you comfortable.” he told her as he pulled her into his lap. She sat sideways, her forehead resting in the crook between his neck and shoulder. Her wrapped an arm around her shoulders while his other arm draped across her hips. She wrapped both arms around his neck, closed her eyes and absorbed the moment; the feeling of his warmth around her, the way his soap smelled, how his chest gently rose and fell with each breath, the way the breeze danced over her exposed knees.

Dean, meanwhile, was in heaven. Here she was with the beautiful girl he’d had his eye on for months. The one that always made him laugh, the one who brought in an outsider’s prospective, who was always two steps ahead of him and that always had a smile as warm as sunshine for him, was in his lap, wrapped up in his arms right after agreeing to be his girlfriend. A smile played over his lips as he laid a hand over her knee and the other stroked her shoulder. He gently kissed the top of her head and looked up at him.

“What’s that look for?” She asked him

“Just happy, that’s all.” he said

She leaned in and kissed his lips. His mouth enveloped hers in a sweet, sensual way. His kisses weren’t rushed, as they had previously been. This go around, he took his time, letting her know she had his full attention. He traced over her knee with his thumb as they kissed over and over. His free hand ran up and down her spine, his feather light touch leaving goosebumps in its wake. She sighed and pulled herself closer to him, then she slide her hands up his shoulders and held his face in her hands and he opened his mouth and kissed her again. They pulled apart, her thumb running over the apples of his cheeks while his hands linked together on her hip. She gave him two short and sweet kisses before asking

“Want to go in? I’m getting cold.”

“Sure.” He said and they got up, walking inside.

They settled in to watch a movie, which mostly meant that the movie was on the the background while they drank and made out on the couch, high school style.

“At least we don’t have to worry about any parents walking in.” Kat thought. She was laying on her side with her back to the TV, her legs tangled up with Dean’s. Her hands were tangled in the hair in the back of his head while he had one hand on the back of her head and the other on her hip. They came up for air and a sip of their drinks when Dean looked at the screen.

“What the hell are we watching?” He asked as they sat up and he took a sip of his beer.

“That’s using the term loosely,” Kat said and watched the screen “It’s called “Just Friends” Ryan Reynolds and Amy Smart are in it.”

He shrugged as she finished off her glass of wine. During the “movie” she had switched from beer to wine.

“Want another?” She asked him as she got up

“No, I’m good.” he said.

“Okay, just checking.” she said as she walked to the kitchen. She poured herself another glass of wine a joined him back on the couch. He lifted her legs into his lap as she laid back against the sofa, setting her glass of wine on the coffee table in front of her. His eyes focused on the screen while hers were focused on him. He looked so relaxed and at ease, a five o’clock shadow on his chin and cheeks, his hand resting in her knee. A smile crossed her face and she turned her attention to the screen.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Hope you guys enjoyed!! Kind feedback is always welcomed, don’t forget to like and share with your subscribers & friends. Hulk smash that “follow” button if you wanna see more from me!! All my lists are open, so if you wanna be tagged in future works, please let me know!

DON’T FORGET, my live stream/ get ready with me is THIS SUNDAY (12/2) at 4:00 EST. I’m taking questions on here and live so tune in if you want to catch the craziness that’s gonna go down!

The Squad:

@waywardbaby @waywardnerd67 @familybusinesswritingbro @ain-t-bovvered @mrswhozeewhatsis @girlborninstorms @dacleverfox @emoryhemsworth @bobasheebaby @deanscarlett @myinconnelly1 @mogaruke @imma-winchester-addict @purpleskiesandcherrypies @dean-winchesters-bacon @animerose96 @l8nit-l0vr @drakelover78 @curly-haired-disaster @roonyxx @snffbeebee @ezilyamuzed @mirandaaustin93 @srsllydunnodoncare @latetothewinchesterparty @emilyshurley @atc74 @midnightsilverafterdark @adoptdontshoppets @biawol @supernatural-teamfreewillpage @spaceystacey123 @bella-ca @clo-heda @closetspngirl @thekatherinewinchester @maddiepants

Dean/ Jensen:

@spnbaby-67 @akshi8278

#lady winchester writes #dean winchester #dean #supernatural #dean winchester x ofc #dean winchester smut #Supernatural smut #18 plus

55 notes · View notes

nellie-elizabeth · 6 years ago

Text

Suits: Stalking Horse (8x15)

This was a pretty great episode of Suits, but I do have a couple of things I need to discuss.

Cons:

I'm rapidly becoming super irritated with the Donna/Harvey back-and-forth. I wish they would just put a bow on that and end it, or else just let them be together if that's the direction we're going. All of the drama of this situation could have been achieved without the faint hints of unresolved romantic tension between these two characters.

Also, this wasn't just a matter of Donna choosing herself over the firm. It wasn't some personal victory she achieved by making the right call for her. She broke privilege. She used her privileged information to help her boyfriend, and not only did Harvey lose a client over it, he's also being sued by Daniel Hardman. Like, it's hard to think of a more serious consequence for Donna's actions in this case. This was a big, big screw-up and it feels like the kind of thing that should honestly get Donna fired.

I thought the flashbacks with Donna and her mom were fine, but they didn't really add anything to the story or to my understanding of the characters. The choice that Donna had to make wasn't informed by her mother's decision years ago, even though that's what the episode was trying to push.

There's also the fact that the entire scenario of this main plot thread doesn't make a lick of sense. This show has this hilarious tendency to talk about "waiving privilege" as if that means that suddenly it's cool to represent both sides in a deal. What it really means is something a lot more complicated and restrictive than that. An actual law firm would never find itself in this position in the first place. It's not a big deal in the grand scheme of things, and I know this show has never been concerned with accuracy, but still. I can't help but notice these things.

Pros:

You'll notice that all of my "cons" are about the main plot. Before I jump to the subplots, I will say that I still like the idea of Donna and Thomas, and I still find myself hoping that we're not just going to jump right in to a Harvey/Donna romance. It feels really forced at this point, and I'd just as soon not go there. Even though the specific situation makes Donna seem incompetent, I do like the concept of her standing up for herself instead of putting Harvey first like she always does. If there's one central theme for Donna's character, that's it.

Also, seeing Daniel Hardman walk through the door at the end was a serious punch to the gut, in the best possible way. He's the only Big Bad that Suits is ever going to have, and bringing him back now is the perfect way to up the stakes before next week's finale. I'm stoked!

In subplot news, we've got Louis taking the stand against the man who mugged him back at the start of this season. I had sort of forgotten about that, so it was interesting to see that plot element come back in such an interesting way. We think of Samantha as someone who's willing to cross lines, but it's important to notice the reasoning behind her occasionally ruthless behavior. She crosses those lines in defense of people she cares about, and this week, we see how much Samantha cares about Louis. I'm glad that she didn't do the sketchy thing she was planning on, but blackmailing someone is still pretty hardcore. I'm wondering if Samantha and Louis are going to have to pay for their behavior later, or if this really will put the whole thing to rest.

