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darkesttimelinestuff · 4 years

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Mature

Men make houses. Women build homes. –Proverb.

Come come, come out tonight. Come come, come out tonight. –Sherry, The Four Seasons

***

Oh, Halloween. How it coaxes all from their shells, a come-hither seduction of ghouls and their admirers. Whether one chooses to be a witch or a princess, a criminal or a cowboy – to paint their face and knock on doors, to drink until they are but pumpkins, mouths filled with their pumpkin guts – it is all done under the otherworldly spell of the undead, the souls that ascend from their place in the basement to play marionette games with the dolls who inhabit the first floor.

Fox Mulder has, over the years, made an exceptional doll. Spock, then Captain Kirk, then Spock again. Several years of him doing nothing but sitting alone and staring out the window, ignoring the pull of a fairy costume resting in a trunk in the attic. Even then he had been a prime target; Halloween souls feed on elation, but will take misery in a pinch. His misery tasted sweet like a tootsie pop. The saints love tootsie pops, all the waiting and the work. The sinners prefer Reeses.

There were others when the memories began to fade. Han Solo. Han Solo. Paul Stanley from KISS, though his first girlfriend ended up wearing most of the makeup. Han Solo. Doctor John Watson, although years later he would grit his teeth and mutter I should have been Holmes. Serpico at a Hoover party, the last one he went to. No one got it. Then Han Solo every year he chose to celebrate after, and by then he finally had Princess Leia at his side.

The halloween of 2016, he slips into his finest costume yet.

Fox Mulder. Hopeless romantic.

On one arm, he carries a bag that is filled with good wine, cheap wine glasses, and assorted fruits, cheeses, and fancy chocolate. He has convinced his partner that the actual contents are a P.K.E. meter (a psychokinetic energy meter, for those who have not seen the documentary Ghostbusters), a thermographic camera, an audio recorder, sage, a lighter, his gun.

On the other arm, or underneath it, is his partner. Who is unsure about such open gestures of affection while they are technically on the clock, even after all the years of steaming up their steakouts, but is not stopping him, and is possibly even snuggling back as the October chill descends.

“This is not a love story, Scully,” he warns, pulling her closer as they follow the long, winding pathway up their destination. Her body heat is his favorite temperature, even when it’s ice cold. “It is a story of lies, obsession, betrayal, and murder.”

“I think I’ve heard this one.” She bumps his arm with her shoulder and smiles up at him, her lips wine deep under the bright moon.

Their shoes are silent on the stone and disappear under the layers of fog that curl and cozy around them like amorous smoke. He tugs her closer still, filling his nose with the woodsy scent of her shampoo.

“The early 1960s, Scully. Free love was just a storm a’brewin in the air, and sex, drugs, and rock ‘n roll were waiting on the doorsteps of American counterculture, waiting to be invited in. Doo-wop was still a prominent feature on family radio stations. The Beatles had yet to write their own songs, and Paul McCartney wouldn’t smoke his first joint until 1964. It was a wholesome time, Scully. You would’ve loved it.”

“I loved Rubber Soul,” she argues.

He rubs her shoulder. “But it wasn’t all sock hops and sweet Jackie Kennedy. We were fighting a war with Russia, a war of discovery, and losing to the success of Sputnik. The U.S. invaded Cuba, got their asses kicked, and were the laughing stock of the world. In the veins of America, in the buses and lunch counters, the streets and in the schools, thrummed the blood of a movement. The Civil Rights movement. The early 1960s was a time of immense change.”

They were getting closer and closer to the scene where it all took place: a sprawling, overly-windowed ranch style home, its angular roof sloping into flatlands. In the quiet darkness, the cars and the rest of the world all celebrating miles behind them, the house appears white, almost bleached. But when the sun comes out it will reveal its truth: baby pink painted wood.

“And situated in all of this madness, this time between tumult and revolution, hatred and love, was a woman named Sherry Battersea.” She hmm’s. That means Mulder, I love your stories. Keep going.

He does.

They arrive at the front door – solid mahogany, undistressed. The steps leading up to the porch are made from brick, unhassled by the years of disuse. With the moon hanging overhead, vines creeping onto the roof, and the glare of (assumed) white bathed in midnight blue and the shadows of trees rustling above, it looks absolutely– “Isn’t she beautiful?” Mulder whispers, moving his hand to Scully’s waist.

Precisely.

***

It’s all a bunch of phooey, if you ask him.

Didn’t expect that, did you?

He spent weeks finding the right place. The runner ups were all either too far away, too haunted, or not haunted enough. He wanted something with history, something still alive in the hearts of believers – but nothing verifiable, and nothing with a real reputation.

He wanted a pretty lie. Most ghost stories, he will begrudgingly admit, are indeed pretty lies.

He found the Battersea house on a subreddit dedicated to paranormal encounters, and this one hadn’t even managed to get twenty upvotes. He was number twenty. The Battersea home is in Virginia, which heavily swayed his opinion in its favor, and from the pictures posted the years of abandonment had not left it dangerous, which put it above two other options off his list. Making love to Scully while the roof collapses over their heads is a fantasy he put to rest many moons ago, about the time he realized they could just do it on a bed.

They roam the house with their flashlights, Mulder’s low voice playing in her ear as he finishes his story. “Sherry’s husband returned from war, but he never returned to her. She made this home for him and he wouldn’t even grant her the decency of staying the night.”

The biggest draw of the place had been its pristine condition. No graffiti stains the wood-paneled walls; the rooms were all intact. The interior design is a certified blast from the past, from the richly carpeted floors and textured rugs to the lucite furniture, pops of neon that splash under their flashlights. It is colorfully but rather tastefully decorated. It reminds him a bit of a movie set, which is another place he has been thoroughly laid by this woman.

As they move through the house, however, he realizes with mild disappointment the utter lack of haunting thrill. Nothing shifts in the night to give them pause. No dirt or dust to brush away, no holes in the walls or rot in the furniture. It doesn’t even smell old. It all feels more like a vacation home, some sort of themed romantic getaway, and they’re wading behind the scenes with the power turned off.

It’s not what he planned, but he’ll take it.

“Miss Battersea was a fashionable lady, keeping up with the times faster than they could come to her. She had a leopard skin pill-box hat before Jackie O had a leopard skin pill-box hat, and was dead by the time Bob Dylan could think to write a song about it.” Oh, that long, mid-century sectional couch. It might be white or a gawdy turquoise color. Whatever it is, he’s going to have her there. “She was a smart woman, too. The head of all of her many bookclubs. All of the books you see in here are hers.” His runs his beam over behind the couch, where the entire back wall is lined with books, and they move along. “And there are more in the den.

“She did everything she could to make her husband love her. She danced to his favorite records. She cooked for him and did his laundry. She cut her skirt an inch shorter with each passing trend.” They stand side by side, halted in the kitchen doorway. He turns his head and lets his eyes dip into her blouse. “I’ve been very appreciative of your new work wardrobe, by the the way.”

“Mulder,” she chastises, pulling her shirt down for better access. He laughs loudly at that, places his hand on the small of her back and leads her through the kitchen.

“She was driving herself crazy, trying to make him love her the way she loved him. And oh, did she love him, her sweet Maximus Battersea.” More wood paneling, and modular, pastel appliances that appear as if they haven’t aged a day since their prime. In the middle is a solid island with a geometric vase of dead flowers. This is where he’ll lay out all the food. Should’ve gotten flowers, he mopes to himself, but remembers that Scully doesn’t have a lot of patience for them. “They were high school sweethearts, and when he was 18 he was drafted off in the Korean War.

“Something was wrong when he came back. He got a job at some juicing plant working the machines, but showed a savvy for bossing people around that made itself known to the owners. He moved up quickly to supervisor and then warden. He and his little wife then bought this house, and Sherry made it her life’s work to take good care of it. Not a speck of dirt to be found.” Even to this day. They both marvel at the cleanliness. “Dishes were done as soon as they were used. Food was on the table for when he got home, still hot enough to serve. But he never got home to her at night. He would spend his nights at the bar, and then he became a favored customer at the Grand Major Hotel.”

“Oooooh. I would’ve killed the bastard,” Scully whistles, opening up a cabinet and standing on her tiptoes to peer in. He steps in behind her and lifts her up, chuckling when she screams and elbows him in the chest.

“Hmm, I know you would,” he mumbles in her ear, smacking a little kiss underneath it. All the glassware in the cabinet, chipless and clean as a whistle, clinks and jingles while she moves her hand through it. “You’re a jealous monster. So was Sherry Battersea.”

He’s making some of this shit up. He doesn’t know if she liked to read or if she was all that beautiful a woman, but the details make the story. “I’m not jealous,” Scully snorts, and he bites her neck as punishment for her blatant lie while dropping her back on her feet.

He wonders, as he pins her against the counter, if she’s caught on to his plans. He sets the flashlight down in front of her and snakes his arms around her from behind. “One night, he did come back to this big old house. But he was with someone else.”

“Oh, I would’ve killed him,” she repeats, tilting her head to get his lips on her neck. His nose brushes her cheek and he grins; she definitely knows. “I would’ve killed her.”

“And that’s what she did,” he says, kneading her hips. “They were on the couch, still mostly in their clothes. She snuck up from behind, and with all the power of her rage, she pushed one of her many bookcases right on top of them, crushing them to death.”

“I would’ve waited until they were naked. More humiliating.”

“Jealous. Monster.” Mulder says fondly, breaking away to grab her arm. “Now they say that Sherry Battersea remains in this house, long after she was convicted and put to death. She gave her life to building a home. It’s fitting that she give it her death as well.”

“And that’s what we’re here to investigate?” She says, narrowing her eyes.

“We’re here to say hi to old Sherry,” Mulder lies, urging her along. Neither of them are scared, despite of their previous history with ghosts. He’s not sure if Scully even remembers. That house had not been a pretty lie. It had only been filled with ugly truths.

On their way up the stairs, pausing at each creak even though the foundation is craftful and sturdy, a tune plays in his head. “Sherry… Sherry baby…” he sings, letting his voice go comically high. It’s too loud in the quiet house surrounded by nothing, and Scully turns around to slap a palm over his mouth.

“That’s a bad Frankie Valli impression,” she says, arching her eyebrow. “Want me to make it better?”

He kisses her palm. She takes it away and continues her charge up the stairs. When she’s far away enough, he finishes the line in his ghastly falsetto, voice cracking.

“Sherry, won’t you come out tonight?”

Come come, come out tonight. Come come. Come out tonight.

***

In the den on the other side of the house, a lightbulb flickers. The glow it casts under the lampshade is a soft, pinky red, the color of a deep blush. The winds caress the house with the sigh of a new lover. There is a soft scritching noise, a click of a record sliding into place. Static, and then…

Sherry, Sherry baby! Sherry, Sherry baby!

***

“I was listening to particle physicist Brian Cox on the radio the other day, talking with Neil deGrasse Tyson,” Scully says, sipping coffee from her thermos. She shivers a little in her suede jacket and Mulder regrets not finding somewhere a little warmer. Temperatures are at an all time high this fall in Virginia, but it’s still uncomfortable. He plans on warming her up anyway. “He’s a Professor at the University of Manchester and works on the Large Hadron Collider at CERN. You’ve probably listened to him before on a podcast. He tackles a lot of different concepts in science fiction. Frankenstein, for instance.”

“Corpse reanimation is my favorite,” Mulder says. “I know a lot about it.” She pets his hair and hands him her mug. He drinks from it gratefully. Another thing to regret. He hadn’t brought his own mug.

“Specifically, he was saying that ghosts could not exist because of what the collider tells us. You know what it does. It essentially uses a network of very complex, high-powered magnets – the largest, most expensive machine in the world – that are continuously switched on and off to send particles flying at almost the speed of light. The purpose of it is to find out what everything is made if. The particles collide and emit smaller particles, which we can observe, along with their interactions with other particles.”

“We used it to discover the Higgs Boson particle, which tells us how particles get their mass. The God Particle. It was a discovery over half a century in the making.”

“Mostly, yes. The argument was that if ghosts were real, they would emit particles that should be detectable in the Large Hadron Collider, and those particles would be able interact with the particles that make us up.”

Mulder’s silent for a moment, thinking. “What if the LHC isn’t powerful enough to detect those particles?”

“Mulder.” She licks her lips and angles her body towards him on the couch, looking into his eyes. Incredulity is still her best look. “This machine has been able to reconstruct temperatures and states of matter that only existed a microsecond after the birth of the universe, before it changed states. It is a very powerful machine.”

“But it still hasn’t answered everything,” he points out, shrugging his shoulders. “I mean, we still know nothing about dark matter. And dark matter is called dark matter because we know nothing about dark matter, only that it could explain why galaxies might contain less mass than what we’ve calculated.” He nods at her, taking another sip. “Maybe all that extra mass is a bunch of ghosts. Bet you never thought of that.”

“Mmm. Your souls in the starlight.” He scoots closer to her, slowly sliding his arm behind her on the back of the couch. When he leans forward, she says, “Mulder, maybe we should split up.”

“What?” He says, not pulling back. There’s enough light coming in from the windows that he can see her clearly, her noble profile shadowed and unshadowed as he moves towards her. He smells her perfume… and pine sol. “Now why would we do that? Last time we split up during a case like this you shot me.”

“I didn’t shoot you. You shot me.” So she does remember. She’s still talking when his lips are close enough to brush hers. “But how are we gonna catch this ghost sitting down?”

“Well, we don’t have to be sitting down.” He kisses her, a chaste, sweet little thing. He pulls back an inch and kisses her again. And again. And again. “We can.” Kiss. “Stop sitting.” Kiss. “Anytime you want.”

“Mulder.” Kiss. “Where’s the ghost?” Kiss. “Where’s Sherry?” Kiss. She’s folding under his body weight, falling back into the remarkably undusty cushions. She cups his jaw in her small hands and kisses him for real, chasing the flicker of his tongue with her own. She stretches one leg behind him, lets the other fall off the couch.

He groans and shifts so that he’s nestled between her thighs. There is – so much he loves about kissing Scully. In a lot of ways he’s learning her all over again after the time they’ve spent apart. Her face is thinner, he can trace her bones with his fingers, but not that sickly thin it had been the day she walked out. Her hair got its shine back. She tastes like a day at the office, her coffee and Cliff bars and the Burt’s Bees lipstick she wears during the cold weather.

But. Kiss. Her hands are bunched up in his shirt, very much like she’s prepared to rip it off of him. But this is is going too fast. Kiss. He forces himself to break away, taking his hand out from under her blouse.

Trying to control her breathing, pupils dilated, she lifts her chin and licks his lips. “So you want me to shoot you this time around?”

He laughs and moves off of her, giving her space her to sit back up and fix her wrinkled clothing. He winces and struggles to rearrange his wayward dick. Men’s pants are so tight now. He misses the freedom of the 90s.

“I uh. So here’s,” he pauses, rubbing a hand over his jaw. “Here’s the thing. There is no ghost.”

She blinks slowly. He wants to move a lock of silky red hair out of her eye, but keeps his hands to himself as she thinks things through. “You brought me to an abandoned house to… what? Make out with me?”

“Well, no. I mean yes. But I have…” All these years and this stuff still makes him tongue tied. “Libations. And… mood music.”

She raises her eyebrows, but her eyes are softer. “The Monster Mash?”

“The Prince version, yeah.” He leers at her. “It was a graveyard smash.”

“Oh my god,” she groans, letting her head fall back on the cushions.

“Think about it. The way I see it, Halloween is our holiday, right? Mr. and Mrs. Spooky.”

“No one ever called me Mrs. Spooky.”

“I did. All the time.”

She smiles. “I guess it beats the time you set me on fire for Valentine’s Day.”

“I don’t want to kill the adrenaline here,” he says, partially damning himself for ruining it so early. He lost a good amount of blood to that kiss. “There could absolutely be a ghost here. I’m just saying this isn’t my most reliably sourced case.”

“Are any of them?” She sighs, but she reaches out to pat his shoulder. “Go grab us some libations and make me forget this conversation.”

He ducks down to kiss her cheek. “Yes ma’am.”

Taking his bag of goodies to the kitchen, he pulls out the wooden cutting board he brought along to serve everything and all of the bags of pre-cut cheese, crackers, fruit and meat. He hums while he works. Hm. Hm hm. Hm hm. Hm hm. Hm. And it starts over, the notes twanging loudly in his mind. It is almost as if he could hear it being played through the walls – he feels it from the outside, rather than in his head. He blames it on his massive erection. He takes out the wine glasses and fills them up high enough to placate Scully and make his mother roll in her grave. Vineyard folk are serious about their wine.

He gets a good look at the kitchen as he works, transported back into a time he doesn’t know very well. The cottages on the Vineyard never kept up with any particular trend, opting instead for the timelessness of colonial whitewash and brown trim. They changed out maids and nannies like they’d change the air filters, and neither Teena nor Bill put effort into upkeep. Neither cared much for fidelity either he grimaces, and immediately feels bad for doing so.

If there is any truth to the tale, he aches for people like Sherry who gave their all and never knew when to take it back. He gets it. Sometimes you fixate on people. He had been a victim of it more than once, and now he’s the one waiting for the one he loves most to come back home.

He grabs the cutting board and the wine glasses, balancing them carefully, anchoring the stopped bottle in his armpit. The second bottle of wine and the dessert he’ll save for later are left on the counter. He hums his way back to the living room, his woman still sprawled out on the couch, waiting for him, and he forgets about Sherry.

Behind him, in the kitchen, there’s a flutter in the cabinets, sounds of gently moving ceramic. A pleasant, almost feminine noise, like tinkering laughter. Then there’s the pop of a cork.

The bottle moves, sliding to the end of the island. Then it rises into the air, bobbing up and down as if being carried by invisible hands.

Over the sink, the bottle upends. The glug-glug-glug of sweet red flows into the pipes. Just one glass’s worth.

The air is warmer, somehow.

Like a full body flush.

***

He sweeps her over the creaking floorboards, her cheek pressed to his chest. The cold has left them. His phone sits on the sleek, white coffee table, and his Elvis tunes play, his Dylan, some acoustic hits. She nuzzles in closer and hums along to Roberta Flack, Sinatra, that Cher song they both like so much.

“Why don’t you believe in the ghost, Mulder?” She murmurs, a little sad.

“I don’t know that I’m against the idea of her existing,” he says into her hair, closing his eyes. They turn. Sometimes he dips her, sometimes he spins her, but they spend most of the time just like this: as close as possible, eyes closed, careful not to bump into any of the furniture. “I just need more proof these days.”

“Well,” she says. “I’ll believe for the both of us then.”

He lifts his chin from her head, surprised. He pushes her away to search her face. “You believe in Sherry?”

“You had me with that dark matter point,” she shrugs. “If souls… did exist, they would most likely exist as a form of matter we haven’t discovered yet.”

“Dana Scully, but you are tipsy,” he chuckles, pulling her back to him. “If you believe, I believe. Sherry Battersea is alive and with us.”

“Why’d you bring us here if you didn’t think it was haunted?”

He thinks about this, rubbing his hands up and down her back. “We’ve got a long way to go, don’t we Scully?” She looks up at him, cocking her head. “You haven’t…. Moved back yet.” His thumbs caress her waist. “Into our home.”

Her face falls. “Mulder–” she tries to step away, but he holds onto her, shaking his head.

“It’s okay, Scully. Scully, I’m not mad. I’m not asking you to do anything before you’re ready.” He presses a kiss to the center of her forehead, smoothing his hand down the length of her hair. She closes her eyes. “But I thought maybe… if I could recreate… not an exact replica of the good old days, because we were always getting our asses kicked, but something tonally similar, it might help. Show you that I appreciate you and that… I miss you, and that I’m so fucking grateful that…”

She saves him by wrapping her arms around his neck and bringing him in for a slow, mind-melting kiss.

There are none of the cobwebs that decorated all those places in their youth, not like he’d been hoping. The shadows that float across the room are all accounted for. There is no fear. It is not quite like the old days, but he remembers this: holding her hips as they move above him in the dark, the rise and fall of her upturned breasts, the underside of her chin when she tosses her head back and gasps. She rides him into the couch, the sweltering sheath of her body spreading warmth from his cock to the tips of his fingers and toes. He watches her face in the shadows again, how her expressions undulate in the moonlight. She still keeps her apartment, but she’s come back to him in every way that matters.

In the kitchen, a bottle breaks. A tray of dark chocolates hits the wall at full speed.

“Did you hear that?” Scully breathes, furrowing her brow but not stopping, refusing to stop their decades-old rhythm. His hands slip around to grip her rear and he shakes his head. Wind rattles the windows, a howling, devastated screech that neither Mulder nor Scully can relate to.

***

“…Mulder,” Scully frowns, her nude form wrapped up in a fleece blanket he’d brought in from the car. She sits on the floor in front of the middle bookcase, running her fingers over the titles. “You said this place was abandoned, right?”

He’s dozing on the couch, KO’d from sex and the little bit of wine they’d had. “Mmm,” he rubs his cheek and yawns. “Yep. No one lives here.”

“I just find it odd that a place that’s been abandoned for so long shows so few signs of disrepair. In fact…” she runs her hand over the books again. “This place is cleaner than my own. You’re absolutely sure no one lives here?”

“It’s condemned,” he says. “Government says it’s no longer fit to live in.”

“That’s… weird.” She pulls out an old pulp romance novel and flips through the pages. “It seems perfectly habitable.”

“It might have something to do with the plumbing. There are all sorts of strange, outdated Virginia laws that classify a place as livable –” he’s cut off by a sharp yelp and a thud. He sits straight up and peers over the couch. “Scully?”

“I’m okay,” she groans, massaging the back of her head. “A book fell and hit me from the top shelf. But it hit me hard. Jesus, it feels like I got pelted with it.”

He climbs over the back of the couch to join her on the floor, and she laughs when he pecks and pats the top of her head.

“I have just the thing to make it better,” he says, standing back up.

“Again? So fast?” She sounds impressed. Excited. He shoots her a look.

“I was offering more wine, Scully. But ouch.” Her cackling follows him into the kitchen.

The sight that greets him freezes him cold. That extra wine bottle rests in a million shiny pieces, and what was once a glaringly yellow wall bleeds dark red with the wine streaking down to the sideboards. “Scully?” he calls out hoarsely, approaching the scene with caution.

“Shit!” she screams. His stomach drops with fear and he darts back out into the living room to find her huddled under hundreds of fallen books. “What the hell?”

“Scully!” He drops to his knees beside her, throwing book after book off to the side and clutching her face in his hands. “Are you okay? Are you hurt?”

“Not bad, but I’m beginning to see why this place might be condemned. The bookshelf just rattled and all the books fell off. Maybe there’s something wrong with the foundation.” He helps her out of the pile and they both move away, far back from the shelf.

“Rattled?” he asks, alarmed. “Like it was being shaken?”

“I thought it might be coming from the walls,” she posits, but that doesn’t sit right with him. Anxiety begins to gnaw his stomach into pits.

“You don’t think,” he starts and stops, biting his lip. He wants to put his clothes back on. The chill is coming back. “You don’t think that…”

“Think what, Mulder?”

“That… something was trying to push the bookshelf? On purpose?”

She looks at him, startled. “What? Like a ghost?” He nods his head, shrugging, and she angrily clutches the blanket around herself, turning her back to him to pick up her clothes. “You just told me you didn’t believe there were any ghosts here.”

“You just told me you did,” he argues, following his own garment trail.

“Mulder,” she whines, pulling on her bra. “I don’t actually – I was just…”

“You were lying?” He asks, pausing with his shirt over his head. The hurt catches him off guard.

“I wasn’t lying, I just… I’m so…” she sighs, doing up her fly and buttoning up her shirt. “I never know how you’re feeling these days, and…” she doesn’t finish. He nods slowly, a hot wave of dejection flooding his cheeks. There are traces of ancient anger he wants to pull from, that’s the easier path, but he can’t bring himself to do it.

“I never needed you to lie to me, Scully, and I certainly never asked you to,” he says roughly. He turns away from her to pull on his underwear, jeans, and jacket. He ignores her attempts at apologies and walks in long strides to the kitchen. “Come look at this,” he calls to her flatly.

Just when he thinks he’s pushed past the resentment of her leaving and the guilt at having made her leave, all of the other feelings are brought to the forefront. The shame. The fragility. He’s spent the last several months trying to prove to her that he can make it on his own – that his need for her doesn’t stem from an inability to function without her, but the irrefutable fact that they work so much better together – and the whole time she’s been… what?

Seeing him as a fucking child? Wearing kid-gloves in all of her interactions with him, holding back her opinions in fear of setting him off? Oh, Jesus. Is this why she won’t move back? She thinks he’s not ready?

“Here.” Side by side, they stand in front of the stain on the wall, mindful of the smushed chocolates and shards of glass.

“Maybe they fell?” Scully guesses weakly, at least having the decency to look contrite.

“They fell? At fifty miles an hour?” Maybe there is some anger he can pull from. “Unlikely. Didn’t you tell me you felt like that book had been pelted at you?”

“Yes but Mulder that could be anything. You said yourself the house was condemned.”

“Yeah, but–” he bends down to inspect the chocolate on the floor, picking one crushed morsel up to show her. “This looks… this looks like it’s been stepped on, crushed by something. What kind of foundational issue would cause that?”

She looks at it and sighs, pinching the bridge of her nose.

“Let’s split up,” Mulder says. “Take the top floor. I’ll take the bottom. It’s what we came here for anyway, right?” And he leaves her alone in the kitchen.

***

The den drastically departs from the design ideal of the rest of the house. Under his flashlight he spots leather rock chairs, worn and overstuffed, plain walnut bookshelves and orange shag carpets. He looks through the books and the desk drawers, searching for anything personal. Photos, journals, receipts kept, anything that might give him any insight into Sherry Battersea and the lonely, lonely house she kept. No luck.

There is a large stack of records sitting next to a hefty Champion record player, dressed in supple red leatherette. He flips through them. The Big Bopper. Fats Domino. The Lennon Sisters. More and more of the same ilk – an Elvis Christmas LP he’s pretty sure is the real deal, and which he shamefully considers sliding under his coat. He then inspects the player itself, lifts the arm to see the stack of singles underneath it. He lets the arm fall back into place.

It begins to play.

He yelps, stumbling backwards and collapsing onto the rock chair as the music plays loudly enough to fill the house.

Sherry! Sherry baby! Sherry! Sherry baby!

Mulder clutches for the back of the chair and watches in terrified fascination as the entire den comes to life. The lamp flicks on and casts the room in its soft pink light, turning brown into different shades of red. Warmth trickles in from the air vent and all in his body he feels the electric hum of a machine coming to life. He knows instantly that means every other room in the house must be waking up in the same way. Scully he thinks, attempting to jump to his feet.

He’s knocked back on his ass. “What the–” he tries again, and the shag rug slithers out from underneath the desk, coming at him like a cautious snake.

Sherry! Sherry baby! Sheeeeeeeeeeeeerry bay-ay-by! Sherry, can you come out tonight?

“Scullllllaaaay!” He shouts, but he’s no match against The Four Seasons bleating from the – not from the record machine, but from – everywhere, what –

Why - don’t - you - come out? Come out! To my twist party! Where the bright moon shines!

The rug does just that, rises up, twists back and forth like wringing water out from a cloth. Still moving slowly it comes up to his feet, and he brings his legs up and hugs his knees close to his body, expelling an embarrassing squeak that would give Frankie Valli a run for his money. The rug continues its ascent, sliding up his legs, like – like a caress - gentle – warm – not like a rug, but like –

Like a human.

Mulder kicks his legs out with as much force as he can muster and the rug drops to the floor with a muffled poof. Then he’s leaping out of the chair and throwing open the door, giggling crazily when – he swears he feels it – something invisible tugs at his shirt, at his pant legs and hands.

He runs out out of the den into the open hallway like a scene straight out A Hard Day’s Night, and it’s just as he suspected. All the lights are on, and the Battersea house is thrown into full technicolor, much more vivid than he could have imagined. The lucite chairs are the brightest reds and blues he’s ever seen on furniture in his life, the sofa and the tables and the cleanest, starkest white. The light from the bulbous chandelier sparkles and spins. That pine sol scent – and then something else – Shalimar? – the alien-looking Philco television set on its tall thin stand, some old Gunsmoke episode. Then the channels flip and flip and it’s the Twilight Zone, and he’s being shoved by the air over to the couch. “Scully!” He yells again, laughing, merrily going along with the phantom guide. How is this for proof of a spirit world? This has got to be the single strongest case for the existence of poltergeists ever experienced. “Scully! Come here!”

“Mulder!” Scully screeches, straight from the gut.

Three gunshots go off.

His laughter corks in his throat, his heart drops to his stomach. Mulder races into the kitchen, faster than the grip that vies for him. The wine has been scrubbed from the walls, the glass swept from the floor. Something delicious simmers on the stove, and as he darts past the island he notices a bottle of vodka and a carton of orange juice pouring into a metal mixer. No body performs the action. They float in the air and the liquid comes out in steady, even streams.

That’s his drink. He shudders and hops up the stairs, taking two at a time. Scully’s voice has died out but he can still hear it pounding in his head, along with the never ceasing with your red dress on! Mmm you look so fine! and his ragged breath. “Scully!” He yells again, throwing open every door as he comes to it. The towels in the bathroom, the shower curtain, all rip themselves from their places and slither and slide after him, licking at his ankles and tripping him up. Gold and copper tubes of lipstick chase behind him, leaving behind perfect lip imprints on the walls.

When he gets to the bedroom, he finds Scully bound and gagged to the four poster bed, screaming into the pillowcase stuffed in mouth. “Scully,” he hisses, falling to his knees in front of her, pulling out the gag and deftly untying the knots around her ankles and wrists.