I like the way this episode framed Louis in terms of his love for his family, and his fear over what had happened to him. He did a good service by identifying his attacker in a lineup, and by taking the stand against him, but it's clear that it took some bravery to do so. When things backfire, it makes sense that Louis would want to bury his head in the sand, but I think Samantha was right at least about one thing: he needed some closure, some peace, after everything he went through. I'm curious if we'll find out more about some of the sketchy stuff that Samantha and Robert got up to back in the day. There was an odd reference to some past shenanigans and I'm honestly not sure if I'm supposed to know what that's about yet or not... but I'm definitely curious!

Brian and Katrina are breaking my heart. This story has been such a highlight for me this season. Turns out, surprise surprise, that Brian and Katrina just can't keep working together, for the sake of Brian's marriage. This was a decision that they already made, but this time Brian is ready to make a clean break and leave the firm entirely. I love the tension here, because if Brian made a different choice and kept working with Katrina, it would be hard to respect him. He's absolutely doing the right thing for his marriage. But Katrina is the woman we've seen him with. We don't know Brian's wife. I'm rooting so much for Katrina's happiness that I'm sad that Brian did the right thing, even though I know he had to. I can't imagine that's the last we'll see of Brian, or at least I hope it's not. Their love story feels very real to me, despite the inherent difficulties.

There are two moments that I want to praise in particular from this subplot. The first is when Brian is telling Katrina that he's leaving. You can just see how much he despairs at giving her the news, and how heartbroken she is to receive it. I love how Katrina squares her shoulders and tells Brian that she respects his decision, even though you know how much pain she's in. The other moment that I really loved was when Louis already knew that Brian was giving his notice, and offered to let him take his first solo client with him when he relocated. Louis can still be his own worst enemy sometimes, but we are seeing how he's growing as a leader. I liked how gentle and understanding he was of Brian in this moment.

And that's that! I had some problems with the main plot of this episode, but to be honest, I still greatly enjoyed the whole thing. Usually I find myself disappointed if we don't get any mentions of Mike (his name did come up once), but this week there was enough to distract me that I didn't even miss him that badly! That's a good sign.

8/10

#review #suits #suits review #suits usa

5 notes · View notes

illuminating-dragons · 7 years ago

Text

Nesting (1/?): New Additions

Summary: Welcome to the sequel! For people who may be thinking 'well, I didn't read the original, but I will be okay to read this'....this is not one of those sequels. You need ALL the context. Now, let's go to the battlefield...

Read it on AO3

The armies stood ready, flags flying in the wind. The only sounds were the faint babbling of the judges, sitting close together at a table.

One side was short two members, but they weren’t afraid. They had the battle plan of the missing Sage, and the Lady, while well-beloved, hadn’t been able to fight for months.

Besides, the judges were the children of their Handmaiden.

The Handmaiden stood proud at the head of his troops, waiting for his Queen to give the word. His husband stood beside him, looking every so often towards the judges. There was always trouble when those two were bored.

Finally, the Queen’s consort raised her hand. The Handmaiden stepped forward, ready to give one of the three speeches he knew (he’d already used the Braveheart speech that month)…

Then his phone rang.

“Oh come on, man!” someone yelled from the other side.

“Shut up!” Queen Charlie said sharply. “We talked about this before, remember?”

The heckler fell silent. They’d all heard about the possibility of a character break today.

“Yeah, Sammy?” the Handmaiden was saying. He paled. “Yeah, we’ll be there in a minute.” He hung up. “Sorry, everyone. We’ve got to go. I’m about to be an uncle.”

Both sides erupted into cheers.

“Send Lady Sarah our love!”

“We all want pictures!”

Dean nodded distractedly as he dashed to the judge’s table and picked up his son.

“Daddy, what’s going on?”

Dean glanced over his shoulder to make sure that Cas had their daughter before heading to the Impala. “Aunty Sarah’s having her babies,” he explained. “We’re going to see them.”

The little boy clapped his hands with delight.

Sam held Sarah tight as another contraction ripped through her body. “You’re doing so well, honey,” he whispered soothingly.

Sarah panted and tried to smile. “You have no idea how I’m doing, but I appreciate the trying.” She winced. “Adam, how much longer?”

“Don’t look at me, I’m only pre-med!” Poor Adam had been home when Sarah went into labour, and once it was clear she wasn’t going to make it to the hospital, he’d been roped into helping. Sam had never appreciated his brother more.

Kevin was also home. He’d locked himself in his room to pray for Gabriel to “please come quickly!” (poor kid couldn’t stand seeing people in pain). As Gabriel’s prophet, he had the best chance of getting through to the archangel in time. As Sarah screeched in his arms as another contraction hit, Sam worried for the first time that he wouldn’t make it in time.

Women still die in childbirth.

But no. It couldn’t be. Not after the last seven years, after their wedding and the art gallery just above the bookstore…

Please Gabriel. Please hurry.

Gabriel appeared out of nowhere, looking a bit frazzled. “Sorry, kiddos. Bit of trouble on Asgard.” He put a hand on Sarah’s forehead, and she sighed with relief. “I didn’t think you’d be this fast.”

“Is something wrong?” Sam asked worriedly.

“No, everything’s fine,” Gabriel said soothingly, his hand going to Sarah’s stomach. “Kiddos are just excited to be born. They should be, family like this.”

Sam smiled, but his worry didn’t totally fade. Of course his twins would be lucky to have this family—they had an amazing mother, wonderful aunts and uncles, and two cousins (with another on the way, once Hannah was satisfied with her nest). But…would they want him? He’d had some practice with Mary and Adam, but that was being an uncle, not a dad.

“Sam. Focus up.”

Sam looked at Gabriel.

“You’re going to be just fine,” Gabriel promised, his voice unusually gentle. “Now let’s get your babies born, okay?”

The last few moments of the birth were a complete blur. Sarah crying out from pressure, not pain, Adam searching for the blankets Benny and Anna had made, Gabriel chanting quietly in Enochian...

Then—“Sam, hold your daughter while I get your son turned around.”

Adam took hold of Sarah as Sam let go, holding his arms out for the baby wrapped in a blanket crocheted with suns. The tiny baby looked up at him, and Sam felt himself start to cry. “Hi baby,” he whispered. “I’m your Daddy. It’s so good to meet you…”

He heard Sarah gasp and turned to see her reaching for a baby swaddled in stars. “Hi sweetheart,” she crooned. “Oh, you’re beautiful…” She brought their son to her breast and he latched on hungrily. Sam gently lay down beside her, holding their daughter so she could feed too. Sarah looked up at him, and Sam was struck by the love in her eyes, the love he never thought he would have.

“Our babies,” she whispered. “I love you so much.”

“I love you too,” Sam whispered back, throat tight. “I love you all…”

It was awkward like this, but he managed to take her hand.

“Do you need anything, Sarah?” Adam asked gently. Gabriel was cleaning up, laying a hand on Sarah’s stomach once more.

“I could sit like this forever,” Sarah replied dreamily. Then she blinked. “Actually, I’d better get covered up a bit before everyone comes in. And…maybe some water?”

“Water coming up,” Adam promised. As he opened the door, Kevin poked his head in, his headphones dangling.

“Is it…is it over? Omigosh, they’re adorable!”

Sarah laughed. “The screaming’s over, Kevin. Come on in!”

Kevin came in and cooed over the babies. Their son finished feeding first, and they switched babies. Sam studied his son’s face. He looks like Dean, he realized. And then, he looks like me too.

Adam had returned with water and some fruit and the twins were both cuddled between them—

Then a stampede began over their heads.

Adam glared at the ceiling, and Sarah giggled. “I think our family’s home.”

Sam could hear Jody and Donna’s voices among the clamor, trying to shush the mob.

“They seem okay,” Sam noticed. His son actually looked sleepy.

“They’ve had a while to get used to it,” Gabriel agreed. “Oh, Balthazar called—he and the Braedens are on their way.”

The door swung wide and the family poured in, Dean leading the way with Adam Gabriel in his arms. Everyone was in Moondoor gear except for Jody and Donna. Charlie’s crown was askew and Benny’s quiver was upside down.

“Did you guys get any fighting done?” Sam asked. He was smiling—he couldn’t stop smiling.

“Nah, we got your call just before we started,” Dean said softly, tenderness in his eyes. “Look at you two, huh? As pretty as your mama, thank goodness.”

“Jerk.”

For a moment everyone just looked at the babies, all crowded into the small Bunker room he and Sarah had shared for seven years. Seven years leading to two new lives.

“So,” Meg asked in a would-be casual voice. “What are their names?”

“We should tell them, shouldn’t we sweetheart?” Sam asked Sarah. “After all, they’re the newest members of our family.”

“Yes,” Sarah agreed. “And they need to settle their bet that they don’t think we know about.”

The humans in the room blushed. Benny just shrugged. “Thought I could make some easy money.”

“Well, we’ll see,” Sarah said. She cradled their daughter closer as she fussed. “This is Abigail Ellen. We’re going to call her Abby, that’s what my—my mom went by.” She blinked hard, and Sam squeezed her hand.

“And—where are Bobby and Rufus?” Sam asked, distracted. They’d gone out for groceries about two hours before.

“Right here, son.” Bobby pushed his way to the front of the crowd. He beamed at the babies. “You both did good work.”

“Sarah did most of the work,” Sam said immediately.

“You did work too,” Sarah corrected him. Sam knew she wasn’t referring to the ecstatic moments of conceiving their children, or even the months where he hovered over her, making sure that she didn’t want for anything (until she told him to go away and let her breathe on her own). No, she was talking about the years before, when he shook in the nights and tried to believe that she could love him. That he could ever love her enough.

It was the hardest work he’d ever done, but today, holding their children, surrounded by their family, Sam knew it was worth it.

“Well,” Sam said, coming back to the present, “I wanted to name our first son—”

“What do you mean first?” Sarah cut in.

“Sorry,” Sam sputtered. “I thought you wanted more kids; if you changed your mind that’s okay.”

“I haven’t changed my mind,” Sarah replied. “But why are you so sure our next kid is going to be a boy? Maybe it’s a girl.”

“I think you might both be right,” Gabriel said casually.

Sam didn’t press that. “Anyways…I wanted to name our first son after the two men who raised me. Who made me who I am.” He held his son up. “Say hello to Robert Dean, everyone.”

Dean’s eyes filled with tears. Cas took Adam from him and Dean gently took the baby, cradling him between him and Bobby. “Hey little man,” he whispered. “Welcome to the family.”

#spn fanfiction #spn au #sam winchester #sarah blake #sam winchester/sarah blake #acme146 fanfiction #bobby dean winchester #abigail ellen winchester #deancas #AWOBS verse #crosspost from AO3 #nesting

1 note · View note

nomercles · 8 years ago

Text

spn meme

Oh, fun! Thanks, @zmediaoutlet!

1. What season did you start watching SPN?

Between 4 and 5. I was in a game and our GM was a HAAAACK, and also a big mouth, and so he figured out that when he wholesale lifted the plot of the show he’d finally did something I liked and found interesting, and tried to curry favor by telling me all about this show I’d really love. Except I’m actually smart, and figured out pretty damned fast that I was basically priestess!Sam, which is flattering I guess, but still pretty shitty. And I immediately dropped the game and kept the show.

2. Who was the first character you fell in love with?

Oh, Dean. Absolutely. He was exactly my type, and Jared Padalecki looks like the cleaned-up Hollywood version of the dominant who’d just dropped my ass and it freaked me out quite a lot. Dean’s love for him won me over, though.

3. Who was a character you hated at first, but grew to love?

I don’t know that love is as strong as I’m feeling, but I’m going to go with Rowena and Naomi. They finally got really interesting, just before they died. Why the hell do the writers do that? (rhetorical question) And a touch of Sam, because of the aforementioned bad relationship timing business, but I got over it fairly quickly. (And bonus? It helped me get over the guy faster, too. “This is who you could have been, you asshat!”)

4. Which character would you most like to be in a long-term relationship with?

Oh. Um. Here’s the trick. This answer will be different in about a week. Ask again for variety. Right this second, I’m going with Jody or Benny. Jody just hits every single one of my buttons, and Benny is really not far behind. Ohhhh, can I have Jody/Ellen/Benny? Is that greedy?

5. If you could go on just one date with one character, which one would you choose?

Oof. Meanie. Yeah, I’m going with Dean.

6. What would you do on the date?

I do love a nice car. I’m a girl of varied tastes. I can do aperitifs in the parlor just as easily as burgers in a bar. But I love someone who’s uncomplicated--or if they are complicated, they’re self-soothing. I just think Dean could make it fun. Unpretentious, easy, and fun. I don’t date easily or well at all, and being with someone who could help us over the bumpy bits would be nice. (I think I basically have been on a date with Dean, and it was just about perfect. They made for the perfect one-night-stand, if I’m only ever going to have one.)

7. Which character would you most want to be like?

Ellen. It takes a hell of a woman to go through everything she has and to still have her shit together, and she still has steel and velvet in her spine. She’s tough, but not hard, and she doesn’t tolerate fools lightly, and she will absolutely go to war for you, if you’re one of hers. I admire the hell out of her.

8. Which character would you most like to see brought back from the dead?

No one. Let people fucking die. Let death have meaning again. The story is so much more interesting and powerful if there are some fucking consequences. That said, I do wonder how an older and wiser Sam and Dean would handle being faced with a new roster of Special Children.