“That crazy–” she coughs and struggles underneath him, making it impossible to get her unbound. “That crazy bitch –” “Stop moving–” but she won’t, she’s writhing and wrestling until he has to cover her with his weight, yelling at her all the way. “Crazy fucking bitch!” She screams. When she’s free from her ties she shoves Mulder off of her and hops to her feet, tearing through the bedroom like a hurricane. “Where the fuck did she put my gun–”

“She took your gun?” Mulder panics, ripping through the room with her. “Scully, did you–” he sees it, three bullet holes in the corner of the ceiling. “Did you shoot the house, Scully?”

“You bet I fucking shot the house!” She screams. “Aha!” She pulls out the gun from the nightstand, cocks it, and tries to run out of the room.

“Scully,” Mulder grabs her by the shoulders and pulls her to him, ignoring her struggling. “Scully, I’m thinking this is an extremely malevolent, extremely powerful poltergeist. You cannot shootpoltergeists–”

She whips around, turning on him and backing him into the wall. “Malevolent? Did she drag you by your hair into the bedroom and tie you to a bed, Mulder? You look suspiciously unharassed.”

He licks his lips and stutters. “Uh, no. That has not been – that has not been my experience.” She raises both eyebrows and crosses her arm, waiting for him to continue. He rushes on. “I think Sherry’s still here, trying to take care of her husband.”

Scully steps back, eyes widening in shock. Her mouth opens and closes. Slowly, quietly, she asks, “Are you saying… the… poltergeist… is trying to seduce you?”

“And kill my mistress? Yeah,” he huffs a laugh and wraps his arms around her stunned and silent frame, letting his body relax against hers for just a minute. He’s getting too old for this kind of exertion. “Oh, god. You scared the shit out of me, Scully.”

“Sorry to cause so much stress, Mr. Battersea,” she grumbles, burying her nose in his neck. He nuzzles her hair and she lifts her head, slotting their lips together in a sweet, relief-filled kiss. If she’ll forgive him his affair with the carpet, he’ll forgive her everything. She pulls back, shaking her hair out of her face and straightening out her shoulders. “Now how do we get rid of this thing? What’s all in that bag you brought?”

He freezes. Shit.

“Mulder, no,” she says, horrified.

***

They slink down the stairs, Scully first, gun first, just in case. The breath of the house is soft, deceivingly calm. The music has been shut off. No objects float in the kitchen, the stove is turned off. Nothing tries to pull Mulder out of his clothes, or Scully into a closet.

“I think our little display back there pissed her off,” Mulder says grimly, staying close behind Scully.

“You’re my husband,” she bites out, straightening her shooter’s stance. “I kiss you whenever I want.”

They pause before entering the living room, looking at each other.

“That’s where it all happened,” Mulder whispers, nodding his head at the door. “If we go out there…”

“Should we just make a run for it then?” Scully asks, biting her lip. He bites his lip, too, and they meet each other’s eyes. He nods slowly.

They take off, pounding their feet against the hardwood and running as fast as they can, Mulder’s hands barely grazing Scully’s shoulders, but they never stood a chance. Floorboards are snatched almost from under their feet; chairs and tables go hurtling through the air. They drop down, Mulder curling his body over hers and shielding his head when bronze ornaments chuck themselves off of their stands, decorative mirrors drop to the floor, sending their shards flying.

From every molecule of the house, Frankie Valli’s falsetto warps into a deep, unsettling baritone.

Come come. Come out tonight. Come come. Come out tonight. Come come. Come out tonight.

“Say a prayer, Scully,” Mulder groans, wincing when a piece of glass whizzes past his head and scrapes up the back of his hands. She begins to frantically mutter one under her breath, but it’s useless. The storm doesn’t stop.

“Sherry,” Mulder tries. “Sherry!” He says louder. The music ends, but the the violence doesn’t. “Sherry, I know you were hurt!”

A woosh of a sigh is expelled from all the air vents. Objectiles drop straight to the floor. Mulder takes a deep breath and rolls off of Scully, who chokes and coughs into her arm.

He keeps going, not exactly sure what he’s saying. “Your husband was a selfish man who didn’t treat you the way you deserved. You loved him. You gave him everything. You cleaned up every mess, you paid every bill, you did everything he asked of you and it still wasn’t enough.” He swallows, pressing his bleeding hand to his stomach. “He still wouldn’t come home to you.

“It wasn’t your fault, Sherry. People who love you don’t do that to you. People who love you know that you aren’t perfect and come home to you anyway.”

The house is so quiet it is almost as if his soft, soothing voice has lulled it to sleep, and for a moment he thinks it has. Water drips from the air vents, from the windows, single, silent tears of condensation.

Crumpled next to him, Scully is sniffing. He glances at her, worried, but she’s smiling through her tears, sliding her hand through debri and dust to wrap around his. He smiles back, surprised to discover that he’s crying, too.

But she’s suddenly yanked away, screaming as those invisible hands drag her by her ankles and toss her onto the couch. “Scully!” Mulder yells, getting up to run toward her.

He’s tripped by an orange shag carpet.

“It’s not you, Sherry, it’s me,” he whimpers, frantically wriggling as the carpet begins to roll up with him inside of it. He groans and drags himself across the floor with his hands, carpet and all. The Philco set buzzes past him in the air and he shouts. “Watch out, Scully!”

He doesn’t see where it lands, but it the sound it make is a sickening smack, a bludgeoning soundtrack. “Scully?” No response. “Scully?”

He groans, dragging himself with agonizing slowness until he’s at the couch. Propping himself up his arms, his legs still wrapped in the rug, his mouth waters in fear and his stomach tightens at the sight of her, pale and silent, with one patch of bloody red hair staining her temple.

He checks her pulse, is relieved to find it faint, but still there. He kicks and pounds inside his trap until it’s beaten slack and stupid, and lifts himself onto the couch.

“Scully?” He lightly touches the spot where she’s hurt and she jerks her head and groans. “Oh, thank god.”

“Take me to dinner next time,” she winces, feeling the wound for herself and hissing out when she brushes the most tender part. She sits up, he pulls her hair away to give her better access. “I probably need to go to the hospital for this.”

“Well let’s try and get you there, partner.” One hand on her back, the other on her shoulder, he tries to help her up, but is interrupted with the sound of… “Scully. Scully, shit.”

“What?”

“Scully, the bookca–” SLAM.

***

She hauls him out of the dead and empty house, panting with the exertion and the throbbing pain in her head.

“I think–I think she went back to sleep,” Mulder yaps manically. “I think that put her to sleep. Reenacting the – the crime.” “We’re not dead, Mulder,” she grunts. Another foot down the driveway. “I just wish we were dead.”

“I think we better call an ambulance, Scully,” he says, resigned. “I don’t think either of us can drive.”

They call the ambulance and wait. Scully plops down beside him, wincing as the morning sun reflects off the ugly pink wood and cuts into her blurry vision. “This sucks, Mulder,” she sighs, squeezing her fists into her eyes.

“God, I know. This was a terrible idea. I don’t know what I was thinking.”

“How are you going to help me move with two broken ankles?” She sighs again, shaking her head. “I’ll have to hire somebody now.”

He beams at her.

***

All the spirits rejoice and return to their graves for their year long sleep.

***

Girl, you make me lose my mind!

#fanfic #xfiles fanfic #the x files #txf #wtfmulder #mulder #scully #mulder and scully #mulderxscully #halloween #haunted house #spooky #msr

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thecoleopterawithana · 5 years

Quote

The next night Elliot [Mintz] took us out with a friend of his, Sal Mineo, and we all went to a gay cabaret/discotheque. John was oblivious to the gay ambience. He was curious about everyone's sexuality and liked to gossip about who was sleeping with whom, whether they were gay or straight. John made no judgements about homosexuality but was really curious about who was and who wasn't gay. He knew that his appearance at a gay club might start rumors about his own sexuality, and it made him laugh. He told me that there had been rumors about him and his first manager, Brian Epstein, and that he usually didn't deny them. He liked the fact that people could be titillated by having suspicions about his masculinity. Then I was the one who was laughing. "How could anyone believe a man who likes women as much as you do is gay?" I told him. After the show we went back to Mineo's apartment. I was thirsty, and Mineo told me to look in the refrigerator. There was nothing in it but one big bottle of amyl nitrite. Mineo told John that he knew Ava Gardner. "I'm a real fan of hers. I love Ava," John replied excitedly. Mineo went to the phone, called London, woke Gardner up, and told her that John wanted to speak to her. John took the phone. "Ava, is that you? Ava, I think you're beautiful. I've seen all your movies. Christ, is it really you?" They spoke for five minutes, then a thrilled John handed the phone back to Mineo.

In May Pang’s Loving John (1983).

[Once again, a million thanks to @eppysboys for sending over passages of interest.]

Elliot Mintz (born February 16, 1945) is an American consultant. In the 1960s and early 1970s Mintz was an underground radio DJ and host. In the 1970s he became a spokesperson for John Lennon and Yoko Ono, and took on other musicians and actors as clients as a publicist, including Bob Dylan. [...]

Though not in a professional capacity, since the death of Lennon, Mintz has acted as a spokesperson for the Lennon estate. In addition, while sifting through Lennon's belongings, he discovered hundreds of unreleased tape recordings including half-finished new songs, early versions of famous hits, and idle thoughts. Beginning in 1988, he hosted a weekly syndicated radio series based upon these recordings called The Lost Lennon Tapes, which was broadcast for about four years. After the show came to an end, Mintz began hosting the spinoff radio program The Beatle Years. Mintz has appeared in feature documentaries about Lennon and Yoko Ono, including The U.S. vs. John Lennon, Imagine: John Lennon and The Real Yoko Ono. In 1985 he was a technical advisor on the television film John and Yoko: A Love Story. He also authored an essay about his relationship with them published in 2005 in a book entitled Memories of John Lennon. [Source]

Salvatore Mineo Jr. (January 10, 1939 – February 12, 1976) was an American actor, singer and director. Mineo is best known for his Academy Award-nominated performance as John "Plato" Crawford opposite James Dean in the film Rebel Without a Cause (1955). Mineo also received a Golden Globe Award and an Academy Award nomination for his supporting role in Exodus (1960). A 1950s teen idol, Mineo's acting career declined in his adult years. He was murdered in 1976. [...]

By the early 1960s, Mineo was becoming too old to play the type of role that had made him famous, and his rumoured homosexuality led to his being considered inappropriate for leading roles. [...] In 1969, Mineo returned to the stage to direct a Los Angeles production of the LGBT-themed play Fortune and Men's Eyes (1967), featuring then-unknown Don Johnson as Smitty and himself as Rocky. The production received positive reviews, although its expanded prison rape scene was criticized as excessive and gratuitous. [...] By 1976, Mineo's career had begun to turn around. While playing the role of a bisexual burglar in a series of stage performances of the comedy P.S. Your Cat Is Dead in San Francisco, Mineo received substantial publicity from many positive reviews; he moved to Los Angeles along with the play.

Mineo met English-born actress Jill Haworth on the set of the film Exodus in 1960, in which they portrayed young lovers. Mineo and Haworth were together on-and-off for many years. They were engaged to be married at one point. According to Mineo biographer Michael Gregg Michaud, Haworth cancelled the engagement after she caught Mineo engaging in sexual relations with another man. The two did remain very close friends until Mineo's death. [...] While some have described Haworth as being nothing but a close friend and a "beard" to Mineo to conceal his same-sex partners, Michaud casts doubt upon this claim; he asserts that Mineo and Haworth's relationship was genuine, that Mineo fell in love with Haworth, and that Mineo regarded her as one of the important people in his life. [Source]

“Portrait of a Marriage really disturbed [John]. The book was an account of the fifty-year marriage of Vita Sackville-West and Harold Nicholson, both of whom were bisexual and continually unfaithful to each other, yet were able to evolve a relationship of great depth and longevity despite the incompleteness of their marriage. John was very distressed by the theme of sexual incompatibility in the midst of great emotional attraction and the fact that no matter how hard one tries, a marriage may always remain incomplete.”

In a 1972 interview with Boze Hadleigh, Mineo discussed his bisexuality. At the time of his death, he was in a six-year relationship with male actor Courtney Burr III. [Source]

BH: Who are those two girls you mentioned, for a double date?

SM: (Laughs.) Are you kidding? I got a girl in every port- and a couple of guys in every port, too.

BH: Do you think rumors about being bi have hurt you in your career?

SM: Maybe. . . Nah, I doubt it. Everyone's got those rumors following him around, whether it's true or not. Everyone's supposed to be bi, starting way back with Gary Cooper and on through Brando and Clift and Dean and Newman and . . . you want me to stop?

BH: Did you resent the rumors?

SM: Well, no. Because what's wrong with being bi? Maybe most people are, deep down.

BH: Shirley MacLaine has publicly said that.

SM: I think she's right- got a good noodle, Shirl does. But anyhow, the rumor about me, from what I hear, was usually that I'm gay. Where, like, with Monty Clift or Brando, the rumor was that they're bi. [Brando later publicly admitted to bisexuality.]

— Boze Hadleigh’s interview with Sal Mineo (1972).

“John and I had a big talk about it, saying, basically, all of us must be bisexual. And we were sort of in a situation of thinking that we’re not [bisexual] because of society. So we are hiding the other side of ourselves, which is less acceptable. But I don’t have a strong sexual desire towards another woman.”

Have you ever? “Not really, not sexually.”

One online satire imagined an affair between Ono and Hillary Clinton.

“It’s great,” Ono laughs. “I mean, both John and I thought it was good that people think we were bisexual, or homosexual.” She laughs again.

What about that old rumor that Lennon had sex with Beatles manager Brian Epstein (which was also the subject of the 1991 film, The Hours and The Times)?

Lennon himself said: “Well, it was almost a love affair, but not quite. It was never consummated. But it was a pretty intense relationship.” Later, Lennon’s friend Pete Shotton said Lennon had told him that he had allowed Epstein to “toss [wank] him off.”

“Uh, well, the story I was told was a very explicit story, and from that I think they didn’t have it [sex],” Ono tells me.

— in Yoko Ono: I Still Fear John’s Killer by Tim Teeman for the Daily Beast (13 October 2015).

Q. Have you ever fucked a guy?

A. Not yet, I thought I’d save it til I was 40, life begins at 40 you know, tho I never noticed it.

Q. It is trendy to be bisexual and you’re usually ‘keeping up with the Jones’, haven’t you ever… there was talk about you and PAUL…

A. Oh, I thought it was about me and Brian Epstein… anyway, I’m saving all the juice for my own version of THE REAL FAB FOUR BEATLES STORY etc.. etc..

Q. It seems like you’re saving quite a lot for when you’re 40…

A. Yes, there might be nothing better to do, tho I don’t believe it.

— John Lennon, interview conducted by/on John Lennon, and/or Dr Winston O’boogie, for Andy Warhol’s Interview Magazine (November 1974).