9. Which character would you most like to punch?

Most? That’s hard. Balthazar. Or Zachariah. Or really, and this would please me greatly, lock them in a room together and never let them out and tell me how that goes.

10. Who is your absolute favorite character?

SamDeanSam&Dean. If I put that all together we can pretend it’s just one character, yes? Okay, fine. Sam and Dean, the unit.

11. Which “big bad” do you think was the worst?

Toss up between Metatron and Azazel. I hated Metatron the most, but Azazel was most frightening to me. Often, it’s the lesser-bads that are more unbearable to me.

12. Which character are you most like?

You know, someone told me just recently that I’m a lot like Donna. I don’t think this is a question I can answer for myself. I know myself pretty well, but I still come armed with pre- and misconceptions. I know who I want to be, and I know who I think I’ve been. I don’t have a solid grasp on how others see me.

13. What death hit you the hardest?

Bobby’s, or Dean’s latest one. Though, again, repeated returns cheapen it. Oh, man, and Ellen and Jo going out had me bawling. I think those are the only ones that have had me needing to take a break.

14. What season finale hit you the hardest?

5. And then 11.

15. What are your ten all-time favorite episodes?

Oh, man, I hate you so much right now. This is going to take some thinking.

(2.14) Born Under a Bad Sign

(3.10) Dream a Little Dream of Me

(4.01) Lazarus Rising

(5.04) The End

(5.14) My Bloody Valentine

(5.16) Dark Side of the Moon

(6.04) Weekend at Bobby’s

(7,10) Death’s Door

(8.06) Southern Comfort

(10.05) Fan Fiction

(12.04) American Nightmare

I tried. I really did. There’s eleven. I couldn’t get it lower. Chronological order, rather than order of preference. And to be honest, I’m probably wrong on a couple, but now my brain hurts, and this is what you get.

16. What’s been your favorite season?

Ohhh, so, fun discovery! I always hate the current season for a while, and then a few watches later, I’ll realize that I fucking love that thing. (S7 being the exception so far. Still don’t care for it.) But I’m going to go with S4-5, because I can’t separate them. They flow too beautifully together.

17. Who is your favorite angel?

Super unpopular--though not surprising--opinion: it is decidedly not Cas. Probably Gabriel. He’s not a good guy, but he’s fucking interesting. And that whole “run from my problems, make things worse, try to be heroic but maybe it’s too late by now” thing is a trend for me. Though, thank Chuck, not on quite such a cosmic scale.

18. Who’s your favorite demon?

Meg, Ruby, Casey, Alastair, War. I’m not good at this There Can Be Only One thing. And all of those appeal in completely different ways, so I can’t really compare them anyway. Meg had such an interesting character development. Ruby was so smug, and for all that she was sly, she was also kind of clumsy. Moments of brilliance, but she wasn’t any kind of master manipulator. I wonder if she could have done it without the blood. Casey seemed like she had some fascinating stories in there, and she was the first demon we really got to see as a person. Alastair was...God. *shudder* And War was just so cheerful about it all. He knew his job, he liked his job, and he was secure.

19. Who’s your favorite evil character?

Alastair. And a runner-up of Azazel!John.

20. Do you have any Supernatural ships?

Have you met me? Die-hard Wincester over here. Dimpala. And what’s the one for Death/Dean? I don’t read that one very often, but there are some good fic. And for Sam, I kinda like asexual Sastiel and cozy snuggly Sevin.

21. Who’s your favorite supporting actor?

Oh, man, it’s between Charles Malik Whitfield, Ruth Connell, and Aldis Hodge. I have liked literally everything I have seen Whitfield do, I followed Hodge over to Leverage, and I could watch Ruth Connell say “moose” all damned day.

22. What’s your favorite quote from the show?

...is there a database of good SPN quotes somewhere that I can consult? Because I think I need one for this question. Maybe Meg: “Look, I'm simpler than you think. I've figured one thing out about this world – just one, pretty much. You find a cause, and you serve it. Give yourself over, and it orders your life. Lucifer and Yellow Eyes – their mission was it for me.”

23. If you could cast one famous actor in an episode of SPN, who would it be?

Fuck, man, I don’t know. *stares at DVD shelf* Brendan Fraser or Sam Elliott.

24. If you could write your own episode, what kind of creature would you like to see included?

ooo! I’d like to see them dig into some very local monsters. Not local to me, but personal to America monsters. Try to hunt down a Thunderbird.

25. Who’s your favorite girl that Dean’s hooked up with?

Tara Benchley. She just looked so satisfied. Or Suzy Lee from (9.08) Rock and a Hard Place.

26. Who’s your favorite girl that Sam’s hooked up with?

Dr. Cara Roberts. I have an affection for women who are just there for fun and aren’t interested in anything more. Not because I don’t want the guys to have outside relationships (though, I don’t, because that’s not what I’m watching the show for), but I like women who just know what they want and are interested in playfully objectifying the guys.

27. What are some of your favorite convention moments?

I don’t really watch the con videos much. I will every so often, but the sound is always crap, and I get a headache. I do quite like watching Jensen sing, though. Hot damn.

28. If you were going to guest star (or be a recurring guest star) on spn, how would you want your character described?

Cheerful, and snarky. I’m gonna die anyway, I might as well be fun.

29. What do you hope to see in the next season?

The Winchesters just being Winchesters. Unless I am very much mistaken, this is the last season, so how about we go back to the show I fell in love with? Like all mythic characters, Sam and Dean are both inherently human, and deeply divine. So how about we get shit like the great icons trying to find clothes that fit them, or arguing over who left red socks in the laundry and why the hell do we even have red socks, Sam. I want the show to end as beautifully as it could have been if they’d actually stopped at the end of 5.

30-40. If you had to choose...

Bobby or John? After all this time, John. Let Bobby die.

Bela or Ruby? Ruby.

Jess or Madison? No opinion. Madison, just because Jess carries the same problems as Mary.

Jo or Lisa? Jo.

Charlie or Kevin? Kevin.

Balthazar or Ash? ASH.

Cas or Crowley? Crowley.

Ben or Claire? Claire.

Jody or Donna? Jody. That’s a tough one, though.

Sam or Dean? No. I’m not even going to entertain this one.

#spn #spoilers #this was fun!#and took forever!#thanks!

1 note · View note

lynchgirl90 · 8 years ago

Photo

#TwinPeaks revival: 8 things fans need to know

“Twin Peaks is a mystery that holds other mysteries,” says David Lynch when asked to sum up his legendary TV creation in a sentence. So it’s fitting that he wants to keep Showtime’s forthcoming revival of the cult classic as Laura Palmer as possible: wrapped in plastic and full of secrets. He’s doing it for your own good, you know! “People want to know right up until they know, and then they don’t care,” the director tells EW. “It’s really beautiful and you go into another world not knowing what you’re going to find.”

Still, we can tell you some stuff. The 18-hour limited event series is “a feature film in 18 parts,” says Lynch, who wrote the script with Twin Peaks co-creator Mark Frost over a period of three years and shot for 142 days over seven months, but not on Saturdays and Sundays. (Lynch doesn’t do weekends.) The script started in the area of 400-500 pages, but it grew during pre-production, and more so during production, as the cast kept expanding. Lynch used digital cameras for the shoot. “Film is organic, it’s beautiful, no two ways about it, it has a quality that I don’t think has been surpassed, but there’s so many drawbacks to it,” says Lynch, whose movies include lovingly crafted celluloid masterpieces like Eraserhead, The Elephant Man, and Blue Velvet. “Digital has gotten to a good point where you can get a pretty beautiful thing, and there’s a million things you can do with it. And even if you shoot on film, you’re going to end up transferring it onto a digital format eventually. So digital is pretty beautiful, and it assures you you’re going to have a chance of everybody seeing the same thing.”

Angelo Badalamenti, a frequent Lynch collaborator who did the music for the original Twin Peaks, is doing the music for the revival. Lynch is a musician himself, and he plays a mean, home-made guitar. When I asked him if he’ll be playing on the soundtrack, he said no, but then his producing partner, Sabrina S. Sutherland, corrected him. “There are a couple things.”

“There are?” he asked.

“Yes, there are,” she said.

He shrugged. “Okay, then maybe I did.”

Here are some other things that might be true about Twin Peaks:

1. Everyone in Hollywood is in it.

Okay, that’s not true at all, but it sure feels like it. There are 217 people in the cast, including most of the original cast. Notable omissions include Lara Flynn Boyle (Donna), Moira Kelly (who played Donna in the Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me movie), Michael Ontkean (Sheriff Harry S. Truman), Joan Chen (Josie Packard), and Piper Laurie (Catherine Martell ). Jack Nance, a longtime Lynch player (Eraserhead) who played Pete Martell, and Frank Silva, the set dresser whom Lynch famously cast on the fly to play BOB, passed away before the project was conceived. Notable newcomers including Laura Dern, Naomi Watts, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Monica Bellucci, Michael Cera, James Belushi, Tim Roth, Robert Forster, Pearl Jam frontman Eddie Vedder, and more. Lynch won’t say who the newbies will be playing, and it’s quite possible many will have blink-and-you’ll-miss-them cameos. The way some actors tell it, it sounds like some people called up, asked if they could be in the show, and Lynch said, “You bet!” Says Kyle MacLachlan: “I would hear stories from them about how they were heavily influenced by Twin Peaks, and so they wanted to be part of the new series, even if it was just one day of shooting. For others, it was about working with David because he is so phenomenal. It just kept growing.” Asked who Vedder plays, MacLachlan says: “You know, I didn’t know Eddie was there. But I think he sings.”

2. That fan theory you like might be true. Or not.

In the season 2 finale of Twin Peaks, which ended up being the series finale of the show, Agent Cooper enters The Black Lodge and encounters the specter of Laura Palmer (Sheryl Lee). “I’ll see you again 25 years,” she says. Then, after adding, “Meanwhile…,” she strikes a vogue pose and freezes. The popular theory among fans is that the revival — which arrives nearly 26 years after the last episode aired — will retroactively turn the line into a prophecy. Put another way: The new Twin Peaks will be set in the present. Frost said as much in the early press about the project, and if you look at EW’s first look photos from the production, you’ll see there’s no attempt to make the actors look anything any younger than they are. (Although we think it’s odd that many of them still dress as they did back in the day.) But the official word from Lynch — clearly the lead creative pilot on the revival — is that you shouldn’t assume anything about what you’ll see on screen. He won’t even confirm that the original cast will actually be playing their original characters in any real way, except for one: Kyle MacLachlan will reprise his role as FBI Agent Dale Cooper. Lynch himself will be in it, playing Cooper’s boss Gordon Cole, or some version of him. “Gordon is a fantastic person,” is all Lynch will say about the character. What’s it like directing himself? Lynch laughs. “Gordon doesn’t need much direction,” he says.

3. It doesn’t all take place in Twin Peaks.

“It takes place all over the country,” says David Nevins, Showtime’s president and CEO. “Twin Peaks is an important locus, but it’s not the only locus.”

4. Expect a lot of Agent Cooper, and a lot of mythology.

Nevins says that he was prepared to say yes to the new Twin Peakseven before Lynch and Frost pitched the project to him in 2014. But he did need to hear two things; we’ll tackle them separately. First, he wanted to hear that the story would have a lot of Agent Cooper. Check! “I’m really interested in the journey of Agent Cooper — where he’s coming from, where he’s going to, and what the obstacles in his way are,” says Nevins. “That, to me, just as a viewer, was my core interest in what happened to Agent Cooper.”

The original Twin Peaks ended with a number of cliffhangers, none more shocking or disturbing than the fate of Agent Cooper. While trying to rescue his girlfriend Annie from the clutches of former partner Windom Earle in The Black Lodge, Cooper was assaulted by his own dark-side doppelgänger. In the episode’s final shot, we saw that it was Cooper’s dark half — or, to put the same idea a different way, Cooper possessed by demon BOB — that made it out of that red-curtained underworld. “As we left, evil has established a beachhead in Twin Peaks through Agent Cooper,” says MacLachlan, who declined to elaborate further, other than to say that he found it very rewarding to play Cooper’s dark side, and that we might be surprised how Cooper reconciles and resolves this crisis of duality. “Twin Peaks is a cosmology,” says Nevins. “What I think is satisfying about the new version is that it’s a deeper exploration of that stuff. What is the red room? How does the red room work? Where is Agent Cooper? Can he make it back?”

5. Expect pure grade Lynchiness.

The second thing Nevins needed to hear was that Lynch would direct the whole thing. Check! Nevins was quoted earlier this year as saying that new Twin Peaks is “the pure heroin of David Lynch.” Asked to elaborate, Nevins recently told EW: “What I really meant was like uncut and that it’s just a very pure form. We are getting to observe a master artist, master filmmaker getting to use all of the tools that he’s developed over the course of his career. It just feels like that sort of uncut, unadulterated version of it.” That’s important, he says, because “my only anxiety was that the show not feel like the ersatz version of Twin Peaks. We weren’t going to do ‘Twin Peaks: The Remake,’ and David would lend his name and someone else would write and direct it.”

6. Okay, but what kind of pure grade Lynchiness?

Lynch’s films often feel dreamy or nightmarish or both, but some are as linear as The Straight Story and some are as looping as Mulholland Drive. Which one will the new Twin Peaks be? “The honest answer is both,” says Nevins. Adds Gary Levine, Showtime’s president of programming: “There’s a very compelling spine through this story, and yet there are diversions, tangents, fantasy.”