John: [...] I was trying to put it 'round that I was gay, you know– I thought that would throw them off… dancing at all the gay clubs in Los Angeles, flirting with the boys… but it never got off the ground.

Q: I think I’ve only heard that lately about Paul.

John: Oh, I’ve had him, he’s no good. [Laughter]

— John Lennon, interviewed by Lisa Robinson for Hit Parader: A conversation with John Lennon (December 1975).

Like other alkyl nitrites, amyl nitrite is bioactive in mammals, being a vasodilator, which is the basis of its use as a prescription medicine. As an inhalant, it also has a psychoactive effect, which has led to its recreational use with its smell being described as that of old socks or dirty feet. It is also referred to as banapple gas. [Source]

Popper is a slang term given broadly to drugs of the chemical class called alkyl nitrites that are inhaled. [...] Popper use has a relaxation effect on involuntary smooth muscles, such as those in the throat and anus. It is used for practical purposes to facilitate anal sex by increasing blood flow and relaxing sphincter muscles, initially within the gay community.

"If you trace the bottle of amyl (a type of alkyl nitrite) through late 20th century history, you trace the legacies of gay culture on popular culture in the 20th century”

The drug is also used or for recreational drug purposes, typically for the "high" or "rush" that the drug can create.

Poppers were part of club culture from the mid-1970s disco scene and returned to popularity in the 1980s and 1990s rave scene. [Source]

“A cable had arrived for him that very morning stating the obvious: ‘Come too quickly. Stop. Try again. Stop. Am waiting in Paris. Stop me if you’ve heard it. Stop. Stuff yourself with artichokes and live. Stop. Don’t stop. Stop.’ He knew it was from Amie L'Nitrate.”

— in John Lennon’s unfinished story about a sudden rendezvous in Paris. Published in “Skywriting By Word Of Mouth”.

Ava Lavinia Gardner (December 24, 1922 – January 25, 1990) was an American actress and singer. [...] Gardner appeared in several high-profile films from the 1940s to 1970s [...] She is listed 25th among the American Film Institute's 25 Greatest Female Stars of Classic Hollywood Cinema.

Answered asks about:

John’s sexuality

Yoko and his sister Julia’s public statements about John’s sexuality

John "trying to put it ‘round that” he was gay

The Bob Wooler Episode

The Tony Manero Story

[Disclaimer: The answer to these asks represent my personal opinion at the time, which is liable to have evolved since then.]

#John Lennon #May Pang #Elliot Mintz #Sal Mineo #Brian Epstein #Ava Gardner #i'm not a homosexual or we could have had a homosexual relationship #it's only love and that is all #He could be a real soft sweetie #the lost weekend #johnny #1974 #quote #compilation #my stuff #(I added the links to other asks about his sexuality because it apparently is a topic of great interest)#(As exemplified by the number of asks I received about it)#(Ft. notions about sexuality being tied to masculinity and May not considering the option of bisexuality)#(And an emphasis put on John's curiosity about who was and wasn't gay)

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thestarkerisobvious · 4 years

Text

The Shed

amazing art work by @starker-sorbet A snugglefic for @mrstarksbabyy

Sixteen The DeSlaughter House

2 The Shed

The shed was, technically, on Peter’s family’s property, although he had learned that fact from the boys that had dared him to go in it. As far as Peter knew, their property ended in a line that cut across the lake. Peter had found the shed and the free-standing chimney the first year they had moved there, of course. He had gone inside more than once, looking for owls’ nests or foxes dens. But the last time he had gone in, he had discovered it was a human boy nest, with some obvious attempts at a clubhouse and some magazines featuring naked girls. He never went back inside.

That’s where they were headed that last day of school, the last day that Buster and Buddy Greenleaf suddenly got chummy with Peter and said they wanted to “hang out” to “shoot the shit.” Peter was suspicious of course, but in the end he joined them.

Walking home with a crowd of boys, at least he wouldn’t have to worry about dodging hand-holding, and marriage proposals, from Missy Lovelace.

And it had been educational, sort of.

He had heard the story of Tom Dylan Post before, and had known that the man had disappeared after murdering his girlfriend. What he did NOT know was that the intact fireplace-and-chimney that stood apart from the shed had been Tom Dylan’s house, and that it had been burned down by angry townspeople who couldn’t find the man. “They would have burned down the house you live in too,” Buster had informed him. “But you know, the ghost.”

“That’s a pretty helpful ghost, I’d say,” Peter posited. That got a laugh. They had seemed friendly, Peter remembered. Even with Mike’s warning, the day up until the shed was a happy memory. School was out. Summer was starting. Summer meant endless library time, uninterrupted by pointless schoolwork. Summer meant three months free from hand-holding and marriage proposals from Missy Lovelace. (And Summer meant Autumn. And Autumn meant Tony.)

“I still don’t see why I’m supposed to be afraid of a “haunted shed” that is on my property, and I told you, I’ve been there twice…” he had said boldly as they approached the shed from the south. They were headed north, directly facing Peter’s house. Peter felt 6 feet tall. On his own property, facing his own “haunted house” he didn’t feel awkward or tongue-tied at all. He could crack dirty jokes and swore just like they could. Suddenly fitting in with this ghost-story telling, wise-cracking crowd of boys didn’t seem like such a herculean task at all. Sure, they liked to shoot animals and he liked to study animals, but Mike’s dad liked to study animals too. Sure they wanted to drop out of school when they turned 18 and Peter wanted to go to college, but Mike wanted to go to college too.

And sure, they wanted to trick him into going into a shed to discover some girly magazine, a Playboy or a Penthouse, and peter could do that too. It was gross and disgusting, but a lot of science was gross and disgusting. He figured it out as they approached the shed, stealing himself up for the moment. Dissecting frogs and fetal pigs and cows hearts was gross too, and he was looking forward to doing all of that if they let him take the senior science class next year. A naked woman wasn’t any more gross than that, was it? Well, yes it was, but it was a gross he could handle. He was ready. And he had a plan.

“That shed has got ghosts AND snakes, and that’s why we dare you, cuz’ YOU claim you ain’t afraid of either, Parker,” Buddy was sneering, but Peter waved him off. Of course he wasn’t afraid of snakes, because he knew whatever was in there wasn’t venomous. He knew because of Tony. And he wasn’t afraid of Playboys, either. Grossed out, yes. But not afraid. He had a plan.

“Come on, you’re just stalling. You’re as slow as Christmas. Quit draggin’ your feet,” the boys hectored as Peter and Mike examined the lone chimney and fireplace, talking to teach other excitedly about how the cabin must have been situated around it. Peter hadn’t spent much time examining the chimney after he determined nothing was living inside it, now, knowing it was part of the Post Family’s history.

“Hey Slaughter-man, quit yackin’ about chimney and tell Pussy-boy to go in the shed! We dared him!”

“Shut the fuck up Buster!” Mike had yelled back, and Peter had thrown up his hands in between them both and made a joke.

And, just like that, for just that moment, he had felt it. Something he hadn’t felt since New York City. That feeling of home. He was hanging out with his friends. They were trading ghost-stories and trashtalk and dares, and he was playing peace-keeper when voices were raised. Just like he had in the city. He was laughing as he walked toward the shed. He felt completely carefree.

“Hey Mr. Post! Mr…. what was his name? Hey Mr. Murder-guy Post? Did you know you were famous?” he called out to what lived in the shed (if there were non-venomous snakes inside, he wanted to give them plenty of warning. That’s why he stopped to knock on the wall.)

“Hey… Mr. Tom? Tom Dooly… Dula… Mr. Tom Whateverthehellyournameis…”

“Oh my god man, stop!” That was Buddy, a moment of real fear in his voice. Peter smirked. But that was Devil’s Holler’ boys for you. They had no fear of grabbing a girl’s butt or starting a fist fight or handling loaded guns, but they took the Post Ghosts very seriously.

“Sorry, don’t be mad at Buddy, Mr. Tom-Ghost. He doesn’t care that you went all Lizzy Borden on your girlfriend. He says he’s going to kill his girlfriend too. Axing your girlfriend, that’s heavy. But for serious, Just Say No man…”

That’s how he announced himself as he stepped inside the cool darkness of the shed. Automatically he looked up to see if any owls had moved in since he had last been there, but there was only empty birds’ nests. Probably eastern bluebirds, from the looks of it. Several brown mud dauber structures as well, he could see. Nothing interesting.

Then he remembered what he was supposed to be doing there. He looked towards the north wall, to see if the boys could see or be seen. But the gap in the wall was grown over with weeds now. If he stood next to the wood he could look through the bullet holes and see out, but unless they came and stood by the door, they wouldn’t see him. So he looked for the magazine.

There it was, exactly here he knew it would be. Dead center on the floor, just so he wouldn’t miss it. Sitting on an overturned crate, like an offering.

He picked it up fearlessly and started tumbling through looking for the right picture. His plan had been to walk up to Buddy and say “Hey look! I found a picture of your mom!” and point at a random page. He had been planning to do that without even looking at the picture, but had thought better of it. Not every picture in those magazine was of a naked lady. Some of them were articles.

The first picture surprised him.

The second picture made him cringe.

But what the men were doing to each other on the third page made him drop the magazine and back away.

For what seemed like several minutes he could move. His heart was pounding, his face flushed. He had forgotten how to breathe. He might have stood that way for an hour if he hadn’t heard something move above his head. That drew his eyes back the empty bluebird nest. The mud daubers structures. The place where the owls weren’t. That reminded him – he was in the shed. The boys were outside, pranking him with the magazine. If they were behind him, looking through the doors they would know…

…they weren’t. He crept to the north wall. A quick look through the bullet holes told the truth – they had sent him int here and snuck away. At least he was alone.

His heart still pounding, as he were an animal being pursued, he turned over the crate and found it empty. Picking the dirty magazine up by one corner he tossed it into the box and exited the shed through the gap in the south wall. Then he ran.

A dead oak stood dramatically at the top of the ridge, it’s bare black limbs could be seen grasping towards the sky all the way from the Post Lake. Under the leaves there Peter shoved the dirty pictures. Tossing the crate aside, he ran all the way home.

He was back two hours later.

Finding the magazine was alarmingly easy. It was still there, intact, most of its pages surprisingly legible. It was like the evil doll in the Twilight Zone, Peter thought grimly as he retrieved the empty crate and tossed the hateful pages back inside. Maybe there’s no point it trying to destroy it.

“But it’s not a doll, it’s pictures on paper,” Peter assured himself. “Just ink on paper. And paper is delicate.”

And that’s why the magazine featuring muscular sweaty men with huge mustaches (for the rest of his life Peter would think of it as the “mustache magazine”) found its new home at the bottom of Post Lake. Peter walked home and slept easy that night.

He slept in one of the other beds in that hallway, but he slept easy. The dirty magazine had been completely destroyed.

That way, he could never go back and study those pictures again.

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The Master (Post)

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#The Thing That Lives Under The Bed #Demon!Tony #But not THAT Demon!Tony #Starker #TheWitchway writes stuff

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chibiclem · 4 years

Photo

“Hetalia Cardverse : The Kirkland Family”

A quick picture of the part 2 of my “Blessed and Cursed family”!

*****

The Blessed and Cursed family part 1 (with Arthur and Peter) : https://chibiclem.tumblr.com/post/624004691163037697/cardverse-the-blessed-and-cursed-family

Part 2 : https://chibiclem.tumblr.com/post/624710989426868226/cardverse-the-blessed-and-cursed-family-part

*****

The Kirkland and their history : The Kirkland are farmers living in the Spade's Kingdom. They're are not really poor even if they look like it because remember, it's middle age and shit! In fact they were just common with some land until one Queen Pretender was born in the family. Quite a shock right? Far later, when Arthur becomes the Queen of Spades, he will put his family in more financial and belonging ease but his brothers will stay at the farm or marry and settle elsewhere. (And if you believe me, it might be better as Alistair and Alfred can be double irritating for Arthur when they are put together!!) But let's come back in Arthur's childhood, when his future was still uncertain. Physically, you will guess that the ginger hair and green eyes came from Daddy, giving a great mix among the respective children! But why not representing him then? That's because Father Kirkland have died from tetanus (so in horrible pain you can imagine) 8 years before my story after injuring himself with a farmer fork when Peter was only 2 years old and Arthur 5. The healer of the nearest village was called too late, as fierce forcastle Father Kirkland though it was only a small injury and didn't called one until it was too late. A traumatic experience for his children that can remember, but also an important lesson, that would later push Arthur to study herb and medecine as well as magic. Widowed Alicia immediately had to get an hold of her house for the time being (and did amazingly even if she struggled like hell), while her older boy Alistair, who was 13 year old at the time, had to early replace his deceased father and support the rest of his brothers. It took a great part in explaining his personality of a young man that matured really young and strong as the new pillar of his house. Of course, as soon as they were old enough, Connor and Dylan helped him with all the chores and work at the farm, and so does Arthur and Peter even if they are still young. For info, Arthur is 13 year-old in my story, while Peter reached 10. The number near the family are their respective age, so you can see a gap that will explain the relation between each other. Alicia Kirkland : You might wonder why I didn't choose Britannia as the Kirkland's mother. That's because she is another character in my story and have her importance. So I created Alicia, which can be compared to a Nyo!England if you want! She looks like a reserved and tired woman, but if she can hold her 5 sons and teach them discipline, you might want to reconsider thinking she's weak! Birthmarks and clothes: I've shown the place of each birthmark. It is law that every citizen must wear clothes indicating their appartenance to their respective kingdom. That's why there is heavily Spade's symbol drawn on every of them. But if you wonder why some are colored and some not, it's because the colored one are the symbol that actually hold magic. The birthmark is much much more that a vulgar ID identification, and there is rumors that if injured on your birthmark, the misfortune will strike for you. Alistair being the elder, he inherited of the sheep vest and the boots of his father, placing him as the actual head of the family as they are expensive for the period. (Knowing as Spades is quite an old fashioned place) The boys successively wear their older brothers clothes, but since Arthur might be promised to a great future as a Queen, he got the privileged to have a small cap, which is a sign of magician above average. (because in Spades, everyone has basic magic knowledge, being the Kingdom of Magic, but I will talk about that when I finish part 2!) He also has clothes with Spades symbol on it, but it's hidden by the cap! Technically, I've tried to find middle age farmer clothes, and it's not very clear because of course you only show the nobles or knight ones, never the poors that were 97% of the population! (They might have dissapeared and not be really technical though) Country correspondance : I've chosen some more or less canon for the Kirkland family (from google! XD), as they are not really present in Hetalia but kinda popular in a way people have represented their own version! Understand that there are different version of them (specially Wales) and I selected one! Their personality are not very explored in my comic but might be different from your conception of them. Alistair -> Scotland Connor -> Ireland Dylan -> Wales

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ofviolentdeath · 5 years

Text

Character(s)::Cord and Drifter Word Count::743 @amongstmortals @bewitchedandblessed

She had been in the back, working on Dylan’s death trap of a truck when one of the kids came out, muttering under his breath about clearing the damn place out. There were very few reasons to clear the bar and almost none of them were good.