7. It might not be as TV-MA as you think.

Some fans are assuming that Lynch will take full advantage of pay cable’s creative freedoms and deliver an R-rated version of Twin Peaks, à la Twin Peaks: Fire Walk With Me. “He is taking advantage of cable freedoms and there are moments of very strong material, but David’s pretty clean,” says Nevins. “There’s darkness and there’s scariness, but a lot less cursing and probably somewhat less nudity than most of our other programming. Definitely a lot less cursing…. Part what defines David as such an entertaining filmmaker is he’s got such a range of tones. It’s funny, it’s dramatic, it’s emotional, it’s shocking, and occasionally it’s violent, but a lot of times the violence is more implied than shown. That’s one of the things I really like about the show, there’s just such a satisfying range of tones. I don’t like things that are one thing. I like things that are lots of things.”

8. Lynch wants you to watch the show on a TV with a great sound system.

Lynch doesn’t just take great care making images — he’s also known for his dense, intricate soundscapes. Hence, he really hopes you have a home entertainment system that’ll flatter it, and if not, you’ll invest in one. Because art, people! Art! “It’s not just for me, it’s important for everyone! Sound and picture flowing together in time is the thing, that is cinema, and it’s just so beautiful, it’s got to be protected. So on little speakers on a computer or laptop or something, it’s like you have a B-52 bomber flying close in the sky, just barreling along, and it becomes like a mosquito on the little machine. It’s pathetic.” Besides, we hear there’s someone plays some mean guitar on the soundtrack, and you surely don’t want to miss that.

The Twin Peaks revival debuts May 21 at 9 p.m. ET on Showtime.

(TP)

#Twin Peaks #David Lynch #kyle machlachlan #Eddie Vedder #Showtime

19 notes · View notes

thebuckblogimo · 8 years ago

Text

Ten things I remember from kindergarten when I was a five-year-old at Lowrey.

January 15, 2017

There’s a new movie out that I saw the other day called “Lion,” based on the book A Long Way Home by Saroo Brierly (with Larry Buttrose). It’s the real-life story about a young Saroo, who as a poor, five-year-old boy from a small village in India, goes out one day with his older brother to scavenge coal, gets separated from him, hops a train, falls asleep…and wakes up 900 miles later in Calcutta where the people speak a different language.

Knowing his mother only as “Mum,” and the first initial of the name of the town where he came from, Saroo spends several harrowing weeks alone in the streets before an adult rescues him and takes him to an orphanage. Eventually he gets adopted by a loving, affluent Australian couple and lives a happy life with them for 20 years in Tasmania…until he becomes obsessed with the idea of researching his identity and finding his birth mother.

Relying on foggy memories of his village, as well as Google Earth to search for images of it, he painstakingly conducts his investigation and is finally reunited with his mother. A review in the New York Daily News calls “Lion” a “10-hanky film.”

After seeing Saroo Brierley interviewed on 60 Minutes, I was intrigued by the random things he could visualize as a five-year-old to find his village and family two decades later. I was five when I started kindergarten in the fall of 1952 at Lowrey School in Dearborn, and Brierly’s story caused me to recall some of the things that I can remember from that time in my life. Here are ten of them:

I’m not sure how my mother connected with the Massaro family who lived two-and-half blocks away from our house, but Mrs. Massaro and my Mom took turns walking Freddy Massaro and me to kindergarten each morning, until our moms were comfortable with the two of us making the 1.3-mile trip together on our own. I remember that there were both morning and afternoon sessions at Lowrey. I also remember being disappointed that my friend Butchie, whose house I passed on the way to school every day, attended the afternoon session, not the morning one with me.

There were two kindergarten classrooms for each session. Miss Grumman taught my class; Miss Vincent taught the other. The rooms were separated by a “cloakroom” or “clothes press.” One classroom had a piano where Miss Grumman played the “alphabet song” to teach us our ABCs. When I first heard it I recall asking Freddy, “What’s an ‘alamenno pea’?”

There was a specially equipped classroom down the hall where the “crippled kids,” as we called them in those days, went to learn. Every day I saw children who couldn’t control their body movements and kids whose legs were in braces. I remember feeling really sorry for them.

At the south end of my room, the biggest of the two kindergarten rooms, there was a playhouse. At Christmas time, a tree was decorated near it for which we made cords of garland by linking colorful pieces of construction paper. I remember standing on risers in front of the tree where we sang “Up on the Housetop.” We hit rhythm sticks every time we came to the part that goes, “…click, cIick, click.” I recall being surprised that most of the other kids seemed to know the words to the song, while I didn’t. I thought I knew all the Christmas songs: “Jingle Bells,” “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,” “Frosty the Snowman,” “Santa Claus is Coming to Town” and “Silent Night.” I never did learn the words. I still don’t know them today.

At mid-year, after semester break, Freddy and I began to attend the afternoon kindergarten session. That’s when a new kid by the name of Noel was introduced to our class. After a few days it was discovered that he could read and write. So he was quickly transferred to first grade down the hall. The following year Noel entered the first grade at St. Alphonsus. He remains a good friend of mine today and is a successful attorney.

Every time it was someone’s birthday, he or she would be seated at a special table at the front of the class. A parent would usually deliver treats, such as cupcakes, and everyone would sing “Happy Birthday.” I remember feeling so proud because my Dad picked up candy bars–big boxes of full-sized Mounds Bars and Almond Joys–at my Uncle Frank’s “filling station.” Also, you were to select someone of the opposite sex to sit with at the head table. I picked a girl by the name of Donna, who, in my opinion, was the prettiest girl in the class. But I was really, really shy. I don’t recall ever talking to her again.

Random names I recall: Besides Freddy and Noel, I have the strongest image of a kid named Leeroy. Hearing his name made me think of a cowboy. Hearing his raspy voice made me think of sandpaper. Leeroy had buck teeth with wide gaps. He often wore white shirts. He was always sucking up to Miss Grumman. I suspect he turned out to be a “sid” who probably carried his books in a school bag when he started first grade. I also remember the names of Nancy, Joyce and Jackie. I don’t remember any last names. Random things I recall: tricycles we could ride on the wooden floor; old-fashioned stereoscopes (forerunners to View-Masters) with 3-D images of faraway places; closets with dark wooden doors where we stored our rugs for “rest period;” Miss Grumman’s desk at the entrance to our room; and, finally, Big Chief tablets for writing and drawing.

My mother didn’t drive. So occasionally she would arrange for Mrs. Phillips, our next-door neighbor, to pick me up from school. I remember that the Phillips owned a 1949 or ‘50 or ‘51 Ford. I think it was a “two-door sedan.” Navy blue. With black walls. It was a “three-speed,” with the shifter on the column. I remember that the clutch made a deep, bellowing “clump” every time Mrs. Phillips changed gears. The Phillips owned one car. I wonder how Mr. Phillips got to work on days that Mrs. Phillips picked me up.

I was sitting at a table in the back of the room the first time I figured out how to write “Lenny” on a piece of paper with a crayon. I remember getting excited and getting up out of my chair to show Miss Grumman. She smiled, but I remember feeling disappointed that she didn’t get all excited like me.

There was a recess every day so we could go outside to play. I remember how the kids would rush out of the room to the south door of the school which opened up to the playground. It bugged me the way they would all push and shove. I never did that. It didn’t seem right. Then, when the door opened, the kids would race to be the first one to the swings. I remember thinking that if I chose to rush the door and run to the swings there was no way that anyone could beat me. I tried it once. And I was right.

A few years ago a good friend gave me the 1980s book of essays called All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten by Robert Fulghum. Striking me at the time as preachy, sugarcoated, I never finished it. And yet, I’ve long thought that there’s validity to its central thesis: that the world would be a better place if adults were nice to each other, shared things, cleaned up after their own messes, etc. Just as we were taught at Lowrey.

1 note · View note

erickmalpicaflores · 6 years ago

Text

Erik Malpica Flores Erik Malpica Flores recommends: SUITS Recap: We’re A Community |

SUITS’ “Sour Grapes” saw members of opposing factions in the Next Name Partner Battle of 2018 team up on two separate cases. For Harvey Specter and Samantha Wheeler, the task at hand involved standing up for the firm’s slimy landlord and newest client, David Fox. Alex Williams assisted Robert Zane with a personal business matter; and that left Louis Litt’s drama of the week to be purely personal.

We found Robert Zane. Insert Firm Name Here’s current managing partner has been absent from recent SUITS episodes, but he finally made a reappearance in “Sour Grapes.” For Robert, the episode title was about as literal as it could get: Because he received his barrels too late, the product at his winery had gone sour — and his business was tanking.

So, when the boss called Donna to say that he needed Alex Williams’ help, proving he’d taken the COO’s commentary about “fostering harmony” to heart, “Red” purchased Alex everything he would need and sent him on his way.

Zane was convinced that he wasn’t treated fairly because of his race, especially because of the all-too-familiar looks he’d received at the bank and elsewhere in the community. In a heated meeting, Mr. Newton, who had sold Zane the barrels, actually admitted to some sabotage — but because Robert was a rich outsider, not because of the color of his skin. After a falling-out with Alex and some good advice from Donna, Robert wound up taking the man at his word and working things out. He even decided to give something back by funding a community tasting room.

So, SUITS really did the whole, “it’s not racism” thing here. That’s unsettling, given that people of color don’t normally cry racism for no reason, but that’s none of my business. The storyline included a moment in which Robert stated that, if some outsider came into his own community, he’s not sure he would have acted any differently because where he grew up, the people were “tight and close, mistrusting of outsiders.”

That would all be fine and good if we weren’t ignoring the reasons for that mistrust. Between that and the supposed problem with Robert’s “Wall Street money,” the story gave shades of the “economic insecurity” argument that’s been debunked time and again in America…And that’s really not a good look.

Surprise! She’s not pregnant! Louis Litt might have actually gotten some work done in SUITS 8×07 if Sheila hadn’t called him on his “sex phone” to inform him that she was pregnant and ask him to promise to keep her pregnancy a secret. Instead, said phone call did happen; and Louis…didn’t do such a great job of keeping secrets. Gretchen was the first to know, thanks to Louis’ in-office happy dance, but the party didn’t last long.

When Louis took Sheila to a fancy dinner to celebrate [insert euphemism for becoming pregnant here], things took a predictably bad turn for SUITS’ least healthy relationship (and that’s including the non-relationship mess that a certain other pairing has trapped themselves in for 13 years, by the way). This week’s order from Sheila was that, not only would Lous not be able to raise his child Jewish, but he should also just, like, completely drop the conversation: “This is supposed to be a celebration. Can’t you just let it go?” Yeah, Louis. Let something that’s clearly a major part of your identity go. Because why have a discussion, when you can take Sheila’s orders and leave it at that?

This sent Louis in search of persons two and three to learn of his “secret” news: Esther (his sister) and everyone’s favorite therapist, Dr. Lipschitz. Esther was surprised to hear that Louis wouldn’t raise his child Jewish and had always just assumed that any future Litts would attend Camp Bracha, just like their daddy and aunt had. But when she heard that the decision was Sheila’s, not Louis’, Esther was a little bit less accepting — especially when Louis mentioned that the couple hadn’t even had a real conversation about it. The situation reminded Esther of her failed marriage, which fell apart from a lack of communication, not anything that her husband had done to her.

So, Louis finally stood up to Sheila — for once — only to have her shoot him down with passive aggressive nonsense about he and Esther dragging her for being a shiksa. Evidently, Sheila’s decision not to raise her kid one way or the other had to do with not wanting to further alienate her Catholic parents, who already had a problem with her for not being particularly into their religion. But when Louis tried to explain to her that his wishes weren’t about what was important to his parents but, rather, what was important to him, Sheila made it all about her.

“What about what’s important to me?” Literally your entire relationship, Sheila. Question answered.

Unlike with Harvey, Louis chose to solve his relationship problems with Sheila in a solo session with Dr. Lipschitz. Louis wanted his doctor to wave a magic wand and get Sheila to let him raise their child the way he wanted to; but it wasn’t that simple. The therapist explained his own family story to Louis, the all-too-familiar one of a family that could have had a better chance of surviving in nazi Germany if they’d denied their identity — but didn’t.

Lipschitz’s advice highlighted the hard truth about this relationship: “I’m saying if you can’t be on the same page about how to raise your children, maybe you should discuss not having them.” But when Louis told Dr. Lipschitz that it was too late, the advice was softened to, “it’s more important that you make a decision together than what that decision is.” And then, SUITS’ greatest hero congratulated Louis with a “mazel tov” and a hug.

Louis went home, hoping to (finally) have a real discussion with Sheila, but she’d already changed her mind because Esther had called to welcome her to the family. So, as nice as it was that Sheila was willing to compromise — exposing the baby to both traditions — and even surprised Louis with his mother’s kugel, I’m still calling this one a fail. This couple should have had real discussions before thinking they were pregnant, and the more Sheila continues to control every aspect of the relationship, the more it, quite frankly, needs to end.

Unfortunately, the end is not in sight. Louis tried proposing to Sheila again, but she wanted to be the one to pop the question this time. Yay. They’re engaged…Ummm, and they’re not actually pregnant, so now they get to have (one-sided, probably) conversations like (terrible) adults before any Litt heirs actually come into being. Woo!