“Drifter’s back. Didn’t think you’d want an audience for that fight,” Judas announced as he dug out a pack of cigarettes. He had never bought her being dead in the first place. It was too damn hard to kill tricksters and even he knew that much.

“Good call.” Probably one of the few smart choices her son had made recently, honestly. “Tell Dylan the death trap should be good for another month or two but I’m gonna need to rebuild that whole damn transmission sooner rather than later.”

Judas nodded and watched her walk back into the bar before setting off in the opposite direction to find the coyote.

“What the fuck do’ya think you’re doing here, Ik?”

The trickster frowned as she turned to face the demon, amused more than anything. “You’re pissing off all of hell this time and didn’t think I would stop by to make sure my son wasn’t caught in the crossfire? Really, Cordae, you should know me better than that.”

“Well golly gee whizzes, Tricks, it didn’t seem all that important when you fuckin’ abandoned him to me and Grayson before faking your own damn death. Pardon the fuck out of me for thinking you didn’t give two shits about the kid.”

It wasn’t exactly fair, she supposed, she didn’t know what Drifter had gotten herself mixed up in, but letting Chay think she was dead was too far to her.

“Are you saying you would not do the same if you felt you needed to protect your own?”

The question drew a bitter laugh from Cord as she gestured around her bar. “What the fuck do you think I been doin’ with this bar? I would never abandon my own like that. Not by choice.” Her hand had been forced once before, when she was human, and it was a regret she had lived with every day for centuries. She didn’t blame Robert for his refusal to forgive her because she had yet to forgive herself for it. The difference was she had actually died, in a technical sense.

“I do not want my son involved with whatever mess you got yourself into this time.” The tone of Drifter’s voice was one that almost no one would argue with, but no one had ever accused Cord of making smart choices.

It was almost a point of pride to the demon.

“Little late on that one. Sorin’s got him on a project. Maybe should’a thought of that before fuckin’ Grayson.” It was a low blow, but she didn’t exactly care. She was trying to get a rise out of the woman. “And, for the record, Judas is absolutely gonna be tellin’ Chay and Grayson that your ass is still alive.”

Her anger was nearly palpable as she stared Cord down, the urge to actually throw a punch rising. It was hardly the first time she had wanted to deck the other, but she had always been pretty good at refraining. Especially given that Cord had hellhounds at her call and the odds were hardly in her favor inside the bar. “Cordae, I am not playing games. This ends now.”

“Yeah, I don’t think it does. His daddy works for hell, you left the kid to him, that means he works for hell too. That’s sort of how it works.”

“The hell it does!” The trickster stood, rage getting the best of her as she stared down the last person she had considered her friend.

“Don’t matter if you like it or not. Had you not wanted the kid involved in hell business, you shoulda stuck by him. But you didn’t and that’s on you.”

It felt like flames were crawling up her arms as she curled her hands into fists, the next words ground out. “I will bring this bar down to the ground.”

“No, you really won’t. We both know that if you do that, Chayton loses the last bit of protection he has in this world. So you’re gonna sit the fuck down and deal with your mess and then you’re going to fuck right back off to where ever you were hiding because I am done, Ik.”

#drabble #cord:drabble #drifter:drabble #guest muse: drifter #she was singing baby queue home

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mysteryofjotun · 6 years

Text

My Destiny – chapter 10

summary: making a mistake after having way too many drinks can change everything

pairing: ceo!tom x female reader

warnings: none?

word count: 3k

a/n: Hey guys, it's my ya girl. I'm FINALLY back, it was about time. I didn't plan on making you wait that long. My life is just a complete mess at the moment and I didn't find time to get something done. I'm so sorry for the delay ;; I can't tell you when the next chapter will come. I'll try my best to write as fast as possible! Thank you so much for still sticking with me, you're all the best! As always, I’m sorry for all the possible mistakes (I’m like 100% sure that there is plenty of it! And I’ll correct them later!) It’s possible that some turn of phrase or else are awkward, that’s because English’s not my mother tongue. Feedback is always welcome, feel free to ask me/tell me anything. The taglist is open if some of you are interested.

Two short months had passed since the night Tom had come back. And he never left again. You didn't really know if he still saw her and you didn't want to think about it. You wanted to believe that he really chose you for what you really were and not because of the baby you were waiting for. You wanted to believe in his feelings. You always kept this little apprehension and restraint, your feelings were present, but you didn't want it to get the upper hand. Because after all, you could only be a passing thing. You didn't really have the opportunity to talk about the contract for a while so you weren't sure if it still stands. And you probably wouldn't ask him, you already had enough on your mind.

Tom's attitude made you think quite the opposite, that he had set the contract aside or even shredded it. He was so enthusiastic about you and the baby. He always had a little thought, whether in the morning at breakfast or in the evening when he came home from work. Now that you were in your fourth month of pregnancy, your little belly started to show and he loved to touch it. The first few times, you were quite embarrassed. Tom never really touched you, except for that night and the time he kissed you. However you got used to it quickly, and the baby too. He moved non-stop the day, not giving you a moment of calm. As soon as Tom arrived he calmed down. The baby was not even born yet that it was already hooked to Tom. He had that power over people, you fell for his charm too quickly.

Lately, it's been the same every day. Your only activities were to read, get out Tessa (but always with someone, most often one of the twins or Harrison, the Holland were scared that something might happen to you), and occasionally see Dylan and Lizzy. Not that going out didn't really miss you, but it was the fact of being always watched who weighed you a little. Nikki and Dom were adorable and would do anything for you, but it was quite stifling. Especially from Nikki. You'll never thank her enough for what she did for you, but sometimes it was too much. You took advantage of the fact that the house was empty, which was rare nowadays, to sit comfortably in the big sofa of the living room to read a book, Tessa lying at your side, head securely against your stomach. If anyone stuck it in this house it was Tessa. She didn't let anybody she didn't know get close to you and always stayed by your side, except of course when Tom was out walking her. At that moment she was completely unaware to you. Like every day other days, you waited for Tom's return, with always in mind the fact that he could leave at any time.

——

Tom was constantly tired and it didn't come from his work. He knew where it came from, though he preferred not to think about it. That was a bad thing, there were people he needed to take care of now. It was always easier to ignore it and think about something else.

And to think about something else he didn't have to go very far. He just had to go home and find you. Most of the time, when he came back you were waiting for him with a book in his hand and Tessa by your side. And that was the only thing that matters right now. Tom had decided to no longer overthinking things and appreciated the present moment. Of course, Leah was still there somewhere but she wasn't the one who mattered, at least not for the moment. He seemed to be in a great place about it, strangely enough. And that convinced him about his choice.

He came out of his thoughts when someone knocked on the window of his car. He turned his head to find Harry, looking at him somewhat dazed.

“What are you doing?” Harry asked once Tom lowered the glass.

“What’s it look like? I’m going home,” Tom retorted.

“You’ve been seated here for 10 minutes straight. Without moving.”

“I was thinking.”

“Oh, you can think?” Harry said mockingly.

“Move, you div,” Tom laughed raising the glass and getting out of the car.

“She’s waiting for you, you know,” Harry said leaning on Tom’s car, waiting for him to walk back home.

“I know, I don’t want to keep her waiting. And I need to take Tessa for a walk.”

“You’re a lucky bastard,” Harry laughed putting his right arm on Tom’s shoulder. “She’s really great,” he added more seriously.

“Yeah,” Tom smiled.

Tom knew how lucky he was, he was aware of it. Another person wouldn't stand what he had done to you. You were special and he only realized it now. They both came back, it was quite late so Tom didn't think you waited. Tessa ran up when she heard the front door open and recognized Tom's steps. You had tried to stay awake as long as you could but sleep got the best of you. You did nothing special in the day but the little peanut inside you gave you no peace. Tom came back from his daily walk with Tessa and was surprised to find you asleep in a strange position on the living room couch. He took a few minutes to watch you before eventually waking you up. He had never felt that way with Leah. He couldn't put words on how he felt, but he knew it was entirely different from all his previous relationships – not that he had tons of them. He was more the kind of guy to only have one-night stands and not be serious. Not wanting to disturb you in your slumber, he held you in his arms and brought you to your room – as calmly and safely as possible – to place you in the bed. Tessa, behind him, was thrilled to jump on the bed and lie down at your feet, watching over you.

——

"Tom, we’re going to be late," you shouted from the living room.

You had an appointment to know the baby's gender and you didn't want to be late. As if the day wasn't already stressful enough, there was a big charity gala tonight. It will be your first appearance since the disaster of the last time. However this time, you'll be joining as Tom's wife, not as a secretary or a mistress. His wife.

"I’m coming, here I am," he replied descending the stairs and putting on his leather jacket.

You took a few moments to admire him. It wasn't often that he dressed as casual. You were more accustomed to costumes, though you quickly got used to the jogging t-shirt he wore when he came home. You always had a hard time telling yourself that all of this "belonged to you" and that you could say that it was your husband. It was crazy and insane for you. Not so long ago, you had a job of misery – even if technically you liked it, it was the atmosphere that was shabby – a trashy boyfriend and you lived in a flatting situation with your best friend. And there you shared a beautiful house with a Greek god and you were surrounded by great people. Of course, without all the problems you had to meet on your way. But of a rather optimistic nature, you put them aside, taking advantage of this break to enjoy your pregnancy. The ride to the gynaecologist's office was quiet, Tom drove as carefully as he could, his hand secured on your stomach. A habit he took these past few months. Once arrived, we called you quickly, after all, you were late. Tom didn't want to admit it – you had never seen so much bad faith in anyone before. You just laughed at his bad faith. A nurse guided you to the doctor's surgery where she was waiting for you. When you entered the room, she got up and greeted you before inviting you to sit down.

“I’m happy to see you both here today,” the middle-aged woman said joyfully. “The father’s presence is really important for the baby as much as for the mother.”

“I do my best,” Tom admitted.

“I can see it, your presence today is the proof.”

Tom smiled and held your hand tighter as he listened to the ob-gyn’s words. After the many recalls, the consultation began. You got up and headed to the examination table, Tom on your heels.

“We’ll know the baby gender today, right?” the woman smiled while she applied the icy gel on your belly.

“Yes,” Tom rushed to answer, which made you smile.

“Someone is in a hurry,” the ob-gyn laughed.

“Kind of...” you smiled.

The exam went on normally, the doctor took her time to explain everything that was happening on the screen. Tom couldn't stay still and literally drank in the doctor's words. It made you enthusiastic to see him like that and you couldn't imagine the latter with mini you running in the Holland property.

“What?” Tom smiled at you. You didn’t even realize you were staring at him.

“Nothing,” you blushed, looking away.

"Congratulations! It's a girl!" the woman said happily.

"A girl," Tom repeated not believing his eyes.

A little girl, he was going to be a dad. These words hit him hard. Now it was hard facts. You knew the gender and you will soon look for a name. Whereas before, he knew she was there, he saw the belly grow from month to month and he didn't forget about its existence but it was easier to put it aside. To act as if nothing had happened. But now he couldn't bury his head in the sand any more. He was going to be a dad and taking care of a family. And that, it terrified him much more than he would dare to admit.

"You’re not happy?"

"I'm beyond happy! I… I don’ know what to say. I’m at loss of words." Tom declared quickly. "And I need to call my mum! Oh my god, she'll be so happy. I'll be right back, okay?"

"Hum," you said as he kissed the top of your head.

When Tom came out, the doctor waited a few minutes before speaking. Making sure that the young man wouldn't resurface.

"You seem a lot closer than during the last appointment. In fact, you’re like chalk and cheese.”

"Ah, yeah" you replied awkwardly. "He made a lot of efforts for the baby. I’m hopeful.. for both of us.”

"Does he.. he treat you well?"

"Of course! Why wouldn’t he?"

"Well, pregnancy can also be hard to live for the husband. And it’s the first time he came to an appointment."

"He’s busy."

"I believe you, but you shouldn’t glorify him. You must also communicate so that all these emotions don't eat you up inside, especially with your poor record."

"Yes doctor, don't worry, he takes really good care of me and does his best to free himself as much as possible."

And as if Tom had felt that you were talking about him, he returned to the room, a big smile on his face.

"I'll leave you a few moments, while I'm going to print the ultrasounds," she said before leaving the room, giving you a big smile.

Tom sat next to you, taking your hand. But as you had to get dressed, you let go of it.

"What did Nikki say?" asked him, putting on your shirt. "She asked how you were doing and she literally popped my eardrum when I told her it was a girl." "A bit of femininity in this family won't hurt," you laughed. "And wait to see the reaction of my brothers," he added laughing in his turn.

A silence settled between you two again. As you continued buttoning your shirt, Tom cleared his throat ready to talk.

"Uhm ..." he said moving to be in front of you.

You raised your head when you heard the sound of his voice. He took your hand in his. You lowered your head and he put his fingers under your chin so that you could look at him.

"I'm really happy we can start this family together, really," he said looking at you straight in the eyes. "I absolutely don't regret my choices and this appointment really comforts me on my choices." You lowered your head again, facing his words. "Look at me," he said gently stroking your right cheek. You blushed, not quite accustomed to his gestures of affections. "Can I kiss you?"

You looked intensely at him, blushing again. You just nodded, not finding the words. You didn't actually know if it was a wise choice. On one side your rational side told you not to do it, that he was just trying to soften you and then make you suffer but your less rational side wanted to this kiss, you wanted to succumb. And that's what you were going to do. You chose weakness – it wasn't surprising. He pressed his forehead to yours, raising your head smoothly and pressed his lips to yours delicately. Tom didn't push things, he took his time. He didn't depend the kiss, it wasn't what he was looking for, he wanted to convey these feelings. Someone cleared its throat which cut short the kiss. You raised your head and saw the gynaecologist with a big smile. You blushed even more because of the surprise. Tom turned, scratching the back of his head – a nervous tic.

"Here's your picture, lovebirds," she laughed, as she gave Tom the scan.

——

"Are you sure it's not ridiculous?" You asked Nikki through the bathroom door, "My belly is really starting to show ..." "Of course not, that's not ridiculous!" She replied outraged. "Would you prefer something more fluid?" "Yes, please," you added, still hiding in the bathroom.

This night was important. Tom was going to introduce you as his wife. And you really hoped that everything would be better than the last time. Tom promised you, but what did he know after all? Nikki had absolutely wanted to pick you a dress, tearing you away from Tom when you came home. Usually, her enthusiasm was a communicator and made you happy but right now it stressed you. This night was designed to stress you out.

"Put this on," Nikki said knocking softly on the door. "You're beautiful," Nikki exclaimed as she finally looked at you coming out of the bathroom.

"Thank you," you stuttered.

You weren't really accustomed to receiving compliments, especially from someone other than your mother. You turned to admire yourself in the mirror. The dress was black and made of a very fluid fabric. Your shoulders were partly bare, with embroidered sleeves. You touched the baby bump that you could guess through the dress. This dress really looked good on you.

"So?" Nikki asked excited by the fittings. "Waoh," a voice said behind you two, cutting you before you could open your mouth. You went back and saw Tom in the dressing room. You lowered your head so that he didn't notice the crimson shade of your cheeks.

"I think it's... not bad," you said to answer Nikki's question. "It's even better than not bad, Y / N, you're gorgeous," he said, kissing your cheek, increasing your blush. Nikki couldn't stop smiling.

——

"Tom, lucky bastard," Harry said tapping him on the shoulder and looking at you in the distance. Nikki and Dom had insisted on presenting you - or at least showing you to their friends at the charity gala. Hum," he said sipping his bourbon. He couldn't look anywhere else, you were breathtaking. You looked up and your eyes met. You apologized to the people to whom you were and went to Tom.

Once in front of him, he took your hand and brought you closer, protectively. "No alcohol?" he said, pointing to your glass. "No alcohol sir," you answered sarcastically. As if you were going to risk drinking, especially after your appointment. "Do you want to come home?" He asked, taking your hand in his and playing with one of your fingers.

"No, it's good we can stay." You lie, feeling uncomfortable. Since the beginning of the evening, you could feel the eyes of people on you, even worse than last time. "Are you sure?" He asked you, staring at you trying to disclose your lie. "Yes yes," you continued before adding. "And I know how important this evening is to you, I don't want to ruin your chances, Tom." "It's not that important," he lied.

In fact, this evening was more than important for him. It was in those kinds of parties that he made the most contracts and contacts. However, he was trying to think about anything except for himself, it was hard enough for him but he really tried. So, if you felt bad, he would come home with you. After all, his brothers were there. Even if deep down, he would like to bring back the biggest contract, it was just an ego thing.

You only looked at him with a 'don't bullshit me' look on your face. "Okay, maybe it's important. But you too are important," he said.

You continued to chat about everything and nothing. Tom introduced you to some of his partners. Tom was in a conversation with a group of men and women when you saw him. You would recognize his superior appearance from miles around. A shiver ran down your spine. As if Tom could have felt your discomfort, he looked at you, questioning you with his eyes. You smiled at him to convince him and he returned to his conversation. You couldn't stop looking around, praying he wouldn't see you. You were fearing he would make a fuss like last time. After a moment, Tom apologized to the group of people and took you by the arm, moving away.

"What's the matter?" Tom asked "Nothing," you answered softly. "I can obviously see that something is wrong, it's the baby?" "No no," you say. "It's ... it's just that I saw someone I didn't want to see." "Who is that?" "Harold," you whispered.

"I didn't hear anything," he replied as he leant on you. He couldn't hear anything because of the noise around you. "Harold," you repeated louder. Tom turned around and looked around the room. His eyes finally found his mark and sighed with annoyance. "I had done everything so that he wouldn't be here tonight, I'm sorry." "It doesn't matter, you have nothing to do with it."

"Look at him strutting like a cockerel," he said, anger slightly rising in him. "We'll see who's going to be humiliated this time." Tom started walking toward him when you stopped him. "Stop it. That's stupid." You said while holding back Tom. "If you do that you'll be even worse than him." "Not even torture him a bit?" Tom asked hopefully. "No," you said seriously. After a moment of silence, he came back, not giving up.

“Are you SURE I can’t punch him in the face?”

“Yes.”

“What if I just break his nose a little?”

“Tom, stop,” you said hitting his chest. “C-Can we leave?” you asked shyly.

“Of course, princess,” he said.

You blushed, your cheeks turning crimson red at the name use. He took your hand and you left under the gaze of Tom’s family taken aback of seeing you leaving this early.

tags : @deadlyaffairs @hbmoore1986 @bellagrayson-wayne @smexylemony @aquawomxn @meyrapp @champagnesugamama @let-me-luve-you @vogueworthy-barnes @tmrhollandkay @avatarkyoshithewarrior @hollandertom2013 @tomshufflepuff @fnosidam @tryn25 @margauxa29 @hannahholland1811 @whatareyouhidingpeter @ultimategalaxyprogram @parkerssweb @justmesadgirl @loxbbg @andreuskystuff @hazosterfield-and-mcu

#tom holland #tom holland x reader #tom holland imagines #tom holland fanfiction #tom holland fanfics #tom holland x y/n #tom holland x you #tom holland x oc #peter parker #peter parker imagines #peter parker fanfiction #peter parker fanfic #peter parker x reader

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keywestlou · 4 years

Text

DEATH ROW MURDERERS WILL GET STIMULUS CHECKS

This morning a first. I am back to doing a normal blog. My first Greece trip has ended.

I enjoyed sharing the trip with you. Hopefully you enjoyed reading it. I received many favorable comments, except for one. A snowbird good friend. He was unhappy. He had followed it day by day 9 years ago and was bored with the repetition.

I returned to Greece the next year. I plan later this year in doing that trip. If any of you think you would not enjoy it, speak now or forever hold your peace.

I took about 600 photos of the trip. Never posted them. Sloan and I have been working on how to set them up, etc. In a week or two I will begin posting. Once a week. Eight to ten pics with some brief identifying information below. And not all 600. Not even close.

The reason I opted to run the first Greece trip again was because there was little to write about. Before coronavirus, I was out and about most evenings. There was much to report.

However, the virus has kept me self quarantined for more than a year now. Key West residents and visitors not available to me. Nor the Chart Room or any other bar.

Prior to the virus, I rarely wrote about politics and world happenings. Without Key West available, I was forced to write about those 2 areas.

An interesting observation. My readers have doubled with the changeover primarily to politics. I plan on mixing Key West and politics as soon as I am out again. I hope the new readers stay with me.

My second shot is March 27. I am told I should remain in self quarantine for another 2-3 weeks. Then ok to go out. However must wear a mask.

I can live with it.

An article in Newsmax 3/7 reported death row murderers would receive stimulus checks. Doesn’t sound right. However politics being what it is, you never know.

Senator Tom Cotton (R-Ark) was interviewed by Newsmax and shared the information.

Before my sharing it with you, let me make one thing clear. I fear Cotton and those of his breed. He is a far righter. Even worse a favorite of the moneyed Republicans we never hear about. He and his friends want him to run for Presidnet in 2024.

He is of the same ilk of Senator Hawley. Birds of a feather.

One thing that has been bothering me the past couple of years is that many of the new Republican faces are Harvard or Yale law graduates. These people receive the finest legal educations which for some reason I cannot fathom sets them off on a path even beyond Trump.

Cotton provided the following examples of death row murderers to receive stimulus checks.

Dylan Roof murdered 9 people. He is on federal death row.

The Boston Bomber Dzhokhor Tsarnaev who murdered 3 people and terrorized a city.

Aaron Shamo was sentenced to life for selling 1 million fentanyl-laced fake oxycodone pills to unsuspecting buyers.

What is the justification for providing death row murderers and those sentenced to life with the stimulus? For commissary use buying cigarettes, soda pop, and candy?

Florida COVID-19 vaccine shots chaos. Distribution still sucks in Florida.

A woman in Florida City stood in line for 5 hours with her 6 month baby and when reached was turned away on some technical reason. That same day, the Florida City sites were allowing people without appointments to be vaccinated.

Eligibility requirements were screwed up. Those providing the shots were not aware who could get a shot. Eligibility practiced in an uncertain fashion, and not properly so in most instances.

The Washington Post 3/4 reported living in Texas right now feels like an exercise in survival. Citizens are caught between the power failure and Governor Abbott opening Texas 100 percent beginning wednesday.

My adult life has been governed by the philosophy that every one must have a seat at the economic table. Not just the rich. Rich, middle class, and poor alike. Each must receive the benefits of the American economy. Not however must each earn an equal amount of money.

People must be able to afford to buy things like food, clothing, and shelter.

The U.S. minimum wage for years has been $7.25 an hour. Whether rich or poor, an insufficient amount to live on. I wonder what Senators and Representatives would do if they and their families had to live on $7.25 an hour.

NBC News recently said: “The world has changed.”

In addition to every one having a seat at the table, I have also believed that if not all are and some struggle, there will be revolt in order for people to survive economically. It is the story of history.

Today is International Woman’s Day. Biden will be signing an Executive Order establishing a Gender Policy Council within the White House. Its purpose to support gender equity and Title XI policies.

Equality wise women have risen dramatically over the years. What I have observed in my lifetime alone supports the premise.

The birth control pill had something to do with it. Gave women a sense of equality and protection. The feminist movement in the 1960s and 1970s likewise.

Recall around 1970, the new cigarette Virginia Slims came out directed primarily at female purchasers. Its advertising slogan: You’ve Come A Long Way, Baby!

While I was in law school in the late 1950s, there were only 2 women in my class. Today ladies make up more than half. The same is applicable to medical school graduates.

Female judges abound. Women gradually becoming CEOs of major corporations.

They may have come a long way, the ladies are going to go even further. It’s a new world!

International Woman’s day is not a new event. It was established by Clara Zetkio at an International Woman’s Conference in 1910 in Copenhagen.

My thought process has reached the point where I believe women should basically run the world. Men have for centuries and screwed it up. Let the ladies have a chance. They could not do worse and probably do better.

On this day in 1917, the Russian Revolution began.

International Woman’s Day had something to do with it.

The “February Revolution” as it is called, began over protests celebrating International Woman’s Day and riots in St. Petersburg over food rations and Russia’s involvement in World War I.

I have always found Russian history prior to, during and since 1917 interesting and exciting. Russian movies and novels have contributed to that interest and excitement.

I was fortunate while in college in the mid 1950s to take 2 courses taught by Alexander Kerensky. Kerensky was there in Russia as a prominent figure during the Russian Revolution.

At the beginning, there were 2 Russian factions. The Whites and Reds. The Whites first controlled the government. Not for long. Several months at the most.

Kerensky was the President of the White Bolsheviks. Lenin was a leader of the Red Bolsheviks. Lenin toppled Kerensky. Kerensky had to escape to save his life. He eventually ended up in the U.S.

The contrast between Lenin and Kerensky is interesting also. Probably why Lenin succeeded where Kerensky failed. Lenin came to power promising “peace, land and bread.” At a time Kerensky’s people were selling more efficient government and continued participation in World War I.

What a time in world history!

I live and learn. I seem to make that statement more frequently in recent years.

We all have heard the word misogynist. Represents men strongly prejudicial against women.

How many have heard the word misandrist. Represents hatred of men by women. The word rare. Its meaning I suspect prevalent.

Enjoy your day!

DEATH ROW MURDERERS WILL GET STIMULUS CHECKS was originally published on Key West Lou

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youveneverbeenalone · 7 years

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Inktober for Writers/Fictober:

Day 15- Intimacy (Darejones)

These just keep getting later and I’m still behind and my apologies. What even is time? Oh well. If something’s not coherent, it’s late, so I’m sorry, and I’ll edit it later. Prompt list here, just in case, and links to previous days at the bottom. Thanks for reading and sticking in there with me. I appreciate the support.

Also, today’s is quite long- mostly because I combined it with a different wip I had in the works based on a beautiful and simple prompt that @onlymorelove asked for like two months ago. I hope it was worth the wait! I had a blast making this stuff up for their backstories, and I hope you enjoy. Oh, and in terms of continuity- pretty general & fits with my other stuff after they’ve been together for a little while.

Day 15- Intimacy

It sneaks up on her, the way so many things do with him (though they are miraculously never bad things, and she can’t find words to express how glad she is about that). This, though, is a bit of a surprise for how suddenly she realizes the way their interactions have been leading up to this, and how she is actually happy, incandescently happy, to be sitting where she is - on her couch, him next to her, holding her feet in his lap while they share stories from childhood. Something she never would have imagined was possible before. Because it’s strikingly and terrifyingly intimate, but for once she’s turning into that feeling of raw vulnerability instead of turning away. And she doesn’t have a good track record for that. She never really has.

Even before Kilgrave, she had the tendency to keep her truest self under lock and key, hidden away, safe where no one and nothing (except for Trish- the only family she has left) could hurt her. Loss will do that to a person, and in her line of work, she’s watched many people learn the necessity of living this way. Perhaps she’s no different from the masses; she’s lost plenty in her life. Everything with Kilgrave just multiplied that loss, magnifying her pain and creating infinitely more layers of separation and security through which someone would need to pass in order to really know her.

So it comes as a bit of a shock when she realizes that Matthew Murdock has come quite a long way toward achieving that feat. Mostly through increasingly familiar and very entertaining bullshit sessions in which they share about their lives. Also, they drink whiskey, and that might have to do with how the questions always seem to get easier the later the night gets. Tonight, though, the questions seem to get particularly personal.

She starts this round, after they toast and she takes a drink from her glass of whiskey. “Alright, time to get into the hard-hitting stuff. What was your most embarrassing moment as a kid?"

"Wow, the gloves are really coming off, huh? Oh god… well, when I was ten or eleven, I was finally chosen to be a server Mass. It was a big deal because I had practiced really hard to prove to them that I would be fine, that I had the route memorized and wouldn’t run into anything or whatever. But when the time finally came, I was so nervous that I ended up tripping on my robe on the way up. And I biffed it in front of a church full of people.”

“Yikes, that sucks. But I did trip in the cafeteria when I was in second grade, with a tray full of food. I was so messy that my mom had to bring me a change of clothes, so I think I win. Your turn.”

“Hmmm… what was the first cd you ever owned?"

The sigh she lets out tells him that she just rolled her eyes. "That’s the best you can do? Whatever. Technically, the first cd I ever owned was something by Mariah Carey, but it was given to me by my aunt who was very out of touch and had no idea what I was really interested in. I don't think I ever even listened to it, so I'm saying that doesn't count. But, the first cds I bought for myself were Nirvana's Nevermind and the Red Hot Chili Peppers' Blood Sugar Sex Magik. You?"

"Oh wow, I don't know. Maybe the Goo Goo Dolls Dizzy up the Girl?”

"Seriously? You didn't own a cd before 1998?"

"Hey, I was lucky Sister John Marie let me keep my original walkman when I moved in.”

The eye roll she gives is automatic more than malicious. “I guess. Well, what was your first tape, then?”

“Bob Dylan’s Blood on the Tracks. My dad was a big fan.”

“Fair enough. Let’s see ... who was your teenage celebrity crush?"

"Yikes, I haven't thought about that in years.. Uhhhhh, I don't know ... maybe, Fiona Apple?”

She does a double take because she really didn’t expect him to say that. “What? Seriously? Not someone like Alicia Silverstone, or ... Angelina Jolie? Or hell,

Madonna? She had that whole fake chastity angle going and everything."

He gives a throaty chuckle at that, and her heart flutters at the sound.