Harvey, meet your new client: David Fox. Remember when Donna made a deal with the devil and promised him that Harvey would be his lawyer for a year, for free? Well, Harvey doesn’t because he was never told.

Insert the world’s worst “not-actually-married spouses screaming at one another” fight when Harvey was approached by David Fox with the news that not only was he in the dark about the deal, but it was also time to deliver.

When Harvey confronted Donna about not keeping him informed, she said she’d added Fox to his client roster — I guess Donna’s still holding Harvey’s hand like a secretary, even now that she’s COO? — something she knew Harvey never checked. After admitting that she just wanted to see the look on Harvey’s face when he realized he didn’t have a choice in representing Fox, Donna also told him to “suck it up, take one for the team, and get this thing done.”

…and the whole dynamic was of the head-scratching, “no, really, what is happening with these two???” variety. There are some bottled-up emotions out here, being expressed through work spats, that do not actually appear to be about work. It’s confusing and frustrating…and exhausting.

When Harvey grudgingly went to see his client, he learned that David Fox wanted to by a building from his rival, John Billups, who was refusing to so much as put the building up for sale. Harvey tried (and failed) to make the purchase with a series of lies, but Billups saw right through him. Billups knew that Harvey was lying for David Fox, and he stayed firm in refusing to sell.

While this was happening, Donna was approaching Samantha about being Harvey’s backup on the case. The COO’s philosophy was that, sooner or later, the (snooze-worthy) competition between Sam and Alex would finally come to a resolution; and “no matter who [becomes name partner] first, the other team isn’t going to be happy about it. But the more we’re bonded as a family before that happens, the more likely we’ll stay a family after it does.” During the conversation, Donna also admitted to her and Harvey’s mutual hatred for Fox, which Sam took into account when doing her (as always) solo research.

So, when the meeting between Fox and Billups went downhill, complete the reveal that his client had been paying one of Billups’ clients tens of thousands of dollars per month so Billups couldn’t kick him out, Harvey snapped. He told Samantha he didn’t “give a shit about Donna’s deal” and refused to represent a client who lied to his face, then went back to the firm to have yet another huge argument with Donna.

And it got ugly, fast. Harvey went so far as to say that he was the reason Donna was even in her position, to which she had to remind him — for the millionth time — that she’d earned it. With one last plea to Harvey to keep her reputation in tact, Donna turned to her new best buddy, Samantha — whom Harvey was already jealous of because she kept secrets from him but seemed to share everything with Donna — to ask her to please keep working the case.With much less of a fight than Harvey had put up, Sam agreed.

Darvey found dead in New York. Murder suspect: Damantha.

Harvey finally came to his senses and went back to see David Fox, giving him one last chance to come clean. As it turned out, Fox was actually doing something good with all of those payments — helping out the guy who could have ruined his life for some teenaged theft but instead taught him the value of hard work. Samantha and Harvey were able to put their respective knowledge together and come to an outcome that, while not great for Fox’s ruthless image, was exactly what he needed for his mentor.

With the case finished, Harvey went in search of Donna and Sam, who happened to be together and chatting about what a terrible gift-giver he was. The ladies joked about Harvey’s terrible apology-giving style and barely addressed him while he stood there, dumbfounded, as SUITS’ newest power relationship flourished.

Sorry, Harvey. You snooze, you lose.

…but whatever that weird reaction from Donna was after Harvey tried to joke back at her, leads me to question, for at least the billionth time, what exactly is happening in the SUITS universe. Will we ever know, or is the series just going to continue to drop hints and let viewers interpret things as they will?

News & Notes.

Welcome back, Amy Acker! And please come again! Acker is amazing in everything she does, and the face that “Esther” made when she heard that Louis wasn’t going to raise his child Jewish was so, so relatable.

“I’m taking my side.” Finally, Donna. Go off.

“No, Harvey, I’m in my position because I [f-ing] earned it!!” Again, I say, “GO. OFF.” We love one incensed woman.

I never want the phrase, “sex phone” used on SUITS, ever again. Thank you.

“I’m a big, bad motherfucker, and I’m here to drink your goddamn milkshake.” Here for it, Mr. Zane. HERE. FOR. IT.

Isn’t it wonderful that Louis never once thinks about the fact that he might not have a son? What time period is this?

“I may have to represent you, but I don’t have to tolerate your mouth.” Harvey Specter, y’all.

Pretty sure Louis called his sister’s ex an asshole, meaning the Litts have a type.

“Being Jewish isn’t just a religion to me. It’s in my blood.” This is the most real SUITS quote of the week.

Louis’ story in “Sour Grapes” really hit home for Yours Truly, given that I am the product of a mixed marriage, who didn’t even wind up practicing the religion that her parents chose for her. Not to mention, I work in an environment where I see the blending of Jewish and non-Jewish families all the time. There were some great moments highlighting that struggle, and I particularly loved when Lipschitz got personal…But, ultimately, as most things do when Sheila is involved, the story fell flat. So much for great potential.

“I understand as much as anyone the value of maintaining a Jewish identity.” Same, Doc. Same.

“I didn’t know you could read.” Ok. It’s official. Sam can stay.

“Ok. Let me put this in words that you’ll understand: I have integrity. You let him go, you’re making me a liar.” Canon: Harvey can’t read, needs to be spoken to in words he’ll understand only. One of those words, however, is not “sorry.”

“There’s no way if I’m white we’re in this situation right now.” There’s your narrative, SUITS…not the way that Zane’s story actually unfolded.

Why do we never get enough Gretchen? A quick laugh about Louis not being “the only middle-aged white man who wants to be Doctor Quinn, Medicine Woman,” followed by that beautiful “you don’t need to be strong for me” moment, is just teasing SUITS viewers by dangling good food in front of their faces before starving them to death.

Loved sweet and reassuring Louis, hated that it was wasted on a toxic relationship.

“This was Donna’s idea?” “Yes. It was.” “Then, why don’t you sit down, and I’ll bring you up to speed?” Harvey can’t do anything without making sure Donna is behind him. Ok then.

Harvey was a pretty good gift giver that for that one anniversary…too bad Donna was in a relationship with someone else, though. Meanwhile, Robert Zane’s poor gift-receiving is an interesting nugget to try to look at in terms of characterization. Jury’s still out on what it all means.

“Wouldn’t you rather have people know you’re loyal than have them think you’re an asshole?” The Harvey we met in SUITS’ first season is in shock.

Is anyone else loving “The Adventures of Pops and Red” this season, or is that just me?

No, really. What is happening with Donna and Harvey in SUITS season 8? It’s…something. Donna’s certainly made Harvey do things he didn’t want to before, and they’ve certainly argued plenty, but the level of anger just didn’t fit the perceived slight with this whole Fox thing.

The next all-new episode of SUITS airs on Wednesday, September 5 at 9/8c on USA.

View Source

Ver Fuente

#ErikMalpicaFlores

0 notes