"'Fake chastity angle' aside, consider my criteria, Jess. I lost my sight at nine, and that changed my life and the way I saw the world pretty significantly. This might surprise you, but I'm not a big movie guy. I much prefer music. Hence, Fiona Apple. And have you ever really listened to her music? Her voice is gorgeous- smooth and haunting but also lush and warm. In my opinion, very attractive."

“Uhh huh. And it’s probably just a coincidence that you became a lawyer. Doesn’t have anything to do with her being a ‘criminal’ and needing a ‘good defense’?”

A beautiful flush rises on his cheeks, but he’s a good sport and plays along with her. “That has less than a fraction of a percent to do with it. Believe it or not, I’ve always been this righteously indignant.”

She sighs to keep from chuckling back at him. “Oh, I bet. But, what about ‘ya know, before the accident? What was your type?”

She’s not sure how he manages it, but his blush intensifies, and it’s possible that it’s the prettiest blush she’s ever seen.

“I'm entirely sure that, being the good little Catholic boy I was at nine years old, I didn't have a type."

She snorts derisively at him. “Bullshit. Just because you were nine doesn't mean you weren't looking. You had to‘ve had a preference, at the very least. So share. Was it blondes or brunettes? Or maybe redheads? And I'm positive that by then you had already formed an opinion about tits vs. ass, whether or not you're willing to admit it."

He blinks at her a few times, still and silent where he sits. “Wow. I really don’t have clue how to answer that. And why is this starting to feel like a trap?"

"Oh, come on! I’m not going to take offense at what you say. I'm not insecure, I'm just curious. Besides, you have plausible deniability, anyway.”

She hears him chuckle under his breath as he lifts his eyebrows.

"Well, I will admit that now I'm curious, or at least even more curious, to know what you look like- what color your hair and your eyes are."

“Nice attempt at a deflection there, but I'm not telling you until you phrase it in a question, and you'll have to wait your turn and answer my question first."

He is quiet for a moment, expression intent- as though he’s calculating something. Finally, he lets out a long, belabored sigh. "Well... when I was growing up, I remember- we had this picture of my mom, which my dad kept framed on the mantle. It only the proof of her existence that I had back then, and I remember spending hours looking at it and thinking she was the most beautiful woman in the world. So I guess I'd say... brunette hair- like a warm chestnut color- and bright blue eyes."

She doesn’t know why her heart jumps at that, but it does, so she uses some wit and sarcasm to (hopefully) distract him and keep up appearances for her. "So maybe Freud wasn't too far off with that whole Oedipal complex thing, hmm?"

The look that he gives her at that is priceless. “Oh, god. Tell me you didn't just accuse me of being sexually attracted to my mother."

She can’t help but chuckle under her breath. "Fine, whatever. It's your turn, then."

He shrugs and gives her a knowing look. “Okay. Well... what color is your hair?"

Her heart starts to hammer in her chest, and she feels her cheeks flush, so she forces a few deep breaths to calm herself. When she’s calm enough to use neutral voice, she dodges him again. “Nice try, Murdock, but that's a hard pass."

"Oh, come on! How is that fair, Jones?"

The look she gives then is lost on him, but she’s hoping he’ll feel her weighty stare. “What about me gives you the impression that I care if it’s fair or not?”

He sigh exasperatedly at her. “Fine. Who was your teenage celebrity crush?"

She smirks and takes a sip of her whiskey. "I'd think that was obvious- Kurt Cobain."

He gives her a skeptical look. “Wasn't he already dead by the time you would have formed any kind of a serious opinion?"

She shrugs, a wry smile on her face. “That was part of the allure, honestly."

He’s quiet for a beat, but after taking a drink of his own whiskey, he looks up at her, approximating her gaze. “So, what's your type, then?"

With a shake of her head, she flattens her mouth into a thin line. “Nope, you already asked your question.”

“Oh, come on! You got a two-parter last time. Turnabout is fair play. We've set plenty of precedent for that."

She silently stares at him for a beat. “Again, I ask you: what makes you think I care?”

His shoulders slump, and he shakes his head at her. She thinks that, in this case, it’s the equivalent of him rolling his eyes. “Fine. Next question, please.”

She can’t help but smirk at that and how she was able to shut him down so easily. “What was your superlative?"

"...I don't understand how those words go together in that order." His eyebrow might as well be part of his hairline for how he’s raising them.

"You know, in high school yearbooks - people voted 'most fill-in-the-blank'? What was yours?"

"Oh, right. Well, I was voted 'worst driver'."

She snorts as she takes a drink of whiskey. "Who knew? Turns out Catholic kids have a sense of humor after all.

"Yeah, well Sister Mary Margaret didn't share that sense of humor. Everyone who voted for me got a demerit. A lot of people were pissed at me the last month of school."

She huffs a laugh at him. Yikes."

"Yeah, it wasn't a great time. But what about you?"

"Oh boy. Well, a group of kids got together and created their own write-in ballot section and voted me as 'most likely to die alone'. But Trish was on the yearbook committee, obviously, and she wasn't about to let that slide. Instead, we were voted 'best buds' or some shit like that. But to this day, I'm not convinced that she didn't circumvent the voting process to make sure the only place my name turned up was next to hers."

"Must be nice to have connections."

"Yeah, Trish continues to be a helpful contact that way. You're up."

He starts to blink at her, and she has to bite the inside of her mouth to keep from decking him for the false gratitude he uses in his tone.

“Oh really? It's my turn? How gracious. Thank you. And as penance, I want to know … your worst nickname.”

She grimaces at that. “Oh god. Well, in middle school, after the accident, people just started calling me an orphan. Even if it was true, that was brutal as an adolescent. And then my parents and my brother always called me Messy Jessie. Because my room was always a mess.”

Her thoughts drift off for a moment, to her family and the way things were before the accident. But she doesn’t continue with that train of thought for too long- the memories are too bittersweet. “Wow, I haven't thought about that in years. What about you?"

He sighs heavily. “Well, the kids at school were not all that creative and generally just called me a freak. And then my dad, and later, Stick, called me… Matty."

She chews her lip and looks at the floor before sighing and offering an apology. “Shit. Sorry. Shouldn’t have brought that up.”

"It’s okay, Jess. His death is a thing that happened. That won't change even if we don't talk about it." His expression turns cloudy and distant, and it occurs to her that she should probably ask him about that sometime. Maybe offer to listen and help him grieve. But that time is not today, because she’s already feeling vulnerable enough as it is. So she simply fixes him with a steady gaze.

"Doesn't mean that being reminded of it isn't the fucking worst, though."

The slightest of smirks flashes across his face, but it’s gone in a breath. And then he raises his glass, his mouth a grim line. "I'll drink to that."

She raises her own glass to his and drinks in tandem with him. A heavy silence falls between them, and suddenly she has the urge to share something with him- something meaningful and personal. Her mouth opens and she hears herself speaking before she consciously registers the word that comes out in a hesitant voice.

"Black."

But he’s only confused by that, tilting his head toward her. “What?"

She closes her eyes and blows out an exhale. Part of her wants to take it back, pretend to say something else, but she’s committed. So she tries again, using a louder and surer tone this time. “My hair. It's black."

He doesn’t quite gasp at that, but he inhales sharply, and it makes her stomach do gymnastics. “Jess-"

But she cuts him off, barreling ahead because she knows she’ll lose her nerve if she lets him talk now. "And my eyes are hazel, but mostly dark brown. Not all that different from yours, actually. But sadly, it looks like I’m not your type.”

He huffs a breath and shakes his head once before reaching out a hand and cupping her cheek softly. "Actually, you’re just my type.”

She bites the inside of her lip to keep as neutral an expression as she can. "And what is your type, exactly?"

"An intelligent, strong, dangerous woman who doesn't take anyone's shit.” He draws her closer, resting his forehead against hers as he speaks. He drops his voice- not quite into a whisper, but close- for the last bit. “And I'm a sucker for an alto."

Her heart jumps at that, and takes a few calming breaths. With a shake of her head and a sigh, she leans back from him, raising an eyebrow in his direction. “Does that line actually work for you?"

"It's working for me pretty well right now, if your pulse is anything to go by. But in all seriousness, thank you, Jess. For telling me."

She rolls her eyes and shrugs. "Just consider it my apology for not playing fair earlier... Matty."

She smirks playfully as he shakes his head, a pained look on his face.

"You're never gonna let that go, are you?"

"No. I'm not."

He sets his jaw and raises his chin the slightest bit. "Okay ... Messy Jessie."

She hums at him and leans a little closer. “You've got some nerve, Murdock."

"I'm just following your lead, Jones."

She gives a comically large shrug and uses a teasing tone. "Fine. But you know, I can go back to calling you St. Matthew, if that’s what you would prefer."

With that, he sighs and deflates, hanging his head and conceding his defeat. “... No, you don’t have to do that.”

"That's what I thought... Matty."

The beaming smile he gives her as the endearing nickname fall from her lips is like a star going supernova. It’s brilliant and mesmerizing, warm and beautiful, and it creates a strange, though not necessarily unpleasant feeling in her chest.

It’s a curious one, this feeling- frightening in its unfamiliarity. Because she hasn’t felt this way since… well, maybe ever. And now that she does, she has to admit, it isn’t quite what she thought it would be like. But she can’t deny that she loves it, suddenly yearns for it as if it’s the only fuel on the planet which could sustain her. And all because of the way he smiles when she calls him by that sweet name that so few have called him.

It’s times like these that remind her of how well they are coming to know one another. And it’s because of that strange feeling- which is increasing in its intensity and getting harder to ignore, but which she is still not quite ready to name- that she settles further into the couch, leaning closer to him, and relaxing more fully than she has done in god knows how long.

Day 14 | Day 16

#inktober for writers #fictober #my fic #a prompt a day #matt murdock/jessica jones #jessica x matt #mattjess #matt x jessica #matt murdock x jessica jones #darejones #messica

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giveamadeuschohisownmovie · 7 years

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Imaginary shows: “Marvel’s Ghost Rider” (version 2.0)

So let’s say, hypothetically, AOS gets one more season to finish off their remaining storylines. All of a sudden, Marvel TV announces a spin-off featuring Robbie Reyes. Here’s my fancast:

MAIN CAST

1) Gabriel Luna as Robbie Reyes / Ghost Rider

2) Lorenzo James Henrie as Gabriel “Gabe” Reyes

(AN: So I learned recently that Lorenzo is Italian. Shame on you AOS, now I feel dirty for keeping him on here)

3) Chloe Bennet as Daisy Johnson / Quake: Back due to popular demand from the fans, Chloe signed on for the Ghost Rider show. Daisy’s in-story reason is that SHIELD assigned her to watch over Ghost Rider since he returned, a task that she immediately accepted. I’d imagine her and Robbie’s relationship to be similar to Angel and Cordelia.

As for the other main AOS cast, I’d imagine there’d be 1-2 episode guest roles for them but nothing too heavy. I can see Mack coming on the show in a recurring role but Fitz, Simmons, Coulson, and May, not so much. Maybe just to say hi to Daisy.

4) Genesis Rodriguez as Lisa Ortega: A child prodigy / law school student who befriends Robbie after he stops a group of thugs trying to rob her. She eventually becomes an integral member to Team Rider and is Robbie’s main love interest (the Iris West to his Barry Allen).

Or is she? I’d imagine sometime around season 2 or 3, the writers would set up a love triangle between Lisa, Robbie, and Daisy. That’d be fun.

5) Becky G as Azucena Gonzalez: A high school student and Gabe Reyes’ best friend. She is a bit of a smart-ass but is vocal in her support of Ghost Rider.

6) Martin Sensmeier as Detective William Talltrees / Red Wolf: A LAPD detective who is assigned to investigating the Ghost Rider killings. He eventually finds out that Robbie is the Ghost Rider but has a change of heart when he realizes that GR is fighting only the wicked.

In season 2, William quits the LAPD and becomes the vigilante known as “Red Wolf”. As Red Wolf, he joins Team Rider.

7) Sophie Wu as Ruby Minh Tran: A half-Scottish, half-Chinese sorceress who hails from the London Sanctum Sanctorum. She is sent to Los Angeles by Doctor Strange in order to monitor the Ghost Rider.

A fun little subplot that I came up with is that Ruby reveals to Daisy that she was Fitz’s first girlfriend. They broke up around the time he left for the SHIELD Academy and she left for “cooking school” (magic training).

When Daisy asks for any funny memories with Fitz, Ruby says, “He tried complimenting me on our first date. I think he wanted to say I had a nice face but he ended up saying I have nice feet”. (that’s a reference to ‘The Fades’, a BBC show that featured Iain and Sophie)

8) Ryan Guzman as James Ramirez: A rookie sorcerer who hails from the New York Sanctum Sanctorum. He is assigned to work with Ruby Minh Tran and the two immediately clash (she’s a bit more sassy and fun, he’s a bit more stern and serious).

So Ramirez and Tran are basically the Fitz and Simmons of the Ghost Rider show. But instead of science, it’s magic. And instead of falling in love, they can’t stand each other.

9) Diego Boneta as Hector Morrow: Robbie’s cousin and Eli’s son. He despises Robbie and Gabe and has a bit of an arrogant streak. But as the series goes on, he eventually redeems himself by joining Team Rider.

So...the Draco Malfoy of the show.

10) Emily Rios as Alejandra Jones / The Punished Rider: A woman who was a victim of human trafficking. She eventually escapes her captors, who are all eventually killed by Ghost Rider. Inspired by GR, she joins Team Rider. She’s recognized as the ‘hardcore’ member of the team because of her sheer hatred of all criminals.

In season two, she takes on a Spirit of Vengeance separate from Robbie’s. It’s this moment that Team Rider realizes there can be more than one Ghost Rider.

To distinguish herself from Robbie, she nicknames herself ‘The Punished Rider’.

11) Santiago Cabrera as Dr. Javier Ybanez: Robbie’s best friend from childhood who grew up to be an oncologist. He is a member of Team Rider, offering Robbie his medical advice.

NOTE: Santiago is only on the main cast for season one. Javier is killed by Blackheart in the season finale.

RECURRING CAST (BUT PROMOTED TO MAIN CAST IN SEASON TWO)

1) Steven Yeun as Hannibal King: A private investigator who was turned into a vampire. He is now a vampire hunter, seeking to prevent others from suffering the same fate.

Hannibal King’s appearance is meant to foreshadow the appearance of Blade.

2) Emilio Rivera as Lt. Michael Badilino / Vengeance: An army veteran who initially joins Team Rider as an ally. He eventually leaves the team due to growing tensions with Robbie. Robbie has a strict no-killing-of-innocents rule while Michael didn’t care for collateral damage.

Michael eventually comes across a Spirit of Vengeance and becomes a rogue Ghost Rider, simply named “Vengeance”. Although not a true villain, Michael ends up becoming one of Robbie’s main enemies of the show.

RECURRING ONLY

1) Walton Goggins as Johnny Blaze / Ghost Rider 1: The original Ghost Rider. Johnny returns to Robbie’s life and acts as his mentor from time-to-time.

2) Naoko Mori as Roxanne Simpson-Blaze: An investigative journalist and Johnny Blaze’s wife.

3) Burn Gorman as Mephisto: Arguably the main antagonist of the whole series. He’s the Devil, nuff said.

4) Reg E. Cathey as Carter Slade / The Phantom Rider: One of the first few people to take on the Rider. He was Johnny’s mentor and ends up becoming Robbie’s mentor as well.

BIG BADS (ONLY GOING UP TO SEASON THREE)

1) Dylan O’Brien as Blackheart: Main antagonist of season one. He is a powerful demon and one of Mephisto’s sons. Blackheart comes to Earth, seeking to overthrow his father.

During his rampage, he manages to kill Javier Ybanez, which led to Robbie losing his mind and destroying Blackheart with the full power of the Ghost Rider.

2) Emily Kinney as Zadkiel: Main antagonist of season two. She used to be an archangel before being tossed out of heaven for attempting to usurp God. Desperate for payback, Zadkiel went after the Ghost Riders on Earth, seeking to obtain their power in order to be powerful enough to return to heaven and defeat God.

Zadkiel was eventually defeated in combat by Robbie, Michael, and Alejandra. To make sure she wouldn’t return, she was dragged to hell by Mephisto.

3) Kate Micucci as Andrea Wallace / Jose Zuniga as Eli Morrow (visions and voice only): Main antagonist of season three. Andrea Wallace was a struggling comedian who bothered no one. One day, while walking home from a gig, she becomes an accidental victim of a gang shooting. Just minutes later, she is resurrected after accepting an offer from a strange spirit who told her he would help her get revenge. The spirit was later revealed to be Eli Morrow, who also wants revenge on Robbie.

So Andrea ends up becoming the host for Eli. She’s still there but slowly loses her mind due to Eli’s influence. Like in the comics, due to Eli’s spirit, Andrea can transform into a being similar to the Ghost Rider. Because of this, Team Rider nicknames her “Fool’s Rider” since even though she looks and acts like a Ghost Rider, she’s technically not one since her powers didn’t come from a Spirit of Vengeance.

Andrea is eventually defeated by Robbie, who uses his Penance Stare to punish Eli’s soul. Although free from Eli, Andrea is quaked to death by Daisy in order to make sure Eli doesn’t return. This is the moment where Daisy starts becoming more of an anti-hero.

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thestarkerisobvious · 4 years

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Dream Of A Starless Sky

inspired by @starker-sorbet

moodboard by @von--gelmini aka @starker-stories

A snugglefic for @mrstarksbabyy

With great thanks for the betaread by @mrstarksbaby

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At 13, Peter made friends with the Thing that Lived Under the Bed. But things change. Nothing stays the same (not even 2000 year old demons.)

SEVENTEEN

Chapter 4 Dream Of A Starless Sky

(Soon, Amado)

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TAG: fisting (well sort of)

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Later, Peter realized, it was because he had been talking to Tony while also waiting for the rain to fall.

Outdoor work had been humid and miserable, but every distant roll of thunder made Peter smile. Stormy nights meant he would dream of Tony.

But the storm simply wouldn’t happen. As he sat on his bed, working on “the books” (really a single notebook with rows of columns that he wrote in with black and red pens, just like Aunt May had showed him) he had been complaining to Tony about money.

It seemed the whole summer had been about money.

No money for the trips to New York City. No money to fix the electricity in some parts of the house so those parts just remained dark. No money to fix May and Ben’s bathroom so now they both bathed in the same bathroom as Peter. Which was exactly the same as it was in New York City, only now it seemed wrong. At least their toilet still worked on their side of the house. Otherwise they’d have to move into one of the bedrooms in Peter’s hall (he HATED that idea because all those rooms were his ‘offices.” He tried to discourage them by insisting the room across from him was “really truly haunted.” Even after all this time, that’s where the strange noises still came from.

Peter didn’t have real money problems, of course. He now had more spending money that he’d ever had in his life. But worrying over the numbers, somehow, made him feel more grownup.

“I just can’t maintain a terrarium budget and buy all these books and afford a long distance call to Ned,” he complained to the silence. “And I have to have those terrariums before school starts if I’m going to feed you snakes. And any day now I’m going to catch a snake, I came really close today, Tony. Really close. But what’s the point when I don’t have anything to put him in, let alone feed him. But it’s so much easier now that they aren’t running from me. And it’s so easy not to be afraid of them when I know they're not venomous, when I know they’re trying not to be afraid of me. I’m getting really good. But not fast enough to do it by hand, not like Mr. DeSlaughter. Not yet.

“And there’s no point in trying to build a rabbit hutch until I learn how to build a damn fence…” he groused, subtracting $10 from the column marked “Rabbits” and moving it over to “Phone” with a frown. It seemed the more that went wrong inside the house, things that Ben knew he couldn’t fix, the more outside projects he decided needed doing outside. He had tasked Peter with building a pretty fence around the patch of flat ground right outside the kitchen where Aunt May planned to plant a garden someday, a frustrating task given that Aunt May never seemed to get around to planting and Peter’s fence kept sinking. Even now he turned his head and glared at the room across the hall from him. The room they were now calling the “Noisy Room.”

The “noisy room” was technically one of his “offices” but he had never put anything in there. The carpet, along with the uneven wallpaper, was spectacularly ugly. He didn’t even store his extra books there. The sole piece of furniture was an old bed that Aunt May had made once and forgotten about. The only other thing in that room was a huge, uncurtained window that, if you stood in the right place, could look at the “sunny patch.” Peter glared through the walls at the noisy room and the window that looked out on his failures. The “sunny patch” was a better place to make plans for than to actually work on. Secretly Peter hoped May would never get around to planting that garden. He had envisioned putting up a different kind of fence and raising a goat there.

“That’s it!” he said finally, tossing “the books” aside and flopping down on his bed. “It won’t work! I just can’t afford to call Ned!”

He fell asleep just like that, angry at the world, angry at the constantly sinking fence, angry at his sudden loss of privacy now that Ben and May both had to make one nightly trip each down his hallway, but mostly angry at the distant thunder that meant the storm would never ever come.

“I don’t wanna’ piss off any Post Sisters, Tony,” he remembered murmuring before he fell asleep on top of the covers. “But I’d really love to find one of those spellbooks on how to find treasure right about now. I know I’m a boy and boys have cooties and all but… damn finding a buried bucket of money would help a lot right now.”

* * *

He was more than a little confused to wake up with Tony standing, silently, by his bed. There was plenty of grey around his temples and he looked pale, but not as drawn or grizzled as Peter had seen him before. But he was silent, and that was unnerving. He had a tight, determined look on his eyes that reminded Peter very much of the night he had received his witchesmark in Franeknstines’ lab.

Still, it was Tony, and he was more grateful than anything else. So when Tony reached out and took his hand he gladly went with him.

Tony silently led him into the woods and to the path that led to the lake. Peter realized quickly that he was dreaming because he was still barefoot. Still, he held onto Tony’s hand. Holding Tony’s hand and following him into complete darkness had always ended well for him.

The lake in the moonlight was lovely. From there Tony led him steadily up the ridge, the dead oak’s black branches reaching out to caress the night sky. They passed under the oak until they came within sight of the Lone Chimney.

Only it wasn’t a Lone Chimney anymore, it was an entire little house. Peter gasped with delight, letting go of Tony’s hand and running towards it. It was charming. It was more than that -- for the first time Peter understood how the word “charming” could be used to describe a house. It seemed to be laid out the same way he and Mike had envisioned it, but they never could have envisioned the beautiful sash windows or the ornate wrought-iron patterns that decorated the wide porch. It was delicate and feminine and so very romantic. It could have been a picture in a storybook. Peter and Aunt May had passed bed-and-breakfasts that wished they were this charming. It was surrounded by an elaborate garden of hedges and neatly trimmed trees. There must have been flowers, Peter could smell roses, but in the darkness he couldn’t tell. He could only make out the finespun, ivy covered gates and the dark shapes beyond. If anyone wanted to go on a honeymoon, they would come here.

“Did he… Tony this is lovely. Is this… did Tom Dylan make this house? For her??” It took Peter’s breath away. All of a sudden he could see it, so perfect and complete: A labor of love. A charming, picturesque miniature house, far away enough for complete privacy but close enough to walk over for a family dinner. And the ivy-covered gates and the swing and the loving planned romantic garden, arranged like a flower bouquet. Arranged like a bouquet to be presented to someone own true love. It was absolute art.

No wonder Tom Dylan Post was furious when Laura Foster wanted to live there, married to his little brother instead of with the man who had made it for her.

Suddenly, absurdly, Peter found himself wishing Missy were here.

When he turned back to look for Tony, he understood the wish. It was romantic, tragic ending aside. The dark roses. The charming secret cozy castle with the cozy bed inside. And the handsome man, wearing a handsome black dress-coat and a grey vest, standing silently in the moonlight. It made Peter’s heart skip a beat.

Tony reached out one hand, but Peter didn’t take it right away.

“This is a dream, this is a dream,” he said, his eyes firmly closed. It was a risky move, something he never attempted in his normal meetings with Tony, but right now he longed for it with his whole body. It was worth the risk.

Twice he tried it, closing his eyes and then opening them again. The second time, it worked.

He was no longer wearing a baggy t-shirt and boxers. He was wearing a billowy white nightgown, tied with ribbons at the neck and at the wrist. (It wasn’t a womans’ nightgown, he had seen men wearing the same thing in books. Still, he felt.. pretty.)

He was also significantly shorter. He padded up to a confused-looking Tony, proud of his accomplishment. Since he turned 16 he was usually eye-level with Tony’s nose but now he had to stand on his tiptoes when he lifted his face for a kiss, draping his hands over the back of Tony’s neck.

Tony looked down at him curiously in the moonlight. Then he smiled, understanding. With two gentle hands on Peter’s waist, he leaned down for a long, tender kiss.

For several moments they stayed that way, kissing in the silence of the night. Then Tony pulled Peter closer, wrapping one long arm around Peter’s slight waist and scooping him up off his feet. “Take me inside,” Peter whispered into the kiss, picturing the cozy bed that would be there. It was a dream, and whatever happened in the dream...

But Tony was shaking his head between kisses. He sank to his knees and laid Peter out on the earth.

Tony had done things to him in dreammeetings that had felt wonderful, but nothing prepared him for the thrill of feeling the weight of Tony’s body on his. He whimpered as he clutched at Tony’s back and remembered, quite suddenly, that he was dreaming.

And what they did in dreams didn’t count.

Although that was hard to remember as Tony’s eager hands pulled up Peter’s nightgown up to his waist and Peter felt the hard earth on his bare skin (had he really forgotten to dream about underwear??)

Tony’s hands on his ass was not a familiar sensation, but the fingers were knowing and thorough. Peter relaxed in Tony’s arms, looking up with wide eyes at the starless sky.

He panicked and tried to keep Tony with him when his friend tried to rise, clutching at him desperately, but Tony was stronger than he was. Firmly he moved Peter’s arms away from him and rose to his knees.

Peter whimpered and flinched, his hands flying out, when Tony parted his knees and moved to kneel between them. His face was calm, but unreadable, and Peter was reminded again of the Tony he had met in Frankenstein’s laboratory. Then the face was gone, and Tony lovingly scooped his right arm under Peter’s shoulders and kissed him gently again, letting the weight of his body press down upon Peter’s.

Peter moaned as his stiff cock was pressed against the rough fabric of Tony’s vest. It shouldn’t have felt so natural, laying this way, naked from the waist down underneath Tony’s body as Tony rocked against him, over and over again. But here they were. Peter opened his eyes again and let the tension build in his body. He would be coming soon, suspended in this strange place between the black earth and the night sky, moaning Tony’s name.

Then Tony pulled away again and, with the same determined look on his face, slipped his forefinger into his mouth, wetting it slowly.

Peter whimpered as Tony reached between Peter’s legs and, gently but firmly, slipped his finger into the earth.

The earth yielded without comment.

Peter, however, moaned and flinched and looked between his legs in confusion, then moaned again. What Tony was doing with his finger in the earth looked even more obscene than when he had put it in his mouth. Then he pulled his finger free and inserted his middle finger into his mouth, watching Peter’s eyes as he wet it. Gently but firmly he reached between Peter’s thighs and pushed both wet fingers into the earth, pulling them out and easing them back in again. Peter could no longer see, his eyes were closed, but he knew. He hid his face in Tony’s arm, keening when Tony wet his third finger, then the fourth. Peter couldn’t bear to look down and see Tony’s four fingers working themselves tenderly in and out of the earth, but he felt every inch of it. His legs were trembling. His breath came out in sobs.

“Nononono…” he cried out when Tony wet his thumb.

“Shhhhh…” Tony crooned. It was the only sound besides Peter’s panicked breathing. He pressed his face back into Tony’s arm. He tried to lay his feet back on the ground, tried to relax his aching legs. But his legs kept pulling away from Tony’s hand and what Tony was doing with it.

“Please… please Tony… please I’m so close…”

“Soon, amado. Soon.” His voice was thick and determined and sounded far too urgent to be comforting.

Peter’s arms flailed out when Tony’s hand had sank in up to the wrist. His left hand came into violent contact with the brick wall beside him, and he looked up in surprise to see where they were laying. He hadn’t noticed before, but directly above him, looming in the darkness, was the chimney. Tony’s hand was now buried past the wrist, and he was making a strange, panting noise that Peter had never heard from him before.

The pain in his fingertips made it easier to focus. Pressing the back of his skinned fingers solidly against the brick wall, Peter wrapped his other arm around Tony’s back and watched his face. Tony had always taken him to bed with such patience and gentleness. Tonight he didn’t look patient or gentle at all. He looked lost. Peter watched with wonder even as he pressed his aching erection against the rough fabric of Tony’s vest over and over again.

“Yes Tony, yes,” Peter whispered as Tony thrust his body down with a final grunt and a choked-off moan. He kissed Tony’s face over and over again, the clenched eyes, the slack jaw, even as he jerked his body desperately against Tony’s until he finally came between them. They lay together on the ground, panting and holding each other in the darkness. Peter hid his tears in the sleeve of Tony’s coat. Tony’s arm, buried up to the elbow, remained in the earth between Peter’s thighs.

* * *

Peter woke and changed the sheets of his bed. He put bandages on his scraped fingers and got dressed. Grabbing a toaster waffle and a shovel he headed out to Chimney Hill.

He had plans to find the spot by using the length of his arm. The spot would be exactly where he stood if he could press his knuckles to the bricks of the chimney. But there was no need to measure. The hole was already there, marking the spot, exactly the same size as Tony’s fist.

Peter started to dig.

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The LAST chapter (and the big reveal) will be posted tomorrow.

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The Master Post (not that one, the other one)

as always please direct comments, questions and constructive crit to @witchwayisright

#The Thing That Lives Under The Bed #Demon!Tony #TheWitchwayWritesStuff #Von's Moodboards #Tony Stark/Peter Parker #Starker

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